Fireball CL5 (avg 17) vs 10 Ftr4 with Con14 (avg 34 hp) sounds bad, but if all fail the save you just did 50% enemy hp in one round, which is likely a better outcome than putting 2 to sleep or slightly weakening them with a stinking cloud (since they will likely make those fort saves) or casting Haste so your allied can hit them more.You know. . .10 lv4 Fighters is a CR 9 or so encounter. It's in that annoying gap between 9 and 10, due to the number of creatures.
Now, if this were a lv6 Sorcerer, that suddenly becomes 6d6 damage. Add another 6 for the proper bloodline, and now you're doing an average of 27 damage. Huh. That's only 7 less than those monsters' HP.
Note that the guy you're quoting hasn't posted in almost two years, for what it's worth.
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I just love well-built blasters.
A 15th-level NPC fighter with a focus on Constitution would only have about 172 hit points. (That's average hit points with a Constitution score of 22.) A CR 14 monster would only have about 200 hit points.
A well-built 15th-level sorcerer, with Spell Perfection, Intensified Spell, Maximize Spell, Empower Spell, and a lesser metamagic rod of Quicken Spell (among other things) can deal an average of 306 damage (round down) with his fireball spell in a single round. With the magical lineage trait and the Elemental Spell metamagic rod, this doesn't to be fire damage.
That's enough to outright kill a small army of 15th-level NPC fighters or CR 14 monsters. Even with successful reflex saves and/or fire resistance, the damage is still so high as to take off anywhere from a third to half their life in one round. Most sane creatures won't want to wait around for a second salvo.
That's just what one blaster can do. He's only down two spell slots and still has an entire party eagerly waiting to mop up whatever meager hit points those bags of XP have left.
I prefer blasting, it's fun. Sure a well place battle field control spell along with save and suck less or suck more spell it more effective but there is just something about blowing stuff up.
For me though after fireball I find blasting spell lacking so it only usually level 1-10 that blasting occurs. After that blasting when don't want to waste a better spell on some minor threat.
...what about dazing blasts? Especially if you are allowed access to a Lesser Rod of Dazing, what is not to be loved about things like a Dazing Fireball?
Blasting is great for villains because it makes the players feel likes they're in danger when it could be far worse. OH NO WE ALL TOOK DAMAGE
They start pants-wetting over a fireball powerful enough to take out a quarter of their hit points. They should be glad the villain didn't instead haste that big mob of orc warriors.
...what about dazing blasts? Especially if you are allowed access to a Lesser Rod of Dazing, what is not to be loved about things like a Dazing Fireball?
I really like hitting someone with a dazing blast, then a quickened blast. I call it the good old one two punch.
What's more, you can stack everything from my above post onto it with the right build.
As much as I love blasters, I still recognize blaster/controller hybrids as being better than both blasters and controllers.
I have to give credit to disintegrate where credit is due.
It's a fort save effect that undead MUST roll against, despite not having a fort save. This means that it's a wizard/sorcerer spell that's a guaranteed knockout against a LOT of powerful undead.
Just saying. :D
Undead have Fort Saves. They use Cha for it.
"I like setting people on fire, so I play a blaster. Here's a guide to setting people on fire." Good on you, fire is awesome. BTW, you're better off with magic missile over true strike because blah blah math.
"Blasting works well, because it stacks with your fighters and ends foes faster." >:|
See the difference in the two statements, and the response I gave both? I completely understand weighing aesthetics over strict efficiency. But when you start making false statements about efficiency, you can't retreat back behind "personal playstyle" when they're challenged. It's perfectly possible to optimize within stated parameters, and you don't even need to bend over backwards justifying the parameters. In fact, don't bother justifying the parameters; "fire is cool" is reason enough.
You are far more patient than I. Threads like this remind me why I hate 3e. Perhaps I should make a thread about how fighters vs. wizards.
Ravingdork: 306 damage? The fireball(s) in that case should be 15*6 (90) from Maximize plus 15d6/2 (26) from Empower -- averaging 116 each unless I'm missing something.
Also consider an 18th-level Sorcerer similarly built, with Spell Perfection (Delayed Blast Fireball) and a Greater Rod of Maximize.
Use Time Stop followed with three Maximized Delayed Blast Fireballs delayed for the remaining duration of the Time Stop, applying any other metamagic feat known for free to each of them. Exactly 324 damage, +4 to the save DC, making the caster level check against SR at +26 (an auto-success for anything up to CR 15). Use Elemental Spell if necessary to bypass fire immunity, Persistent Spell if you want to cut down the enemy's chances of making the save even further, Piercing Spell to automatically succeed at the SR check against foes up to CR 20, or Empower Spell if you just really need that extra 94 average damage for some reason.
What I like about this is that it doesn't rely on some opaque interaction of feats and class features obtained through level dipping -- the feats and spells mentioned are all completely reasonable and self-evident choices for any blasting mage. As such, if you've got a good blaster it's no stretch at all to make a great one, given time.
I suposse he can take that archetype that let you take two bloodlines, orc/dragon for a +45 to damage, and then he said he use lesser rod of quciken so it will be more of less 300 hp of damage.Ravingdork: 306 damage? The fireball(s) in that case should be 15*6 (90) from Maximize plus 15d6/2 (26) from Empower -- averaging 116 each unless I'm missing something.
Yep. Half-Orc sorcerer with the draconic/fire bloodlines. Put your favored class bonuses into extra fire damage while your dual bloodlines give you +2 fire damage per die.
It's a bit of an extreme example to be sure, but even without being a half-orc and only having one bloodline you can expect to knock a quarter of your CR-appropriate foe's life off with a single round of blasting (provided they MAKE their saves and have SOME energy resstance, otherwise, you do more).
That's nothing to sneeze at, especially considering you may well be blasting MULTIPLE foes of your CR all at once.
That feel when a blaster encounters resist energy and protection from energy.
That feel when a blaster encounters resist energy and protection from energy.
Admittedly, at least most of the other schools like Necromancy and Illusion have to wait until 4th level spells before they're trivially defended against with a single spell. Evocation gets blocked as early as 1st level, and by almost everything from 3rd+. O.o
The average damage on a fireball at 5th level is 17.5 damage, save for half. The basic resistance for resist energy is 10, making fireball save for none, and piddly damage on a failed save. Since it applies to each instance of damage, it completely shuts down scorching ray. :P
Life ain't fair to an evoker. I remember this problem coming up in the playtest. It was ignored because the "open playtest" was a laughable lie.
That feel when a blaster encounters resist energy and protection from energy.
Tom. TOZ. Ahiel.
Naysayers and disbelievers all!
380 damage in a round is nothing to sneeze at. Even with protection from energy (a maximum of 120 points of protection) will only PARTIALLY protect you from the FIRST fireball.
The second one is going to HURT.
Even if you make your save, the two fireballs will knock out any absorption capabilities you have AND STILL do damage to you. Guess what? Now you must save versus daze. Come round two, you're going to be hurting something fierce.
AND PFE, as a single target spell does nothing to protect any of your allies that might be caught in the blast. Congrats. You bought yourself a round, maybe a few with repeated castings of PFE (assuming you're not dazed). Shame your friends are all dead, and you still have to deal with the blaster's party mates.I can make high powered blasts almost all day. How many times can you use PFE I wonder?
The only effective defenses are high hardness values and immunity.
Energy immunity is pretty easy to come by. Not that I play with anyone who actually puts out 380 damage with their spells.
Blasters can be quite powerful. It's been proven repeatedly. They just have a bad rep because people don't know how to utilize them properly.
Would you mind naming a few that aren't racial abilities? I really don't think it's as common as you seem to indicate. Many of them are 20th-level capstone abilities I'd imagine.
