It's been a pretty long time since I gave up on shalswars, so I was pleasantly surprised when I gave them another shot recently and found that they seem to have been improved considerably. It looks like the mounted dragon priests refrain from using their special attacks while the shalswar is alive and attacking, and I haven't had a shield or weapon damaged yet; these things combine to make them much better than they previously were for defense training. Thanks to whoever was involved in these adjustments.
There is still some room for improvement, though. I'm finding myself overrun with numbers extremely quickly, to the point that I can't even get a sane number of them long enough for a few to reach melee. To remedy this, I have a few suggestions. Please consider one or more of the following options:
1. There are two distinct areas with shalswars. Lower one of them to three-per-hunter generation.
2. Lower the magic resistance and/or increase the will vs. will susceptibility of the shalswars so that they can be despawned with the Innocence spell (Currently a max-prep cast from melee doesn't do the trick with 50 discipline, 45 intelligence, and 40 charisma. I have a hard time believing that this would be considered low for a creature of this level).
3. Make them spread out! It seems like all five or six of the things in the hunting area all converge on me every time I try them out. If it were possible to get three of them alone for any length of time, things would be much better.
The area's almost workable at this point; the above adjustments would make shalswars into a much needed creature in this region of Elanthia of thier particular difficulty which is good for defense training.
Thanks,
-Grand Master Empath Karthor
