List of Spells?

[MaxWilson]

vfb said:
Banefire Aura does give the Decay effect, on units striking the Poison Golem.

Good to know. That's a lot nicer than the puny damage. It looks like a Poison Golem has a legitimate use for Boots of the Crane.

-Max

[vfb]

Well, Sandals of the Crane aren't that great for it, since he'll probably not end up next to units. They need to hit (not necessarily damage) the golem to get the Decay effect.

Poison Golems benefit more from regular winged boots, or maybe Boots of the Planes -- is that what you meant? The additional mobility is nice for navigating around in enemy territory.

Decay is not really super-spectacular in melee. It takes too long to kick in any damaging effects. It's a nice side effect if you've equipped fear items and some decayed elite units flee the battlefield. But if you want your Golem to live he'll need to dish out some real AOE damage in addition to his aura.

[MaxWilson]

My thought was that since Decay doesn't kill them immediately, it's not real useful for an SC since he kills the chaff around him anyway. Relatively few units will age to death, most of them will die to his sword. My next thought was that that's not true if you use Boots of the Crane.

The thought after that should have been that Boots of the Behemoth would work just as well, but I didn't get that far.

-Max

[Tifone]

vfb said:
[...]They need to hit (not necessarily damage) the golem to get the Decay effect.

Don't think so at all. In my last game SP I made a (bad but funny) use of a Monolith Armor giving it to my poison golem. All the sorrounding little units were just taking the damage - but I have serious doubts they were hitting him (surely not damaging).

P.S I also used the Sandals of the Crane I think, or the ones of the Planes, one of those 2 but I don't remember exactly).

Peace

[JimMorrison]

Definitely makes me want to try out a Poison Golem. Gear him in a way to get the least possible defense - don't even bother with Charcoal or Eye shield. Obviously, this won't do so well against enemies with long lifespans - choose your targets wisely!

[vfb]

Tifone said:

Don't think so at all. In my last game SP I made a (bad but funny) use of a Monolith Armor giving it to my poison golem. All the sorrounding little units were just taking the damage - but I have serious doubts they were hitting him (surely not damaging).

That's exactly what I mean. The attacker has to win the 'Attack roll versus Defense roll' to get whacked with the aura. It doesn't matter what the result of the 'Damage versus Protection' roll is. It's actually pretty easy to hit the golem because the defense is low, and that's a good thing for the golem for the purposes of triggering the aura.

The attacker gets an MR check versus the Decay effect.

Also, if the attacker has mirror images, they can get 'hit' instead by the banefire effect, meaning the attacker doesn't take the banefire damage. (I just happened to do my testing against units with mirror image).

JimMorrison said:
Definitely makes me want to try out a Poison Golem. Gear him in a way to get the least possible defense - don't even bother with Charcoal or Eye shield. Obviously, this won't do so well against enemies with long lifespans - choose your targets wisely!

Well, you do want protection. You don't want defense. A 'shield hit' counts as a hit for triggering the auras. So you are actually better off wielding a Charcoal Shield than nothing, since it lowers your defense by 1. Also you'll take less damage because of the 'shield hits', and the auras stack.

The Decay effect really is not that powerful. But Poison Golems overall are pretty durable and nasty, so I think they are a cost-effective summon.

If your enemy is refusing to come out of his castle and play, then sitting a Poison Golem outside the gates is a nice incentive for him to do something other than just party on inside the walls. (Assuming he's affected by disease, or cares about the pop level of the province.)

[Tifone]

I know SP games don't give a valid image of what could be the actual strenght of some tactic - one could be easily counterable but the AI just doesn't know it.

But, just to say, in my last SP large map all nations game the Poison Golem Idro was at the top of the Hall of Fame with some thousands of kills, having taken 3 or 4 nations all by himself with the obvious exception of the castles.

He just fell attacking more than a thousand Marverni chaff army - when the enemy was already routed, he died for turn limit. - (Now NTJedi if you are reading, don't gloat ^_^ I still like this mechanic as it is. I would just have needed more firepower, period. Somewhat annoying maybe but surely fair)

[Tifone]

@ vfb,

ah right. Yes, I now see you're true. Thanks for clarification.
Btw, can I ask you another thing? In another thread (a guide of you) you suggested me to place a Poison Golem outside the enemy castle to have him healed - I have yet to try - I'm not even at home now so I can't too - but does it really work? I think being the Poison Golem lifeless has some role in it

[vfb]

If there is a lab in the castle and you siege the castle with a 'never heals' magic being, like a Gargoyle, then your unit will be healed. I don't mean afflictions get healed, just your HP.

But actually, Poison Golems don't have this tag, I thought they did. So there's no need to worry about healing them after combat, their HP comes back all by itself.

Now I've got to go find that other thread!