Wizardslayer alterations

[Rataxes]

Originally posted by SixOfSpades: Of course, this calculation would only hold true if the Paladin always kept Carsomyr equipped, but since better weapons are virtually nonexistent, I don't think this is an unreasonable assumption.

Are they? Leaving out the set 50% MR, I'd say there are quite a few more powerful weapon setups, including just about any 2-weapon combination of ToB or end game SoA weapons.

What if charging up into melee range leaves your Wizard Slayer open to Imprisonment? What if your WS's Normally-enchanted attack penetrates PfMW and Stoneskin, but not Mirror Image?

I'm quite positive it does. Actually, I think the case of Imprisonment is one where the WS has a very great advantage over a regular fighter. The regular fighter is much more susceptible to it in the first place since he has to stand right next to the mage till he's dead, and if the mage should happen to start casting it, he can do nothing but keep attacking, hoping to either kill him before he finishes the casting, or interrupt it. The WS however, increases his odds of surviving that situation by 10% with every attack he makes. Furthermore, since he can move away from a mage after just ten hits and leave him there hapless, the chance that he will even stick around long enough to be the target of an Imprisonment spell is pretty small.

Yes, ten hits from a WS will completely incapacitate any spellcaster (I wonder how long for, though--I've never seen a quote on the duration of Spell Disruption), but so will being out of spells, or at least good spells.

I agree that sending in cannon fodder to drain a spellcaster of his spell supply is the safest way to to deal with them, though I think this tactic is comparable to trapping someone in a ring of summons (Drizzt?) or being able to prevent a 9 foot demon from following you by slamming a wooden door shut, ie cheesy and unrealistic (would a reasonably bright mage leave himself completely vulnerable by wasting his ADHWs on kobolds when he can probably suspect they will be followed by more dangerous foes? Would a mage keep casting spells at a target who does nothing but stand a few feet away and shrugs off everything that is thrown at him, or would he go for the other people who're standing at a safe distance away from the action?), but I don't see why this fact has anything to do with who is the best of the monk and WS. Summons are better used for this job than any wizard slayer, fighter, thief, paladin or monk.

Yes, getting in a few quick hits with a WS is theoretically the fastest way to take out a spellcaster....but does that make it the best?

Yes, in many fights, especially difficult ones against enemies with good AI where you have little space and time to maneuver, you have to deal with the spellcasters as fast as possible or suffer their spells.

1) Almost any spellcaster that appears alone is easily taken care of by causing him/her/it to waste spells on a target that is either immune or expendable. 2) Almost any spellcaster that appears with backup from the other classes is easy to isolate from said backup, thus leaving you back in Case 1.

And these tactics are applicable in anything but generic fights involving foes with poor AI and where you have ample space and time to prepare and maneuver?

Incidentally, I should point out that immunity to a certain element only makes the person immune to damage: Their spells will still be disrupted if they are hit with a damage type to which they are immune. Unless, of course, they keep right on casting due to the bug that you mention, but unfortunately I lack any real data on that.

Yes I know, I was referring to the time it takes to dispose of a mage with a fighter equipped with an elemental damage weapon. If your regular fighters elemental damage is blocked by protection spells, he wont even cause damage until his physical damage component goes through, meaning he cannot possibly kill the mage before every single layer of stoneskins (could be more than 50 against high level mages) has been stripped. That is *quite* a longer time than it takes for a Wizard Slayer to render a mage harmless.

Only when you're more than halfway through the game. During the first half, it's the Fighter who likely has the better MR, and that's only when disregarding mod items.

What is this abundance of easily available MR equipment you're talking about? The Ring of Gaxx and Kaliguns Amulet are the only equippable items that fighters, but not Wiz Slayers, can use that are even available in SoA, and Kangaxx isn't exactly someone you deal with in the first half of the game. Kaliguns Amulet isn't available until Chapter 5 and I think your party will be above level 10 by then.

As I said, WSs are just as screwed as anyone else when it comes to Liches, so I hardly think that's relevant.

Then why is it relevant to bring up Liches at all when the only thing that Wiz Slayers are supposed to excel at is attacking spellcasters, which he does better than any other warrior kit?

quote: You can't always be sure that .... all spells will be cast at your spell absorber,

Of course you can, don't be silly.[/QUOTE]Of course you can't. What you can and can't pull off against Kangaxx says nothing about what you can pull off when the third kind of night bandits spawn in a ring around your party or when Ira'kiou'dneg follows up a Time Stop with a teleportation to your party and then drops a few ADHWs on everyone. Heck, any mage casting time stop robs you of your ability to choose who in your party is to be on the receiving end of the mages bombardment.

