What is also very underrated, is this build in Baldur's Gate 3 (did you know about it?): th-cam.com/video/WMBSgfvJpLw/w-d-xo.html I also did one for the WORST spells by the way: th-cam.com/video/lePa3Knkm5Y/w-d-xo.html AND FINALLY, you know what else is underrated? You pressing that subscribe button. Thank you legends for watching, appreciate you all.
The best part of the spell is that its a 'summoned' effect, which stacks with all other AOE effects including other summons (unlike clouds or surfaces). So, you can stack Hunger over Plant Growth and Silence to create a large area that Blinds, Silences, damages every turn, makes movement almost impossible, AND can be attacked into without issue- all without a single Save. AOEs make it so dang hard to value concentration for anything else.
Great list. Another spell that I slept on was Otto’s Irresistible Dance. I didn’t think it was worth a level 6 slot until I forced Raphael to gangam style while my party beat him to death
That was my experience with the Slayer avatar. I didn't think it would work, but popped a scroll of Dance just for shits and giggles, and just beat the snot out of the Slayer.
Also they cannot jump. While I didn't use Hunger of Hadar in fight against orthon in Shar's gauntlet, I still messed around a lot with Spike Growth, only downside was in jumps. But with Hunger of Hadar it is not the issue at all. But it did quite pain in the Moonrise tower for me, when I needed to drop concentration for enemy spellcasters. Luckily my monk did it very nice and fast.
(I don’t tend to change original characters class too far off their original class, at least not in the first play through) This is the reason I kept Wyll in the party most of the time with my ranger tav. Ranger cast spike and Warlock casts hunger of hader, then watch everyone dies.
If you're a druid you also eventually can get a dryad summon that can cast spike growth everytime it's her turn.. which reinjures enemies standing in it anytime it's cast. So even standing still doesn't save them if you recast it over the same area
I like to nominate sleet storm as well. It guarantee removes all concentration from casters and it create an large ice surface that almost everyone slip on. It's so underrated imo.
@@neburiveStbh I don’t even use it for the concentration removal, the are of the ice is vast enough that with a clever cast half the enemies are useless for a lot of the fight, and as was mentioned in other comments, this combined with hunger of hadar is dastardly work. They basically can’t excape
I never used longstrider until I realized it was a ritual spell. They really should include whether something is a ritual, and what effects upcasting has, on the spell select screen while leveling up.
It would also be really convenient if you could pre-select "until long-rest" spells to be automatically applied after long rest. Would even make sense from RP perspective. I mean, there's no way my Wyll wouldn't bind his weapon as ritual after waking up.
Hey, I just want to say that I saw this video about a year ago. I was a brand new D&D player, and this helped me SO MUCH. Basically, just wanted to stop back by, and say thank you. I really appreciate the help. This game turned out to be one of the best games I've ever played. Keep up the good work!
If you want to make Hadar even stronger, if you use snowburst ring, the cold damage from hadar creates ice under every target meaning they can slip and fall prone in the hadar making it pretty much impossible to escape. (Patch 3 seemingly removed The interaction, but any other cold spell still works in combo with Hadar to create absolute hell)
I use this ring, boots that prevent slipping on ice, and the hoarfrost staff in my Paladin. Constantly makes everyone around him slip prone which really locks enemies down. Love it. It would absolutely pair beautifully with HoH.
Me and my buddies did a 3 man playthrough and were very surprised that we were ambushed by Raphael's enemy in that area with the displacer beast. The entire group of the enemies were upstairs and I opened up by using misty step to jump onto a wooden beam outside and dropped hunger of hadar on them. It totally shafted their entire ambush as they were confused as to how to get to us with all that movement speed and blindness.
I’ve seen a bunch of these BG3 what spells are great type videos…and I have to say this is one of the best ones I have seen, for two reasons: 1. You concisely go into the reasons why the spells are great and show examples. 2. This one is my favorite…you zoom into the spell icons, descriptions etc. I can see everything so clearly! When watching on a phone screen it’s hard to see all the details. Wonderful job, I’m gonna check out your other vids, thanks!
This is one of the most useful videos I've seen on BG3. I recently discovered the joy that is Sanctuary, and oh my gods is it perfect. You can even twincast it if you get into a tight spot, enabling ridiculous strategies like twinned Greater Invisibility on your two assassins -> twinned Sanctuary on your two non-assassins.
Long jump + potion of hillstrength is super effective for mobility. Ritual spell, potion lasts a long rest, distance you can jump is even bigger than the radius from misty step, all for a bonus action. Absolute killer. And the matrix jumps are not only fun to do, but also usefull out of combat for exploring
I use this on my ranger/rogue Tav. Incredible to always achieve optimal positioning. Also got Lae'zel (natural high str) with the athletic feat and ring of increased jump. She can jump through the battlefield and bash enemies left and right un impeded .
My wife used hunger of hadar to solo the gyrmforge dwarves by slapping it down just before a little jump off to the side. Only one dwarf actually made it over, and all the rest died of hadar damage. The one lucky dwarf who *did* get past it, immediately got pushed into a chasm.
My only disappointment with Hunger of Hadar is that the damage doesn't scale with upcasting, but that's not so bad in a game that stops at level 12. Anything past that and it falls off, which is a shame because Warlock spell slots are so great with spells that scale, since the slots automatically scale. It's a phenomenal move though. It's like 3 different spells in one.
Totally caught off guard by the quality of this video. Excellent info, concise, entertaining and you obviously put a ton of work into the editing. Good job!
This is a nice tip until you learn that if you throw a poison on the ground and then dip your weapon in the pool, it lasts until long rest- and multiple characters can dip in the same pool. Start your day with this plus your Aid and Longstrider casts every time you camp.
@@SarajevoShotz Did I say use this spell just to only dip your weapons in fire, no I'm saying it's a feature of this spell not many people know about or considered
Hunger of Hadar is ABSURDLY powerful. Started my second playthrough, included Wyll in my party for the first time. Discovered the true wonder of Hunger of Hadar. In my first playthrough the only time I was against that spell was during the assault on Moonrise towers, and I swear getting stuck in TWO Hunger of Hadars in the main hall of the towers was PAINFUL. Couldn't even misty step out of it.
An added bonus about the hunger of hadar is that it is not considered a surface effect, meaning that you can stack additional surface effects upon it to further debuff the enemy within.
I prefer darkness over hunger because of the projectile negation combined with sleet storm, and I get melee warlocks with devil’s sight and anti slip shoes inside spank and tanking
@@KonStarStudio If you're going with devil's sight build darkness is definitely better than hadar. However, this would mean that all other teammates without devil's sight can't participate in the fight. Though 4 warlocks is pretty fun lol.
Not bad. I'd add in Sleet Storm as well - it doesn't do damage by itself, but it covers a huge area, lasts forever (as long as you concentrate) and causes ice underfoot which enemies slip on and go prone. Combine it with something like Insect Plague (from another caster) and you have something truly nasty
+1 for sleet storm, probably my most used CC spell, it's just hilarious seeing 90% of enemies dash and then immediately go prone. I would add it works well with summon woodland beings because the Dryad is immune to prone and can just walk through the sleet storm.
@@sullenskulls9709 I have one pair, the hoarfrost boots, not aware of the others though. I think the spell freedom of movement works also, although not sure about prone.
appreciate the video, and deeper dive into some actually overlooked spells (new ideas for me in maybe half). Still waiting for one of these for higher level wizard spells, but so far they usually focus on level 1-2 spells only.
You can add Otto's irresistible dance - it has no save on cast and the boss is out of the whole fight - goodbye Cazador and his annoying mist form, he starts to dance and you can cast sunlight, sunbeams, anything without any trouble.
@@azurelion6722 Not worth the time wriggling back and forth using stealth and shimmying out of LOS and such. Money is extremely plentiful in this game.
4:10 kinda late but sometimes Telekinesis can be used to recover bodies from chasms as well, I remember I pushed Orin off of the ledge to beat her and then recovered her body with Telekinesis to loot it. Don't know if this has been patched but it's a great use too.
With Sanctuary I have Shadowheart cast on my Druid Tav and then have my Tav cast Moonbeam. I'm not sure if it's a bug or actually part of the game but damage from Moonbeam doesn't count as my own damage, so Sanctuary stays on. Also everytime i move Moonbeam the ten turn staying power starts over. It's genius and works great.
Part of the game. After you cast moon beam even if you’re using your action to move it you aren’t making an attack you are moving the spell so sanctuary stays
FINALLY someone mentioning hungar of hadar. My favorite spell which carried my warlock through the entire first run. Any group of big enemies just get screwed over completely.
I love it too, especially in conjunction with Evard's Black Tentacles, or Plant Growth or even Spike Growth . Тhey interact and we get - low tier total zone of death, without hope of salvation )
@V3x0r my first character was a warlock and as soon as I hit level 5 I took it. I was drawn to the colour of it tbh its so nice. Anyway I used that and silence from shadowheart to completely destroy auntie ethel
I'm honestly surprised it's even on a list of underrated spells. I picked on my first play through because I thought it sounded cool and very warlock. I don't think I ever replaced it.
