Enchantment, Transmutation and necromancy

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I have my sorc planning to get greater spell focus enchantment because i really like mass domination and want it to succeed but ive just noticed i have pretty much no other enchantment spells to make use of this feat just chaos and malison(which doesnt seem to require a save). Does anyone know any other enchantment spells worth taking? Cause if not can anyone judge if mass domination is worth those two feats which could be put elsewhere in like rapid shot, improved critical or a random elemental spell(such as acid though she has only 1 real acid spells)

Or it could also be put into transmutation but currently i can only find ONE spell in that school which requires a save which is disintegrate which though GREAT in battle squares(no one is immune) its not that great elsewhere due to loss of items upon using it. So anyone know some good transmutation spells?

Also anyone now some good necromany spells apart from wail of the banshee ive already taken greater spell focus necromancy but mainly i took that to aid my wail. So i want to know other spells to take more use of this feat

So it seems the only school with a focus feat i dont need help with is evocation which is obviously easy to find spells needing saves there.

BTW can you tell me spells aimed at these schools particularly for level 5 or 6 cause i have no good spells there i NEVER use any of those spells And even just random good spells in those levels would help

 

Horror, Skulltrap, and Slow are all awesome spells that are affected by these feats, with Finger of Death later on.

 

Yea but finger of death is a level 7 spell and i normally save my castings in that level for the GREAT delayed blast fireball which is even better then meteor swarm or mordenkainens sword and though she already knows finger of death i normally rely on my druid to cast it. And yea i forgot about skull trap but i already know that and use it to take advantage of the feat and horror with the +3 to saves just isnt good at higher levels since EVERYONE can save against it. But with slow good idea i kinda thought about it but yea its pretty good i dont normally use debuffs(i got no other way to put it) and normally just rely on buff or pure damage but now that you mention it ill try it). You got anymore though particularly from enchantment?

 

Chaos requires a save, abeit it has a -4 penalty? With greater spell focus you can make it as tough as Mass Dominate.

There are Emotion spells, Hold/Charm spells but you may think they are weak.

 

Evocation [33 spells]:
It's good that you are taking these feats anyway.

Enchantment [16]:
I am not sure how useful it really is to concentrate on this class.
Charm Person, Dire Charm, Hold Person, Dominate Person, Feeblemind, Hold Monster are all single target spells, so I don't really think you would pick them with a sorcerer. Still I think Dominate Person or Hold Monster (both L5 spells) would be useful.
Confusion, Chaos, Mass Dominate are ofcourse great picks. Specially since they get bonus to DC.
Emotion: Despair is nice but its duration is too short.

Necromancy [23]:
The problem with necromantic spells is that quite a few go against Fort saves. Since you might use them more often against creatures and not humans, any increase in their DC is helpful.
Some useful speels include Ray of Enfeeblement, Skull Trap, Soul Eater, Finger of Death, Flaying, Horrid Wilting, Wail of the Banshee.
Control Undead is useful in only one area.

Transmutation [21]:
Disintegrate, Slow, Suffocate are the only useful spells that enemies can save against. I guess SF: Transmutation is not worth taking.

 

My cleric/mage had all greater spell focuses, 30 wis and 28 int, his spells were uber powerful! Gotta love that!

 

Cleric/Mage? Level 40 rules, Silverstar?

And I didn't know about the difference in difficulties. IWD is kinds stupid that way.

 

No, I was unaware of that lvl40 thing, I did Silverstar of Selune 12/Invoker 18, it was damn powerful, put points into int, got that +5 ring and drank potion of holy transference, and a robe that gives +3 int. He was one bad guy, casting 3 lvl 9 spells was enough, WoB, MassDominate they were powerful.

I want to play upto lvl40 now BUT my IWD2 CDs were used as a chewing tool by my friend's familiar. (Cat, I suspect he is CN indeed)

 

I finished IWD2 twice but I still don't know how is DC counted? I didn't use many spells which required save, because I didn't even know how high is their DC. As far as I remember it wasn't mentioned in guidebook.

 

Disintegrate only destroys items in BG2, not in IWD games. You also have Flesh To Stone, but obviously it's the same level as Disintegrate.

Hold Person is not a single target spell. It has a radius and affects 1-4 creatures iirc.

