A great thing about the Deva summon is that their Wisdom is at 20, which means they are highly likely to resist going mad if your wizard is wearing the Abyss Beckoner's gloves.
cloud kill should absolutely be S tier. Not only can it do tons of damage when first cast and when enemies go, it’s a huge area that can be moved around, dealing continued damage to entire groups of enemies. Also in Act 3 there actually aren’t many enemies immune or even resistant to poison, excluding House of Hope of course. And this spell is even better as a Necromancer wizard, as all your ghouls and zombies and whatever are immune to poison. Imagine how fun it is having your ghouls paralyze someone in cloudkill. It’s a fantastic spell worth of S tier.
You make a compelling argument. My main concern is that it's really quite a large area and if you don't make your party members immune to it then it can cause problems. That's probably a skill issue on my part!
Concentration spell, so useless tier like all other concentration spells past lv3 when Haste exist. Rather then casting cloud kill, just cast another fireball with your totally fair and balanced permanent quicken spell from haste.
Even without poison immunity is amazing for creating killboxes. Ai will just try to run through it and right combinations of spells make it so they barely can move forward, so they will slowly die while trying to reach you.
I tried using wall of stone in a fight to block off three undead from a giant doorway in an Act 3 fight. They broke it down in two attacks. 30 HP per stone pillar is way too low for a level 5 spell so late in the game. Ironically, I feel like arcane lock would have been better in that fight than wall of stone. Maybe it has potential for creating a choke point but I feel like the spell should be C or D at most. Also, just want to say I appreciate the in-game demonstration of the spells during your tier list. A lot of these spells I never even bother to try out myself so It's good to see them in action.
Theoretically sounds like you’d be better off just dashing (or somehow moving toward the door) and do the stack crates strategy, as it would actually work, at least from what I have seen in videos
My best use for telekinesis was when karlach threw her trident, and instead of returning to her hands it got stuck in middle of the air, and no one was able to reach it. I only had to target it with telekinesis and the weapon remembered it was supposed to obey gravity.
I used Telekinesis to throw one of the guards in the moonrise jail off the edge to take him out without raising the alarm. It's not too great aside from funni memes though
Reminds me of when i tried to throw the orphic hammer to break one of the obelisks, it didnt break it and got stuck on top of it. Got super scared but remembered i had an enlarge scroll to reach it pick it back up. There was probably numerous options to get it back like grabbing crates. But i know mage hand wasnt able to get up to it since there was no ledge for it to stand on so no throwing the orphic hammer back down :(
Telekinesis seems underrated here. You can move lots of enemies that you aren't normally able to shove and there's dozens of locations where it can one shot. You can one shot all the steel watchers down by the docks with it by chucking them into the water. It does require concentration, but the upside is that you can recast it for free for ten turns. And it can also function as an incredibly versatile utility spell.
I do feel like destructive wave needs to go up to S for me personally. There’s too much amazing gear that works with both radiant and thunder damage so you aren’t just knocking them prone but also stacking radiant orbs, reverberation, etc. It is an incredible debuffing tool with good damage that works on a great AoE that doesn’t hurt allies.
I can totally agree that with the right items it's an easy S tier. I tried to avoid taking items into account very much since then I'll have to take into account the best items for each spell, and quite simply we have a limited number of slots.
@@CasualVeteranGamer I definitely understand the logic behind it. My personal viewpoint is that similar to how cold/lightning damage gets to take the support of create water into consideration, radiant damage should be able to take into consideration just how much better its support items are. It is definitely preference though.
@@CasualVeteranGamerimo destructive wave is S tier even without gear optimized for it. It’s like fireball but does damage to a MUCH larger area, doesn’t affect allies, knocks enemies prone, and has 2 damage types=2 potential saving throws. It doesn’t do as much single target damage as some other things like chain lightning or disintegrate, but for me personally it’s like in top 3 best damaging spells in the game.
My funniest moment that I can think of was dealing with the Umberlee worshippers after that dwarf with the submarine helped me rescue the Gondians. They talked big talk about how drowning was the blessed way to die, so I gave it to them! I had Gale use telekinesis and threw like 3 of them into the water around the sub, which is considered a chasm so they instantly die. That being said whenever there weren’t any chasms, I struggled to find a use for it
I just threw a health potion at him so he'd survive the spiders lol. Another tactic that works is just leaving a concentration aoe dmg spell wear they summon, though you have to be careful of damaging the other prisoners with that one.
Artistry of war is basically Larian going "Remember how OP Isaac's Greater Missle Storm was in NWN?" Lets drop it a spell level and add 6 damage per missle." I can't believe they buffed the crap out of the most OP spell from their predecessor game.
@@flakdampler11it's absolutely insane. Every bit of support that works to make magic missile builds do crazy damage works on this spell, it's so good.
1. Dominate Person and Telekinesis are S for me. Tele - 1shot, Dominate - for fun 2. Cloud kill S if u play with the Feast of Heroes (your party are immune to Cloud) 3. Destruction S for light cleric in radiant orb build. Strong aoe and -2-17 debuff to attack rolls "forever" (this is a madness mechanic in game)
dominate person is rp tier for me, since there is the level 2 spell hold person it's a big waste to use a lvl 5 slot. with the upcast to lvl 5 hold person u can target 4 people instead of one, and if two of them get hit, it's already MUCH better than dominate person. not only do they lose their turn, they also die in seconds because they get critted into oblivion.
@@johnwallace5284 do u understand what rp means? rp is roleplay. it doesn't matter if it's a waste if your character is the type of guy to make 2 friends attack eachother. get it?
During my whole time with the game i never felt so badass as the time my best mate Gale got left alone outside of steel foundry and a steel watcher aggrod him. He cast telekinesis and tossed it into the bay like it was nothing. Quickest combat in my playthrough lol
Planar Binding is incredible in any fight with elementals/myrmidons, cambions, or anything similar, since a simple level five spell slot basically flips a level five or six equivalent summon to your side for potentially multiple turns, and they’re good about using their abilities to work the battlefield (ex. water myrmidons do their heals). In a pinch it even can give you a single turn of allied Raphael, which is handy since it works when he uses his unique form.
@@untrustingstatuesome people play with the Tactician Plus, or similar mods, where most enemies have much higher HP pools along with other changes believe it or not…
Banishing smite being in the game and paladins not being able to get it because it's a 5th level spell is so funny Also, cloud kill isn't a surface so it can combo with surface creating spells.
