POLL: Scales, Magic Paths, and Dominion

[Velusion]

Szumo said:
Dominion result surpised me. It seem i'm the only one who selected 7, which is the absolute minimum i'll choose, and everyone else thinks you can take even lower :S

As someone who almost selected 3 (but settled on 4) I think it's possible (though rare) to create a competitive nation with a relatively low dominion under the right circumstances if you go for a good bless and lots of money bonuses to crank out lots of temples.

However, typically I never go below 5 though and usually stick with between 6-7.

[Ironhawk]

I'm amazed that people think Astral is the best 9-path to use on a Pretender. I admit that its exceptionally useful and powerful but the risk of your opponent getting a lucky Mind Duel victory, IMO, outweighs any of that value when comparing one path to another.

[Nikolai]

Dueling a S9 is a far shot. Impossible with less than S3, and not worth I think. Pythium, Rlyeh, maybe Arco? Who would waste S3s on a 10% chance?

I often take S4 or S5 with my god, and just use it to hilt early, then keep him/her hidden and casting. If I had native S9, I would not worry about duel AT ALL.

By the way, my friend says it is impossible with less than S4, and with S4, the best you can hope is murder/suicide. Is that true?

[Lazy_Perfectionist]

Sunray's Virtual Library

# Magic Duel : each side gets to add his astral skill to a (not open ended) d6. Ties result in the death of both mages.
A +3 differential gives you a 1 to 6 odd. +5 gives you a 100% chance of killing the opponent but you still die about 3% of the time, and you have to be 6 levels higher to always win and never die.
Magic Duels use base astral levels, spells and items do not seem to have any influence.
There is no saving throw. This is an area effect spell (1 square), so you better disperse your astral mages. Mages without astral magic are unaffected.

4+d6 -> 5 to 10
9+d6 -> 10 to 15

[Ironhawk]

Lazy_Perfectionist said:
4+d6 -> 5 to 10
9+d6 -> 10 to 15

Ah! Didnt know that Mind Duel was NOT open ended. Huh, unusual to find something not OE in the dom world.

[Velusion]

Ironhawk said:

Ah! Didnt know that Mind Duel was NOT open ended. Huh, unusual to find something not OE in the dom world.

Also - in larger games being able to cast Arcane Nexus and Wish is very, very handy.

[thejeff]

But you still don't need 9S to cast Arcane Nexus or Wish. That's what boosters are for.

Do people really take 9 in any path for any reason other than the bless?

[SelfishGene]

I should have but forgot to add a poll for the least powerful 9-path as far as casting/rituals/globals go. Many off the off-paths like Nature and Earth can summon large numbers of effecient troops if you have high magic in that particular path.

Generally though i'd say 9-Water or 9-Nature are the least useful 9 paths you could take as far as non-bless strategies go; except that, without some Water, you'll miss a way to easily enter the sea, and having that 9-Water is a great gurantee for an easy late game solution. 9-Nature is kind of less impressive but there are at least 3 great Nature globals. 9-Fire or 9-Air are less useful global spells, but even they have some pretty impressive if rare globals; and both are excellent at battle magic.

[DrPraetorious]

Thetis blessing is a sick joke, and in MP I found exactly one use for it.

I cast it and let R'lyeh think I was using it to survive under water (I wasn't, I had enough WB items to keep everyone alive). He wasted some huge number of astral pearls bringing it down after I cast it at minimum strength .

That was a pretty unusual circumstance, however. The spell is basically a trap for the unwary.