Mastering Magic: Precision Damage

Good morning gamers,

Today is our seventh post in our series on magic and we turn our attention to spells that do precision damage (that is, damage to a single target). While we've already covered Sorcerous Blast and area-of-effect spells, these spells require a lot of thought to use well - just plucking off a Wound here and there or sniping a random warrior could leave you drained by the end of the game without doing enough for the cost you pay. The spells we'll be covering today are the feared Chill Soul, the deceptively alluring Black Dart, the cool (mostly for Kardush) Flameburst, the very-much-hated Paralyze, and . . .

BANISHMENT!!!! Credit: Quora.com

As I was preparing this post, I didn't see a lot of places that needed pictures, so I've passed on them again. Call me lazy, I guess.

What Do These Spells Do?

Two of these spells do Wounds: Chill Soul does 1 Wound against whoever the target is (need to specify if the mount or rider is the target if the model is a cavalry model), while Banishment does 1 Wound against a target Spirit model. If Chill Soul is channelled, you add 6" of range to the spell, which means you'd only want to do this if you need that range (more on this later). Banishment moves from doing 1 Wound to doing D3 Wounds against your target. This could mean one-turn-killing many Spirit models in the game (even if they pass all their Fate). As has been discussed in previous posts, sometimes that D3 roll will still result in a single Wound - whatever.

Two of these spells do Strength-something hits: Flameburst does a Strength 6 hit (which is a pretty decent hit - any model in the game will be wounded on a single die, most warriors will be wounded on a 3+ or a 4+, heavily-armored troops and most combat-oriented heroes will be wounded on a 5+), while Black Dart deals a Strength 9 hit (which will wound most things on a 3+, really tough things on a 4+, and Sauron on a 5+). While you have to specify the mount or rider for Black Dart, Flameburst damages both mount and rider.

When channelled, the Black Dart deals D3 hits instead of one hit, which (again) means that sometimes your channel will do absolutely nothing because you will roll a 1 or 2 and end up doing 1 S9 hit. Flameburst, when channelled, adds Set Ablaze to the target (mount and rider), which deals an extra S9 hit and a S5 hit at the end of each turn until the model a) lies down and crawls (aka, chooses to be prone for a turn), b) walks through water (aka, risks drowning or is entering difficult terrain), or c) dies. This can be REALLY useful at forcing an enemy hero to step away from the fighting for a turn or two, but more importantly, this will make whoever you're facing think twice about whether their hero can just press through and kill stuff. 

Finally, Paralyze on its own doesn't do any damage, but functionally, models that are Paralyzed will take damage from whoever charges them. As we discussed in our podcast on evil spell-casters, when you choose to cast Paralyze, you need to make it count - charge that model with strong stuff, beat the model into a bloody pulp, and move on. Paralyze, at the moment, cannot be channeled - it's channelled version is cool, but not game-altering (each turn the model is Paralyzed, they take a S5 hit - this would be really good in some cases, but since most of the targets for Paralyze tend to be big models that you don't want to deal with, you probably aren't wounding on better than a 5+ each time).

Who's Got These Spells?

These damage spells are actually present on many profiles, but most of them are Ringwraiths - we won't be digging into all 10 Ringwraith profiles today, since almost all of them function the same way (in general, Black Dart is cast on a 5+ with 12" range - know that there is variation in both the casting value and the range value). The list of units we have today are as follows:

• Gandalf the White (Minas Tirith) has access to Banishment, which is cast on a 4+.
  
• Galadriel, Lady of Light (White Council) also has access to Banishment that is cast on a 3+. 
  
• Tom Bombadil (Wanderers in the Wild) has access to Banishment, also cast on a 3+, and this is the only way Tom Bombadil can do damage to someone (unless you count charging a Ringwraith to death - Banishment might be faster though).
• The Dark Lord Sauron (Barad-Dur) casts Chill Soul on a 4+.
  
• The Necromancer of Dol Guldur (The Dark Powers of Dol Guldur) also has Chill Soul, but casts it on a 5+. Thankfully, if you keep your army bonus (you should), you get a free die to cast if you spend 1 Will to cast the spell (so you've got a slightly better chance of casting this spell on 1 of your 25 Will points than the Dark Lord Sauron has of casting it on just his free Will point).
  
• Ringwraiths (Mordor, Barad-Dur - Witch-King/generic Ringrwraiths, Angmar - Witch-King/Tainted/Dwimmerlaik, Easterlings - Khamul, Serpent Horde - Betrayer, Corsairs - Knight of Umbar) have access to Black Dart, and either cast it on a 5+ or a 6+ (Khamul the Easterling, the Knight of Umbar, the Betrayer).
  
• Kardush the Fire Caller (Mordor) has access to Flameburst and can cast it on a 3+. With the ability to get Will points back by sacrificing expendable Orcs (Orc Trackers on foot and Orc Warriors in particular - or an archer from the howdah of the Great Beast of Gorgoroth?), Kardush can throw fireballs all day long (and if his position is being overrun), he can give up and sacrifice himself to give more Will to one of your Ringwraiths nearby - perfect for making sure one of your Ringwraiths stays in the game!
• Saruman (Isengard) also has Flameburst, but casts it on a 5+ (it's his hardest spell). 
• Barrow-Wights (Angmar) are the only model with access to Paralyze as a cast spell - lots of models (the three Trolls, Ruffians against Hobbits, Mirkwood Spiders) have access to the rules for Paralyze with special rules/Brutal Power Attacks, but Barrow-Wights are the only models that can cast Paralyze on someone. Cast on a 4+ with no Might, you've got a real risk in failing to cast with these guys, but when it goes off, you can be sure your opponent will try to resist the spell.

How Do You Use These Spells Most Effectively?

As with the other spells we've covered in this series, here are some principles for using these spells:

• Spend enough Will to cast the spell with a 70% reliability;
• Channel or throw an extra die ONLY if you want to drain your opponent's Will/Might (assuming you can channel the spell);
• Find a target where 1 Wound will make a difference.

1) The 70% Success Guideline

You know this by now if you've followed this series - if you're casting against enemy models, shoot for 70% (nearly three-out-of-four successes). Shoot for 50% if you're casting on friendly models (every-other-time is a success). These spells do direct damage - so you want these spells to work. 70% is high, but throwing more dice not only makes it more likely that you get the spell off without having to spend Might, but it also makes it more likely that your highest dice values is higher than it could have been by throwing less (which means your opponent has to work harder to resist the spell). Unlike Sorcerous Blast, I think it's a great idea to use these spells against models who CAN resist spells (though if there's someone who can't resist - like Easterling Dragon Knights - hit them all day long). :-)

When trying to cast with a 70% chance of success, you can cast each spell as follows:

• Gandalf the White - Banishment (4+): free Will point + 1 Will = 75%
• Galadriel, Lady of Light - Banishment (3+): free Will point + 1 Will = 89%
• Tom Bombadil - Banishment (3+): 2 Will = 89%
• The Dark Lord Sauron - Chill Soul (4+): free Will point + 1 Will = 75%
• The Necromancer of Dol Guldur - Chill Soul (5+): 3 Will (or 2 Will + the free die from your army bonus) = 70%
• Most Ringwraiths - Black Dart (5+): 3 Will = 70%
• Some Ringwraiths - Black Dart (6+): 7 Will - yes, you heard me, SEVEN WILL POINTS are required to have a 70% chance of success (OR use 3 Will points and being willing to spend 1 Might to make it work) - I'd recommend just skipping this spell with these guys;
• Kardush the Firecaller - Flameburst (3+): 2 Will = 89%
• Saruman - Flameburst (5+): free Will point + 1 Will + reroll = 70%
• Barrow-Wight - Paralyze (4+): 2 Will = 75%

While these are great values to shoot for (albeit costly), some of these spells can be cast with nearly a 70% likelihood (and more than 50% likelihood) on just a single dice. Late in the game, this is a great option for a ditch-effort, but don't be surprised if it doesn't work. Many of these casters get free Will points, so they can take that risk with very little opportunity cost (if you're targeting a Dead Marsh Spectre or a Ringwraith who is out of Fate, you could choose to cast Banishment on a single die, since you have a 50-67% chance of passing and dealing the only wound required to kill them). 

Ringwraiths are the only exception to the list (you're looking at a greater chance of failure than success if you roll only 1 die, only a slightly-better chance of success if you throw 2 dice AND have a 5+ casting value) - hint: I only think you cast this spell with them if you NEED it (just casting it is going to be costly to you if you want to avoid spending Might to boost it - and failing to cast this spell REALLY hurts). 