Sanctuary is so crazy good. If you want to deal damage while it's up, you can use summons or even Glyph of Warding (since that doesn't count as a hostile action). If an ally is downed, you can get them up and cast Sanctuary, and they can't be just knocked down again while they chug potions. Throwing items (including potions) does count as an attack roll though.
Just cast sanctuary before starting lets say viconia conversation in act 3, leave 3 chars back at stairs, cast hazard spells on stakrs and enjoy free win lol
Saving party members from going down a second time and keeping Shadowheart alive while she heals everyone are my favorite uses for it. Invulnerable heal-bot is pretty invaluable. It almost feels broken that you can cast non-attack spells without losing sanctuary.
Ok, these are actually really good spells. Minor illusion is fantastic for manipulating the crowds - and it is fantastic tool for a practicing barrelmancer or just for initiating fights on your own terms. Aid - I must say, I slept on this spell - this is an efficient group heal that is not subject to RNG and it increases max hitpoints - this is far better than it looks like - it is hp boost comparable to improving con by ~4 points when upcast. For the entire party. Longstrider - basically all ritual spells are great, really. Longstrider is an amazing utility spell - if only for the purpose of saving you time. And additional movement in combat is invaluable for certain classes. Telekinesis - shove is already amazing, and this is basically a long distance shove. The only thing to remember is the loot missing - as tempting as an easy kill through a chasm is... It may be sometimes detrimental. Tasha's laughter - wonderful spell, but it being a concentration spell limits it somewhat. I'd say it is probably best taken on secondary casters, like Arcane Trickster or Eldritch Knight, or unless you have no better concentration spells at hand. Blindness is fantastic IF it works. It requires the target to fail a con save, and from my experience, targets actually worth using CC on... often have good con saves. Flaming sphere - I have honestly never used it, but mostly because I was not playing with summons much, YET. Globe of invulnerability - I usually think of it as deployable cover for hit and run attacks. 3 turns duration is not much, but should be enough to massively soften up the enemy or give you enough time to set up proper CC. Sanctuary - oh boy... Sanctuary - when you first look at it, it just looks like your typical "oh no, my squishy fiend is about to get killed" type of saving spell. But it is the offensive use of it that makes it worthwhile. You can't be targeted while using this spell. This alone means you can pretty much freely position your character, or run away. Just watch for AoE. Hunger of Hadar - this spell is good on its own. BUT it becomes absolutely beastly when doing a combo with other spells. Throw a web inside, or oil, or really anything that keeps the enemy inside for even longer. Hunger is not a fast damage spell - it may require a setup to maximise its potential - throw minor illusion to gather the foes, preferably in a chokepoint of sorts. Just remember that various slowing effects do not exactly stack, unfortunately.
Tasha's Hideous Laughter is incredible, and was the best spell my Bard had in my opinion. A level 1 spell that would leave bosses crippled on the floor. In a certain Hell related fight in Act 3 I had the boss just cackling on the ground while blasted everything else, and even then I was able to do a large amount of damage to him before the damage broke the spell. For a level 1 spell slot it's insane, and with a few DC boosting items usually has a 75-95% chance of working on everything I've faced, almost unavoidable because I multi classed into Warlock and could use Hex as a Bonus Action to cripple their chances of resisting.
I never found it all that good because it was a single target control spell with concentration (which again is he shittiest mechanic imo in any table top) with multiple chances for a save. Good early game control but as soon as I get hold person or something, I take that.
@@proverbialking3452concentration is required to not make certain kinds of spells completely broken for their level or broken regardless of level. If it frustrates you it isn't easier it's working lol (also it's DnD you can always just houserule it)
Astarion storyline spoilers!!! My favourite thing is to force bosses to dance with Otto's Irresistible Dance. I made my astarion a rogue/bard and I cast it on cazzador for the sheer rp fantasy of it. How does it feel like to be on the receiving end of this kind of domination of will?
@@anguishedcarpet The thing is on higher lvl, you get better skill to concentrate on. Up-casting hold person for example let you hold a whole squad of enemies. As a Sorcerer you can dual cast haste on your fighter and barb then watch them tear a whole army apart. Want AoE Damage? "Cloud kill", Big AoE and you can re-cast it for free in the same fight. Want a choke point in an open field? Wall of Fire Tasha's Hideous Laughter and other skill mentioned in this video is "good" in some situation but overall, they tend to fall off at higher lvl.
Telekinesis is also a great spell if a massive Aoe is coming and one ally wasn't able to get away from the affected area on their turn; just cast telekinesis on them towards a safe place
Aid is legit. On my second playthrough, my start-of-day rotation was upcast Aid to 5th level (+20 max hp), cast Hero's Feast (+12 max hp), then use the spell crux amulet to get the 6th level spell slot back. That's like +35% hp or something between long rests. Pretty good.
Man, did the same but since first playthrough. I one Up It now, i dont know if its a bug but you can use the active from Markokeshir individually pero character, so you can use It to cast Heros feast for free. Also always cast summons before It: My current rotation is summon cambion with shadowheart, summon mummy, guls, flyung guls and myridion (using al passives in objectos or ilicid powers to mantain spell solts) with Gale. Then cast Aid and Heros feast. You end Up with a 15 man army, all with 32 HP more, and ussually no spells cast (except for a lvl 5 spell from shadowheart). Also what OP said, you can just Cast It in Camp with a different character lol
If you still have access to Act 1, you can combine Aid with the well in front of Auntie Ethel's house to get +10 HP on top of Aid's buff. Even the squishies have decent HP at that point.
Thank you, Hunger of Hadar is my favorite spell! Repelling Blast is perfect to keep shoving them back into it, and other casters can put even more slowing spells on top of them, like Sleet Storm and Insect Plague. I LOVE making a big pool of horribleness and keeping enemies simmering there.
Hunger of Hadar is why my go-to class will pretty much almost always be Warlock. Typically i run Fiend/pact of the blade, for those temp hit points and the ability to do both melee and ranged, but also the great old one is an honorable mention for crit builds. Mortal reminder can also CC enemies bc of the crits proccing fear. Pair that with the lucky feat and anything that increases crit chance, then on top of that you also get tasha's hideous laughter in the great old one spell list. Hypnotic pattern i think is also an honorable mention, I’ve stunned whole rooms of enemies with it before and recieved the condition "surprised" on it's effectiveness. Great video, definitely going to try out aid more often.
Once you use longstrider, you can't do without it. Have a team member cast it in the camp or swap out the slot after you cast (as long as you upcast it, it stays)
Hunger of Hadar also pairs with feats really well too, like obviously you can use the elemental adept feats, but also things like sentinel on your pole arm fighter and suddenly they can't escape at all.
Minor illusion has definitely grown on me. I first became aware of its usefulness at the Goblin Camp by using it to distract the goblins guarding the two giant spiders so I can lockpick the door and let them out for lunch 😜
Best video ever. Been playing 5e since it's inception. Hunger of Hadar is one of the strongest control spells in the game with a creative party. You confirm my biases. 10/10
I found druids CONJURE WOODLAND BEING being quite usefull too. Having a summon that has own summon and can concentrate on MASSIVE thorns that last 100 turns, impair movement and deal damage. And it can be cast unlimited amount of time. Only downside - dryad has abysmally small hp (and 4th lvl spell slot can be considered a downside at some extent). Laying the thorns and throwing locusts on top can create a huge headache for the enemy.
i absolutely love her. I don't bother concentrating on the massive thorn field because she can cast it every turn, remember it does the damage when you first put it down.
It was OP in BG2 as well. Maybe even one... never got that high level of a druid in it. One spell slot in exchange for a whole extra caster? Yes please!
Have her drink Elixirs of Heroism or Barkskin for extra protection :) I learnt in my latest playthrough that summons can interact with potions you drop!
Hunger of Hadar is the strongest spell in the game. I cannot say how much this carry me, I never played dnd, I dont know nothing, I just picked this spell because it looks cool and playing on tactician it was easy. Combining it with repelling blast, it is truly op
I use Hunger of Hadar and Sanctuary all the time and have indeed turned entire fights around with those two spells alone. Moonlight tower after murdering all the Harpers so no backup whatsoever? No problem, Hunger of Hadar, Hold person on the boss, Sanctuary the healer. I have been sleeping on the rest though, except for the globe, but I just got that on Shadowheart and haven't had an opportunity yet. Aid especially seems freaking awesome now that I know it isn't limited to 5 temp hp's. I've had bad luck with enemies winning their saves on blindness so don't use it very often and didn't know you can upcast to hit more than one enemy. Upcasting is amazing and I continuously don't realize how much better certain spells get when upcast. Good video, learned some stuff even after 170 hours played time. Doing a mostly melee dark urge playthrough atm, with two lockadins, Vampy boi as pure thief and Shadowheart as a light cleric, though I'm considering turning her tempest for the endgame. Honestly rolling with double Padlocks is trivializing most stuff and I haven't had to think much during fights since I realized not tossing 5 levels of Warlock onto Minthara was just leaving free damage on the table. If you don't know going 5 blade pact lock, 5 paladin (rolling with Oathbreaker on my main for flavor, it doesn't really matter, they all get divine smite.) and 2 fighter gets you 6 melee attacks, with pact of the blade letting you use Charisma as your attack modifier. I have +16 attack bonus and can usually one or two shot most opponents. Easy to play too, you just gotta remember to use bind pact weapon after rests and have great weapon master for a bonus attack after you kill someone, and this setup usually drops 2-4 enemies per turn if they're close enough together. Imagine two of these beasts roaming the battlefield. Only downside is it's kinda rough kitting out two padlocks, especially if you killed Damon slaughtering the grove to get Minthara. I suggest great old one lock because you basically sap energy from a Lovecraftian elder god. I find that Cthulhu Lock and Oathbreaker Pally is a pretty perfect blend of secret spices for a Dark Urge playthrough from an RP standpoint, as roaming around dropping 2-4 enemies per turn makes you feel like a murder god. I also highly suggest taking all Illithid powers on your main with this build, as by act 3 Cull the Weak auto kills anyone you get down to like 15hp's, also damaging any nearby enemies in the process. This works well with the great weapon master feat, since it gives you an extra attack after killing an enemy. Also flying and Misty Step so you can teleport into groups of enemies, as the one downside to the build is wasted attacks if there isn't another enemy close enough to hit after you kill someone. You can only have one pact weapon at a time so archery sucks with the build, and Eldritch Blast doesn't work with the extra attacks so you can't divine smite someone then use blast on an enemy out of range. Can get 150+ damage per turn with this build, as long as enemies are grouped up well enough. I'm now gonna take the video's advice and use minor illusion to make this part a bit easier!
Great list, love minor illusion, incredibly useful. I would also add sleet storm + spike growth, love watching enemies dash through those. Plant growth is another underrated CC, no damage but 1/4 movement speed can keep enemies in certain AOE's for longer and it doesn't use concentration.
Sleet storm is cool but at 1 spell slot level higher you get ice storm, which is the same thing but does damage. Love plant growth tho bc its not a concentration unlike hadar or spike growth
@@gamignman267 Ice storm is good for some damage but it's only 2 turns of ice surface, sleet storm is 10 turns and about 2x the AOE, I could see using them both, sleet storm for cc and ice storm for damage as they are probably cold already & quite a few items that proc the status crusted with frost. Shame sleet storm doesn't make ppl wet until it ends.
Nothing beats using hunger of Hadar, watching the enemy spend 2 turns just to walk out of it, and then you use repelling blast and say: now do it again.
Combine it with either Plant Growth or Spike Growth, it's even better. Hunger of Hadar is one of several spells that cause the "Difficult Terrain" modifier which halves movement speed. But they do not stack. Plant Growth & Spike Growth both just directly reduce movement speed, which means they do stack with any difficult terrain spell. Plant Growth will quarter movement speed, and Spike Growth will halve it, but also do damage for every 1.5m of movement. Throw in a black hole cast into the middle, and its literally AFK mode for a fight. Plant Growth with Ice Storm is pretty solid too. Dex Save or fall prone and lose all actions/bonus actions. Standing up from prone takes half your movement, but Plant Growth quarters their movement speed, and difficult terrain halves it again. There are so many cool combos in this game.
@@methujeraya There's a few fights in the game where the combo of HoH with Spike Growth will catch 10-15 enemies. You're never doing that with "Hold...."
@@erichdegurechaff9515 I know but... in Act 1 there's only a couple fights where you could use that. On top of my mind it's mostly the werewolf section very early on. Maybe the goblins too? But goblins already have a choke point grease would do plus barrels of bombs. In act 2. if you're facing that many enemies the cleric, by then, already has the spirit guardian. And holy fucks them up in act 2. In act 3, if you hold anyone they're dead that turn. Anyone. In act 3 you could easily hold 5 enemies at the same time. or 2 hold monster. Even dies once he is held. So yeah the combo is great but if that's how much setup we need we got create water + lightning.
exactly. I dont know what people here are talking about. they just jump out. and wisdom save spells only work about 33% of the time, the other times the enemy just makes the save. i just use the wizard for aoe damage and rush the enemies with monk, fighter and a rogue to snipe the big bosses/clear traps/lockpick. only had a downed character 2 times in this run and im in act 3
Great video as always! Unless I've missed it, I'd like to see you do a video on how OP Monks can be in BG3! Perhaps talking of how ridiculously strong a Strength monk is with a few level dips into Rogue/Thief in order to maximize the damage?
As a wizard, my favorite thing about the flaming sphere is that its one of the few spells that has bias AOE, so you don't have to worry about it setting your party on fire unless you use grease or something. And I'm sure the evocation wizards are laughing at me.
Wow, great video - subscribed! Very succinct, clear and persuasive, identifying powerful spells and how to use them. I was aware of some of them - e.g. Longstrider and I always start the big battle at the end of Chapter 2 (entering Ketheric's castle) with Hunger of Hadar. But there are lots I was sleeping on. Thank you!
I often hear about hunger of hadar being the best lock spell in the game, so it's not underrated at all. The guardian of faith/globe of invulnerability combo is really surprising though!
Fun fact, Hunger of Hadar synergizes with ice or grease, and I'm like 75% sure it works with Evard'd Black Tentacles. It doesn't synergize with other gassy effects like Cloudkill, though; that would be way OP.
Telekenisis is one of my fav spells. It is a good delivery system of enemy casters to my barbarian. They nowhere are have enough strength to resist. ( usually i would toss them off cliffs or throw heavy objects at them but that deprives my barbarian of the satisfaction)
I feel like the reasoning behind a lot of these could easily just be damage. If i'm using my action for a utility spell then I'm not doing damage, therefore they get largely ignored because damage wins fights. Telekinesis is an outlier but I don't like using it because I lose any loot from enemies killed this way.
Lemme give another good example. If this was ur 1st crpg games in many years, one thing that differs it from other game is, u have to manage a party of hero. Ur single player experience isn't really single player. What's great about this is u hv many hero to manage, not like Skyrim which only controls 1 hero, so then u hv to min-max: whose the dmg dealer? Who's the "amplifier" (the ones who didnt do dmg at all, but making it possible for ur ally to deal more dmg cz of ur spell), etc. There u hv it.
You don't have to kill them, you can just yeet them away and you'll be free from this enemy for one or two turns. Plus you can recast it without using a slot
If you're only thinking in terms of damage, your game must be rather boring Also Tasha's hideous laughter is a preemptive healing spell and can set up a rogue for a sneak attack. Minor illusion is a setup for more damage with the next cast. So your action does do damage just not immediately.
Strangely, I've tried using minor illusion several times in my playthrough and I've never seen enemies walk towards it like in this video. At most they just turn to look at it
It's perfectly feasible and perhaps even more enjoyable to complete the game without using ridiculously overpowered exploits. Just aa I found tabletop D&D was more fun with "self compromised" charcters and a sympathetic Dungeon Master who encouraged role playing compared to a rule playing Dice Master where you'd feel compelled to maximise every statistical advantage you could in order for a character just to survive.
I use hunger of hadar and globe of invulnerability a lot. I used to cast flaming sphere and Tasha's hideous laughter a lot when I was low level, but ended up replacing these spells with hold person/hold monster/dominate person and conjure elemental (sooo good...). I did not knew blindness don't require concentration. I will start to use it because of that.
Really surprised there aren't more comments about Globe of Invulnerability. This in combination with Black Hole, especially if the caster has it as a bonus action, wins every fight in the game. The Gortash fight with ~12 defenders at level 11 was easily done with the only risk being the mines knocking the characters around, but they actually made the fight easier by blackholing everything into the mines as well. It's the game's easy mode.
True. Didn't even have to fight the first phase of the elder brain fight - didn't touch neither dragon, nor illitids. Just teleported the whole party to the brain, put over them a globe of invulnerability and allowed Emperor to safely cast his spell for 1 turn. They managed to stun him once through the globe, yeah, but I had more than 1 with me xD
I had a Globe of Invulnerability Scroll during the fight where you have to defend the portal Halsin makes into the Shadowfell. Made the entire fight a cake walk since the portal was immune to all damage. XD
I used Tasha's Hideous Laughter on a certain hp 666 boss towards the end of the game that completely took them out of the fight so I could clear out all of the chaff. Seconded this recommendation, would use again.
Im surprised Darkness isn't on here. You can even use it with arrows and put it on your own guys to make them immune from being targeted by any ranged attacks. This was the #1 way I tipped the scales on defending Halsin's Portal. I just put Darkness on it. You can step out of darkness to attack and step back into it.
_Fog Cloud_ is better for this purpose. It is a lower level spell, blocks vision, isn't circumvented by Eldritch Sight, and is easier to get on a character.
