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Archives of Nethys

Pathfinder RPG (2nd Edition) Pathfinder RPG (1st Edition) Starfinder RPG

Rules Index | GM Screen
Mastering the Wild / Spells of the Wild

Low-Level Play (Levels 1–6)

Source Ultimate Wilderness pg. 156
Many wilderness-appropriate spells are available as early as 1st level. These low-level spells are often disregarded, as many of them can be substituted with class abilities, equipment, and skills. Still, low-level spells (those of 3rd level and lower) can remain useful at high levels, especially because highlevel characters can cast them far more frequently.

Conjuration

Source Ultimate Wilderness pg. 156
The benefit of many low-level conjuration spells is that they grant a wider range of versatility, letting the characters focus the spending of their hard-earned gold on items with effects that can’t be replicated, rather than on mundane equipment.

Create Food and Water: As a 3rd-level cleric spell, create food and water is one of the most obvious choices for those looking to bypass some of the rigors of wilderness survival. The Survival skill often eclipses the worth of this spell, as succeeding at a simple DC 10 check allows for a character to provide food and water for herself without needing to expend a 3rd-level spell slot. At 5th level, it’s not unlikely that a party member can regularly succeed at the DC 16 Survival check required to feed himself and three other party members. Imposing heavy penalties on Survival checks to get along in the wild is one way of making create food and water more valuable, and such adjustments are entirely appropriate in wasteland environments.

There are several other ways to prolong the usefulness of create food and water. Armed with knowledge that the party will be entering a particularly inhospitable region, characters might want to stock up on conjured food and water. Repeated castings of create food and water can provide numerous meals, and by spending a few days, a party can create a stockpile of rations for a trip. Combined with the fact that purify food and water can be cast an unlimited number of times per day, stockpiling food and drink with these castings is an economically savvy way of saving both gold and hunting time.

Mount and Phantom Steed: Few wilderness areas are entirely amenable to or completely inhospitable to mounts. Open groves and wildlife paths where mounts can roam free crisscross dense forests, while deserts often contain escarpments of jagged rocks that confound the most sure footed of creatures. The mutable nature of these wilderness regions makes the ability to summon a temporary mount particularly helpful. For routine journeys, mount can conjure a single mount for a character or be repeatedly cast to provide mounts for a whole party. Higher-level spellcasters benefit more from phantom steed, especially at 8th level, when the steed starts gaining extra movement-related abilities.

Neutralize Poison: First accessible by low-level druids, neutralize poison is useful as both a method of healing poison and a means to prevent poisoning from occurring in the first place. Using the spell as a means of detoxifying a creature is its most efficient application, since one casting of the spell prevents that creature from poisoning targets at all. It’s also possible to use this spell to remove a poison applied to an object or from food or drink. The use of neutralize poison in this manner doesn’t guarantee success, and it can be interesting to keep the DC of the targeted poison unknown, leaving the efficacy of a given casting in question.

At a cost of 11,250 gp, a wand of neutralize poison makes for a practical, if unusual, weapon. When added into the arsenal of mobile melee classes, specifically those with ranks in Use Magic Device or supplementary spellcaster levels, such wands can be used to disable the poisons of wilderness-dwelling creatures. The forfeiture of an attack in order to strike a foe with a poison-neutralizing wand could mean the difference between life and death for a character who is facing repeated applications of poison.

Divination

Source Ultimate Wilderness pg. 157
There are only a few low-level divination spells specifically related to wilderness environments. Characters often ignore these spells, and instead they rely on class abilities or skills to replicate their effects. Introducing NPCs with access to these spells can highlight their utility to PCs who might otherwise see these spells as extraneous.

Detect Animals or Plants: This spell has a much larger range than detect evil, beginning with a minimum area of a 440-foot cone. This spell also requires thinking of a specific kind of animal or plant, making it very specialized in its application. Further, it grants the caster the ability to see the current condition of a target, rather than just a sense of the creature’s total power. A handy application of this spell is to monitor the health of allies, such as animal companions or plant creatures such as ghorans and vine leshys.

