Anti-wizard tactics

[phiwum]

Originally Posted by hcobb

Your mission, if you choose to accept it, is to assassinate this mad halfling before she forces the entire world to submit to her twisted vision of peace, love, and joy. Should your party start chanting her slogans the agency will deny all connection.

I've no problems with peace, love and joy, but if she advocates peace, love, joy and creamy peanut butter, I'm in.

[Axly Suregrip]

Just need a clear shot with a heavy crossbow + weapon poison by your zombie sniper (no IQ thus no WOC affect). 6 dice of damage should do nicely.

[Skarg]

Originally Posted by RobW

Having set out fully determined to kill Molly in DT2 (working to shoot her, pole charge, overwhelm, etc), I found it was impossible due to Word of Command: Surrender (Obey, Freeze, Lie Down and others would have worked too). When the two octopi fell to the spell I was too demoralised to continue.

There's no counter to Word of Command Surrender. The entire opposing force is immediately neutralised for 3ST. The saving throw is 5/IQ.

Word of Command is, of course, just about the most powerful thing in the game, and an attention-getter that doesn't really make sense for a Death Test applicant. But still... was Molly accompanied by people casting Aid on her, and if not, what was "Molly's" ST & DX?

[phiwum]

Originally Posted by Axly Suregrip

Just need a clear shot with a heavy crossbow + weapon poison by your zombie sniper (no IQ thus no WOC affect). 6 dice of damage should do nicely.

More than 5% would make their save rolls and the wizard wouldn't know who was unaffected by the Word of Command. Those affected by the Word believe the last thing they hear in the minute, so an unaffected person can possibly convert others to view the wizard as an enemy.

It's a powerful cult leader, no doubt. I think it's a beatable cult leader, however. She could have a large band of true believers who were commanded in small groups (so that the odds are all of them believed), but again on occasion she might think that a fella is a true believer when he has resisted the spell. This would create a member of the resistance in a sensitive position.

[phiwum]

Originally Posted by Skarg

Word of Command is, of course, just about the most powerful thing in the game, and an attention-getter that doesn't really make sense for a Death Test applicant. But still... was Molly accompanied by people casting Aid on her, and if not, what was "Molly's" ST & DX?

Couldn't Word of Command + Drain Strength be used to deal with any ST concerns? Believe would work to make compliant batteries out of foes and arguably so would Surrender.

DX seems a real issue. A faster missile weapon user could put some hurt on a wizard before he could utter the word.

[RobW]

Originally Posted by Skarg

Word of Command is, of course, just about the most powerful thing in the game, and an attention-getter that doesn't really make sense for a Death Test applicant. But still... was Molly accompanied by people casting Aid on her, and if not, what was "Molly's" ST & DX?

I felt confident it would be relatively easy to take out the "full" 40-pt Molly with a concerted effort using a Death Test 2 level challenge. This was because at the time, Molly was discussed only in terms of a dagger-staff expert occult-strike defending wizard. Which looked ok-ish to me, but certainly not as fantastic as made out to be.

I asked hcobb for his setup and team: It was Molly (ST 6, DX 14, IQ 20) plus three starting characters: a whip-wielding judo-throwing physicker, and two light crossbow snipers. Molly's spell list arrived at the very end. The full account is here:
http://forums.sjgames.com/showthread...=168433&page=3

Without WoC I think her crew were set to fall in the first room, and on her own there would be no way she could last against standard melee tactics of many against one.

BTW -- I am a big fan of hcobb's imagination and creations :)

[Kieddicus]

A good way to stop a wizard is have someone in that party with the Net skill and an iron-chain net. Lob it on the wizard and they are at -4 DX to cast spells.

[zot]

Originally Posted by phiwum

That's an abuse for a PC who wants a horde of followers, I guess, but that sounds like an odd path for a player to take. Who wants to run a bureaucracy that manages a huge group of cultists? Most players go for more conventional heroes rather than Jim Jones.

Wait a minute here, in the old days, at least in D&D, that actually was the goal.

In original and first edition D&D, higher level PCs would gain followers and eventually build strongholds. Rangers got 2-24 followers (all of them merry), clerics got 20-200 followers...

[Skarg]

Originally Posted by phiwum

Couldn't Word of Command + Drain Strength be used to deal with any ST concerns? Believe would work to make compliant batteries out of foes and arguably so would Surrender.

Yeah, that's a good point...

Originally Posted by phiwum

DX seems a real issue. A faster missile weapon user could put some hurt on a wizard before he could utter the word.

... but so is this. One ST 9 DX 15 small bow opponent, for example, could end the streak. And since Hcobb thinks exploiting Missile Weapons talent in Death Test is cool, if it were fair, even a mere 32-point opponent could be ST 11 DX 12(15 bow) IQ 9 longbow, which is quite likely to be able to make a ST 6 unarmored wizard not have 3 ST to cast Word of Command.

But I think the main rational comment is that 40-point IQ 20 wizards with Word of Command don't really make sense as Death Test applicants.

[phiwum]

Originally Posted by Skarg

But I think the main rational comment is that 40-point IQ 20 wizards with Word of Command don't really make sense as Death Test applicants.

Well, that's just unfair. Thorz wants the best, right? And surely some very experienced wizards have significant gambling debts.

With, I suppose, a loan shark who's deaf and immune to that snazzy Word.

Actually, you raise a good point. Why does Thorz limit the test to beginners? He wants promising and good heroes, but not too good, I guess.