Why All The Hate Towards Blasting?


Pathfinder First Edition General Discussion

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It seems that alot of people here hate damage-dealing spells. Yes, I've read Treantmonk's guide and am familiar with the typical arguments against it. The thing is, is it really that bad?

Yeah, Haste is a great spell and, depending on how many fighter-types you have in your group, it can, over its duration, contribute more damage than Fireball. Yes, fireball does fire damage and has a saving throw. But your fighter can also miss on his attacks and enemies can have DR that he's not able to circumvent. Fireball also hits a ton of enemies at once, while it may take several rounds for the fighter types of deal as much damage to as many enemies thanks to haste.

And yes, summoning is great. No argument there. But once you've summoned a monster and hasted your party, then what? Does your wizard just sit there and pick his nose? That's when, it seems to me, you should start blasting, because the sooner your enemies die, the less damage your party takes. Sure, he can do other things too, like use enchantment or other debuff spells, or use other tactics as best fits his character. Nothing wrong with that. Nothing wrong with blasting either.

Yeah, things like black tentacles and sleet storm can be great "control" spells, but they also aren't party friendly. You hasted your fighter, but now he has to pull out a bow and start shooting the enemies because they're in your crowd control zone of doom that he doesn't dare enter. That's counter productive. I'm not saying that spells like Black Tentacles suck, on the contrary, they can be devastating when used appropriately. I'm just saying that they aren't always superior to blasting spells. Things often appear much better on paper than they are in practice.


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Release the hounds!


Yes wizards can do hp damage, but fighters can do more. Most combats are over by the time you've run out of control spells appropriate to the encounter.


FallingIcicle wrote:

It seems that alot of people here hate damage-dealing spells. Yes, I've read Treantmonk's guide and am familiar with the typical arguments against it. The thing is, is it really that bad?

Yeah, Haste is a great spell and, depending on how many fighter-types you have in your group, it can, over its duration, contribute more damage than Fireball. Yes, fireball does fire damage and has a saving throw. But your fighter can also miss on his attacks and enemies can have DR that he's not able to circumvent. Fireball also hits a ton of enemies at once, while it may take several rounds for the fighter types of deal as much damage to as many enemies thanks to haste.

And yes, summoning is great. No argument there. But once you've summoned a monster and hasted your party, then what? Does your wizard just sit there and pick his nose? That's when, it seems to me, you should start blasting, because the sooner your enemies die, the less damage your party takes. Sure, he can do other things too, like use enchantment or other debuff spells, or use other tactics as best fits his character. Nothing wrong with that. Nothing wrong with blasting either.

Yeah, things like black tentacles and sleet storm can be great "control" spells, but they also aren't party friendly. You hasted your fighter, but now he has to pull out a bow and start shooting the enemies because they're in your crowd control zone of doom that he doesn't dare enter. That's counter productive. I'm not saying that spells like Black Tentacles suck, on the contrary, they can be devastating when used appropriately. I'm just saying that they aren't always superior to blasting spells. Things often appear much better on paper than they are in practice.

Lemme give you the rundown of a 2nd level game I was in this weekend.

Combat:
9 PCs (ugh, yes, 9 of us) and I'm playing the only dedicated Arcane caster (a Witch, Shadow Patron). I have Evil Eye and Slumber hexes and prepared Mage Armor, Burning Hands, and Silent Image as my level 1 spells. Note that there are no cantrip damage spells for a Witch. The party is put into a fight against 2 Giant Beetles, which are on opposites sides of a large tree.

The party splits in half, roughly, and most of the melee piled on to one of the GBs. The other came up next to our Bard and healing Oracle. The targets are Mindless, so both of my hexes are worthless. I knowledge check the GBs and learn that they have no senses besides the standard sight. I proceed to use Silent Image to create the illusion of 5 squares worth of opponents around the GB near our Oracle and Bard and the GB proceeds to fail the Will save to disbelieve multiple times. I kept concentrating until it was obvious that the GB was no longer interacting with the figments. This bought us 3 rounds of time in which the Oracle and Bard both moved out and healed themselves from substantial hits. During this time, the other GB was killed.

My alternative was to use a single casting of Burning Hands to do 2d4 damage with a Reflex save. This is scarcely better damage than my Light Crossbow.

At low levels, it simply doesn't make sense to use nukes. They do too little. The first nuke worth using is Scorching Ray. The second is Fireball or Lightning Bolt. On a prepared caster, you're looking at putting a major commitment of spell slots into something that is likely not all that good against your targets.

By the time you obtain Fireball (which is admittedly powerful due to its massive size), a Rogue will have a 3d6 Sneak Attack, a Fighter can have Weapon Specialization, Weapon Training, and Power Attack increasing each swing, a Barbarian will consistently be raging every combat, etc.

Your Fireball will do an average of 17 damage with a Reflex half and you will have to aim it to hit enemies without hitting allies. A Fighter will be doing (typically) d8-d12 + 15 (2 Specialization, 1 Training, 6 Power Attack, 6 Strength) with a 2 handed weapon and will usually hit. Depending on the Rogue, you could be looking at 10 SA damage + weapon + STR, which is still comparable to your single target damage. A Barbarian will be doing damage on par with the Fighter.

The issue is this: Nine times out of ten, you could be casting Hold Monster or Hold Person instead of a nuke to enable a coup de grace attempt, which is substantially more likely to kill a target. You could be casting Fog Cloud or Silent Image to manipulate the battlefield. You could even be casting Bull's Strength or Haste on a melee member (or members) to increase damage output. All of these things are simply more effective uses of your spell slots as a prepared caster.

The only way I can conceive of playing a blaster is as a Words of Power Sorceror, and then only because you can get 2 for 1 on all of your energy word selections by picking up one of the UM archetypes (Shaitan, Djinni, Efreeti, or Marid) and still snag several good spells along the way. It's likely the only way that you can stack up against a control Wizard in effectiveness by subbing for damage.


