I've been seeing thread after thread about spellcasters in general, or more specifically wizards and them being lack luster in this or that fashion. On a lot of them I've wanted to ask about the role of the "god wizard" as treantmonk has put it and how viable that still is. I see most of the time spell attack and spell damage being talked about, but I've not really had much interest in blasting. In 1e I like playing the witch and wizard primarily for crowd control, debuffing and summoning, as well as occasionally buffing. I know buffing is entirely untouched and still useful as it doesn't require the wizard be mathematically super great, but how does this hold up for save or suck, especially with the incapacitation trait? I've thought of doing a wizard multiclass into witch with the arcane list since I found out the spell attack and DC is not class dependent but tradition dependent, and with how easy it is to get dedication feats this improves the amount of spells you have by 30-40% from 4 up to 6 for some levels. I've also thought about Witch MCD wizard to use evil eye and then use the wizard slots for things that don't require legendary proficiency, like wall of force, fly, haste, invisibility and so on. Some of the main crowd control, or battlefield control if you prefer, spells still seem good, though force cage is noticably weaker in PF2 compared to 5e, however in 5e is breaks the game, so it's unstable.
I guess I'm looking for build advice, what still works, what should be talked to a GM about doing to sure up weaknesses, and so on. I haven't gotten much time to play 2e, I've just DM'd a tiny amount so I greatly appreciate y'all's input
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I've been seeing thread after thread about spellcasters in general, or more specifically wizards and them being lack luster in this or that fashion. On a lot of them I've wanted to ask about the role of the "god wizard" as treantmonk has put it and how viable that still is.
The "god" part is definitely over. Wizards are still good, but they're not gods anymore.
I see most of the time spell attack and spell damage being talked about, but I've not really had much interest in blasting. In 1e I like playing the witch and wizard primarily for crowd control, debuffing and summoning, as well as occasionally buffing. I know buffing is entirely untouched and still useful as it doesn't require the wizard be mathematically super great,
Actually buffing for wizards was also significantly reduced. Buffing for everyone in the whole game is drastically reduced. Your standard numbers are closer to "good enough" and you can't spike them much more above them. This game has a lot less of "we have to hurry through this dungeon because my 10m/level buffs are running out", and also a lot less "I need Herolab to track my ten different buffs".
but how does this hold up for save or suck, especially with the incapacitation trait?
Save or suck is still very much alive, but you have to recalibrate your definition of "suck". In second edition, inflicting a -2 on an enemy, for example by landing a Fear spell, very much hurts them. A -1 in second edition is worth a lot more than it was in 1E.
Incapacitation is a tricky thing. The main thing to understand about it is, that you don't get to punk bosses with cheap spells. In fact, you very rarely get to punk a boss with a single spell, even your best one.
You can however use your best spells to punk a lieutenant, giving the rest of your party a lot more freedom to work on the boss without distraction. Or use your second-best spells to clear away some mooks.
Sub-maximum monsters in second edition are kind of glass cannons: they can still hit hard, but they're also easier to attack. So the traditional tactic of focus fire everything on the boss is often not the best tactic anymore, because that means taking a lot of hits from mooks. And this is where incapacitation spells can help.
I've thought of doing a wizard multiclass into witch with the arcane list since I found out the spell attack and DC is not class dependent but tradition dependent, and with how easy it is to get dedication feats this improves the amount of spells you have by 30-40% from 4 up to 6 for some levels. I've also thought about Witch MCD wizard to use evil eye and then use the wizard slots for things that don't require legendary proficiency, like wall of force, fly, haste, invisibility and so on. Some of the main crowd control, or battlefield control if you prefer, spells still seem good, though force cage is noticably weaker in PF2 compared to 5e, however in 5e is breaks the game, so it's unstable.
