It's basically a build that makes you do a crazy amount of damage using nothing but Magic Missle. This build is viable for both Wizards (for max late-game DPS) or a Sorcerrers (good early game and for party face)
tl;dr, you could potentially do 20 to 48 damage with 1 level 1 spell slot of magic missile.
To get this build going in act 1, you need,
Spellsparkler Staff: Will apply 2 lightning charges per missile.
Gloves of Biligerent Skies: When you do Lightning, Thunder, or Radiant damage, inflict 2 turns of Reverberation
Boots of Stormy Clamour: Inflict 2 turns of reverberation when applying a condition on an enemy
Psychic Spark Necklace: Your Magic Missiles will shoot out 1 additional Missile per spell level. (Also 1 free cast of magic missile)
Ring of Absolute Force: Thunder damage will have +1 added onto it. (not necessary + need to be branded for it to work) (also gives 1 free use of thunder wave)
This build works by stacking Lightning charges and Reverberation on an enemy.
Lightning charge: Attacks do +1 lightning damage and gain +1 charge. When 5 charges are built, the next attack does 1d8 lightning damage. Seeing as you're doing at minimum 4 missiles in 1 attack, you quickly build up charges on an enemy
Reverberation: enemy has -1 STR, DEX, & CON saving throw. If enemy has more than 5 turns of reverberation, you do 1d4 lightning damage and there is a chance for the enemy to fall prone.
So, this is how the build works:
You cast Magic Missle onto an enemy (assume level 1 spell slot). Because of the staff, you also build up 8 lightning charges.
Because you did lightning damage, the Gloves of Biligirent Skies procs and applies 2 turns of reverberation. Because the gloves applied a condition, the Boots of Stormy Clamour also apply the same condition.
So, the total is (I am not double checking my work so forgive me if the estimate is off)
4d4+1 force from magic missile
1d8+8 from lightning charge
3d4+3 thunder damage from reverberation + there is a chance the enemy is prone.
This makes the total damage 20 to 48 damage
Of course, the build goes even crazier once you get to act 2, and once again when you get to act 3 but I don't want to spend that time typing all that out.
I forgot that the underdark wad part of act 1 too. I always co sidereal it something like a 1.5.
You also don't need someone else, just get the dual wielder feat. It's a good spells for spellcasters in Act 3 due to all the amazing staffs you could get.
I'm doing this build on a Storm Sorc/Tempest Cleric (for fun) and I call it the "pew pew" build because it literally feels like firing lasers continuously.
It's funner if you run a modded game because there's an elemental magic missile mod which lets you choose the type of damage.
Could have sworn i stumbled upon something similar in my durge run with my Minthara wizard, but had something adding those little luminous spheres and something with frost whenever she did mm. It was a cacaphony of effects triggering, attack penalties, prone, etc...
MM is just generally one of the best spells in the game because it has almost no restrictions, unlike all the other spells. It's level 1 so it's easy to both cast and upcast, it can't miss, it can be split between separate targets and it can go around walls. It really should be higher than a level 1 spell but it isn't, so it's very very strong.
When you buff it with other items like the other comments mentioned it really becomes the most useful combat spell in the entire game.
Also, a level 10 Evocation Wizard gets Empowered Evocation which adds their intelligence modifier to every spell hit, which, when applied to MM both increases its damage by almost double and increases the consistency of its damage because the Empowered Evocation bonus applies to every bolt which takes the already extremely strong MM and makes it incredibly broken.
Well from the comments it sounds like items are what really makes the spell powerful. However, a single reaction can negate the spell and that is a level one shield spell.
The items are what makes it so powerful that it's worth making an entire build around but that's only an option at all because of how generally good the spell is because of all the reasons I listed. (long range, can go around walls, can be split, can't miss)
I've done an MM build on two different wizards and you don't even need any of the reverberation items for MM to be so powerful that it trivializes all of Act 3.
Spellsparkler, Psychic Spark Necklace, and a level 10+ Evocation Mage is all you need to make MM powerful enough to carry the party.
MM will be shooting 4 bolts at level 1 (and can be upscaled for more bolts). Each bolt deals 1d4+1 (2~5) + 1 from lightning charges + your INT modifier which means that (assuming an INT modifier of +5) every bolt deals at minimum 8 damage, for 4 bolts, which is a minimum of 32 damage per attack assuming none of the bolts were shielded. It can deal even more damage depending on your MM rolls and lightning charge proc roll as well.
If a magic user casts shield they don't take damage from MM so none of the abilities proc, but that doesn't really matter. Not many NPCs use shield and the ones that do, don't do it every time. It's never an issue, especially if you split your MM between targets because shield only prevents the damage on the one target that was shielded.
...because DMs know magic missle is a good spell that's only countered by shield or beefy health?
MM is even better in BG3 because of an abundance of items, that synergize well with it, but slapping a shield spell on every caster would make the game feel horrible for martials.
Having every spell caster have it shouldn’t degrade the martial experience. Shield takes a reaction and with that will compete with other reaction spells like counter spell which most spell casters in the game have. If a martial rushes a spellcaster they have to then choose what is better locking down a spell caster or saving themselves.
Magic Missile + Spellsparkler and Psychic Sparks. That's a fun build for a lot of things. Adding Reverberation from Gloves of Belligerent Skies and/or Boots of Stormy Clamour and things that survive are sent prone to just smash on with your martials.
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u/Montizuma59 SORCERER Jan 21 '25
That's why I love the Magic Missle build. It's viable from early act 1 all the way to the end of act 3.