I already love this guide but here's something to add the prestige classes section.
Magaambyan Arcanist to get a Good Aura(and some sweet druid spells like 4th level flame strike)
Then? Then? A few levels of Pathfinder Savant to get the Paladin Spell Litany of Righteousness.
Then Magaambyan Arcanist gives you an ability called "Lasting Goodness" which allows the effects of spells with the Good descriptor to last rounds/MA level. So say that's 4 rounds. Thats FOUR rounds of DOUBLE DAMAGE to all your blasts. All of them. And you can cast it on other members of your party, too.
All of that requires being Good aligned but still.
Bonus points is that Savant gives use magic device as a class still so.
Also don't forget a dazing snap dragon fireworks or a familiar with dazing burning gaze on them.
Also don't forget a dazing snap dragon fireworks or a familiar with dazing burning gaze on them.
I prefer that Fire Sneeze spell on the familiar. It's funnier.
And it would fit the WHIMSICAL mold of the BLOCKBUSTER WIZARD.
I like your guide! I do want to warn that admixture wizard in your guide to change to electricity instead of frost though, as devils have frost resistance.
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I played my first Blockbuster Wizard yesterday, he was a replacement for my Undead Lord Cleric who got death-by-pitchforked!
Despite your reservations about the Gnome's lack of Int bonus, I went with my Pyromaniac Gnome idea. It was a home game but I used the PFS rules to swap out Scribe Scroll for Spell Focus: Evocation. Took Varisian Tatto, Spell Specialization: Fireball, Intensify Spell and Additional Traits (to get both the Lore Seeker and Arcane Lineage traits) and watched jaws drop around the table as my 6th level Evoker pumped out 11d6+3 Fireballs and 9d4+3 Burning Hands. Though on one occasion I did make it a "mere" 8d4+3 Electrical Hands spell just so I could screech in a high-pitched voice: "POWER! UNLIMITED POWER!"
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A good class guide makes the reader want play a character of that class. This is a class good guide. Good work.
I have a sort of off Topic question. The block buster guide lead me to your necromancy guide. In regards to the necromancy guide, how do you acquire the spell bucket without having a once a day cast only acquired through taking a lawful neutral or lawful good god? The guide seemed to be written for clerics.
If you took the extra traits feat to pick up Lore Seeker and Missionary, and then chose the same 3 spells, would the effects stack?If you're referring to the Lore Seeker and Missionary from RotRL, you can't take both of them because they are both Campaign Traits and you cannot have two traits from the same category.
It also says (I think in the beginning part of the Trait rules) that Trait bonuses never stack. Two traits that give +2 Initiative don't give you a total of +4
I have a sort of off Topic question. The block buster guide lead me to your necromancy guide. In regards to the necromancy guide, how do you acquire the spell bucket without having a once a day cast only acquired through taking a lawful neutral or lawful good god? The guide seemed to be written for clerics.
Check out the Items section - you can get the spell on a staff for pretty cheap. Btw, you should probably post questions like that in the discussion for that guide (that way if someone else has the same question, you'll be helping them out.)
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It also says (I think in the beginning part of the Trait rules) that Trait bonuses never stack. Two traits that give +2 Initiative don't give you a total of +4If you took the extra traits feat to pick up Lore Seeker and Missionary, and then chose the same 3 spells, would the effects stack?If you're referring to the Lore Seeker and Missionary from RotRL, you can't take both of them because they are both Campaign Traits and you cannot have two traits from the same category.
Wouldn't that mean wayang spell hunter and magical lineage wouldn't stack then?
He's talking about Trait bonuses not stacking which is what traits normally give you. Trait benefits can stack all day long. Forexample some traits give you different kinds of bonuses like a luck, morale, or whatever bonus.
Forgive another question, but I know very little about familiars. In your guide you mention mephitis having UMD. I am somewhat unclear as to how it gets that skill, as it doesn't seem to be a mephit base skill. Does the familiar basically redo all of its skills when you get it?
All Familiars gain all the skill ranks of their master, which is then modified by their own Ability Scores and any racial modifiers, plus the +3 bonus if it's a base skill.
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Mr. Brewer,
We regret to inform you that, due to your inappropriate love of blowing people up, which all wizards know is suboptimal, we have decided to revoke your membership in the Society.
Sincerely,
The Glitterdust Appreciation Society
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Hi Brewer,
thanks you for the guide! Great and fun read! I have thought about writing something similar but failed to dedicate the time to it ;)
Here some quick 'n dirty additions you might consider:
Spells (already mentioned):
Lvl 5 spells and higher are worth it! Their main disadvantage is the requirement for more expensive metamagic rods but they also offer higher DC and damage dice limits.Three strong choices:
Fire Snake (lvl5)
Wonderful spell. Enhanced by "intense spell" very powerful. Also a prime candidate for spell perfection, as with SP allows for free quickening!Cone of Cold (lvl 5)
Great spell, IMHO slighlty worse then Fire snake. Please note that you can use liquid ice (alchemical item) to enhance the damage. Together with a 1 lvl sorc dip (CB Orc/ Draconic Silver or White Tatooed) you get d6+3 each CL!Chain lightning (lvl 6)
Also a great candidate for spell perfection, as you can still use regular metamagic rods. Together with ML you might use spell perfection to enhance chain lightning with quicken spell for free.Items:
Goblins Fire Drum
Cheap and awesome: Additional 1 point of fire damage per die (up to 10). Get a few ranks in perform (percussion) and hand it to your familiar! Works particular well with a monkey familiar :PRobe Blazing/ Shocking/ Voidfrost
Quite expensive at 10k but +1 Caster level to your element of choice!Variants:
The burnificator cleric
"The night is dark and full of terrors" (Song of Ice and Fire)
A fun variant to the blaster wizard is a fire-themed cleric specializing in fireballs. You basically replace the evcocer with a theologican fire Cleric: Better saves, more ac, more hitdice and different spells (except your signature fireball spell).1 lvl Sorc Dip (Cross-blooded Orc/ Draconic Red or Gold Tatooed) Please note that Mage's Tatoo does work for all evocation spells, not only for arcane spells! This helps to prevent CL loss for the fireball cleric. Also, you can get a fire drum monkey familiar ;)
X Level Theologian...
I'll take a look at the items (the drum in particular seems really cool) - but the advice about higher levels spells doesn't really have anything to do with metamagic rods - it's that you can't easily add metamagic to them at all.
Let me use Cone of Cold as an example, with Spell Specialization and Magical Lineage.
Your wizard just hit level 9 and just now got their 5th level spell slots.:
Cone of Cold: You're basically casting a vanilla spell - you can add one level of metamagic, but Intensify doesn't do anything yet. You're basically working with 12d6 damage out of a 5th level slot.
Fireball: Out of the 5th level slot, you're able to cast Intensified Empowered Fireballs for 18d6 damage. You can also cast Intensified ones for 12d6 out of the 3rd level slot, or Empowered ones for 15d6 out of the 4th level slots.
Your wizard just hit level 11 and just now got their 6th level spell slots.:
Cone of Cold: You can now add Empowered to your spell, greatly increasing the damage. You can do 21d6 out of your 6th level slots, or 14d6 out of your 5th level ones.
Fireball: Out of the 6th level slots, you can cast a Maximized Intensified Fireball for 15x6. Or you can match the 21d6 out of your 5th level slots. Your 4th level slots deal 15d6. You also have the option now of casting Quickened Fireballs.
Your wizard just hit level 13 and just now got their 7th level spell slots.:
Cone of Cold: You've exceeded the damage cap, but when it comes to damage, the best is simply a maximized spell (16x6) out of the 7th level slot. Your 6th level slot deals 22d6, and your 5th level slot deals 16d6.
Fireball: For raw damage, you're in an awkward spot - you can't quite fit Intensified + Empowered + Maximized yet, so the best is only a maximized intensified out of the 6th level slot (15x6) You do, however, have the option of casting Intensified Quickened Fireballs for 15d6.
Your wizard just hit level 15 and just now got their 8th level spell slots. They now also have Spell Perfection:
Cone of Cold: This is actually where Cone of Cold gets a little depressing. You can add Quicken to it... but that's about it. You only have one more level worth of metamagic before you'll exceed the 9th level. So for quickened spells, you're looking at Quickened Intensified for 18d6 (5th level slot). For non-quickened spells, your best bet is Empowered + Maximized, for 15x6 + 7d6 (6th level slot)
Fireball: If you're just out for damage, you can toss out Intensified + Empowered + Quickened Fireballs for 22d6 damage (5th level slot.) For regular ones, if you want raw damage, you can go Intensified + Empowered + Maximized out of your 5th level slot, for 15x6 + 7d6. You also have variants at the 3rd and 4th spell slots that do less damage.
... the short story is: before Spell Perfection, you can apply better metamagic to Fireball, because you have more levels to work with (it's a lot easier to apply Empower to a 3rd level spell than a 5th level one.) After Spell Perfection, you simply don't have many spell levels to work with - whatever metamagic you add, you can only put the spell level up to 9th. Adding Quicken to Cold of Cone doesn't really leave room for any other metamagic. Adding Quicken to Fireball still leaves room for Maximize, or Dazing, or Intensified + Empowered.
Also, you have a lot more slots to work with. If your specialty blast is Cone of Cold, you really can't prepare blast spells in your 4th level slots or lower (well, you can, they just won't do hardly any damage.) If your specialty blast is Fireball (or something else low-level) then you can use your lower-level slots for blasting.
Hope that helps out - there seems to be a lot of confusion on that point within the guide. Maybe I should add a step-by-step on the reasoning for not taking higher-level blasts.
The only reason to take a high level blast is because things that aren't damage.
For example, Chain-lighting very nice selective area, or Horrid Wilting doing untyped damage (vs creatures with lots of different resistances), because it adds an effect (like polar ray draining Dex or stormbolt's stun)
For raw damage, metamagic Fireball is king. Maybe Burning Arc if you want to go single target for some reason (lower level, easier to metamagic)
EDIT: Other than the already mentioned globe of invulnerability. This is a glaring weakness of the build and should be addressed somehow in the guide, for example mentioning heighteneed spell
I enjoyed this guide.
I did notice that dropbox seemed a little twitchy, but that might be my browser rather than dropbox. The image on page 16 was missing and when I reloaded I lost most of the text, and the image was still missing.
I did want to point out some things about your comparisons between sorcerers and wizards.
I agree that the admixture wizard is very powerful; essentially the admixture ability allows use of any of the four elemental spell feats a limited number of times per day at no level increase. That's pretty awesome, especially when you probably never need to use all your uses of it in a single day, so it's basically four free feats with an extra edge.
That much being said, the ability is still fairly easy to replace by taking feats and/or metamagic rods. If the fire sorc finds himself facing a foe immune to fire he pulls out a rod of elemental spell, or perhaps he uses the feat.
A big part of your thesis is that your wizard has the spell specialization feat. And yes, especially for this kind of character spell specialization is a great feat.
But practically speaking there's no reason for a sorcerer not to take it. You do need an INT of 13, but with sorcerers at 2+Int skill ranks I would usually make a sorcerer with at least 12 INT anyway, so an INT of 13 is not a stretch, and spell focus is also a good bet for them. If you are playing a blaster sorc focused around one spell (fireball) then it's also a good build.
So when you say the wizard gets 10d6 for his fireball when the sorcerer gets 8d6, no, actually with the same feats the sorcerer is also getting 10d6. But even if your wizard does more damage than a sorcerer, the sorcerer gets an extra 2 spells per level per day. So that's a lot more fireballs he can throw. At the same time he doesn't have to pre-mix his metamagic feats; he can add them on the fly.
Basically what I feel you should be emphasizing here is that though your blaster wizard may not be quite as optimal as a sorcerer, they *still* have the versatility of wizards despite being a decent blaster. People play wizards mainly because they don't want to be limited to knowing a small number of spells, and your wizard can still prepare the oddball spells that sorcerers can never afford to know. He just happens to be really great with a fireball.
Peet
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How are you doing 15d6 from empowered fireball at level 9?
If you take the feats Varisian Tattoo (Evocation) and Spell Specialization (Fireball), you'll cast the fireball spell at +3 caster levels (or CL 12 at 9th level Wizard).
Fireball has a damage cap of 10d6, so it's 15d6 when Empowered. If you were to cast an Intensified and Empowered fireball, (which you could do in a 5th level slot with the trait Magical Lineage (Fireball)) you could do 18d6 (12d6 x 1.5).
Hope that helps...
oh, empowered doesn't add extra dice, it multiplies the result of the roll by 50% more so if it does 40 damage its empowered to be 60 damage.
Empowered increases the variable numeric effects by half, so it does add dice. 50% more dice to be exact. So if you cast a 10 dice fireball you would have normal damage of 10d6. Empowered would add a variable amount - 5d6. A maximized empowered fireball at 10 dice would be 60 damage (for maximize) + 5d6 (for empower).
Remember, too, that any static bonuses to damage (like the evoker's 1/2 damage per level) are added before you multiply it by 1.5.
Benefit: All variable, numeric effects of an empowered spell are increased by half including bonuses to those dice rolls.
oh, empowered doesn't add extra dice, it multiplies the result of the roll by 50% more so if it does 40 damage its empowered to be 60 damage.Empowered increases the variable numeric effects by half, so it does add dice. 50% more dice to be exact. So if you cast a 10 dice fireball you would have normal damage of 10d6. Empowered would add a variable amount - 5d6. A maximized empowered fireball at 10 dice would be 60 damage (for maximize) + 5d6 (for empower).
Wich becomes odd when it's a inyensified maximozed empowered fireball. It's like 90+... 7 and 1/2 d6? 7d6+1d3?
I played my first Blockbuster Wizard yesterday, he was a replacement for my Undead Lord Cleric who got death-by-pitchforked!
Despite your reservations about the Gnome's lack of Int bonus, I went with my Pyromaniac Gnome idea. It was a home game but I used the PFS rules to swap out Scribe Scroll for Spell Focus: Evocation. Took Varisian Tatto, Spell Specialization: Fireball, Intensify Spell and Additional Traits (to get both the Lore Seeker and Arcane Lineage traits) and watched jaws drop around the table as my 6th level Evoker pumped out 11d6+3 Fireballs and 9d4+3 Burning Hands. Though on one occasion I did make it a "mere" 8d4+3 Electrical Hands spell just so I could screech in a high-pitched voice: "POWER! UNLIMITED POWER!"
Sorry could you break that build down for me?
Fireball
6th level wizard: 6d6
Mage Tattoo (Varisian)+1 CL: +1d6
Spell Specialization +2 CL: +2d6
Intensify Spell: adds 5d6 to cap, no bonus dice.
Loreseeker: +2 spellcraft
Arcane Lineage: cannot find this trait. If Magical Lineage, then reduce spell slot by 1 when metamagics (+1 or more) applied.
Spell Focus: +1 DC
Pyromaniac (racial): +1 CL fire spells.
Evoker (class): +1/2 levels damageI get a +1 saving throw DC, 10d6+3 fireball. Where's the other die coming from?
Yeah, I meant to say Magical Lineage, not Arcane Lineage (Doh!) The Lore Seeker Trait doesn't just give you a bonus to Spellcraft checks, but also grants a +1 bonus to DC and caster level for three spells (Fireball being one, and Burning Hands being another)
One other thing. I made him a Thassilonian Specialist, for a couple more times a day that he can deliver flaming (or other) death, in exchange for never being able to cast Conjuration or Abjuration spells ever (I can live with this!)
The Lore Seeker Trait doesn't just give you a bonus to Spellcraft checks, but also grants a +1 bonus to DC and caster level for three spells (Fireball being one, and Burning Hands being another)
Keep in mind though that Lore Seeker is a campaign trait and is unlikely to be available in your campaign. It was included in the APG as an example of a set of campaign traits that were used in one specific campaign.
It is definitely not PFS legal. Campaign traits never are.
If you are playing an adventure path there will be a specific set of campaign traits to choose from that are different for each adventure path and can be only used for characters playing in those adventure paths.
If you are doing a homebrew campaign then it is up to your GM to create campaign traits for that campaign, though many GMs don't bother.
I'm sorry if this is inappropriate to the forum, as I'm referencing old 3.5e material. Not really sure what the policy is there.
My DM is allowing the Incantatrix (from 3.5, Player's Guide to Faerun) in an upcoming campaign he's running. The entire thing is fairly high powered, with people running crazy stuff all over the place. It's also a pretty big group so I can play more or less whatever I want and every role is going to be covered by someone.
Rules are 20PB, everything from the PF hardcovers, and select content from other PF/3.5 sources with DM approval. Campaign is running 1-16.
