More or less, but without requiring a feat and not lowering the spells per day. Wizards’ class features and feats feel weaker than other casters, I’m curious to hear from people more experienced with the system if “baking” in flexible spellcasting would break the game.Would porting arcanist casting from PF1 for wizards break the game?Do you mean flexible spellcasting?
I made all casters spontaneous. Didn't break the game. Works fine. Still can't get anyone to play a wizard, but it's no doubt better than the base wizard.
PF2 is a very tight system regardless of what spells you cast. Saving throws are set very tight. Hit points very tight. All casting DCs are a set progression for all casters. All casters use the same version of spells unless accessing a unique spell to a list.
The only thing differentiating casters in PF2 is class features and cosmetic differences.
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I wasnt asking a rhetorical question about what spell repertoire a sorcerer needs to invalidate a wizard.
That is exactly what I want to test against the wizard against a variety of encounters. better if others share them along with how they would run them to get other perspectives.So far for the sorcerer from what has been suggested the feats to level 10 would be:
Dangerous Sorcery
Arcane Evolution
Advanced Bloodline
Crossblooded Evolution
Greater Bloodline
I'll play.
Here'd be a standard spell repertoire for my level 10 Imperial sorcerer. It's by no means a perfect spell repertoire, but it's serviceable
1 - Force Barrage*, Illusory object, Shockwave, Goblin Pox
2 - Blazing Bolt*, Dispel Magic, Tailwind, Invisibility
3 - Haste, Fireball*, Fear, Wall of Thorns
4 - Mountain Resilience, Invisibility, Vision of Death*, Resilient Sphere
5 - Slither, Howling Blizzard, Scouting eye, Translocate
Against crowds, I can do damage with Fireball and Howling Blizzard, debuff with fear, or crowd control with wall of thorns or Slither.
Against single targets, I have Force Barrage, Goblin Pox, Resilient Sphere or Vision of Death.
To buff myself or my team, I have Longstrider, both Invisibilities, Haste, Mountain Resilience and Fly.
In a bind, I can save someone with Resilient Sphere or sashay away with Translocate, or create an illusion.
I have Scouting Eye just like your wizard (courtesy of imperial bloodline) and thanks to Arcane Evolution, I have a grimoire just like your wizard, with the exact same spells inside (same budget), so provided I can wait a day (like any wizard who isn't spell sub), I can take that one special spell that for some reason looks important.
If I don't, I actually have one more signature spell to play with, and put it on Dispel Magic.
That's also not taking into account that I have a great focus spell that allows my team to be prebuffed (10mn greater invisibility, 10mn haste ? Yes please). Or the fact that crossblooded evolution can help me fix any glaring weaknesses in our party comp, by taking heal (to alleviate the burden on the healer) or Synesthesia (to murder every boss). Something I'm not even including here because synesthesia alone makes it unfair to the wizard.
Of course I won't be able to cover EVERY situation, but I should be able to make a difference in 99% of the games.
And even if you take spell substitution and have the luxury of getting 30mn preparation time (wich is not always a given because ambushes, because your barbarian got spotted, because time is of the essence...), I'm not sure switching in and out three spells will really change things. But we can test this like you said if you provide a standard list and then are allowed to change 3 spells on the fly.
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Would porting arcanist casting from PF1 for wizards break the game?Do you mean flexible spellcasting?
I'm opposed to just giving wizards this ability because it makes spontaneous feel significantly less unique and I rather a different solution, assuming one even needs to be found
I wasnt asking a rhetorical question about what spell repertoire a sorcerer needs to invalidate a wizard.
That is exactly what I want to test against the wizard against a variety of encounters. better if others share them along with how they would run them to get other perspectives.So far for the sorcerer from what has been suggested the feats to level 10 would be:
Dangerous Sorcery
Arcane Evolution
Advanced Bloodline
Crossblooded Evolution
Greater BloodlineI'll play.
Here'd be a standard spell repertoire for my level 10 Imperial sorcerer. It's by no means a perfect spell repertoire, but it's serviceable
1 - Force Barrage*, Illusory object, Shockwave, Goblin Pox
2 - Blazing Bolt*, Dispel Magic, Tailwind, Invisibility
3 - Haste, Fireball*, Fear, Wall of Thorns
4 - Mountain Resilience, Invisibility, Vision of Death*, Resilient Sphere
5 - Slither, Howling Blizzard, Scouting eye, TranslocateAgainst crowds, I can do damage with Fireball and Howling Blizzard, debuff with fear, or crowd control with wall of thorns or Slither.
Against single targets, I have Force Barrage, Goblin Pox, Resilient Sphere or Vision of Death.
To buff myself or my team, I have Longstrider, both Invisibilities, Haste, Mountain Resilience and Fly.
In a bind, I can save someone with Resilient Sphere or sashay away with Translocate, or create an illusion.
I have Scouting Eye just like your wizard (courtesy of imperial bloodline) and thanks to Arcane Evolution, I have a grimoire just like your wizard, with the exact same spells inside (same budget), so provided I can wait a day (like any wizard who isn't spell sub), I can take that one special spell that for some reason looks important.
If I don't, I actually have one more signature spell to play with, and put it on Dispel Magic.
That's also not taking into account that I have a great focus spell that allows my team to be prebuffed (10mn greater invisibility, 10mn haste ? Yes please). Or the fact that crossblooded...
Thank you Blue_frog. I will put that into foundry for the sorcerer.
My preference to test is the spell sub wizard with ars gramatica.My thought for the test is a gauntlet of 3 encounters
First encounter allows scouting and resting prior without time limits.
After wards there is a 30 minute limit on rest.
Second encounter starts when the party moves on and is an ambush on the party. No scouting allowed beforehand. RK only allowed after initiative begins. 30 min rest afterwards.
Last encounter is a boss fight with lackeys. Scouting ahead and RK ahead is allowed.
More or less, but without requiring a feat and not lowering the spells per day. Wizards’ class features and feats feel weaker than other casters, I’m curious to hear from people more experienced with the system if “baking” in flexible spellcasting would break the game.Would porting arcanist casting from PF1 for wizards break the game?Do you mean flexible spellcasting?
Seems legit, assuming you still prepare a total of 2 times your maximum spell rank (upto 2 * 9 = 18). And I'm not against adding school spells as freebie for your spell collection in this case.
I understand the math for PF2 mostly, I mainly was curious if giving wizards flexible casting by default would be enough to make wizards competitive vs other casters.More or less, but without requiring a feat and not lowering the spells per day. Wizards’ class features and feats feel weaker than other casters, I’m curious to hear from people more experienced with the system if “baking” in flexible spellcasting would break the game.Would porting arcanist casting from PF1 for wizards break the game?Do you mean flexible spellcasting?I made all casters spontaneous. Didn't break the game. Works fine. Still can't get anyone to play a wizard, but it's no doubt better than the base wizard.
PF2 is a very tight system regardless of what spells you cast. Saving throws are set very tight. Hit points very tight. All casting DCs are a set progression for all casters. All casters use the same version of spells unless accessing a unique spell to a list.
The only thing differentiating casters in PF2 is class features and cosmetic differences.
I thought it would. But what I found is the problem with wizards is not one of power or competition in the sense of how well they do comparatively. Wizard does fine landing spells and having an effect.
As I stated, so does every legendary caster. Fighter as an example has a +2 advantage to hit and this is sufficient to make them one of the strongest martials in the game. It makes them unique. Wizard has nothing like this.
As people have stated, wizard's main claim to fame is they cast more spells in the long term. Then you must ask, "Is that any good?"
The answer I've found is no, save in a few situations. Why? A variety of reasons.
1. Focus abilities are often as good as spells. A bard can do an AOE group heroism for 1 focus point. A druid can wild shape equivalent to spell level all day. A cleric can heal.
These abilities are every bit as good as spells because they are useful and powerful in almost all situations with rare exception.
2. Skills: Skills are much more powerful than they've ever been in combat. They have focused the main combat power into strength skills and charisma skills making strength martials the best at combat maneuvers and charisma martials the best at social skills in combat like Bon Mot and Demoralize.
Skills also allow you to overcome many obstacles without having to rely on spells. So whatever a wizard can overcome with spells, you can often do just as well if not better with a skill.
Let's take something like Intimidation with Coerce. If you succeed, you get the bad guy to tell you want to hear, no saving throw. And you can build up intimidation super high with more support than a caster DC.
I've had players mass coerce entire guard forces to make them leave. That's the rules. If the charisma character uses Intimidation with the Quick Coercion and Group Coercion, they are often better than casters at forcing entire groups to do what they tell them to do.
Skills are very powerful in PF2. As powerful as many spells and any character can build them up.
3. This is one that doesn't get mentioned much. Length of combat. Combats can average anywhere from a couple of rounds to 5 to 7 or more depending on complexity and number of combatants.
Let's say like the other day. My players are fighting 8 CR3 creatures at level 7, CR-4. They absolutely destroy these creatures quickly. Spending a single AOE spell is enough to often kill most of them.
You're also working in a group that is also taking actions. So your martials are hammering on things and other casters, so you're not sure when the enemy is going to die. Maybe they die quick and you don't even get the chance to cast many spells.
Spells have an action cost and you can only cast so many a round. So if the combat is over quick, you don't really even get a chance to cast many spells. If it takes a long time, maybe you cast quite a few, but unlikely. Even moderately competent parties kill things fast enough you don't get to cast a lot of spells before everything is dead.
So how great is it is to have a lot of spells if everything gets wasted so fast you don't even need to cast that many spells?
At low levels, you can often run out of spells. At high levels, I often end the day with a lot of spells left because everyone in the group is much tougher and doing far more damage so combats even against 200 plus hit point creatures end about as fast as combats against 30 hit point creatures.
PF2 designers did a nice job scaling damage to keep the duration of fights fairly static even as you level.
4. Spells: Spells seem to come in tiers of power. 1st and 2nd level is the lowest tier of power. 3rd to 5th is the next tier. 6th to 8th is the next tier. Then 9th and 10 enter their own tier.
You often don't need much more than the second and third tier even at higher level to do the job.
9th and 10th level spells are often hard to use. I tried to use meteor swarm and I couldn't find the space for it without smashing my allies. The burst was just too big. Sometimes it's hard to find the space for Eclipse Burst. That's why chain lightning is so nice. No unintended targets. Wails of the Damned is nice too because it hits only enemies. You find out these spells that can work more surgically are more valuable, so you grab them.
And this is not a huge list.
Then slow is always useful against bosses and or groups at 6th level. Heal is always good. There's a variety of spells are always good.
So where does that leave the wizard for unique power?
1. Thesis? Nope. Thesis are almost all just more spells.
2. Better spell DCs? Nope. It's all the same.
3. Arcane Bond? That's just poor man's spontaneous casting one or two times a day unless you take unified theory.
4. Focus spells? Nope. Some of the worst focus spells in the game. Which is why you don't even see pro-wizard players bring them up in these debates.
So where does the wizard shine?
1. Non-combat utility. If you need to do some scouting mission or some special action and you need some strange or unique spell load out, wizard is your man as long as it's on the arcane list.
They can be good at magical scouting, scrynig, interrogation, illusions, and different load outs. Not that the other caster classes are bad as I built my harrow sorcerer to do these things and was good at with a handful of well chosen spells, but the wizard can go deep into spell problem solving.
This is their area to shine if they have the money to build out a spellbook and the desire to research all this stuff.
Is it necessary? Not that I've found. Can be it be fun? Sure. Is it an area the wizard is uniquely qualified for? Yes.
Is it sufficient to make the wizard interesting to my group? Apparently not. Maybe they can't get over how weak the wizard is now, I don't know. Maybe they watch rogues do the majority of the problem solving with their stack of skills and thus don't care about sifting spells and spending a bunch of gold on spells to do what a rogue does with no preparation.
I really just don't know. I don't find the wizard fun in this edition. My group doesn't. I've had wizards in my campaigns all the time for decades with at least three of us having our favorite characters as wizards.
PF2 wizard just lacks something that makes the wizard feel good to play for myself and my group. If it were a power problem, then I doubt I would like the druid and sorcerer so much and acknowledge the bard and cleric are both powerful if boring.
The wizard feels like such an empty class with so little to look forward to. I don't know how to make it competitive without rewriting it.
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The bottom line of this entire discussion, but especial the last several pages of this thread, is that what you want out of a caster is largely going to shape wether you find the wizard to be interesting and compelling in play, and because of that, almost no one is going to change their opinion based on anything less than personal experience.
It boils down so much to play style and assumptions about what can be done in exploration mode and downtime mode that convincing someone their personal experience is wrong is fairly demeaning and a fruitless activity.
Certainly players that are asking for something like flexible casting to be built into the wizard chassis are never going to satisfied with a class built on prepared casting, but that doesn’t actually mean anything to someone who would never pick the flexible casting archetype and would rather be able to cast 2 more top 2 rank spells a day.
Personally, I am happy for sorcerers to hear that dangerous sorcery is a built in class feature and that the whole time players have been complaining about blasters, the devs have been working on making it more clear that the sorcerer is the default “blaster first” spell caster. Trying to build and play a wizard that plays the same as a blast happy sorcerer is, and should be a less satisfying experience than playing a sorcerer in the first place.
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Also, about wizards non-spell slot features: those of us happy with wizards do defend theses, schools and focus spells regularly. Inevitably, those conversations devolve to these hyper combat focused white room debates that are again rooted in assumptions about play style.
What sorcerer focus spell is better than rune of observation? Well, that boils down to player desire and how GMs play scrying. “But, third actions and sustain options…” well if my wizard is using spell slots for that and never running out of options, than those other focus spells are useless because I have better things to do with my actions.
So much of the conversation boils down to things like the scarcity mindset of players, or issues with getting on the same page with other players who don’t want to succeed as a team utilizing every character’s strengths as effectively as possible. Like who cares if a wizard or a sorcerer dies more generic damage in a DPR challenge? I am far more interested in how all 4 characters can work together to overcome challenges and if everyone else is trying to play exactly the same around either the sorcerer or the wizard, then the problem isn’t with the one caster player’s character build.
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There is a gulf of difference between a battle wizard not being the best blaster in the game and not being effective enough at blasting to blast every encounter and still not having an exclusive focus on blasting.
Like the school of battle wizardry give non-blasting spells at more than half of spell ranks and even has a non-blasting hire rank focus spell. With irresistible magic your battle wizard will still be better at sticking spells against difficult opponents than the blaster sorcerer.
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It sounds like we need more depth in the spell lists to make prepared casters stand out more compared to spontaneous casters, preferably niche and situational spells that spontaneous casters would be less inclined to pick for their repertoire. As for the wizard chassis itself I think we’re stuck with what we have until PF3 unfortunately, although new arcane schools with better/more interesting focus spells could go a long way towards making wizard stand out.
I know personally I want the following:
1. No curriculum spell slots. They just aren't a wide enough list any longer. Now it leaves too much to DM caveat.
2. Curriculums should be as interesting as druid circles or bard muses. They should be something really cool and unique that makes you go, "Ooooh. I really want to play a Battle School wizard. I can see that build. What cool focus spells."
3. Give them and really all prepared casters Spell Substitution. It's basically the prepared version of Signature Spells allowing Prepared casters to adjust their spells throughout the day so they always feel like they have a useful loadout in exchange for 10 minutes rather than a whole day.
Make the wizard more fun to build in a unique way like the bard, sorc, cleric, or druid. If you're making a wizard who likes to change form, make them good at it. If they're a battle wizard, make them feel like a battle wizard. Start to move farther away from the PF1 wizard box and have some fun with the wizard design now that they can.
I want to see what the PF2 design team can do with the connected to the D&D wizard severed and the ability to make some real interesting choices on what it means to be a wizard of a curriculum like they did with the other classes.
I've never played a druid in 40 years of D&D until PF2. Never really played many bards. I can remember maybe trying one, but PF2 I ran a bard to 17. They definitely have interesting builds, wish I liked that performing concept more but I don't. Played plenty of sorcs in PF1 and 3E, like the sorc in PF2.
But that darn wizard...just man, why does it feel so bad in this edition? It's a legendary caster, but it doesn't feel like it or anything like the PF1 wizard save for the bad parts like limited spell selection for schools.
Did you consider maybe buying scrolls?Don't believe this in the slightest.Our group for Curse of the Crimson Throne actually TPK'd because of a Spontaneous Spellcaster instead of a Prepared one.
If that isn't enough of a reason for Prepared > Spontaneous, then nothing is.
Don't believe it if you want, but it happened for our group, and it's solely because we didn't have the benefits of a Prepared Spellcaster.
In short, it's because Spontaneous requires weeks of downtime to retrain into spells that they need, versus Prepared, which can just change them the following day. This is especially great when comparing Clerics to Oracles, because Clerics can just prep spells like Remove Curse, Restoration, etc. in the following day. Oracles? They can't do that, period.
A lot of our characters suffered permanent debilitations that could not be fixed except with spells like Restoration and such. Problem is, our Oracle didn't have such spells known, and there were no scrolls or anything available to us. This was at the tail end of the 5th book, where we weren't going to have any opportunity to "retreat" to buy scrolls or otherwise get access to such spells, because doing so essentially meant we would lose in the book.
So, we were effectively forced to fight a mini-boss while super-crippled, and after having 2 of the 5 characters die as a result of being super-crippled, the other 3 simply "noped" out of the adventure (since we managed to make the mini-boss burn through their entire spell list and dip), and we ended it there. Granted, we should have TPK'd by the 2nd or 3rd book, but in that case it wouldn't have been because of different types of spellcasters.
No access to Ye Olde Magicke Shoppe, so no scrolls to buy.
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Does anyone have a level 10 sorcerer build they think shows that discrepancy the most? If you use pathbuilder I can just upload it into foundry.
Its really the spell selection i would like to see that is considered all the spells a caster would actually need which obviates the entire existence of a wizard.
I leveled up my 5th-level examples, Esi and I'boko, to 10th level. I am out of time due to leaving on a trip today and might have left errors in the builds. Oops, no time to select scrolls for Esi's Scroll Adept.
I noticed a problem with the Staff Nexus arcane thesis. Leaving up a staff is cannot occur at every other level unless the staff is a personal staff, and those have a lower maximum spell level. I swapped out Esi's atmospheric staff for a staff of summoning, because summoning creatures has more versatility. However, Esi no longer relies on fighting with her staff, so I retrained her Bespell Strikes class feat to Call Wizardly Tools.
Esi Djana Wizard 10
Unique, Medium, Human, Humanoid
Female human wizard
Heritage Skilled (expert Athletics)
Background Sponsored by Family
Arcane School Battle Magic
Arcane Thesis Staff Nexus
Branch Tempest-Sun Mages (master Tempest-Sun Mage Lore)
Perception +14;
Languages Common, Dwarven, Elven, Halfling, Grippli, Mwangi
Skills Acrobatics +15, Arcana(m) +21, Athletics(e) +16, Crafting +17, Diplomacy +15, Magaambya Lore +17, Medicine +14, Nature(m) +18, Occultism +17, Performance +15, Religion +14, Society +17, Stealth +15, Tempest-Sun Mage Lore(m) +21
Str +2, Dex +3, Con +1, Int +5, Wis +2, Cha +3
Items +1 resilient studded leather armor. +2 striking greater staff of summoning staff, dagger, spellbook, healer's tools, various metals for needle darts, adventurer's pack, holy water, moderate healing potion, moderate antidote, moderate antiplague
Ancestry Feats Natural Ambition (Reach Spell), Natural Skill (Crafting, Performance), Wavetouched Paragon
Skill Feats Assured Identification, Battle Medicine, Cat Fall, Hobnobber, Magical Crafting, Magical Shorthand
General Feat Armor Proficiency, Toughness
Class features Arcane Bond (staff), Expert Spellcaster, Reach Spell feat 1,[/url] Cantrip Expansion feat 2, Call Wizardly Tools feat 4, Explosive Arrival feat 6, Advanced School Spell feat 8, Scroll Adept feat 10
AC 27; Fort +16, Ref +18, Will +17
HP 88
Speed 25 feet; Swim 15 feet
Melee [One Action] +2 striking staff +16 (two-Hand 2d8) Damage 2d4+2 bludgeoning
Arcane Prepared Spells DC 29, attack +19 (* denotes curriculum slot)
5th darkvision, howling blizzard*, glimmer of charm, sending
4th fly, translate, translocate, <wall of fire* expended to charge staff>
3rd haste, fireball*, gasping marsh, slow
2nd dispel magic, illusionary creature, impeccable flow, <mist* expended to charge staff>
1st breathe fire*, charm, mending, phantasmal minion
Cantrips (5th) detect magic, detect metal, electric arc, message, needle darts, prestidigitation, shield*, telekinetic hand
School focus spells (5th) (2 focus points) force bolt, energy absorption
Staff Nexus on Greater Staff of Summoning +2 weapon potency and striking runes, 11 charges. Extra cantrip light, extra 1st-level spell sure strike, can expend two spells to charge it.
I wasnt asking a rhetorical question about what spell repertoire a sorcerer needs to invalidate a wizard.
That is exactly what I want to test against the wizard against a variety of encounters. better if others share them along with how they would run them to get other perspectives.So far for the sorcerer from what has been suggested the feats to level 10 would be:
Dangerous Sorcery
Arcane Evolution
Advanced Bloodline
Crossblooded Evolution
Greater Bloodline
I used that list of class feats for I'boko, retraining her Reach Spell to Dangerous Sorcery. However, she kept Cantrip Expansion rather than retraining it to Arcane Evolution. For this test, making her more like a wizard would muddle the comparison. Likewise, as a Magaambya Student, she really would have gone with Druid Multiclass Dedication and Basic Druid Spellcaster in place of Arcane Evolution and Crossblodded Evolution, but we are avoiding multiclassing, too.
I gave I'boko a greater staff of summoning, too. She did not decorate it with weapon runes, because she put her weapon runes on her clan dagger and her handwraps. She would rather use her clan dagger in combat than her staff. Nor is either weapon her arcane bond, because sorcerers don't have an arcane bond.
I'boko chose to make more of her skills expert rather than any of them master (the master Rain Scribe Lore is from attending the Magaambya Academy). She is essentially a respected leader of her home village Kiutu abd serves many roles. She grabbed Cleanse Affliction with Crossblooded Evolution rather than a combat-oriented spell, due to her village needing it more.
I'boko Sorcerer 10
Unique, Medium, Dwarf, Humanoid
Female dwarf sorcerer
Heritage Elemental Heart (cold Energy Emanation)
Background Sponsored by a Village
Bloodline Draconic (Cloud)
Branch] Rain Scribes (master Rain Scribe Lore)
[b]Perception +15; darkvision
Languages Common, Dwarven, Draconic, Garundi, Mwangi, Orcish
Skills Arcana(e) +18, Crafting(e) +18, Diplomacy(e) +18, Dwarven Lore(e) +18, Intimidation +16, Medicine +15, Mountain Lore +16, Nature(e) +17, Occultism +16, Performance +16, Rain Scribe Lore(m) +18, Religion +15, Society +16, Survival +15
Str +0, Dex +3, Con +2, Int +4, Wis +3, Cha +4.5
Items +1 resilient studded leather armor, +2 striking clan dagger, +2 striking handwraps of might blows, dagger, greater staff of summoning, healer's tools, various metals for needle darts, adventurer's pack, holy water, moderate healing potion, moderate antidote, moderate antiplague
Ancestry Feats Dwarven Lore, Fire Savvy, Energy Blessed"
Skill Feats Forager, Glad-Hand, Intimidating Glare, Magical Crafting, Natural Medicine
General Feat Armor Proficiency, Fleet
Class features Signature Spells, Expert Spellcasting, Dangerous Sorcery feat 1, Cantrip Expansion feat 2, Advanced Bloodline feat 6, Crossblood Evolution feat 8, Greater Bloodline feat 10
AC 26; Fort +17, Ref +15, Will +19
HP 90
Speed 25 feet
Melee [One Action] +2 striking clan dagger +14 (agile, dwarf, parry, versatile B) Damage 2d4 piercing
Melee [One Action] +2 striking dragon claws +16 (finesse, unarmed, from a spell) Damage 2d4 slashing plus 1d6 electricity
Arcane Spontaneous Spells DC 28, attack +18 (^ denotes signature spell, * denotes granted spell from bloodline, + from Crossblood Evolution)
5th (4/day) chromatic wall*, glimmer of charm, howling blizzard, sending, umbral journey
4th (4/day) enervation, fly, invisibility, shape stone, spell immunity*
3rd (4/day) aqueous orb, cloud dragon's cloak, fireball,^ haste*, translate
2nd (4/day) cleanse affliction^+, dispel magic, gecko grip, illusionary creature, resist energy*,
1st (4/day) charm, mending, pocket library, sure strike*, weave wood
Cantrips (3rd) daze, detect magic, electric arc, message, needle darts, prestidigitation, shield*. spout
Bloodline focus spell (5th) (3 focus points) dragon claws, dragon breath, dragon wings
Energy Emanation [Two Actions]
Evocation, Primal
Source Character Guide pg. 19 2.0
Frequency once per day
Energy bursts forth from your body. You deal 7d6 cold damage in an emanation of 5 feet, 10 feet, or 15 feet. (DC 28 basic Reflex save).
Blood Magic Draconic scales grow briefly on you or one target, granting a +1 status bonus to AC for 1 round.
The class feat selection appears better for the sorcerer. The wizard's Call Wizardly Tools removes the disadvantage of depending on separate objects, but the sorcerer lacks that disadvantage without a feat. The wizard's Advanced School spell is feat 8, but the sorcerer's Advanced Bloodline is feat 6 and is followed up by Greater Bloodline feat 10, so that I'boko has one more focus spell and one more focus point than Esi.
As for the scenarios, I imagine four challenges.
1) Negotiate You want the permission of the locals for access to an archeological site. The chief has Will +12 and you to need change his attitude from unfriendly to friendly. If he becomes indifferent or better, healing local sick people or performing similar favors gives the party a second opportunity to Make an Impression. If the chief becomes helpful, the party can buy food and supplies from the local village. If you fail, the party camps nearby and a successful challenge 3 will give them access.
2) Attack in the night The party is attacked by wild animals while sleeping in their camp. The rogue is on watch, but the rest of the party is in sleeping clothes (comfortable armor at best). The camp is dimly lit, but both Esi and I'boko have darkvision, Esi's from a spell.
3) Rescue The local village is attacked by seven 7th-level slave raiders (Gang Leader). The party should defeat the raiders while releasing bound villagers mixed among them.
4) Construct-infested site The site is sealed and an ancient inscription in a rare language explains the hostile war machines stored inside. Create 3 moderate-threat encounters, each against a different kind of construct, such as four Toilforged Sentinels, two Clay Effigies, and one Glass Elephant.
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Does anyone have a level 10 sorcerer build they think shows that discrepancy the most? If you use pathbuilder I can just upload it into foundry.
Its really the spell selection i would like to see that is considered all the spells a caster would actually need which obviates the entire existence of a wizard.
I leveled up my 5th-level examples, Esi and I'boko, to 10th level. I am out of time due to leaving on a trip today and might have left errors in the builds. Oops, no time to select scrolls for Esi's Scroll Adept.
I noticed a problem with the Staff Nexus arcane thesis. Leaving up a staff is cannot occur at every other level unless the staff is a personal staff, and those have a lower maximum spell level. I swapped out Esi's atmospheric staff for a staff of summoning, because summoning creatures has more versatility. However, Esi no longer relies on fighting with her staff, so I retrained her Bespell Strikes class feat to Call Wizardly Tools.
** spoiler omitted **...
Thank you Mathmuse.
This encounter is one I wouldn't have thought up myself.
In totality, I agree that Wizards are well below par mechanically.
One note I'd like to add is on the nature of resource attrition as a concept. For all the instances in which the resource does not deplete, the limitation is irrelevant. This is why a potentially higher spells p day count of the Wiz feels so inconsequential, because most of the time it literally is.
