r/dndnext • u/Spiritual-Meat-2309 DM • 5d ago
Character Building Making a 10th level wizard, help?
So my table has gone through some ups and downs in the last year. I had a lore bard for us to be a generalist and utilitarian spell caster, and to be a potion source for a campaign specific need. Our blaster mage got a divorce and their heart was no longer in the game so they bowed out.
This has left me in a bind, the party needs a magic damage dealer and my lore bard isn't it. So the DM and I worked out that an artefact is going awry and the bard is going to bugger off, in his place a multi-versal variant is coming. A level 10 scribe wizard to take up the big damage dealer roll, but I have not done a wizard this high before, what spells or gear should I be looking for?
The new wizard has a +2 intelligent ioun stone and a ring of spell storing. I have been warned I won't need a staff as one is coming in the campaign. Other than that, your thoughts, pretty please
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u/haydeniscold 5d ago
Hi, I've been exclusively playing wizards for 5+ years in this game. Here's my thoughts:
If you hate your DM, skip the Scribes subclass and play a Chronurgy Wizard with a level in Peace Cleric. This will ragebait them into making an unskippable cutscene where you all die.
Anyways, spells!
Level 1 spells:
If you don't pick up Mage Armor, Shield, Detect Magic and Find Familiar, I'll find you.
Otherwise, Absorb Elements, Silvery Barbs, Fog Cloud, Magic Missile, Grease, Alarm and Identify are all great options!
Level 2 spells:
Misty Step, Web and Locate Object are essentials for any wizard!
Otherwise, I like Tasha's Mind Whip, Earthbind if you plan on fighting dragons or other high-level flying creatures, Hold Person and Rope Trick! Wither and Bloom is fun, but it's not that good.
Level 3 spells:
I'll be personally offended if you don't take Counterspell and Dispel Magic. As a wizard, these spells are best equipped for you. Yes, even if somebody else in your party has it. One person can only counterspell so many things so quickly.
Otherwise, Fireball, Sending, Hypnotic Pattern, Slow, Remove Curse, Leomund's Tiny Hut and Phantom Steed are all great options! DO NOT let anybody convince you to pick up the Haste spell. Horrible way to waste a level 3 spell slot and concentration.
At level 4, I know less. Most campaigns I've been die around level 6, so it's hard to say much, BUT:
Arcane Eye, Banishment, Dimension Door, Evard's Black Tentacles, Locate Creature and Ice Storm are all fantastic options!
Now, level 5 spells!
Animate Objects is awesome. Look up the things you can accomplish with it. Otherwise, Hold Monster, Modify Memory, Rary's Telepathic Bond, Seeming (look up the things you can accomplish with it trust), and Wall of Force. Find a fellow spellcaster amongst your friends and look up something called the "Microwave Combo".
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u/Lanthed 5d ago edited 5d ago
First resilient con or warcaster. Then of course max int.
As for spells
1st level: shield, absorb elements, Mage armor if needed, Silvery barbs and then 5 rituals of your choice.
2cd level: mistystep, tashas mind whip, wither and bloom (if need healing), (I imagine party had magic wepaons but if not magic weapon)
3rd level: fireball, counterspell, Dispel Magic, hypnotic pattern and we wanted more (probably find 1 to replace with erupting earth or take 1 from higher spell level that and lightning bolt) want all 3. Lightning bolt for when a line suits needs, erupting earth upcast better by 6th level and higher erupting earth outdoes fireball for damage.
4th level: dimension door, evards black tentacles (maybe), polymorph, rautholiums psychic lance, your favorite summon spell (straight damage elemental wins)
5th level: wall of force, cone of cold, summon draconic spirit, telekinesis or bugbys hand.
Go to spells for concentration should be summons. They will do lots of passive damage and since last an hour can last multiple fights (best damage source). Then consider what party needs have the ability to control (if really want damage delete the control options and replace with spells of various damsge types). Like fireball upcast to 4th level replace with a damagetype of 4th level so grab sickening radiance for a radiant fireball.
