Best Paladin Spells in Tales of the Valiant

Introduction

The Paladin in Tales of the Valiant is a half-caster drawing from the Divine spell list, the same source as the Cleric, but with significantly fewer slots and a fundamentally different combat role. Unlike a Cleric, a Paladin knows a small number of Divine spells rather than preparing a list, then uses those spells to amplify the melee damage they are already dealing.

Your spellcasting ability is Charisma, which sets your spell save DC and spell attack modifier for options such as Wrathful Smite and Banishment. At 2nd level you learn two 1st-circle Divine spells; the Paladin Progression table governs later additions and lets you replace one known Divine spell whenever you gain a Paladin level.

The Paladin's half-caster spell slot progression is the defining constraint of the class. You reach 5th-circle spells at 17th level. Every slot you spend on a spell is a slot not available for Divine Smite, the class's signature mechanic that converts spell slots into radiant damage on a hit. This means your spell selection should clear a high bar: it needs to do more for you than a smite would. If a spell slot doesn't provide more value than 2d8 (1st circle) to 5d8 (4th circle) of guaranteed radiant damage, smite instead.

The Old Margreve expands the Divine list with a few Paladin-relevant tools: Bleed (The Old Margreve) for slashing-weapon pressure, Heart-Seeking Arrow (The Old Margreve) for ranged or thrown weapon burst, and Maim (The Old Margreve) for resistance stripping or vulnerability setup. It also adds campaign-specific utility in Feed the Forest (The Old Margreve), Blood Offering (The Old Margreve), and Tracer (The Old Margreve). The combat spells are worth discussing; the utility spells depend heavily on whether your Paladin is actually adventuring in the Margreve.

The Labyrinth Worldbook expands the Divine list in a more dungeon-forward direction: door control, fear pressure, new smites, radiant and psychic punishment, defensive glyphs, and strange corpse magic. For Paladins, the standout Labyrinth additions are Luminous Smite (Labyrinth Worldbook), Vengeful Smite (Labyrinth Worldbook), Golden Bull (Labyrinth Worldbook), and Castigation Glyph (Labyrinth Worldbook) because they reinforce the class's frontline role instead of asking you to play like a Cleric.

Player's Guide 2 is the Paladin expansion for players who like party math. Radiant Smite (Player's Guide 2) and Sapping Smite (Player's Guide 2) give better low-circle rider choices, Deadly Weapon (Player's Guide 2) and Perceive Vulnerability (Player's Guide 2) help martial allies cash in on crits, Shadow Guardians (Player's Guide 2) protects the formation, and Aura of Mercy (Player's Guide 2) / Aura of Order (Player's Guide 2) reward the Paladin for standing exactly where the party needs them.

The Paladin subclasses each provide thematic spells and features that lean into different aspects of the Divine list. This guide covers the core Divine spell list spells available to all Paladins; for subclass feature ratings, use the Paladin class guide.

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How to Use This Guide

• ● Avoid - weak for the Paladin's limited spells-known list.
• ● Situational - strong in a specific campaign or encounter.
• ● Good - reliable enough to consider learning regularly.
• ● Fantastic - one of the class's strongest choices.

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1st Circle Spells

Paladins do not receive cantrips or ritual casting from their base class. Their 1st-circle slots are the cheapest smite option (2d8 radiant) and also their access point for early utility. The bar for learning a 1st-circle spell is beating that 2d8 smite in situational value.

