Post/Author/DateTime	Post
qsoe 02-02-08, 12:56 PM	Is there any area spell, that fits the criteria in the title? I could not find any. I think it is a shame, that druids have spells like that (flame strike, arc of lightning), and the wizards do not.
Nephlite 02-02-08, 01:10 PM	Is there any are spell, that fits the criteria in the title? I could not find any. I think it is a shame, that druids have spells like that (flame strike, arc of lightning), and the wizards do not. Single Target: Orbs spells do more. Ray of deanimation (constructs only) Enervation (could be considered to do more depending on HD) Burst/cone: Dragon Breath (10d8 is more than 10d6)
qsoe 02-02-08, 03:12 PM	Burst/cone: Dragon Breath (10d8 is more than 10d6) It is true, but a druid can do more than 10d6 on level 11 (no metamagic), and a Dragon breath does 8d8 on level 16, besides its area is kind of a joke. I consider it seriously unbalanced given wild shape, better hp, bab for a druid.
DS 02-02-08, 03:16 PM	Wizards and Sorcerers have Wings of Flurry which doesn't have a damage cap. Probably not what you're looking for since it's force damage and not energy.
Meloku 02-02-08, 06:24 PM	Ewww, energy damage. That's not where the strengths of a wizard lie. In 4th level slots you could instead use: Solid Fog, Black Tentacles, Enervation, Bestow Curse, Greater Invisibility. Polymorph.
Avatar of Kokusho 02-02-08, 06:33 PM	I believe that Blast of Flame would be something you would be interested in. 4th level, Spell Compendium...I think. Either that or Complete Mage.
qsoe 02-02-08, 07:37 PM	Ewww, energy damage. That's not where the strengths of a wizard lie. Burning hands(1), Flaming sphere(2), Lightning bolt(3), Cone of Cold(5), Delayed blast fireball(6). I see the pattern here, and #4 is missing. Wizards are strong in energy in my opinion, and they should be. Except for level 4. I can not understand. In 4th level slots you could instead use: Solid Fog, Black Tentacles, Enervation, Bestow Curse, Greater Invisibility. Polymorph. I intend to use Empower and Practical Metamagic as a sorcerer. It means I can cast an empowered Fireball on level 8. At 9th and 10th levels, it is still fireball, 9d6, 10d6, and it is fine. And on level 11 it is still 10d6, because the creators of all the books were ignorant enough, not to fill this hole. 12th level and over, it is covered. I mean, if I chose to play an elemental blaster, I should be able to do it right. So sure, I will use Solid fog and Greater Invisibility, as they are great spells. They will fit well in the character concept. Black tentacles use grapple, so it is ridiculously difficult to use, and slows the game. Bestow curse is clearly inferior to Ray of enfeeblement (or Ray of clumsiness, Shivering touch, Touch of idiocy, you can pick one) as it requires touch AND save, and the only advantage is being permanent. If anyone comes against me, I want him to be dead in a minute, not to suffer for 10 years. I have never understood the popularity of Enervation, as it requires an attack, and then causes 1d4 negative levels. Even with a 4 would it not be too powerful. So yes, there are good forth level spells, but no elemental damage dealers for big areas. And I consider it a mistake of the creators. Even bigger mistake, that the druid has these spells.
Maekrix 02-02-08, 09:45 PM	Correct me if I'm wrong, but I believe Arc of Lightning is a 4th level spell (its one higher than regular lightning bolt) and does max of 15d6. Its in Complete Arcane
Father Dale 02-03-08, 12:39 AM	Bestow curse is clearly inferior to Ray of enfeeblement (or Ray of clumsiness, Shivering touch, Touch of idiocy, you can pick one) as it requires touch AND save, and the only advantage is being permanent. If anyone comes against me, I want him to be dead in a minute, not to suffer for 10 years. I have never understood the popularity of Enervation, as it requires an attack, and then causes 1d4 negative levels. Even with a 4 would it not be too powerful. Actually, if you can get Bestow Curse to work, it can be devestating. 50% chance to take no action. Makes it hard to do much of anything. Imagine going through a combat encounter and only getting to act every other turn. Also, being able to impose the nice penalty to any ability score can be useful as well, especially if you are targeting a particular saving throw for a save-or-fubar spell. Enervation is powerful because it can stack. Negative levels are nasty and effect everything. Spellcasters lose their best spells. Fighters lose attack bonuses. And if something takes enough negative levels it just dies. Even things like Trolls. Granted though for an energy based caster these aren't very thematic spells. But there are good spells for that stuff at this level. Fire shield is very useful (especially if empowered), as is Wall of Fire. Look in the Compendium and there are some direct damage spells as well. Although it seems, at least its been my experience, that 4th lvl spells tend to get used for defensive or utility purposes rather than attack.
