Okay...let's start with the first question...why, oh why, Weapon Finesse? Cuz I didn't know any better. Actually, my original concept was for this character to be in melee a lot more than what he is--more of a Battlecaster or Warmage concept. I didn't really know of those yet, though. We started at 3rd level, so I had to pick 2 feats to begin. He started with touch and ray attacks and uses a sickle for melee. I picked Combat Casting and Point Blank Shot. Later I picked the Weapon Finesse because of the touch attacks I wanted to continue using and also the sickle, both being light weapons. Plus my Dex is better and was eager to get into the thick. It was all for character thematics mainly. Also, I was only working from the PHB at the time. I really didn't know of the feats from the other handbooks. Later I got all the other resource books (CA, CM, SC, etc.). Once I saw ALL the possibilities, I could see how I could have rethrought the character and have different options for his progression. That is all the additional resources I really have access to.
Well, on top of that, most people would probably take Skill Focus Concentration over Combat Casting.
Good call on the Skill Focus Concentration (+3 for all Concentration Checks vs +4 for casting only, right?).
Do you have enough area-effect spells to make Explosive Spell useful? Since it's +2 level (unless there's an errata I missed) feat, you won't be able to use it on a fireball or lightning bolt until 10th level (when you'll have 5th level slots).
Personally, I think I'd rather get Extend Spell than Sudden Extend -- how often do you need to cast an extended spell and only have a standard action to do it and don't have the higher level slot to cast it?
Well, right now I have Pyrotechnics (assuming explosive spell would be used on the choking smoke 20-ft in all directions), Rainbow Blast (line effect), and Force Missiles (which has a burst effect to all adjacent squares). Unfortunately, the Force Missiles is my highest level spell (4th). Pyrotechnics would be the only one available for any good effect since I have to use 2 more levels. But later at 12th and 15th, my Rainbow Blast and Force Missiles would be served well by Explosive Spell. On the other hand, I am looking to get Whirling Blade (2nd) and Weapon of Energy (3rd) at 9th. Whirling Blade which is a 2nd-lvl spell with a 60-ft line effect, the idea is to cast
weapon of energy on my sickle and toss it with
whirling blade. That would be greatly enhanced with the explosive spell feat. If I did that, I could whirl it up to 5 times with energy on it within 9 rounds. It would be a decent trade off on the
Force Missiles.
Most of my other spells are instantaneous touch or ranged attacks, except for mage armor and haste. I don't think the Extend does much to help me out more than once per day as I mentioned above.
If I took the Extra Spell feat, I feel the pressure to get either
greater invisibility or
fly neither of which sounds interesting to my chaos sorcerer although my party would like either of those. C'est la vie.
My thought on sudden extend is this...I get an extra spell. Because I cast Haste several times in a game session, I would most likely extend it for the big combat. It seems like we tend to have short combats of about 10 rounds where one casting of Haste covers them, but then that last combat of the session goes about twice as long. And I wouldn't need to tap into my slots of higher level spells needed for that big combat. So at this time, I could get 18 rounds of Haste on 9 friends with a single casting--that seems pretty darned good for fighting that big boss enounter...and I haven't used up any other higher powered spells to fight with. It simplifies my battle tactics, for sure. Additional casting time not an issue either way. Most of my other spells are instantaneous or otherwise of no appreciable duration which means I would only have it for this one simple, concise, easy to play reason + it satisfies a prerequisite. Maybe that's not enough?
