Wizard

A few unintelligible words and a fleeting gesture carry more power than a battleaxe, when they are the word, and gestures of a wizard. These simple acts make magic seem easy but they only hint at the time the wizard must spend poring over her spellbook preparing each spell for casting, and the years before that spent in apprenticeship to learn the arts of magic.

Wizards depend on intensive study to create their magic. They examine musty old tomes, debate magical theory with their peers, and practice minor magics whenever they can. For a wizard, magic is not a talent but a difficult, rewarding art.

Adventures: Wizards conduct their adventures with caution and forethought. When prepared, they can use their spells to devastating effect. When caught by surprise, they are vulnerable. They seek knowledge, power, and the resources to conduct their studies. They may also have any of the noble or ignoble motivations that other adventurers have.

Characteristics: The wizard's strength is her spells. Everything else is secondary. She learns new spells as she experiments and grows in experience, and she can also learn them from other wizards. In addition to learning new spells, over time a wizard learns to manipulate her spells so they go farther, work better, or are improved in some other way. Some wizards prefer to specialize in a certain type of magic. Specialization makes a wizard more powerful in her chosen field, but prevents her from being able to cast some of the spells that lie outside her field. (See School Specialization)

A wizard can call a familiar: a small, magical animal companion that serves her. For some wizards, their familiars are their only true friends.

Alignment: Overall, wizards show a slight tendency toward law over chaos because the study of magic rewards those who are disciplined. Illusionists and transmuters, however, are masters of deception and change, respectively. They favor chaos over law.

Religion: Wizards commonly revere Boccob, god of magic. Some, especially necromancers or simply more misanthropic wizards, prefer Wee Jas, goddess of magic and death. Evil necromancers are known to worship Nerull, god of death. Wizards in general, however, are more devoted to their studies than to their spiritual sides.

Background: Wizards recognize each other as comrades or rivals. Even wizards from very different cultures or magical traditions have much in common because they all conform to the universal laws of magic. Unlike fighters or rogues, wizards see themselves as members of a distinct, if diverse, group. In civilized lands where wizards study in academies, schools, or guilds, wizards also identify themselves and others according to membership in these formal organizations. While a guild magician may look down her nose at a rustic wizard who learned his arts from a doddering hermit, she nevertheless can't deny the rustic's identity as a wizard.

Races: Humans take to magic for any of their varied reasons: curiosity, ambition, lust for power, or just personal inclination. Human wizards tend to be practical innovators, creating new spells or using old spells creatively.

Elves are fascinated by magic, and many of them become wizards for love of the art. Elven wizards see themselves as artists, and they hold magic in high regard as a wondrous mystery as opposed to more pragmatic human wizards who see magic more as a set of tools or tricks.

Illusion magic comes so simply to gnomes that becoming an illusionist is just natural to brighter and more talented gnomes. Gnome wizards that don't specialize in the school of illusion are rare, but they don't suffer under any special stigma.

Half-elf wizards feel both the elf's attraction to magic and the human's drive to conquer and understand. Some of the most powerful wizards are half-elves.

Dwarf and halfling wizards are rare because their societies don't encourage the study of magic. Half-orc wizards are rare because few half-orcs have the brains necessary for wizardry.

Drow (evil, subterranean elves) are commonly wizards, but wizards are quite rare among the savage humanoids.

Other Classes: Wizards prefer to work with members of other classes. They love to cast their spells from behind strong fighters, to "magic up" rogues and send them out to scout, and to rely on the divine healing of clerics. They may find certain types, such as sorcerers, rogues, and bards, not quite serious enough, but they're not judgmental.

Role: The wizards role depends somewhat on her spell selection, but most wizards share certain similarities in function. They are among the most offensively minded of the spellcasting classes, with a broad range of options available for neutralizing enemies. Some wizards provide great support to their comrades by way of their spells, while others may focus on divination or other facets of wizardry.

