Analysis Paralysis: Only the Good Spells from the Cleric, Oracle, and Warpriest Spell Lists in Pathfinder
By platinumCheesecake
Edited by Punslinger, Fkeyes
For the complete guide, including a more extensive introduction, click here.
Pathfinder is an intensely intimidating game to both newer players and veterans alike. In addition to the now-thousands of feats and items at your disposal, hundreds of pages of rules to memorize, you also have these gargantuan tables from which to choose your spells. For Clerics and Warpriests, these are spells you get to choose from every day! That’s a clear and conscionable decision your character gets to make that can often mean life-or-death for your party should you choose incorrectly. Too often I see players get mired up in the scope of their spell list that they end up preparing the exact same spells day in and day out, crucially missing out on a major class feature just because of how intimidating their spell list is.
Oracles and other spontaneous casters are put in a similar problem; while they don’t have to choose their spells every day, every time they level up they must make the agonizingly tough decision of which spells they will be able to cast for the rest of the game. Sure, they’ll have a few levels where they can swap out a singular spell, but for the most part what they pick is what they’re stuck with. A bad set of spells can quickly lead to frustrating gameplay where the resident Oracle doesn’t feel like he or she is contributing anything to the party.
More often than I can count, I’ve found myself in a position where a player of mine experiences choice anxiety over the massive list of options available. It’s often newer players, though even experienced players have expressed to me their frustrations every time they need to pore over their list. God forbid we need to change our daily preparations in the middle of a session, something which can easily turn into a 20-minute ordeal. Even personally, when I’m choosing my daily spells or designing NPC casters, I tend to get annoyed having to sift through the hundreds of spells way too situational for any person to reasonably pick. Having a list with fewer options makes for a more visually digestible, streamlined experience.
This guide answers the question “What spells are the most useful on any given adventuring day?” This is a simplified spell list that only includes spells ranked Green or above from the standard Cleric/Oracle/Warpriest Spell list. My goal is simply to help GMs and players alike by presenting you a spell list that, should it come down to it, you could pick exclusively from and perform just fine. Also, I understand that not everybody has the time to sift through a 140-page document (or even wait for the darn thing to load properly).
Note that aside from the intro, this guide is pretty much a direct copy-paste from my other one, so there will be some things I say that might not make sense out of context. Apologies.
This guide will include spells that have Orange and Red somewhere in their rating. I have decided to do this to show the spells that are worthwhile in their respective situations. I feel it would be irresponsible even in this abridged guide to leave out crucial information such as scrolls I believe every party ought to have.
As is convention, I am coloring spells by usefulness in accordance with community standards.
Purple- Either you will regret not preparing this spell, or it is so good you are actively hindering yourself by not preparing it. Purple spells are usually meta-defining options that are practically required for play, but in a few cases they are just simply gamebreakingly strong. A Purple spell will always see use if it is prepared.
Blue- This spell is always useful. It does many things well, or serves a role no other spell can match. Blue spells will usually be your first spells considered in a given day of adventuring.
Green- This spell is usually useful, or performs very well at a narrow role. Green spells are never something you feel bad for taking, though sometimes you might go to bed without casting all of them.
Orange- This spell is situationally useful. Orange spells often fit a narrow, situational niche that they can do better than any other spell, but one that might not be needed all the time.
Red- This spell is too situational to prepare with any regularity. Spells that are red are not necessarily useless, but usually they’re the type of spell that you will know in advance if you’ll need.
Black- Spells I rate Black are impossible for me to judge. These spells are usually poorly worded, mechanically broken, reliant on niche rules systems I’m not familiar with, or too dependent on GM fiat for me to give an accurate assessment of.
Split Color- I’ve seen this convention a few times in other guides and have grown rather attached to it. Spells with a split color generally have one notable situation in which they perform better than they might otherwise. These spells usually are highly beneficial to specific campaigns, playstyles, or builds. Sometimes, I’ll use Split Color spells to indicate my inability to decide between two ratings.
This image is moreso a remnant of my copy/paste from the Archives of Nethys database than anything. If you’re still playing 1st Edition PFS this signifies the spell is legal for play.
Restricted (R)- A superscript R indicates religion or racial requirement. Without satisfying the requirement, you might not be able to cast the spell. Make sure to check the sourcebook and consult with your GM if you want to take one of these spells without meeting the requirement.
Scroll Utility (SU)- A superscript SU indicates that the spell is significantly more useful in scroll format (and rarely, potion or wand format). Spells that are as useful as normal or worse in scroll format will not be included, as well as spells that are bad no matter the format.
Oracle Only (O)- A superscript O indicates this spell can only be cast as an oracle.
Cleric Only (C)- A superscript C indicates this spell can only be cast as a cleric.
Hyperlinks- For your convenience, I’ve ensured every spell herein links to its associated page on the Archives of Nethys.
Create Water- A very good survival spell. I’m sure creative players can find more situational uses for this one too. Dumping water over people’s heads has been a favorite of my groups since the dawn of time, and it’s never once failed to be amusing.
Detect Fiendish PresenceSU- It’s a cantrip detect evil that only works for evil outsiders. If you’ve got the cantrip slots to burn (you don’t) and know outsiders are in your future, this is not a horrible call. Definitely better in games where such enemies are common. At least a scroll for a cantrip is dirt cheap.
Detect Magic- Someone in your party needs to know this spell, it may as well be you. The game practically assumes you always have detect magic, and I frequently see parties where every caster has this prepared. At low levels, this can serve as a rudimentary scouting spell as there is no reason not to cast this on anything and everything. A trick I like to use is to cast it through doors to tell if a creature might be in the other room. This works especially well at higher levels when magical equipment and long-duration buff spells become ubiquities.
Enhanced Diplomacy- This is a very solid spell. Competence bonus stacks with everything, and a +2 is nothing to scoff at. Sure, it means you have to make your check within a minute’s casting, but that should be easy enough.
Guidance- A very strong cantrip. There is no reason not to throw this out before an anticipated fight at low levels. And of course, a spammable bonus to skill checks has many uses as well.
Light- I usually prefer letting the Wizard prepare dancing lights, but there’s nothing you shouldn't like about this spell. It lasts much longer and is good for throwing on rocks and dropping into holes. Green even if your party doesn’t have anyone who can see in the dark. (Aside: I love dancing lights. Your party can coordinate signals with it really easily, and I’ve even designed a nonverbal language based on how the lights are manipulated.)
MendingSU- Generally a spell reserved for a key few situations away from the battlefield. If you have a sunder build in your party, I can see you making this a daily prep. Otherwise, repairing things isn’t useful enough to justify one of your precious spell slots.
Read Magic- You’re pressed for cantrip spell slots, and read magic is a tough spell to decide whether it is worth it. Deciphering scrolls and magic writing is absolutely useful, but it’s hard to know in advance when this sort of thing pops up. Some GMs I know just waive over this spell entirely and arbitrate everything on Spellcraft and Knowledge (arcana). Your mileage may vary.
Stabilize- Now here’s a cantrip. Particularly useful at low levels, stabilize is good for when you don’t have any more healing and your fighter is at -13 hp, or for when you want answers out of the lackey and don’t feel he deserves your precious 1st level spell slots.
Vigor- Guidance, but for damage. Spammable and effective, vigor sees use on clerics who don’t expect to be hitting much with allies that very frequently do. This cantrip quickly falls off beyond level 2 or so, as 1 hp of damage stops meaning so much. You might be asking me here, “Why is a spell that does only 1 point of damage rated so highly?” It’s because it’s 1 point of true damage decided not at the attack roll, but the damage roll. When enemies have anywhere from 6-13 hp, a functionally save-less, roll-less, repeatable, 1 damage spell starts to look really good.
Abadar's TruthtellingR- A better zone of truth at a lower level no less. This spell is very good at what it does, and only costs a first level slot, so you could spam it until an enemy fails their save if needed. Early level intrigue games can get a lot of good use from this spell. Late-game, you’re probably better off using other methods to gain info, though you could Heighten this spell if you really needed to. Just be cognizant of all the limitations a zone of truth imparts.
Abundant Ammunition- Ammo can be expensive. If someone is using firearms or masterwork ammo, early-game this can be a big buff to your thin pockets. This spell sucks once magical weapons become affordable. Editor’s note: Green on ranged warpriests, since you can immediately full-round attack if you use Fervor.
Air Bubble- Good old air bubble. Useful for breathing when it might otherwise be challenging. This is one of those spells that is likely better at mid levels due to the relative rarity of gas-based effects early game. If you’re in an aquatic campaign, take this and don’t look back.
Barbed Chains- A very cool, if not somewhat sinister spell. Even better, it’s a 1st level spell that actually scales with level. The bonus to trip is based on BAB instead of caster level (boo), but when you’re rolling 4 dice odds are you’re going to do something. At high levels you’re not gonna see much use from the trip, but even still, a potential for 4d6 damage off a 1st level slot isn’t bad at all. The Shaken effect is just icing on the cake. The only thing that should stop you from considering this spell is that maybe the [evil] descriptor was meant to go on this one.
Bestow Planar Infusion I- Who uses planar infusions? I sure as hell don’t. In skimming the list of infusions for this spell, I see a lot of small, forgettable buffs. And considering few parties are traversing planes when 1st level slots are relevant, it seems like a spell you can pretty safely pass up. At high levels I can see this line of spells coming back around to usefulness for those sweet hours/level buffs, provided you’re travelling the planes of course.
Bless- Tied with divine favor for the best 1st level buff spell on your list. +1 on attack rolls for all allies is probably better than the +1 to attack and damage if you can affect 3 or more characters that will be making attack rolls. The AoE is huge, and the bonus to saves vs. fear is never unappreciated. Do take note that this is a morale bonus, whereas divine favor is a luck bonus.
Blessed Fist- Magic weapon for monks. On creatures without Improved Unarmed Strike, this lets them make AoOs with unarmed strikes, which really isn’t anything impressive. Since an amulet of mighty fists is so expensive, your unarmed fighter will appreciate this spell for your first three or four levels.
Blessing of the WatchR- Technically better than bless if you know your mission will be under the guard’s jurisdiction thanks to the long duration. Otherwise, worthless. Abadar clerics need something, I guess.
Burning Disarm- Fun spell. 1d4 fire damage isn’t great, but it does scale up to 5d4 at least (12.5 damage average). The nice part here is that the Reflex save is entirely voluntary, and if the opponent chooses to save, they drop their (presumably) best weapon and still might take half. And unlike other blast spells, this one isn’t really affected by a low saving throw DC.
Cause Fear- Your staple full caster 1st level encounter winner. Enjoy ending fights this easily while you can, because this spell falls off real fast. Even on a failed save, Shaken is a good enough debuff that you can just throw another one of these out again and probably make it the second time around.
Command- A multipurpose mind-affecting enchantment spell. The 1 round duration is what really stops this spell from being great. It’s more versatile and relevant longer than cause fear, but lacks the sheer encounter-ending power of the aforementioned spell. Generally when you see a spell that’s fully negated on a save, you want the impact of a fail to be more-or-less game over.
Comprehend LanguagesSU- You will need this spell at some point. Understanding language is too crucial to pass up, and a scroll of this is not expensive at all. As far as making this spell a daily prep, your usage will depend on what kind of game you’re playing and on your party.
Coward's Cowl- A genuinely useful buff for casters and a small subset of martial builds. +1 DC is never bad on spellcasters, but you do need to be careful of the rules regarding readied actions. AoO fishing and Overwatch Style martial characters will appreciate this spell, while other martials will probably just waste the bonus after a turn or two. The negative tradeoffs in exchange for these buffs are noticeable, and should not be taken lightly. Being unable to approach enemies is rough, so choose your timing carefully.
Cure Light WoundsSU- I never recommend this spell. There are three classes of characters that gain benefit from reading this guide, and all three of them get cure spells for free in some way or another. Even if you chose to channel negative energy at character creation, or if for some reason you don’t get cure spells due to an archetype or something, it’s probably still not worth taking generic heal spells just on the account of how bad in-combat healing is in this game. For everyone who doesn’t get significant buffs to your healing spells (cough cough, life oracles), you should just buy a wand of cure light wounds and heal out of combat. While boring and kind of stupid, the clw wand is cheap and saves you from wasting your time and spell slots, making it one of the most necessary items in the game. Scrolls and potions are also incredibly useful, but less cost-efficient.
Divine Favor- Finally we get back to a good spell. Divine favor is your other contender for best 1st level buff spell. Scales fantastically well, and as a luck bonus it can synergize with Fate’s Favored if you so choose. I have known many mid-level clerics who prepare nothing but divine favor for their 1st level slots. Warpriests treat this spell as Aroden’s gift to mankind and with good reason. You will never regret having this spell prepared.
Ears of the City- I read this spell as “The GM gives you everything on their Rumors table.” Not bad for a 1st level divination spell. Note that the spell text says you “can” substitute your Perception for Diplomacy. This means clerics can use their high Perception while oracles can rely on their high Diplomacy.
Egorian Diplomacy- Useful for anyone who frequently uses Intimidate. You probably won’t know whether or not the target failed their save, so be careful who you try this on. A good candidate for Heighten Spell to keep the DC relevant.
Embrace DestinyO- Roll a d20 and elect to use its result at any point during the spell’s duration. I guess you could use this spell multiple times to fish for a good result for a skill check. But honestly, you have basically the same odds of this spell being useful as you do from not using it at all. With Maximize Spell however...
Endure ElementsSU- Setting-specific environmental protection spell. Oracles treat this spell as red. But preparing niche stuff based on circumstances basically the cleric’s whole job, so it’s orange for them. If your setting is focused on exceptionally hot or cold climates, bump this spell up by one color. Buy scrolls of this only if you somehow can’t afford the communal version.
Face of the DevourerR- Rovagug does not kid around; this spell is awesome. You get a +4 circumstance bonus to Intimidate (stacks with everything!) and a beefy 1d6/1d4 damage bite attack. This spell is great for Intimidators and all melee attackers, and should not be passed up for those willing to worship the Great Destroyer.
Fallback StrategyR- One reroll on an attack or skill check isn’t bad. I wish this spell gave you the chance to reroll a save, but I guess that wouldn’t fit with the theme. Not as good as bless or divine favor in combat, but this is a buff Torag worshippers should give consideration.
Infernal HealingSU- On average, a level 1 cure light wounds heals 5.5 hit points. Infernal Healing always heals 10. Out of combat, this spell is, barring some crazy tea of transference nonsense, the most efficient healing in the game. At level 5, your cure light wounds heals 9.5 hit points on average, and this spell ceases to be relevant. I still don’t recommend preparing healing spells.
Inflict Light WoundsSU- I rank the inflict spells similar to the cures, but with these you do “some” damage instead of healing it. These spells do require a melee touch attack and afford a save for half, which means your damage output will be minimal. Negative energy divine casters get these spells spontaneously and will only use them in rare circumstances. Necromancers and those with negative energy affinity should exercise the same caution I gave for cure light wounds with regards healing in-combat and preparing redundant spells you can swap anyway. Useful in potion or scroll format if you have someone in the party who thought it would be fun to have negative energy affinity.
Karmic BlessingR- My only gripe with this spell is the small amount of metagaming you need to get the fullest use of it. You need to know the target doesn’t have the given skill as a class skill and has a rank in it, which might be a problem when you cast this spell on anybody but yourself. If that’s not a problem for you, take this spell for a versatile +3 to specific skill checks.
Liberating Command- Immediate action anti-grapple measure. It’s worth noting the singular component of this spell being Verbal. When you have the spell slots at high levels, this is a good spell to have in your arsenal.
Magic Stone- Bad, but not unusable. 3 bullets for 1d6+1 is a pretty bad draw for a 1st level spell, made better if you expect to fight a lot of undead. The only true saving grace for this spell is that whoever throws the stones gets to add their Strength modifier to damage. Don’t prepare this once you get real +1 weapons.
Magic Weapon- A divine favor you can give to your fighter. Better than divine favor at low levels, weaker when you have masterwork weapons, and useless once +1 weapons come online.
Moment of Greatness- This spell was designed to be used with bless. If that’s your only synergy, you’ll find this spell lacking. If you’ve got a bard, barbarian, or someone to cast heroism, (Charm domain, anybody?), get ready to become everybody’s friend real fast.
Murderous Command- Take one creature out of the fight for a round and potentially do some damage to another. Very respectable, but fails out when you’re fighting only one baddie.
Murderous CrowR- There exists no statblock for a crow, which is what this spell apparently summons. Which is honestly a shame, because this seems like a genuinely solid spell once you get a few more rounds on that duration. Ravens don’t have 2 claw attacks, so it’s very likely this spell was intended to summon an Eagle (which is already the best monster on the summon monster I list). Giving an Eagle eye rake and Improved Steal would make this spell Green beyond level 1, but you’ll have to talk to your GM.