No one is saying that blasters can't be useful. I'm saying they have to put a disproportionate amount of effort into being useful. If the average player plays a wizard, he's not going to scour the books for synergies. He's going to wonder why his fireball did 9 damage and look for something better to waste his spell slots on.
TOM: I can see that happening, sure, but bringing up disproportionate resource investment, though true, is something of a moot point. You can be an awesome battlefield controller with almost no investment. All you need are the right spells. In fact, there are very few options available to make battlefield control much better. So what is a spellcaster supposed to invest in? Blasting. Someone who can blast effectively AND be an awesome battlefield controller will dominate a straight blaster or a straight controller (and pretty much any other living thing) any day of the week. Being more versatile and having more options ALWAYS means more powerful. That's why people developed the tier system in v3.5. In short, every blaster can also be a god-wizard. Not every god-wizard is going to be a great blaster.
TOZ: You can still be pretty damn effective without utilizing all the options. Saying that blasting sucks isn't true. Saying it is suboptimal isn't true. Most people just don't know what they're doing. If I played a barbarian who never raged, a rogue who rarely flanked, or a controller that incidentally used his control options to interfere with his party members ability to do anything about the enemy are all going to be terrible characters. That doesn't mean that barbarians, rogues, and controllers are weak or otherwise suboptimal. Those people just don't know what they're doing. It's the same with blasters.
TOM: I can see that happening, sure, but bringing up disproportionate resource investment, though true, is something of a moot point. You can be an awesome battlefield controller with almost no investment. All you need are the right spells. In fact, there are very few options available to make battlefield control much better. So what is a spellcaster supposed to invest in?
Improved Familiar, Great Fortitude, Lightning Reflexes, Iron Will, Great Fortitude, Improved Save Boosters, various Item Creation feats, Metamagic feats like Widen or Enlarge or Selective, Toughness, Leadership, Spell Penetration / Greater Penetration, Spell Focus / Greater Focus (Conjuration, Necromancy, Transmutation, Divination), Spell Perfection, Superior Summoning, Combat Casting, Uncanny Concentration, etc.
Blasting. Someone who can blast effectively AND be an awesome battlefield controller will dominate a straight blaster or a straight controller (and pretty much any other living thing) any day of the week. Being more versatile and having more options ALWAYS means more powerful. That's why people developed the tier system in v3.5. In short, every blaster can also be a god-wizard. Not every god-wizard is going to be a great blaster.
Since every spell that you prepare/cast is another you didn't, and blasting is generally the most limited in usefulness as far as spellcasting specializations go; I find this argument to be...questionable.
Especially since all of that focusing on making blasting effective in turn means you aren't doing things like increasing the save DCs of your favorite schools, aren't summoning more monsters, aren't having better saves, aren't playing certain races, etc, etc, etc. If a god-wizard isn't being a great blaster, then it's a wizard that's smart enough to know that he's better than wizards that try to be fighters.
TOZ: You can still be pretty damn effective without utilizing all the options. Saying that blasting sucks isn't true. Saying it is suboptimal isn't true. Most people just don't know what they're doing. If I played a barbarian who never raged, a rogue who rarely flanked, or a controller that incidentally used his control options to interfere with his party members ability to do anything about the enemy are all going to be terrible characters. That doesn't mean that barbarians, rogues, and controllers are weak or otherwise suboptimal. Those people just don't know what they're doing. It's the same with blasters.
Xd6 save for half is not a matter of tactical superiority. It's a simple matter of numbers. Plus, for every pro there is for blasting, there's a huge problem with it too. The biggest problem I have with blasting is the fact it means you are going to nuke your loot. I've pointed this out before.
Enemies who are already dead and thus their gear unattended objects? Nuked. Throw a fireball into a room with badguys? Took out the shelf with all the magic scrolls, burned the tapestries, destroyed the desk and the notes of the BBEG's right hand man that detailed critical portions of the BBEG's plans, cracked and scorched the gemstones in the bag on the table; etc. Fireball in a forest? Great, now you've pissed off every fey within a 100 mile radius for starting a forest fire recklessly. Cast cone of cold in the middle of a city? Oops, you're not a murderer because you didn't see those people inside the cloth tent that was obliterated by getting caught in the blast.
