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yea yea I know. Blast wizards suck. IDC, I wanna play one :P.
That's not to say I won't take buff/debuff/utility spells. but I will be focused on Blasts. (or Save or suck) spells.
gonna be level 9. (I was thinking about, either evocation school, OR, elemental schools, (air or wood or fire)
and taking an empower rod.
the idea would be to eventually get intensified spell, empower, and a rod of maximize. so that at 20, I would be using 6th level spells (intensified- empowered + rod for 180 damage fireballs!)
but for now. at level 9. thoughts?
Did you look at the Blockbuster Wizard guide in the guides list? Probably do you well to start there.
One thing I've noticed in my experience is, depending on your AP/campaign, you may want to go spell pen much earlier. I've had 45-50 damage fireballs shrugged off because of SR.
I would argue against using fireball as your main "blast", since it's the most common elemental resistance. Cone of Cold may be a good alternative, or Chain Lightning if you are planning for the future.
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Paizo BLASTER CASTER build:
Goal: Pile on the hurty-hurt with direct damage spells. You don't need battlefield control if the enemy is dead.
Level 1: Take Sorceror: Crossblooded Orc/Draconic, Human, take Varisian Tattoo, take Trait: magical Lineage (pick spell), Reactionary (+2 Init)
Then take Wizard/Evoker -Admixture Specialist for your remaining levels. Why Admixture? Because you can change the element of any of your blasting spells on the fly to get around elemental resistances/immunities.
If you want to superspecialize outside of Evoker, take Sin Magic, lose two schools (Conjuration/Abjuration), gain yet another spell slot per level of raw power.
Key Feats: Intensify Spell, Empower Spell, Quicken Spell, Spell Perfection, Spell Penetration, Spell Specialization, Greater Spell Specialization.
End result: Crossblooded sorc orc/dragon bloodline 1, Wiz/19, Admixture Evocation specialist.
Note: Can use Sin Magic for more slots. Sorcerer level allows use of spell devices from denied schools (Conj/Abjuration).
Magical Lineage Trait allows Intensify for free on chosen spell.
Spell Perfection allows free Quicken at higher levels.
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Play Hints:
Take Burning Hands or Magic Missile as a Specialized Spell early. Burning Hands will deal more damage, Magic Missile has better long-term utility and keeps you out of danger. Every other level, you can change your specialized spell.
Add Greater Spell Specialization at level 7 or 9. Why? You can then memorize utility spells, and trash them for your blaster spell.
Change your specialized spell up to Scorching Ray or Fireball when you can, depending on campaign, typically at 5 or 7.
At level 12 or higher, change it to Fire Snake.
Use Admixture specializing to change the element on the fly.
Use Fire Snake until higher levels. Why? High damage base and level 5 spell still leaves room for metamagic, esp Quicken.
Mechanics behind Choices: Orc blooded, Draconic: +1 to all damage spells, +1 to element of choice, retasked by Admixture = +2 dmg/die on blasting spells.
FEATS
Intensify Spell: Increases caster level damage cap +5 to apply to a specific spell. Burning hands goes up to 10d4+20. Magic Missile goes to 7d4+7. Fireball to 15d6, Fire Snake to 20d6+40.
Empower Spell: Increase dmg by 50%.
Quicken Spell: Hit enemy with two spells/rd.
Spell Specialization: +2 to caster level with a specific spell. Helps bring the damage earlier and faster.
Varisian Tattoo: +1 to Caster level with a specific school (Evo). This buys off your sorc level.
Greater Spell Specialization: Sacrifice spells to power your chosen blaster spell. Means you can memorize utility spells freely.
Spell Perfection: Doubles fixed feat bonuses, apply one metamagic for free. An Empowered/Intensified spell with Magical Lineage is still its original spell slot. SPell Penetration doubles to +4. Varisian Tattoo to +2. Spell Specialization to +4. Effectively, you've got +10 on Spell Resistance rolls, and are casting at 5 levels higher then your own.
Top End Damage: 30d6 +60 from Fire Snake, empowered, Intensified, average 165 dmg, save 1/2, level 5 slot.
Quicken for another hit, 5th level slot, 20d6 + 40dmg, avg 165.
= 330 blasting dmg in one round, save for 1/2. If you've a Rod of Maximize, you can lift this to 215 base damage.
Base level 5 spell slot is 20d6+40 dmg, 165 dmg.
BY LEVEL
At level 1, your Burning Hands should be 2d4+4 (avg 9)
At level 2, its unchanged.
At level 3, Spell Specialization kicks in. 5d4+10 (22.5). This tops it unless you Intensify it.
At 4th, 6d4+12 (27), Intensified BH.
At 5th, Intensified BH, 7d4+14 (31.5).
At 6th, you can shift Spec to Scorching Ray. 2x 4d6+8 (44). Your Fireball is 5d6+10 as well, or 7d6+14 if specced.
At 7th, 6d6+12 fireball, or 8d6+18 if spec. An Empowered, Intensified Burning Hands, if still the spec spell, is 13.5d4+27 (about 60).
8th - Empowered Scorching Ray, 2 x 6d6+12. E/I BH is 15d6+30 (74, max)
9th - Intensified, Specialized Fireball is 11d6+22 (51).
10th - Firesnake. E/Spec Fireball is 15d6+30 (74). Emp Scorching Rays are 3 x 6d6+12, or 18d6+36 (99 dmg). You can now Quicken a Burning Hands or Magic Missile as kicker damage in a round, although you've few slots.
12th - E/I/Spec Fireball is 21d6+42 (115) damage. You can now Quicken a 12d6+24 Scorching Ray.
14th level - A Specialized Firesnake now exceeds/equals an intensified Fireball. Fireball caps at 22.5d6+ 45 (123~) damage. An Empowered Firesnake is 24d6+48 (132) damage. You can now Quicken a 10d6+20 Fireball. Intensified, Empowered Scorching Ray tops out at 24d6+48 (132 dmg)
15th level - Spell Perfection. You can now add a Meta for Free. This will be Quicken or Empower. Intensified might be free if Magical Lineage applies to it. Caster level buffs for spec spell exceed +5, so top out at 20d6 dmg at 15th level. You will miss Spell Resistance rolls against CR appropriate enemies on a 1.
Assuming Firesnake, you can now cast a Quickened Intensified Firesnake for 20d6+40 (110) damage out of a 5th level slot, and an Empowered Firesnake out of the same slot for 30d6+60 (165) damage. Using a 7th level slot, you can Empower both.
16th+ - Damage remains the same, higher level spell slots are open for use of other Metas or control spells.
Conceivably you could use Disintegrate to get a higher damage total, but the delay isn't worth it, and you'd lose the Varisian tattoo bonus.
If your DM allows you Twin Spell from 3.5, you can very, very easily clock in at 495 raw dmg/round. IF he allows Arcane Thesis, god help your enemies.
==+Aelryinth
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I was wondering. If I didn't go evo school. which would be a good replacement?
also, I was looking into the debuff metamagics (for something to help other than pure damages/turn) any suggestions on those?
SO, I was thinking. sorc. cross blooded. dragon/elemental
Elf-race (or emberkin when available)
I like Aelryinths suggestions.
I'd highly recommend looking at my thread:
Add some debuff to your fireball and keep your spell slots open for non-blasts! Rime and Dazing are fantastic; and you're at level 9 so you can use dazing right off the bat.
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also, was considering 2 rods of maximize at least the normal ones, probably one greater. (hopefully around level 15) 2 rods of quicken metamagic. one rod of Sickening Spell, and 1 rod still casting. on top of a few magic items (pearl of powers, ring of wizardries. Head band of Int, (looking to make most of these with said character) suggestions?
I suggest Spell perfection with delayed blast fireball to use with time stop at high levels :p
Fireballs are generally speaking as good as any other damage type. The problem is not that creatures are 'resistant' to fire, but that more creatures are 'immune' to fire, then are immune to any other element.
This specifically calls out all devils and all subtype (Fire) creatures.
But you know, if you're not going to be fighting that stuff, fire works just plain fine.
The best debuff spell for the cost is likely dazing. The next best is probably Toppling.
Your tiers of spells for damage are:
1) Burning hands or Magic Missile
2) Scorching Ray.
3) Fireball or Lightning Bolt
4) -
5) Firesnake
You don't want anything higher level, because meta'd spells are more powerful then spells of the same caster level, and you are going to find you can't meta higher level spells because of caps. Example: at level 10 with the above build, you can cast a 12d6 cone of cold, OR an 18d6 Fireball/Lightning Bolt. Which would you prefer? You can toss a Maximized 15d6 fireball out of a 6th level slot as a 'hello' to anyone you like.
The reason I noted you defer Firesnake (or cone of cold) as a choice until level 12 is that at 12th your caster level exceeds 15, and so you capped Fireball, and Cone of Cold can finally be more powerful cast straight up. Alas, Empowered Fireballs are going to be stronger until you have higher spell slots to pay for the awesome glory of maxed 5th level spells (around the time you get Spell Perfection).
==Aelryinth
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Fireballs are generally speaking as good as any other damage type. The problem is not that creatures are 'resistant' to fire, but that more creatures are 'immune' to fire, then are immune to any other element.
That's why numerous posters pointed the OP to 'Admixture Wizard'. The 'Admixture Wizard' can change the spell type to any of the four energy types many times each day. You should read the guide to the Blockbuster Wizard. That's the obvious place for the OP to start, and is probably superior to most other 'blaster' builds.
Personal recommendation is an Elf Admixture School, like everyone else here.
I like taking a familiar as my arcane bond, and a dodo, compsognathus, or greensting scorpion at that for the +4 initiative bonus, as well as being able to make a second perception check, and getting Alertness for free.
I like Fleet of Foot as a racial trait, for the bonus on initiative, as a bonus you also get Run as a free feat.
As far as the build goes, Fireball being a 3rd level spell makes it most economical with Lesser Metamagic Rods being usable on it regardless of what metamagic feats you have on it (barring Heighten), and it has the best scaling damage and area of effect as far as blasts go. Lightning Bolt won't hit as many enemies, and Cone of X (including burning hands) require you to get up close to use. For these reasons Fireball is considered the go-to evocation spell to specialize in.
Magical Lineage and Wayang Spell Hunter have yet to be ruled afaik to not 'stack' so one could take both of them and be able to apply multiple metamagic effects on it. Warrior of Old is a race trait that adds yo your initiative, and there are many other traits that are also useful. Because of this, the feat Additional Traits could actually benefit you mechanically more than it can on most builds.
Feat selection is pretty straight forward actually. Much like a vanilla fighter selecting feats like Weapon Focus and Weapon Specialization, you select Spell Focus, Spell Specialization and such.
What is your point buy? Are you rolling for stats? This is rather important to know what we're working with for resources.
Sample Build:
Elf Admixer 9
TN medium humanoid (elf)
Fleet-Footed Elf; Familar arcane bond (Compsognathus)
traits) Magical Lineage (fireball); Warrior of Old
lvl 1) Improved Initiative
lvl 3) Spell Focus (Evocation)
lvl 5) Additional Traits (Wayang Spellhunter; Unhappy Childhood); Empower Spell/Rime Spell
lvl 7) Spell Specialization (Fireball)
lvl 9) Greater Spell Specialization
This is a pretty simple build, Fireballs are spontaneous and do not require being prepared, and you can cast them empowered. Rime Spell is better as a metamagic rod, and you can apply your Admixture to turn your fireball into an iceball or whatever you wanna call it and entangle all of the enemies that you hit.
Feats to look forward to from here are Dazing Spell at lvl 10, Spell Penetration at lvl 11, Greater Spell Focus at lvl 13, and both Quicken Spell and Spell Perfection at lvl 15, selecting fireball of course.
Master Marshmallow, the errata on Metamagic Rods has changed.
The slot a spell is cast from determines the level of Rod you need. So, you can't use a Lesser MM Rod on an Empowered, Intensified Maximized Fireball cast out of a 9th level slot. You actually need the Greater MM Wand to do so.
:( It still works, its just a more expensive now.
Also, without Sorceror bloodlines to add +/die of damage, your damage is going to fall behind the curve, and then further behind the curve, relative to monster's hit points. That's why you dip crossblood sorc at level 1, and Admixture the rest.
==Aelryinth
Master Marshmallow, the errata on Metamagic Rods has changed.
The slot a spell is cast from determines the level of Rod you need. So, you can't use a Lesser MM Rod on an Empowered, Intensified Maximized Fireball cast out of a 9th level slot. You actually need the Greater MM Wand to do so.
:( It still works, its just a more expensive now.
NOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO OOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO
Also, without Sorceror bloodlines to add +/die of damage, your damage is going to fall behind the curve, and then further behind the curve, relative to monster's hit points. That's why you dip crossblood sorc at level 1, and Admixture the rest.
==Aelryinth
Or just play an Arcanist and not have to multiclass to get both things going on.
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I can only give a couple of advice, you want spells that affect all kind of saves, reflex, fort, will, if possible spells with no saves or spell resistance are preferred. You want at least a couple of force spells to hit Incorporeal creatures for full damage.
The daze spell metamagic feat is worth its weight in gold.
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If you're going the distance take Spell Perfection Delay Blast Fireball. That way when you cast Time Stop, you can drop Empowered DBFs all over the bad guys. If you luck out and get 5 rounds you could potentially drop 10 Empowered DBFs (assuming you have 2 rods of greater quicken). Assuming caster level 20 you could net 800 damage (save for half). That's good enough to kill almost anything.
As for items, don't forget Dweomer Essence. It's a one off item, but it gives you a +5 boost to penetrate SR.
That, plus Spell Pen and Greater Spell Pen is +9 to overcome SR right there.
I'd add being a Tower Elf for the extra +2 versus SR.
So if you have a Rod of Piercing and Dweomer Essence along with the two feats and the race, you have a total of +11 to overcome SR and their SR is treated as 5 lower. At level 10 you can easily bust through SR 27 by rolling a 1.
Just remember Dweomer Essence is a 1 use item, so I'd save it for those enemies with really high SR.
Master Marshmallow, the errata on Metamagic Rods has changed.
The slot a spell is cast from determines the level of Rod you need. So, you can't use a Lesser MM Rod on an Empowered, Intensified Maximized Fireball cast out of a 9th level slot. You actually need the Greater MM Wand to do so.
:( It still works, its just a more expensive now.
==Aelryinth
Could you provide the link to the errata on this? I must have missed it somewhere
If you are willing to use presteige classes bloatmage can be really useful, lots of extra spells per day, and cast off only one slot, there are dissadvantages, but its cool. Go vanilla Aassimar, get the two prereq feats and you qualify at lvl 3 (lvl 1 if you can shinanigans spell focus like pfs craft scroll, or somehow get a bonus feat). Go admixture definitely. Get intensify, varisian tattoo, and spell specialization. Get metamagic adjust on fireball, and get empower, also get more metamagic, cause its fun. Get selective spell when you qualify. also quikened fireball is a fifth level spell with two metamagic adjusts, and you can cast it multiple times off one slot with your blood. Take care of your movement speed though. Wall of text, bah.
My search-fu doth sucketh, but I'm sure someone has the link. I was muchly bummed when I saw it. No more low spell level meta'd spells actually having a benefit!
==Aelryinth
FEATS
Intensify Spell: Increases caster level damage cap +5 to apply to a specific spell. Burning hands goes up to 10d4+20. Magic Missile goes to 7d4+7. Fireball to 15d6, Fire Snake to 20d6+40.
Intensify spell doesn't do anything to Magic Missile. It caps at 5 missiles. The spell's damage isn't level dependent; the number of missiles is level dependent. Intensify spell ups the level dependent dice cap.
The missiles do 1d4+1, or 1d4+2 with the benefit of the orc bloodline. (5d4 +5 or 5d4 +10) The draconic line cannot help, nor can admixture change it to an element type other than force.
Admixture wizard single classed will not do you wrong. If DPS is your only concern (even as a blaster) then I would say go for a Sorcerer.
The wizard offers more versatility and regardless of what Conjurers say, even while specializing in blasting. Again, Fireball is one of your best options.
FEATS
Intensify Spell: Increases caster level damage cap +5 to apply to a specific spell. Burning hands goes up to 10d4+20. Magic Missile goes to 7d4+7. Fireball to 15d6, Fire Snake to 20d6+40.Intensify spell doesn't do anything to Magic Missile. It caps at 5 missiles. The spell's damage isn't level dependent; the number of missiles is level dependent. Intensify spell ups the level dependent dice cap.
The missiles do 1d4+1, or 1d4+2 with the benefit of the orc bloodline. (5d4 +5 or 5d4 +10) The draconic line cannot help, nor can admixture change it to an element type other than force.
This has been argued back and forth, and the general consensus was that the missiles represent dice of damage, and Intensify works fine, with some vociferous nay-sayers. JJ said he didn't have a problem with it. Note that if it was a normal 10 hd spell it would cap at 8 missiles, not 7, but because MM caps at 9th, it loses out.
And if you look at the damage numbers, you'll notice that the non-elemental spells do not have a damage boost from bloodlines. I gave it to Fire Snake because it was the core damage spell involved here, and expected you to apply your own mods to any spell you pick.
==Aelryinth