Game Rule Information

Wizards have the following game statistics:

Abilities: Intelligence determines how powerful a spell a wizard can cast, how many spells she can cast, and how hard those spells are to resist. To cast a spell, a wizard must have an Intelligence score of 10 + the spell's level. In addition, a wizard gets bonus spells based on Intelligence. The Difficulty Class of a saving throw against a wizard's spell is 10 + the spell's level + the wizard's Intelligence modifier. High Dexterity is helpful for a wizard, who typically wears little or no armor, because it provides her with an Armor Class bonus. A good Constitution gives a wizard extra hit points, a resource that she is otherwise very low on.

Alignment: Any

Class Skills

The wizard's class skills are Concentration, Craft, Decipher Script, Knowledge (all skills taken individually), Profession, and Spellcraft.

Skill Points at 1st Level: (2 + Int modifier) x 4.

Skill Points at each additional level: 2 + Int modifier.

Class Features

All of the following are class features of the wizard.

Weapon and Armor Proficiency: Wizards are proficient with the club, dagger, heavy crossbow, light crossbow, and quarterstaff, but not with any type of armor or shield. Armor of any type interferes with a wizard's movements, which can cause her spells with somatic, components to fail.

Spells: A wizard casts arcane spells (the same type of spells available to sorcerers and bards), which are drawn from the sorcerer/wizard spell list. A wizard must choose and prepare her spells ahead of time (see below).

To learn, prepare, or cast a spell, the wizard must have an Intelligence score equal to at least 10 + the spell level (Int 10) for 0-level spells, Int 11 for 1st-level spells and so forth). The Difficulty Class for a saving throw against a wizard's spell is 10 + the spell level + the wizard's Intelligence modifier.

Like other spellcasters, a wizard can cast only a certain number of spells of each spell level per day. Her base daily spell allotment is given on the table below: The Wizard. In addition, she receives bonus spells per day if she has a high Intelligence score (see Ability Modifiers and Bonus Spells. Unlike a bard or sorcerer, a wizard may know any number of spells (see Writing a New Spell into a Spellbook). She must choose and prepare her spells ahead of time by getting a good night's sleep and spending 1 hour studying her spellbook. While studying, the wizard decides which spells to prepare (see Preparing Wizard Spells).

Bonus Languages: A wizard may substitute Draconic for one of the bonus languages available to the character because of her race (see Races). Many ancient tomes of magic are written in Draconic, and apprentice wizards often learn it as part of their studies.

Familiar: A wizard can obtain a familiar. Doing so takes 24 hours and uses up magical materials that cost 100 gp. A familiar is a magical beast that resembles a small animal and is unusually tough and intelligent. The creature serves as a companion and servant. See Familiars.

The wizard chooses the kind of familiar he gets. As the wizard advances in level, his familiar also increases in power.

If the familiar dies or is dismissed by the wizard, the wizard must attempt a DC 15 Fortitude saving throw. Failure means he loses 200 experience points per wizard level; success reduces the loss to one-half that amount. However, a wizard's experience point total can never go below 0 as the result of a familiar's demise or dismissal. For example, suppose that Hennet is a 3rd-level wizard with 3,230 XP when his owl familiar is killed by a bugbear. Hennet makes a successful saving throw, so he loses 300 XP, dropping him below 3,000 XP and back to 2nd level (see Level Loss for rules for losing levels). A slain or dismissed familiar cannot be replaced for a year and day. A slain familiar can be raised from the dead just as a character can be, and it does not lose a level or a Constitution point when this happy event occurs.

Scribe Scroll: At 1st level, a wizard gains Scribe Scroll as a bonus feat. This feat enables her to create magic scrolls (see Scribe Scroll, and Creating Magic Items).