Do I think damaging spells are great? Sure do! But the uses that they're good for require little to no specialization at all. Simply a cheap metamagic rod, or maybe a book of harms. Blasting spells are good at fighting other spellcasters. Ready actions, blast when casting. A 5d6 lightning bolt deals an average of 17.5, save for half. A maximized lightning bolt is 30 damage, save for half. Good luck making that Concentration check!
High end 3.5 blasting was certainly much more blasty then high end pathfinder blasting.I miss 3.x blasters. There were so many stupid feats. I was never much of a blaster myself, but one of my best gamer buddies is a dedicated blaster. He had some inane combo where he was shooting out 32 negative levels a round with enervate wands thanks to that split ray feat then twin spell. I remember he was firing off three fireballs a round with a combination of a twinned fireball followed by a quickened fireball. He also had some tagged feat so that for every aoe effect in a round the DC went up by one. That was some ridiculousness.
I think blasters have come down a notch or two in Pathfinder honestly.
This is definitely true. I had a friend who specialized in Abjuration and Evocation (he was allowed to specialize in two schools for an extra barred school) who focused entirely on stopping magical harm, and causing it. By 20th level, he had all the usual suspects. Twin-Spell, Split Ray, Energy Admixture, a couple of metamagic rods, etc.
I recall him dropping some 9th level-equivalent doomsday ball (I think it was like a 30-40d6 maximized twinned acid ball) on a group of demons to create fiend-soup. He kind of took out a large section of the tower they were in as well, but it meant they didn't need to find the elevator to the next floor. >.>
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Well RD, I would like to see a couple of bulds of this so called Blaster/god wizard. That is the only way we can see if a blaster can be a controller too.
Ultimately, it's very possible to create a sort of hybrid. The biggest problem with creating a blaster that controls or a controller that blasts comes in feat selection and the like. Most god-wizards specialize in buffs, debuffs, and battlefield reconfiguration spells. Most of these tend to fall into the schools of Conjuration, Enchantment, Transmutation, Illusion, and Necromancy schools; with emphasis on minion summoning (summoned, bound, or undead), battlefield re-negotiation (sleet storm, wall of stone, stinking cloud, various image spells), improving your allies (haste, enlarge person, polymorph, heroism, rage), and debilitating your enemies (enervation, ray of enfeeblement, waves of exhaustion, bestow curse, slow, charm spells, dominate spells), and spells which hybrid certain aspects of these (such as pit spells).
The primary benefits of god-wizards is they generally attempt to go for things that are usable in multiple situations. It is exceedingly rare that a good god-wizard will find themselves out of options for assisting their party even long into an adventure or against exotic foes. Most spells favored by god-wizards have multiple uses. A simple silent image spell can create a distraction to get past guards, or may form the illusion of a wall in front of the party, providing total concealment and a place to hide. Likewise, spells like stinking cloud have several nice uses (it can be used to funnel enemies or slow them down as most will not wish to be inside the cloud, it can be targeted to an area to provide total concealment against enemy ranged attackers, and it's also a really nice debuff). Finally, many of their spells can be improvised to help in different scenarios. If you are out of debuffing spells or your ally needs some help but you've got no more buffs, you could summon 1d4+1 monsters to use Aid Another to protect your ally, flank with your ally, provide soft cover for your ally, or make it easier to hit your ally's enemies.
Blasting tends to be pretty direct. A far more attractive option since the release of the almost brokenly nice "Dazing Spell" feat, it tends to only do one thing, which is deal damage. Dazing spell makes blasting seem more appealing because it turns blasting spells into god-wizard spells. No longer do you desire them for blasting, but for the sickeningly good daze kicker. That being said, blasting deals sub-par damage on its own. You must optimize blasting pretty hard to make it really attractive (the last time I saw a RD blasting build, it involved a specific race, some sorcerer bloodlines, wizard school properties, and quite a lot of metamagic feats), which seems to be a poor option when blasting only does 1 thing. Against the right opponents, blasting can seem very, very strong. Against the wrong opponents, a blaster will often fold.
