Being Paralyzed

Some chars in my group seem more likely to becoming paralyzed than others. I learned that there was a resist paralyze spell and that seem to greatly reduce the incidents.

Being paralyzed seems to remain in effect until others in the group either kill the monster causing the paralyzing or wipe out the entire set of monsters- I am not certain which since I am not always certain what mons is doing it. The other thing that removes being paralyzed is dying - and that's worse than being paralyzed.

Recently, being deeper in the dungeon, the majority of my group quickly became paralyzed (by weredragons I think did it) and I got confused and didn't move to safety the two active chars before they too became paralyzed or died from attack. At that point the alive chars were all paralyzed and all I could do was watch them be hit and die. The paralyze effect never did go away on any of them so I could move away before they too died. This was the 1st time my whole group died!

I realized then that I do not remember the paralyze effect going away by itself while a char was still alive - only disappearing on death of the monster or of my char. My question is this the way paralyze is supposed to work, or have I just been unlucky when paralyzed?

Mike

Paralysis typically lasts a long time, even longer as you go deeper into be dungeon. It *will* wear off eventually (but death will often come first). I will double check the code though.

Charm of freedom is an underused yet handy spell.. cast it during combat to un-para a party member. Keep a company status window up to look for paralysis. Our status updates should happen much more rapidly than in previous versions..

res para (like res magic) is not optional. your ability to ward off para and recover from it both increase with your levels. unfortunately, monsters ability to para you increase with depth in the dungeon.

killing any encounter while para'd will end the paralysis. leaving the game, and re-entering will not.

Just a quick followup on this one:  

I checked the code, and it looked like it was possible to hit a player with a paralyze attack even if the player was already paralyzed. Whoops!  This was pretty bad, because it would allow a player who had been waiting for paralyze to 'wear off', i.e. wait a certain number of rounds, to have paralysis go away, keep getting 'reupped' for a full dose of paralysis rounds.. bummer.

I just fixed the code (it's live now) so it is only possible to become paralyzed if you are not already paralyzed... thus it should be a lot more likely for the effect to actually wear off as intended.  

But remember, going down without resist para, hoping to just 'shake it off' is going to be a losing strategy even in the mid level dungeon.  Good luck!

After a few minor bouts with a char or two being paralyzed,I have gotten in the habit of casting the resist spell when leaving the city. I got reacquainted with paralyze again big time when I ran into 2 groups of Zombie Packs, a new monster for me. Even with the resist paralyze spell on, my group leader and key fighter quickly became paralyzed. With the group leader out of commission, I tried to move each individual char out of the room but each was either quickly killed or paralyzed before I could move them out of the room. After that it was just a case of watching them all die. I have got to learn how to react more quickly with individual char movement instead of depending on the leader to control movement. Any tips other than the obvious one?

Do you have any spellers in the back of your party able to cast 'charm of freedom'? I just checked the spell lists, and it looks as though it is healer only. If you have that in a spell slot, you might be able to fire it off easier than leaving a room (depending on the room I guess).

Sometimes the randomness of the game can make it tough to avoid a party wipe out. If the monsters get lucky with a few paralysis attempts during the surprise round, you may need to think fast to survive.