• ● Bless — Three allies add 1d4 to attack rolls and saves for 1 minute, concentration. The math impact of Bless across a full combat with three attackers making multiple rolls is larger than almost any offensive spell you could cast. This is the Paladin's mandatory first-turn spell in any significant fight. It even benefits your own attack rolls and saves. Learn it for campaigns with frequent party combat.
• ● Bleed (The Old Margreve) — Bonus-action concentration spell for a slashing weapon. Your hits deal extra necrotic damage and can open a bleeding wound that escalates as you keep hitting. This competes directly with Bless, Wrathful Smite, Divine Favor, and smite slots, so it is best for long boss fights where you expect repeated slashing hits rather than quick burst rounds.
• ● Shield of Faith — Target gets +2 AC for up to 10 minutes, concentration. On your most-targeted ally, +2 AC is a passive 10% reduction in hit probability across every attack against them for the entire fight. Long duration and no ongoing cost beyond concentration.
• ● Wrathful Smite — Next weapon attack deals an extra 1d6 psychic and the target must make a WIS save or be frightened until the spell ends. Concentration. The frightened condition prevents the target from willingly moving toward you and gives them disadvantage on ability checks and attack rolls while you're in sight. This is crowd control and a damage bonus packaged into a single 1st-circle slot.
• ● Healing Word — Bonus action heal for 1d4+CHA. In combat, this spell's action economy advantage over Cure Wounds is the defining difference — pick up an ally and still attack with your main action on the same turn. Learn it when you're your party's only healer.
• ● Heroism — Ally is immune to frightened and gains temporary HP equal to your CHA modifier each round, concentration. Against enemies with fear effects, this neutralizes one of the most disruptive conditions in the game. The temp HP per round compounds over a long fight.
• ● Divine Favor — Your weapon attacks deal an extra 1d4 radiant for up to 1 minute, concentration. Worth considering if you make multiple attacks per turn and don't want to burn a slot on each smite individually. At 1st circle it is a more conservative radiant damage source than smiting — less spike, more sustained.
• ● Command — Force a creature to obey a one-word command on their next turn: "Drop," "Flee," "Grovel," or "Halt." CHA save. At early levels against lower-CR enemies this works frequently. Falls off at higher tiers as saves improve.
• ● Cure Wounds — Standard heal at touch range. Better than Healing Word for out-of-combat recovery; worse in combat. Learn it when you need a burst heal during a short rest.
• ● Bane — Three enemies subtract 1d4 from attack rolls and saves, concentration. The offensive equivalent of Bless. Useful against groups of enemies making multiple attack rolls; less useful against a single boss who might succeed on saves frequently.
• ● Feed the Forest (The Old Margreve) — Negates the Margreve Forest's penalty to your spell attacks and spell save DCs for 1 hour. In that exact campaign frame, it can be mandatory. Outside the Margreve, it does nothing; do not learn it as general utility.
• ● Truth of the Void (Labyrinth Worldbook) — Arcane/Divine/Wyrd control that attacks an enemy's nerve with fear, movement, or disarm pressure. It is a real 1st-circle Paladin option when you want control instead of another damage rider, though Wrathful Smite still owns the general-purpose slot.
• ● Radiant Smite (Player's Guide 2) — Divine/Wyrd smite that adds radiant fire pressure and ignites the target. This is the clean new-player PG2 smite: simple, on-theme, and easier to justify than spending every slot on vanilla burst.
• ● Sapping Smite (Labyrinth Worldbook / Player's Guide 2) — Divine/Wyrd smite that deals necrotic damage and slows the target. Player's Guide 2 presents this as a 1st-circle option, which makes it much more attractive: cheap control rider, not mid-tier luxury purchase.
• ● Infernal Shield (Player's Guide 2) — Imps shield a target. The AC bonus is good; the concentration-protection angle is the reason to care. Put it on the ally maintaining the spell that is already winning the fight.
• ● Follow Through (Player's Guide 2) — Let an ally make a backswing after a miss. Best beside Rogues, smiters, heavy-weapon users, and anyone whose one missed attack made the whole table make the same face.
• ● Guiding Counsel (Player's Guide 2) — Add WIS to an ability check. Good skill-support utility, but Paladins usually learn fewer social/exploration spells than full Divine casters.
• ● Bountiful Stamina (Player's Guide 2) — Resist fatigue. Strong in travel and attrition campaigns, weak in clean arena-style adventure days.
• ● Withering Gaze (Player's Guide 2) — Frighten and deal psychic damage. Stylish, but Paladins usually get better fear pressure by hitting someone with a smite rider.
• ● Feed the Worms (Labyrinth Worldbook) — Arcane/Divine/Primordial corpse magic that creates swarm pressure from a recent body. Mechanically useful in grim campaigns, but most Paladins should treat it as a table-tone spell rather than a normal learned option.
• ● Protection from Evil and Good — Ward an ally against aberrations, celestials, elementals, fey, fiends, and undead. Concentration. Campaign-dependent: exceptional in fiend/undead-heavy settings, irrelevant in humanoid-only encounters.
• ● Guiding Bolt — Ranged attack for 4d6 radiant plus advantage on next attack. Strong opener against a key target when you need to set up a melee ally's attack. But a smite is usually better for your action if you're going to be hitting anyway.
• ● Inflict Wounds — Melee spell attack for 3d10 necrotic. High damage ceiling but costs your attack action, bypasses all the weapon features you have, and doesn't synergize with your class mechanics. Never worth it.
• ● Sanctuary — Ward a creature so attackers must save to target them. Good on a support character; bad on you, since it breaks the moment you make an attack roll, which is every turn.

