Is Ablative Shield flawed? (in General)


sonicstrike April 24 2006 5:14 PM EDT

Tails cast Ablative Shield on all friendly Minions (5944)
Sonic cast Ablative Shield on all friendly Minions (8570)
while
Tails's Ablative Shield: 16,343 (8,181)
Sonic's Ablative Shield: 7,234 (3,627)
Can anyone explain this?

Maelstrom April 24 2006 5:17 PM EDT

Enchantments stack, so the second one cast is actually the combined value of both.

"Sonic cast Ablative Shield on all friendly Minions (8570) "

This is the total effect of both Tails' and Sonic's AS.

bartjan April 24 2006 5:19 PM EDT

Also, there's a builtin limit/penalty on Ablative Shield depending on the number of minions you have.

bartjan April 24 2006 5:21 PM EDT

A tip: 2 instances of Ablative Shield (or any other defensive enchantment, if of the same type) is much more vulnerable against Dispell Magic than 1 strong one.

Dudley Dotson April 26 2006 3:33 PM EDT

but if theres no dm you get lots more AS...you could have all 4 minions having AS and by the end you would have a 20k AS

bartjan April 26 2006 3:51 PM EDT

Equally much as 1 minion training AS on 1 minion at 4x the level of all those tiny ones.

Instead of 4 minions all training AS, AMF and Cone of Cold for example, have 1 minion 100% AS, 1 minion 100% AMF and 2 100% Cone of Cold. That way you get much more value out of the same XP.

Dudley Dotson April 26 2006 7:49 PM EDT

but if you have 2 minions pure AS it kills..I got a 33k and a 90k used against me. they really shouldn't stack..at least not that much

AdminQBnovice [Cult of the Valaraukar] April 26 2006 7:54 PM EDT

they don't stack, people have tried explaining how it works, yet you still persist. Lets try again.

if you have two minions casting AS, the seconds minions AS acts exactly the same as if the first minion had trained the same amount of xp into it, not only does AS not stack like you think it does, it also by being split amongst multipule minions become extremely vunerable to DM.

Please don't chew on the clue token...

Dudley Dotson April 27 2006 6:58 AM EDT

I don't get it...how is it that big then? does the second AS just show the total number of AS everyone receives and not the effect that person has?

Drakon(DS) April 27 2006 8:10 AM EDT

yeah the second is the total level of the enchanment

AdminQBGentlemanLoser [{END}] April 27 2006 8:15 AM EDT

Yup! That's it.

For example. You have two minions with AS. The first (for example) has 100,000 (40,000) the second 200,000 (70,000). On thier own, the first would provide 40,000 HP the second 70,000.

When casting together, they don't add effects, it's not 40,000 + 70,000 = 110,000. But they add levels, and the total AS level is cast. So it would be 100,000 + 200,000 = 300,000 (100,000) (All numbers made up...)

The battle log just shows the total amount cast.

For you, if only Tails was alive, you would get 5,944 HPs, with both you get (16,343 + 7,234, levels added) 8,570 HPs instead.

I hope this helps! :)

QBsutekh137 April 27 2006 11:47 AM EDT

I might as well pollute this...

It is not EXACTLY true to say two are worse than one... Training two is cheaper, since both take advantage of the low end of the training curve (when each point only costs 10, 11, 12, etc. EXP per). One large AS coule get into the 14 and 15 EXP cost per level, while two smalls would only be costing 12 or 13 per level).

That was the old thinking, anyway. Now, with DM it is is not worth trying to wring out those gains. Two smalls get completely fizzled while one large one can overcome the DM effect.

For enchantments that cannot be quelled (such as AMF, provided you aren't DMing it yourself), stacking can be slightly more EXP-efficient, as long as you have the slots for it and don't need to be concentrating it for something else on those particular minions.

AdminQBnovice [Cult of the Valaraukar] April 27 2006 12:00 PM EDT

good point Sut, but we were trying to drag the kid out of the dark, not reach enlightenment.

QBJohn Birk [Black Cheetah Bazaar] April 27 2006 12:01 PM EDT

I think another hedge against having DM nerf your two minion AS versus a one minion AS is a big DM spell. Basically if they are going to work hard to knock your AS down, train a little HP on your minions and carry one big single Direct Magic spell. Now they can DM out your AS but they are subjected to the full force of your Direct Magic spell, or they use AMF to protect from your Direct Magic spell and you get full use of a cheaper overall AS.

Another note, but trickier is Decay. Again, if you can make it so the Decay does not hurt you much when AMF totally nerfs it, the use of DM with you using Decay can mean they get a big effect from your Decay or they nerf it.

To me the real danger from two minion AS vs one comes from the RoS strats that use both AMF and DM and use the RoS special ability to reduce the nerf effect DM has on its own AMF. Now you have two relatively effective EO spells and now you cannot hedge using a Direct Magic spell. So I think the only real drawback to a properly hedged two minion AS strat is its big vulnearability to the ever more popular RoS strats.

QBsutekh137 April 27 2006 12:06 PM EDT

Point of notation, Sefton: aren't we calling magic-based damage spells "DD" (Direct Damage)? Calling them DM is extremely confusing.

DM - Dispel Magic
DD - Direct Damage spell (FB, CoC, MM, Decay)

Especially on a thread with a newer player asking questions, let's not confuse enchantment and direct damage training...

QBJohn Birk [Black Cheetah Bazaar] April 27 2006 12:25 PM EDT

And you are correct I certainly should have used DD instead of Direct Magic in my explanation.

Dudley Dotson April 27 2006 3:14 PM EDT

Thanks for dragging me into the blinding sun..ow my eyes

/me hands out anti-caps eyewash.

/me hands out UV-glasses.

/me now understands.

Thank you :)
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