What Sorcerer spells to pick?

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I think that some spell choices are affected by the size of the party, or if the sorc is going solo.

For example, I've never taken Sunfire. I don't want to nuke my own party, nor do I want to have to have the sorc run out ahead of the party, just to make the spell useful. (I will admit that Sunfire could be useful in one of the monk challenge rooms, the spider room, though...)

A spell that I use quite often that you've left out is Symbol of Hopelessness. Also, Chaos is a very useful spell.

I'm a little surprised to see Stinking Cloud as a suggested sorc spell. I've always had a fondness for it, but with limited sorcerer spell book options, it always seems to get left out in favor of more offensive options like Fireball, Flame Arrow, and Skull Trap.

 

True, I usually play with four characters, and send my sorcerer ahead to nuke the opposition before leading the remainder back to my fighters. I take Sunfire in particular simply because every man and his dog is resistant to cold damage, especially during Chapter 2. On the flip side, Cone of Cold kicks arse simply because it ignores magic resistance.

The duration is a little short. I'd prefer Symbol of Death.

It doesn't work the way it is advertised. Confused enemies still attack my party members. I'd rather just use Dominate.

Why would you choose Fireball when you have Skull Trap (3 times the damage!) on the same level? And with Stinking Cloud, nauseated opponents are not only incapacitated, they are also auto-hit.

 

I always play 6 person parties, and I always keep my mages well hidden and protected by the other 5 party members.

I agree that fire-based spells are often quite useful in IWD1/2, if only because it is Icewind Dale, and most of the monsters are naturally resistant to cold.

As for Cone of Cold, I didn't know about it ignoring magic resistance. I rarely choose it simply because of my standard party formation (I don't want to expose my mage so that he doesn't hit a party member with the cone).

Short? SoH's duration has never seemed like it was "short" to me. As for SoD, I don't like it because it is limited to only 150 HP of creatures. And in 3e that could be as few as 1. I like SoH because it can totally neutralize an unlimited number of creatures and because it is a Will Save based spell, and far fewer monsters have good Will saves.

I never use Dominate. At that level, I don't want to use a single target spell that's all or nothing. Mass Dominate is great because if the area of effect contains, say, 10 baddies and you can get half of them, it's still a very positive outcome. But with Dominate, it's all or nothing on that one target, and that just isn't worth it for me. If I feel that need to change the odds by adding another ally to my side, I'd rather just summon one that I *KNOW* will be on my side after the spell is cast.

I agree that Chaos may produce inconsistent results. However, like Mass Dominate, the goal isn't really to affect ALL of the monsters in the area, it's to affect some of them. And if, say, half of the monsters stop attacking my party, then it's still been a success. I will say though that if you want to limit the number of confused enemies continuing to attack your party, then spells like Confusion and Chaos are best cast before the enemy has already closed to melee range. If you can hit them before they've closed to melee range, then perhaps you can get them to attack each other.

Because judging the value of a spell based on casting it as a level 30 mage is silly. Skull Trap is a great spell, and I'm a solid proponent of it. However, it does the same amount of damage as a Fireball up until FB hits its damage cap at level 10. And even at that point in Normal Mode, it's still a rather decent spell. FB only really starts seriously underperforming once you're in HOF mod where the monsters have so many more HP and damaging spells just cannot keep up.



Regarding ST, it's a great spell, if you know how to use it effectively, and its smaller AoE can come in handy in certain places when you don't want to risk a larger explosion. Also, the fact that it's a "trap" spell can have its uses. I've often used it to cover my party's back in certain areas when I know that the enemy will likely be coming in from the rear. (And BTW, a nasty little trick for use with ST is this... if you are trying to use ST like a small fireball, but mistarget it and the enemies are just out of triggering range, try summoning the weakest summons you can right under the ST. I've often memorized a level 1 animal or monster summons just for this purpose... triggering a mistargetted ST.)

Stinking Cloud can be a very useful spell in normal mode, but I suspect that it's rather weak in HOF, as most monsters rarely fail their Fort saves.

 

Personally, I find sorcerers to be a one-man army. Magic users who hide in the back lines and don't utilise their most powerful crowd killing spells are *not* pulling their weight.

Haha, yeah, it's all in the name. On the flip side, there are a lot of enemies resistant to fire, especially during the time-loop portion of the game, and the final bosses are vulnerable to ice. Personally, I find lightning to be the least resisted element.

It does.

What a waste. Throughout most of the game, you can easily wipe out most cold vulnerable enemies with one or two blasts.

10 rounds, which translates to 70 seconds. A respectable amount of time I guess. I'll have to try SoH for my next playthrough.

From what I gather, your sorcerer doesn't use area of effect damage spells because they harm the party. Now you're saying that they also don't use powerful single-target spells because you want to affect more than one creature. What exactly does your sorcerer do? I'm guessing that you cast area of effect disabling spells, which is fair enough. But that's only tapping a small fraction of a sorcerer's potential.

Regarding Dominate, I admit that it is usually my third or fourth pick, simply because the hordes of monsters in IWDII make hard hitting nuke spells more useful. However, for tough or isolated enemies, single target save or die spells are useful. The only other Level 5 spell I might consider taking (and actually using) is Cloudkill.

But you're not just adding an ally with dominate, you're also removing an enemy. Furthermore, a 'boss' character is often superior to a summon, both in strength and duration.

Inconsistent? Enemies continue to attack my party members even when confused. What good is that? You call dominate unreliable, but at least I know with 100% certainty that if the enemy fails their save, they won't attack me, and will actually fight for me.

If you're playing on normal mode, and not HoF. Either way, the point is that skull trap's power scales with one's level, whereas fireball is capped at level 10.

Yes. Up until level 10, skull trap does the same damage as fireball. And once you pass level 10, skull trap's power continues to increase, whereas fireball does not. Furthermore, few creatures resist slashing damage, whereas more tend to resist fire. Fireball does have a larger radius, but apparently that's the sort of thing you regard as a disadvantage. So why on earth would you double up when you could take Slow, Stinking Cloud, Haste or Hold Person?

You can easily reach level 18 by the end of the game, at which point skull trap will be far superior to fireball.

Stinking Cloud is good for kill zones, although admittedly it's usefulness declines in HoF. Haste, Slow, and Hold Person are all marginally better if you don't favour kill zones (which I suspect is your style of play).

 

I see it much differently. In my parties, it's the duty of mages to stay behind the lines and provide fire support for the tanks, and not place themselves at risk.

Somehow, I don't think that a place near the equator would ever be called "Ice"-anything...

I don't see it that way. I fight my parties with rigid formation discipline. I never ever play with the party AI turned on. It causes my parties to act in ways that are often not in accordance with my wishes and in ways that I feel are just plain silly and sometimes, even suicidal.

I won't argue that it'd be great if the duration was longer, but in nearly every battle in normal mode, if I hit an enemy force with a SoH, the enemy's pretty much toast. First of all, most of the force will likely have been disabled by the SoH and the remaining foes will fall quickly. And then the disabled foes will fall that much more quickly.

In HOF, I'll admit that 10 rounds may not be enough to kill of the the enemies. However, that unfortunate truth is very much outweighed by the ability to disable a very large portion of the enemy force for 10 rounds with a spell that remains very difficult for HOF enemies to resist with a Will save.

You are reading too much between the lines. I an most certainly not against using area effect spells. I just use them with great care. I will often drop a grease, web, or entangle spell in front of an enemy force to slow their advance before hitting them with damaging area effect spells.

Furthermore, I'm a bit of an arcane minimalist. I don't have my mages casting spells willy-nilly, just because they still have memorized spells to cast. I prefer to use physical combat to deal with most enemies, and reserve offensive magic for situations where the enemy threat requires more power than my tanks can produce. I also like being able to go as long as possible (within reason) between rest breaks. I'm not one of these players that will use a mage's entire arsenal of spells in every engagement, large or small, and then rest seemingly every few minutes. (... though I will admit that in HOF this becomes a bit more difficult for the obvious reasons...)

Of course, there are some battles where the enemy is powerful enough that the immediate application of overwhelming force becomes necessary ... the battle against Saablic Tan in the Fields of Slaughter, for example. And quite often, if the enemy starts the battle in fairly close proximity to my party, I'll open the battle with a Holy Word/Symbol of Hopelessness combo... HW because it's a very fast casting spell, and SoH as the longer term (but slower casting) spell.

No kidding. This is why I so often argue that Mass Dominate is such a powerful spell. But the single target version is vastly weaker because it's so totally all or nothing. I simply HATE casting any single target spell that is all or nothing because it's such a waste. I'll go so far as to say that I never memorize any spell that's all or nothing against a single target.

Somehow, I doubt that ALL of them enemies continue to attack. Also, if some of the enemies aren't yet in melee when they get hit with Confusion or Chaos, there's a great chance that they'll just stand there, or will attack each other. Like I said before, if you want to avoid having confused enemies continuing to attack you, don't use the spell against an enemy force that's already fully engaged in melee.

I stand by my statement. Judging the value of any spell based on its performance at level 30 is just plain silly. Period. The game is not played at level 30 only.

You really haven't been around here very long, have you?

There's nothing wrong with Fireball in normal mode, unless you are one of those people that can't seem to properly target an area effect spell against a moving target (which doesn't include me).

