Re: Indy commanders with magic items
 

Hardest one I have run into so far was a lich, wearing a crown I've never seen before that let him create mummies.

I wasted so many troops on him just to try and get that crown for myself ><

Re: Indy commanders with magic items
 

For some reason I always thought that it made a difference that you had commanders near them when they died. I havent tested it, it just seemed that combat commanders that charged in had better results than the ones that stayed behind. Or maybe I just wanted it to work that way.

Anyway, I often had mounted commanders or flying commanders set to attack rear when I knew there was a magic item I wanted.

Re: Indy commanders with magic items
 

I dont think being near them helps but flying/mounted units have a better chance of catching and killing them before they flee the battle. As endo said if you see a province with devils it probably has a soul contract so, if you plan on evert taking it do it asap (on bigger maps ive had to fight indys with 100+ devils)

Re: Indy commanders with magic items
 

That is probably Amon Hotep, an artifact crown.

Re: Indy commanders with magic items
 

Nah. It's Katafagus the Lich, and his crown is named after him. Amon Hotep is nicer, at least for a mage (MR -and- Invulnerability in a head slot -- saves body slot for rainbow armor, robe of shadows, Calius, souls, what have you, robe of the archmage if you're feeling lucky http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/images/smilies/evil.gif).

Those Cyclops... that hammer was the Hammer of the Cyclops, and it's unique -- but there IS a unique forgeable 2-hd hammer with the same forge bonus. No, you don't get free forging if you give both hammers to a Nataraja mage.

Re: Indy commanders with magic items
 

Alternate path: use Charm. Preserves their commander status, and therefore their inventory... so long as they survive the battle. Not the longest range and you need to beat the MR check, of course.

Re: Indy commanders with magic items
 

and you need to kill any pesky troops in the way without them routing...

Re: Indy commanders with magic items
 

You should. The chance of that happening is so rare and epic, indeed, it would make sense. I think someone who manages to get a Nataraja, and Hammer of the Cyclops and a
Hammer of the Forge Lords altogether deserves a unit that can create free items every turn. It's not like it would guarantee a win; it's just the same as a supplemental gem income. In fact, it's not economically different than having both items and giving them to two separate commanders except that it would allow you to craft things when you have no gems.

=$=

Re: Indy commanders with magic items
 

No it wouldnt because no matter what forge bonus you have, you must pay atleast 1 gem per magic level required to forge the item iirc. And since you can wish for the hammer of the cyclops it isnt impossible to get both without indies so if it did allow you to forge items freely it would be imba and widely complained about.

Re: Indy commanders with magic items
 

IIRC, in Dom2 a nataraja with the hammer of the cyclops and the hammer of the forge lord you forge any item for which your nataraja meets the requirements for 1 gem in each path the item needs. The only problem is that unless you have a nataraja pretender, you have to empower your nataraja an awful lot to be able to forge anything where the savings are truely meaningfull. I fail to see how it really all that imbalanced. A master smith with the hammer of the forge lord, earth boots, fire helmet, skull of flame and maybe another path booster or two, even without the forge of the ancients, still isn't that great. The only REALLY expensive items that can be forge again and agian are rings of wizardry (getting a fourty gem item for 10 gems isn't THAT much worse than getting it for 1 gem). Ok, maybe it would be nice to take an astral 9, four armed pretender, wish for BOTH of the hammers, and give all of your mages a ring of wizardry, but for thae many gems you wish for power, and cast arcane nexus, then go on a rampage accross the world. OK, you'd probably get petrified, but I don't really see how getting nearly free items is all that imbalanced.