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2nd Circle Spells

Second circle spells represent 3d8 smite damage in opportunity cost. The spells learned here need to earn that comparison.

• ● Aid — Raise the current and maximum HP of up to three creatures by 5 each for 8 hours, no concentration. Pre-dungeon spell that compounds across every encounter in the session. Five extra maximum HP per creature means five extra HP of buffer before they go down, for the entire day. Learn it when the party benefits from a durable HP buffer.
• ● Branding Smite — Next hit deals extra 2d6 radiant, target emits light and cannot become invisible, lasts 1 minute concentration. Superior to a smite at the same slot level when revealing or tracking the target matters; otherwise it is competing against a cleaner burst smite.
• ● Spiritual Weapon — Bonus action summons a spectral weapon that attacks for 1d8+CHA as a bonus action each turn, 1 minute, no concentration. No concentration means you run Bless and Spiritual Weapon simultaneously. Your bonus action becomes a bonus attack. Over a 5-round fight, this spell contributes 5d8+5(CHA) force damage with zero opportunity cost beyond the slot.
• ● Hold — Paralyze a Medium creature for up to 1 minute, WIS save repeating. Paralyzed creatures are automatically critically hit by melee attacks within 5 feet. For a Paladin with Divine Smite, this is obscene: cast Hold, paralyze the boss, walk up, auto-crit Divine Smite for double smite dice, repeat. This is the Paladin combo that defines 5th-level play.
• ● Zone of Truth — 15-foot sphere where creatures can't lie, concentration, 10 minutes. Invaluable in investigation and interrogation sequences. Learn it when you know a deception-heavy social encounter is coming.
• ● Silence — 20-foot sphere of magical silence for 10 minutes, concentration. Drop it on an enemy spellcaster and they cannot cast verbal-component spells. Strong in fights where enemy spellcasting is the primary threat.
• ● Restoration — Cure disease or end a condition. Concentration-free condition clearing. Invaluable when the campaign throws blindness, paralysis, or poisoning at the party.
• ● Warding Bond — Ally has +1 AC, +1 to saves, resistance to all damage — but you take half the damage they would take. Concentration. A real sacrifice. On the right table with a frontliner absorbing most incoming damage, this is a meaningful trade. Know your HP budget before committing.
• ● Prayer of Healing — 10-minute cast heals up to six creatures for 2d8+CHA. Pure out-of-combat recovery between encounters. Learn it only when you're the primary healer for a session.
• ● Blindness/Deafness — Blind or deafen a creature for 1 minute, no concentration. Blinding a powerful melee attacker is a significant debuff. The lack of concentration is the key advantage over similar control options.
• ● See Invisibility — Detect invisible and ethereal creatures for 1 hour. Situationally critical against invisible enemies; irrelevant otherwise.
• ● Suggestion — Creature follows a reasonable order for up to 8 hours. Strong social tool; less available to Paladins than to Clerics or Bards given slot scarcity. Use it when the social payoff is significant.
• ● Luminous Smite (Labyrinth Worldbook) — Divine/Wyrd smite that adds radiant pressure and helps the party punish the target. This is the cleanest Labyrinth Paladin pickup because it speaks your language: hit the enemy, mark the enemy, make the team better at finishing the enemy.
• ● Vengeful Smite (Labyrinth Worldbook / Player's Guide 2) — Divine/Wyrd smite that layers psychic punishment and fear pressure onto a weapon hit. Wrathful Smite remains the cheap benchmark, but this gives higher-tier Paladins another control-forward smite when fear matters.
• ● Deadly Weapon (Player's Guide 2) — Weapon support that inflicts more devastating blows. No-concentration martial math is exactly Paladin food: buff the best weapon user, then continue doing Paladin things.
• ● Eldritch Smite (Player's Guide 2) — Force-damage weapon rider that makes the target easier to hit. Strong when the whole party can pile on before the target recovers.
• ● Shadow Guardians (Player's Guide 2) — Shadows hide you and give foes disadvantage against allies. Think of it as Spirit Guardians' defensive sibling: less blender, more "stop hitting my friends."
• ● Perceive Vulnerability (Player's Guide 2) — Learn vulnerabilities and improve critical damage. Best in parties with Rogues, Fighters, other Paladins, or crit-heavy builds. If the group has no damage payoff, it becomes expensive trivia.
• ● Star Bolt (Player's Guide 2) — Radiant ranged attack with blinding pressure. Good when the enemy refuses to stand next to you, which is rude but tactically understandable.
• ● Psychic Block (Player's Guide 2) — Makes a target struggle to find or attack you. Useful defensive oddball, but Paladins usually prefer effects that protect the whole formation.
• ● Imbue Projectile (Player's Guide 2) — Thrown object deals extra force. Better for thrown-weapon Paladins than sword-and-board defaults.
• ● Feather Guard (Labyrinth Worldbook) — Divine/Wyrd protection that can soften a dangerous hit or reposition a creature out of trouble. It is a real defensive tool, but Paladins usually prefer proactive concentration and smite spells unless the party needs reaction-style protection.
• ● Ray of Enfeeblement — Sap a foe's STR damage. Too slow and too narrow for Paladin slot investment.

