Most Useful Items

[shovah]

Vicious Love said:

Thought? You mean you might actually consider giving a commander a "balanced" Wraith Sword? Its only edge is armor negation. True SCs have too many HP to derive much benefit from it without heroic quickness. Weaker thugs, in contrast, have too few HP to benefit. I imagine there's a middle ground, but I don't doubt it could do more damage with a lowly Sword of Sharpness. If you really want to give your nonessential commanders lifedrain, it's easier to just use the Standard of the Damned.
And there's still the question of thematic dissonance. Magical or otherwise, a sword is a sword. A 200-ton titan should be able to inflict more damage with it than a scrawny little hoburg.

Wouldn't it have been easier to drop the Wraith Sword's damage to 0, drop its defense to a negative value, and do more of the same to the Blood Thorn? We could assume the sword exerts some sort of icky insalubrious influence upon the wielder's life/unlife. It's still potentially deadly, but it screws with the wielder as much as with the target. Mere mortals would be too weak to endure it, and SCs would approach it with at least a hint of caution. There'd still be the possibility of lifedraining uber-SCs, but they'd be much rarer, somewhat less effective, and still every bit as susceptible to the usual counters.

Meh. Still pretty inelegant a solution, but it makes for a semi-viable weapon, and it has more style than a strengthless sword. Too bad we don't have the mod commands to curse the Wraith Sword, make it decrease reinvigoration, possibly make it decrease MR, and make the Blood Thorn suffer the same, plus the "berserker(+0)" attribute and a hefty defense penalty.

Beg to differ. I've seen plenty of SCs without luck; it's simply one of the most cost-effective buffs for expendable thugs. Luck is certainly useful under most circumstances, but it's not always advisable. Ditto regarding MR, albeit to lesser extent. Ever notice how the Charcoal Shield/Shield of the Accursed are so much more popular than the Lead Shield? There's also something to be said for paranoia leading players to overemphasize MR.

As for quickness, there are only two items that can grant it. Using the boots usually precludes flight(the Stymphalian Wings are a problematic item), and the armor is only viable for 0-encumbrance fighters that don't cast too many spells before engaging. Besides, there are times I would opt for Hydra Skin Armor over Jade Armor even on a 0-encumbrance chassis without Boots of Quickness.

but i thought the wraith sword was meant to be a sort of etheral blade? as in no matter how hard you swing it will basically go through someone and hurt them, therefore i think zens change makes it more what i expected but thats just me

[Ironhawk]

Actually, QM was the one that made it no-strength added, not Zen. Zen just increased the cost IIRC. But regardless, I am with shovah on this one. QM's concept behind it was that the blade itself should be ethereal (as per the description, i think?). So that makes total sense to me that it should be no-str added. My only, admittedly minor, complaint is that its damage should be 1-2 points more so that it has a higher % chance of killing a regular inf unit in one hit.

[Vicious Love]

Ironhawk said:
Actually, QM was the one that made it no-strength added, not Zen. Zen just increased the cost IIRC. But regardless, I am with shovah on this one. QM's concept behind it was that the blade itself should be ethereal (as per the description, i think?). So that makes total sense to me that it should be no-str added. My only, admittedly minor, complaint is that its damage should be 1-2 points more so that it has a higher % chance of killing a regular inf unit in one hit.

"When in command of a Wraith Sword, a warrior can replenish his life energy by stealing it from those he cuts down. This sword is often used by powerful undead beings". End description. Questions of balance aside(and the strengthless sword is virtually useless), I dislike the idea of a "powerful undead being" causing no more damage than a Hoburg with this thing. Against unarmored opponents, it does one point of damage more than a hoburg's punch. A hoburg's punch. Even if the blade does go right through a foe, the idea of a sword that does less damage than a human's fist is... no.

[Frostmourne27]

I wouldn't really be able to say whats best on early game SCs (I tend to do one or two SCs in the late game and go all out and spend upwards of a hundred gems on each (sometimes more). I find the best items in the early game are path boosters and possibly survival items for mages (especially against archer heavy races, like man or races that tend towards offensive magic). Under Conceptual balance most of the late game items are fairly unaffected (the ones I take anyway) so it doesnt really change my choices. In the late game i doubt theres a better value than Amon Hotep (its summoning ability aside). Ummmm... what else? Quickness I find to be good only in one or two scenarios: SCs that dont get fatigued (or have someway of getting rid of their fatigue-I suppose that's most of them) and big bad undead killer priests (priests with spell foci (possibly a rune smasher too) and a high priest lvl). i find that with quickness all you really do is compress a seven turn cast orer into four turns, then you fall unconscious, whoop di doo. I find that regeneration is excellent but more for the health per round than the lower chance of getting afflictions, but again, that's more from late game experiance where I often have the chalice, gift of health, healing units (witches are fun) or an SC that will get rid of afflictions on its own (immortal or recuperative).

[Endoperez]

Quickness has other uses as well. One of the most devastating is high-water pretender aiming for Falling Frost. With Water 9, you not only give all your sacred units lesser quickness and get a chance to make a prophet out of Quickness-Heroified commander (double the fun!), but the spell has huge AoE, range AND damage. It isn't very good against armor, and Crushers barely got damage by it, but fatique doesn't really matter in most battles. It is easy to get dozens of kills in few easy battles.

EDIT: When I said that fatique doesn't matter, I meant that thanks to that high Water level the fatique the Quickness-Frosting pretender gets from casting the spell is very low.

[Agrajag]

Besides, sometimes cramming all of those action into a shorter period of time can be useful.
If you spam skellies for example, because then you get a thicker squad each time, which will function better.
Also useful for decimating armies with spammable magic before they reach the mage (especially with short-ranged spells, like Nether Darts).
And its also useful for buffing soldiers (though most of the time, you have no reason to do that), so you can get them all buffed before they reach the enemy/die in a hail of arrows.

[Valandil]

Nether darts isnt very short ranged... What do you mean you have no reason to buff soldiers? are you insane? am I insane? aren't buffing spells some of the best in the game? helllp?

and this isn't an insult, just a question. Sorry if it sounds critical.