EKruze's page

I find that scrolls are MUCH more cost effective than wands for this. A wand costs 10 - 15 times as much as a scroll (depending on level) so you have to cast a spell that many times for it to be cost effective. And THAT ignores the fact that wands are front ended (ie, you have to but the whole wand, but you can buy the scrolls in dribs and drabs)

Many of these are spells that you would choose to cast every day. Alarm is good for every camp. Instant Armor for every rest. Level 2 Longstrider is an 8 hr duration and useful always and Mind of Menace is all-day. Illusory Disguise and Humanoid form can be used regularly in any kind of infiltration setting.

You are correct that for more infrequently used utility spells scrolls are more cost effective. The original poster was specifically looking for wands that would be appreciated in treasure which is what I've tried to provide here.

Most of these do not significantly add to player power but provide neat effects that one a player obtains the wand they'll seek out opportunities to use again and again.

A player isn't likely to buy a pile of Iron Gut scrolls but if they come across such a wand it can become a go-to method of hiding small objects whenever that need arises.

My favorites are utility spells that you may want to cast often but not often enough to justify expending a known spell or spells that maintain their potency beyond the level they're gained.

Level 1 - Alarm, Ant Haul, Animate Rope, Create Water, Illusory Disguise, Pet Cache, Pocket Library, Restyle, Unseen Servant
Level 2 - Longstrider, Animal Messenger, Create Food, Darkness, Humanoid Form, Instant Armor, Iron Gut, Phantom Steed, Shrink, Silence
Level 3 - Bottomless Stomach, Clairaudience, Meld Into Stone, Mind of Menace, Fear

As to Specialty wands Manifold Missiles and Teeming Ghosts are persistently useful.

The Cleric's Emblazon Armaments line of feats also carries the restriction of applying just a single effect. Later feats expand the choices that can be made for this ability but the limit of one remains.

I think your experience is fairly typical, though there are opportunities for your casters to find better effectiveness.

A caster should not expect to completely control an above-level foe due to the difference in magic defenses and the effects of incapacitation. The four degrees of success still allow them to contribute with spells that have effects on a successful save. For the early spell levels Fear, Hideous Laughter and Slow are good candidates.

Spells that cause enemies to lose or waste actions are particularly valuable in these circumstances because the actions of an above-level foe are relatively more important than multiple of your own actions. If your caster spends two or three of their own actions to cause a solo creature to use one of their own actions attacking a weak summon, moving to reposition or just outright taking an action away by preventing reactions or inflicting a slow effect it will be too your greater advantage. A party of four has 12 actions a turn and your spellcast is 1/6 of your resources. A solo boss monster has three actions and losing one is 1/3 of his turn.

Generally damaging spells will be less useful against a bigger foe because you'll likely be dealing less damage and whittling away at a higher number of hit points but Magic Missile deserves special consideration because this damage is automatic. If your caster wants to go for damage a three-action Magic Missile may be more effective than a spell that does half on a save.

My limited experience has been that between the ways they impair foes and buff allies a party goes much further with effective caster support in such fights than a group of all martial characters can achieve.

Near as I can tell the Rage trait is relevant in two scenarios: enabling concentrate traited actions in the manner of Raging Intimidation or allowing an action to be activated with the Mighty Rage free action trigger.

Passive abilities made active with raging don't really interact with either of those scenarios, which is probably why it's absent from them. It may cause some confusion but I think the confusion would be greater if the trait were present on Raging Athlete as some would wonder if the modified actions High Jump, Long Jump and Leap take on the Rage trait and then could be activated with reduced action cost by Mighty Rage.

I totally agree that battleforms, picked up judiciously, work fine mathematically. I totally disagree that the weird, arbitrary, restrictive thematics of those options are something to just be content with. I can't think of a good mechanical reason to keep Animal Form from scaling, and the possible thematic reasons step on some perfectly reasonable fantasies to no benefit that I can see.

I don't think it's unreasonable for forms to have more level scaling for battle form spells. There are two mechanical effects of that change to consider though.

First is an effective buff to lower level Druid Form feats. The second is a buff to spontaneous casters who could then get with one signature spell scaling benefits through all levels.

