creating a specialist wizard

[kaffalidjmah]

Yo guys, i wanna ask you an advice/your personal opinion on specialist wizard

I want to create a new wizard, i played lot of them and here is my opinion on the various kind of specialist and the role in the party. Fell free to say "you're wrong" or anything. Also, i usually play pure wizard, from 1 to 20, using maybe prc with full progression

-Abjurer: the party shield. You can create some strange kind of defense with him, that almost no one can dominate your barbarian, or nearly no one can steal something to you. Bannes school: usually illusion and enchantment. They gave me ability i don't really need, or i am wrong? If you can protect well the party there is no need to create illusion or dominate people.

-divination: there is something strange for being a diviner, i created an agoraphobic wizard with mental problem. I scryed all time from a tower when my party go out for adventure, it was a strange pg but was funny :). Ban school: necromancy, if i spy around i don't need horde of undead at my command

-evocation: blast and repeat. This is how i played this class, and it work. Then i added some conjuration and started the serious stuff. Ban school: usually i pick enchantment (if i kill him in an explosion is sub efficent to gain control over him) and the second school...i tried various mix and match but i didn't find a viable combo of banned school. Need help here.

-conjuration: "hello, i'm Isaac and i Control the battlefield". Am i right or am i wrong? The conjurer can just choose who can continue the fight and who can't, and the teleportation spell are just the cherry on the cake. Ban school: illusion, because i usually have just so much control over the battlefield that is enough, and usually necro because i already summon random creature to do the mess.

Illusion: gnome illusionist, master of shadow art, i don't have to say anything else right? Ban school: often evocation, whit the grater shade you have a lot of blastomancy, always necro

Enchantment: well, i don't used many enchanter, because i don't like to enthrall someone, i just want to blow them up, but other time is just funny. Ban school: not enough trained for a respectable choice here.

Necromancer: prepare to die, than be raised and die again, then i'll use your remain to create a huge badass golem. Seriously, is one of the most powerful buddies you can ever found,it just need a bit of time to prepare. Ban school enchantment and evocation.

Trasmuter: the buffer. You can made your whole party immune to a breath weapon, grant damage reduction, other stuff. Comboed with conjure is so hard talk. Ban school: necro and ench, or necro and illusion, it depend on what i have in mind.

guys, your turn

[eggynack]

Specialists are alright, though in a world where both domain wizard and elven generalist exist, you tend to need some extra incentive to make them work. For the most part, this means going conjurer and picking up abrupt jaunt or rapid summoning, though some prestige classes can also pick up an advantage from it. Specialization tends to be reasonable at earlier levels, but it suffers a bit when you hit higher levels and versatility becomes a much more important resource than slots.

As for your evaluations, there are a few issues I can see. First, evocation isn't really all that blasty. Yes, it has a lot of blasting spells, but you can do better with conjuration. The real advantage of evocation is a decent selection of defensively minded spells, along with a smattering of utility. That means stuff like resilient sphere, wind wall, wall of force, contingency, sending, and so forth. It's not the best set of unique effects (it is, in fact, the second worst set), but it's a good pile of spells.

Second, I would avoid banning illusion in the places you noted it as an option. Illusion offers spells like invisibility, mirror image, silent image, simulacrum, and a bunch of other stuff that other schools don't have. It's a great stack of unique effects, and one you shouldn't really be giving up unless you have focused specialist.

Third, on the topic of missing banned schools, it seems pretty simple, really. The best schools to ban, in order, are enchantment, evocation, necromancy, and illusion, followed by maybe abjuration if you have another caster in the party. So, an evoker should ban enchantment and necromancy, and enchantment should be evocation and necromancy, and so forth.

That covers most of it, I think. As a final note, you could stand to be a bit less reductive in the way you look at the schools. Necromancy is more than just some disposable minions, and in fact grants piles of debuffs on top of that that are the bread and butter of any necromancer. Conjuration is more than BFC, in the sense that it is everything. Transmutation is ostensibly focused on buffs, but in reality, in a world where the polymorph line and other crazy effects exist, it's really also focused on everything.

[kaffalidjmah]

Onestly, in the quest wherr i am the player my master don't use the domain wizard, and we don't have race of the wild
i know a generalist elf is one of the strongest stuff around, but i really don't see the power of the domain wizard...except if you mean "you don't ban school"

For the rest, thank for the advice!

