I'm making a 15th level wizard as a replacement character and everything is done except for spells. We aren't doing WBL at char gen (think the DM got tired of how much money makes the man and wanted to dial it back a bit), but the DM gave me a number of how many spells I could have at each level. I made a rough draft for my list but as I've never played a Wizard before I was hoping some of you fine people could offer some advice.
The party has a paladin, a twf ranger, a bladebound magus, a blaster sorcerer (new player; blasting is about all he does), and a Time oracle that the DM allowed to have channel (he used to be a nature oracle and spent his time using his revelations to destroy enemy items or buffing). I'm thinking I'm going to go a bit of a generalist route with buffs/debuffs/control and if all else fails I have True Names to call in. I'm not sure exactly how often spells will be available to me or how easily I will be able to find what I want from this point on, so it seemed important to get the basics of all I'm going to need first. With that in mind what are your thoughts? What do I definitely need and what should I drop from my book?
Cade Talbot
Halfling (Fleet of Foot alt racial for 30 movement, but no +2 climb/acrobatics)
Deity = Ohgma / Hastur
Alignment = TN
Wizard - Void School
Opposition school - n/a (no longer an issue due to taking Opposition Research; elemental schools only have one opposition school)
Ability Scores: 22 buy
Str 11 (1) -2 = 9
Con 14 (5) = 14
Dex 12 (2) + 2 = 14
Int 17 (13) +1+1+1 = 20
Wis 14 (5) = 14
Cha 7 (-4) +2 = 9
Feats
1. Spell Penetration
3. Greater Spell Penetration
5. Fast Study
5. Extra Traits: Student of Philosophy / Illuminator
7. Improved Initiative
9. Opposition Research
10. Beyond Morality
11. True Name - Advanced Animate Dream (Melandra) (incorporeal, phantasmal killer. Nice with Void School's Reveal Weakness)
13. True Name - Akhana (Healing, bring people back from the dead)
15. True Name - Arcanotheign (Healing, super versatile, incorporeal)
15. True Name - Thanadaemon (pretty good melee combatant, bestows negative levels, greater teleport and plane shift at will for the party)
15+ feats = True Name. Maybe for a more combat based one that the DM shot down at this level.
0-2 level spells = all spells in spell book
Bonus = Twilight Knife
1. Dispel Magic
2. Call the Void
3. Haste
4. Fly
5. Fireball
6. Sepia Snake Sigil (with Blood Money of course)
7. Stinking Cloud
8. Blacklight
9. Displacement
10. Vampiric Touch
11. Slow
12. Battering Blast
13. Heroism
14. Tongues
15. Gloomblind bolts
Bonus = Wandering Star Motes
1. Emergency Force Sphere
2. Dimensional Door
3. Dimensional Anchor
4. Stoneskin
5. Enervation
6. Greater Invisibility
7. Scrying
8. Infernal Healing, Greater
9. Antithetical Constraint
10. Black Tentacles
11. Resist Energy, Communal
12. (3)Shrink Item
13. Shadow Projection
1. Break Enchantment
2. Wall of Stone
3. Dominate Person
4. Feeblemind
5. Wall of Force
6. Wall of Light
7. Fickle Winds
8. Overland Flight
9. Echolocation
10. Permanency
11. Telekinesis
Bonus = True Seeing
1. Antimagic Field (to aid combat based, non-item dependent True Names if necessary: Cast it on me and stand by as they beat down the now defenseless fool with his shiny, non-functioning magic gear)
2. Dispel Magic, Greater
3. Geas, Quest
4. Permanent Image
5. Mage's Lucabration
6. Contingency
7. Mass Suggestion
9. (5) Teleport (for contingency most likely)
1. Magnificent Mansion (not negotiable)
2. ???
3. ???
4. ???
I was considering Powerword Blind, Vision, Spell Turning, Force Cage, Prismatic Spray, and Waves of Exhaustion. With a Thanadaemon at my command, Greater Teleport is covered.
Bonus = Moment of Prescience
1. Mind Blank
2. Maze
Also considering Powerword Stun or Prismatic Wall, but the wording on PW leaves me unsure how it actually works.
I'll give my 2 cents.
Tiny Hut - Utility + Battle implications. Not only does it make harsh weather more bearable for you and your allies (within the area), but it also gives any within the spell total concealment. Giving those within the area a 50% miss chance against them, while everyone inside can see out normally. Not to mention it lasts a long time.