Now the difficulties with a hybrid caster is emphasis on different things. God-wizards tend to enjoy being more well rounded. Typically their specializations come in the form of school specializations (to increase their save DCs) and ensure that their spells land (spell penetration), and then often go to things improving their survivability such as saving throw boosters, improved familiars, Toughness, and selecting a few metamagic feats they can get a lot of mileage out of, such as Dazing spell. Blasters have to preform a lot of specializing just to get their spells to be at a point that they are seen as a major threat.
To give an example, let's say you can deal 30d6 fire damage. That averages 105 damage, save for half. Most non-dedicated martials like Bards, Clerics, and Druids can outpace that sort of damage, and dedicated martials (like Fighters) are capable of dealing that sort of damage as early as 10th-11th level, every round on the round. That's before dealing with things such as spell resistance.
Now it's no secret that no good wizard should completely forgo different types of spells. A good god-wizard will keep a few damaging spells on hand as well, even if only in a wand or the like, simply because there is one really nice fact about blasting spells. All the damage comes at once, and so it's really good at disrupting stuff. Why bother with the uncertainty of dispel magic to counter-spell, when you could simply slap your opponent with a 10d6 lightning bolt for an average of 35 damage? You're very likely to force even enemies of a higher level than you to fail their saving throw. Best yet, your familiar can use wands to chuck around spells at enemies. A caster level 9 wand of magic missile unerringly slams anything not protected by a shield spell or amulet pretty hard. 5d4+5 is 17.5 average damage (minimum 10, maximum 25), which is great for disrupting spells.
Incidentally -- and this is a big one for me -- god-wizards only require the player to be skilled. It doesn't require you to be some sort of breeding abomination of orc/dragon/sasquatch/specialist to make it look attractive. Any human, elf, wizard, half-orc, half-elf, gnome, halfling, or dwarf can comfortably do it. Even ORCs could theoretically do it (though their mental stat penalties hurt a bit).
EDIT: The irony is that god-wizards can often do some direct damage themselves, without actually focusing on it. At higher levels, they can summon monsters who have at-will cone of cold and similar spells; and the various pit spells often have some sort of damaging effect anchored to them. They even get a lot of mileage out of dazing spell. A dazing acid arrow is a mean weapon in a god-wizard's arsenal, and will ruin virtually any golem that the mage encounters, and works wonders on enemy casters (forced concentration checks + save vs losing actions for 2 rounds). Combined with metamagic rods and Heighten Spell, and you can get some very scary dazing spells (save each round vs being dazed 9 rounds? Yes please).
Summons and undead can also deal solid amounts of damage. The extra damage that your party + summons + undead deal when they're all hasted can be significant too. All are wonderful options for god-wizards, and never require them to so much as look at most blasting spells.
Wow very long post Ashiel :P, we all know the advantages of the god-like wizard. I never played a pathfinder blaster, tat is why i want to see an actual build.
I have to say taht the blaster does not have to fill his slots with blast spells, one or to per level would be fine. Also the efectivity of the blaster would depend of the composition of the group, the same with the god wizard. For example black tentacles work well if the group have an archer or other way of do range damage and not so well if the group is more melee focused (and i know you can just cast more spells but taht is far from eficient).
That's more or less my biggest concern. I don't see why anyone would go to such extremes for spells they are only going to prepare 1-2 per level of, especially since normal god-wizards prepare them about that often (like I said, counter-spelling with damage works nice).
Now, do not understimate the tactical advantages of blasting, kill an oponnent is great, kill a a couple of opponent even better but even if you force the enemy to spend an action to use a curative spell that will be good to. An even just hurt the enemy is good too if the rest of your party can finish the job in the same round.