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Treantmonk had a couple of good ideas, but he isn't God. He made some mistakes. Certainly, think about what he's said, but make up your own mind.
A couple of rules for evocation
1.) Keep your knowledge skills up so that you know your enemy's vulnerabilities
2.) Evocation is best off of magic items - energy adaptation isn't in Pathfinder and you want to be able to target several energy types
3.) Fear that an evocation spell will be cast is better than an evocation spell being cast - your goal is to split the enemy up and get them out of position. Using evocations to control the battlefield is more valuable than using them to do damage. (An example, your enemy has ambushed you, they've camoflaged a wall and, now, you see that three of them are taking cover behind it while shooting arrows at you. Your archers are having trouble hitting their archers because of the cover. Your melee guys will take several rounds of arrow fire if they try to charge the enemy archers. Your party has all taken cover while they are trying to figure out what to do. You pull out a scroll of fireball and signal to your party Bard who does his best to Intimidate the enemy archers. You read your scroll. The enemy archers are in a fireball. They now know that you can damage them. They don't know that was your only fireball. They think the battle is tilted against them. They believe that if they stay where they are, you'll just keep fireballing them. They spread out away from the wall. Now, your archers have a chance.


*Arf Arf Arf*

Yes, once I've buffed the party as a wizard I exit the battle field post haste to perseve my valuable and weakly armored hide.

Do I want to take a 50/50 chance of mega-death ray #9 doing half (or worse) no damage or do I want 75% chance to hit Fighter to have a second shot each turn, for much longer then my one shot mega death ray! Hum....

I guess my question is, will mega-death ray kill it even at half damage? If the answer is yes fire away. If the answer is no buff the fighter and let him make better use of the resource over time.... while you run for the hills with a bag of pop-corn. As I'm about to do....

*casts summon fire elementals and runs* (they will fight this thread for me you see, vs your 'direct arguments')


LilithsThrall wrote:

Treantmonk had a couple of good ideas, but he isn't God. He made some mistakes. Certainly, think about what he's said, but make up your own mind.

A couple of rules for evocation
1.) Keep your knowledge skills up so that you know your enemy's vulnerabilities
2.) Evocation is best off of magic items - energy adaptation isn't in Pathfinder and you want to be able to target several energy types
3.) Fear that an evocation spell will be cast is better than an evocation spell being cast - your goal is to split the enemy up and get them out of position. Using evocations to control the battlefield is more valuable than using them to do damage.

I thought the rules for evocation were

1.) walls are your friends
2.) The Artist Formerly Known as Bigby is your friend
3.) those water evocations in the APG that bull rush are better than nothing for some of the levels that don't have walls or hands


FallingIcicle wrote:

It seems that alot of people here hate damage-dealing spells. Yes, I've read Treantmonk's guide and am familiar with the typical arguments against it. The thing is, is it really that bad?

IMHO: Mechanically, it is most of the time. A character really built for it can redeem it somewhat. Overall it doesn't typically have a great rate of return in terms of resources spent to enemies neutralized.

Playing a wizard, my goal is to turn the fight into a sure thing for my side with the minimum spells burned possible, because

A) I'm trying to make my mojo last all day and

B) I want to make sure that when I really need the good juice, I still have it.


Atarlost wrote:


I thought the rules for evocation were
1.) walls are your friends
2.) The Artist Formerly Known as Bigby is your friend
3.) those water evocations in the APG that bull rush are better than nothing for some of the levels that don't have walls or hands

I mesnt to write, "the rules for blasting are.."


It seems to me that blasting is a better option for sorcerers than it is for wizards. Since wizards have to pick exactly how many fireballs, etc they will have available each day, and each blasting spell they prepare is a utility spell they don't get to prepare, it is simply less optimal for them.

That said, I did recently play an admixture evoker and it was very effective. To the people who says fighters will always do more damage, I beg to differ. Maybe against single targets that is true, but when the wizard is hitting several enemies per round, the total amount of damage inflicted per round simply leaves fighters in the dust. On those rounds I didn't want to use a spell, I used my ring of telekinesis to hurl rocks and other weapons, grapple foes or use the scenery strategically. It was a blast (pun intended).

Of course, my character didn't just blast. That would be like playing an illustionist that only uses illusion spells. I utilitzed things like summoned monsters, black tentacles, cloudkill, image spells (to make monsters waste attacks on imaginary threats), etc.


Blasting is better if your GM lets it do special damage to buildings and siege equipment or if you are fighting lots of weak enemies - especially if you use some kind of morale rules.

Blasting is terrible, most of the time, against single strong bad guys.

Sometimes blasting lets you really help. Magic missile is great if you hold your action until one of your teammates "bloodies" a target. Then you finish him with it automatically.


cranewings wrote:

Blasting is better if your GM lets it do special damage to buildings and siege equipment or if you are fighting lots of weak enemies - especially if you use some kind of morale rules.

Blasting is terrible, most of the time, against single strong bad guys.

Sometimes blasting lets you really help. Magic missile is great if you hold your action until one of your teammates "bloodies" a target. Then you finish him with it automatically.

I just don't agree with that. Why is there this assumption that if you don't kill it in one round, it's not worth even doing any damage at all? The monster will die faster with the wizard helping to kill it than it will if you let the fighter kill it all by himself.


FallingIcicle wrote:
cranewings wrote:

Blasting is better if your GM lets it do special damage to buildings and siege equipment or if you are fighting lots of weak enemies - especially if you use some kind of morale rules.

Blasting is terrible, most of the time, against single strong bad guys.

Sometimes blasting lets you really help. Magic missile is great if you hold your action until one of your teammates "bloodies" a target. Then you finish him with it automatically.