Obscuring Mist- Somebody tell me why this spell is always ranked Blue. It’s clearly got a multitude of uses, but I never think any of them are truly spectacular. It’s good at blocking line of sight, but without significant investment this spell is going to hurt your team in a fight just as much as it’ll help you. It’s good for sneaking around within the spell, but you’re still putting up a rather obvious bank of fog. It’s good for retreating, except for the fact that you move at half speed through it. It’s a good spell, but I wouldn’t say it’s worth the rating everyone else gives. Someone feel free to tell me what’s so good about obscuring mist and I’ll gladly update my ranking.
Pesh Vigor- This might just be my new favorite spell. Taking nonlethal damage to increase your Strength is just about the most metal thing I can think of. For a spell that gives an enhancement bonus, this actually scales phenomenally well with level. The material component is relatively cheap, but does require you to have a reliable supplier of pesh. My editor reminds me that you can always drink coffee to ease the Fatigued burden and that this spell is quite solid when cast with Fervor.
Protection from [Alignment]SU- These spells are absolutely ridiculous. At low levels, the bonuses to AC and saves are fantastic, and at all levels the outright immunity to mental control and summon contact are even more so. This is the commonly cited example of a 1st level spell outright beating a 9th. The only downside is you can only ward against the given alignment, but scrolls are cheap when it means you won't be getting dominated. Because this is only a 1st level spell, it’s not necessarily required you have it prepared, but it is all but required that you have it in some capacity at your disposal, be it in wand, scroll, or spell format. Easily a Top 5 spell, period.
Recharge Innate MagicR- Core gnomes won’t take this. However, there are about 3-4 gnome alternate racial traits with very solid SLA lists I would happily refresh. Re-cast an extra grease and silent image by sacrificing one spell slot? Heck yeah! Charm person and entangle? Yes please! Outside of the Utilitarian Magic trait, these SLAs are cast off Charisma, which is amazing for Oracles and okay for clerics.
Remove FearSU- Absolutely, without a doubt, you need to get yourself a scroll of this spell ASAP. The average dragon can take you out of the fight for 5d6 rounds as a free action. Fear is a nasty debuff, and when you can remove it for just 25 gp, why would you not? You probably shouldn’t prepare this, though.
Remove SicknessSU- This spell is a lot less necessary than the above. A -2 to everything isn’t bad enough you need to prepare a contingency for it, but if you have the money I see no reason why you can’t have a scroll of one of these laying around too.
Sanctuary- If you are playing a support cleric, this spell is for you. Use your body to take up space, summon some mooks, and throw out buffs all while staying perfectly safe. A good candidate for Heighten Spell, as this spell only gets better when you get more rounds out of it.
Shadow Trap- This is a fun spell. Entangle is a solid debuff already, and being able to mess up flying creatures at level 1 is a huge deal. Add on the opponent being unable to move away from its square and you’ve got a spell that’s very much worth being a save: negates. Shadow domain builds will appreciate this spell’s school and subschool.
Shield of Faith- Deflection AC is hard to come by, and getting a 1st level spell that provides scaling bonuses to it will never be bad. Shield of faith isn’t a spell that will ever wow you, but it’s also never a spell you’re upset that you prepared. Good with Fervor until your ring of protection catches up.
Speak Local LanguageSU- The closest thing you can get to tongues at level 1. The usage of this depends on your campaign, but theoretically in a game where regional languages matter, you could be seeing a lot of use here.
StarsightSU- While this spell was designed for nighttime navigation, something which it honestly does terribly, it is far more useful as a gimmick. Heavens oracles can use their Guiding Star revelation and starsight whenever the GM tries to squash your fun by arbitrarily deciding it’s a cloudy evening. Just watch the smile melt from their face next time you tell them you actually prepared starsight of all spells.
...But really, nobody else should even consider this garbage and I probably shouldn't have made this Green in the first place.
Stone ShieldR- I really do enjoy these immediate action defense spells, even if many of them are mechanically weak. Stone shield, however, stands above the rest of the 1st level cleric/oracle ones. Once you get to the point where you can burn your 1st level slots, a +4 untyped bonus to AC and +2 on reflex as an immediate action is absolutely worth your time.
Strand of the Tangled Knot- Man, I have a hard time rating this spell Orange. On one hand, if you know you’re about to be hit with something, logic would dictate that you try and do something to prevent yourself from being a target in the first place. On the other hand, once BAB gets to the point where your AC ceases to matter, a -10 to one attack in a round (which will likely be the creature’s best attack) could very well prove impactful. I’d say give this spell another chance once you hit 8th level or so. A possible candidate for Quicken spell. A definite candidate for Fervor at all levels.
Summon Minor Monster- Don’t bother with summon monster I, this is a summoner cleric’s go-to first level summon spell. The duration is still gonna suck, but with this spell you get 1d3 attack sponges, and a much wider list of summons to choose from. I recommend using the Advanced Monster Search as you decide what to summon. Some solid options include owls, porcupine, hagfish, podokesaurus, rhamphorhynchus, skunks, and anything that can poison. Particularly skunks.
Sure Casting- Of all the spells I wish would be swift actions, sure casting is far and away the one I want the most. You’ve heard me say it a ton by now; ignore this spell until high level when you have the slots to burn. I think on an oracle with Quicken Spell this could be a pretty powerful option to make sure your absolute best spells can land.
(My editor has since reminded me Warpriests can do this with Fervor! They won’t be using offensive spells as much, but it sure helps beat SR when they do)
Tap Inner BeautyR- One of your few true low-level social buffs. Shelyn loves to help people be the party face. A +2 isn’t super impressive, but Charisma governs a whopping 7 skills, so you bet I’m gonna recommend giving anyone a supremely stackable bonus to all of ‘em.
Touch of BloodlettingR- Bleed damage is pretty negligible, but Exhaustion is an absolute pain in the butt. I’m kind of surprised this is a Will save, but we can live with it. I still dislike having to connect with a touch attack only for the enemy to get a save to negate, but you could do a lot worse than this spell.
True Appraisal- The buff to end all buffs to the game’s worst skill. Everything about this spell would be awesome if it weren’t affixed to the skill everyone ignores once the novelty of haggling wears off. If your party judiciously uses any sort of bargaining rules (like from Ultimate Combat), take this spell every single time you spend a day at the market for literal free money. Be careful with stuff like this, though. I guarantee after a few times of unloading all your Appraise buffs on a shopping spree your GM will get wise to your tricks and either try to counter you or elect to stop using that subsystem altogether.
Unhallowed Blows- A strong buff for necromancers. +1 to attack and damage, 1 minute/level, and 1 creature/ level puts this spell solidly above any other damage buff spell of this level, assuming you have enough creatures to cast it on.
Unwelcome HaloR- As far as I can tell, this seems like a pretty good spell. It looks like it straight-up beats magical darkness regardless of level. In addition, the spell has a line stating that it “makes it impossible for the creature to gain concealment in nonmagical darkness.” You can choose to read this one of two ways: the first being that this spell negates any concealment the target might have as long as they are within nonmagical darkness. That alone would make this spell worthwhile, allowing it to act as a cleric’s faerie fire. The second interpretation, the one I suspect this spell was meant to read as, would exclusively prevent the creature from gaining concealment from being in darkness and from nothing more. Either way, a 1st level spell that can beat darkness wins out in my book.
Weapons Against EvilR- At low to mid levels, bypassing the DR of any evil creature is straight up awesome. Made even awesomer by affecting the weapons of your allies as well. Depending on the campaign, this spell could easily be one of your strongest picks, at least until DR scales past it.
Admonishing Ray- A nonlethal equivalent to scorching ray. This spell scales nicely, hits reliably, and is a very rare damage type: force. Fire is a common resistance, so honestly the inability to damage constructs and undead as compared to scorching ray isn’t too bad of a trade-off. Plus, it’s a good amount of damage for a caster starved for blasts. If you plan on taking Toppling Spell, this spell could be a very nice addition to your toolkit.
Alchemical TinkeringR- Talk about versatile. There’s dozens of useful alchemical items, and being able to swap them around based on the situation seems pretty darn useful if you know what to look for. Just be aware that this spell is a total action-economy sink; to do anything with the item you want takes at least a full round plus a standard action. I recommend using this spell primarily as a panacea. Buy a bunch of alchemical items of common price points, and whip out the perfect remedy to whatever ails you.
My editor has done a fantastic job of reviewing the many items you can substitute with this spell. Rather than list them all, I will highlight some of the more impressive ones for your convenience. Air Crystals, Antiplague, Antitoxin, Troll Oil, Blackfinger Paste, Cardice Oil, Duskeye, and Mithralbane Sap.
Align WeaponSU- Bypass alignment-based DR. Depending on your game, this spell could be very necessary. I’d personally opt to buy scrolls of this, but it’s your call.
Alter Summon Monster- Just like with ally across time, a cheese option exists with this spell and a heightened version of the wizard’s Mount spell. If that kind of stuff flies at your table, have fun. For the rest of us, this spell provides a small amount of utility to our rounds/level summons. Only take this if you are playing a summoning build at levels where summons get SLAs worth talking about, or if you managed to convince your GM to let you cast this on a flaming steed or summon accuser.
Ancestral Communion- Gain a +4 on Knowledge checks, or reroll failed Knowledge checks for the spell’s duration. Really, really good for fact-finding if you find yourself placed in the role of the party librarian.
Animate Dead, Lesser- It may just be one zombie or skeleton, but any effect that permanently puts another controllable body on the field rules.
Arrow of Law- Law and Chaos have never been as compelling narratively than Good and Evil. You’ll see this mindset reflected a lot in my alignment-based spells, where I rank these alignments as worse paths to pursue. I’d recommend this spell only if you anticipate fighting Chaotic outsiders, in which case it’s a very nice spell.
Ashen Path- Now this is a buff! Remember when I said wizards usually have the showstopper meta-defining spells? This is a rare time you get included in that. Abusing fog effects has always been a strong option to parties with the tools to exploit them, and ashen path makes this a terrifying reality. Everything about this spell is awesome, from the bonuses against magical contaminants (notably stinking cloud) to the ability to divide the duration (10 minutes per level!) among creatures touched. If you’ve got a party rogue, get ready to be new best friends on the bus to sneak attack city.
Bloody Tears and Jagged SmileR- There is one reason and one reason alone you’d choose to worship Szuriel, and that’s to abuse the hell out of this spell. +4 to spell DCs is simply unheard of, and on top of that you get a strong bonus to Intimidate and a free deathwatch. Unlike spells like bestow curse and mind fog, you don’t have to force a save to make your spells harder to resist, you just get it for free, and for ten minutes per level. Because fear effects are usually encounter-enders, anyone who takes this spell will dictate the flow of combat for your group. This is a busted spell that absolutely should not exist. Your GM would be well within their means to ban this crap.
Bone Fists- +2 on damage for natural weapons would be a decent pick around levels 3-6 for a single-target spell. Bone Fists goes beyond that and affects multiple targets. If you’ve got a druid and her companion, 4-6 natural attacks per round will really start to really show off how much damage this spell can do. Or you can just spam the crap out of summons and cast this on the round your new minions arrive. Plus, the +1 natural armor bonus means even the wizard can get something out of this. This spell’s usefulness is definitely going to be based on your party composition.
Boneshaker- Control a skeleton like a puppet. Does reasonable (uncapped!) damage and allows you to slightly reposition living targets. Against undead, you force them to spend an immediate action to move or attack. At levels 3-6, the damage from this spell is very good for a 2nd level spell, but as you grow the CL scaling eventually drops off. Versatile and moderately impactful means you won’t ever have a situation in combat where this spell is unappreciated.
Bull's Strength- Here’s a buff your Big Dumb Fighter will appreciate every time. Or at least until he gets himself a belt in a level or two. Then this spell just becomes okay.
Burst of Radiance- Much better than blinding ray in just about every regard. I love debuffs with partial saves, and the failed save effect here is very enticing. A 10-ft. radius Blindness effect usually can snag 2 or 3 bodies within. Add in 1d4/level true damage against evil creatures and you’ve got a no-brainer spell.
Calm Emotions- For the goody-two-shoes clerics, calm emotions is the spell that makes Diplomacy with Hostile creatures possible. The ability to stop negative emotion effects rarely comes up (save for maybe confusion), but it’s nice to be able to stop when they do. Combos well with peacemaker’s parley.
Cleromancy- This spell is a bit confusing and does not seem particularly good unless you build for it. At low levels, you’re likely to get only one or two rounds of a bonus, and the bonus isn’t necessarily going to be all that impressive. At high levels, this spell might be worth it to gain a few +4 bonuses you can add to anything, though with the rounds/level duration it becomes tough to justify casting in the middle of a fight. If you’ve got a lesser rod of maximize spell this spell shoots from good to great.
Cloud of SeasicknessR- Sickened is nowhere close to being as good as the nauseation stinking cloud offers, but then again this is only a level 2 spell. In all regards save for its duration, this spell beats out the wizard’s fog cloud by a mile. Much, much better than obscuring mist, and a solid addition to any control cleric's kit.
Compel TongueSU- A solid language option while you wait for tongues to come online. As long as your target isn’t going to get offended or anything...
Contact Entity I- Contact eldritch entities in a 100 mile radius to potentially come to your location. I can’t really rate this line of spells, as it’s entirely GM fiat how the entities respond or if they even do at all.
Cure Moderate WoundsSU- See cure light wounds.
Dark WhispersSU- This spell is basically a multi-target message spell that lasts 10 minutes per level. You don’t need to have line of effect once the spell has been cast, which is a very attractive quality in a communication spell. If for some gods-forsaken reason you need to split the party, this spell helps diminish that risk.
Darkness- Your mileage here is going to be entirely based around the visibility of your party and your enemies. A lot of enemies, especially at high levels, tend to have darkvision so you’ll need to utilize deeper darkness if you want to have any reliable impact.
Death Knell- Honestly not a bad spell. The bonuses are solid, last a good amount of time, and shouldn’t be that hard to farm if you just make a habit of reminding your GM to not take tokens off the board once a creature drops below 0.
Deathwine- You suffuse a potion with necromancy, and when you drink it you gain a bonus to your CL on the next necromancy spell you cast within a minute equal to the level of the potion consumed. The bonus here is solid, but the issue is that you’re burning money rather quickly if you intend on using this spell often. This could be useful if you really need a buff to CL for something crucial, but use it sparingly else your whole WBL will be wasted on potions. Green for horde necromancers who need every HD they can get.
Defending BoneR- Pharasmins get this beauty of a spell. You grant yourself DR 5/bludgeoning for hours per level. No material component, no long casting time, nothing. I don’t see how this spell is anything but a complete win.
Drunkard's BreathR- A stinking cloud that doesn’t impair vision. Depending on your party, that might just be an upgrade. A very good reason to worship Cayden.
Eagle's Splendor- Depending on your party this could be a solid buff before you get headbands. Paladins, Oracles, Sorcerers, Bards, all appreciate a +2 to their class features and DCs, and even out of combat a +2 to Charisma checks is pretty darn nice for really important social encounters. This spell tapers off fast once everyone gets a headband of it though.
Early JudgmentR- Another thematically cool Pharasmin spell. The debuffs are decent, but the short duration and specific targeting requirements are a real bummer. If you choose to interpret it where a NE creature gains the debuffs from being N and E, I can see this spell being Green. That’s pretty clearly not what the author was going for, though.
Endure Elements, CommunalSU- I much prefer this spell to casting endure elements multiple times. Unless you’re in a 2-person party, one 2nd level slot is usually less valuable than all of your 1sts.
Enemy's HeartR- A minor buff to death knell that works on any helpless target without save, offers a profane bonus to Strength, and gives a few extra hit points. Still not good enough to be Blue, but the improvements are significant enough to matter. My editor says the saveless aspect makes this decent as a scroll, though I still wouldn’t call it good enough to warrant a higher rating for the SU.
Find TrapsSU- Gain the trap sense rogue talent for minutes/level. I dislike the short duration, as it means a dungeon will require multiple castings of this spell to actually have any use. Why don’t you just summon some “trapfinders” instead?
Grace- You don’t provoke AoOs for a round due to movement. The casting time here is what really sells it; you generally don’t have much need for your swift actions unless you’re a Warpriest. Pass this spell up at 2nd level spells, and revisit it when your higher level slots are the only things you regularly use.
Halfling Vengeance- Super-specific spell that provides a strong buff to small-sized creatures that wield daggers or slings. Adding multiple extra d6 as sneak attack on all attack rolls is no joke, and to top it off you give the character the flexibility to impart one of four not-inconsequential saveless debuffs when they inflict precision damage. For reference of just how absurd this spell is, a prototypical TWF dagger rogue at level 8 could very well be looking at an extra 8d6 per round. Or they could do 6d6 and ensure next round they can continue the onslaught regardless of battlefield positioning by forcing the target flat-footed. If you’ve somehow got the party composition for this, prepare it multiple times and never look back.
Hold Person- The most ubiquitous 2nd level save-or-die. All it takes is one failed save and a party member’s coup-de-grace and that humanoid is donezo. Rated green instead of blue for the creature restriction, the ability to make additional saves, and the save: negates aspect. Pairs nicely with Persistent Spell.
Holy Ice Weapon- Make a masterwork weapon out of ice that deals cold damage and holy water damage. Could be worse, but also could be much better. The spell shines when you can fight undead since the damage buff stacks decently with level. Rated Green if you’ve built yourself for melee and you’ve got undead or evil outsiders in your future.
Inflict Moderate WoundsSU- See inflict light wounds.
Inheritor's SmiteR- Gain a +5 sacred bonus on an attack, with the same bonus applied to a bull rush attempt. A swift action cast makes this spell solid for the battle-minded Iomedaeans who get it. As with many swift action spells, I recommend passing it up until you’ve got the slots to spare.
Instrument of Agony- Transmute a weapon to be more terrifying. The +2 bonus on Intimidate checks is pretty forgettable at this level. No, the real benefit is the potential 1d4+1 rounds of Nauseation on a failed save when the wielder discharges this effect. Basically just treat this spell as a single-target nauseate effect that has the very respectable plus side of Sickening for a round on a successful save.
Intensify Psyche- A +1 bonus to the DC of your emotion and pain spells, and a +2 to some Charisma checks. Didn’t we see a spell like this before…? Either way, boosts to our DCs are always much appreciated, especially when your 2nd level slots stop meaning as much.
Ironskin- Shorter duration personal barkskin that gives more AC and can be discharged to negate a crit or sneak attack. Very nice for anybody.
Lead PlatingSU- This spell encloses a person or object in lead to eschew divinations. Rarely if ever will you want an item to be protected from divinations for mere minutes. Creatures, on the other hand, definitely can benefit from this spell, even despite the relative rarity of hostile divinations out there. If nondetection is financially or magically out of reach, this spell can work in a pinch. Has good synergy with invisibility.
Light PrisonR- Enclose a creature per 2 levels in a cage of light. Except instead of actually trapping them, it forces them to stand still or else take 1d6 points of damage and 1 round of Blindness. Single target, this is mediocre at best. AoE, it’s worth your slot.
Mortal Terror- Start off making one enemy Shaken, and every turn they take damage they have to roll a save or have their fear increase by one step. I like that enemies are Shaken for at least one round regardless of save. The thing keeping this spell from being better is the fact that the enemy has to fail 2 saves and take damage for the debuff to actually mean much until they’re actually frightened.
Muffle SoundSU- Minutes/level party buff to Stealth at the cost of verbal component spell failure. Situational, but not horrible.
Oracle's BurdenO- Some of these effects are absolutely brutal, and others are laughably useless. I’m including some of the notable curses as how good I think the effect is. Blackened, Clouded Vision (worse at 5th), Deaf, Lich and possibly Site-Bound Oracles (assuming anybody ever took it) might consider this spell.
Owl's Wisdom- Getting a +2 to Cleric, Inquisitor, Druid, and Warpriest DCs, a number of important skills (you know the one), and Will saves is awesome. Seeing as most of a Cleric’s offensive spells are based on saving throws you really shouldn’t pass up what is effectively a 10% increase in potency. Once you get a headband this spell drops off, but not as hard as some of the other animal stat spells. No matter who you play with, there will always be somebody in the party without a headband that would appreciate a +2 to their most important save.
Pilfering Hand- Perform a disarm or sunder maneuver, or attempt a Sleight of Hand or Disable Device check at a distance. The value from this spell comes from the versatility, which is still admittedly narrow. Nonetheless, disarming and retrieving a weapon at range isn’t bad by any metric. You can usually bet whatever the baddy is carrying will be their best weapon, if not their only weapon of that type. How often do you actually see NPCs carrying a backup to their +5 super evil artifact bastard sword? Rated mixed color because I was really torn on this one.
Protection from [Alignment], Communal- A more efficient buff when you’re in a scrap with an enemy of a certain alignment. The bonuses to AC and saves should be lower by now, but the immunity to mind control is still ever relevant. The cool thing about the communal version of these spells is you can ward your fully party from domination at once. Scrolls of this communal version are still fantastic, but by default they only affect 3 creatures, and are pricier enough to justify the SU staying blue.
Protection from OutsidersSU- A stronger, more situational protection from [alignment]. With good preparation this spell will treat you very well. Feel free to take this if you’re in a campaign dominated by a certain outsider type, but don’t rely on it exclusively as it cannot prevent mind control from anything not the designated outsider.
Protection from Technology- You will never need this spell unless you’re playing Iron Gods. I don’t know what qualifies as a technological effect, but I can only assume this spell was meant to be analog to the ubiquitous level 1 class of spells and extend that umbrella of mind protection to the special effects of robots.
Remove ParalysisSU- You will need a scroll of this. Period. Paralysis is so incredibly deadly I don’t believe any party should go without having some method with which to defend against it.
Resist Energy- The quintessential energy resistance spell (go figure). It’s never a bad idea to have somebody in your party with this spell prepared at all times. The only thing stopping this from being blue is that this spell is very hit-or-miss based on whatever the GM throws at you. Scrolls are less valuable thanks to poor scaling and the requirement that you designate which element the scroll wards against.
Restoration, LesserSU- One way or another, this spell needs to be somewhere in your party. Restoring ability damage is just that important. In the case of this spell, the SU actually does not refer to scrolls exclusively. Lesser restoration is the only spell on the entire list I actually advocate getting in potion form if you can afford it. Turning a 3 round casting time into a standard action is very useful in the case of poison damage. Plus, anybody can activate them and almost all GMs interpret the spell to allow the imbiber to decide what ability score is healed instead of the caster (thanks to years of PFS loot tables establishing this precedent). Another option is seeing if you can buy it as a wand from a paladin, which is considerably cheaper per casting and will last you a very long time, with the caveat being you must be conscious and capable of standing still for 3 rounds.
Sacred SpaceR- A kick-ass buffed version of consecrate that works only against evil outsiders. Evil outsiders are a pretty wide-ranging category of enemies, and getting a +2 on good spell DCs as well as imparting a -1 to all of their rolls can not be underestimated. Unlike spells like songbird, you have actually a good number of spells to buff with this spell.
Shackle- The essence of a touch-save-negate. This spell has a lot of utility in and after combat, and imparts upon your target a very nasty debuff if it hits regardless of the option your select. A very useful spell for messing up spellcasters, and a solid candidate for Reach Spell. Also if you want to be a jerk to any shopkeepers, you could try and make money from the masterwork manacles produced by this spell.
Shard of Chaos- An arrow of law for chaotic creatures. Unlike dread bolt, 1d6 rounds of slow is very enticing a debuff. Like the two before this, this spell varies in usefulness based on what you’re fighting.
Share LanguageSU- A perfectly good spell to communicate with friendly NPCs before you get tongues. It’s also generally a nice thing to give your friends so nobody is left out of a fun RP encounter.
Shatter- Breaking stuff the easy way. Windows, doors, and obstacles are good candidates for the environmental aspect of the spell. At low levels, sundering weapons usually results in a crippled enemy, though you need to be careful about continuously sundering away your WBL. And of course, possibly the best use of the spell, is sundering holy symbols or spell component pouches. Be very very careful when using this tactic though. This is one of those “technically works but you really shouldn’t” tactics in Pathfinder, else you provoke the GM’s retaliatory ire.
Shield Other- I don’t really like shield other, but I get why people take it. To me, your party is still taking the damage anyway and you’re just wasting a perfectly good spell slot. Good on an Oradin, meh on anybody else.
Silence- My favorite spell on this list and the best illusion you have access to bar none. Cast on a pebble and literally invalidate any caster with no save. Because this effect is so busted, it’s a pretty common houserule that gives any creature entering the radius a save, so ask your GM how they plan to interpret the rules. In exchange for awe-inspiring anti-magic abilities, silence comes with the very real drawback of affecting all allies as well, so be careful. Thanks to having an option to not allow a saving throw, this spell scales with level amazingly, so it’s a fine candidate for metamagic feats (and consequently Magical Lineage). Quicken Spell lets you ready action counterspell (a counterspell that’s actually good), and even Widen Spell can be taken if you want to flood the battlefield with your magic-hurting juice.
Soothing WordSU- Lessen the severity of a target’s conditions. I don’t think this is something you should regularly bring, but I guarantee if you do prepare it you’ll often find an applicable time to cast it. Even if its effect is minimal, I can’t fault you for considering this. Scrolls of soothing word are fairly useful, since they’re still relatively cheap and can save your life, particularly in the case of someone being Nauseated or Frightened.
Sound Burst- Nobody takes sound burst for the damage. A 10 ft. radius burst Stun is very attractive. Remember that a Stunned creature not only loses their entire turn, but also has to drop whatever they’re holding. A good follow up to sound burst is spending your move action to retrieve or kick away an item you really don’t want your foe to have. My editor wishes to tell you that this spell is very nice for allowing your allies to position themselves better too.
Spindrift Spritz- An immediate action spell that gives a target a second roll against any effect that would cause Fatigued, Shaken, Sickened, or Staggered. That’s a lot of monsters and a lot of spells you could be giving bonuses against. I don’t recommend this at low levels, but it is decent at high levels. The cool thing here is you aren’t just giving second roll against the condition, but against the entire effect. So spells like blasphemy or slow that have one of these conditions as only part of the effect still let you roll twice against the whole thing.
Spiritual Squire- You create an ally of force to aid you in combat. This is a very cool spell that can be used in a number of different ways. By far the most useful applications of this spell are the retrieval of a stored item and the ability for it to aid another on AC or attack rolls. Check with your GM to see if the “carry an object” means the ally can pick up a dropped item. If it can, any effect that disarms foes works nicely with spiritual squire. Due to the solid duration and flexible versatility, this spell gets the A-OK from me.
Spiritual Weapon- You create a weapon of force to aid you in combat. This spell is simply amazing. Despite not being a blaster, spiritual weapon is the attack spell you’ve always wanted. At lower levels this spell will only amount to a d8 or two, but at higher levels you get to apply your iterative attack bonus onto the weapon How cool is that!? If you worship a deity with a favored weapon that has a nice crit range (Cayden, Sarenrae, Lamashtu, Urgathoa, etc), this spell is Blue for you, otherwise it's Green. Ask your GM if you can apply Dazing Spell to this bad boy.
Staggering Fall- An immediate action 1d6 damage coupled with a solid rounds/level Staggered condition and a forced standard action waste, marred by being contingent upon cast on a falling target and allowing another save as a free action. At least the casting time means you can combo this off of a barbed chains for a one-two punch. I’ll admit, I’ve never played around with this spell, so I can only guess that it doesn’t necessarily seem all that terrible if you’ve got the right setup. If you have someone who excels at tripping or plan on allying with creatures that Overrun (Editor’s addition), I can see this spell becoming your party’s new favorite tactic.
Summon Cacodaemon- Cacodaemons are way ahead of the curve for level 2 summons, sporting a number of prototypical evil outsider SLAs, telepathy, and very respectable defenses. It’s a little cheesy and might impact your relationship with NPCs, but you can relay short conversations through these daemon in lieu of tongues. An all-around useful summon you can and will regularly rely on.
Summon Monster II- We’re getting there. Summon monster I was bad because it was crippled by short duration, but now you can actually summon something and have it stick around for a bit. I remember the celestial wolf and lightning elemental being solid choices at this level.
Editor’s note: Earth elementals are strong creatures at this level for their Power Attack, spiders let you get crowd-controlling webs out in the battlefield, and the Summon Evil Monster option Pugwampis are straight-up busted with their aura of unluck and shatter.
Tears to Wine- Grant any creature that drinks the alcohol you make a significant, scaling enhancement bonus on Wisdom and Intelligence checks for 10 minutes/level. The real boon here is that this is a respectable duration party buff to over half the skills in the game.
Unliving Rage- An AoE rage spell that only affects your undead thralls. A fantastic buff for the horde necromancer.
Weapon of Awe- A flat +2 to damage on any weapon, with the bonus of imparting 1 round of free Shaken on a crit. Even better on weapons with large crit ranges.
Align Weapon, CommunalSU- As with the lesser version, the usefulness of this spell will be entirely contingent upon your game. I no longer recommend buying scrolls of this as much, though, as we’re starting to get to the point where they just get too expensive for what they do.
Animate Dead- This is why people say clerics make the best necromancers. You get access to the quintessential zombification spell two levels earlier than the wizard does, coupled with your incredible ability to pump out buff spells to your subjects. Make sure to confirm with your GM whether or not you can make variant zombies and skeletons to fill your ranks.
Archon's Aura- Send out a 20 ft. aura that penalizes enemies’ attack rolls, saves, and AC and stacks with other similar debuffs like Shaken. This spell could be worse, but it certainly isn’t useless. My main problem here is that a successful attack against you ends the effect for any given creature. Thankfully, sanctuary is on your list too, and by the time you get 3rd level spells dropping a 1st level to supplement your action isn’t the worst idea in the world. Especially if it means imparting an AoE penalty to three very important battlefield attributes. Rated Split Color for indecision.
Aura Sight- All alignment auras become visible to you. This is a severely underrated spell in my opinion. 120 ft. vision is nothing to sneeze at when you consider how often a typical dungeon throws you into a 20’ x 20’ room. Use this spell to highlight when a fight is coming, track high level enemies, pinpoint concealed creatures in a pinch, and identify the presence of aligned spells and magic items. An excellent candidate for permanency, which makes this spell Blue.
Bestow Curse- One of the best debuff spells in the game and exactly what you want to see in a touch-save-negate. This spell is the benchmark by which all of touch-save-negate spells will be compared to. A creative player with a lenient GM can take this spell very far, thanks to its power and versatility. The 50% action effect is absolutely killer, and is honestly more in line with a 6th level spell in my opinion. Lowering Con or Wis by 6 can really put a dent in your enemy’s defenses too (-3 hp per hit die is brutal). A good candidate for Reach Spell, as is it a great candidate to specialize a build around; and Persistent Spell, as its effects will often make or break a battle. Plus, unlike the Wizard, you get this spell as a level 3, meaning it is a valid candidate for any other lesser metamagic rod you might find. Here is a good resource from published (3.5) sources to assist you in making your own effects, and here is one from Horror Adventures (PF) with a few more to consider.
Blindness/Deafness- A save-or-suck that the wizard got two levels ago. That doesn’t mean you shouldn’t take it, but it’s not the Blue spell for you as it was for him. With 3rd level spells, you’re much more likely to run into creatures that can dispel magic your permanent duration spells.
Blood Rage- A variant of the arcane rage spell that doesn’t increase Constitution or saves but allows the targets to gain additional Strength based on damage taken. According to the Monster Creation rules, the average damage of a CR 5 creature is between 15 and 20, so after just a single attack you’ve essentially given your ally a +8 to Strength in exchange for a -4 to AC. At high levels, AC stops mattering as much, so you really don’t care too much about the penalty. Plus, unlike rage, this spell doesn’t affect your ability to cast spells. All-around insane buff. Editor’s note: pairs well with ablative barrier since blood rage still triggers upon taking nonlethal damage.
Oh, did I forget to mention your bonus can be doubled with moment of greatness?
Chain of Perdition- You summon a chain with reach that can perform a number of maneuvers per turn, most notably dirty tricks and trips. The bonuses to the maneuvers scale with level and should work with reasonable efficacy until levels 12-14 or so when everything starts to get asinine CMD. I love the fact that the chain doesn’t suffer miss chance too, making it a solid anti-caster spell. Chain of perdition is the phony summoning spell you never knew you needed.
Champion's BoutR- A compulsion that prevents anyone else from interfering with your mano-a-mano duel. Considering the game is based around party support, I humbly request you refrain from getting yourself in such a duel in the first place.
My editor informed me that this spell actually never specifies that the creatures ever have to fight. It’s blatantly against the spirit of the spell, but you theoretically could target your ally and ward both of you against all attacks as sanctuary. This is the cheesiest of cheese, but you can do it and it would be good.
Channel the GiftR, SU- The very essence of a “team player” spell, exclusive to Nethys worshippers. The general idea is you touch a spellcaster and they don’t use up their next spell slot of 3rd or lower. In combat, this will often be a waste of a standard action, but it’s fantastic the round before you kick in the door and want strong party buffs from someone else’s list. I recommend considering this only if you are playing an oracle (or other 9th level spontaneous caster) and have a prepared caster ally. Because you get more spells per day than your wizard buddy, you can open them up to their arguably stronger selection of 3rd level spells without forcing them to prepare haste or fly multiple times. Oracles might consider swapping this spell out for something else at level 10 or 12 once your party’s 3rd level slots have stopped meaning as much, but hey, that’s what your class does!
Note that you can abuse this spell on your partial caster allies, too. Generally they’ll have more access to powerful 3rd level spells than you will, and this spell doesn’t exclude these classes from qualifying. Even though it’s still using up your standard action, no ranger is going to complain about getting extra castings of instant enemy.
No matter your class, you will always have a use for scrolls of these. They’re basically single-use 3rd level pearls of power.