While seeing what a spontaneous caster can do and slapping things like Spell Substitution onto Wiz as a way to help it out is perfectly valid, I would like to explore other ways to help the wizard less morph toward the existing Sorc's orange, and instead refine their apple to get them up to par.
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I see Wizards as those who have gained their magic via mastery over the arcane, and I would try to give them more magical abilities that are not spells in and of themselves.
It really is astounding how many Wiz Feats are crippled for no apparent reason. I look at possibilities like Split Slot and think about how it adds a neat wrinkle to the entire prep process and--- Oh, its for a single slot, total. The game's asking me to spend a class feat slot, for the literal smallest possible gain in spell flexibility that technically fits the presented concept. It's not even funny enough to call the Feat a joke.
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Paizo's conservative balancing nature may have put a big dent into this, but they did seem to try to give the Wiz more "magical mastery" in the Remaster.
One example of a change I'd make is to buff Spell Protection Array from being a 1A + sustain option (yikes) and into a free action flourish that needs to be triggered by the Wiz doing Cast a Spell. I would also give the effect a 2 turn duration, with each 1A sustain giving it 2 turns.
Another change that would really help is for a Wiz version of Bespell Strikes to actually let them put the effect onto an ally. Limit it to first strike if concerned about balance. Class Feats should matter, should genuinely affect your combat decisions.
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As the Wiz has spell slots guaranteed, I'd love for the Wiz to get a unique Feature to burn low R slots to add the normally 1A metamagic effects as free Actions.
Wiz really needs to have ways to play with magic as a concept baked into the class Features to really sell it has having a unique identity as a wielder of magic, as opposed to someone who simply casts spells.
However it would be implemented, I think one way to address the "Wiz is weak" issue would be to give the class more non-spell uses of its arcane mastery, including spending slots on non-spell abilities/effects.
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What if wizards were represented by continuing education and study rather than it all being past tense?
at level 1 the wizard chooses their thesis. At level 6 level 10 and level 16 a wizard chooses a thesis or an expanded thesis.
Expanded theses are slight improvements to the one they already have studied.
Additionally new feats can be introduced to allow adopting a new field of study to add spells from a different curriculum
I think these two changes would round out the class in a way that satisfies a lot of the problems people have with them.
This would be a conceptual change from having just studied at a wizard school to continually studying and adapting those studies as you level.
The wizard seems like the kind of class that doesnt stop at a bachelors degree
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Really if we model the Wizard after an academic, your original thesis is just "what gets you into the club where people won't dispute your credentials" and beyond that you just formalize and subsequently publish your results.
This is why when comic books (and comic book movies) want to make someone sound really smart by saying "they've got 6 PhDs" it's very funny hardly anybody on earth gets more than 1, since the 1 already lets you submit to journals and not get rejected out of hand and no PhD program would accept someone who already has one since it's a waste of time, effort, and resources.
But the problem with making the Wizard super-academic, is that you don't spend a lot of time going to school in this sort of game.
Really if we model the Wizard after an academic, your original thesis is just "what gets you into the club where people won't dispute your credentials" and beyond that you just formalize and subsequently publish your results.
This is why when comic books (and comic book movies) want to make someone sound really smart by saying "they've got 6 PhDs" it's very funny hardly anybody on earth gets more than 1, since the 1 already lets you submit to journals and not get rejected out of hand and no PhD program would accept someone who already has one since it's a waste of time, effort, and resources.
But the problem with making the Wizard super-academic, is that you don't spend a lot of time going to school in this sort of game.
Its a game so it doesnt have to be accurate to life as this game isnt in many ways and we can conceptualize it as research in the field.
the important thing is wizard gets more choices as they level that continue to develop their concept and abilities.
...I wasnt asking a rhetorical question about what spell repertoire a sorcerer needs to invalidate a wizard.
That is exactly what I want to test against the wizard against a variety of encounters. better if others share them along with how they would run them to get other perspectives.So far for the sorcerer from what has been suggested the feats to level 10 would be:
Dangerous Sorcery
Arcane Evolution
Advanced Bloodline
Crossblooded Evolution
Greater BloodlineI'll play.
Here'd be a standard spell repertoire for my level 10 Imperial sorcerer. It's by no means a perfect spell repertoire, but it's serviceable
1 - Force Barrage*, Illusory object, Shockwave, Goblin Pox
2 - Blazing Bolt*, Dispel Magic, Tailwind, Invisibility
3 - Haste, Fireball*, Fear, Wall of Thorns
4 - Mountain Resilience, Invisibility, Vision of Death*, Resilient Sphere
5 - Slither, Howling Blizzard, Scouting eye, TranslocateAgainst crowds, I can do damage with Fireball and Howling Blizzard, debuff with fear, or crowd control with wall of thorns or Slither.
Against single targets, I have Force Barrage, Goblin Pox, Resilient Sphere or Vision of Death.
To buff myself or my team, I have Longstrider, both Invisibilities, Haste, Mountain Resilience and Fly.
In a bind, I can save someone with Resilient Sphere or sashay away with Translocate, or create an illusion.
I have Scouting Eye just like your wizard (courtesy of imperial bloodline) and thanks to Arcane Evolution, I have a grimoire just like your wizard, with the exact same spells inside (same budget), so provided I can wait a day (like any wizard who isn't spell sub), I can take that one special spell that for some reason looks important.
If I don't, I actually have one more signature spell to play with, and put it on Dispel Magic.
That's also not taking into account that I have a great focus spell that allows my team to be prebuffed (10mn greater invisibility, 10mn haste ? Yes please). Or
This sorcerer would have 2300gp to gear up. Any preferences or must have items?
or you could use the permanent items 9th: 1, 8th: 2, 7th: 1, 6th: 2 350 gp guidelines.Whichever you choose the wizard will use that same method for gearing up.
