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There are quite a few spells that always end up "green/blue" on any caster guide, and for good reason:
Obscuring Mist
Glitterdust
Pyrotechnics
Sleet Storm
Stinking Cloud
Black Tentacles
Confusion
Fear
and so on and so fourth. But the number of spells like this that allow you to choose the targets can probably be counted on one hand with fingers left over (Horrid Wilting comes to mind for extremely-high-level play).
So, how do you control the battlefield without also controlling your allies? Sure, if you can take the first action in combat and if the foes are starting totally separated from the allies and if the space you're fighting in is large enough to not be entirely engulfed in the spell effect, then yes it's amazing as a tactic.
But that's a whole lot of "ifs."
Curious about opinions here.
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Tell them its going to blow, if they still want to stand down there, throw it anyway. Its their loss for being stupid. Glitterdust is fairly easily targettable, black tentacles is from ground to 20 ft, so if the casters are flying high enough, we're all dandy.
I generally don't use stinking cloud, sleet storm much, mainly because it screws up visibility. Confusion - eh a little iffy on my list because there's still a 1 in 4 chance they do the right thing.
Fear - don't bother about that paladin, he's immune anyway.
Otherwise, there's something called a metamagic rod of selective spell.
Besides I'm actually fine with some collateral damage.
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For some of the specific examples above.
Obscuring Mist - Goz Mask (see through mist and smoke)
Pyrotechnics - "Everyone! Close your eyes!"
Sleet Storm - Boots of the Winterlands "(The boots enable her to travel at normal speed across the slipperiest ice (horizontal surfaces only, not vertical or sharply slanted ones) without falling or slipping.)"
Stinking Cloud - Necklace of Adaptation or Air Bubble(air bubble subjected to GM ruling)
Black Tentacles - Freedom of movement spell or ring, Liberation Domain Cleric lv 8 Aura
Fear - Paladin, certain spells boost saves on fear, etc.
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I should clarify:
How do you work with spells like these without selfishly asking your entire party to gear specifically for spells that you may or may not actually prepare/cast that day.
Obviously there is gear that offsets such effects, but that's either expensive, or asking the party to give up a "big 6" item, or potentially both.
That's rough. :/
Pyrotechnics - "Everyone! Close your eyes!"
Pretty sure this doesn't work. The Smoke Cloud effect definitely not, but the Fireworks effect requires line of sight, not actual visibility. It'd be a really lenient GM, methinks, who would let that slide (and even if they did, what's to stop the enemy from doing the same as you blatantly call it out?)
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Start by asking your party "what kind of control do you need?"
An archer would prefer enemies to stay put, but visible. Black Tentacles good, Sleet Storm bad.
A melee type might like a steady trickle of enemies coming closer one by one into full attack range, and then falling prone. Sleet Storm then becomes good to dosage enemies coming out of it and to stop enemy archers and casters from hanging back leisurely. Grease is good for melee PCs, bad for PC archers.
I've been in combats where the enemies didn't really have any plan other than "lets spam LOTS of control"; they didn't have anything to follow up on all that control, just more annoying stuff. That didn't work for them; your control needs to serve an actual purpose.
Possibilities include:
- stop enemy casters from viewing and targeting the entire battlefield
- stop enemies from fleeing and getting reinforcements/warnings
- keep enemy melee types away from your squishies
- soften up a difficult enemy so your strikers can hit more reliably
- hamper over-mobile foes so your heavy armor melee types can run them down
- stop multiple enemies from ganging up on a single PC
- help PCs move into a flanking position
- stop enemies from monopolizing flight to gain the advantage
Clearly it will vary depending on
- The terrain; small rooms require different control than big rooms. Both kinds of terrain occur often; don't obsess only about large-area control that you can't use in 5ft corridors.
- Your allies: they have differing problems to fix and advantages to exploit
- The enemy: different enemies require different answers
I think this is why wizards make some of the best controllers; you want lots of different tricks up your sleeve, not lots of one.
I should clarify:
How do you work with spells like these without selfishly asking your entire party to gear specifically for spells that you may or may not actually prepare/cast that day.Obviously there is gear that offsets such effects, but that's either expensive, or asking the party to give up a "big 6" item, or potentially both.
That's rough. :/Pyrotechnics - "Everyone! Close your eyes!"Pretty sure this doesn't work. The Smoke Cloud effect definitely not, but the Fireworks effect requires line of sight, not actual visibility. It'd be a really lenient GM, methinks, who would let that slide (and even if they did, what's to stop the enemy from doing the same as you blatantly call it out?)
Use code words or the message spell.
@OP:Yea, that's why many spells do not get used in our games. It's all good when the stinking cloud makes the enemy nauseated. But if you can't attack it because you don't see the enemy, it doesn't help much.
Well, I ask specifically about battlefield control because other options are either ineffective (blasting), risky (sos/d), or done better by a different class (summoning/buffing).
So what sorts of "small area" control spells are even available?
(As to some are good/bad for archers/melee, most groups [mine certainly] has both, so no matter what, someone's getting screwed. :( ).
