4e: Don't take magic missile for your wizard

[wodan46]

People have been making rather odd remarks that Magic Missile is a must for a wizard, and that they would in fact use no other ability. This is odd because of the 3 out of the 5 level 1 at-will wizard abilities revealed so far, Magic Missile is probably the weakest so far.

The 3 currently known level 1 at will wizard abilities:
Magic Missile: Ranged 20, 2d4+Int force damage, counts as basic ranged attack
Ray of Frost: Ranged 10, 1d6+Int cold damage, target is slowed
Scorching Burst: Area Burst 1 within 10 squares, 1d6+Int fire damage

People have been saying that because Magic Missile deals 5+Modifier damage rather than 3.5+Modifier damage on average for the other 2, it is better. However, the Wizard is not a Striker, it is a Controller. If it tries to go DPS blaster mage, it will be completely outperformed by the actual Arcane Striker, the Warlock. The Warlock's Eldritch Blast+Curse combo deals 8+Modifier damage on average instead.

In short, while spamming Magic Missile with a level 1 wizard can actually be done in 4e unlike 3.5e, it is still not using the Wizard properly. Now, lets take a look at the other 2 abilities and how they do fit the controller role.

Ray of Frost slows an enemy, reducing their movement to 2. Remember that the spell's range is 10. That means that against a charging Orc, whose movement is 8, you could instead slow it to a standstill and land multiple attacks, to say nothing of your allies. Reducing to 2 movement makes the enemy easy pickings for you and your allies. You could even shoot the enemy, retreat, shoot again, retreat, and so on.

Scorching Blast deals damage to a 9 square box. Except when fighting a boss, this ability will reliably deal more damage than Magic Missile will. When used against minions, it can insta-kill several enemies at once, as it only needs to damage, and it is thus not important that it deals 1.5 less damage on average than Magic Missile does.

The only thing going for Magic Missile is if you have a Warlord in your party granted you extra ranged attacks. Outside of that, it is simply not a useful ability for the wizard to have except as a backup, as Warlocks and Rangers are both far better at blasting enemies from a distance with ranged attacks.

[Da King]

But... but... what will I cast at the darkness?

[Matthew]

And so it begins... 4e optimisation and rules mastery discussion.

[Aquillion]

This discussion would be easier if we knew the rules to 4th edition.

[wodan46]

http://www.ucalgary.ca/~amwhit/4e_PrRC_v2_6.pdf

and knowing is half the battle.

[Siosilvar]

Also note that magic missile has twice the range of the others, so it's a more specialized spell for long-range combat vs. single targets. One is a debuff with some damage and the other is an area attack.

[JaxGaret]

People have been making rather odd remarks that Magic Missile is a must for a wizard, and that they would in fact use no other ability.

Link to comments made in that vein?

[Rutee]

Plus, it's Magic Missile. You can't not take it, or you're a communist and a subversive.

[skywalker]

People have been making rather odd remarks that Magic Missile is a must for a wizard, and that they would in fact use no other ability. This is odd because of the 3 out of the 5 level 1 at-will wizard abilities revealed so far, Magic Missile is probably the weakest so far.

The 3 currently known level 1 at will wizard abilities:
Magic Missile: Ranged 20, 2d4+Int force damage, counts as basic ranged attack
Ray of Frost: Ranged 10, 1d6+Int cold damage, target is slowed
Scorching Burst: Area Burst 1 within 10 squares, 1d6+Int fire damage

People have been saying that because Magic Missile deals 5+Modifier damage rather than 3.5+Modifier damage on average for the other 2, it is better. However, the Wizard is not a Striker, it is a Controller. If it tries to go DPS blaster mage, it will be completely outperformed by the actual Arcane Striker, the Warlock. The Warlock's Eldritch Blast+Curse combo deals 8+Modifier damage on average instead.

There's no warlock in the preview adventure.

Ray of Frost slows an enemy, reducing their movement to 2. Remember that the spell's range is 10. That means that against a charging Orc, whose movement is 8, you could instead slow it to a standstill and land multiple attacks, to say nothing of your allies. Reducing to 2 movement makes the enemy easy pickings for you and your allies. You could even shoot the enemy, retreat, shoot again, retreat, and so on.

This doesn't help much if the orc is already right next to your buddy. Also, nobody charges in this edition. Charging sucks.

Scorching Blast deals damage to a 9 square box. Except when fighting a boss, this ability will reliably deal more damage than Magic Missile will. When used against minions, it can insta-kill several enemies at once, as it only needs to damage, and it is thus not important that it deals 1.5 less damage on average than Magic Missile does.

If you can catch several enemies in the blast, this is good. However, as soon as those minions get interspersed with your party, this power is useless.

The only thing going for Magic Missile is if you have a Warlord in your party granted you extra ranged attacks. Outside of that, it is simply not a useful ability for the wizard to have except as a backup, as Warlocks and Rangers are both far better at blasting enemies from a distance with ranged attacks.

And that it does more damage to an enemy who is already engaged with your defender and you, thusly, hope never moves again.

[ahammer]

counts as basic ranged attack

this is a good reson to take it.. for attack of opp

[xirr2000]

Plus, it's Magic Missile. You can't not take it, or you're a communist and a subversive.

What that guy said

Seriously though each of the wizards abilities has a time and place. Maybe you dont expect to out damage the warlock or ranger, but you want to do more damage than you could with either of your other attacks. Plus they use different defenses so in addition it may be easier to hit someone with magic missile than with Ray of Frost, which is vs. Fort.

But seriously, not take magic missile? You almost had me there....

[wodan46]

While its true that Ray of Frost and Scorching Burst aren't useful against targets directly next to allies or more than 10 squares away, the majority of the time you will be able to do so.