I guess I'm looking for build advice, what still works, what should be talked to a GM about doing to sure up weaknesses, and so on. I haven't gotten much time to play 2e, I've just DM'd a tiny amount so I greatly appreciate y'all's input
Don't expect to be a god, but a wizard can still be very useful to a party. Especially since you really don't have to choose between being a controller or blaster; you can be a bit of both because you mostly need the same things to be good at them.
A key thing to embrace as any caster is being flexible in your approach. This isn't the same as "your class is flexible" (it is); the message is "YOU need to be flexible". Sometimes blasting mooks is the most effective way to control the battlefield. Sometimes making the fighter fly so he can chase the flying demon is the best move. As a wizard you have a lot of options, and the best way to be a strong wizard is to always keep your eyes open for which tool is best for that situation. Don't always try to use the same hammer on anything that you hope is a nail.
but how does this hold up for save or suck, especially with the incapacitation trait?Save or suck is still very much alive, but you have to recalibrate your definition of "suck". In second edition, inflicting a -2 on an enemy, for example by landing a Fear spell, very much hurts them. A -1 in second edition is worth a lot more than it was in 1E.
Incapacitation is a tricky thing. The main thing to understand about it is, that you don't get to punk bosses with cheap spells. In fact, you very rarely get to punk a boss with a single spell, even your best one.
You can however use your best spells to punk a lieutenant, giving the rest of your party a lot more freedom to work on the boss without distraction.
Also keep in my that save or suck spells come in various degrees, not all of which are labelled incap.
I have yet to determine by what meter incap traits have been assigned to the individual spells but it seems like many spells that have a potentially "encounter ending" failure effect have been labelled a incap spell, however most of the spells that really do help end encounters nowadays are those that have noticable success effect.
So considering the usually good chance of succeding a save a BBEG - if given the choice - might rather save versus a Blindness spell once, and then be immune for 1 min, rather than having its action economy perma crippled by a Sorcerer or Wizard using Hideous Laughter and/or Slow.
Thanks for the answers, I know I was looking through the spells and there are a few like Maze that have no save and take an opponent out for at least one turn I'm wondering how effective that will be
Also point of clarification when I say "god wizard" I am referring to a role not a power level. The idea is that ancient gods, lower case, provided tools to heroes so that they could win. Effectively that's the role I felt wizards were most potent in the previous edition, and even in 5e. My hope is that this role is still viable especially for battlefield control, which it seems like it might be which is promising and I'm glad to hear it. I wonder though if the wizard is still the best class for the role and what might be good build avenues to make this happen
Well, the god wizard of olde had a few tricks up its sleeve: buffing, battlefield control, debuffing, utility and summoning.
As far as 2nd ed go:
- Summoning is kind of awful and won't get you anywhere, even if you spec heavily into it.
- Buffs are few and far between and they're less powerful than before - but then, the math is tighter than in 1ed, and every little bit counts. You cannot layer buffs, but some are still pretty efficient. You'll have to wait a long time to get enhanced version of those buffs in order to affect your whole team, though. For instance, heightened haste is a 7th level spell.
- Battlefield control is still there, with walls and difficult terrain and repositioning. However, the three-action system of PF2 makes it so moving is less painful than before. Losing your third action to get out of a zone or circumvent a wall is an acceptable trade-off, while in PF1 losing your full attack was more painful.
So, you might say "ok, the god wizard is screwed". Not quite. You still get utility and debuffing.
One thesis makes the wizard the ultimate batman. Take 10 minutes and memorize any spell from your spellbook. No more waiting a whole day, now you can prep banishmen or fly or resist fire or invisibility in a pinch.
As for debuffing, it's actually very effective in PF2, even more so than PF1. Sure, some spells have an incapacitation tag, but 1) that's only relevant against boss monsters and 2) a lot of great spells have no incapacitation. The fact that they have an effect on save makes it much, much more powerful than in PF1.
Take slow for instance. On a failure, mob loses 1/3 of his action for a whole minute. On a success, he still loses 1 action next round. And no incapacitation tag. That's a real killer on a boss. Same with fear. Dominate stuns 1 even on a successful save.