You should remember that there are plenty of circumstances where the terrain is open enough that the larger area of effect of a FB is valuable. It's also worth noting that Skull Traps can be more useful in close proximity to your party, but ST's can be tricky to properly target since they are a "trap" that requires it be triggered by some sort of creature. In some situations, this is great, when you really do want it to act as a "trap". But if you want to use it like a mini-fireball spell, it can be tricky to target properly to guarantee that an enemy will trigger it.

In my experience, you aren't going to reach level 18 with a party of 6 with only minimal numbers of ECL races without using some pretty heavy usage of level squatting. From what I've seen, level 16 is about the most that can be expected from such a party.

And of course, the further you progress beyond level 10, the greater the differential between Fireball and Skull Trap.

However, it's important to note that a player's spell choices can be very much dictated by whether or not he intends on continuing on into HOF mode. Spells that have upper limits (or at least relatively low upper limits) are of limited utility in HOF. However, in Normal Mode, those limits simply aren't that big a deal for some spells.

SC is a spell that I'd probably use more with a wizard than a sorcerer, simply because wizards can change their spell selections while sorcerers cannot.

At level 3, I think that my primary 3 favorite spells for a sorc are Fireball, Flame Arrow, and Skull Trap. I happen to like FA because there are times when you're facing a smaller number of targets, and AoE spells may be contraindicated by the enemy's proximity to your party, and a flame arrow spell is a very effect, relatively low level spell. (I particularly like using FA against the white dragons.) I suppose that Ice Lance could fall into the same category, but as was mentioned before, there are a lot of creatures that are very resistant to cold, but less so to fire.

 

It's a calculated risk. And given that a mage often has stoneskin, mirror image and can turn invisible at a moment's notice, the risk is very small. I can't say I've ever had my sorcerer die on me, and even if they do, big deal. That's what I have a cleric for!

My strategy often involves pre-buffing, sending the sorcerer ahead with summon support to bust up the enemy, retreating, turning invisible (if necessary), and having my warriors mop up the rest while my sorcerer provides support with Slow, Dominate, and well placed Skull Traps.

I suppose they would be. And there really is nothing better available on Level 8 anyway, apart from Horrid Wilting.

I'm the exact opposite. In my eyes, a primary role of the sorcerer is the mortar fire before the infantry (ie. enemy) charge towards you. It's very important that my sorcerer pull their weight, otherwise why bother having them at all?

You mentioned that if you wanted another ally, you'd just summon one. I thought it was important to point out that Dominate doesn't just get you a powerful ally, but also removes a powerful enemy from the battle. Obviously if you're attacked by 20 barbarians, then dominating one will have very little effect. However, if you're attacked by four enemies, one of whom is a named character, then suddenly dominate becomes a more plausible option.

It is, but you won't always have Level 9 spells. Indeed, as you yourself pointed out, a sorcerer in a 6 man party will only be around level 16 at the end of the game!

I re-iterate, whether a single-target spell is a waste depends on the scenario. After all, I doubt you'd argue that a successful disintegrate cast against the Guardian is 'a waste'?

No idea. I just know that when I've tried casting Chaos against mobs of enemy, that mob still attacks me. The same thing happens with spells that bestow the Beserk status.

Not from what I've seen. I'll give this another test though.

There's nothing 'wrong' with it, it's just that skull trap is better. I can't think of one instance where I would cast a Fireball over a Skull Trap, despite the larger radius and instant detonation.

True. However, it still is an advantage over the alternative.

 

Different strokes for different folks. Any mage in any party of mine that broke party formation would get a sword shoved into his behind for disobeying his commander, aka me.

My preferred strategy involves sending my rogue and my ranger stealthed ahead of the party to get in a first strike on the enemy, and if possible to target any enemy spellcaster(s). And depending on the nature of the enemy force, my party will either come a-running once the fighting starts, or my rogue and ranger will break off and run back to the rest of the party. And in the latter scenario, if the chasing enemy force is large enough and the terrain is proper, I'll drop a quick grease and web combo and set up an arcane kill zone.

Regardless, my preferred tactic always involves some sort of stealth.

Something else that's worth mentioning about SoH is that it's an enemies-only spell, which makes it much safer to use in close proximity to one's party.
Always makes for a good option. If the enemy is starting out at a good distance from the party, you can hit'em with a damaging AE spell. But if they start rather close, SoH can be a safer (level appropriate, of course) alternative.

Well, of course, IF the enemy is starting at a considerable range from your party and you have time to call in "fire support", I'm all for that. Indeed, depending on your party composition, perhaps you can start with some combo of mobility-reducing spells (grease, web, entangle, etc.), followed up the the heavy artillery (fireballs, ice storms, acid storms, whatever...). Those are the times when the spell casters really have fun and let loose with the full arsenal!!!

