What spells become (more) OP when CL cap is removed?

[Jarmen4u]

In the campaign I play in, the DM has removed caps from spells, i.e. Fireball's cap of 10d6 damage, so a 12th level caster would cast a fireball that deals 12d6 damage.

I'm more curious about damage spells, but even buffs or other spells are relevant, and I'd like to hear about them. What spells get way better (pushing must-have levels) with this caveat?

[Biffoniacus_Furiou]

It depends on your caster level, i.e. your build and your character level. Something like this may be what you're looking for.

[Venger]

What possessed your dm to do this?

priya will give you a pretty good place to start.

what list is your guy pulling from?

[Jarmen4u]

I'm looking for near-epic or epic scaling, it's a long running world with at least a few retired epic PCs floating around.

I can't really explain his reasoning, but he's an old DM and he likes to make magic more powerful, so things like caps are ignored, and there's a custom mana system he uses in place of spells/day. Spells can be from any 3.5 material, even Dragon Mags.

[TotallyNotEvil]

In what will surely be made to look like chump change, Elemental Darts could get some crazy damage out of a second level spell.

As in, easily topping Harm/Disintegrate. With a CL booster or two to get you to, say, 10 darts, you are looking at ~245 damage, save for half, out of a second level slot. Best of all, no Metamagic, no shenanigans.

Enough to one-shot, say, a Pit Fiend. Just repeat if it makes this save, a quicken Rod is dirt cheap at any point you might be expected to face one.

[Jarmen4u]

In what will surely be made to look like chump change, Elemental Darts could get some crazy damage out of a second level spell.

As in, easily topping Harm/Disintegrate. With a CL booster or two to get you to, say, 10 darts, you are looking at ~245 damage, save for half, out of a second level slot. Best of all, no Metamagic, no shenanigans.

Enough to one-shot, say, a Pit Fiend. Just repeat if it makes this save, a quicken Rod is dirt cheap at any point you might be expected to face one.

This is certainly along the right track, though that spell only allows one dart per target.

[Dimers]

Lots of skill boosters get more interesting without caps. Spell Vulnerability to reduce SR. General of Undeath for more minions. Wouldn't hurt to keep a Maximized Junglerazer in your pocket, in case of fey/plants/animals/vermin.

Plenty of spells have no caps anyway, like Kelpstrand. (Which pairs up nicely with Owl's Insight, I might add.)

I guess my best contribution would be Languor. Not great against beatsticks, but those don't tend to be the most dangerous enemies. With high CL, anything corporeal with non-ridiculous Strength would be denied physical actions with no save against that part of the spell.

[AnonymousPepper]

I'm gonna throw out Orb of Force.

Sure, it doesn't crap out an obscene amount of damage - just d6/CL to a single target - but the thing about Orb of Force is that just about nothing resists it, as a ranged touch attack with good range.

Antimagic field? It's an instantaneous conjuration, it doesn't care; the actual force projectile is not magical (which, you could argue, also says no to Globe of Invulnerability and Spell Turning - the orb is not a spell effect; the spell only conjures the ball of force, which is itself mundane).
Energy resistance or immunity? There's no such thing as force resistance.
Spell resistance? It's SR:No.
Armor? It's a touch attack.
Incorporeality? Force attacks don't care (this also shuts down Greater Blink, which would otherwise be a prime counter).

The absolute only things that protect against Orb of Force are touch AC (which is notoriously hard to pump, and can be countered with a quickened True Strike), Forceward - which explicitly cancels all force attacks - and spells like Friendly Fire which prevent ranged attacks from hitting in the first place. Or, I suppose, a Celerity into [spell that breaks line of effect like Wall of X goes here] combo. And miss chance (Mirror and Greater Mirror Image, Blur, etc), though there are plenty of ways around that.

The balancing factor for Orb of Force versus the other Orb spells, and direct damage spells in general, is that it's capped at 10d6 at CL10 (the other orbs cap out at CL15) and somewhat less significantly doesn't do anything besides damage (whereas the other Orbs have small rider effects).

If you remove the caster level cap from Orb of Force, it becomes much, much, much more busted than it already is, because it becomes a viable source of damage without Mailman metamagic and action economy shenanigans at high levels, where otherwise enemy HP starts scaling beyond the point where Orb of Force does much useful damage on its own. 35 average damage is relatively little against a 300HP baddie, unless you chuck an Avasculate at it first to cut its HP in half, at which point it becomes acceptable (granted, Avasculate is a very common pairing with Orb of Force normally for precisely this reason; it helps that the -1/2HP effect is no save and is also a touch attack, though it is SR:Yes, and the fort save against stun is just gravy). A more or less guaranteed, unresistable, undodgeable -70HP at level 20, on the other hand, is good on its own, and against a target whose HP has been halved, that's brutal.

[Venger]

Energy resistance or immunity? There's no such thing as force resistance.

There actually is, but your point that it's rare enough not to be a serious issue for you stands.