[eggynack]

i know a generalist elf is one of the strongest stuff around, but i really don't see the power of the domain wizard...except if you mean "you don't ban school"

What's not to see? You get the same pile of extra spells/day as a specialist, except limited to a particular list, and with no banning cost. If the spells you're getting from the domain are ones you'd be prepping anyway, which is reasonably likely with something like conjuration domain, then it's much better than a specialist unless they make use of ACF's as well.

[Extra Anchovies]

Indeed. Compared to vanilla Specialist, Domain Wizard wins out big-time. Master Specialist can be more useful, but that's dependent on your party.

[KillianHawkeye]

I would say that the subject of banned schools somewhat depends on the other characters in your party. If there is a Cleric, they can usually cover a lot of enchantment and abjuration, and they can also summon just as well as a Wizard. If you have a Beguiler, let them take care of enchantment and illusion. If there is a Warmage, let them handle evocation. If there is a Dread Necro, you can easily ban necromancy. Druids can do summoning as well as battlefield control, so you can probably be safe banning conjuration even though it's really good.

Otherwise, if you're playing the party's only primary spellcaster, I'd recommend banning enchantment and evocation first, and either necromancy or abjuration if you just REALLY want one of the first two. Conjuration and illusion are too good to ban, and you can't ban divination.

Personally, I've had a lot of fun playing a specialized Abjurer with evocation and necromancy banned. I'm really tanky and can get into melee pretty easily after dropping some BFC and using magic for personal protection.

[eggynack]

Druids can do summoning as well as battlefield control, so you can probably be safe banning conjuration even though it's really good.

No, conjuration is conjuration. I can't actually imagine circumstances under which banning it is a good plan. Maybe if you're level 17, and everything is shapechange, but even then you're losing a lot. I mean, really, you're losing out on all teleportation spells, calling effects, utility summoning, some BFC's that are very much not on the druid list (solid fog, for example), and some standard utility effects unrelated to summoning. In fact, even if the wizard list just overlapped with the druid one, conjuration still tends to be a wizard's main way of interacting with the battlefield. Effectively doubling down on those druid actions is a big game.

[Emperor Tippy]

Third, on the topic of missing banned schools, it seems pretty simple, really. The best schools to ban, in order, are enchantment, evocation, necromancy, and illusion, followed by maybe abjuration if you have another caster in the party. So, an evoker should ban enchantment and necromancy, and enchantment should be evocation and necromancy, and so forth.

I generally find that Evocation is better than Necromancy, or at least missed more. Which is not to say that I ever really find specialization to be a positive power wise (beyond maybe the first few levels).

[atemu1234]

I like necromancers, but only in Low-OP settings.

I like transmuters, because mwahahaha I will alter you to my will.
Illusionists because THATS TOTALLY A WALL GUYS, JUST DON'T LOOK AT IT TOO HARD.

[kaffalidjmah]

I like necromancers, but only in Low-OP settings.

I like transmuters, because mwahahaha I will alter you to my will.
Illusionists because THATS TOTALLY A WALL GUYS, JUST DON'T LOOK AT IT TOO HARD.

sir, you made my day :)

[atemu1234]

sir, you made my day :)

Happy to do so. Maybe I should sig this. Permission?

[heavyfuel]

Five words: Mage of the Arcane Order

This class allows you to be a Focused Specialist (one less spell per day the Sorcerer) with the versatility of a Generalist. Pick Conjurer for Abrupt Jaunt and you have a specialist that is better than any generalist.

[kaffalidjmah]

Happy to do so. Maybe I should sig this. Permission?

do what you want :)

Five words: Mage of the Arcane Order

This class allows you to be a Focused Specialist (one less spell per day the Sorcerer) with the versatility of a Generalist. Pick Conjurer for Abrupt Jaunt and you have a specialist that is better than any generalist.

interesting...now THE problem. My master doesn't allow the use of Perfect mage. Specifically, no manual not translated in italian that he have (we are italian)

Thanks for tip all the tip, they're useful, but not really pratical for me :(

We don't have race of the wild, the master won't allow for unearthed arcana, and no Perfect mage. Almost half of the optimization build are maded with this 3 manual, is a very pain in the ###