D&D 5E Elemental Evil companion spells underwhelming?

[Shadowdweller00]

Ok, maybe Immolation IS just plain weak - comparing to Disintegrate at just one level higher, which provides both instakill, better utility, and more than double the damage. Not even the potentially disruptive DoT effect of Immolation is remotely effective, given that a victim needs to fail TWO saves before taking repeat damage. I guess 5th level spell slots still fall into the "not quite so strictly limited" range, but still...

 

[Shadowdweller00]

So, I agree that it's weak, if you (the ranger) have to cast it yourself. If you can convince your friend (don't recall who has it on their list at the moment) to cast it on your arrows, it's ok.

That's ONE of the reasons I'm a little curious to see how it plays out in practice. The hour-long duration is decent...but that's still probably no more than maybe two fights given the limitation on number of arrows.

 

[bganon]

Horrid Wilting's damage is on par with one round of Incendiary Cloud, or a hit from a 1-round-charged Delayed Blast Fireball. I think the designers' idea was that despite its limitations, if it did much more damage it'd be a "must-have" spell and those are to be avoided. Even as it is, it interacts nicely with several of the Necromancer specialization benefits so it's still fairly attractive to those particular Wizards. For everyone else it's very situational, and for a spell appearing in a random supplement I'm OK with that.

 

[Bupp]

The fire blaster mage in my group is looking forward to using bonfire and following it up with pyrotechnics.

 

[Minigiant]

Flame arrow is probably for hunter ranger's volley and horde breakey.

Hunters mark has this nasty habit of forcing you to attack one guy.

 

[I'm A Banana]

Conjure Bonfire: Besides being way cool.... it can be used for battlefield control, block off a doorway, put it in front of your fighter, so the enemy melee fighter must leave or take extra damage

Not that CB isn't cool, but I'm surprised more folks don't use flaming oil for this. It's cheap and readily available and creates a damaging area like BAM.

 

[houser2112]

Flame arrow is probably for hunter ranger's volley and horde breakey.

Hunters mark has this nasty habit of forcing you to attack one guy.

Yes, but a 3rd level slot? More importantly, a 3rd level spell known?

 

[CM]

I for one am perfectly OK with adding spells that are situationally useful and not must-haves.

For me, about the time Complete Arcane came out is when the wheels fell off 3e.

 

[Coredump]

Not that CB isn't cool, but I'm surprised more folks don't use flaming oil for this. It's cheap and readily available and creates a damaging area like BAM.

Yeah.... but oil costs money, needs to be transported, has a very limited range, probably need to roll to hit, then has to be lit, and only lasts 2 rounds.

 

[Coredump]

Flaming Arrow vs Hunter's Mark

People often forget that HM only has a 90' range, there have been a number of times that my Longbow Archer was targeting at 100'+.... so flaming arrow would have worked when HM didn't.