2 Paladin/ 10 Bard would let you add a divine smite to the banishing smite through a reaction. With luck of the far realms you could do 10D10 force + 10D8 divine + 2D12 slashing and banishment. That’s an average of 113 points and more for a half-orc and/or savage attacker and/or great weapon fighting style.
I would like to say thank you for making these videos. There is plenty of Spell ranking videos out there but most people just sit on the tiermaker website and don't show off the spells or niche uses of it in game. I hope people will find your videos more often.
Personally, getting Gale every spell save DC item he can get his grubby little paws on makes him a complete boss destroyer and disruptor. Want to just clear groups of infantry? Cast hold person on the entire group by upcasting it, ending fights by giving your entire party 10 turns to do whatever they like. Act 3 bosses causing issues? A certain cambion who has ridiculous AC but apparently quite low saving throws? Hold monster for those insta-crits. Because AC does not matter if all you do is crit.
Dethrone is obviously bad if you actually spend a lvl5 spell slot for it, but it’s necromancy spell so it’s meant to be cast for free by a necromancer yo ;)
Dominate Person should be A tier, its very strong form of CC For example in temple of Bhaal when you deal with Saverock you can cast it on him and he will murder them for you.
Wall of Stone is especially good for splitting up huge battles into more manageable sizes. I've used it in act 2 to cut off the Meregon from their leader in the temple. It blocks line of sight! It forces them to reposition or waste actions on dash.
If they didn’t have halberds they would have broken down the stone walls (which have a depressing 30 hp). Even a zombie could break it down if its pathing decided it was the best idea
The 6th level spell Heroes' Feast makes your allies IMMUNE to Cloudkill's damage, thus you don't have to worry so much about where you put down the AoE. It also keeps them obscured, helping to protect them from attacks until they're ready to move out of the AoE on their turn in order to attack (unless they're immune to blind). Buffing your allies with Heroes' Feast DEFINITELY helps make Cloudkill an S tier 5th level spell, unless you're fighting enemies who are immune to poison, which does happen, but is still pretty rare.
Artistry of war is oppressively powerful if paired with the right items. It does so much damage, enemies rarely have resistance against force damage and sometime are even vuilnerable to it. It can take almost any "normal enemy" out in one go.
Cloudkill is great for Spore Druids. Cast plant growth which quarters movement and is NOT a concentration and then Cloudkill. Because Cloudkill is a cloud surface and not a floor surface they can overlap 😊 Plus Zombies and Spore Zombies are immune to poison damage so you can use them to chip damage, attack of opportunity and potentially turn weaker enemies to zombies. I had so much fun with this 😂
Seeming specifically helped me get Florrick out of jail, but for the rest of the game she was then a human woman with curly hair so it was a bit weird after that😅
Wall of stone is incredibly useful to hold back the horde of shadow-cursed creatures when helping Halsin in Act 2. You can still manage the fight on regular difficulty without major preparations but on tactician you absolutely need some form of cc. I had a scroll of it lying around and it made the encounter much more manageable. It can definitely carry one or the other encounter, but compared to other level 5 and concentration spells it doesn't have a ton of consistent value
That fight can be almost completely won (even on tactician) simply by casting spirit guardians, which is only a level 3 spell. Or another AoE such as Evard’s Black Tentacles or Spike Growth, which both also hinder movement and deal damage. Wall of stone is not worth the L5 spell slot when there are better options at lower spell levels.
I always use plant growth, sleet storm, and spike growth, I doubt the plants and spikes stack but as long as no fire gets in the plants I don't have to worry about concentration too much. And for the shades that spawn on the beach, I use spirit guardians and a very angry Teifling
I think Insect Plague should be ranked A at least. 1. It has a huge area of effect. 2. Not many creatures are resistant to piercing damage. If you center it right on a boss, it may waste two turns just trying to get out of it since the AOE is so large. And it basically stops any spellcasting/range attacks since enemies will always try to get out of it before doing anything else. It's been my late game go-to spell in most fights.
And if you combine it with ice storm the enemies may fall over wasting their turns trying to get out of it further increasing the effectiviness. Or combine it with some other aoe spells.
One thing larian got right I think is when you go down you lose your action on revive. I find myself using mass cure wounds or healing word as preventative to try and keep characters out of one shot territory bc unlike dnd I can’t just pick them up and use their attacks. Makes healing in combat actually kind of useful in some cases now.
Seeming definitely belongs in D-tier IMO. Though I haven’t finished the game yet (almost done with Act 2) so maybe there are instances where disguising your entire party could be useful, but I sort of doubt it. All the situations I’ve come across so far where a disguise is useful only needed 1 person to be disguised. Unless there are multiple scenarios in Act 3 where a whole party disguise is useful I can’t imagine anyone wasting an L5 spell slot on this.
The strength of disguise spells is that they allow you to use race specific items, e.g. Karlach can use the Silver sword to its full potential if she's disguised as a gith. With Seeming you can donate the disguise to a companion that normally couldn't cast the spell him/herself. It's kind of niche, I personally don't use it and I think the racial item interaction is a glitch that will be patched, but at the moment it's not useless
@@exantiuse497 Sure but that is hardly a reason to use a L5 spell slot IMO. If it was a L1 or L2 slot then maybe I could see it because by Act 3 you have a fair amount of those. And considering they haven’t pitched it yet, I’m not convinced that the racial items working with disguise is a glitch, but we’ll see I guess.
Kinda sucks that Telekinesis is only for throwing in BG3. The main reason (imho) to use the spell in 5e was to Restrain creatures. Also, again in 5e rather than BG3, it's resolved with contested ability checks so things like Bardic Inspiration, Jack of All Trades, Hex, and Enhance Ability can wildly swing your chances of success.
i think you underestimate telekinesis, it’s not particularly useful when you just throw enemies to deal damage, but you can throw them off a cliff to instantly kill them and there really is a lot of locations where you can do that
I used wall of stone once and that was to block my team into a corner to heal back up and take out the two enamies on my side. Usually I just use wall of fire or that druid spell that makes a big hedge pop up.
You need yo layer utility spells to see them shine. Take wall of stone for example, one tav to drop a cloudkill or similar aoe, wall of stone to block off their escape. Doesnt work 100% but where the env allows for it, these are killer combos.
I'm playing on Tactician plus a difficulty mod. Hold Monster is a must since my fighter/paladin can barely hit any enemy without my spellcasters doing something first.
