Shield of Reflection

[cganya]

-edit: somehow accidental posted the topic before I finished typing it, sorry for the casting of mass confusion.

rather than necro another topic to ask a barely on-topic question:

are shields of reflection really that bad?

I understand how the blocking defence is reduced dramatically for every attack that gets blocked in a round and that the reflected attack needs to attempt a hit on the attacker.

For tough monsters though you should be trying to get into a 1 on 1 fight with them anyway (quickly kill it's buddies from afar or by getting into a corridor). and against tougher monsters you want them to die as quickly as possible with as little potential damage done to you as possible.

The popular strategy is to wield a big stick (two hander) with the idea that a two handed weapon is always the fastest (and thus safest) way to kill a tough monster. But what about those tough monsters that you cant kill really fast with even a nice two-hander and that also have a really nasty attack? I'd want as much defences between me and it as possible. Now if one of those defences includes a decent chance to turn the monster's own nasty attack back at it, wouldn't that also be really good? (certainly more than a resist that you can find on another piece of equipment).

I ask this because the few times I have picked up a shield of reflection from Donald and brought my shield skill up to use it; my characters were able to take on monsters, that used to make me worried, much more easily.

also it is always fun for an ancient lich to kill itself with it's own casting of crystal spear. "Glad that didn't hit me!"

edit2 - oh hey and using a shield/ one hander combo gives you two slots for randarts (or unrandarts) rather than one slot from the two-hander.

[Jabberwocky]

Yes

[cerebovssquire]

Yes

sorry i'm going to be a spoilsport and give reasons here: if you rely on something unreliable in tough fights, you are going to be screwed sooner or later, by the way, randarts are usually pretty bad, and finally, a monster that doesn't die quickly to a two-hander, surprisingly enough(!), will take even longer to die to a one-hander, thus dealing even more damage to you

[SchwaWarrior]

I prefer Reflection as well. For other elemental resistances I just load up on the randarts. Shields and only Shields will get the Reflection brand, you can't get it on weapons or armor! And since I like to use Repel Missiles a lot more than Deflect Missiles as far as spells go, having Repel Missiles up makes most missiles miss me completely, so there's less that do connect and get bounced back, meaning less blocking reduction to worry about. It's a TON more effective still if you pair that up with Invisibility, especially in Vault:8 when about 100 Centaur Warriors and Yaktaurs and Stone Giants are firing at you from every direction and are killing each other and themselves practically every turn. It's absolute hysteria. Oh and I have yet to pair THOSE up with Alistair's Intoxication plus Demonic Horde at the same time. That would be my ultimate dream battle come true. Jesus Christ I would record that shit and make it a reality show.

But I think it's the size of the shield that matters most, and I prefer Medium shields on my casters (using 15.0 Shield skill to negate the casting penalties). I would much rather use a Medium Shield of __ Resistance than a Buckler of Reflection, or better yet, the unrandarts Shield of Resistance or Shield of the GOOONNNGGG (which I use because I am insane, you probably won't want to).

Anyway you should use whatever you want. ^^ I agree the chance for dangerous foes to kill themselves using Reflection on their spells is awesome, but it's style dependent. I more often blast things at range with my spells and such rather than close in for melee, so for me I think I'd prefer Reflection more than a straight melee build such as a typical Minotaur Fighter, which relies more on tanking and defense.

On the subject of one-handed versus two-handed weapons, I agree, I feel a lot safer with a shield, as I play a caster and I can only rely on light or medium armor if I want to cast any of my powerful spells. The above Minotaur Fighter can rock Gold Dragon Armour, Crystal Plate, etc. but my High Elf Conjurer with less than 20 STR throughout the whole game cannot. No matter what you'll want something between you and attacks, be it armor, a shield, your summons, or pure stealth-- it's virtually impossible to solely rely on high EV to save you, especially since some attacks like Smite or Hellfire are impossible to dodge. But again, style dependent. You could be using a Vampiric Great Mace and Crystal Plate and have like 30 or 40 STR and be a demon of destruction with it. Or you could be using a Vampiric or Flaming Demon Blade and some maxed out Storm or Pearl Dragon Armor (the latter being a rare thing, but awesome) and an amazing Medium or Large Shield, with like 25 to 30 STR and DEX spread out, and be just as absolutely awesome. Personally of those two options I would go with more of the second.

But what I love so much about Crawl is that you can play however you want. I regularly train my High Elves in Summoning even with their -2 aptitudes, or train both Fire and Ice magic despite anti-training, or use Crazy Yiuf's weapon, just because I want to and it's fun! If you like the Reflection shields and they work for you, use them to your hearts content, despite what people tell you "not to do". There's good things and bad things about them (and everything), and as long as you don't disregard it, you can learn to rock anything in anything.

(Good lord I make long-winded rants heheh)

[njvack]

Yes

[JeffQyzt]

Shields of reflection aren't bad. They're just worse than everything else.

[palin]

Shields of reflection aren't bad. They're just worse than everything else.

But they are fun.

[cganya]

Ack. I made this big long post before heading to work but was running late so I posted it then shut off my computer before running out the door. Must have asked me if I still wanted to post since some else posted while I was writing x.x

Well the short and the long of it was:

Thank you cerebovssquire for actually giving reasons. I was already aware of the general consensus, it's nice to have some elaboration.

My thoughts: shields are good for a non caster who has the spare xp to raise shields and another defence skill. One on one with a tough monster, shield + defence skill + one handed weapon would leave you with hp then just a defence skill and a two handed weapon.

My observation: I have had lots of success with shields but not much with two-handers, I should try getting past lair with a two hander and see how it compairs. I still think that with compareable equipment, xp levels and scenarios; a shield user would come out of encounters with more hit points left on average.