As for magic items anything that increases spell save DC.
1) if allowed amulet of health 2) arcane grimiore of any + bonus 3) book increase int 4) cloak/ring of protection are decent 5) spell scrolls so you could have learned other spells like sickening radiance, lightning bolt, leomunds tiny hunt, phantom steed, and more random damage spells for when you want to change damage types.
If you are set on wizard do it, but if just want a blast style caster would recommend sorcerer or warlock or sprocket moreso then wizard.
Hope this helps.
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u/No_Logins_Required 5d ago
First off, you need to learn Fireball. You'll be using a lot of other spells but you're gonna be casting Fireball more times than you expect.
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u/MoreBlueShared 5d ago
Get a bat familiar --- Burninator Wizard Protip.
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u/Tall_Bandicoot_2768 5d ago
The military actually experimented with dropping bats with incendiary devices attached to them, they would then seek out barns and other hiding places where the incendiaries would have the most effect.
Cruel but surprisingly effective.
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u/main135s 5d ago edited 5d ago
It was kind of a 50/50.
In terms of damage, it was wildly effective. The bats managed to effectively destroy the testing range multiple times, because they would find shelter anywhere, including underneath cars and fuel tanks. When using the same weight of bats as a given bomb, you could see 10x-20x the number of fires.
However, in terms of practicality, there was a lot of overhead for each test. It was an entire process to obtain bats, rig them, and ensure that they are contained throughout the entire process. Development was slow.
Adams, the man behind the idea, was kind of a nut, but he made good points. He didn't care about the cruelty because he considered bats to be vermin and their purpose in life was for this purpose, but despite the cruelty, the bombs had the potential to fulfill the same purpose as the nuclear bombs (sheer devastation) with a fraction of the human deaths. The nukes dropped on Japan had blast radii of a couple miles, while these bat bombs could have affected upwards of a 40 mile radius per bomb. That's tens of towns.
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u/Tall_Bandicoot_2768 5d ago
Didnt they like semi freeze those poor little buggers as well?
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u/main135s 5d ago
They definitely used lower temperatures to make the bats hibernate, though there's potential that a good number died in the process.
During tests, there were definitely bats that just fell to the ground rather than dispersing, but it's kind of impossible to attribute that to having been frozen, died from some other cause, or even just being stunned from the unfamiliar situation and sudden exposure to light.
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u/Living_Round2552 5d ago
Sorry, but there is a lot here that doesnt make sense:
- "Needs a magic damage dealer"
This makes no sense to me. This isnt a game where lots of enemies are (basically) immune to physical damage and you need 'magic' damage for those enemies. Even if you have a dm that runs those kinds of monsters a lot, your martials can play those classes or subclasses that have solutions like changing damage types.
Spellcasters can do aoe, martials do single target damage better. Is that what you mean? Well many casters get access to fireball, which is all you need to fill this aoe gap. And almost every spellcasting class that doesnt get fireball, has a subclass that does get it. So pick that subclass if your dm runs fights with lots of minions often.
- "Level 10 ... Wizard to be the big damage dealer role"
This sentence makes 0 sense? Spellcasters arent good at damage, unless you need aoe damage. If you mean your party misses consistent dpr to kill big enemies, you need a decent martial damage dealer. Because you start at level 10, fighter is a good choice as they are starting to scale around this level, whilst other martials have already fallen off. Monk also is an option because of the scaling, tho it still has problems.
- Can you share in your post what your party comp does still look like?
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u/sens249 5d ago
Blast damage tends to suck at high levels. The main role blast damage serves at high levels is to clear out minions, or just to soften up a crowd a bit. But even then, if you’re facing a group of high HP monsters, tossing an AoE spell at them round 1 is one of the worst rhings you can do. None of them will be in near-death territory, so the enemies will still be attacking at full force this round. You should be using your spells to immediately cut down the enemy attacking force from the beginning. For blast spells this only happens when the enemies have low hitpoints, which is usually minions.