Channel VigorR- A personal-range blessing of fervor predecessor exclusive to worshippers of Irori. All four of the options you can choose from have their time and place. You will never regret taking this spell, and it’s probably the single reason any cleric actually worships the guy.
Charitable Impulse- Force the target to perform a number of charitable acts. This spell isn’t alignment-locked, which is fantastic because you can use this spell to completely rob people blind. In combat, this spell is passable as a save-or-suck. More important than anything else on the list is the fact that whatever your opponent is doing, they aren’t fighting you. Consider Extend Spell for this to get more time that your target spends doing nice things for you. I couldn’t choose what to rank this spell so I made it Split Color.
Contact Entity II- See contact entity I.
Contagious Zeal- One creature gets melee buffs and can select a new creature to gain them per round. Compare this to the 3rd level buffing benchmark heroism and you’ll find that it has noticeably worse bonuses for noticeably less time, in exchange for its ability to buff multiple allies. Green for warpriests since they can Fervor and actually affect other people with it.
Create Soul Gem- I’ve never played around with soul gems, but the costly focus component, impermanent duration, and all-around lack of utility makes me pretty confident this spell isn’t something to regularly prepare, if ever. A quick search of the source material seems to indicate that if you can find the right buyer, at high levels you can easily make thousands of GP per day through soul gems. That’s a GM call, though.
Cure Serious WoundsSU- See cure light wounds.
Dark-Light- Very respectable AoE Blind spell technically designed for kobolds. In most ways, this spell is a buff over blindness/deafness. It has a save for partial and affects a 20 ft. radius burst in exchange for not working on the few number of creatures with light sensitivity. Yes, the duration is rounds/level instead of permanent, but how often does a Blinded enemy usually last anyway? If anything, the instantaneous duration should be seen as a buff, since this spell can not be dispelled. A workhorse debuff to add to your collection for sure.
Deadly Juggernaut- The more you kill, the better your melee buffs. Usually you won’t be fighting hordes of enemies, but when you do you’ll appreciate the benefits you get from this spell. Combo with Fate’s Favored for a truly terrifying spell. Green for battle-oriented casters and Warpriests.
Detect Desires- An offshoot detect thoughts that you have access to. Learning what a creature wants is a heck of a lot more useful in-game than learning its anxieties. Most major NPCs are in some way a vessel for the story. Use this spell to get on their good side or uncover their evil motives. Still not as powerful as detect thoughts, but we take what we can get.
Dispel Magic- Alright, so here’s the deal here. I love dispel magic a little more than is probably warranted. If you’ve read my counterspelling guide you probably know that I am of the insane belief that dispelling and counterspelling is not only just a ton of fun, but also an actually viable thing to build around. I am a firm believer that every party needs somebody with this spell at all times; it’s just too useful not to carry. Selectively removing buffs, debuffs, or negative battlefield effects can often swing the tide of battle, and it’s generally useful outside of it as well. But even I must also acknowledge that dispel magic is not a perfect spell. To succeed on a dispel check requires you to roll an 11 against a caster of equal CL. That’s only a 50% chance, not something you want to find yourself always relying upon.
The problem is there’s really no alternative to what this spell does, and scrolls of this don’t mean anything when they’re all at CL 5, so you have to suck it up and take this spell even if you don’t want to. Now, feats do exist like Dispel Focus, Dispel Synergy, and Destructive Dispel that make dispel magic more worthwhile, but odds are you’re going to be very strapped for feats. With that all said, remember that I’m biased here. This spell is Purple because I think you need it, not because it’s necessarily broken. In terms of actual power, this spell is Green, and you can afford to skip it if your party has some other solution to dispelling stuff.
Draconic Malice- If you or a party member has built themselves around Intimidate or fear effects, look no further than draconic malice. This spell strips away fear immunities in a 10 ft. radius without saving throw. Unfortunately, many creatures immune to fear don’t qualify as “living,” so constructs and undead will still be unaffected.
Forced Mutation- A rounds/level touch-save-negate with a rounds/level duration. You do get some flexibility in what you impart, which is nice, and the debuff is rather significant. I’m not sure I’d ever take this over bestow curse, but if for some reason this spell speaks to you have at it.
Free Spirit- The absolute epitome of a Cayden Caliean spell that anyone can take. Gain the ever-powerful freedom of movement at the cost of a -2 to all rolls thanks to your drunkenness. Absolutely hilarious in practice. I just imagine a cleric drunk out of his mind accidentally slipping his way out of grapples and manacles. If you’re primarily a buffer or debuffer who rarely makes attack rolls, I can see this spell being as good as Blue.
Glyph of Warding- The cornerstone base defense spell until guards and wards. I’ve always wondered why this spell wasn’t on the wizard list, since it’s the truest essence of the abjuration school in my mind. It’s not often that you need to defend stuff, even less so when you’re willing to spend 200 gp to do it. But when you do, good ol glyph of warding has got you covered.
Horrifying Visage- Force a number of creatures to gain a phobia. In combat, this functionally results in 1d6 rounds of the Frightened condition. Out of combat, you can use this spell to defend a base or a campsite. Not super impressive for a 3rd level spell, but it’s the best fear spell you’ve got by now with no HD cap. Green if you’re built for scaring people or combo with bloody tears and jagged smile.
Inflict Serious WoundsSU- See inflict light wounds.
Invisibility Purge- I’d much rather the wizard cast glitterdust, but Invisibility is a strategy that will never go away. Your party likely has a few answers to invisible creatures by now, but none of them will ever be as effective as this. Green when your 3rds are a precious commodity, Blue when you’re at higher levels.
Irradiate- This spell is no joke. It scales nicely with level, has a sizeable AoE, provides battlefield control, cannot be dispelled, and drains Constitution. Pass this up until 7th level, and once you get to 10th level you’ll be vaporizing people left and right. The two big downsides are that you’ll be getting the most benefit here at high levels when Fort saves are highest, and that accidentally draining your allies’ Con quickly becomes a very difficult thing not to do. Ask your GM if you can combo this with lead plating for your allies.
Locate Object- A useful divination, depending on how lenient your GM lets you be. RAW you cannot find creatures with this spell, but what about the clothes or weapon of a creature you’ve observed extensively? Personally, I think that should be allowed. No harm in picking up a scroll of this for emergencies.
Magic Circle against [Alignment]- Still good, but unlike communal protection from evil, this version has a longer duration that in exchange basically forces your party to huddle together, which can open you up for nasty AoE attacks. Plus, by now the bonuses to saves and AC should be largely irrelevant. It’s still good, but vastly overshadowed IMO.
Magic Vestment- Everything you’ve ever wanted in an AC buff spell. Hours per level? Check. Scaling bonus? Check. Not personal? Check. Magic vestment is kind of weak at 3rd level but quickly grows in usage as the bonus grows and your 3rd level spells fall off.
Meld into Stone- Conform to a body of stone. Very useful in combat, and situationally useful for scouting. Note that nothing says you cannot make attacks or threaten flanks while in the stone, and I’d even imagine summoning earth elementals wouldn’t be too much of a stretch. Consider this spell if you have a lenient GM or if you love making use of spells that allow for crazy shenanigans.
Mind Maze- I read “blah blah blah blah, the target can’t make attacks or cast spells, blah blah blah.” Potentially your best save-or-suck at this level, as a failed save basically erases a creature from the fight.
Monstrous ExtremitiesR- A Lamashtu spell that lets you swap out any limb for a tentacle, hoof, or wing. Even though the duration is long, all you’re getting from this spell are weak secondary natural attacks, so you better make sure the person you’re casting this on has the melee attack bonus to make them work. The cool thing is, there’s not many ways to get these types of natural attacks on most characters, so the odds of this spell ever becoming obsolete with your natural attacking friend are low. I’m hesitantly putting this spell Green because there’s really no martial who wouldn’t appreciate free hoof attacks.
Paragon SurgeR, SU- There have been guides to this spell already, but the long and short of it is that it’s absolutely busted. Oracles can take Expanded Arcana for 1/day free spells, or can elect to gain an Extra Revelation. A bonus feat is still incredible for Clerics and Warpriests, though not having the insane versatility Oracles do is a bit of a bummer. Still a fantastic spell.
Recharge- I do not know anything about Technology rules. What I do know is that this spell costs 500 gp and has a chance of blowing up your precious items.
Remove Blindness/DeafnessSU- There are a number of effects that inflict permanent Blindness and Deafness that you’ll want this for eventually. Scrolls are nice since Blinded is just so crippling a condition. You should never prepare this spell unless somebody is already affected.
Resist Energy, Communal- Very respectable. This spell is a dead draw many days, but a complete lifesaver often enough you’ll want it around. More necessary than its 2nd level cousin for prepared casters who don’t have the luxury of a zillion 2nd level spells like the Oracle does.
Sand Whirlwind- Man, what a spell! You create a whirlwind of sand around someone that Blinds them on a failed save, and forces them to make concentration checks with a DC equal to the DC of this spell + the spell level regardless of save. Bypassing SR is just icing on the cake.
Screaming Flames- My absolute favorite spell so far that I’ve discovered from writing this list. Just read this description:
A sheer wall of flame appears and rushes away from you. Tendrils of fire reach out of it, shaped into skulls screaming in agony.
Holy crap, how badass is that?! The damage from this spell is merely okay, but any creature that takes even a single point of fire damage has to make a Will save or take 1d3 Wisdom damage. Anybody more south of Good should take this spell if for no other reason than to be the coolest caster on the battlefield.
Second Wind- As much as I dislike healing in combat, second wind is admittedly halfway decent. The fact that this spell doesn’t waste a standard action goes a very long way for keeping it relevant, and the healing you get from it is respectable. You’re likely your party’s primary divine caster, and reviving you of all people takes the most effort. It might well be situational, but it’s strong enough to warrant consideration since it can keep you conscious.
Share Language, CommunalSU- If you need to negotiate with foreign emissaries and don’t have tongues yet this is your spell. It’s a lot less worth it occupying your higher level slot in the communal form and probably never really needed over the singular.
Shield of Darkness- Give yourself 50% miss chance for a round per level. Overall comparable to displacement and a very solid spell.
Shield of WingsR- Gain a 50 ft. fly speed that diminishes by 10 every time you get hit by fire. You also gain fire resistance 30 when you do so, and once your fly speed goes away you gain fire immunity for a minute. Considering how few options you have for flight at this level, Ragathiel worshippers should definitely consider this one.
Speak with DeadSU- Like zone of truth, the big issue here is that you don’t know if the body you’re messing with has made their Will save and is actively trying to deceive you. Unlike zone of truth, at least you get a Sense Motive to realize any potential Bluff. Still a good option for when parley can’t happen before a fight and you need some info.
Stone Shape- Sculpt 10 ft3 + 1 ft3 per level into whatever you want. Dungeons, cities, and buildings are all typically made of stone, so you have plenty of places where this spell comes in handy. It can shape the battlefield, create passageways, manufacture crude tools, and more. The best part has got to be the instantaneous duration-- whatever changes you make to your environment stay.
Stunning Barrier, Greater- I told you this spell was going to be awesome. +2 to AC and saves will barely matter by now, but the ability to stun a boatload of melee attacks is absolutely incredible.
Summon Ancestral Guardian- Conjure two dwarves wielding their signature weapons to attack like spiritual weapon. Curiously, this spell isn’t explicitly locked to Dwarf characters even though it probably should be. A worthy successor to spiritual weapon that anybody would be happy to add to their repertoire. Ask your GM if you can add Dazing Spell to this.
Summon Monster III- Summons are officially online; I repeat, summons are online. Leopards are combat machines and the crocodile is a scary effective grappler. 1d3 wolves can triplock anything with a modest CMD and the dretch has enough staying power to put in some serious work.
Summon Totem Creature- A narrow summon monster II analog with an impressive 1 hour duration. You won’t ever be able to refresh your summon in combat, but that’s a small price to pay for having a lasting meatshield. I don’t recommend this spell past 7th level or so, as it really falls off once your summons routinely end up dead in a single hit.
Toxic Blood- A version of blood blaze that doesn’t suck outright. Anytime a creature affected by this spell takes piercing or slashing damage, a stream of poison jets out in the direction of the attacker. Poison effects are generally bad, but toxic blood is straight-up nasty with its ability to repeatedly dish out sweet, sweet Constitution damage.
Oh, and what’s this? You can permanency this spell? Whaaaaaaaatttttttt?
Unhallowed Blows, Greater- Man, this spell is strong. Hours per level duration, scaling enhancement bonus to attack and damage, creatures per level, and can be permanencied. There’s not a horde necromancer out there who shouldn’t take this.
Voluminous VocabularySU- An upgrade to share language. The duration is 8 hours instead of 24, but you don’t have to have the language in question to impart a creature, can target yourself, and affected creatures gain the ability to speak the language even if they don’t have oral functionality to do so.
Wall of Split Illumination- Create a wall of illumination with darkness and light on opposite sides. This is honestly a pretty cool spell. None of its effects independently are anything unduly impressive by this level, though it does offer loads of versatility. It blocks line of sight for all creatures and can serve as both a daylight and a darkness spell if the situation demands it. If you don’t want one of these two light effects, you can always throw this spell right up next to a solid wall.
Water BreathingSU- Chances are you’ll need this spell at some point in your game. If your game is aquatic themed, obviously this is a no-brainer pick.
Water WalkSU- For those of you who really took Medium Armor Proficiency to heart. Similar deal with the spell above.
Waters of Lamashtu- This spell is straight up-nasty. The natural combo to it is beguiling gift, nearly guaranteeing the opponent is beset by all manner of nasty debuffs. The problem I’m running into in rating this spell is the vague interpretation of the term “anoint.” Does this spell let you huck splash weapons of the stuff for holy water damage plus the actual effects, or does it take a special action to perform on someone? Additionally, how on-board is your GM with you transforming yourself into a beast? Why is this spell not restricted to Lamashtu or categorized by the [evil] descriptor? These are questions I do not have the answers to.
Absorb Rune I- You can transfer a 3rd level or lower spell effect affixed to a surface to another surface. It’s probably a bit of a stretch, but do people count as surfaces? You could probably make shields work with little argument. If so, that seems like a viable method for transferring personal-range spells to others. This is a weird spell series I’d love to see some clarification on. As of right now, whether or not your GM lets you lift spells off of people or not is the real determiner of how good this spell is. Otherwise, situational.
Air Walk- An absolutely necessary spell, and one of the meta-defining options the Sorcerer/Wizard list is sorely lacking in. When compared to fly, air walk has a longer duration, doesn’t force Fly checks, and affords its targets full mobility. Take it, use it, love it.
Ancestral Gift- Summon a +1 weapon with a +1 weapon property that lasts 10 minutes per level. The level you get this spell is about the level you should have a +2 equivalent weapon already. There are a few interesting situational weapon abilities you can call with this spell, like limning, quenching, or glamered, but the real money here comes from bane weapons. You’ll never get anything better than a +1 bane weapon so this spell won’t scale very well, but as of the level you get this it’s a worthy pick.
Bestow Planar Infusion II- Just as situational as the last time.
Bit of LuckR- Ultra-strong Catfolk-exclusive spell. Spend points from a pool of luck points to gain +1d8 luck bonus to any attack roll or skill check you make. If that wasn’t good enough, you can add even more d8s at once at higher levels. Combo with Fate’s Favored or Magical Lineage (plus Empower or Maximize) to routinely become the party’s solution to any skill imaginable.
Blessing of Fervor- The best 4th level spell on your list, and one you should open almost every encounter with (unless you’re a Warpriest…). Everybody in your party will appreciate this spell. The benefits are simply fantastic, and the ability to change them out on an as-needed basis is simply too good to pass up.
Chaos Hammer- A chaotic holy smite. 1d6 rounds of slow is considerable, even if the damage is mediocre at best. Green if you regularly fight devils or something.
Conditional Curse- A bestow curse that lets you set a condition in which the curse is broken. In addition, the DC to remove it by remove curse or break enchantment goes up by 5. A natural pick for bad touch clerics who hate it when their GM keeps throwing status removers on the enemy team. Green because the level bump doesn’t really match up well with the buff you get over bestow curse.
Control Water- An awe-inspiring spell that establishes your supreme dominion over the seas. In an average campaign, you won’t have too many times where you’ll be close enough to a body of water to routinely benefit from this spell. Any GM worth their sea salt will understand that this spell will turn the tide in any naval battle. In aquatic campaigns you’ll be hard-pressed to find reasons not to take this.
Crusader's Edge- A strong buff against evil outsiders, a common enough enemy type to have spells to prepare for. It’s just a shame that this doesn’t overcome DR by default. This spell is even better on weapons with high crit ranges.
Death WardSU- A fantastic buff you hope to never need. This spell used to provide absolute immunity to its listed effects in 3.5, and that got changed to giving only a +4 in Pathfinder. That said, at higher levels, energy drain and save-or-dies are some of the scariest things you can encounter. The sad reality is that you have so many awesome “mandatory” 4th level spells that one of them has to get the axe, and it generally ends up being death ward. Your usage here will be largely determined by what kind of campaign you find yourself in. Either way, I recommend keeping a few scrolls of this on hand if you can spare the cash.