For Halsin I just had wyll and gale using hunger of hadar and other aoe spells while shadowheart held down the fort with guardian of faith. Especially since I had somehow made shadowheart into a tank with 21 ac, my new fav thing is to have her sprint towards enemies with guardian of faith and then run back to protect the casters and my very squishy bard.
i wanna mention that before you get magic items that increase ur save dc some of these spells are harder to get off, especially for spells like hideous laughter and blindness that reroll every turn
Another advantage to flaming sphere you didn’t mention is that you can dip weapons in it like you would burning oil, which means your melee party members can hit even harder with the ball around
We used Tasha's hideous laughter in our dnd group for the very first boss fight and it made sure one of the 4 vampire bosses was down for 80% of the fight. Even when I used a fireball + wine barrel to light her up and we killed the rest of her vampire family, she was just literally rolling on the floor laughing her ass off.
Great video! This video is very complete, i might show it to my newb friends who just started now playing, when you don't know certain things they just blow your mind😂
Another cool thing about spells such as Longstrider and Aid is that you can still utilize them even if you don't want to use casters in your party. After every long rest, you can simply swap someone, such as Gale, in for a moment then you can have him cast Longstrider on everyone at camp before swapping him out. Since it is not a concentration spell, its effects will remain. This works with other spells too such as Aid, Mage Armor or any other buff that can target others and is not a concentration spell. This does not work with concentration spells because the character will immediately stop concentrating as soon as they are dismissed to camp.
me and my group of sadistic nutjobs abuse the crap out of Hunger of Hadar, Wall of Fire, and Spike Growth to create a pit of horrible death. stay in it, take massive damage from HoH and WoF. try to move, take immense damage from SG, get nowhere, then get railed by HoH and WoF. is it a bit of overkill to blow those spell slots? maybe. is it entertaining as fuck? oooooooh yes it is.
Bro, even though I’ve beat the game, HUGE thank you for blurring out spoilers in this video. So many people make guides but don’t care about spoiling things for the people watching. You’re insanely awesome for doing that dude!
While not strictly a spell, Frenzy on a barbarian allows them to pick up small enemies (Goblins, Drauger etc.) and either just throw them off a cliff or club another enemy to death using them. It's both hilarious and brutally efficient at clearing out hordes.
I didnt even know about Hunger of Hadar until I got wiped in the first Moonrise Towers fight multiple times in a row...I hate that spell sooooo much. It is amazing. Definitely the most underrated spell in the game. Solid video mate
Globe of Invulnerabilty came in so clutch in my last playthrough. Helped me tank Raphael and his gaggle of goons in the House of Hope and helped me in the last fight to open up the portal to the Netherbrain. Really useful spell, also really good to have scrolls of. Sanctuary is the goat too, ngl.
I LOVE the telekinesis spell. The amount of times I’ve had Gale throw enemies into melee range for my character (who was a bit challenged in the movement speed department lol) or just off a cliff was incredible. I do wish that at higher slots you could target more people but I understand that would be ridiculously powerful
In Act 2, rescuing the tieflings in Moonlight Towers dungeon, Minor Illusion was key for me because you can bait the warden out if her office then have Gale cast Arcane Lock on the door. Even if the tieflings are seen escaping, the guards wont turn hostile until they get in the office and open the cells. So cast Arcane Lock 2-3 times, then quickly teleport out to the boat before they start combat
I’m so glad I saw this because I never ever ever remember that long strider is a ritual spell! Putting long strider plus twin casting haste to the whole party is so broken.
As a Warlock, seeing Hunger of Hadar at number one brings a tear to my eye 🥹. My favorite spell in the game by far. Great tip for Hunger of Hadar, use repelling eldritch blast to launch fools back into the aoe when they walk out. It's so satisfying.
Hunger of Hadar is underrated. Used it + any spell that put ice on the ground + Spike Grove = absolute crowd control in the best way. When they weren't taking consistent damage from walking through the spikes they were taking damage from standing in Hadar and being knocked prone by the ice to keep them within it. XD Lots of fun, honestly.
What is also very underrated, is this build in Baldur's Gate 3 (did you know about it?): th-cam.com/video/WMBSgfvJpLw/w-d-xo.html
I also did one for the WORST spells by the way: th-cam.com/video/lePa3Knkm5Y/w-d-xo.html
AND FINALLY, you know what else is underrated? You pressing that subscribe button.
Thank you legends for watching, appreciate you all.
God damn it. You got me with this video - I am in! 😎
@grlt23 00p0😊}P😊😊Pp😊😊😊😊😊0LP0😊p😊😊😊😊
😊😊P😊PP😊pp0😊😊p😊P😊😊😊😊0😊😊😊pP😊😊😊😊PP😊😊😊😊😊😊😊p😊p
😊PP😊😊😊P😊😊😊😊😊😊😊😊p😊😊😊😊😊😊😊😊😊😊😊😊😊P😊😊😊p😊😊😊p😊
Great video, count me in
Hunger of Hadar is a display of how warlocks can be an epitome of "I have only two spell slots, but I won't need more"
Warlock supervillain kit: Hunger of Hadar and Repelling Blast. Any who escape the cloud just gets push blasted right back into it.
@joshuakim5240 this plus black tentacles is how I beat the fat thorm for the first time
The best part of the spell is that its a 'summoned' effect, which stacks with all other AOE effects including other summons (unlike clouds or surfaces). So, you can stack Hunger over Plant Growth and Silence to create a large area that Blinds, Silences, damages every turn, makes movement almost impossible, AND can be attacked into without issue- all without a single Save. AOEs make it so dang hard to value concentration for anything else.
My favorite spell
It goes great with the illithid spell black hole, let everyone waste a turn or 2 to escape just to throw them all back in
Quick note @01:00 Minor Illusion is NOT naturally a bonus action, it’s a normal action. It is only a bonus action if you are an Illusion Wizard.
Thank you. I am playing an illusion wizard and was miffed he forgot to mention that.
Great list. Another spell that I slept on was Otto’s Irresistible Dance. I didn’t think it was worth a level 6 slot until I forced Raphael to gangam style while my party beat him to death
Lmao
That was my experience with the Slayer avatar. I didn't think it would work, but popped a scroll of Dance just for shits and giggles, and just beat the snot out of the Slayer.
My fight is to spell him tasha hideous laughter to death. 😂
It looks like Raphael not only like to laugh,but also to dance. 100% social person. 😂
@@BotoDai to spell him?
thats the most broken spell in the game actually it needs a nerf 😅
You mentioned Aid, but the part that I really like is when you short rest that increased health counts towards that 50% health restoral.
Wyll casting Hunger of Hadar and spamming Eldritch Blasts to knock enemies back really carried a lot of fights for me
Due to poor tactical planning eldritch blast lost me more loot than any mechanic in the game lol
@@V3x0rwho cares when you can instakill enemies with a cantrip loo
@@BridgyP people who like loot...
Combine it with wizard casting ice storm and cleric casting swarm of insects... you can push enemies further than they can move
I'm running Warlock on my main this playthrough and it carried me until I could get Lockadin online.
3:48 you really blurred the video to prevent us from receiving spoilers.. bro, you're a god.. few youtubers have this concern for subscribers
Hunger of Hadar + Spike Growth is a great wombo combo as well.
They die if they move.
They die if they stay still.
W.
Also they cannot jump. While I didn't use Hunger of Hadar in fight against orthon in Shar's gauntlet, I still messed around a lot with Spike Growth, only downside was in jumps. But with Hunger of Hadar it is not the issue at all. But it did quite pain in the Moonrise tower for me, when I needed to drop concentration for enemy spellcasters. Luckily my monk did it very nice and fast.
(I don’t tend to change original characters class too far off their original class, at least not in the first play through) This is the reason I kept Wyll in the party most of the time with my ranger tav. Ranger cast spike and Warlock casts hunger of hader, then watch everyone dies.
Yeeeeeessss, this is my favorite combo!
I discovered this once I added Halsin to my party, now I use this combo in every single fight
If you're a druid you also eventually can get a dryad summon that can cast spike growth everytime it's her turn.. which reinjures enemies standing in it anytime it's cast. So even standing still doesn't save them if you recast it over the same area
In the fight against Z’rell I used this on the bulk of their troops, it really helped.
I like to nominate sleet storm as well. It guarantee removes all concentration from casters and it create an large ice surface that almost everyone slip on. It's so underrated imo.
Sleet storm isnt guaranteed concentration fail. It just forces the targets to make a save.
@@neburiveStbh I don’t even use it for the concentration removal, the are of the ice is vast enough that with a clever cast half the enemies are useless for a lot of the fight, and as was mentioned in other comments, this combined with hunger of hadar is dastardly work. They basically can’t excape
I never used longstrider until I realized it was a ritual spell.
They really should include whether something is a ritual, and what effects upcasting has, on the spell select screen while leveling up.
This. It really should be highlighted in a better way
It would also be really convenient if you could pre-select "until long-rest" spells to be automatically applied after long rest. Would even make sense from RP perspective. I mean, there's no way my Wyll wouldn't bind his weapon as ritual after waking up.
@katerinachuranova8435 that's a really good idea for a mod though
They do. It does. You just didn't read
@@katerinachuranova8435I think having to remember to cast it makes more RP sense
Hey, I just want to say that I saw this video about a year ago. I was a brand new D&D player, and this helped me SO MUCH. Basically, just wanted to stop back by, and say thank you. I really appreciate the help. This game turned out to be one of the best games I've ever played. Keep up the good work!
If you want to make Hadar even stronger, if you use snowburst ring, the cold damage from hadar creates ice under every target meaning they can slip and fall prone in the hadar making it pretty much impossible to escape.
(Patch 3 seemingly removed The interaction, but any other cold spell still works in combo with Hadar to create absolute hell)
That's a very good idea. >:)
Did I see that caster holding 2 staffs?! What!
@@ramco6060 Get the Dual Wielder Feat on your caster.
I use this ring, boots that prevent slipping on ice, and the hoarfrost staff in my Paladin. Constantly makes everyone around him slip prone which really locks enemies down. Love it. It would absolutely pair beautifully with HoH.
Me and my buddies did a 3 man playthrough and were very surprised that we were ambushed by Raphael's enemy in that area with the displacer beast. The entire group of the enemies were upstairs and I opened up by using misty step to jump onto a wooden beam outside and dropped hunger of hadar on them. It totally shafted their entire ambush as they were confused as to how to get to us with all that movement speed and blindness.
My favorite Telekinesis move is throwing enemies into each other
So you hit MFer with another MFer. Nice.
I've started doing this in tabletop. It makes for some memorable fights.
I’ve seen a bunch of these BG3 what spells are great type videos…and I have to say this is one of the best ones I have seen, for two reasons: 1. You concisely go into the reasons why the spells are great and show examples. 2. This one is my favorite…you zoom into the spell icons, descriptions etc. I can see everything so clearly! When watching on a phone screen it’s hard to see all the details. Wonderful job, I’m gonna check out your other vids, thanks!
This is one of the most useful videos I've seen on BG3. I recently discovered the joy that is Sanctuary, and oh my gods is it perfect. You can even twincast it if you get into a tight spot, enabling ridiculous strategies like twinned Greater Invisibility on your two assassins -> twinned Sanctuary on your two non-assassins.
1. Hunger of Hadar
2. Sanctuary
3. Globe of Invulnerability
4. Flaming Sphere
5. Blindness
6. Tasha’s Hideous Laughter
7. Telekinesis
8. Longstrider
9. Aid
10. Minor Illusion
Thank you.
Bump
I use Sanc CONSTANTLY to screw over big packs
Hunger of Hadar took out the Surgeon and his nurses for me - for Shar worshippers, they weren't very comfortable in the dark.
Can a sorcerer learn these?
Long jump + potion of hillstrength is super effective for mobility. Ritual spell, potion lasts a long rest, distance you can jump is even bigger than the radius from misty step, all for a bonus action. Absolute killer. And the matrix jumps are not only fun to do, but also usefull out of combat for exploring
I use this on my ranger/rogue Tav. Incredible to always achieve optimal positioning. Also got Lae'zel (natural high str) with the athletic feat and ring of increased jump. She can jump through the battlefield and bash enemies left and right un impeded .
My wife used hunger of hadar to solo the gyrmforge dwarves by slapping it down just before a little jump off to the side.
Only one dwarf actually made it over, and all the rest died of hadar damage. The one lucky dwarf who *did* get past it, immediately got pushed into a chasm.
Something more amazing than that... your wife is playing games with you haha... lucky man
Yeah I can't imagine playing without it. It's so good for bottlenecking enemies.
My only disappointment with Hunger of Hadar is that the damage doesn't scale with upcasting, but that's not so bad in a game that stops at level 12. Anything past that and it falls off, which is a shame because Warlock spell slots are so great with spells that scale, since the slots automatically scale. It's a phenomenal move though. It's like 3 different spells in one.
@robertartigue5541 his wife is the girl in his profile pic
@@MrE.8882d character?
Totally caught off guard by the quality of this video. Excellent info, concise, entertaining and you obviously put a ton of work into the editing. Good job!
Another hot tip for No. 4 Flaming sphere, you can use Dip on it to make your weapons gain a 1d4 fire damage for 3 turns
Wow good
you can do that with a candle and not waste a spell slot
@@SarajevoShotz but can a candle attack multiple enemies and block them from reaching your backline ? :)
This is a nice tip until you learn that if you throw a poison on the ground and then dip your weapon in the pool, it lasts until long rest- and multiple characters can dip in the same pool. Start your day with this plus your Aid and Longstrider casts every time you camp.
@@SarajevoShotz Did I say use this spell just to only dip your weapons in fire, no I'm saying it's a feature of this spell not many people know about or considered
Hunger of Hadar is ABSURDLY powerful.
Started my second playthrough, included Wyll in my party for the first time. Discovered the true wonder of Hunger of Hadar.
In my first playthrough the only time I was against that spell was during the assault on Moonrise towers, and I swear getting stuck in TWO Hunger of Hadars in the main hall of the towers was PAINFUL. Couldn't even misty step out of it.
An added bonus about the hunger of hadar is that it is not considered a surface effect, meaning that you can stack additional surface effects upon it to further debuff the enemy within.
absolutely, stacking it with others AoE effects is horrifically deadly.
Ohh, yeah, Spike Growth all the way!
@@suzanneromijnders6320grease better or what i do is stink cloud
I prefer darkness over hunger because of the projectile negation combined with sleet storm, and I get melee warlocks with devil’s sight and anti slip shoes inside spank and tanking
@@KonStarStudio If you're going with devil's sight build darkness is definitely better than hadar. However, this would mean that all other teammates without devil's sight can't participate in the fight. Though 4 warlocks is pretty fun lol.
and when you realize aid can be cast lvl 6 by some hireling and the effect stay when dismissed for a net +25 permanent health it becomes even better
Not bad. I'd add in Sleet Storm as well - it doesn't do damage by itself, but it covers a huge area, lasts forever (as long as you concentrate) and causes ice underfoot which enemies slip on and go prone. Combine it with something like Insect Plague (from another caster) and you have something truly nasty
Combine it with the number 1 spell on this list :p
Also if you melt it with fire you can also conduct an electric spell in the aoe.
+1 for sleet storm, probably my most used CC spell, it's just hilarious seeing 90% of enemies dash and then immediately go prone. I would add it works well with summon woodland beings because the Dryad is immune to prone and can just walk through the sleet storm.
@@karllong There's also quite a few boots that make you immune to difficult terrain, or ice, or prone etc... So, very easy to only affect enemies.
@@sullenskulls9709 I have one pair, the hoarfrost boots, not aware of the others though. I think the spell freedom of movement works also, although not sure about prone.
appreciate the video, and deeper dive into some actually overlooked spells (new ideas for me in maybe half). Still waiting for one of these for higher level wizard spells, but so far they usually focus on level 1-2 spells only.
You can add Otto's irresistible dance - it has no save on cast and the boss is out of the whole fight - goodbye Cazador and his annoying mist form, he starts to dance and you can cast sunlight, sunbeams, anything without any trouble.
completely neutered Raphael for me.
And you buy a ton of Scrolls. You dont even need to be a caster
Yeah, used it on Raphael too. That and turned Yurgir on him, made that fight a breeze.
Who's out here buying scrolls!? Gloves of Thievery + 20 dex + expertise + guidance + pickpocket = Scrolls are practically free.
@@azurelion6722 Not worth the time wriggling back and forth using stealth and shimmying out of LOS and such. Money is extremely plentiful in this game.
4:10 kinda late but sometimes Telekinesis can be used to recover bodies from chasms as well, I remember I pushed Orin off of the ledge to beat her and then recovered her body with Telekinesis to loot it. Don't know if this has been patched but it's a great use too.
With Sanctuary I have Shadowheart cast on my Druid Tav and then have my Tav cast Moonbeam. I'm not sure if it's a bug or actually part of the game but damage from Moonbeam doesn't count as my own damage, so Sanctuary stays on. Also everytime i move Moonbeam the ten turn staying power starts over. It's genius and works great.
Part of the game. After you cast moon beam even if you’re using your action to move it you aren’t making an attack you are moving the spell so sanctuary stays
This video has really unique editing. It's fantastic. Zooms highlights focuses. Gj
FINALLY someone mentioning hungar of hadar. My favorite spell which carried my warlock through the entire first run. Any group of big enemies just get screwed over completely.
I love it too, especially in conjunction with Evard's Black Tentacles, or Plant Growth or even Spike Growth . Тhey interact and we get - low tier total zone of death, without hope of salvation )
I didn't realize Hunger of Hadar was awesome until it was used against me in act 2 in combination with Black Hole.