Regarding Stun and Greater Restoration, [Freedom of Movement] cures stun, and lets you ignore difficult terrain, and prevents roots, and prevents paralysis, and makes you immune to "hold" spells, and is a lv4 spell, and does not require concentration, and lasts until long rest. So yeah...
A couple of notes on cloudkill: 1. the reposition is a 1/turn free action unlike similar spells like moonbeam. 2. blink normally breaks concen. it doesnt break cloudkill's concen. it would've been cool if you talked about/demonstrated each variant of conjure elemental.
In dnd campaigns when I am allowed to play as a legacy yuanti I love cloud kill both from an rp perspective and from mechanic due to immunity especially when playing as sorcerer
I think dethrone should be at least B tier considering that you can access up to to seven level 5 spell slots every long rest (Markoheshkir, staff of the weave, freecast, spellcrux amulet and wizard restoration) and you can long rest very often in act 3. So having a single target damage spell is always helpful.
Doesn't telekinesis work like throwing, so you do double damage when you throw an enemy at another enemy. Often times you can remove an enemy from battle for 2 turns by throwing them really far away. It's definitely better than seeming. Seeming is only useful if you get caught.
Wall of stone is incredibly useful for robbing sorcerers sundries. Just use the spell to block the guards line of sight and then pickpocket the shopkeeper over and over again until he has nothing left (he will never get mad at you for stealing).
I think Wall of Stone should be probably high B or low A since you can create cover for yourself if you need to maintain concentration. Flame strike should be the same as destructive wave because destructive wave is a con save where as flame strike is a dex save, a lot of enemies have a lower dex save than con save.
Something I find really interesting is the disparity in power for some of these spells between bg3 and 5e. Contagion is an AMAZING spell in 5e, and Greater Restoration is better too.
Moment I used Wall of Stone to good effect: The fight (against) Minsc. You come through a tight spot and there's lots of enemies. So I let a few of them come at me and then cut off the rest with this spell. It took them a long time to destroy the wall and then they had trouble going through the small gap they'd created. It made a big difference. Archers can't really shoot through either. Maybe A tier but I'd still say B because I didn't end up using it very often
on my spore druid run I think my favorite aoe move was to lay down hunger of hadar with a warlock for the blind+difficult terrain, then both cloudkill and ice storm using haste spores with the spore druid
In the Iron Throne I used wall of stone to block off the sector that spawned the Sahuagins once I evacuated the two gondians and Omeluum. That way the mobs had to take the long way around so I didn't have to worry about them
telekenisis deserves a bump up in use, you dind't use it's best ability, drop the steel watcher on another enemy. they both get damaged. And it's just visually appealing to watch.
I know concentration is annoying, but imagine playing against a caster using hold person on you with no option except to hope you roll a save. It’s necessary. Plus you can just run War Caster at level 8 after maxing your casting attribute.
The staff of Lorrakan (the asshole mage in the tower which wants Dame Ailin) can be used for Destructive Wave as well. A conjuration mage makes it even better, because you won't friendly fire.
Dispel Evil and Good is outclassed by its predecessor simply because this is a video game; you can reload a save. It's probably a god-send in the pen and paper game because you need to have a REALLY forgiving DM to have the same affect as a save system. The only time it would be better than Protection from G&E is if it's your first playthrough, and you absolute hate reloading saves to win a fight. That, or you're one of those loons that does an iron man run for their first playthrough.
I was able to use wall of stone to block a certain large optional boss’ devastating all encompassing AOE Charge attack! And by block I mean I cowered behind the stone wall. Was surprised it worked.
I think you judge healing spells harshly because perhaps you are good at the game and do not struggle as much as some average or novice players. "Why heal when you can just kill them all?" is not really a good judgement of healing spells. Obviously if I can kill them all, I don't need to heal. - that spell and that decision is not for me as an expert. I think you should take a more objective approach to how it turns around a bad situation or (potential) downed ally. If my cleric is already concentrating on a nice CC spell but my thief is at 20hp, I may want to throw down heals instead of swing a 1d8 +1 mace or spend a slot on Guiding Bolt. I feel like you judged Beacon of Hope the same way in your level 3 video. "Why would I need max healing when I can just murder them." I understand you do want to guide your video tone in a direction to let players know "Consider level 4 hold person / command instead of just swing/heal swing/heal" I agree with that. There are times however when a less skilled player is struggling. Maybe 1 party member down and 1 party member critical, And currently you are telling them "Don't heal, use flame strike / Cone of cold".
To be fair, in this specific example he also pointed out that Healing Word was more effective. And that's the thing, there are better healing spells than Mass Cure Wounds and Beacon of Hope - Mass Healing Word and Aid are great AoE healing spells that heal more for less, and they don't get much benefit from Beacon of Hope. Healing has its uses, but bad healing is still bad, the same way that bad damage is bad.
I won't keep going back and forth, but that's kind of my point though. No, there isn't better healing spells than MCW and BOH. Healing word, MHW are good for light touch ups and keeping the flow going easily. With items, those heals add up for only a B-Action. But when you are getting badly beat up, when you've made a few mistakes and you have people down, BOH / MCW can bounce you back in 2 actions. Then maintain the ability to take a lot of abuse and undo it easily. When you really NEED HEALING 911, healing word / MHW is not better. It is rank 3rd behind potions. If they introduce a hard core mode with 1 single save file, you will use these spells because they are better. Just my 2 cents @@normal6483
@@Pkasso89 You don't have to respond, but I wanna point out that the average healing of Mass Cure Wounds is 18.5 per target if you have max wisdom, while a 5th level Aid heals 20 hp per target at the same level even with 10 wisdom. So at a base level on a worse build, Aid does more healing on average. (And is less likely to heal 8 hp because of a bad roll.) Adding a Beacon of Hope can get you up to 29 per target, for a 10.5 increase and 9 more hp per target, which makes it more reliable, but it costs a 3rd level slot and your concentration. This eats up any defensive spells you might be concentrating on, eats up resources that you might be short on, and requires you to hyper invest in Wisdom to get the benefit. It can also only be done twice in a battle before you have to rely on lower-level healing spells like Mass Healing Word and Aid anyway, so it's still sub-optimal compared to using Aid as your healing spell, which you can keep using when you run out of high level slots.