When you can't, magic missile is still inferior to eldritch blast+curse, or bow+ranger's quarry, both of which can be triggered by a basic ranged attack.

Yes, my comments were direct to Skywalker's thread. I think that the scenario gives an unfair portrayal of the role of a wizard for 2 reasons:
1. The scenario in question does not have a prepared warlock or ranger, which are for more effective as ranged strikers than a magic missile throwing wizard.
2. Kobolds seem to be a prominent enemy in it, and kobolds are a nightmare for a controller, as they are constantly shifting this way and that, making it difficult to pin them down.

[JaxGaret]

Its 20 range is also a factor in the favor of Magic Missile, that advantage over the 10 range RoF and SB doesn't seem to have been mentioned at all here. That can make a pretty decent difference in a lot of battles.

[Patashu]

Hmmm. What is the rule for determining how many spells you know in 4e? Is it loose enough that you can get all the spells you'd want to use?

[Reel On, Love]

Just be a human and take all three.

[Farmer42]

I have to stress that YOU SHOULD NOT JUDGE 4E BY THIS DOCUMENT, it is assembled by community members from potentially
outdated preview material and some pretty clever guess-work by fans, but that is all. It gives impatient players a single place to see what
has been revealed (and what might be deduced), and it can give you an idea how it "might" play, but for goodness sake, wait until you get
your hands on the final official Core Rulebooks in June before you make any final conclusions.

Wodan, it helps if you read the source you're citing. Simply put, that document is not a valid source, by it's own admission on the first page. We haven't seen the official, final rules for most of your argument.

[xirr2000]

Wodan, it helps if you read the source you're citing. Simply put, that document is not a valid source, by it's own admission on the first page. We haven't seen the official, final rules for most of your argument.

Meh, a lot of stuff out there has the warning you cited, but its still pretty well verified at this point.

[wodan46]

There are 5 at will abilities available for level 1 wizards. You get to pick 3 of them if you are Human and 2 otherwise. So, in theory, you could pick all 3 of these if you are human, but we have to find out what the other 2 are first. I hope that they are something like Color Spray or Grease, but those have likely been converted into utility spells.

[holywhippet]

If you can catch several enemies in the blast, this is good. However, as soon as those minions get interspersed with your party, this power is useless.

Unless you are chaotic evil.

[ahammer]

Unless you are chaotic evil.

its just evil now remeber... mahaha

[skywalker]

2. Kobolds seem to be a prominent enemy in it, and kobolds are a nightmare for a controller, as they are constantly shifting this way and that, making it difficult to pin them down.

Which is why you shouldn't put all your eggs in the "control" basket. Kobolds are a very common low level enemy in 3.5, I think they will continue to be in 4e. If the party gets into a situation like those in the preview adventure, what is a magic missile-less wizard going to do?

[wodan46]

Scorching Burst carefully will still work. Most of the time, you can avoid hitting your allies even in close combat, and even then, they will probably dodge and not get hurt, while the kobold minions will die automatically.

However, why can't the party just retreat with defenders and leaders covering, in order to get the strikers and controllers out of the melee mess and bombard from a distance?

[holywhippet]

However, why can't the party just retreat with defenders and leaders covering, in order to get the strikers and controllers out of the melee mess and bombard from a distance?

That would depend on your combat scenario. If you are out in the wide open with no cover then you have nowhere to retreat to. If the enemy have ranged attackers then you have the problem that if you can hit them, they can hit you.

[Farmer42]

And not every situation calls for an AoE spell. Do you really want to be dropping an exploding ball of flame in a wooden structure, or a mine with important wooden braces? Or what if you enemy is immune to cold or fire?

[Cuddly]

Your speculations are largely meaningless until the game's release. CHILL OUT GUYS.

[TheOOB]

We can't yet judge on how useful the ability to count as a standard ranged attack is, depending on how the system works out, it could be enough to push MM over the edge, and considering that damage will scale out of control much slower then in 3e, that 2 extra damage will mean something (not to mention two dice generates a bell curve which is much more reliable then a single die). Also, non-elemental damage usually is(I'm assuming) preferable to elemental damage(as in 3e).

I figure it will all be up to personal preference and the concept you are running with. If I'm correct humans get an extra at-will ability so they won't have to make as tough of a choice.

[Squash Monster]

Given a choice of two of those three, I'd probably take magic missile and ray of frost. I think an AOE blast is going to be more useful as an encounter power, as you can most likely get a much bigger and more powerful blast out of it. Of the three options given of debuffing, aoe, and easy damage, AOE is the only one that's likely possible to get out of the way all at once.

Mind you, I think magic missile to be quite lackluster. If any of the other powers count as a basic ranged attack I'm very likely to take those instead.

[xirr2000]

Your speculations are largely meaningless until the game's release. CHILL OUT GUYS.

Clearly you are not famaliar with internet forums :) Our speculations are largely meaningless only AFTER the game's release. Until then it gives folks plenty of room to tell others they are uninformed compared to ourselves as there is no basis of comparison.....

Just kidding, a lot of the information out there has been handed out by WotC since the books have all actually been printed already which means the rules are out there if you want to look for them. Enough accurate information from the designers is out there to make provide info on how gameplay will be done, not mere speculations.

[Sir_Dr_D]

It sound like the wizard spells are quite well balanced then. I take back my original statement on wizards always needing magic misile. I disgree with the title in the thread though. Magic missile would be the only spell the wizard can use wehn at a distance.

What at-will spells you take would depend on what you encoutner powers are. If you take magic misile, then you would want to take short range encounter powers. And if you take short range at-will powers, you may want melf's acid arrow to componsate.

[Nohwl]

Plus, it's Magic Missile. You can't not take it, or you're a communist and a subversive.

what about when evocation is one of your banned schools?