As far as sorcs carrying their weight, I figure that they're around to handle the situations when full blown "fire support" is appropriate. But I don't see those situations as happening in every single skirmish. For example, in the Ice Temple, there are a number of Aurilites deployed in 2's and 3's. I can deal with those most of the time with just my rogue and ranger stealth team. Then there are some rooms where there may be about 5-6 Aurilites, and my rogue and ranger team can start the battle, but my other tanks can run in to support them. And there's rarely any need to call in sorcerous fire support. But then there are battles where the number and quality of enemies simply requires you to open up with everything. Those are the battles where the sorcerers pull their weight in my parties... the battles against Sherincal or Saablic Tan, or against the final room of Visicamera Driders, or the final room in the mindflayer fortress.

In the end, it's all about playing style.

The problem still remains ... Dominate does not have a guarantee of any success. Yes, IF it succeeds, you gain an ally and the enemy looses one. But if it fails, not only are the odds unchanged, but your mage has expended a spell to no effect and lost time doing it. At least with a summoned monster, you get half of the value of successful Dominate spell (i.e. a new ally, but without reducing the number of enemies) but with a 100% guarantee of success.

And while you are correct that it's likely that a dominated "named" boss character would likely be tougher than his minions, it's also likely that he's more able to resist the spell.

True, but frankly whenever I'm thinking of MD, I'm thinking of it as a HOF mode spell anyways for that very reason.

Bad example. Disintegrate isn't an all-or-nothing spell, since even on a successful save, the target takes 5d6 damage. Disintegrate falls into the better category of All-or-something spells, which are entirely acceptable, though the idea of having the treasure carried by a target of a Disintegrate spell destroyed does tend to make me wary of its use.

It's been a while since I've used a chaos spell, so I don't recall with perfect clarity. However, it'd be an entirely useless spell if confused targets of a Chaos (or Confusion) spell all still attacked you regardless of the situation. To the best of my memory, Chaos has always be a rather effective spell. About the only complain that I recall ever hearing is that some people don't like having confused enemies running away from them cuz they dislike having to chase them around the screen to finish them off.

Frankly, even above the damage cap, there are times when Fireball is a better option than skull trap simply because of the larger radius and instant detonation (or perhaps you're just looking for fire damage). ST always seems to work best when I can use it in "trap" mode (i.e. not trying to drop it on top of an enemy that will trigger it immediately), or against enemies that are disabled by something like a web or SoH, so that their location is 100% certain when the ST appears. ST is also nice when you really want to have a smaller AoE for tactical reasons, like some of the battles in the halls of the Hand. I mean, in those situations, you probably could place a delayed FB spell in "trap" mode, but you risk damaging some nearby slaves and potentially turning them hostile. Plus DFB also has an even larger radius than regular FB, so you'd have to place it quite a distance from your party to avoid getting singed. ST may not do as much damage as a DFB, but its smaller radius has its tactical advantages.

 

This is the crux of the issue. If you're playing normal mode with a largish party you probably won't exceed level 16 or so, and you will find spells like Fireball (w/ Spirit of Flame) and Symbol of Death relatively acceptable given the opposition you face. If you're playing HoF and reaching high levels, Symbol of Death is pointless (an 8th level spell to kill one goblin? no thanks) and a 100% chance of a Gelugon (Greater Shadow Conjuration) beats out a 60% or so chance of an elite Duergar crossbowman (Dominate).

In my humble opinion, these are some great wizard spells for normal mode:
1. Chromatic Orb
2. Web
3. Fireball, Skull Trap
4. Stoneskin
5. Animate Undead, Dominate Person, Sunfire
6. Mass Haste
7. Delayed Blast Fireball
8. Symbol of Hopelessness, Horrid Wilting
9. Meteor Swarm, Wail of the Banshee

These are some great spells for HoF:
1. Shield, Charm Person
2. Invisibility, Eagle's Splendor
3. Ghost Armor, Blink, Invisibility Sphere, Haste, Slow
4. Shadow Conjuration, Improved Invisibility (patched version), Emotion: Hope
5. Animate Undead, Greater Shadow Conjuration, Chaos
6. Shades, Mass Haste, Tenser's Transformation
7. Mass Invisibility, Mordenkainen's Sword, Finger of Death
8. Symbol of Hopelessness
9. Mass Dominate, Wail of the Banshee, Executioner's Eyes

I think that Charm Person is still useful in HoF because it's better than most other options at level 1, while Dominate Person gets crowded out by long-lasting or tough summons.

Note: I don't think that HoF is necessarily a better or funner game than normal mode. In many ways normal mode is superior and truer to the tabletop rules. If you're going to be playing HoF though you should plan for it from the beginning.