A clunky way to circumvent that effect would be to create a series of higher level animal form spells to scale into higher levels, and likewise to create another Dragon Form spell that fits into the levels different from the original.

Whether it would be necessary to circumvent this buff at all is another matter.

But here you are saying I want casters to be better than martials when I have never said anything of the sorts.

...

And g#~ d+# a Sorcerer should be better at using Dragon Claws than a martial

Thank you for making my point so clearly.

You are not asking for "RP concepts" as you insisted earlier in this thread. If you have an RP concept that requires you to be able to sprout dragon claws and fight like a Barbarian the game supports that in a martial character dedicating into a Dragon Claw build.

Instead, you are asking to be better than the Barbarian at utilizing those dragon claws while getting full spellcasting benefits along the way. There is no way to enable this and maintain a balanced game.

And exactly. People want to transform into things for RP reasons. But they actively can't because the spells just don't have the stats for it.

I am sorry that people want to use their abilities more than once during a roleplay scenario that rarely happens. I did not think wanting more use of such a cool ability would hinder your usage.

To be more than just RP.

We've shown that if you want to build a caster that utilizes forms to engage in melee combat that the battleform numbers support it. If you want to build a character that highly optimizes features like Dragon Claws or Glutton's Jaws that you can dip in with a martial character and make an effective build around these features using martial combat progression. If you decide to be a full caster with one of these features that there are opportunities to bring them into action in cool and useful ways without any investment.

Could form spells have a little more coverage in terms of heightening levels? Maybe. Could the transmuter wizards do with a little more support? Yeah I think so.

But at present the system effectively supports the concepts of caster-primary-shifter, shift-augmented-martial and caster-with-shifting. Furthermore, we're about to get another 200 spells to further expand on caster abilities.

I'm sorry I'm having trouble here, but what are you really looking for? I ask this because it's starting to sound like you want to have a character that keeps up in every way with martial characters in their niche while maintaining full spellcasting progression too. That's not an RP concept, it's power creep. I think we have a lot of flexibility right now in making shifter characters and part of the reason for this is that the system is built with limits and tradeoffs that give each build their own area in which to shine.

Given that statement from Mark, I think then marital classes getting as many spells as they do, with the bonus they do, should actually be considered way overpowered.

I've seen you make this argument frequently and I really struggle to see it in practice. I cannot honestly say that I've ever seen a caster overshadowed or driven from their niche by a multiclass dedication. There was some talk for a time about Shifting Staves of Divination and related shenanigans but that has been clarified and errata'd. Beyond this I do not see multiclass spellcaster dedications dominating build discussion topics, as one would expect of this was really a problem.

Is there a particular use case that you see as being overpowered? At what levels do you find it to be so?

What if i don't want elemental form?
Might come to surprise, but RP element is important in RPG game. I'v talked about it earlier, if ppl who want to roleplay in dragon form also suffer, especially when will try to use it on lvl 18-20. But lets say a druid who want to keep using bear(animal) form on high levels will suffer so much more.

The reply I originally made was to your post making a specifically mechanical argument with numbers that were just unsound. It was not an RP argument. Why are you moving the goalposts?

If it is essential to your RP that your Druid, Wizard or Sorcerer be able to transform into a dragon in combat at level 13 you will find your options limited and underperforming. Since this is so important to your character vision, consider flavoring your 7th level Elemental Form transformation as that of an elemental dragon. I think you'll find many tables accommodating to this non-mechanical reflavoring and the math will continue to work effectively.

They were talking about Dragonform which does give you 22 attack until you heighten it to 8th, which is level 15.

At level 15 a martial gets, d20+15+6+6+3+misc bonus, which is...

So we're going to compare spells outside of their intended levels and use that as a basis of comparison?

At level 11 forms can be cast as 6th level spells and provide a +22 to hit.

At level 13 Dragon Form can no longer be Heightened to you max spell level but either of Elemental Form or Dinosaur Form can be and you have a difference of just 1 point.

At level 15 your numbers are wrong again. Apex items are level 17 and characters should not be expected to have them at this level. Weapon Potency (+3) runes are still one level away but it may be reasonable to consider a character with one. A martial's attack bonus at that level is thus 15(level)+5(stat)+6(master)+3=29. Comparable with the +28 granted by forms of this level.

Let's take a look.
Dragonform, level-6 spell, which you can pick on been level 11 arcane or primal spellcaster. It provides you with attack bonus of +22.
Now what martial classes can do on the same level. Pretty much all of them will have master proficiency with their weapon on that level. And they should have at least 18 in their primary stats (str or dex), more importantly, unlike for user's of battleforms, they CAN apply item bonuses to their attacks. AT level-11 they pretty much should have +2 weapons. So, 11+4+6+2=23. Now lets look what we will have on level 14. just one level before we will be able to get heightened version of dragon form. As dragon form user you still normally get +22 to attack. If you try to use your own as a sorcerer, you will get at most +20, druid wildshape, using his special status bonus can get it to +24.
while martial classes, even with +2 weapons (even though there are chance for that to acquire +3 weapon at this level) will get - 14+6+4+2=26, That's already a very sizable gap.

Your numbers are way off.

Non-Fighter martials don't get Master attacks until level 13. Endeavoring to maintain their accuracy stat they should have a 20 in their relevant attack stat At level 10.

At level 11 the expected martial attack bonus is therefore 11+5(stat)+4(expert)+2(item)=22, matching Dragon Form.

At level 13 when mastery comes online Elemental Form heightens to level 7 granting a +25 attack modifier, just behind a martial's expected +26 bonus.

Weapon Potency (+3) runes are a level 16 item and should not be available for level 11 or 13 characters.

As your can see battleforms are carefully balanced to enable their users to participate effectively in melee combat while remaining less effective in that role than dedicated martial characters.

Spell penetration and conceal spell aren't precisely amazing and can both be accessed through multiclassing.

A quick survey of CR 15 creatures on AON shows that 11 out of 23 have some form of status bonus to saves. Filtering to CR 21-24 creatures 7 out of 12 have such a bonus. Some of these are specific to certain types of effects but even so Spell Penetration provides a functional +1 to spell DC almost half the time against higher level monsters. This is a bonus that stacks with other forms of save-lowering conditions and costs a single level 6 feat for Wizards.

There's been plenty of analysis on how a Fighter's +2 gives a substantial edge against higher level foes as compared to other martials. This is a smaller bonus and only active half of the time but functioning in the four degree of success world of saving throw effects. That's pretty amazing and I think you're underselling it. This doesn't have a whole lot of effect at the exact level you get it but I'd argue it's almost mandatory for a Wizard in a level 10-20 campaign and I've often considered dropping the three feat investment on other caster classes just to take it as a level 12 feat.

I don't want to add power to a wizard in order to overshadow all the other classes. I want to make it so that a wizard isn't a liability to the party the moment they run out of spells unless the party decides to rest. The party wizard should not be the primary determining factor on when it's time to rest - especially in this edition where the emphasis is on long term adventuring for almost every other class with short 10 minute breaks.

a fight against the boss has 4 turns (let's assume) as almost all spells spend two actions, it doesn't matter much if I have 4 or 300 slots. I will launch 4 spells.

I find it hilarious that we have one poster arguing that the Wizard's advantage in raw casting power is bad because the slots will run out and another complaining that it's bad because there's no way to use that many slots.

KrispyXIV wrote:

They are classes defined by their spellcasting, and it is their best and defining feature.

What does that mean? What's the value of that? Why do you think this is true? Why are Wizards more defined by their spellcasting than Druids or Bards?

Because Wizards are the BEST at it.

On even levels a specialist Wizard gets to cast from their top level slots five times (3 + School + Bond), rising to six with Spell Blending. Druids add Bards get only three and Sorcerers eek out four. When it comes to using Summons or applying spells with an Incapacitate tag these extra slots matter and are a class defining advantage.

In addition to this Spell Penetration becomes a virtual +1 to casting proficiency for the purpose of overcoming saving throws. This is an ability that no other class can duplicate.

Yes when building a character. I agree.

But not when discussing what a class is good at. A wizard doesn't overly excel at recall knowledge. A wizard lorekeeper does. Heck you could go a x lorekeeper is better at recall knowledge checks. You'd still be objectively accurate.

So you are missing the point of the discussion if you think it's still applicable.

