D&D 5E Turning a lacklustre blaster into an all-rounder with a tool for every situation?

[Malovaan]

I feel that my wizard has troubles - the troubles being me and my questionable spell selection!

With a level-up due, I'm seeking advice on how best to start turning him away from inefficient damage dealer into general battlefield controller!

This is my first character, the rest of my party are as new as me, we came into this game generally for the RP and so our characters are in no way "optimised" in terms of fighting. At L3 we consist of a Barbarian, a Light Cleric, an NPC Paladin, and me - an Evoker Wizard.

I started off picking spells pretty much for damage in fights, without much consideration to anything else (with some detect magic usefulness thrown in, etc) and at L3 my spell list now looks like this:

Cantrips:
Firebolt
Mage Hand
Prestidigitation

Spells:
Burning Hands
Detect Magic
False Life
Identify
Magic Missile
Phantasmal Force
Scorching Ray
Shield
Sleep
Thunderwave

We rolled for stats, and our barbarian is already at 20 Strength, and whilst I've managed to do some cool stuff with Burning Hands and Thunderwave with the Evoker ability to weave spells to avoid allies, and found Scorching Ray to be effective, I've in general found myself feeling ineffective in comparison to the barbarian when it comes to dealing damage. I think the fights where I've potentially had the most enjoyment and been most impressed with how useful my character can be are where I've used sleep or more recently phantasmal force to good effect. Taking NPCs out of the picture with spells like that seems to be a great way to be incredibly useful and make the whole fight much easier, and are something I'd like even more versatility with.

Thus as we're ready for a Lvl-4 upgrade, I'm wondering about what to pick next. I should get 2 more spells for my spellbook, and also learn an extra cantrip.

My thoughts so far have been:
Web (L2) - would seem useful for making an encounter with multiple enemies easier
Hold Person (L2) - useful for helping my allies to beat down on something?
Suggestion (L2) - excellent skill for manipulating social situations?
Invisibility (L2) - useful for being sneaky, but not so much for the "battlefield control" I'm after?
Mage Armour (L1) - why don't I already have this?
Feather Fall (L1) - useful to have just in case?

In terms of an extra cantrip, potential ideas are Minor Illusion, Friends (though I question its usefulness) or potentially a damage spell that isn't of fire type?

Advice on how to improve my utility would be much appreciated!

 

[Ath-kethin]

One of the challenges of playing an evoker is that most evocation spells blow stuff up. End of story. It's a specialization for a blaster - but since that also makes it a good choice for a group of new players learning the rules. Most blast spells require little to no DM adjudication, making them less controversial to use. I doubt I'm saying anything you haven't already thought or heard here.

Your ideas for your next round of spells are good. Hold Person and Web are great for immobilizing foes without killing them, which opens up more RP opportunities. Suggestion is the quintessential Jedi mind trick spell. If you haven't needed Mage Armor yet, I wouldn't really worry about it. As a wizard, it's a better idea to just not be in a position to get hit.

 

[jrowland]

My thoughts so far have been:
Web (L2) - would seem useful for making an encounter with multiple enemies easier
Hold Person (L2) - useful for helping my allies to beat down on something?
Suggestion (L2) - excellent skill for manipulating social situations?
Invisibility (L2) - useful for being sneaky, but not so much for the "battlefield control" I'm after?
Mage Armour (L1) - why don't I already have this?
Feather Fall (L1) - useful to have just in case?

In terms of an extra cantrip, potential ideas are Minor Illusion, Friends (though I question its usefulness) or potentially a damage spell that isn't of fire type?

Advice on how to improve my utility would be much appreciated!

You seem to have a good enough grasp of what you need to do to get more utility. One thing to consider: Whatever the specialty, your wizard specialty is your "spam" move: What you do over and over. Therefore filling your spellbook with those spells is actually not useful. Just grab the "best" spell for your specialty then fill with others. A good rule of thumb is grab 1 specialty and 1 other when you level...but even that might be too much.

As an evoker, you have the "boom" spells covered. Sure you could get melf's acid arrow, but scorching ray is fine. Given the above list, here is my advice:

Web: Very useful against crowds. Even against high strength creatures it can slow them them down.

Hold Person: Locks down a single target for the rest of your group to gank. Unlike past editions where it was hold and forget, this spell is hold and focus fire. Good against a BBEG that has a low save.

Suggestion: Not just for social situations. This spell can be used as a "suggest and forget" to remove a target from a combat. Talk to your DM about various suggestions like "Flee this (dungeon, castle, boat, place) and do not return!" is an effective way to remove a target. It lasts 8 hours or until you break concentration. Effectively they will "flee" for the number of rounds you concentrate, but even 1-4 rounds can make a huge difference, especially used on a brute with low wis. Spells like these are "divide and conquer" spells.

Invisibility: Great spell for sneakier wizards, or as a defense, but as an evoker it seems a poor fit.

Mage Armor: I am of the mind you should choose either shield or mage armor and be done. You have shield, you are done. Stay out of combat, move a lot, and IF you need it, use shield.

Feather Fall: Way too situational. Great spell when you need it, so nice to have if you expect adventuring in high places. But at level 4, I doubt it.

