An animated ethereal triton sentry drifts in, gliding swiftly above the ground.

[zhelas]

So for kicks one morning I figured I would animate a Triton Sentry.
These can be quite tricky since they are non corporeal and fade really quickly. And according to the cartographer, Tsoran about a Level 103.

This is a pure which normally isn't the best animate.

I brought it town spelled it up and took it out to the temple.

Here are a few things I saw it do. Please note these this isn't an actual combat log but bits and pieces from my hunt.
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An animated ethereal triton sentry's hollow eye sockets become clouded with a muted purple fog. An odd wave of energy distorts the air, rippling outward from the sentry, inspiring a strange sensation within you that begins to encroach upon your thoughts.

CS: +438 - TD: +359 + CvA: +20 + d100: +80 == +179
Warding failed!
A triton executioner's eyes begin to glow purple.

CS: +438 - TD: +343 + CvA: +20 + d100: +3 == +118
Warding failed!
A triton combatant's eyes begin to glow purple.
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An animated ethereal triton sentry points an ethereal, clawed finger toward a siren!
CS: +449 - TD: +403 + CvA: +20 + d100: +85 == +151
Warding failed!
... and hits for 30 points of damage!
A siren is suddenly engulfed in flames of pure essence!
... 70 points of damage!
Fire completely surrounds a siren. Blood boils and heart stops.
The siren gives a plaintive wail before she slumps to her side and dies.
The brilliant luminescence fades from around a siren.
The bright luminescence fades from around a siren.
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You gesture at a triton executioner.
CS: +515 - TD: +381 + CvA: +20 + d100: +18 == +172
Warding failed!
The triton executioner's right arm explodes!
The executioner's sharply tapered longsword falls to the ground.
The triton executioner is stunned!
Cast Roundtime 3 Seconds.

A severed radical arm splashes around in a puddle of its own blood. With sudden determination, it reaches towards a triton executioner, but can't seem to grab her.
>
An animated ethereal triton sentry looks around blankly.
An animated ethereal triton sentry shifts its gaze towards a triton executioner.
An animated ethereal triton sentry's eyes flash a bright, ghostly blue as her stares deeply into a triton executioner's eyes!

A triton executioner reels as its temporarily disoriented!

An animated ethereal triton sentry points an ethereal, clawed finger toward a triton executioner!
A void rips open in the area, directly above a triton executioner!
Rather abrupt decompression causes a triton executioner to explode!
Billions and billions of tiny executioner bits shower everything.
Quite severely dead.
A single item, about 4 feet from the void, was picked up and sucked toward the blackness. The item did more mutilation to the corpse. The void disappears without further incident.
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A severed executioner arm skitters across the ground, twitching like a snake slithering towards its prey, and leaving a trail of blood and flesh. Quickly, it reaches towards a triton radical, but can't seem to grab him.
>
An animated ethereal triton sentry points an ethereal, clawed finger toward a triton radical!
The dull golden nimbus surrounding a triton radical suddenly begins to glow brightly.
CS: +449 - TD: +408 + CvA: +25 + d100: +35 == +101
Warding failed!
... and hits for 10 points of damage!
A triton radical is suddenly engulfed in flames of pure essence!
... 15 points of damage!
Minor burns to head. That hurt a bit.
... 5 points of damage!
Icy chill to the triton radical's midriff. Looks like a bowl of nice hot stew is in order.
... 5 points of damage!
Light shock to chest. That stings!
... 20 points of damage!
Strike to head reddens cheekbone.

An animated ethereal triton sentry swings a twisted soot black runestaff at a triton radical!
AS: +485 vs DS: +238 with AvD: +4 + d100 roll: +93 = +344
... and hits for 52 points of damage!
Blow to chest causes the triton radical's heart to skip a beat.
The triton radical collapses, gurgling once with a wrathful look on his face before expiring.
The dully illuminated mantle protecting a triton radical begins to falter, then completely fades away.
A white glow rushes away from a triton radical.
The dull golden nimbus fades from around a triton radical.
The brilliant aura fades away from a triton radical.
The very powerful look leaves a triton radical.
The white light leaves a triton radical.
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This was fun but for the best bang for your buck for an animate in Nelemar, I recommend a Triton Radical.

