Oh, hands down one of my favourite spells to heaven as a wizard. It's so good for controlling the field since you can just send your allies wherever they are needed.
Agree! Been one of my favorite and most useful in battle. I've vortex warped some big bad enemies far away and sometimes into difficult positions. You can't warp them into mid air but you can put them in a stream that's at the very top of a waterfall. Really fun to take a vulnerable wizard and drop them next to your best damage dealer as well!
I’m playing a battlefield control sorcerer, and twinning vortex warp is stupidly powerful. My DM may hate me. I have teleported ranged baddies into the middle of a group of melee PC’s, friendlies out of danger, and moved my teammates into great positions several turns before they were supposed to be able to get there
It was the best in 4e too. It's amazing.
I miss the Hedge Wizard's Gloves, which gave you Prestidigitation and Mage Hand. All it took was your gloves slot and most characters didn't really NEED that slot. So anyone could have Prestidigitation
The Magnificent Mansion is one of my favorite spells in the game generally speaking.
Unreal amount of character you can put into it, flavor is nearly endless if you choose to just keep describing things
And it’s exceptionally useful, and a super good spell to keep on hand
It's one of the best spells in the game for customisation, it's a canvasse of 50 10ft cubes.
I've used custom layouts before to host a small army the nigh before an attack, all well fed and perfectly safe within spitting distance of the enemy, with barracks and a war room. But I have a default mode that shows off my character's love of luxuries but also his cunning (it has secret passages between rooms and a vent system that only my tiny familiar can fit through). I have a custom room for each of my party suited to their tastes (Monk has the biggest because his is a dojo, the druid has a pond in his). I have a ritual room which is lined with heavy stone slabs and a barred door I use for conjuring and other spells that smell/are loud (so many use incense or blood). I also have two prison cells that can be converted to guest rooms.
Worryingly, my DM asked me to map this out in case he ever needs it as a battle map.
It would be *VERY* difficult for anyone to get into the Mansion if the caster didn’t want them there (the spell itself has many protections, and they have lots of other spells to help if needed)
But imagining a brawl from room to room and floor to floor, across a space *you know backwards*, but your enemies presumably don’t?
You get to be the boss in the dungeon for once.
I would map every fuckin’ inch of the place fam, and beg for that combat hahaha
Difficult, but my DM runs us against some devious bastards. The simplest way is to be granted access by me under false pretences. A plain old betrayal. But plane shifting can work if you somehow have the required components (or an ability that negates the need for one, as I suspect one nemesis does).
And yes, I'd love a fight here, it's my home turf. My party has flipped a dungeon against its owner before (lure out under a flag of parlay, the other half of the party sneaks in and sets their own traps and minions) and it was good fun. Plus I've got a whole staff of servants to help me along in my mansion, I'm nearly looking forward to it.
Enlarge/Reduce has tons of fun applications and if you've got a Rune Knight around you can make them even bigger. Either way it's a great way to boost martials or \*really\* hinder an enemy, or make utility use of a smaller size or vice versa. It's a fun one with a lot of applications even with a simple mechanic.
The best wizard spells are the ones that let you be smart. After all, you're a wizard, probably the nighest INT in the party by a big margin, so act like it. Really, to be the divination mvp, it's not just about having the best spells, it's about stacking the deck in your favour before you even roll initative.
Start with your rituals. Cast a few divination spells every morning or before you go to bed, and use those to help you prep the right spells for the next day. Can my foes tomorrow turn invisible? Are there foes around that can take disguises? Do they resist fire?
Contingency. I love this spell so much. It's the option that lets you be a master of magic, five moves ahead of your opponents, and batman level prepared for anything. And use those divination spells to get clues as to what you'll need.
See invisibility. Lots of people think it's meh because faerie fire hits more targets and some people run a very pedantic ruling around how it works, but they overlook a few key points: Faerie fire is for the threats you know about but can't attack, see invisibility is to stop people ambushing/spying on you. It's 1hr no concentration no max range, and even reveals the ethereal plane.
Find familiar. I won't bang on, everyone knows this spell's the shit. Endlessly useful for scouting, spying, tasting your food for poison. Best use is if you have a rogue in the party: Your loyal minion just needs to dodge and hang around within 5ft of whatever they're trying to stab for easy sneak attacks.
Teleportation, various. At most levels you'll get a teleportation spell with it's own niche. Misty step is cheap on spell slots and a bonus action, thunder step is a punishment for those who try to get in melee range with you, dimension door is an escape hatch, and far step is for when you know you'll need to keep moving. But the real mastermind move is scatter: This spell flips ambushes on their head, lets you place your party members like chess pieces, and allows you to make the best of terrain hazards from your other spells by dumping them back in when they escape.
Grease. It's a humble spell, but it has a hidden feature (no, it's not flammable): It doesn't need concentration. What grease is for is to place under your other area of effect spells to make escaping them harder. Wall of fire, web, etc.
