Which Mage school to pick??

[kirdie]

I want to have 2 mages in my party (and 2 fighter/barb, 1 rogue,1 cleric)
but i cant decide which mage school to take. i want at least one who can identfify. a must is fireball, this lvl 4 confusion-spell (if it still exists in new d&d), chromatic orb, haste, cloudkill+stinking cloud...
what schools are really unusefull?

[Lord of Alcohol]

I have a tiefling necromancer, which I somewhat regret. Should have gone invoker or regular mage. She still kicks ass, just misses out on a few spells I would like have had. Enchantment spells mainly (all of the emotion spells)

[Darkon Blackblood]

pick two opposite schools, such as conjuration and evocation, just make sure both of them don't have oppositions that overlap

[kirdie]

OK i've chosen Evoker (no Divination+Conjuration) and Abjurer (no Illusion and Transmutation). What do you say about this?

[Warhammer]

That's very good, one can focus on summoning and the other on blasting.

[Zateel]

I play mine like an evoker (I'm all about elemental damage), but I chose diviner. I still lose conjuration, but not the divination spells. I took a sorcerer for my other one, and she is really wiping the floor on everthing not in close quarters. I use mirror image, then walk up to a pack (with my party clear) and lay the fireball or a snowball swarm right next to me if I have to without taking damage.

[DraconisRex]

Originally posted by kirdie: I want to have 2 mages in my party (and 2 fighter/barb, 1 rogue,1 cleric) but i cant decide which mage school to take. i want at least one who can identfify. a must is fireball, this lvl 4 confusion-spell (if it still exists in new d&d), chromatic orb, haste, cloudkill+stinking cloud... what schools are really unusefull?

Well, you already selected. My 2 cents anyway: 2 teifling mages with 20 intelligence. Your bonus modifier for spells = 2/1/1/1/1. Not quite as powerful as a pair of specialist casters. But if one dies, you could be between a rock and a hard place.