@V3x0r my first character was a warlock and as soon as I hit level 5 I took it. I was drawn to the colour of it tbh its so nice. Anyway I used that and silence from shadowheart to completely destroy auntie ethel
@@ArqteW another spell I use with it ice storm to decimate enemies and make em slip up. Sleet storm is also good
I'm honestly surprised it's even on a list of underrated spells. I picked on my first play through because I thought it sounded cool and very warlock. I don't think I ever replaced it.
As an obsessed necromancer player, I will now CERTAINLY be using Aid to turn my undead horde into an unkillable flesh shield.
Sanctuary is so crazy good. If you want to deal damage while it's up, you can use summons or even Glyph of Warding (since that doesn't count as a hostile action). If an ally is downed, you can get them up and cast Sanctuary, and they can't be just knocked down again while they chug potions. Throwing items (including potions) does count as an attack roll though.
last patch fixed glyphs to break sanctuary but it's good regardless, especially to save npcs you want
Just cast sanctuary before starting lets say viconia conversation in act 3, leave 3 chars back at stairs, cast hazard spells on stakrs and enjoy free win lol
Not sure if it's fixed yet but casting phantasmal killer and protecting the concentration with sanctuary didn't break it
Saving party members from going down a second time and keeping Shadowheart alive while she heals everyone are my favorite uses for it. Invulnerable heal-bot is pretty invaluable. It almost feels broken that you can cast non-attack spells without losing sanctuary.
Ok, these are actually really good spells.
Minor illusion is fantastic for manipulating the crowds - and it is fantastic tool for a practicing barrelmancer or just for initiating fights on your own terms.
Aid - I must say, I slept on this spell - this is an efficient group heal that is not subject to RNG and it increases max hitpoints - this is far better than it looks like - it is hp boost comparable to improving con by ~4 points when upcast. For the entire party.
Longstrider - basically all ritual spells are great, really. Longstrider is an amazing utility spell - if only for the purpose of saving you time. And additional movement in combat is invaluable for certain classes.
Telekinesis - shove is already amazing, and this is basically a long distance shove. The only thing to remember is the loot missing - as tempting as an easy kill through a chasm is... It may be sometimes detrimental.
Tasha's laughter - wonderful spell, but it being a concentration spell limits it somewhat. I'd say it is probably best taken on secondary casters, like Arcane Trickster or Eldritch Knight, or unless you have no better concentration spells at hand.
Blindness is fantastic IF it works. It requires the target to fail a con save, and from my experience, targets actually worth using CC on... often have good con saves.
Flaming sphere - I have honestly never used it, but mostly because I was not playing with summons much, YET.
Globe of invulnerability - I usually think of it as deployable cover for hit and run attacks. 3 turns duration is not much, but should be enough to massively soften up the enemy or give you enough time to set up proper CC.
Sanctuary - oh boy... Sanctuary - when you first look at it, it just looks like your typical "oh no, my squishy fiend is about to get killed" type of saving spell. But it is the offensive use of it that makes it worthwhile. You can't be targeted while using this spell. This alone means you can pretty much freely position your character, or run away. Just watch for AoE.
Hunger of Hadar - this spell is good on its own. BUT it becomes absolutely beastly when doing a combo with other spells. Throw a web inside, or oil, or really anything that keeps the enemy inside for even longer. Hunger is not a fast damage spell - it may require a setup to maximise its potential - throw minor illusion to gather the foes, preferably in a chokepoint of sorts. Just remember that various slowing effects do not exactly stack, unfortunately.
Tasha's Hideous Laughter is incredible, and was the best spell my Bard had in my opinion. A level 1 spell that would leave bosses crippled on the floor. In a certain Hell related fight in Act 3 I had the boss just cackling on the ground while blasted everything else, and even then I was able to do a large amount of damage to him before the damage broke the spell. For a level 1 spell slot it's insane, and with a few DC boosting items usually has a 75-95% chance of working on everything I've faced, almost unavoidable because I multi classed into Warlock and could use Hex as a Bonus Action to cripple their chances of resisting.
I'm sorry, but hex doesn't affect saves. Only ability checks. So you're better off targeting STR/DEX to make the enemy easier to shove.
I never found it all that good because it was a single target control spell with concentration (which again is he shittiest mechanic imo in any table top) with multiple chances for a save. Good early game control but as soon as I get hold person or something, I take that.
@@proverbialking3452concentration is required to not make certain kinds of spells completely broken for their level or broken regardless of level. If it frustrates you it isn't easier it's working lol (also it's DnD you can always just houserule it)
Astarion storyline spoilers!!!
My favourite thing is to force bosses to dance with Otto's Irresistible Dance. I made my astarion a rogue/bard and I cast it on cazzador for the sheer rp fantasy of it. How does it feel like to be on the receiving end of this kind of domination of will?
@@anguishedcarpet The thing is on higher lvl, you get better skill to concentrate on. Up-casting hold person for example let you hold a whole squad of enemies. As a Sorcerer you can dual cast haste on your fighter and barb then watch them tear a whole army apart.
Want AoE Damage? "Cloud kill", Big AoE and you can re-cast it for free in the same fight.
Want a choke point in an open field? Wall of Fire
Tasha's Hideous Laughter and other skill mentioned in this video is "good" in some situation but overall, they tend to fall off at higher lvl.
Telekinesis is also a great spell if a massive Aoe is coming and one ally wasn't able to get away from the affected area on their turn; just cast telekinesis on them towards a safe place
"move them" heh. Gently I'm sure 😂
I sometimes use it as a “teleport” where I chuck my battle master or paladin to the enemy because of low movement.
Aid is legit. On my second playthrough, my start-of-day rotation was upcast Aid to 5th level (+20 max hp), cast Hero's Feast (+12 max hp), then use the spell crux amulet to get the 6th level spell slot back. That's like +35% hp or something between long rests. Pretty good.
As it doesn't require concentration, you can have one of the mercs cast it in the camp.
Man, did the same but since first playthrough. I one Up It now, i dont know if its a bug but you can use the active from Markokeshir individually pero character, so you can use It to cast Heros feast for free. Also always cast summons before It: My current rotation is summon cambion with shadowheart, summon mummy, guls, flyung guls and myridion (using al passives in objectos or ilicid powers to mantain spell solts) with Gale. Then cast Aid and Heros feast. You end Up with a 15 man army, all with 32 HP more, and ussually no spells cast (except for a lvl 5 spell from shadowheart).
Also what OP said, you can just Cast It in Camp with a different character lol
If you still have access to Act 1, you can combine Aid with the well in front of Auntie Ethel's house to get +10 HP on top of Aid's buff. Even the squishies have decent HP at that point.
10 more hp from the well
@@santosiconly issue with the well is when you long rest you get nauseous
Thank you, Hunger of Hadar is my favorite spell! Repelling Blast is perfect to keep shoving them back into it, and other casters can put even more slowing spells on top of them, like Sleet Storm and Insect Plague. I LOVE making a big pool of horribleness and keeping enemies simmering there.
Thank you again! This video was really helpful for me.
Thank you goat! Appreciate the generosity.
Hunger of Hadar is why my go-to class will pretty much almost always be Warlock. Typically i run Fiend/pact of the blade, for those temp hit points and the ability to do both melee and ranged, but also the great old one is an honorable mention for crit builds. Mortal reminder can also CC enemies bc of the crits proccing fear. Pair that with the lucky feat and anything that increases crit chance, then on top of that you also get tasha's hideous laughter in the great old one spell list. Hypnotic pattern i think is also an honorable mention, I’ve stunned whole rooms of enemies with it before and recieved the condition "surprised" on it's effectiveness. Great video, definitely going to try out aid more often.
Totally agree with hunger of hadar! There’s a certain fight in act 2 against a TON of enemies, and it was an absolute game changer!
yup i did the same + darkness to disable ranged enemies so they dont brake a portal. Works on tactician didnt test it on honor
Once you use longstrider, you can't do without it. Have a team member cast it in the camp or swap out the slot after you cast (as long as you upcast it, it stays)
Great tip!
Hunger of Hadar also pairs with feats really well too, like obviously you can use the elemental adept feats, but also things like sentinel on your pole arm fighter and suddenly they can't escape at all.
Minor illusion has definitely grown on me. I first became aware of its usefulness at the Goblin Camp by using it to distract the goblins guarding the two giant spiders so I can lockpick the door and let them out for lunch 😜
Best video ever.
Been playing 5e since it's inception. Hunger of Hadar is one of the strongest control spells in the game with a creative party.
You confirm my biases. 10/10
I found druids CONJURE WOODLAND BEING being quite usefull too. Having a summon that has own summon and can concentrate on MASSIVE thorns that last 100 turns, impair movement and deal damage. And it can be cast unlimited amount of time. Only downside - dryad has abysmally small hp (and 4th lvl spell slot can be considered a downside at some extent).
Laying the thorns and throwing locusts on top can create a huge headache for the enemy.
She can hit like a truck with shillelagh which she can cast on herself.
I summoned one out of desperation in the Yurgir fight and she saved my ass
i absolutely love her. I don't bother concentrating on the massive thorn field because she can cast it every turn, remember it does the damage when you first put it down.
