ULTIMATE POWER - BG3 Spells Tier List - Level 6

Let's talk about the general principles you can use to build strong characters. Want to never need a build guide again? This is the video for you!
Hang on. I may not have thought this plan through.
Today we're talking about the most powerful spells in Baldur's gate, the pinnacle of your caster's adventuring career: level 6, where the rules of physics break down entirely! How much power can we wring from the strongest spells in the game?
BG3 Wiki complete stats for all level 6 spells: bg3.wiki/wiki/List_of_6th_lev...
0:00 Intro and Corrections
5:40 Arcane Gate
9:02 Blade Barrier
11:48 Chain Lightning
16:28 Circle of Death
19:32 Create Undead
23:01 Disintegrate
25:25 Eyebite
30:35 Flesh to Stone
31:40 Globe of Invulnerability
36:00 Harm
36:55 Heal
38:46 Heroes' Feast
43:39 Otiluke's Freezing Sphere
47:04 Otto's Irresistible Dance
51:05 Planar Ally
55:04 Sunbeam
57:15 Wall of Ice
1:01:35 Wall of Thorns
1:04:31 Wind Walk
1:05:46 Sights of the Seelie - Summon Deva
1:06:49 Final List and Summary

[@alliu6562]

Otto’s irresistible dance is clearly S tier bc it instantly makes any boss encounter 20x funnier

[@Cephalopocalypse]

very true!

[@wrath-2187]

Every time i cast irresistable dance, like when i fought raphael, i cast it twice and he never danced to his own song and it genuinely dissappointed me

[@AliceObscura]

Especially if you use perform the next turn for the LOLs 😂 dance puppets, dance! 🩰

[@TheRealCHIMShady]

This spell made sarevok go from a menace to a joke on my first playthrough

[@ellowell8160]

An upcasted spell tierlist would be sick!

[@nuclearbirds]

Aid becomes S++++ tier

[@Obileo346]

Agreed.

[@tobiaskoran6787]

We all know that if true strike could be upcast 6th level true strike would be an instant win button

[@Fawstah]

I’d like it too, but then he’d be reviewing basically all spells at every level, which seems like a lot for one video, maybe if he broke it down level 2 upcast video, level 3 upcast video, but by level 6 he’d be reviewing all the spells again, so idk.

[@20dieux]

@@Fawstah A lot of spells don't have benefits when upcasted though.

[@Roonayy]

I think an important thing to consider is the spellcrux amulet. It lets you restore a single spell slot of any level, so you could have an entire additional level 6 spell slot. That means you could summon before a fight, restore the slot and still go into an encounter with a level 6 spell slot for your globe of invulnerability or whatever you might need, or you could even use both to summon from 2 different spells if that's the kind of playstyle you got. The same goes for other spell levels, but for level 6 it's way more important since a character only gets one per long rest.

[@ShannonFrailey]

With arcane battery from staff of spell power and the amulet you get 3. So lvl 6 aid + feast + summon or feast + summon + invulnerability are my favorite.

[@bachstrad1994]

What about scrolls? So many level 6 spell scrolls in act 3.

[@Nirob615]

@@ShannonFrailey Markoheshkir also has the arcane battery as well and you can swap to it to get a second arcane battery. Make sure you keep a secondary amulet on hand though because spellcrux is literally useless after it's ability is used up.

[@conscioushealthconnections5877]

@@Nirob615 Dual-wield feat so you can use Markoheshkir and Staff of Spell Power at the same time ;). When sorcerers were able to twin spell Chain Lightning, dual wielding these staff enabled 4 chain lightning casts in a turn. Twas glorious.

[@jguitar151]

Spellcrux amulet is OP. My shadow heart summons planar ally then I do all my other summons, then spellcrux, then heroes feast the whole squad. It’s like having two teams.

[@Zashtheman]

Chain lightning is easily still S-tier. Its still capable of absolutely demolishing everything in sight with simple item/effect combinations. Twinned spell was just making it hilariously over the top broken.

[@whisperingcrown591]

My sorcerer playthrough was so easy once I got it. Especially since I was dual wielding the 2 staves that allow a free cast of a spell. I used the amulet from the house of hope to give advantage on constitution saves, cast haste on myself and cast create water as a hastened spell. Next turn I could cast 3 chain lightnings and it was hilariously overkill

[@kevinschmidt8101]

You can actually still twinspell it

[@johnwallace5284]

Not really it is a 6th level spell slot and is only worth casting if you can hit 3 or more enemies against 1 or 2 enemies it is a waste of a cast considering you will have fighters and paladins who will be hitting for 150- 200 damage per turn by then.

