by Dr Disaster aka Niriel`{SNOB}
by Dr Disaster aka Niriel`{SNOB}
Who haven't had this or a similar setup:
Your mage finds Nightmare/Hell level 15 filled with Soul Burners and Balrogs. They have 420-675 (SB) and 520-600 (B) real HP and both are immune to fire and resist lightning and magic. You know that it will take loads of Chain Lightning to bring them down.
*yuck*
When i ask "Isn't there another option?" for sure 99% of you say "NO WAY!".
But i say "Yes there is one!" I show it to you and it works for all those monsters out there that are immune to fire and resist lightning and magic. And it will save you a few trips to Adria for more mana.
The alternate is called "TeleFlash".
First off a special note about the Flash spell. Whenever you cast Flash you have to wait until it's finished before you can cast is again or another spell. BUT when you cast it very quickly you can set of two Flashs insteed of one! This doubles the amount of damage that is dealed to the target! This technique will be refered to as "doubled Flash".
Now how does that "TeleFlash" work?
Correct positioning to maximize Flash damage is elementary. Some of you may know that Flash sometimes does not kill a monster even after 10+ doubled flashes. This obvious bug finally bugged me so much that i did a little testing on my LAN. I don't go to much into details and only show you the results.
Each monster or player that stands still can be attacked with Flash from
8 different spots. The X represent your target and the numbers the possible attack spots
as you see them on your screen.
1
From any of the 8 spots the target takes damage when you cast Flash. BUT! Because of some buggie program routine the target takes only approx. 10% damage when you invoke Flash from spots 4, 6 and 8! This renders Flash ratter useless when you try it on these three spots. So under all circumstances try to move to spots 1, 2, 3, 5 or 7! Here your Flash will unleash it's full damage potential!
Those of you that are familiar with the TeleKill strategy of the warrior know that you almost always end up on spot 6 when you teleport onto your target X. Don't try this on a mage that knows about Flash! He is then target X and he will automaticaly sit in your Flash spot 3! Bye bye warrior!
For moving targets it's almost the same. But you can gain an additional bonus when this happens: A monster moves in a 45 decree angle. Stone it when it is between two tiles, move on one of the adjacent tiles and let go. This is explained further in example 4.
One last word about listed Flash damage in the spell book. It says something like 150-300 or 500-1000 if you have a high-level Flash. I can verify that the damage that is really dealed out tends to be close up to the maximum damage listed! The listed minimum damage is misleading and far too low. More correct number would something like 75%-100% listed damage instead of 50%-100%.
Example 1: Nightmare dif. The mage M encounters
3 Soul Burners (S) in a corridor leading from southeast to northwest.
First the mage stones each of them. Then he teleports behind(!) them ...
The mage arrives in the Flash spots 1, 3 and 5 of the Soul Burners and casts a doubled
Flash! WHAMMO! 3 SBs falling to dust! If he teleports in front of them ...
he ends up in spots 4, 6 and 8 and his Flash does only 10% of the estimated damage.
That's a waste of mana because it won't kill anything. Example 2: Mage M encounters 2 Balrogs in h/h, same direction
as in example 1. He is able to stone them in this position:
He then teleports to spot X and sets of a doubled Flash. Both Balrogs are dead meat
now! The mage could also teleport to spot Y. But then he would be in spot 6 of the Balrog to
his right side and this one will survive the assault. Example 3: The perfect Flash! Try to stone your enemies into
this position
S
and teleport to position X. Now you can kill five enemies with one invocation!
Example 4: a Monster is stoned between two tiles.
The game handles this situation in a very simple way: it thinks that two monsters are
attacked by the player. For the player it is the same situation as if he has stoned two
monsters on both occupied squares. Therefore the inflicted damage from each square is
added together and implied on the poor lone critter.
Note that you can attack from more than the standard 8 spots when you face this situation.
In fact you have twice 10 and twice 12 possible attack squares. Now how can this occur and
which of the Flash spots are most effective? The spots in the following diagrams are rated
like this:
- X marks the two squares that the stone moonster occupies
- P marks a perfect Flash spot where both ttarget squares receive maximum damage. In this
spots a single Flash is able to kill a monster that would require a doubled Flash on one
of the G spots
- G marks a good Flash spot where at least one target square receives maximum damage.
- B marks a bad Flash spot where only minimmum damage is deal to the target
Here are the 4 different possible situations. Our lone stoned monster made
a) a 90 degree west-east (or left-right) move
G G
G P G
B X X G
B G G
B B
Note: here the P spot is in a bad position because it's directly behind the monster
sprite, almost impossible to target/reach by the Teleport spell and also hard to walk to.
b) a 90 degree north-south (or up-down) move
G
G G
B X G
G P
B X G
B G
B
c) a 45 degree southwest-northeast (or lowerleft-upperright) move
G
G G
G X G
B X P
B G
B
Note: this is the best of the 4 situations. It has only 3 B spots and the P spot can be
reached very easy.
d) a 45 degree northwest-southeast (or upperleft-lowerright) move
G
G G
B X P
B X G
B G
B
Additional note: these 4 situations are the same when you have stoned 2 monsters on the
adjacent X-squares. BUT since you're now attacking 2 individual monsters you have to move
in on the P spot to get them both at once with Flash. Attacks from the G Spots will only
bring down one of them while the other one goes nearly unharmed.
Finally here are some of my favorite victims for TeleFlash:
| Normal + Nitemare | Hell | Any Difficulty |
| Magistrates Steel Lords Azure Drakes |
Vortex Lords Balrogs |
The Butcher Stareye the Witch The Vizier |
My basic advice for casting spells is: Check the resistances of your enemies! If they are immune to fire and resist lightning look at their magic resistances. If they are not immune here give the TeleFlash a shot.
Sometimes those underrated spells like Flash are the best.
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