Granted, the installation of an EXP cap remover and a Level 50 ruleset would benefit the Wizard Slayer greatly in this regard, but it was my understanding that these calculations were to exclude mods.

Yep, I've never made any assumptions with regards to anything but standard SoA/ToB with patches and fixpacks.

quote: I believe he [a Level 30 Wizard Slayer] would have 50% innate resistance at that point, and yes I do think that 50% MR is better than the total sum of bonuses those five item slots can potentially provide for a fighter.

Now that I've actually gone nuts with Shadowkeeper and made the complete tables, a WS of that level would actually have 54% MR, so your guestimate was closer. Even so, a Fighter at that point in the game can have 35% MR, simply by equipping items, which brings up another important point: The Fighter's access to item slots means greater versatility in preparing for a certain type of encounter. If the party Thief scouts ahead and reports a big group of Golems, the Fighter can switch out those MR items in favor of things like AC and immunity to Poison. Not so the Wizard Slayer--he's stuck with Magic Resistance, 24/7. (At least he's far better off than the Monk in that regard, though--but then the Monk has nice AC and immunity to Poison anyway.) [/QUOTE]I think we're losing ourselves a bit too much in details here, because I could see this debate going on forever with it's current direction. I outlined what I thought was the core issue on the previous page, but now I'm not even sure what your main beef with the Wizard Slayer is that makes you think he is in such dire need of improvement.

• Is it his inability to use certain items that it would be reasonable for him to be able to use?
  - Balance issue here, if the list of items that the Wizard Slayer can use was extended to the list you posted earlier there would hardly be any worthwhile items left that he couldn't use to weigh down his advantages over the standard fighter kit. There would be no reason to use a standard fighter instead of a wizard slayer if his item restrictions were eased. Also, is there any item he cannot use that would actually help him kill mages, not just help him defend against them? I might actually agree that wands of breaching could be opened up to him.
• Is it that other classes can obtain better magical protection than him?
  - Again I ask why you see it as obvious that he should have better magical protection than any other class? There is no text in either the game or in the manual to support this claim. Wizard Slayers specialize in attacking mages. I see no more reason for them to have better magical protection than they currently do, than I see reason for rangers to have improved defense in the form of bonuses to saves and AC against their racial enemy.
• Any other reason?

But what I wonder the most here, is if you play through the game with a Wizard Slayer along with a party of arbitrary size and composition, and then at the end ask yourself if you, when you consider all the various challenges and encounters you've been through, would've been better off with a pure standard fighter as the PC? I'm only in chapter 4 with my human wizard slayer at the moment, but I doubt the answer will be yes in my case. Maybe it would for you but what does that really prove? Is a class underpowered or inbalanced just because it doesn't go well together with a particular playing style? I think what this debate has proven more than else is that the usefulness of any particular class is both circumstancial and dependant on the players style and attitude towards the game, such as what tactics you use, what self-imposed restrictions you have (such as for instance not using the shield of balduran, not using traps, not using reload knowledge, etc etc), if you're a roleplayer or powergamer, the list goes on. A total powergamer might argue that every class is in dire need of improvement, when compared to the sorcerer.

[ 04-17-2005, 05:00 PM: Message edited by: Rataxes ]

[SixOfSpades]

Originally posted by Rataxes: Leaving out the set 50% MR [of Carsomyr], I'd say there are quite a few more powerful weapon setups, including just about any 2-weapon combination of ToB or end game SoA weapons.

True, there's a plethora of truly kickass weapons and combinations thereof: Foebane (or was it CFury?) + Belm for pure damage, FoA against Golems, Axe of Unyielding + DoE, Ravager, Answerer + Angurvadal, etc, but if you're going to compile a list of the best weapons in the game, Carsomyr will always be on that list. It's one of those items that every party takes to the final battle, unless of course you're playing a Solo Cleric or something.

I'm quite positive it [Spell Disruption] does [ignore Mirror Image].

I don't know either way, I've never tried it. I know that a Vampire's Level-Drain-on-hit does, for some odd reason. Since you're running a WS, I'll let you make the reports; test it on a party member & see what happens.

