Quote Originally Posted by HalfQuart View Post
Unless you can use hit-and-run tactics regularly, Power Word Pain takes too long to be useful for PCs. It is killer when used against PCs by NPCs, though, so I recommend staying away from it entirely to not give your DM any ideas.

A couple other useful 1st level spells are Identify and Mage Armor. You can probably put off Identify until a bit later, as you won't have many magic items or enough money for the material component for a bit.

I'd also hold off on taking Grease and get it at 2nd level -- it's a good spell, but only lasts 1 round/level.
I'm kind of in agreement on Grease, but will mention that needing that one round while facing off against a bunch of mooks in a hallway or cave entrance, comes up more often than you think it would. If you wanna try on BFC to see if it's something you enjoy, or if it's going to be a great compliment to your party, Grease is awesome....