Scribes, if access to extra spells is limited this could go down to about 3 or 4)
War Magic (I'm surprised so many people have it so low arcane deflection, tactical wit and durable magic are all really good features
Divination (Mainly for portent)
Chronurgy (Arcane Abayance is broken, spells like tiny hut should never be possible to cast in combat, the number of familiars the party can have is limited only by the amount of gold you have and a familiar shouldn't be able to cast a concentration spell and disappear into a pocket plane. I am assuming a sensible change is made such as limiting it to spells with a casting time of 1 action and only allow a humanoid to release the spell)
Divination Enchantment
Abjuration
Bladesinging
Graviturgy
Evocation (Blasting is OK but any PC can do damage wizards are often better doing other things like control;ling the battlefield
Scribes, if access to extra spells is limited this could go down to about 3 or 4)
War Magic (I'm surprised so many people have it so low arcane deflection, tactical wit and durable magic are all really good features
Divination (Mainly for portent)
Chronurgy (Arcane Abayance is broken, spells like tiny hut should never be possible to cast in combat, the number of familiars the party can have is limited only by the amount of gold you have and a familiar shouldn't be able to cast a concentration spell and disappear into a pocket plane. I am assuming a sensible change is made such as limiting it to spells with a casting time of 1 action and only allow a humanoid to release the spell)
Divination
Abjuration
Bladesinging
Graviturgy
Evocation (Blasting is OK but any PC can do damage wizards are often better doing other things like control;ling the battlefield
Conjuration
Necromancy
Transmutation
Illusion
Blood Magic
You have divination listed at #3 and 5.
The thing with evocation is you can do AOE like sickening radiance which does damage every round but protect your enemies or have party members carry and smash multiple otilukes freezing spheres (and be protected from the spell) plus RAW you can overchannel sickening radiance for all its rounds or disintegrate for a lot of damage. Makes evokers one of the best at DPR if not the best. Also, you may not be the only spellcaster in the party that can cast balltefield control spells....druids, sorcerers, bards, etc can take that role.
Scribes, if access to extra spells is limited this could go down to about 3 or 4)
War Magic (I'm surprised so many people have it so low arcane deflection, tactical wit and durable magic are all really good features
Divination (Mainly for portent)
Chronurgy (Arcane Abayance is broken, spells like tiny hut should never be possible to cast in combat, the number of familiars the party can have is limited only by the amount of gold you have and a familiar shouldn't be able to cast a concentration spell and disappear into a pocket plane. I am assuming a sensible change is made such as limiting it to spells with a casting time of 1 action and only allow a humanoid to release the spell)
Divination
Abjuration
Bladesinging
Graviturgy
Evocation (Blasting is OK but any PC can do damage wizards are often better doing other things like control;ling the battlefield
Conjuration
Necromancy
Transmutation
Illusion
Blood Magic
You have divination listed at #3 and 5.
The thing with evocation is you can do AOE like sickening radiance which does damage every round but protect your enemies or have party members carry and smash multiple otilukes freezing spheres (and be protected from the spell) plus RAW you can overchannel sickening radiance for all its rounds or disintegrate for a lot of damage. Makes evokers one of the best at DPR if not the best. Also, you may not be the only spellcaster in the party that can cast balltefield control spells....druids, sorcerers, bards, etc can take that role.
The thing is, the way I read sculpt spell, its "when you cast" you can create the safe zones. So on the first round they're OK, but that doesn't necessarily apply to subsequent rounds, since they are no longer casting, just concentrating. Seems like a DM ruling situation there. Maybe, if the ally doesn't move, you can argue you've hollowed out that one square as a safe spot. But If I were DM'ing, I don't know I'd let them move around in the area without taking damage. And I also don't think I'd give them a free pass for the entire spell duration.
Scribes, if access to extra spells is limited this could go down to about 3 or 4)
War Magic (I'm surprised so many people have it so low arcane deflection, tactical wit and durable magic are all really good features
Divination (Mainly for portent)
Chronurgy (Arcane Abayance is broken, spells like tiny hut should never be possible to cast in combat, the number of familiars the party can have is limited only by the amount of gold you have and a familiar shouldn't be able to cast a concentration spell and disappear into a pocket plane. I am assuming a sensible change is made such as limiting it to spells with a casting time of 1 action and only allow a humanoid to release the spell)
Divination
Abjuration
Bladesinging
Graviturgy
Evocation (Blasting is OK but any PC can do damage wizards are often better doing other things like control;ling the battlefield
Conjuration
Necromancy
Transmutation
Illusion
Blood Magic
You have divination listed at #3 and 5.
The thing with evocation is you can do AOE like sickening radiance which does damage every round but protect your enemies or have party members carry and smash multiple otilukes freezing spheres (and be protected from the spell) plus RAW you can overchannel sickening radiance for all its rounds or disintegrate for a lot of damage. Makes evokers one of the best at DPR if not the best. Also, you may not be the only spellcaster in the party that can cast balltefield control spells....druids, sorcerers, bards, etc can take that role.
The thing is, the way I read sculpt spell, its "when you cast" you can create the safe zones. So on the first round they're OK, but that doesn't necessarily apply to subsequent rounds, since they are no longer casting, just concentrating. Seems like a DM ruling situation there. Maybe, if the ally doesn't move, you can argue you've hollowed out that one square as a safe spot. But If I were DM'ing, I don't know I'd let them move around in the area without taking damage. And I also don't think I'd give them a free pass for the entire spell duration.
It just protects those you specify: nothing is written about safe zones: "The chosen creatures automatically succeed on their saving throws against the spell, and they take no damage if they would normally take half damage on a successful save." I'm going with Jeremy Crawford's ruling:
"Sculpt Spells is used the turn you cast a spell and is intended to affect only saves made that turn. The chosen creatures automatically succeed on their saving throws against the spell, and they take no damage if they would normally take half damage on a successful save. RAW, it works on all the saves #DnD."
So, they didn't intend for it to protect you every turn...but that is how it is written RAW, and they didn't feel strongly enough to update with errata.
I finally took a look at the blood magic subclass, because it has pretty mixed opinions. Some say it's weak, some say strong, some say fun, some say boring. The first two class features, Blood Channeling and Sanguine Burst are pretty decent, but not all that notable or powerful. Bond of Mutual Suffering is pretty cool, and can be pretty powerful in certain situations, like when a dragon blasts with their 60+ damage breath, and you can have them take that damage. The problem is that you can only use it sparingly in between rests. It would honestly be better if you could use something like 3 times, right when you get it at 6th level. Glyph of Hemmorrhaging kind of sucks, because it's literally Hex, a 1st level spell, as a 10th level feature. I don't think I should explain why this sucks. The final feature, Thicker Than Water, is nice, sure, but it lacks its role as a 14th level class feature heavily. Overall, they kind of suck as a subclass, even though they seem like they would be very fun as a class normally, and would be better with some simple buffs, or a rework, which I think would be great.
IMO the "best" arcane tradition is very much dependent on the kind of game you're playing. In a RP-heavy, intrigue campaign, Enchantment and Illusion are found to be more powerful than usual, whereas in a hack-and-slash, dungeon crawl style game where combat is prioritized, the Evoker, War mage, and Abjurer will be optimal choices. Divination and Chronurgy will always be quite powerful, often even verging on broken level, to the point where they are banned from many tables. Conjuration and Necromancy both revolve around the use of minions (undead/summoned creatures), and can be incredibly strong or rather middling depending on how your DM and table reacts to this playstyle (and the obvious moral dilemnas with Necromancers). Transmutation was never outstanding, and now feels like a wizard trying to dress up as an artificer. Bladesinging is great, nothing more to be said, and Order of Scribes, though often complex and niche, is my personal favorite tradition.
