I think teleport and greater teleport should each be a level higher.
Haste probably should be 4th.
The only spell I see in this thread with a reasonable arguement is haste.
The others are arbitrary travel based spells. Fly, teleport, that sort of thing could realistically be put at any level, as long as the CR challenges of that level expected you to have them. There's no 'right' level for these spells, beyond the fact that its a good idea to have fly vs a lot of CR 6-7 monsters. Thus, its perfect where it is.
Invisibility? Not particularly powerful, since it's defeated by a cantrip (detect magic) and breaks on attack. Greater invis is the powerful one, and sits fine at level 4.
Protection from Evil is a little too powerful - stops all mind control and blocks summoned creatures.
Hold Person is way too powerful. I'm not a big fan of spells that are lower level because they only affect one creature type - Looking at you dominate person!
Blindness is too powerful for second level.
Mirror image might be too good, but is fairly harmless.
Improved invis and a sneak attacker can be a devastating combo.
The power of summon spells varies on campaign balance, but summons can be VERY powerful and disruptive to the game.
There are also a few spells like wall of thorns and spikestone (spike growth?) that seem remarkably powerful for their spell level.
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i love haste. and i beleive it's a little overrated. much like fly, invisibility and black tentacles. there are dozens of counters to invisibility, flight can be stopped by lower indoor ceilings or other flying creatures, and black tentacles fails to discriminate between friend and foe.Second, before Invisibility there are no counters to Invisibility. Detect Magic helps you discover that there are invisible creatures (in case of magically invisible creatures) but it doesn't prevent them from exploiting the spell's effects. Scent (and in theory Perception) helps you find the target but likewise does not counter the effect.
I would also like to emphasize that, in practical terms, Detect Magic would be useless against any invisible foe that knew what detect magic was (which should be all of them). You would ping that there was magic in a general direction (which can ping off of damn near anything), then the invisible guy would move and you would lose any signal. Pretty soon the invisible guy would either be gone or have a knife in your back and your "detect magic" fanciness did you zero good (unless you had some guards on hand to block doorways or something). On top of this, you have to concentrate to keep the spell going, meaning that you aren't doing this unless you are *already* suspicious that there is someone there.
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I agree with spells provided sofar, adding to that some thoughts :
Scorching Ray was an offender in 3.5, as soon as you see creatures getting a limited scorching ray as a spell like ability, shooting less rays than their CL would indicate than something is wrong with a 2nd level spell. In PF damage is upgraded significantly so I dont think it is a problem, it still looks a bit too good compared to other 'blast' spells, but more likely other spells need a little upgrade, and artificial means to upgrade spell damage through roundabout ways need to be downsized a bit. If the only way to make blasting work is through specific niche builds it is bad design imo.
Fly I would agree with if there wasnt the druid being able to do it quite easily already at level 4, polymorph spells give flight but are quite restrictive for classes other than druid in casting and combat potential, though this might be considered a problem with druid as well, personally I would like fly and overland flight 1 level higher, same thing with teleport and greater teleport, though I might want to drop those completely in favor of other magical means of long distance travel.
Mage Armor/shield, this should be a basic wizard ability providing some basic defense through magical deflection of attacks the wizard is aware off.
I rather see buff spells translated into hexes rather than spells, the fly witch hex is a fine example, invisibility could work in a similar manner, haste/slow would work fine as a hex much like fortune and misfortune or giving creatures an enhancement to ability scores makes for a versatile hex, cuts down on 15 minute adventuring days significantly and depends on class abilities instead of more limited use spells. I could see different 'hexes' for the various specialist wizards, allowing wizards to customize their own class abilities.
Sorry if this is a bit off topic, tend to forget what the topic is about when writing. =)
Protection from Evil is a little too powerful - stops all mind control and blocks summoned creatures.
According to the SRD: Third, the spell prevents bodily contact by evil summoned creatures.
It's not all THAT powerful. There are a lot of non-evil summons.
Scorching ray never bothered me. It's close range, and requires up to 3 attack rolls. Arcane casters do miss with those, now and then. DAMHIK
The spell that always bothers me from players when I am running low level games and that I always feel especially bad about using against them is Glitterdust. Mirror Image is pretty damn cheesy too. I actually don't have a problem with Invisibility because Glitterdust is so good and prevalent.
According to the SRD: Third, the spell prevents bodily contact by evil summoned creatures.It's not all THAT powerful. There are a lot of non-evil summons.
That and its no protection from ranged attacks, spells, or manufactured weapons. Only melee natural weapons from evil summons.
Blindness in general usually feels like an undercosted effect to me in Pathfinder. It takes you out of combat pretty hard. I think this could be fixed by nerfing the game effects of the blind condition a bit or by making things like scent a little better.
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I never understood how the whole party is able to fly around level 7 or 8. How is that happening?
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River of lava? The PCs fly over it.
Well, this at least is still an issue. Flying over lava will kill you. Unless you're the sort to say "Convection Schmonvection."
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Since we're all here: yes yes, haste turns 5th/6th level melee characters into war machines.
Fireball too low? It's rather subpar vs monsters and decent to good against NPCs. Hell, by comparison, Black Tentacles is a 4th level 'fireball' of -I win- against packed enemies, even with the slight nerf.
Resist energy - maybe a bit too good as a 2nd level spell but not that overpowered.
Knock: why why why can the wizard 1shot my expensive safe.
Blindness is my personal offender here. It renders almost anyone next to useless. Fighter-types have decent chance of saving but Rogues, bards, wizards and sorcerers are screwed. Fortitude save or be unable to target any spell 95% of the time. This is 2nd level spell that bestows permanent condition that can't be removed until 5th level. I would understand if it had duration counted in rounds but permanent?
Time Stop.
This is 2nd level spell that bestows permanent condition that can't be removed until 5th level. I would understand if it had duration counted in rounds but permanent?
Remove Blindness/Deafness is the same level as Blindness/Deafness so it can be removed at 3rd level.
PRD begs to differ: Blindness/deafness is 2nd level for Sor/Wizards while Remove blindness/deafness as 3rd level spells is not available until 5th level.
I guess you are right, but that just means the devs made a mistake since most opposing spells are always given at the same level. Whether Blind/Deafness should be raised or its counter should be lowered is a matter of opinion though. Even as is I don't think the spell is too high though. Finding some 5th level caster is not that hard in most GM's games.
Other spells: Haste is worth a 4th level slot. Invis could probably go up to 3rd level. Fly could probably be moved up a level also.
Maybe haste / black tentacles. They're powerful, sure, but if they were each 1 level higher, we'd simply pick the next most powerful spells in line and complain about them.
Actually that is plainly false. What you did was to perform an inductive step. There logically must exist some spells that we would not complain about. If your statement was true, then we would bump up the next most powerful spells and complain about the next next most powerful spells. This line of logic is independent of the number of spells. Therefore we repeat this until we run out of third level spells. This logic is also independent of spell level. Therefore, in order for your reasoning to be valid, we must excise all spells from all spell lists.
I never understood how the whole party is able to fly around level 7 or 8. How is that happening?
It's not happening. Unless you have a party full of mages, then it's not happening. It's just another example of people making mountains out of mole hills; some one can fly and potentially ruin your precious little encounter, so the spell must be OP/broken. :/
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So he can spend the vast majority of his most precious slots to trivialize one encounter?
I have no problem with that. Especially since others sure won't have any ranks in Fly skill.
I was thinking a 7th level sorcerer, in which case 4 3rd level spells are most of them. Especially since 3rd level slots can be quite good.
I'm genuinely surprised that anyone finds Haste to be powerful enough to shift it up to 4th level. Its usefulness is contingent upon the full attack action. I don't know about everyone else's game, but in my games people aren't standing around in a void. There's a lot of incentive to keep moving. It's a solid 3rd level spell but in my opinion Slow is a better choice.
As for being able to fly at low-mid level, I often (not always) have a hippogriff mount by then.
I agree with pretty much every spell listed in this thread.
Haste and Fly are indeed pretty egregious, AFAIC.
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RPG Superstar 2008 Top 32, 2011 Top 16
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Another way a whole party can fly at mid levels is by supplementing their spell slots with potions of fly. Sure it's a bit pricy, but it's doable at 5th level or higher.
I think the important thing is that, yes, a whole party can fly, but it will use up resources - either 4 3rd level spells, or potions or a combination of the two. Either way, the party has spend resources that won't be availible later that day.
The problem for having your whole party have fly is making several assumptions. What if your party has a Wizard instead of a Sorcerer, now those third level spell slots start drying up much faster. Since most 8th level PCs don't have an Int/Cha of 24+ (not everyone starts with a 20 in their caster state at lvl 1), they only have one bonus spell for 3rd level, and unless you are a transmuter, that means a max of 4 level 3 spells per day. God forbid your wizard wants to memorize some other 3rd level spells that day (say haste). So your wizard has just used 4 of his 17 spells per day. Many wizards don't have a bonded item and those that do want to keep it as a reserve to save their butts during a TPK event.
The only spell i have a problem with is Blindness/Deafness. It shouldn't be permanent, only mins/level. Otherwise no complaints
The only spell i have a problem with is Blindness/Deafness. It shouldn't be permanent, only mins/level. Otherwise no complaints
I can tell you seriously, that I have never seen anyone Blinded for the duration of an entire combat that walked away from that fight. As long as the blind lasts the length of a single fight, it doesn't really make a difference whether it's Permanent or mins/level. So, I would be perfectly fine with such a change, as it effectively changes nothing.
Edit: Ok, in retrospect, I suppose you're talking about having NPCs casting it on PCs. I support that change, then, since hopefully, PCs are walking away from fights. I don't know, as a GM, I personally just wouldn't be using that spell on PCs--I'd stick to Glitterdust if I wanted to Blind.
As for the Flying thing, I don't think entire parties fly through every encounter starting at level 7. I think the entire party flies through every encounter starting in the early to mid teens, though. I think Wizards and Sorcerers fly every encounter starting at 7, but I doubt they'd often take their party with them rather than Hasting them.
1) Part of the issue with haste and fly (at least from what I have read) is that a lot of groups seem to have way beyond the WBL of equipment. One of the PC's has craft wonderous & craft arms and armor. Now you have virtually doubled their magic items for the cost they had to dish out. You start seeing lots of flying magic items or hasting gear.
2) Occaisionally I've also seen the group plan their magic aquisitions as a group. Such as, ok after the wepon guys each have a magic weapon everyone saves for something that flies or levitates (they can then be hauled where ever). Then everyone gets a 1 haste per day item. Now you have 4 group hastes per day. That will usually get you through all the really tough fights in a day. It's not needed for the mooks.
If you combine the 2, it can seem to be a problem. The avoiding encounters/traps and killing things so fast usually counters the fact that they don't have hugely powerful weapons or much defensive gear.