I just don't agree with that. Why is there this assumption that if you don't kill it in one round, it's not worth even doing any damage at all? The monster will die faster with the wizard helping to kill it than it will if you let the fighter kill it all by himself.

Well, a hasted, flying, occasionally invisible fighter is way more awesome than a boring fighter with three fireballs backing him up, and the damage will be higher.

I think fireball is a utility spell for mass combat. One fire ball could change a battle between a thousand men. It could wreck a castle or destroy a bridge. What it can't do is kill one strong guy. Sure, its better against a strong man than nothing but might as well stick to the best tool for the job.

Imagine 20 first level guys leading a siege tower to your wall. You cast hold person on one. He gets run over. Big deal.

Instead, fireball them, kill everyone, and take the tower down. Good stuff.

Fireball a sixth level fighter, monk, or rogue... nothing happens. They probably don't even take enough damage to be described as injured. Cast haste on your fighter and let him go attack - autowin.


FallingIcicle wrote:


I just don't agree with that. Why is there this assumption that if you don't kill it in one round, it's not worth even doing any damage at all? The monster will die faster with the wizard helping to kill it than it will if you let the fighter kill it all by himself.

D&D combat boils down to playing tag with rocket launchers. Fighters are good at it. Wizards aren't. Maybe its because they don't care much about it. After all, your a wizard and damage is for chumps. Why should you do damage when you can win the fight instead?

Scarab Sages

Serisan wrote:


Lemme give you the rundown of a 2nd level game I was in this weekend.

Combat:
9 PCs (ugh, yes, 9 of us) and I'm playing the only dedicated Arcane caster (a Witch, Shadow Patron). I have Evil Eye and Slumber hexes and prepared Mage Armor, Burning Hands, and Silent Image as my level 1 spells. Note that there are no cantrip damage spells for a Witch. The party is put into a fight against 2 Giant Beetles, which are on opposites sides of a large tree.

The party splits in half, roughly, and most of the melee piled on to one of the GBs. The other came up next to our Bard and healing Oracle. The targets are Mindless, so both of my hexes are worthless. I knowledge check the GBs and learn that they have no senses besides the standard sight. I proceed to use Silent Image to create the illusion of 5 squares worth of opponents around the GB near our Oracle and Bard and the GB proceeds to fail the Will save to disbelieve multiple times. I kept concentrating until it was obvious that the GB was no longer interacting with the figments. This bought us 3 rounds of time in which the Oracle and Bard both moved out and healed themselves from substantial hits. During this time, the other GB was killed.

My alternative was to use a single casting of Burning Hands to do 2d4 damage with a Reflex save. This is scarcely better damage than my Light Crossbow.

Ok, let me give you a counter run down.

Build was Gnome Elemental Sorcerer, Fire based. Pyromaniac alternate racial, and trait where I get +1 caster level on certain spells, level 2 caster, +10 initiative.

Assaulting a warehouse, from the outside to the inside. Stealthy rogue had gone and peeked in windows to get us our intel. Round 1, fighter bursts thru the door (gnome prepared move action first) and then slaughters the guard by the door. Gnome takes prepped action, runs ahead (had expeditious retreat on, cast by bard), streaks ahead and casts burning hands, 15 foot radius, 3d4+3 damage, hits for 13 total, reflex save for half and kills 2 of 3 guys seated around a table playing cards...3rd guy wounded. Other combat ensues. Round 2, Gnome fires Elemental Ray (d6+3) hits max damage, kills 3rd guy that was wounded. More combat. Round 3, 4, 5, more Elemental Rays, various damage but essentially picking off the wounded and ending combat.

All told, the blaster killed 6 guys total, 3 outright, 3 that were previously wounded, and ended combat MUCH faster. These were CR2 fighters (caravan guards).

Sometimes blasting ends the fight much faster. MUCH faster. At higher levels it would probably be a lot less impressive, sure...maybe.

Level 15 bladewind cast by a fire oracle of similar build was devastatingly productive against the BBEG's mooks.


FallingIcicle wrote:
cranewings wrote:

Blasting is better if your GM lets it do special damage to buildings and siege equipment or if you are fighting lots of weak enemies - especially if you use some kind of morale rules.

Blasting is terrible, most of the time, against single strong bad guys.

Sometimes blasting lets you really help. Magic missile is great if you hold your action until one of your teammates "bloodies" a target. Then you finish him with it automatically.

I just don't agree with that. Why is there this assumption that if you don't kill it in one round, it's not worth even doing any damage at all? The monster will die faster with the wizard helping to kill it than it will if you let the fighter kill it all by himself.

Well, the dichotomy is usually "do damage" or "take them out of the fight for a while".

Taking them out of the fight is equivalent to temporarily killing them.


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I don't think there's actually that much hate towards blasting. I think it's more a realization that blasting is usually, at best, a so-so option. It's rarely the best thing you could be spending your turn on.

That doesn't mean you can't build a character that's good at blasting. It just takes a lot of specialization, whereas any wizard can be great at battle field control by just preparing the right spells.

I think the main issue with blasting is that spells haven't really changed all that much over the past editions of D&D: A fireball does 10d6 damage today, same as it did 20 years ago. But average HP has increased a fair bit, which means that spells that deal direct damage have a harder time keeping up, compared to more control-focused spells.


I'm someone who thinks blaster wizards can do well. I can tell you it takes a dedicated player though. You've got to be all in. You can't half-ass it. I'm running Age of Worms and the party wizard was doing ok as a semi-blaster up to the mid levels. I have seen him become less and less effective with his blasting. The rest of the party is asking for buffs and movement more than blasting. His hit point damage isn't needed. The inquisitor, paladin, and two-handed fighter don't need the extra damage dealing. The party is now level 18. He's an evoker with some focus but not enough to be a great blaster.