Detect Snares and Pits: As a concentration effect, this spell is more useful in low-stress situations. It cuts down on some of the monotony of having PCs attempt repeated Perception checks, but the spell’s specific detection parameters mean that some skill checks are still required.

Enchantment

Source Ultimate Wilderness pg. 157
Low-level enchantment spells that are appropriate for wilderness campaigns most often focus on the manipulation of animal minds. Keep in mind that animals are often simple creatures, with simple thoughts driving their actions—drinking, eating, and sleeping being at the forefront of an animal’s mind. Due to having average or lower Wisdom scores, certain kinds of animals can be especially prone to being affected by these spells.

Animal Messenger: This spell compels a Tiny animal to venture to a designated area, likely with an item in tow. The longer casting time of the spell makes it useless in combat situations but incredibly helpful in other situations. Delivery of an item via animal messenger isn’t guaranteed, as the animal could be waylaid by other creatures or potentially find itself unable to follow directions to the intended area. As with most spells, it’s important to understand that a PC shouldn’t be penalized for the casting of such magic. If you, as the GM, decide to have an animal messenger fail to reach its intended destination, consider rewarding the PCs in another way. For example, the animal messenger might have been consumed by a local predator, and by finding the slain messenger, the PCs uncover the predator’s stash of claimed trophies.

Calm Animals, Charm Animal, and Dominate Animal: Spells that can adjust the attitudes of animals have obvious uses as deterrents when traversing through wilderness environments. Simply calming or charming animals is often sufficient to travel through an area without harassment, while more powerful spells such as dominate animal can be used to deal with more dangerous or more immediate threats. Another insidious use of this magic is to subvert the loyal animal companions of foes. The ability to charm or dominate an animal companion of an opponent can significantly reduce the challenge of an encounter, while simultaneously presenting that foe the moral quandary of how to handle its wayward companion.

Transmutation

Source Ultimate Wilderness pg. 158
The wilderness is a place of constant change, so it’s no surprise that most wilderness-appropriate spells come from the transmutation school of magic. These spells not only mutate the caster and her immediate surroundings but also are highly sought-after ways to control plant life. As plants are universally immune to mind-affecting effects, it falls to transmutation spells to grant a modicum of control over these creatures, providing an analogue to spells commonly found in the enchantment school.

Diminish Plants: This spell controls the vegetation in a specific area. The prune growth option for this spell is an effective counter to spells such as entangle and wall of thorns, granting the caster some combat control in addition to straightforward utility. Using this spell also allows for the creation of open areas more amenable to mounts or other big creatures. The secondary use of diminish plants, the stunt growth option, is most effective as a narrative tool. Spiteful PCs seeking to punish an enemy druid might decide to use this effect on the druid’s preferred territory. Conversely, an enemy druid might wrack the PCs’ homeland with several castings of this spell, potentially leading to starvation in the face of reduced crop yields. PCs who have left their homeland for a prolonged period of time might be drawn back after hearing word that a magically induced famine has taken hold, only to find that the cause was a previous foe from the campaign!

Meld into Stone and Tree Shape: Hiding in blocks of stone or taking the form of a shrub allows for both intrigue and tense moments of avoiding a threat. PCs and NPCs can use these spells to perform highly effective spying on their enemies, with very few effects or spells being able to reveal the presence of a melded or shaped creature. True seeing or a similar effect could spell disaster for a stone-melded creature, and the destruction of the melded stone has immediate—not to mention mortal—repercussions. Be sure to reward the creative use of these spells when used by the PCs, but also make them aware of the dangers of using them, should the PCs come to rely on these spells as a guaranteed means for avoiding detection and spying on foes.

Pass without Trace: This basic 1st-level spell can defeat even the most dedicated of trackers. Pass without trace prevents being tracked by a Survival check or any other nonmagical means. Only spells such as locate creature are suitable for tracking creatures that have obfuscated themselves with pass without trace, and such spells aren’t readily accessible until later levels. Due to the difficulty in countering this spell at lower levels, the best point to take advantage of pass without trace is in the 4th- to 6th-level range, when the spell can affect all members of the average party and rangers gain access to the spell. At levels above that, the foes can use magical countermeasures to overcome pass without trace.

Plant Growth and Spike Growth: Control of the battlefield is essential when fighting in a wilderness environment. As many such environments lack manufactured cover and traps, it falls to magic to create such hazards. Plant growth can drastically cut down on targets’ maneuverability on a battlefield, allowing spellcasters to target enemies from afar, or even enhancing the effectiveness of spells such as entangle. Similarly, spike growth creates areas of damaging terrain that are difficult to bypass without some means of flight or levitation. In wilderness-heavy campaigns, these spells can be on par with other control-based magic, while in campaigns with only a smattering of wilderness, these spells operate best when taken in the form of one or more backup scrolls.

Quench: Often forgotten due to its specialized nature, quench can swiftly extinguish fire-based creatures, effects, and spells. The typical use of the spell is to put out nonmagical fires in its considerable area of effect (a minimum of 5 20-foot cubes at minimum caster level). A more potent use of the spell is to act as a dispelling effect on fire-based spells in its area. This allows the spell to be reserved and used to counter potent spells such as fireball or wall of fire, though only if a character expects such spells to be used. Using the spell on magic items that create or control flame can change the combat dynamic, especially if the effect is considerable (such as disabling the flaming burst ability from an enemy’s weapon). Creatures with the fire subtype are particularly vulnerable to quench, taking anywhere from 5d6 to 10d6 points of damage without any sort of save—a wand of quench is a potent weapon against such foes.

Stone Shape and Wood Shape: Building a bridge, creating a door, or manufacturing a barricade are all immediate uses for shaping magic such as stone shape and wood shape. The wording of these spells is very open to interpretation, granting a lot of leeway in adjudicating their effects. Unexpected barriers can change the dynamic of combat or wilderness exploration, so be sure to have a basic understanding of the consequences of using these spells in areas primarily made of stone or wood. Just as PCs can use these spells to upturn encounters, their adversaries can use these spells to surprise them in dynamic ways. The PCs might explore a chamber with one entrance only to be ambushed from a stone-shaped wall during their inspection of the area, or an NPC villain might allow half the party to go through an exit door before cutting it off with a well-timed casting of wood shape.

Water Breathing and Water Walk: Both of these spells accomplish different things, but they are similar in that they overcome an incredibly common wilderness impediment: water. Watery barriers can include a lake in the middle of a forest, rivers running between mountains, a series of flooded chambers in a cavern, treacherous swamps, and underground oceans. Water breathing can be split among numerous creatures effectively, allowing for long or quick treks underwater. Similar magic, such as aboleth’s lung or air bubble, can function in similar roles to water breathing at a lower spell level, albeit at reduced efficiency. Player characters often come to rely on these spells to traverse difficult environments, sometimes believing in a simple “cast and forget” mantra. Be sure to occasionally remind the PCs of their reliance on these spells, such as directing a casting of dispel magic in their direction. It’s best to give this kind of reminder in a situation where it’s possible to recover so that the potential for a more disastrous situation can loom large in the mind. Dispelling water breathing when the PCs are deep underwater and have no way to escape and no more ways to cast the spell can mean certain death, so you shouldn’t spring this tactic on players often—if ever!

Whispering Wind: While sending requires 10 minutes to cast, whispering wind takes only a standard action. Use of this spell doesn’t guarantee a successful transmission though, as it requires the caster to be knowledgeable of a specific location within range, but even then, there’s no guarantee that the intended recipient is at the designated location. It’s also entirely possible that if the PCs find themselves camping at an easily identifiable landmark, they might become the unintended recipients of a whispering wind message. Mistakenly receiving a message in this manner could spark a new adventure or entire campaign, especially when you consider that whispering wind often revolves around the need to get a message out in a quick and urgent manner.