Dimensional Anchor- Your best answer against teleportation. You’re now at the level where teleportation is common, and having an answer to it is usually nice to have. I usually don’t see this spell entirely making or breaking encounters, though it is practically unparalleled in its efficacy those times you do need it.
Divination- There’s a reason the entire school of divination shares a name with this spell. For the low, low price of 25 gp you can rest assured you are every bit prepared as you ought to be. There’s a reason I keep saying some spells are useful based on situation, and divination is the perfect spell for outlining to you exactly what that situation is. High level Pathfinder is predicated on two things: intel and initiative. From here on out, it’s your own fault if you don’t know exactly what it is you’re getting yourself into. Even if your GM wants to be coy and give you riddles, this spell is pretty explicit that what you’re given is going to be useful somehow.
Divine Power- The reason the Warpriest didn’t open with blessing of fervor is because she cast this spell instead. Your 3/4 BAB means you’re a perfectly competent fighter by now, so even if you don’t primarily focus on weapon attacks, this gem lets you pretend you always meant to.
Enchantment Foil- A cast-and-forget that makes it really darn tough to hit you with an enchantment. It’s harder to justify a 4th level slot that gives you Wis-based casters a boost to your already sky-high Will save, but the Oracle is sure to appreciate the comfort this spell provides. Definitely revisit this in a few levels.
Flame Steed- Rapidash, I choose you! Aside from being totally, unquestioningly badass, this spell packs some legitimate firepower (pun obviously intended). People often forget that mounted casting is totally a thing you can do. Getting to retaliate with a cloud of Sickening smoke every time you get attacked is an awesome deterrent.
Fleshworm Infestation- What I like about this spell is it’s got that nice Fortitude partial tag. As long as you succeed on your melee touch attack, your target is Sickened for the entire fight. The failed save effect is also nice, forcing extra saves else take Dex damage and become Staggered. The only poopy part is getting blocked by the common-enough protection from evil.
Freedom of Movement- One of the strongest and most ubiquitous 4th level spells in the game, and for once the Wizard can’t cast it. That means the responsibility falls squarely on your celestial shoulders to make sure the battlefield stays exactly how you need it to be. You are the one who decides who gets the privilege of grappling. You decide whose wizard can win the control war. You decide who is allowed to suffer at the hands of paralysis. And when someone dies because they didn’t get spared by your holy touch of freedom, you were the one who decided they didn’t deserve to live.
Freedom of movement is not a choice. Freedom of movement is an obligation.
Glimpse of Truth- Spoiler alert: true seeing is a busted spell. Even getting just 1 round of it can have its uses; from spotting hidden doors, to foiling illusions, to ensuring your bag of flour hits the invisible target. Definitely doesn’t hold a candle to the real thing, but certainly not a spell to be overlooked. At least until you get 5ths, anyway…
Globe of Tranquil WaterSU- Quite the curious little abjuration, this spell is. You grant yourself (and presumably your party too) protection against precipitation, fog, and water effects, and ensure your Swim checks are made only against calm water. Only issue is that I don’t actually know if by “bubble” of water the spell means the interior is made of air or water. Regardless of the ruling, there’s such a weird combination of abilities that still could somehow combine to be a situationally appropriate choice.
Hallucinogenic Smoke- A weird but useful spell. Targeting Fort now sucks, but the AoE save for partial more than makes up for it. Nauseated is a nasty debuff, and Sickened for 1d4 rounds is nothing to sneeze at either. The buff to augury won’t come up much, but is nice to have if you don’t want to cast divination for some reason. A solid spell thanks to its ability to hamper a respectable number of enemies.
Heavy Water- Useless if you aren’t fighting in water. Stupidly good if you are. Because of the wording here, you basically eliminate all standard actions (sans spellcasting) within the radius without affording a save at all. If your GM loves aquatic combat, you’ll very quickly wear them thin by perpetually invalidating their encounters.
Iron Spine- A cool spell that royally messes up fey and moderately messes up everything else. In exchange for not doing much against certain types of DR, this spell only requires a ranged attack to hit and doesn’t grant a saving throw. Note that unless your target has Still Spell, almost all spellcasting will still constitute some form of movement. Any fey creature struck by this spell is basically dead meat as long as you beat their SR. If you know your enemies will have DR/cold iron this is solidly Blue.
Magic Circle Against Technology- See protection from technology.
Magic Weapon, Greater- When you initially gain access to greater magic weapon, the spell is likely rather unimpressive thanks to your low CL. As you grow, the enchantment bonus becomes nicer and nicer. The cast-and-forget duration is just the icing on the cake.
Mighty StrengthR- Dwarven pantheon worshippers will appreciate this spell. It works as bull’s strength, except it grants an impressive +8 enhancement to Strength and is purely personal range only. Blue for Warpriests, or at least until the stacking with your belt gets too redundant.
Oracle's VesselO- Target gains the benefits of your oracle's curse. I’ve colored each viable curse with how good I think this spell is for them. Generally any curse that offers spells to a creature won’t be too useful since you already have access to them. A Split Color rating below indicates that the spell gets better as your curse gets better.
Aboleth (gives Bluff or Intimidate as class skills), Clouded Vision, Cold-Blooded, Deaf, Deep One (in aquatic games), Hellbound, Hunger, Lame (if you’ve got a barbarian), Legalistic, Powerless Prophecy, Putrid, Reclusive, Shattered Psyche.
Order's Wrath- Similar to arrow of law, Daze is incredibly strong. This spell is arguably the best variant of the 4th level alignment blasts, at a solid Green if you’re against enemies of the appropriate alignment.
Path of Glory, Greater- One of the most efficient healing spells in the game. Weak (but not useless!) in combat, but amazing as a mass-heal outside of it. 50 hp per party member is honestly insane, making this spell a worthy exception to the no-healing-spells rule. If you have the swift actions to burn, there’s no reason not to carpet the battlefield in squares. The healing only goes to people you designate allies, after all!
Planar Ally, Lesser- Strong, expensive, and entirely up to the GM. Not a chance I can give this spell an adequate rating.
Purify Body- An incredibly useful panacea spell. You heal damage as cure serious wounds which can overheal allies against one attack, you remove all ability damage from physical scores, and you can cure the target of a very respectable variety of conditions. The first healing spell on this list that has genuinely impressed me, and a very worthy choice for your daily preparations for its status removal versatility.
Quieting WeaponsSU- Basically a silence spell but only localized on a weapon. Very useful for stealth missions and for when said spell would be too inconvenient to play around.
Rigor Mortis- Wow, a damaging spell that does an uncapped 1d6 damage per level. We haven’t seen one of those yet. Sure, its nonlethal, but aside from a few creature immunities who cares? Unconscious still wins you fights. The rider effects here are decent, too. Split Color because while I don’t think single target blasts are altogether the best use of your spells, I can’t discount that this spell actually contributes to a fight.
Sacrifice- Give something up to aid in your planar binding request. You have to give up quite a lot to get any benefit from this spell, but then again, you wouldn’t be casting planar binding if you weren’t already prepared to take that risk. Ultimately the act of binding outsiders should be discussed with your GM, and while this spell can help tremendously in doing so, is therefore too subject to GM fiat for me to rate.
SendingSU- Deliver a 25 word message to anyone, even across planes. Definitely useful if your campaign requires long distance communication with important NPCs.
Spell ImmunitySU- I see this spell more as a GM tool than a PC tool. You get immunity to a number of 4th level or lower spells of your choosing. You have to know what you’re up against, which might not be too much of a downside if you can nail your Knowledge checks on SLAs. But the real downside here is that this only affects one of your party members. Good if you know what the boss enemy is planning and you have enough money to buy scrolls for the whole party.
Spiritual Ally- This spell functions as spiritual weapon except it can be moved by a swift action, threatens squares, and has the ability to fly. There is not a combat situation where this spell is useless. Ask your GM if Dazing Spell applies here.
Spit Venom- Spit black adder venom at your target. I love the Fort: partial here; it more than makes up for doing less Con damage than poison. Also worth noting are the SR: no tag and the only component being Verbal.
Summon Accuser- One of the best summon spells in the game for its level. Accuser devils are designed for scouting (something they do excellent at), which means this spell got hit with an unprecedented ten minute per level duration. I don’t care how bad they might be in combat, you can amass an army of these things to do your bidding. And yes, they really are quite good as scouts.
This spell falls off once a single AoE can reliably take your army out, around 10th level or so. Enjoy it while you can!
Summon Barghest I- The Barghest is a combat summon with a number of potent SLAs. It stacks up nicely with the options from summon monster IV, trading some of the raw damage for survivability and a few enchantment SLAs. The lack of versatility from summon monster obviously is a downside, too. Lastly, don’t forget that you have your beast change shape if you need the wolf’s trip attack.
Summon Genie, Lesser- Janni aren’t particularly impactful in combat. They have mediocre combat abilities, and offbeat spell-like abilities. The only reason you’d want to summon them would be for the early access to the elemental planes, but you explicitly cannot do that as per the wording on summon monster.
Summon Monster IV- One of the best levels for the summon monster line. The Deinonychus makes for a quick striker thanks to pounce and 4 attacks; the grizzly bear puts in work grappling, as do 1d3 crocodiles; the rhinoceros is excellent at getting in the fray and taking up space; and earth elementals hit hard with Power Attack.
Symbol of Revelation- See symbol of death. Actually one of the cheaper symbols, and possibly worth getting made permanent on your armor or something to thwart glamers you yourself won’t be using.
TonguesSU- Understand and communicate in any language. I prefer this in scroll form.
Traveling DreamR- This spell checks all the boxes for me. It’s useful but not overpowered, oozes with flavor, and gives both the GM and the player a lot to work with beyond the mechanical aspect of the spell. Yes, it’s pretty much a straight downgrade to the wizard’s arcane eye, but dang it if it’s not interesting as all hell!
Wall of Bone- A variant of wall of stone that comes a level early but has less hardness, isn’t shapeable, and tries to grapple adjacent creatures. Two points of concern with the whole grabby bit: the bonus to CMB is downright terrible, and you must be careful your allies aren’t affected. Those concerns addressed, wall of bone is still a very viable way to control the battlefield.
Warp Metal- A simply fantastic spell. In addition to all of the stuff you can do with this spell out of combat, you can completely ruin all of your enemies’ melee weapons with one fell swoop. Not even magic items are safe from this effect, but don’t worry about destroying your precious loot: you can just unwarp your spoils of war back in the safety of your home base.
Wave Form- Another insanely cool spell that I never knew about until writing this guide. Turn yourself into a Huge sized wave of water and surge forward at twice your movement speed, knocking over literally everything in your path. This spell is really good for maneuvering around the battlefield. Plus, at higher levels Reflex becomes the go-to save to target, and since this spell doesn’t specify otherwise you can topple creatures of any size with the resulting wave.
Wrathful Weapon- Enhance a weapon with one of the alignment special qualities. Super useful for overcoming DR while adding on a boatload of damage. Blue for Warpriests and parties with Neutral-aligned melee fighters.
Air Walk, Communal- Solid party buff. The Wizard’s mass fly is still a ways off so we take this and use it and love it.
Angelic Aspect- Hell yes. You are now a literal friggin angel. In addition to flight, you get a number of nifty resistances and even some DR. Works for me!
Astral Projection, Lesser- You and your party now instantly revive upon being slain. At the cost of just 1,000 gp you have successfully idiot-proofed your party with a cheaper, better, 5th level version of clone. There is an argument to be made that you only get to forge a new body on a separate plane, but you could always just cast this spell already from the Astral Plane or a mage’s magnificent mansion. The one downside here, as I lay out more extensively in astral projection, is that you don’t get the chance to breath of life a fallen teammate. But at this level, costless death immunity is generally more valuable than an ally being out of the fight for awhile. Just be careful of dispel magic.
Awaken the Devoured- An AoE blast spell that only works against daemons. It’s actually pretty good damage and comes with a rider effect nobody would complain about. Entirely dependent on how often you find yourself against daemons.
Boneshatter- Absolutely brutal spell. This is a single-target blast spell that has a primary upside of inflicting Fatigue whether your enemy saves or not.
Break Enchantment- Your panacea spell against some of the worst effects in the game. Flesh to stone, feeblemind, dominate person, bestow curse all crumble before this spell. The minute long casting time really sucks, and prevents this spell from true greatness.
Breath of Life- Director James Jacobs has cited this as a “spell tax,” and I’m inclined to agree. Death is expensive in Pathfinder and sometimes despite your best preparation someone is going to get crit and straight up crumple. You need this spell somewhere on your party to prevent the ordeal that is character death. If the idea of this spell bores you and you don’t want to take, I don’t blame you; in that case look into picking up some first-aid gloves for your party. Preferably more than one set so you aren’t screwed when the guy with the gloves goes down. It’s well worth the cost.
This spell would be a good candidate for Reach Spell if the 6th level inspiring recovery didn’t do all of that but better.
Caustic Blood- Most rounds/level buff spells are bad. Most “effect activates when you get hit” spells are bad. Most “costs an expensive material component” spells are bad. Somehow this spell manages to be all three and still worthy of your attention. Black adder venom is 120gp a pop, so you have to be careful not to blow your whole budget casting this spell. If you find yourself frontlining a lot, you can quickly find yourself wading knee-deep in puddles of acid damage. Cast this before the scary white dragon attacks and watch as he tries to full-round you and dies halfway through his first turn.
A hilarious candidate for Empower Spell.
Command, Greater- Yesssss! The biggest issue with command was the crappy duration. Now, not only is it rounds/level, but you also get to target multiple enemies at one time! Simply awesome.
CommuneSU- I think this is a very powerful spell in the right hands, guarded behind a costly material component fee. As such, it’s kind of hard to justify someone regularly taking it, knowing full well that doing so cuts into your party funds. I wouldn’t say a scroll of this spell is strictly necessary, but there do come situations where it’s really nice to get some clear-cut answers from the man in the clouds.
Compel Tongue, MassSU- If you’ve got a language you know and need to share it with everyone, here you go.
Constricting CoilsR- Hold Monster isn’t on your list. Normally I’d just say to take that spell instead, as the bludgeoning damage here is not worth the spell level increase. But since you don’t, and it’s still a save-or-die without any frilly restrictions, I can’t say it’s a bad spell.
Contact Entity III- See contact entity I.
Curse, Major- No longer a touch spell! And anyone you tag is going to have a very difficult time getting cured. I don’t know if it’s necessarily worth being two slots higher than bestow curse, though the save DC does scale where a reach bestow curse wouldn’t.
Dispel [Alignment]- This spell benefits immensely from having a wide utility. You gain a +4 deflection bonus to AC against the associated alignment, which is mediocre at this level. You also get to either attempt to banish a creature (like dismissal) or dispel any spell of the associated alignment descriptor or enchantment cast by such a creature without needing to worry about succeeding on a dispel check. Hugely useful abilities, if you ask me.
Dispel Balance- Basically just read the previous entry. This spell affects True Neutral creatures marginally more, and creatures with Neutral alignment components marginally less.
Fickle WindsSU- Entirely invalidate an encounter with a party buff that makes arrows, swarms, gas effects, Small flying creatures, fog effects, and (creation) subschool ranged attacks useless. Arrows tend to be less common than melee attacks, but this is still a wide range of blanket immunities you should think twice about passing up fickle winds.
Forbid Action, Greater- A bit harder to use than greater command but with much higher potential payoff. It’s pretty debilitating telling every enemy at once they aren’t allowed to take any more attack rolls for the fight. Oh, and unlike greater command, your targets don’t get saves beyond the initial round.
Ghostbane Dirge, Mass- Ugh. As annoying as incorporeal creatures are, you’re going to be repeatedly wasting your slots if you take to relying on this spell and its predecessor. I still don’t like that it requires a failed save, and one that’s likely your target’s best one. I resign myself to making this Green only in the circumstance your campaign sees a lot of ghosts and stuff. I’d still hope you regularly bring other contingencies instead of this…
Hallow- Base defense done to the extreme. You ward a site with a magic circle, add a suped-up analog to consecrate, and carpet the whole area with a specific spell of your choosing. Oracles should never take this, and clerics and warpriests only should when they’ve got something worth spending a few thousand gps defending. If you’re willing to go this far, you may as well set up some nasty traps with permanency too.
Heretic's TongueR- A brutally blasphemous spell courtesy of the Archdevil of Heresy, Geryon. This is a single target debuff that upon a failed save restricts the target from casting spells or SLAs. If restricting spellcasting wasn’t already incredibly powerful, this spell has a second effect on certain divine classes. It’s downright nasty on Paladins, Clerics, and Warpriests; you can guess their alignment to potentially strip away entire class features for the spell’s duration. This shouldn’t be that hard, since the target’s going to have their holy symbol visible the whole time. The target can willingly end this effect by paralyzing themselves and basically blaspheming their own god; but that’s a win-win for a worshipper of Geryon like you!
