Like others already said, electric arc really is too good to pass up. The only drawback is that most opponents at low level are unusually nimble (kobolds, goblins and the like all have high ref save) but even so, electric arc should be your go-to damage cantrip.
As for your spell selection, I'm all for AC and +1 can make a big difference in PF2, but Mage Armor is still a waste when you're strapped for slots (and is probably a waste anyway since the heightened version follow the cash progression).
Good first level spells when you're first level are:
- Magic Weapon. The best bang for your buck when cast on a friendly melee (especially one using a two-hander), but not everyone likes to be a buffbot so your mileage may vary.
- Magic Missile. Using three actions, it's 3d4+3 automatic damage, or 10,5, which on a boss/high AC opponent is probably more than the average damage of a martial in a round. Plus the ability to split damage if needed.
- Fear. It's a bit lackluster because you can only have one target and the real bonus is the fact that it's still useful later in your career, but it's still a great boss spell since it has a great effect on a save. Not every group has someone who can demoralize and even then, it's iffy on a boss. Not so with fear, where he'll at least be frightened 1 and maybe 2 if you're lucky.
- Grease. A great friendly prone AOE with a bit of area denial.
- Color Spray. It'll lose steam quickly and needs some positioning but it will ruin the day of any non-boss. However, at low level, killing monsters can be quicker than incapacitate them so it really depends on who you'll be fighting.
I actually have electric arc in his spell book already. I did think about Magic Weapon and Magic Missile, but didn't choose them. I'll go back and take another look. Didn't even think about Grease, but yeah. I got a lot of use out of that in the Kingmaker CRPG, and should have looked for it. :-)
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@Nik, well, yeah. And maybe I'm just looking at it wrong, especially considering I really like Harnmaster, where everything is a skill, and if you don't spend downtime on keeping your skills up, they'll degrade. And there are no hit points. Instead you get graphic wounds (serious cut to the right upper arm, for example) that come with "injury points", and healing the wound involves reducing the number of injury points to zero, usually at a rate of about one per day (a serious injury would have 1d10+10 injury points). Also, if you do certain things (like combat) any injury points you've already accumulated reduced your skill at whatever it is you're doing.
Anyway, Harnmaster, however much it appeals to me, ain't Pathfinder, and it's not for everyone, I know. :-)
As for your spell selection, I'm all for AC and +1 can make a big difference in PF2, but Mage Armor is still a waste when you're strapped for slots (and is probably a waste anyway since the heightened version follow the cash progression).
Yep. If you spend a large portion of your slots for +1 to AC, then what is the wizard doing adventuring? They have to contribute offensively or to the party as a whole or the wizard is a waste of space. At least until character level 3 when you have a lot more slots, mage armor is an expensive use of your resources.
Train light armour and use that for a few levels if you are concerned, but really you should trust your party to protect you.
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I'd rather "waste" a spell slot than a feat. Besides, one slot is only a large portion of your slots at low levels. It's not like you have to prepare six slots worth of Mage Armor every day. One is plenty.
Hm. At first level it's 1/3 of the slots. At second level, it's 1/4. Hardly a large portion.
Now, if you want to argue that a first level wizard would do better to try to stay out of the sights or reach of the enemy than to add a paltry +1 to his abysmally low armor class, I'd say you might have a point. :-)
Made some changes. How's this look?
Wizkid
Male human enchanter 1 Lost Omens Gods & Magic
NG, Medium, Human, Humanoid
Perception +4
Languages Common, Draconic, Dwarven, Elven, Goblin, Halfling
Skills Acrobatics +6, Arcana +7, Crafting +7, Diplomacy +3, Dragon Lore +7, Medicine +4, Nature +4, Occultism +7, Religion +4, Society +7, Stealth +6, Survival +4, Thievery +6
Str 10 (+0), Dex 16 (+3), Con 12 (+1), Int 18 (+4), Wis 12 (+1), Cha 10 (+0)
Other Items explorer’s clothing, dagger, backpack, bandolier, basic crafter's book, bedroll, belt pouch, belt pouch, chalks (10), enchantments and things, extra ink and paper writing set, flint and steel, healer's tools, material component pouch, ordinary clothing, rations (1 week)s (2), replacement picks thieves' toolss (2), rope (foot)s (50), soap, thieves' tools, torchs (5), waterskin, writing set, purse (4 gp; 5 sp; 10 cp)
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AC 16; Fort +4; Ref +6; Will +6
HP 15 Focus Points 1 Hero Points 1
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Speed 25 feet
Melee [1] dagger +6 (versatile Slsh, thrown 10 ft., agile, finesse), Damage 1d4 Pier
Ranged [1] dagger +6 (versatile Slsh, thrown 10 ft., agile, finesse), Damage 1d4 Pier
Arcane Wizard Spells DC 17; 1st fear, grease, magic missile Cantrips (1st) daze, detect magic, electric arc, light, mage hand, shield
Focus Spells 1 Focus Point, DC 17; 1st Charming Words
Feats Natural Skill, Skill Training
Other Abilities arcane bond, arcane schools, arcane spellcasting, arcane thesis, drain bonded item, enchantment, spell blending, spellbook
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This is a test character. Do these notes get printed on the character sheet? No, but they do get printed on the stat block.
Hero Lab and the Hero Lab logo are Registered Trademarks of LWD Technology, Inc. Free download at https://www.wolflair.com
Pathfinder and associated marks and logos are trademarks of Paizo Inc., and are used under license.