A buddy and I were fighting Orin and we were struggling against the constant unstoppable status she got, but one turn we got rid of it before my friend's turn, and he used artistry of war, and it just annihilated her when she had like 65% of her health left. It made the fight trivial 😂. S tier spell for sure
Contagion is such a cool idea.. I was so excited when I got it, but it turned out to be not that practical. Too bad that it lasts so long to take effect, if it even does :(
Dominate is easily A teir and realistically its S teir. With sorcery points, it effectively kills 4 enemies since 2 enemies are removed and 2 are put in the way, the dominated enemies will be the easiest for the remaining enemies to attack and therefore free up your beaters to make their first few plays without being disrupted. Just make sure to dominate enemies without legandary who can disrupt your concentration, like archers.
Somehow on my playthrough I managed to find Dethrone but not the summon Deva or the buffed up magic missile spell and now im kicking myself that I got the worst one out of the three unique spells... That being said I did instakill an enemy with Dethrone once so maybe it isn't all that bad. I do understand that it is bad by comparison with the other two, but it's not a hopeless spell, it can do quite a bit of damage in the right circumstance. I'd give it C tier but that might just because it's the only one of those that I found :p I'll make sure to get the other two on my other playthroughs when I get to act 3 though, for sure.
36:50 I have used it rare but its been cool sometimes. Sometimes AI says fuck it and goes all the way around. I used it in the steel watch foundry and specfically the sharran temple. You can kinda split them in half. (A little wonky cause temple terrain is weird)
I'd move Cloudkill down 2 whole tiers. You usually just get a single turn of mediocre damage because the enemy A.I. ALWAYS moves out of it after the initial cast, and gets right in your face, preventing you from effectively using the "re-cast" ability, AND if you do re-cast it you are just taking a turn to move the spell, not doing anything new or useful like, say, casting another spell like Haste or something. You could have just fireballed a crowd instead, for more damage on a level 3 slot, or quite a bit more if you up-cast to the same level 5 slot Cloudkill requires. Then there's the problem that moving melee fighters into the cloud to attack foes damages those friendlies as well, so you either take friendly fire or don't get to move in and attack with them. Stupid. And the final thing that this spell has against it is that so many enemies and objects are either resistant or immune to Poison damage in this game. Hell, you can cast Glyph of Warding at level 3, do the same amount of damage as Cloudkill, and choose between 5 different elements and 2 effects, and even up-cast it to the same level as Cloudkill to do even more damage for the same tier of spell slot. Cloudkill is just bad, and at the very least it needs re-worked so that inside the cloud is considered difficult terrain so it can slow down enemies trying to move out of it, you can move the cloud as a free action on your turn, and anyone in it needs to save or be rendered unconscious for a turn like it did in the original BG. Then it would be worth using.
You are severely underestimating greater restoration’s ability to compress multiple spell functions into one spell known/prepared slot. Greater restoration frees up your cleric and other support characters from having to keep calm emotions, remove curse, basilisk oil etc ready and means they can prepare other highly useful spells.
I don't see how dominate person could be a C tier. Come on, between almost erasing 5+ enemies with an AoE or have a usually low chance to have a single enemy converted, dominate person is just vastly inferior. Same applies to hold monster and planar binding
I, for one, appreciate that insect plague is bugged. Seems fitting
I was wondering if he would comment about it!!
A great thing about the Deva summon is that their Wisdom is at 20, which means they are highly likely to resist going mad if your wizard is wearing the Abyss Beckoner's gloves.
cloud kill should absolutely be S tier. Not only can it do tons of damage when first cast and when enemies go, it’s a huge area that can be moved around, dealing continued damage to entire groups of enemies. Also in Act 3 there actually aren’t many enemies immune or even resistant to poison, excluding House of Hope of course. And this spell is even better as a Necromancer wizard, as all your ghouls and zombies and whatever are immune to poison. Imagine how fun it is having your ghouls paralyze someone in cloudkill. It’s a fantastic spell worth of S tier.
You make a compelling argument. My main concern is that it's really quite a large area and if you don't make your party members immune to it then it can cause problems. That's probably a skill issue on my part!
@@CasualVeteranGamer You could use heroes feast and become immune to the damage
@@goyslopium17you can use a druid or a cleric in camp without needing them in your party, too.
Concentration spell, so useless tier like all other concentration spells past lv3 when Haste exist. Rather then casting cloud kill, just cast another fireball with your totally fair and balanced permanent quicken spell from haste.
Even without poison immunity is amazing for creating killboxes. Ai will just try to run through it and right combinations of spells make it so they barely can move forward, so they will slowly die while trying to reach you.
I tried using wall of stone in a fight to block off three undead from a giant doorway in an Act 3 fight. They broke it down in two attacks. 30 HP per stone pillar is way too low for a level 5 spell so late in the game. Ironically, I feel like arcane lock would have been better in that fight than wall of stone. Maybe it has potential for creating a choke point but I feel like the spell should be C or D at most.
Also, just want to say I appreciate the in-game demonstration of the spells during your tier list. A lot of these spells I never even bother to try out myself so It's good to see them in action.
Theoretically sounds like you’d be better off just dashing (or somehow moving toward the door) and do the stack crates strategy, as it would actually work, at least from what I have seen in videos
My best use for telekinesis was when karlach threw her trident, and instead of returning to her hands it got stuck in middle of the air, and no one was able to reach it.
I only had to target it with telekinesis and the weapon remembered it was supposed to obey gravity.
Well worth choosing the spell then!
I used Telekinesis to throw one of the guards in the moonrise jail off the edge to take him out without raising the alarm. It's not too great aside from funni memes though
I accidentally yeeted that trident at the final boss and it fell into the void forever 😭
@@Pyroific note to self….don’t expect the trident to return to you at that point.
Reminds me of when i tried to throw the orphic hammer to break one of the obelisks, it didnt break it and got stuck on top of it. Got super scared but remembered i had an enlarge scroll to reach it pick it back up. There was probably numerous options to get it back like grabbing crates. But i know mage hand wasnt able to get up to it since there was no ledge for it to stand on so no throwing the orphic hammer back down :(
Telekinesis seems underrated here. You can move lots of enemies that you aren't normally able to shove and there's dozens of locations where it can one shot. You can one shot all the steel watchers down by the docks with it by chucking them into the water. It does require concentration, but the upside is that you can recast it for free for ten turns. And it can also function as an incredibly versatile utility spell.
That it literally the only place I used telekinesis in this entire game. But damn was that useful.
I do feel like destructive wave needs to go up to S for me personally. There’s too much amazing gear that works with both radiant and thunder damage so you aren’t just knocking them prone but also stacking radiant orbs, reverberation, etc. It is an incredible debuffing tool with good damage that works on a great AoE that doesn’t hurt allies.