Incorporeality? Force attacks don't care (this also shuts down Greater Blink, which would otherwise be a prime counter).[/quote]
Greater blink actually makes you ethereal, not incorporeal, but again, ethereal monsters can indeed still get hurt by force effects

The absolute only things that protect against Orb of Force are touch AC (which is notoriously hard to pump, and can be countered with a quickened True Strike), Forceward - which explicitly cancels all force attacks - and spells like Friendly Fire which prevent ranged attacks from hitting in the first place. Or, I suppose, a Celerity into [spell that breaks line of effect like Wall of X goes here] combo. And miss chance (Mirror and Greater Mirror Image, Blur, etc), though there are plenty of ways around that.

scintillating scales (alongside commensurate na buffs) are the preferred method of dealing with touch attacks, but unless you already have a high na mod, it's unlikely to help much.

ray deflection completely shuts you down, but that's true for pretty much anything.

orb of force is a solid choice.

[AnonymousPepper]

Wait, what has force resistance? There's force immunity on Force Dragons and that's about it as far as I know. (And to be fair, if you're tryna attack a Force Dragon with Orb of Force, you deserve to get wrecked. It'd be like chucking Fireballs at the angry elder fire elemental that's about to chunky salsa you.)

Yeah, I should have said ethereal, although they're similar effects in practice.

Scintillating scales is, as far as I know, the only way to economically pump touch AC, and getting that much natural armor if you don't already have it isn't easy (edit: Ghostform also works if you're a high-charisma caster). I think the most NA I've ever seen a spell generate is 9, which is a non-trivial amount, but not enough, especially not if they can just throw a quickened true strike on the Orb to counter it. Or just Disjoin it, obviously, which is almost never a bad use of an action if you don't care about the loot.

And yeah, Ray Deflection is a thing, but that goes in the same general pool of spells as Friendly Fire (which, honestly, is my preferred option for that sort of spell, especially if you can shenanigan your way into Persisting it).

[Celestia]

Dispel magic looks pretty good without a cap.

[AnonymousPepper]

Dispel magic looks pretty good without a cap.

That one I might shy away from. Spell Theft is just plain better all of the time for dispelling a single target, particularly if you can cast it as a Bard so it's only one level higher, and for AOE purposes at the levels where removing the CL limit on Dispel would matter, it's perfectly valid to just chuck a Disjunction at them off of a scroll instead.

I can see it, but I think there's better stuff out there. Poor Greater Dispel, though. RIP. And Reaving Dispel too.

[The_Snark]

Divine Favor is the first spell that comes to mind. It's not a game-changer, exactly, but it's part of the standard cleric self-buff routine for a reason - and it normally caps at level 9, so making it uncapped can potentially double its output.

Barkskin is also a decent choice. AC tends to be less useful at high levels, but hey, it's a level 2 spell with a long duration, you're not wasting a lot of resources here.

[Venger]

Wait, what has force resistance? There's force immunity on Force Dragons and that's about it as far as I know. (And to be fair, if you're tryna attack a Force Dragon with Orb of Force, you deserve to get wrecked. It'd be like chucking Fireballs at the angry elder fire elemental that's about to chunky salsa you.)

Yeah, I should have said ethereal, although they're similar effects in practice.

Scintillating scales is, as far as I know, the only way to economically pump touch AC, and getting that much natural armor if you don't already have it isn't easy (edit: Ghostform also works if you're a high-charisma caster). I think the most NA I've ever seen a spell generate is 9, which is a non-trivial amount, but not enough, especially not if they can just throw a quickened true strike on the Orb to counter it. Or just Disjoin it, obviously, which is almost never a bad use of an action if you don't care about the loot.

And yeah, Ray Deflection is a thing, but that goes in the same general pool of spells as Friendly Fire (which, honestly, is my preferred option for that sort of spell, especially if you can shenanigan your way into Persisting it).

argent savant's ablate force ability effectively functions as force resistance. again, extremely niche, but it does technically exist.

well, in a normal environment, yes, but now that everything's uncapped, you can just cast tortoise shell or whatever first and then have NI deflection through scintillating scales

[theboss]

Really guys? I'm disappointed.....
None of you said Shapechange??
Shapechange without a CL cap would be the *most* broken spell in d&d because you'll be able to change to any creature in the world as long as it is not unique creature. For example, great wyrm force dragon........

[Venger]

Really guys? I'm disappointed.....
None of you said Shapechange??
Shapechange without a CL cap would be the *most* broken spell in d&d because you'll be able to change to any creature in the world as long as it is not unique creature. For example, great wyrm force dragon........

he said CL cap. shapechange is not affected, since it still has an HD cap independent of the cl

[The_Snark]

Really guys? I'm disappointed.....
None of you said Shapechange??
Shapechange without a CL cap would be the *most* broken spell in d&d because you'll be able to change to any creature in the world as long as it is not unique creature. For example, great wyrm force dragon........

Shapechange already has a pretty high CL cap; removing it only matters to characters who are level 25+. The original poster did ask for near-epic and epic scaling, so I suppose this technically qualifies, but I'm not sure how much it actually helps given how many HD most epic monsters have.

