Common wisdom says that direct-damage blasting is a suboptimal route for high-tier casters. Damage that doesn’t kill leaves an enemy at full capacity for hurting you or your allies, plenty of low-tier classes can only deal damage, and tend to have an easier time dealing it than a caster does, most direct-damage spells are pretty poor, and so on. There are a lot of reasons to avoid blasting altogether as a caster.
However, it’s worth noting that, at the high end, sorcerer blasting is pretty terrifying and extremely reliable, even by the standards of high-tier, high-optimization builds (see the Mailman). Immunity to HP damage or death thereby is extremely rare, after all, and immunity to being dead just doesn’t exist. And the sorcerer is well-placed to do it really well, what with access to the Sor/Wiz list plus arcane spellsurge. At this point, you’re not handing out damage, you’re handing out death.
So good sorcerer blasting is very all-or-nothing: either you kill, or your blasting was a bad idea in the first place. Much better to apply some very-debilitating condition than to deal a bunch of damage that won’t actually kill. Even if an ally mops up the remainder before the enemy gets to go, that’s an entire turn the ally didn’t spend dealing with a different threat.
Now, if you do want to go the blasting route, do you want to know a bunch of attack spells? No. Knowing any at all basically means you’re “specializing” in it, relative to most sorcerers. You build your blasting on one or two key, excellent spells, not on knowing a bunch of different blasts. That would be pointless and redundant.
Because that is something that is always true of every sorcerer: you do not want redundant spells. You get an extremely limited number of spells known. Your total spells known is, in fact, very similar to the spells a wizard gets to prepare every day, but where he’s only got to worry about his spells being useful for the next 24 hours or so, you have to make sure they’re pulling their weight for the rest of your life.
So no, under no circumstances do you want a “lot” of blasting spells. You may want a “few” blasting spells (like literally 1-3), but even if you specialize in blasting, you still shouldn’t know too many direct-damage spells; a few well-chosen spells should be quite sufficient. You need the remaining spells known to ensure your mobility, battlefield control, versatility, defenses, and so forth. And if you’ve chosen your blasting spells well, there should be no reason to use a different one.
Personally, I’d probably get some lesser orb at low level, swap it out at 8th or 6th (or the last even Sorcerer level I took), get a real orb at 8th, and only get another once I hit the orb’s Caster Level cap. That is, if I was actively trying to be a blaster. If not, I’d be fairly likely to not bother with any at all.
Yep, they definitely can
Looking at the 3rd Edition Forgotten Realms Sourcebook Faiths and Pantheons, we get this as a listed Salient Ability that a god may have (i.e. a "things a god may be able to do because they are a god")
Divine Spellcasting:
The deity can cast spells whose effective level is above 9th. The number of spells per day the deity can cast of each spell level above 9th depends on the deity’s key ability score for spell-casting classes in which the deity has achieved 20th level
Following is a table listing the required ability scores for the deity to have spell slots up to 25th Level. With a note that says
Even though the table only includes ability scores up to 61 and spell slots up to 25th level, the progression continues infinitely in both directions. For ability scores beyond 61, or for spell slots above 25th level, expand the table to follow the same patterns as shown.
The can be found transcribed in the 3.5e SRD
I would also add, however, that deities don't have to use spells to achieve supernatural feats if they don't want to. Another Salient Ability available to them is...
Alter Reality
This ability is similar to the wish spell. The deity merely thinks of something and then makes it so.
This is not the deity casting Wish...it does not come with the restrictions or perils that a mortal wielding the Wish spell are saddled with. This is a god altering reality because they are a god who is able to do that. (This is still a drain on their power and requires them to rest after using it...which is why gods aren't constantly doing this. But, y'know...when a Cleric prays for a Miracle and something not replicable by a spell happens? This is probably what the god did.)
Spellcasting is a god electing to use the interface created by Mystryl/Mystra that let mortals safely interact with magic.
Suddenly, rather than magic being restricted to just the deities, any creature with the talent or training could draw upon the power of magic through the Weave.
Magic of Faerun p.4
Deities were perfectly capable of wielding magic before The Weave existed--it's a useful interface that some of them choose to interact with, but they can manifest magical effects because they are gods--they don't need The Weave to do it.
Best Answer
It's a third edition concept which might exist only in a world's history.
Epic magic is an idea which dates to earlier editions of the game, and which isn't available to player characters in fifth edition (yet, at least). However, it is something which canonically existed in many worlds, such as the Forgotten Realms. How it exists or existed in a 5e campaign is largely a matter of setting-specific history.
The general concept of epic magic is that it's a form of magic which is not limited to the level 0-9 range of normal spells. When you wield epic magic, you're weaving the raw components of magic together, in ways which can even exceed the power of ninth level spells.
The idea goes back to Bruce Cordell the 1997 AD&D 2nd edition sourcebook College of Wizardry, which introduced the concept of the Language Primeval or Aleph, a sort of ancient language of magic. Complete understanding of this form allows one to construct words and sentences which have magical effect. The sense is that when you hear legends of wizards of long ago who wielded seemingly godlike levels of power exceeding even ninth level spells, this ancient form of magic is what they were using. It has since become a forgotten lore.
The third edition Epic Level Handbook, not concidentally written in part by Bruce Cordell, revives this idea in the form of epic spells, a form of spellcasting which is not bound by the constraints of spell levels. Epic spells are constructed by combining basic "seeds" or magical concepts. The power of an epic spell is only limited by the caster's skill with magic. Since the Epic Level Handbook allowed characters to exceed 20th level, this allowed players to wield spells of practically unlimited power.
D&D 5th edition doesn't allow player characters to exceed 20th level, so if epic spells existed in the world, it would be generally beyond the ability of anyone to cast. However, in settings with continuity of storyline between editions, such as the Forgotten Realms, epic level magic is something which definitely existed in the past, and has merely become unavailable to modern heroes.
How exactly epic magic appears in any given D&D setting will vary: