Summons

[Ragnars Wolves]

i just read Baal'z guide again and have a couple of pretty dumb questions (even for me) and 1 that makes sense. Starting with the dumb ones...

1. everyone keeps saying that you can't change the order of the units...I have no idea what that means. Does that mean when you go into the battle setup If you have 2 enaries then your pretender then 10 more enaries in that order, then you can only have a communion with 2 slaves (assuming the Pretender is the master)?

If so, how would you change the order (it says you can't), so is it all luck, If it is then a lot of folks are luckier than hell.


2. let us assume I AM lucky and have 8 enaries above my pretender. I make all 8 slaves and my pretender the master (so far so good if I am understanding it right). Now, I have another 4 AFTER my Pretender on the list (and this is important to me if I do a reverse communion), If I make THEM slaves will they help soak up the Fatigue. Since they can't cast spells once my pretender would and they are slaves...it would seem they could.

If I do a reverse and have all 8 enaries casting and my pretender soaking up the fatigue...will the extra 4 under him help so he doesn't die?

If I have it all screwed up, I am sorry. If I could just figure this out ONCE and know for SURE what happens. then I would be ok in this game.

Thanks for putting up with a question i am sure you have heard 1000 times...

[rdonj]

1)Only the 2 enaries above the pretender can be slaves and ALSO CAST, assuming the pretender is casting spells. ALL enaries would still be slaves, just most could not cast spells on turns that the pretender also casts.

2) Yes, they would all soak fatigue. You can't have 2 communions in the same battle, so all slaves would share the spellcasting fatigues... yes, that would help your pretender not die.

[GrudgeBringer]

Ok you just said something that may put things in order for me...

You said that most of the enaries could not cast spells (only the 2 above him)when your pretender cast.

OK...What if I only want my Pretender to cast 1 spell (say Fire storm). Fatigue is soaked up by the rest. Now second round I want enaries to cast and Pretender to soak up fatigue (lets not worry if it would kill the pretender or not as I am just trying to figure something out). Can ALL of the enaries cast if they want too if the pretender doesn't as he is the master?

[thejeff]

Just to clarify, since it seems you might be confused, in a reverse communion you still have 1 master (or a few) and many slaves. It's just that the purpose of the masters is to case path booster spells to raise the slaves' effective levels.
So when you say, "have all 8 enaries casting and my pretender soaking up the fatigue", that implies 8 enarie masters and the pretender as a slave which is not how you want to do it.
In that situation, I'd put all the enaries as slaves, the pretender as master, have him cast PotS, putting each enarie at 2S3D2N. Only those before him will cast. They will also absorb fatigue from anything he casts.
I'd also probably cast LotNS, depending on who you're fighting, and Summon Earthpower to help with everyone's fatigue if your pretender has Earth.

[thejeff]

Grudge: I don't think you can do what you want, though the answer to your actual question is "yes".

If he's powerful enough to cast Fire Storm without the communion, he could cast it, then cast Communion Slave, but with multiple masters and only 1 slave he'd die very quickly.
If I understand correctly, you want the pretender to act as master for 1 round to cast Fire storm, then become a slave. That can't be done.
You could have the pretender as master to boost him enough to cast firestorm and then have him not cast, which would let the other mages cast, though he wouldn't absorb their fatigue. Getting him to not cast is slightly tricky. You could retreat him. If he's thug material he could attack, or you could give him a bow and order him to
fire.
Either way, I'd probably have him cast PotS first. +1 to all the slaves paths is probably worth a round of casting.