So in light of two very very powerful mummies just deleting I thought I share some thoughts of how fighting them is. (suggestions at the end)

The Army!
As a shapeshifter (umnys) its pretty much a one way street. Any zombie in the army has about 3k hitpoint total?(no idea on the exact number, guessing it depends greatly on the zombie, but take the current mostly used ones like the unicorn or storm giant's) and hits a bit weaker than an offense form. To me thats just insane. You are walking around with 5x zombies that all hit for 2-3 Massacre mangle (occasional dismembers) a round! And to boot has the health of 3x normal player! Not even considering the necromancer himself at this point.

Their weakness, sure they will run when their controller is not about. So killing them off when their controller is not there is easy. Very time consuming but easy.

So the argument is that it takes a long time to make such an army. About 1 hour game time? Pretty big investment right? But in reality you are then walking around with the equivalent of 5-7 npc's that will make short work of most classes.

I have not played a necromancer higher than 30's so any enlightenment here is always appreciated. So far I have yet to play a class that can deal with a mummy or lich in any form alone.

So liches and mummys!
Very powerful in their own right, requires a quest (automated or imm run) You could just have wasted 80-150 hours of gametime becoming a lich or a mummy! And it takes a good bit of time to gather the items and performing the ritual. So a reward should be given.

The resulting reward/curse
Lich/mummy: immunity to very many spells and maledictions. You could say you disable classes that do maledictions.
Lich/mummy: Vulnrability to holy/light attacks. (can be covered by phylacteries or spells(spells can be dispelled)
Lich/mummy: Immunity to sleep, which is both good and bad, probably takes away a bard, rogue, ap or other necromancers strongest weapon.
Lich/mummy: Deaths now eat more health. Can be recovered by rituals, not always reliable?
Lich: rituals can gain abilities from corpses by performing a ritual.

So the final thoughts.
Is there any class that can deal with a lich/mummy on their own? Is the thought to have these only be taken down by groups? Do you need to be a paladin with defiance, is that enough?
Some suggestions:
1. Perhaps take away word of recall, it makes traveling a bit harder, and makes sense in the form that undeath is a curse much like the curse spell. That would leave them with teleport which is still very very powerful.
2. Reduce the damage of the zombies. When it outdamages mele from some classes its just disturbing to me. I do understand they need to be healthy as they dont dodge much but do they need to hit for massacre/mangle?
3. Give the communers something that can aid them deal with liches/mummies specifically. (wrath/holy/light attacks are easily covered by a lich/mummy)
4. My greatest wish. For the future, distant in a world greener and filled with unicorns. Have a quest to gain a last ability for each class. Automated would be good.

Cheers Umnys
Just my thoughts after being on the recieving end.

Zombies are disproportionately good against characters that are truly terrible tanks. Offense shifter, for example.

Really any character that you play like "Oh, I'm going to be beat to ####, but you'll be dead!" is probably going to have a really hard time with a full zombie army. They are the rock to its scissors.

>So in light of two very very powerful mummies just deleting I
>thought I share some thoughts of how fighting them is.
>(suggestions at the end)
>
>The Army!
>As a shapeshifter (umnys) its pretty much a one way street.
>Any zombie in the army has about 3k hitpoint total?(no idea on
>the exact number, guessing it depends greatly on the zombie,
>but take the current mostly used ones like the unicorn or
>storm giant's) and hits a bit weaker than an offense form. To
>me thats just insane. You are walking around with 5x zombies
>that all hit for 2-3 Massacre mangle (occasional dismembers) a
>round! And to boot has the health of 3x normal player! Not
>even considering the necromancer himself at this point.

Zombies are mobs. You kill mobs that are way more powerful than zombies quite frequently when leveling and/or getting eq or wands. Keep in mind that I have no real vested interest in this - my next char will likely fight zombie hordes too. But having played many many characters of varying builds, I can say that the zombie army is often the least of my concerns when dealing with a mummy/lich.

>Their weakness, sure they will run when their controller is
>not about. So killing them off when their controller is not
>there is easy. Very time consuming but easy.

Zombies can be kept in place via lagging attacks, fwiw. Also some classes have a chance to insta-kill them (I did this a lot as Dupmasione, and a few times as Brom (much lower int/wis)).

As Tavlin, fighting Invokers (for example) was quite frustrating. They'd throw 4 pillars or more before having to flee (if they did) and often would kill the entire army or most of it with very little risk to themselves. Paladins/shamen/enemy necros could/would summon the zombies away. Warriors would drive/pull me away from them and then lower level allies would beat on them. I could go on but you get the point.

>So the argument is that it takes a long time to make such an
>army. About 1 hour game time? Pretty big investment right? But
>in reality you are then walking around with the equivalent of
>5-7 npc's that will make short work of most classes.

I think having fought me 2 or 3 times, largely as your offensive form, does not really give you a good picture of how short the work is on "most classes". Many classes, yes, but any class that has good melee tanking abilities generally stood toe-to-toe with my army for many, many rounds. And I've done so on the reverse side.

>I have not played a necromancer higher than 30's so any
>enlightenment here is always appreciated. So far I have yet to
>play a class that can deal with a mummy or lich in any form
>alone.

