Reverse Communion Confusion

[Adam J]

Thanks for pointing that out that I'm just oblivious Stagger Lee... although to be fair it'd be helpful to retards like myself to explicitly state that slaves won't act if the master casts first rather then make me have to infer it from the statement that slaves will act sol long as they go first sequentially before the master. I'm surprised I didn't figure that out before though, seeing as I like doing mixed communions with mystics and maguses (magi?) and apparently just never noticed some mages were sitting on their butts.

[RadicalTurnip]

I've heard (untested) that any form of quickness (did they have quickness, even though not a W9 bless) can sometimes lead to 2x holy spells a turn (or 2x item-spells a turn). Any quickness at all?

[thejeff]

That's what I was thinking of, though I'm not sure it's that simple.

I believe 2 item spells a turn works reliably. I'm much less sure about the 2 holy spells.

[chrispedersen]

Originally Posted by Stagger Lee

The slaves won't cast holy spells if a master has cast, they will simply absorb fatigue for the master. I did some testing with Marverni Druids in a similar configuration to what you described. I scripted:

8 slaves (communion slave;flying shards;blade wind;blade wind;blade wind), and
2 masters (communion master;pots/summon earth;blade wind; blade wind;blade wind)

The flying shards was just to keep them all doing the same thing that round. Rounds 3 and 4 had everyone throwing blade wind. Round five was mostly blade wind. Fatigue enters the calculation in this round.

My understanding of fatigue distribution would give you something like this:

Where E2 is the base for slaves and masters, masters are boosted 3E for 8 slaves, + 1E for pots or summon earth, so masters can cast blade wind without problem. And slaves are actually boosted 2 from pots & summon earth, so they can all cast + 3 for fatigue from 8 slaves. So fatigue cost/N+1 (N = 7-3)

Each master casting blade wind -> 80 fatigue * 2(masters) = 160 / 8(slaves) = 20 * (1/N+1) = 20/5 fatigue/trn = 4

And for their own casting -> 80*(1/5)= 16

Giving each slave 20 fatigue/turn. But that doesn't quite work. I think they probably don't get the +3 communion bonus when doing their own fatigue calculation.

So for their own casting -> 80*(1/2)= 40

total about 44 fatigue/turn.

This would explain why some but not all stopped casting blade wind on round five. The druids have at least 50% chance of being E3 Which would drastically improve their fatigue score, and allow more castings. I did not base anything in my tests on native E level, since everyone should have been able to cast the spell. The only determining factor was who came first in the setup screen, the two masters being the bottom two.

No, this is not right. First, calculate each spell separately, as you have to add the spellcasting encumbrance of the master to each slave, on top of their normal encumbrance.

[Stagger Lee]

Originally Posted by chrispedersen

No, this is not right. First, calculate each spell separately, as you have to add the spellcasting encumbrance of the master to each slave, on top of their normal encumbrance.

I'm not so sure, chris. I think you're correct in that the 80*2 should be divided by 10.

160/10=16

16/5=3.2 rounded up? =4

I don't care about the fatigue on the masters themselves, they're going to be fine. And again, I'm looking at lowest case E2 druids. At least half of them should be E3 or better.

[Fantomen]

Not entirely on topic, but you should have one of the masters casting eagle eyes too.

[Adam J]

Fantoman- I considered that, but it was such a large army I was facing that I figured it was irrelevant and I wanted to get my masters casting blades asap. I am doing that now though with another army of druids (along with correcting the ordering issues I had) since I've shifted over the often painfully inaccurate gifts of heaven.

[nordlys]

This might be a newb question (never tried communions before), but how to reorder mages in the list to ensure the masters are first or last? Isn't commander order more or less random/governed by obscure procedures? Providing someone special is to be used as a master; if it's just "whoever is first/last will be master", the question is moot.

[Gregstrom]

Originally Posted by nordlys

This might be a newb question (never tried communions before), but how to reorder mages in the list to ensure the masters are first or last?

You can't, I'm afraid.

Originally Posted by nordlys

Isn't commander order more or less random/governed by obscure procedures?

It's predictable at least - as noted before, commanders cast in the order you see them in the tactics screen.

[Stavis_L]

Originally Posted by Gregstrom

You can't, I'm afraid.

It's predictable at least - as noted before, commanders cast in the order you see them in the tactics screen.

[OldMeme]
In Communist Russia, you don't reorder the Communion, the Communion reorders YOU!
[/OldMeme]

:-P