...I wasnt asking a rhetorical question about what spell repertoire a sorcerer needs to invalidate a wizard.
That is exactly what I want to test against the wizard against a variety of encounters. better if others share them along with how they would run them to get other perspectives.So far for the sorcerer from what has been suggested the feats to level 10 would be:
Dangerous Sorcery
Arcane Evolution
Advanced Bloodline
Crossblooded Evolution
Greater BloodlineI'll play.
Here'd be a standard spell repertoire for my level 10 Imperial sorcerer. It's by no means a perfect spell repertoire, but it's serviceable
1 - Force Barrage*, Illusory object, Shockwave, Goblin Pox
2 - Blazing Bolt*, Dispel Magic, Tailwind, Invisibility
3 - Haste, Fireball*, Fear, Wall of Thorns
4 - Mountain Resilience, Invisibility, Vision of Death*, Resilient Sphere
5 - Slither, Howling Blizzard, Scouting eye, TranslocateAgainst crowds, I can do damage with Fireball and Howling Blizzard, debuff with fear, or crowd control with wall of thorns or Slither.
Against single targets, I have Force Barrage, Goblin Pox, Resilient Sphere or Vision of Death.
To buff myself or my team, I have Longstrider, both Invisibilities, Haste, Mountain Resilience and Fly.
In a bind, I can save someone with Resilient Sphere or sashay away with Translocate, or create an illusion.
I have Scouting Eye just like your wizard (courtesy of imperial bloodline) and thanks to Arcane Evolution, I have a grimoire just like your wizard, with the exact same spells inside (same budget), so provided I can wait a day (like any wizard who isn't spell sub), I can take that one special spell that for some reason looks important.
If I don't, I actually have one more signature spell to play with, and put it on Dispel Magic.
That's also not taking into account that I have a great focus spell that allows my team to be prebuffed (10mn greater invisibility,
Also what is the arcane evolution spell and rank that will be added to the repertoire for the test. Since the test is 1 adventuring day this choice will be set before the encounters (if your sorcerer is the kind that would have a bunch of spells in this book for different occasions I would still recommend putting a sufficient amount of the budget to scrolls that fill this book even if only one is selected for this test to actually use. The scrolls apparently dont get used up so they will be there to use as well at the ranks you pay for) Also what is the crossblooded evolution spell and rank? If Synesthesia is a spell you feel puts the sorcerer above the wizard then I think it should be the one you pick.
No access to Ye Olde Magicke Shoppe, so no scrolls to buy.
Did you consider maybe buying scrolls?
Yeah, I'm not gonna lie. I understand why the GM might say it's hard to get access to scrolls during that stretch of the AP, but I feel like denying that party access to scrolls of restoration would be incredibly shortsighted. You had no means of accessing it, and it's a spell you really need when you do need it.
Makes it sound like the GM was (probably unintentionally) punishing you for choices that had been tacitly communicated to be fine up until that point. I am just not a fan of that. Like, yeah, the oracle not having condition removal is a bit rough. But you had been fine with that through book 5; punishing you for it this late is a bit ??? to me.
I also really hope the GM was giving you ABP if you didn't have magic shop access. That makes me worry you hadn't had reliable access to magic items since the beginning of book 4 or so, despite how items are dead necessary to keep up with PF2E's power curve. If you were behind on items, that may have only exacerbated all the other issues you were experiencing.
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Well... I was kinda fine before, but after seeing how Sorcerer is turning out, the Wizard being the way that it is is not even acceptable anymore.
Wait, the Imperial bloodline can do what?!
For the next spell, I forgot to add that. Still nuts though
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Also what is the arcane evolution spell and rank that will be added to the repertoire for the test. Since the test is 1 adventuring day this choice will be set before the encounters (if your sorcerer is the kind that would have a bunch of spells in this book for different occasions I would still recommend putting a sufficient amount of the budget to scrolls that fill this book even if only one is selected for this test to actually use. The scrolls apparently dont get used up so they will be there to use as well at the ranks you pay for) Also what is the crossblooded evolution spell and rank? If Synesthesia is a spell you feel puts the sorcerer above the wizard then I think it should be the one you pick.
Wait, I'm confused. I thought you were trying to compare sorcerer and wizard in the course of a busy adventuring day and out of combat, i.e. identifying stuff, deciphering script, reading auras, mapping a dungeon, fleeing an enraged mob, climbing a cliff, swimming at the bottom of a putrid pool, and so on and so forth.
If it's just straight-up fighting, I fail to see how a non spell blending wizard can even compete with the sorcerer and I doubt anyone ever tried to make this argument.
Also what is the arcane evolution spell and rank that will be added to the repertoire for the test. Since the test is 1 adventuring day this choice will be set before the encounters (if your sorcerer is the kind that would have a bunch of spells in this book for different occasions I would still recommend putting a sufficient amount of the budget to scrolls that fill this book even if only one is selected for this test to actually use. The scrolls apparently dont get used up so they will be there to use as well at the ranks you pay for) Also what is the crossblooded evolution spell and rank? If Synesthesia is a spell you feel puts the sorcerer above the wizard then I think it should be the one you pick.Wait, I'm confused. I thought you were trying to compare sorcerer and wizard in the course of a busy adventuring day and out of combat, i.e. identifying stuff, deciphering script, reading auras, mapping a dungeon, fleeing an enraged mob, climbing a cliff, swimming at the bottom of a putrid pool, and so on and so forth.
If it's just straight-up fighting, I fail to see how a non spell blending wizard can even compete with the sorcerer and I doubt anyone ever tried to make this argument.