[@ZanderKreegan]

@@kevinschmidt8101 sort of. You can twincast the version from Markoheshkir, but can’t twincast one cast from spell slots. Still, being able to twin it 1/short rest is very powerful

[@markbeatty368]

Never used eyebite. Feared vs frightened confusion. Gonna try it next time around. Thanks for the content

[@Cephalopocalypse]

One of the most fun spells in the game imo

[@ryanmccarty8961]

BG3 is my first real taste of DND, and I can’t tell you how valuable your videos have been for me! I’ve watched each tier list you’ve made and feel much more confident with my decisions now. Thank you so much for all the effort, thought, and time you put into these!

[@Feersumdjinn]

Personally I'd really love to see more of you playing the game, executing strategies etc. (Essentially more of your honour mode run!) Thanks for all the excellent content though, keep up the good work!

[@Cephalopocalypse]

Thanks so much for the support! I'd love to do more gameplay videos - that honour mode run save is still waiting for me to come back to it, I just have to grind through all the quests in the grove to get to the next real fight :P

[@Feersumdjinn]

@@Cephalopocalypse Totally understand, you need to prioritise spending time on stuff that grows the channel as well. I'll be waiting patiently for gameplay content when you find the time :)

[@platypus547]

One benefit of a spell like heroes feast not discussed is that it really doesn’t take your one spell slot a day with items. A good use of the spell slot restoration amulet is to cast heroes feast, restore the slot then put on a more useful amulet. This can all be done out of combat and is probably one of the best uses for the amulet charge.

[@Revan619]

you can use a cleric from withers in camp to cast it on the whole party for free

[@exantiuse497]

Globe of invulnerability is a horrendously overpowered effect that completely trivialises most hard bosses in the game. The enemy AI is completely incapable of playing around it, they will spend their damage spells and attacks on invulnerable characters, do not try to displace your characters from the globe and do not intentionally use your globe. And the messed up thing? Larian completely changed the spell from the tabletop. In TT it makes you immune to all SPELLS level 5 and lower, i.e. you won't suffer any effects from them instead of just being immune to the damage, but higher level spells and attacks still go through. Why did Larian change a spell so drastically, but not make sure the enemies attampt to play around it? I love abusing the globe but to be fair it shouldn't exist in the game. "I win" button isn't good game design

[@GAMER32231]

I’m still gonna use it when I hit level 12 tho

[@mxmadifae]

Yes to all the future vids! The whole series has been fun and looking forward to more to come!

[@XxThe_ExiledxX]

I'm looking forward to a very cool bard build one day. Seeing how you are the only person who is regularly putting out updated videos after the latest patches. Plus I've use some of them and they all work great

[@astrayecho]

I feel like you vastly undervalued Sunbeam, especially in terms of it's usefulness in a radiating orb build. In that setup, you not only get a repeatable spell with dmg and possible blindness, but you're also essentially making a bunch of enemies miss future attacks, which pretty reliably means you can win an encounter based off of just that spell and then a bit of mop up dmg. Maybe not S tier but certainly A tier for me.

[@kingofgrim4761]

Very true. Sunbeam radiating orb is the only reason I beat house of grief

[@princealibaba]

“The jokes write themselves” you get a like for that one 😂

[@TheJinnobi]

I think factoring in 1) the Mummy can be cast via a Crypt Lord ring, 2) the Mummy can be cast for "free" using a charge of Staff of Cherished Necromancy, 3) the curse that it can apply with its autoattack disables enemies from healing (and gaining temp HP IIRC), and 4) the fear effect it has may be about a 50% chance to work, but it has no cooldown or resource cost... well, it's better in practice than on paper. Especially in Hardcore where every advantage is a good thing, and enemies are significantly more likely to have odd spells or effects that heal or manipulate HP totals.

[@sawyerhackett1509]

Appreciate that you included how these lists are supposed to help you have fun not over analyze the game 😅

[@doggoTB]

I think black tentacles is actually pretty important because spells don't overwrite it. Coming into bg3 from dnd I had ideas about microwave strategies where you lock down enemies and then let aoe dmg cook them. In bg3 black tentacles is really the best / only way to do this. It's very effect in certain fights with choke points where you drop black tentacles plus wall of fire or cloudkill or hunger of Hadar. Add in the black hole power and it's very strong. I wouldn't cast black tentacles at lvl 6 but upcast wall of fire and roast those enemies as they get stuck. It's a fun option if you want to microwave enemies.

[@pancakes4193]

Hell yeeeee, here we go. Been so sat for this entire series the past weeks.

[@Cephalopocalypse]

Glad you're enjoying them! :D

[@Baseballman1224]

I really enjoyed the series! You are well spoken and i appreciate your various incites into all the spells

[@Cephalopocalypse]

Thanks very much!