The problem with that is it assumes a lot. The first thing that raises a red flag in my GMing mind is that you assume that enemies are going to stop and heal. Since healing sucks worse than blasting, they would only do so if they're wholly suicidal. In a game where enemies try to let you kill them, then perhaps blasting would be more appealing; but certainly not in a game where enemies will either try harder to kill you or will fall back and regroup; or demonstrate their own dirty tricks.
That also assumes quite a lot concerning enemy defenses. Most spells traditionally considered "blasting" spells are very vulnerable to spell resistance, energy resistance, energy immunity, and Reflex saves (and thus by proxy Evasion and Imp. Evasion). At low levels versus lots of humanoids and animals, you can enjoy lower resistances, but must deal with equally unimpressive damage numbers (often outdone every swing by the party's martial). Meanwhile, it's easier to prepare against blasting (resist energy is cost effective), and many creatures get progressively harder and harder to damage as levels rise, while Hp gets progressively higher and higher.
To get blasting to "keep up", you need it to deal at least 1d6+1 per caster level, because the majority of enemy hit dice are d8s, which is an average of 4.5 per level, while your typical blasting spell deals 3.5 per level. That means that you are doing a lot more damage at 5th level at 5d6 vs 5d8 than you are at 10th level with 10d6 vs 10d8. More so, to be able to effectively one-shot most enemies, you will need to be doing an average of 1d6+3 to 1d6+5 per level, because of Constitution modifiers and/or Toughness. Maximizing and empowering can help, but they're a double edged sword (increasing damage dice while increasing the % chance that the foe will successfully save and take half of said damage).
Blasting also tends to have pretty piddly durations. Most are instantaneous, which means that it's more difficult to pace yourself over longer combats. In mediums where blasting excels (fighting tons of low CR enemies), you have to deal with stuff like obstacles, total cover, and waves of enemies (as in not all of them grouping together into the same group to get wiped out with artillery fire). If you're fighting a CR 8 encounter, you can encounter anything between 48 CR 1/4 humanoids to a single 19 HD warrior.
I'm not saying that blasters are unplayable. I think it's one of the more fun options in Psionics, actually. Merely that it requires more specialization that is usually better spent being more useful (as in literally being able to do a wider variety of things regularly).
But as i said i never played a blaster in pathfinder so i not sure of the capacities of that kind of character, certainly a pure blaster is bad idea that is the reason i want to see taht hybrid build of RD.
I'm a bit curious myself.
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You are far more patient than I. Threads like this remind me why I hate 3e. Perhaps I should make a thread about how fighters vs. wizards.
Please don't. Just search for one and necro it, or better yet, don't, because that dead horse has been beaten into oblivion already.
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Debuffs and battlefield control spells make it easy for your warriors to clean up groups of badguys. Amazingly, if you blast and it takes away half the hit points of a group of monsters, it also makes it easy for your warriors to clean up that group.
I can repost a generic high damage PF blaster build again, if people want me to.
A blaster wizard with Greater Spell Spec NEVER has to memorize his preferred spell..he can sack other spells to power it. This actually makes him more versatile then a standard wizard.
He can switch the elements of his blaster spell on the fly to get around immunities, and still put out huge amounts of damage.
A blaster gives you a Save AND Suck option. A devoted blaster build starts maturing around level 8-10, depending on the spell, but after level 12 can really get rolling, and generally doesn't have a problem reaching that 2 HD/level blasting ability.
Also, 3.5 was quite a bit stronger on the Blaster damage then PF. With the Force Missile Mage and the right feats, you could clear 800 damage with the right feats and a simple Magic Missile spell. Twin Spell, Split Ray, Admixture and Born of the Three Thunders basically meant x16 damage on an attack, and anything which added fixed damage just added insult to injury. You need one level of Spellwarp Sniper to convert to a ray.
And the glory and wonder of Arcane Thesis made meta'ing a blaster spell CAKE.
