Hey, I was trying to build a sorcerer who only knows 1 spell each level and wants to be useful all the time. The cleric can go beg her deity for a Dim Anchor if one is necessary.About all that's missing there is a Dim Anchor style spell.I have never seen that happen. A player that knows his stuff will almost always have a spell he can use. I will admit he might not have the best spell for the situation, but wizards often have the same issue. In that case you think outside the box and made good use of what you have.it is about to choose good spells. At 4 level when the sorceer learn his first second elevel spells he can only have one spell known, the wizard would have 4. And what happens if the sorcerer spell do not work in a given situation? then the sorcerer would have 4 useless slots.But the Wizard must assign the spells to those slots before be can cast them.
The Sorcerer does not.
A sorcerer who knows one spell per level:
1: Grease, 2: Glitterdust, 3: Stinking Cloud 4: Black Tentacles 5: Magic Jar, 6: Disintegrate, 7: Reverse Gravity, 8: Maze, 9: Time Stop
I mean, your life would suck, but you will rarely find yourself unable to ANYTHING in combat.
I totally agree, though there was one campaign (War of the Burning Sky, 3.5) where I think the party wizard wanted to kill the party warmage for not getting a Dim Anchor effect using Eclectic Learning.
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Hi everyone,
I'm searching for a way to nerf the wizard down to approximately meet the powerlevel of the sorcerer
Don't allow your characters to rest and recover spells after 15 minutes.
Don't allow them to burn all their resources and then rest without any problem before the door of the BEEG. Random encounters exists, things that go bump into the night exists.Don't always give the possibility to the wizard to tailor his spells to teh specific encounter.
The difference between a wizard and a sorcerer is that the wizard should prepare his spells and a good wizard need to select a mix of defensive, offensive and utility spells, so he can deplete some of his options, the sorcerer, as long as he has spell slots, still has all of his options open.
A the wizard that need a extra fireball and has fly memorized is out of luck. A sorcerer, as long as he has a 3rd level slot and know the spell, has both options available. He is an endurance fighter, that is his advantage, so if that aspect of the game never come in play in your campaign he is weaker than the wizard.
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Maybe this makes my point more clear: aside from bonded items, pearls of power, scribe scroll, the ability to leave open slots and other tricks to offset the wizards more limited spells people forget that sorcerers start a new spell level with just one spell known. So even if the wizard is set back a level he will have more versatility in the highest level of spells (on top of the same amount of castings).
Page of spell knowledge, Ruenstone of power, the new vest that allow the sorcerer to treat a spell on a scroll as a know spell 1/day, bonded item with the correct bloodline.
Sorcerers have as many options as the wizards to get more spells and several options to get more know spells.
If you really do the math on spells available in the top 2 casting levels of the wizard vs those available to the sorcerer at the same level, the wizard always wins (without a nerf). By the time the sorcerer has his spontanious mechanics overshadow the wizard in lower levels he has so many spell slots and some pearls of power they suffice for the usual encounters per day (unless heavy dungeon crawling). So I find him mechanically strictly superior to the sorcerer (aside from metamagic use and spells like feather fall).
Because there aren't plenty of low level spells that are useful in high level play, right?
Invisibility, see invisibility, blur, mirror image, fly, glitterdust and so on.
None of those spell is really trumped by a higher level version. Even Greater Invisibility don't replace invisibility as they have different uses.
Your problem seem to be more about overequipped wizards than a weakness of the sorcerer. Try equipping the sorcerer with the same quantity and quality of equipment and you will get a similar level of power.
As Da'ath suggested check what items you want to remove from the game before changing the class. As an example, if you reduce the spell slot that a wizard has witout removing the pearl of powers you make the wizard a even more direct competitor to the sorcerer. He will have little variance in spell during a day (pearl of powers allow him to recall a spell that he has already cast) but he will try to compensate increasing the number of spells he can cast in a day.
I'm searching for a way to nerf the wizard down to approximately meet the powerlevel of the sorcerer (with human fav class ability nerfed to 1/2 for spontanious casters). I'm looking for a simple solution not involving complicated rule changes (staying as close to the original PF mechanics as possible), probably something involving the spells known table.
One idea in my head is to slow the wizard's spell progression by one level. Do you think that would be appropriate?
It would be a little heavy handed, I think, since the wizard progression is the basis for many encounter balance assumptions. I'd need to know a lot more about your gameplay history, and your group's style, to give you a proper answer on this one. I don't think it would break anything too badly, but that's a complete guess.
Do you think that if this is done to the wizard, the cleric and druid should be nerfed as well?
Yes.
Please post only if you agree that 1. wizard is the most powerfull class in PF and 2. Wizards are mechanically superior to sorcerers. This thread is about how to fix it for people who think this is an issue not to discuss wether it is, so please stay on topic.
Hahaha, you'll have to pour on the guilt a lot more if you expect OP-defined ground rules to work. Trust me.
I have never seen that happen. A player that knows his stuff will almost always have a spell he can use. I will admit he might not have the best spell for the situation, but wizards often have the same issue. In that case you think outside the box and made good use of what you have.it is about to choose good spells. At 4 level when the sorceer learn his first second elevel spells he can only have one spell known, the wizard would have 4. And what happens if the sorcerer spell do not work in a given situation? then the sorcerer would have 4 useless slots.But the Wizard must assign the spells to those slots before be can cast them.
The Sorcerer does not.
This is actually an argument in favor for the wizard since it means spntaneous casting is not that much of a gain.
Wizard: Fewer spell slots and have to prepare spells, Spells galore.
This is actually not true until late levels where the sorcerer has one more lower level slot per level then the wizard.
Spell slots per level a casting stat of 20 (not counting cantrips):
lvl 5: Wizard 14/ Sorcerer 13
lvl 7: Wizard 20/ Sorcerer 20
lvl 9: Wizard 26/ Sorcerer 27
...
The wizard gets 6 per 2 levels while the sorcerer gets 7 (not counting casting stat increases by level or headbands), those extra for the sorcerer are 3 levles below maximum casting level though.
I do not view spontanious casting superior to prepared casting. They are just different. The spontanious caster trades ultimate versatility when you know what's coming for more versatility when you don't know what's coming. Since the wizard has less MAD (he can dump cha while the sorcerer shouldn't dump int too much) and more out of combat use (all those usefull knowledges, very good with high int) he shouldn't get ahead in spell levels on top of that.
Page of spell knowledge, Ruenstone of power, the new vest that allow the sorcerer to treat a spell on a scroll as a know spell 1/day, bonded item with the correct bloodline.
I think people tend to forget when comparing the wizard to the sourcerer that wizards tend to be better prepared, but usually only when they have advanced notice. A varied sourcerer selection can be just as/more powerful, a single themed sourcerer will usually be worse (I'm glaring at you single-elementalist/warmage builds) when they run into something resistant to their spell type, with actual SR or that doesn't require blowing up and/or knocking down.
What anyone should be asking here is this:
1) What non-core materials do you allow?
2) Are there any other classes getting this treatment?
3)Is there a specific player getting out of hand? If so, what is the rest of the party like and what is he doing?
4) If there is a problem PC: How much item access/free time/advanced notice is he getting?
You are right, sorry, my game is APG+Core only. It's not that I have a problem with a specific PC, it's more a problem that I feel the wizard is overshadowing the sorcerer. Since I share the view that full casting classes already are more powerfull then mundanes I'd rather nerf the wizard then buff the sorcerer. 2) is a point I#ve been asking myself :)
While I think the others are more correct (item bloat rather than class problem), I'll give you a potential "fix" that you may like: give the wizard the sorcerer's spell progression/spells per day, but leave him a prepared INT-based caster with all the other mechanics identical. That more or less seems to be what you're asking for, yes?
Anyway, hope this helps.
I do not know why item bloat comes up as an argument so often. The pearl of power is the only item I mentioned, it's fairly cheap, it's core
Rather than nerf the wizard you could possibly buff the Sorcerer. [...]If thats not enough you could always let them gain their next level of spells a level earlier to be equal with Wizards.
I actually think that the wizard already is the most powerful class in the game so why not take a level from the wizard instead?
You might get interesting comparisons if you 'weight' spell levels and add up their weighted value rather than saying two level 1 spells is equal to one level 1 and one level 2.
Try recalculating with something like spell level x number of spells per day of that level, for each level of spells per day.
You might get interesting comparisons if you 'weight' spell levels and add up their weighted value rather than saying two level 1 spells is equal to one level 1 and one level 2.
Try recalculating with something like spell level x number of spells per day of that level, for each level of spells per day.
Speaking of weight, there are typically only so many spells a wizard can place in his spell book before having to get an additional one and start filling that up. Each of these books has a weight - this is an enforcement of a pre-existing rule. A lot of wizards, not all, make Strength one of their dump stats. They'll have to start sacrificing other things to carry these eventually.
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Oh no! They might have to keep their spellbooks in a handy haversack or some other extradimensional space!
I'm searching for a way to nerf the wizard down to approximately meet the powerlevel of the sorcerer (with human fav class ability nerfed to 1/2 for spontanious casters). I'm looking for a simple solution not involving complicated rule changes (staying as close to the original PF mechanics as possible), probably something involving the spells known table.
One idea in my head is to slow the wizard's spell progression by one level. Do you think that would be appropriate?
It would be a little heavy handed, I think, since the wizard progression is the basis for many encounter balance assumptions. I'd need to know a lot more about your gameplay history, and your group's style, to give you a proper answer on this one. I don't think it would break anything too badly, but that's a complete guess.
Do you think that if this is done to the wizard, the cleric and druid should be nerfed as well?Yes.
Please post only if you agree that 1. wizard is the most powerfull class in PF and 2. Wizards are mechanically superior to sorcerers. This thread is about how to fix it for people who think this is an issue not to discuss wether it is, so please stay on topic.Hahaha, you'll have to pour on the guilt a lot more if you expect OP-defined ground rules to work. Trust me.
You got my attention :)
About the playing style: We usually have a heavy emphasis on RP and story telling. PCs spend a lot of time investigating, talking to NPCs and figuring out what to do next. PCs do not like to just run into the woods they heared so many terrifying stories about, if they do they prepare. And for the sake of story climax they do not encounter a lot of monsters in there, but unusual things to keep them on their toes, paranoid. But they are attacked when they find the obilisk that seals the portal to the plane of shadows and rest, during the night the grove where the obilisk stands changes as the ties to the shadowplane strengthen during the night. Encounters in our group are more about horrific climaxes then dungeon clawling.So wizards with all their knowledge about dusty tomes and the more unusual things in the world have a lot of use already. And as I tried to point out I think they are the mechanically superior spellcasters as well.
I've never found wizards to be overpowering, but I tend to play at levels 4-9, where things balance out fairly well.
If I wanted to weaken wizards, I'd require a fairly difficult Spellcraft check to understand and use the spells he finds. I'd require another (slightly easier) Spellcraft check each time he wanted to add a particular spell when leveling: If he blew his roll, he'd have to choose a different spell. The cumulative effect of such rules would be to gradually force him to suffer "holes" in his spell selection or force him to blow considerable funds researching different versions of the spells he wants.
To throw in another idea being less drastic then setting the wizard back a whole level:
Specialist wizards do not get a specialist slot in the highest level they can cast.
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You are only comparing to the sorcerer though, you need to look at how the wizard compares to the other casting classes, by the core (I don't have the other books) sorcerer is the one that stands out, even cleric has more spells then the wizard does. If anything needs fixed, it's the sorcerer, not the wizard.
edit,
@Wulf
Wizards already have to make difficult rolls for spells they find, GMs just don't do it.
@Spock
Specialist wizards need that extra spell slot to keep up with clerics.
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Spell slots per level a casting stat of 20 (not counting cantrips):
lvl 5: Wizard 14/ Sorcerer 13
lvl 7: Wizard 20/ Sorcerer 20
lvl 9: Wizard 26/ Sorcerer 27
Spell slots per level a casting stat of 20 (not counting cantrips):
lvl 6: Wizard 15/ Sorcerer 18
lvl 8: Wizard 21/ Sorcerer 25
lvl 10: Wizard 27/ Sorcerer 32
So, because the Wizard has 1 more spell slot (paid using 2 slot to memorize spells from 2 schools) it should be nerfed every level?
Your sense of balance is a bit sleeved. Or you will remove the extra spell slots from the sorcerer at the even levels to balance your nerf?
Specialization has its cost, so you are looking it wrong.
The real comparison is:
lvl 5: Wizard 11+3/ Sorcerer 13
lvl 6: Wizard 12+3/ Sorcerer 18
lvl 7: Wizard 16+4/ Sorcerer 20
lvl 8: Wizard 17+4/ Sorcerer 25
lvl 9: Wizard 21+5/ Sorcerer 27
lvl 10: Wizard 22+5/ Sorcerer 32
Those extra spell can come only from a specific school of magic, so treating them as a normal spell slot is comparing oranges to lemons.
They are both citrus but they aren't the same thing.
So wizards with all their knowledge about dusty tomes and the more unusual things in the world have a lot of use already. And as I tried to point out I think they are the mechanically superior spellcasters as well.
So knowledge more than raw spellpower is the key in your game? How do you treat the bard?
Bardic Knowledge (Ex): A bard adds half his class level (minimum 1) to all Knowledge skill checks and may make all Knowledge skill checks untrained.
With that a bard will rapidly overshadow the knowledge of a wizard, he has spells and skills that are optimally tailored for the kind of campaign you depict and more than decent martial and buff abilities.
So clearly they are the most powerful class for your stile of playing. How is that they don't dominate the game?Maybe it is a problem of players ability instead of class abilities?
About the playing style: We usually have a heavy emphasis on RP and story telling. PCs spend a lot of time investigating, talking to NPCs and figuring out what to do next...
Consider leaving the spells the same, but increase most of the casting times. You could turn spell slots on their head, and let the wizard have access to every spell in their book, but they have to use the book to cast any spell without spell mastery. Clerics could be similarly nerfed with longer prayer times, and druids may need to commune. In most cases, changing casting times to 1 full round would achieve this.
I mean, that would be nice and thematic, but it would have far-reaching consequences. I'm not sure how "elegant" it is.
Explain the specific problems you've had with Wizard PCs (or NPCs, if that's the case), and we will stand a much better shot at helping your campaign specifically.
Or, we can all sit here and bring our preconceived notions to SpoCk0nd0pe's campaign which we know nothing about, and hope we sound really smart.
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Evil Lincoln, you really mean 1 full round?
There is a big difference between 1 full round and a full round action.
Giving all the spell a 1 full round casting time mean that the wizard will be totally incapable to cast a spell in the surprise round and he will lose a lot of spell to damage received while casting.
Evil Lincoln, you really mean 1 full round?
There is a big difference between 1 full round and a full round action.Giving all the spell a 1 full round casting time mean that the wizard will be totally incapable to cast a spell in the surprise round and he will lose a lot of spell to damage received while casting.
Yes, ish. If actually flipping through the spellbook and reading it is your goal, why not? Full-round is perhaps more sane.
He said that his campaign was a lot of careful planning and not necessarily combat solutions. Wizards could be the utility caster, but useless in combat.
After all, I did say this would have terrible, far reaching consequences...
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I would be curious to see the effect of your suggestion in the OP campaign. Probably he would discover that the witches are all powerful.
"They can cast almost as many spells as a wizard and have the hex."
Nerfing something for balance generally only guarantee that something other will get the spot as the "all powerful" class.
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I do not know why item bloat comes up as an argument so often. The pearl of power is the only item I mentioned, it's fairly cheap, it's core.
By the time the sorcerer has his spontanious mechanics overshadow the wizard in lower levels he has so many spell slots and some pearls of power they suffice for the usual encounters per day (unless heavy dungeon crawling). So I find him mechanically strictly superior to the sorcerer (aside from metamagic use and spells like feather fall).
You presented them as if they were so common that the wizard as several of them for different levels.
Oh, it was a random suggestion that wouldn't work at all, but it did get the thread back on track. ;)
Oh no! They might have to keep their spellbooks in a handy haversack or some other extradimensional space!
The over-proliferation of magic items seems to be the core of a lot of complaints regarding classes, so I'm not really seeing the point of the "Mr. or Mrs. Obvious Post".
Dealing with extra-dimensional space is easy.
I have never seen that happen. A player that knows his stuff will almost always have a spell he can use. I will admit he might not have the best spell for the situation, but wizards often have the same issue. In that case you think outside the box and made good use of what you have.it is about to choose good spells. At 4 level when the sorceer learn his first second elevel spells he can only have one spell known, the wizard would have 4. And what happens if the sorcerer spell do not work in a given situation? then the sorcerer would have 4 useless slots.But the Wizard must assign the spells to those slots before be can cast them.
The Sorcerer does not.
This is actually an argument in favor for the wizard since it means spntaneous casting is not that much of a gain.