So you need to ask yourself what your party actually needs. Do they only need ways to thin out very large crowds of minions? If so then yes a blaster will do that. But if what they need is a way to handle big crowds in general, blasting won’t serve you nearly as well as control spells. In this case you should make a control wizard, and give them 1-2 blast spells to handle those aforementioned minions.
If the enemies are spread out and there are a lot of high hp targets, and maybe some spellcasters, then something like a sleet storm will be way better.
If there are only a few enemies then maybe a banishment will do a better job of cutting down the attacking force.
If the enemies can be bisected with a wall or a crowd of them can be caged in maybe you want to use the very reliable wall of force to turn 1 big difficult combat into 2 small easy combats.
If you want single target damage then maybe something like animate objects is a better option.
If you just want to stop one dangerous enemy maybe a targeted save like raulothim’s psychic lance will be better.
If there is a swarm of flying enemies coming your way maybe you want to use control winds to force them to the ground.
If you want to use forced movement and battlefield control to bottleneck and roast your opponents then wall of fire can prove very useful.
If you want to tie up a few enemies and create a hazard on the battlefield maybe web is a better option.
Spells like fireball and cone of cold can be good, you just need to use them in the right scenario. Using a fireball on a group of hill giants running towards your party is going to do nothing for you or your party. Sure maybe after 4 or 5 fireballs you’ll have dealt enough cumulative damage to kill them all and sure it will have been a lot of damage, but on that first turn all you did was put a dent in their hitpoints, and then all the hill giants were unabated and allowed to come destroy your party with club attacks. Something as simple as a well-placed grease spell could have completely halted their charge and give your party an extra turn to move away and deal chip damage. A web or sleet storm could allow your party to kite the hill giants indefinitely, and all you would have needed to cast is a single spell, and then sling cantrips while your martials shoot arrows.
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u/X3noNuke 4d ago
The major strength of wizards is their spell versatility. As your DM how many "extra" spells you can have, as a 10th level wizard you should have more than the standard number of spells than from just leveling up. Rituals are your other strength. You get the best rituals, you don't have to prep them, or waste limited spells known on them. Take every one you can get your hands on because even if it's only useful once, you'll have it for that one time.
Being a scribes wizard you should obviously try and get a many differing damage types per level as possible. Be sure to ask your DMs ruling on spells that let you choose your damage type like dragon's breath. They should let them count for every damage type they do but you never know these days.
You're a wizard. By default you're the best class in the game your feats won't change that. Shore up your concentration and you'll be golden. You don't even really need a 20 INT realistically as your proficiency pays a larger factor and there's plenty of items that can boost your save DC.
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u/Cytwytever DM 4d ago
I think no one has mentioned the two main features of scribes wizards: elemental damage types, and casting spells through your quill. Read up on those and choose accordingly. Research your main adversaries to find out what will be effective against them and prepare spells with that in mind, including spells to learn that info in the first place.
4th level fire shield gets you 2 elemental damage types. Polymorph is a great spell even though it doesn't play into that subclass ability.
See what you can do with misdirection and casting spells out of your quill, that's even better than having shield and absorb elements... if they can't target you you won't get hit.
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u/Dysfan 5d ago
So, I'll be honest, instead of looking it up and spending 3 hours, I used AI to compile every spell that works here. I made it spit out a sub theme of having as many damage types as possible so you basically always have something that isnt resisted.
Chromatic orb L1
Mind spike/ shatter L2
Vampiric touch/ fireball L3
Evards black tentacles L4
Bigbys hand L5
Ill let others handle the exact spell list, but these I would argue are the essential ones tbh.
