Race Designs & Strategies

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Vorkosigan said:
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Notes: Build Warlock Apprentices as fast as possible, send 3 per province with pop 6k-8k to bloodhunt, set taxes to 0. At Blood 3 build Demonbred, have them cast Bind Devils. at Blood 5 have Ghost King summon Ice Devils. Alternatively, get Constr-2, build a Dwarven Hammer then build Soul Contracts. Constr-6 gives you Blood Thorns, which are essential for your IDs.

Blood Thorns ? I largely prefers Hell Swords : more damage (so more drain), fire protection, plus Berserk+3 so you can pair your IDs without fear of rout !

[Nagot Gick Fel]

PDF said:

Blood Thorns ? I largely prefers Hell Swords : more damage (so more drain), fire protection, plus Berserk+3 so you can pair your IDs without fear of rout !

Hell Swords are ideal on low-end Thugs who can't buff themselves and/or you recruit en masse (eg, Jotun Herses). A Blood Thorn might be better on an Ice Devils: (1) it makes more sense to give full equipment to an expensive SC and the Blood Thorn allows him to wear another weapon or a shield, (2) ID have plenty of STR and ATT already so the marginal extra damage from the Hell Sword isn't that important, and (3) with a Hell Sword there's still a chance your ID will go berserk before casting Quickness and/or Breath of Winter.

[archaeolept]

well, hell swords are cheaper, and, it is true, the blood thorn is pretty sucky as a weapon - good enough against chaff, but not what you want if you end up in a duel w/ another SC.

but blood thorns are ideal for Magoth and Bifrons who both need time to cast a full complement of buffs and who can include astral weapon amongst them; making the blood thorn a rather frightening drain weapon

[Taqwus]

It rather depends what's on the off-hand, no? The shield 'Barrier', for instance, would be useful... or the Aegis, or a Magebane/Blood Thorn combo.

Or for a blood-mage SC who includes Leech or something like that in his script, perhaps.

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The main drawback of a HS is no shield, but IMHO it only makes a real difference if you can afford one of the rare really good shields -Aegis/Barrier.
But the HS also "free" a slot with its 50% FR, so for example you can have any ID 100% FR with an Elem Armor, and an "additional" misc slot to use.
And about the high Att/Def of ID, it's true, but they often have to fight pretty good opponents, so the difference between damage 24 and 29 can really make a difference on a Prot 25 foe ...

[Vicious Love]

So dual Blood Thorns != good?

[Nagot Gick Fel]

PDF said:
The main drawback of a HS is no shield

Not true. I've seen Hell Swords kill their wielders because they turned Berserk too soon. If you're counting on your ID's Breath of Winter to do most of the damage, you've got an issue to deal with here.

but IMHO it only makes a real difference if you can afford one of the rare really good shields -Aegis/Barrier.

If the other slots are filled with resistance stuff, and you're facing a Botulf Barrage (tm), a Shield of Valor will probably be better either of these.

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Nagot,
Sure I have less experience than you have, but I recently saw a good number of ID fights and not once did they fail to cast Quickness/BoW before fighting. Sometimes they were killed before (by spells) but the sword wasn't in the equation .
Agreed on your remark about Shield of Valor, it should also work against Eth X bow and JMCs.
But I now wonder if a combo Athame + MageBane, or Faithful, or Firebrand isn't better, at least against other SC (not against hordes of chaff dying to BOW alone ..)