Holy Ice- An analog to wall of ice that splits damage between cold and holy water. You can also unleash a salvo of frozen javelins all at once for a few d6 of damage if you really need it, but that’s way below the power for a 5th level spell. You don’t get many control spells, so we take this spell even at the expense of a dose of holy water for the wide range of applications it can be used for. Really good with Rime Spell if you don’t mind having like zero other decent spells to use it on.
Hunter's BlessingR- A cast-and-forget party buff that rewards clerics of Erastil for doing their homework and utilizing divinations by letting you give one favored enemy and terrain to your party. At the bare minimum, you should have zero issue pinpointing what terrain you’re going to be traversing, and the resultant +2 to initiative and Perception to everyone in the party alone would make this spell a worthy contender. Add in the favored enemy and you’ve got yourself one heck of a spell. This spell is good and you should prepare it often.
Lend Path- With lend path, you can temporarily give your mythic path abilities to another creature. Ideally you’re giving this to an already mythic creature, otherwise the benefits are going to be largely wasted. There’s so many good mythic abilities and I’m not anywhere near familiar with them that I can’t give this spell a fair rating. I’m absolutely certain there’s some super-specific combos you can perform here that would further break the game (y’know, more than you’re already breaking it by playing Mythic).
Plane Shift- Touch-save-negate that ends encounters outright that also doubles as a preventative measure against itself. You’re getting up there in levels where planar travel is common so it’s only a matter of time before you need this.
Raise DeadSU- I don’t think this spell needs to be a daily prep. Breath of life ideally is your anti-death measure, but there are times where it won’t be applicable and having this will be a relief. I recommend always having on hand a scroll of this for such emergencies.
Cheese alert: dead bodies are objects. You can make whole on your broken fighter...
Reboot- Temporarily “resurrect” a construct for a few short rounds to do your bidding. I suppose if you found a particularly strong destroyed construct you could take it around with you and use this spell when you need a beatstick. The spell doesn’t specify how much of the construct needs to exist either, so potentially you could just carry around a mechanical femur or something. Entirely dependent on what your GM throws at you and how they rule the destroyed state must be.
Respectful QuietR- A silence that only affects targets and not the empty space between them. Sneaking about using this spell is even easier than it was with silence and you are no longer in jeopardy of hurting your allies in a scrap. A worthy buff to silence, though I do feel it came a level or two too late. Plus you no longer get the ability to throw a silent pebble around to deny saving throws.
Righteous Might- Turn on butt-kicking mode and wade into battle as a literal titan of war. My favorite part about this spell is how it stacks so beautifully with other buffs; size bonuses are quite rare. Blue for warpriests thanks to fervor-ability and general propensity for melee destruction.
Sand Whirlwind, Greater- The only improvement from sand whirlwind is that the spell now affects a 10 ft. radius spread instead of a single target. Honestly a pretty pathetic buff for what was a really fun spell two levels ago. Split Color for indecision.
Scrying- Ubiquitous in its ability to find people, scrying is one of those spells just about any party will appreciate having. It’s because of this spell that any bad guy worth anything should have mind blank active at every waking moment. Target fails their save? Too bad, guess I’ll just cast it again tomorrow!
Slough- Brutal save: negates debuff that throws the target into a world of Con damage and further adds a few passable penalties for you to potentially combo off of. Combos nicely with spells like poison, spit venom, snake staff, and summons that poison.
Smite AbominationR- A Pharasma spell that lets you smite undead just like a paladin does. To quote the Flex Tape guy, “That’s a lot of damage!” Blue if your campaign has a lot of undead, though you’ll always have some undead to kill no matter what you’re playing.
Snake Staff- Transforms wood into snakes to fight for you. Ask the wizard nicely if he’ll cast shrink item on some felled logs for you, otherwise just fill a bag of holding or something. As long as you put in the effort, there’s no reason this spell shouldn’t result in a few well-suited bodies on the battlefield whenever you need it.
Spell Immunity, Communal- Yes, you have the same issues as before where you need to know what you’re up against, but the fact that you can affect your party significantly improves the viability of this spell. This often means allowing you to functionally remove two or three 4th level or lower SLAs from an outsider. Make sure you remind your GM that the monster isn’t likely to know you have this spell up and could waste an action or two trying to affect you. Not a bad spell at all to prep before boss fights.
Spellcasting Contract, LesserR- A beefier imbue with spell ability that is actually totally worth it. Trade a 5th level slot for what could easily become a permanent +2 bonus to attacks, saves, and checks that’s likely to stack with everything. Plus you have every spell on your 1st and 2nd list available for delivery. Clearly the best use here is relinquishing personal-only buffs or saveless control spells to your party members, like grace, ironskin, divine favor, silence, and spiritual weapon. Overall a very worthy upgrade to a previously terrible spell.
Summon Ceustodaemon- These things hit pretty hard with Power Attack and have a respectable list of special attacks, SLAs, and defenses. It’s rare you’ll see one of these guys die outright before their summoning time ends, during which they’ll be putting in some serious work on the battlefield. Constant see invisibility is especially nice, and its breath weapon is just viable enough to ensure even on a failed save it’ll deal a dozen hit points of damage or so.
Summon Genie- While not outstanding combatants, Djinni have a number of excellent uses for the party that summon monster V can’t come close to replicating. While they can affect 3 creatures with wind walk, create anything with major creation, and put up a persistent image, do note that these abilities all end when the summon disappears. In combat, they are good at dishing out a number of small hits thanks to reasonable attack bonuses, Combat Reflexes and invisibility. Their whirlwind is rather low DC for this level, but could be useful in certain situations. You could also summon 1d3 janni, but in that case I’d say summon monster V is the superior choice.
Summon Lesser Demon- You get a whole slew of demons to summon, each an incredibly viable choice in its own right. This spell features a number of useful spell-like abilities, as well as a number of very respectable beatstick monsters (brimoraks and thoxel). Nothing in here is quite as impressive as summon monster V, but the sheer volume of SLAs you get makes it more than worth it (thanks, incubus!). Without going too much into the list of useful spells, you can replicate spider climb, tongues, detect thoughts, suggestion, crushing despair, air walk, dispel magic, and fireball.
Summon Monster V- The best summon spell for its level. Ankylosaurus are simply no joke with their DC 23 stun effect whenever they hit an attack. Dire lions are incredible strikers and woolly rhinoceros are good at charging in and eating damage. Earth elementals are okay and the Bralani is good at distributing blur to the party.
Symbol of Scrying- See symbol of death. Symbol of scrying is actually one of, if not the best symbol spells, for whatever that’s worth. If I’m bothering to ward something, I want to know what it is that’s now got access to my stuff. This spell lets you do that, making it the only symbol to actually do something to let you know your defenses have been breached. Saving throw: none is awesome here, and makes this spell well worth the 1,000 gp cost of whatever you elect to slap it on. Even better permanent.
Tongues, CommunalSU- Eh. Honestly you have so many other “let the party communicate” spells by this point you really do not need this. It’s so rare that you even need more than 1 person able to speak a language at all. I don’t think your precious 5ths should be going to something as trivial as solving a simple language barrier.
Treasure Stitching- A pretty cool way to store your stuff. Basically you heap any number of items on a cloth and cast the spell, rendering all affected items inert and sewn into the fabric, waiting to be retrieved at some time in the future. The duration here really sells this for me, allowing you to carry a lot of stuff you’d normally never get to. As a huge fan of shrink item, I can attest that there’s bound to be fun shenanigans you can do with this. I am cautiously making this spell Green for prepared casters just because I think there’s the potential to do cool stuff and it only takes up a slot once every week or so.
True Seeing- A busted, stupid, absolute gamebreaking spell. This dumb spell is the mother of all “detect” spells. It straight-up beats an entire school of magic. It trivializes darkness. It sees the Ethereal. It locates secret doors. And it even slices bagels! The only thing stopping this spell from the coveted Purple rating is the hefty 250 gp cost that a spell like this ought to have, making you really consider if the situation in question calls for some perfect sight.
Unhallow- See hallow. Only prepare if you’ve got a base to defend.
Unholy Ice- See holy ice. Works on fewer creatures, so it’s technically worse, but not enough so to worth changing its rating. Turns out, wall of ice is good even if doesn’t deal damage.
Unleash Pandemonium- Finally, a good spell for the forces of chaos! And what a spell it is, let me tell you. Windstorm-speed winds are already an incredible debuff, and this spell adds not only a saveless Deafened onto that, but also a side helping of Shaken on a failed save. You don’t get many control spells that function this strong without granting a saving throw. You completely invalidate ranged attacks in the massive 30 ft. radius. Enjoy having access to this spell, it’s going to become a favorite of yours real fast.
Vile Dog Transformation- Dumb. You get to turn regular dogs into hellhounds for the duration of the spell. Which happens to be hours/level. Hellhounds kind of suck, but you have little to lose by just spamming dogs. Entirely dependent on how much money you’re willing to spend buying dogs to supplement your army, how much patience your GM has for your antics, and how you can possibly get the dogs all together at the time of casting. I almost don’t want to mention that Extend Spell exists.
To make it clear, I think this is a terrible spell. Hellhounds die so quickly it’s hardly worth making them at all unless you plan on going absolute dog-crazy. I can’t find an adequate rating because at a certain point, an army of a few dozen monsters always with you becomes a GM abstraction rather than a numerical assessment I can rate, no matter how weak they are.
Wall of Blindness/Deafness- Battlefield control that makes creatures seriously consider walking through your wall. Good for surrounding melee creatures, since this particular wall doesn’t block line of sight.
Wall of Clockwork- A cross between wall of stone and blade barrier. It grants cover and does a low amount of damage to anything that tries to move through it, similar to blade barrier, and is a completely shapeable (creation) school effect like wall of stone. A good control spell.
Wall of Stone- The quintessential wall spell. Maybe not as frustrating to play around as wall of thorns, maybe not as unstoppable as wall of force, but wall of stone is unquestioningly not bereft of utility. In and out of combat, wall of stone reigns supreme as the paragon of all that magic is capable of. Shapeable, durable, and permanent, this is a spell just begging to be taken by a creative caster. Obviously a good spell to combine with stone shape.
Absorb Rune II- See absorb rune I. Same deal.
Animate Objects- Excellent. Simply excellent. This spell works as a blanket solution to any number of mundane problems only restricted by your creativity. Thanks to the Construction Points you can have your constructed minions do all sorts of interesting things, kind of like a polymorph any object spell. You can turn a table into a flying carpet, a bookshelf into a raft, a piece of straw into a sewing needle, you get the idea. The minions are passable in combat, made better by, again, the ability to customize them to fit your needs. Making this spell permanent is fun, though do make sure you prepare a few make whole spells to offset your general inability to heal your beatsticks.
I recommend using d20pfsrd’s spell entry for this one, as it has a nice, convenient link to the statblocks and construction requirements.
Antilife Shell- This is my personal space bubble. Do not cross my personal space bubble. Antilife shell is a fantastic spell that works like sanctuary on steroids. Completely hedging out most creature types allows you to ward anyone in the center of the bubble with a high degree of safety. Magical ranged options are clearly still going to pose issues (particularly AoEs if you’ve got everyone in your party within the sphere), though this doesn’t prevent you from also abusing ranged attacks. Pairs nicely with fickle winds and spells that ward against energy types, as well as if you plan on commanding constructs, undead, or summoned outsiders.
Banishment- A welcome improvement to dismissal. Target even more creatures of stronger strength, and potentially utilize additional components to better ensure success. This is a good choice for the level. Good in conjunction with Piercing Spell.
Besmara's Grasping Depths- Manifest a haunt on a number of water squares that drags affected targets to the bottom. This spell has a chance to kill creatures through drowning (something you don’t see all that often) and does a decent job of taking creatures out of the fight. It’s not good to take if you’re not in an aquatic campaign, obviously, but it has a lot of potential if you regularly spend time swimming.
Blade Barrier- Evoke a barrier of whirling blades that make enemies think twice about passing through. Cool tip: if you need to wall off a small enough corridor, you can use the ringed wall effect to functionally force two Reflex saves. Excellent for controlling the battlefield, just be aware that it's not shapeable like wall of stone.
Bloodsworn RetributionR- Sacrifice up to 25 maximum hp and gain a +1 for every 5 hp you forfeit on all attacks, saves, and checks related to the completion of a specific task. Could be entirely broken depending on your GM. But that’s just it: it’s entirely based on how much rope your GM wants to give you.
Chains of Light- This spell is functionally a hold monster spell that targets Reflex and prevents any sort of extra dimensional travel. Already a good effect, this spell is made better by the SR: no tag and not being limited by creature type. Plus, by now, Reflex is statistically the best save to target with your debuffs since monsters are larger on average at high levels. Pairs nicely with Persistent Spell.
Edit: Be careful with this spell. There’s a lot of vague rules inconsistencies with the way it affects those that are immune to paralysis. Can the creature cast spells with Somatic components? Can they leave their square? Ask these questions to your GM before using this.
Cold Ice Strike- A blast spell that would be on par with some 3rd level wizard spells if not for the fact that this spell takes a mere swift action to cast. Super nice to keep around to finish off threatening enemies at low hp.
Create Undead- Create much more powerful undead than you could with animate dead. This spell is the next logical step up for the necromancer, and one you’ll rely on heavily.
Dimensional Blade- A swift action cast that lets your weapon ignore all material armor for the round. You aren’t good enough a fighter to make this spell really do the work a 6th level slot ought to, so it remains rather situational in my book. Green for warpriests or particularly offensive melee builds.
Discharge, Greater- Probably a worthy buff to discharge that lets it mirror some of the effects of greater dispel magic. If you found yourself relying on discharge six levels ago this is an excellent step up. I wouldn’t know enough to say exactly how good it truly is for those of you in such a situation.
Dispel Magic, Greater- Solves most of the problems the regular dispel magic had. Your CL is still going to be just as (in)consistent (unless you really found yourself counterspelling a lot…) but now you can target multiple effects at once. Making three or four dispel checks per round means you’ve got a good chance to remove a couple buffs per turn. This vastly improves the viability of this spell, especially when the boss spellcaster walks into the fight with 6 spells already cast on himself. If you know me, you know how much I enjoy this spell.
Dust Form- Gaseous form’s big daddy. Incorporeal is a very rare buff, and this spell lets you still use all your fancy magic at zero downside. Absolutely consider this spell, there are very few things that can truly scare you while you’re affected by it. The personal range and short duration does make it a bit underwhelming at times, so save it for the most crucial combats only.
Eaglesoul- An hours/level buff that gives a +2 on initiative, detect evil constantly, and a +2 on Perception. Already this would be rather decent, but then you get the ability to shorten the spell’s duration and go full beatdown-mode against evil. Very strong on any good-aligned character, better for particularly melee-focused characters.
Emblem of Greed- Become the runelord of greed and turn into a combat machine with your trusty flaming mace--er, I mean glaive. This spell scales well and gives you BAB equal to your hit dice, so it’s not going to be bad on anybody.
Flesh Wall- A bit of an odd wall spell, the benefit here is that you get to emulate some of the features that make wall of thorns so dangerous. Namely, the ability to ensnare creatures who try to break through. It’s a shame you can’t create this spell in an enemy’s square, but it is shapeable so you can very easily just enclose them instead. Each section of the wall can make attacks and provide flanking, which is very cool despite the relative ease with which it can be breached. It’s pretty hard to be bad for a wall spell so this one gets the green light. Just don’t expect it to last all that long.
Geas/Quest- If you can somehow get the target still for 10 minutes, you can all but force them to play by your rules. Good if you want to mess around with planar binding since it doesn’t have a HD or allow a saving throw, and if you’re doing that then you don’t care about the casting time anyway. Obviously that build-up makes this a situational pick otherwise.
Glyph of Warding, Greater- See glyph of warding. Still good at defending when you need to.
Harm- The principal spell in the “bad touch” category, and boy oh boy is this one fun. It deals at minimum 5 * your CL in damage, and at maximum it frequently drops enemies straight to 1. Pairs beautifully with a Quickened inflict wounds spell, especially if you can cast them spontaneously. Even on a successful save, a harm spell typically shaves off a quarter of the enemy’s health. Is good with Reach Spell, though destruction largely outclasses that niche. You can also spontaneously apply Reach to your quickened inflicts as well if you want to burn your high-level slots on a one-two death punch.
Heal- The antithesis of harm, heal acts instead by healing the target of 10 hp per caster level. In addition to affording an absolute ton of healing, it also has the amazing benefit of curing nearly every condition in the game. Whoever you tap with this spell will instantly be fighting at 100%, making this well deserving of being the spell to champion the idea of healing. Nothing really is going to reduce your healing, so this spell tends to win out slightly over harm in my book. Pairs well with Quickened cure spells against undead, and is good with Reach Spell to save allies from afar. Scrolls of this are a bit too expensive for me to claim to be mandatory, but they’re very nice to have and shouldn’t be sold if ever found as loot.
