I'll attempt to distill the book's advice & assertions about blasters (remember, this book only looks at the PHB):
1) There are 2 kinds: Front-end blasters (FeB) use spells requiring attack rolls and thus benefit from attack bonuses, Dex, and targeting feats/ancillary spells; Back-end blasters (BeB) use spells that require saving throws by the target/area, and focus on Feats/abilities that boost saving throw DCs against their spells.
2) Empower & Maximize are key Feats for any blasters, Spell Penetration & Greater Spell Penetration should be taken down the road. FeBs benefit from Point Blank Shot & Precise shot. BeBs should look to Spell Focus & Greater Spell Focus.
3) To deal with foes who won't be affected much by blasting, choose spells like Ray of Enfeeblement, Enervation, Energy Drain, Resilient Sphere, Wall of Force, Forcecage, Haste, the party buffers, the various Hand spells, Phantasmal Killer, Solid Fog and a Summon spell or 2...all, of course, depending upon what your oppositional schools are. Also consider something like Spectral Hand, which can be a key spell for extending the range of your touch damage spells.
4) Generally speaking, spells which deal damage over time are less effective. There are times when its handy, especially if it can be re-targeted. As such, they prefer Flaming Sphere as opposed to Acid Arrow.
5) As hinted at in 3 (above), there will be foes where blasting is definitely sub-optimal, if not outright ineffectual. Thus, they suggest that every mage have a "backup" plan that helps them deal with such. A blaster, for instance, might round out his feat & spell selections with Summons that will let him improve his party's ability to flank, deal sneak attack damage, deal weapon/natural weapon damage, or just generally be damage sinks.
There's more to it, of course, but I'm not copying a whole bunch of pages out of the book.
1) There are 2 kinds: Front-end blasters (FeB) use spells requiring attack rolls and thus benefit from attack bonuses, Dex, and targeting feats/ancillary spells; Back-end blasters (BeB) use spells that require saving throws by the target/area, and focus on Feats/abilities that boost saving throw DCs against their spells.
2) Empower & Maximize are key Feats for any blasters, Spell Penetration & Greater Spell Penetration should be taken down the road. FeBs benefit from Point Blank Shot & Precise shot. BeBs should look to Spell Focus & Greater Spell Focus.
3) To deal with foes who won't be affected much by blasting, choose spells like Ray of Enfeeblement, Enervation, Energy Drain, Resilient Sphere, Wall of Force, Forcecage, Haste, the party buffers, the various Hand spells, Phantasmal Killer, Solid Fog and a Summon spell or 2...all, of course, depending upon what your oppositional schools are. Also consider something like Spectral Hand, which can be a key spell for extending the range of your touch damage spells.
4) Generally speaking, spells which deal damage over time are less effective. There are times when its handy, especially if it can be re-targeted. As such, they prefer Flaming Sphere as opposed to Acid Arrow.
5) As hinted at in 3 (above), there will be foes where blasting is definitely sub-optimal, if not outright ineffectual. Thus, they suggest that every mage have a "backup" plan that helps them deal with such. A blaster, for instance, might round out his feat & spell selections with Summons that will let him improve his party's ability to flank, deal sneak attack damage, deal weapon/natural weapon damage, or just generally be damage sinks.
There's more to it, of course, but I'm not copying a whole bunch of pages out of the book.