A specific though about Grease: How is this a good spell for anyone, honestly, unless your goal is escape? If all goes according to plan, the enemies fall prone in the middle of the spell effect, so archers take a penalty to shoot them and melee can't close without subjecting themselves to the Grease. Seems like a lose/lose situation, no?
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Pyrotechnics - "Everyone! Close your eyes!"Pretty sure this doesn't work. The Smoke Cloud effect definitely not, but the Fireworks effect requires line of sight, not actual visibility. It'd be a really lenient GM, methinks, who would let that slide (and even if they did, what's to stop the enemy from doing the same as you blatantly call it out?)
Well the first thing the GM usually ask if we try the above is, "what language are you shouting that in?".
In PFS, this usually have everyone looking at their list of languages and picking the one most of them knows. (And hopefully one that the enemies don't understands.)
In a homebrew the above reason is why some GMs would advise the party to have a one or a couple of "party languages". Languages that are rare for most npcs, but one that everyone understands or picked up.
Well, I ask specifically about battlefield control because other options are either ineffective (blasting), risky (sos/d), or done better by a different class (summoning/buffing).
So what sorts of "small area" control spells are even available?
(As to some are good/bad for archers/melee, most groups [mine certainly] has both, so no matter what, someone's getting screwed. :( ).A specific though about Grease: How is this a good spell for anyone, honestly, unless your goal is escape? If all goes according to plan, the enemies fall prone in the middle of the spell effect, so archers take a penalty to shoot them and melee can't close without subjecting themselves to the Grease. Seems like a lose/lose situation, no?
Grease + power component flask of acid once won a otherwise hard fight of 2nd level party vs gelatinous cube. The cube moved into the grease and was stuck there because with a Dex of 1 it had a hard time making the acrobatics check. Every round it suffered 1 point of acid damage (not much but the "fight" lasted 10 rounds or so.) The PCs just used their ranged weapons and killed it before it reached their side of the grease.
Special circumstance but it was only the most noteworthy use of grease.
I should clarify:
How do you work with spells like these without selfishly asking your entire party to gear specifically for spells that you may or may not actually prepare/cast that day.Obviously there is gear that offsets such effects, but that's either expensive, or asking the party to give up a "big 6" item, or potentially both.
That's rough. :/
You should also ask the party, "If I WASN'T the one casting those spells, are you gearing up to get past those spells being cast at us?"
If they simply shrug and say, "I'll deal with it later" AND not wanting you to prep those spells because it gets in their way, they're basically liabilities at higher tier because they have no reasonable knowledge of high tier play. You should prep and cast those spells anyways before they get cast on you, cast them on enemies while they're still at a distance and melee party members still needed time to get to them anyways (for concealment spells, maybe single out one or two enemies to not be affected so ranged party members can focus fire on them).
First , boost your initiative. Lets be fair , you should be almost always be going first after you reach a certain level.
If you go first , then you can use large area of effect spells on enemies before anyone else moves.
Second , dont be greedy. Sure you could hit ALL enemies if you also hit your own team , but that might not even be necessary. Just cast spell around your party , sure after they engage that probably means you wont be hitting everyone , but you usually dont have to.
Third , talk to your party. Sometimes "sacrificing" a party member to a debuff to also hit certain targets is the best option. Depending on the person , they might just take it for the team.
A lot of Metagaming is what I encounter. Rogues laugh at AoE, and Paladins can shrug off a lot of effects. At its core, so long as your teammates understand that its nothing personal, then be as effective as you can be with the focus of benefitting the party. If an area needs to be locked down, do it. If it will cause more harm than good to the party, long run or immediate turn then you may choose another course of action. If tentacling the BBEG is what you need to survive, then in character you may have to make the fun RP decision of choosing self versus the ally you may envelop in the effect.
Closing eyes for a fleeting moment on a rehearsed cue that the Players and DM are aware of should be a Free Action that does not provoke AoO for the blinding effects and such.
Same reason why soldiers scream things at each other like "Frag Out," "Gas,Gas, Gas," "Back-blast area, Clear" and "Fire in the Hole". They are alerts drilled where training takes over and appropriate action is taken like everyone in a stack knowing to cup/shield their ears/close their eyes when a flashbang entry is performed in combat.
Ask yourself: Will this hinder the enemy significantly more than it will hinder your party?
Did the party get ambushed with a darkness spell by a group of core rogues with no way to get rid of the darkness. Drop the obscuring mist, and make it hard for everyone.
Is there one high CMD martial in the room with 6 mooks using mobility tactics, drop the black tentacles. It will hinder the enemies more than your ally.
Are you in a scenario in a dwarven complex with structural columns made out of steel:
Those spells aren't really meant to hold all the enemies while you fight them. They are meant to negate SOME enemies for a few rounds while you kill the other enemies.
Example. There are 10 enemy kobolds, 5 archers and 5 melee. Obscuring mist the archers. Now there are 5 enemy melee kobolds for a few rounds, then in a few rounds you'll fight 5 enemy ranged kobolds.
Using the buffing example. Throw down obscuring mist on all the kobolds giving you a few rounds to buff before they come out of the mist.
It's not really meant to throw down on the fighter whose already fighting them. But even then, it'll stop those pesky archers from attacking, so it could be worth the loss of accuracy to not be hit by half of the enemy.