CryoSilver 02-03-08, 01:05 AM	Wall of Fire isn't very damaging to indivdual creatures, but it affects a massive area. One good use for Wall of Fire (if you are so inclined) is burning down towns. At level 10, you can conjure a 200 foot long wall of flame that will burn buildings, villagers, livestock, etc. Two or three of those, and the whole village center goes up in flame.
qsoe 02-03-08, 06:42 AM	Correct me if I'm wrong, but I believe Arc of Lightning is a 4th level spell (its one higher than regular lightning bolt) and does max of 15d6. Its in Complete Arcane Druid 4, sorcerer/wizard 5 That is exactly my problem, it should be Druid 5, Sor/Wiz 4 Actually, if you can get Bestow Curse to work, it can be devestating. 50% chance to take no action. Makes it hard to do much of anything. Imagine going through a combat encounter and only getting to act every other turn. Also, being able to impose the nice penalty to any ability score can be useful as well, especially if you are targeting a particular saving throw for a save-or-fubar spell. Charm monster is better for the first use you mention, not only does it loose 1/2 of his actions against you, it will use all of them FOR you. I would consider it a 4 times improvement. Confusion requires no touch, affects more targets and affected creatures have a higher chance of not doing anything useful. On penalizing saves: If it were to lessen a will save, you have waisted a round, as he just failed a will save. For a Ref save Ray of clumsiness is better, and is of lower level. I think the most useful 4th level necromancy spell is fear, as it can effectively thin the lines of attacking fighters
Father Dale 02-03-08, 02:50 PM	Druid 4, sorcerer/wizard 5 Charm monster is better for the first use you mention, not only does it loose 1/2 of his actions against you, it will use all of them FOR you. I would consider it a 4 times improvement. Confusion requires no touch, affects more targets and affected creatures have a higher chance of not doing anything useful. On penalizing saves: If it were to lessen a will save, you have waisted a round, as he just failed a will save. For a Ref save Ray of clumsiness is better, and is of lower level. I think the most useful 4th level necromancy spell is fear, as it can effectively thin the lines of attacking fighters I might debate whether Charm Monster is more powerful as far as combat encounters then Bestow Curse. This would depend on how the DM treats charms, as it can vary greatly. However, if treated properly, charm would not be powerful enough to make it stronger than Bestow Curse, at least from the perspective of a single encounter in which you want the creature dead. Of course, this would all be situation dependent. No, it wouldn't be smart to impose it on a Will save, unless you were shooting to Dominate said creature and you were gunning to utterly destroy its Will save. Its benefit in this department is that its penalties would generally stack with others. Although i still find the 50% or take no action ability the strongest use of the spell. Its by no means a favorite of mine, and my primary character right now is a high level Necromancy specialist wizard/Archmage. I'd rank Enervation then Fear as the most useful 4th lvl Necromancy spells. I'm playing in a Dragonlance campaign and there is an exceptionally useful 4th lvl Necromancy spell I also use called Ethereal Flame; it is an area effect with 10' radius, living creatures take 1d4 + 1/5 levels wisdom damage and undead take the same but as charisma damage, Fort for half. I'm sure the uses for this spell are readily apparent. Confusion is indeed a nice spell, but again it would be situation dependent verse Bestow Curse. The issues with confusion are its indiscriminate targeting, the chances that the subject does something undesireable, and the fact that if its attacked it will automatically attack the creature that attacked it. This last part can sometimes defeat the purpose of the spell if its a BBEG fighter type and your party meleer is going toe-to-toe with it. The biggest benefit to Bestow Curse is that it will work against pretty much any creature, whether living, undead, construct, mind-blanked, deathwarded, etc. Many creatures are completely immune to spells such as Charm/Dominate, Fear, or Confusion, or might be receiving very large saving throw benefits against them. There are very few ways to become immune to bestow curse, aside from general defenses such as high SR, high touch AC, or high Will save. The biggest drawback to Bestow Curse is having to make the touch attack (what arcane caster wants to get up close enough to touch?) but it can be used with Spectral Hand, Arcane Reach, or any other way of delivering touch spells at range. Its also pretty strong for things such as Channel Spell or a spell storing weapon. (Excellent use is in a spell storing weapon against a BBEG fighter type.) Its definitely a spell for helping to take down the BBEG as opposed to a simple minion, as many Necromancy spells tend to be. So I wouldn't consider it a weak spell by any means, but it certainly is situation dependent, and can easily be the deciding factor in some encounters.
