Starting Scroll Selection for Level 5 Wizard.

[Genoin]

I am dropping into a RotRL campaign at 5th level, and I have decided to make a wizard. GM said I can use crafting with my starting wealth (~15k). I decided to pick up CWI in addition to Scribe Scroll. I am going to craft

Headband of Vast INT +4
Belt of Incredible DEX +2
Cloak of Resist +1
Handy Haversack

I would like to use some of my remaining gold to grab a utility selection of scrolls (I know the standard advice, things that are very situational). My question here, what does your toolbelt of level 1-3 scrolls look like, with a heavy focus on wizard/sorc spells?

[Wheldrake]

Don't forget to splurge some wealth on buying more spells for your initial spell selection. Not to mention a handy haversack so you can access all of those scrolls quickly.

Basically, you want to make into scrolls any spell that
- would be cool to have in a specific situation that isn't likely to come up often.
- doesn't suffer (much) from having low caster level and INT scores, since it will have the minimum of both.

So you don't want to make scrolls of spells that do damage (damage dice are generally linked to caster level) or give saving throws to a victim (DCs are linked to spell level and INT).

[Genoin]

Right, I have the Haversack already. I know certain things like:

"Remove" Spells
Comprehend Languages
Obscuring Mist
Secluded Grimoire (One I found the other day I have never heard anyone recommend)
Unseen Servant
Ant Haul
Locate Object
Knock
Make Whole
Shrink Item
Resist Energy, Communal

I wanted to know if there were others that I missed that are particularly good as scrolls, basically any time a super random situation has come up and it made your DM say "You have a scroll of THAT?"

[Kurald Galain]

Mobility scrolls are great, e.g. Expeditious Retreat and Air Bubble. Well, the latter should probably be a potion, but you get the idea. Slick Walls, Mount, Shatter are also good picks. And don't forget Infernal Healing in case your cleric is out.

[Genoin]

Good suggestions. Considering a Wand of Infernal Healing.

[Wheldrake]

Just don't get a scroll of remove blindness. Kind of hard to read, eh?

[Coidzor]

Level 1:

Spoiler:

Alchemical Tinkering could be useful if you find yourself in a situation where you need an alchemical item, fast, but don't have it.

Authenticating Gaze has certain aspects that could be useful on short notice, namely the faster ability to do a Linguistics check vs. forgery and auto-detecting scrolls and magic books and such. I also see it as fairly unlikely you'd ever need to use it for that purpose.

Break, while it has a save, is for breaking or destroying inanimate objects, which have lousy saves as long as they're unattended. Niche, but there may be some cases where being able to break some maguffin or a mechanism involving a portcullis or chandelier will be helpful.

Enlarge Person is a potentially useful scroll for stretching out your ability to contribute during long adventuring days, especially if you spring to make one with a higher than minimum CL so that it can last through multiple fights.

Expeditious Construction is the kind of thing that if you spam it a few times you can create a significant blockage of a dungeon or castle hallway or doorway. So, say, around 4 scrolls might present an interesting possibility.

Decompose Corpse offers an ability you should never underestimate if you should happen to do a murder and need to really quickly hide the evidence and can't disintegrate or teleport it away or what have you.

Instant Portrait requires you to see the creature while you make it, so being able to grab a scroll and go can be useful in comparison to having to had to dedicate spell slots to it in advance.

Kreighton's Perusal may be helpful on a scroll to quickly read various books, though you'll probably get more use out of just filling a bunch of spell slots.

Mindlink is Info Dump: The Spell.

Mount is emergency Wall of Horse, and at 2 hours, the CL 1 duration is just fine.

Protection from Evil/Law/Chaos can help cover your bases against various forms of mind control, at least for the duration of something like a combat or an evil item of evil. Even as nerfed as it is.

Reduce Person can have many utility uses, especially if you have a Small-sized humanoid on hand to make Tiny.

Sculpt Corpse can be handy in a pinch for helping disguise a dead body, possibly while one of you adopts a disguise, in order to get away with murder or even murdering and replacing someone. It works much better when you make a corpse look like someone no one knows in order to obfuscate its identity, at any rate. Still best to plan that sort of thing in advance rather than improvise, but having a scroll on hand would at least afford that option.

Silent Image in scroll form mostly only has a limitation of its size and range in comparison to casting it from a spell slot if you have the creativity and a GM that is cool with the open-ended nature of illusion magic.

Level 2:

Spoiler:

Aboleth's Lung will give you 3 hours / party members of being able to breathe water, but only water. Still, it is cheaper than Water Breathing and this is for emergency rather than offensive use so the low save DC doesn't really matter.