Actually, I think the case of Imprisonment is one where the WS has a very great advantage over a regular fighter. The regular fighter is much more susceptible to it in the first place since he has to stand right next to the mage till he's dead, and if the mage should happen to start casting it, he can do nothing but keep attacking, hoping to either kill him before he finishes the casting, or interrupt it.

Ummm....why does a Fighter have to stand right next to a Mage, and a WS does not? The only situation in which the WS has the advantage here is when a Mage (not a Lich) is under both PfMW and PfNM. In this situation, the Fighter (or even the entire party) can simply withdraw, since Mages thankfully are excluded from the asinine Recall ability exhibited by Tactics Liches.
Mage protected by PfMW but not PfNM? There ain't no amount of Stoneskins that can give you more than a round of spellcasting time against missile fire from the entire party.

The WS however, increases his odds of surviving that situation by 10% with every attack he makes. Furthermore, since he can move away from a mage after just ten hits and leave him there hapless, the chance that he will even stick around long enough to be the target of an Imprisonment spell is pretty small.

After the time it takes to close to melee range, you'll be lucky if you manage to get in two hits before the Mage completes his Time Stop. A party member who actually has good MR (or Saving Throws or Resistances), though, need not ever go near the Mage at all.

...I think this tactic is comparable to trapping someone in a ring of summons (Drizzt?) or being able to prevent a 9 foot demon from following you by slamming a wooden door shut, ie cheesy and unrealistic (would a reasonably bright mage leave himself completely vulnerable by wasting his ADHWs on kobolds when he can probably suspect they will be followed by more dangerous foes? Would a mage keep casting spells at a target who does nothing but stand a few feet away and shrugs off everything that is thrown at him, or would he go for the other people who're standing at a safe distance away from the action?), but I don't see why this fact has anything to do with who is the best of the monk and WS. Summons are better used for this job than any wizard slayer, fighter, thief, paladin or monk.

Well, in your last sentence there, you seem to argue that the Wizard Slayer is eclipsed by a Wand of Monster Summoning, which doesn't exactly help you prove that the WS is a viable class.
As for AI, you're correct, the game's AI is crap. Mages should be able to do things like wander randomly, Dimension Door to the point where they last saw an enemy, use Lower Magic Resistance on targets that seem to be worth it, and flee under Invisibility when they're running out of spells. On the other hand, throwing spells at people isn't as stupid as all that: If the target has something like 60% MR and he's just standing there, darn right I'd fire three Flesh to Stones at him just in case one does the trick. If they're teasing me with Summons, I'd summon a Skeleton Warrior or two. The fault in the AI is not that Mages will cast all their best spells against a resistant target, but that they stick around after their defenses are down.

quote: 1) Almost any spellcaster that appears alone is easily taken care of by causing him/her/it to waste spells on a target that is either immune or expendable. 2) Almost any spellcaster that appears with backup from the other classes is easy to isolate from said backup, thus leaving you back in Case 1.

And these tactics are applicable in anything but generic fights involving foes with poor AI and where you have ample space and time to prepare and maneuver?[/QUOTE]Improved Guarded Compound. Southwestern staircase, run into the first room on your right as you come upstairs (you can even ignore the Trap, it doesn't actually do anything). Hey, lookit that, Stalman and Sion forgot to tag along. Guess it's going to be a cakewalk from here on in....
Improved Twisted Rune. Got Shangalar problems? Nail him with a Ring of the Ram and watch him forget to re-enter combat.
Improved Kangaxx. Ain't much that even a Level 40 Lich can do against a Bard with 95% MR standing there singing "Stayin' Alive."

I was referring to the time it takes to dispose of a mage with a fighter equipped with an elemental damage weapon. If your regular fighters elemental damage is blocked by protection spells, he wont even cause damage until his physical damage component goes through, meaning he cannot possibly kill the mage before every single layer of stoneskins (could be more than 50 against high level mages) has been stripped. That is *quite* a longer time than it takes for a Wizard Slayer to render a mage harmless.

If the target is not under PfMW, the amount of Stoneskins doesn't even enter into it. A Mage who is taking hits, whether damaging or not, is a Mage who cannot cast spells, unless those spells have extremely short casting times.

What is this abundance of easily available MR equipment you're talking about? The Ring of Gaxx and Kaliguns Amulet are the only equippable items that fighters, but not Wiz Slayers, can use that are even available in SoA, and Kangaxx isn't exactly someone you deal with in the first half of the game. Kaliguns Amulet isn't available until Chapter 5 and I think your party will be above level 10 by then.

Your Wizard can actually hold the MR fort for a while, given easily-obtainable equipment like the Amulet of Power, Robe of Vecna, and Robe of the Good Archmagi. But you want Warrior stuff. The Amulet of 5% MR is actually a pretty easy haul, there's no reason anyone has to wait until ToB levels to kill Kangaxx (I didn't see anything that Spell Immunity + MMM couldn't handle), and if you are willing to admit Paladins into this contest, then of course we have *cough* Carsomyr.
Besides which, MR is hardly everything, especially when it's below 50%--which, for a Wizard Slayer, is 68% of the game. It's Saving Throws that are paramount in most cases, and compared to a Fighter, a Wizard Slayer is operating under permanent Greater Malison.

quote: As I said, WSs are just as screwed as anyone else when it comes to Liches, so I hardly think that's relevant.

Then why is it relevant to bring up Liches at all when the only thing that Wiz Slayers are supposed to excel at is attacking spellcasters, which he does better than any other warrior kit?[/QUOTE]Ummmm....because Liches are spellcasters? I don't mean to attack you or anything (believe me, your opinions really do matter to me), but Liches aren't exactly feared because of their legendary skills at playing Nine-Men's-Morris.
As for "better than any other Warrior kit," (and yes I will include Monks in this, because they sure don't act like Priests), I must point out that, in this game, defending is attacking. The backbone of any strong party is not the Wizards or the Thieves, it is the Tank(s), the ones who can give the party the time they need to wipe the floor with the enemy. Even the most badass Solo Kensai in the world can only drink Healing Potions so fast, and even Odin Magnus would have bit the big one long ago if it wasn't for Stoneskin, Mirror Image, and PfMW. Killing wizards by making them waste their spells is every bit as viable as killing them by disrupting their spells. So, while I agree that the Wizard Slayer should be the very best there is at whipping spellcasters' collective butt, at least I can correctly recognize that that position is currently held by the Monk.

quote: quote: You can't always be sure that .... all spells will be cast at your spell absorber,

Of course you can, don't be silly.[/QUOTE]Of course you can't. What you can and can't pull off against Kangaxx says nothing about what you can pull off when the third kind of night bandits spawn in a ring around your party or when Ira'kiou'dneg follows up a Time Stop with a teleportation to your party and then drops a few ADHWs on everyone. Heck, any mage casting time stop robs you of your ability to choose who in your party is to be on the receiving end of the mages bombardment.[/QUOTE]1) Anybody who plays Tactics without a stack of Invisibility Potions in every party member's quickslots is either a brave fool or someone who made the mistake of letting a Wizard Slayer in the party. Bandits show up, *Gulp!* Choose your Tank.
2) I can have Nalia tank against Ira'kiou'dneg just fine, thanks. Besides, Weimer cheese is not the issue here.
3) Like it's that difficult to choose who to have in the Mage's sight range before he finishes that Time Stop. It's not as if we haven't memorized the sounds by now. Raesii....Aalia....Faero!

I think we're losing ourselves a bit too much in details here, because I could see this debate going on forever with it's current direction.

Speaking of details, I calculated the MR score of my Rebalanced WS as well. Compared to the Monk's average MR of 60.45% and the Wizard Slayer's 39.84%, the Rebalanced WS would have 49.44% average MR.
I like debate, it can actually iron things out.

I outlined what I thought was the core issue on the previous page, but now I'm not even sure what your main beef with the Wizard Slayer is that makes you think he is in such dire need of improvement. Is it his inability to use certain items that it would be reasonable for him to be able to use? Balance issue here, if the list of items that the Wizard Slayer can use was extended to the list you posted earlier there would hardly be any worthwhile items left that he couldn't use to weigh down his advantages over the standard fighter kit.

Vhailor's Helm, Ilbratha, Daystar, most of the magical armors in the game, most magical shields, all stat-enhancing gear like STR girdles and DEX Gauntlets, etc. Everything that magically benefits melee combat skills, but not odds of killing spellcasters.

There would be no reason to use a standard fighter instead of a wizard slayer if his item restrictions were eased. Also, is there any item he cannot use that would actually help him kill mages, not just help him defend against them? I might actually agree that wands of breaching could be opened up to him.

Which is precisely why my plan for the RebalWS weakens his THAC0 and weapon proficiencies, so as not to render the Fighter obsolete. You'll notice that the Horn of Silence, Ring of Spell Turning, Gauntlets of Crushing, and Wand of Spell Striking are all already on the list.