Regardless of your arcane tradition, you will still end up a very powerful character. You're still a wizard. Just pick whichever sounds the most fun and interesting to you.
IMO the "best" arcane tradition is very much dependent on the kind of game you're playing. In a RP-heavy, intrigue campaign, Enchantment and Illusion are found to be more powerful than usual, whereas in a hack-and-slash, dungeon crawl style game where combat is prioritized, the Evoker, War mage, and Abjurer will be optimal choices. Divination and Chronurgy will always be quite powerful, often even verging on broken level, to the point where they are banned from many tables. Conjuration and Necromancy both revolve around the use of minions (undead/summoned creatures), and can be incredibly strong or rather middling depending on how your DM and table reacts to this playstyle (and the obvious moral dilemnas with Necromancers). Transmutation was never outstanding, and now feels like a wizard trying to dress up as an artificer. Bladesinging is great, nothing more to be said, and Order of Scribes, though often complex and niche, is my personal favorite tradition.
Regardless of your arcane tradition, you will still end up a very powerful character. You're still a wizard. Just pick whichever sounds the most fun and interesting to you.
There really isn't a truly bad one. Even the worst wizard subclass may, very well, be better than most other subclasses in the game. The base features of being a wizard are just good, well thought out and fun to play.
IMO the "best" arcane tradition is very much dependent on the kind of game you're playing. In a RP-heavy, intrigue campaign, Enchantment and Illusion are found to be more powerful than usual, whereas in a hack-and-slash, dungeon crawl style game where combat is prioritized, the Evoker, War mage, and Abjurer will be optimal choices. Divination and Chronurgy will always be quite powerful, often even verging on broken level, to the point where they are banned from many tables. Conjuration and Necromancy both revolve around the use of minions (undead/summoned creatures), and can be incredibly strong or rather middling depending on how your DM and table reacts to this playstyle (and the obvious moral dilemnas with Necromancers). Transmutation was never outstanding, and now feels like a wizard trying to dress up as an artificer. Bladesinging is great, nothing more to be said, and Order of Scribes, though often complex and niche, is my personal favorite tradition.
Regardless of your arcane tradition, you will still end up a very powerful character. You're still a wizard. Just pick whichever sounds the most fun and interesting to you.
This makes sense for why Evokers are always rated mid even those they have the highest DRP. I play a lot of evokers but I also only am involved in combat heavy campaigns and one shots (never high RP)....but someone in a high RP, low combat game would probably prefer a diviner, illusionist, enchanter, etc.
Abjurations ward is very powerful if only for stopping concentration checks. Adding proficiency to counter/dispel rules, not to mention advantage on all spell saves and resistance to all damage?
Yeah, Abjuration is kind of underrated, although I do think things like the Bladesinger and Evocation subclasses are above them, unless you're building a concentration spell character.
At 2nd level they get Hypnotic Gaze which only allows 1 saving throw or locks down any 1 creature for the entire time you continue to spend your action round after round. This feature can be used all day long against as many creatures as you encounter in a day. Just once on each, and that is usually enough.
At 6th level they get Instinctive Charm which can be used over and over against the same creature if they continue to fail their save round after round, diverting an attack and possibly making them make it against one of their allies if that's the only alternative in range. And can be used against other creatures as needed all day long.
At 10th level they get Split Enchantment which is similar to the Sorcerer's Twinned Spell metamagic, effectively doubling their Enchantment spells power. It can be used over and over all day long so long as you have spell slots to take advantage of it.
At 14th level they get Alter Memories which allows them a sort of free use of Modify Memory. It gets around the drawbacks of Charm and similar spells by erasing the target's memory of ever being charmed in the first place.
This is one of the only wizard subclasses where all 4 features are pretty game altering and useful throughout the wizard's career and advancement in levels. It can be underrated by many but also surprise you with just how powerful and effective these features can be in a game.