-Max

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IMHO the shortish duration of Symbol of Hopelessness is not a major issue because 1.) 10 rounds is usually plenty of time to deal with any enemies who resisted or were out of the AoE, 2.) 10 rounds is plenty of time to adjust my formation and/or summon enough meat shields (rattlesnakes, cave bears, Shamblers, etc.) to deal with the stunned guys that I can't kill before they come out of stun.

Also, Greater Command is even better than Symbol of Hopelessness in most ways except the smaller AoE. Dreadmasters rock.

-Max

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By "bad example" you must mean "that's not what I meant by all-or-nothing." Most people would consider Disintegrate vs. the Guardian to be a pretty much all-or-nothing proposition, since 5d6 is peanuts.

-Max

 

Good post Max.

I tend to agree with your Normal Mode and HOF mode spell lists. And I should say that I am less bothered by the all-or-nothing nature of the level 1 spell Charm Person, because it's a level 1 spell. It doesn't feel like a major investment in a higher powered, higher level spell. And compared to other SL1 spells in HOF, it's not a bad choice. I mean, magic missile's damage is so minor in HOF that the choice between CP and MM on the concept worrying about all or nothingness isn't as much of an issue to me (except perhaps if I'm trying to finish off a monster that's nearly dead, but then again I wouldn't be trying to Charm a nearly dead monster anyways).

Regarding Normal vs HOF, I also agree. However, I would say that only Sorcerers need to plan for HOF even in Normal mode. Wizards, by their nature, do not, since they can change their memorized spells whenever they wish to do so.



Regarding Greater Command, I completely agree!!! Greater Command is superb. The one downside of GC is that it's still a glorified sleep spell, and any creature you hit wakes up. This means that you can't use it to start dumping nuking spells on them... well, I suppose you could, but they'll all wake up. With GC, it's better to just focus on killing 1 creature at a time, whereas with SoH, you can then start firing off FB's, ST's, Horrid Wiltings, or whatever nuking spells strike your fancy and the stunned enemies just stand there and suck up all that damage...

I'm not sure that I'd say that GC is "better" than SoH. But it is very close due to its quicker casting time and longer duration.



I like Holy Word as well. Yes, it may have a 1 round duration, but it's also a fast casting spell. It's super for those situations when the enemy starts the battle in very close proximity to your party. A quick HW stunning can allow your mage to complete a casting of SoH, or perhaps something like a fireball. Also, a quick HW can allow your party to get its formation properly set up for the battle to come. Of course, with HW, you need to have a 100% good-aligned party. And it's opposite number, Blasphemy, doesn't really have the same effectiveness simply because most enemies are evil.

 

True. Wizards can also afford to try out spells like Trollish Fortitude and Wyvern Call. The party as a whole still needs to plan for HoF, but that's off-topic so I'll forbear.

Okay, let me clarify what I meant to say. Symbol of Hopelessness and Greater Command are both useful as crowd control spells to disable large mobs of enemies. Greater Command is better than Symbol of Hopelessness in these ways:

1.) It benefits from Spell Focus: Enchantment and thus can get +1 DC relative to Symbol of Hopelessness (+2 if cast as a Banite domain spell).
2.) It doesn't make enemies immune to critical hits or make trolls immune to dying.
3.) It casts almost instantaneously as opposed to "pretty quickly."
4.) Longer duration, 1 round/level.

Symbol of Hopelessness is better in these ways:
1.) Enemies are autohit.
2.) Enemies stay disabled even if you hit them, including nuking them with damage spells as you point out.
3.) Larger area of effect, 30' radius vs. 20'.

Ultimately they don't conflict, and it's great fun to load up a Banite cleric with 9 Greater Commands and 6 Symbols of Hopelessness, all cast at DC 34/33 respectively. I just didn't want anyone who likes SoH to overlook the awesomeness of Greater Command.

I haven't actually used Holy Word because of alignment issues but on paper it looks good. I'll give it a try--I guess it shouldn't be an issue if my evil decoy fails his spell resistance check and gets stunned because all the evil monsters will be stunned too. The most important aspect of stunning spells is that it breaks target lock and lets you regroup, and a 1-round stun is sufficient for those purposes.

Edit: incidentally, Blasphemy should work on undead monsters since they're generally neutral. But unless you're an all-evil party I guess the pain is likely to be greater than the gain even there.

-Max

 

I think that one could argue that for a raw newbie, a wizard might be better for this "try out spells" reason. You don't need to be fully committed to bad spell selections.

I just don't get why "immunity to critical hits" is anything to be concerned about. If an enemy is stunned, it's going to be dead, if you have enough to time to finish it off. (In HOF, you might have too many enemies and not enough swords and time to cut every stunned enemy down, but in Normal mode, it's usually not that much of an issue.) This seems like more of a "style points" issue.

OTOH, the trolls thing is a bit of a pain...

Instant casting can be very, very important indeed. It's also why Holy Word is an awesome spell for good-aligned parties.