That said, players like Mik from the Veni Vedi Vici blog love one-die Black Darts, so there's definitely an argument in their case to have a lower probability of success if you're trying to save Will in the long term (once Will is used to cast magic, it doesn't come back . . . most of the time). While my mind knows that you will successfully wound someone 22% of the time when you use a one-die Black Dart with most Ringwraiths (33% chance of casting, 67% chance of wounding when you cast it), psychologically I don't like failing four out of five times, so for me, I'd only do this if you were facing a major spam army and needed to pluck warriors off (or a bodyguard-horde army). Helps if you have lots of Ringwraiths too. :-)

2) Channeling and "Getting That Six"

As I stated above, I think these are great spells to cast against models that can resist spells. While you want Sorcerous Blast to bowl people over, these spells will only affect the target model. As such, if you want to harm a hero, you need to target him. The main question is this: how many resources can you make your opponent spend on this spell? Resources spent resisting one of these spells (dealing Wounds or high-Strength hits is a pretty good way of getting your opponent's attention) will mean there are resources that can't be used to resist other spells (like Immobilize/Transfix or Sorcerous Blast). Drawing those resources out often means throwing more resources of your own, either by adding an extra die or by channelling it.

As I mentioned in the overview section, most of these spells are "fine" when channelled - none are ground-breaking. Banishment is probably the best as a channelled spell, since many Spirit models have 1-3 Wounds and 0-3 Fate (so dealing 2-3 Wounds could one-turn-flash-bang-kill the target). Chill Soul is "good" only if you need the range (and your target would need to be something like a 1 Wound model that's about to score VPs or something). Black Dart does D3 S9 hits, but this could translate into the same amount of Wounds as casting it normally (since you never wound on better than a 3+ with this spell). Flameburst will make your opponent play differently, but don't expect it to do too many additional wounds (maybe if your target is D5 or lower).

All told, these spells are the kinds of spells that are likely to make your opponent throw dice at a resist attempt, so instead of spending 1-2 Will, he might spend 2-3 Will points instead. By throwing an extra die of your own (as we talked about in the previous section), you increase your chance of passing the roll without spending Might (additional Might if you channelled it) AND increases your chance of casting the spell on a really high roll (a 5 or a 6). The higher your casting value is, the more dice your opponent needs to throw in order to stop the spell from going off reliably. It's not uncommon for one of these spells to clear out the entire Will store of an opponent's hero - that's good for you in the long run!

3) Picking Your Target

At most point levels and against most factions, your opponent will have more than one hero. In many points match games, most factions will have a banner (or some kind of banner-equivalent, like a Moria Goblin Drum). In many points match games, your opponent might have models that are holding objectives, moving across the board to get to a camp/escape off a board edge. And against some factions, you might be facing a siege weapon team that's trying to pound big holes through your army. Any of these models would make great targets for many of these spells - but who do you prioritize?

The main thing to keep in mind is your scenario objectives and what your opponent needs to fight your army. If you are an Angmar force and your opponent has Cirdan, your opponent can charge any of your units if Aura of Command is up, and your units will have a hard time charging him if Aura of Dismay is up. What archery you have will be ineffective if your opponent has Blinding Light up. If there's a banner nearby or the army leader is nearby, I think the primary target is simple: Cirdan (because of what he does for his team and how he hinders yours).

Against other models, the decision will be harder: King's Champions have three models that are really good when working together, but which one do you snipe first? Sniping a herald could be easy (only 1 Wound), but they also have 2 Fate points that each could use for himself (or lend to others). Sniping the Champion would remove a powerful killing piece from the board, but you'll likely have to chew through all 5 Fate if you hit him as it is. Personally, I'd say plucking a banner out of the battle line would be useful (though if all three are touching, most of their banner area is overlapping, so . . . it's a hard choice).

In certain scenarios, your target priority will be easier: people who are sitting on objectives/carrying a mobile objective (the Heirloom/the Prize) are clear priority targets (with lone targets on an objective taking a higher priority than one-among-many). Models that are racing for a board edge are clearly important targets too (saves you from having to run them down). These cases will be clear to you - when it's less clear, prioritize banners and army leaders (Banishment might not have these targeting options).

One final note: I would avoid casting these damage spells against 3 Wound + 3 Fate models UNLESS they're the enemy army leader (most of these models also have 3+ Will, some are Resistant to Magic). For your first cast, the hero may just choose to take the hit on a Fate point instead of resisting. Your second attempt may see the same result. By the time you're finally through his Fate and Will, you have ignored other heroes (in most cases) who could be dead - doesn't make much sense to me to do this.

