horror mark on pretender

[SalsaDoom]

My poor fellas got attacked by the Eater of the Gods, which pretty much got him in one hit, on the second turn (he wasted the last turn of his life casting "Mass Flight" -- this guy interupted my storming of a castle).

He wasn't -quite- a SC, didn't have quite the hit points but was very close, close enough no regular swarm of units could have a hope of killing him -- especially with such nicities as the sword of many colours, att and def of 24, mr of 20, 3 attacks and spells, etc.

--SD

[alexti]

I think that ease of horror mark casting has some merits. If the pretender is bold enough to lead his troops in the battle he should be able to deal with horrors (at least pretender god scared of horrors doesn't seem thematic). But pretender following his battle plans when attacked by horror really hurts. He should be able to realize that his plans were for leading troops into the battle, not fighting horror one-on-one. I would like to see optional scripts, so one can be assigned for scheduled battle and another for duels (vs horrors, assasins etc). Unfortunately, it's probably difficult to implement. But even the ability to tell the pretender (or any commander) not to follow script in case of duels and use his judgement instead would be very nice.

[SalsaDoom]

Well, I actually managed to defeated the Eater of the Gods the second time he came, (ring of warning has it uses), but shortly later a Hunter of Heroes came. My pathetic guard fled after a few turns and then the hunter killed my pretender in one hit -- if you look at the Hunter of Heroes attacks, he has one that just kills it one hit always. So, no matter who your god was he would almost certainly die against this creature nearly instantly. I ended up just throwing in the towel.

Horror Mark shouldn't be permanent on pretenders after death. In my Humble Opinion, thats stupid and extremely frusterating and annoying for no reason.

[Folket]

Why don't you look at way to avoid geting your pretender horror marked? Having large summons that might get targetet instead of your pretender and such.

I do not think we should nerf horror mark and call it over powered before we have tried all possibilities.

It is nice to see that horror mark has become powerful,but I'm not certain that there is no way to counter it.

Horror mark should be powerful, as it sacrifies the option to do some use in the battle for the possibility of doing great harm later.

[Belcarl]

This might be silly, but I got a nasty idea.

Would it be possible to enslave horrors with a horror marked pretender, equiped with say Tartarian chains?

Dont know how high the Horror MR is, but maybe it's too high.

[SalsaDoom]

Well, I seem to attract horror marks personally. I never actually -see- my fellas get horror marked, they just one day magically get one. This has happened to many of my pretenders over the years, and I've yet to see how it actually happens.

No one is getting close to them, they never go into battle without a pretty huge army to absorb spells and damage... I don't use any magic items that would get you horror marked... So I've no real knowledge of how my pretenders get the damn things in the first place. Unless there is some way of giving someone a horror mark from another province outside of battle (like seeking arrow, but with a horror mark). Beats me ;P Part of the reason I hate that damn thing so much.

Horror mark would be very powerful if it went away after you died from it, a near-guarantee that a pretender gets kacked is powerful, and I'm not sure why people seem to think otherwise. Any commander (I'm not sure what happens to regular units... I've never seen one of my regular units get munched by a horror before) that gets it is as good as dead -- certainly no non-pretender cmdr would make even to the end of the first turn against one, not against something like an Eater of the Gods or Hunter of Heroes. Now, a normal cmdr is out of the game once he is dead. But your pretender gets to be killed again and again and again. Its just lame. I'd be happy if I could at least mod it so horror mark goes away with death, for my own games at least.

--SD

[Breschau]

SalsaDoom said:
Well, I seem to attract horror marks personally. I never actually -see- my fellas get horror marked, they just one day magically get one. This has happened to many of my pretenders over the years, and I've yet to see how it actually happens.

No one is getting close to them, they never go into battle without a pretty huge army to absorb spells and damage... I don't use any magic items that would get you horror marked... So I've no real knowledge of how my pretenders get the damn things in the first place. Unless there is some way of giving someone a horror mark from another province outside of battle (like seeking arrow, but with a horror mark). Beats me ;P Part of the reason I hate that damn thing so much.

Maybe due to a magic item s/he was using? There's a few magic items that have a "small chance" of giving the wearer a horror mark, but not all of them mention it (explicitely or otherwise) in the in-game item description. I unwittingly got half my battery of researchers horror marked because I didn't realise lightless lanterns did that now (for lanterns it's mentioned in the manual, but doesn't even hint at it in the in-game text).

Though fwiw, I did have one non-pretender commander do nicely against horrors. A decked out golem SC (built mainly for fighting mass armies, oddly enough) who tore his way through three individual Hunter of Heroes, and one regular horror that summoned two more during the battle. I'm not sure if he lucked out against that insta-kill attack the Hunters get, or if being inanimate made it ineffective against him.

But yeah, for an effect as nasty, and most importantly permanent as that, it should maybe be a little trickier to research or cast.. or at least disappear on death.

[Folket]

SalsaDoom, Do you have summons that are as large or larger then your pretender when you go to battle?

Perhaps your pretender is singled out as a large creature and horror marked. If I remember corretly horror mark has range 100 so there is no goood way to hide from it and there is a blood 9 spell to horror mark armies from a distance.

I would still like to see the stats of the horror.

[Endoperez]

Okay. Haven't done this in a while...

See attachment for the horror. Spoilers! Beware!




Blood Vengeance is +2. Fear is +15. His weapons are all considered magical:
Code:

---

Consume Soul

  dam: death, MR negates

Astral Fetters

  dam: special

Astral Hooks (x2)

  dam: -5 (but str added),

  three attacks, Horror Mark

Life Drain (x2)

  dam: 0 (str added), armor-piercing life-drain

Curse Luck:

  dam: special, MR negates

  AoE: 1

---

[Nerfix]

Okay, now *that* is a horror. D: