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I do not believe there is as large a consensus that wizards are broken and need fixing. No one will complain about additional feats, and maybe additional theses, but I am over the moon any time I join a table and they need a caster, and will always choose to fill that role with the wizard unless the other players feel that doesn't fit the vibe of the game. Like I have some fun sorcerer ideas, but I would rather actually be playing a wizard in game than a sorcerer almost every time because I love prepared casting from the arcane list and I want as many spell slots as possible and as much flexibility with those slots as I can manage.
The wizard hits this exact itch perfectly in PF2 and while it has some less used options, My Cosmos Oracle that is stuck with spray of stars and then either shadow cloak or moonbeam as their focus spells, which they trade away spell slots to get only ends up using any focus spells in about 30 to 40% of encounters. It will get better as I take more options with feats later on, but the basic chassis is fun, and playable, but not at all equipped with easy to use focus spells, and the need of the oracle to play healer is so intense that there are few rounds where casting anything other than heal is anywhere close to an optimal use of actions.
In that regard it ends up feeling a lot like the bard, where I have useful things to do every round, but they are incredibly predicable, rarely tactically engaged in the encounter, and repetitive.
The wizard is not any of those things, and that is why it is my favorite class in the game.
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I do not believe there is as large a consensus that wizards are broken and need fixing. No one will complain about additional feats, and maybe additional theses, but I am over the moon any time I join a table and they need a caster, and will always choose to fill that role with the wizard unless the other players feel that doesn't fit the vibe of the game. Like I have some fun sorcerer ideas, but I would rather actually be playing a wizard in game than a sorcerer almost every time because I love prepared casting from the arcane list and I want as many spell slots as possible and as much flexibility with those slots as I can manage.
The wizard hits this exact itch perfectly in PF2 and while it has some less used options, My Cosmos Oracle that is stuck with spray of stars and then either shadow cloak or moonbeam as their focus spells, which they trade away spell slots to get only ends up using any focus spells in about 30 to 40% of encounters. It will get better as I take more options with feats later on, but the basic chassis is fun, and playable, but not at all equipped with easy to use focus spells, and the need of the oracle to play healer is so intense that there are few rounds where casting anything other than heal is anywhere close to an optimal use of actions.
In that regard it ends up feeling a lot like the bard, where I have useful things to do every round, but they are incredibly predicable, rarely tactically engaged in the encounter, and repetitive.
The wizard is not any of those things, and that is why it is my favorite class in the game.
The schools still provably are not up to par.
The only wizard thesis with the versatility you are discussing during play is the Spell Substitution thesis.
Do you really think that Spell Substitution and being able to change spells in 10 minutes is the only reason someone plays a wizard?
You have to look at the overall class and every aspect of it, not just one narrow aspect.
Is playing an evoker for you interesting? Is playing an enchantment school wizard interesting?
Or is the only worthwhile build option a Universalist with Spell Substitution?
When I'm talking rework, you don't get rid of what is decent like a Universalist Spell Substitution Wizard which is probably their current best build. I've played one of those and that is probably the best wizard build.
But I'd like to be able to play a Metamagic Experimentation Evoker wizard as well and feel just as potent or at least have as much fun. Or a conjuration wizard and enjoy myself feeling like my focus spells work well with the build.
So when you analyze a class, you look at what the effective build options are and how they work.
Also I have enormous problems believing your opinion is the majority as well. I used to have a wizard in nearly every campaign of every edition of D&D dating back to the little red book and up through 5E and PF1. PF2 is the first edition where my usual wizard players hate the class including myself. I have never had an edition of D&D where the wizard was so disliked and avoided as I have seen in PF2.
For me, that is pretty disappointing. I have trouble believing long-term wizard players across editions are happy with the PF2 wizard. I want to be sure to make this clear: plenty of my PF2 players like other caster classes. They just dislike the wizard immensely and avoid after having tried multiple times to make worthwhile wizards. The always give up because they are always overshadowed or reach a point of frustration where the class doesn't feel worth it.
I know my group focuses almost solely on combat effectiveness. Wizard combat effectiveness is one of the worst of all the classes in the game. This is the first edition of a D&D-like game where that has been the case. My group won't touch that class any more. I wish the witch and wizard would get reworked to make them better in combat with their class chassis abilities and feat builds.
I have played many wizard characters.
I have used the meta magic thesis, the spell substitution thesis and the Spell blending thesis. Familiars were not a part of the wizard fantasy for me to begin with so I had no interest in that one and The staff one is interesting, but cannot really compete with spell blending and spell substitution, which are my favorite.
Each of those 2 play very differently. With spell blending, your spell selection needs to stay pretty tool boxy, with generally useful spells , it plays a lot like a sorcerer. At low levels, you get lots of cantrips to hit every weakness. At higher levels you transition into having amazing amounts of high level spells. It is even better than trying to replicate this with scrolls.
Spell substitution lets you really focus on filling your spell book with absolutely everything, and then actually using those niche spells every time you can. It is the most wizard of theses in my opinion, and the one I have the most fun playing.
The meta-magic thesis was fun and getting that flexible metamagic feel was interesting and unique. There still are not enough metamagic feats though for it to really shine yet. I think this one could get really good with a couple more metamagic feats spread out over lower levels.
I have played a conjurer, 2 illusionists, a necromancer, and an evoker. Oh, yeah, and an Abjurer.
My favorite wizard fantasy is the diviner, and I really look forward to getting to play one, but haven't had the chance to yet.
Th tankiest of my wizards was the necromancer. I played him through part of the slithering and then again in a homebrewed one shot. False life is a lot of extra temp HP. Call of the grave does a good setting up second round spells. It was crucial in the slithering, probably the best spell any of us could possibly cast, between hero points and true strike, there was a lot of critical hits with it against oozes. It is a better focus spell than many focus spell focused classes get. vampiric touch was hard to use against oozes, even debuffed ones, but it was great against many of the later threats in that adventure.
The blastiest was the evoker. I used spectral hand and shocking grasp a lot. Maybe my GM was being too kind to me by interpreting "When making a melee spell attack with the hand, you use your normal bonuses" to mean I could gain flanking. Zapping with that and force bolt was a very good round of damage on very many occasions, and electricity was never a problem damage type for me, but sometimes AC was a tough one to target. At very low levels, most casters are just electric arc anyway, so being able to do that and force bolt was still excellent damage through level 4 for most of the time, with the occasional nova that very often burned a hero point to pull off. Eventually I was less single target focused, but only because the damage output from area spells was nearly as good and often more useful. Most lower level spell slots that didn't get blended went to magic missiles for 3rd action boosts in later rounds.
