Feeble minded

[Executor]

I just had a very VERY powerful Mandaha go feeble minded with no apparent reason so,
is there perhaps some site that makes units feeble minded that I am not aware of or some other way to gain this awful affliction? (not old age)

[rdonj]

My first guess would be nether darts?

[vfb]

Oath Rod of Kurgi, maybe. Either one of your other units wielding it, or an enemy scout trying to sabotage your mages. It feebleminds units (friendly and enemy) in the same province, but not the wielder.

[Gandalf Parker]

Isnt that what the Black Bow does also? or some bow.

[Tifone]

But for the Black Bow of Botulf the Mandaha should have been hit in battle and with "no apparent reason" I suppose he's sure he wasn't hit by anything in battle ;)

[archaeolept]

if no nether darts or black bows in the battle, and he wasn't hit, the most likely answer is the oath rod, which can be an awesome stealth harrassment attack. Any unit in the same province as the unit carrying the rod has a reasonably good chance to become feebleminded.

[Executor]

Dammit it is the oath rod, I missed that. Of all the possible mages and commanders in that province...

I like to use it in combination with horror harmonica or twin spear. From my experience works best on sorceress. Cast ritual of returning and script mistform and horror mark/call horror during the battle. Pretty nice actually

Thanks vfb.

[Micah]

oath rod doesn't bother enemy units.

[Executor]

I really don't see a use for it other than to direct a stream of horrors in a battle.
And for that matter does it have a MR check?

[vfb]

Thanks Micah! I did not know the Oath Rod province-feeblemind effect was friendly fire only. How disappointing! :shock: :)

As far as using it in battle goes, it looks like the Feeblemind effect is not unresistable:

318 striking with weapon Oath Rod. att26 def23
hitloc Slave Prince strikes Ice Devil wl4 diff-2 -> 4
hitunit 318 252 dmg5 spec3 ba4
damage 15 on Ice Devil, spec0x3 ba4
hitloc Slave Prince strikes Ice Devil wl0 diff1 -> 2
hitunit 318 252 dmg33554432 spec131072 ba2
ustatbox unr252 sel0xbfad226c

[Micah]

Yeah, I did a lot of testing with it for Artifacts since I started with it. The bearer is immune to it, but the best use I found for the thing is running it into a pile of enemies and hoping they pick it up (after casting as many marks out of it as possible.) Certainly not worth forging.

[Executor]

Depends, I could name a couple of far less useful uniques.