Summon Monster 3 / Mad Monkeys - While I'm weary of summoning spells due to their casting time, they can be some truly impressive spells. Considering that it offers a variety of options and distractions. Alternatively, Mad Monkeys is a controllable swarm that can take your opponents stuff and hurt them at the same time. Pain in the neck for enemy casters.
Suggestion - Depending on how you word things, if the target fails their save, they may just be out of the battle or will help you as much as you can make reasonable. Lots of uses, but may not be needed since you do have mass suggestion.
Major Image - While it takes imagination and knowledge of how the Dm prefers to handle things, there is a lot of potential in getting out of sticky situations with this spell. Especially since it has sound and thermal effects.
Gaseous Form - Not as much needed IMO, but it can be a good get out of bad stuff spell.
Clairvoyance / Clairaudience - Yes, I did see you have scry, which is great. However, what if you find yourself in need of nearby info and you don't want to waste (or have used) your scrying? Like gaseous form, for me it can be 50/50 on whether to get.
As for what I'd suggest replacing them with?
Either Vampiric Touch or Call the Void - Sure, you may want something for when enemies get up on you, but two here seems more than necessary. If I had to choose between one of the two to keep, I'd keep vampiric touch most likely. Too many things that won't be affected by Call of the Void IMO.
Battering Blast - I can understand the want for force magic, but I think you have plenty of damage as it is and it seems your sorcerer has that covered (not to mention you have magic missiles). So not as needed in my opinion.
Tongues - This largely depends on your wizard, however at 15th level and a high INT if you were to rank linguistics up regularly, this spell shouldn't be needed.
Blacklight - While a potentially decent control spell, your allies won't be able to see through it (without help). Not to mention, if you step out of it, you can't see into it.
Confusion - Sure it gives a save. Sure they still have a chance to act normally. However, they also have a chance of attacking a nearby friend or not acting and it can get a small group.[/b]
Bestow Curse - Yes, you have to be within touch range and it gives a save... but, it does a host of amazing things. Including debuffing and in some cases, full on neutralization without killing.
Summon Monster 4 - Same as summon monster 3.
What to consider taking out.
Antithetical Constraint - I suppose it could be potentially useful and maybe I'm reading it wrong, but it seems very limited. Maybe I'm wrong though.
Shadow Projection - This is a cool spell I'll admit. It's also quite risky. At your levels there's a decent chance you'll meet things that can attack and harm / kill that shadow dropping you in the process. A decent scout spell I suppose, but risky if you don't have healers right around you.
Magic Jar - Can wipe out a bunch of enemies, or maybe just cause unrest amongst an unknowing enemy.
Summon Monster - As above. Not sure you need many summon monsters, so perhaps you could just pick the highest one you can get and choose from the list then.
Dominate Person - "Hey. You over there! Stop that!" Better than suggestion because they just do it without convincing.
Possible one to change out.
Echolocation - A decent spell. Just not above Magic Jar IMO. All the rest of your spells on this level seem very solid though.
Disintegrate Sure it's a blast style spell, but it has other uses too, including getting past some force spells.
What I might change it out for:
Mage's Lucabration - It being a standard action to allow you to use a spell you just used seems like you could be a sitting duck until the next round. Not to mention you have so many different useful spells, I'm uncertain how much you'd need to use a spell you just had used. Especially if it were control based. Could be good though.
I'm just going to give what I like the most personally.
Teleport Greater - I know you have teleport already, but another more accurate one couldn't hurt right?
Prismatic Spray - Random but fun. Could potentially land a power enemy in another plane altogether... hopefully they can't get back.
Resonating Word - They have to make saves each round. Get damaged and each failed save gets worse the next time around.
Power Word Blind - No save (but SR admittedly). A blind enemy, even if a few rounds (for the powerful ones) are weaker enemies.
Plane Shift - If you get sent to another plane by force, you could make it back with this.
8th seems fine.
Note: I may have listed more than I suggest you take out, in the end all of it's up to you, so if you don't want to put particular ones in, or take certain ones out... don't. :)
Just my opinions of course. Hopefully some of this helps. Good luck!
Thanks for your input. I was thinking I was a little damage heavy in 3rd level spells too so that's something I should change up. Shadow Projection is just too cool to lose. Antithetical Constraint seemed potentially awesome, with the enemy auto-missing against people of most alignments, but with a wide array of party alignments it could be less useful... I'll add that to the reconsider pile.
Magic Jar is definitely cool, but from what I understood you really didn't have much control over who you targeted and could possibly end up hitting an ally with it. That's what made me a bit iffy there.
