Have you read Treantmonk's guide? He takes a critical look at all the schools HERE.
Last thought...choosing conjuration means excluding divination and necromancy (...)
chosing divination means excluding necromancy and then a hard choice like evocation.
That reminds me of opposition schools in AD&D2.
IIRC, when making a specialist with Pathfinder, you just choose your two opposition schools, and you can still prepare and cast spells from those schools (provided you have them in your spellbook), you just lose the specialist's powers for that day.
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Last thought...choosing conjuration means excluding divination and necromancy (...)
chosing divination means excluding necromancy and then a hard choice like evocation.
That reminds me of opposition schools in AD&D2.
IIRC, when making a specialist with Pathfinder, you just choose your two opposition schools, and you can still prepare and cast spells from those schools (provided you have them in your spellbook), you just lose the specialist's powers for that day.
I just checked the rulebook and it doesn't say anything about losing your specialist powers. You just have to use 2 slots for opposition school powers. Perhaps that rule was in the alpha or beta version?
I agree with Enchanter actually (not my usual flavor). The social benefits are nice, and one nice way to win tough battles is to change some of the foes to friends. Unless you're going to be facing mind-affecting immune foes (undead, etc.)
Also.. crafting a Runestaff of 4 spells you don't have of your opposed school would have a +25 to the craft DC. Perhaps you mean buy though, instead of craft :)
shea83 even without evocation you can still blast:
After all you can still cast evocation spells (they are simply more expensive) and if you aren't expecting to blast too often then the extra cost of prepping them isn't nearly as much (since you'll rarely use them).
The biggest things you are losing out of evocation are wall of force, and the hand spells (which are much more useful than 'standard' blasting anyways).
Truthfully the necromancy school has more high level blasting spells than evocation does and generally deals better damage too.
Illusion is highly useful for the shadow spells, the misdirection type of spells and the low level defensive spells (displacement, and mirror image for example).
Might I suggest that enchantment might be a better choice of spells to lose, as well as possibly (if this is a highly social game) transmutation or evocation?
Conjuration still has a lot of really really useful battle spells that you are going to want to use I think (cloud kill, stinking cloud, acid arrow, mage armor, grease, summons) that can easily cover for the lack of evocation (while illusion can actually give you back all your evocation spells albeit with an additional will save for reduced effectiveness).
I like the choice of Divination as your specialty... remember that in a social game having the bonus of being able to see your opponent's from rooms away is a great thing (excellent for spying) and offers your team the one advantage no one else can give: information.
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Mostin the Metagnostic is probably the most powerful Diviner I have ever read about.
He is also quite mad ...
Im going to throw my hat in there for a Conjurer with Enchantment and Necromancy as prohibited schools. Conjuration has the best overall spell list, and youve already said Enchantment will be restricted for this character so I would think that would be a no brainer.
For the more 'unusual' build of a Wizard, I've found Necromancer with the Prohibited schools of Divination and Enchantment make for an interesting game. Diviniation spells are best used to create items like crystal balls and amulets and brooches bound with Arcane Eye spells so the Wizard can see through party members and the like, and Enchantment are best scribed onto scrolls or, again, turned into magical items. Nothing says "You're my b~$*&." like a Ring of Charm Person, a cursed item that cannot be removed without a Break Curse or Arrow of Feeblemind.
A more 'reliable' build is Enchanter with Necromancy and Transmutation as Prohibited Schools. This allows you to effectively charm your way through the world, and also leaves open the options of blowing it to pieces via Evocation when necessary, opening up a can of Summon Monster Whoop-Ass when required or seeing into the future or chasing down elusive enemies with Divination. You do lose access to the 'buffing' power of the Transmutation skill and the good old 'Save or Die' spells of the Necromancy school for the most part, but nothing stops the Wizard from scribing them onto a scroll or making a wand or staff if the need for specific spells is great enough.
I prefer conjuration/transmutation with necromancy and enchantment as the prohibited schools. Necromancy is huge on debuffs which people can easily save against while enchantment is situational vs people with minds.
Illusion has too many good spells for prohibit it... invisiblility and other defensive spells.
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I couldn´t play a wizard without illusions. Since enchantment spells have restrictions in your game world, maybe you should choose that. Also for blasting, there is quite a few spells other then the orb spells in the spell compendium that are conjuration that blasts...so unless those have been changed too, evocation can be the second.
Hi guys, i'm building a wizard for a campaign based on social interaction with few but hard fights.
I was wondering about which specialization will be more powerful.
Divination on his side has better initiative, Conjuration has really useful dimensional door and nice time boost for summoned creatures.Real problem is that divination has REALLY few spells at higher level...i use pathfinder corebook and spell compendium 3.5 and there are almost no divination spells over 4th level...apart maybe from superior scrying and moment of prescience...so it's like a really poor school.
Keep in mind that you only need to prepare one spell of your specialty school of each level. The rest you can use to prepare anything you want. Divination is a bit smaller school than some others, but it still has plenty of useful spells, and its specialist abilities are really, really good.
I'm not sure why you think Divination has no good spells beyond 4th level. Telepathic Bond is extremely useful since it lets you communicate without being overheard and to strategize with your party in the middle of battle without yelling commands at each other. True Seeing is extremely powerful, it basically neuters the entire Illusion school. Greater Arcane Sight lets you know, instantly, what spells are active on every creature you see. That is very powerful, since you know exactly what youre up against and what to dispel. Moment of Prescience is a real lifesaver. When you really need to succeed at a saving throw or skill check, it makes it almost guaranteed. And foresight is one of the more overlooked and underrated spells in the game. People look at it and all they see are the +2 bonuses, forgetting that the spell makes you immune to ambush, falling in traps and many other things. Don't underestimate Divination. It may not blow things up or make people bow before you, but it provides knowledge - and knowledge is power.
You may even consider specializing in Illusion. It has a great mix of offense, defense and utility spells. It can also be really good in a social campaign if you're clever. Disguise Self lets you be someone else. Invisibility lets you evesdrop on private conversations. And Image spells, they can be so much fun! With minor and major images you can create illusions of people and have those illusions have conversations with real people. You can spread alot of misinformation and intrigue this way. Used cleverly, illusion can be just as devastating in social situations as the enchantment school.
You may even consider specializing in Illusion.
Illusion also has fairly decent powers. The ray is pretty nice at lower levels. Extended illusions can be very handy, and the greater invisibility power is excellent.
Have you read Treantmonk's guide? He takes a critical look at all the schools HERE.
He also has a bent towards summoning, so..
Have you read Treantmonk's guide? He takes a critical look at all the schools HERE.He also has a bent towards summoning, so..
Yes. I didn't mean to imply that his opinions are the end-all and be-all for wizards, but it's a good examination of the various schools and such.
You have to keep in mind how Pathfinder is different from 3.5 when deciding which school to specialize in and which to choose as opposition schools.
On opposition schools: Two big things to remember, 1) you can still prepare and learn spells from the opposition schools, so the 'cost' of having an opposition school isn't nearly as big, and 2) you can still use magic items from opposition school with no problem.
What this means is that picking opposition schools comes down to what schools have spells you won't mind not preparing often but that can also be called upon via wands, scrolls, potions and staves. Thus, schools with spells that typically are not highly dependent on saving throws and caster level make the best choices.
Also, the spell levels are really important. The 3-6 level spells are most important, as thats where most of the important spells for a wizard will fall. Lvl 1 and 2 spells not so much, since most wizard specialists will eventually have around 7 spells per day at that level, so preparing an opposition spell won't be as big a deal for those levels of spells.
With that in mind, I actually like abjuration as an opposition school, particularly for a PC build where the PC's party will have another spellcaster or two. (I would never willingly choose abjuration in 3.5 as an opposition school, but for PF core only it seems a solid choice.) Look at the 3-6 spell list for abjuration, not a whole lot going on. The most important spells here are the Dispel Magic spells. 3rd lvl version is nowhere near as useful as it once was. The 6th lvl version is very nice of course, but its highly situational and actually makes a great spell for a staff. You can also allow the party cleric to deal with dispelling stuff. Most of the other useful spells are extremely situational and be used in scrolls without any real loss of effect (Dimensional Anchor, Antimagic field, Repulsion). The most commonly used abjuration spells are at 1st or 2nd level (shield and resist energy), and these can easily be used via scrolls or doubling up on the spell slots (for resist energy in particular for the caster level boost). Abjuration does have some nice high level spells, but really doesn't shine till the 9th lvl spells come up (Disjunction and Prismatic Sphere); Mind Blank is nice but not as awesome as it used to be.
