Best spells?

My favourite spells:

Magic Missile
Identify
Strength
Flame Arrow
Haste
Greater Malison
Improved Invisibility
Stoneskin!!!
Breach
Chaos
Cloudkill
Lower Resistance
Pierce Magic
Tenser's Transformation
True Sight
Invisible Stalker
Finger of death
Ruby ray of reversal
Simulacrum!!!
Spell Trigger
Spellstrike
Time stop

[omegadawn]

I found spiderspawn worthwhile only after I reached 12th lvl because you summon sword spiders at that lvl that do decent damage and move pretty fast. They have nothing on elemental summoning(particularly the druid variety), but are useful as cannonfodder. ( I always haste and chant my summoned minions to give them an extra kick)Plus some of the times you conjure two.

[Jon Irenicus]

favorite spell is summnon lighting!

[Memnoch]

One you shouldn't miss out on is Abi Dalzim's Wilting. You can cast it in melee and it is an AOE spell which will only affect enemies (as opposed to casting Incendiary Cloud). I found Cloudkill to be THE best AOE spell, it affect pretty much anyone.

I say the most useful spells are magic missles and identify. The trick to using cloud spells is to use a thief to scope out a room then cast it when your party members aren't in it. Then go in and mop up. Most of my characters have heavy magic or element resistances so they take the incidiary cloud pretty well without much damage.

I say the most useful spells are magic missles and identify. The trick to using cloud spells is to use a thief to scope out a room then cast it when your party members aren't in it. Then go in and mop up. Most of my characters have heavy magic or element resistances so they take the incidiary cloud pretty well without much damage.

My most-used mage spells would have to be Stoneskin, Mirror Image, Dispel Magic, Emotion, Chaos, Haste, Death Spell, Khelben's Warding Whip, Mordekainen's Sword, Abi-Dalzim's Horrid Wilting and Maze. Cloudkill is good when used from a wand - where it isn't affected by magic resistance - otherwise it's the weakest AOE spell in the game.

[Ladyzekke]

Wow, lots of good input here. Thanks everyone. Ironfist, Yikes! overkill! Are the spells you listed with the exclamation points your alltime favorites? Omegadawn, unfortunately, I have Aerie and I don't think she'll ever reach level 12. You must have a kickin mage in your party! Still wish I could find some ring or amulet to up Aerie's intelligence. I remember in BGI I found a ring of wizardry or some such under a tree that upped my mage's intelligence. Jon Irenicus, I love lightning spells too. They were my favorite in Planescape Torment and Icewind Dale (although I never finished that game yet, Baldurs took precedence!). But with all the opponents in BG2 that have magic resistance (sheesh, what doesn't?), it makes it a bit harder to get a good hit. Like your lightning bolt in your message! Memnoch, old faithful, what level spell is Abi Dalzim's Wilting? Conan, ah, cloud spells in another room. Sneaky, but sounds effective! Be sure I'll be giving it a try! Armisael, my good man, does Emotion work on monsters? I know what you're saying about cloudkill wands/spells. Wish I could find more of those wands, but they seem to be pretty scarce.

Two Wands of cloudkill:
1)the wand-powered trap in Irenicus's dungeon

2)Go see a play in the bridge district, rescue Haer'Dalis

Maybe you need more than two... but they are rechargeable, after all.

[Ladyzekke]

Cloud kill wands - rechargeable Bhaalin? I have one wand with 4 charges on it. But previously in an old test load, when I used all four charges, the wand dissappeared from my inventory. So I figured that was it for the wand. How do you recharge? Sounds great if possible (thoughts of dead dragon.....)!!