For 6th level spells Disintegration does make me happy, so Mage's Lucubration may go. I was kinda iffy about it, but it seemed like it had some potential if I was walking into an area blind with no way to prep for the occasion.
I think Prismatic Spray is definitely going to be in, but Greater Teleport and to a lesser extent Plane Shift is covered by the Thanadaemon. Sure he can't actually Plane Shift me back to the material plane if I get sent away but I'm sure he'd love to take me to Abaddon if I'd let him.
I was lazy when I typed that. By PW I meant Prismatic Wall. For that spell I was confused by how exactly it affected creatures trying to pass through it.
"Each color in the wall has a special effect. The accompanying table shows the seven colors of the wall, the order in which they appear, their effects on creatures trying to attack you or pass through the wall, and the magic needed to negate each color."
So what does that mean? Do creatures get affected by each affect in the order presented, do they suffer one randomly, or do they get hit with one effect per application and if they do it again get hit with the second listed effect and so on?
Limited Wish... yeah that could be a good panic button, especially in combination with Blood Money if necessary as our Oracle does have a ton of second level spells he never uses that he can waste on Lesser Restoration.
If someone attempts to walk through primastic wall, they get hit with every single effect in the order presented - so it's the best of the options you presented there there. Prismatic wall can be brutal - it's basically a 'no go' zone and if you can force enemies through it, death is practically certain.
Power word stun and maze are also fantastic spells, mind.
I know it's an 8th level spell, but damn, that still seems a bit much. I do like the idea of using it in combination with Telekinesis for forced movement if that's how it works though.
@Chaoseffect
Your party is going up against a lieutenant of the BBEG and a half dozen minions. Describe your first few rounds of combat, if you please.
@Chaoseffect
Your party is going up against a lieutenant of the BBEG and a half dozen minions. Describe your first few rounds of combat, if you please.
Let's see...
Fighter (now Paladin): Charges in and due to having a higher initiative tends to miss out on any area buffs like Haste. From there he does his thing and hits stuff.
TWF Ranger: Going to be a new character, replacing an archer. Most likely going to be doing the same as the fighter, except he's a bit more tactics-minded, i.e. he would delay to wait for his buffs.
Magus: Normally starts by casting Shield and moving behind cover. From there he would probably try dropping something like Wall of Sound to mess up the minions before moving in to engage the closest... he has the unfortunate idea that using Gloves of Spell Striking + Lightning Bolt is a good combination and won't be dissuaded.
Oracle: We are doing rebuilds so this may not be applicable anymore. He loves to use the Unmake ability from the Nature mystery to destroy items that look dangerous and obviously weren't going to end up in party loot anyway. From there he does some support casting, casting Heal if someone is about to die, Freedom of Movement if necessary on the melee people, etc. Occasionally battle field controls with Wall of Stone.
Sorcerer: Greater Invisibility. Fireball and/or Chain Lightning.
Fabricate can be used to create some pretty decent stuff by most intelligence casters.
Limited Wish is an incredibly versatile spell that can cover a lot of situational utility spells of levels 3 to 6.
I've only glanced through the thread, so I may be redundant here but some thoughts:
5: Life Bubble (definitely), and Hold Monster (much more useful than Dominate Person - great way of dealing with big, dumb monsters, setting them up for a coup de grace with a vampiric touch... you can add 14d6 temp hit points for an hour!)
6: Disintigrate (I think of this less as a combat spell than as a utility spell - it's just nice to be able to make things go away, especially force effects)
7: Reverse Gravity (though less useful for you since you lack an archer among your minions), Greater Teleport (anywhere in the world!), and Ice Body (you'll want this if you ever face strength or charisma drain like, say, greater shadows or a shemahzian demon, among other things - terrific immunities to a lot of bad things for casters). Since you have Maze, you should take Force Cage (which you set up around the Maze-point to receive the creature when it escapes.)
8: Polymorph Any Object (limited pretty much only by your imagination) - you could use this to augment your called beings, as well.
If you had dazing spell and a staff of the master, Horrid Wilting would be a no-brainer at 8; as it is, it's worth passing on.
i would ditch maze but mind blank is solid for 8th... maybe poly any object
5th seems a little wall heavy.....
It's also worth having a look at Irresistible Dance at 8 - it's quite a terrific debuff for a follow-up attack on reflex.
Even if the target makes it's save, it's at -10 to reflex saves for a round - perfect for your sorcerer friend to hit it with a dazing chain lightning, or to bind it in chains of light or an icy prison.
It's especially nice if you can quicken an attack on reflex that same round (inherently, or with a rod).