Is Ghost Riders too powerful ?

[apoger]

>Games are (or ought to be) long over before you can cast a level 9 - especially since most take serious empowerment.

A long time ago I used to think like that. Then someone hit my army with Master Enslave. You can play a long way with little or no magic... but if someone gets some funky research done, they can ruin your day.

I'm not saying that everyone should take tons of magic. What I'm saying is that as a game goes long, you have to start worrying about the possibility that your enemies may whip some nasty stuff out of nowhere.

[ January 07, 2004, 01:42: Message edited by: apoger ]

[Graeme Dice]

Originally posted by apoger:
I'm not saying that everyone should take tons of magic. What I'm saying is that as a game goes long, you have to start worrying about the possibility that your enemies may whip some nasty stuff out of nowhere.

Remember also that even an astral 1 mage can cast master enslave if he has a full load of gems. The AI is pretty good about not wasting them on armies you can defeat easily either. Give him a spell focus or rune smasher for good measure to boost it's effectiveness.

[apoger]

>Remember also that even an astral 1 mage can cast master enslave if he has a full load of gems.

Um...no.

Sadly it looks like gem usage is not explained well (at all) in the new rule book. At least I can't find it.

In Dom1 a mage can only spend one gem per level of skill. I appears that this holds true in Dom2 as well.

You need very potent mages to cast the serious spells. Beyond even the skill and gems you must account for fatigue from the spell. If a spell will take you over 200 fatigue it will not cast, since this would endanger the mages health.

[Graeme Dice]

Originally posted by apoger:
You need very potent mages to cast the serious spells. Beyond even the skill and gems you must account for fatigue from the spell. If a spell will take you over 200 fatigue it will not cast, since this would endanger the mages health.

Then I'll amend my statement to say that an astral 6 void lord with a starshine skullcap and a ring of sorcery can cast master enslave.

[apoger]

>Then I'll amend my statement to say that an astral 6 void lord with a starshine skullcap and a ring of sorcery can cast master enslave.


Sorry, try again.

Such a mage would have the skill but would not be able to eat the fatigue... all 800 points worth. Since the spell needs 8 gems and the mage is skill-8 you have no way to lessen the problem.

You either need more skill or need a communion.
Communion is the most common way to pull of Master Enslave, as the fatigue cost is staggering.

[Jasper]

Originally posted by Keir Maxwell:
What? A 9th level spell overpowered? In all my PBEM and SP play in Dom1 and 2 I've never got to cast a 9th level spell. If I ever do I hope its seriously overpowered!

Never? Strange... I found games with shifting alliances to often Last longer. The Last game I played with 6 players on a small map had enough resources to research to 9, despite resource depleting global spells. It wasn't a terribly fast game, but it wasn't slow either, with constant warfare for me from before turn 20.

I'm curious, do you tend to play on small maps with permanent alliances? That's the only way I can imagine games consistently having such low research.

Bigger maps with more players inevitably Last long enough to see high level research, in my experience.

[Jasper]

I should clarify the previous post is for Dom 1. I'm not sure how research plays out in competitive practice for Dom 2, as waiting for the patch before considering joining a game.