[ 04-18-2005, 03:17 AM: Message edited by: SixOfSpades ]

[timothy trotter]

i reckon this is the longest page of writing ive seen in IW!
i just reckon the problem with wizard slayers is that you dont come up against enough wizzards for them to be usefull. and when you do, they are usually at the back

[Rataxes]

Well, in your last sentence there, you seem to argue that the Wizard Slayer is eclipsed by a Wand of Monster Summoning, which doesn't exactly help you prove that the WS is a viable class.

I thought I was arguing that any class whose main purpose is to absorb spells (Monks and Carsomyr wielders, but NOT Wizard Slayers) is eclipsed by a Wand of Monster Summoning. Actually, is there any scenario where you have argued that a Monk or Carsomyr wielder is superior to a WS, where the wand doesn't serve the purpose just as well?

I like debate, it can actually iron things out.

Well as I said, I think we're losing ourselves in theoretical scenarios that have little to do with the subject. Not to attack your post as it was only a reply on my own irrelevant notions, but as I read through this I found myself wondering what any of it had to do with the issue of whether the Wizard Slayer needs to be fixed.

Vhailor's Helm, Ilbratha, Daystar, most of the magical armors in the game, most magical shields, all stat-enhancing gear like STR girdles and DEX Gauntlets, etc. Everything that magically benefits melee combat skills, but not odds of killing spellcasters.

We've been through this before, but surely you agree that the overwhelming majority of powerful end-game equipment (note, equipment != weapons), the items that are likely to be permanently worn by your PC, or be his "standard" ultimate setup, provide primarily magic protection? The same goes for potions, just about all of them barring STR potions and Potion of Defense provide magical protection.

Which is precisely why my plan for the RebalWS weakens his THAC0 and weapon proficiencies, so as not to render the Fighter obsolete. You'll notice that the Horn of Silence, Ring of Spell Turning, Gauntlets of Crushing, and Wand of Spell Striking are all already on the list.

Thus making him more specialized. Is it really a good idea to make him specialized? It's generally true that a human player will find a way to negate the cons of any kit, so it follows that the power of a kit is equal to the power of his pros. Kits usually become more overpowered or have higher potential for cheese the more they stray from their base class, and RebalWS strays a lot from the standard fighter compared to the original WS.

[ 04-18-2005, 04:57 PM: Message edited by: Rataxes ]

[Marant]

This debate is all very interesting and informative.. but does anyone know if it's possible for me to easily alter the MR to 2% per level, and if I can do it in my current game?

[K2Grey]

I think any respectable player would have some difficulties engaging in such strange tactics like running away to abuse really bad chase mage AI, and seeing a supra-genius lich forget where the battle is and just sit there after being knocked away [img]tongue.gif[/img]

But isn't Shangalar supposed to Dimension Door to the PC if there's no one nearby?

[timothy trotter]

Marant to answer yur question, i think the only way to do it is to use shadow keeper at each level up. but im sure other people will have better ideas then me

[Dundee Slaytern]

Spell Disruption punches through Stoneskin, Mirror Image, etc...

So long as the weapon connects, the effect kicks in.

I have not read the thread in full yet, but, have you tried playing with a WSlayer yet, Six?

[SixOfSpades]

Originally posted by K2Grey: I think any respectable player would have some difficulties engaging in such strange tactics like running away to abuse really bad chase mage AI, and seeing a supra-genius lich forget where the battle is and just sit there after being knocked away

Realistically, I think it's plausible for any reasonably intelligent Mage to keep firing spells at a target that is mostly (but not entirely) immune to them. It's more plausible, at any rate, than for reasonably intelligent Warriors to try to pound the crap out of a Wizard whose defenses they have no hope of bringing down anytime soon....any smart and self-respecting Warrior would simply fall back for a bit and let the simple passage of time do most of the work for him.

Originally posted by Dundee Slaytern: ...have you tried playing with a WSlayer yet, Six?

I have, a long time ago. Got him all the way up into ToB levels before I got so $@&! sick of all the good anti-spellcaster stuff being usable by everybody but me, and finally Dualed to Thief. Call me a scourge on Paladins everywhere, but a Good-aligned WS->Thief swinging Carsomyr just means that all is right with the world.

Originally posted by Rataxes: Actually, is there any scenario where you have argued that a Monk or Carsomyr wielder is superior to a WS, where the wand [of Monster Summoning] doesn't serve the purpose just as well?