I asked the Sentry to magic me. It really only gave me Fasthr's Reward.

Peace

[Sam]

Pretty Cool. Is doing this sort of thing extremely impractical for normal hunting? I very rarely notice animates anywhere. In fact I think the first time was earlier this year when someone had an Illoke Jarl, I think it was, in solhaven North Market. Surprised the shit out of me at first, then made me think briefly about making a sorcerer.

[Kronius]

Practical? Not for most applications. I 717/719 mostly everything in Nelemar, so stuff doesn't usually hang out long enough for an animate to be worth the HEINOUS BULLSHIT one has to go through to acquire one.

I guess if you've dropped 100m+ on a soulstone wand, you probably want to get your money worth. Other than that, it's more trouble than it's worth.

[zhelas]

Pretty Cool. Is doing this sort of thing extremely impractical for normal hunting? I very rarely notice animates anywhere. In fact I think the first time was earlier this year when someone had an Illoke Jarl, I think it was, in solhaven North Market. Surprised the shit out of me at first, then made me think briefly about making a sorcerer.

To be honest.. if you want to animate then you can make it practical.

Many folks have written this spell off because of the components that are needed, the intensive Necromancy Lore training, the duration and what is required to heal a damaged animate.

So to make it work. When you need the components for the crystals.. you collect large batches of sea water, trolls blood and moonflowers.

Then while you absorb exp after a hunt, you create the crystals. I run a script. Or you can probably find high end crystals in player shops. I don't know how much they cost.

I have Zhelas use Emeralds when he animates. This is a RP choice.

Duration? Zhelas has 100 ranks of Necro. That means he has a MAL of 6. I had that Sentry for atleast 30 min. Normally I hunt with a Triton Radical. I can get 2 complete hunts from it so my duration is about 45 min to an hr.

Healing animates: Unless you are one of the lucky few that have the wands that heal them. You have to spend grueling hrs learning alchemy so you can make the potions that heal them. Personally I despise alchemy and at this time I refuse to do it. So if my animate gets damaged, I find another one.

Hunting: Squares are the best. I brought Shan Warriors into Stronghold. Minotaur Warriors into the Bowels. Both very effective. Hunting with an animate uses different tactics. Your primary goal is crowd control and you must damage the attacking creatures to get any sort of experience. Hunting with an animate is an excellent way to stretch your mana. Why? I remove the right arm of the attacking creature... 8 mana... I let my animate kill the creature. Zoink! cost me only 8 mana, I get exp and loot.

[zhelas]

Practical? Not for most applications. I 717/719 mostly everything in Nelemar, so stuff doesn't usually hang out long enough for an animate to be worth the HEINOUS BULLSHIT one has to go through to acquire one.

I guess if you've dropped 100m+ on a soulstone wand, you probably want to get your money worth. Other than that, it's more trouble than it's worth.

I agree that 717/719 is the most effective way to hunt. I don't think 100mil plus is worth spending on a soulstone wand and the owners of those wands more than likely will not part with them.

But the practicality of the spell depends on the person who plays their sorcerer.

Example: Sereg had 202 plus ranks of demonology. Why? Because it was a RP choice. Another would be the original owner of Querthose. The guy would only hunt with animates. He knew there were other more effective means to hunt. There were other effective means to get outside spells. But he would animate pures to give him wizard strength, thurfals, shims etc.

Mechanically? Yeah there are more practical means to get your desired results.

One great plus with an animate: You can use them for Construct bounties.

[Ceyrin]

I've always liked the animate spell. I think it's unfortunate that it's less than practical in most cirumstances.

One of the things I found that was the best/most practical, is some of the 'off-the-shelf' gems that come around sometimes at festivals/events.