Bonus Feats: At 5th, 10th, 15th, and 20th level, a wizard gains a bonus feat. At each such opportunity, she can choose a metamagic feat, an item creation feat, or Spell Mastery. The wizard must still meet all prerequisites for a bonus feat, including caster level minimums. (See Feat Search to find feat descriptions of feats and their prerequisites.) These bonus feats are in addition to the feat that a character of any class gets every three levels (as given on Experience and level-Dependent Benefits). The wizard is not limited to the categories of item creation feats, metamagic feats, or Spell Mastery when choosing these feats.

Spellbooks: A wizard must study her spellbook each day to prepare her spells (see Preparing Wizard Spells). She cannot prepare any spell not recorded in her spellbook, except for read magic, which all wizards can prepare from memory.

A wizard begins play with a spellbook containing all 0-level wizard spells (except those from her prohibited school or schools, if any; see School Specialization) plus three 1st-level spells of your choice. For each point of Intelligence bonus the wizard has (see Ability Modifiers and Bonus Spells), the spellbook holds one additional 1st-level spell of your choice. At each new wizard level, she gains two new, spells of any spell level or levels that she can cast (based on her new wizard level) for her spellbook. For example, when a wizard attains 5th level, she can cast 3rd-level spells. At this point, she can add two new 3rd-level spells to her spellbook, or one 2nd-level spell and one 3rd-level spell, or any combination of two spells between 1st and 3rd level. At any time, a wizard can also add spells found in other wizards' spellbooks to her own (see Adding Spells to a Wizard's Spellbook).

WizardHit Die: d4Spells per day
LvlBABFortRefWillSpecial01st2nd3rd4th5th6th7th8th9th
1st+0+0+0+2Summon familiar, Scribe Scroll31--------
2nd+1+0+0+3-42--------
3rd+1+1+1+3-421-------
4th+2+1+1+4-432-------
5th+2+1+1+4Bonus feat4321------
6th+3+2+2+5-4332------
7th+3+2+2+5-44321-----
8th+4+2+2+6-44332-----
9th+4+3+3+6-444321----
10th+5+3+3+7Bonus feat444332----
11th+5+3+3+7-4444321---
12th+6/+1+4+4+8-4444332---
13th+6/+1+4+4+8-44444321--
14th+7/+2+4+4+9-44444332--
15th+7/+2+5+5+9Bonus feat444444321-
16th+8/+3+5+5+10-444444332-
17th+8/+3+5+5+10-4444444321
18th+9/+4+6+6+11-4444444332
19th+9/+4+6+6+11-4444444433
20th+10/+5+6+6+12Bonus feat4444444444

Wizard Spells

In the Realms

Wizards, like other people who can turn a person into a toadstool with a glance, tend to be well respected or simply feared by common folk. The mightiest mortals in Faerûn are powerful wizards such as Elminster, Manshoon, and Szass Tam. Extending their lives for centuries (or, in some cases, choosing the path of lichdom and eternal undeath), these dangerous magic-wielders grow ever wiser and stronger in the ways of the Art as centuries pass by.

Most practicing wizards learned the basics of the Art as apprentices to more experienced wizards. This slow form of education is reliable, and the work an apprentice performs has the advantage of paying for her studies. Other would-be wizards graduated from one of the universities of magic, common in the lands of Lantan and Halruaa in the distant south but uncommon in the northern parts of Faerûn.

North of Halruaa, the best-known university of magic is located in Silverymoon. Smaller universities of magic are known in areas such as Waterdeep, Sembia, Chessenta, the Vilhon Reach, Impiltur, and Tethyr, with an illusionist's school recently opened in Damara. The methods of education used by the Red Wizards of Thay are equally as effective, even if fully half of those who begin such studies die in their torturous training regimen.

Wizards also have access to the additional familiars listed in the sorcerer entry.