But here's the bad news: the occult spell list is more suited to debuffing than the arcane one. Some gems like synesthesia are so powerful that they can turn whole encounters around. Arcana's real strong suit come from Power Words, which are very late in the game.
So, if you really want to be a buffer/debuffer, play a bard or an occult sorcerer.
The wizard's now a jack of all trade, master of none.
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Debuff specialist Wizards definitely work, and have some very cool and even encounter ending spells that lack the Incapacitation trait (Baleful Polymorph lacks that trait, for example), as well as very good debuffs such as Slow or, as you note, Maze. Buff spells like Haste are also both good and available.
An important thing to bear in mind in that regard is that, at least for pure numerical debuffs, Bards and other Occult casters tend to do better than Arcane casters, so if you want to do this as a Wizard, you're gonna want to take advantage of the areas they're better at than that list, most notably area damage spells. Area damage spells are actually excellent mook killers this edition, even at several levels below max, due to mooks tending to crit fail vs. them a lot, so this isn't exactly a hardship, but it's a departure from pure 'God' style play, and one that will benefit you to bear in mind.
I'm going to have to go back over the spells. Because synesthesia to me looks like a spell i would pass on because it hits a single target, but if it's common that spells like that are now single target up to that spell level, well, that's going to greatly impact how I judge the quality of a spell. Generally I would skip on single target CC like hold person, or in this case the cc+debuffs that is synesthesia, because an area CC even at 50% or 60% success rate, which it looks like most spells have vs will and reflex DCs for level appropriate enemies, will result in at least some of the enemies being stopped and will help keep your allies alive by filtering out enemies. Also, do you GMs not allow you to make walls into domes? RAW doesn't prevent this afaik. One strategy is to encompass enemies in a wall of force so that they are locked off from your allies while they deal with other enemies or what have you
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Synesthesia is amazing for two basic reasons:
-It lacks the Incapacitation Trait. This makes it work on bosses, and bosses of significantly higher than PC level are the most dangerous foes in PF2's system, much more dangerous than their XP level in minions IME.
-Even on a successful Save, the victim is at -3 AC for a full turn, as well as suffering other penalties. -3 AC for a turn is an insane debuff to be inflicting on people and well worth the action investment, and that's if they succeed. If they fail? It's a full minute.
Synesthesia is amazing for two basic reasons:
-It lacks the Incapacitation Trait. This makes it work on bosses, and bosses of significantly higher than PC level are the most dangerous foes in PF2's system, much more dangerous than their XP level in minions IME.
-Even on a successful Save, the victim is at -3 AC for a full turn, as well as suffering other penalties. -3 AC for a turn is an insane debuff to be inflicting on people and well worth the action investment, and that's if they succeed. If they fail? It's a full minute.
Fair enough, I guess if you can use a fifth level slot, and not a valuable slot of higher level, for a boss, then it's a decent trade off even with the 60% or so regular success rate I saw for most boss type enemies of equal level(though some have worse will saves ofc)
Fair enough, I guess if you can use a fifth level slot, and not a valuable slot of higher level, for a boss, then it's a decent trade off even with the 60% or so regular success rate I saw for most boss type enemies of equal level(though some have worse will saves ofc)Synesthesia is amazing for two basic reasons:
-It lacks the Incapacitation Trait. This makes it work on bosses, and bosses of significantly higher than PC level are the most dangerous foes in PF2's system, much more dangerous than their XP level in minions IME.
-Even on a successful Save, the victim is at -3 AC for a full turn, as well as suffering other penalties. -3 AC for a turn is an insane debuff to be inflicting on people and well worth the action investment, and that's if they succeed. If they fail? It's a full minute.
Well, that's the thing: like we said, most spells have the same effect on a save, only for a shorter time.
In PF1, casting hold monster on a boss was a coin toss. Either he succeeded his saving throw and you lost your turn, or he failed and fight was basically over.