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3rd Circle Spells

Third circle is where the Paladin's slot investment crosses into high-value territory. These spells outperform most smite scenarios.

• ● Spirit Guardians — 15-foot radius aura deals 3d8 radiant or necrotic per turn to creatures inside, half speed. Concentration, 10 minutes. This spell was designed for frontline melee characters — you move toward enemies, they take damage just by being near you, and their speed reduction makes it harder for them to escape. Combined with Spiritual Weapon on your bonus action and a smite-enhanced weapon attack, your action economy reaches its peak output at 5th level.
• ● Revivify — Resurrect an ally who died within the last minute. Emergency resurrection that can save a campaign. Learn it when your group needs a reliable answer to a recent death.
• ● Dispel Magic — End a magical effect. Insurance against enemy concentration spells and magical barriers. Paladin access to Dispel Magic separates the class from Fighter-equivalents — you can tear down magical defenses that would stop a pure martial dead.
• ● Beacon of Hope — Allies have advantage on WIS saves and death saves, and healing spells restore the maximum amount. Concentration. In a session where your party is in severe danger, this doubles your healing output. Learn it for boss fights or the final dungeon.
• ● Remove Curse — End all curses on a creature. Campaign-critical when curses are present; useless otherwise. Learn it when the dungeon description suggests curse content.
• ● Daylight — 60-foot sphere of bright light, dispels magical darkness up to 3rd circle. Against vampire-type or shadow-adjacent enemies, this changes fight dynamics entirely.
• ● Mass Healing Word — Bonus action heal for 1d4+CHA to up to six creatures. When your party takes a bad AoE round, this spell recovers everyone on the same turn you also attack. The action economy is the value.
• ● Bestow Curse — Impose a significant debuff on a creature: disadvantage on saves, ability checks, or attacks, or waste turns. Concentration. Against a priority target you need to weaken before your party engages, this is powerful front-loading.
• ● Blood Offering (The Old Margreve) — Touch a corpse you helped kill within the last hour to heal yourself based on the creature's challenge rating. It is concentration-free, but it is post-kill sustain with grim resurrection consequences, not a reliable in-combat Paladin recovery button.
• ● Sending — 25-word message anywhere in the world. For Paladins in narrative-heavy campaigns, divine communication across distance can be a plot-critical tool.
• ● Tracer (The Old Margreve) — Bonus-action ammunition beacon that lets the firing weapon point toward the marked target for 8 hours. Useful for hunts, fugitives, and battlefield escapees, but most Paladins are not spending turns firing ammunition. Better on a ranged or thrown-weapon Paladin than on a sword-and-board build.
• ● Golden Bull (Labyrinth Worldbook) — Divine/Wyrd abjuration that punishes approach and helps a frontline Paladin control space. This is one of the better Labyrinth picks because it stacks with the Paladin's natural job: stand where enemies want to go and make that choice painful.
• ● Forceful Courser (Labyrinth Worldbook) — Divine/Primordial/Wyrd conjuration that sends spirit beasts crashing through enemies with force and prone pressure. Good when you need an area-control spell from a slot that is not simply being converted into smite dice.
• ● Star's Radiance (Labyrinth Worldbook) — Arcane/Divine radiance that supports the party against mental or fear pressure. Paladins already bring Aura of Protection and Courage, so this is a strong theme fit but not an automatic preparation.
• ● Aura of Bane (Player's Guide 2) — Divine aura that imposes a d4 penalty on enemy rolls. Strong if you can stand close enough to matter without overextending; fortunately, "stand close enough to matter" is the Paladin job description.
• ● Abjuring Smite (Player's Guide 2) — Force-damage smite that hampers extraplanar creatures. Excellent in fiend, celestial, fey, or outsider-heavy campaigns; merely fine elsewhere.
• ● Venomous Smite (Player's Guide 2) — Poison smite that can poison the target. Good when poison works, sad when poison resistance enters the room wearing sunglasses.
• ● Animate Dead — Create undead servants. Thematically misaligned with most Paladin identities; strong in necromancy-adjacent campaigns.

