YASD! My first visit to Pan & frustrating death :'(

[duvessa]

This example has nothing to do with the character build that I envision. Look, how clear do I have to write this? My intention is to go with two elemental schools as a strategy from the outset, starting as soon as I can find the second. So you will always be looking at the first scenario

The whole point of my example is:
1. The first scenario is the only one where bolt of magma has decent spell power.
2. The first scenario is the worst one, because it cripples all your other spells, when you could instead be casting higher level fire/conjuration (or earth) spells with higher power, or get some dodging or fighting skill.

But if this is precisely what you plan to do, then BoM is a wonderful spell, giving you the highest level-5 spell damage on average.

And short blades are the highest damage weapons if you plan to only train short blades skill. The point is that planning to train two elemental schools is a bad plan. I know it "works for you". That's because DCSS is easy/generous enough that you can win it even with bad skill training. This doesn't make bad skill training into good skill training.
And even in the specific case of having equal conjurations, fire, and earth magic skills, and 0 in everything else - which, again, is bad and not good - LRD on a rock wall, or a Lightning Bolt double-zap (despite having half the pre-stepdown power), still does more damage than bolt of magma. So "highest level-5 spell damage on average" is wrong even in the most generous situation possible.

What do you do if you start as (for example) fire elementalist and you find books containing iron shot and LCS before finding any high level fire books and weren't worshipping a spell gifting god? Would you switch gears and decide your long term path is now earth/conjurations? Or stay the course with fire?

Bolt of Fire is nice, but you don't need it. Fireball is enough. Switching to earth magic wouldn't be a disaster, since, again, you can win even with inefficient XP allocation, but is Iron Shot really going to do that much for you that Fireball won't? It's probably a better idea to get less redundant spells like summons, DMsl, necromancy...and some Fighting/Dodging/possibly Armour, of course. If you're after unresistible damage, keep in mind that dangerous rF++(+) monsters don't really exist until quite late in the game, by which time there's probably a demon weapon or IOOD sitting around. There are also plenty of other easy-to-cast Conjuration spells with unresistible damage, like Battlesphere, IMB, and yes, Bolt of Magma - it's not worth training Earth for, but if you're desperate for unresistible damage it does provide that.
(This goes for other elements too, although AE and IE both have unresistible damage in their starting book anyway.)

[Majang]

But if this is precisely what you plan to do, then BoM is a wonderful spell, giving you the highest level-5 spell damage on average.

And short blades are the highest damage weapons if you plan to only train short blades skill. The point is that planning to train two elemental schools is a bad plan. I know it "works for you". That's because DCSS is easy/generous enough that you can win it even with bad skill training. This doesn't make bad skill training into good skill training.

You are creating a false absolutive here. Training two elemental skills is not as harebrained as trying to win a game by going for short blades only. You still have not really explained why a two-elemental school strategy is inherently worse than training one school only and then dumping the experience into support-spells instead. This is the trade-off I am suggesting here, and I can't see where this is bad advice. Your repeating of this claim without providing the evidence or even discussing it is tiresome.

And even in the specific case of having equal conjurations, fire, and earth magic skills, and 0 in everything else - which, again, is bad and not good - LRD on a rock wall, or a Lightning Bolt double-zap (despite having half the pre-stepdown power), still does more damage than bolt of magma. So "highest level-5 spell damage on average" is wrong even in the most generous situation possible.

LRD on stone wall has 3d(5+power/5) damage. BoM has 4d(4+power/6) damage. What am I missing here? BoM clearly wins out on this, except in the rare cases where LRD rolls more dice.

[VeryAngryFelid]

And I'm somewhat wary of the advice that all you need is 1% failure rate to stop training your magic skills. Particularly when your are going with Vehumet, but also when you rely on wizardry items, this can leave your spells underpowered. A 8#-Ironshot is an entirely different matter than a 6#-Ironshot. You can have both with 1% failure rate.