Great combo: Suggestion on a Big Brute to Flee...concentrate a few rounds while blasting mooks with AOE...then break conc by using Hold Person on BBEG when rest of team is ready to gang up...concentrate while Firebolt on BBEG (let party get the hits here)..when Big Brute returns, up level Magic Missile or (when 5th or higher ) Scorching Ray on it (hopefully BBEG is dead or near dead and party can help).

Good luck!

 

[jgsugden]

Assuming 18 intelligence after the level 4 bump you should be able to prepare 8 spells and should know 4 cantrips. I think your current array is pretty solid.

For the cantrips, I'd add create bonfire from Elemental Evil if allowed. It provides some battlefield control and is very versatile for outside of combat situations as well. I also prefer minor illusion to prestidigitation for versatility.

If you can, see if your dm will let you buy a scroll of mage armor. At this level, you do want it, but you need more spells of higher level for your two free spells per level.

The 8 spells I would prepare for your evoke are sleep, shield, mage armor, thunderwave, burning hands, phantasmal force, scorching ray and misty step. The two in there you do not know are mage armor and misty step. You're not feeling versatile because you're still low level. At this level you don't have enough slots to be versatile. You need all of them for your main strengths. The best way to be versatile at low levels is through creative use of cantrips to close doors, block paths, mislead enemies, and otherwise create havoc. As you advance you'll find it harder to prepare all the spells you want for a while. Always rhin about the Spell slots you'll be using for certain spells to figure out if you'll have enough slots left over to making it worthwhile to memorize other spells of that level. For example, at 5th, is there any chance you'll be casting anything other than fireball? If not, you only need to prepare the one 3rd level spell.

 

[Baumi]

Wait till you get to level 5 .. with Fireball, you become the Master of Disaster! 8D

Anyway, damage Spells have one big Advantage, you don't need Concentration. So you should try to use one Concentration Spell as soon as possible to disable one or more enemies (Suggestion, Web, etc.) and then you can start to dish out with damage. By the way, Sleep has the big Advantage of not needing Concentration, while disabling Enemies and it scales quite well!

Your selection of Spells are actually quite good (what you have and what you have planned to get). I personally am not a Fan of Hold Monster since the Enemy can try to save every Round.

Controlling Spells like Fog Cloud, Web and Grease (no Concentration!) should not be underestimated. Splitting up the enemy or force ranged combatants to come closer are absolute game changers.

If you have your share of non-combat encounters than I would recommend Find Familiar (awesome scouts), Disguise Self and Illusion Spells. Rope Trick is also wonderful to get secure short rests.

 

[Shiroiken]

Some utility cantrips to consider

Light: super awesome for parties with even 1 member lacking darkvision

Dancing Lights: similar to Light, but with different utility (you can cast it down a hallway, revealing enemies, but not yourself)

Mending: never lose some important item

Minor Illusion: useful in and out of combat, but entirely limited by your imagination and DM interpretation


Super useful spells:

Alarm (ritual): especially as a wizard, this is almost a must to avoid surprise encounters in the night

Comprehend Languages (ritual): also super awesome as a wizard to help learn what enemies are up to and to read ancient runes

Find Familiar: familiars can be really useful for scouting, assuming the DM doesn't kill it regularly

Grease: a combat control spell, mostly useful if you have a rogue (who can sneak attack a prone enemy)

Tasha's Hideous Laughter: a combat control spell to take 1 enemy out until you kill all his friends

Blindness/Deafness: mostly blindness, as it's not concentration combat control (most control spells are)

Detect Thoughts: super useful when interrogating prisoners, but also good during social encounters with questionable characters

Hold Person: the same as Tasha's, but without the extra save when attacked

Knock (ritual): hate the noise, but sometimes needed if you don't have a lockpicker

Levitate: useful in and out of combat (control in combat, since you can target an enemy)

Shatter: never doubt the power of area damage, especially as an evoker

Web: probably one of the best low level combat control spells, but make sure your allies have ranged weapons

 

[mpwylie]

couple thoughts...

Hold Person, a must have in my book. Sure it's only usable on humanoids, and sure they get a save every round, but if you get it to land your group gets advantage, AND automatically crits every hit, Imagine how big a hero you will be to the group when the big bad gets held and your entire team slaughters it with crits.

I am a big fan of Tasha's Hideous Laughter for the non-humanoids. Not only crowd control but also makes them prone, so again, your team gets advantage on them. Fog cloud and web are also great spells for controlling the battlefield.

As for Cantrips, Shocking Grasp and Chill touch are both great choices, less because of the damage but more for the fact that one stops the enemy from taking reactions and the other stops them from being able to heal. Come across a big angry Troll that is taking forever to kill due to regeneration? Stop it from regen'ing with chilltouch. You get attacked and need to get away, stop them from taking AOs for a round to run away. Pair shocking grasp with a familiar to deliver it at range.

 

[seebs]

Most important advice I can offer:

You're a wizard. You know what the wizard's shtick is? You can learn every spell. Well, every wizard spell.

Give particular attention to finding, and adding to your spellbook, every ritual-tagged spell you can find, because you don't have to prep those to cast them out of combat (given ten minutes).