For those familiar with the campaign, they are at a point where they are dealing with more than just a handful of iconic creatures. He's down to 7 spells and he said that only 2 of them are combat oriented. They still have half the module to go through and there isn't time to rest. At least they don't think so. He only needs 3 hours (ring of sustenance plus prep time).


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Slaunyeh wrote:


I think the min issue with blasting is that spells haven't really changed all that much over the past editions of D&D: A fireball does 10d6 damage today, same as it did 20 years ago. But average HP has increased a fair bit, which means that spells that deal direct damage have a harder time keeping up, compared to more control-focused spells.

I think you just hit the nail on the head. Back when you stopped getting hit die at tenth level, gods were only a 9th through 13th level challenge, and ancient red dragons had 88 hp, doing 1d6 damage per level was pretty sweat.


Bob_Loblaw wrote:

I'm someone who thinks blaster wizards can do well. I can tell you it takes a dedicated player though. You've got to be all in. You can't half-ass it. I'm running Age of Worms and the party wizard was doing ok as a semi-blaster up to the mid levels. I have seen him become less and less effective with his blasting. The rest of the party is asking for buffs and movement more than blasting. His hit point damage isn't needed. The inquisitor, paladin, and two-handed fighter don't need the extra damage dealing. The party is now level 18. He's an evoker with some focus but not enough to be a great blaster.

Exactly. Once you get haste, your best bet for dealing damage is that spell. Remember, every single extra attack your martial types make because of it is *your* damage, not theirs.

An inquisitor, paladin, and TH Fighter is going to be doing a ton of extra damage with that extra attack. Far more than your fireball can ever hope to do, especially since it'll be at full BAB (aka: it'll hit).


In my experience, the blasters usually get screwed over in the mid to higher levels, when elemental resistances and immunities, as well as evasion and Reflex saves become common. On the flip side, monsters generally have either a high Fort or high Will save, but not both.

Therefore, Dominate that ogre attacking your Fighter (now your party's taking less damage) and turn him against the enemy spellcaster (now you're party's doing more damage). Any damage done to or by the Dominated creature is damage YOU'RE not taking.

Enemy spellcasters wrecking havoc? Stinking Cloud. Now they can't do anything. Next turn, they'll run out of the Stinking Cloud. Nauseated for 1d4+1 rounds for your Fighters to have at 'em.

BBEG spellcaster? Feeblemind.

Ten ogres coming at you? Transmute Rock to Mud. Now they move 5' per round. Have at him, Ranger!

Invisible Rogue kicking your ass? Glitterdust to reveal AND blind him.

My favorite battle was in a fight against two huge trolls or giants (I forget). My character was still evil at the time, so I wasn't helping out the Fighter, Rogue, Cleric, and Wizard in the group. The Fighter and Rogue were getting rocked - tripped, full-attacked, etc. The Wizard and Cleric were blasting for average damage. Too bad for DR. Finally, the Fighter's player said he was nearly unconscious.

I jump in, drop Charm Person one round and Suggestion the next. Battle's over. Then I used the Charmed baddie for information on what monsters were in the next room and how to get through this huge door we couldn't open (he opened it for us).

I went up against some pretty tough zombies once, too. Just kidding. Command Undead, followed by, "Take me to your leader."

In another battle: first turn Slow. A favorite. Now my enemies can either move or take a standard action. No full attacks on my Fighter and Rogue beating it to smithereens with Haste. Keep in mind if the Fighter and Rogue got knocked out, I'd be next.

Overall, Fireball can do average damage, but remember you are limited on your spells per day. Plus, if you can Knowledge your enemies and find out what their weakest saves are, your spells are better spent exploiting those weaknesses, potentially by stopping them in their tracks or turning them against their enemies. But hey, if they have a vulnerability to fire, have at him!

Dark Archive

normally it makes much more sense to not deal with the enemy at all, than to whittle away hp.

for example at 12th level you could use chain lightning (average 42 damage at this level, with a reflex for half), or you could flesh to stone, or a good dominate, or circle of death. Disintegrate isnt even all that great, it only does an average 84 damage or 5d6 on a save.
granted, if you plan on fighting a bunch of low level things soe AoE's are ok, but against most BBEG fights i'd rather have the FtS

AoE damage is only good vs a lot of lower level opponents. Leave damage to the brutes. If you cast things that remove an enemy's ability to fight, you've already won.


Pathfinder Roleplaying Game Superscriber; Pathfinder Starfinder Roleplaying Game Subscriber

To those saying fighters do more damage, I must rebut:

That is only true at lower levels. I've created blaster sorcerers that can (several times a day) deal 200+ damage to MULTIPLE targets in a single round.

Not even 20th-level fighter archers can top that.


Ravingdork wrote:

To those saying fighters do more damage, I must rebut:

That is only true at lower levels. I've created blaster sorcerers that can (several times a day) deal 200+ damage to MULTIPLE targets in a single round.

Not even 20th-level fighter archers can top that.

Sure you can do it. But how much investment does a 20th level mage need to make his blasting spells competent? Now ask yourself the same question about each of the following spells. Gates, Wail of the Banshee, Polymorph any Object, Mage's Disjunction, Dominate Monster, Mass Hold Monster, and Weird. When compared to the awesome power of Overwhelming Presence I think most people are less than impressed by 200+ damage.


If I was going to create a blaster, it wouldn't be a Sorcerer. Sorcerers have very few spells known. They need to focus on spells which are useful in the widest possible situations. Blasting doesn't meet that description.


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Pathfinder Adventure Path, Rulebook, Starfinder Adventure Path, Starfinder Roleplaying Game Subscriber

Why all the hate? Because it isn't the single best option, which makes optimizers grind their teeth like Stannis Baratheon.


Pathfinder Roleplaying Game Superscriber; Pathfinder Starfinder Roleplaying Game Subscriber
WPharolin wrote:
Ravingdork wrote:

To those saying fighters do more damage, I must rebut:

That is only true at lower levels. I've created blaster sorcerers that can (several times a day) deal 200+ damage to MULTIPLE targets in a single round.