[@eraserdusting1840]

Im so excited to use Wall Of Ice this patch combined with the Encrusted With Frost and Chilled gear set items! Being stuck with mid spells really sucked before.

[@kunalsingh4418]

Yeah I was looking this video up for the same. Kinda disappointed by freezing sphere but wall of ice blew the disappointment away lol. My Ice wizard Tav will finally have his own nuke!

[@Graysett]

Looking forward to the inevitable Class Actions tier list. Rage, Wildshape, Action Surge, Channel Divinity, Sorcery points, etc.

[@Kailokel]

The future videos you mentioned sounds super interesting, including illithid powers. I'd also enjoy seeing some video that include gameplay. I don't have a great suggestion for the subject of those videos, and I know you have some let's play videos available. It would be nice to see some of your suggestions in action as you intended, though.

[@brendonfernandez]

Thanks for this series! Coming to BG3 from tabletop, a lot of the spells don’t work the way I expected. So detailed explanations of how they work in game is super useful! Would love a discussion of spell or ability combos. eg. You mentioned stacking Wall of Fire over spells that restrain enemies - any more combos like that? Thanks again!

[@robertbuchanan7609]

If you swap gear at the right times you can get 3 bonus 6 lvl spells. The 2 staffs with spell battery and the spell crux amulet.

[@Cephalopocalypse]

Yep! That just goes to show how valuable a resource they are though - it's worth going way out of our way to get more!

[@seeinred]

The best use for Level 6 spell slot is to upcast magic missile, while wearing gloves of reverberation (triggers on radiant, thunder, lightning damage), boots of reverb (triggers on applying status effects), callous glow ring (adds 2 radiant damage to each missile so long as there's light), ring of radiant orb (applies radiant orb on each status effect, ergo from every missile/reverb), while dual-wielding markoheshkir and Staff of Spellpower, as well as cloak and hat of the weave. Not robes tho, because style over substance. And that's how i've got my honour mode run, kids.

[@farrex0]

You forgot the amulet that gives you an extra missile per cast, essentially making it a 7th level magic missile.

[@seeinred]

@@farrex0 Oh i didn't, really. It's just that in Act3 i swapped it for 23 CON necklace. Also the necklace that restors 1-3 slot per long rest and better one that restores 1-6 slot per long rest. Those were very useful.

[@elion4245]

Yep, gonna try magic missile artillery unit Gale soon. I did everything similar in terms of items, except, still used Spellsparkler in act 3 as dual wield with markoheshkir. So it's literally + charisma modifier + proficiency bonus (from staff if you use it's ability and select fire version) + 2 radiant + reverberation + 1d8 from spellmight (which is completely negated with arcane acuity) to each ray. You can cast 4 rays per turn. And that's exactly how viconia, ansur, cazador and especially orin (felt so bad only casting 2 rays in durge duel) were all over on turn 1. And for someone like Raphael (immune to fire) i took one level of warlock to extend command with ridiculous spell dcs thanks to arcane acuity. I think my record was 50 attack roll with +31 bonus. This thing as my MC destroyed everything on honor mode and if it couldn't destroy something, it would 100% hold monster it for the rest of a party. Gonna give magic missiles builds a try after critical hit eldritch blast sorlock one

[@d.altounian244]

Otto's irresistable dance was what won my the fight against Sarevok. I just find i hilarious that the nightmarish corpse maker of Baldur's Gate was made a corpse himself because he just couldn't stop dancing.

[@ElliottDent]

Maybe a magic weapon/equipment tierlist, maybe split into weapon types or something, to weed out any shiny-looking weapons which might just be traps. Feel like there's so many items in the game that that would give you plenty of lists to make

[@anthonymendenhall1776]

Globe of Invulnerability, if you can use it in your run, makes it easy to save Wyll's dad when defying Mizora. Totally worth it

[@wawho9645]

Thanks for doing all this, it’s been very useful 👍 Sad about not being able to able to twin-spell Chain Lightning though, right in the middle of my honor run 😢 I’m the type that does in with an army of summons, all with upcasted aid and heroes feast, bond ward, 4 stay at home clerics, etc. So pretty much obliterate everything in the first couple of rounds-never saw the need for heal with Shadowheart as Storm Cleric. I mean she’ll cast mass healing word but that’s to buff party with blade ward and bless. Destroy the enemy before I need to heal. That’s my motto.

[@OldManYells]

Would definitely check in for an upcast or illithid tier list!

[@FantastickACE]

Love Glove of Invulnerability. Saved me plenty of times, though watch out for Yurgir (as friend or foe) in House of Hope. That concussive blast almost cost me an honor mode run.

[@Jewgubu]

I think you underrated heal. You talked it up enough and made enough arguments for it that it should be C-tier.