I'd agree if I didnt have to get into melee range to use hypnotic gaze. That's generally the last place I want my wizard to be found.
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Any time an unfathomably powerful entity sweeps in and offers godlike rewards in return for just a few teensy favors, it’s a scam. Unless it’s me. I’d never lie to you, reader dearest.
IMO the "best" arcane tradition is very much dependent on the kind of game you're playing. In a RP-heavy, intrigue campaign, Enchantment and Illusion are found to be more powerful than usual, whereas in a hack-and-slash, dungeon crawl style game where combat is prioritized, the Evoker, War mage, and Abjurer will be optimal choices. Divination and Chronurgy will always be quite powerful, often even verging on broken level, to the point where they are banned from many tables. Conjuration and Necromancy both revolve around the use of minions (undead/summoned creatures), and can be incredibly strong or rather middling depending on how your DM and table reacts to this playstyle (and the obvious moral dilemnas with Necromancers). Transmutation was never outstanding, and now feels like a wizard trying to dress up as an artificer. Bladesinging is great, nothing more to be said, and Order of Scribes, though often complex and niche, is my personal favorite tradition.
Regardless of your arcane tradition, you will still end up a very powerful character. You're still a wizard. Just pick whichever sounds the most fun and interesting to you.
This makes sense for why Evokers are always rated mid even those they have the highest DRP. I play a lot of evokers but I also only am involved in combat heavy campaigns and one shots (never high RP)....but someone in a high RP, low combat game would probably prefer a diviner, illusionist, enchanter, etc.
Diviner is fantastic in combat as well. It's not one you would expect to be great in combat, but being able to determine your enemy's saving throw for them when delivering a bit spell, is amazing. Being able to use Mindspike to recover spell slots is also very good. Illusionist is potentially really good, but I don't have the imagination to use illusions effectively. It's very much a "realm of possible" and it takes me too long to think of creative ways to use illusions to solve the problem.
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Any time an unfathomably powerful entity sweeps in and offers godlike rewards in return for just a few teensy favors, it’s a scam. Unless it’s me. I’d never lie to you, reader dearest.
Tasha
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DivinationEnchantmentEdited error
You have divination listed at #3 and 5.
The thing with evocation is you can do AOE like sickening radiance which does damage every round but protect your enemies or have party members carry and smash multiple otilukes freezing spheres (and be protected from the spell) plus RAW you can overchannel sickening radiance for all its rounds or disintegrate for a lot of damage. Makes evokers one of the best at DPR if not the best. Also, you may not be the only spellcaster in the party that can cast balltefield control spells....druids, sorcerers, bards, etc can take that role.
Food, Scifi/fantasy, anime, DND 5E/RPG geek.
The thing is, the way I read sculpt spell, its "when you cast" you can create the safe zones. So on the first round they're OK, but that doesn't necessarily apply to subsequent rounds, since they are no longer casting, just concentrating. Seems like a DM ruling situation there. Maybe, if the ally doesn't move, you can argue you've hollowed out that one square as a safe spot. But If I were DM'ing, I don't know I'd let them move around in the area without taking damage. And I also don't think I'd give them a free pass for the entire spell duration.
It just protects those you specify: nothing is written about safe zones: "The chosen creatures automatically succeed on their saving throws against the spell, and they take no damage if they would normally take half damage on a successful save." I'm going with Jeremy Crawford's ruling:
"Sculpt Spells is used the turn you cast a spell and is intended to affect only saves made that turn. The chosen creatures automatically succeed on their saving throws against the spell, and they take no damage if they would normally take half damage on a successful save. RAW, it works on all the saves #DnD."
So, they didn't intend for it to protect you every turn...but that is how it is written RAW, and they didn't feel strongly enough to update with errata.
Food, Scifi/fantasy, anime, DND 5E/RPG geek.