Not even 20th-level fighter archers can top that.

Sure you can do it. But how much investment does a 20th level mage need to make his blasting spells competent? Now ask yourself the same question about each of the following spells. Gates, Wail of the Banshee, Polymorph any Object, Mage's Disjunction, Dominate Monster, Mass Hold Monster, and Weird. When compared to the awesome power of Overwhelming Presence I think most people are less than impressed by 200+ damage.

Maybe so, but my blaster does his damage with only a few feats and a 3rd-level spell. The spells you mentioned require MUCH higher slots and can therefore be used far fewer times per day.

In actual play, I put them both about on par with one another.

The best spellcasters will be using both serious blasting AND battlefield control.


hippononymous wrote:
In my experience, the blasters usually get screwed over in the mid to higher levels, when elemental resistances and immunities, as well as evasion and Reflex saves become common.

Evasion is common? Looking through the bestiary I only saw a couple creatures that have it in the entire book. But sure, there are creatures against which blasting is less effective, just like there are enemies against which things like mind control, paralysis, sleep, stunning, etc aren't effective. No single strategy is supposed to be an "I win" against every foe in the game.

Name Violation wrote:

normally it makes much more sense to not deal with the enemy at all, than to whittle away hp.

for example at 12th level you could use chain lightning (average 42 damage at this level, with a reflex for half), or you could flesh to stone, or a good dominate, or circle of death. Disintegrate isnt even all that great, it only does an average 84 damage or 5d6 on a save.
granted, if you plan on fighting a bunch of low level things soe AoE's are ok, but against most BBEG fights i'd rather have the FtS

AoE damage is only good vs a lot of lower level opponents. Leave damage to the brutes. If you cast things that remove an enemy's ability to fight, you've already won.

Sure, those things can be effective options. The problem is, if your foe saves against your Dominate, Flesh to Stone or Circle of Death, you just wasted your turn and accomplished nothing. Most blasts, on the other hand, at least deal half damage if the foe saves, so barring resistances, immunities, or evasion, you've at least accomplished something. Many enemies are also immune to specific types of debuffs or save-or-dies.

LilithsThrall wrote:
If I was going to create a blaster, it wouldn't be a Sorcerer. Sorcerers have very few spells known. They need to focus on spells which are useful in the widest possible situations. Blasting doesn't meet that description.

A 20th level sorcerer knows a total of over 50 spells. You can easily afford to include several blasting spells among that number and still have plenty of other spells.


Bomanz wrote:

Ok, let me give you a counter run down.
Build was Gnome Elemental Sorcerer, Fire based. Pyromaniac alternate racial, and trait where I get +1 caster level on certain spells, level 2 caster, +10 initiative.

Assaulting a warehouse, from the outside to the inside. Stealthy rogue had gone and peeked in windows to get us our intel. Round 1, fighter bursts thru the door (gnome prepared move action first) and then slaughters the guard by the door. Gnome takes prepped action, runs ahead (had expeditious retreat on, cast by bard), streaks ahead and casts burning hands, 15 foot radius, 3d4+3 damage, hits for 13 total, reflex save for half and kills 2 of 3 guys seated around a table playing cards...3rd guy wounded. Other combat ensues. Round 2, Gnome fires Elemental Ray (d6+3) hits max damage, kills 3rd guy that was wounded. More combat. Round 3, 4, 5, more Elemental Rays, various damage but essentially picking off the wounded and ending combat.

All told, the blaster killed 6 guys total, 3 outright, 3 that were previously wounded, and ended combat MUCH faster. These were CR2 fighters (caravan guards).

Sometimes blasting ends the fight much faster. MUCH faster. At higher levels it would probably be a lot less impressive, sure...maybe.

Level 15 bladewind cast by a fire oracle of similar build was devastatingly productive against the BBEG's mooks.

Kind of curious where your +3 is coming from on the Burning Hands, unless the gnome somehow had picked up Draconic bloodline (Crossblooded?). Regardless...

It was a very heavily specialized Elemental Sorceror who was able to do his thing. The Sorceror had an ideal situation to work with (pre-buffed with surprise). The Sorceror also had support in the form of additional damage from a Bloodline ability. The targets were particularly ripe for the spell used.

There are times when blasting is good. This was one of them. Typically, I don't see that many of them, though.


I’ve seen several people say an effective blaster caster can be done well, you just really need to build him and be dedicated towards it.

My question is, what is it you recommend to be a dedicated blaster? What feats to take?

RPG Superstar 2015 Top 8

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The usefulness of any given spell type is dependent highly upon circumstance--and especially upon the type of creature met, the make up of the party, and the play style of the characters.

It all comes down to these two relatively equal priorities:
1. Do what will support the party the most
2. Do what is the most fun/in character for you.

The problem with message board theorists advocating non-blaster style casters is that they tend to assume all enemies are vulnerable to non-blaster spells, and that enemies always fail saves and casters always beat SR/hit with their touch attack, etc.

For example, hold monster is a favorite example win button spell. But if you are fighting a horde of skeletons (immune to mind-affecting, and there's a HORDE of them), what are you going to cast, hold monster or fireball?

Of COURSE if you're fighting creatures who AREN'T immune to mind-affecting spells and you're pretty sure the creature has a low Will save, go for hold monster.

But the strength of a spellcaster is of course in his or her versatility. Any caster who favors ONLY blasting or ONLY control will likely find themselves out of their element at some point.

And perhaps that's the real flaw of spellcaster design in this kind of system. Sometimes it would seem fun and cinematic and cool looking to have a strongly "themed" caster--say, a "fire mage" or what have you. But if you stick to too narrow a build concept you will be at a loss (the "fire mage" will be useless versus a red dragon, save perhaps to protect others from fire).


