Additional Flavor for Specialist Wizards

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Kalopsia
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Additional Flavor for Specialist Wizards

Post by Kalopsia » Sat Sep 19, 2020 5:00 pm

Currently, the only reason to specialize is the additional spell slots. A great majority of specialists thus don't select their school of specialization for its RP, but rather the school of spells they lose, often omitting Enchantment. The reason is simple: The school does not provide much utility for casters that do not intend to take the spell foci. I've been giving this situation some thought and come up with a few potential changes that would incentivize people to specialize in other schools as well.

Essentially, in addition to the usual bonus spell slots, all specialists could gain the following:
- At Wizard level 1, specialists receive a thematic, passive bonus related to their school of choice.
- At Wizard level 10, specialists receive Arcane Defense against their chosen school for free.
- At Wizard level 15, specialists receive a “signature spell” of their chosen school. They can cast this spell on a 3-minute cooldown.
- Upon taking the GSF and ESF feats in their chosen school, they gain additional thematic benefits in addition to the usual GSF/ESF bonuses.

Here is some ideas for the respective spell schools I've come up with. I've tried to balance these things by the schools specialists lose access to (details below):

Abjuration (opposed by Conjuration)
- Passive bonus: +1/+2 CL against dispels, unlocked at Wizard levels 20 and 28.
- Signature spell: Globe of invulnerability
- GSF bonus: +2 to saving throws against spells
- ESF bonus: +1 dispel CL and/or +2 breached effects for Greater Spell Breach and Disjunction

Conjuration (opposed by Transmutation)
- Passive bonus: summon tier increase (works like Animal domain; GSF will provide stat bonuses rather than further increasing summon tier)
- Signature spell: Acid fog
- GSF bonus: Alignment divergence is 10% less likely to result in a hostile summon.
- ESF bonus: 25% chance to summon an elemental monolith with Summon Creature IX.

Divination (opposed by Illusion)
- Passive bonus: The truesight effect of the True Seeing spell lasts 1 round longer when cast with Extend Spell (allowing for a maximum of 5 rounds with ESF: Divination).
- Signature spell: True Seeing (Note: cooldown variant cannot be extended)
- GSF bonus: Clairaudience/clairvoyance duration increases to turns per level
- ESF bonus: Scrying duration doubled and scrying harder to detect for other diviners

Enchantment (opposed by Illusion)
- Passive bonus: Persuade bonus equal to Wizard level/3
- Signature spell: Dominate Person
- GSF bonus: Dominate Person/Monster duration increases to hours per level
- ESF bonus: Humanoid creatures become immune to other caster’s mind-affecting spells as long as they are dominated.

Evocation (opposed by Conjuration)
- Passive bonus: IGMS can hit single targets with up to 11 missiles instead of 10
- Signature spell: Isaac's greater missile storm
- GSF bonus: +1 to Evocation spell DCs
- ESF bonus: Evocation spells no longer consume spell components

Illusion (opposed by Enchantment)
- Passive bonus: Bluff/Perform bonus equal to Wizard level/3
- Signature spell: Shadow Conjuration
- GSF bonus: Can mimic a single stat even without skill investment. Also gains a +15 bonus to all hidden skill checks related to mimicking abilities. (Does not apply to disguises.)
- ESF bonus: Invisibility spell duration increases to turns per level.

Necromancy (opposed by Divination)
- Passive bonus: +2 to Undead Caster Level (earlier access to more powerful undead)
- Signature spell: Circle of death
- GSF bonus: Regular GSF: Necromancy summon stat bonuses doubled
- ESF bonus: 25% chance to create two Dread Mummies with Mummy Dust instead of one.

Transmutation (opposed by Conjuration)
- Passive bonus: animal spells are automatically maximized
- Signature spell: Haste
- GSF bonus: +1 to all animal spells (allowing for a reliable +8 with ESF, no metamagic required)
- ESF bonus: unlocks Epic Caster Level scaling for the Mordenkainen's Sword summon.

As mentioned above, these bonuses have been tailored to the currently available spells in every single school and the consequential "sacrifice" omitting this school implies:
- Omitting Conjuration (most summon spells, Maze, Cloudkill etc.) is a high investment, the specialist boons and signature spells are thus a bit more powerful.
- Omitting Divination (True Seeing), Illusion (concealment spells, Shadow Shield) or Transmutation (animal buff spells) is a medium investment that can partially be negated with wands, the specialist additions are limited to specific, mostly PvE-focused bonuses.
- Omitting Enchantment is a minor investment often already justified by the extra, free spell slots. Boons and signature spells in this category are meant to be flavor-additions that don’t have much effect on class balance.
Furthermore, in order to prevent 3-level Wizard dips, passive bonuses should scale with Wizard levels, be dependent on Wizard feats and/or require a more significant level investment to provide their full benefits.

I believe these changes would make all specialist wizards more appealing without being a significant buff to the class as a whole.

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garrbear758
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Re: Additional Flavor for Specialist Wizards

Post by garrbear758 » Sat Sep 19, 2020 6:47 pm

Approved, although the specific mechanics are subject to change
You've done it [Garrbear], you've kicked the winemom nest. -Redacted

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