Vengance of the Dead
 

If a commander retreats from battle in Vengance of the Dead does that commander die? or do they survive by retreating?

Ive seen in some other types of assassination attempts that if the commander retreats it appears that they die regardless of making it off the battlefield alive. But I'm not sure if VOD works that way as well or not.

Anyone know that would care to enlighten me? If it's the case that the commander dies regardless of retreating then it appears I get a chance to summon a now dead King of elemental earth :D But I'd hate to waste 50 Earth gems if he's still alive hiding out somewhere.

Re: Vengance of the Dead
 

Retreat = death.

Re: Vengance of the Dead
 

This is correct. Personally I feel retreating should be allowed as described below:

Ideally the attacker and defender should be on opposite sides of the battlefield thus anyone trying to retreat would need to run past the enemy before fleeing the battlefield.

Re: Vengance of the Dead
 

I think it works okay thematically and practically.

I believe there may still be a problem that the defender autorouts by time limit eventually if he can't kill all the attackers, which I'm not sure I do agree with thematically. Although in practical terms, it's nice that no matter how terrifying the SC, something can take it out.

Re: Vengance of the Dead
 

I sent a VoTD against an Air Queen once, who happened to be carrying the pocket lich. The hordes of soulless did not last long.

Re: Vengance of the Dead
 

Terrifying SCs can be killed without bugged spells with hordes of mindless chaff that cant rout when it should. Perhaps not with a self-targeting lvl4 overland spell, but still.

Re: Vengance of the Dead
 

You've still got to pass an MR check to get the attack to work, and a terrifying SC should have at least 23-34 MR (probably nearer 30 if enough of an investment), so it would still usually need a lot of VotDs cast to kill it - particularly as until you get sufficiently far into the hundreds of chaff, the SC will probably be able to kill them, so you might need multiple successful castings.

Re: Vengance of the Dead
 

Yeah, in power terms it's quite fair imo. Especially as a simple Mind Hunt will do the trick for many SCs even better.

But I still find it extremely ironic, that some invulnerable never tiring supercreature would just turn around after 5 minutes of fighting and commit suicide.

Re: Vengance of the Dead
 

I never really found Votd worth casting. The cross paths are hard to come by, in no way does it guarantee success even if it does hit the target, even more than once, and it's more expensive and harder to get than a mind hunt.

Re: Vengance of the Dead
 

The advantage over Mind Hunt is that mind hunt hits a random target in the province. With enough cheap targets, your valuable SC might not even be targeted, much less hit often enough to overcome his mr.

Re: Vengance of the Dead
 

VotD is also good for trying to take out any Astral pathed Hall of Famer's, which Mind Hunt has trouble against for obvious reasons.

Re: Vengance of the Dead
 

MR is notoriously unreliable. I had mr 25+ penetrated with 1-2 attempts, in several several games, routinely. I have penetrated MR 30 with my first and my only mind hunt, just two weeks ago. Etc, etc.

And no, its not 'VotD vs simple Mind Hunt'. Its 'Mind Hunt vs simple VotD'. Let me remind me that VotD is much lower in the research tree and it has much less restrictions, and its not hard to cast for many already powerful nations. Its just UNGODLY good in certain situations, and the fact that its not worth casting in other situations doesnt make it any better.

Re: Vengance of the Dead
 

Yeah, there are definitly advantages of VOTD over Mind hunt. For one like thejeff mentioned VOTD targets the commander with the most kills. In another game beside the one I posted here where I routed an Earth king I managed to stick 3 VOTD's all in the same province on the same turn. I killed a High value Air Mage that had been casting Arrow Fend and blasting my troops with thunder strike, Then I took out an Arch devil that would have cast Fire Storm and wiped out all my undead And I got yet another commander as an added bonus. My enemy in that game had tried to break the siege of his fort at the same time and ended up facing my 20 or so Bow of War/visions foe equipped Bane's with no Arrow Fend and No Firestorm to wipe out my troops and thus he died horribly and lost a lot of good high value commanders and artifacts.

If I had simply Mind hunted who knows who it would have killed, but chances are it wouldn't have hit the targets I wanted to hit. And besides that I'm not too fond of risking getting my mage's feeble minded or what not due to some Astral mage I wasnt aware of being in the targeted province.

But to also address the thought that it in no way guarantee's success... If you know what your enemy is going to be casting you may very well be assured of success.. like in the case I stated above, I knew my enemy would be casting Fire Storm.. So he casts fire storm ends up with a ton of fatigue and is unable to defend himself and guess what? He's got no one there to block for him while he regains his endurance so he's dead as hell with pretty much no chance despite his phoenix pyre which doesnt help at all after casting fire storm.