Does anyone use cleric undead turning?

Lews Therin · Post by **Lews Therin** » Wed Jul 25, 2001 8:23 am

I had Viconia use it in Bhodi's compound after returning from the underdark. It was fun getting the vampires to fight on my side against each other. Since I had a full party I could afford to have Vic standing around turning the vamps.

the Refrigerator · Post by **the Refrigerator** » Wed Jul 25, 2001 8:26 am

I found it extremely helpful when

SPOILER

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Cleaning up Bodhi's lair for the second time in chapter 6 or 7. Viconia, equipped with the mace of disruption in one hand and crom fear in the other just walked in and the majority of vampires immediately became allies. The large groups of vampires with green circles I used to attack the few hostile vampires.

This was repeated in several rooms and also the vampiric mists easily forgot where their priorities were once Vic arrived on the scene. My other characters did nothing but stand in the back, avoiding any contact with enemies because of that nasty energy drain effect. Not a single hitpoint was lost while acquiring the lanthorn (although some helpful shadow thieves and Paladins of the noble heart bit the dust).

The only undead Viconia can't seem to control are skeleton warriors and liches, but I don't know if a lich is counted as an undead..

Laurelei · Post by **Laurelei** » Wed Jul 25, 2001 8:27 am

If your cleric is set with a script that engages him in melee or ranged attacks, it's very difficult to effectively turn undead. Your attack keeps interrupting your turning. However, at higher levels this skill is just AWESOME. It can blow up liches, vampires, skeletons, flaming skulls, just about everything undead in one shot. At higher levels I turned off Anomen's script for tough undead fights and just had him "walk around" with turn undead activated while my other melee fighters kept the baddies occupied (for the second or two it took for the turn undead to kill them, that is).

koz-ivan · Post by **koz-ivan** » Wed Jul 25, 2001 8:36 am

turn undead is great vs the "pesky" undead, i.e. shadows, wights, ghouls, ect. all of these creatures have some kind of special attack that can seriously weaken your group, (and are often used as wandering monsters) lvl drain, nausea, disease, str drain, slow and it's a pain to have to cure these kind of wounds before moving on to the "real" threats.

it's not that hard to kill them in melee but why? if you scout them out you can bumrush them w/ a sancutuary'd cleric and blast away. keeping all your ftr's in top shape.

vs the tougher undead liches, vamp's ect it's usually easier to just wack them w/ the mace & azureedge and whatever undead hosers they have in tob.

hermetic · Post by **hermetic** » Wed Jul 25, 2001 8:40 am

How about using Viconia at the Shadow Temple out in the Umar Hills? Those shadows or shades can be mustered together to make a huge army. if only there were some cool enemy to slay with all those undead under your control. At the higher levels Turn Undead is fantastic; skeleton warriors are turned, as are vampires. Very good skill.

Gruntboy · Post by **Gruntboy** » Wed Jul 25, 2001 8:57 am

Its great.

Clerics aren't fantastic fighters. So have them turning undead - even if it doesn't kill them they run a mile, leaving you with the mopping up.

I use it in IWD all the time.

Promise · Post by **Promise** » Wed Jul 25, 2001 9:21 am

Blasting liches with turn undead is always a great fun

Spoiler

actually, anyone can turn the undead bhaal priests in the temple ruins where a woman tell you how to kill Yaga-Shura, or any demi-lich?

MegaToerist · Post by **MegaToerist** » Wed Jul 25, 2001 9:25 am

I don't know if it's correct, but I have the impression that a higher charisma increases your turning ability. I had Anomen equipped with the Plate of Balduran, Ring of Human Influence, Nymph Cloak and Sensate Amulet, and he just blew away all the vampires in Bhodi's lair. I don't know about this having any effect on the liches or even on Kangaxx (now that would be cool: Kangaxx running around with Boo chasing him

)

TC, Geert

Saruman · Post by **Saruman** » Wed Jul 25, 2001 9:54 am

There is nothing in ADnD rules that say that higher charisma or even higher wisdom allow you to turn undead any better... as far as I'm concerned turning (good/neutral) or controlling (evil) undead is based purely on the priest/paladins level.