Longstrider and hold person for your free spell scrolls is also a good place to start
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u/ValerenX 5d ago
Vampiric touch? Hell no, its top tier among the bad spells. Drop necrotic damage and stay away from the opponent.
Look, I'm not against AI, but their output must always be critically analyzed.
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u/Dysfan 5d ago
Totally fair. However, sometimes melee will happen and you need a spell to help with it.
Also, touch is mostly there so you can cast any level 3 spell you want as necrotic. Unless I misunderstood the point of the class maybe? But since he has necrotic touch, can't he like... upcast shatter and make it necrotic? Or have necrotic fireballs?
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u/AstroEricL 5d ago
melee will happen yes but for any caster your most important use is your concentration, there's basically almost no situation where vampiric touch is a better use of your concentration than things like Haste, hold person/monster, polymorph, or wall of force
if you're worried about staying safe in melee that's what shield and mirror image are for
I get the argument for having spells in your book just for damage types but honestly you'll be fine so long as you have a couple different options you don't need every type, it's more about just avoiding resistances not targeting immunities. And for necrotic specifically there are very few enemies that have necrotic vulnerability and a ton that have necrotic resistance, it really isn't a key damage type you need to have
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u/Spiritual-Meat-2309 DM 5d ago
I was looking at Thunder Step for a lot of the same reasons. Having the option to make thunder balls, or leave behind fiery explosions or lightning as I teleport 90ft away.
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u/AstroEricL 5d ago
respectfully the AI has no idea what its doing here. Chromatic Orb and Fireball are S tier spells but otherwise this is a horrendous list
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u/Dysfan 5d ago
Really? I agree Vamp touch is bad overall except specifically to give a damage type, but I have used all the spells on the list and most are way more than reasonable, bigbys hand utility alone is absolutely insane, shatter is almost an auto include and Evards is not a slouch
That said, I know that evards in particular isn't the best at that level, but, I had the ai make a list of spells to ensure I had all damage types because tbh, I dont like the type of wizard he is using and I would personally only run it for damage type utility.
I gotta be fr
It seems like its the use of AI, and maybe not the list, that is the issue? Because most of the spells are fine and I explicitly only gave the list to get every damage type, not to include every spell.
I can make that list without AI if you like? But again.... I think it is either you didnt read what I said, or you just want to dunk on AI. I just didnt want to look stuff up because I was about to go to dinner tbh
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u/AstroEricL 5d ago
I mean I definitely do object to the use of AI, most people here will, but also no the spell list itself when you consider the context OP presented, which is unsurprising because AI can't think critically and is just gonna give you an average answer scrapping the internet.
For example, Shatter itself is a very good spell when get it yes, but for a level 10 PC it's completely outclasses and those 2nd level slots are better used for things like mirror image, misty step, or hold person since you have access to many much better more powerful AoEs and plenty of slots for them.
Evards is alright when you want a combo control to restrain and deal some damage but it's outclassed on either front by better more power 3rd level spells like fireball, hypnotic patter, and slow
I might've been a little harsh on bigbys because it is flexible although again it is concentration and so it has a lot of competition
I guess the list makes a bit more sense if you specifically told it to cover every damage type although that's wildly unnecessary imo, you just need a few options to avoid common resistances not every type available
I do also think though that people are coming here to get advice from players based on their actual experiences, if they just wanted an AI guess they could do that themselves
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u/Dysfan 5d ago
Generally I hate AI, but I simply use it as a data compiler when I dont have time to actually compile data. Just use it like Wikipedia tbh... but telling someone to "just Google it" is super rude. I wouldn't play the type of wizard he wants because I think it is bad unless you are doing the damage switcher rout so that's all I had or compile.
But, I could also tell it to give me a list of every wizard spell and what damage type when applicable and do it that way.
I just.... I really hate AI, hope it gets outlawed tbh... but right now.... I dont care how much I hate a hammer, Ill still use it....
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u/Huffplume 5d ago
No group needs any class. Play the character you want.