Arcane Lock doesn't really care about CL, and 90 square feet is a pretty decently sized door. In an emergency it can buy the party time to actually escape enemies when retreating.

Blur might be better on a wand, but it's a good decent duration buff that may actually last for multiple combats or multiple waves through a combat, even with the minimal 3 minute duration.

Carry Companion is a great way to put an animal or magical beast that likes you and everything on it or that it's carrying on ice, but will usually just be cast rather than needing a scroll.

Command Undead isn't something you'll want to have prepped regularly unless you already know you're dealing with a lot of mindless undead, but it's a great way to turn the dungeon against itself. 3 days of control is plenty, too.

Darkvision lasts for 3 hours and can be used on any member of the party for when absolute stealth is called for but they chose to be a human or what have you.

Defoliate can help safely determine the answer to the question of whether a plant is a normal plant or a plant creature. Admittedly, the range and spell description combine to be a bit awkward. It should also kill molds and other fungi dead due to them counting as plants in PF, IIRC.

Greensight gives half an hour of seeing through plants but not wood to a party member, which could be useful in certain maze-like conditions.

Invisibility can serve dual purpose as an emergency defense spell or a bit of emergency utility, since you get 3 minutes on basically anyone in the party and just about any object with that 300 pound weight limit.

Raiment of Command can give you or a UMD monkey in the party 3 hours of pretty decent bonuses to several social skills and it synergizes nicely with other disguises or illusion magic. There may be some situations where you'd want to pull it out on short notice.

Spider Climb can have some great adventuring utility and there are some situations where getting it out using a scroll instead of waiting to prepare it in a spell slot would be better.

Summon Cacodaemon lets you turn a foe into a soul gem, which can be useful for certain purposes, though less purposes if your GM is using the nerf to soul gems.

Level 3:

Spoiler:

Adjustable Disguise would give you (or someone who has decent UMD) almost a full hour of Disguise Self with 5 different disguises. There might be some situations where that could come in handy, but they won't happen regularly.

Anthropomorphic Animal at minimum CL still gets you 5 hours of animal-person, in case you really want to pump an animal for information and don't have someone who can talk to it or read its mind. Also gives a way to leverage social skills against a few things if such a situation comes up.

Audiovisual Hallucination might be something useful in a pinch and being able to mess with up to 5 creatures is still pretty decent. The lower Will save matters a bit less due to it requiring them to actually try to disbelieve the illusion, which requires them having a reason to disbelieve the illusion. Since you can change the hallucination as part of concentrating on the spell and can concentrate for however long you feel like, this could potentially help stretch out your resources on a long adventuring day.

Aura Sight and its ability to discern all alignment auras simultaneously can be useful in certain kinds of pinches.

Blink can be a handy emergency defense spell to have around in case of a marathon adventuring day or attack on you while resting.

Blood Biography can be handy to gather some amount of information, but due to being able to use dry or fresh blood there may be situations where you can afford to wait to fill some spell slots that had been left empty or even wait until the next day.

Burrow gives 5 minutes of a Burrow speed, even if it is through only a limited number of substances.

Conjure Carriage could be of interest for if you need to make a spiffy appearance somewhere and you've already prepped all those spells for the day.

Daggermark's Exchange lets you play around with different poisons for different occasions similar to Alchemical Tinkering. Probably less likely to be a situation where you can't just wait and prepare it though.

5 people for 5 rounds is still a pretty decent example of Haste, and can come in handy for helping cover your bases during an extended adventuring day.

Revelation can give a decent enough +5 Insight bonus on figuring out a puzzle, but it also can be a legitimate hint button as well.

You might find it desirable to have a Shrink Item handy in case of needing to transport something in an emergency.

Tongues can have situations where you don't have the luxury of stopping to prepare it and instead want to be able to read something or understand what's being said now.

Unseen Engineers can come in handy if all of a sudden you have to do a lot of excavation and could use a new pit (trap). Will vary heavily based upon GM.

Also depending upon your GM, Waves of Blood may or may not create a buttload of blood in case you really need some in a pinch.

Iron Stake will create a foot long piece of cold iron that should most likely be able to be used as an improvised weapon in a pinch, but at this point your party's beatsticks should already have acquired cold iron backup weapons. So you probably shouldn't be hurting on items with which to harm or torture fey or other creatures vulnerable to cold iron.

At a higher level and in a case where it might be worth the cost to slap on a Permanency, Stolen Light *might* just barely qualify for if you suddenly have to record something visual perfectly for posterity.