Guide: Guide to communions

[Baalz]

Hmmm, can you get them to cast spells? I actually haven't equipped bows on the slaves in quite a while so I suppose it might have changed, but I have the slaves cast spells all the time....er...though I suppose not in 3.15 yet. Seems unlikely such a change snuck in unannounced though.

[SsSam]

Yes, my Theurgs will cast spells as slaves.
They will also cast scripted spells as slaves.
They (both Theurgs and Theurg Communicants) will use the bows when they are not in a communion.
In a communion as slaves I can't get them to use the bows. They do appear above the masters in the army setup screen.

It does seem like a large thing to be altered without being mentioned in a change log. ....

[Baalz]

It is possible I've misremembered how this works, as I said it's not my usual MO. I'll test it out tonight to verify what you're saying and update the guide.

[thejeff]

So spells work, but not bows. Interesting. Makes sense, actually.

Spells come before firing in the turn sequence. So by the firing comes up, the masters have cast, used the slaves fatigue and the slaves count as having acted.

[Baalz]

I verified that it does indeed work as thejeff suggests. Movement and Melee as well, they resolve after the casting phase. The only way to leverage this is to have an item which casts spells, though with anybody except the communicant this leaves the window open for the AI to cast something else after the first 5 turns.

Anyway, thanks for the catch, I've updated the guide.

[SsSam]

Ok. Thanks for the explanation.

Since Pythium is archer-poor. I was thinking it would be a nice little surprise to buff up some communicants to reign down fire arrows on the other side.

Given that's the case. There seems to be little use for the communicants. Sure, the Theurgs are more expensive, but they're a lot more versatile as well.

[Baalz]

Yes, the primary problem with communicants is that of opportunity cost. As you point out, you could have theurgs instead, and you've got a limited number of castles. I will say though that in testing this last night I did do a very nasty linebacker communion with communicants - 8 slaves, 3 masters. Masters cast mistform, personal luck, twist fate, quicken self, mirror image, breath of winter, then the masters fired the bows I had equipped to them. Pretty hideous damage output and the mistform + luck + twist fate made the communicants last plenty long enough wielding that quickened frostbrand to deadly effect....

[DonCorazon]

In a recent post here:
http://www.shrapnelcommunity.com/thr...912#Post605960
some info was added that seemed relevant to help clarify the danger of communion boosting for high level spells when your slaves don't have the the right paths. It may be in the guide but I thought this spelled it out pretty well and may be worth including in the Superman section:

MaxWilson said:
3. The short answer is that fatigue is split between master/slaves BEFORE adjusting for path levels, but slaves also get the communion bonus to their paths for these purposes. If a spell is cast which requires D4 and 400 fatigue, and there are 4 slaves in the communion all with no Death paths, each slave and the master will take 80 fatigue, adjusted for path levels and drain (plus fatigue, for the master). With the +2 communion bonus for 4 slaves, each slave is D2 casting a D4 spell, and since they are 2 levels short they take triple fatigue damage or 240 fatigue (which I think means 40 fatigue gets converted to 4 HP damage). If you are N levels short you take (N+1) times fatigue, if you are N levels over you take 1/(N+1) times fatigue.

[Baalz]

Thanks Don, added it to the original.

[ano]

I just thought about a nice trick. If you have tough slaves with regen (Ulmish Vampire counts are a good example), then when you cast Holy Avenger with your master, every single point of damage done to slaves through fatigue will result in a nice smiting divine bolt. Needs testing, but I'm pretty sure it should work)