Shattered Kingdoms

Could you please quote specifically where I posted misinformation in this thread?

Ah, you're right, my bad. Looking back, I meant Dabi, not you. I read Dabi's posts talking about the different touch attacks and then read your posts about the mechanics of paralyze and didn't realize it was Dabi, not you, that was touting that the different touch attacks were legitimately useful for anything other than flavor text.

I was specifically referring to the post on the second page where Dabi claimed that people are "doing it wrong" if they didn't see the benefits of using wraiths. Not only is that a statement that I don't think someone who has played a necromancer could agree with, it's subtly suggesting that people who have played necros and personally experienced wraiths to be worthless are somehow incompetent for coming to an obvious conclusion.

Anyway, I thought some of those posts were yours, so I apologize. You haven't posted any misinformation.

Ahhhh, I see the error, then, is in the fact that you've mis-read, mis-understood, or mis-represented my comment, in how you've wrongly portrayed it above.




ie- Are you using a zombie the same way that you'd use a wraith? Are you using a skeleton the same way that you'd use a zombie? Are you using a veteran-level corpse the same way that you'd use a GM-level corpse? Because if you are using all animates for the same purposes, then, yes- you're just doing it wrong.

I used the word "IF" in there, because obviously some people don't. IF it doesn't apply to you, then neither does the comment.

I didn't say your entire post was wrong, I said it had misinformation in it. Specifically, I think it's wrong to portray the touch attacks of animates as anything more than flavor text: Undead don't have art and don't impair, meaning that against a moderately geared PC or any NPC that fits into the "supernatural" category the touch attacks are going to have little to no impact. The only way they could even be slightly useful is in PvP to get a lucky curse or maybe to stack enough poisons or plagues to keep someone from fleeing, but if a PC is in melee combat with a group of wights or ghouls long enough to get debuffed, then that's guaranteed to be the least of their problems: And they should count their lucky stars too, because if they had been getting hit by skeletons instead, they would have likely died faster.

Yes, it is an option to choose to sacrifice damage by animating ghouls, wights or wraiths to take advantage of their touch attacks, and yes, you can bend over backwards to try and use animates in end-game PvE through an extremely convoluted process that requires having pre-designed characters to fit that mold. That doesn't change the fact that doing so is simply not rewarding, much like casting detect poison.

Small data point



This is with an enchanted diamond bill. Apparently some skeletons don't know how to use weapons. Sweet!

Skeletons are members of the soldier NPC class and get the polearm skill at a later level than PCs. So skeletons raised from lower level corpses may not have the skill mastered (or may not have it yet at all).

This skeleton could use bills and then died, was re raises, and forgot how. Do skeletons lose levels when they die?

They do lose levels. I've never really noticed them being too effective at gm. Its as if even at gm, the skill maxes at superb, but I could be wrong. What level was the npc originally?

What D said.

I'm curious how all the other lines of combat read in the brief log snippet shared above.

In my test, this same animated skeleton used an un-enchanted diamond bill to kill that same ghastly NPC. If you test it using the same weapon wielded by that NPC while alive, the battle ends twice as fast.

Your corpses will lose power as they are recycled and re-used. The first time you animate a corpse, it remains at full power. If that undead then collapses and you re-animate it, it comes back in a weakened state. This stepping down of corpse strength will continue with each cycle. As the corpses lose power, their animated form is less powerful too.