Maybe I should try a spell blending illusionist too. :-)
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If you enjoy the enchanter/Illusionist build, I get a ton of usage out of the ventriloquism spell, both as a first, and then eventually second level spell. Its duration and lack of a sustain make it incredibly useful compared to most other illusion/distraction spells. I would also highly, highly recommend picking up deception as a skill (even with a CHA of 10) if your plan is to use spells to deceive or manipulate enemies, unless you have talked to the GM and they made it clear they would be allowed to use arcana or anther skill explicitly when trying to deceive with magic. I find most GMs are more likely to ask for a deception check, perhaps with a bonus, rather than substitute a skill.
^Not really a necro as long as the guide continues to be maintained (and it seems to have been last updated in November 2020, so that's not TOO long ago, although some stuff has been released since then).
Just make sure you and your GM are on the same page about which kind of spells can go in up-converted spell slots when the parent slots were of different types, since the Rules As Written left this out, potentially opening up some exploits that some GMs may consider undesirable when they realize that such things are possible.
So, I was reading this guide and I'm pretty sure I've spotted a pretty big error... maybe some one else has noticed this? Let me explain first by quoting the text of the CRB:
"When you make your daily preparations, you can trade two spell slots of the same level for a bonus spell slot of up to 2 levels higher than the traded spell slots. You can exchange as many spell slots as you have available. Bonus spell slots must be of a level you can normally cast, and each bonus spell slot must be of a different spell level. You can also trade any spell slot for two additional cantrips, though you cannot trade more than one spell slot at a time for additional cantrips in this way."
So even though you can "...exchange as many spell slots as you have available" it doesn't let you gain more than one bonus spell slot to any given level.
Blue_frog gives this example in his guide:
"But wait, it gets better. At level 7 onwards, you can use spell blending once again and the discrepancy only grows.
A level 8 wizard has:
- 2x level 1 spells
- 2x level 2 spells
- 5x level 3 spells.
- 6x level 4 spells
From now on, you’ll consistently get 3 more top level spells and 2 more top-1 level spells over anyone but a sorcerer. And you’ll still get 2 more top level spells than they do."
This is clearly not possible. An 8th level specialist wizard would have a total of 4 spell slots for their 4th level spells. Since, as per the text, you can't get more than 1 bonus spell per spell level.
The 'spell math' could, however, actually look like these:
Normal 8th Level Wizard
1st level x4 (3 base + 1 specialist) = 4
2nd level x4 (3 base + 1 specialist) = 4
3rd level x4 (3 base + 1 specialist) = 4
4th level x4 (3 base + 1 specialist) = 4
Spell Blending 8th Level Wizard
1st level x2 (3 base + 1 specialist) -2 spell blending = 2
2nd level x2 (3 base + 1 specialist) -2 spell blending = 2
3rd level x5 (3 base + 1 specialist) +1 spell blending = 5
4th level x5 (3 base + 1 specialist) +1 spell blending = 5
1st level x0 (3 base + 1 specialist) -4 spell blending = 0
2nd level x3 (3 base + 1 specialist) -2 + 1 spell blending = 3
3rd level x5 (3 base + 1 specialist) +1 spell blending = 5
4th level x5 (3 base + 1 specialist) +1 spell blending = 5
However, it's never possible to get more than +1 bonus spell to any spell level, as explicitly stated by the rules.
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He's not getting another bonus spell. He just assume you're using your arcane bond tp regain a max level slot each day (because why wouldn't you?). That's why he lists 6 slots at Max level.
I note with interest that the distribution above looks similar to the Wave slots of Summoner and Magus. At least, that is how I understand it.
Unless I missed something completely, they were still referring to both classes as 4-slot-casters during the recent PaizoCon. So like in the playtest they'll have a maximum of 2 spell slots for their two highest levels and nothing below that.
That's the baseline, anyway. At least the Magus seems to get some additional lower level slots from some class feature, but thos slots are very specifically limited to a small selection of spells.
Still an insurmountable gap between them and a spell blender. Let's hope their martial abilities make up for it.
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Cool guide, learned some new things. So is Shocking Grasp not worth getting even with Reach Spell metamagic due to having to make that difficult Spell Attack roll?
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Good guide. A couple notes.
1. While you rightly laude the spell subsistution thesis as the king of out of combat utility, it also lets you prepare combat spells in all your slots without sacrificing that utility.
2. Gimp is considered an ableist term IIRC. Might want to switch it with nerf or something.
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I'm not quite sure why that's relevant. As you say, context does matter, Ed - GIMP (the program) is an acronym for GNU Image Manipulation Program and has nothing to do with the topic of conversation at hand. Saying something that you 'gimp yourself' by taking a sub-optimal choice is part of an ongoing issue of describing someone with a physical disability as inherently worse. Captain Morgan simply seems to be pointing out that this implication is not the intent of most people using the phrase, and that they might wish to alter that phrasing if it's not the intent. It certainly seems like Captain Morgan isn't the one taking this out of context.
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If I take a severe permanent injury, I am worse. If I lose a leg, my unaided mobility is going to plummet, in addition to all the other ways that it will make me less capable.
That said, there's no call to mock people for it. That's just being rude and mean-spirited for no reason, and we should be better than that. To my ears, "gimp" has always had an air of mockery about it, and I suspect that if each of you thinks about it, you'll find the same. So maybe we shouldn't use that particular word.
In general, "nerf" is a better pick overall.
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Saying people with physical handicaps, such as myself, have been nerfed in life doesn't sound any better to me. I for one certainly wouldn't receive it well if someone used either term regarding my disability.
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Saying people with physical handicaps, such as myself, have been nerfed in life doesn't sound any better to me. I for one certainly wouldn't receive it well if someone used either term regarding my disability.
No one is saying they should RD. We are saying that nerf could be used when discussing game optimization specifically because it has nothing to do with disabilities.
Look, I know some of you have a visceral reaction anytime a modicum of political correctness is suggested, but try to follow the point being made here.
Good to have some free guide to spell-blending wizardly types out there for PF2e, Blue_frog. ;)