==Aelryinth
Debuffs and battlefield control spells make it easy for your warriors to clean up groups of badguys. Amazingly, if you blast and it takes away half the hit points of a group of monsters, it also makes it easy for your warriors to clean up that group.
Most debuffs and battlefield control spells don't destroy innocents and loot in the surrounding vicinity. It really sucks to know you destroyed every piece of unattended loot in a 20 ft. radius along with the guard dogs. :P
Debuffs and battlefield control spells make it easy for your warriors to clean up groups of badguys. Amazingly, if you blast and it takes away half the hit points of a group of monsters, it also makes it easy for your warriors to clean up that group.Most debuffs and battlefield control spells don't destroy innocents and loot in the surrounding vicinity. It really sucks to know you destroyed every piece of unattended loot in a 20 ft. radius along with the guard dogs. :P
If the loot is easily destroyed by a fireball I didn't want it anyway and the hot dogs are always good eating.
(I'm just kidding about the loot.)
I love playing blasters but I am cautious to avoid blowing up the loot. There are options, like spells that target individuals, to avoid that problem.
Debuffs and battlefield control spells make it easy for your warriors to clean up groups of badguys. Amazingly, if you blast and it takes away half the hit points of a group of monsters, it also makes it easy for your warriors to clean up that group.Most debuffs and battlefield control spells don't destroy innocents and loot in the surrounding vicinity. It really sucks to know you destroyed every piece of unattended loot in a 20 ft. radius along with the guard dogs. :P
We also making the assumption at all times that every DM keeps track of AOE damage to the area, damage to items of fallen baddies and etc. Most DM's I play with don't even bother with that kind of stuff, which makes blasters a lot better. Blasting really depends on your groups style. I enjoy blasters and normally hate seeing "God-Wizard" because the ones I see screw over combat. Maybe they are bad, idk. But blasting is just as fun as "god-wizards."
We also making the assumption at all times that every DM keeps track of AOE damage to the area, damage to items of fallen baddies and etc. Most DM's I play with don't even bother with that kind of stuff, which makes blasters a lot better. Blasting really depends on your groups style. I enjoy blasters and normally hate seeing "God-Wizard" because the ones I see screw over combat. Maybe they are bad, idk. But blasting is just as fun as "god-wizards."Debuffs and battlefield control spells make it easy for your warriors to clean up groups of badguys. Amazingly, if you blast and it takes away half the hit points of a group of monsters, it also makes it easy for your warriors to clean up that group.Most debuffs and battlefield control spells don't destroy innocents and loot in the surrounding vicinity. It really sucks to know you destroyed every piece of unattended loot in a 20 ft. radius along with the guard dogs. :P
So basically if the GMs ignore all that good junk that's also inside of the mass AoE of destruction, and ignore the fact that things like scrolls have a hardness of 0, wood objects a hardness of 5, stone 8, iron 10, and even after taking half energy damage, will likely be little more than a pile of melted crap and ashes; or in short ignore that destructive spells are destructive; then you can also ignore a really big glaring problem with using them? :P
This is actually a topic my group has been discussing lately. And I would like to point out I have seen some of Raving Dork's blasting builds. And while they are impressive... it isn't until the mid-teen levels that they really become so. And they seem reliant on Fire based damage from what I recall (I could be totally wrong on that)
Sub level 12 is really what I would like to see him address. After all that's where most of the AP's dwell and where I think a lot of people's campaigns spend time.
Where you don't have the slots to quicken anything beyond a Magic Missile and certainly can't stack much in the way of meta-magic feats without losing valuable high level(4th and 5th) spell slots, if you even have more then 1 or 2 meta-feats to begin with.
Basically in our group the caster's spells are very weak compared to the melee. Our game last night was a good example.
Without buffs our 4th level archer was shooting 2 arrows a round for 1d8+10 points of damage each. So consistently he was dishing out between 25-30 points of damage a round.
