A couple of Magic related questions

[OG_Gleep]

1. I have looked all over for info on short ranged spells, but can't find any discussions about them. There are a lot of PBAE (point blank area effect) and PB spells, and I can't figure out how to use them. Any tips...specific spells, practical application of said spells, scripting etc. I would be most grateful.

2. A couple of the magic items have a warning that the user better have high magic resistance or risk becoming a victem of the effects. Can someone replace the word "High" with a number?

3. Quick question about blood hunting: I have read conflicting reports about using SDR with scouts. Some say it makes no difference, some say it turns them into blood 1 hunters (but only for hunting). Has anyone tested this?

4. A lot of spells are low Prec, one person spells. Spells like Lightning Bolt...you can tie up a mage for 5 rounds of combat casting this spell, and even with Aim, miss all 5 rounds. And even if you do hit all 5 rounds, you just killed 5 troops. In all but small battles, this isn't a huge deal. In mass though.....those One person effect spells when fired by multiple mages are very effective. Do you guys tend to script these spells when you don't have the numbers? Or take your chances on AE spells?

5. In multi-player games, I see a lot of races entering the water well before its possible to get items that grant water breathing abilities to troops. How is this typically done?

[Agrajag]

I still call myself a n00b as far as dom2 goes, but I can still offer my advice:
1) I'd say most of these aren't very good at all, because they require your mage to be in the midst of the enemy (I'm assuming you're talking about offensive PB and PBAE spells), and most mages are way too frail to withstand that, and even the more durable mages are still in risk. IMO they are useful only for thugs, and even then are hard to script properly for.
2) I think that means that the user has to pass an MR roll, not sure how hard to resist it is though. Just pretend you're trying to make sure your thug/SC is immune to the devestating MR spells.
4) Depending on available mages, more often than not I just use those spells as "filler" for when I haven't researched better spells (like AE spells), or when there's a high risk of fatigue deaths (since these spells often don't require lots of fatigue).
5) You can get Poor Amphibian or Amphibian summons in the water pretty early. Many of the undead summons are Poor Amphibians. And once you conquer an underwater province you can just get the ball rolling by adding in indy Amphibians/Aquatics. Atleast that's how I'd go about entering the water early.

[Morkilus]

OG_Gleep said:
5. In multi-player games, I see a lot of races entering the water well before its possible to get items that grant water breathing abilities to troops. How is this typically done?

I would say (from personal experience) that an early mercenary such as the Shipwreckers gets a lucky non-water player going. Nifel Jarls are also good at soloing water provinces.

[quantum_mechani]

OG_Gleep said:
1. I have looked all over for info on short ranged spells, but can't find any discussions about them. There are a lot of PBAE (point blank area effect) and PB spells, and I can't figure out how to use them. Any tips...specific spells, practical application of said spells, scripting etc. I would be most grateful.

2. A couple of the magic items have a warning that the user better have high magic resistance or risk becoming a victem of the effects. Can someone replace the word "High" with a number?

3. Quick question about blood hunting: I have read conflicting reports about using SDR with scouts. Some say it makes no difference, some say it turns them into blood 1 hunters (but only for hunting). Has anyone tested this?

4. A lot of spells are low Prec, one person spells. Spells like Lightning Bolt...you can tie up a mage for 5 rounds of combat casting this spell, and even with Aim, miss all 5 rounds. And even if you do hit all 5 rounds, you just killed 5 troops. In all but small battles, this isn't a huge deal. In mass though.....those One person effect spells when fired by multiple mages are very effective. Do you guys tend to script these spells when you don't have the numbers? Or take your chances on AE spells?

5. In multi-player games, I see a lot of races entering the water well before its possible to get items that grant water breathing abilities to troops. How is this typically done?

1. Most are quite impossible to script for, you just have to hope your mage is smart enough to use them when the situation arises. The one possible exception is shock wave, I have seen van/tuatha thugs use it to good effect as well as virtue pretenders.

2. If you are speaking of the stone sword, you will probably want at least mr 22-26.

3. SDRs should do nothing for scouts.

4. Totally depends on the spell and the enemy you are facing. In the case of lightning bolt, I find it extremely useful versus almost everything (that isn't lightning immune or an infinite spam) spam).

5. A lot of ways, most commonly with a pretender or water mercs.

[Oversway]

For #5. you can find Ichtyid as population types in some coastal provinces. Also some costal provinces have shambler reef sites, so you can recruit them. Either of those can get you into water, if you recruit enough of them. Or, they provide a screen for tritons if you have commanders with water that need buffing. Ichtyids rule.

[NTJedi]

2. A couple of the magic items have a warning that the user better have high magic resistance or risk becoming a victem of the effects. Can someone replace the word "High" with a number?

This will be a minor concern compared to the surprise bad effects of equipping some of the unique items.

4. A lot of spells are low Prec, one person spells. Spells like Lightning Bolt...you can tie up a mage for 5 rounds of combat casting this spell, and even with Aim, miss all 5 rounds. And even if you do hit all 5 rounds, you just killed 5 troops. In all but small battles, this isn't a huge deal. In mass though.....those One person effect spells when fired by multiple mages are very effective. Do you guys tend to script these spells when you don't have the numbers? Or take your chances on AE spells?

All depends on the mage you are using and the opponents you expect to be fighting.

5. In multi-player games, I see a lot of races entering the water well before its possible to get items that grant water breathing abilities to troops. How is this typically done?

Usually Mercenaries... second most frequent is their pretender... some mercenaries aren't that good... others are "oh my word I need them mercenary eye_poppers".

[Cainehill]

Oversway said:
For #5. you can find Ichtyid as population types in some coastal provinces. Also some costal provinces have shambler reef sites, so you can recruit them. Either of those can get you into water, if you recruit enough of them. Or, they provide a screen for tritons if you have commanders with water that need buffing. Ichtyids rule.

Other ways : Most undead can go underwater, and even if the nation's mages can't, you can get an amphibious undead commander at enchantment 2.

Also, Water Cult lets all the sacred troops go underwater in friendly dominion.

[OG_Gleep]

Quantum - I have been wanting to try it, but am a little concerned about hitting my own troops. Do you have any idea what the scripts were?The script I was thinking about was:

Mistform, Resist Lightning, Attack one turn, Attack one Turn, Shockwave.

The Stone Sword was one of them, there are a few though that had this warning if I remember right. I'll take a look at the MIR and see if I can find them.

6. Since everyone generally agrees about PB spells, what about short range spells...in the 10-15 range? I normally ignore these as I have done the 1-10 range. Are there any particular spells in this range that you do script? Personally I haven't found any that are effective enough to warrent the possibility that I may lose a round of casting due to the fact that there are no valid targets within range.

[Wish]

Sometimes i put the short range spells at the end of a script, if the enemy tends to be all up ons before or by the end of the script.

[NTJedi]

OG_Gleep said:
Personally I haven't found any that are effective enough to warrent the possibility that I may lose a round of casting due to the fact that there are no valid targets within range.

You won't lose a round of casting... if no one is within range of your caster for that spell then your caster will do some other spell.