As an example, Eomer is a beastly hero for Rohan, but will take a long time to kill if you deal 1 Wound every turn (assuming you don't fail to cast Chill Soul and Eomer passes at least 1 Fate point). By contrast, 2-3 unblocked Chill Soul spells will result in a dead Theoden or Theodred or Gamling (and possibly Eowyn). I feel like you're better off finishing one of these weaker heroes first than sinking everything into Eomer.

When Do You Use It?

These spells are really cool spells - and they are undoubtedly useful (some are costly). To understand how you can use each of them in the context of the characters that have them, let's look at some use cases for the characters in this post.

Use Case Study: Gandalf the White and Banishment

Gandalf the White has Sorcerous Blast, which is a PHENOMENAL spell. When you need to clear out a group of models, Banishment is not a great spell to use (and Sorcerous Blast definitely is a great spell). However, when your opponent brings a Ringwraith, a Shade, or a handful of Barrow-Wights (Angmar armies can bring all three of these kinds of units), you need a way of dealing with them (and a S3/S5 hit from Sorcerous Blast is just not going to do enough damage to them). Casting Banishment against a Barrow-Wight will be nasty - and a channelled Banishment has a 67% chance of killing the Barrow-Wight outright if you cast the spell successfully and the Barrow-Wight doesn't resist the spell. Similarly, a channelled Banishment will clear out a Ringwraith's Fate points (and potentially kill him) if you get 2-3 Wounds from the Banishment. Finally, Shades have 3 Wounds and a channelled Banishment runs the risk of clearing them out too - who wouldn't want to cast this spell against foes like that!

Banishment will always contend with Sorcerous Blast for priority, but if there's an enemy spirit model on the board, this is a great spell to have. When facing models like Sauron or the Balrog, a successful cast can get you victory points for wounding the enemy army leader (and if you can deal enough Wounds, you can threaten to kill them too)! Since these models are hard to wound even when you beat them in combat, it helps a lot to be able to "just deal a Wound." Against these kinds of models (or 1 Wound models that don't have Fate), you can skip the channel and save your Might for something else (like a Heroic Move, Heroic Strike, or boosting a roll).

The greatest benefit of Banishment, however, is that you can make Spirit models that rely on their Will to spend their Will on Resist tests instead of their normal uses. Barrow-Wights want to cast Paralyze - and with only 5 Will, resisting this spell will probably mean they cast Paralyze one time less in a game (even if they don't die from it). Shades want to spend their Will to apply -1 penalties to non-Angmar models near them, so each Will they spend to resist a spell is a turn they won't be doing what they're supposed to do. Ringwraiths live and die based on their Will store - each point of Will they use to resist is a turn they can't fight (and Will they can't use to cast magic). This is a HUGE benefit and you want that!

Use Case Study: Galadriel, Lady of Light and Banishment

Galadriel, as we covered last time, will probably be casting Fortify Spirit early in the game. When she gets within 12" of an enemy Spirit model, however, Banishment is a great way to just mess someone up! As the battle lines get closer, you want to evaluate the benefits of casting Banishment vs. casting Instill Fear (on a 4+ with a -1 penalty to the Courage of your targets - we'll cover this spell in a future post), but you again want to remember the priority targets in your opponent's list. If he has an important support hero, you may still want to cast Banishment, but otherwise, scattering models with Instill Fear can be really powerful.

Use Case Study: Tom Bombadil with Banishment

Tom Bombadil can't wound stuff when he fights - but he CAN deal wounds with Banishment. While his 15 Will may seem like a lot, it's really not - see my post on Multi-Purpose Will Casters for my recommended Will allocation (which we'll cover again below, by the way). Once you've figured out how many attempts at Refreshing Song you want to do, how many fights you to want to be in, and keeping 1 Will to stay alive, you're probably only casting Banishment once or twice during the game. Sure, it might be enough to eek a wound out of an enemy army leader, polish off a Ringwraith, or kill a Barrow-Wight (thematic, that), but you have to be very intentional about its use. 

This post concludes the list of spells for Tom Bombadil so let's take a look at the prioritized game-plan for him:

• If your opponent has a Spirit model as its army leader, cast Banishment on 1 Will each turn until you get 1 Wound on him (if that hero is a Ringwraith and only has 1 Wound, so much the better);
• Spend your other Will dedicated to casting spells to cast Refreshing Song on 1 Will on heroes that need more Might (extra Wounds, Will, Fate are good too);
• Make sure you parcel out Will for fighting (I'd save 5 Will) and staying alive (1 Will) - this means you have 9 Will to cast spells during the game.

