New to the forums. New to 5th Edition....
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What? I know that the effects are triggered only on a roll of a 1. But many of the effect seem useless. EVen the spell effects will probably have nothing to do with the combat being conducted at the time. Grease. See invisibility? I get that it is random. But I can see much of the time, the reaction is: Meh! What do I do with this.....
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Curious what other players / DM have done.
First off, welcome to the forums!
Then, to truly understand the Wild Mage, let me offer an alternate view of what makes the subclass tick, and you can think about whether it is for you or not, okay?
Let's say the power of the Wild Mage
isn't the surges at all, despite how the class is presented.
And moreover, let's also say that in order for the Wild Mage to be able to compete with the Draconic subclass (and all the other classes for that matter), you need to have a Wild Surge
after each and every spell you cast.
This gives you a whole other picture of the Wild Mage than what the text manages to convey, doesn't it?
And that is the main issue with the Wild Mage. Unlike most classes and subclasses, the PHB description mostly confuses a reader about how to use the subclass and what features it's supposed to be using.
It makes you think it's a mostly ordinary Sorcerer but one that - once in a while, with the DMs blessing - rolls on the Wild Surge table; slowly getting better at controlling its chaotic effect.
But that makes for a very poor deal, compared to all the goodies the Draconic Sorcerer gets.
In reality, to compete with all those goodies, the Wild Mage needs to get advantage on nearly everything he does.
And that's the true power of the subclass. The surges are just a distraction.
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So, for me to consider playing a Wild Mage, I first would talk to my DM to see if she's onboard with the following picture:
My Wild Mage character getting an automatic Wild Surge after every non-cantrip spell I cast. That's dozens of Surges every day.
If I sense my DM isn't comfortable with that, I would rather play a Draconic Sorcerer or perhaps something else entirely.
All this focus on getting surges when you roll 1, and having surges when the DM feel like it: cut that crap. If the subclass isn't used to its full potential, then it is the PHB's weakest subclass. The class itself, that is Sorcerer, is still as good as always, but you're supposed to get a little extra something from your subclass too, and in this case, you would be much better served by choosing Draconic.
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Then, to put all the cards on the table, I must confess I would still not play a Wild Mage as it appears in the PHB. Not that I dislike it. Quite the contrary - I like it, but I won't cripple myself by playing one until there is more class support for it. Let me explain:
The Sorcerer is in my opinion probably the game's least well developed class. In my opinion metamagics is a poor choice for class exclusivity. It lacks flavor. And it would have been useful to all spellcasters. Once the Sorcerer was justified by mechanics alone (in the d20 era of 3rd edition), but I believe it was a mistake to port this thinking to 5E. The class was missing from the playtest and it shows. The devs probably didn't have time to redefine the class as something truly evocative. Just look at the wonderfully imaginative Witchhunter class Vin Diesel is playing and you see the missed opportunity I'm talking about.
(Don't get me wrong: the Sorcerer is still a full spellcaster with access to level 9 spells. So it's never weak. But the feeling is of restrictions and confinement. The Sorcerer class is defined by its limitations, and that's never fun.)
To aggravate this, the Wild Mage subclass is, again IMO the second worst developed subclass in the game (way ahead of the atrocious Beastmaster Ranger subclass, but still). How? You're onto it yourself - there's nothing connecting the Wild Surges to your character. Also, there are simply not enough ranged spell attack spells in the game that the Wild Mage can use. In fact there are no such spells on the crucial meat-n-potato spell levels 3, 4 or 5! That's no fun! Finally, I feel it's a missed opportunity to not have even one "wild" spell, that is a spell normally too wild (great benefits balanced against even greater risk) to use, but which a Wild Mage could control through his subclass abilities.