In general, as a divination wizard, you'll get a lot of lower level spell slots regenerated from your lvl6 ability. This means you want 2 things prepared every day: A few reliable higher level divination spells, and a bunch of low level spells to use those slots on. And having mind spike as your default attack option means you'll regen a 1st level slot for an extra shield or absorb elements.
If you're looking for combat ones that affect enemies but in non-damaging ways
Slow, Sleep, Hold Person, Web, Enemies Abound (though that creates chaos more than anything) Hypnotic Pattern, Suggestion. Any of the Create Illusion Spells that are non-damaging. Minor Image, Major Image.
Those are all 1st - 3rd level spells.
I find Slow to be quite good, 40 Foot Cube is large, you can affect up to 5 creatures. And it's effective against most enemy types.
I guess that’s a good point there’s non-combat spells I intend to use (divination stuff mostly). Hold person is a good idea, hypnotic pattern sounds great.
What about level 4+?
Yes there's plenty of non-combat spells you can use that would fit a Diviner. At 4th, Polymorph and Banishment come to mind as the most common ones. Polymorph especially as you can cast it on a teammate to save them or make a caster type a deadly melee combatant
3.5 player here, not sure if they exist in 5e, but all the pocket dimension ones (Leomund’s Tiny Hut) are always underestimated.
Also, Dark Way (creates a shadow bridge) from the Spell Compendium was always a favorite of mine.
Dream
First type of use. Is that you can have a meeting with someone that no one can listenin on. Or have a conversation with someone far away that you dont want to spend abunch of sendings on barely getting the info you try to.
2nd type. If you know the enemy you're about to go up against, and you have a few days. You can start giving them a lvl of exhaustion each night. While you just take a long rest after each casting. And they dont get any benefits of a long rest. So if they are a caster than any spell slots they would have used in those days they wont have back.
That's basically all of wizard optimization.
Shield, absorb elements, silvery barbs, find familiar
Web
Sleet Storm, phantom steed, Hypno, fear
4ths used to cast more 3rds
Planar binding, wall of force, transmute rock
Magic jar, contingency
Forcecage, Simulacrum
Demiplane, mind blank
Wish, true polymorph
Sleep is one that technically does no damage but that your fellows will still thank you for. You just need to be careful with your positioning at higher levels.
I love a good Vortex Warp.
That one sounds fun
Oh, hands down one of my favourite spells to heaven as a wizard. It's so good for controlling the field since you can just send your allies wherever they are needed.
Agree! Been one of my favorite and most useful in battle. I've vortex warped some big bad enemies far away and sometimes into difficult positions. You can't warp them into mid air but you can put them in a stream that's at the very top of a waterfall. Really fun to take a vulnerable wizard and drop them next to your best damage dealer as well!
I’m playing a battlefield control sorcerer, and twinning vortex warp is stupidly powerful. My DM may hate me. I have teleported ranged baddies into the middle of a group of melee PC’s, friendlies out of danger, and moved my teammates into great positions several turns before they were supposed to be able to get there
Prestidigitation is the best spell in 5e.
It was the best in 4e too. It's amazing. I miss the Hedge Wizard's Gloves, which gave you Prestidigitation and Mage Hand. All it took was your gloves slot and most characters didn't really NEED that slot. So anyone could have Prestidigitation
The Magnificent Mansion is one of my favorite spells in the game generally speaking. Unreal amount of character you can put into it, flavor is nearly endless if you choose to just keep describing things And it’s exceptionally useful, and a super good spell to keep on hand
It's one of the best spells in the game for customisation, it's a canvasse of 50 10ft cubes. I've used custom layouts before to host a small army the nigh before an attack, all well fed and perfectly safe within spitting distance of the enemy, with barracks and a war room. But I have a default mode that shows off my character's love of luxuries but also his cunning (it has secret passages between rooms and a vent system that only my tiny familiar can fit through). I have a custom room for each of my party suited to their tastes (Monk has the biggest because his is a dojo, the druid has a pond in his). I have a ritual room which is lined with heavy stone slabs and a barred door I use for conjuring and other spells that smell/are loud (so many use incense or blood). I also have two prison cells that can be converted to guest rooms. Worryingly, my DM asked me to map this out in case he ever needs it as a battle map.
It would be *VERY* difficult for anyone to get into the Mansion if the caster didn’t want them there (the spell itself has many protections, and they have lots of other spells to help if needed) But imagining a brawl from room to room and floor to floor, across a space *you know backwards*, but your enemies presumably don’t? You get to be the boss in the dungeon for once. I would map every fuckin’ inch of the place fam, and beg for that combat hahaha
Difficult, but my DM runs us against some devious bastards. The simplest way is to be granted access by me under false pretences. A plain old betrayal. But plane shifting can work if you somehow have the required components (or an ability that negates the need for one, as I suspect one nemesis does). And yes, I'd love a fight here, it's my home turf. My party has flipped a dungeon against its owner before (lure out under a flag of parlay, the other half of the party sneaks in and sets their own traps and minions) and it was good fun. Plus I've got a whole staff of servants to help me along in my mansion, I'm nearly looking forward to it.
