Which spells are in biggest need of a rewrite?

[Lycanthromancer]

The major thing I have with it, really, is that it's self-only. It'd be nice to give to the party's bard, say.

[Midnight_v]

The major thing I have with it, really, is that it's self-only. It'd be nice to give to the party's bard, say.

I'm gonna say... I agree with this. Thats kinda cool... I'd like to give it to the rogue too. Or hell the monk... might make them work.

[SneeR]

The major thing I have with it, really, is that it's self-only. It'd be nice to give to the party's bard, say.

I'm gonna say... I agree with this. Thats kinda cool... I'd like to give it to the rogue too. Or hell the monk... might make them work.

If the Cleric casts that and persists it at the beginning of the day, an Ardent Dilettante also can gain the benefit. Only time I've ever seen that, short of the cleric chaining the spell with the ocular spell enhancement.

[X-Codes]

The major thing I have with it, really, is that it's self-only. It'd be nice to give to the party's bard, say.

I'm gonna say... I agree with this. Thats kinda cool... I'd like to give it to the rogue too. Or hell the monk... might make them work.

Take the PF version and make it affect a 30' radius.  You know, like Recitation.

[Endarire]

Blast spells are generally weak.  What should be done with those?

[zugschef]

Blast spells are generally weak.  What should be done with those?

Most of them should be changed to Evocation and SR: No. (I never understood why a fireball is affected by SR, when it's actually fire.)

[SorO_Lost]

Blast spells are generally weak.  What should be done with those?

Echoes of Power?

[Gribel]

Blast spells are generally weak.  What should be done with those?

If blast spells were as optimizable as melee damage, blasting builds would be ok and non-blaster wizards wouldn't be capable to deal as much damage. Not that they'd care about it anyway, but it would be more fair to require specialization the same way it is required in melee cases.

[Midnight_v]

Blast spells are generally weak.  What should be done with those?

Most of them should be changed to Evocation and SR: No. (I never understood why a fireball is affected by SR, when it's actually fire.)

+1
I'm also thinking that we can take a lesson from psionics there, and say its okay that the spells do + 1 per spell level damage. Maybe + 2 damage per spell level for evokers.

So your fireball does 5d5+5 or 5d6+10 if your an evoker. That doesn't shatter the game or anything judging from what I see from energy missle, but then there are SOOO Many more spells, maybe the Mail Man would make this too deadly? Lastly, adding status effects seems to work.
Wings of Flurry seems to be really favored as the best or nearly the best evocation (damage) spell.

[veekie]

I personally figure instead of making the evocator be best at what the fighter is doing(massive point damage), make it better at being basically high power artillery(high massed damage, focused high damage over time, unavoidable moderate damage).

[Unbeliever]

I think we added +5 damage per spell level in a campaign I am involved in where we wanted to encourage more blasting.  This is in part due to the fact that the DM doesn't love DR all that much, and so has simply jacked up the hit points a whole lot instead (which we tend to do anyway ...).  At high levels, nothing is going to beat Avasculate for damage, but that's just the way it is.  We also cap spells where it seems reasonable, following the Epic Level Handbook's guidelines, so I think Wings of Flurry would cap at 15 dice.  We also made Metamagic a bit easier to use, so free maximizes help out blasting. 

Isn't there also that ongoing Metamagic feat from Dragon Magazine? 

To some extent, I think this depends on what the goal you're aiming for is.  I know I can build a wizard who does some hella blasting w/out too much effort.  But, that involves making a build w/ that orientation.  Should spellcasters be good at dealing damage even if they don't center their build around it?  I'm not so sure.  The melee damage machines have certainly committed a lot of build resources to being able to churn out that kind of damage. 

[CantripN]

Blasting works just fine, to my mind. Sure, without proper optimization, it's a semi-useful option, but done right, you can get ridiculous amount of damage. I'm talking things as simple as a Magic Missile doing (5d4+3d6+30)x1.5, to a Stored Lightning bolt for 43d6+215 without a save - and I'm not even bringing in the really nasty stuff like Arcane Fusion, that can really break this.

[Shiki]

Blasting works just fine, to my mind. Sure, without proper optimization, it's a semi-useful option, but done right, you can get ridiculous amount of damage. I'm talking things as simple as a Magic Missile doing (5d4+3d6+30)x1.5, to a Stored Lightning bolt for 43d6+215 without a save - and I'm not even bringing in the really nasty stuff like Arcane Fusion, that can really break this.

+1, I don't get why blasting should be any better out of the box when you can already something w/ it if you optimize it somewhat a bit and if you really want to break it, you can. The same can be said about beatsticks; they usually kind of suck out of the box, but can be made to be functional w/ little care.

[Echoes]

Blasting works just fine, to my mind. Sure, without proper optimization, it's a semi-useful option, but done right, you can get ridiculous amount of damage. I'm talking things as simple as a Magic Missile doing (5d4+3d6+30)x1.5, to a Stored Lightning bolt for 43d6+215 without a save - and I'm not even bringing in the really nasty stuff like Arcane Fusion, that can really break this.

