>Great Parry: attack twice, use missile weapons, or rely on magic and
>you've bypassed it. For that matter any shield with AP stronger than
>your attack is as good as a Great Parry.
Attack twice, and Babs' attack (which you can't parry) comes before your second. Also, at least according to the straight RQ3 rules, if you split your attack, you can't attack the same target twice, so it isn't even a valid strategy. A regular success with a GPed shield stops *all* damage - even a Truesworded BS4 Greatsword critical. Essentially, Great Parry makes all successes with a shield criticals. Very nice.
>Slash: is one woman with an 8d6 Axe attack as useful as 5 Truesworded
>Humakti?
Why one against 5? Are five women with 3d6 Axe attack as useful as five Truesworded Humakti? How about five women with 4d6 attack as opposed to five Humakti with Truesword & Shield? Pretty much a wash.
>Axe Trance: if she's at 90% skill anyway, how often does she miss? And
>her axe doesn't impale. A parry is just as good as ever (though Dodge
>does lose some utility).
Axes don't impale, but they do slash, and critical. Each point in Axe Trance increases the Slash% by 2, and each two points increases the critical chance by one. Since there's no limit to the MP you can put in, this gets scary; 300% Attack isn't out of the question, which gives 60% Slash & 15% critical.
>Her powers are all good ones, don't get me wrong, but they're very
>specialized, very single-person oriented. A single boosted Mindblast and
>your Female Death Machine is out of action.
Well, unless she's cast Berserk, which makes her immune to mind-affecting magic...
>Take a warrior with 5 points of Rune Magic:
>
>Babeester Gor: Slash 2, Great Parry
>Storm Khan: Berserk, Shield 4
Babeester Gor: Berserk, Shield 4
>The Berserk attacks twice a round since he can't parry anyway (which
>pretty much cancels out the Great Parry), and gets +8 armor, which
>cancels out the 2 points of Slash. I'd bet on him in any fair fight.
He can't attack the same target twice, and if he could, Babs' unparried attack would come before his. Sure, on average Shield 4 cancels out the 2d6 from Slash 2, but those 2d6 aren't going to roll 7 every time, so when they roll an 11, Babs comes out ahead. Besides, Babs *also* has access to Berserker & Shield, so if those are better, she can use them too. The, when their Berserks run out, Babs allied spirit can cast Invigorate on her, and she can take out the helpless Storm Khan.
I don't think that Babeester Gor is absurdly powerful, given the social restrictions placed on them, but remember, other warrior cults have restrictions placed on them as well (Humakti - those geasa can hurt, and no resurrection can be a pain; Storm Bull - being a berserker is deadly). It's just that Babs has access to virtually *all* the useful combat magic - Slash, Axe Trance, Shield, Berserk, Great Parry, Invigorate - so that Babs can be the ultimate combat machine. Not that there's anything wrong with that, but don't pretend it's not true.
>Sandy
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Doesn't the fact that there are *exactly* 50 states seem a little suspicious?
George W. Harris gharris_at_dur.mindspring.com ------------------------------
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