Good & Bad : Wizards

[Mal Malenkirk]

In the campaign I play, I love my combat wizard!

He is the king of damage. Unless we fight a solo monster, no one will deliver as much damage to the opposition over the course of the combat.

At level two he managed to catch 6 bad guys in his burning hand power (We were defending a gate). Using action surge and good rolls, I hit 5 of these guys. That's 10d6+25 worth of damage at level 2! No one else can touch this. He recently acquired fire shroud. Just hitting two guys yielded 2d8+30 over the course of the combat. Sure, the rogue usually hit one guy for more damage than I do, but he doesn't come close to the total damage inflicted over the entire fight.

Also, it is easy and fun to make a mage that goes on the frontline.

Mine has solid AC at the cost of just one feat. Level one he had AC 17 (+2 leather armor and +1 staff of defense). Soon he will purchase a defensive staff for an extra +1 and by level six will pick hide armor. His AC will keep apace with the fighter by that point.

I routinely put him on the front line side by side with the fighter. The fighter marks the most dangerous foe and I use my many blast and burst power to great effect. That strongly tempts the enemies to take shots at me but a marked enemy pays a high price for attacking, often getting hit by the fighter's interrupt and missing me since the -2 to attack give my wizard an effective AC matching the fighter's (Actually better by one, at this point, thanks to his magic armor).

Seeing the damage he does, enemies often try focusing on him but usually don't manage to put him in serious peril. Always standing next to the fighter prevent the worst of being surrounded (I've seen wizards hanging back get in worse stituation than my wizard because of stealthy or very mobile skirmishers) and the AC is high enough that a high % of attack miss. If banged too badly, as of level 4 he has a healing word to spend on himself, being a devotee of Erathis. Then I systematically attack 2 or more foes on the return strike. Plus the fighter is a dragonborn so it's actually funny to see the monsters mass on us and getting blasted two or three time in the same round for their trouble. This usually racks up a huge amount of damage on the opposition, leaving many enemies bloodied and then the rogue gets to work on these weakened foes. Plus, using a staff means I threatens enemies and the rogue often use my wizard to flank.

My wizard is just cool and is the lynchpin of his party's offense. I just love him.

 

[LightPhoenix]

I would also say that you need to be in the right group for it to work. A group that is constantly running off and spliting up is going to make a wizards job much more difficult. A group that sits back a bit more, letting the wizard toss out his area spells and THEN rushes in works much better.

The same problem happens when your group is mostly melee in nature. You don't have access to the feat for creating holes (blanking on name) until Epic tier. It's part of the reason why it's almost necessary for Wizards to take Improved Initiative; once allies are in melee, those large AoE spells are a lot less attractive.

Thunderwave can be quite useful at epic levels, when a wizard with a high enough wis mod can use it to zig-zag a foe through a wall of fire multiple times.

Thunderwave's best use is either pushing enemies into bad places...

This is my experience. Using Thunderwave in conjunction with terrain is a great tactic. KotS spoilers:

Spoiler

I used TW to keep a swarm locked down in a pit, and shoving baddies into the brazier is so much fun

.

 

[Caliban]

Thunderwave can be quite useful at epic levels, when a wizard with a high enough wis mod can use it to zig-zag a foe through a wall of fire multiple times.

You would need to be able to push them 9 squares to zig zag them twice - each square of the Wall of Fire costs 3 extra squares of movement, and since it's not "difficult terrain" the ability of forced movement to ignore difficult terrain doesn't apply.

 

[Runestar]

Since when was forced movement affected by any effect which reduces speed anyways? I took it to mean that even though wall of fire is not difficult terrain, it still has no impact on forced movement abilities...

I felt it was more amazing how a "push" power can make them move in a crooked line...but it would work RAW, since each new square is further away from you than the previous one.

 

[Rashak Mani]

"Controller" is also about killing minions quicker in order to "clean" up the battlefield. You don't want strikers wasting precious attacks on minions.

Wizards' area spells help speed up minions to their respective gods.

I built a 12th level combat wizard that dealt overall much more damage than even a specialized striker. But since he takes damage from multiple enemies these enemies tend to last longer than if they were being hit by a striker that focuses more damage on 1 enemy.

 

[Caliban]

Since when was forced movement affected by any effect which reduces speed anyways? I took it to mean that even though wall of fire is not difficult terrain, it still has no impact on forced movement abilities...

Forced movement only states that it ignores difficult terrain. (PHB, page 285).

FORCED MOVEMENT

Ignore Difficult Terrain: Forced movement isn’t hindered by difficult terrain.​

 

[Atlatl Jones]

The same problem happens when your group is mostly melee in nature. You don't have access to the feat for creating holes (blanking on name) until Epic tier. It's part of the reason why it's almost necessary for Wizards to take Improved Initiative; once allies are in melee, those large AoE spells are a lot less attractive.

There's a very handy paragon-level feat in the Player's Guide to Faerun which also helps with this. It gives you a -5 penalty to hit allies, and if you do hit you only do half damage.

 

[Nifft]

I personally never understood why stuff like Icy Terrain or Thunderwave really was all that useful. Let's face it, what's a 3-square push or difficult terrain going to do to stop full movement + charge distance?

Dunno about Icy Terrain, but I've pushed many foes off of or into things (towers, wells, pits, etc.) with Thunderwave. It's downright amazing.

Cheers, -- N

 

[James McMurray]

Icy Terrain also knocks them prone. Combined with difficult terrain and good timing that can remove their entire next turn and mangle their formation. The ones that fall down have to stand and walk out, while the ones that aren't knocked down move up and attack, but leave their friends behind and are easy targets.

 

[Stalker0]

My first character in 4e was a wizard. Now traditionally I've played more fighter types, but I've done my fair share of teh spellcasting crowd. I played him through 4th level, and honestly it wasn't that much fun to me.

The controllerness of the wizard doesn't seem to really kick in until higher levels. I found the slow effect didn't help that much (and this was even after we changed slow to mean 2 squares total, not 2 square per move, I don't know how anyone gets any mileage when a monster can still move 4).

I tried ray of frost for a while, I killed minions with my scorching burst, I even started summoning a tenser's disk, putting oil on it, lighting it on fire, and moving it around the battlefield to burn my opposition. I threw some my icy terrain, and used my icy rays.

But it wasn't that fun. I didn't have the fun of tactical movement that other classes did. I didn't do a lot of damage, my statuses didn't always work, and in exchange I have terrible hitpoints compared to my friends.

Now I play Zagan the fighter. I still have area attacks, I have attacks that slow, and knock things prone, I stop creatures in their tracks that try and run from me, I do more damage with a two handed weapon, and...he's just more fun.

Of course my experience will not be the same as other people's necessarily, but I do see where the frustration over the wizard is coming from. 4e got a lot of things right, but I don't believe the wizard was one of them.