Great example of a mid-level control wizard

posted by /u/Sinistrad

-11th level Elf Wizard (Foresight Diviner) of the Scarab Sages- Oppsition Schools: Illusion/Enchantment Racial trait: Fleet-foot (+2 init, Run feat) replaces Weapon Familiarity and Keen Senses Stats: STR - 7 DEX - 18 CON - 12 INT - 28 (20 + 6 headband + 2 levels) WIS - 7 CHA - 7 Initiative Total: 22 Traits: General Trait: Warrior of Old +2 initiative General Trait: Magical Lineage: Slow Familiar: Greensting Scorpion (or any other that can hide in your robes and give you +4 initiative) School Powers: Forewarned (Su): +5 initiative, always act in the Surprise Round Prescience (Su): Free action at the beginning of your turn to save a die roll, you can use it in place of any roll you are required to make. Foretell (Su): Grant a luck bonus to nearby allies or penalize nearby enemies by predicting the immediate future (handy when I don't feel like casting spells) Feats: Elf: Run Wizard: Spell Focus: Transmutation Lv1: Improved Initiative Lv3: Greater Spell Focus: Transmutation Lv5: Heighten Spell Wiz5: Preferred Spell: Slow Lv7: Yuelral's Blessing Lv9: Ambuscading Spell Wiz10: Time Stutter (Su) Lv11: Persistent Spell Gear: Cracked Dusty Rose Prism Ioun Stone (+1 intiative) Lesser Quicken Rod +6 Headband of INT (Escape Artist, Fly, Knowledge Engineering) Sandals of Quick Reaction (move + standard in the surprise round) 2x Spring Loaded Wrist Sheathes with Grease and Surecasting wands Wayfinder with clear spindle ioun stone ALL THE TANGLEFOOT BAGS Handy Haversack (Could almost go with an Efficient Quiver instead) Lesser Extend Rod Pearl of Power Key Spells: Heightened Awareness (Insurance against low initiative rolls. Also, knowledge of enemies is a powerful weapon.) See Invisible Pilfering Hand Grease Stone Call Euphoric Cloud SLOW with tanglefoot bags used as alchemical power components Haste Shifting Sand Black Tentacles Hungry Earth Obsidian Flow Wall of Force Tar Pool Emergency Force Sphere Disintegrate True Seeing Low level tactics (1-4): Grease enemy weapons or trip them with it, cast Break on armor shields and weapons, Hydraulic Push enemies into hazards, Thunderstomp to trip enemies next to your allies, Euphoric Cloud to split encounters, Stone Call for a huge aoe of guaranteed damage and difficult terrain, See Invisible often (it averts TPKs) Mid level tactics (5-8): Slow is your bread and butter from now on. Sacrifice your Divination slots to cast it! Surprise round move+standard because sandals! Slap groups of enemies with Slow and burn some tanglefoot bags to debuff the everliving shit out of them. They'll be at 1/4th their normal speed and have a decent chance of being glued to the spot or falling from the sky (DC 15 reflex at a -3 penalty). Even if they make the strength check or do the 15 slashing damage, they're staggered and have wasted another turn. Also at this level, Stinking Cloud is good for splitting up encounters, but it is more disruptive to the party. Shifting Sands is amazing if you happen to be on natural terrain, and combines well with Slow. At 7+ Slow, Obsidian Flow, and Black Tentacles are all amazing options for the Surprise Round. Any time you cast Black Tentacles always burn a Prescience that round. If it's a good roll use it for your Black Tentacles roll. High level tactics (9-11): You'll have access to Time Stutter and quickened spells at this point. Identifying a crucial encounter to use Time Stutter on is important, but the results are amazing. At 11 your Surprise Round should look something like this (separated the various options with "/"): Quickened Tanglefoot Slow -> Move -> Time Stutter -> Quickened Shifting Sands/Stinking Cloud -> Black Tentacles/Hungry Earth/Tar Pool -> Move -> End Surprise -> 1st round of normal combat, you still go first and enemies are still flat-footed -> Quickened Slow/Shifting Sand -> Obsidian Flow/Black Tentacles/Hungry Earth. Congratulations, you just got the drop on some enemies and cast five spells before they could even take an action. They're all likely staggered, entangled, and possibly grappled, wasting their precious single action per round attempting to extricate themselves from your myriad impediments. Toss a Haste to your party and enjoy the show. Exception: Always use Prescience at the beginning of the surprise round if there are clear targets. If you roll a natural 20, save it. Set it aside. Quicken a True Strike. Cast Disintegrate on the biggest baddest enemy, use your natural 20 to threaten a crit, and your True Strike to avoid any miss chance and almost guarantee a successful confirmation roll. The DC is 27, and they get a -2 penalty on the save. On a failure, that's 44d6 damge (avg 154 dmg). Other Tricks: Grease: Your headband should get Escape Artist before anything else. If you are grappled or need to use Escape Artist, you can access a Grease wand as a swift action, and then use it as a standard, even in a grapple. This gives you a +10 to your CMD to avoid the grapple and a +10 to any Escape Artist or CMB checks to get out. This will then stack with anyone who tries a Liberating Command to set you free. Alternatively, if your friend is grappled, do not cast Liberating Command as an immediate action, using spells slots (not wands) cast grease normally and then cast Liberating Command. At level 11 this adds up to a +30 on their check to break free. Prescience (Su): In addition to using it for Black Tentacles and Disintegrate, at lower levels waiting until a good Prescience roll to try things like Pilfering Hand or Hydraulic Push is a fantastic idea. Later, use Quickened True Strike + Prescience for truly spectacular combat maneuvers when you really MUST disarm an enemy or shove them a long distance (like through their own Blade Barrier!). The key is to pull of really impressive tricks at JUST the right time to swing the encounter. Disarm the BBEG's nasty weapon despite his ridiculous CMD! Trip that baddie while three of your friends are threatening it. Prescience, even when the roll is not great, lets you know what you're working with rather than praying for a good roll. There's a lot of situations where it becomes "don't roll a one." If your saved die is not a one, there ya go! Use it! If you can't use a low roll, choose another action that's less reliant on your own die rolls. It especially shines any time you have an obstacle to overcome. If you need to make a risky jump or climb check, burn a couple Prescience rolls until you have a guaranteed success. Monster with a gaze attack? Keep your eyes closed until you roll well enough, then open them, cast any spells you want, make your save, and then close your eyes again before your turn is over. The list goes on and these are only a few of the things you can do. Contingent nonsense: Contingent Action + Contingency are great spells. You can put a Contingent Action in a Contingency. Make the Contingency trigger as normal and release the Contingent Action. Set the Contingent Action to something universal that would always trigger. Now you have a Contingent Action that lasts days per level instead of minutes. My favorites are a single move when I speak a command word (useful when VERY BAD THINGS are happening in a room, just leave!), Liberating Command (so you can use it on yourself), Catatonia (play dead and even count as a corpse for most effects for the duration), or any obvious abjuration spells if you know what's coming up (like lots of fire damage). Use slow to "counterspell": Non-damaging spells incur a concentration check. If affected by a non-damaging spell, the concentration DC for the enemy is your Slow save DC + the spell level they're casting, and if you burn a tanglefoot bag, they have to make another concentration check 15 + spell level from being entangled as well. This is better than counterspell because the odds off success are roughly the same or better, but you get the benefit of slapping that enemy caster with a nasty debuff as well. TL;DR Super high initiative and a good variety of mostly transmutation spells to completely shut down enemies in the surprise round. Also, try to maneuver things to protect your allies and always ask to make knowledge checks and pass that information to your team mates.