[@galliumgames3962]

Disintegrate is D tier because it’s save or suck (Attack roles are so much better) and I can output significantly more damage per cast/attack with anyone, and my ice wizard + wet condition can get similar damage off ray of frost (Which can twin to average about 100 DMG). Definitely a lot more useful in D&D as it’s diet power word kill that helps make sure what your fighting stays dead, though this is never a concern in BG3.

[@Martdogg3000]

Ah, the ol "infinitely putting yourself into cloud of daggers" trick. I should have known.

[@ItzGenesis]

Remember theres the ammulet that restores 6th level spells + markohekshir (or whatever its name is) that allows 1 free cast of any spell + 1 free cast of chain lightining with the eletric buff. Which could total to 3 casts of chain lightining a day. Thats not counting scrolls ofc. When you consider 3rd act fights with the robots, which are vulnerable to eletric, chain lightining goes crazy

[@ProbeAway]

It gets worse for Harm because it's bugged (or at least, it was prior to patch 6, I don't know if they stealth fixed it). On a successful enemy save it acts normally - half damage, no disease. However, on a failed save there is no actual damage roll. The game just computes a hidden max HP reduction roll in the background and applies it. This is mostly fine if the enemy is at full health, since it has the effect of damaging them for the same amount. However, if they have already lost HP then the effective damage on a failed save is the max HP reduction roll *minus* the damage already lost. This can actually result in zero effective damage. But it gets *even worse*. Since there is no damage roll on a failed save, damage riders and on-cast/hit effects don't work. For example, you can't apply radiating orb to an enemy that fails their save against this spell, despite the fact you can apply it on a successful save. This really sucks because with the staff of cherished necromancy (even though it is now fixed and actually uses up life essence charges) I think Harm could be a solid resource-free, disadvantage-on-saving-throw damage option while concentrating on say, spirit guardians. Unfortunately even that specific use case isn't worthwhile due to the bug. I've reported it to Larian and they have acknowledged it, but no fix yet that I'm aware of. I guess they know it's such an infrequently used spell that no one is really hanging out for it. (Also, your description refers to level 5 spells, not level 6.)

[@RansomMemoryAccess]

A tier list for the 5e Spells mod would be great. Those spells are generally completely unknown to most, so would be helpful with a short guide to the best spells.

[@uncreativeperson8497]

Two things: the freezing sphere can be reverse pickpocketed into peoples inventories where it will explode after its remaining duration, basically acting as a time bomb. This is funny. Also heal has the ability to restore one memory each to shadowheart and the dark urge, which is cool and interesting.

[@MAKAKEVICH]

About the Wind Walk spell - the two time i really had to use it were The Bank Vault in Act III, where there are 5-6 safes hidden behind bars, and getting a friend out of jail peacefully (there also exists a quest to get Florrick out of jail). Certainly not worth the 6th lvl slot, bur if u can replace them freely as wizard - you probably should. The vault itself requires some preparation to raid, a skilled rogue with advantage on sleight of hand, or like, 15 knock spells.

[@bachstrad1994]

Something I always think about with these tier lists is the availability of scrolls. Disintegrate sucks for a level 6 spell slot, but if I've stolen 4 scrolls of Disintegrate from Sorcerous Sundries, it feels pretty good to cast. Same with the freezing sphere.

[@riptidetube123]

This would take absolutely forever... but I kind of want to see these higher level tier list compared to upcasted early level spells lol. Just to get an idea of when you should upcast

[@HereAndThere-o4j]

Flesh to Stone is fun because sharpened snare cuirass causes enemies to have disadvantage on saves against it. With all compsnions and hirelings built as portent wizards and using restore spell slots or the fountain in the house of hope you canturn 23+ npcs into statues per day. In other words you can stop the Elder Brain by simply turning all of the city and rivington into statues.

[@dimKiriyenko]

I once had a pure tempest cleric, who I have Markoheshir and just did a chain lightning each fight. I don't long rest after each battle, but I do short rest after almost each battle (and I tend to always have one song of rest in the party). Having one chain lighting per short rest without even having to be a sorc or wizard is actually so incredible that I feel like I will never use an actual learnable chain lightning. I mean, one chain lightning per battle is enough, given it's not the only thing you do and you have other party members.

[@camilavillanueva1139]

Love this!

[@notCalle]

Strangely enough, it feels like level 5 spell slots are a more scarce resource than the single level 6 slot, because there are so many ways to get one free max level spell slot every day.