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4th Circle Spells

• ● Death Ward — Ally survives one killing blow, dropping to 1 HP instead. No concentration, 8 hours. Pre-fight insurance on your most endangered party member. It costs one 4th-circle slot and potentially saves the session. Learn it before every major dungeon.
• ● Banishment — Send a creature to another plane for up to 1 minute while you maintain concentration. Against an extraplanar enemy, sustaining it for the full minute makes the removal permanent; against a native creature, it is a time-out that lets your party stabilize and focus on remaining threats.
• ● Freedom of Movement — Ally can't be slowed, grappled, or restrained by nonmagical means for 1 hour, no concentration. Put this on yourself before a fight where grappling enemies are present. You continue fighting without interruption while they waste actions trying to pin you down.
• ● Guardian of Faith — Radiant sentry deals 20 radiant damage to approaching foes for 8 hours, no concentration. Summon it and walk away — it protects a position independently. Excellent for guarding vulnerable party members or blocking a chokepoint.
• ● Compulsion — Charm foes and direct their movement. WIS save. Strong against enemies you want to reposition (into hazards, away from allies, into your Spirit Guardians zone).
• ● Confusion — Targets act randomly on failed WIS saves, 1 minute, concentration. Against clustered enemies when your Spirit Guardians is already down, this wastes their turns while the zone damages them.
• ● Blight — 8d8 necrotic to a living creature on a CON save. Plants auto-fail. Your largest direct damage option at 4th circle. Not as good as a well-timed smite but available when you need reliable damage on a specific target.
• ● Heart-Seeking Arrow (The Old Margreve) — Bonus-action concentration spell that empowers your next ranged or thrown weapon attack for +6d6 weapon-type damage on a hit, or half as much on a miss, with an ugly resurrection rider if it kills. This is niche for melee Paladins but strong for spear, javelin, thrown-weapon, or mounted ranged builds that want smite-like burst at distance.
• ● Castigation Glyph (Labyrinth Worldbook) — Divine abjuration that punishes the target for attacking you or your nearby allies. It is exactly the kind of 4th-circle Paladin spell worth considering because it changes enemy incentives instead of only adding damage.
• ● Spectral Wall (Labyrinth Worldbook) — Arcane/Divine battlefield control that blocks space with frightening spectral force. Paladins have fewer slots for wall magic than Clerics, but this can win fights in corridors, bridges, and defensive stands.
• ● Aura of Mercy (Player's Guide 2) — Divine aura that heals nearby allies each round. This is a strong Paladin spell because it turns your positioning into sustain while your action remains free for attacks, smites, or rescue work.
• ● Otherworldly Orchestra (Player's Guide 2) — Ghostly soundtrack that hinders enemies or helps allies. Useful and funny at the table, but a 4th-circle Paladin slot has ruthless competition from Death Ward, Banishment, and Aura of Mercy.
• ● Wield Soul (Labyrinth Worldbook) — Arcane/Divine corpse magic that extracts power, memory, or leverage from the dead. It can be campaign-defining in grim or investigative play, but it is not a default Paladin combat spell.
• ● Control Water — Command water bodies in large areas. Environment-dependent; extraordinary near water, irrelevant in dungeons.
• ● Faithful Hound — Invisible sentry for 8 hours. Camp protection. Situational utility.

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5th Circle Spells

Paladins reach 5th-circle spells at 17th level. By this point, the opportunity cost of a spell slot versus a smite is extreme: a 5th-circle smite deals 5d8 radiant on a hit. The spells learned here must be extraordinary.

• ● Greater Hold — Paralyze any creature (no size limit) for 1 minute. The boss fight upgrade to Hold. When you paralyze the dragon or the lich, every melee attack from your party auto-crits. Your smite on a paralyzed target doubles its dice. This is the highest-ceiling Paladin play.
• ● Greater Restoration — Remove a severe condition or reduce ability score drain. At 17th level, the conditions this removes (exhaustion, charm, petrification) are more commonly inflicted by high-CR threats. Learn it when the enemy's stat block suggests these conditions.
• ● Mass Cure Wounds — Average heal to up to six creatures. At 5th circle, this is emergency full-party recovery. Against a boss who has already burned through most of your party's HP, this can turn a potential wipe into a winnable fight.
• ● Maim (The Old Margreve) — Melee spell attack for necrotic damage plus a permanent withering rider until removed by serious magic. The body option can remove resistance to bludgeoning, piercing, or slashing, or create vulnerability if the target lacks resistance. That is potentially fight-defining if your party is loaded with weapon attackers, but it still has to compete with Greater Hold and 5th-circle smites.
• ● Flame Strike — 10-foot radius column of fire and radiant damage, each save-halved separately. Radiant is broadly unresisted. Your best AoE damage option at 5th circle when you need to hit a cluster rather than a single target.
• ● Dispel Evil and Good — Send creature types home or end charm/fright on allies. Strong defensive utility in extraplanar campaigns.
• ● Geas — Compel a creature to follow a task for 30 days. The duration is extraordinary — a month of compelled compliance is narrative gold. For Paladins in campaigns with political complexity, this spell reshapes story arcs.
• ● Aura of Order (Player's Guide 2) — Divine aura that improves allied defenses against hostile magic. This is the PG2 high-circle Paladin prize: the party stands near you, enemy casters get sad, and everyone pretends this was always the plan.
• ● Feathered Flock (Player's Guide 2) — Allies grow wings and fly. Party flight is expensive on a half-caster, but some encounters are solved the moment everyone can ignore the floor.
• ● Lifeblind (Player's Guide 2) — Foe cannot see living creatures. Strong into the right boss or stealth plan, but narrower than Aura of Order or Greater Hold.
• ● Contagion — Sicken a foe with disease after three CON saves. Powerful but slow. At 17th level fights rarely last the rounds needed for setup.
• ● Antilife Shell — Block living creatures from entering your 10-foot aura. Defensive positioning tool. The concentration requirement competes with Spirit Guardians, which is usually stronger.
• ● Legend Lore — Know legendary information. Intelligence tool; situationally essential, broadly irrelevant.
• ● Raise Dead — Resurrect 10 days dead. Revivify handles most resurrection needs. Raise Dead covers the cases Revivify misses (more than 1 minute dead), but at 5th circle you're asking whether it beats a smite. Usually no — unless the situation demands it.
• ● Planar Binding — Bind a planar creature. Extremely niche. Requires summoning and restraining a planar creature first.

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Top 10 Spells

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Best Old Margreve Paladin Picks

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Best Labyrinth Worldbook Paladin Picks

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Best Player's Guide 2 Paladin Picks

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Spell Synergies

Hold + Divine Smite = Critical Hit Factory Cast Hold on the most dangerous enemy. Paralyze triggers automatic critical hits on every melee attack from adjacent allies. Your own Divine Smite dice double on that crit, so a 2nd-circle smite's 3d8 becomes 6d8, and a 3rd-circle smite's 4d8 becomes 8d8. Against a paralyzed boss with your party surrounding it, this combination ends fights in 2-3 rounds that would otherwise last 8+.

Bless or Spirit Guardians + Spiritual Weapon Bless and Spirit Guardians both require concentration, so this is a choice, not a stack. Bless is the team-math opener when the party is making lots of attacks or saving throws. Spirit Guardians is the melee blender when enemies are already close. Spiritual Weapon stays excellent beside either plan because it does not require concentration.

Branding Smite + Invisible Enemies Branding Smite makes the target emit light and prevents invisibility. That is the real use case: hit the disappearing enemy once, then make the rest of the fight happen in public.

Aura of Protection + Concentration Your Aura of Protection adds your CHA modifier to allied saving throws within 10 feet, including your own if you are in the aura. That makes your key concentration plans, such as Bless, Spirit Guardians, Hold, and Aura of Mercy (Player's Guide 2), less likely to collapse when the enemy finally hits back.

Death Ward + Your Squishiest Caster Cast Death Ward on your lowest-HP full caster before the boss fight. They now have a one-time death prevention that lets them make a risky high-value play: casting at full power without holding back in case they go down. A caster who knows they're insured against one killing blow plays more aggressively, and aggressive play from a full caster wins fights faster.

Maim (The Old Margreve) + Martial Party If Maim strips resistance or creates vulnerability to a weapon damage type, every Fighter, Rogue, Ranger, Monk, and Paladin hit after that becomes more valuable. This is one of the few Paladin spells where the correct question is not "does it beat my smite?" but "does it double the party's weapon damage plan?"

Heart-Seeking Arrow (The Old Margreve) + Thrown Weapon Paladin A javelin, spear, or other thrown weapon lets a Paladin deliver burst damage at range without abandoning the martial identity. It is not replacing Divine Smite in melee, but it gives you a credible answer when the enemy refuses to stand next to you.

Luminous Smite (Labyrinth Worldbook) + Focus Fire The best Paladin smites are not only damage riders; they tell the party who dies next. Luminous Smite is strongest when your Fighter, Rogue, Ranger, and summoned allies can immediately exploit the marked target.

Golden Bull (Labyrinth Worldbook) + Aura Positioning Your aura already rewards allies for standing near you. Golden Bull makes that same area unpleasant for enemies to enter, turning your aura cluster into a defended pocket instead of just a saving throw bubble.

Castigation Glyph (Labyrinth Worldbook) + Tanking Paladins are at their best when enemies hate every target choice. Castigation Glyph punishes attacks into your defended area, while your AC, Lay on Hands, and Aura of Protection make attacking you inefficient too.

Deadly Weapon (Player's Guide 2) + Critical Builds Deadly Weapon is a support spell with a Paladin soul: improve the weapon user who already hits hard, then spend your actions doing frontline work. It pairs especially well with Rogues, Fighters, smite builds, and any ally using martial talents for bigger hit payoffs.

Shadow Guardians (Player's Guide 2) + Aura Formation Shadow Guardians rewards the same positioning as Aura of Protection: allies near you are harder to punish. The spell is strongest when your party can hold formation instead of scattering across the map like someone yelled "free snacks."

Aura of Order (Player's Guide 2) + Anti-Caster Bosses When enemy spellcasters are the actual threat, Aura of Order turns your space into the party's safest square footage. Park the vulnerable allies near you and make the villain work for every spell effect.

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Hot Takes

Hot Take: Paladins who spam Divine Smite are playing the class at half capacity. The Paladin's highest-ceiling play is Hold + auto-crit smite, not just swinging and smiting every turn. A Paladin who saves two 2nd-circle slots for Hold + a big smite on the paralyzed boss deals more burst damage in two turns than six turns of casual smiting. Slot conservation is not timidity. It is setting up the combo that ends the fight.

Hot Take: Bless is a better first-turn play than attacking, at every level of the game. The Paladin is a melee fighter. The instinct is to wade in swinging. The correct play in any fight lasting more than two rounds is to spend your first action on Bless, giving three party members +1d4 to every attack roll and save for the entire fight. A Fighter with Bless and four attacks per turn generates statistically more damage per turn than your attack plus a smite. Casting Bless first multiplies everyone else's offense instead of sacrificing your own.