I like enchantment too as an opposition school. While there are definitely some good spells here, the most commonly used ones are the hold spells that offer repeated save attempts. (As a DM that often employs these with enemy spellcasters, I've seen how easily these spells fall apart even against targets with poor will saves) Also, there are many potential targets that will be completely immune to these spells, more so than most other schools. Unless enchantment is a focus of the character (and thats certainly a viable way to play a caster), I think theres better uses of spells than enchantment spells. Necromancy offers Will save spells as well that can often have more devastating effects, as well as opening up some more powerful debuffs.
If not chosen as the specialization school, divination becomes a decent choice for opposition. However, I probably wouldn't do this unless theres another spellcaster in the party who can pick up the slack. And even as big a fan as I am of the school, how many spells from each level of divination do you really plan to prepare? Detect Magic is the biggest one really, and could be easily replaced by a wand or a bunch of scrolls. The other big spells are See Invis and True Seeing, which usually end up on scrolls anyways (or in the case of See Invis, permanencied on the caster.) The rest are very situational and usually get called upon in downtime scenarios, where using the extra slot to prepare them isn't a big problem.
If 3.5 splatbooks are used, I'd probably be less inclined to take abjuration as a prohibited school, as there are some pretty damn fine abjuration spells in the spell compendium and in Complete Mage.
On choosing specializations schools, the things to look at are: 1) what bonuses/abilities does the specialization school get, 2) what schools offer the spells I want to cast at each and EVERY level, and 3) what schools offer spells I want to learn a bunch of. (Since one of the two free spells learned at each level has to be from the specialization school.)
Divination has some great abilities. The bonus to initiative is always useful, as is the ability to always act in the surprise round. I actually like the Diviner's Fortune ability better though; that eventually turns into a huge boost (say at 10th lvl you can give that hasted fighter a +5 to hit on all his attacks that stacks with pretty much everything.) The drawback is having to learn and prepare divination spells all the time. While I can certainly come up with a spell list incorporating these spells, it will really cut into the spellbook having to learn a divination spell every level, and this will really start to hurt at higher levels.
Conjuration has some useful abilities, and theres lots of good conjuration spells at each level to learn and make use of. The Summoner's charm helps make summoning useful earlier on, although the benefits of this will probably start dropping at higher levels as the summons would last an entire encounter anyways but probably not enough to get into another encounter (after looting and searching after the first encounter). The biggest thing is the Dimensional step, pretty much freeing up having to prepare Dimension Door all the time. And as a SLA it means no components, so no worries if bound or gagged or in a silenced area.
Transmutation school, like Conjuration, offers lots of useful spells at every level, so no problems for picking spells to prepare or learn. The abilities are decent too. Getting the boost to a physical stat everyday lowers reliance on magic items that will probably get claimed by most of the non casters first anyways (you think the wizard is going to get that +4 belt of Physical Might before the party fighter or rogue?) Note that most people consider Dex and Con to be the two second most important stats for a wizard. The shapeshifting ability is also very handy since its a SLA requiring no verbal or somatic components, thus allowing it to be a useful method of escape in many tough situations.
A small nit pick here or two.
First the PF dispel magic doesn't have a CL limit anymore, so while nerfed in some areas it continues to have value at higher levels where it didn't before. This makes for a nice cheap staff at higher levels, where a 6th level greater dispel is still a big investment while 7k or so for a dispel magic staff isn't.
Secondly Repulsion is an awesome spell but is save dependent so it goes into a staff rather than on a scroll. (Likewise most targets of dim anchor have SR, so a staff of that is preferable to a scroll).
In general the advice is very sound. Consider the altered nature of PF opposition schools as they are vastly different than 3x.
-James
Yeah I agree completely on the utility of 3rd lvl dispel magic. I like it as a spell very much even at higher levels, but it is one that can be done without. Its utility does drop though due to only being able to remove one spell off of a target; its primary purpose would be removing single spell effects such as cloud effects, webs, dispellable walls, etc., and thats certainly not a bad use of a 3rd lvl spell slot.
Right you are on Repulsion, I forgot about the saving throw.