Evocation Caster

[thecrimsondawn]

I just started playing an alt for my current group, and as such, it is time to make a new backup in the event that this one dies. While often boring to play, I have a concept idea in mind to make it interesting.

What do you think would make the best Evocation mage? There are 3 options I really see.

A Wyvaran Wizard, focused on Universal school of magic and using the races 1/4 metamagic level reduction to its utmost advantage.

An Arcanist of X race, focused on controlling the very nature of magic itself. Potent Magic exploit with evocation school focus would allow for near unbeatable save DCs for spells.

A Magus of X race, strong as hell early levels, but kinda feels bland to me later on. Their spell list is practically nothing but evocation tho


If anyone has any other ideas, or tweaks to these ideas, let me know too :)

[Psyren]

Sorcerer blasting is a big one - Crossblooded Orc + Draconic and tons of spells/day.

A Wyvaran Wizard, focused on Universal school of magic and using the races 1/4 metamagic level reduction to its utmost advantage.

This FCB is third-party - is that allowed? That adds quite a lot of options to the discussion.

[thecrimsondawn]

Sorcerer blasting is a big one - Crossblooded Orc + Draconic and tons of spells/day.



This FCB is third-party - is that allowed? That adds quite a lot of options to the discussion.

Ya, my DM is allowing this since in his world, dragons are sort of viewed as "gods" even tho they are nothing of the sort. Being that Wyvaran is of the dragon family, having power over "lesser" races makes sense. If you have any other 3rd party content that may be of note, drop it by me and if any catch my eye I will run it by the DM.

Sorc will not really work for me since I dont need more spells per day. As an evocation focused caster, I will still only ever be getting into 2 or 3 fights a day tops, and most of those will end in less then 3 rounds. Having a large number of blasts per day kinda goes to waste at that point.

[Psyren]

I thought you were asking about blasters in general, not for a specific character build/campaign. Are there any other restrictions or pre-existing conditions?

[thecrimsondawn]

I thought you were asking about blasters in general, not for a specific character build/campaign. Are there any other restrictions or pre-existing conditions?

Lets see...
Current party level is 6, should be 7 after a few more games or so. exp is slow so that does account for some build data

There are 3 major races in this game, Orcs, Humans, and Elves, but there are still many sub races. There are no Dwarfs left, they all died out.

Our DM will let me have nearly anything provided I have a good argument for it/backstory and that its not 3.5 broken as hell.

Hmm..what else. Oh, starting stat max is 20 counting race bonuses with 22 point buy 1 for 1, all stats starting at 10. Stats can be lowered down to 7 for bonus points for min maxing.
The third bonus trait is in play if I take a drawback, so if a 3rd trait is needed that is also on the table.

Hero points are being phased out for Mythic. We are just starting the quest to become mythic so its gonna take quite a few games.

He dislikes third party content, but does not disallow it unless its obviously unbalanced. Since all our heroes are revived figures of legend from the past, we are all allowed some sort of toy or power of a sort to match with our back stories, many being DM custom made. but some player made as well.

Lots of us have 3pp spells so that gives a lot of casting options too.

Did I leave anything out?

[avr]

You don't play (or dip a level of) cross-blooded sorcerer for the spells/day, you do it for the +2 damage per die.

If you do choose to play a wizard though, consider the evocation/admixture school in order to be able to blow stuff up with elements the targets are not immune to. Or the spellslinger archetype to make those save DCs even higher than an arcanist can get them. Or the exploiter archetype to be an arcanist with full spell level advancement.

A magus is an entirely different sort of character, usually focused on using spells to hit absurdly hard in melee. It's possible for a magus to be focused on using spells to deal out control in melee instead, but neither is what usually comes to mind when people mention evocation casters.

[Kurald Galain]

A Magus of X race, strong as hell early levels, but kinda feels bland to me later on. Their spell list is practically nothing but evocation tho

Wherever did you get that idea? They've got plenty of conjuration (BFC) spells like the clouds and walls, transmutation buffs/debuffs like Enlarge and Haste, enchantments like Greater Magic Weapon, and abjurations like Dispel Magic. Plus they have several ways of adding wizard spells to their list.

Now a Magus is really more of a gish than a blaster; but it's really a lot more versatile than you give credit for.

[thecrimsondawn]

You don't play (or dip a level of) cross-blooded sorcerer for the spells/day, you do it for the +2 damage per die.

If you do choose to play a wizard though, consider the evocation/admixture school in order to be able to blow stuff up with elements the targets are not immune to. Or the spellslinger archetype to make those save DCs even higher than an arcanist can get them. Or the exploiter archetype to be an arcanist with full spell level advancement.

A magus is an entirely different sort of character, usually focused on using spells to hit absurdly hard in melee. It's possible for a magus to be focused on using spells to deal out control in melee instead, but neither is what usually comes to mind when people mention evocation casters.

Spellslinger is an interesting archetype as I am doing something very similar right now with my Summoner. I am binding my elementals into my gun shots, fueling it with my summons per day to cause an elemental based secondary effect. However I think I made some headway on the builds so far.

As far as Wizard goes, I am looking at Metamagic Mastery from the Universalist school. Since I will be getting 5 free levels of metamagic from the RCB, that opens up even more options. I have no decided yet on the optimal metamagics to use this on however, I am still running simulations in my head for what would be better. Evocation school does indeed have the option of swapping element types out, bypassing many monster resists with a good knowledge check, but the Generation subschool catches my eye more then that. As a player who plays a god wizard more often then not, having the ability to bend and change the rules of magic is a big deal. I can use metamagic anyway to alter element types if I want that, but keep in mind that as a damage dealing caster, I will have force spells always at the ready for creatures like that.

Arcane Discoveries have a couple gems too. Creative Destruction, Fast Study, Opposition Research, Staff-Like Wand, and Knowledge is Power (the hell where they thinking making that one? that is so exploitable!)

So a TLDR of that
Evocation - change element damage type OR make evocation spells with duration last way longer then they should.
Universalist - add metamagic to spells without changing spell level so long as total level is not over 10. This is on top of the 5 free metamagic levels I would get.


As far as Arcanist goes, I am looking at the Samsaran race with their Mystic Past Life race option. I have the points to make my cup runnith over with cha and int, but I would not be able to take with me a good con and dex or str score that I often grab depending on what kinda spells I plan to use, but I guess spending a truestrike before hand would do just as well, just hurts the action economy a bit. Arcanist is all about their exploits more then anything else from what I can see. It supplements and changes everything based on what you decide. Glancing over the full list, I think I could remake a good ol 3.5 nope.wizard with Counterspell, Dimensional Slide, Illusion Catcher, and Quick Study. However, as you can see, the more I look at Archanist, the closer I go back to making a god wizard, and while far more effective as far as casters go (including having other classes spells on their list) I kinda just wanna burn a few cities down and kill a few armies ya know :3

[thecrimsondawn]

Wherever did you get that idea? They've got plenty of conjuration (BFC) spells like the clouds and walls, transmutation buffs/debuffs like Enlarge and Haste, enchantments like Greater Magic Weapon, and abjurations like Dispel Magic. Plus they have several ways of adding wizard spells to their list.

Now a Magus is really more of a gish than a blaster; but it's really a lot more versatile than you give credit for.

Magus is the very definition of the term gish, lol. I could not ask for more from a class that fuses casting and melee combat together. However I am not saying they are not versatile. I am just saying compared to what I am making, they fall a bit short post level 12. I did some damage research on them, and shocking grasp can get some rather broken high numbers even at 20, but due to a limited spell list, they cant make proper use of metamagic, and that is a flaw for what I am aiming for right now.