It was OP in BG2 as well. Maybe even one... never got that high level of a druid in it. One spell slot in exchange for a whole extra caster? Yes please!
Have her drink Elixirs of Heroism or Barkskin for extra protection :) I learnt in my latest playthrough that summons can interact with potions you drop!
Great video, sanctuary i used to use as a form of disengage, never knew it was so strong.
Hunger of Hadar is the strongest spell in the game. I cannot say how much this carry me, I never played dnd, I dont know nothing, I just picked this spell because it looks cool and playing on tactician it was easy. Combining it with repelling blast, it is truly op
I use Hunger of Hadar and Sanctuary all the time and have indeed turned entire fights around with those two spells alone. Moonlight tower after murdering all the Harpers so no backup whatsoever? No problem, Hunger of Hadar, Hold person on the boss, Sanctuary the healer. I have been sleeping on the rest though, except for the globe, but I just got that on Shadowheart and haven't had an opportunity yet. Aid especially seems freaking awesome now that I know it isn't limited to 5 temp hp's. I've had bad luck with enemies winning their saves on blindness so don't use it very often and didn't know you can upcast to hit more than one enemy. Upcasting is amazing and I continuously don't realize how much better certain spells get when upcast. Good video, learned some stuff even after 170 hours played time. Doing a mostly melee dark urge playthrough atm, with two lockadins, Vampy boi as pure thief and Shadowheart as a light cleric, though I'm considering turning her tempest for the endgame. Honestly rolling with double Padlocks is trivializing most stuff and I haven't had to think much during fights since I realized not tossing 5 levels of Warlock onto Minthara was just leaving free damage on the table. If you don't know going 5 blade pact lock, 5 paladin (rolling with Oathbreaker on my main for flavor, it doesn't really matter, they all get divine smite.) and 2 fighter gets you 6 melee attacks, with pact of the blade letting you use Charisma as your attack modifier. I have +16 attack bonus and can usually one or two shot most opponents. Easy to play too, you just gotta remember to use bind pact weapon after rests and have great weapon master for a bonus attack after you kill someone, and this setup usually drops 2-4 enemies per turn if they're close enough together. Imagine two of these beasts roaming the battlefield. Only downside is it's kinda rough kitting out two padlocks, especially if you killed Damon slaughtering the grove to get Minthara. I suggest great old one lock because you basically sap energy from a Lovecraftian elder god. I find that Cthulhu Lock and Oathbreaker Pally is a pretty perfect blend of secret spices for a Dark Urge playthrough from an RP standpoint, as roaming around dropping 2-4 enemies per turn makes you feel like a murder god. I also highly suggest taking all Illithid powers on your main with this build, as by act 3 Cull the Weak auto kills anyone you get down to like 15hp's, also damaging any nearby enemies in the process. This works well with the great weapon master feat, since it gives you an extra attack after killing an enemy. Also flying and Misty Step so you can teleport into groups of enemies, as the one downside to the build is wasted attacks if there isn't another enemy close enough to hit after you kill someone. You can only have one pact weapon at a time so archery sucks with the build, and Eldritch Blast doesn't work with the extra attacks so you can't divine smite someone then use blast on an enemy out of range. Can get 150+ damage per turn with this build, as long as enemies are grouped up well enough. I'm now gonna take the video's advice and use minor illusion to make this part a bit easier!
Great list, love minor illusion, incredibly useful. I would also add sleet storm + spike growth, love watching enemies dash through those. Plant growth is another underrated CC, no damage but 1/4 movement speed can keep enemies in certain AOE's for longer and it doesn't use concentration.
Sleet storm is cool but at 1 spell slot level higher you get ice storm, which is the same thing but does damage. Love plant growth tho bc its not a concentration unlike hadar or spike growth
@@gamignman267 Ice storm is good for some damage but it's only 2 turns of ice surface, sleet storm is 10 turns and about 2x the AOE, I could see using them both, sleet storm for cc and ice storm for damage as they are probably cold already & quite a few items that proc the status crusted with frost. Shame sleet storm doesn't make ppl wet until it ends.
excellent video. i only used 3 of these on a regular basis, sanctuary, longstrider and aid. and I didnt know you could upcast the last two!
Nothing beats using hunger of Hadar, watching the enemy spend 2 turns just to walk out of it, and then you use repelling blast and say: now do it again.
Combine it with either Plant Growth or Spike Growth, it's even better. Hunger of Hadar is one of several spells that cause the "Difficult Terrain" modifier which halves movement speed. But they do not stack. Plant Growth & Spike Growth both just directly reduce movement speed, which means they do stack with any difficult terrain spell. Plant Growth will quarter movement speed, and Spike Growth will halve it, but also do damage for every 1.5m of movement. Throw in a black hole cast into the middle, and its literally AFK mode for a fight.
Plant Growth with Ice Storm is pretty solid too. Dex Save or fall prone and lose all actions/bonus actions. Standing up from prone takes half your movement, but Plant Growth quarters their movement speed, and difficult terrain halves it again.
There are so many cool combos in this game.
But what's the point. you could just hold them
@@methujeraya There's a few fights in the game where the combo of HoH with Spike Growth will catch 10-15 enemies. You're never doing that with "Hold...."
@@methujeraya Hold can be saved every turn and its limited, those terrain control cannot be saved and will catch everyone depending on the location
@@erichdegurechaff9515 I know but... in Act 1 there's only a couple fights where you could use that. On top of my mind it's mostly the werewolf section very early on.
Maybe the goblins too? But goblins already have a choke point grease would do plus barrels of bombs.
In act 2. if you're facing that many enemies the cleric, by then, already has the spirit guardian. And holy fucks them up in act 2.
In act 3, if you hold anyone they're dead that turn. Anyone. In act 3 you could easily hold 5 enemies at the same time. or 2 hold monster. Even dies once he is held.
So yeah the combo is great but if that's how much setup we need we got create water + lightning.
From someone who has lots of trouble with tactics, this video is a god send. Thank you 🙏
The problem with hunger is on tactician mode enemies will just jump out of it. Jump is op.
The number of enemies that just jump out of AOE spells like Spike Growth is irritating AF, lol.
Hyenas shouldn't be that smart!
Here's why I like Evard's Black Tentacles. Smothered enemies can't jump away.
Its good to combine it with other surface effects
exactly. I dont know what people here are talking about. they just jump out. and wisdom save spells only work about 33% of the time, the other times the enemy just makes the save. i just use the wizard for aoe damage and rush the enemies with monk, fighter and a rogue to snipe the big bosses/clear traps/lockpick. only had a downed character 2 times in this run and im in act 3
great info, well-edited/produced, and entertaining. A+
Great video as always! Unless I've missed it, I'd like to see you do a video on how OP Monks can be in BG3! Perhaps talking of how ridiculously strong a Strength monk is with a few level dips into Rogue/Thief in order to maximize the damage?
OMG thank you for explaining Aid! I’ve seen so many people saying it’s a must but none of them ever explained WHY
As a wizard, my favorite thing about the flaming sphere is that its one of the few spells that has bias AOE, so you don't have to worry about it setting your party on fire unless you use grease or something.
And I'm sure the evocation wizards are laughing at me.
Evo School for Life
Wow, great video - subscribed! Very succinct, clear and persuasive, identifying powerful spells and how to use them. I was aware of some of them - e.g. Longstrider and I always start the big battle at the end of Chapter 2 (entering Ketheric's castle) with Hunger of Hadar. But there are lots I was sleeping on. Thank you!
I often hear about hunger of hadar being the best lock spell in the game, so it's not underrated at all. The guardian of faith/globe of invulnerability combo is really surprising though!
Fun fact, Hunger of Hadar synergizes with ice or grease, and I'm like 75% sure it works with Evard'd Black Tentacles. It doesn't synergize with other gassy effects like Cloudkill, though; that would be way OP.
Telekenisis is one of my fav spells.
It is a good delivery system of enemy casters to my barbarian.
They nowhere are have enough strength to resist.
( usually i would toss them off cliffs or throw heavy objects at them but that deprives my barbarian of the satisfaction)
And after you kill with the barbarian, just throw the body at someone else, to get them prone.
It makes me so happy when a githyanki misty steps in front of me just so I can express ship them back to my frontliners
it makes me smile when I yeet the boss off the edge with telekenisis
For some of these spells, I HIGHLY recommend picking up the spellcrux amulet from the Warden in moonrise- one free replenished spell slot of ANY level
I feel like the reasoning behind a lot of these could easily just be damage. If i'm using my action for a utility spell then I'm not doing damage, therefore they get largely ignored because damage wins fights. Telekinesis is an outlier but I don't like using it because I lose any loot from enemies killed this way.
just use it on non-boss enemies. Let's be honest, what are you going to lose? A letter from their mum, a crossbow and 3 gold?
@@Twitxx But i want to deliver the letter back to their mum then give her the corpse then make her a corpse.