To use your own example, turning into a great wyrm force dragon requires CL 75; I tend to assume the game implodes long before you get to that point.

[Jack_Simth]

A lot of buffs get much better. Divine Insight (5 + CL bonus to an arbitrary skill check), Divine Favor (+1/3 CL Luck to Attack/Damage), Shield of Faith (+2 Deflection, +1 per 6 CL), Magic Vestments (+1 Armor or Shield per 4 CL), Greater Magic Weapon (+1 Enh per 4 CL)... a lot of them get much nicer.

[Goaty14]

How would divine power work out? Like could you bypass epic BaB with it or not?

Skill spells would be pretty neat, +10/3 levels.

[noob]

How would divine power work out? Like could you bypass epic BaB with it or not?

Skill spells would be pretty neat, +10/3 levels.

you already could get bab equal to your character level in epic with divine power.
since the bab is equal not to your cl but to your character level then it does not helps getting more bab than before but you could already get 30 bab at level 30(+5 epic attack throw which does not participate to bab but helps qualifying for prcs)

[Crichton]

If your DM is gonna drop the CL cap on spells, see if you can twist his arm into dropping the max PP spent rule for psionics. If you're not limited to your Manifester Level, you can pump enough points into augmenting the powers to make them somewhat ridiculous.

[Uncle Pine]

he said CL cap. shapechange is not affected, since it still has an HD cap independent of the cl

Actually, he said "caps from spells". This technically means any cap that limits scaling.

Step 1: Prepare consumptive field, as well as blasphemy, dictum, holy word, and/or word of chaos.
Step 2: Acquire bag of rats (or equivalent thereof).
Step 3: ???
Step 4: Profit!!!

Otherwise, the kind of spells you can abuse with this houserule are the same you'd use with Reserves of Strength, so searching for threads about that feat may yield some easy suggestions. I had fun in the past using the aforementioned five as well as mirror image and gembomb.

[Telonius]

I think the real power here isn't going to be from higher-level spells getting rid of CL caps. It's going to be in being able to use 3rd-level spells (Lightning Bolt, Fireball) for the vast majority of direct-damage needs without needing to use higher-level spells to keep the damage relevant. Direct Damage isn't really what the Wizard needs to do, but having a few available is never a bad idea. More high-level spells available means more ways to make the universe's laws cry.

[Jarmen4u]

Actually, he said "caps from spells". This technically means any cap that limits scaling.

Step 1: Prepare consumptive field, as well as blasphemy, dictum, holy word, and/or word of chaos.
Step 2: Acquire bag of rats (or equivalent thereof).
Step 3: ???
Step 4: Profit!!!

Yeah sorry, the title is correct here, it's only the CL cap he ignores. I am curious what that combo would do though, could you explain it briefly?

[Cosi]

Yeah sorry, the title is correct here, it's only the CL cap he ignores. I am curious what that combo would do though, could you explain it briefly?

holy word et al kill anything thing with the wrong alignment descriptor instantly and with no save provided the gap between its HD and your CL is large enough. This makes them enormously effective if you have some way of cheesing your caster level (famously resulting in half of The Wish and The Word).

[Uncle Pine]

Yeah sorry, the title is correct here, it's only the CL cap he ignores. I am curious what that combo would do though, could you explain it briefly?

Whoops, my bad then. I must have totally skimmed over the title.

Basically what completely uncapped consumptive field does is setting your hit points, Strength, and CL at NI. This allows you to kill any opponent with less than NI hit die. NI stands for nigh infinity (in other words, arbitrarily high) and it's achieved by sacrificing to the field an arbitrarily high amount of small, insignificant critters (the bag of rats), each of which will give you +1d8 temporary hit points, +2 Strength and increase your CL by 1. For maximum results, use greater consumptive field (which kills anything with less than 10 hit points, so you don't have to set the bag on fire), a "bag" containing something smaller than rats (i.e. worms, or insects), and do the whole process twice: once with consumptive field, the effect of which will only last 1 round/your original caster level, as the duration of a spell is set at the moment of the casting, and a second time with greater consumptive field, which stacks with the former and will have a duration of NI rounds.

[TotallyNotEvil]

This is certainly along the right track, though that spell only allows one dart per target.

... No? Youu can target the darts however you like, explicitly so.

[Pex]

Magic Missile possibly. 10d4 + 10 autohit damage from a 1st level spell slot is asking a lot even for 20th level.

[Celestia]

Magic Missile possibly. 10d4 + 10 autohit damage from a 1st level spell slot is asking a lot even for 20th level.

Especially if you quicken it and get that in addition to your regular action.

[Falontani]

Especially if you quicken it and get that in addition to your regular action.

Magic Missile Mage!

1d4+1 per missile normally
5 missiles max normally
Magic Missile Mage negates shield immunity, adds 2 missiles and sets it to 1d4+2
Ardent Savant ups this to 1d4+3 per missile
Twin Spell + Chain Spell
Innate Spell (shenanigans using heighten spell, earth spell, and psychic reformation)
at Caster Level 20: 36d4+108 unerring force damage