+1, I don't get why blasting should be any better out of the box when you can already something w/ it if you optimize it somewhat a bit and if you really want to break it, you can. The same can be said about beatsticks; they usually kind of suck out of the box, but can be made to be functional w/ little care.

Practically anything is viable with sufficient optimization. The problem is with newer and/or inexperienced players. A newbie building an out-of-the-box blaster wizard is going to be performing at fighter-level at best. In a group of newbies, that will work (sort of), but if that same player joined a party with an experienced wizard player he's going to wind up being a second-string contributor at best.

Ideally, every option would be equally valid and trap options wouldn't exist. Since they do exist, you have two real options: nerf everything to the trap level or buff everything to the optimal level. Since I prefer the latter, I advocate for improving blasting. Because it takes zero optimization to make color spray, sleep, glitterdust, stinking cloud, etc rock face we have to make blasting as effective as battlefield xontrol/SoDs are out-of-the-box.

That generally means increasing the base damage, lowering the level of spells, making metamagic easier to use, or some combination of the three.

[CantripN]

And then you end up with Blasting being made so broken, it's not funny, with just a bit of work. Color Spray is hard to improve upon, except to raise the DC, but blasting is a numbers game, so you can win that.

I say it's okay as it is. Trap options should and do exist, to make people THINK.

[Unbeliever]

As someone who shepherds people into 3.5 D&D w/ some regularity, I don't love trap options.  But, I don't think blasting necessarily needs to be fixed.  One of the greatest resources are things like the build handbooks, that really become templates for certain abilities.  Like, I can say to someone "you want to blast, here are some good options?"  I'd actually love it if someone did something like that for blasting -- a counterpart to the God Wizard handbooks.  I haven't looked at the Mailman thread in a while, though, so maybe it's got some of that, though I don't recall it listing the Krynn Warmage and so on. 

[CantripN]

I was gonna do something like that, except I've been too busy. I might do it now, I suppose. Dictum did offer we make one together...

[Lycanthromancer]

Unless blasting has rider-effects involved, any blaster handbook would be about one-kill pot-shots and only those, as blasting doesn't do much of anything unless the target(s) die(s).

Thus, such a handbook would be all about killing things in one hit, which generally means very specific builds, and the handbook would basically just be a list of such builds.

[CantripN]

Unless blasting has rider-effects involved, any blaster handbook would be about one-kill pot-shots and only those, as blasting doesn't do much of anything unless the target(s) die(s).

Thus, such a handbook would be all about killing things in one hit, which generally means very specific builds, and the handbook would basically just be a list of such builds.

Not true. There are at least 10 different ways to go about it. And it's no different than a Fighter or a Barbarian Handbook, considering you attack the same thing - hit points.

Besides, you can have several rider effects, some of them rather scary.

And yes, it'd also be about killing things in just one spell, so it's cost effective.

[Midnight_v]

CantripN, after reading what you've presented about actually being able to MAKE evocation be good. I'm gonna have to say
+1
To pretty much everything you said.
The more I think about it the more I realize evocation does indeed work.
(takes a second to look at the mailman) yeah it can be done.
My question is should it be so hard? I presented the mailman to a friend of mine who
complained "I want to be a WIIIIIIZARD, evoker, who blasts, not a sorceror, I want my fireballs to matter" He was a second ed player who just got back to D&D so that was kinda uphill.
So, there's that held over player expectation, that can be accouted for somewhat. The thing about wings and why I brought it up is because the secondary effect is so good, which is similar to adding riders.
That being said i'd like to see the base evocation spells be good. Frankly, so do most of the people who want to play evokers, so honestly fireball, lightning bolt, and cone of cold can get slight rewrites that let the have a built in rider, and seriously lets uncap them, It doesn't need to be perfect out the box it just needs to not suck as bad.

  Fireball
Evocation [Fire]
Level: Sor/Wiz 3
Components: V, S, M
Casting Time: 1 standard action
Range: Long (400 ft. + 40 ft./level)
Area: 20-ft.-radius spread
Duration: Instantaneous
Saving Throw: Reflex half
Spell Resistance: Yes

A fireball spell is an explosion of flame that detonates with a low roar and deals 1d6 points of fire damage per caster level (maximum 10d6) Uncapped to every creature within the area. Unattended objects also take this damage. Living creatures who fail the saving throw are also set on fire taking 1d6 ongoing damage untill they take a full round action to extinguish the flames

I don't think such a minor change breaks it or makes it all that good, but it is better. It's more pathfinder style non-fix than a real adjustment but I'm just saying it should be closer in power to a orb or something maybe.

Lightning bolt, and cone of cold should probbably "condition" you as well. Thats not too much to ask really, letting the spells that are Iconic have more use.