Preferred Character Regions: Lands where wizards are relatively common include Calimshan, Chessenta, Cormyr, Damara, Evermeet, Halruas, the Lake of Steam, Mulhorand, Rashemen, Sembia, Silverymoon, Tethyr, Thay, Unther, Waterdeep, and the Western Heartlands. Races with similar traditions include drow, moon elves, sun elves, wood elves, and deep and rock gnomes, who frequently specialize as illusionists.

Epic Wizard

To the epic wizard, knowledge is power, and the quest for knowledge is never-ending. The secrets of greater magic and the creation of artifacts tempt the epic wizard, who pursues these secrets across the planes.

Hit Die: d4.

Skill Points at Each Additional Level: 2 + Int modifier.

Spells: The wizard's caster level is equal to her class level. The wizard's number of spells per day does not increase after 20th level. Each time the wizard attains a new level, she learns two new spells of any level or levels that she can cast (according to her new level).

Familiar: The epic wizard's familiar continues to increase in power. Every two levels higher than 20th (22nd, 24th, and so on) the familiar's natural armor bonus and Intelligtnce each increase by +1. The familiar's spell resistance is equal to the master's level + 5. At 21st level and again every ten levels higher than 21st, the familiar gains the benefit of the Familiar Spell epic feat for a spell of its master's choice.

Bonus Feats: The epic wizard gains a bonus feat every three levels higher than 20th (23rd, 26th, and so on).

Planar Substitution Levels

While other spellcasters may have a vested interest in a particular planar viewpoint, the wizard prefers a more open policy toward the planes. To a wizard, the planes represent knowledge and power, and the wizard who can learn the secrets of the planes without regard to those planes' alignments or other traits is a true master of magic.

More so than many other classes, the wizard already has the ability to customize her abilities with an eye to the planes, simply through the spells she learns and prepares each day. If a wizard learns plane shift and planar tolerance, then the caster is self-customized to adventure on the planes. But the planar wizard goes a step beyond this adaptation, learning to channel the pure power of the planes themselves in her spells.

Requirements

To take a wizard planar substitution level, a character must be about to take her 6th, 10th, or 14th level of wizard.

Class Skills

Wizard planar substitution levels have the class skills of the standard wizard class. Skill Points at Each Level: 2 + Int modifier.

Class Features

All of the following are features of the wizard's planar substitution levels.

Unimpeded Magic (Su): A 6th-level planar wizard learns to overcome planar impediments to her spellcasting. When casting a wizard spell that would normally be impeded because of a plane's magic traits (such as a fire spell on the Elemental Plane of Water), the spell functions normally without need for a Spellcraft check.

This benefit replaces the 3rd-level spell slot gained by a standard wizard at 6th level. From now on, the wizard can prepare one less 3rd-level wizard spell than indicated above.

Planar Spellcasting (Su): A 10th-level planar wizard learns to channel planar energy through her spells. Upon gaining this ability, the wizard chooses to make her spells anarchic (chaotic), axiomatic (lawful), celestial (good), or fiendish (evil). Her spells gain the indicated alignment descriptor. The wizard can choose any of the four options, regardless of her own alignment. Against creatures of the opposed alignment, she gains a +1 bonus on caster level checks made to overcome spell resistance, and her spell save DCs are increased by 1. If she casts a spell that normally has the same alignment descriptor that she would apply, or whenever she casts a spell on a plane with an alignment trait that matches the alignment she chose, the bonuses increase to +2. These effects apply only to the character's wizard spells; any spellcasting ability gained from another class functions normally.

For example, the spells of a wizard choosing to cast fiendish spells gain the evil descriptor. She gains a +1 bonus on caster level checks to overcome the spell resistance of good-aligned creatures, and good-aligned creatures attempting to save against her spells do so against a DC that is 1 higher than normal. If she casts a spell that would normally be an evil spell (such as contagion), or if she casts any spell on an evil-aligned plane (such as the Abyss or the Nine Hells), these values would increase by 2 instead of by 1.

This benefit replaces the bonus feat gained by a standard wizard at 10th level, as well as the two spells a standard 10th-level wizard learns for free.

