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[Frumple]

There's a list somewhere in this thread of sacred mounts, in one of my posts. Most of the rideability conflicts should have been fixed by the most recent version (H3 or H4, I forget which. I is actually a version or two behind the latest ). There were some specific checks added for the more exotic stuff at some point.

But yeah, kobold pretty much has the sexiest sacreds. Giant dragonfly is just ridiculously fast, heh.

As for use magic, yeah, things were never quite... well, fleshed out isn't quite the right word. "Viable" is more accurate. Scroll writing is pretty much only useful really useful for mages (and is outright broken for them if you push it right -- if a Mage reads a persistent buff scroll for a spell they know, it's free. This allows Shenanigans^(tm).), and alchemy and potion making are thoroughly subpar. You can make a pretty effective character leaning on wands for heavy blasting, though. One of my bard wins and my only rogue win did that. Some of the wands have just massive damage output.

[Kagus]

Ahhh, that might be why...  Silly git, I've got the I edition.  Might just have to fix that.


I'd carry on about the orcish druids, but now I'm not sure if everything still applies.  I think it should, but eh.

Basically, the druid has the ability to take advantage of the orcish +2 to Wis, and doesn't suffer *quite* as much from the -2 Int as some (but it does muck some things up still).  In addition, the druidic spell list includes a number of strength buffs to pile on top of the intrinsic +4, which allow for a relatively low-level character to get close to around 30 strength without even starting in on the potential +5 intrinsic training.

That's just the standard stuff.  Now for the peculiarities.

All orcish characters start off with certain weapons, namely a polearm and some shotputs.  Shotputs are generally iron (wrought iron in the case of orcish equipment).  Druids, however, automatically change all iron equipment on their person into ironwood.  This includes the shotputs.

Why is this important?  Because the 1st-level spell "shillelagh" allows for a player to enchant a weapon with a +1 enchantment, plus some extra sonic damage.  However, it's limited to wooden weapons that do blunt damage.  Thanks to your natural tweaks, the stack of shotputs you have now qualifies for the spell, allowing for a rather gnarly ranged attack early on.

In addition, orcs have the devouring ability, allowing them to gain intrinsic bonuses from eating certain corpses.  On the one side, this is just nice, as it fits in well with a druid's wilderness lore and also their ability to shapeshift into creatures with massive constitution scores to make snacktime less disease-ridden.  On the other side, this allows you to max out your intrinsic dexterity bonus within the first few levels of the game.  Here's how:

Druids are granted the ability to conjure animal companions to serve them.  Unlike standard summoned creatures, these are persistent, "natural" creatures that will stick with you through thick and thin.  You're basically just adding another NPC to the game.  As a side effect of this, their corpses also stick around after their death.  One of the animals that can be summoned as a companion is the elven cat, a creature which apparently qualifies as a poster child for the nimble, agile grace of all elvenkind.  This means you can eat them for said bonuses.

Summon a cat, kill them or get them killed, and eat them for the bonuses.  Use your pumped dexterity along with your massively buffed strength, plus the rending claws you get from a later persistent buff, to utterly shred enemies in close range after having pummeled them from afar with magic wooden wrecking balls.  Tack on obscurement for some hysterical stealth and protection from most ranged attackers, and things are looking fairly decent.


Now, mind, I really shouldn't be talking too much about what's good and what's not good, as I've never actually brought a character far enough along to wipe the goblin king.  Although, if my good characters would stop bugging out and breaking the game, I might have been able to reach the bastard by this point...

[Frumple]

Orcs make solid Druids, yeah, especially considering Druids are the most direct-combat capable of the main casters. Druids just by themselves are pretty ridiculous, though, even if you're not cheesing earth meld. They've just got a very effective spell set and a lot of advantages. They arguably make the best alienists, too -- summoned animal companion synergizes best with pseudonatural, simply because they can't generate with a weapon and lose out on the extra natural attacks. It's pretty deadly.