Hellfire Ray- A scorching ray analog that does up to 15d6 per ray and gives you another ray at 15th and 19th. If that wasn’t already enticing enough, this spell has the flame strike “half unholy” effect too. The “damning to Hell” effect is flavorful but rarely all that useful. This spell is underwhelming when you get it, but quickly becomes a fine use of a 6th level spell slot once you get your second and third ray. Good with Intensify Spell, decent with Empower Spell.
Addendum: The source book where this spell originates states that the unholy damage from “hellfire” doesn’t affect evil creatures and deals double damage to good creatures; ask your GM if that applies to this spell too.
Inspiring Recovery- An improved version of breath of life that comes packed with goodies. While the healing may be weaker overall, you are able to cast it at a very generous range and give all allies who see the resurrection the effects of heroism for 1 minute. Strictly better than a reach breath of life, so this spell gets the coveted Purple rating just as its predecessor did. Note that it is not mandatory to have both of these spells prepared at once; you can usually do just fine with one.
Invoke Deity- A 10 min/level buff that’s entirely dependent on who you worship. You can select one set of themed powers for each domain offered by your deity, and you can spend 10 minutes of duration to switch to a different one. In essence, this means that this spell is better the more good domains your deity possesses. Watch out, though. The 1,000 gp material component and 2,500 gp focus component make this not something you want to get in the habit of casting.
Open the Dead Roads- Take your party to a particular designated location on the Boneyard, Material, Shadow, Ethereal or Astral planes. The ability to travel across planes is a nice improvement over wind walk, and keeps this marginally relevant despite its hefty drawback of requiring your party to have someone who knows your destination. You do also miss the opportunity to cut your journey short if you need to. In a vacuum, this spell is Green, but you really should just take wind walk instead for most purposes.
Overwhelming Poison- Poison is generally not all that viable a strategy in Pathfinder. Overwhelming poison seeks to rectify that with a very enticing DC buff to whatever it is you’re summoning or smearing on your weapon. Now you can bring a bunch of cheap poisons (Flaying Spider Venom and Fire Jackal Saliva) or a particularly nasty outsider and turn them into legitimate battlefield threats.
...Or you could go the route of an absolute madman and play around with drow poison, i.e., “the rare time when poison is actually scary.” Drow poison is an absolute bastard in conjunction with this spell. Overwhelming poison would be a solid Green if drow poison didn’t exist, but unfortunately it does, and boy is it stupid. Call now and for the low, low cost of 75 gp, a successful attack roll, and a failed Fortitude save you too can have your very own instant-onset unconsciousness poison. Normally, I’d say something about Fortitude saves being high and poison immunities being common (~50% of all monsters from here on out). However, there’s absolutely nothing stopping you from preparing a Manyshot salvo for the boss and forcing three functional save-or-dies in one turn (six if you’re sadistic enough to use Persistent spell). For the record, there is almost nothing in the game that cures “unconsciousness.” Unconsciousness as a condition is almost always directly tied to hit point loss. But drow poison circumvents actual hit points entirely, sending one creature of your choosing straight out of the fight. Your GM would be well justified to ban this spell in conjunction with drow poison outright.
Oh, and if drow poison isn’t your speed, remember that you can still employ the Manyshot strategy to stack doses of Con poison for a sweet, sweet +2 DC.
Planar Adaptation, MassSU- 100% necessary for planeswalkers. Getting your allies included is a BIG deal with this sort of thing, especially when your high-level spell slots are so valuable. See planar adaptation.
Planar Ally- Strong, expensive, and entirely up to the GM. Not a chance I can give this spell an adequate rating.
Prognostication- Honestly, for most purposes I see this spell as a downgrade from divination. Long-term predictions are generally a lot less useful to adventurers than short term ones, the extra material component, and the fact that this is even more cryptic than divination makes me hesitant to call it anything extraordinary. Don’t get me wrong, it’s still a phenomenal spell when divination’s relatively short 1-week range isn’t acceptable.
Sarzari Shadow MemorySU- Spend 1,500 gp to get one of three useful bonuses against a creature you plan on slaying. Particularly useful is the “Character” benefit, imparting a +10 to gather information on the target, a +4 on checks to beat SR, and imparting upon them a -2 to saves against mind-affecting effects. This spell is an expensive but worthwhile cast-and-forget for your campaign arc’s BBEG, and one any adventurer on the Lawful and Evil sides of the alignment chart should consider. Green for prepared casters who don’t need to commit a valuable spell slot to something they’ll cast once a month at most.
Seer's BaneR- A nondetection spell analog that you actually gain access to and doesn’t require a material component. Remember that nondetection RAW fools all divinations, even the mighty true seeing. Given how common it is at this level for monsters to have constant divination spells active, this spell seems like a VERY enticing option. I love the ability to key in different harmful spell effects to this as well; it keeps the spell relevant and thematic. Pairs beautifully with spells that grant Invisibility.
Sign of Wrath- An impressive and visually kickass blast spell that damages enemies within 25 feet of you and pushes them away with the ever-coveted force damage. You even get to automatically exclude allies from this effect, potentially keeping melee attackers away from their deadly full-round attacks. Just know that enemy CMD is typically high at this level, especially for those monsters that you do want to keep away from you. I don’t normally rate blast spells this high, but the ability to mess up incorporeals pushed this spell over the edge.
Source Severance- An analog to antimagic field that doesn’t leave you entirely bereft of magic. You can only select arcane or divine magic to impede, though regardless you must make a difficult Concentration check if you want your own spells to go off. This can be pretty good for certain parties. It is a shame you can’t stop most SLAs, though, which at this level tend to be on pretty much any monster worth being scared of.
Speak with SoulSU- You can communicate with a soul much more effectively than speak with dead. Excellent for communicating with dead creatures that you weren’t directly responsible for killing.
Spellcrash- Each round the target must make a save or lose a 5th level spell slot. Once they’re out of 5ths they start to lose their 4ths, and so on. Obviously, as you pass by the relevance of 5th level slots this spell also drops off in effectiveness. But if you’re fighting an extended fight with a spellcaster enemy, you can effectively put a timer on their worthwhile spells. Decent if for some godforsaken reason you want to counterspell since this spell is good at pressuring casters into using their slots before they’re sucked dry. Just keep in mind that all casters have good Will saves and will likely only be failing a third of their saves or so.
Summon Barghest II- Barghests are no longer anything truly special in combat. The greater ones you can now summon have a few nice SLAs like mass enlarge person and mass bull strength, which are about the only reason you’d want to use this spell. After that, these aren’t going to put up much of a fight. Thankfully, that’s more than enough of a niche, since you’re getting a useful party buff spell you couldn’t cast otherwise in mass enlarge person. Plus, since the original spell is a 1 round cast but all SLAs are standards, you’re basically not losing any considerable time for casting this. Green because it’s still a fine spell, though it’s heavily outclassed by other summons of this level. Such as...
Summon Genie, Greater- YES! These spells just went from good to absolutely bonkers. Shaitan have a show-stopper list of spell-like abilities and you get to abuse all of them. There is not a single spell on here that I would turn away-- quickened glitterdust? Hell yes! Wall of stone three times per fight? We take those. On top of all of that, these things are surprisingly competent attackers; sporting excellent bull rushes, Power Attack, Earth Mastery, and Stone Curse. Stone Glide gives them stellar mobility, Tremorsense lets them probe for invisible creatures, and to round out their kit Metalmorph lets your fighter bypass exotic DR for the entire day. Just remember that any non-instantaneous spells do go away when the shaitan goes away, which shouldn’t be a problem since almost their entire list is instantaneous.
It seems there is nothing you can’t solve by summoning a shaitan.
Summon Monster VI- 1d3 Ankylosaurus are still relevant threats and likely your bread-and-butter at this point, alongside the powerful striker that is the dire tiger. Shadow demons get multiple uses of the “shadow” spells for your flexibility option, and Invisible Stalkers make for passable scouts. Erinyes are fearsome ranged attackers, and giant octopi are grapple machines. Lillends can throw out bardic performances and 3rd-level bard spells, though they tend not to be all that impactful. Another good level for summon monster, though this one is more combat-focused and less SLA-focused.
TruespeakR, SU- An aasimar spell that once-and-for-all solves any possible language-related issue you might have. We’re far beyond the levels where generic language concerns really should be our primary focus, but this spell goes the extra step and lets you speak with almost anything. As long as it physically has an Intelligence score, you can speak to it. That alone makes this worthy to keep around.
Vengeful StingerR- Melee attackers targeting you provoke AoOs from a tail you grow that does a pittance for most casters and forces a Fort save for 1d4 points of Dex damage. This is usable if you’re playing a high-dex Combat Reflexes build (which, let’s be honest, you’re playing a Calistrain so you probably are), letting you punish anything that dares make a full attack against you. One Fortitude save generally indicates a bad spell, but 3-4 in a round is much more enticing.
Wall of Silver- Create a transparent field of energy that damages evil creatures and potentially Blinds them. You also get to completely hedge out anything with the [evil] descriptor from passing through. Against devils, lycanthropes, and other silver-weak foes, the damage grows and has a chance to Blind and stagger. Personally, I’d just prefer a wall of stone, but this is a worthy pick if such enemies are common in your games.
What Grows WithinR- Looks pretty bad to me, but there’s just enough that’s questionable here that makes me say this is a spell to go over with your GM. Namely, the fact that by casting this you’ve just opened yourself up to being plagued with nightmares you cannot hope to save against from an immortal eldritch abomination. Even if that weren’t a GM-fiat issue, I don’t think you really need to care all that much about further subjecting those that already failed against your mind-affecting spells. By this level, something failing one of those should be out of the encounter anyway. No reason to further drain their Constitution thereafter.
Wind Walk- The staple divine overland travel spell. Since it functions as gaseous form, this can also serve as a slight buff to psychic casters if they don’t mind reducing their speed to a 10 ft. fly. If you don’t have any other expedient travel solution, this spell will service you well.
Archon's Trumpet- If you’ve played around with paralysis before, then you know just how good this spell is. As long as you have the ability to get you or an ally in for a coup-de-grace, this spell functionally becomes a terrifying AoE save-or-die. Unlike most AoE spells, this one encourages you to get right up in an enemy’s face so if they fail their save they’re just a 5’ step away and you can bash their skull in before they recover. This spell is only held back by the Fortitude save and the danger of getting allies involved.
Bestow Curse, Greater- Just like bestow curse, the greater version is a touch-save-negate that, when landed, basically ends the encounter. -12 to an ability score is simply ludicrous-- that can very easily remove a creature’s entire casting ability or drop it’s Constitution to half. A -8 to saves similarly spells doom for your target, meaning your next save-or-suck is almost guaranteed to land. And the 25% chance to act normally is just stupid. Amazing for all the reasons bestow curse is amazing. Still pairs well with Reach Spell.
Bestow Grace of the Champion- There’s a lot that has to go right for you to gain any benefit from this spell. You have to have a fellow non-paladin LG ally in the party, preferably with a martial bent and with a halfway decent Charisma score. The bonuses are about on par for the level you get it, especially when you view this as a nice +7 to all attacks for its duration. The rounds/level duration also doesn’t do this spell any favors, inhibiting it from being better than Green on most of the targets it’d even be viable on. LG battle oracles are the one exception here, since with Smite Evil they’ll be getting Charisma to AC, attacks, and saves.
Bestow Planar Infusion III- See bestow planar infusion I. Probably just as bad.
Blasphemy- Far and away the best of the “alignment word” spells, imparting any non-evil creature with Dazed, Weakened, Paralyzed, and then Killed. Every single tier of this spell is nothing but hands-down amazingness. Even on a successful save, these effects are brutal. If you’re the truest type of evil, go ahead and twirl your moustache as you walk into a town square and murder every commoner at once without stopping to care about whether or not they made their save.
Bloodstone Mirror- An expensive 500 gp component cast-and-forget that provides one of the best immunities you can possibly acquire: immunity to a single mind-affecting effect. You even get to redirect the enchantment back at any target within range. Green because of the one time use quality, material component, and personal-only target. Make sure you’re making your Spellcraft checks so you don’t end up trying to dispel a charm person you’d make the save against anyway.
Contact Entity IV- See contact entity I.
Destruction- A close range harm upgrade that still inflicts 10d6 points on a partial save and doesn’t stop at 1 hp. This spell is absolute madness, and the biggest exception to that “you don’t get blast spells” rule.
Halfling Vengeance, Mass- See halfling vengeance. The cool thing here is now that you’re giving presumably more than 1 person the effects of the spell, there’s a strong incentive to get everyone flanking with each other. At this level, you’ll be giving 3d6 points of sneak attack, and while the debuffs are still nice, they don’t really stand out much anymore compared to the other stuff you’re doing with your 7ths. This is a niche pick entirely dictated by your party composition. Could be as good as Green if you somehow have 2+ other Small-sized martials or as terrible as Red if your team doesn’t have any.
Holy Word- Middle of the pack for the “alignment word” spells. Deafened on its own is a very weak debuff, but Blinded and Deafened together puts most creatures in a tricky situation. In Good campaigns, you’re likely to be fighting non-good outsiders of your HD or lower enough to take this for the -4 Will save banishment feature alone. As with all the alignment spells, this combos well with anything that can boost your CL.
Hymn of Peace- An AoE centered on you that basically affects creatures with the same hostile restrictions as sanctuary. It’s a nice trick if you can somehow get in the fray and not include your allies (which is really hard to do with that 40 ft. radius). This spell will never completely lock an enemy in place, but it can give you a good 40-60% of rounds where they aren’t trying to murder you. Split Color for indecision.
Plundered Power- You kill a creature and give yourself access to its highest level SLA castable 1/day. It’s an expensive cast at 2500 gp, and entirely dependent on the stuff you can find. Potentially too situational to regularly prepare, and potentially too cheesy to actively seek out.
Repulsion- Create a barrier around you of a very generous shapeable size that creatures cannot enter without making a Will save. Sometimes the best offense is overwhelming defense. Combos well with spells that mess up ranged attacks like fickle winds.
Restoration, GreaterSU- See restoration. There are very few situations in which you’ll want a greater restoration over two restorations or a bunch of lesser restorations in quick succession. I’d never seek out a scroll of this, but if I got one I’d also never sell it.
ResurrectionSU- See raise dead. By now, you’re probably waist-deep in end-of-the-world plot stuff and rerolling a new character would just be a horrible experience for everyone. Moreover, sometimes it’s just not feasible to wait a day or two to transport whatever tiny fragments of your ally remain, usually due to the fact that whatever was nasty enough to leave the body in such a state was likely encountered in hostile territory. I always recommend parties have a scroll of resurrection on them.
Scrying, Greater- A worthy upgrade to scrying. Better, stronger, longer, faster, and morer reliabler.
Spellcasting ContractR- See lesser spellcasting contract.
Summon Monster VII- Brachiosaurus are your first noteworthy Gargantuan creature and almost always get to utilize their Cleave feats thanks to their impressive reach. 1d3 Dire tigers are still good and 1d4+1 Ankylosaurus might still pose a threat against less-armored creatures. Dire crocodiles are worthwhile improvements, which isn’t something that can really be said for the elementals. This list is very much so a downgrade from before, sporting mostly melee beatsticks and offering almost no new SLAs to play with. One final note: 1d3 succubi are good if your opponents aren’t immune to mind-affecting effects, since they have a slew of high DC Spell-Like-Abilities that you can spam every round*.
*Note: this is actually more viable a strategy than it seems. The average Will save of a CR 13 enemy is only a +11. If you roll average and summon 2 succubi, you can have them spam dominate person 1/day (DC 23) and suggestion at will (DC 21). Even just looking at suggestion’s DC, that means the average monster has to roll higher than a 11 two times in a row or be out of the fight (20% chance). And on the first round, you could have them dominate instead, making that even more unlikely (12%).
Vision of Lamashtu- Allow for a 6th level spell that doesn’t deal hit point damage to ride along a nightmare spell and affect the sleeping creature regardless of range. This isn’t a spell to choose if you’re an Oracle, but if you’re a non-good cleric and have a day where you don’t need your 7ths and 6ths, there’s no reason not to throw these out in the hopes of preemptively messing up whatever villains you’ve got on your kill list. Just be aware that it’s likely anything you do “offscreen” gets completely absolved given enough time.
Waves of Ecstasy- We have a lot of fun names for this spell at my table. The official description of this spell states “pleasure stuns and staggers creatures” so I’ll leave exactly what to your imagination. This spell is a solid AoE debuff with a mediocre partial effect. Staggered is neither amazing nor terrible; be sure to pair this with something that can capitalize on stationary opponents.
Word of Chaos- Second best “alignment word” spell, only slightly ahead of holy word. Like it, Deafened is not particularly exciting, though 1d4 rounds of Stun very much so is. Confusion is a very nice debuff to throw in there as well, as it’s very likely that when you’re fighting anything with so few HD relative to you that there’s going to be a greater number of them. Remember that casting a Confusion effect into a crowd of enemies all but assures they start attacking each other as a Confused creature must attack back.
