How often do you fight spellcasters?

[Quasqueton]

How often does your party find a spellcaster in the enemy ranks of a battle? Is a dedicated "mage killer" character really useful in a campaign? Is a brooch of shielding a good investment? Does your group have a standard plan for dealing with spellcaster enemies?

I'm using the term "spellcaster" to mean mages and priests and any creature that uses spells or SLA as its main weapon.

Quasqueton

 

[shilsen]

Speaking as a DM, I'd say that the PCs in my two Eberron campaigns encounter a lot of spellcasters. We usually have about a combat a session, and I think every second encounter involves at least some enemies who are primary spellcasters. If you include creatures that use SLAs and enemies who are not primary spellcasters but use some spells, the number jumps to 60-75% of the time.

As for a standard plan to deal with spellcasters, not really. Both of my groups generally take the "hit the enemy hard" approach to combat.

 

[tetsujin28]

One of our PCs has a sword of dispelling (or whatever it's called in Magic of Faerun). Pretty handy. Otherwise, our wizard holds his action (if he rolls a decent initiative) to hold it and counter enemy mages.

 

[Thanee]

We encounter spellcasters and creatures with spell ability frequently, especially at mid to high levels.

A dedicated Mage-Killer PC is not a good idea, except in a highly specialized campaign.

A brooch of shielding can be nice at low levels, but is not really that great.

No standard plans, nope.

Bye
Thanee

 

[Dagger75]

When I run and latly been playing we fight spellcasters all the time. I persoanlly wouldn't play mage killer, but then I wouldn't play a strict dragon slayer either.

Thats not saying they aren't any. In one campaign there was a group in the Kings Army who specialized in killing mages and other spellcasters.

 

[IronWolf]

Depends on the campaign and what phase we are in of a campaign. For example, in the Legacy of the Green Regent campaign by the RPGA it seems we are always fighting some sort of spellcaster - whether it be of the arcane or divine variety. A mage-killer type could actually be pretty useful there. I think in a normal campaign though I wouldn't go that route. Sure there are spellcasters to be faced but not enough to merit a specialization to that degree.

 

[VirgilCaine]

A brooch of shielding can be nice at low levels, but is not really that great.

Low levels? 1500 gp at 5th or less level? I'd call it a standard piece of gear--maybe in a different slot, perhaps, but once you get to 8th level or higher it's simply a good investment, IMO.

 

[Altamont Ravenard]

Spellcasters are usually the most versatile enemies you can come up with, so it's not rare that the big boss is a spellcaster of some sort.

A Mage Slayer character could be useful, but I don't like playing characters that are too specialized.

Tactics for dealing with spellcasters? We have no tactics for anything.

A brooch of Shielding is rarely bought by a player. The reason is at higher levels, you have worst things to worry about that a magic missile...

AR

 

[ThirdWizard]

20-25% of all classed enemies are probably some kind of spellcaster. Monsters will spell like abilities? I've been fond of demons, devils, and the like recently, so a fair amount, though they have some nice SLAs and physical attacks.

I don't know how useful a brooch of shieldiing would be. Probably not too useful. A mid level NPC spellcasters has much better spells to throw around than magic missile, and they usually don't last more than 5 rounds or so, thus never getting down to 1st level spells. A ring of evasion, or something that increases Will saves or helps domination would be very much nice.