Wind of Death useful?

[MaxWilson]

Does Wind of Death have any real utility in the game without using Penetration items? +4 to MR might be okay on Master Enslave, where you get some utility out of the few units that fail to resist, but Decay is a weak enough effect that I suspect the spell is useful only against animals, or with a Rune Smasher + Spell Focus.

-Max

[Wish]

it seems to get about a third of the army, unenhanced. (in my experience)

[PvK]

Decay is a weak effect?

[Wish]

it used to guarantee death at the end of combat (in dom 2), i dunno if it still does that for those who retreat - but it does sure make folks retreat like crazy.

[Rathar]

I am avidly trying to use it asap in a MP game at the moment.

I shall do my best to remember this thread and let ya know how it went!

Rathar

[MaxWilson]

Hmmm, perhaps I'll have to reevaluate my opinion of decay (and of that Corpse Candle shield). I ran a quick test with Wind of Death against 30 or so Marverni and as far as I could tell affected none of them, but that might have been a fluke. You say it makes them retreat? Does it force a morale check, as if decay were a wound? That might make it worth loading up on the penetration items for.

-Max

[Shovah32]

Im not sure about retreats but decay isnt exactly a weak effect. If they retreat thats great but, in the case of regular troops, it would be better if they DONT retreat. They gain 5 years of age every battle turn they are decayed meaning that provided the battle goes on for long enough all the affected units(who dont have some crazily high old age requirement) will be crippled beyond belief.

[jutetrea]

Would the effects of Wind of Death stack with a D-9 bless? There was an earlier post about affliction chance, etc and this may be good synergy or just a waste, unsure.

[MaxWilson]

I'll check it later on, but I don't see how it could stack if Wind of Death doesn't do hit-point damage. 450% of zero is still zero. It would be really wicked if it did stack, though.

-Max

[Wish]

i've played with it some, and it definitely causes a morale check every time they age.

[Shovah32]

in that case: Wind of death+wailing winds=fun http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/images/smilies/happy.gif

[Loren]

A while back I used this spell to considerable effect. I was playing against the AI and decided to try something. I was being seiged by an army of about 1100 units. I had enough food from kettles and they couldn't hurt my walls but I probably would have lost in open combat.

My pretender could throw the spell with ease. I put Armor of Virtue on him, put him at the back of the battlefield and scripted him to cast it a couple of times and then retreat. I repeated this attack more than once. The armor got me out a couple of times and a couple more times I retreated. I whittled that army down to a couple of hundred units but for some reason I couldn't do anything more to them.

[Wish]

probably the 100 or so units with enough mr to not worry about wind of death

[vfb]

The manual says that if you give the order to Break Siege, but then retreat, your units die instead of being returned to the fortress (p69).

Loren, was your pretender attacking from outside the castle, or was he inside doing a "break siege"? It would be useful to know if the manual was wrong about this.

[Wish]

whatever the manual says, if you retreat from ab reak seige (from inside the castle) you route to neighboring provinces. you only die if no such province exists.

[Baalz]

Question, if I break a siege on my capital with my immortal pretender, and he dies, does he continue to attack the sieging force every turn, or does he respawn inside the castle?

[Wish]

inside

[Loren]

vfb said:
The manual says that if you give the order to Break Siege, but then retreat, your units die instead of being returned to the fortress (p69).

Loren, was your pretender attacking from outside the castle, or was he inside doing a "break siege"? It would be useful to know if the manual was wrong about this.



Attacking from the outside.

[Wish]

nono, thats if they die and are recalled by priests. I am pretty sure immortals re-appear inside.

(I could be wrong, haven't tested)