This argument was missed in your later conversation with duvessa so let me argue about it. It is a bad idea to train Conj/Earth to get 8# instead of 6#.
6# is spell power 50-74, 8# is spell power 100-149. To double spell power from 60 to 120 you will need to more than double your magic skill levels i.e. if you have Conj/Earth 9 (let's assume you are high Int species like DE of Vehumet and probably another ring of wizardry, I am too lazy to check it in game), you will need Conj/Earth 19+ and you are better casting Shatter instead. Most other combos don't even have Iron Shot at 1% with that low Conj/Earth 9, they need 12+ as far as I remember and increasing Conj/Earth from 12 to 16 (i.e. by 33%) will increase your spell power and damage by less than 33% and will never give you more than 1 extra #.

[duvessa]

You still have not really explained why a two-elemental school strategy is inherently worse than training one school only and then dumping the experience into support-spells instead.

I didn't explain that because 4Hooves2Appendages already did. It's redundant, it is like training two weapon skills. Just as you don't get to attack with both maces and axes at once, you don't get to attack with both Bolt of Fire and Iron Shot at once, so if you've already got one you're better off getting something that can be used in tandem with Bolt of Fire (like defenses, or summons and buffs that you can cast before monsters get within your conjuration range), or that at least has a significantly different purpose (like a translocation spell to escape).

And even in the specific case of having equal conjurations, fire, and earth magic skills, and 0 in everything else - which, again, is bad and not good - LRD on a rock wall, or a Lightning Bolt double-zap (despite having half the pre-stepdown power), still does more damage than bolt of magma. So "highest level-5 spell damage on average" is wrong even in the most generous situation possible.

LRD on stone wall has 3d(5+power/5) damage. BoM has 4d(4+power/6) damage. What am I missing here? BoM clearly wins out on this, except in the rare cases where LRD rolls more dice.

Yeah, I misspoke there.

[Majang]

With twice the spell power most spells are more than twice as good - all those spells that have a to-hit rate based on spell power. When I have a spell that deals twice as much damage at #8 compared to #6, and hits twice as often, in effect I have quadrupled its efficiency. That's why I think it is worth going for higher spell power in spite of the step downs in the formula. I guess these step-downs are in there for that reason. I know that the to-hit formula never allows for an exact doubling of accuracy by doubling the spell power, but for example for Iron Shot the influence of spell power on the to-hit rate is significant with 7+power/15. I mentioned before that encountering St. Roka with a 6# IS was a disaster, and meeting him at 8# had a totally different outcome. Now I see why. With 60 spell power I dealt an average damage of 30 (affected by Roka's AC) with a to-hit rate of 11. With 8# (twice the spell power) the damage on average is at about 53, which leaves a lot more once you overcome the AC; but the to hit rate bounced up to 15. In combination, these two values give you a much sharper and more powerful weapon.

Increasing your spell power through skills training seems to me a good investment for an offensive spell caster. Of course it also has the effect of getting higher-level spells castable sooner, and that is something an offensive spellcaster wants more than the ability to cast summons (who prevent him from using his best spells) or utility spells like controlled blink, which becomes useless by the time you are ready to cast it.
Again, I'm not suggesting with a word that you should be stingy on your basic defenses - fighting and dodging, possibly armour. But the experience you have is sufficient to cover all of that.

[VeryAngryFelid]

I am not sure what's your point here. I am not going to argue that having robe of archmagi AND staff of conjurations is good because they increase spell power by 125% combined. I see I really cannot prove it to you because we don't have a specific character example so we might analyze what you could get in exchange of increasing your spell power. I know that instead of training Conj/Earth from 12 to 16 I can get other 2 (two!) skills from 0 to 12, those can be fighting and weapon, for example. Or if you insist on spells, you can get level 6 spells in 2 other schools. A character with improved Iron Shot is ways weaker than character with Iron Shot AND Death Channel AND Shadow Creatures.

You can see it in table below, it takes about the same XP to train a skill from 0 to 12 as it takes to train it from 12 to 16 and as I said before the increase gives you less than 33% more spell power and it's not that important (weaker than a single archmagi which gives 50%).

  Code:

          { 0, 50, 150, 300, 500, 750,          // 0-5
            1050, 1400, 1800, 2250, 2800,       // 6-10
            3450, 4200, 5050, 6000, 7050,       // 11-15
            8200, 9450, 10800, 12300, 13950,    // 16-20
            15750, 17700, 19800, 22050, 24450,  // 21-25
            27000, 29750 };


https://github.com/crawl/crawl/blob/mas ... s.cc#L1532

[4Hooves2Appendages]

Actually, I calculated the LRD vs BoM example. 20 Int, 8 SC and then 16 Earth vs 12 Earth/Conjurations/Fire. Spellpower after stepdow is 64.34 for LRD and 54.20 for BoM respectively.

If you plug the numbers in, you'll find that LRD has slightly higher mean (28.3 vs 28.1) and maximum damage, and slightly lower minimum damage.

It's worth bearing in mind that 1 school at 16 costs slightly less XP than 3 schools at 12, and also that an EE would usually train some conjurations, because getting Stone Arrow to a low fail rate is critically important in the early game.

[VeryAngryFelid]

It's worth bearing in mind that 1 school at 16 costs slightly less XP than 3 schools at 12, and also that an EE would usually train some conjurations, because getting Stone Arrow to a low fail rate is critically important in the early game.

12 level costs 4200, 16 level costs 8200, that's about double amount, not triple.

Edit. Let's not forget that BoM deals 55% fire damage so if we are talking about FE, then BoM is not that great because bolt of fire deals way more damage to monsters without rF+ and the 55% fire damage weakens BoM vs monsters with rF+ considerably. Actually I tried using BoM as FE a long time ago and I still remember how disappointed it was. These days I try to get Iron Shot or IOOD as FE, easy with Vehumet.

[4Hooves2Appendages]

Oh, you are right, you actually only get your 3 schools to 10 (nearly). In that case LRD is just plain better. But we already knew that, didn't we?

In any case, Lightning Bolt wins this contest hands down. And Air is a useful school for utility too, giving Swiftness and DMsl.

[Majang]

A character with improved Iron Shot is ways weaker than character with Iron Shot AND Death Channel AND Shadow Creatures.

Sigh. You keep suggesting summons to a build that cannot have summons or allies. Remember, we are having this discussion in the context of an offensive spell caster. Neither LRD nor Shatter can be cast as long as one of your Shadow creatures is fluttering around the opposition. Training summons really, really does not make sense for such a build. It cripples it. An offensive spell caster wants more offensive spells of a slightly different nature, giving the caster all the offensive options to meet all tactical situations.

And yes, when I see a Robe of the Archmagi, I wear it for this very reason. The trade-off is AC, but the more powerful your conjurations are, the less you are in need of defences. DE players know this. Gr are certainly protected enough to survive with this robe anyway.

[VeryAngryFelid]

I keep suggesting to put that XP into better use. If you don't need summons, train Deflect Missile (level 6 spell with 2 schools, right from my example). If you have not found DMsl yet, train Fighting/Dodging.

[VeryAngryFelid]

An offensive spell caster wants more offensive spells of a slightly different nature, giving the caster all the offensive options to meet all tactical situations.

You are contradicting yourself here IMHO. Training better Iron Shot is the opposite of the described. Train weapon (probably ranged one), evocations, translocations, summons, necromancy if you want great answer in "all tactical situations". I wonder what you are going to do vs Mennas or Jorgrun, for example.

[Majang]

In any case, Lightning Bolt wins this contest hands down. And Air is a useful school for utility too, giving Swiftness and DMsl.

But, as you noticed, LB is an air spell. You are not suggesting that an FE or EE should train this instead of BoM, are you? Are you suggesting, instead, that we all should only play AE to have one-school access to this amazing spell?

Those utility spells require training of charms. Why is this better than training another elemental school, if this makes you killing your enemy before they can throw missiles at you, or before you have to run (very fast) away from them?

To bring this all to a less pointed solution:
There are different kinds of characters, all of them using spells to kill. There is the hybrid, the guy who is as good with his weapon as with his spells. He needs one particular kind of skill training. There is the rounded caster, who uses offensive spells as much as support spells, which help him in situations his offensive spells leave him unprepared for. He needs another particular kind of skills training, getting many schools up to fairly low levels.

And there is the offensive caster, that I am talking about here. With this particular skills set, the player will not often be in a situation that cannot be resolved through offensive spell casting. Escape options consist mainly in consumables. And this offensive caster needs a second elementary school (except, maybe, an Earth Elementalist) to fill the tactical gaps caused by resistances.

All three casters need basic defenses: Fighting, dodging, maybe armour, maybe shields. And so far I have always given all my casters some weapons skills, although I guess it would work without.

[Majang]

An offensive spell caster wants more offensive spells of a slightly different nature, giving the caster all the offensive options to meet all tactical situations.

You are contradicting yourself here IMHO. Training better Iron Shot is the opposite of the described. Train weapon (probably ranged one), evocations, translocations, summons, necromancy if you want great answer in "all tactical situations". I wonder what you are going to do vs Mennas or Jorgrun, for example.

Mennas makes me wet my pants, but I have not died to him in a long time. I guess this is why I still train a weapon. A high-powered staff of earth or fire, with some evocables, seems to be enough to whittle him down in silence. Jorgrun? If I see him as an EE, he dies to his own weapons, and he always does.
Edit: And I wrote my above quote in the context of training two elemental schools, that's why it makes sense. I want both schools as high as possible, for maximal spell power.

[VeryAngryFelid]

I guess this is why I still train a weapon.

You should have written it before IMHO. Then do whatever, you are all set, it does not matter that much if you get 15% more HP or 15% more spell damage

[Majang]

Edit. Let's not forget that BoM deals 55% fire damage so if we are talking about FE, then BoM is not that great because bolt of fire deals way more damage to monsters without rF+ and the 55% fire damage weakens BoM vs monsters with rF+ considerably. Actually I tried using BoM as FE a long time ago and I still remember how disappointed it was. These days I try to get Iron Shot or IOOD as FE, easy with Vehumet.

Incidentally, BoM and BoF actually have the same damage output - on average 75 at full power. But BoF is a level-6 spell, and BoM a level-5 spell. Okay I know about range and three spell schools and all that, but the more I look at BoM, and the more others here are writing how crappy it is, the more I love it.

An earth elementalist might actually want to train some fire anyway for utility purposes. Conjure flame works very well in conjunction with short range spells such as sandblast or stone arrow. So even from a utility point of view it makes sense for an earth elementalist to go into fire, all the more so as you want to develop this skill anyway.

[4Hooves2Appendages]

In any case, Lightning Bolt wins this contest hands down. And Air is a useful school for utility too, giving Swiftness and DMsl.

But, as you noticed, LB is an air spell. You are not suggesting that an FE or EE should train this instead of BoM, are you? Are you suggesting, instead, that we all should only play AE to have one-school access to this amazing spell?

I'm suggesting that an EE doesn't need BoM or LB, (or BoF/BoC/FB/etc.), because LRD is better than BoM already. An FE desperate for non-fire damage, as written before, has options other than training Earth. The options include Evocations, Summons and Ranged. Those are strong additions to any character. By excluding them you weaken your character. I don't think that is really debatable. Of course you can do that if you want, but you are deliberately reducing your power relative to what you could have.

Allies (from Summons/Necromancy/Gods) are likely the strongest regular thing in the game. Just because your character started casting fire conjurations, doesn't mean you can't or should not get summons. You can. And you should. They will make your character stronger. The same is true for Evocations.

(I feel like I've written this at least 3 times in this thread alone, and I will write it a few more times I guess.)

Those utility spells require training of charms. Why is this better than training another elemental school, if this makes you killing your enemy before they can throw missiles at you, or before you have to run (very fast) away from them?

Well, BoM does not let you 'kill your enemy before they can throw missiles at you'. It has short range. The same is true for Iron Shot. Now if you had a bow or Freezing Cloud, or Lightning Bolt, you'd have a better case. Still, it isn't possible to blow up every enemy before it does something to you. (Unless you are deliberately doing mostly damage to enemies out of LOS, but that's quite a different discussion.)

Having access to two different elemental attacks (Say Fireball and BoM) is weaker than having access to just Fireball (or LRD) and Swiftness. That's why it's better. Swiftness is really good. DMsl is really good. Summons are really good, Lightning Spire is amazing for its cost. Evocations are really good. Not everything is equally good in crawl. There is a lot of redundancy. Multiple elemental attacks are redundant. Multiple ranged weapons are redundant. Multiple melee weapons are redundant.

To bring this all to a less pointed solution:
There are different kinds of characters, all of them using spells to kill. There is the hybrid, the guy who is as good with his weapon as with his spells. He needs one particular kind of skill training. There is the rounded caster, who uses offensive spells as much as support spells, which help him in situations his offensive spells leave him unprepared for. He needs another particular kind of skills training, getting many schools up to fairly low levels.

And there is the offensive caster, that I am talking about here. With this particular skills set, the player will not often be in a situation that cannot be resolved through offensive spell casting. Escape options consist mainly in consumables. And this offensive caster needs a second elementary school (except, maybe, an Earth Elementalist) to fill the tactical gaps caused by resistances.

All three casters need basic defenses: Fighting, dodging, maybe armour, maybe shields. And so far I have always given all my casters some weapons skills, although I guess it would work without.

You create some kind of categories for crawl characters that only exist in your head. Those are not strict divisions. Crawl characters can, and usually should, branch out into widening their toolkit. There is no such thing as an 'offensive caster' in the design of crawl.

If you want to play a character that fits the description then you can do so, of course, but it isn't the strongest way to build the character.

If you hand me a late D or early L FE, I will not learn BoM. If you give me an EE, I will not learn FB. If you give you me an AE, I will not learn VB. In all those cases I will train Evocations, Fighting, Dodging, Summoning/Necromancy, Bows/Throwing, Charms and Invocations before training other elemental schools for doing damage. That's because I can already do damage, but I can't summon allies, can't cast strong buffs, don't have high HP, don't have high EV, can't attack at full LOS without paying MP and don't have low failrate on my Invocations. But I would like to be able to do all of those. Each of those will make the character significantly stronger.

[4Hooves2Appendages]

Incidentally, BoM and BoF actually have the same damage output - on average 75 at full power. But BoF is a level-6 spell, and BoM a level-5 spell. Okay I know about range and three spell schools and all that, but the more I look at BoM, and the more others here are writing how crappy it is, the more I love it.

Imagine two identical characters, and one trains BoM as best as possible, and the other BoF as best as possible.

The one training BoF will always have a longer range spell that does more damage. Until the BoM player gets to 200 spell power (never happens during the part of the game where XP matters). At that point both spells do roughly the same damage, but BoF can hit every tile in LOS, but BoM can only hit around 50% of the tiles in LOS.

I think it's clear which spell is better.

[Majang]

BoM and BoF always do the same damage with the same power, not just at full power.
I think we should stop our discussion on summons and allies - we are talking past each other here, I guess.

One more word - reading through my previous comments here, I notice that I let a lot more heat seep into this discussion than was helpful. So, dear all, please take my apologies for that. Let the record state that I appreciate and respect all of you; I know that my experience with this game does not get anywhere close to what you have accumulated, and I really should take a more humble stance. I have been called out for writing rubbish more than once already, and I am grateful for these learning experiences.

And apologies to Jeoffrey Monk for abusing your post for making my points...

[4Hooves2Appendages]

BoM and BoF always do the same damage with the same power, not just at full power.

I feel it's worth continuing to talk about this. You are right that at same power the damage is approximately the same.

The difference is that for the same XP investment, the character with BoF (training Fire/Conjurations) will have more spellpower than the character with BoM (training Fire/Conjurations/Earth). Do you know why?

[Majang]

BoM and BoF always do the same damage with the same power, not just at full power.

I feel it's worth continuing to talk about this. You are right that at same power the damage is approximately the same.

The difference is that for the same XP investment, the character with BoF (training Fire/Conjurations) will have more spellpower than the character with BoM (training Fire/Conjurations/Earth). Do you know why?

Sure, you invest your total experience in only two spell schools, that gives you 50% experience more for each of them. So much is clear, and that is not disputed.

[4Hooves2Appendages]

So then you see that character with BoF will always have a higher damage spell.

[Majang]

So then you see that character with BoF will always have a higher damage spell.