In 5ed, casting hold monster on a boss was an exercice in frustration because of legendary saves. Either you have a team built around abusing it and throwing debuff after debuff, or it just won't land.
Now, no matter how powerful the boss is, no matter how magic resistant, you can GUARANTEE at least one round of synesthesia-galore on your martials. Or you can GUARANTEE he'll get badly hurt by spellwrack. Or you can GUARANTEE he'll lose an action to slow - and since he's a boss, his actions are much more valuable than yours, so it's an incredible trade. And don't get me started on things like uncontrollable dance.
So, when casting a spell on a boss, always assume he'll succeed on his save and see whether the debuff is hefty enough to warrant casting it. If he succeeds, well, you debuffed him hard anyway. And if he failed... well, congrats, fight's probably over.
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I think there's a bit of unclear/non-universal terminology here. What is "Boss type enemies of equal level" supposed to mean? Being higher level than the PCs is a pretty major part of being a boss-level threat to the party.
Per the encounter building rules, an on-level enemy is "Any standard creature or low-threat boss"
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Fair enough, I guess if you can use a fifth level slot, and not a valuable slot of higher level, for a boss, then it's a decent trade off even with the 60% or so regular success rate I saw for most boss type enemies of equal level(though some have worse will saves ofc)
Even at +3 levels, enemy Saves aren't quite this good. A Moderate Will Save at level 23 is +37. An optimized 20th level PC's Save DC is 45. That's a 5% Crit Failure, 30% Failure, 55% Success, 10% Critical Success.
That's a 90% chance that you hit it for some effect, and that's without anything lowering its Will Save (and there are several things that can do so...a +38 Diplomacy and Bon Mot make for real good odds of an extra -2 on that Will Save, for example).
And even the one turn 'successful save' effect on Synesthesia is something absurd like a 50% buff in DPR for the whole PC group other than the person who cast the debuff. -3 AC is insane.
This is actually pretty fundamental to using debuffs on bosses: They are going to succeed at most Saves...if you pick the right debuffs, the effects they have on a Success will still screw the boss over pretty hard. Synesthesia is sort of an extreme example of that fact, but hardly the only one, and Slow is another good example of this.
I'd say 3 things:
- Don't disregard damaging spells. I'm mostly inimpressed by other spells. Control, buff and debuff spells are no more winning fights. They are winning specific fights with specific parties. But in most combats, they'll prove themselves weak. Wizard is, in my opinion, a blaster in combat the same way most classes are mostly dealing damage in combat.
- Try to assess the length of your adventuring days (ask your GM if you don't know). Some options, like Spell Blender Specialist, have more high level spells. If your DM likes multiple fights per day, it will be important to choose such options and forget about versatility.
- If you really value versatility, you should check the Arcane Sorcerer. Wizard is no more the versatile class, Sorcerer is. If you're leaning towards options like Spell Substitution and Generalist, you should really consider playing a Sorcerer instead.
Here's a small story of my last session:
I recently got close to a campaign-ending boss fight with my level 9 Wizard. Before we could storm his final bastion we had to take down his personal guard: A huge Evil Orc Champion and his two large skeleton buddies.
Orc won initiative, hit the wild druid twice and raised his shield. Our Fighter goes, but can't connect because the Orc's AC was too high with the shield.
I was next and noticed that all three enemies were lined up perfectly. So I Stride into position and unleash a 5th level lightning bolt. Orc makes his save and blocks the remaining damage with his blue dragon scale shield. Both skeletons crit fail their save and crumble to ash. Tunrs out killing things is still a good way to "control" the fight.
Our Wild Druid goes and also fails to connect with any attack. That raised shield is becoming a real problem. Next round, the Orc hits the fighter and Raises his Shield - again.
Since I knew the real boss fight was still coming up, I decided to not blow more of my highst level spells. I cast Slow, Orc fails his save. He still wants to attack twice per turn, but he's slowed 1 now - that means his shield is no longer an issue. Our melee guys finally start hitting him.
