Yuku free message boards

I'd probably pick enervation first, followed by greater invisibility or dimension door. (Greater invis is better if Judan is restored to the party, though Amella could still make use of it.)

Enervation is an awesome spell. And yes, I mean the 3.5 version. It is brutal on enemy spellcasters, since it prunes them of high level spells (one per negative level). Against any powerful enemy it's a solid debuff. There's no save, only SR, and very few things are resistant or immune to negative levels--mainly undead and constructs.

Consider that as you get higher in level, many creatures you run into start having awesome saves, often have spell resistance, and often have energy resistances or immunities. This is one of the weaknesses of the fire cones--fire resistance/immunity is the most common in the game, especially at higher levels. The demon apes were good examples of this as well. Versus enervation they'd only have had SR to go on. Better yet, multiple enervations stack, which means you can repeatedly cast it at a foe and create a cumulative penalty. The negative level affects pretty much all checks, including grappling and saves.

Enervation works best if you also take a feat like Spell Penetration/Greater Spell Penetration (which I would recommend for Volreff), as well as a metamagic feat like Split Ray or Twin Spell. If you really want to focus on it, you'd need Point Blank Shot/Precise Shot, and there's a feat that lowers the level bump by one when applying metamagic feats to one specific spell chosen. Ultimately, Heighten Spell might be useful also, since it's 4th level, so globe of invulnerability would block it. Still, that's a spell that's not often seen until very high levels.

I once ran a kolyarut encounter at GenCon, and it has enervation at will, and did a serious number on the PCs. I've also heard stories of major boss battles against powerful spellcasting foes that were overcome largely because of enervation. A couple of Split Ray/Twin Spelled enervations quickly stripped the caster of their highest level memorized spells, seriously reducing how deadly they were as casters. By then you'd hopefully have gotten a lesser metamagic rod of Quicken Spell, so you could do a quickened true strike followed by something like that. (We're talking 15th-level characters by this point, where we should be able to greater teleport to Sasserine or wherever to buy this stuff.)

Confusion sounds good, but a lot of creatures are immune to this sort of effect, or have bonuses to their saves, and it allows both SR and a Will save. It is an area spell, and it's not terrible, but enervation is IMO better.

Don't take the Pathfinder version of solid fog. I agree it's worthless for a 4th level spell.

Dimension door is a nice tactical spell with a variety of uses. I'd probably make that your second spell choice for 4th level.

Charm monster - maybe good eventually, but I'd want to build a character specifically optimized to make it work if you take this spell (e.g., Spell Focus feats, items/abilities to enhance enchantments, maxed out Diplomacy to sway charmed critter to helpful, and again Spell Penetration/Greater Spell Penetration).

Caustic mire - the acid damage is not huge, and any creature with any acid resistance at all will ignore it. You can do crowd control probably just as effectively with a 2nd level web spell. Note that with Jenkin gone, web is a viable option for a spell switch.

Taking identify...tough call. At this point you have enough other spell options at various levels that you can get away with taking it though, so it's a decent choice. You're just giving up shoring up another weakness with something like a web spell.

I'd definitely steer clear of summon monster spells unless you have Augment Summoning.

BTW, Judan would recommend (were he to have a voice in it) that you consider Fatespinner (Complete Arcane p. 37). The first four levels of the five-level class improve your casting, and the abilities are helpful, especially given the capricious nature of the die roller. It's also pretty easy to qualify for--about all you need is a few more ranks in knowledge (arcana), and 5 ranks in profession (gambler).