Wall of Force...How do other players use this spell?

[Celtavian]

I use this spell extensively. There are several uses for this spell and they seem to drive my DM nuts.

I use this spell as follows:

1. Separate range weapon force from the melee force.

2. Cut off reinforcements.

3. Cut off escape. I will often cast this spell once I see how the battle is going to cut off any kind of retreat or escape route for those without teleport.

4. Imprison beings in their rooms or in hallways.

5. Imprison them in force spheres or hemispheres.

6. Shrink a hallway limiting the number of attackers that can engage us in battle.


Wall of Force is one of those great multi-use tactical spells. I wonder how other players use this spell to their advantage.

I also pose the question: Is this spell hard on the DM in your experience?

 

[Destil]

My only DMing problem is using the hemisphere or sphere version as a no save entrapment spell. Better than forcecage and lower level.

As a rule I don't allow this unless the creatures inside are fully immobile or the sphere has a large enugh raidus that their entire threatened area is within the wall. If so I just rule that the surface was not considered unbroken and the spell failed.

Note: As many willing creatures can huddle inside as can fit. I just don't let this be used againt unwilling creatures this way.

 

[Hypersmurf]

7. Summon 60,000 pound Elder Earth Elementals above someone's head.

-Hyp.

 

[shilsen]

8. Autokill against non-teleporting/dimension-dooring creatures when combined with a cloudkill or acid fog spell.

9. Cast it around own party. This can be helpful when some regrouping or healing is needed in the middle of a fight.

House Rule: Trapping a creature in a hemisphere allows a Reflex save to avoid it.

Note: Even without a house rule, the spherical version cannot be used to trap a creature standing on a solid surface. Since the plane of the wall is broken by the creature's feet, the spell doesn't work. But it's great on flying opponents.

 

[Sinjin the Rogue]

Wall of Force

Wall of force is a great utility spell, and one that I think gets overlooked by novice spellcasters.

I use it to:

1. seal off escape routes to prevent an enemy from chasing my group as we retreat.
2. to keep potentially deadly foes at bay.
3. To divide enemy groups so that my group only has to deal with half of an enemy force at one time.

Recently, my party was in the underdark, chasing a necromancer who has become quite the antagonist. He had been aiding the vampire Gulthias in his efforts to create an army of undead to conquer a portion of the Flaness and help bring back the worship of Ashardalan. (See Heart of NightFang Spire) We defeated Gulthias, but Quinn the necromancer was able to get away. We gave chase and found an ancient drow temple that had been ruined centuries earlier, and that was now being used by beholders. After a few weeks in game time, we defeated the beholders and continued our search for Quinn. We finally found him in the bazaar of a Desmodu city. Quinn had now recruited some friends; a cleric, wizard, rogue and fighter. We could not attack this group openly, without incurring the wrath of local law enforcement, so we had to bide our time. I know, through experience, that NPC characters are usually the most difficult enemies to defeat, because they can usually match their group's strengths to yours, and sometimes they have the edge. In this case, they had 2 clerics and a wizard, all of whom could cast insta-death spells. It was obvious that my group was at a disadvantage. Tactics, and a Wall of Force, carried the day though. When we finally had the chance to attack the bad guys, they were already buffed up. We did not have the chance to prepare. (I won't explain why, because that would mean providing spoilers for Deep Horizon), but we definately started with a disadvantage. Fortunately, our rogue and my wizard had high intiatives. The wizard started with a mass haste, and he followed that with a wall of force. I was able to position the wall of force in such a way as to separate both clerics from he rest of the group. The only way those clerics were going to be able to bypass the wall of force was through Ethereal Jaunt, or through word of recall (which would have taken them completely out of combat) Fortunately for us, neither Cleric had ethereal jaunt.

The enemy wizard could have used disintegrate to bring down the wall of force, but he never got the chance. The rogue, who is actually a Temple Raider, had cast invisibility on himself. He then used his wand of silence on his own buckler and all he did after that was ready actions to follow the enemy wizard around, so that the enemy wizard was never able to cast spells. (Our DM learned from this tactic though, so in the future, we fully expect our enemies to have a few silenced spells.) This effectively took the wizard out of combat as well, and my group only had to deal with the enemy fighter and rogue. It only took a total of 4 rounds to defeat the enemy, and my group suffered almost no damage.

Without the wall of force though, it is highly likely that we would have lossed, considering the potential of the enemy clerics to cast harm, followed by melee attacks from the fighter and rogue. In addition, the Slay Living Spell would have meant certain doom for our wizard and rogue, and if the rogue had been killed, the wizard would have been able to get off some nasty spells as well.

"Divide and conquer" is a good guideline to follow when given the opportunity, and wall of force lets you do just that.

 

[Rashak Mani]

- I have trapped a member of my own party that somehow decided she could take on a Collosal Spider by herself. You could trap possessed or charmed Party members...

- In big battles I use it to isolate part of the monsters to make our job easier.

- Block tunnels with sphere version in the same manner.

- Trap the stronger enemy. Hemisphere or sphere if they are flying. Why take spells... trap the main target.

One I havent managed yet... but I dream and drool about... is the Wall of force ready to be cast in front of fireball casting mage. You make him eat his own spell... in nasty manner.

 

[Hawkeye]

One of our favorite tatcis under 2ed using wall of Force, was the Follwinf:

Project image of the wizard.
Move the Image up to the enemy.
Wall of force, hemisphere over the Image and the enemy.
Fireballs at point blank range, no saves since the opponent can't dodge until said opponent is dead.

Haven't done this under 3ed yet.

Hawkeye

 

[shilsen]

One of our favorite tatcis under 2ed using wall of Force, was the Follwinf:

Project image of the wizard.
Move the Image up to the enemy.
Wall of force, hemisphere over the Image and the enemy.
Fireballs at point blank range, no saves since the opponent can't dodge until said opponent is dead.

Haven't done this under 3ed yet.

Hawkeye

Can't be done in 3e. The caster must maintain line of effect to the image, and Wall of Force blocks that.

 

[Brown Jenkin]

I use this spell extensively. There are several uses for this spell and they seem to drive my DM nuts.


I also pose the question: Is this spell hard on the DM in your experience?

All of the options listed are quite acceptable uses and are just good tactics. Our group has been using similar tactics for awile using other lower level spells (Web, Entangle, Wall of Ice) Once Our wizard gets wall of Force I'm sure we will continue to do the same. What you have to watch out for are similar tactics used against your own group. The only hard part on the DM that I see is that he is required to use good tactics as well.

 

[AuraSeer]

It's great for providing cover. Since the spell is dismissable, you can easily take it down if it starts to hamper you more than the enemy.

Cover is especially important against monsters with reach. We recently fought a Colossal+ plant creature with 30' reach, and our monk got bashed unconscious during the first round. A planar Wall of Force separated him from the fight, long enough for the cleric to go in and heal him safely. Once he was back up, he could Spring Attack out from behind the wall and then duck back behind it.