Next turn, I cast Glitterdust. Orc fails his save again and is dazzled. This protects our low HP fighter from a nasty crit which just whiffs completely. Turn after that, I cast Grease on the Orc's weapon. And he's nice enough to CritFail his save, leaving him without a weapon. He now has to spend one action to pick up his weapon and then swings once with a -2 penalty (which causes him to miss the druid). He doesn't get another turn because the melee guys make short work of him.
Bottom line: I'm positive I was the MVP in that fight by a large margin. I didn't deal a single point of damage to the Orc but without me the fight would most likely have gone downhill VERY fast.
By the way, in the final boss fight, I locked a high threat, low damage target (some Mummy) into a resilient sphere, taking it out of the fight for like 4 rounds. By the time it got free, the fight was basically over and none of us was frightened by its aura or had to spend potentially multiple turns to kill it.
So yeah, depending on your approach, a God Wizard is very much still possible. Just no longer as world-shattering as in PF1.
So yeah, depending on your approach, a God Wizard is very much still possible. Just no longer as world-shattering as in PF1.
Good to hear. If a wizard can't fulfill the roll of being the ultimate support similar to that, frankly it's just not a wizard. I don't care for a blasting focus and if it was or is the case that this is what the wizard ended up best and and paizo designed them for, I'd ditch what used to be my favorite class entirely to be very blunt about it
. In 1e I like playing the witch and wizard primarily for crowd control, debuffing and summoning, as well as occasionally buffing.Rather off-topic, but, there was a witch class in 1e? I don't remember there being one.
As of the 1e APG... the Witch (1e)
I've found the damage spells to be very weak on Wizard. Almost always feels like they should have tried a debuff or other disrupting spell instead. When the enemy has an elemental weakness, cantrips are preferred since the extra damage is flat.
Have a campaign where 2 of my players have started spamming Lightning Bolt and it does like 20-30 from the 4d12. Enemies save almost as much as they fail the save, at which point it's a light breeze for most enemies. Granted, I try not to use mooks that are lower than party level -2 because they're just a waste of precious session time most of the time. You kill them to speed things up and clog the battlefield and not because they pose any threat. Need some scenarios where you fight 10x lv-3 or -4 enemies for them to all crit fail and get obliterated.
Might as well use something like Glitterdust or the multi-target fear most of the time. Those really get the job done against most enemies.
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I've found the damage spells to be very weak on Wizard. Almost always feels like they should have tried a debuff or other disrupting spell instead. When the enemy has an elemental weakness, cantrips are preferred since the extra damage is flat.
It's quite the the opposite in my experience. I've often hurt bosses while still damaging/killing their henchmen with area spells. Even my single target spells have dealt significant damage, you just need to be willing to invest the resources. I used a max level level 3-action magic missile to finish of a wounded, but hard to hit boss. Another time, I opened combat with True Strike + Acid Arrow and just watched the boss melt because he didn't manage to make his save.
I wouldn't call a Wizard's damage outstanding or anything, but it does get the job done well enough.
I will say that I did have Dangerous Sorcery via Multiclassing. But honestly, I forgot to add that damage like 80% of the time. My party also lacked any real damage dealer so that might influence my perspective a bit.
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I feel like blasting got a lot better in this edition. You no longer need to do very specific builds to get your damage and save DCs above the normal wizard baselines to make it work, monsters have fewer immunities and resistances, and more weaknesses.
While magical blasting doesn't have the single-target power that a melee fighter does, it has some important advantages over it:
- Range; spells certainly compete with archery. A melee fighter who moves to confront the left enemy is leaving the path free for the right enemy, and if he wants to chase that one down next round, he's spending movement again. The wizard doesn't have to move to enemies, can move to a safe spot and still blast.
- Versatile damage types; avoid resistances and exploit weaknesses
- Multiple targets; mooks are glass cannons in this edition, to the point where taking out the mooks before focusing on the boss is often the strongest tactic now.