The illusionist was my favorite of favorites. With spell substitution I was using spells like illusory disguise, phantom crowd and illusory object very often. It was in a free archetype game and he was a dandy as well so he could really stick illusions like nobody's business. The character was beloved in the group and when he died it was a sad day for everyone. He was not the toughest, but only died because he was trying to be a hero and draw an impossibly difficult "Puzzle" enemy's fire for one round so the rest of the party could live. Very high, constant damage auras against level 6 characters are absolutely brutal.
The Conjurer was the tool boxiest of the bunch. I din't utilize his focus point that often in combat, but that is because my summons were getting attacked often right away, and usually dropped before I got to go again. But I did start using it when I would use summons for recon and out of combat utility and that extra +1 to everything was pretty useful.
Enchantment is a weird school for me. Most of the people I play with have a pretty hard rule against using charm/domination etc, and would rather kill an enemy than use a charm spell to get them to leave. Personally, I think it is weird to have that block against the charm spell but not using coerce or influence as skill checks to overwrite NPC goals, but that is a much bigger conversation than we should have here. Enchantment is probably the most difficult school of magic to use effectively in PF2, but that is probably a good thing for the sake of getting the ick factor as low as possible.
I have never played a universalist. It is just not my style. I do like casting spells from lots of different schools, but school focused wizards still get lots of extra spell slots so they don't have to not cast those spells. I am a player who will spend almost all my gold every time we get to a town buying scrolls I anticipate needing in the upcoming adventure. I do lots of gathering information in my character's down time and research about locations, organizations, and creatures we might be facing.
When I am analyzing the wizard, I am doing it from a pretty broad perspective. Combat effectiveness matters, but it is not separate from what the rest of the party is doing and what supports the most effective action for the group. I agree that the wizard is not as powerful of a contributor as a bard or a cleric in that regard, but that is because most people I play with want 2 or 3 martial melee characters in the mix who are focused on doing as much damage as possible. When that is already the case party buffing and healing are incredibly valuable. That is why I said that other casters often get shoe horned into very repetitive and boring action routines.
The wizard can't heal. It is a virtue of its class because it means its job is always something else. In the games I play, solid, tactical Battlefield control is awesomely powerful. We have tricked enemies into getting into fights with third party enemies, and then escaped in the fracas on multiple occasions due to illusions in social heavy urban campaigns, and solved intense puzzles by busting out things like over leveled dispel magic scrolls that could succeed where the caster could not . It is a feature of the class that specialization does not limit you to only have 3 or 4 total spells per level you can cast and still do really awesome things as a wizard.
Ultimately massive reworks appear in two forms: house rules and variant rules appearing in GM guides or books like D&D's Unearthed Arcana.
IMO, even the Gygaxian approach to playing (and DMing) tried to balance combat with other activities. It sounds like your group might be better off playing something like Gloomhaven (although even Frosthaven has added more puzzle scenarios and down time activities so obviously combat isn't the end all be all). Personally I like to balance adventures around 1/3 encounters, 1/3 exploration, and 1/3 down time. For encounters, I like for 1/3 of them to be hazards, disasters, or situations that the PCs can't fight their way out of. For the remaining 2/3 I always leave the door open for negotiations, or other ways of overcoming the adversary that don't necessitate the PCs be reduced down to perpetual murder hobos. Experience is gained for overcoming adversity and achieving accomplishments, not merely seeing how many goblin heads fit on a pike...
My advice, is rather than argue that the Wizard needs fixing, try making some house rules that everyone in your group can agree on. (Heck, this entire hobby essentially grew out of house rules for miniature wargames to add activities that weren't just combat.) Regarding Witches, I partially agree, they could use a soft fix. This could be accomplished with additional feats and items rather than reworking mechanics. But again, your group could address this more directly just be developing some house rules that everyone agrees to. House rules are part and parcel of TTRPGs. I know of 0 GMs who slavishly use every rule in the books exactly as it's specified. The goal is to have a good time. Not fall on our swords under the weight of making sure every rule is followed to perfection. This is actually in the rules, and is part of the GM's adjudication function.
From the little red book means basic box edition D&D that came out in the 70s. We play D&D or PF which is based on D&D. That's all we play. That's all we're ever gonna play as our main game.
I've already implemented house rules. I'd prefer the wizard and witch be reworked by the designers, same with the summoner though that I am less sure about as I have less experience with it as I'm the only one that enjoys that particular class from PF1.
I have played many wizard characters.
I have used the meta magic thesis, the spell substitution thesis and the Spell blending thesis. Familiars were not a part of the wizard fantasy for me to begin with so I had no interest in that one and The staff one is interesting, but cannot really compete with spell blending and spell substitution, which are my favorite.
Each of those 2 play very differently. With spell blending, your spell selection needs to stay pretty tool boxy, with generally useful spells , it plays a lot like a sorcerer. At low levels, you get lots of cantrips to hit every weakness. At higher levels you transition into having amazing amounts of high level spells. It is even better than trying to replicate this with scrolls.
Spell substitution lets you really focus on filling your spell book with absolutely everything, and then actually using those niche spells every time you can. It is the most wizard of theses in my opinion, and the one I have the most fun playing.
The meta-magic thesis was fun and getting that flexible metamagic feel was interesting and unique. There still are not enough metamagic feats though for it to really shine yet. I think this one could get really good with a couple more metamagic feats spread out over lower levels.
I have played a conjurer, 2 illusionists, a necromancer, and an evoker. Oh, yeah, and an Abjurer.
My favorite wizard fantasy is the diviner, and I really look forward to getting to play one, but haven't had the chance to yet.
Th tankiest of my wizards was the necromancer. I played him through part of the slithering and then again in a homebrewed one shot. False life is a lot of extra temp HP. Call of the grave does a good setting up second round spells. It was crucial in the slithering, probably the best spell any of us could possibly cast, between hero points and true strike, there was a lot of critical hits with it against oozes. It is a better focus spell than many focus spell focused classes get. vampiric touch was hard to use against...
A few questions.
Do you have metrics to back up your combat effectiveness as in numbers showing you perform at a level that is roughly equivalent to the other classes?
What level did you play to as our games average level 15 to 17?
Did you test them in pure combat effectiveness? We do not engage in games where we care about tricking someone to fight each other as we have very little interest in seeing that rolled out.
I don't want anecdotal evidence, I want hard metrics.
So far my experience with wizards is minimal because most of my players can't stomach them past 5th level or so due how badly they feel in the game.
My initial character was an evoker wizard as I wanted to test the quintessential blasting wizard you could play in PF1/3E. Obviously schools weren't particularly relevant prior to 3E/PF1. It was an abject failure as my damage and ability to effect combat was far inferior to the martial classes and even the cleric was having a more substantial effect on combat.
Then another wizard player played a wizard to level 9. He was a universalist staff nexus wizard. We started this campaign around level 5 or 6. We ended it about level 9. Once again per the metrics he was behind on damage and combat effectiveness to the martials. He was using the usual blast spells and tried a few summons, but summons are so far behind the enemies you fight that they are ineffective in the most important fights. Summon Dragon looks amazing, but plays in the game like you summoned an illusory dragon that looks tough but does nothing worthwhile.
It was at this point I was starting to think caster damage dealers were awful, all of them. The bard and cleric support casters were fine, but the damage casters were terrible. I was basing this almost solely on my experience with the wizard which in past editions was a decent damage dealing casters as they leveled. This seemed to not be the case in PF2.
There was some dabbling with the wizard in-between using archetypes, but the wizard never seemed to work as a damage dealing caster painting this idea that damage casters were nonviable.
So I decided to give some other casters a try as damage casters. That when I tried the druid and the sorcerer. The Storm Druid and Sorcerer proved to be good damage casters capable of doing sufficient damage to maintain parity with the martials across levels. It wasn't every fight, but I don't expect parity every fight. I expect final damage metrics to indicate rough parity over multiple fights with them achieving high damage numbers some fights and lower others based on RNG.
It was also determined that good damage focus spells were the reason for this as this extended max level damage slots throughout an adventuring day. This claim the wizard has the most high level slots is a false one. A powerful focus spell is as good or better than a high level spell slot and thus provides extended power throughout an adventuring day. A focus spell may not be as versatile as a spell slot, but it doesn't need to be if the base focus spell works in nearly every situation doing sufficient damage and effect to be on par with an equivalent level spell.
I am now playing a level 10 wizard as a sort of NPC test. I'm finding the class is still a very weak combatant, but stronger in outside of combat abilities. A large spellbook to do nifty little things like create magic mailboxes, facilitate communication, transport, and provide utility options is strong. They also make a good crafting class if they have sufficient downtime. They are good with knowledge checks if you pick up some feat that allows skill checks for nearly every lore skill like Untrained Improvisation where their high intelligence allows them to make Lore checks on almost everything. Unified Theory at level 15 is a highly desirable Legendary Skill feat for Arcana. They are also good ritual casters at higher levels if you feel like investing in rituals.
Main issues for the wizard seem to mainly revolve around combat and build versatility mainly due to the following:
1. Weak focus options that do poor damage in school focus spells.
2. No feat boosting damage like Dangerous Sorcery, though this is obtainable with archetype feats.
3. A 40 to 60% or greater success rate against spells. With wizards relying more than other classes on limited resource spell slots. A 40 to 60% spell failure rate makes for a lot of failed spells that they cannot recover with a 10 minute rest.
Focus spells seem absolutely essential to doing well as a caster throughout an adventuring day. What seems to separate the quality casters from the crappy casters are the quality of the focus spell options or in the case of the witch the cantrips as well. Quality focus spells for a particular class build truly separate the wheat from the chaff as focus spells extend the ability of a caster to contribute effectively to combat throughout an adventuring day.
The druid as an example when built with storm and wild shape allows them to be effective blasting while providing a little martial combat ability and more important mobility and scouting utility throughout an adventuring day. Wild shape is like having a multiuse fly or water breathing/swimming spell usable throughout the day for a variety of purposes. At higher level you can also access different types of elemental attacks with a form like dragon form on top of the fast flight, reach combat ability, and high acrobatics or athletics. This is all acquired for a relatively low feat investment.
Whereas the wizard or witch investing a similar number of feats can not obtain anywhere near the blasting or mobility or martial versatility of the druid while also having lower hit points, less access to armor, and a less valuable casting stat as Wisdom is the highest value casting statistic in the game affecting will saves, perception, and a high value skill like medicine.
Thus the wizard and witch end up in this weak place where they have lower hit points, less effective feat and build options, a less valuable casting stat, weaker armor and weapon options, weaker focus spell options, weaker hex cantrips with the witch, and all this adds up to a comparatively weak class in the PF2 paradigm compared to a bard, druid, cleric, or sorcerer with their more valuable feats, focus spells, build versatility, combat effectiveness, and in the case of the bard composition cantrips.
This isn't based on feeling, but on measurable metrics that show the wizard and witch have clearly inferior focus options, class abilities, and feats that make for a negative class experience for those of us that do compare the capabilities of a given class in an empirical manner and want comparative numerical effectiveness.
My highest level wizard has been level 13. I really look forward to playing past that but games keep getting restarted. I am running a Fists of the Ruby Phoenix campaign just to get to higher level play.
I think you are familiar enough with the game now to play a better Evoker for what you want to do, Deriven. You are underestimating the damage potential of assuming a top 2ish level magic missile as a third action for every significant round of combat in your analysis. If you want to build for damage, I agree that you probably MC for sorcerer. 1 action magic missiles with dangerous sorcerery are very powerful. You have to cast them with spell slots, but because of the weird scaling on the spell, you usually get pretty effective magic missiles in your 2nd highest level spell slot. Your nova potential here exceeds the harm spam sorcerer because you have so many more spell slots. And your Force bolt is always a good later round focus spell to get more automatic damage out of your focus spell slots. Mostly, you want to be hitting multiple targets with AoE spells as often as you can, but you can mix it up to pick off targets with those magic missiles and your effectiveness will not be questioned.
Another team tactic that can really brutalize and is only really available to wizards, is for the wizard to use Forcible Energy on a spell that the martials have energy runes for. +5 damage per successful attack is probably the best party wide damage buff in the game.
My table plays this as a role playing game, not a damage simulator. We don't track our damage every round. Our GMs (myself included) play NPCs hard, and fights dangerously. We experience TPKs probably about once every 12 to 13 levels of play (part of why we struggle to get through full campaigns) and character deaths even more frequently because our GMs run encounters hard. Sometimes enemies capture fallen heroes and stuff like that, when it makes sense, but that is only to keep the story going where it is feasible. We still have to raid bases and combine 2 or 3 encounters together at a time pretty frequently to get characters back. Combining encounters inherently makes AoE spells better. I think a lot of "casters are not good" comes from GMs running 1 encounter at a time, letting the whole party heal before moving on, and never having enemies move out of their rooms. When encounters end every 2 to 3 rounds and you get to refocus in between every one of them, I think focus casters are going to bury spell slot casters. The effectiveness of different kinds of spells is definitely campaign dependent. Damage over time and battlefield control are essential when you are in a fight in a central hall way and three side doors open with multiple creatures behind each one.
What you are asking for, Analytic Proof that the wizard can hold there own is impossible to provide because games can be run so differently. I see wizards do well in PFS, which is like the exact opposite of our campaigns too though, but it never gets to that high of level that you are trying to compare. Stories of actual game play and theory crafting are all you are really going to get.
When I'm talking rework, you don't get rid of what is decent like a Universalist Spell Substitution Wizard which is probably their current best build.
How would you rework the wizard? For example, how would you make "specialist wizard" better? What other things would you improve?
Frosthaven
Sheesh. Board Game Geek wants $360 for this thing. And I thought Gloomhaven was overpriced at $150! :-(
I have played many wizard characters.
Sound like you might enjoy the magic system in Harnmaster. :-)
My highest level wizard has been level 13. I really look forward to playing past that but games keep getting restarted. I am running a Fists of the Ruby Phoenix campaign just to get to higher level play.
I think you are familiar enough with the game now to play a better Evoker for what you want to do, Deriven. You are underestimating the damage potential of assuming a top 2ish level magic missile as a third action for every significant round of combat in your analysis. If you want to build for damage, I agree that you probably MC for sorcerer. 1 action magic missiles with dangerous sorcerery are very powerful. You have to cast them with spell slots, but because of the weird scaling on the spell, you usually get pretty effective magic missiles in your 2nd highest level spell slot. Your nova potential here exceeds the harm spam sorcerer because you have so many more spell slots. And your Force bolt is always a good later round focus spell to get more automatic damage out of your focus spell slots. Mostly, you want to be hitting multiple targets with AoE spells as often as you can, but you can mix it up to pick off targets with those magic missiles and your effectiveness will not be questioned.
Another team tactic that can really brutalize and is only really available to wizards, is for the wizard to use Forcible Energy on a spell that the martials have energy runes for. +5 damage per successful attack is probably the best party wide damage buff in the game.
My table plays this as a role playing game, not a damage simulator. We don't track our damage every round. Our GMs (myself included) play NPCs hard, and fights dangerously. We experience TPKs probably about once every 12 to 13 levels of play (part of why we struggle to get through full campaigns) and character deaths even more frequently because our GMs run encounters hard. Sometimes enemies capture fallen heroes and stuff like that, when it makes sense, but that is only to keep the story going where it is feasible. We still have to raid bases and...
Good to see you have some post 10 experience. It seems a lot of the time these discussions are based on low level where every class is sort of ok.
That Forcible Energy tactic sounds good. I might give that a shot since my particular NPC test wizard is a metamagic thesis.
I do want analytic proof. So far tracking the wizard has shown them to be weak. The third action magic missile pales in comparison to Tempest Surge or even the Elemental blast focus spell of the Elemental sorcerer that you use more often as you gain levels in sorcerer. It's a one action magic missile you can obtain from a wand that better accomplishes the damage aspect as it continues to launch the missiles as long as you are wielding the wand. It's a fairly easy to get wand that gets more powerful the higher level you buy it.
I understand the majority of people don't bother with metrics, but they have always been important in my games as a player and a DM to ensure I can create challenging encounters and classes are performing on a relatively equal basis in a given role.
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When I'm talking rework, you don't get rid of what is decent like a Universalist Spell Substitution Wizard which is probably their current best build.How would you rework the wizard? For example, how would you make "specialist wizard" better? What other things would you improve?
So far I've done the following:
1. Switched to 5E casting. Doubt I'll ever go back to Vancian casting. 5E is way better.
2. Given every wizard the Spell Substitution Arcane Thesis for free so at least the spell versatility of the wizard is true. They still get to choose another thesis as well.
I did some rework of the school focus spells, but not enough to power them up to make them attractive. I'd focus on the schools myself. 5E did a much better job with schools for the wizard. I'd make the schools meaningfully powerful like druid orders or bard muses including higher level feats for each school.
For battle casters the bard and druid should be the standard by which all other casters are built including the ability to dabble in other schools or patrons like the bard and druid can dabble in other orders and muses.
The wizard and witch should get a little more love as they have six hit points and super limited weapon and armor options. It seems they could easily power up hexes to bard composition power and schools to druid order power without making either the wizard or witch outside the balance spectrum.
wands of magic missile are expensive to keep up as top level-ish spell slots. It is also once a day and you have to drop it to do it again. It isn't bad for a first round option, but I don't play where wands trigger dangerous sorcery so that is damage left off the table. I know you tend to play casters who also take a weapon attack as a third action instead of cast a spell, and you can build into that, but it is expensive. Adding automatic damage every single third action, even in the toughest of fights should not be brushed aside when looking at the combat potential of a class. The sorcerer can do this pretty effectively, but a lot of players wont want to make it a signature spell, which is pretty much necessary to make this tactic work out.
A spell blending wizard can pretty reasonably be doing big AoE spell and a 1 action magic missile two times an encounter for an entire day of adventuring, with force bolt or a wand missile as a back up for rounds 3 or 4, if your encounters go that long. You do the analytic testing though, check it out. I think you might be undervaluing the dangerous sorcery additional damage, which you can tap 2x in a round with this strategy.
