Fix Archamge and make CONJUATION, ALTERATION, ILLUSION and ABJURATION useful.

[SorcererVictor]

Basically, Wizards are only useful as Pale Masters. Alchemists are much better elementarists and sorcerer specific element savants. That said, would be cool if Wizard could be great casting conjuration, alteration, illusion and abjuration spells.

The trees for sorcerer gives + caster level to a specific element. Why not make each "archamge" core tree giving a +caster level to a specific school? And why not pick better spells for SLA? The spells obtained as SLA for archmages are awful. I would suggest giving better ones.

On order from core 1+2+3+4+5.

1. conjuration : Summon monster II + Sleet Storm + Cloudkill + Acid Fog + Incendiary cloud :
2. Abjuration : Protection from evil + dispel magic + stoneskin + greater dispel magic + disjunction
3. Illusion : Invisibility + Displacement + Phantasmal killer + Greater Pahntasmal killer(NOTE BELLOW)
4. Evocation : Magic missile + Chain missile + Force missile + Chain force(force version of chain lightning + Force ray(force version of polar ray)
5. Enchantment : Charm Person + Suggestion + Dominate person + Dominate monster + Charm monster, mass
6. Transformation : Jump + Knock + Flesh to Stone + Disintegrate + Greater disintegrate(NOTE BELLOW)
7. Necromancy : Lesser death aura + Death aura + Necrotic ray + Finger of Death + Wail of the Banshee

I also suggest bringing a higher version of certain spells. Inspired by Knights of the Chalice 2, why not a tier 9 "greater disintegrate" spell? Because lets be real, disintegrate is a amazing spell for mid level play but is very lackluster on epic level. Even in the case of pale masters, they will have a choice. They will pick necromancy on archamge secondary tree and get necromancer SLA's? Pick abjuration to dispel immunities, enchantment to have CC, evocation to be able to dish force damage?

[Ulfo]

Weird instead GPK, we need MOAR must have AoE IK!

[Enderoc]

I have an idea,how about allowing specialists access to the spells of that school of a chosen secondary class? Maybe more... each class costing 3 enhancement points.
This would not increase spell slots only allow a wider range of spells from the school of the Wizards specialation. Maybe go 2/1...example a 4th level wizard would have the same access to the spells of its school as a 2nd level Cleric up to 10th level Cleric at level 20 which could climb to 15 under certain destines as far as casting levels go.

[Pandjed]

Archmage isn't too bad of a tree, but it's very costly. It also suffers from an identity crisis, as it tries to do too much without actually doing enough. Ways for me to deal with it:

1.) Replace that tree with 2-3 others, that concentrate on specific school(s) of magic, just like a pale master. Like a War Wizard that uses Conjuration, Evocation and have some defensives that reminds of Abjuration, and somethingt like a Biomancer, that uses Transmutation for buffs, debuffs, and CC.

2.) Make a huge redesign of this tree, like:

• Moving SLAs out from core and give passive benefits for cores
• Mechanics that rewards you for using spells from your specialized school (temp SP/HP, spellpower/saves/striding buffs, etc.)
• Greatly reduce costs of many enhancements
• Making new SLAs or spells that goes into your spellbook. May include upgraded versions of other spells (like a Celsius Shield, which is fire shield with fire and cold)
• Additional benefits for using Metamagics on spells (SLAs may be too good)

[thunir]

We need a complete re-design that includes more spells to fill in the gaps and makes clear divisions.

Then we need to make the spells specialized school all SLA, and Close out the opposing school denying the ability to cast completely.

+4 in the Capstone and some way to give fleshies a self targeted to heal.

Cantrips and familiars


Make it so!

[assimilateur]

I'm not opposed to reworking Archmage in general, but conjuration already has one of the most desirable spells as an SLA: web. Getting rid of that would be a downgrade.

And SLA: ddoor is a huge boon when doing some of the challenges, as it cuts down the cooldown from 60 to 15 seconds.

[Verlok_the_Red]

conjuration : Summon monster II + Sleet Storm + Cloudkill + Acid Fog + Incendiary cloud :

monster summoning in general.. in a word SUCKS! ..

I see 2 major issues..

1: players simply do not use/want or accept clouds as a viable method of cc .. its always been a hard sell, and even worse way back when clouds were even less transparent then they are now

2: people would literally cloud the entrance of the quest, pull the entire zone and mass kill everything in a single shot.

If done properly.. option 2 is still true today, even on r10. conjuration is incredibly effective with 1 exception ..
the duration nurff .. easy fix .. but will they? .. nope..

conjuration is VERY power if you think outside the box

Abjuration : Protection from evil + dispel magic + stoneskin + greater dispel magic + disjunction

currently antimanic or the ability to remove magic doesn’t exist .. with only a few exceptions monsters do not use magic in the same respect (ie a cleric in pop will cast fom on themselfs) .. but 99.9% of monsters simply get a set of attributes you cant dispel .. sadly you see this more and more with "mantles" and "wards" .. that you cant dispel becasue they contain all of the abilities and slas for monster.. aka if you could simply dispel an epic ward .. the raid mob would become raid jello..

hopefully u50/1 will address that and make antimanic more of a thing? who knows ..

Enchantment : Charm Person + Suggestion + Dominate person + Dominate monster + Charm monster, mass

Ever see how mad people get when your charm doesn’t break the second they want to kill the mob? this is more of a player perception problem.. enchantment, with the proper investment is VERY powerful. and if used creatively.. exceptionally OP.

[TheAlicornSage]

Why do people get mad about charm effects not wearing off? Did they get rid of the dispel charm button or something?

[FuzzyDuck81]

I'd like to see more flavourful & useful side benefits added to specialist wizards, as you see in PnP, that are related to their specialty, so resistance to their specialty school, increased spell penetration with that school's spells (where appropriate) plus something extra. A few examples:
Enchantment: boosts to intim/diplo/bluff skills plus a couple of item imbues a la artificer
Illusion: true seeing, ability to increase or decrease threat generated
Necromancy: vampiric touch spell, resistance to death effects, maybe a mini-phylactery at high level (essentially death pact spell)
Transmutation: access to turn to frog & mass flesh to stone (non-shiny mass flesh to gold), increased physical stat of choice.
Abjuration: increased AC, PRR, MRR (including +MRR cap of the same number), spell resistance, maybe some level of DR or barbarian style % damage resistance.

[Ulfo]

Why do people get mad about charm effects not wearing off? Did they get rid of the dispel charm button or something?

Because such effects not always can be removed with button, like wild charm? Because some mobs is bugged and become neutral after charm effect off and cannot be targeted and killed at all?

[TheAlicornSage]

Wild charm?

Also, never had a charm turn neutral much less be non-attackable, though to be fair, I'd only care about that if I had to kill them, otherwise I have no need to kill dverything.

[Ulfo]

Wild charm?

Improved Wild Empathy, Ranger class feat. Dominate monster, cannot be dispelled or cancelled.

Also, never had a charm turn neutral much less be non-attackable, though to be fair, I'd only care about that if I had to kill them, otherwise I have no need to kill dverything.

Sure, it's not problem if you just can leave such bugged mobs behind and go forward, but it become great problem if you must kill all mobs spawn to open door etc...