Count Arioch the 28th 02-04-08, 07:41 PM	I find that casting Bestow Curse and reducing constitution by 6 will often deal more "damage" than an actual damaging spell if cast on something with enough hit dice.
solbergb 02-04-08, 07:49 PM	Wings of flurry is the only one that comes to mind, as they forgot the damage cap on that. The L5 equivalent is moonbow, post-eratta.
solbergb 02-04-08, 07:50 PM	Correct me if I'm wrong, but I believe Arc of Lightning is a 4th level spell (its one higher than regular lightning bolt) and does max of 15d6. Its in Complete Arcane As with flame strike, druids get it a level earlier. For wizards, it is a 5th level spell.
ravenshrike 02-05-08, 01:40 AM	Actually, if you can get Bestow Curse to work, it can be devestating. 50% chance to take no action. Makes it hard to do much of anything. This is NASTY when used against a dragon, and when combined with a Limited Wish/Wish, is more or less an auto-win. It pretty much grounds them and kills their movement.
Father Dale 02-05-08, 01:51 AM	This is NASTY when used against a dragon, and when combined with a Limited Wish/Wish, is more or less an auto-win. It pretty much grounds them and kills their movement. Indeed! If it tries to fly theres a very good chance it will fall out of the sky in a round or two and possibly take some hefty falling damage. Im a big fan of the Limited Wish penalty to save trick. Works best if you have two casters in the party--one to drop the Limited Wish bomb and the other to use a readied action to immediately follow with the save-or-screwed spell.
Father Dale 02-05-08, 01:54 AM	Wall of Fire isn't very damaging to indivdual creatures, but it affects a massive area. One good use for Wall of Fire (if you are so inclined) is burning down towns. At level 10, you can conjure a 200 foot long wall of flame that will burn buildings, villagers, livestock, etc. Two or three of those, and the whole village center goes up in flame. Its also a good spell against undead, since it deals double damage to them. And don't forget you can shape it into a circle, and it doesn't necessarily have to be centered on you--you can center it on an enemy with the heat side facing inward! I sometimes have a Quickened one prepared with my high level Archmage--it always makes for quite a surprise.
RobbyPants 02-05-08, 10:01 AM	I believe that Blast of Flame would be something you would be interested in. 4th level, Spell Compendium...I think. Either that or Complete Mage. If it's the same spell I'm thinking of, I think it caps at 10d6. Even still, it's primary strength lies in that it does not allow for Spell Resistance. That being said, I'll still put in my vote that there are much better uses for your 4th level slots. Meloku listed a few good ones.
Nephlite 02-05-08, 12:20 PM	Its also a good spell against undead, since it deals double damage to them. And don't forget you can shape it into a circle, and it doesn't necessarily have to be centered on you--you can center it on an enemy with the heat side facing inward! I sometimes have a Quickened one prepared with my high level Archmage--it always makes for quite a surprise. A Circle? Nice. Make it a 10 foot raduis circle around enemy with flames shooting inward. Now, they take damage very round and if they decide to leave area.