Yes, but as Duvessa rightly pointed out, so will a dagger if I only train short blades. If my strategy consists of learning both fire and earth anyway (not just for damage-dealing purposes; both schools have useful utility and escape spells, see above), then the experience for the second elemental school is not just a sunk cost, it is part of a character build that wants to accomplish just that. Making BoM a useful spell is just one of the synergies of earth and fire. Here are others:

• conjure flame in conjunction with short-range earth conjurations
• passwall as escape spell
• having sticky flame as DoT spell for EE
• having BoM, IS as irresistible spells for FE
• both Firestorm and Shatter leave a lot of stuff standing/flying. Alternate them, and the room is clear.

The same is true for the combination of Air and Ice:

• Freezing Cloud as the obvious synergie spell; it also serves as a block similar to conjure flame, to have more time to apply air conjurations
• Ozo's armour for AE
• swiftness for IE
• better damage dealing options for early AE
• if you want to, each spell school's summoning options (but who wants to?)
• same effect as above for the two level-9 spells

I think there is a case to be made for training the synergetic spell schools together. I agree, the extra experience has to come from somewhere, and this is (in my planning) a complete negligence of ranged weapons, summoning, charms, necromancy until fairly late in the game. Well summonings I don't train ever, not only because it is not compatible with conjurations. But that, I guess, is a matter of taste, and we don't need to discuss this here.

[duvessa]

With twice the spell power most spells are more than twice as good

No. Almost no spells have superlinear returns on spellpower.

When I have a spell that deals twice as much damage at #8 compared to #6, and hits twice as often, in effect I have quadrupled its efficiency. That's why I think it is worth going for higher spell power in spite of the step downs in the formula. I guess these step-downs are in there for that reason. I know that the to-hit formula never allows for an exact doubling of accuracy by doubling the spell power, but for example for Iron Shot the influence of spell power on the to-hit rate is significant with 7+power/15. I mentioned before that encountering St. Roka with a 6# IS was a disaster, and meeting him at 8# had a totally different outcome. Now I see why. With 60 spell power I dealt an average damage of 30 (affected by Roka's AC) with a to-hit rate of 11. With 8# (twice the spell power) the damage on average is at about 53, which leaves a lot more once you overcome the AC; but the to hit rate bounced up to 15. In combination, these two values give you a much sharper and more powerful weapon.

I have to wonder if you're just pulling our collective legs. None of these numbers you're giving make sense - for Iron Shot to do an average of 30 damage to Saint Roka at 60 power, Roka would need to have 9 AC, which requires him generating with a -1 chain mail, -3 plate armour, or downgrading his armour or putting on a negative ring of protection or getting polymorphed into a coloured draconian or something similarly unlikely.
And it's almost impossible for doubling your to-hit to double your chance of hitting.

BoM and BoF always do the same damage with the same power, not just at full power.

BoM mean damage is 10+power/3. BoF mean damage is 12+power/3. BoF always does more damage on average. Getting BoM to X power also costs 50% more skill points than getting BoF to X power, and since skill point cost increases with the number of skill points you've already gained, that means it costs more than 50% more XP.

Summoning is absolutely compatible with conjurations. Just shoot at the enemies instead of at your summons...

[4Hooves2Appendages]

]BoM mean damage is 10+power/3. BoF mean damage is 12+power/3. BoF always does more damage on average. Getting BoF to X power also costs 50% more skill points than getting BoM to X power, and since skill point cost increases with the number of skill points you've already gained, that means it costs more than 50% more XP.

Maybe I'm losing the plot after this long discussion, but shouldn't this be BoM costs 50% more to get the same spell power?

[Majang]

I have to wonder if you're just pulling our collective legs. None of these numbers you're giving make sense - for Iron Shot to do an average of 30 damage to Saint Roka at 60 power, Roka would need to have 9 AC, which requires him generating with a -1 chain mail, -3 plate armour, or downgrading his armour or putting on a negative ring of protection or getting polymorphed into a coloured draconian or something similarly unlikely.

That's why I wrote "affected by Roka's AC", which, I admit, wasn't very clear. I meant exactly what you imply with your explanation - the damage I actually dealt was much lower than the 30 before AC reduction. I don't want to pull anyone's leg, lest they come off...

And it's almost impossible for doubling your to-hit to double your chance of hitting.

I have to shamefully admit that I have no idea what the to-hit number actually expresses in terms of likelihood of actually hitting the opponent. Obviously, it is not a percentage, but probably a dice that is rolled against a number intrinsic to the opponent, right?

BoM mean damage is 10+power/3. BoF mean damage is 12+power/3. BoF always does more damage on average.

Hmm. That makes a difference of exactly two damage points per cast. According to the damage formulas on your spell-guide page I actually only see one point difference on average. I took the liberty of stating that these are equivalent in damage, considering that we are comparing a level-5 with a level 6 spell.

Summoning is absolutely compatible with conjurations. Just shoot at the enemies instead of at your summons...

Try that with a fire storm, not to speak of Shatter (I know, Shatter is strictly speaking not a conjuration, but it is what I'm talking about here). To satisfy your crave for anecdotal evidence: I once got killed playing a TSO caster, happily forgetting all game that I have angels potentially at my side, until, on a Ziggurat level full of Greater Mummies, I got the brilliant idea to unleash two angels against them, because, after all, they are cheaper than a Firestorm. From then on I watched in horror while these two daevas or whatever they were fumbled in the fray against the undead, while these were tormenting and agonying me to death, and I could not do a thing about it. It's as good as sending your little brother into a fistfight you should be fighting, while at the same time tying your hands on your back.That was the last time I used an ally as a caster. No, that is not true. The demonic-guardian demonspawn mutation, though annoying, at least gives you allies that sometimes do something useful without standing in the way. And you don't have to keep track of them. The same is true with the fire elementals coming with a fire storm, who are, strictly speaking, also allies. But they don't survive my other spells, so they never turn against me.

[watertreatmentRL]

Astonishing thread.

Strongly agree with advice to get summonings with spare XP for extended and strongly disagree with all posts here arguing for skilling schools to get more elemental flavors for your direct damage spells. You may still win following that game plan, but it will be in spite of it not because of it.

[Siegurt]

Astonishing thread.

Strongly agree with advice to get summonings with spare XP for extended and strongly disagree with all posts here arguing for skilling schools to get more elemental flavors for your direct damage spells. You may still win following that game plan, but it will be in spite of it not because of it.

Personally, i would slightly rather get necromancy over summons, but the difference isn't huge.

[4Hooves2Appendages]

Sure, Necromancy and Summons fill approximately the same niche, but come with different restrictions, in terms of gods, aptitudes and what you actually find on the floor. I would say that Necromancy is probably stronger, but Summon Lightning Spire is extremely strong.

[watertreatmentRL]

I like necromancy in extended as well.

[Majang]

I like necromancy in extended as well.

I do to. It's nice to see something we can agree on!

[duvessa]

That's why I wrote "affected by Roka's AC", which, I admit, wasn't very clear. I meant exactly what you imply with your explanation - the damage I actually dealt was much lower than the 30 before AC reduction. I don't want to pull anyone's leg, lest they come off...

At 60 power, Iron Shot deals a mean of 34.5 damage before AC, not 30. (A 2/3 chance of rolling 9d7 and a 1/3 chance of rolling 9d6)

According to the damage formulas on your spell-guide page I actually only see one point difference on average.

So, to review: you don't know what to-hit does, you didn't care to research how much damage Iron Shot does, and, unless I've made some tremendous mistake, you didn't care to calculate the mean of 4d(4+X/6) or 6d(3+X/9). I have no problem with people not wanting to do the math, but you should acknowledge that you don't want to do the math, instead of making up numbers; making up numbers and presenting them as real is dishonest.

[Majang]

So, to review: you don't know what to-hit does, you didn't care to research how much damage Iron Shot does, and, unless I've made some tremendous mistake, you didn't care to calculate the mean of 4d(4+X/6) or 6d(3+X/9). I have no problem with people not wanting to do the math, but you should acknowledge that you don't want to do the math, instead of making up numbers; making up numbers and presenting them as real is dishonest.

Anything bad you've had for breakfast this morning? I'm sorry our conversation went as bad as that. I'll stop here. Thanks for your patience with me.