I was not trying to argue for either class. I was just pointing out how the example was flawed.
You are right, sorry, my game is APG+Core only. It's not that I have a problem with a specific PC, it's more a problem that I feel the wizard is overshadowing the sorcerer. Since I share the view that full casting classes already are more powerfull then mundanes I'd rather nerf the wizard then buff the sorcerer. 2) is a point I#ve been asking myself :)
I have seen a few posts like this before when comparing other classes. Are you sure it is not the player? As an example if you build an evocation based wizard, and the sorcerer uses his spells wisely I am sure that he would look better in most cases.
An another example the rogue is outdamaging a fighter, but said fighter dumped strength, and did not take any feats that upped his damage. The rogue was called out as being OP. The issue was the player however, not taking better feats and then complaining about his effectiveness.
Sorcerer light me on fire. I run around a lot screaming. Sorcerer light me on fire more. I die.
Wizard light me on fire. I run around a lot screaming. Wizard make tentacles grab me. I burn a lot with no more running but some squeezing. I die.
Seems balanced from my perspective.
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Since someone up there thinks that casters overshadow the mundanes, you could have casters roll for caster level every time they cast a spell. This puts some more chance into the mix meaning their attack could be weak or short lived, basically you would end up with chance to be very good or very bad (magic) vs. relativily the same every time (mundanes).
Mundanes are more predictible and magic is a gamble. People will often like one or the other with equal merit.
I bump the sorcerer spell progression to one level earlier and let them have bloodline spells as soon as they're able to cast spells of the necessary level. Same deal with oracles.
About the playing style: We usually have a heavy emphasis on RP and story telling. PCs spend a lot of time investigating, talking to NPCs and figuring out what to do next...Consider leaving the spells the same, but increase most of the casting times. You could turn spell slots on their head, and let the wizard have access to every spell in their book, but they have to use the book to cast any spell without spell mastery. Clerics could be similarly nerfed with longer prayer times, and druids may need to commune. In most cases, changing casting times to 1 full round would achieve this.
I mean, that would be nice and thematic, but it would have far-reaching consequences. I'm not sure how "elegant" it is.
Explain the specific problems you've had with Wizard PCs (or NPCs, if that's the case), and we will stand a much better shot at helping your campaign specifically.
Or, we can all sit here and bring our preconceived notions to SpoCk0nd0pe's campaign which we know nothing about, and hope we sound really smart.
This is definately a good idea. Problem is like you said, it's far fetching. I even wanted a second before decing by myself whether or not to cut a level from wizards spellcasting. I think that's a lot less drastic.
Since someone up there thinks that casters overshadow the mundanes, you could have casters roll for caster level every time they cast a spell. This puts some more chance into the mix meaning their attack could be weak or short lived, basically you would end up with chance to be very good or very bad (magic) vs. relativily the same every time (mundanes).
Mundanes are more predictible and magic is a gamble. People will often like one or the other with equal merit.
I definately like some random element in magic. One of my favourite Oblivion mods was Audacious Magery.
But I do not wish to invent rules that add dice rolls so I'll have to pass on that one.I bump the sorcerer spell progression to one level earlier and let them have bloodline spells as soon as they're able to cast spells of the necessary level. Same deal with oracles.
I've seen a lot of people do that. Like I said, I'd rather cut a level from the wizard. That's why the idea came up in the first place.
The idea most appealing for me at the moment is to just cut one spellslot of the highest level he can cast for every wizard, cleric and druid. Maybe a nerf to the bonus spell table would be a good thing too (having the table start at 16 casting stat). One level of spellprogression might be a but too much.
It all seems a bit of a headache to me, trying to change a class which as far as I can see is balanced.
My 2 cents for its worth (not much I know).
Save yourself some time and a headache, you are the GM, its you're world and game. If you think the Wizard is too powerful then why not just say no to Wizards and just have the players build sorcerers if they want an arcane spellcaster.
I know unless I was sure it was going to work and I had time on my hands I would be very hesitant to try it. The problem from a player perspecive is that players get attached to their PC's, if they have invested a lot in to the PC and a few levels down the line it all goes wrong they may not like you for Nerfing a perfectly balanced class in the first place.
Then again, it is an intersting exercies to try I guess so good luck with it :)
... you do realize the Sorcerer is commonly viewed as superior to the Wizard right?