[@MMORPGFreaky]

I feel like disintigrate is so good for destroying the enviroment, for example I insta killed all the pillars in raphaels fight with it, and destroyed the huge doors in the iron throne

[@AliceObscura]

I'm a tempest cleric in my playthrough with my friends. I always go Genie (since I'm tempest domain, I love that it has thunderwave which just works thematically with my character) and it has been so clutch in so many encounters, especially as a tank. I also aways bring along a skeleton archer, who shoots and then runs off for a good deal of damage as a level three, Us whose psychic attacks are way more power than a lot of people give them credit for, scratch for the loot hunting, and if any enemy wastes an attack on him, so be it, spiritual weapon for the free damage since it's cast with a bonus action, and shovel via our wizard. Our druid has summons too, as does our warlock. So, all in all, we have a huge pet party going 😂 unfortunately, we screwed up an animal handling check, so we don't have the owlbear with us. I also have a slightly worse version of Sunbeam from the blood of lathander, which is still fun to do. Kamehameha!

[@THEMithrandir09]

I'd bumb sunbeam a tier because of how strong the items that give radiating orb are. Imposing a -1 (or more) to attack rolls on multiple enemies is quite powerful. Enemies more than 3 stacks of radiating orb are basically removed from combat if they rely on attacking.

[@NightOfTheRavens]

There was ONE case where dimensional gate actually was really helpful to me. On the water prison, i needed to save Ravengard but i took Mizora's deal. By walking through the Dimensional gate he ignores being stunned and only spiders are spawned around him so he just needs enough HP to survive jumping one time from the gate exit to the ladder.

[@Caesar512]

Oh boy, it's here!

[@Cephalopocalypse]

Finally made it!

[@jotarokujo3603]

You mentioned the staff of cherished necromancy bugs. I believe they fixed that in patch 6. It was specifically mentioned, but I haven't personally tried it out.

[@Cephalopocalypse]

That's correct - this was recorded before patch 6

[@ncamon]

I got an amulet that restores a spell slot per day, so Shadowheart gets another cast after the hero's feast. Minor add on to hero's feast it drops container full of food to long rest with. Not a major thing, but I stopped stealing food after I got this spell.

[@mattduchan251]

The difference between the deva only and the mirmadons is that a wizard can have both a deva and the elementals cast at the same time. Giving your character extra summons for the day

[@bethany833]

cleric chores for every day in act 3, borrow the arcane battery staff from the wizard and cast heroes feast for free (:

[@the_og_alpha]

Chefdowheart build let's gooo

[@garyco766]

Chainlightning was S tier for sure. I didn't know they nerfed it by making untwinnable (making up words here), but I'm not sure even that drops it to A tier. It will still flat out win you fights. A hasted sorc with Markoheskir can still potentially cast chainlightning 3 times in the first round of combat and just devastate enemy forces (quicken create water, chainlightning, hasted chainlightning from the staff, bloodlusted chainlightning using the freecast from the staff). I also think Disintegrate is slightly undervalued here. It ranks among the highest damage single target spells, especially without building specifically for fire or lightning damage. Yes, a fire sorc will get more damage out of upcast scorching ray, and a lightning mage will get more damage out of a maximized chainlightning on wet targets, but as a fallback spell for immune creatures, disintegrate is great, it can be twinned, and it's trivially easy to get your DC high enough that it doesn't fail. It's at least B tier, if not A. I used it fairly often on my solo honor run, and it averaged like 88 damage, which is pretty good!

[@Sultan-cf5wf]

43:51 you can find a spell scroll for this in the astral plane world in act 1. i kept it to learn for later.

[@heyhoojoe]

Disintegrate suffers even more from its abysmally short 30ft range, because you can probably not even target the kind of enemies - namely spellcasters - that would be threatened by its mediocre damage while also not having great Dex. I would honestly not ever consider using it in BG3, even though I love this kind of spell from a class fantasy point of view.

[@gonetomars3697]

Subscribed!

[@Cephalopocalypse]

welcome!

[@amandajas6287]

I think Blade Barrier is much better than D-tier if you can hit multiple enemies. I've seen the enemy AI break with this spell rather often and refuse to move out of it in desperation to reach melee, ensuring 3 applications of damage. This usually happens when the path is drawn away/toward your party, rather than parallel to them, and 3 instances of damage application on 2 enemies not only does very high damage, the breaking AI causes them to lose their turn.

[@Honeyist]

Otto’s Irresistible Dance felt like an instant-win button for many Act 3 bosses. I don’t think any bosses that were hit by it ever broke out of it before they were killed before ever getting their turn. It’s my personal S-tier choice (and Heroes Feast is S+ if we count camp casters)

[@Devexxan]

Freezing sphere can reverse pickpocket, and I believe it can also be twin spelled. I don't iknow if that was fixed in patch 6 like ice knife, but I remember hearing someplace that it was able to be twin spelled.