For early game throwing shenanigans, though, all Druids have access to that throw fire whatsit straight from the first level. It doesn't seem that impressive, until you realize your animal companion gets a stack, too. Buggers basically machine-gun the things, t'boot. Iirc, I once killed pretty much everything down to like the sixth level just spamming those everywhere. Two critters tossing an unending stream of fire at everything is somewhat effective

And yeah, re:shapeshifting, there's a couple of mythical forms, later in the game, that have outright disease immunity if you don't feel like investing in wilderness lore. I don't think I've tried cheesing Orc devouring via animal companion before, though. Won't in the future either, but it's a nice trick. Did use 'em to get ridiculous piety from the multitude once, heh. Pretty sure that ranger won

[Kagus]

I tried making a druid alienist one time just to see how it would work (my previous weavecrafter alienists going completely balls-out on anything and everything down for several levels), but seeing as alienists are borked in .9I, well...  Yeah, never really got to see that idea come to fruition.

I have wondered a bit how well druids do as diplomat characters though, seeing as they're capable of making amends with both humanoids and beasts.  Toss in some Mara worship and you've got the dead on your side too.  Haven't quite had the motivation to play the test characters I made with that design to the point where they can actually be evaluated, but hey.

Hehe, I also can't make much use of ranged attacks now either thanks to this computer having an unresponsive "f" key (yes, that means I have to Ctrl-V every single one I use while typing), making firing or throwing projectiles a wee bit more aggravating.


My most effective character to date (discounting the alienist who thoroughly abused the thing with psuedonatural summons not draining mana properly) was actually a warrior, of all things...  Gnomish warrior.  I'd either smack'em up close with a mercurial broadsword, skewer'em from afar with the arbalest thanks to his naturally quick reloading, or blast them to smithereens with one of an assortment of magical wands.

Then he got hit with a Con-draining disease and died pitifully in the depths as his fortitude saving throws grew progressively weaker and weaker.  Wah.

[Mictlantecuhtli]

The main reason I love this game is the incredible depth available to you when making characters, especially when combined with the random bonuses you gain from rolling. I still love making a Kobold [anything] Rogue that specializes in chain whips. Those things are like blenders on a chain, I swear.

[Frumple]

Dual-wield spiked chain, maaan. It's hilarious cheese once it gets off the ground. It's like... take that one spikey blender. And then add another. It's just great.

Kobolds can't do it without some size manipulation, though. Which is actually pretty easy to pull off -- level of zurvash priest, ferex, or anything else with the might (or maybe it's strength, forget at th'mo) domain. Then that size boosting persistent buff. Suddenly, you qualify for monkey hand dual-wield, and things are wonderful.

I usually build it with humans, though. It's pretty feat heavy to get really sexy.

[alamoes]

All three of the official links, plus the one some guy posted are down.  Could someone repost or something? :/

[Frumple]

Was it this post? The one I posted a ways back is dead, but the one mict posted seems to be functioning (though I can't actually check on this damn tablet thing). I'm supposed to have a copy of the incursion group files lurking in my email, but damned if I can find the bloody things navigating the mobile version of my email

[0x517A5D]

Dual-wield spiked chain, maaan. It's hilarious cheese once it gets off the ground. It's like... take that one spikey blender. And then add another. It's just great.

Kobolds can't do it without some size manipulation, though. Which is actually pretty easy to pull off -- level of zurvash priest, ferex, or anything else with the might (or maybe it's strength, forget at th'mo) domain. Then that size boosting persistent buff. Suddenly, you qualify for monkey hand dual-wield, and things are wonderful.

I usually build it with humans, though. It's pretty feat heavy to get really sexy.

I was using humans too, back here.

The idea of spec'ing a kobold for 2chain.net/spiked/ is interesting, and no more warped than taking a human that direction.  I kinda just wrote them off because, nonhuman so less feats, and small so no dual wield.  I've never tried size manipulation at all, with any race or class.

Two-spiked-chains builds are powerful but fragile.  Too much focus warps the build.  You don't have any build room for generalist feats.  It's like the opposite flaw of a glass cannon mage.

But man.  Reach & close-range in one weapon, plus entanglement, plus trip.  Spiked chains are THE WEAPON as far as I am concerned.