New thing for TOB evil clerics can turn paladins (ooh nasty) I seem to remeber them being able to do this in PnP ADnD

Anyway would it be possible for anyone who has it to dig out there second addition ADnD players handbook and copy the turning table to this thread. I would do it but I've just moved house and I can't think for the life of me where all my DnD books are.

Craig · Post by **Craig** » Wed Jul 25, 2001 9:54 am

What i don't get is why they have a spell like repulse dead

MegaToerist · Post by **MegaToerist** » Wed Jul 25, 2001 10:59 am

I thought that 3rd Ed. D&D rules give a reaction modifier to turning attempts based upon Charisma (can anyone confirm?) This would make sense, as the description of Turn Undead states that the priest must step forward boldly during the attempt. Since Charisma represents leadership and appearance, a higher Charisma score means the priest will be better at this.

@Saruman: High-level Evil Clerics are indeed able to turn paladins. However, I remember that it is extremely hard to do (harder than turning Vampires), and so can only be done with Paladins that are of reasonably lower level than the priest. Furthermore, Paladins cannot be controlled or destroyed this way.

TC, Geert

Saruman · Post by **Saruman** » Wed Jul 25, 2001 11:55 am

Never having read the third edition rules I wouldn't know about charisma bonus to priest's turning ability.

On the other hand BG 1 and BG 2 are both based on ADnD second edition where there are no charisma modifiers applied to the roll

Path of Wind · Post by **Path of Wind** » Wed Jul 25, 2001 12:45 pm

Originally posted by Saruman:
<STRONG>There is nothing in ADnD rules that say that higher charisma or even higher wisdom allow you to turn undead any better... as far as I'm concerned turning (good/neutral) or controlling (evil) undead is based purely on the priest/paladins level.

New thing for TOB evil clerics can turn paladins (ooh nasty) I seem to remeber them being able to do this in PnP ADnD

Anyway would it be possible for anyone who has it to dig out there second addition ADnD players handbook and copy the turning table to this thread. I would do it but I've just moved house and I can't think for the life of me where all my DnD books are.</STRONG>

I already asked for this, and I was given this link by Pebz: [url="http://www.planetbaldursgate.com/bg/character/classes/tables/turnundead.shtml"]http://www.planetbaldursgate.com/bg/character/classes/tables/turnundead.shtml[/url]

Xyx · Post by **Xyx** » Wed Jul 25, 2001 4:14 pm

In D&D3, Charisma enables Clerics to turn better and more often.

Bodhidharma · Post by **Bodhidharma** » Wed Jul 25, 2001 5:31 pm

My level 20 cleric's were exploding vampires instantly with their turn undead....
Including Bodhi

Valorhan · Post by **Valorhan** » Wed Jul 25, 2001 5:47 pm

To think I had to fight my way through Bodhi's lair, suffering level drains when I could have blown them away with my lvl 20 Anomen! Argghh the irony of it all!

Xandax · Post by **Xandax** » Wed Jul 25, 2001 11:13 pm

I use high-level turn undead all the time.

I've had Amoen kill up to 8 vampieres in one round in Bohdis lair the secondtime (She was also turned, so she just ran away and could be hacked down.)

Also when you are highlevel - there are liches all over the place - Amoen had turned/killed 4 of these in one go - and actually in the middle of a timestop(bug?)

Also the temple-ruins - allmost all the shadows were killed by turning undead

It is highly effective, if IMO a bit to powerfull.

prateek · Post by **prateek** » Thu Jul 26, 2001 12:13 pm

YES, cleric's undead's kickass

Anomen, not vaconica sucks at it.

Vaconica, even though it is for a short bit, can ofen just make them blow up, run away, or even get them on your side!

useful against vamps........