Sildatorak 02-06-08, 11:22 AM	I have never understood the popularity of Enervation, as it requires an attack, and then causes 1d4 negative levels. Even with a 4 would it not be too powerful. It is a no-save ranged touch for -1d4 to all d20 rolls and lose that many of your top level spells. It is a caster slayer in the extreme, and an effective debuff to follow up with a save-or-lose spell.
solbergb 02-06-08, 02:11 PM	The popularity of enervation is often tied to the popularity of save/die spells. It greatly shifts the bell curve of such spells. As others stated it also strips casters of their top tier spell slots and weakens their spell effects on remaining spells. It's a good general purpose debuff, in the same category as ray of enfeeblement on a melee monster. It won't kill the enemy normally, and lacks the impact of empowered RoE on a melee, but it makes followup spells a lot easier to stick and DOES impair the enemy to some extend. Repeated castings can actually cripple an enemy pretty good too, so sorcerers like it (as do people with things like split ray, or the ability to quicken it, etc)
qsoe 02-07-08, 06:43 AM	It is a no-save ranged touch for -1d4 to all d20 rolls and lose that many of your top level spells. It is a caster slayer in the extreme, and an effective debuff to follow up with a save-or-lose spell. An Empowered Ray of Enfeeblement is a better caster killer, as casters usually do not excel in Str: - Lower level - Single shot, no follow up is needed, except for a repeat, if you rolled unlucky. This (bestow curse) is NASTY when used against a dragon, and when combined with a Limited Wish/Wish, is more or less an auto-win. It pretty much grounds them and kills their movement. Against Dragons, Empowered Ray of Clumsiness is also better, as they have only a Dex of 10: - Lower level - Single shot, no follow up is needed, except for a repeat, if you rolled unlucky. - No save, no need for a Limited wish - A grounded dragon still can be devastating 50% of the time, one with a Dex of 0 can not.
Father Dale 02-07-08, 10:07 AM	An Empowered Ray of Enfeeblement is a better caster killer, as casters usually do not excel in Str: - Lower level - Single shot, no follow up is needed, except for a repeat, if you rolled unlucky. Against Dragons, Empowered Ray of Clumsiness is also better, as they have only a Dex of 10: - Lower level - Single shot, no follow up is needed, except for a repeat, if you rolled unlucky. - No save, no need for a Limited wish - A grounded dragon still can be devastating 50% of the time, one with a Dex of 0 can not. Actually, neither of those is very good for what you are suggesting. Take a look at both those spells. They both do 'penalties' to their respective ability scores, and they cannot reduce those scores below 1. Thats important to note. Also note that the spells will not stack with themselves; only the better will apply. (e.g. I get hit with a Ray of Enfeeblement for a -8 penalty and another for a -10 penalty; i now have a total penalty of -10 and not -18) The worst you can do with Ray of Enfeeblement is to drop a target's Str to a 1. While this will have repercussions against any creature that carries more than a few pounds of equipment, it is by no means a killer. Generally, if they are carrying more than 10lbs of equipment, it will mean that the target is heavily encumbered--loses Dex to AC and can only move 5ft as a full round action. Not fun but certainly not the end of the world for most casters; many high level casters won't be really bothered by this much at all (I know my high lvl Necromancer/Archmage wouldn't be bothered in the slightest by having a temporary Str of 1.) Ray of Clumsiness can drop a Dragons Dex to a 1. The only results of this is essentially a -5 to its Dex mod (since almost all dragons always have a dex of 10). Thus, -5 to AC, Reflex saves, ranged attacks, initiative, and Dex based skills and checks. For most dragons thats not a huge deal, since they rarely use any of those except for the AC and Reflex saves (once combat has been initiated), and those are usually pretty darn high to begin with. Certainly its nowhere near as painful as losing every other turn's worth of actions. Now, spells that do ability 'damage' or 'drain' can definitely mess people up by reducing ability scores to 0. But those are a different breed from these lvl 1 Ray spells; they are usually much higher in level and have several ways to defend against.
qsoe 02-07-08, 01:05 PM	They both do 'penalties' to their respective ability scores, and they cannot reduce those scores below 1. Thats important to note. You are right, I did not read the spell descriptions well enough. In this case, use a Ray of Exhaustion on the next 2 rounds (1 round if it fails the save). Still lower levels and fewer rounds than with Enervation. If penalties from different sources stack.