If your only solution to wizard is don't...

This is such an unserious approach to the discussion. The Loremaster archetype takes the same investment (level 2 class feat) as it takes a Polymath, Maestro or Warrior muse Bard to obtain the equivalent effect. It should absolutely be part of the discussion.

A Wizard is uniquely suited to recall knowledge because a plurality of non-Lore recall skills (Arcana, Occultism, Crafting, Society) and all Lores are Intelligence based. Even skipping the Loremaster archetype a Wizard remains competitive with an Enigma Bard investing in Untrained Improvisation alone.

If a Wizard chooses to invest just a little they can certainly become one of the best classes at general Recall Knowledge abilities.

Wizard is not unique, and the extra spell or two don't really make that much of a difference. They certainly don't make the flavour of the class.

Depending on the build Wizards get 1-2 more selectable spells of their max level that any other class. This difference is even greater at highest levels.

Spell Penetration is comparable to being half a proficiency level higher than all other casters once status-based spell resistance becomes a thing.

They get the best form of counterspell.

Conceal/Silent spell Metamagic uniquely allows an undetected caster to cast without revealing themselves.

My play hasn't included Universalist Wizards yet but Bond Conservation appears to allow a Wizard the potential to cast virtually nonstop by cascading bonds.

These are no small things and each one of them are full of Wizardy flavor.

Given that both the witch and oracle have this wording in a newer printed book (along with sorc & bard) it seems clear to me that the intent is for this to apply to all casters and that extra 10ths can't be gained by any method aside from the 20th feat is the intent.

I take this as evidence of just the opposite. Given the fact that this wording is absent only from the two classes that carry bonus slots as part of their design seems to indicate that this was intentional.

This verbage was left out because Arcane School, Drain Bonded Item and Divine Font exist.

EKruze wrote:

Deriven Firelion wrote:

Xenocrat wrote:

...

not sure where this idea that fighters can only do single target damage is coming from,. I feel people still think this is P1E. Martials now have the tools to be very versatile in and out combat.

Respectfully, and at the risk of getting off the topic of the thread, I think it's a fair statement. Not don't get me wrong, I LOVE the 2E Fighter. It's focused and very powerful in its role.

Now every class gets their mix of Ancestry and Skill feats allowing them to do things in Exploration and general Role Playing modes as they choose to specialize but there is nothing in the Fighter features or feats that build on options outside of combat.

Barring a few particular features a Fighter can build into one isn't getting much more than two or three attacks in a turn. I think the DPR calculations are very clear that three targets is about the breaking point where a leveled AoE spell outpaces a Fighter's DPR. Sure they can do other things in combat such as Trip, Shove, Attack of Opportunity, Demoralize and Seek but I don't think it's a stretch to say that single target focused damage is their 'thing.'

If Wizards are given a spell that lets them compete with a Fighter in that main thing, in addition to having all the diverse utility they bring in other ways, it would absolutely devalue the role Martials play.

One issue I think I see with so much of this discussion is that so often we end up comparing one feature of the Wizard class with the best comparable feature of any other Spellcasting class. Of course the Wizard is going to come up short when compared to a mish mash of the best of every other class. It may be useful then to compare the Wizard to each other class individually.

*Wizard vs Druid*

The Primal list is perfectly comparable with the Arcane list when it comes to blasting. With a few notable exceptions such as Magic Missile the damaging side of the spell lists are the same. When it comes to focus and non-magic class abilities the Druid is miles ahead and they can also heal and prepare from their whole list. There do exist some real gaps in Primal list, however. Notably the Primal list lacks in teleportation, selected utility such as Invisibility and debilitation/control. The Wizard also has the advantage of having 33% more spell slots at every level and can go so far as bringing double the number of max level spells to bear if combining school focus, bond and spell blending. The Druid is an excellent magical blaster with better initiative and the ability to supplement their spellcasting with focus powers. Play a Wizard if you don't want to give up control magic, want to focus entirely on casting and if you want more utility.