I can totally agree that with the right items it's an easy S tier. I tried to avoid taking items into account very much since then I'll have to take into account the best items for each spell, and quite simply we have a limited number of slots.
@@CasualVeteranGamer I definitely understand the logic behind it. My personal viewpoint is that similar to how cold/lightning damage gets to take the support of create water into consideration, radiant damage should be able to take into consideration just how much better its support items are. It is definitely preference though.
@@CasualVeteranGamerimo destructive wave is S tier even without gear optimized for it. It’s like fireball but does damage to a MUCH larger area, doesn’t affect allies, knocks enemies prone, and has 2 damage types=2 potential saving throws.
It doesn’t do as much single target damage as some other things like chain lightning or disintegrate, but for me personally it’s like in top 3 best damaging spells in the game.
Planar binding has a special place in my heart, made Raphael my ally on his own boss fight and didnt do much, but got to cheese him a bit xD
My funniest moment that I can think of was dealing with the Umberlee worshippers after that dwarf with the submarine helped me rescue the Gondians. They talked big talk about how drowning was the blessed way to die, so I gave it to them! I had Gale use telekinesis and threw like 3 of them into the water around the sub, which is considered a chasm so they instantly die. That being said whenever there weren’t any chasms, I struggled to find a use for it
I used wall of stone to save wyll's father by blocking the path of spiders before they were summoned.
Thanks for sharing!
That’s pretty creative. I put otiluke’s resilient sphere on him but it slowed him down so much we barely got out
Dimension Door or Arcane Gate also work for that. Good that there are multiple solutions such problems.
I just threw a health potion at him so he'd survive the spiders lol. Another tactic that works is just leaving a concentration aoe dmg spell wear they summon, though you have to be careful of damaging the other prisoners with that one.
I threw an invisibility potion on him so he wouldn't be targeted, but that's pretty creative
Artistry of war is basically Larian going "Remember how OP Isaac's Greater Missle Storm was in NWN?" Lets drop it a spell level and add 6 damage per missle."
I can't believe they buffed the crap out of the most OP spell from their predecessor game.
It's crazy just how good that spell is!
Oh man I never knew this spell exists. I wonder how nuts it would be with the Spellsparkler
@@flakdampler11it's absolutely insane. Every bit of support that works to make magic missile builds do crazy damage works on this spell, it's so good.
Insect plague deserves S tier just off the strength of NPC allies love it so much they walk directly into it every time I use it.
The AI does seem to ignore some area of effect spells and avoid others, for instance they always seem to walk straight through cloud of daggers!
1. Dominate Person and Telekinesis are S for me. Tele - 1shot, Dominate - for fun
2. Cloud kill S if u play with the Feast of Heroes (your party are immune to Cloud)
3. Destruction S for light cleric in radiant orb build. Strong aoe and -2-17 debuff to attack rolls "forever" (this is a madness mechanic in game)
I can respect those opinions, and point number two has already made it into the level 6 spells tierlist.
@@johnwallace5284 It's in the process of being made
dominate person is rp tier for me, since there is the level 2 spell hold person it's a big waste to use a lvl 5 slot. with the upcast to lvl 5 hold person u can target 4 people instead of one, and if two of them get hit, it's already MUCH better than dominate person. not only do they lose their turn, they also die in seconds because they get critted into oblivion.
@@johnwallace5284 not for rp. makes sense for some characters to use dominate person to make them attack their friends. tihi. :D
@@johnwallace5284 do u understand what rp means? rp is roleplay. it doesn't matter if it's a waste if your character is the type of guy to make 2 friends attack eachother. get it?
During my whole time with the game i never felt so badass as the time my best mate Gale got left alone outside of steel foundry and a steel watcher aggrod him. He cast telekinesis and tossed it into the bay like it was nothing. Quickest combat in my playthrough lol
yeah, gale indeed best mate. he will always lend me a hand. not two tho cuz the other one is stuck ina stone together with his body and soul.
Planar Binding is incredible in any fight with elementals/myrmidons, cambions, or anything similar, since a simple level five spell slot basically flips a level five or six equivalent summon to your side for potentially multiple turns, and they’re good about using their abilities to work the battlefield (ex. water myrmidons do their heals). In a pinch it even can give you a single turn of allied Raphael, which is handy since it works when he uses his unique form.
Honestly you have to be a special kind of bad to spend enough turns in a fight to make Raphael use his true form.
@@untrustingstatue not sure that’s fair, it only takes him a turn or two
@@untrustingstatuesome people play with the Tactician Plus, or similar mods, where most enemies have much higher HP pools along with other changes believe it or not…
Curriculum of Strategy: Artistry of War sounds like a 40K novel from 1998
Banishing smite being in the game and paladins not being able to get it because it's a 5th level spell is so funny
Also, cloud kill isn't a surface so it can combo with surface creating spells.
I really wonder why that was chosen as we know they never really planned to have the higher levels included in the game
I had a sorcerer paladin that had 5th level spellslots, and still you wont get it, although you are not missing out on much😂
2 Paladin/ 10 Bard would let you add a divine smite to the banishing smite through a reaction. With luck of the far realms you could do 10D10 force + 10D8 divine + 2D12 slashing and banishment. That’s an average of 113 points and more for a half-orc and/or savage attacker and/or great weapon fighting style.
@@neiljopling4693 that actually sounds kinda niceee
I would like to say thank you for making these videos. There is plenty of Spell ranking videos out there but most people just sit on the tiermaker website and don't show off the spells or niche uses of it in game. I hope people will find your videos more often.
If you have a monk and a few zombies on your team, the poison damage of cloudkill is suddenly a lot better
My next video includes the idea of poison immunity and cloudkill, but I missed it in this video! Thanks for the reminder about the monk.
Oh hi Balthazar
Personally, getting Gale every spell save DC item he can get his grubby little paws on makes him a complete boss destroyer and disruptor. Want to just clear groups of infantry? Cast hold person on the entire group by upcasting it, ending fights by giving your entire party 10 turns to do whatever they like. Act 3 bosses causing issues? A certain cambion who has ridiculous AC but apparently quite low saving throws? Hold monster for those insta-crits. Because AC does not matter if all you do is crit.
Druids don't get Remove Curse, so Greater Resto can be the only way you have access to curse solves depending on your party comp
Telekinesis is just too fun though. I threw Balthazar right off the stage in the Shadowfell battle.