A lot of theorycrafters look at the choice of spell to cast something like this:

Step 1: choose spell
Will this spell help me end this encounter more quickly? If yes, continue.

Step 2: Will this spell eliminate an enemy or more than one enemy? If yes, continue. If no, see 2b.

2b: Will this spell significantly hamper the ability of the enemy to hurt us? If yes, continue. If no, 2c.

2c: Will this spell improve the ability of one or more party members to end this fight quickly? If yes, continue.

3: Does this spell have a 100% chance of success? If yes, continue.

Etc.

Blasting spells do not impair the ability of an enemy to fight until they reduce the foe to 0 hp or less. But battlefield control spells do. Often, people aren't thinking of the fact that those few hp of damage may knock an opponent down when combined with other PCs efforts. Instead, the decision is made in character isolation: use a save-or-suck with X chance of screwing over 1 or more enemies, or use a blasting spell that will have Y chance of dropping one or more enemies, where Y is less than X. As I've joked with a few friends, the only hit point that matters is the last one, so hp damage is therefore considered weak unless you actually get that last hp of the bad guys.

For my own part, I believe there's a time and place for everything. I also believe you can build a character who's good at anything you like and that PC will make even "bad" ideas work.

Grand Lodge

Hobbun wrote:

I’ve seen several people say an effective blaster caster can be done well, you just really need to build him and be dedicated towards it.

My question is, what is it you recommend to be a dedicated blaster? What feats to take?

Improved Initiative

Spell Focus, Greater Spell Focus if you are going to rely on AOE, otherwise Point Blank Shot and Precise Shot for ray spells.

You'll want Spell Penetration and Greater Spell Penetration by the time you start to consistently run into SR - around level 9.

IMO, it's easier to do an effective blaster than control type (especially if you want to go wizard instead of sorcerer). Control means knowing your spells, and making the best possible use of them during multiple battles. An inexperienced blaster is more effective than an inexperienced control type, because 1) they are putting damage on the opponent(s) and 2) they aren't hindering the rest of the party through poor spell selection.


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Hobbun wrote:
My question is, what is it you recommend to be a dedicated blaster? What feats to take?

Spell Focus: Evocation

Greater Spell Focus: Evocation

Chosen to reduce the chances of the baddies making the saving throw. Full damage is better than none. Elemental focus can also be good, but might be a trap, as it encourages the use of a single energy type.

Improved Initiative

Chosen so the fist blast happens before the fighters rush into the mass of enemies.

3 Meta-magic feats not gained from rods. Feats from rods can't meet pre-reqs for Spell Perfection. Spell Perfection allows a meta-magic feat to be applied to a spell for free (provided the modified level is not more than 9) and doubles the modifier of ALL feats that apply a set numerical bonus to the spell. Just choose a good spell for it.

Spell Penetration
Greater Spell Penetration

Cause SR is a downer

Also useful are feats like Varisian Tattoo.

Also helpful (for the sorcerer-blaster)is choosing a sorcerer bloodline that adds extras to the spells, such as the bonus damage per die from many bloodlines, and additional bonus to the DR of your blasting spells (Stormborn Bloodline) or merely adding a kicker effect to them that is hard to duplicate (Rime-Blooded).

For other classes choose archetypes or specializations that add something beyond what mere feats can achieve.


DeathQuaker wrote:

The problem with message board theorists advocating non-blaster style casters is that they tend to assume all enemies are vulnerable to non-blaster spells, and that enemies always fail saves and casters always beat SR/hit with their touch attack, etc.

For example, hold monster is a favorite example win button spell. But if you are fighting a horde of skeletons (immune to mind-affecting, and there's a HORDE of them), what are you going to cast, hold monster or fireball?

But that's why you don't carry just one spell. For example, your typical skeleton made out of something with 3-4 natural attacks is cleaned up in a pretty bad way by Slow.

In most situations there's a good "control" spell, and your better controller-style-casters will have a variety ready to go.


Jason Ellis 350 wrote:

Spell Focus: Evocation

Greater Spell Focus: Evocation

Chosen to reduce the chances of the baddies making the saving throw. Full damage is better than none. Elemental focus can also be good, but might be a trap, as it encourages the use of a single energy type.

Improved Initiative

Chosen so the fist blast happens before the fighters rush into the mass of enemies.

3 Meta-magic feats not gained from rods. Feats from rods can't meet pre-reqs for Spell Perfection. Spell Perfection allows a meta-magic feat to be applied to a spell for free (provided the modified level is not more than 9) and doubles the modifier of ALL feats that apply a set numerical bonus to the spell. Just choose a good spell for it.

Spell Penetration
Greater Spell Penetration

Cause SR is a downer

Also useful are feats like Varisian Tattoo.

Also helpful (for the sorcerer-blaster)is choosing a sorcerer bloodline that adds extras to the spells, such as the bonus damage per die from many bloodlines, and additional bonus to the DR of your blasting spells (Stormborn Bloodline) or merely adding a kicker effect to them that is hard to duplicate (Rime-Blooded).

For other classes choose archetypes or specializations that add something beyond what mere feats can achieve.

Ok, so basically what I’ve already been taking feat-wise. That Varisian Tattoo is pretty interesting, but would need to check with my GM first as it is Golarian specific (Inner Sea World Guide).

I do want to take Spell Perfection later on, but not sure what spell to use it with. Any suggestions?


FallingIcicle wrote:

It seems that alot of people here hate damage-dealing spells. Yes, I've read Treantmonk's guide and am familiar with the typical arguments against it. The thing is, is it really that bad?

Yeah, Haste is a great spell and, depending on how many fighter-types you have in your group, it can, over its duration, contribute more damage than Fireball. Yes, fireball does fire damage and has a saving throw. But your fighter can also miss on his attacks and enemies can have DR that he's not able to circumvent.