You can't recharge a Wand for free using only a Ring of Regeneration. Or a Wizard Slayer, for that matter.

We've been through this before, but surely you agree that the overwhelming majority of powerful end-game equipment (note, equipment != weapons), the items that are likely to be permanently worn by your PC, or be his "standard" ultimate setup, provide primarily magic protection? The same goes for potions, just about all of them barring STR potions and Potion of Defense provide magical protection.

I agree with you. As you get closer and closer to the end of the game, "Immunity/Resistance to X" stuff gets more and more important. But why, indeed, should there be any difference on whether the WS or other Fighter kits would not use such equipment?
The Wizard Slayer's item restrictions were not meant to show what he was unable to wear, they were meant to show what he would refuse to wear. Gauntlets of Weapon Skill? A product of enchantment and doesn't really help against Mages who have crap AC anyway, won't use 'em. Ring of Djinni Summoning? Stinks of enslaving other beings to one's will, won't use it. A Potion that increases my Constitution? I'm not going to drink that! Etc.
But--A Potion that grants immunity to mind-controlling spells? A Ring that grants improved Saving Throws and Magic Resistance? A Book that lets me cast Spell Turning? A Cloak that deflects ALL spells cast directly at me? There is no question about it: A Warrior who is sworn to abhor dangerous magic and eradicate its practitioners would use such items. As long as the item is sufficiently balanced to be more useful against spellcasters than any other type of foe, the only question of usability is which classes are capable of using which items: Montolio's Cloak for Rangers, the Helm of the Rock for Fighters, and, eventually, Wands of Spell Striking for Wizard Slayers.

quote: Which is precisely why my plan for the RebalWS weakens his THAC0 and weapon proficiencies, so as not to render the Fighter obsolete.

Thus making him more specialized. Is it really a good idea to make him specialized? It's generally true that a human player will find a way to negate the cons of any kit, so it follows that the power of a kit is equal to the power of his pros. Kits usually become more overpowered or have higher potential for cheese the more they stray from their base class, and RebalWS strays a lot from the standard fighter compared to the original WS. [/QUOTE]What, you mean a loss of 4 THAC0 points, 1 ApR, 2 points of Damage per hit, and the inability to Dual-Wield efficiently means you think Wizard Slayers aren't capable of fighting anything but Mages? Last I checked, Paladins and Rangers were getting along just fine, as were Clerics. (In fact, now that I type those stats out loud, I don't think the RebalWS has enough disadvantages--I'm thinking of limiting their "Greater" HLAs.) And I think you'd be hard pressed to find a way to negate the cons of the RebalWS, unless you really think it's worth Dualing to Thief so you can use Ilbratha.

[K2Grey]

[quote]Originally posted by SixOfSpades:

Originally posted by K2Grey: [qb]I think any respectable player would have some difficulties engaging in such strange tactics like running away to abuse really bad chase mage AI, and seeing a supra-genius lich forget where the battle is and just sit there after being knocked away

Realistically, I think it's plausible for any reasonably intelligent Mage to keep firing spells at a target that is mostly (but not entirely) immune to them. It's more plausible, at any rate, than for reasonably intelligent Warriors to try to pound the crap out of a Wizard whose defenses they have no hope of bringing down anytime soon....any smart and self-respecting Warrior would simply fall back for a bit and let the simple passage of time do most of the work for him.

That doesn't really answer the question, since while it's reasonably plausible for a mage to try various spells against a guy with high MR (what else is he gonna do? try and run away?), it's not that unplausible for Sion and Ketta and those other Guarded Compound guys to set up an elaborate trap, and when their quarry breaks out, for only the fighters to follow and for the mages to just sit there. Surely if they cast all those spells and prepared all those neat tricks then they realize you are a relatively tough enemy and that it would be good to give the fighters some magical support. Similarly, Shangalar should realize that just because the enemy is not in plain sight, does not mean that Layene can handle the magic aspect of the fight on her own.

As far as the warrior bit goes, the fighter in question may not necessarily know for sure whether it is Protection from Magical Weapons that he is running up against, or Stoneskin, and since one can be bashed through, it makes sense to make the attempt. Similarly, Stoneskin is available for mages much sooner than PfMW, and a fighter may make the mistake of assuming a PfMW can be broken in the same way as a Stoneskin. Finally, even if the fighter knows how both spells work and can recognize them via the meta-ability of message buffer, he may not necessarily wish to just run away and allow the mage to summon up an army of Skeleton Warriors, at which point killing him can get real hard.