Nothing quite as satisfying! Especially as a 5th edition Evocation wizard so you can safely explode your allies too
In 3.5 it’s Haste.
It still didn’t let me cast two spells per round, so I rarely cast haste, at least on myself. The fighter, monk, and rogue got hastes courtesy of the bard. I needed to be casting fly and fireball/lightning bolt. Occasionally we hit the cleric with a haste, but she had reachspell so it wasn’t needed.
The true reason barbarians are still useful in a party with a wizard; so the wizard has someone to drop their second twincast haste on :P
Oh, my point is simple. Let me spell it out for you.
COUNTERSPELL.
Me: fireball isn’t the answer to everything
My son: No?
Me: No. Fireball is the question.
Son: Fireball is the question?
Me: Fireball is the question and the answer is yes
Skull trap ftw
Well, in that picture, I’d go with Lightning Bolt instead.
In a 5e campaign where I played a halfling Warlock, and found that Fireball isn’t on the basic Warlock spell list, I convinced my DM to allow me to create a Fireball-like spell, since at that point I didn’t have a lot of choices for AoE attack spells, and my party-mates could all do more single-target damage than I could.
Since the 5e go-to attack cantrip for Warlocks is Eldritch Blast, I figured I might as well learn into it and called it Eldritch Boom. The effect is similar to a sonic boom. Instead of catching fire, creatures and objects in the AoE that fail their save are knocked over (creatures are knocked prone). For the damage, I conceded that I couldn’t just copy Fireball, so instead of 8d6, I went for 6d8, but higher level slots add 1d8 per level.
The DM allowed it mainly because I was the main spellcaster. But later on, our party got a new addition: a pyromaniac sorcerer. Around that time, I switched to Blight as my go-to attack (when I didn’t just use Eldritch Blast).
Counterspell
Need a wizard with a gun going Counterspell This you filthy casual
If he picked Lightning Bolt he could hit everyone in that entire line with minimal collateral damage
For aoe damage? Yeah it was designed that way. Same for lightning bolt but a fireball will hit more in average than a line spell. But the line has more range. But 3rd is when great utility comes into play as well.
I have spent the last few combat encounters trying to line up enemies for a good lightning bolt. Much harder than just plopping a fireball in their general vicinity.