[@doglatine]

Hey man, love the channel! Longtime 5E and BG fan and I’ve been driving for work all month and listening to your tierlists has made it much more fun. Two quick thoughts - (1) your guides are all impressively spoiler-free but I’d love to hear some BG3 tierlists of more spoiler heavy stuff - eg a boss fight tierlist. (2) did you ever play BG1 and BG2? I’m a grognard who loves them and I’d love to hear your thoughts on them some time. Peace dude!

[@Cephalopocalypse]

Thanks so much for the support! I really appreciate it :D I probably will come back to the more spoiler-heavy content at some point - especially later in the game's lifecycle, a lot of players will have already played the game. I did indeed play BG1 and 2 and loved them - I might do a retrospective on them (and maybe the neverwinter and planescape games as well) sometime!

[@doglatine]

@@Cephalopocalypse Awesome man, I'll be here for it! In general I love your style, it's a perfect mix of cozy and crunchy - no stress, no forced edginess, just good vibes and great insights into interesting rules mechanics. And as an active DM myself I love the analyses of how BG3 differs from 5E and breakdowns of subtle differences. Keep doing what you're doing!

[@doglatine]

@@Cephalopocalypse Oh and a final fan request, I'd love to see you do a Light Domain Cleric for your power builds series at some point! I think the Cleric of Selune is such a cool roleplaying choice given the events of the game, and I know you've rated the Light Cleric as almost *too* good, but afaik you haven't spelled out how to build it for maximum carnage. Just an idea for when you're looking for something fun to build!

[@petrisz]

4:03 so true. I do my first run at this time with a very sub-optimal party, But I rather long rest more often than go with a party that does not match the back story of my character that I have in mind :D

[@WilliamTheByrd]

I finished off the Netherbrain with Disintegrate. It felt pretty cool.

[@noamto]

I think you really underestimated the freezing sphere. The fact that you can give it to allies is important, because those with extra attack don't need to waste a whole action on it in order to throw it. Also the damage is a bit more than the 10d6 because you also get the physical damage from using it as a thrown weapon.

[@wafflenaught9151]

When you use the orb as an item and pickpocket it into another npcs inventory. They continue to wander and when it explodes if you are around it wont start combat for you as nobody know you set them up the bomb

[@timothyburger6715]

Wall of Ice buff is hype. Wall spells in general are always my favorite since they're the most literal manifestation of battlefield control.

[@Cephalopocalypse]

Agreed! I'm also not solid on the rating here, since I haven't had time for actual in-play testing, so it's mostly theorycraft; it's possible the sheer damage of the cast-then-cancel usage slots it right into S tier.

[@t-moneymayhem7386]

One thing to consider about blade barrier is that it blocks lines of sight, allowing you to divide fights up while dealing decent damage. I found it useful to protect my party from ranged attacks while allowing my front line to deal with rushing melee fighters, dealing decent damage in the process. This helps primarily in big fights in big arenas, which are some of the hard fights you need 6th spell slots for, like the fight against Rapheal.

[@markopusic8258]

Nah, the only thing you need against Raphael is to retreat in the hallway. A cowardly move no doubt, and it screws with Raphael's boss theme... but it's a free chokepoint to cheese all of those pesky cambions.

[@t-moneymayhem7386]

@@markopusic8258Correct, as with literally every fight in the game, there are lots of ways to approach the encounter. Insightful.

[@thomashightower7881]

I usually just Hunger of Hadar and then continually black hole/void bulb Raphael and all the cambions into the center of it while hitting him with ranged attacks. I don't even bother with the soul pillars, even on honor mode. Raphael, like most bosses, isn't all that scary when he's blinded, since he can't target you with spells or reactions while blinded.

[@MrSvinota]

Circle of Death is a spell that you must cast with a sorcerer safe metamagic on melee allies surrounded by many enemies. In that case it does greate regular damage if you use it with a Staff of Cherished Necromancy many times per battle.

[@Nokaret]

Protip for Globe of Invulnerability: Though not mandatory, occasionaly yelling 'which part of INVULNERABLE didn't you understand!?' when an enemy targets you is highly recommended.

[@TheRedAzuki]

Give Otto's Dance to Sword Bard with helmet of arcane acuity & Mysterious Scoundrel and you just do double-attack to get (or 4 attacks) to get +8 spell DC. Then cast Otto to just guarantee another turn and then you can just attack also just stock up on Crawler Mucus on all your characters, so their weapon attacks just have high chance of causing para. Fighter + haste + Action Surge at lvl 11 = 9 Attacks after all... one of them will probably get below 13 con save... and if not, your fighter if using Battlemaster maneuvers can just bombard them with disarm/prone as well, to make sure that they spend all their legendary actions and then, if it's not dead by that point (like with bosses) then you can easily do hold monster with your Bard the turn after and then just get 100% para on the follow-up attacks.