I do love using it just to see everyone flying around so much!
It makes saving Wyll's Dad pretty easy too
Before some item nerfs artistry of war used to deal +300 damage in one turn
Dethrone is obviously bad if you actually spend a lvl5 spell slot for it, but it’s necromancy spell so it’s meant to be cast for free by a necromancer yo ;)
Dominate Person should be A tier, its very strong form of CC
For example in temple of Bhaal when you deal with Saverock you can cast it on him and he will murder them for you.
Wall of Stone is especially good for splitting up huge battles into more manageable sizes.
I've used it in act 2 to cut off the Meregon from their leader in the temple. It blocks line of sight! It forces them to reposition or waste actions on dash.
If they didn’t have halberds they would have broken down the stone walls (which have a depressing 30 hp). Even a zombie could break it down if its pathing decided it was the best idea
Keep making tierlist videoes, I love them
The 6th level spell Heroes' Feast makes your allies IMMUNE to Cloudkill's damage, thus you don't have to worry so much about where you put down the AoE. It also keeps them obscured, helping to protect them from attacks until they're ready to move out of the AoE on their turn in order to attack (unless they're immune to blind). Buffing your allies with Heroes' Feast DEFINITELY helps make Cloudkill an S tier 5th level spell, unless you're fighting enemies who are immune to poison, which does happen, but is still pretty rare.
Artistry of war is oppressively powerful if paired with the right items. It does so much damage, enemies rarely have resistance against force damage and sometime are even vuilnerable to it. It can take almost any "normal enemy" out in one go.
Cloudkill is great for Spore Druids. Cast plant growth which quarters movement and is NOT a concentration and then Cloudkill. Because Cloudkill is a cloud surface and not a floor surface they can overlap 😊 Plus Zombies and Spore Zombies are immune to poison damage so you can use them to chip damage, attack of opportunity and potentially turn weaker enemies to zombies. I had so much fun with this 😂
I also love Plant Growth + Hunger of Hadar. such underrated combos
Seeming specifically helped me get Florrick out of jail, but for the rest of the game she was then a human woman with curly hair so it was a bit weird after that😅
That's actually a great use of the spell, but I guess it does have its downsides!
I never even knew Banishing smite was a thing lol. Guess it is very obscure, but a nice option for a swords bard.
17:17 Next up: Dominate Person *Astarion moans in the background*
okay dude
Insect plague was Jaheira's best spell in BG2, it stopped casters from casting all the time. 😢
Wall of stone is incredibly useful to hold back the horde of shadow-cursed creatures when helping Halsin in Act 2. You can still manage the fight on regular difficulty without major preparations but on tactician you absolutely need some form of cc. I had a scroll of it lying around and it made the encounter much more manageable. It can definitely carry one or the other encounter, but compared to other level 5 and concentration spells it doesn't have a ton of consistent value
That fight can be almost completely won (even on tactician) simply by casting spirit guardians, which is only a level 3 spell. Or another AoE such as Evard’s Black Tentacles or Spike Growth, which both also hinder movement and deal damage. Wall of stone is not worth the L5 spell slot when there are better options at lower spell levels.
You could just use wall of fire though, or hunger of hadar - for a cheaper spell slot and probably even better outcome m.
@@hobojoe9717 I used spirit guardians too, but they wouldn't have been enough. Stone wall completely trivialised the encounter
I always use plant growth, sleet storm, and spike growth, I doubt the plants and spikes stack but as long as no fire gets in the plants I don't have to worry about concentration too much. And for the shades that spawn on the beach, I use spirit guardians and a very angry Teifling
i used a bottle of grease and a couple arrows of darkness LOL
I think Insect Plague should be ranked A at least. 1. It has a huge area of effect. 2. Not many creatures are resistant to piercing damage. If you center it right on a boss, it may waste two turns just trying to get out of it since the AOE is so large. And it basically stops any spellcasting/range attacks since enemies will always try to get out of it before doing anything else. It's been my late game go-to spell in most fights.
And if you combine it with ice storm the enemies may fall over wasting their turns trying to get out of it further increasing the effectiviness. Or combine it with some other aoe spells.
This is why enchantment wizard is so good, dominate person and hold monster both get 2 targets
One thing larian got right I think is when you go down you lose your action on revive. I find myself using mass cure wounds or healing word as preventative to try and keep characters out of one shot territory bc unlike dnd I can’t just pick them up and use their attacks. Makes healing in combat actually kind of useful in some cases now.
That being said at a table top not having your action in combat just feels bad but I think it works good for a video game.
Been super looking forward to this & the lvl 6 video. Thanks homie!
magical secrets ✨️
I find it hard to choose just two spells with that ability.
@@CasualVeteranGameri find it very easy to choose exactly fireball and counterspell
you can use dethrone with the necromancy staff from the thrumbo quest and use it all the time since it's a necromancy spell
Seeming definitely belongs in D-tier IMO. Though I haven’t finished the game yet (almost done with Act 2) so maybe there are instances where disguising your entire party could be useful, but I sort of doubt it. All the situations I’ve come across so far where a disguise is useful only needed 1 person to be disguised. Unless there are multiple scenarios in Act 3 where a whole party disguise is useful I can’t imagine anyone wasting an L5 spell slot on this.
The strength of disguise spells is that they allow you to use race specific items, e.g. Karlach can use the Silver sword to its full potential if she's disguised as a gith. With Seeming you can donate the disguise to a companion that normally couldn't cast the spell him/herself. It's kind of niche, I personally don't use it and I think the racial item interaction is a glitch that will be patched, but at the moment it's not useless
@@exantiuse497 Sure but that is hardly a reason to use a L5 spell slot IMO. If it was a L1 or L2 slot then maybe I could see it because by Act 3 you have a fair amount of those. And considering they haven’t pitched it yet, I’m not convinced that the racial items working with disguise is a glitch, but we’ll see I guess.
Kinda sucks that Telekinesis is only for throwing in BG3. The main reason (imho) to use the spell in 5e was to Restrain creatures. Also, again in 5e rather than BG3, it's resolved with contested ability checks so things like Bardic Inspiration, Jack of All Trades, Hex, and Enhance Ability can wildly swing your chances of success.