Does anybody know how the DC for Symbol spells are determined? Since they belong to "all" spell schools...

 

How does spell DC work at all? I still don't understand why it does not depend on class level. After all if greater levels mean greater damage or spell duration, shouldn't they also make it more difficult to resist a spell.
And concentration has nothing to do with spell DC doesn't it.

 

I think the caster's level does dount in the DC. Higher level spells have higher DC's. Other factors are the caster's primary statistic (INT for mages etc.) and the Spell Focus feats. The base number is 10 I think, and the number after all the modifiers are applied is what the enemy must achieve by rolling 1d20 + his appropriate Save.

 

I prefer Greater Spell Focus: Evocation with Greater Spell Penetration and the elemental feats starting from Spirit of Flame. Good for mages (especially sorcerers), morninglords, druids etc. Transmutation isn't so bad. With the right feats, you can disintegrate dragons or drider priestesses.

Going artillery isn't so bad if you have some back up spells for creatures immune to fire. They aren't so numerous, anyway. And there's always electricity. Or cold. Who's immune to acid, anyway? The same two feats (Spell Focus and Greater Spell Focus: Evocation) work with all, as does Penetration (which also works with Transmutation).

 

GFS: Enchantment is an all-star just for Chaos and Mass Dominate. Charm Person is a fine level 1 spell; what else are you going to cast besides Chromatic Orb? Dominate Person is exactly like Charm Person except it can affect anything not immune to charms (the "person" part is a lie), and it has a Will save DC 6 points harder. Don't get Hold Monster; it is better to charm something than freeze it.

I agree with Shrikant that GSF: Transmutation is a waste. I dislike Disintegrate because you could cast Dominate Person instead on almost any monster, and have a much better chance of success.

 

spell DC is 10+spell level + casting attribute modifier (+ spell focus) and goes agains the monsters roll of 1d20 + save.

The spell description says disintergrate still destroys items i thought .

BTW the -4 penalty to will saves against confusion means that the opponent needs to roll 4 higher to save then it should right? cause im just confused by the way sileverstar said things

PS thanks for the info all especially your detailed info shrikant

 

DC = 10 +X (spell level) +Y (Spellcastimg Atribute) +Z (modifiers like spell focus)

SAVE = 1D20 +X (Save bonus) +Y (Racian bonus, misc bonus) +/-Z (misc bonues or penalties from spell, like chaos -4)

Example:

Chaos = 10 + 5 + 4 (int 18) + 2 (normal spell focus) = 21

Save (Dwarf Fighter level 10) = 10 (on a roll of 1-20) + 5 (base save will 3 + 2 for wis 14) +2 (racial bonus vs magic spells) -4 (Chaos) = 13

Aka he failed. If we used confussion instead of chaos, the spell would be one level lower, and thus reduce the DC by 1, so only DC 20. and iirc confussion did not give any save penalty, so the dwarf could have used hes full +7 bonus to save, and woudl thus only need a roll of 13 or better instead of a roll of 18 as in the original example.

 

Is it more difficult to save against a finger of death cast by a druid than a FoD cast by a mage, since finger of death is a level7 mage and level8 druid spell ?

 

Yeah. That should be how it works. Also, since Wis is the casting stat for Druids and Wis increasing items are found more often that Int increasing ones, the Druid's FoD will have still greater DC.

 

Yeah, that is a little weird. But the mage can cast wail of the banshee, so it evens out.

 

Good point JT!

@Goon
Everyone here has made a good point on which spells (from their respective schools) to take, but just make sure, because you have a sorcerer, that you pick the ones you need.

Finger of Death will become paramount. Ray of Enfeeblement and Skull Trap become pretty nice to have too. Most of the other Necromancy will just be decided on what you like best, i.e. which 1 you like to utilise the best, which one deals the most damage etc.

Transmutation, meh, slow is good enough but i thought disintergrate DIDN'T destroy items in IWD2 because i used it a few times and the items remained???

Evocation is just, well, Evocation - Nice damage dealing spells! Take whatever you want, depending on your playing style.

Enchantment, as Shrikant pointed out before, isn't really too useful later on, but just as a backup you could take some feats here, as long as you've picked all of the other ones you've wanted first.