Angelic Aspect, Greater- As before, you’ve got a kickass grab-bag buff spell that tends to be more cool than it is completely necessary. It’s a shame that protective aura provides bonuses that won’t stack with all the magic equipment you’ve got on. There’s absolutely no ability here that’s unilaterally spectacular; it’s the wide range of defensive applications this spell offers that makes it appealing.
Antimagic Field- Lights out. AMF will completely ruin an encounter provided you know what you’re doing. With one spell, you bring everything down to how well-built your party’s martials are. For those of you who’ve invested heavily in combat prowess, now’s the time to show your stuff and shred some wizards. High level play is almost entirely predicated on magic, and as long as you can bear to make the very real sacrifice of your own spells for awhile, there is simply no greater combat spell to let your fighter shine. Split Color partially for indecision and partially due to its complete reliance on party and build synergy.
Cloak of Chaos- Our first of the “alignment aura” spells. All of these grant a relatively worthless +4 resistance bonus to saves and a +4 deflection bonus to AC. You should really have at least a +3 in both of these by now. Thankfully, the goodies don’t end there. You also get the mental immunity like protection from law, and SR 25 against lawful effects and creatures. Lastly, you have a chance to Confuse any lawful creature that attacks you for 1 round. The SR, mental immunity, and confusion effects make this spell an all-around solid “can’t touch me” spell for the whole party. An overall strong rounds/level buff that gets better if you’re fighting creatures of the appropriate type.
Counterbalancing Aura- See cloak of chaos. An “alignment aura” spell that works against creatures with a Neutral alignment component. Creatures that attack you are Sickened for 1d6 rounds instead of Confused for 1 round, a much worse draw for you unless they’re Neutral, in which case they’re Nauseated for the same duration. The only real interesting thing this spell brings to the table is a higher SR of 27 if you predict correctly you’ll be fighting true Neutral enemies. As with arbitrament, I feel like the neutral-only component is less reliable than targeting only good or only evil creatures. While I think this is worse than its brethren, it’s still a decent rounds/level buff that gets better if you’re fighting creatures of the appropriate type. Blue only if those creatures are exclusively Neutral.
Create Demiplane- See lesser create demiplane. Now with the customization you can do, this spell becomes largely limited by your creativity and the GM’s willingness to allow your shenanigans. You can largely sculpt your demiplane to your wishes, so what you do with this spell isn’t really bounded by any rules I can draw precedent from. Being a mere 500 gp focus component spell that lasts days/level, it’s entirely reasonable you have this spell perpetually active even with just 1 day of downtime per two weeks.
Create Greater Undead- More options to pad your shambling army. Even the lowest CL option here, the shadow, is incredibly strong.
Death Clutch- Ostensibly the coolest, most metal spell out there. Go full “Temple of Doom” and rip out some poor idiot’s still beating heart. It’s not a touch attack surprisingly, and targets Fortitude, but the effects on a failed save basically result in death regardless of if your target meets the 200 hit point threshold or not. If only this didn’t target Fortitude.
Dimensional Lock- Completely hedge out teleportation within a 20 ft. radius. No attack roll. No saving throw. No escape. Absolutely crucial for shutting down what has undoubtedly become a nuisance of a strategy from all the outsiders you’ve been fighting.
Discern Location- While you might not be able to view a creature’s activities like you can with the scrying line of spells, you do get a definitive lead on your target with only one singular defense against your efforts. This spell is for the precocious caster who wants to get the BBEG over and done with.
Divine VesselO- Harness the raw power of your oracular curse and transform into a monolithic manifestation of the end of times. Simply put, there is not an oracle out there who doesn’t think this spell is the coolest thing there is. Like angelic aspect, your defensive and offensive features are all over the place, granting SR, DR, size bonuses, extra attacks, natural armor, and damage reduction, to name just a few. This spell is Blue for particularly martial-focused oracles.
Earthquake- Evoke a tremendous earthquake in an 80-ft. radius. Normally, for a spell of this caliber, the large radius would be a drawback due to the likelihood that you target your allies. But with earthquake you have full ability to shape the spell to your wishes. The uses for this spell are wide-ranging and powerful. The only thing holding this spell back is that most of the Reflex saves are capped at a pitiful DC 15.
Euphoric Tranquility- Busted. The single best touch spell in the game. Make a melee touch attack and take one creature out of the fight entirely. They can’t attack, cast spells, and move at half speed, all without getting to make a saving throw. You can even attack the enemy straight-up, giving them a save to act normally for one round only. This spell is an incredible tool for isolating the strongest member of an encounter and dealing with lesser threats. Plus, it’s even good outside of combat as a saveless, charm monster that lasts for a minute or two. Amazing with Reach Spell.
Frightful Aspect- Become large sized and more durable, emanating a saveless aura of Shaken. Anything Shaken by you that hits a melee attack is automatically Frightened. Again, no save. Excellent spell to keep creatures at bay, and put yourself in threaten range.
Holy Aura- See cloak of chaos. This is a solid “alignment aura” spell for good-aligned casters. Permanent Blindness is a nice deterrent against melee attackers that keeps this spell more than relevant.
Maw of Chaos- A battlefield control effect that manifests a 5 ft. radius spread that attempts to drag creatures nearby every round. Anything adjacent to the spread without a chaotic subtype takes ability damage to all its scores. I like the ability score damage effect here, and I like the teleport redirection. Both are useful abilities. I don’t like that this spell is only concentration duration and will easily shred all of your precious loot. Even more problematic, targeting CMD at this level is near-impossible to do. The average CMD of a CR 15 creature is 42. That means a level 15 caster with a +8 ability score modifier still only succeeds on a 19. This spell has its good and its bad, but that doesn’t mean you should entirely write it off. Green if you’re fighting devils, and that’s probably about the only time.
Nine LivesR, SU- Catfolk get the best racial spells. This spell makes it ludicrously difficult to die. For a whopping 15 hours minimum, you get to pick and choose 9 times to perform one of six immediate actions that might save you from an otherwise cat-astrophic fate. Most notably among these are the abilities to reroll saving throws and negate critical hits, though you can also use them to avoid going unconscious, escape grapples, and end almost any harmful condition that affects you. Oh wait, my bad. You OR whatever party member you cast this on. That’s right, this spell isn’t even personal range. If you’ve got Scribe Scroll, spam the bejeezus out of this one.
Planar Ally, Greater- See lesser planar ally. Same chance to be gamebreaking.
Quintessence Mastery- Sculpt the reality of an Outer Plane which you currently inhabit to your mortal whims. Like create demiplane, this spell grants you an extraordinary amount of flexibility so long as you inhabit one of the nine alignment planes. You have a star-studded list of terrain spells to choose from and you can cast multiple effects in the same round. If you’re traversing the Abyss and you need both a wall of thorns and a fog cloud in the same turn you can DO that. One of the only ways in this game to effectively cast more than 2 spells in a single round.
Rift of Ruin- This spell acts as a shapeable create pit that sends affected creatures to the Abyss. Anything caught within the spell takes 6d6 points of a random damage type per round, and if it can’t fly must make a DC 25 Climb check to escape. I like that you can end the spell early to summon a demon from summon monster VII; that keeps this spell very relevant and versatile (though I have no idea why this spell has the (calling) descriptor). Rift of ruin is everything you want in a spell: Reflex partial, battlefield control, shapeable, summoning, blast damage, no SR, long range, and enemy action removal. Just fantastic.
Sacramental Seal- A touch-save-negate that, when successful, results in you capturing the target’s soul in a small object. There’s a bunch of rules here about what happens if you relinquish control of the item, but really you should just use this spell as a temporary solution to transport the creature to whatever deathtrap you’ve got lined up. Cast protection from fire and throw the item in a volcano or something; my point is that this spell is a save-or-die with easily circumventable restrictions. This would be better if it didn’t cost money, wasn’t a long casting time, and didn’t require a touch attack and a save. Save it for boss enemies only.
Shield of Law- See cloak of chaos. This “alignment word” spell affects attackers with slow, which is nothing to scoff at. At the very least, you’ll be unlikely to get full attacked by anything.
Spell Immunity, GreaterSU- See spell immunity. Even at this level, I’d rather a communal spell immunity over this unless I had the ability to ward my whole team. It’s pricey, but if you can get enough scrolls for that, this can be excellent for boss encounters where you have a general idea of what you’re up against.
Stormbolts- Actually a decent blast spell! Deals 1d8 damage per level to anything within 30 feet of you and stuns anything that fails the Fortitude save. Plus it automatically excludes anything you don’t want to zap. What a win!
Summon Erodaemon- Erodaemons are good when you really need somebody’s Charisma drained who doesn’t appear to be capable of flying away. Their Spell-Like Abilities are bad, save for the mediocre enervation and quickened crushing despair and the almighty modify memory. They’re decent summons that don’t necessarily live up to the versatility of summon monster VIII, but they’re respectable in their own right for these talents.
Summon Monster VIII- Barbed devils are terrible and hezrou demons are mediocre thanks to their subar movement and senses. Elder elementals are barely threatening as well, save for when you need a whirlwind or something to move through rock. This spell is only good because of your ability to send out 1d3 beatsticks from the 7th level list or 1d4+1 succubi to spam save-or-sucks*. The enemy has to fail its save eventually!
*Note: this is actually more viable a strategy than it seems. The average Will save of a CR 15 enemy is only a +14. If you roll average and summon 3 succubi, you can have them spam dominate person 1/day (DC 23) and suggestion at will (DC 21). Even just looking at suggestion’s DC, that means the average monster has to roll higher than a 6 three times in a row (34% chance) or be out of the fight. And on the first round, you’ll could have them dominate instead, making that even more unlikely (21%).
Tomb Legion- Summon 1d4+2 advanced mummies. What’s awesome here is that these do not count against your undead HD limit and last for a very long time. No reason not to cast this spell if you’ve got a day before heading out on a mission.
Unholy Aura- See cloak of chaos. This “alignment aura” spell deals 1d6 points of Strength damage if a good creature attacks you in melee and fails a Fortitude save. Yet again, Evil wins out of these alignment-based spells. Strength damage is a phenomenal deterrent to attacks, making any concurrent attempts to physically harm you in melee weaker and weaker. Just a fantastic spell; easily the best of its kind.
Absorb Rune III- See absorb rune I. Same deal.
Ascension- One creature per 3 levels ascends to a 1st tier mythic rank for 2 hours per level. Extremely expensive, and will probably only ever see use on final boss battles because of this. You can cast this even without being mythic yourself, and because it basically means reworking large parts of your character sheet; granting feats and class features on an as-needed basis, this spell quickly grinds the game to a halt while everyone figures out exactly what they want to do with it. The flexibility here is outstanding as long as you’re willing to pay for it in money and real-world time.
Astral Projection- Prevent your party from dying. That’s not an overreaction, you literally just give your party better clones that can travel across planes and instantly reanimate and don’t cost a boatload of money. Thankfully, this spell comes with a very big drawback that prevents it from being entirely busted. Whenever a creature under its effects would die, they instantly reanimate back to wherever their material body is. Which means there’s no chance at a breath of life or raise dead; you’re back at your headquarters with 2 brand-new negative levels. If the fighter should go under while you’re out adventuring thousands of miles from home, he’s out until you can stand to go back for him. The ideal Cleric casts this spell one time upon gaining 9th level spells and never prepares it ever again because no party members of hers will ever drop below 0 anyway. In practice, however, this never happens. Welcome to high level; the revolving door of death is thataway.
Create Demiplane, Greater- The 1% of the time you didn’t choose miracle for your 9th level spell was to build your greater demiplane and further annihilate whatever shreds of Pathfinder’s rules remained intact. Go ahead and spend 16 quadrillion years Crafting 1cp baskets to sell. You can do that now.
Energy Drain- Suped-up enervation. Excellent spell, requiring only a ranged touch attack and a lucky roll of the dice. On average, you’re knocking targets down 5 negative levels whenever this spell hits. That’s at minimum two full spell levels gone from a caster’s repertoire, and a huge slew of minuses to the target. Negative levels mean this spell combos with basically everything, making it a solid choice for anyone who gets it.
Gate- The second strongest spell you have access to, except maybe greater create demiplane. Create an interplanar connection between two planes and call any one outsider to assist you. There’s no spell that lets you cross planes like gate, providing you with complete accuracy of location. Specific outsiders or those called by gate with more HD than you are under no compulsion to assist you, though presumably you can always just call your deity’s herald or denizens from the plane of your alignment for easy allies. The real power here is in your ability to call basically any creature of your choosing to assist you, provided you have 10,000 gp to spare. As long as you have the patience to read through all the monsters at your disposal you can truly do anything you set your mind to.
Heal, Mass- Fully heal the party. All hit points, conditions, and ability damage from your party-- gone. The best healing spell in the game bar none.
Imbue Army Special Ability- I don’t play with mass combat, but from my initial assessment this seems incredibly strong in the few cases you would ever find yourself in mass combat. The list of army special abilities is incredibly broad, allowing you to pick and choose the most beneficial. Most notable to me is the ability to straight up choose to make your army immune to anything the enemy happens to have.
Judgement Undone- A spell to talk over with your GM; you circumvent Pharasma’s judgement and bring a petitioner back to life outside the bounds of conventional resurrection. The problem with this spell is the ludicrous 50,000 gp material component and the CR 17 psychopomp you are all but guaranteed to fight halfway through the spell.
Miracle- Congrats, you’ve done it. You’ve beaten Pathfinder. It’s taken you hundreds of hours of gameplay to get to this point and now you’ve finally gotten your hands on 9th level spells. You have become completely unstoppable. There is, quite simply, no reason you should prepare any other 9th level spell in place of miracle in 99% of cases. It is the single strongest anything a person can have in this game. You are now in control of 90% of the spells in the game at your fingertips as a standard action. Despite some of the other cool things you can do with your 9ths, miracle beats them all out through sheer versatility. As long as you can win initiative and find the time to look through several thousand pages of spells, every fight is essentially over. And if having all those spells somehow wasn’t good enough for you, you could always just design your own effect to invalidate whatever mundane conflict a recently ascended god like you finds themself in.
Miracle should not exist, but as long as it does you’re taking it and you’re abusing it.
Overwhelming Presence- Take this spell so that the world finally shows you the respect you deserve. Every creature you target sees you as the divine vessel you rightfully are and prostrates themselves before your holy presence. You can just walk up to those affected and coup de grace them systematically like a feckless deity pruning his ungrateful flock. Even after recovering from prostration as a full-round action, the affected target is going to be in a world of hurt thanks to the 1d4 rounds of Stagger and 1d6 points of Wisdom drain.
SalvageSU- Target a shipwreck to wrest it from the seas. Considering the cost of a 9th level scroll versus the cost of a sailing ship, you could make some serious money at any level of play by buying scrolls and seeking out shipwrecks to raise. Otherwise, salvage isn’t particularly useful even in aquatic games.
Scourge of the Horsemen- A generous AoE blast spell that inflicts acid damage and negative levels with a Fort save for half. Negative levels are always good and handing them out as an AoE is respectable. It’s a cool spell and will always result in something, but it’s just a little too weak an effect for this level. Fort save for half is less than ideal, so you’ll often end up only really imparting a -1 or -2 to enemies across the board. Green if you’re fighting like a bunch of Arcane spellcasters.
Spell Immunity, Greater CommunalSU- It’s a hard spell spending your best spell on such a risky defense, but when this spell comes through it comes through bigtime. Like, “difference between a TPK or not” big. Not worth an everyday cast, but one of the best buffs you can cast before your final boss fight given you have the proper intel. See greater spell immunity and communal spell immunity.
Spellcasting Contract, GreaterR- See spellcasting contract. This time, I’m rating this spell one tier lower because it’s likely you already get profane bonuses somewhere else in your build, and because it’s really hard justifying giving up a 9th level slot long-term. A +5 to everything is impressive, sure, but when you could be doing some of the other stuff here it sure looks bland by comparison.
Summon Monster IX- Ghaele are strong summons, coming packed with useful SLAs and an always-active holy aura (personal range). Have the Ghaele play the role of the band-aid cleric while you go to town with offensive or control spells. Trumpet archons are basically just Ghaele that have magic circle and aura of menace. Glabrezu are decent if your GM is sane and doesn’t give them wish, allowing you to reverse gravity early in the fight and power word stun to finish off weakened targets. Astral deva and ice devils are generally unimpressive, and nalfeshnee are useful mostly for their constant unholy aura (also personal).
Nothing here screams “combat machine,” and summoning too much from the lower lists will just end up as AoE fodder. I like that Good summoners get the chance to summon an extra spellcaster, but you won’t be using this summon for the kind of damage you used to be summoning for.
True ResurrectionSU- God, I hope you never need this. I would venture that 90% of the time when someone important dies you could make do with resurrection instead. Total bodily destruction is incredibly rare, and usually you can find enough of a creature’s remains through locate object cast on a skeleton or something. It’s a nice scroll to have if your GM is kind enough to provide one, but you shouldn’t ever feel compelled to drop 28k on a contingency you might never need. Never prepare this and pray you never have to.