I never got a character high enough to have both Great Cleave and Two-Weapon Tempest.  Just imagine what that must be like.  Mmmm.

[Frumple]

It's nice. There's just this little square around you in which everything melts. Well, gets lacerated into mulch, I guess.

That said, by the time you actually hit the end game that combo is almost completely superfluous -- usually the only stuff that shows up in sufficient number to really benefit it is the goblin camp, and a melee focused character is going to be pretty much completely immune to the chaff critters by that point. Cleave or great cleave speeds things up, but it doesn't make the encounter particularly easier. I've wrecked the place just facerolling it with a melee dude more than once without even cleave, heh. It's slower, but I generally don't lose much more HP or fritter away more fatigue.

But yeah, dual spike's actually not that defensively weak, due to expertise and the desired high dex (which boosts the trip/entangle DC) leaving you with oodles of... whatever the dodge stat is, that I'm forgetting the name if. A bit less than a good shield will offer, but still plenty capable of making most things unable to hit on anything but a natural twenty.

Their biggest problem is the same problem all warriors have (that only lasts until late-mid game or so, when you get the kit to fix it), which is utility -- and again, a lighter armor/high dex build (which a dual spiker is after, though they probably won't go finesse -- knock prone has hilarious synergy with spiked chains, iirc, so strength is desired, too.) avoids a lot of the armor penalty (and thus utility) issues heavier warriors run in to.

Cleave and numbers would be an issue, but two-weapon tempest and mastery generally means you hit fast enough it just doesn't matter, heh.

Anyway, yeah. Ideal stat spread for a spiked chain user is 13 int (adjusted for racial modifiers -- almost every melee fighter wants this, for expertise.), then strength and dex as high as possible and in that order of preference. Then decent con and luck if you can swing it. Non-abysmal cha helps out much later (for bartered buff spells), but some stat boosting kit tends to fix that. Wisdom is an ehn thing. Helps with saves but not much else. E: One of my winners (DitL'd over in the google group~) went with 16,16,17,13,11,13,10, but I think that was a bit more than stat buy can manage (the stat sets do that, heh, sometimes extremely), but it's roughly bloody perfect for a spiked chain wielder.

[Frumple]

Doublepost bump to bring to attention Boss Mensch noticed the links were down and fixed things. Fellow was offline for a period and just recently got back on and saw the links were down.

So, website downloads should be working again. Drop a line if anyone has problems and I'll relay things, iffin' y'don't feel like going straight to the google group.

[Kagus]

I know spiked chains are gods among melee weapons, but I never really quite "got" the double-wielding.  Just seems like way too many feats and focuses in order to get something to work properly, and for what bonus?  The primary awesomeness of the chain, at least by my understanding, is its versatility and use in being able to strike enemies at range, up close, and even while grappling (plus the entanglement natural and the bonus to tripping), so I don't really see how any of that would be increased through having two of them and burning a number of feats just on that (unless it is indeed to just increase the damage output to the point where you're killing things faster, because simply immobilizing them and rendering them helpless wasn't enough), especially seeing as you will always have a +tohit penalty when using two weapons.  But I honestly haven't played around with dual-wielding much, so I don't know what I'm missing out on.

And...  Don't you ever have issues with versatility?  Or does that kind of character somehow manage to punch its way through all the various threats down there?


Just attempted to run a Xavias priest to try out the scroll-discount buffing...  But then things wonked out a bit with the domains not working properly so the Scribe Scroll feat which I *should* have received was not, in fact, granted to me.  Plus some other weirdness.

Then he got into a scuffle with a kobold and was summarily backstabbed by that goddamn shadow ooze that had been wandering around...  I really do hate shadow oozes.

[Mictlantecuhtli]

Shadow Oozes: Experts on tracking you down and instagibbing you if you're trying to play a new character with a special build which happens to include weakness at the starting levels. Always sends me right back to a melee character when that happens 3 or 4 times in a row..

[Frumple]

Re: Dual spiked chain questions, let's see... the primary bonus from having two is, well, having two. Double the attempts to trip, tangle, and knock prone. Double the attempts for a crit. Two five percent chances of autohit (natural 20) per attack round. More versatile ego representation. Somewhat more than double the damage. It helps that two weapon tempest, in particular, is a particularly stunning talent.