[@Johnjthin]

sunbeam+haste is very good (and other stuff plus the blinding) so I do not understand why it got a c. disintigrate is also good but only if you freeze them ;P

[@gerhards.oesterlein8746]

So quick question if globe of invulnerability makes you immune to all damage could you use it to negate power word kill and just wait out the timer and just slowly clean house afterwards??

[@Cephalopocalypse]

I haven't tried it myself, so I'm not sure! I don't know if PWK is coded as actual damage or just some kind of instant death effect - would need to test it out

[@WiiSportsTwo]

This might be cannibalized by the upcasting tier list, but a summons tier list might be nice or for wizard/necromancer specifically. I would also enjoy a deep dive into wild shapes, perhaps as a tier list to clarify their use cases and quirks. Might also be cool to make a difficulty tier list for legendary actions on bosses or something, though that might have less draw for people that want to avoid spoilers

[@Cephalopocalypse]

Good ideas! I'll definitely consider a wildshapes list.

[@thegrimdeather3691]

Can we also get a ranking of the higher level spells, I know there aren’t a ton (I’m looking at you power word kill) but I’d be interested in seeing your opinion on them

[@Cephalopocalypse]

I think there's just PWK as a player-castable spell unless I'm missing something - I'd rate it "A, but I will never remember to actually cast it"

[@alish1895]

Arcane Gate is incredibly useful in a certain Act 3 mission when you need to save a lot of NPCs with bad movement speed. It’s useless otherwise, but that mission is enough to move it to C imo.

[@travisbrown9936]

I’ve found the djinni pairs super well with wall spells. Also it’s super frustrating they nerfed sights of the seelie. There is basically no reason to cast it anymore because it’s just worse than a Myrmadon.

[@pikachuhoodie]

Honor Mode tip - Act 3 vs Ethel youre going to definitely want 2 summoned Cambions

[@Majormanlol]

Looks like you copied the description of your level 5 video and didn't update it for level 6 (wiki link links to level 5 list, everywhere in the description you talk about level 5). Love the video

[@minhngnp]

My first time used Eyebite was on Orin's granpa. Making old chosen of Bhaal weeping and shaking in the corner is so disrespectful but so funny.

[@LazyninjaxLNX]

Only time I ever used arcane gate was to avoid the courtyard fight after going through the sewer at the end. I snuck gale up on a rafter and teleported the rest of my group behind a door so no courtyard fight for me

[@MidKnightOTC]

Animate dead turned my cleric of lolth into a death knight that turns the tide of the battle immediately as soon as its cast

[@cadesummers5866]

I believe casting blade barrier from a scroll does not use concentration, I was able to use it in the nether brain battle to huge effects against mindflayers and the other aberrations

[@drgan4568]

I would put gate to marginal, it’s great for melee casters like a pact of the blade, and has a lot of uses in act 3 where positioning is more important in some combats, I know of a few end mission bosses where it trivializes the fight

[@rorymkirk]

Haven’t tested the chain lightning nerf yet BUT - the range was busted. You could chain lightning the titan watcher and it’d hit all the watchers in that arena. Such a cheat.

[@minhocho5487]

Wish it was still like that since it is a 6th level spell. I kinda want all 6th level spells to be busted af

[@Cephalopocalypse]

So it's supposed to arc within 30 feet of the main target if they used the tabletop distance, but it's also supposed to have 150 range - they've shrunk the combat ranges a lot in BG3, so it makes sense that they reduced the arc range, but I'd still rather it just hit everything.

[@rorymkirk]

@@Cephalopocalypse btw that glyph of warding thing I mentioned a while back - seems to be an inconsistent bug with any spell cast from hidden, have had it with shadowheart and game a few times now. haven’t seen if it’s still happening with new patch

[@alessandrogarofalo9951]

Even with the nerf, chain lightining is still busted, expecially if you consider it comes for free with Kereska's favor. Easy S I mean, a sorcerer with haste and blood elixirs can cast up to 4 chain lightning (1 from kereska, 2 from arcane battery from double sceptre, 1 from a lvl. 6 slot) in a single turn. Pair it with create water from a cleric and it's IMPOSSIBLE something is still standing against you in the battlefield. Otiluke ice sphere is very strong too against wet enemies, not at chain lightning level, but easily a B.

[@Cephalopocalypse]

That's exactly the thing though! *Any* 6th level spell cast 4 times over will win an encounter. The question is which ones don't need to be.

[@mcmatt186]

37:34 "70 healing basically brings any character back to full" My 160hp barbarian: 🗿

[@Kailokel]

I wonder if any of the patch 6 updates changed how AI will interact with you hiding in globe of invulnerability.

