Can a Mage be Both Communion Slave *and* Master?

[Meglobob]

I don't know the answer to that.

I do know if you try to be clever and have slaves/masters all casting every round, then by the end of the battle you will have alot of dead mages!

After killing several groups of 8 and 16 mages using communion slave/master, I give up on it!

I would just use communion slave/master in extreme emergency when you desperately need a certain high level spell and expect to lose the mages.

Fatigue = mage killer

[carlosib]

I used lots of communions in my last game and i learned that you have to take in consideration the objective of the communion at the moment of the setup. Communions are rather flexible and they allow some nice strategies, but if you lose the focus and try to cast a bit more than it can handle, then you can have some nasty results.
Just one word of advice, to get it right and dont lose a game to a bad planned communion always try it before in a SP test game. You'll be surprised of how many times you'll blow it just for a little detail and be glad you didnt test it in a MP game.
(I've been hours trying to setup communions to cast Fog Warriors and Doom + Bone Grinding x 2 as Ermor)

[MaxWilson]

Meglobob said:
I would just use communion slave/master in extreme emergency when you desperately need a certain high level spell and expect to lose the mages.

Fatigue = mage killer

I have found that regenerating mages have surprisingly high resilience in Communions (although they sometimes pick up afflictions too). Instead of regaining 5 fatigue per round, they effectively regain 5 + (regener * 10) fatigue per round because 1 HP = 10 fatigue. At least, that's what I remember, although I'm not at home to check. I'd probably try this with C'tis, and have one lizard shaman master cast Personal Regeneration while a bunch of Sauromancers used them as living batteries.

Regenerating personal guards + Soul Vortex works, too. I've done this as LA Agartha with sepulchrals (and DrPraetorius' undead blessing hotfix).

-Max

[thejeff]

Not quite that simple, I don't think.

They only get the benefit of the regen once they hit 200 fatigue and start taking damage. And while, 1hp = 1 fatigue, that's rounded up, so after 200 fatigue they'll take 1 hp for every spell cast. Since slave mages tend to be normal humans, they'll only have ~10 hp and thus regen 2 max. It'll help, but much less than having a master cast Summon Earthpower or an Earth bless(assuming sacred slaves) since that'll help keep them from reaching 200 in the first place.