In my experience, a player's dislike of blasting spells is usually correlated to how good the other damage-dealing PCs are in his group.

I've played in both types of group (groups with deadly melee monsters and groups where the only melee fighter is a bard with 8 Str and a rapier); blasting is definitely more useful (dare I say "necessary"?) in one group as opposed to the other.


The downfall of evocation for me is how much resistance someone can get from a 2nd level spell, Resist Energy. By 11th level it pretty much negates the majority of damage from most energy based spells. At the end of Rise of the Runelords, I was playing a paladin who was caster level 11, he was hit by a meteor swarm and took no damage.

level 2 Abjuration > level 9 evocation


Ravingdork wrote:

To those saying fighters do more damage, I must rebut:

That is only true at lower levels. I've created blaster sorcerers that can (several times a day) deal 200+ damage to MULTIPLE targets in a single round.

Not even 20th-level fighter archers can top that.

You mind sharing what build you used to do 200+ damage with an AOE spell? I have a few Ideas but I have yet to run a high level wizard in pathfinder.


To be fair to the OP, he's partially right. Fireball is actually a pretty decent spell in the right circumstances. Most of the fights in my last campaign started outdoors, from several hundred feet away (I hate it when a horde of ogres randomly appears next to you on a sunny day in the plains. And part of me really enjoys punishing dumb*sses who call themselves professional warriors but only bring a sword with them). I'm also a fan of using groups of mundane enemies instead of a singular uber-monster. So yes, in about 75% of those fights, fireball was pretty decent.

The real problem appears when you get beyond that level. Cone of cold is an unbelievable turd for non-maguses. I'd be easier to just fireball than get within 60 feat of a large enough group of monsters for that spell to not be a waste. Chain lightning isn't too bad, but, really, there are much better uses of a 6th level slot. Polar ray, I believe takes the cake for the worst nuke (perhaps worst in the game). A few of the newer nukes, like polar midnight and cold ice strike, are good, but overall, after 2nd and 3rd level spells, usefullness goes downhill.

And yes, people can argue that you CAN make a decent nuker, but you're going to get less return for more investment than you would get with other spells.


Thaylen wrote:


You mind sharing what build you used to do 200+ damage with an AOE spell? I have a few Ideas but I have yet to run a high level wizard in pathfinder.

He's posted it before if you want to dig in the archives -- I don't remember all the details but it's seriously all-in on jacking up fire damage and doesn't *really* get going until level 15.

But at that point, assuming you're not dealing with something that's fire immune, it does make blasting seem workable.

(Although, since roughly 0% of the hundreds of PCs I've ever started throughout my gaming career have seen level 15, I'm still going to continue to build characters as though blasting is not especially workable.)


Lathiira wrote:

Blasting spells do not impair the ability of an enemy to fight until they reduce the foe to 0 hp or less. But battlefield control spells do. Often, people aren't thinking of the fact that those few hp of damage may knock an opponent down when combined with other PCs efforts. Instead, the decision is made in character isolation: use a save-or-suck with X chance of screwing over 1 or more enemies, or use a blasting spell that will have Y chance of dropping one or more enemies, where Y is less than X. As I've joked with a few friends, the only hit point that matters is the last one, so hp damage is therefore considered weak unless you actually get that last hp of the bad guys.

For my own part, I believe there's a time and place for everything. I also believe you can build a character who's good at anything you like and that PC will make even "bad" ideas work.

Often times in actual play, in lower-level scenarios (up to 9th level, even), I've found that the use of clever tactics (focused attacks on a given target, positioning, teamwork, etc.) makes Blasting as good or better than many Control spell options. I believe that this has been the case partly because if everyone is dealing damage, and coordinating their attacks, the party is faced with a more narrowly defined challenge (deplete Enemy HP) than in the cases where Control spells are used (deplete Enemy HP unless it disrupts Control, while avoiding any Control effects), and also partly because many Blasting effects are much easier to do bookkeeping for compared to Control effects (decrement HP after saves, if applicable, compared to tracking conditions that last multiple rounds, sometimes with saves per creature per round).

Admittedly, there are lots of scenarios where Control spells are tactically sound options, I don't mean to contest that notion. The fact remains, though, that the group of spells that require adjudication in their application contains a significantly smaller number of Blasting spells compared to non-Blasting spells. (Blasting spells deplete HP, that's what they do.) This, in addition to the likelihood that the other party members are probably prosecuting their actions in most combats with the intention to deal HP damage at least half of the time, means that the choice to do something other than deal HP damage increases the complexity of play at least for the GM, and possibly for all other players, depending on the scope of the effects produced.

While it remains true that the *right* Control spell can be a Win button, different Control spells have the property of being *right* for different scenarios. Blasting spells, while hardly ever Win buttons, are also hardly ever totally useless. Charm Monster is a good option against creatures with low Will saves and a bad option against Undead, Constructs, and creatures with high Will saves. Empowered Scorching Ray is not necessarily as good as Charm Monster when Charm Monster is good, but is usually better than Charm Monster when Charm Monster is bad. Obviously some Control spells, such as Slow, are almost uniformly as good or better than Blasting spells. Happily, as has been observed, casters can memorize multiple spells per day. Of course, a caster could be well-served by memorizing Slow in a good portion of his available slots, but this puts him in the position of doing the same thing over and over again, which might be less than fun.

On an individual scale, it's usually true that, for every scenario, a Control spell exists that performs better than a Blasting spell of the same level in the same scenario. Sadly, Wizards and other prepared casters can't memorize on-demand, but are required to memorize after resting, and must take 15 minutes to fill empty slots during the day - not designed for choosing spells on a moment's notice. Sorcerers and other spontaneous casters, while not limited by preparation, are limited by spells known, which are determined even less frequently. Thus, adventuring casters faced by potential encounters of an unknown quality will have difficulty choosing the "right" Control spells to "Win" encounters easily, but can make a choice of Blasting spells that will usually allow them to make a contribution to offensive encounters.

Casters who have no idea what they're likely to face and also avoid Blasting spells are more likely to find themselves in a situation where they are incapable of directly effecting their opponents.

Of course, most adventures allow for some sheer speculation about the nature of likely foes, and at higher levels allow for safe (or safer) reconnaissance, so the evaluation between Blasting and Control spells becomes less clear.


Doskious Steele wrote:


Empowered Scorching Ray is not necessarily as good as Charm Monster when Charm Monster is good, but is usually better than Charm Monster when Charm Monster is bad.

On the other hand (to stick with your example) there's a staggering amount of fire resistance / immunity in the game.

Probably there aren't quite as many fire immune monsters as charm immune monsters, but I bet it's not too far off.


Thaylen wrote:
Ravingdork wrote:

To those saying fighters do more damage, I must rebut:

That is only true at lower levels. I've created blaster sorcerers that can (several times a day) deal 200+ damage to MULTIPLE targets in a single round.

Not even 20th-level fighter archers can top that.

You mind sharing what build you used to do 200+ damage with an AOE spell? I have a few Ideas but I have yet to run a high level wizard in pathfinder.

Likely, he means in total not toward each.


Starbuck_II wrote:


Likely, he means in total not toward each.
Ravingdork wrote:
That is only true at lower levels. I've created blaster sorcerers that can (several times a day) deal 200+ damage to MULTIPLE targets in a single round.

Emphasis mine. He means what he says he means. I don't doubt that he was able to make a high damage blaster. I'm more curious about how he got around immunity and second level abjurations spells.


Ravingdork wrote:

To those saying fighters do more damage, I must rebut:

That is only true at lower levels. I've created blaster sorcerers that can (several times a day) deal 200+ damage to MULTIPLE targets in a single round.

Not even 20th-level fighter archers can top that.

Lemme guess. Half-Orc sorcerer, putting all the points into the favored bonus, with the cross-blooded options that add +2 damage per die.

At level 20, your spells that cap at 20d6 will be doing +50 damage. You can raise this by 5d6, I suppose to get an extra +10 damage. So that's 87.5+60 = 147.5 damage.

Maximized Intensified Fire Snake will be doing 20d6 damage. That's 170 damage for a 9th level slot.

Maximized Intensified Empowered Fireball will be doing...Well I'm not sure what it'd be doing since static bonuses based on level are increase by empowered, and I'm not sure if the +2 per die (which is related to level) is affected. But assuming it's not, that's 15d6 * 1.5 = 135 + 50 = 185 damage.

Now, assuming it's RavingDork, which it is, he probably would assume that +2 per die does scale, so now it's 202.5 damage to multiple enemies. And we've finally figured out how he does it. By using up his 9th level slots for a spell that deals the most resisted type of energy as opposed to something useful like Time Stop, or creating wooden golems to fight for you, or imprisoning your enemies beneath the ground.


Starbuck_II wrote:
Thaylen wrote:
Ravingdork wrote:

To those saying fighters do more damage, I must rebut:

That is only true at lower levels. I've created blaster sorcerers that can (several times a day) deal 200+ damage to MULTIPLE targets in a single round.

Not even 20th-level fighter archers can top that.

You mind sharing what build you used to do 200+ damage with an AOE spell? I have a few Ideas but I have yet to run a high level wizard in pathfinder.
Likely, he means in total not toward each.

Not as hard as you might think, really.

Crossblooded Orc and Draconic Sorcerer could be looking at hurling around 10d6 +20 damage fireballs. Apply maximize (via rod), and you've got a guaranteed 80. Empower it (oh, hey! you can hold two rods at once!) and you're hitting 110 (or maybe 120, depending on how empower is handled at your table. I think there was a recent posting about an official ruling on it, but I can't recall for certain). Toss on an intensify (if you're high enough level for it to be worth while), you're looking at 15d6 + 30 (120 when maximized, and either 165 (90+45+30) or 180 (90+45+45) with empower).

Half Orc racial bonus might factor in their somehow as well.

I'm barely even trying here.


Cheapy wrote:
Maximized Intensified Empowered Fireball will be doing...Well I'm not sure what it'd be doing since static bonuses based on level are increase by empowered, and I'm not sure if the +2 per die (which is related to level) is affected. But assuming it's not, that's 15d6 * 1.5 = 135 + 50 = 185 damage.

The damage is not right (Empowered does not stack with Maximized), but this is a 6th level spell via Spell Perfection.

Further, Ravingdork said 200+ damage "per round" and not with one spell, so you can bet he is using a Quickened-Intensified-Fireball as a 4th level spell too.

Maximized-Intensified-Empowered Fireball = 90 damage + 15d6/2 + 15 (draconic bloodline) + 7 (orc favored class bonus) = 139ish damage

Quickened-Intensified-Fireball = 15d6 + 15 (draconic) + 7 (orc) = 65ish damage

139 + 65 = 204 damage (at level 15)

You can get around the fire resistance by using the meta magic to change energy types and the trait to give -1 casting level to meta magic to the class. This is required for against fire immunity, so pick cold energy to hit the vulnerability to account for loss of damage from not being a fire spell. Against 30 pts of fire resistance, this combo is 144ish AE damage potential, which is still respectable.


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Bah, play what you enjoy playing. Let the people who like buffing buff and the people that like blasting blast. Whats the point of taking the best option if your bored doing it?

Scarab Sages

The caster can also spend 2 feats to get Eldritch Heritage and get the elemental arcana which allows them to change the energy type of their offensive spells into their element. With the appropriate skills you can figure out if monsters are immune to fire and convert your fireball into an frostball or scorching ray into Earth Ray! (How would that work?)

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