I don't know... they seem like they conflict a little bit. If you've hit a group of enemies with GC, it seems like a waste to then hit them with a SoH. Holy Word and SoH do work together well, because you use HW to quicky stun them and give your mage time to complete the SoH spell to get them stunned for a long time.

Yes, HW really is a spell best used with 100% good aligned parties.

A trivial thing about Holy Word (and Blasphemy) is that it has a long list of effects. But in my experience, its effect is actually more limited since you will only be seeing more powerful enemies by the time you get Holy Word. You're not going to be seeing any of those low level monsters that HW would kill outright.

Regardless, a fast casting, 1 round duration, difficult to resist stunning spell is very useful for good parties. Not only is it good for opening up a battle with a quick stun when the enemy's up close... it can be very useful in longer battles (particularly in HOF) when you find the need to re-order your formation because the enemy is starting to penetrate your formation. I've found this to be a very useful use of HW later in HOF mode in some of the tougher battles. Casting a HW can feel a bit like calling a time-out in the battle.

Yeah, HW and Blasphemy tend to be best used when your party is entirely good or evil.

FYI, on a trivial note, Holy Word and Blasphemy worked a little differently in IWD1. In IWD1, HW worked only against Evil creatures, whereas in IWD2 it works against Evil and Neutral creatures. (and the reverse for Blasphemy, of course...) I'm not sure which version of those spells is better or worse, since having HW work or not work against neutral creatures is a double-edged sword because it isn't an enemies only spell (IIRC).

 

I fully agree. A new player should have both a wizard and a sorc in the party. The wizard experiments with random scrolls that he finds. The sorc ensures that he never gets frustrated by never finding a cool spell the manual says he should have; and if the wizard's testing shows that a particular spell is cool then the sorc will pick it too.

It's all about duration. In HoF mode it can take some time to kill enemies even after they're already stunned. Killing them 50% faster means less time for enemies to wake up and start fighting back, less time used up on your buff spells, and less time that I (the player) have to pay attention. It's not a huge deal but it's potentially nice, particularly when you're dealing with creatures that have high enough DR that crits are doing 5x or 6x damage. (E.g. 33 - 15 DR = 18, 99 - 15 DR = 84.)

By "they don't conflict" I meant that Symbol of Hopelessness and Greater Command aren't competing for the same limited resources. It's not like trying to pick between memorizing Symbol of Hopelessness and Tremor, for example, or WotB vs. Mass Dominate.

I'm going to try out Holy Word in my mixed-alignment party now. The fact that it is Saving Throw: None makes it potentially useful for my berserker battlecleric with relatively low Wisdom, and I think maybe it won't be a big deal for my evil guys to deal with. If nothing else they can ensure they're out of range and/or not casting anything important when she lights off a Holy Word.

-Max

Edit: Off-topic speculation on Holy Word. I wonder if D&D players who've tried GURPS are more likely to create mixed-alignment parties than people who haven't played GURPS, because of the disadvantage system. Good = one or more of disadvantages { Sense of Duty (kittens and small children), Pacificist (cannot harm innocents), Charitable, Broad-minded }, Evil = one or more of disadvantages { Callous, Bloodlust, Megalomania, Greed, Intolerance, Bully }. Good and Evil guys may not be close personal friends but they might certainly wind up on the same side of a conflict. In fact they'll probably get along better than the Law/Chaos axis will, { Truthfullness, Honesty, Code of Honor } vs. { Kleptomania, Impulsiveness, Compulsive Lying }.

Moreover, you could be Evil because you have (Greedy, Bloodlust, Callous) and yet still have some good traits like Sense of Duty (women and children) and Code of Honor, and maybe that's what the characters have in common. That's actually what stopped me from killing all the monks last night--even my evil guys didn't feel right about it so I reloaded from a saved game and did their stupid eight trials. And my Neutral Evil guy may have secretly killed Jemeliah because he "needed" the Lucky Knucky, but he still didn't steal the kids' lunch money in the Wandering Village, hilarious as the dialogue option may be.

 

Even if they wiped out 80% of the enemy with a few well placed Delayed Blast Fireballs? That seems rather harsh!

That's a good strategy, but I'd contend that a sorcerer would carry out that role far better. A sorcerer can not only mask themselves much easier (with Invisibility, a level 2 spell), they can strike far more decisively against the enemy.

Yes, you've convinced me on SoH.

I guess. But then your sorcerer is only active for approprimately 20% of encounters, meaning that they aren't being used to their full potential.

Pretty much. I prefer overwhelming and decisive force.

If you have a decent DC and target a monster with low will saves, then success is near guaranteed. Granted, the usefulness is situational, but the same could be said of all spells.

