Best newbie Wizard build


Advice


Hey everybody,

A couple of friends and I recently started playing Pathfinder. We have played 3.5 briefly but we are pretty much new to this (minus one player who has years of experience).

I'm thinking about creating a wizard but I still have a couple of questions and things I'm not sure about. My stats are as follows, we used the D6 method and throw away the lowest (I got kind of lucky):

STR: 14
DEX: 15
CON: 17
INT: 19
WIS: 15
CHA: 9

I used to play a fighter/cleric in 3.5 but my role became pretty useless later in the game. I'm considering chosin the conjuration school with the teleportation subschool (pretty standard choice I gathered) for optimal battlefield control. But the divination school with Forewarned and Prescience looks awesome. The problem is that the spells from the school itself are kinda crap.

Would it be wise and possible to choose Divination and then use mostly spells from other schools (minus the two opposing schools which will probably be necromancy and abjurarion)? Or do you have to use spells from your own school, as far as I know only spells from opposing schools would take two spell slots.

Or would choosing conjuration be a better option since my focus would mainly be on battlefield control and summoning?

Does anybody have advice on playing an elemental wizard, how does it stack up against the regular arcane schools?

Any advice would be more welcome, I spent 10 hours yesterday reading through the rules hahaha.

The GM has decided that we characters know nothing of the world, so I'm not sure about terrain and foes. The rest of the party consists of a fighter, rogue and a ranger.

Thanks!

Silver Crusade

When you have a school, or subschool, for a wizard, you only have to prepare one spell of each of the spell levels from that school. So, by far, most of your spells can be from other schools. You can even choose feats away from your school, such as spell focus from a different school.


Thanks man! I think I'll go for the Divination school (iniative is key) and focus more on battlefield control spells and summoning. Any advice for skills/feats? I will probably play a human since it will have the benefit of an extra spell.


I've always liked the Air Elementalist wizard.

At lvl 1 you can cast feather fall at will, at lvl 5 you can cast levitate on yourself at will, and at level 10 you can cast fly on yourself at will.


I agree with air elemental wizard. Also, and I don't mean to be a naysayer or anything, it looks like your party would benefit more from an oracle. Healing, can do stuff in melee, I don't know, just a thought.


If you want battlefield control, then I would stick with Conjuration and not Divination. The bonus spells will be better, too. If you're worried about initiative, switch your Con and Dex scores and take Improved Initiative. You'll have a +7 bonus to initiative at 1st level. Not too bad.

Also, the human wizard's favored class bonus is not that exciting. Unless your GM doesn't let you have easy access to buying scrolls, you can just learn all the spells you want (and don't want) from scrolls and pilfered spellbooks. If you have a familiar, the halfling's favored class bonus is better, but then you have to be a halfling. I'd just choose +1 hp every time, honestly.

I also have to agree with the air elementalist wizard. It's not at all what you're looking for, but it's really fun to play. I am currently playing one at 11th level, and I am amazing at shutting down archers, flying out of melee range, and blasting enemies with evocation spells. I guess you could do that with any wizard, but the air elementalist doesn't have to waste as many spell slots doing it. The only drawback is that a lot of the earth spells (opposed school) are awesome spells, but there are ways around that.


Thanks for the suggestions! I will seriously look into the air elementalist.

I hate Nickelback (dig your nickname btw), an oracle might be useful for its healing spells and melee skills but it would too close to the character I've already played (Cleric) and I would definately like a new experience, thanks for the feedback though. :)

I'm still not sure whether to go for the bonded item (+1 unprepared spell a day) or a familiar for improved skills. Anyway back to reading!

More advice is always welcome!


As far as a bonded item versus a familiar, I chose a bonded item (rapier). It was mostly for back story and flavor reasons, but I really love having an extra "spontaneous" casting of any spell in my book, especially when you gain access to a new level of spells and don't have as many slots available. Since wizard AC is terrible and I chose a weapon, I also crafted it to have the defending weapon property. I never use it for attacking, so I always apply its enhancement bonus to my AC. The best part is that it's untyped, so it stacks with all of my other AC boosting gear.

Some people feel safer with a familiar, though. Also, they can cast touch spells for you, but I'd never want my familiar that close to an enemy unless they can turn invisible. There are a couple of good improved familiar options that can do that (silvanshee comes to mind), but you'll have to wait a while before you can get one.

Shadow Lodge

Having a hawk familiar and the Eyes and Ears of the City trait (must follow Abadar) can give you a rockin' Perception score (more valuable than high initiative when it prevents surprise). Later on take Leadership for a monstrous cohort (instead of Improved Faniliar).

To the OP, I'd switch your CHA and STR scores -- you'll just get your head caved in goofing around in melee as a straight wizard. (CHA also affects your Leadership score if you go that route.)


Metal Earth wrote:

Thanks man! I think I'll go for the Divination school (iniative is key) and focus more on battlefield control spells and summoning. Any advice for skills/feats? I will probably play a human since it will have the benefit of an extra spell.

The extra spell is great on someone with limited spells known, but for a wizard that's just a little bit of gold. Unless your GM restricts spell availability hard you're better off with hitpoints.


https://www.dropbox.com/s/5t2af1cwekhnrkj/BlockWiz.pdf

looks super fun, blaster wizard.


trust me, control wizard isn't nearly as fun as blasting wizard. check it out before you make a control wizard.


morrissoftxp wrote:
trust me, control wizard isn't nearly as fun as blasting wizard. check it out before you make a control wizard.

It's a matter of taste.

Some people like rolling handfuls of d6s. Some people like knowing they had a unique contribution to the battle. Some people like imagining their enemies doing a three stooges routine in a patch of grease. Some people like playing with summons. I know a guy who roleplays summons. When he summons a Hound Archon it's the same Hound Archon and it has a name and personality.


Control Wizard is definitely party dependent, but if you have the right party I would easily pick control over blasting any day.

I personally think it's much more fun to Me-Doken my party BSF into the enemy using Telekinetic Charge than it is to cast disintegrate on a single creature. I also think it's more fun to cut out sections of the enemy party while my party wipes the floor with the remaining pieces etc.

Without a decent party though... I still wouldn't play a Blaster Wizard, I'd play something else. But eh, I guess I'm agreeing with what Atarlost said - to each their own.


Some good feat options are Improved Initiative(really for anyone), Precise shot (helps the xbox at low level and the ray at high), scribe scroll (lot of spells that are very situational but you do not want to wait a day to cast).

I find that control is more fun as wizard and it plays better to thier limited spells per day. It is better for wizard to only need to cast 1 or two spells per encounter. (our group often takes 10-15 encounters a day)


Bah, I had a really big response that was just eaten by the internet!

Oh well.

Anyway, best recommendation I can give you is to remember that when you specialize you ONLY have to memorize spells from your specialization schools in your specialization slots. Basically this means that if you're a diviner, all your other spell memorizations can (And might as well should) be Conjuration or something else.

Pick your school specialization based on the granted powers, not on the specialization slots. This is especially true if your DM lets you replace specialization slots with spontaneous casts from Preferred spell.

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