Its just one testable encounter day. But the money for equipment probably needs parameters set to balance out what the wizard and sorcerer are bringing to the table with the same amount of starting gp.
mathmuse offered a different set of conditions for the encounters.each idea people offer up can be tested as we go. Im willing to keep testing this as long as there is interest both mine and that of others. It may take time though.
A variety of situations and constraints or lack of constraints given from different perspectives is IMO a good way to find non obvious interactions limitations strengths ect..
Also I am not actually making any argument. But I do wonder if I will see things that we assumed away or just didnt think of when I test.
One thing though, I might want to wait for the changes to be made on Foundry for the PC2.
remastered wizard should be compared to remastered sorcerer.
Two observations that have been left out of the conversation.
First you can heighten any lower level school spell into a higher school slot.
Second wouldn't you pick a school that has the spell you want to cast?
So you will never have a spell rank with a wasted slot if you just start with the school that has spells you want to use.
Like a battle mage can slot force barrage in any rank school slot. They also get fireball and chain lighting/disintegrate. but if you dont like what you know for second rank spells in curriculum put in a force barrage which you would have done anyway if the slot was open to anything.
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druids, who have access to everything
Just a reminder about the other prepared casters. They only get common spells.
To access uncommon and rare spells. They have to find them (ie GM permission) and then can copy them into a spellbook to keep access. Very much like wizards do.| 2 people marked this as a favorite. |
I just noticed that the sorcerer for the test only has a CHA of 4.5 at level 10 in order to have an INT of +4. This seems like an incredibly improbable attribute spread, and one that hurts the sorcerer. How many level 10 sorcerers have an 18 in the stat of their magic tradition skill and have it at master by level 10?
It doesn’t matter for every campaign but casting rituals, identifying magic and magic related skill challenges are not that rare in APs, some of which have pretty high/hard DCs. I think spontaneous casters all using CHA and often having a INT based magic tradition was an intentional drawback in those classes development. It is an easy one to ignore in simulated play, but one that can be a party wide hole with multiple spontaneous casters
No access to Ye Olde Magicke Shoppe, so no scrolls to buy.
Did you consider maybe buying scrolls?Yeah, I'm not gonna lie. I understand why the GM might say it's hard to get access to scrolls during that stretch of the AP, but I feel like denying that party access to scrolls of restoration would be incredibly shortsighted. You had no means of accessing it, and it's a spell you really need when you do need it.
Makes it sound like the GM was (probably unintentionally) punishing you for choices that had been tacitly communicated to be fine up until that point. I am just not a fan of that. Like, yeah, the oracle not having condition removal is a bit rough. But you had been fine with that through book 5; punishing you for it this late is a bit ??? to me.
I also really hope the GM was giving you ABP if you didn't have magic shop access. That makes me worry you hadn't had reliable access to magic items since the beginning of book 4 or so, despite how items are dead necessary to keep up with PF2E's power curve. If you were behind on items, that may have only exacerbated all the other issues you were experiencing.
To be clear, this was after that portion of the AP, and honestly, the portion you were talking about prior is, in hindsight, the AP's warning to prepare for that stuff since it became so prevalent there. However, due to the nature of the AP's objectives, even surviving that, we wouldn't have had the time or resources available to retrain and prepare for it. Plus, even planning for it, we were just too low of level for it.
ABP was not in place for this group, but we did get a lot of solid loot after clearing that part of the AP, so affording the stuff wasn't an issue, but having access to it was, since when we came back, we were essentially denied access to Ye Olde Magicke Shoppes.
druids, who have access to everythingJust a reminder about the other prepared casters. They only get common spells.
To access uncommon and rare spells. They have to find them (ie GM permission) and then can copy them into a spellbook to keep access. Very much like wizards do.
What? Except for the magus and some sorcerers, other classes don't have a spellbook.
You're correct about access, but I don't know of any rule or passage that indicates they need a spellbook or anything of the sort in which to record their new knowledge. They simply get access under the right conditions, which might include or require Learn a Spell, depending on the GM.
druids, who have access to everythingJust a reminder about the other prepared casters. They only get common spells.
To access uncommon and rare spells. They have to find them (ie GM permission) and then can copy them into a spellbook to keep access. Very much like wizards do.What? Except for the magus and some sorcerers, other classes don't have a spellbook.
You're correct about access, but I don't know of any rule or passage that indicates they need a spellbook or anything of the sort in which to record their new knowledge. They simply get access under the right conditions, which might include or require Learn a Spell, depending on the GM.
This is correct. Uncommon/rare spells are for some reason not simple enough or have bad vibes so that you can't get them via normal preparation, but once you have a source explain them to you or show you and you succeed at the skill check to learn it you can prepare without a physical record from that point on.
It seems like the arcane preparation sorcerer feat went this same way in PC2, got rid of the physical book.
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It looks to me like the wizard gets access to uncommon spells if they get them through curriculum.
have anyone had different interpretations of this?
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It looks to me like the wizard gets access to uncommon spells if they get them through curriculum.
have anyone had different interpretations of this?
No, I would agree with that. Otherwise focus spells would very much not work out of the box either. Pretty much all focus spells are marked uncommon.
Witch: Basic Lesson and Lesson of Life are common options. The GM doesn't get to decide to just not let the Witch player have access to Life Boost afterwards.
Yes. It was very sloppy and careless to publish those schools with those spells without making the schools themselves uncommon.
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Yes. It was very sloppy and careless to publish those schools with those spells without making the schools themselves uncommon.
Not at all.
It just makes access to those Uncommon/Rare spells a feature of the school.| 5 people marked this as a favorite. |
From the Uncommon trait:
Some character choices give access to uncommon options,
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Yes, and the design of the CRB ensured that GMs had control of those spells so they wouldn't ruin their campaign. PC1 took that away from them.
Slotted uncommon spells are not the same as (everything is) uncommon focus spells.