You also need to remember that it's not necessarily a waste to expend two dominate spells to nullify an enemy, if the alternative was to expend five flame arrows. Ergo. Casting an 'all-or-none' spell until you obtain a success may be more efficient that casting multiple damage spells to whittle down the enemy's health, especially for single tough enemies who are in close proximity to your party (eg. boss characters such as the Guardian).

At the end of the day, the purpose of summoning monsters is to have them destroy your enemy. When I cast a Dominate spell, it's with the same intent as if I were casting a Finger of Death or Disintegrate: To remove a powerful enemy from the mix. That they fight for me is a big perk.

And named characters often have hefty physical and elemental resistances, which warrants multiple castings of direct damage spells. Again I re-iterate, two Dominates on the same enemy will likely provide me with a better result in some cases that four Sunfires.

Ahhh, you got me on a technicality there. As a previous poster mentioned, 5d6 really is peanuts, an average of 18 damage that will have little impact on the outcome of a battle. But let me pose the question again: Surely you'd agree that a successful Disintegrate against the Guardian which required two prior unsuccessful castings is still preferable to 20 rounds of melee combat, or 10 rounds of area of effect spells?

Disintegrate doesn't destroy items in IWD II, which is a welcome change from Baldur's Gate.

I'd agree that there would be instances where Fireball would be preferable to Skull Trap. It's just that those instances aren't common enough to justify the overlap that would occur if I were to take both Fireball and Skull. If Haste, Slow and Hold Person weren't all on the same level, I'd feel differently.

 

Hmmm.... Well, I suppose it's worth knowing that SoH and Ex. Eyes don't mix, since nearly the entire point of ExEyes is to generate more Crits.

In any battle (particularly in HOF) where I can set it up, I'll use kill zone tactics. And SoH is very useful in Kill Zones. I also have a fondness for using those slower, multi-turn damaging spells, like cloudkill, Firey Cloud, acid fog, spike stones, etc. in combination with grease, web, entangle, spike growth, etc. I don't concern myself with DPS issues. I just like setting up these deadly kill zones that grind down baddies. And I'll often stick a summoned monster (that's immune to most of the damage type I'm using) like a Fire elemental or an undead in the middle of the kill zone just to keep the baddies attentions.

Ahhhhhh! That went right over my head. I was thinking in terms of conflicting effects, not conflicting spell slots.

I suppose that it depends on how many characters you have that might be affect by the spell, and what roles they fill. I suppose if they're tanks, it's not too, too bad. But a major use for HW (or Blasphemy) has always seemed to be to give the mage time to cast a slower casting super-spell, like SoH, or some of the level 9 spells. The last thing you want to do is have HW stun your mage... (or possibly a druid that might also be casting some nasty spell...)

After all, given its short duration, it's not generally likely that you'd be able to completely kill a single target during the stunned round. And in the nastier battles where HW is quite useful, there are usually plenty of enemy tanks between you and an enemy boss mage, and the boss mage may also be out of range of the HW anyways.

Regardless, give it a shot and figure out how it works best for you. I suspect that in a mixed alignment situation, it may not be quite as useful as for a 100% good party, but it may still have some utility.



I've never played GURPS. However, in IWD2, I've always avoided mixed alignment parties largely because of Holy Word. In IWD1/HOW/TOTM, since Holy Word ignores neutrally aligned creatures, you can safely include neutral characters... which works out pretty well, since there are some good items in IWD1 that can't be used by good aligned characters. In my last IWD1 party a couple weeks back, I intentionally included a TN elven fighter for this reason.

As for additional dialog options based on a wider array of alignment, or even class, skill, etc. variations, in theory it sounds great. However, when you actually start looking at dialog files and thinking about what would be required to do it, you quickly realize that it's probably a LOT more work than it's really worth. Instead of having a simple NPC with only perhaps a dozen lines of dialog, you could end many dozens of lines of dialog. That's a lot of code writing and a lot of effort to come up with all those dialog variations. The code writing is relatively easy and straightforward. It's coming up with creative and original dialogs that can be difficult.

 

I actually think the designers did a pretty good job with the dialogue options.

For anyone who doesn't play evil characters, I'll explain the example: in the Wandering Village, after you save all the kids, you can talk to them in the village. A kid will say something like, "You saved me from Limha! Thank you so much!" and if you're evil you'll have two options:

1. If you have any coins or extra food hidden away, give them to me right now. And don't tell anyone about this or you're DEAD!!!
2. Farewell.

Class dialogue options can be pretty hilarious too.

-Max

 

Doesn't matter to me. In the end, I'm a spellcasting minimalist. I get far more enjoyment out of taking out an enemy with physical combat than with arcane combat. Also, I take great enjoyment out of sneaking thru a dungeon or a temple or whatever and taking the enemy apart little by little with stealth and guile. Sending in a sorc to do it with raw power is far too powergamey for my tastes.