Lemme give another good example. If this was ur 1st crpg games in many years, one thing that differs it from other game is, u have to manage a party of hero. Ur single player experience isn't really single player.
What's great about this is u hv many hero to manage, not like Skyrim which only controls 1 hero, so then u hv to min-max: whose the dmg dealer? Who's the "amplifier" (the ones who didnt do dmg at all, but making it possible for ur ally to deal more dmg cz of ur spell), etc.
There u hv it.
You don't have to kill them, you can just yeet them away and you'll be free from this enemy for one or two turns.
Plus you can recast it without using a slot
If you're only thinking in terms of damage, your game must be rather boring
Also Tasha's hideous laughter is a preemptive healing spell and can set up a rogue for a sneak attack. Minor illusion is a setup for more damage with the next cast. So your action does do damage just not immediately.
Strangely, I've tried using minor illusion several times in my playthrough and I've never seen enemies walk towards it like in this video. At most they just turn to look at it
@10:45 That is when you realize the true brilliance and fun of this game. "Get back in there, b*tch!" Hahaha
Getting hit with HoH: 😮😡
Hitting others with HoH: 🤣🥰
I feel like dnd players and video game exploiters have combined forces and just caused every dm to cry
It's perfectly feasible and perhaps even more enjoyable to complete the game without using ridiculously overpowered exploits.
Just aa I found tabletop D&D was more fun with "self compromised" charcters and a sympathetic Dungeon Master who encouraged role playing compared to a rule playing Dice Master where you'd feel compelled to maximise every statistical advantage you could in order for a character just to survive.
I use hunger of hadar and globe of invulnerability a lot. I used to cast flaming sphere and Tasha's hideous laughter a lot when I was low level, but ended up replacing these spells with hold person/hold monster/dominate person and conjure elemental (sooo good...). I did not knew blindness don't require concentration. I will start to use it because of that.
Really surprised there aren't more comments about Globe of Invulnerability. This in combination with Black Hole, especially if the caster has it as a bonus action, wins every fight in the game. The Gortash fight with ~12 defenders at level 11 was easily done with the only risk being the mines knocking the characters around, but they actually made the fight easier by blackholing everything into the mines as well. It's the game's easy mode.
True. Didn't even have to fight the first phase of the elder brain fight - didn't touch neither dragon, nor illitids. Just teleported the whole party to the brain, put over them a globe of invulnerability and allowed Emperor to safely cast his spell for 1 turn. They managed to stun him once through the globe, yeah, but I had more than 1 with me xD
I had a Globe of Invulnerability Scroll during the fight where you have to defend the portal Halsin makes into the Shadowfell. Made the entire fight a cake walk since the portal was immune to all damage. XD
Love the transitional dialogue. Good job
I used Tasha's Hideous Laughter on a certain hp 666 boss towards the end of the game that completely took them out of the fight so I could clear out all of the chaff. Seconded this recommendation, would use again.
I dig ur style of presentation, editing, music and Humor
Im surprised Darkness isn't on here. You can even use it with arrows and put it on your own guys to make them immune from being targeted by any ranged attacks. This was the #1 way I tipped the scales on defending Halsin's Portal. I just put Darkness on it. You can step out of darkness to attack and step back into it.
_Fog Cloud_ is better for this purpose.
It is a lower level spell, blocks vision, isn't circumvented by Eldritch Sight, and is easier to get on a character.
For Halsin I just had wyll and gale using hunger of hadar and other aoe spells while shadowheart held down the fort with guardian of faith. Especially since I had somehow made shadowheart into a tank with 21 ac, my new fav thing is to have her sprint towards enemies with guardian of faith and then run back to protect the casters and my very squishy bard.
i wanna mention that before you get magic items that increase ur save dc some of these spells are harder to get off, especially for spells like hideous laughter and blindness that reroll every turn
i dunno how anyone could not know hunger of hadar after playing thru moonrise assault
enemy cast hunger of hadar on me is pain in the ass, I can't move and if I jump, I lose action, this is op
Another advantage to flaming sphere you didn’t mention is that you can dip weapons in it like you would burning oil, which means your melee party members can hit even harder with the ball around
Yeah but you usually havea torch too
We used Tasha's hideous laughter in our dnd group for the very first boss fight and it made sure one of the 4 vampire bosses was down for 80% of the fight. Even when I used a fireball + wine barrel to light her up and we killed the rest of her vampire family, she was just literally rolling on the floor laughing her ass off.
Great video! This video is very complete, i might show it to my newb friends who just started now playing, when you don't know certain things they just blow your mind😂
hunger of Hadar + Rock wall = win
Isn't them both concentrarion spells?
@@Vinicius-xm3cycast them on different characters
Evards Black tentacles which prevents movement + hunger of Hadar 👍
To make it even more fun cast crown of madness on the stronger victim. Watch him turn on his allies in the trapped mire. 😅
Could probably use confusion at that point
Aid is actually even more OP than that! The healing effect can also revive downed allies. So it acts as an AOE revive for your team.
also the buff can stack with temporary hit points and increase the amount healed during short rests
Hunger of hadar + Druid thorny floor thing helped me clear entire rooms of enemies. Act 2 was surprisingly easy with just these two spells
Love the Lose Yourself inspired wording at the end of the video. Well done. Made me laugh a couple of times and learned stuff. You Rock.
Every time I watch one of these videos it's 10 different spells 🤣
It's awesome that each player has found the way to make each spell work for them
Another cool thing about spells such as Longstrider and Aid is that you can still utilize them even if you don't want to use casters in your party. After every long rest, you can simply swap someone, such as Gale, in for a moment then you can have him cast Longstrider on everyone at camp before swapping him out. Since it is not a concentration spell, its effects will remain. This works with other spells too such as Aid, Mage Armor or any other buff that can target others and is not a concentration spell. This does not work with concentration spells because the character will immediately stop concentrating as soon as they are dismissed to camp.
Addition Aid can also be used to heal undead summons that not other spell can making spore druid and necromancer builds much easier to deal with.
Great tips and funny commentary! Thank you.
me and my group of sadistic nutjobs abuse the crap out of Hunger of Hadar, Wall of Fire, and Spike Growth to create a pit of horrible death. stay in it, take massive damage from HoH and WoF. try to move, take immense damage from SG, get nowhere, then get railed by HoH and WoF. is it a bit of overkill to blow those spell slots? maybe. is it entertaining as fuck? oooooooh yes it is.
Bro, even though I’ve beat the game, HUGE thank you for blurring out spoilers in this video. So many people make guides but don’t care about spoiling things for the people watching. You’re insanely awesome for doing that dude!
While not strictly a spell, Frenzy on a barbarian allows them to pick up small enemies (Goblins, Drauger etc.) and either just throw them off a cliff or club another enemy to death using them. It's both hilarious and brutally efficient at clearing out hordes.
Achievement unlocked for using a goblin (usually) to kill another creature while simultaneously killing the wielded goblin.
I didnt even know about Hunger of Hadar until I got wiped in the first Moonrise Towers fight multiple times in a row...I hate that spell sooooo much. It is amazing. Definitely the most underrated spell in the game. Solid video mate
Telekenis destroys loot? If it does That is a crime.
Best use is probably to free your caster from attackers.
Who in his right mind would sacrifice the loot in a RPG?
Globe of Invulnerabilty came in so clutch in my last playthrough. Helped me tank Raphael and his gaggle of goons in the House of Hope and helped me in the last fight to open up the portal to the Netherbrain. Really useful spell, also really good to have scrolls of.
Sanctuary is the goat too, ngl.
Great list! I use a few of these spells, but most I never knew! Thanks so much.
I LOVE the telekinesis spell. The amount of times I’ve had Gale throw enemies into melee range for my character (who was a bit challenged in the movement speed department lol) or just off a cliff was incredible. I do wish that at higher slots you could target more people but I understand that would be ridiculously powerful
great video, glad to know about minor illusion especially!
In Act 2, rescuing the tieflings in Moonlight Towers dungeon, Minor Illusion was key for me because you can bait the warden out if her office then have Gale cast Arcane Lock on the door. Even if the tieflings are seen escaping, the guards wont turn hostile until they get in the office and open the cells. So cast Arcane Lock 2-3 times, then quickly teleport out to the boat before they start combat
I’m so glad I saw this because I never ever ever remember that long strider is a ritual spell! Putting long strider plus twin casting haste to the whole party is so broken.
Thank you great video! I really appreciate how brief and to the point it is! 👏
As a Warlock, seeing Hunger of Hadar at number one brings a tear to my eye 🥹. My favorite spell in the game by far. Great tip for Hunger of Hadar, use repelling eldritch blast to launch fools back into the aoe when they walk out. It's so satisfying.
Hunger of Hadar is underrated. Used it + any spell that put ice on the ground + Spike Grove = absolute crowd control in the best way. When they weren't taking consistent damage from walking through the spikes they were taking damage from standing in Hadar and being knocked prone by the ice to keep them within it. XD Lots of fun, honestly.