>So liches and mummys!
>Very powerful in their own right, requires a quest (automated
>or imm run) You could just have wasted 80-150 hours of
>gametime becoming a lich or a mummy! And it takes a good bit
>of time to gather the items and performing the ritual. So a
>reward should be given.

More than 80-150. If you try to mummy that quickly (or lich, even worse) your odds of a successful transformation are really, really bad. You probably shouldn't even try until you've got over 200 hours in, possibly more.

>The resulting reward/curse
>Lich/mummy: immunity to very many spells and maledictions. You
>could say you disable classes that do maledictions.

No. Imm poison, bleeding, and disease. A common warrior tactic was to maledict me so that my dex/str was too low to pick anything up, then offhand disarm my shield (which made me resist_holy). It worked once, after that once I got impaled (especially if they had just looked at me) I removed my shield immediately. :P So some malediction immunity yes, but not all.

>Lich/mummy: Vulnrability to holy/light attacks. (can be
>covered by phylacteries or spells(spells can be dispelled)

Not vulnerable to light. Mummies don't get phylacteries, but I did have that one item to cover the holy vuln. Without it, I got seriously lit up by anyone with a wrathing sword.

>Lich/mummy: Immunity to sleep, which is both good and bad,
>probably takes away a bard, rogue, ap or other necromancers
>strongest weapon.

I'd disagree on AP, but the rest is pretty accurate.

>Lich/mummy: Deaths now eat more health. Can be recovered by
>rituals, not always reliable?

Not all liches and mummies receive RoC. Liches lose 1 con per death, Mummies 1 con per 2 deaths. Whether leader or not, FYI.

>Lich: rituals can gain abilities from corpses by performing a
>ritual.

...on corpses of sufficient level. That crumble, if not from corpses that they created.

>So the final thoughts.
>Is there any class that can deal with a lich/mummy on their
>own? Is the thought to have these only be taken down by
>groups? Do you need to be a paladin with defiance, is that
>enough?

It isn't the class, it's the player. I forced Satebos to flee quite a few times as Feilinal (whip/staff elf Sunwarden) and finally managed to seal the kill when I ganked him with a druid Nexun (I really really wish I had that log, I lost it in a HD crash).

I regularly caused Ahtieli to withdraw, as Dupmasione and as Woldrun. (But Ahtieli managed to kill Woldrun several times and possibly Dupmasione a few times too, I don't recall.)

I killed Frismund more than once as Dupmasione. He also got me, later, I believe with a group.

>Some suggestions:
>1. Perhaps take away word of recall, it makes traveling a bit
>harder, and makes sense in the form that undeath is a curse
>much like the curse spell. That would leave them with teleport
>which is still very very powerful.

Hah. There's no way this will happen. So you're saying you'd make it that entwining a lich/mummy should mean almost certain death if they aren't outdamaging you? Hah. No.

Also keep in mind that if you make a necromancer word, you really should be able to reduce his army by at least one zombie.

>2. Reduce the damage of the zombies. When it outdamages mele
>from some classes its just disturbing to me. I do understand
>they need to be healthy as they dont dodge much but do they
>need to hit for massacre/mangle?

Again, fight them as something other than offense shifter.

>3. Give the communers something that can aid them deal with
>liches/mummies specifically. (wrath/holy/light attacks are
>easily covered by a lich/mummy)

Like dispel evil and dispel (shaman), turn undead (all), all kinds of virtue abilities, wrath, incredible tanking and healing (paladin), gate/turn undead (healer), and decomposition (druid)? BTW saying they are "easily" covered is false. Ask Cotzibue how easy it is to get resist holy as a mummy and keep it up regularly.

>4. My greatest wish. For the future, distant in a world
>greener and filled with unicorns. Have a quest to gain a last
>ability for each class. Automated would be good.

I'm not saying this will never happen, but I don't see it in the near future.

Having played the game for many years, off and on since 94-96. (Forgotten when I started, mages could be dwarves). Fun times.
Ive seen and fought mummies(which is "recent") with 5 different classes. Liches with sadly 4 different ones. Even the arguably "worst ones" like Zorazoul and Istendil. Both incredibly powerful. But thats all side points.

I know that you have no vested interest in this specifically(other than the love for a balanced game), hence why I would not have brought it up unless all mummies/liches were dead. Their gone their gone. None’s feelings get hurt. And I would have to disagree with you on that they are the least of my concern. I can gear up to resist spells from the necro, but it would leave me vulnerable to the “army” of sorts and it would make short work of just about any char, unless they are a shield spec paladin as you mention or a gating healer that turns undead now and then. (Mayhap a sword spec warrior) (Not really a threat that last(gating healer) one, tried that and its easily avoided or punished by any clever player)

As for invokers vs necromancers: With a well geared invoker Id say they would be almost evenly matched. Having tried it, you still get beat on for 8-12 rounds casting those 4 pillars your hp is pretty low. And you may be maledicted to hell. And we are still talking about matchups for necromancers on a one to one basis. (Groups are a whole different thing)

As for having fought you specifically, yes it was 3 times total. And largely as an offensive form, choosing a defensive form would do what? Let me live another 3 rounds but do nothing to slow/intimidate? Not sure about the point here. But that’s irrelevant. Most classes cant stand against an undead army for long was my point. Even as your own logs show, fighting villagers at the destructor still tears them up. Fighting outside that beats them silly. I have to say I have a slight problem with that when it comes to game balance.