I will always view spellcasting as a supplement to the good right arms of my tanks, not the other way around.

Yep, and I prefer stealth, guile, and a number of good stout sword.

Actually, I don't agree that the purpose of summoning monsters is necessarily about having them destroying the enemy. Sometimes that's true. But I can think of at least 2-3 other reasons for summoning monsters.

1. Particularly in HOF where you can find yourself heavily outnumbered very quickly, summoning monsters can even the odds and take the attentions of enemy tanks off of your party. I'm not thinking of these summons as actual decoys, per se. I'm perfectly happy if they kill enemies. But their first role is to even the odds and prevent my party from being overrun. Summons used in this role need not be the toughest available. In large part, if they're only roughly equally tough as the enemy, they'll get the job done.


2. To create havoc behind enemy lines. In a battle like the one with Saablic Tan, the enemy has a rather significant number of tanks that separate you from Tan and his fellow spellcasters. And it might be a bit risky to break formation to send a tank to try to engage Tan in melee. But if you summon something like an elemental or a Gate demon right in front of Tan, oh what fun! All of the sudden Tan and his buddies have a very serious problem right in their faces and their battle plan suddenly becomes dealing with the demon in their faces. Whether the demon actually kills Tan or not is less important than the fact that it is creating havoc and keeping Tan's attentions diverted from your party. It's also worth noting that the "havoc-creating" summons works best if it's the toughest summons you can create, since it's quite likely that you're trying to divert a rather powerful spellcaster.

3. The outright decoy. Sometimes, it's useful to summon a monster to be a total decoy. Sometimes it may be to get the enemy's entire attention on the summons while your spellcasters create a kill zone. (And with a "kill zone decoy", I try to use a summons that will be immune to most or all of the damage spells that I intend to rain down on its head.... like a Fire Elemental, if I intend to use a lot of Fireballs, DFB's, Fire Storms, etc.) Or sometimes it's to keep some enemy monster that might come in from your flank occupied. In either case, the summon's job is less about killing the enemy as it is about diverting their attentions.


I suppose that all of these are somewhat similar ... the use of summons to divert an enemy's attentions, though each is slightly different in its own way.

This can be entirely true, and yet I so despise moderate to higher level single target spells that are all or nothing, I simply refuse to use them.

No, not necessarily. Your statement carries with it an underlying presumption. I actually enjoy taking down the Guardian with swords, etc. rather than getting lucky with a single spell that just happens to slip past its saves and resistances. I enjoy the sense of accomplishment that comes with defeating the Guardian (or whatever) without getting lucky.

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So, do you get any coins or food?

 

Hmmm, good point about level 3 spells being crowded. Maybe I should try skipping learning Fireball next time and see how it goes. Of course a wizard would still memorize Fireball for the first 10-12 levels. (Hat tip to the other thread.)

I generally play like a beancounter, with even my sorcs relying mostly on ranged weapons. However, I like your mortar analogy and maybe I'll give that approach a shot--it could be fun.

-Max

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I'm not sure, I think the one time I tried it I was too busy laughing to check. And then I reloaded from a saved game because Baldrick (the evil guy) felt bad for scaring the kid.

-Max

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Even the weak little skeletons and zombies that you get from Wand of the Dead can do a good job in this third position, at least in HoF. Enemies pretty much always hit everything anyway, so every blow the zombie soaks up is one that your flank units aren't taking. It buys time for your tank to position himself so the spellcasters don't get attacked and/or time for the Ranged Assault Power Squad of Big Black Flying Death and Miscellaneous Weapons to take out the flanker. Additionally, moving and attacking are exclusive actions, so even a weak unit can stretch out its effective lifespan by running away.

I love decoys.

-Max

 

One battle where I use a "flank covering" decoy is the battle in The Hand, in the tower room where the Xvimian monks reside. I being my party into the room, but leave a summoned monster at the door to keep the 2 boneguards occupied while my party takes on the monks.

Another battle where this sort of flank covering decoy is useful is in the River caves. A trailing summons is great for catching the attentions of the Hook Horrors that try to hit you from behind.



Also, I've found that pure rangers are surprisingly pleasant secondary summoners in HOF when you don't need super tough summons, but just some cannon fodder. Saves the spell slots of your more powerful casters. Of course, druids are nice in this role as well, though rangers are a bit less obvious, since they're primarily a warrior class, and not a terribly popular one for most players.

 

You're quite right that summons can have other functions. It's just that the summons I get from Shades are often so powerful, I figure I might as well just use them for brute force.

Yet there is also an element of luck involved in melee combat, in regards to determining attack rolls, damage, and dodge rates. And like with all-or-none spells, you tilt the odds in your favour with good gameplay.