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Message: <blockquote data-quote="Eldritch_Lord" data-source="post: 5421237" data-attributes="member: 52073">I've found that a wizard's free spells will hold them without needing to buy others until level 7-9 or so, when they start facing more and more magical foes and impediments because mundane stuff just can't keep up.  By that level, there are two important factors to consider:1) They rarely, if ever, fail the necessary Spellcraft check for copying spells.  An 8th-level wizard with max ranks in Spellcraft, at least 5 in Knowledge (Arcana), and a level-appropriate Int 20 (16 starting + 2 level boosts + 2 headband) scribing a 4th level spell automatically succeeds on the check (minimum roll 1 + 11 Spellcraft + 2 Arcana + 5 Int vs. DC 19), and many wizards can start auto-succeeding earlier than that.2) They can buy a Boccob's blessed book, which removes the per-page scribing cost.  That changes Aberzanzorax's numbers somewhat:Cost per spell level:0 - 251 - 502 - 1003 - 1504 - 2005 - 2506 - 3007 - 3508 - 4009 - 450 To buy every spell in the SRD by 20th level, it would cost the following (this time taking free spells into account, using a wizard with a starting Int of 16): 0 0 lvl spells = 0 (all known already)31 1st lvl spells = 1,550 (5+Int or 8 already known)46 2nd lvl spells = 4,600 (4 already known)38 3rd lvl spells = 5,700 (4 already known)37 4th lvl spells = 7,400 (4 already known)39 5th lvl spells = 9,750 (4 already known)39 6th lvl spells = 11,700 (4 already known)31 7th lvl spells = 10,850 (4 already known)31 8th lvl spells = 12,400 (4 already known)16 9th lvl spells = 7,200 (8 already known) The grand total for every PHB spell is thus 71,150 gp for the spells + 25,000 for the 2 BBBs necessary = 96,150 gp, about 40% of the original cost.  While buying spells before buying the BBB will increase that price somewhat, many factors (such as higher starting Int, taking Collegiate Wizard, or finding captured spellbooks) will lower it as well.So in many games, the difference between being limited to free spells and having every single PHB spell or an equivalent number of PHB+Splat spells is around 12.5% of 20th level WBL.  Most wizards won't need that many spells, but if one really must have all of them, that effectively means the difference between a wizard with all PHB spells and only free spells is approximate +3 to +4 to Dex from an appropriate manual of quickness of action.If someone really cares about completeness ('cause most wizards aren't going to need more than 300 spells), picking up Collegiate Wizard and dipping 2 levels of Geometer reduces that cost to 13,450 gp.  That means that it's entirely possible for a 20th level wizard to have every PHB spell for less than the cost of bracers of armor +4, i.e. all that wizard needs to do to have the money for all those spells is to cast mage armor every day.  Before someone complains that an incantatrix/archmage doesn't have room for geometer, most optimized wizards considered to be overpowered are going to need vastly fewer spells than these and shouldn't need to buy more than two to three dozen or so spells at most (and only if they didn't pick up Collegiate Wizard) rather than the full 300+ of the PHB.And that's why wizards being overpowered doesn't depend on ignoring spell scribing costs. <img src="https://cdn.jsdelivr.net/joypixels/assets/8.0/png/unicode/64/1f609.png" class="smilie smilie--emoji" loading="lazy" width="64" height="64" alt=";)" title="Wink    ;)"  data-smilie="2"data-shortname=";)" /></blockquote>

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