Must-have wizard's spells

[Ofelix]

I have recently acquired NWN 2 (without the Mask of the betrayers, yet) and I have taken upon myself to create a Sun Elf Wizard / Eldricth Knight as my first character, so far I'm in Fort Locke. Which means I'm really still in the beginning. I'm familiar with most DnD spells as written in the PHB, but a quick look into NWN 2 has reviled that many in the game haven't got any connection to the PHB. Many are only element-variation of existent spells, like the one that replaces fireball with electric damage.

So, I think the title is pretty much self explanatory. What are the must-have spells?

[Trellheim]

Not probably the best ones, but I used:
Level 1: Mage Armor, Burning Hands, Magic Missile
Level 2: Fireburst, Bull's Strength
Level 3: Fireball, Haste, Improved Mage Armor, Heroism
Level 4: Stoneskin, Isaac's Lesser Missile Storm
Level 5: Hold Monster, Cloudkill
Level 6: Greater Stoneskin, Isaac's Greater Missile Storm, Greater Heroism
Level 7: Finger of Death, Mass Hold Person

+ Summon Creature spells.
The level 8 & 9 are, to quote the RPGCodex review, "orbital bombardment", "tactical nuclear strike", and "summon Death Star MK2", so you can't go wrong.

[Master Leo]

i suppose you want to use your spell choices for spellcasting and not for buffing up your character for melee (which is what wiz/ek is usually for)

here's my sorcerer's spell picks, it's motb xpac based, but there really aren't any great new spells:-

1 Magic Missile, Identify, Shield, Endure Elements, Prot from Alignment

out of these, protalign:evil is one of the best spells, since it makes you immune to mind attacks of all evil aligned enemies, and obviously magical missile for early offense

2 Knock, Mirror Image, Gust of Wind, Blind Sight, Scorching Ray

mirror image is good until you get stoneskin, scorching ray is a good offensive spell in motb otherwise you take acid arrow or combust
gust of wind dispells any area clouds effect with no save, very good spell!
blind sight does nothing now (i think it's bugged since 1.10?)

3 Fireball, Fire Arrow, Haste, Displacement

rock solid picks here, fire arrow is great if you play D&D rules or higher (aoe damage)

4 Isaac's Lesser Missile Storm, Stoneskin, Icestorm, Assay Resistance

stoneskin is vital spell here, cast on your whole team always, isaac is okay, use icestorm on mobs far away or on rogues (no save), assay resistance is rarely useful

5 Cone of Cold, Firebrand, Cacophonic Burst, Lesser Spell Mantle

basically what you use here is firebrand, which is one of the best spells in the game (large damage in a large area, yet no aoe damage!), the rest is cosmetic picks

6 Great Stoneskin, Chain Lightning, Isaac's Greater Missile Storm

out of these, isaac is vital because it's magical damage and hits really hard against single targets (20d6), makes some battles a piece of cake
take great stoneskin but replace it later with something else

7 Finger of Death, Shadow Shield, Energy Immunity

finger of death is great spell if you take it first in original campaign, it arrives just in time for some hard demon battles
shadow shield gives death immunities which is needed toward the end, and energy immunity makes dragon battles a cake

8 Premonition, Sunburst, Horrid Wilting

not much else to say here, sunburst is just awsome against undead, premonition best defense and horrid is cosmetic, but useful in motb xpac

9 Bigby's Crushing Hand, Wail of the Banshee, Mordenkainen's Disjunction

bigby's line is absolute cheating in this game, they're really overpowered
cast on enemy and he's disabled for a long time
morden is sorta useful but it only works as an aoe spell
wail is good in xpack but in original game you don't have a chance to test it unfortunately

well i hope this helps with your spell decisions

[Trellheim]

Leo's list is good too, but:

1 Magic Missile, Identify, Shield, Endure Elements, Prot from Alignment

You won't need indentify when your intelligence is over 16 and you have even some points in lore.

2 Knock, Mirror Image, Gust of Wind, Blind Sight, Scorching Ray

Fireburst is the best offensive spell in the first five or six levels. Use it with the suicide bomber technique: Run in the middle of the enemies and boom.

6 Great Stoneskin, Chain Lightning, Isaac's Greater Missile Storm

Greater Heroism is a must have: +4 bonus on attack rolls, saves, immunity to fear and temporary hit points.

[Master Leo]

Originally Posted by Trellheim

You won't need indentify when your intelligence is over 16 and you have even some points in lore.

what else do you recommend then? and identify is definitely useful, there is a lot of magical stuff you can't easily identify with lore, until you are very high level

Originally Posted by Trellheim

Fireburst is the best offensive spell in the first five or six levels. Use it with the suicide bomber technique: Run in the middle of the enemies and boom.

it depends, if you play on hard-core rules or higher, the aoe will most likely hit your party as well, which makes it useless
not to mention in first levels, it's hard to get enough protection on your mage to make this work

Originally Posted by Trellheim

Greater Heroism is a must have: +4 bonus on attack rolls, saves, immunity to fear and temporary hit points.

it's okay, but unneeded, since i've usually destroyed major enemies before my fighters even came to melee range

i just prefer protEvil, it does much more ( i know they stack but such huge bonuses are simply not needed)

still, if you want it you can replace great stoneskin for it at level 16, which is exactly the moment you can take premonition
i tend to prefer undeath to death however