Re: Artifact "feature" and some late game stuff
 

<font size="2" face="sans-serif, arial, verdana">The Astral Shield actually can work against you on an SC: If your SC becomes stunned/paralyzed, but your opponent is unable to kill you, eventually, everyone will rout after the battle has dragged on forever. However, if you've paralyzed/stunned opponents with stunning spells, weapons, or Astral Shield, neither you nor your opponent's remaining units can rout. That means they'll just sit there forever. Eventually, the game gets tired of this. Everyone dies (of boredom?).

And it's quite possible with a empowered 10-all SC that he can be pretty much unhittable with heavy armor, earth magic prot bonus, mirror image, personal luck, and etherealness all going at once, even when completely immobilized.

Plus, the Astral Shield will work against the Fire Shield: Stunned opponents cannot attempt to attack you, thus setting themselves on fire in the process. They also get in the way of preventing other opponents from leaping to self-immolation.

So basically, don't use Astral Shield: It's mildly counterproductive at best, and can potentially kill your SC.

Re: Artifact "feature" and some late game stuff
 

Astral Shield is a powerful spell. I'd rather have a slight chance of losing the entire battle and my god, than the greater chance that the opponent swarms and kills my god.

That and the fact that if you are going to cast Astral Shield, you had better have the ability to kill them. This works well with tramplers or anything with high strength, since Paralyzed units have an effective 0 Def.