Man this post sucks, I wish I haven't lost my real post x.x

[cerebovssquire]

One on one with most tough early-game monsters, sure, I can't argue with that. However, it's unlikely that you will have a decent amount of Shields skill at that time.
So let's look at mid- and late game. Not only do shields decrease in effectiveness when you are surrounded, which inevitably happens sometimes, in particular in the Vaults, but they are completely useless against fireballs, elemental bolts, clouds, airstrike, torment, smiting hellfire, MR-checking attacks such as confusion, slow and paralysis, and some others, ie: all a shield does in these situations is take up a hand, unless it provides a useful resistance. Of the ones I listed, torment and hellfire are the great threats of extended, so it seems unreasonable to dismiss shields for a three-rune game just based on their existence. However, the other ones are the attacks that make a three-rune game dangerous to the end. To name a few enemies which use them heavily: titans, orbs of fire, ancient liches, dragons of all sorts, Margery, Azrael, Nikola, Norris (and other uniques but let's stop with these here), sphinxes, death drakes, draconians, electric golems, frost and fire giants, some of the deep elves, etc.

Yes, against some monsters shields will be better, and it can probably be reasonably assumed that shield+good onehander will do at least as well as a good twohander against, say, stone giants, ettins, yaktaurs and other "basic" monsters of the mid- and lategame. But these are not the monsters which are usually fatal, regardless of character.

In regards to the casters you mentioned: I assume that you mean that most primary spellcasters won't train for a medium shield, but instead opt for a buckler? Considering that two-handers take a lot of investment, and most of your experience is going into spell skills anyway, it can't hurt to use a buckler which takes no skill, or little if the 2% failure it adds is too much for your character to handle

[cganya]

Are elemental bolts not reflectable? I thought they were. For most of the other threats you list; getting your hands on stuff with resists is important for most/all styles of play, those threats are still pretty bad for two handed users.

I never really noticed if it took very long to kill most monsters with a decent one handed weapon, especially not caster uniques. Like I said though, I have yet to experience late game with a two handed weapon, uc without a shield yes, but not a two hander. I'll have to get a bit more experience under my belt before I can really decide. As is for me, it's hard to pass up a good shield.

[njvack]

The thing shields help with a lot is solitary ranged attackers, where the shield will soak a fair number of the projectiles that are coming in before you can start damaging the monster.

However! Good use of combat tactics (essentially, choosing your positioning and terrain to limit your ranged attacker's ability to get off a shot) also really helps with solitary ranged attackers, and is useful in the cases where shields don't help at all.

I'd thought you were asking about the reflection ego in particular, which is better than no ego on a character that doesn't use allies, but is worse than a shield that provides any resistance or has protection.

[cerebovssquire]

Are elemental bolts not reflectable? I thought they were. For most of the other threats you list; getting your hands on stuff with resists is important for most/all styles of play, those threats are still pretty bad for two handed users.

I never really noticed if it took very long to kill most monsters with a decent one handed weapon, especially not caster uniques. Like I said though, I have yet to experience late game with a two handed weapon, uc without a shield yes, but not a two hander. I'll have to get a bit more experience under my belt before I can really decide. As is for me, it's hard to pass up a good shield.

Perhaps I've worded that in a way that can easily be misunderstood: elemental bolts are Bolt of Fire, Bolt of Cold, Lightning Bolt, and Bolt of Draining, not the ones you get from magical crossbows. Not all of my listed enemies are affected by resists, and in some cases (death drake) only by extremely rare ones.
Yes, they are still pretty bad for twohander-users, but the point that shields will usually hinder you against them rather remains, and so does the one about the enemies with blockable main attacks being generally weaker. If an enemy is hard, then surely it is all the more important not to cripple yourself!
Also, I'm not categorically dismissing shields here. Obviously if you find a shield that covers your resistances nicely, has a good slaying bonus, or anything comparable to that, it's worth considering using one-handers even on a character type that would normally use two-handers. When it comes to character planning, all depends on item drops; when I argue against shields, I'm assuming good or bad drops on both sides. If you find a good shield, I don't discourage using it.

[Turgon]

But they are fun.

Yes.

The ogre throws a large rock.
You reflect the large rock.
The large rock hits the ogre!
The ogre dies.
Xom howls with laughter!

[Beaver]

I just did my best ever with a score of 240k, still never won, got my first runes ever tho, 2 of em! Worst death ever, died by being poked while asleep by a lone spriggan enchanter...

Anyway I had 20 shields skill, and Donald's shield of Reflection +2, and I killed SO many wizards bouncing orbs of destruction around, holy cow... I also had that bone plates mutation so that might have made the shield better than it really was, but hot damn... on a halfling a shield of reflection is amazing (had a +8+7 sling of flaming). Only downside is you don't get piety or xp for people killed by other people's orbs strangely, I think cause they still home in on you after you reflect them.

Killed any centaur that came near as well... great little shield!

[edit: holy crap don't post first thing when you wake up... wow...]

[yogaFLAME]

I don't understand the question being asked here.

Is a shield of reflection better than a vanilla shield of the same enchantment level? Yes.

Is it worse than a shield with a pip of rF? Yes.

Are shields in general bad? See every other thread asking this question ever. (hint: probably.)

[mikee]

Why are we talking about a thread from November 2012?

[FDru]

Why are we talking about a thread from November 2012?

omg 2012 was so long ago!

Seriously though, I don't see the problem if the information is still relevant.

[Abominae]

Shields are good. Seriously.
But reflection isn't.

[njvack]

Reflection is better than no ego if you don't care who (or how) you hurt (allies, religion). Resistances and protection are better shield egos. You probably won't find enough shields that you get to choose anyhow.