*Wizard vs Cleric*

The obvious difference here is that it Arcane vs Divine Spellcasting. Clerics have the advantage of being able to prepare off of their entire list but the list itself is really quite limited. Compared the the Arcane list Divine casting lacks AoE damage, debuffing, travel, significant areas of general utility. Clerics get the best in combat healing option around and a great spread of effect removal spells but outside of these particular strengths there are a great many things their list just doesn't do. A Cleric will have the advantage when it comes to initiative and fall way behind in available skills. Play a Wizard if you prefer to do a broad range of things very well with magic and if you want to excel at Lores.

*Wizard vs Bard*

The Bard is awesome. They're really about Compositions first with Spellcasting on the side. A Wizard is not going to be able to out-support a Bard that dedicates themselves to helping the rest of the party. There are still ways that a Wizard just beats a Bard on. The Occult spell list is comparable the Arcane list for debuffs and general utility but there's a major gap when it comes to damaging enemies. A Bard cannot effectively target Reflex and struggles to hit Fortitude. The utility of the Occult list is also somewhat hampered by the limitations of the Bard Repertoire. Three spells per level with only one signature prevents Bards from utilizing all of the utility their list holds. Like the Druid we also see the Wizards having 33% more spells in general with the possibility of taking on double of the most valuable max level spells. Play a Wizard if you want all of the Spellcasting utility with the freedom to blast as well.

*Wizard vs Arcane Sorcerer*

This is probably the class most similar to the Wizard in features. Both classes can expect to have four spells per level and they draw from the same list. In terms of Repertoire my experience has been that four spells is far better than three and knowing four spells of each level can get the Sorcerer almost everything they would want from any given spell level. Because of the larger Repertoire I think Sorcerers are probably going to be better than Wizards at actually utilizing all of their slots in a day. Both classes are all about casting: A Spell Substitution Wizard can probably utilize their spell slots with close to the efficiency of a Sorcerer by rebalancing between encounters and potentially gets one extra max level spell. A Spell Blending Wizard gets two more max level spells but risks wastage if he prepared poorly. Play a Wizard if you're sold on the Arcane spell list and either excel at the spell preparation minigame or want to be the absolute best at casting the strongest spells of the very highest level.

Considering all of this, what are some roles that the Wizard does better than their peers? I think their biggest strengths are summoning, controlling and general utility. I haven't seen Bond Conservation in action to really speak intelligently on it but that may be another niche for a Wizard that really wants to cast all the spells.

Summoning and Controlling builds are greedy for max level slot, Summoning because of the level scaling and Controlling because of the Incapacitate trait. By having up to six max level slots per day a Wizard can afford to one of these spells in every combat. Other classes that want to achieve these things will have to step down into lower level spells before the adventuring day is through.

As for General Utility the Arcane list really has everything except for realized
Healing, removal of certain conditions and some select buffs. Any other magic is under it's umbrella and it's an awful lot. A Spell Substitution Wizard combines the excellent 4 spells per level with this huge list to do it all. They may not do any one thing better than another class might, but any other spellcasting class is going to lack in some needful area whereas a Wizard really gets to do it all.

Xenocrat wrote:

The Wizard is the PF2 version of the Medium - meh until level 19+, when all the bonus 10th level spells and the 20th level feats vault it ahead.

I'm not waiting until 19th level. I'm going to wait for more books to come out and hope they make a wizard/sorcerer type focused on magic damage that doesn't require more than one target. I don't feel like playing a martial buff bot. I'll leave that to those that enjoy that style of play or make a bard when I want to buff the party.

If your goal is to play a Wizard or Sorcerer that is competitive with Martial classes at single target damage I think you may need to adjust your expectations a little. Single target damage is only thing Fighters and Barbarians really do. They can specialize a little to pick up some combat control or mobility but fundamentally their one niche is dealing large amounts of damage to one enemy at a time.

If future spells allow Wizards to deal similar single target damage while still having all of the utility, buffing, control and general flexibility they currently possess it will really invalidate those other classes in play.

Spellcasting is flexible and very potent when used with a party in the current state of the game. Wizards have the particular feature of bringing to bear more spells of the highest levels than any other class and have tools to further accentuate that advantage in the form of Spell Blending or to take on more flexibility in Spell Substitution. Both theses are excellent in actual play. I think both Metamagic and Familiar specializations could use a little work but by all signs it appears we're getting some of that in the APG.