Class progression: 1-5 Wizard, 6-15 Incantatrix, 16 Wizard
At the moment I have stats and a feat progression that look like:
str: 8
dex: 12
con: 14
int: 20
wis: 10
cha: 8
L = Level, W = Wizard, H = Human, I = Incantatrix
L1: Spell Focus Evo
W1: Scribe Scroll
H1: Spell Specialization
L3: Greater Spell Focus Evo
L5: Iron Will
W5: Intensified Spell
I1 (6): Empowered Spell
L7: Spell Penetration
L9: Greater Spell Specialization
I4 (9): Dazing Spell
L11: Quicken Spell
I7 (12): Selective Spell
L13: Greater Spell Penetration
L15: Spell Perfection (Fireball)
I10 (15): Maximize Spell
I want to be good at doing blasting and have utility options. I want to be powerful but not overly cheesey. That said, the definition of cheesey is a bit of a moving target, so if you have any over the top ideas please let me know and I'll decide whether it would fit in the game.
The Lore Seeker Trait doesn't just give you a bonus to Spellcraft checks, but also grants a +1 bonus to DC and caster level for three spells (Fireball being one, and Burning Hands being another)Keep in mind though that Lore Seeker is a campaign trait and is unlikely to be available in your campaign. It was included in the APG as an example of a set of campaign traits that were used in one specific campaign.
It is definitely not PFS legal. Campaign traits never are.
If you are playing an adventure path there will be a specific set of campaign traits to choose from that are different for each adventure path and can be only used for characters playing in those adventure paths.
If you are doing a homebrew campaign then it is up to your GM to create campaign traits for that campaign, though many GMs don't bother.
We're actually playing Rise of the Runelords, so this IS legal for our Campaign. But I take your point that for all other Campaigns it won't be a rules-legal option.
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I have a low-level Cong/Tele wizard whom I really enjoy playing (so I'm not going to kill him and start over) who'd like to heavily dip his toe into this. The feats are easy enough to do (he's just leveling to 3rd), but the lack of Evoc/Admix is an annoyance.
-- What goodies exist which can semi-replicate the effect of Admixture?
I have a low-level Cong/Tele wizard whom I really enjoy playing (so I'm not going to kill him and start over) who'd like to heavily dip his toe into this. The feats are easy enough to do (he's just leveling to 3rd), but the lack of Evoc/Admix is an annoyance.
-- What goodies exist which can semi-replicate the effect of Admixture?
The Elemental Spell feat is what you want. Its a 0 level metamagic which allows you to convert a spell into the element which you choose when taking the feat. Its also available as a fairly cheap Rod.
Of course as a Wizard you cant do this on the fly without the Rod so consider grabbing Preferred Spell for a blast or two and you can cover three different elemental types which will be fine.
It's level 1 metamagic, but it's good regardless.
I'm guessing I won't need it prior to 7th & higher -- the game usually gives a caster a few levels to enjoy a new spell before nerfing it, so I should be able to enjoy fireballs made of real fire for awhile before a lot of DR starts cropping up.
...is there anything immune to both fire and cold?
Yes.
But in the long run, you can have preferred spell in the Fireball, which means you could swap any perpared 4th level slot for a Elemental Fireball, selecting a new element on the fly.
You can't choose a new element on the fly. You choose a new element when you take Elemental Spell feat and then you can choose the spell's normal element, or the new one you chose.
Oh. My bad
Disclaimer: dont know the incantrix well.
Otherwise, looks like you got the basics covered. Some food for thought:
-You might think of adding the traits Magical Linage and Wayang Spellhunter (each -1 level requirement for MM). With both, you can throw intensified selective fireballs for a 3rd level slot.
-You have a lot of MM feats- you might want to get rid of some and add, e.g., craft feats (c. wondrous item or c. (MM) rod, check with your group). One particular example would be dazing spell and empower/ maximize: you want to either daze them (3 rounds of daze basically eliminates them from the combat) or maximize damage (dead basically eliminates them from the combat :P ), I would not go for both. Also lesser rods are very cheap so you dont need everything as a feat.
-If you want to go for max damage think about the wonderful 1 lvl sorc dip (tatooed croos-blooded orc/draconic) to add +2 damage to each hit dice which is massive. (average 3.5 per dice becomes 5.5 i.e. ~60% more)
-I dont think spell penetration becomes a real problem before high levels, so you could replace those feats (but make sure you have some dweomers essence for the case where you NEED to overcome SR).
I was under the impression that those 2 traits overlapped.