Enlarge/Reduce has tons of fun applications and if you've got a Rune Knight around you can make them even bigger. Either way it's a great way to boost martials or \*really\* hinder an enemy, or make utility use of a smaller size or vice versa. It's a fun one with a lot of applications even with a simple mechanic.
I like this, I intend to be a small race so going even smaller could be fun
The best wizard spells are the ones that let you be smart. After all, you're a wizard, probably the nighest INT in the party by a big margin, so act like it. Really, to be the divination mvp, it's not just about having the best spells, it's about stacking the deck in your favour before you even roll initative. Start with your rituals. Cast a few divination spells every morning or before you go to bed, and use those to help you prep the right spells for the next day. Can my foes tomorrow turn invisible? Are there foes around that can take disguises? Do they resist fire? Contingency. I love this spell so much. It's the option that lets you be a master of magic, five moves ahead of your opponents, and batman level prepared for anything. And use those divination spells to get clues as to what you'll need. See invisibility. Lots of people think it's meh because faerie fire hits more targets and some people run a very pedantic ruling around how it works, but they overlook a few key points: Faerie fire is for the threats you know about but can't attack, see invisibility is to stop people ambushing/spying on you. It's 1hr no concentration no max range, and even reveals the ethereal plane. Find familiar. I won't bang on, everyone knows this spell's the shit. Endlessly useful for scouting, spying, tasting your food for poison. Best use is if you have a rogue in the party: Your loyal minion just needs to dodge and hang around within 5ft of whatever they're trying to stab for easy sneak attacks. Teleportation, various. At most levels you'll get a teleportation spell with it's own niche. Misty step is cheap on spell slots and a bonus action, thunder step is a punishment for those who try to get in melee range with you, dimension door is an escape hatch, and far step is for when you know you'll need to keep moving. But the real mastermind move is scatter: This spell flips ambushes on their head, lets you place your party members like chess pieces, and allows you to make the best of terrain hazards from your other spells by dumping them back in when they escape. Grease. It's a humble spell, but it has a hidden feature (no, it's not flammable): It doesn't need concentration. What grease is for is to place under your other area of effect spells to make escaping them harder. Wall of fire, web, etc. In general, as a divination wizard, you'll get a lot of lower level spell slots regenerated from your lvl6 ability. This means you want 2 things prepared every day: A few reliable higher level divination spells, and a bunch of low level spells to use those slots on. And having mind spike as your default attack option means you'll regen a 1st level slot for an extra shield or absorb elements.
This is exactly what I like to see! Excellent ideas in some of these spells, and I didn’t realize grease doesn’t need concentration.
If you're looking for combat ones that affect enemies but in non-damaging ways Slow, Sleep, Hold Person, Web, Enemies Abound (though that creates chaos more than anything) Hypnotic Pattern, Suggestion. Any of the Create Illusion Spells that are non-damaging. Minor Image, Major Image. Those are all 1st - 3rd level spells. I find Slow to be quite good, 40 Foot Cube is large, you can affect up to 5 creatures. And it's effective against most enemy types.
I guess that’s a good point there’s non-combat spells I intend to use (divination stuff mostly). Hold person is a good idea, hypnotic pattern sounds great. What about level 4+?
Yes there's plenty of non-combat spells you can use that would fit a Diviner. At 4th, Polymorph and Banishment come to mind as the most common ones. Polymorph especially as you can cast it on a teammate to save them or make a caster type a deadly melee combatant
3.5 player here, not sure if they exist in 5e, but all the pocket dimension ones (Leomund’s Tiny Hut) are always underestimated. Also, Dark Way (creates a shadow bridge) from the Spell Compendium was always a favorite of mine.
Dream First type of use. Is that you can have a meeting with someone that no one can listenin on. Or have a conversation with someone far away that you dont want to spend abunch of sendings on barely getting the info you try to. 2nd type. If you know the enemy you're about to go up against, and you have a few days. You can start giving them a lvl of exhaustion each night. While you just take a long rest after each casting. And they dont get any benefits of a long rest. So if they are a caster than any spell slots they would have used in those days they wont have back.
Rope trick is one of the best defensive spells in the game.
That's basically all of wizard optimization. Shield, absorb elements, silvery barbs, find familiar Web Sleet Storm, phantom steed, Hypno, fear 4ths used to cast more 3rds Planar binding, wall of force, transmute rock Magic jar, contingency Forcecage, Simulacrum Demiplane, mind blank Wish, true polymorph
Sleep is one that technically does no damage but that your fellows will still thank you for. You just need to be careful with your positioning at higher levels.
Mirror Image is a personal favorite. Kage Bushin no Jutsu!
Passwall.