1st Level Spell #41: Guiding Bolt (5E)

[@ChancesSpellbook]

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[@alesanetzley9900]

Also used by circle of stars Druid

[@samwalley]

Currently player a level 2 Cleric. used guiding bolt with 5 minute of playing the game. Very OP

[@Blossoming_Fate]

Decent damage, Nice bonus effect, awesome range, only 1st level... This seems a little strong....

[@ChancesSpellbook]

It's honestly sooo much fun to use haha!

[@ermacmacro7136]

Ok so I did more research. Here's my now Revised and quite frankly more Fleshed Out Guiding Bolt Build. Start with a Tiefling Wizard, putting your 15 into Charisma to bring that up to an immediate 17. Bring those levels of Evocation Wizards to 14, you get your Overchannel Ability. I would recommend actually using your first 2 ASIs to cap your Charisma. Then focus on Intelligence for the rest. Then take 3 Levels of Divine Soul Sorcerer. You get your Divine Favor feature, which lets you add 2d4 to an attack roll or a Saving Throw if you miss or fail respectively. For you Metamagics, grab Subtle and Distant Spell: giving a surprise moment when you dish out Guiding Bolt from 240 feet away (which we'll get in a moment) For your spells, grab some simple ones that you didn't think you needed as a Wizard. Just don't grab Mage Armor yet (We'll get that too in a moment) For your Last 3 Levels, sink those into a Celestial Warlock, which gives you the option to take Cure Wounds and Guiding Bolt as Warlock Spells. Take those immediately. For your Invocations: Grab Armor Of Shadows and Agonizing Blast. For your Pact Boon, I want to say use Pact Of The Tome. You gain access to any Cantrip from any spell list, which gives you more versatility as a caster. So now you can Cast Guiding Bolt with your Wizard Spell Slots, which (I might be wrong here so I don't know) means you can Overchannel it. So now in one turn, you're blasting 48(+5?) Radiant Damage that can go to 240 Feet if you want it to. Along with that, you make yourself a dang good healer to not just yourself but your party. You can Cure Wounds with a 5th Level Slot, potentially bringing a friend back to full up from 30 feet away with Distant Spell. Or you can use the Celestial Healing Dice ability to heal that way, then Overchannel a Cure Wounds onto yourself to heal yourself. Assuming you have a +2 to your Constitution, you still only have an average HP of barely over 100. That can go away quick, especially if you start getting crazy with your Overchannels. But you can heal yourself with Wizard Slots, burn the Warlock Slots to replenish your Metamagics and then keep going to be a support caster that can nuke with Fireballs.

[@ChancesSpellbook]

Awesome stuff! I can see you really did a deep dive since last time!

[@jessesoares8100]

this spell is amazing recently in the campaign I used i'm a cleric lvl 2 (tempest domain) and i cast this on the boss with Channel Divinity and dealt maximum damage, so the warrior just needed an attack to finish

[@ChancesSpellbook]

AWESOME!! Great job!

[@AlbertaGeek]

Both you and your DM are using it incorrectly. The tempest cleric's channel divinity destructive wrath that grants maximum damage only applies to thunder and lighting damage. Guiding bolt is radiant damage. In short, using RAW, you *_cannot_* maximize the damage of Guiding bolt.

[@ajaafive1384]

Battlemaster fighter + magic initiate + ranged weapon Cast guiding bolt (120ft), next atk has adv. Action surge Fire bow(adv) with the distracting strike maneuver (adds dmg and returns adv for party, laughs in rouge) Combine with sharpshooter to deadly effect once a day.

[@AlbertaGeek]

Assuming the Guiding bolt hits in the first place. It's not an auto-hit like, say, magic missile, and it relies on WIS to hit, which if you're a fighter, will not be nearly as pumped as DEX. But props for the _distracting strike_ idea. The two turns of advantage for the rest of the party if brilliant! And available at a mere level two if one is a variant human.

[@chaoscommentary2179]

This and inflict wounds are my favorite damage spells for the cleric and I just realized I’ve been calling it the wrong name this whole time. I called it guided bolt not guiding bolt

[@ChancesSpellbook]

Haha it's one of the best 1st level spells in the game!

[@Janshevik]

guided bolt would be magic missile, since it has homing properties to the target and never misses

[@pennylowes6389]

If you have a ranger on your team definitely cast this spell because if they're at the range that causes disadvantage remember advantage cancels out disadvantage. And if they are close enough there's a pretty good chance that they will hit

[@ChancesSpellbook]

Good point, this is great for lending a hand! I really appreciate you taking the time to comment! Feel free to use the Discount Code 'COMMENT', and get a free One Shot at chancesguild.com/collections/job-board!

[@fossil754]

Nothing too fancy but guiding bolt+war domain bonus action attack with GWM deals tons of damage per round and is available at lvl 1 with variant human.

[@ermacmacro7136]

14 Levels Of Evocation Wizard, 6 Levels of Divine Soul Sorcerer. Go with Quickened and Twinned Spells for your Metamagics. Now you're hammering 2 creatures with 48 Radiant Damage as a bonus action, and if those things are still alive afterwards then they both are marked with Advantage for the next attack.

[@ChancesSpellbook]

That is one heck of a disgusting use of Twinned Spell haha!

[@marcosguzman7858]

What level are they? He just Shoot Dragon... Oh well, Roll for Initiative!

[@ChancesSpellbook]

Ah yes! The classic blunder!