Alexander's ever-expanding Tome of Knowledge

[Peter Ebbesen]

alexti said:
Oops, Peter Ebbesen's post I was replying to has disappeared... I guess he's realized how I scripted them.

Yes, sorry about that. I wrote a long post, then realised that I was dead wrong under the right circumstances, i.e. slaves placed right in the line of fire. I still think Hydra Skin Armour is a poor choice due to fatigue issues, but that does not invalidate your strategy.

You might want to add to your original post the point about how the slaves get activated and actually fight. Since many people use communion slaves in the rear row, the most common experience is that they do nothing at all no matter how you script them.

[alexti]

Peter Ebbesen said:

Yes, sorry about that. I wrote a long post, then realised that I was dead wrong under the right circumstances, i.e. slaves placed right in the line of fire. I still think Hydra Skin Armour is a poor choice due to fatigue issues, but that does not invalidate your strategy.

Fatigue management needs to be tailored to the custom situation. If the enemy has a lot of living troops fatigue problem doesn't exist due to soul vortex and life-draining weapons. With masters going into melee the usual fatigue issues of communion disappear, so slaves suffer fatigue only from their own spells. There're several ways to deal with situation: have a slave scripted to relief (uncertain after round 5), minimize encumbrance, wear reinvigortion items (rainbow armor is a primary candidate to replace hydra skin),script slaves to 5 spells and attack. It is also possible to ignore the problem. Without masters casting, slaves only need to deal with their own fatigue, which starts to restore after it gets over 100. With Tartarian staying power and multiple aura effects, falling unconcious for few turns may not be a big deal, especially when different slaves use different strategies. And the only reason for hydra skin was to provide regeneration vs non-resistable damage, so if it doesn't work it should not be used.

Peter Ebbesen said:
You might want to add to your original post the point about how the slaves get activated and actually fight. Since many people use communion slaves in the rear row, the most common experience is that they do nothing at all no matter how you script them.

Thanks, I've added explanation about that to my original post.

Actually, I think placing communion slaves in the back is impractical in many regular communions as well. Spellcasting slaves can add quite a bit of firepower, so in many situations I'd place them to have enemies within the range of spells I'd like to use.

[Zooko]

Regarding "we walk in shadows": I don't understand the point of putting three Groups of two units each in the square directly in front of the mage. Why not instead do the thing that you want done: a squad of two units in the same square as the mage, a squad of three units in the square in front of the mage, and a squad of three units in the square south of the mage?

Or for that matter, why not just make a squad of 8 units and put it right on top of the mage?

[Wendigo]

Zooko said:
Regarding "we walk in shadows": I don't understand the point of putting three Groups of two units each in the square directly in front of the mage. Why not instead do the thing that you want done: a squad of two units in the same square as the mage, a squad of three units in the square in front of the mage, and a squad of three units in the square south of the mage?

Or for that matter, why not just make a squad of 8 units and put it right on top of the mage?

Both your suggestion & Pocus are valid, yet for different targets.

Body ethereal is area 1 (1 square), thus you can etherealize Groups of 3x size2 infantry as you suggest, or Groups of 2x size3 horse, such as knights.

A different issue is whether to group everybody together or use small Groups. Both options have advantages & disadvantages (higher morale for a big group, but also higher loses & when you fail a check everybody is gone, which might result in an army rout).
One further reason in favour of using small Groups as Pocus suggests is that you have more control over battlefield placement (which is important to get everybody etherealized), when you stick a bunch of leaders in the same place as a unit (say, 3 mages & 24 troopers) they do not always end in the exact center, and if they are not well placed some of the soldiers might be out of range. Using multiple small units increases the micromanagement exponentially however.

[Nagot Gick Fel]

Wendigo said:
when you stick a bunch of leaders in the same place as a unit (say, 3 mages & 24 troopers) they do not always end in the exact center

True, the trick is not dumping the leaders on the same square. Try this:

Code:

---

     +-------------------+

     |       +---+       |

     |       |   |       |

     |       +---+       |

     |       +---+       |

     |       |   |       |

     |       +---+       |

     |       +---+       |

     |       |   |       |

     |       +---+       |

     +-------------------+

---

Big square = 24 Inf squad
Small squares = 1 etherealizer each

Always worked for me so far.

[Edit: for this to work, each leader must be at least 1 tile away from the battlefield edges]