So far I've done the following:1. Switched to 5E casting. Doubt I'll ever go back to Vancian casting. 5E is way better.
2. Given every wizard the Spell Substitution Arcane Thesis for free so at least the spell versatility of the wizard is true. They still get to choose another thesis as well.
I did some rework of the school focus spells, but not enough to power them up to make them attractive. I'd focus on the schools myself. 5E did a much better job with schools for the wizard. I'd make the schools meaningfully powerful like druid orders or bard muses including higher level feats for each school.
For battle casters the bard and druid should be the standard by which all other casters are built including the ability to dabble in other schools or patrons like the bard and druid can dabble in other orders and muses.
The wizard and witch should get a little more love as they have six hit points and super limited weapon and armor options. It seems they could easily power up hexes to bard composition power and schools to druid order power without making either the wizard or witch outside the balance spectrum.
Hm. I know nothing about 5E. I suppose I'm going to need what, the Player Handbook? to figure out how it works.
Yeah as you say the problem with that solution is you end up homogenising all the witches that come after if you make a new batch of class feats that fix everything.
It would be better than what we have now but it still wouldn't be great.
The unchained wouldn't have to just be for the classes that it "fixes" it could also supply some other experimental types of rules for people to try (like stamina in pf1)
Like a framework for power point casting as an alternative to Vancian spell slots. Some sort of inbuilt scaling bonus to replace items for people who don't like the constant ruin upgrading thing.
I'm sure there are other alternative rules people could think of. I'm sure a fair few people would be interested in buying.
Hm. I know nothing about 5E. I suppose I'm going to need what, the Player Handbook? to figure out how it works.
So far I've done the following:1. Switched to 5E casting. Doubt I'll ever go back to Vancian casting. 5E is way better.
2. Given every wizard the Spell Substitution Arcane Thesis for free so at least the spell versatility of the wizard is true. They still get to choose another thesis as well.
I did some rework of the school focus spells, but not enough to power them up to make them attractive. I'd focus on the schools myself. 5E did a much better job with schools for the wizard. I'd make the schools meaningfully powerful like druid orders or bard muses including higher level feats for each school.
For battle casters the bard and druid should be the standard by which all other casters are built including the ability to dabble in other schools or patrons like the bard and druid can dabble in other orders and muses.
The wizard and witch should get a little more love as they have six hit points and super limited weapon and armor options. It seems they could easily power up hexes to bard composition power and schools to druid order power without making either the wizard or witch outside the balance spectrum.
It in the PHB. It basically consists of making every spell a signature spell. You can modify the size of the spell list as well as 5E doesn't allow as many spells on the list, but I made it easy and gave everyone unlimited signature spells to work within the PF2 framework.
wands of magic missile are expensive to keep up as top level-ish spell slots. It is also once a day and you have to drop it to do it again. It isn't bad for a first round option, but I don't play where wands trigger dangerous sorcery so that is damage left off the table. I know you tend to play casters who also take a weapon attack as a third action instead of cast a spell, and you can build into that, but it is expensive. Adding automatic damage every single third action, even in the toughest of fights should not be brushed aside when looking at the combat potential of a class. The sorcerer can do this pretty effectively, but a lot of players wont want to make it a signature spell, which is pretty much necessary to make this tactic work out.
A spell blending wizard can pretty reasonably be doing big AoE spell and a 1 action magic missile two times an encounter for an entire day of adventuring, with force bolt or a wand missile as a back up for rounds 3 or 4, if your encounters go that long. You do the analytic testing though, check it out. I think you might be undervaluing the dangerous sorcery additional damage, which you can tap 2x in a round with this strategy.
Dangerous sorcery doesn't work with focus spells. It states only spells cast from slots. Are you saying to cast a first level magic missile for 1d4+2 damage as a third action option from a slot? Or were you talking about the force missile focus spell for evocation?
Spell Blending uses up lower level slots which are useful for defensive or utility spells like mirror image, invisibility, see invis, or a good attack spell using a lower level slot like phantasmal killer. Spell Blending is one of those abilities that sounds good on paper, but isn't great in practice because lower level spell slots are still valuable. You don't want to to use too many of them and not have helpful defense and utility slots.
I haven't found keeping up a weapon to be too expensive. One of the few things you find a lot of in modules is weapon runes. You can easily transfer them cheaply to keep up. You don't need to keep up your weapon as much as a martial, just enough to do some decent 1 action attacks for a little damage. If you're smashing with an AOE spell or an electric arc on a few targets, then a bow shot for 2 or 3d8+2 and maybe an energy rune it's still about 10 to 15 extra damage a round.
I am saying fill your 2nd highest level spell slots or 3rd highest level spell slots with magic missile. If you can cast 6th level spells, use your 5th level slots with magic missile. That is 3 missiles and +5 for dangerous sorcery. You need spell blending to really make this work but the damage is good. You can do it for 2 rounds in 3 or 4 encounters. You can use your focus spell in later rounds to clean up.
Low level spells are easily covered by scrolls. They are incredibly cheap.
I am saying fill your 2nd highest level spell slots or 3rd highest level spell slots with magic missile. If you can cast 6th level spells, use your 5th level slots with magic missile. That is 3 missiles and +5 for dangerous sorcery. You need spell blending to really make this work but the damage is good. You can do it for 2 rounds in 3 or 4 encounters. You can use your focus spell in later rounds to clean up.
A 1 action magic missile spell? 3d4+8 damage? An average of 16 damage with 5th level slot? That is not a good use of spell slot resources. I'd do 4 less damage than a 3 action 1st level magic missile for a 5th level slot. I'd only do that if I knew the enemy was in death range.
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For what it’s worth, I think most people’s wizard fantasy is in a powerful dude who casts a load of spells for every little thing, even when it’s extra and realistically you can just do that with your hands.
Less so the pack rat that rummages through his bag of a bajillion scrolls at the drop of a hat.
Anyway, I’ve home brewed a witch, it’s in the home brew section I’d be interested to see if y’all thought it got closer to the fantasy than the official material.
I am saying fill your 2nd highest level spell slots or 3rd highest level spell slots with magic missile. If you can cast 6th level spells, use your 5th level slots with magic missile. That is 3 missiles and +5 for dangerous sorcery. You need spell blending to really make this work but the damage is good. You can do it for 2 rounds in 3 or 4 encounters. You can use your focus spell in later rounds to clean up.A 1 action magic missile spell? 3d4+8 damage? An average of 16 damage with 5th level slot? That is not a good use of spell slot resources. I'd do 4 less damage than a 3 action 1st level magic missile for a 5th level slot. I'd only do that if I knew the enemy was in death range.
The point of a spell blending wizard is that you don’t have to treat your top level slots as precious commodities anymore. If you end the day having not cast top level spells, you’ve wasted being a spell blender. By your own account, you are happy to spend money on a weapon attack that does 10 to 15 points of damage, maybe, on a hit. Assuming it is a creature you can hit on a 11, magic missile is about 2x as effective a use of an action here for a 9th level character. This is an option that does this much damage automatically, without a roll, even against very difficult to hit targets, at a range of 120 ft, so it gets better and better the harder the opponent is.
A 1 action magic missile cast from a 5th level slot still gives you 3 missiles. Every 2 levels you get an extra missile per action used.I am saying fill your 2nd highest level spell slots or 3rd highest level spell slots with magic missile. If you can cast 6th level spells, use your 5th level slots with magic missile. That is 3 missiles and +5 for dangerous sorcery. You need spell blending to really make this work but the damage is good. You can do it for 2 rounds in 3 or 4 encounters. You can use your focus spell in later rounds to clean up.A 1 action magic missile spell? 3d4+8 damage? An average of 16 damage with 5th level slot? That is not a good use of spell slot resources. I'd do 4 less damage than a 3 action 1st level magic missile for a 5th level slot. I'd only do that if I knew the enemy was in death range.
Which also means that if you spread out your missiles you get the dangerous sorcery to each one
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Dangerous Sorcery doesn’t say it only affects 1 target. The damage for a fireball is applied to everyone. Magic missile is the special instance where number of targets gets complicated.
Yes, dangerous sorcery is very important for any caster that wants to blast.
My understanding is the fix to the magic missile + dangerous sorcery issue from the playtest was to limit the damage in the spell description. So the bonus damage applies to each target, not each missile. Multiple threads have discussed this and the difference between the playtest and the final CRB was the added language to the magic missile spell. Every GM I have played with plays it this way. A one action top slot magic missile with dangerous sorcery is very effective damage per action.
Temprans, that is not how any GM I have played with runs it. Does your GM run it that way? This could be a contributing factor to your frustration with casters.
I don’t say that. I say that adding magic middle as a third action is a viable blaster wizard. I have never targeted more than 2 enemies with missiles from the spell so it isn’t really spiking things that much in games I’ve played. Even just targeting 1 enemy with it is better than a weapon attack as far as DPR goes and it really raises the overall damage output of wizards. With dangerous sorcery it scales well over levels and makes even level magic missile spells worth casting, making it reasonable for a spell blender to pull off 4 to 6 times a day pretty easily without even touching scrolls. If Deriven thinks sorcerers and druids are fine blasters, than a dedicated evoked spell blender is going to be fine as well.
I wonder what other feats Temperans is running incorrectly, it might explain why they have such a negative view of casters.
Temprans, that is not how any GM I have played with runs it. Does your GM run it that way? This could be a contributing factor to your frustration with casters.
I run it once per spell. Never have allowed magic missile to add the damage once per missile. Do we know if it works that way?
I don’t say that. I say that adding magic middle as a third action is a viable blaster wizard. I have never targeted more than 2 enemies with missiles from the spell so it isn’t really spiking things that much in games I’ve played. Even just targeting 1 enemy with it is better than a weapon attack as far as DPR goes and it really raises the overall damage output of wizards. With dangerous sorcery it scales well over levels and makes even level magic missile spells worth casting, making it reasonable for a spell blender to pull off 4 to 6 times a day pretty easily without even touching scrolls. If Deriven thinks sorcerers and druids are fine blasters, than a dedicated evoked spell blender is going to be fine as well.
You must have never played a storm/wild druid. An Evoker Spell Blender is not comparable to a druid. You don't get that many higher level slots. Not sure why you think you do.
The sorcerer is very dependent on the focus abilities, but once again you will not keep up with what they can do with higher level slots and the build.
You can replenish two to three focus points per 10 minute rest at higher level. That is 2 extra max level blasting slots per 10 minute rest. In the case of the wild druid, you can turn into a dragon and blast with breath weapon while doing decent melee damage. If you use Effortless Concentration with a damaging spell prior to turning into a dragon or other form, then you can sustain that spell for free while engaging in the melee damage and blasting.
I've already tested this stuff with the druid. Evoker wizard won't stand with them even blending. It's more a matter of some people who like the wizard have never spent time building other classes for blasting to see what they are like.
If you don't enjoy the druid or sorcerer, I understand not maximizing their builds. If you maximize their builds, you will find their focus spells are more plentiful than your blended maximum level slots. And quite potent for blasting.
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IMO spell blending is the best wizard archetype. It improves your action economy. Useful spells usually have a higher level.... and if you want optimize take a spellcasting archetpye and use those slots to fuel spell blending.
Wizards downside is the weak focus spell options. Upside is the large quantity of unrestricted slots per day.
The one thing I hate when I play as a wizard in any edition is spending a fortune on that spellbook.
How does Spell Blending improve your action economy?
Temprans, that is not how any GM I have played with runs it. Does your GM run it that way? This could be a contributing factor to your frustration with casters.More like that explains why you aren't seeing issues and keep saying "just play magic missile mage".
It sounds more like some have never played around with optimizing a druid or sorcerer build. Even with magic missile they aren't keeping up.
When I talk about maximizing a druid, I have archetyped into monk, picked up flurry of blows, and built a storm druid for dragon form as well as spent Ability boosts on strength and invested in handwraps.
So my damage sort of mixes up across battles. Sometimes I use Tempest Surge and weapon attacks. Sometimes I'll open with a chain lightning, then switch to dragon form, melee, blast, melee. Sometimes I'll open up with a powerful sustain spell, shapechange into dragon form, melee and blast and mix it up. It depends on what what we're fighting. The overall damage adds up over time and multiple fights adds up to a whole lot of damage that a wizard can't compete with with minimal resource expenditure. This doesn't even include scrolls, staves, and wands you can pick up along the way.