Meanwhile our 5th level cleric cast a spell that required an attack role, granted a save and then wound up doing 9 points of damage.
The wizard cast Spontaneous Immolation (Dc-16) and through a failed save did 11 points of damage (that would have been 5 whole points! if the creature saved)
Then the ranger went and through feats and power attack did 17 points of damage with his Falchion.
The 5th level paladin was in a smite fest with and anti-paladin. They were trading blows that were on average doing 20-30 points of damage.
I really think one of the main problems with blasting/Evocation spells is that they are a limited resource compared to melee attacks. The limited resource should do a lot more damage or at least have the potential to than the usable all day melee swings/shots. Or be much harder to resist.
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So basically if the GMs ignore all that good junk that's also inside of the mass AoE of destruction, and ignore the fact that things like scrolls have a hardness of 0, wood objects a hardness of 5, stone 8, iron 10, and even after taking half energy damage, will likely be little more than a pile of melted crap and ashes; or in short ignore that destructive spells are destructive; then you can also ignore a really big glaring problem with using them? :PWe also making the assumption at all times that every DM keeps track of AOE damage to the area, damage to items of fallen baddies and etc. Most DM's I play with don't even bother with that kind of stuff, which makes blasters a lot better. Blasting really depends on your groups style. I enjoy blasters and normally hate seeing "God-Wizard" because the ones I see screw over combat. Maybe they are bad, idk. But blasting is just as fun as "god-wizards."Debuffs and battlefield control spells make it easy for your warriors to clean up groups of badguys. Amazingly, if you blast and it takes away half the hit points of a group of monsters, it also makes it easy for your warriors to clean up that group.Most debuffs and battlefield control spells don't destroy innocents and loot in the surrounding vicinity. It really sucks to know you destroyed every piece of unattended loot in a 20 ft. radius along with the guard dogs. :P
Also, just to drive home the point, let's look at what a basic, un-buffed fireball spell will do if you drop it into an area. Your basic unbuffed 5d6 fireball statistically will deal 5d6 (17.5 average) damage and specifically sets things on fire. If you drop it into a room, you will destroy the following all or most of the time:
All paper and/or cloth items will be destroyed wholly.
All rope will be destroyed wholly.
7 inch thick glass objects will be destroyed.
1 inch thick leather or hide objects will be destroyed.
So let's look at what that includes. Well it includes scrolls, spellbooks, documents and parchments that may include clues or details of valuable information (such as a password, or a key to your investigations), various art objects such as blown sculptures or tapestries (easily thousands of GP worth of art objects), will utterly destroy most trade goods (living or otherwise), furs, rugs, clothing, and more will all be instantaneously devastated and destroyed.
So what happens if we actually manage to reach the kind of damage that Ravingdork suggests through extreme optimization of damage? 360 damage was the number he gave, I believe? Well, let's pray that everything on the planet is made of adamantine, because that's 180 points of raw damage coming for everything in the massive AoE. That's enough to melt through almost a whole foot of stone, 17 inches of wood, 5 inches of steel, 5 inches of mithral, and 4 inches of adamantine.
Very, very few treasures are going to be able to survive that. It will burn through and broil anything in chests; cabinets; shelves are gone; entire rooms may be destroyed; gemstones are cracked, scorched, and melted; art objects are obliterated; scrolls are obliterated; books are obliterated; rods are obliterated; wands are obliterated; weapons are obliterated; wondrous items are obliterated; even +5 adamantine full plate is obliterated; potions and oils are obliterated; and so forth.
Ironically, the only thing not obliterated is many monsters that you will encounter at this point. :\
I'd imagine that highly intelligent spellcasters, such as wizards, will choose alternative spells when surrounded by such valuables.
Not so sure about sorcerers though... :P
If a GM takes care to note damage dealt to unattended objects, I would be completely fine with that -- because the corollary is that the enemies' weapons and armour might get destroyed too. Really, though, I've never recommended using fireball indoors.