Quote:
Vicious Love said:
As for hand slots, a shield seems like a bad choice as, except in the case of missile fire, a good offense is much, much more effective than a good defense. At least when you have six or so turns per round. Imagine one of these bastards with dual Duskdaggers, or a Sword of Swiftness in one hand, a Duskdagger in the other.
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I really must disagree with this. Maybe an SC tricked out for offense would be good against another SC, but he'd be potted by the first petrify or drain life to roll around, or the first army of chaff summoners. When i build an SC, almost every item/spell involved is defensive in nature, because if you never die you will win nearly all your battles.
for instance, a favorite pretender scheme would involve a pretender with:
A drain life weapon, Blood Thorn if possible because its one handed.
Charcol shield, For the intrinsic fireshield, the prot and def bonus doesnt hurt, but a fireshield is great for taking out chaff.
Starshine Skullcap, For the MR. MR = Good. Very good.
Jade armor/ Hydra Skin, If i need Quickness then go with the Jade Armor, if i need poison resist or regen then go with the hydra skin. I like regen, not for the HP so much as the reduced chance to get an affliction.
Flying boots for mobility/ boots of quickness for quickness
Amulet of Luck, Antimagic Amulet Both are cheap and effective.
The spells i like to cast, which are almost all defensive in nature:
Quickness
Breath of Winter
Mirror Image
Air Shield
Mistform
Summon Earthpower (gives rejuve if your missing it)
Invulnerability/ironskin
Body Ethereal
Luck
Twist Fate
Astral Shield
Fire Shield
Soul vortex
My favorite combination on an SC pretender would be something like 4-6 air, 2 water, 2-3 earth, thereby avoiding the vulnerability to magic duel, and capitalizing on the number of mirror images.
I currently have a game going where i have about 10 niefel jarls running around with a N9 blessing and a standard loadout of
Wraith Sword
Possibly flying boots
Antie Magic Amulet
Lucky Pendant
They are all set to cast quickness, bless, breath o winter, and while i've lost a couple (stupidly tried to retake a manikin province with only SC's) They have steamrolled over all other indeps and i have yet to see an affliction pop up on a single one. This is on Faerun btw, so i already have a goodly number of provinces.