Enhanced Magic (Su): A 14th-level planar wizard learns how to channel the essence of a specific plane's enhanced magic trait through her spells. Upon gaining this ability, the wizard must choose a specific plane that she has visited (other than the Material Plane). Three times per day, the wizard may spend a standard action to channel that plane's magical essence. The next spell she casts (if cast within 1 minute) is enhanced as if she were casting it on that plane, applying any magic traits normal to that plane. This ability doesn't apply any other planar magic traits to the wizard's spells, such as wild magic or impeded magic.

For example, a planar wizard who chose to channel the essence of the Elemental Plane of Fire would maximize and enlarge the next spell she cast after activating this ability (as if she had applied the Maximize Spell and Enlarge Spell metamagic feats, but without adjusting the spell slot used), as long as that spell has the fire descriptor.

This benefit replaces the 7th-level spell slot gained by a standard wizard at 14th level. From now on, the wizard can prepare one less 7th-level wizard spell than indicated above.

Wizard Planar Substitution Levels
LvlBABFortRefWillSpecial
6th+3+2+2+5Unimpeded magic
10th+5+3+3+7Planar spellcasting
14th+7/+2+4+4+9Enhanced magic

Aquatic Variation

Wizards in aquatic environments might specialize in magic of winds and waters, or in abjuration magic to protect those who dare the waves. They are slightly less likely to found on board ships than sorcerers, being more inclined to study and not wishing to risk their precious books. Some wizards make a career of creating magic items to assist with life on or under the water, such as everfull sails, magically enhanced vessels, devices for breathing underwater, and so on.

Familiar: Sorcerers and wizards in aquatic regions can obtain a familiar appropriate to that environment; see Aquatic Familiars (below).

Treat each familiar as the kind of animal linked to for the purpose of HD, attacks, and other basic statistics. Costs and effort involved in obtaining aquatic familiars are identical to those required for other familiars.

Aquatic Familiars
FamiliarSpecial
AlbatrossMaster gains a +1 bonus on Spot checks
EelMaster gains a +3 bonus on Escape Artist checks
Fish owlMaster gains a +3 bonus on Spot checks in shadows
OctopusMaster gains a +3 bonus on grapple checks
Parrot*Master gains a +3 bonus on Appraise checks
Sea snakeMaster gains a +3 bonus on Bluff checks
* A parrot familiar can speak a language of its master's choice as a supernatural ability.

Alternative Class Feature: Wizard of Sun and Moon (Dungeonscape)

You have attuned yourself to the motions of the cosmos. The sun does more than mark off the day as it travels across the sky. It alters the magic you command and the spells available to you. When in the sun's warm embrace, you can cast one set of spells. When you journey into the dark, or when the moon hangs in the sky, you gain access to a second set of spells. This alternative class feature does not give you more spells to cast; it gives you more to prepare and choose from.

Level: 1st.

Replaces: If you select this alternative class feature, you do not gain a familiar.

Benefit: You can designate one slot per spell level above 0 as the union of sun and moon. When you prepare your spells, you can prepare two spells for one or more of these slots. Designate one of the two as a spell of the moon and the other as a spell of the sun. You can cast the moon spell only if you are underground or aboveground during the night, and you can cast the sun spell only when you are aboveground during daylight hours. If you cast one of these paired spells, it takes effect normally, but you no longer can use that spell slot to cast the spell from the opposite environment.

For example, Mialee is a 5th-level wizard with Intelligence 16. She selects this class option and prepares her spells for the day as follows. In the list, a superscript M denotes a spell of the moon, which can be cast only underground, or at night aboveground, and a superscript S denotes a spell of the sun, which can be cast only aboveground in daylight.

If Mialee casts daylight while underground, she marks that spell plus its environmentally opposite spell of the same level (in this case, displacement) off her list of prepared spells.

Source: Player's Handbook

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