I finally took a look at the blood magic subclass, because it has pretty mixed opinions. Some say it's weak, some say strong, some say fun, some say boring. The first two class features, Blood Channeling and Sanguine Burst are pretty decent, but not all that notable or powerful. Bond of Mutual Suffering is pretty cool, and can be pretty powerful in certain situations, like when a dragon blasts with their 60+ damage breath, and you can have them take that damage. The problem is that you can only use it sparingly in between rests. It would honestly be better if you could use something like 3 times, right when you get it at 6th level. Glyph of Hemmorrhaging kind of sucks, because it's literally Hex, a 1st level spell, as a 10th level feature. I don't think I should explain why this sucks. The final feature, Thicker Than Water, is nice, sure, but it lacks its role as a 14th level class feature heavily. Overall, they kind of suck as a subclass, even though they seem like they would be very fun as a class normally, and would be better with some simple buffs, or a rework, which I think would be great.
IMO the "best" arcane tradition is very much dependent on the kind of game you're playing. In a RP-heavy, intrigue campaign, Enchantment and Illusion are found to be more powerful than usual, whereas in a hack-and-slash, dungeon crawl style game where combat is prioritized, the Evoker, War mage, and Abjurer will be optimal choices. Divination and Chronurgy will always be quite powerful, often even verging on broken level, to the point where they are banned from many tables. Conjuration and Necromancy both revolve around the use of minions (undead/summoned creatures), and can be incredibly strong or rather middling depending on how your DM and table reacts to this playstyle (and the obvious moral dilemnas with Necromancers). Transmutation was never outstanding, and now feels like a wizard trying to dress up as an artificer. Bladesinging is great, nothing more to be said, and Order of Scribes, though often complex and niche, is my personal favorite tradition.
Regardless of your arcane tradition, you will still end up a very powerful character. You're still a wizard. Just pick whichever sounds the most fun and interesting to you.
In my experience...
There really isn't a truly bad one. Even the worst wizard subclass may, very well, be better than most other subclasses in the game. The base features of being a wizard are just good, well thought out and fun to play.
This makes sense for why Evokers are always rated mid even those they have the highest DRP. I play a lot of evokers but I also only am involved in combat heavy campaigns and one shots (never high RP)....but someone in a high RP, low combat game would probably prefer a diviner, illusionist, enchanter, etc.
Food, Scifi/fantasy, anime, DND 5E/RPG geek.
Bladesingers will be good in any kind of campaign, honestly, and so will Chronurgy.
I like all wizards.
A GOBLIN with a big brain. (int 30)
BOOYAGH!!!!
I do it this way:
1. Chronurgy
2. Divination
3. Graviturgy
4. Abjuration
5. Bladesinger
6.Necromancy
7. Illusion
8. Evocation
9. War mage
10. Transmutation
(Scribes at 4.5 if you want that)
Abjurations ward is very powerful if only for stopping concentration checks. Adding proficiency to counter/dispel rules, not to mention advantage on all spell saves and resistance to all damage?
Yeah, Abjuration is kind of underrated, although I do think things like the Bladesinger and Evocation subclasses are above them, unless you're building a concentration spell character.
I'd agree if I didnt have to get into melee range to use hypnotic gaze. That's generally the last place I want my wizard to be found.
Any time an unfathomably powerful entity sweeps in and offers godlike rewards in return for just a few teensy favors, it’s a scam. Unless it’s me. I’d never lie to you, reader dearest.
Tasha
Diviner is fantastic in combat as well. It's not one you would expect to be great in combat, but being able to determine your enemy's saving throw for them when delivering a bit spell, is amazing. Being able to use Mindspike to recover spell slots is also very good. Illusionist is potentially really good, but I don't have the imagination to use illusions effectively. It's very much a "realm of possible" and it takes me too long to think of creative ways to use illusions to solve the problem.
Any time an unfathomably powerful entity sweeps in and offers godlike rewards in return for just a few teensy favors, it’s a scam. Unless it’s me. I’d never lie to you, reader dearest.
Tasha