Your mentioning shamans as a possibly class that can deal with a mummy/lich. That matchup I can say ends up horribly. Yes I can summon away some of the mummy's army or even separate them, provided they are not imperial. (Having an arguably insanely powerful cabal power). Spells are mostly horrible, even with improved turn undead it still takes 2-3 goes to take the army to "flee", and that gives the mummy/lich 2-3 tries to get a pwk off. And thats after you probably being cursed. Pretty much ending up dead even with more than decent saves. Taking in that your pretty good at blocking as a shaman. Your still taking decimates from the army with shield/sanc/stoneskin prep. (I rarely had shield with my last effort, so a bit higher, was not really what would kill me).

Twist : More than 80-150. If you try to mummy that quickly (or lich, even worse) your odds of a successful transformation are really, really bad. You probably shouldn't even try until you've got over 200 hours in, possibly more.
Really good information here! This is greatly appreciated!

Regarding maledictions: So yes still vulnerable to again one class (still warrior)’s ability to decrease your stats so that you could not loot, (that’s what the army is for. Im jesting but only slightly). The maledictions would prevent you from dodging? Parrying? Using a wand?

Twist: Not vulnerable to light. Mummies don't get phylacteries, but I did have that one item to cover the holy vuln. Without it, I got seriously lit up by anyone with a wrathing sword.
Now here I have attempted this with classes that use a wrathing sword, or divine attack. (Not warrior), but rescue, re-directing means you take a significant amount of damage and the necromancer gets to vamp, maledict you between rescue, initiating combat and redirecting.

As for covering the holy vuln. 1 item in game that I know of covers it. And 2 preps that I know of gives resist holy(positive). (one may be resist light, its been a while since I have bothered with the second one due to it only covering one)

Twist: Not all liches and mummies receive RoC. Liches lose 1 con per death, Mummies 1 con per 2 deaths. Whether leader or not, FYI.
Great information here! I knew about the liches but not about the mummies! And had no idea about the leader thing.

Twist : I regularly caused Ahtieli to withdraw, as Dupmasione and as Woldrun. (But Ahtieli managed to kill Woldrun several times and possibly Dupmasione a few times too, I don't recall.) I killed Frismund more than once as Dupmasione. He also got me, later, I believe with a group.

What I would like to see is some number crunching, on how many deaths vs single opponents historically mummy’s liches have suffered. What class deals with a mummy lich or what spec. As a side note with Dupmasione did you have Defiance? And if so, how would the fight have gone without it?

>2. Reduce the damage of the zombies. When it outdamages mele
>from some classes its just disturbing to me. I do understand
>they need to be healthy as they dont dodge much but do they
>need to hit for massacre/mangle?

Twist : Again, fight them as something other than offense shifter.
Been there, done that. Your still getting beat up. Remember I was not even considering the necromancer at this point. With the necromancer the chance of winning is minimal at best. As another class your still getting beat up but perhaps not that quickly. Still a warrior having to re-direct to a rescued necro means you are taking 2-3 rounds of damage each time a rescue goes through.

A shaman/paladin would have a summoning fight which favors the mage due to spellcraft. And a blindness landing for a necromancer is fairly hard to remove (especially with edges, sightblinding is very powerful, perhaps one of the most powerful tools in the "toolbox" that a necro/shaman/ap/conj has.

>3. Give the communers something that can aid them deal with
>liches/mummies specifically. (wrath/holy/light attacks are
>easily covered by a lich/mummy)

Twist: Like dispel evil and dispel (shaman), turn undead (all), all kinds of virtue abilities, wrath, incredible tanking and healing (paladin), gate/turn undead (healer), and decomposition (druid)? BTW saying they are "easily" covered is false. Ask Cotzibue how easy it is to get resist holy as a mummy and keep it up regularly.

Here’s the thing, every class has to have preps to deal with some folks. And one of those for a lich/mummy is resist holy(positive) Which you could compare to having a barrier wand. If I don’t have it, Im pretty much dead as a mage if I do have it, Ill have a better than fair chance to deal with just about any class.

And I have attempted dispel evil as a shaman, it does not do scary stuff. Seriously. Turn undead with edges, still gets you killed. And when I say “easily” it does require some game knowledge. But its pretty much addressed in the point above.

>4. My greatest wish. For the future, distant in a world
>greener and filled with unicorns. Have a quest to gain a last
>ability for each class. Automated would be good.

Twist: I'm not saying this will never happen, but I don't see it in the near future.
Sad .

I still think that it is imbalanced when most liches/mummies make such a significant impact on the game. Arguably these are very skilled players and I have a tremendous respect for their ability to do so. They are very impressive.

But thanks for the responses.

You got a lot of decent advice and mostly countered it with bad assumptions.

It's not like many classes haven't killed liches and mummies solo. Including several that you say can't.