In PFS in particular, the tendency is to scale fights for large player parties by adding more enemies, and that makes blasting more valuable. Fireball is much better in this edition than it was before.
The typical teamwork is that the wizard ensures the fighter has his hands free to focus on the main monster, instead of getting flanked and shredded by mooks. And the fighter cracks the tough boss' AC.
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Have a campaign where 2 of my players have started spamming Lightning Bolt and it does like 20-30 from the 4d12. Enemies save almost as much as they fail the save, at which point it's a light breeze for most enemies.
And what are your martials doing? Fanning the enemies? Because they will hardly go over 30 points of damage at level 5, some won't even do it on a critical hit.
In my opinion, this is more a question of expectations than a question of efficiency. My Angelic Sorcerer is often the top damage dealer of its parties (PFS, so I change parties a lot) and for me it's enough. I don't need to outdamage others 2 to 1 to feel strong.
In my opinion, this is more a question of expectations than a question of efficiency. My Angelic Sorcerer is often the top damage dealer of its parties (PFS, so I change parties a lot) and for me it's enough. I don't need to outdamage others 2 to 1 to feel strong.
As an aside, what damaging spells are you using as an angelic sorcerer ? The divine list seemed sorely lacking blast-wise, until at least level 10.
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Divine Smite is pretty good in practice, because you can fairly safely drop it in the middle of your allies. It doesn't do quite as much damage as a fireball, but if you make a couple of enemies Sickened to soften them up for your martial allies, that can actually be a bigger contribution.
It's become a favorite spell for my cleric, I've been really surprised by how good it is.
As an aside, what damaging spells are you using as an angelic sorcerer ? The divine list seemed sorely lacking blast-wise, until at least level 10.
In my opinion, this is more a question of expectations than a question of efficiency. My Angelic Sorcerer is often the top damage dealer of its parties (PFS, so I change parties a lot) and for me it's enough. I don't need to outdamage others 2 to 1 to feel strong.
I'm getting spells a bit from every spell lists. As Deadman said, I got Fireball from Sarenrae, but also True Strike from Adaptive Adept (True Striked Searing Light scares undeads and fiends alike). Fireball is massive. You just need 3 enemies to see the damage rolling, and when you have more than that (or weak enemies, fire weakness seems the most common from what I've seen, outside good weakness of course) you really deal tremendous amounts of damage.
I'm getting to level 7, so I haven't had the occasion to try Divine Smite but I expect a lot of it.
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The key here is that mechanics have changed from 1e and the math is tighter. Take some time, learn how the system works, and then parse through the spell list(s). After learning the mechanics you should be able to understand the ways to make most spells contribute, ignore some others, and cherish the really good ones. Spells are no longer the point, click, win they once were. Now, you need to be smart and strategic. Wizards can still be great (despite what some threads may lead you to believe), you have to adjust your expectaions from other systems.
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Summoning isn’t awful, but you really need to look through the lists to get something good. Animate Dead (Bone Croupier) is the most powerful option by far, but isn’t PFS legal, will likely never be and your DM might not even allow it (it’s printed in an AP so should be uncommon, but it isn’t). Summon animal provides some good utility as well, Giant Ant, Elephant, Roc are all great. Summon construct has a couple - Animated Broom and Living Graffiti. Elemental and Dragon are mostly worthless until very high levels, and even then aren’t that great.
The average case summon is really bad, however. You can’t put your finger down on a random level appropriate bestiary monster and expect it to be good. You need to know exactly what abilities you want.
God wizard is still alive and well. Plenty of good buffs and debuffs on the arcane list still - invis (4th) is spectacular, haste is still decent, slow is good, resilient sphere is solid when you get it all the way up until about 14th. The key is choosing the right mix of spells. Single target debuffs with strong success effects are good against bosses. Multi target debuffs with better failure effects are good against mooks, as are blasts.
Though if you want to focus purely on buffs and debuffs, arcane probably isn’t the right list - Occult would be much better suited.