Larian Studios Forums Baldur's Gate III Baldur's Gate III - Build Discussion Creative ways to play Wizard

Hi, with Baldur's Gate 3 I have entered the amazing world of DND and I absolutely love being a Wizard. Casting spells, robes, staffs are my vibe, but I know how creative BG3 can be. There are numerous ways to do even just one quest, goblin camp for example, and this makes me love the game so much more. But I feel like with the Wizard I just find myself casting damage dealing spells, even though I love spells like Arcane Lock, Hold Person etc. I was just wondering how do you guys combine your spells, what kind of build(s) do you do, how you get creative with spells, how do you play your Wizard? I'd love to hear. it because I kinda feel like I am missing a bit.

well i kinda like sorc more unless you want summoner, similar spells but meta magic is riduculas the only thing sorc cant do is doing any summon spell unless you use scrolls

I have used Arcane lock to shut out aggro from enemy forces outside the room I am in. I use Knock all the time and seldom need a rogue. I make use of a wide variety of spells.

Wizard is ideal for experimentation, my goal is typically to get ALL spells on a Wizard.

Which is why I prefer to usually only have one of them, because otherwise it would get too expensive.

With Cantrips obviously you cant have all of them, but of the non-damage ones I would only go for Light or maybe True Strike; the later to make sure the next expensive highlevel spell based on an attack hits. The damage ones, well, I take Eldritch Blast on level 4 by picking Spellsniper as first feat. Other than that Acid Splash is the only area attack Cantrip (very small area though) and leaves acid on the ground, Ray of Frost slows opponents (but only a little) and freezes water surfaces (or acid on the ground), Shocking Grasp makes opponents lose their reaction, Bone Chill makes healing impossible for one turn, Fire Bolt of course can put many things on fire, and Poison Spray does the most damage but you have to get close and of course many things are immune to poison.

Ritual spells can be cast outside battle for free. Which is why its good to have them: Longstrider (cast on everyone after rest), Enhanced Leap (10 turns, good to cast on the tank right before battle starts so they can move around very quickly), Disguise Self (basically a musthave for Drow but also very useful utility), Detect Thoughts (Concentration, Int/Wis Save, so a Wizard is ideal for this).

Good spells:

- Mage Armor - nobrainer until you get gear that does the same and frees the spellslot

- Magic Missle - If everything else fails, Magic Missle always does damage

- Enlarge (Concentration) - Like a lesser version of Haste really, you give your party tank better stats by enlarging them. Note this conflicts with other Concentration spells.

- Hold Person (Concentration, Wis Save) - Uber strong when it hits, but you need to take in consideration its a Wisdom save. So its bad against most spellcasters, and Paladins.

- Misty Step - Get into safety, quite useful to have

- Haste (Concentration) - As mentioned here the Metamagic is really great to have, so you could haste two instead of just one person. But its still good even if its only one person.

- Counterspell - Really basically a musthave, destroy the opponent spells

- Animate Dead - If you go the Necromancer road, you get this spell for free, AND you get two summons, AND they are stronger.

I wish they would expand the ritual spells. Spells like Knock should have a ritual option and there are a number of cleric spells that should be ritual in usage.

Haste, as it exists in game I would like to see concentration removed from.

I want to learn all spells as well! Wizards have the most spells in the game i think and that makes sense, and I love the spells compared to other games. They are often seen as damage dealer or elementalist which is fine by all means but magic to me is more than dealing damage, it is also fun. That is why polymorph is one of my favorite spells as well as the Arcane Lock/Knock, Otto's Irresistible Dance etc. Because in other games it is just Fireball! Ice Spear! go do damage. Magic is so much more than that, and I think BG3 has done amazing job with that.
But still I find myselff casting damage dealing spells. So I am looking for a creative build like, casting grease and firebolt creates a fire surface! or Reduce someone and then throw him etc.
Well it seems I going to try Haste for sure!
Any other ideas? ^^ <3

meanwhile me with lot of spells spaming fireball and scorching ray like there is no tomorow ...

That’s all fine shooting fireball and killing everyone is just amazing! I just want to combine spells I guess.

I haven't really dug deep into wizard personally, I did run Gale in my party the whole time though. For basic combo used Ray of Frost spell with Mourning Frost staff & Snowburst Ring.

Common list of spells active for me:
Enlarge/Reduce - cast on Karlach my frenzied barb.
Misty Step - from his boots, helps a lot
Tasha'ss Hideious Laughter - one of my favorite spells
Flaming Sphere - this guy helps soak up damage

others are just insert damage spell, nothing special

Everybody focuses on combat, where sorcerer will always outshine wizard. I’m playing a wizard right now and I’m having a ball, but not because of combat. The utility is awesome. That’s where wizards are justified. Being able to swap out your spells whenever you are not in combat was a great choice from Larian. I’m constantly find different spells to change the way I interact with and explore the map, or deal with certain quests.

For my build, I went with necromancer since minion master isn’t something sorcerer can pull of to give this play a different feel. Creating a bunch of zombies is good, silly fun.

True Strike is pffft, just a waste of an action.


My favourite combo at the moment needs a Warlock to help, while Hunger of Hadar (Warlock spell) is great on its own for slowing down a big horde of enemies if you then have another caster add Sleet Storm which has an even bigger AOE it becomes another level of calamity.



Be careful learning them all too quickly, At level 9 I had learned everything possible from scribing scrolls I had collected and when it was time to level up to 10 I couldn't as the game wants you to choose 2 spells with no option to skip it.
Now I just ignore a lot of the junk spells I'd never really use to make sure I've got something to pick at level ups if need be.

Now thats a hilarious bug.

Even more hilarious because BG2 also had this bug, but with weapon skill points.

If you played Beastmaster (Ranger kit) (n) / Cleric dualclass, you would get into the levelup screen and couldnt get out anymore because there was no more weapon skills to pick. The EEs fixed that bug, I think the original games still have it.

With BG3 its even less understandable because at least nobody really ever played Beastmaster (all Ranger kits suck in BG2, they always take away metal armor and their benefits are very meh).

This is another reason why I love playing a wizard. Adapting different situations with your spell book just hits different.

Now that's what I was looking for! Combining Hunger of Hadar and Sleet Storm! I would have never thought. I wonder how that looks in the battlefield ^^


I am in no rush! I mean whenever I find a scrolls I learn it, but I am not looking to find more scrolls. If they are in my way I collect them haha

It looks good lol, I also have a wizard in my party, Wiz, Warlock, Sorc, Cleric

So I can also drop a Wall of Fire into the Sleet Storm Hunger of Hadar mess and Cleric can throw Glyph of Warding Lightning so it gets rounds where the ice melts from fire and becomes a big electrified trap.

For the record its REALLY confusing when two people use the exact same avatar.

(Other than the simple first letter default avatar, anyway)

changed it lol

dont forget to get black hole on at least 2 characters xD