Blasting in D&D? Not so Hot

It's a good question. Let me punch some numbers and see how it looks. I'll get back to you tomorrow

Treantmonk's Temple

What do you think of a high AC and Blaster build like Tempest Cleric 2/Evoker Wizard 18? Point being to be a wizard wearing heaving armor (which can be done fairly easily with a Mountain Dwarf). Take custom lineage for respectable stats in the right abilities. This would allow you to channel divinity to do destructive wrath with thunder and lightning spells. Then say at 14th level, after maximizing intelligence, you take the metamagic adept feat to transmute other spells to thunder or lightning damage and combine it with destructive wrath to maximize the damage (granted it can only be done once per short rest). I know some are thinking why not Tempest Cleric 2/Sorcerer 18 but I really want to be able to Sculpt my spells to avoid damaging my allies and I don't believe a sorcerer can do that (closest thing is careful spell). How much would maximizing the damage with Destructive Wrath help with the scaling? Thanks.

Good and valid points. How does the proverbial “sadly boring martial” (your BSF) compare in damage? Yes blast spells do not scale all that well but how do you increase effectiveness for martial characters while you are improving blaster efficiency.

Glenn Wilson

Pretty sure scaling like this is intention, as not to overshadow other classes. Plus damage roughly scales 1/4th the speed of HP increase of monsters, so in a hypothetical party of 4x blast builds it would still work out kiiinda fine. But yea, there's lotsa better ways to deliver damage to big bads. Still digging the idea of minor secodary effects - same reason Synaptic Static is always a fair consideration (plus Int save, plus psychic damage).

Nicely presented. Near the end, I couldn't help but think, "This sounds like some Treantmonk Monk Variant spell rebalancing is in order." I know it would be a big undertaking, but I'd buy this from you on DM's Guild. It wouldn't even need overly ambitious artwork (or any, as far as I am concerned), since it's a straight rebalancing of our existing spellbook.

Element Zero