The sorcerer is more dependent on focus spells. For a blaster you need either a good blast damage spell like the elemental sorcerer has or a good sustain damage focus spell like the Shadow Sorcerer has. A Shadow Sorcerer using Consuming Shadows while wandering invisible through the melee dropping spell attacks or AoE watches the damage meter rack up for doing almost nothing but a sustain and a cast of a mix of spell slots and cantrip attacks.
This idea cantrips are useless at higher level isn't true. Cantrips are quite nice at higher level, especially multitarget cantrips. You mix them up with slot casts and sustain spells, you start a damage mix that matches martials. Martials usually swing on one target and do good damage to that target. But a caster sets up AoE sustain effects, mixes in a blast, and uses a cantrip here or there or a magic item. This layering effect is how they match or exceed martial damage.
The point of a spell blending wizard is that you don’t have to treat your top level slots as precious commodities anymore. If you end the day having not cast top level spells, you’ve wasted being a spell blender. By your own account, you are happy to spend money on a weapon attack that does 10 to 15 points of damage, maybe, on a hit. Assuming it is a creature you can hit on a 11, magic missile is about 2x as effective a use of an action here for a 9th level character. This is an option that does this much damage automatically, without a roll, even against very difficult to hit targets, at a range of 120 ft, so it gets better and better the harder the opponent is.I am saying fill your 2nd highest level spell slots or 3rd highest level spell slots with magic missile. If you can cast 6th level spells, use your 5th level slots with magic missile. That is 3 missiles and +5 for dangerous sorcery. You need spell blending to really make this work but the damage is good. You can do it for 2 rounds in 3 or 4 encounters. You can use your focus spell in later rounds to clean up.A 1 action magic missile spell? 3d4+8 damage? An average of 16 damage with 5th level slot? That is not a good use of spell slot resources. I'd do 4 less damage than a 3 action 1st level magic missile for a 5th level slot. I'd only do that if I knew the enemy was in death range.
10 to 15 is lower level. Dragon Form and some elemental forms do a lot more damage.
Spell Splending. Let's say you have Spell Blending at around level 11.
That is 2 + 1 school 6th level slots. You can take two of your 4th level slots to get an additional 6th level slot. You can take two of your 3rd slots to get a 5th level slot. Two of your 2nd level to get a 4th level slot. Two of your 1st to get a 3rd level slot.
So that would your load:
1. 4 6th +1 school +1 bond
2. 4 5th +1 school
3. 2 4th +1 school
4. 2 3rd +1 school
Compared that to a druid with tempest surge and/or wild shape.
1. 2 3rd level slots +2 focus points plus x number of 10 minute rests
2. 3 5th
3. 3 4th
Sorcerer:
1. 3 6th level plus 2 focus points plus x number of 10 minute rests
2. 4 5th level
3. 4 4th level
So that gives top level slots:
1. Druid: 5 plus x number of 10 minute rests
2. Sorcerer: 5 plus x number of 10 minute rests
3. Wizard: 6 with no 10 minute rest recovery but possible greater versatility in slot use depending on what you prepare in those slots.
Druid and wizard are limited by prepared spell slots. Wizard took spell blending, so does not have Spell Substitution. Thus they must rely on their prepared spells until the next day like a druid.
Sorcerer can flexibly cast all 3 of their 6th level slots and use their focus spells in place of blasting spells for an elemental sorcerer.
So a druid or sorcerer are more dependent on 10 minute rests and a wizard must make sure his 6th level slots are all filled with blasting spells as he has no signature spells or ability to cast spontaneously.
I'm not seeing a huge casting advantage unless we include the wizard focus spells, which are weak in my opinion.
Damage from focus spells:
1. Force Missile will do 3d4+3 as a 6th level focus spell for 1 action.
2. Tempest Surge will do 6d12 with a reflex save and possibly Clumsy 2 and 6 persistent electricity.
3. Sorcerer elemental focus blast will do 6d8+6 or an AoE blast of 8d6 and add +6 to a single target in a shapeable burst.
I have been able to do more with those focus spells than I could with those high level limited slots. If the druid did not have such a high quality focus spell option, they definitely wouldn't be as good a blaster. Same with the sorcerer. Once you hit 12th level, you are able to recover 2 focus spells per 10 minute rest which increases your x to 2x number of 10 minute rests per day.
Temprans, that is not how any GM I have played with runs it. Does your GM run it that way? This could be a contributing factor to your frustration with casters.I run it once per spell. Never have allowed magic missile to add the damage once per missile. Do we know if it works that way?
Well, here's what Dangerous Sorcery says:
Your legacy grants you great destructive power. When you Cast a Spell from your spell slots, if the spell deals damage and doesn’t have a duration, you gain a status bonus to that spell’s damage equal to the spell’s level.
So we know that Dangerous Sorcery only applies to spell slots (not Focus spells, meaning effects like Force Bolt and Elemental Toss go out the window), and that it's a Status Bonus to damage, and isn't akin to Weapon Specialization and other similar effects. We also know that it doesn't specify a target, or a number of targets, which means it would apply to anything affected by such a spell, as nothing tells us otherwise.
Here's what Magic Missiles say:
You send a dart of force streaking toward a creature that you can see. It automatically hits and deals 1d4+1 force damage. For each additional action you use when Casting the Spell, increase the number of missiles you shoot by one, to a maximum of three missiles for 3 actions. You choose the target for each missile individually. If you shoot more than one missile at the same target, combine the damage before applying bonuses or penalties to damage, resistances, weaknesses, and so forth.
The bolded part is crucial, as it means you can't double-dip bonuses/penalties to damage against the same target if you send multiple missiles at them, and it's established that Dangerous Sorcery provides a Status Bonus to such damage, since this spell both deals damage and doesn't have a duration.
So let's take a 1st level Human Draconic Sorcerer with Dangerous Sorcery as a feat for example. One of their known spells is Magic Missiles. There are 3 enemies the party has to face, and all are in range of the spell.
The Sorcerer casting Magic Missiles decides to spend 3 actions to do so. This can pan out in one of 3 ways, depending on how they choose to spread their missiles (if at all):
1. They can put all the missiles on one target. This will do 3D4+3 from the missiles, as well as a +1 damage bonus applied at the end, since you must combine the damage dealt from the spell before applying the bonus provided by the feat. This gives the least amount of damage returns from Dangerous Sorcery per action spent, as you are only getting +1 damage.
