Black heart

[Xietor]

1. is there any way to remove the chest wound associated with black heart surgery? I do not see why this would be worse than an being ran through with a sword, but it seems imperious to gift of health.

2. Can you think of a better black heart assassin than a Pan.

I am thinking of using a blood summoned creature and gift of reason. Fiend of darkness gets every slot when given reason.

Anyone think of a better one?

[Nick_K]

1:You can't remove the chest wound by any means unless you also lose the heart. It's the same as the eyeloss afflictions from the various magical eyes.

2: Better, as in more powerful? Maybe a heliophagus?

[Xietor]

Fiend of darkness flies, and has 30 hp, gave him a fire brand, astral shield, boots quickness, regen armor and ring.

Horned helm, let me see how he does.

[Gandalf Parker]

Heliophagus is definetly a favorite of mine.

Pan isnt a GOOD assassin. I just find it useful because you dont have to use other units to test and see if you have all the commanders out of the way. For clearing indepts on a large map they speed things up.

[Xietor]

Pan is an excellent assassin. What can they not kill? Give them a fire brand, a shield, armor, ring regen, and they are good. they can cast invulnerability and regeneration.

But the fiend flies, and just killed a grand master, who summoned 2 fire elementals during the fight. Fiend won, had 50 percent fr with fire brand, and 2 regen items, but it annoyed me he didnt kill mage 1st.

[Xietor]

I have never summoned that high level blood guy. he is so far down the blood chain. Fiend of darkness is early, and i like his mobility flying. With items he seems to be able to kill most things.

The pan, is a good caster, with a lot hps and high mr. So with good items, he can self buff and win a fight. His low attack and defense become pretty good when he has a good weapon and a shield.

And if he uses gems, he can summon earth elementals. He really kills most commanders with no gems though.

[Xietor]

Ghost looks like he may be tough as well, with items. 20 hps, life drain attack. he gets all 7 item slots with gift reason also.

[Nick_K]

Do Pans still drop Maenaeds every turn? If so I imagine they're not great in MP because your opponent will know where they are and can take action against them. Of course, in SP it's very rare to lose an assassin in a 1-on-1 battle. Most of my losses are when patrolling enemies detect them and they try to fight 100s of enemies.
In Doms2 I used to use succubi with boots of quickness & rods of the phoenix. 2 casts of incinerate per turn will kill almost anything that isn't fire immune very quickly. They're very expensive though so if they get caught by patrollers you lose a big investment.

The annoying thing with the fiend is that you have to cast 'gift of reason' - you need a turn from a N4 mage and an extra 20 nature gems for it. Of course, the need to research blood 8 means that heliophagi are pretty hard to get.
Of course, if you can get them the heliophagi are just plain better than the fiends - I don't think the fiends have any advantages except price, but as you say, they're hard to research.
What's the stealth value on a fiend of darkness? If it's stealth+0 then I wouldn't recommend investing lots of gems on equipment & GoR as they'll get caught fairly soon even by province defence. Most assassin units have high stealth - I think succubi are +30 or something.
Actually, what stealth do pans have? They're quite expensive especially if equipped - the question with assassins for me is "Will he kill enough enemies to more than justify his cost?". If the enemies only cost gold, but he needs lots of gems then assassination becomes about fun rather than an efficient tactic.


(edit) use a spectre rather than ghosts. You save a lot of gems from not needing to GoR and the spectre has magic as well

[Xietor]

Good points Nik, but I play MA pangaea, so nature games, gift of reason are all of what i do anyway. reseaching blood 2 for a flying assassin is not to bad, and cheap cost. I usually have so many nature gems i cant use them all anyway.

So i make items with them. Assassins are expensive for nations that have them without using black heart. And I have never lost a pan to one. pan just owns regular assassins, with 27 hp, invulnerability and regen.

I am not sure the province defense can beat a ghost that regenerates, i will test. etheral, life drain, high morale and high mr. Boots quickness. shrug.

I really have not done much with assassins until this game.
Just toying with them. The pan does not seem to attract the maeoeds stealthed in enemy territory.

[Xietor]

I summoned a succubus, the protection zero, and no chest slot worries me. I doubt i would ever go blood 5 for her any way.