Magic shield effects

[Finalgenesis]

I have a questions regarding shields:

If you have a commander wearing dual shield say, Eye shield + Accursed shield.

A) When enemy attacks and you *dodge*, do any shield effect apply? (Guess: No)

B) When enemy attacks and you *parry*, do all effects on both shields apply? (horror mark + blind)

C) When enemy attacks and hits, do any shield effect applies? (Guess: No)

D) Do shield effect such as blind hit 100% with no MR roll? Do they apply to parrying arrows or parryable projectiles?

E) For vine shield, I know that attackers gets tangle before the strike can hit you, is this effect a MR check on attacker? I ask because I know spells like vine arrow and vine whip is 100% entangle no matter what.

[Psycho]

A) Yes
B) Yes
C) Yes
D) Blind is 100% hit, MR check, no effect of archers
E) Vine shield is MR check

[Gregstrom]

E) I'm pretty sure there's no MR check on the Vine Shield, or it'd be useless against thugs/SCs. There's a STR check to clear the vines once they're on you, IIRC, but that still means you miss a round of attacks.

[RadicalTurnip]

Originally Posted by Psycho

A) Yes
B) Yes
C) Yes
D) Blind is 100% hit, MR check, no effect of archers
E) Vine shield is MR check

To be clear, Blind does not hit 100% of the time, but it checks against MR 100% of the time, and every time it succeeds, it hits.

[Finalgenesis]

Thanks for all the answers! I do wonder on the vine shield though, cause it always activate then wouldn't it mean your would never get hit? I ask because I read about the trick with vine whip, where you can keep a lone SC locked down with the 100% hit vine until the turn limit runs out and SC dies, since even if his STR is super high he still needs a turn to break it, and a new vine entangle is applied every turn.

[Gregstrom]

Vine shield only activates when you're attacked, so it effectively means the guy attacking you only gets to attack every other round.

[Finalgenesis]

Ah I see! I always thought the vine entangles before an attack hits for some reason.

[Psycho]

A lot of misinformation in this thread. Let me try to clarify:
- Eye shield's effect is MR negating
- Vine shield's effect is MR negating
- Both effects are checked for each melee attacker on the target
- Both effects are checked before hit (so entanglement from vine shield prevents the hit to occur and losing the second eye from eye shield pretty much also prevents the hit to occur)

[Finalgenesis]

Hmmm it is true that I observed that not all troops that attack a vine shielded commander gets entangled, so MR check sounds reasonable.

Meaning against high morale low resistance troops vine shield is good.

against low morale high resistance troops gleaming gold shield works better. Fear would also amplify it, as with access to large scale fear effect like blood rain. Though against undead vine shield is a clear winner...

Thanks, learned quite a bit from this thread!

[Psycho]

If you are comparing vine and gold shields, I'd say that gold shield has a better overall value.

You would prefer vine shield for troops with MR lower than moral - undead, ulmish troops, animals (monkeys). On the plus side compared with gold shield, it disables the target for at least two rounds as opposed to one. A niche combo can be achieved with evening star which reduces target strength on hit (no MR check), thus making it harder to release from vines.

Gold shield is better for troops where moral is lower than MR - that is usually more elite troops and thugs. Most thugs (Van, Eriu and the like) have 17-18 MR, but 14-15 moral. In addition it has much better parry and protection values, so it's overall more useful. Plus it needs 1 gem less to forge and needs less valuable gems (fire and earth compared to nature). There is the synergy with fear as well.