2. They can put two of the three missiles on one target, and one missile on a second target. This will do 2D4+2 from the missiles to the initial target, as well as 1D4+1 from the missile to the secondary target. The +1 damage bonus from Dangerous Sorcery applies to both targets, and gives the second most amount of damage from Dangerous Sorcery for +2 damage overall.
3. They can put one of the three missiles on each potential target. This will do 1D4+1 damage to each target, applying the +1 damage bonus from Dangerous Sorcery to each as well, giving the most amount of damage from Dangerous Sorcery at a whopping +3 damage bonus total.
Now, I'm of the opinion that Magic Missiles isn't particularly useful as a one action cast, but when that is the limitation set forth (such as with Force Bolt), or doesn't cost an action to do (such as with a Wand of Manifold Missiles after its activation), it's definitely a neat damage supplement, simply because there are always going to be far better spells to prepare as a damage dealer; the only real benefit of Magic Missiles (and Force Bolt as well) is its ability to affect (nearly) everything, and there aren't many things that can stop Magic Missiles. You would have to specifically plan for it with things such as a Brooch of Shielding, Antimagic Field, Spell Immunity, Globe of Invulnerability, or a Shield cantrip, to prevent it from being effective. It's also one of the most effective spells against higher level foes simply because it's automatic, and isn't reliant on them rolling bad or succeeding an attack roll (or both in some cases). But it's certainly no Maze or Slow/Haste.
Even in your 6th level spell slot example, elemental toss is less DPR than a single action magic missile cast from a 6th level slot with dangerous sorcery if you require an 11 to hit. The automatic damage of magic missile is very strong in DPR calculations since nearly half the damage essentially goes out the window in a 50/50 hit situation with a spell attack roll spell. An 11th level evoked throwing down a chain lightning and a 1 action 5th level magic missile on round one of a combat is doing more damage that round than any Druid. Yes, a sorcerer could do the same, but not as many times per day. Force bolt heightens awkwardly in this level 11 comparison. It is significantly less damage than the 5th level magic missile (at least 5 points behind if only targeting 1, but could be 15 behind). It does much better against elemental toss at odd spell levels, but is more of a round 2 or 3 focus point spell to use when it doesn’t feel as necessary. Against hard to hit enemies though it will outpace elemental toss, even at even spell levels.
Actually, Elemental Toss and Magic Missile at 6th level are equal against single targets, since 6D8+6 is 33, and 3D4+9 is 16.5, assuming averages. Even with the 50% miss chance of Elemental Toss, the DPR equates to 16.5.
Elemental Toss equals Magic Missile/Force Bolt at Even levels of spells targeting the same enemy (meaning it's equal at Level 20), whereas Magic Missile/Force Bolt wins out at Odd levels of spells and/or targeting different enemies.
Just as well, Dangerous Sorcery is far more powerful with multi-target spells than with single target spells, so it's no surprise that a multi-target spell like Magic Missile will win out when Dangerous Sorcery is factored into the equation.
If Dangerous Sorcery isn't included, though, Elemental Toss does an average of 27, whereas Magic Missile does an average of 10.5. Even adjusting it to 5th level, Elemental Toss does an average of 23.5, which is still higher than Magic Missile's 10.5 (even halved to 11.75), and infinitely more reusable throughout the adventuring day as well.
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Temprans, that is not how any GM I have played with runs it. Does your GM run it that way? This could be a contributing factor to your frustration with casters.I run it once per spell. Never have allowed magic missile to add the damage once per missile. Do we know if it works that way?
Yes we have confirmation from Logan
Good call, I was forgetting bloodline magic for the elemental sorcerer. The sorcerer is probably the very slightly better pure blaster class although 6 to 7 top level slots is better in nova situations.
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Usually, but Wizards (even Blaster Wizards) aren't going to prepare all of their top level slots for Blasting. Speaking from experience, some of the best spells I cast were the ones that did no damage.
I will say that I absolutely would have liked to take MCD Sorcerer as a Wizard for the added spell slots as well as feats like Dangerous Sorcery and maybe if there was a good Focus spell feat or something, but the only reason why I didn't was because of the 14 Charisma ability score requirement; it's hard to justify when you need to make sure your Intelligence as well as your 3 key Save stats need to be maximized (because as a Wizard, your Saving Throw progression is awful). You also can't just apply it via Free Archetype, since you still need to meet requirements for it, and Multitalented via Half-Elf is too narrow of a scope to reasonably treat it as a common avenue to take it.
Usually, but Wizards (even Blaster Wizards) aren't going to prepare all of their top level slots for Blasting. Speaking from experience, some of the best spells I cast were the ones that did no damage.
I will say that I absolutely would have liked to take MCD Sorcerer as a Wizard for the added spell slots as well as feats like Dangerous Sorcery and maybe if there was a good Focus spell feat or something, but the only reason why I didn't was because of the 14 Charisma ability score requirement; it's hard to justify when you need to make sure your Intelligence as well as your 3 key Save stats need to be maximized (because as a Wizard, your Saving Throw progression is awful). You also can't just apply it via Free Archetype, since you still need to meet requirements for it, and Multitalented via Half-Elf is too narrow of a scope to reasonably treat it as a common avenue to take it.
I usually build my wizards with INT, DEX and CHA, but that is because I don’t usually focus on blasting either, and really like having good deception for concealed casting. The wizard blaster is for sure a glass cannon.
I'm of the opinion that Magic Missiles isn't particularly useful as a one action cast
Ir is always about nova damage and getting that extra damaage into one round. Yes it is very inefficient in terms of spell slots.
If you have a one action attack spell Magic missile, Harm, Force Fang, Force Bolt, ELemental Toss. Then you can combine it with a normal 2 action spell, much the say way as you can with a weapon attack like say a strike with a bow. For more damage.
OR you can go all in and fire 3 one action effects off in one round.
It can make more sense if you have a static damage bonus that applies to spells like say Dangerous Sorcery, Inspire Courage, Dread Marshal Stance, or Stoke the Heart.
Lets see a quickened Cleric of Nethys with 2 Wands of Manifold Missiles could go Wand, Wand, Harm, Harm, Harm, Kick in the one round for a total of 6 times.