Now I agree the Wizard needs some reworking. Give me a few minutes.
I would simply make it to where they don't get any spells on level up. Those free spells alongside the favored class bonus being reduced similar to the Spontaneous casters would work much better.
Depends on how lenient your DM is with letting you get new spells as a wizard. However I would say that the wizard is stronger than the sorcerer.
My 2 cents for its worth (not much I know).
Save yourself some time and a headache, you are the GM, its you're world and game. If you think the Wizard is too powerful then why not just say no to Wizards and just have the players build sorcerers if they want an arcane spellcaster.
Don't undervalue your 2 cents; it's a good suggestion.
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Hi everyone,
I'm searching for a way to nerf the wizard down to approximately meet the powerlevel of the sorcerer (with human fav class ability nerfed to 1/2 for spontanious casters). I'm looking for a simple solution not involving complicated rule changes (staying as close to the original PF mechanics as possible), probably something involving the spells known table.
One idea in my head is to slow the wizard's spell progression by one level. Do you think that would be appropriate?
Do you think that if this is done to the wizard, the cleric and druid should be nerfed as well?
Please post only if you agree that 1. wizard is the most powerfull class in PF and 2. Wizards are mechanically superior to sorcerers. This thread is about how to fix it for people who think this is an issue not to discuss wether it is, so please stay on topic.
Thanks in advance!
-- Spock
You do realize you can build sorcerers capable of accessing any sorcerer/wizard spell in the game, without taking it as a spell choice.
Sorcerers have more spells per day, more ways to increase damage and far more versatilty in spell access than any wizard.
And frankly, I don't care if you don't want to hear a dissenting opinion. Sorcerers already get 95% of what wizards have + their own bag of tricks.
You do realize you can build sorcerers capable of accessing any sorcerer/wizard spell in the game, without taking it as a spell choice.
How might that be?
You do realize you can build sorcerers capable of accessing any sorcerer/wizard spell in the game, without taking it as a spell choice.How might that be?
I'm curious, as well.
I assume that Artanthos means via magic items such as scrolls, wands, staves, and rings and pages of spell knowledge.
I'm curious, as well.You do realize you can build sorcerers capable of accessing any sorcerer/wizard spell in the game, without taking it as a spell choice.How might that be?
I think he is referring to the Half-Elf spell from ARG that allows you to take a feat. The trick is to take new arcana know any spell you can cast.
Even if I was playing with ARG (it's core+APG only for me) I would not allow that cheese.Sorcerers have more spells per day, more ways to increase damage and far more versatilty in spell access than any wizard.
The 5th level wizard casts haste. How is your 5th level sorcerer outdoing in damage output? Being a venerable dragonwrought kobold?
Sorcerers have more spells per day, more ways to increase damage and far more versatilty in spell access than any wizard.The 5th level wizard casts haste. How is your 5th level sorcerer outdoing in damage output? Being a venerable dragonwrought kobold?
I never wrote that. Your quote is something Artanthos said. Not me.=)
I never wrote that. Your quote is something Artanthos said. Not me.=)
Sorcerers have more spells per day, more ways to increase damage and far more versatilty in spell access than any wizard.The 5th level wizard casts haste. How is your 5th level sorcerer outdoing in damage output? Being a venerable dragonwrought kobold?
Oh, dang, quaoted that manualy and took the woring name out of the other quote. I'm very sorry. Too late to edit my post though.
Easy fix? Specialists now have 4 opposed schools. Done. Universalists are generally a worse option anyway so they can keep their strength (no opposed school).
The difference in power level between sorcerer and wizard is minor, both are incredibly powerful classes.
And to those saying "if wizards are OP then clerics and druids are too": No. What makes wizard > sorcerer is versatility, and for that to work the spell list has to be versatile. The sor/wiz spell list contains basically everything that can be done in the game, while the clr/ora spell list is more limited in scope.
The easiest, and probably most... flavorful way to reign in the power of a wizard is through spell components. Material components are one of those things most people skip right over or don't worry about. Take Fireball for example. The material components needed to cast it once is a ball of bat guano and some sulfur... each time the wizard casts the spell. Just how many balls of bat guano is the wizard carrying?
Simply block access to the Eschew Materials feat for wizards and you now have a way to easily limit what spells the wizard can cast, and how many times he can cast them.