soul slay / mr spells questions
 

according to manual : for soulslay
penetration is 11 + (lvls in astral - 3 ) :2 ( rounded down ) + 2d6
are the 2d6 open ended or not ? the manual doesn't write open ended .

now the magic resistence of the target is :

MR + half the skill in the spell ( here astral / 2 ) + 2d6

you can get additional penetration through :
+2 runesmasher
+2 spell focus
+1 ring of sorcery / wizardy
(+2 from the unique the green eye )

so in general +5 maximum

are the boni cumultative ? +4 for 2 spell foci or only +2 ?

while there are many mr-increasing items
around +10 should be very possible


a pretender has a base mr of 18 . if he doesn't have any astral skill and no mrincreasing equipment but the astrologer doesn't have too :

mr of the pretender of 18+2d6

the astrologer would have 11+2d6 penetration

if both values are equal is it considered a hit or not ?
if yes the astrologer could only hit if he has a 7 higher dice throw
if no only with a 8 higher dice throw

if the pretender uses very good mr equipment :
amulet of antimagic +4 , rainbow armor +3 , starshine skullcap +2 ,lead shield + 4 = 13

without open ended 2d6 throws the astrologer would never hit , with +6 penetration +7 in astral magic the values would be :
19 +2d6 for the astrologer

18+13 for the pretender so the astrologer would never hit right ?

but even with open ended dice rolls i think it is stochastically very rare he hits the pretender , 1 time out of at least 10000 or so .

the pretender should not go astral magic because of magic duel normally .

so conclusion : your normal advantage is 7 or 8 depends on the rules .

lets assume 7 . then you normally only need to get + 10 mr to be only hit successful via soul slay even if the attacker has astral lvl 5 + penetration bonus of 4 via a lucky open ended dice roll .

much more he will not have expect in the very late game .


is this quite true or did i forget something ? http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/images/icons/icon7.gif

Re: soul slay / mr spells questions
 

Almost all 2d6 rolls in D2 are open-ended, so I'd expect so here too.

Two spell foci probably don't add (few misc items of any kind add).

I expect attacker needs to win to succeed, not just tie, but don't know.

Astral 6+ is a reasonable approach for pretenders, in my book.

I think you're more or less right AFAIK, for the limited case you're considering.

It'd be pretty lame/uber if Soul Slay always had a good chance to kill anything with a soul. Soul Slay is hugely powerful as it is, if not against very high MR targets.

PvK

Re: soul slay / mr spells questions
 

<font size="2" face="sans-serif, arial, verdana">what means AFAIK i always forget this http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/images/icons/icon7.gif

yep you are right a almost always hitting soul slay would be lame http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/images/icons/icon7.gif i don't want that either i just wanted to know if i did understand the spell right http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/images/icons/icon7.gif

does a staff of storm prevent all missile fire or just makes it very hard to hit with them ?
does it prevent the use of javelins too ?
the hurled stones from the jotun hurlers ?
in general all physical ranged attacks ?

are there other similiar spells like mind burn / soul slay which have infinite range and always hit (after MRcheck fails )?

i know the drain life spell which has not infinite range but in exchange always hit without MR-check are there any other spells like this ?

Re: soul slay / mr spells questions
 

Storm, from staff or when cast, negates half of the missiles fired. I think this includes all non-magical missiles that can be fired, maybe even missiles fired from magical items like Bow of War and by Sprites/Banefire Archers etc. troops with magical, natural ranged weapons.

Re: soul slay / mr spells questions
 

Also, storm reduces precision on all troops. (either halves it, or -5, cant remeber)

Re: soul slay / mr spells questions
 

Since I play Abysya, similar to Soul Slay there:
F3 Incinerate (don't recall the range)
S2 Paralyze and Mind Burn
S4 Enslave mind.

Re: soul slay / mr spells questions
 

<font size="2" face="sans-serif, arial, verdana">Incinerate cannot be negated by magic resistance. It is fire damage however, and fire resistance works against it. It gives 18+ points of armor-negating! damage, enough to kill most natural units except for Giants and special monsters some nations have.

Available as Very Powerful magical item as Rod of the Phoenix (Fire 3 => 20 gems). Quess what Abysian uber-slayer wants? http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/images/icons/icon12.gif

Re: soul slay / mr spells questions
 

incinerate looks very nice to me http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/images/icons/icon7.gif
i found leech in the manual .
you need 1 blood slave to cast it but it does 25+ armor negating damage and affects an area of 1 .
fatigue is 100 but it is only blood 1 and you should get removed some fatigue from the leech effect .
all in all it seems quite useful to me does anyone use this spell ?

Re: soul slay / mr spells questions
 

I uses very little Blood Magic in battle, very easy to lose slaves quickly due to burnout, arrowing, or other stuff.

However I'll try ^^

Re: soul slay / mr spells questions
 

<font size="2" face="sans-serif, arial, verdana">hm with 25 range for the spell you are very right .
perhaps a stormstaff helps there much. could perhaps be worth a tryout for vanheim .