Several years ago, there was 'a bumpy Kezmonian honey beryl'. I presume sold to help people get them for the alchemy recipe they were involved in. The side-effect here is they were sold off-the-shelf for around 30k. Their value was loresung that high, and they increased the duration appropriately based on their (comparatively) astounding value.

I haven't seen anything like that lately, but I always keep on the lookout for them.

Below is the shop from EG '09.



[Beguiling Selections] – room 33, a dark stone bungalow



In the Common language, it reads:

~~Welcome to Beguiling Selections~~

The tomes in the bookends are useful for interplanar traveling

The runestones in the bowl are simple runes for general purposes, whereas a close look at those on the salver will reveal their use

If necromancy is your specialty, the gems in the case are of superb quality.



In the stained glass case you see a bumpy Kezmonian honey beryl, a hexagonal grass green emerald, a silvery cubical diamond, a smoothly tumbled black opal, a pidgeon blood red ruby and a creamy white pearl.



Properties unknown

a bumpy Kezmonian honey beryl (27k)

a hexagonal grass green emerald (25k)

a silvery cubical diamond (25k)

a smoothly tumbled black opal (22k)

a pidgeon blood red ruby (25k)

a creamy white pearl (22k)


EDIT: I see reading the sign (which I never did before) they were sold under the premise of being useful for necromancy. I think the side effect must have been every gem present was also usable in alchemy recipes.

[Fallen]

Animate dead is extremely useful if you get the right creature type. It just so happens that Tritons are among the best animates possible, level-for-level. I can't remember the name of the creature type (Triton Executioner, maybe?), but they have a near-capped melee type that has a generous BCS range. If you get the one at the top of the BCS range, it swings a full second faster than normal, so once every 4 seconds or so. OTF has Ithzir Scouts which serve the same purpose, though they have a habit of throwing their weapon every now and then so you need to be careful giving them anything nice.

Give that thing a 4x e-bladed lance (or a blessed lance for the Temple, I guess) and it will destroy everything it comes across.

[crb]

I always use the cheapest gem on me, but I can get two hours of duration with a zircon, such is the power of a soulstone wand.

The big problem with the spell is the inability to micromanage critter routines.

You can ask a critter to cast spells on you, and they'll cast 401 30 times in a row, instead of 406 which is what you want (and they can cast) just because of randomness.

Or you ask it to attack, and like for a semi critter, it attacks with spells instead of a weapon, or with a weapon instead of spells.

Then with pure critters, because of how the CS/TD system balance is, they're worthless. A critter's TD is made to stand up to player CS's, which are high, but a critter CS is made to go against player TD's, which are low. End result is you get a low CS vs a high TD. Critters can't ward like level critters with any reliability.

Which is why everyone animates squares.

If you could micromanage

tell animate magic 117
tell animate attack magic 908

something like that, it'd become much more useful.

[Kronius]

Animate Dead is pretty fucking useless. It is only slightly above fucking useless if you have a soulstone wand

fixed that for you

[Ceyrin]

Give that thing a 4x e-bladed lance (or a blessed lance for the Temple, I guess) and it will destroy everything it comes across.

Pretty sure animates don't actually need blessed weapons to hit the undead.

[zhelas]

Pretty sure animates don't actually need blessed weapons to hit the undead.

They do need a blessed weapon.

Normally i give my Triton Radical an ebladed polearm. It can't hurt the Triton Defenders.

Animated a Sand Devil years ago. Which is an animal based creature. It wasn't bad because it would attack quickly. It couldn't affect a Soul Golem.

[Kronius]

They do need a blessed weapon.

Normally i give my Triton Radical an ebladed polearm. It can't hurt the Triton Defenders.

You're able to buy white ora warlances from the Kharam-Dzu clericshop backroom

[zhelas]

You're able to buy white ora warlances from the Kharam-Dzu clericshop backroom

That is pretty sweet. I wonder how it would work with a Triton Radical since it is essentially a paladin