Dethrone spell actually reminds me sort of a Finger of Death spell in some ways
Even rolls are a bit similar and it deal necrotic damage
i think you underestimate telekinesis, it’s not particularly useful when you just throw enemies to deal damage, but you can throw them off a cliff to instantly kill them and there really is a lot of locations where you can do that
You're absolutely right, however I think throwing people off ledges is super lame so I never use it XD
@@exantiuse497 often there’s still a pretty high chance of failure and it’s a 5 level spell so i think it’s fair enough to do it
I used wall of stone once and that was to block my team into a corner to heal back up and take out the two enamies on my side. Usually I just use wall of fire or that druid spell that makes a big hedge pop up.
You need yo layer utility spells to see them shine. Take wall of stone for example, one tav to drop a cloudkill or similar aoe, wall of stone to block off their escape. Doesnt work 100% but where the env allows for it, these are killer combos.
Conjure elemental also adds a ton of HP to your party, which is great if you position them in the thick of things. They soak up tons of damage.
I'm playing on Tactician plus a difficulty mod. Hold Monster is a must since my fighter/paladin can barely hit any enemy without my spellcasters doing something first.
well made list, not much to argue over anything i 100 % agree with you on thease
Thanks! I feel like most people disagree on at least one spell or another.
Excellent, loving your channel. Thank you and keep up the good work. ❤
Regarding Stun and Greater Restoration, [Freedom of Movement] cures stun, and lets you ignore difficult terrain, and prevents roots, and prevents paralysis, and makes you immune to "hold" spells, and is a lv4 spell, and does not require concentration, and lasts until long rest.
So yeah...
A couple of notes on cloudkill:
1. the reposition is a 1/turn free action unlike similar spells like moonbeam.
2. blink normally breaks concen. it doesnt break cloudkill's concen.
it would've been cool if you talked about/demonstrated each variant of conjure elemental.
In dnd campaigns when I am allowed to play as a legacy yuanti I love cloud kill both from an rp perspective and from mechanic due to immunity especially when playing as sorcerer
Immunity to poison is great with cloudkill! Very fitting for Yuan-ti for sure.
Great Restoration should be AOE spell to become somewhat usefull
I was so waiting for it :) really asking myself it is worth muliclassing or do I miss out too much on the high level spells
You should wait until the level 6 spell as they're more easily lost to multiclassing!
@@CasualVeteranGamer Oh I will for sure :)
The good thing about Contagion is that it doesn't put you in Combat
I think dethrone should be at least B tier considering that you can access up to to seven level 5 spell slots every long rest (Markoheshkir, staff of the weave, freecast, spellcrux amulet and wizard restoration) and you can long rest very often in act 3. So having a single target damage spell is always helpful.
Doesn't telekinesis work like throwing, so you do double damage when you throw an enemy at another enemy. Often times you can remove an enemy from battle for 2 turns by throwing them really far away. It's definitely better than seeming. Seeming is only useful if you get caught.
Wall of stone is incredibly useful for robbing sorcerers sundries. Just use the spell to block the guards line of sight and then pickpocket the shopkeeper over and over again until he has nothing left (he will never get mad at you for stealing).
I think Wall of Stone should be probably high B or low A since you can create cover for yourself if you need to maintain concentration.
Flame strike should be the same as destructive wave because destructive wave is a con save where as flame strike is a dex save, a lot of enemies have a lower dex save than con save.
Wall of Stone is amazing for area denial. I find enemies often just don't destroy the wall but resort to (often very weak) ranged attacks.
Insect plague completely trivializes fights versus immobile enemies, that's my favorite way to kill Thorm once he acquires his avatar form.
Something I find really interesting is the disparity in power for some of these spells between bg3 and 5e. Contagion is an AMAZING spell in 5e, and Greater Restoration is better too.
Moment I used Wall of Stone to good effect:
The fight (against) Minsc. You come through a tight spot and there's lots of enemies. So I let a few of them come at me and then cut off the rest with this spell. It took them a long time to destroy the wall and then they had trouble going through the small gap they'd created. It made a big difference. Archers can't really shoot through either.
Maybe A tier but I'd still say B because I didn't end up using it very often
I would place "Insect Plague" higher... it helped me very well, many times already.
on my spore druid run I think my favorite aoe move was to lay down hunger of hadar with a warlock for the blind+difficult terrain, then both cloudkill and ice storm using haste spores with the spore druid
In the Iron Throne I used wall of stone to block off the sector that spawned the Sahuagins once I evacuated the two gondians and Omeluum. That way the mobs had to take the long way around so I didn't have to worry about them
This list is highlighting to me that I don't use level 5 spells, I just up cast lvl 2-3. The AoE are too big or the mechanics are ineffective.
Upcasting hold person is so good against humanoid enemies. I have found myself doing that a fair few number of times.
You can get Scroll of Seeming, and you'll use it so rarely it is not worth memorising.
telekenisis deserves a bump up in use, you dind't use it's best ability, drop the steel watcher on another enemy. they both get damaged. And it's just visually appealing to watch.
Banishing smite for bardadin where you might have savage attacker, on top of divine smite, perfect use of luck of the far realms cast.
I know concentration is annoying, but imagine playing against a caster using hold person on you with no option except to hope you roll a save. It’s necessary. Plus you can just run War Caster at level 8 after maxing your casting attribute.
The staff of Lorrakan (the asshole mage in the tower which wants Dame Ailin) can be used for Destructive Wave as well. A conjuration mage makes it even better, because you won't friendly fire.
I remember trying dethrone and it doing like 40 damage … what a waste
Dethrone has double range which can be handy for starting fights from far away
I liked using myrmidons and using spellcrux to get that slot back and have a walking damage sponge.
Dispel Evil and Good is outclassed by its predecessor simply because this is a video game; you can reload a save. It's probably a god-send in the pen and paper game because you need to have a REALLY forgiving DM to have the same affect as a save system.
The only time it would be better than Protection from G&E is if it's your first playthrough, and you absolute hate reloading saves to win a fight. That, or you're one of those loons that does an iron man run for their first playthrough.
I was able to use wall of stone to block
a certain large optional boss’ devastating all encompassing AOE Charge attack! And by block I mean I cowered behind the stone wall. Was surprised it worked.
I think you judge healing spells harshly because perhaps you are good at the game and do not struggle as much as some average or novice players.
"Why heal when you can just kill them all?" is not really a good judgement of healing spells.
Obviously if I can kill them all, I don't need to heal. - that spell and that decision is not for me as an expert.
I think you should take a more objective approach to how it turns around a bad situation or (potential) downed ally.
If my cleric is already concentrating on a nice CC spell but my thief is at 20hp, I may want to throw down heals instead of swing a 1d8 +1 mace or spend a slot on Guiding Bolt.