Tom Bombadil is one of the most straight-forward Multi-Purpose Will casters, since he doesn't have to save Will for being charged (since he can choose whether he can be charged or not) and he doesn't have to save Will for resisting spells (since he is not affected by any spells). Finding the balance between Refreshing Song and Banishment is a hard one, but it's much easier to do than balancing the spells for Ringwraiths or the Necromancer).

Use Case Study: The Dark Lord Sauron and the Necromancer with Chill Soul

Both of these heroes can use Chill Soul for a variety of uses - the main thing is to figure out who the most important target is. Like Banishment, you want to target the enemy army leader if you are within range so you can get victory points early in the game on him. Once you do 1 Wound, you're probably not far from doing 2-3 Wounds, so you can continue to wail against the hero if you remain in range (why not?), but you don't have to. Sniping models like bannermen (ideally who have been Compelled away from their friends by a friendly Ringwraith or something), models who are claiming an objective, horses under important heroes, or a siege engineer near a siege engine can have a HUGE impact on the game - so target these models.

I wouldn't channel this spell - even if you could use the extra 6" to hit a target that would otherwise be out of range, you're risking a Might point without knowing if you cast the spell or not. You probably want to throw an extra Will point if you choose to channel JUST so you don't need to spend more Might to avoid wasting the Might you spent to channel the spell. This is too big of a risk to me, in my opinion. If your only way of stopping a model from getting off the board is to channel Chill Soul, I'd say there was a miscalculation earlier in the game - though I might be tempted to channel in that one instance only.

"Use" Case Study: Ringwraiths and Black Dart

Ringwraiths casting Black Dart have already been covered in my post on wasting Might points - and I stand by what I wrote there: don't channel this spell (the risk is too great). Actually casting it is a risk - it's so costly to have a good chance of getting it off that you might have to spend Might to boost the spell instead of channeling it (see what I did there - never gets old). If you NEED to kill someone that you can't charge, then cast Black Dart - you want to target 1 Wound/0 Fate models just so you don't "waste" your Will/Might on the spell. 

Since spending 3 Will is a bit draining, you probably shouldn't do it more than once per Ringwraith, because otherwise you'll burn yourself dry too quickly. As I said in my post on Multi-Purpose Will casters, don't be fooled into thinking that Ringwraiths have lots of Will - they don't because of all the ways you need to spend it! If you start with 12-14 Will and you save 3-4 Will for staying alive/fighting (which isn't a lot) and you save 0-4 Will for your special rules that require Will to trigger (the 6" warrior-only-banner for the Dark Marshal, the 6" penalize-enemy-archery for the Shadow Lord, etc.), you could have as little as 4-6 Will for casting and resisting spells (which will mostly be eaten up by a single Black Dart). Not so great. . . .

Once again, though, a Ringwraith has a 22% chance of successfully wounding a D7 or less model on a single Will point . . . maybe that's worth casting if you have a lot of Ringwraiths in your army? I think the new Riders in Black Legendary Legion benefits a lot from this tactic, especially because they don't have to spend Will for participating in combat (or casting a channelled Transfix once per game per Ringwraith).

Use Case Study: Kardush the Fire Caller and Flameburst

Kardush is amazing - Flameburst is a potentially game-altering spell and a great way to get decent "archery" in a list that otherwise has lack-luster shooting units. Fury is a great spell to have on Kardush as well, so expect to burn up a few Orcs in the name of casting this spell! We'll cover Fury in a later post, but know that if you expect that Courage tests will be an issue for your army (facing Terror models, for example), cast Fury on the first turn, then sacrifice an Orc each turn to get more Will and cast Flameburst every turn on 1-2 Will (depending on how risky you want to be). A S6 hit is high enough that most enemy models (heroes especially) will be concerned - and so long as you keep up a healthy entourage of Orcs around Kardush, you can do it all day long.

"Use" Case Study: Saruman and Flameburst

While Flameburst is a great spell on Kardush, it's not that great for Saruman. As we alluded to earlier, Saruman can cast this spell with a 55% reliability on just his free die thanks to the reroll, but if he casts it with two dice (one free, one from his store) and the reroll, he has a 70% probability of success. The problem is that Saruman can cast Sorcerous Blast on just his free die/reroll with a 75% probability of success (turns to nearly 88% probability of success if you throw a Will point from your store at it too). 

Saruman looking at Chuckles

While the hit is slightly bigger with the Flameburst, I just don't see you using this spell with two simple exceptions: first, if your intention is to make a hero step away from the action, a channelled Flameburst can be VERY powerful (you effectively get to knock the model prone in order to get the fire extinguished). Second, while you can knock a S6+ model prone if he's the target of Sorcerous Blast, most models that are S6+ also have high Defense (Wild Warg Chieftains are an exception), which means a S5 hit is likely to wound them on 5s or 6s (and in Sauron's case, 6/4+). Targeting them with a channelled Flameburst is something these monstrous models really don't want, since they will a) get hit with a S6 hit initially, b) take a S9 hit from the Set Ablaze rule, c) take a S5 hit every turn, and d) they have to step away from the action for a turn (and possibly two turns) to make this stop.

One final note on Flameburst: because the Balrog is immune to fire-based attacks, don't target the Balrog with this spell. :) Similarly, if there is water nearby, don't channel this spell against anyone from the Dead of Dunharrow list, as they can safely move across the wet ground and dowse the flames out.

This post concludes our coverage of Saruman (one of my favorite casters in the game - ESPECIALLY in this edition of the game), so here's the organization of the principles we've laid out for Saruman:

• If you're not playing a scenario where you're fighting on the first turn, cast Terrifying Aura (channel the spell if your opponent doesn't have ways of auto-passing Courage tests);
• Once you're within 18" of your opponent, cast Command on any model you like to make them move out of position on your free Will point (backwards, to the side if you can shoot at them, or away from an objective);
• As soon as your opponent is within 12" of you, cast Sorcerous Blast at any model that can't resist the spell (ideally who is in the same fight as several of your opponent's models) and throw that model into at least one other hostile model (ideally who is in the same fight as several of your opponent's models);
• ONLY cast Immobilize if your opponent is ready to charge you and you need him to stand still (though you can also do this with Sorcerous Blast, so long as the model you wish to stop is Strength 5 or less) OR if the target has already Charged and you don't want him making Strikes; and
• Channel Flameburst (throwing 1 Will from your store with your free Will point and the reroll) when you're facing a model that is able to be affected by fire and needs to be taken out of the action for several turns.

Use Case Study: Barrow-Wights and Paralyze

Barrow-Wights have a very important question to answer: how many Will points do you use to cast Paralyze? While we recommended 2 Will points (and that's generally what I do), this means you have two reliable casts and then you have 1 Will lying around . . . so do you cast it three times (once with 1 Will)? Or do you boost one of them to use 3 Will? This is my default mode for Paralyze so I'm probably going with the two more-likely casts vs. the three potential casts (though the argument on the other side of the coin is that if you have 1 Will remaining, you can threaten your opponent with the chance of a Paralyze late in the game, which you won't have if you throw that Will into another attempt to make it go off more reliably).

Barrow-Wights targeted Elrond with a wild Warg chieftain in the same fight

Paralyze is one of those spells, as has already been mentioned, that you need to capitalize on when you cast it - pounce on whatever model gets hit with the Paralyze and kill them in one turn (because at the end of a turn, that guy might roll a 6 and the spell will go away). This is the only spell in the Barrow-Wight's arsenal, so no real recommendation for how to use it besides what we've already written - except that you should probably take at least two of these guys in any list you run (just so you have more threats - and you probably wouldn't suffer too much from taking 3 of them).

Banishment, Black Dart, Chill Soul, Flameburst, and Paralyze

Direct damage spells are good fun, but require a lot more thinking than any of the other spells we've covered (because they can be wasted so easily). Reigning in excitement about doing damage and thinking about priority targets (and whether these spells should even be cast) is always a worthwhile effort - and that is nowhere more clear than in the damage-spell department of MESBG. 

In our next post, we'll be talking about two very niche spells that destroy objects: Your Staff is Broken and Shatter. These two spells might appear to be straight-forward, but you'd be surprised the amount of thinking you need to do with them (and we'll even question if they're worth using). Are medium-level hits worth getting with a Heroic Channeling? We'll see - AND the post will also be covering the last spell for Gandalf the White, so you'll get to see his character summary (and the Moria Blackshield Shaman) at the end of the next post. See you next time - until then, happy hobbying!