As for tohit penalty, iirc it's either -2/-4 at max feats or -0/-2, which is incredibly trivial by the mid game, much less the end. It's mostly a non-issue in the early game, too (though you do want at least up to florentine before dual wielding spiked chains, unless you pick up a decent enchanted one -- +3, +4, something like that -- to use in the off hand.), but if it's a problem you just unequip one of the chains and beat whatever the problem is to death.

Versatility wise... not sure what mean, heh. You can still use bows or wands or whatever if you feel like, and feat wise other than some skill boosters, "moar damage" is about all a melee fighter needs. Reach weapons in particular negate a number of threats that a warrior would be really leery about and maybe burn some feats to avoid, and not going heavy into dual-wielding feats isn't really going to make much of a difference when you run into one of those lovely casters that have every buff in the bloody game running. Only thing you can do about those is dispel wands, usually, or (sometimes) ranged attacks. Burning a feat on picking up use magic isn't a bad idea, but a human warrior probably wants to grab that and lockpicking anyway, so no problem.

Dual spiked chain, basically, has both obscene cost and obscene payout. Make no mistake, though -- single spiked chain (especially with shield!) can still wreck the joint just fine. Honestly, once a warrior gets over the initial I-can't-get-over-lava-or-deal-with-death-aura hump, weapon only tangentially matters. They'll faceroll most things regardless of what they're using (Hohoho resurrected warrior murdering high depth vault with unenchanted dagger to get back to kit hohoho).

[Kagus]

Wasn't aware that you'd get extra attempts for tripping and whatnot, although I can see it for the natural entangle (as it's just an innate function of the weapon itself, and you're attacking with two every natural attack round).  I thought trip attempts were singular, and didn't really consider the bit about knocking prone.  But I can see now that "1 in 3 normal attacks" means a bit more when you're making twice the number of such attacks each swing.

I'd honestly just never played much with warriors, due to seeing them as one of the trickier classes to play.  They demolish a number of early meatsacks, but I never quite liked how they didn't really have many good ways of either splatting mages, resisting or outmaneuvering special-effect creatures, avoiding traps or unlocking chests and doors, or even just running away from particularly nasty encounters.  I tend to regard versatility as just a character's ability to survive different aspects, be it a pack of adlets (god I hate those things too...), a spellcaster, a pit trap, disease, a locked door, or really just anything.  And survival of course does not mean defeating, hehe...  An easy exit is always high on the shopping list, as with any proper roguelike.


Ooh...  Uhh...  On a whim, I just made a wizard-mode character to see how a two-weapon style ranger would match up against a warrior in regards to a large, exotic two-weapon build (however, since rangers can't pick spiked chains as an exotic from the start, they need something else).  Yes, I just have to be different.

As a side result of this, I, uh...  found something kinda nifty.  Scythes.

Yes, I've now got a ranger, who automatically gains the ambidexterity, two-weapon style and even eventually two-weapon tempest at 11th level (but that's a bit long to wait for that) plus the other things rangers are decent at, such as minor spellcasting, sneaking, and summoning a gigantic bat to ride around on.

In addition to this, he's wielding two weapons which automatically have a built-in knock prone effect with DC 16, plus the +4 to trip attempts otherwise.  What makes these particularly interesting is that they have 1d8 damage to large, 2d6 damage to medium and small creatures; score a critical on 18, 19 and 20, and that critical does 4x damage.

Let's put improved critical on that, shall we?  Yes, we are now scoring criticals on rolls of 15 and up.  A critical that deals stupid amounts of damage, in addition to again activating the knock prone effect.


It's still no spiked chain...  They're not reach weapons and they can't be used for grappling, plus they have a -2 accuracy modifier (slightly offset by the +4 parry mod).  Moreover, weapon finesse doesn't apply to them and they only knock prone instead of entangling.

Still though...  Could be worse.  Warriors are probably still better for doing these things just generally, but the weapon itself seems fairly alright and it does provide a potential alternative for nutcase rangers.  Not that I know anything.