I feel like you judged Beacon of Hope the same way in your level 3 video.
"Why would I need max healing when I can just murder them."
I understand you do want to guide your video tone in a direction to let players know "Consider level 4 hold person / command instead of just swing/heal swing/heal" I agree with that.
There are times however when a less skilled player is struggling.
Maybe 1 party member down and 1 party member critical,
And currently you are telling them "Don't heal, use flame strike / Cone of cold".
To be fair, in this specific example he also pointed out that Healing Word was more effective. And that's the thing, there are better healing spells than Mass Cure Wounds and Beacon of Hope - Mass Healing Word and Aid are great AoE healing spells that heal more for less, and they don't get much benefit from Beacon of Hope. Healing has its uses, but bad healing is still bad, the same way that bad damage is bad.
I won't keep going back and forth, but that's kind of my point though.
No, there isn't better healing spells than MCW and BOH.
Healing word, MHW are good for light touch ups and keeping the flow going easily. With items, those heals add up for only a B-Action.
But when you are getting badly beat up, when you've made a few mistakes and you have people down, BOH / MCW can bounce you back in 2 actions. Then maintain the ability to take a lot of abuse and undo it easily.
When you really NEED HEALING 911, healing word / MHW is not better. It is rank 3rd behind potions.
If they introduce a hard core mode with 1 single save file, you will use these spells because they are better. Just my 2 cents
@@normal6483
@@Pkasso89 You don't have to respond, but I wanna point out that the average healing of Mass Cure Wounds is 18.5 per target if you have max wisdom, while a 5th level Aid heals 20 hp per target at the same level even with 10 wisdom. So at a base level on a worse build, Aid does more healing on average. (And is less likely to heal 8 hp because of a bad roll.)
Adding a Beacon of Hope can get you up to 29 per target, for a 10.5 increase and 9 more hp per target, which makes it more reliable, but it costs a 3rd level slot and your concentration. This eats up any defensive spells you might be concentrating on, eats up resources that you might be short on, and requires you to hyper invest in Wisdom to get the benefit. It can also only be done twice in a battle before you have to rely on lower-level healing spells like Mass Healing Word and Aid anyway, so it's still sub-optimal compared to using Aid as your healing spell, which you can keep using when you run out of high level slots.
A buddy and I were fighting Orin and we were struggling against the constant unstoppable status she got, but one turn we got rid of it before my friend's turn, and he used artistry of war, and it just annihilated her when she had like 65% of her health left. It made the fight trivial 😂. S tier spell for sure
We almost there. Level 6 spells.
Contagion is such a cool idea.. I was so excited when I got it, but it turned out to be not that practical. Too bad that it lasts so long to take effect, if it even does :(
Dominate is easily A teir and realistically its S teir. With sorcery points, it effectively kills 4 enemies since 2 enemies are removed and 2 are put in the way, the dominated enemies will be the easiest for the remaining enemies to attack and therefore free up your beaters to make their first few plays without being disrupted. Just make sure to dominate enemies without legandary who can disrupt your concentration, like archers.
Wall of stone is great for sealing groups inside a cloud kill.
Love these vids!
Somehow on my playthrough I managed to find Dethrone but not the summon Deva or the buffed up magic missile spell and now im kicking myself that I got the worst one out of the three unique spells...
That being said I did instakill an enemy with Dethrone once so maybe it isn't all that bad. I do understand that it is bad by comparison with the other two, but it's not a hopeless spell, it can do quite a bit of damage in the right circumstance. I'd give it C tier but that might just because it's the only one of those that I found :p I'll make sure to get the other two on my other playthroughs when I get to act 3 though, for sure.
I mean, it does make sense that insect plague would be BUGGED at the moment, am I right? XD
36:50 I have used it rare but its been cool sometimes. Sometimes AI says fuck it and goes all the way around. I used it in the steel watch foundry and specfically the sharran temple. You can kinda split them in half. (A little wonky cause temple terrain is weird)
I'd move Cloudkill down 2 whole tiers. You usually just get a single turn of mediocre damage because the enemy A.I. ALWAYS moves out of it after the initial cast, and gets right in your face, preventing you from effectively using the "re-cast" ability, AND if you do re-cast it you are just taking a turn to move the spell, not doing anything new or useful like, say, casting another spell like Haste or something. You could have just fireballed a crowd instead, for more damage on a level 3 slot, or quite a bit more if you up-cast to the same level 5 slot Cloudkill requires.
Then there's the problem that moving melee fighters into the cloud to attack foes damages those friendlies as well, so you either take friendly fire or don't get to move in and attack with them. Stupid. And the final thing that this spell has against it is that so many enemies and objects are either resistant or immune to Poison damage in this game. Hell, you can cast Glyph of Warding at level 3, do the same amount of damage as Cloudkill, and choose between 5 different elements and 2 effects, and even up-cast it to the same level as Cloudkill to do even more damage for the same tier of spell slot.
Cloudkill is just bad, and at the very least it needs re-worked so that inside the cloud is considered difficult terrain so it can slow down enemies trying to move out of it, you can move the cloud as a free action on your turn, and anyone in it needs to save or be rendered unconscious for a turn like it did in the original BG. Then it would be worth using.
Hold Monster and Cloudkill are the only two level 5 spells I ever used. And only used Cloudkill from Scrolls. Hold monster though, 100% all the time.
Destructive Wave = A for Light Cleric, S for Tempest Cleric.
30+5d6 is way better than 10d6
You can planar binding Raphael, S tier :)
You are severely underestimating greater restoration’s ability to compress multiple spell functions into one spell known/prepared slot. Greater restoration frees up your cleric and other support characters from having to keep calm emotions, remove curse, basilisk oil etc ready and means they can prepare other highly useful spells.
Frees up supports from carrying basilisk oil? Srsly?
=/
I don't see how dominate person could be a C tier. Come on, between almost erasing 5+ enemies with an AoE or have a usually low chance to have a single enemy converted, dominate person is just vastly inferior.
Same applies to hold monster and planar binding
Are the unique spells always prepared? If so, Dethrone seems like a good necromancer spell, if it's in that school.
Banishing smite can stack with a lvl 4 divine smite for some crazy damge
I hit one attack yesterday with banishing smite that did 207 with critical.
Empowered evocation GIGA BUFFS Artistry of war. (And also giga buffs magic missile.)
Haarleep is the only one in who charms people in Act 3,