Hot Take: Spirit Guardians is a stronger spell for the Paladin than the Cleric in pure combat scenarios. The Cleric runs Spirit Guardians from the back and tries to stay alive. The Paladin runs Spirit Guardians and actively charges the densest cluster of enemies on purpose. Their heavy armor, high HP, and Lay on Hands mean they can absorb the focus fire that comes with being the most dangerous thing on the battlefield. The Paladin's melee identity fits Spirit Guardians' proximity requirement better than any other class in the game.

Hot Take: Maim (The Old Margreve) competes with your party's entire martial damage ceiling, not with Divine Smite. If the target is resistant to the party's main weapon damage type, one landed Maim can outperform several smites by making everyone else's attacks matter again. That is exactly the kind of spell Paladins should care about: not more personal damage, but damage multiplication.

Hot Take: Feed the Forest (The Old Margreve) is both mandatory and bad. In a Margreve campaign using the forest's spellcasting penalty, your Paladin may need it to keep CHA-based saves and spell attacks functional. Outside that setting rule, it is dead text. That makes it a campaign tax, not a build-around spell.

Hot Take: Luminous Smite (Labyrinth Worldbook) is the Labyrinth Paladin spell that actually clears the smite test. Extra damage is not enough by itself. The party-facing payoff is what makes it worth preparing.

Hot Take: Castigation Glyph (Labyrinth Worldbook) is more Paladin than most direct damage spells. A good Paladin spell does not just hurt enemies; it forces enemies to make bad moral and tactical choices.

Hot Take: Radiant Smite (Player's Guide 2) is the new default "I want to hit things with holy consequences" spell. It is simple, direct, and much easier to explain than the Paladin player spreadsheet titled Definitely Not Just Smiting Again.

Hot Take: Deadly Weapon (Player's Guide 2) is a Paladin spell for players who understand that personal damage is only one kind of damage. Making the party's biggest weapon user crit harder is still your violence. You outsourced it responsibly.

Hot Take: Aura of Mercy (Player's Guide 2) and Aura of Order (Player's Guide 2) are the real PG2 Paladin identity spells. They make your exact position matter every round, which is what Paladin magic should do.

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Final Notes

The Paladin's spell list is a scalpel, not a toolkit. You know fewer spells than any other spellcasting class and every slot competes with Divine Smite. Every learned spell should pass the smite test: does this do more than 2d8-5d8 radiant on a guaranteed hit? If not, smite instead.

The spells that pass that test consistently are the ones that shape an entire fight rather than one hit: Bless, Spirit Guardians, Hold, Aid, Death Ward. These spells create conditions that make every subsequent action in the fight better, for you and for your whole party. That is the Paladin's magic identity: force multiplication, not independent power.

Aura of Protection at 6th level changes your party's save math permanently. Position yourself to include as many allies as possible in that 10-foot radius during save-intensive encounters. Your spellcasting is powerful; your passive features are often more powerful still.

The Old Margreve additions do not rewrite Paladin spell selection. They add side doors: Bleed for long slashing-weapon fights, Heart-Seeking Arrow for ranged burst, Maim for party-wide martial payoff, and a few Margreve-specific tools when the forest itself is part of the campaign. Use them when they clear the smite test; ignore them when they are just flavorful.

The Labyrinth Worldbook additions are strongest when they reinforce your frontline job. Luminous Smite, Vengeful Smite, Golden Bull, and Castigation Glyph are the spells to test first. Feed the Worms, Spectral Wall, and Wield Soul are campaign tools; learn them when the dungeon, tone, or map makes them matter.

Player's Guide 2 gives Paladins better low-circle riders and stronger party-positioning spells. Radiant Smite, Sapping Smite, Deadly Weapon, Shadow Guardians, Aura of Mercy, Aura of Order, and Feathered Flock are the additions to test first. The best of them are not just bigger smites; they make the whole formation harder to beat.

For more on the Paladin's class mechanics, subclass features, and combat role, see the full Paladin class guide.

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For the class and circle index, return to the Tales of the Valiant Spell Guides.

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