Father Dale 02-07-08, 02:45 PM	Penalties from different sources would indeed stack. However, the Ray spells there (Enfeeblement and Clumsiness) still can't drop a score below 1. So even if you added additional damage to the ability, the penalty won't let it go below 1. As an example: Mr Rogue has 10 Str. Mr. Wizard shoots him with a Empowered Ray of Enfeeblement that imposes a -15 penalty to Str. Mr. Rogue now has an effective Str of 1 (since it can't drop it below 1). Poor Mr. Rogue then gets bit by a Large Monstrous Spider, and fails his Fort save vs the spider poison. He then takes 4 points of Strength damage. His effective Str score is still at 1. See, the penalty doesn't actually change the Str score, just like a negative level doesn't change a characters Base Attack Bonus; it just imposes a penalty. (re: a lvl 10 fighter with Power Attack incurs 2 negative levels from an Enervation; he can still take a -10 Power Attack, although all his attacks are at a -2 penalty.) So in the above example, the Rogue's Str drops to 6 from the poison, and the Enfeeblement penalty continues to cap out at 1. Not to take anything away from the Ray spells, they are excellent at what they do. But they aren't spells that incapacitate...they are debuffers. They work best against creatures that rely on that primary score (i.e. heavy hitters under Enfeeblement lose a lot of effectiveness; high AC characters and weapon finessers suffer most from clumsiness). Although there are definitely some advantages to using enfeeblement to impose the heavy encumbrance penalties...not only can it completely impair movement of even the fastest characters, its a very good way to open people up to sneak attacks too. (although many monsters won't suffer the encumbrance penalties since they carry no equipment.)
Nephlite 02-07-08, 03:21 PM	It is a no-save ranged touch for -1d4 to all d20 rolls and lose that many of your top level spells. It is a caster slayer in the extreme, and an effective debuff to follow up with a save-or-lose spell. Nehative Levels are do 5 damage per. So 4 levels is 20 damage. Nothing major, but help kill them.
dawnbringer 02-07-08, 05:39 PM	Why is no one using the orb spells?
solbergb 02-08-08, 02:19 PM	An Empowered Ray of Enfeeblement is a better caster killer, as casters usually do not excel in Str: - Ray of enfeeblement is just a penalty, so doesn't stack. It also can't reduce str to zero, even in combination with other spells. Many casters (the unarmored kind) can operate just fine with 1 str...they may not move very fast but can still wiggle their fingers and talk. (those in full plate may have issues with somatic spells. most light armor doens't cover arms though, so the non-shield arm should be able to do somatics) So while it can help, it's not a stopper beyond reducing mobility vs casters. (and monster-casters may not have ANY equpiment, and be just fine at str=1)
solbergb 02-08-08, 02:20 PM	Orb of force caps at 10d6. The others cap at 15 and are obvious, but the OP was talking about flame strike and arc lightning, so most of us assumed he was asking about area spells without 10d6 caps.
ZiggZagg 02-08-08, 02:34 PM	4th level spell level spell that can deal more than 10d6 energy in an area. Channeled Pyroburst for the win. Caps at 10d8 or 10d10, depending on how much time you put into it. 10d8 in a 15ft radius burst, or 10d10 in a 20ft radius burst. This seems to answer exactly what he was looking for, even if it is a little suboptimal to spend an additional full round to do an extra dice worth of damage.
solbergb 02-08-08, 06:27 PM	The channel spells are ok for noncombat buffs when time doesn't matter. If you are taking two rounds to cast though, you need to generate MORE than two rounds of damage output. Ie your target is now 20d6, not 10d6 (leaving swift action add-ons out, but in higher levels they add up). It's why truestrike isn't that good a spell. Losing a whole round of damage output to ensure one attack hits is generally a losing game unless your enemy is nigh-unhittable without it, you've done something to reduce the time to cast or you can cast it in noncombat and somehow have its effect apply during the first round of combat.
ZiggZagg 02-08-08, 06:50 PM	I didn't say it was great, but it answered the OP's question in the fact that it is a spell that does energy damage in an area that is more than 10d6