I can only dream of some day playing in a game where 8th level spells are actually available to us. That, I'm sure, makes my opinion in this poll slightly suspect, but oh well, you never said we needed to have solid experience to back up our opinions, right?
That said, Mind Blank is the most obvious choice and I'll be surprised if it doesn't make nearly everyone's top three. It's a spell that every wizard is jonesing for at lower levels; they look at spells and think "whoa, that would suck if I got hit with it...hey, Mind Blank prevents it, that's what I'd better be aiming for."
I also gave the nod to Discern Location, because divination magic is so damn cool. Getting months' worth of gathered information and intrigue settled with a single spell is always going to be a good idea.
And the rest of my choices aren't going to be quite so clear-cut. I figure a damage spell is a good idea, and I like Horrid Wilting the best of the lot. Sunburst and Polar Ray have some things to recommend them, but I'm going with the Fort save for half damage (eat it, improved evasion guys), the long range, and the easy targeting. That might just be personal preference.
Irresistable Dance is nice because it actually lives up to its name. No save, just 2-5 rounds of funny dancing goodness. Parties love getting free rounds to beat on the BBEG, and getting to see him dance around while they do it is really a lovely thing.
And my fifth-tier slot I threw at Prismatic Wall. I think wall spells are kind of neat, and here's a nasty, nasty wall spell. Lots of fun can be had here.
You might be saying "No Polymorph Any Object? But that's such a powerful and abusable spell!" And I'd have to agree, except that my personal preference is to not have to work so hard to make a spell be useful. Flipping around through the rulebooks and the monster manuals sorting out the details of a polymorph suck up a lot of time and make me really unhappy; something I learned when my 3.0 wizard actually found a book with Polymorph Self in it. It's a spell that's almost as much of a headache for the player as it is for the GM, so I deliberately and maliciously left it off my list. For people who enjoy the complications of polymorphing and can actually use it during play without stopping the game dead in its tracks, more power to you, but I'd say that people who can do that are not the typical players of wizards with 8th level spells, so I wouldn't put the spell on a typical wizard's list.
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playing a wizard requires enough extra work without having to plan out polymorphs
ryan