[@galliumgames3962]

My encounter with the Sharrens was turned from combat to obliteration using globe of vulnerability, cloud kill, water everywhere, and lots of frost and lightning magic. This was post patch 6 and the enemy AI was being dumb still as my party is 4 yeetable gnomes.

[@chasepierce6807]

Could you use arcane gate plus spirit guardians for infinite damage since using the portal is a free action?

[@harrisondunn5376]

Otto’s irresistible dance gets even better on an enchantment wizard cause at level 10 they get split enchantment. Letting you cast this on 2 ENEMIES AT ONCE!!

[@burningisis]

The only time I've liked disintegrate against bosses is on the end (very end) boss of act 2 cast via a scroll. I've never had him pass the save on the spell and it nukes him harder than any other spell I have at that point (even grossly overleveled because I'm a completionist and everything must be saved in Act 2) I like a lot of these spells spent via a scroll rather than as their level 6 spell. Because it saves up the level 6 spell for more buff/debuff related spells and leave the nukes to scrolls (if you cant keep your hands out of EVERY scroll vendor's pockets) and I like using scrolls as my nukes and my spell slots as my control/buff spells and things not available via scroll. I wonder how this tier list would change if scroll usage was taken into account

[@LadyBernkastel92]

I like that you could make a case that harm is arguably worse than the cantrip bonechill. Need to not do lethal damage to an opponent and stop them from healing? You could cast this level 6 spell or a cantrip.

[@Cephalopocalypse]

Yep - it's so terrible it's honestly pretty funny

[@Dorumin]

4:30 me playing bearbarian for the 5th time:

[@invictus7736]

Circle of Death being targeted presumably means you can twin it as sorcerer, not completely sure on that though

[@Cephalopocalypse]

I haven't tested it, but I'd assume so!

[@aratakeneikawa6589]

I think eyebite is very underrated by everyone. For me, it is at least A tier. Literally turns a fight to a joke.

[@beebee3293]

Yes ok, but the djinni is a funny little guy, so he's s+ tier for me. Love his animations and voice

[@Cephalopocalypse]

The only real evaluation that matters!

[@ghostdivision6877]

I was curious about flesh to stone because it made me beat Cazador Zarr so easily in balanced mode, first run. I thought it was great, maybe I just got lucky

[@11tw48]

I feel like Hirelings make Hero's Feast an interesting one - because you can hire a Cleric and have them apply it, right? Which means your actual Cleric should never cast it. You could also have this hired Cleric cast Warding Bond on your Tav/Main.

[@tomsauce6102]

I forget where but there's a ring that grants a free create undead in act 3

[@rorymkirk]

Reckon there is a use case for arcane gate but not sure which fight it’d best apply to… could be used to isolate a particular enemy from mobs? Temple of Shar fight maybe

[@Cephalopocalypse]

The natural ones seem like Iron Throne and the Orin temple approach, but I think dimension door handles both of those just as well - I still think there's gotta be *something* cool we can do with it though

[@rorymkirk]

Ah I’m thinking about it as a cc rather than a movement buff - for eg Cazador or Viconia (mobs can be more problematic than actual boss)… this is a little messy but I’m thinking you could gate next to boss, retreat, aggro boss through gate, end con to close, and then theoretically you’ve separated boss from mobs… fun rp maybe if not actually more effective than other strats. maybe.

[@vio4431]

Maybe just as a failsafe in honor mode... like if the fight is really really going bad and the area would be closed off in some boss fights to prevent escape. But then, spending a concentration slot for just that, may be a bit expensive or makes it more likely to lose a strong fight in the first place

[@ArteriusSaren]

Want to revalue my "bad" take on Chain lightning thanks to guys in the comment pointing out that you can no longer twinned spell Chain lightning after patch 6. You still can twinned spell Chain lightning on Kereska's Favour like all caster it's should be your go to equipment by default. But the thing is, you can have as much as 6 chain lightnings (you don't need the same amount for Globe of Invulnerability) in a single encounter or through the whole day of an adventure. 2 (1 twinned) from Markoheshkir, 2 from batteries, 1 from regular spell and 1 from Spellcrux Amulet. It's meant to be played combining it with water and obliterate anything with that combo, unless an enemy is immune to lightning damage and you can pull out it easily in solo on honor mode even if create water is no longer a cantrip. And yes I do heavily invest it in my playthrough because casting it 6 times with initial twnned version from Markoheshkir + Destructive wind, let me decide any encounter besides Ansur in honor mode. In a party it's definitely lagging behind Heroes' Feast, but you can cast it with a druid while you can focus on lightning. And druid is another point I strongly disagree with Ceph about which Myrmidon is strongest. But it's ok.