I tried to be constructive with my earlier post on the subject - instead of simply saying the skill sucks, it should be obliterated, I attempted to discuss what makes it imbalanced and explore possible solutions. Forgive me if my youth in this land has led to ignorant suggestions, I simply thought splash was a soft eq attack.

Regardless, the point remains that my initial observation that dwarfism can be cured preventatively has now been empirically proved false - simply ask Threap about his experimentations with it. The number of sata it takes to both prevent OR cure is random, sometimes as high as 30. Given that not all professions can smokering or brew sata, and that there is no \"immunity\" against it forming, we can begin to see the problem with dwarfism. Sata is a popular herb, average cost 30 gp. In addition there is, a

s you mentioned, a herb delay. The ONLY way to deal with curing dwarfism is to ingest sata. Now, if you have to ingest 10, 20 or more sata to fix this, WITH herb delay and NO way to prevent yourself from being afflicted, except to sit in alkar and avoid the splash in the first place - consider it. LM splashes, you begin to ingest sata, LM regains balance, you continue to ingest sata, LM pushes, you're still eating the sata hoping that luck will be with you and you'll retain your normal stature, you die

to LM's staves. Because of herb delay, the curing balance is slowed down (versus sipping, for example, physical potion, or any such potion people trigger to cure poisons). Now when we see that a LM has a virtually unlimited number of splashes, and compare that to the number of sata it takes to cure ONE splash, we can see that the balance between affliction and cure is not an equal one.

What I was suggesting earlier is that we retain the same set up for curing dwarfism IF afflicted, but introduce a way to prevent the full transformation - one sata, a charmed item, another potion (with a delay in resip time!). That way, becomming afflicted with dwarfism is not inevitable, and there will be more skill used in both the affliction and prevention - fighters will have to develop clever ways to use it effectively and to avoid getting shrunk. Leaving the random (and potentially VERY costly) n

umber of sata to cure would be a nice motivator for the fighter to prevent themselves from being dwarfed - this will create a priority in healing order, and the frantic scramble to stop the metamorphosis will create a window for the LM to exploit.

My first suggestion of herb delay as one trick LMs could use in conjunction with a modified metamorphosis potion was inaccurate, but there is more than one way to skin a rabbit (unless you're in the school course... but we won't go there, grin). I'm sure clever LMs would not only develop a variety of ways to increase the effectiveness of the potion, but would also use them quite resourcefully and creatively.

One of the delightful things about combat in Avalon is that NOTHING is inevitable. Virtually every attack has a defence or a prevention. Fast reactions are what ensure survival. With dwarfism, however, there is little skill involved in curing, simply a hope that luck is on your side.

Bear in mind this was not an attack on the Loremaster profession, it was simply the topic of discussion. Hell, anyone can use dwarfism potion, albeit not as effectively as loremasters can. But a knight could order jj, sip and push/shieldrush through staves just as easily as a LM could, as I could order sip to let me yank people all over.

As for dwarfism being tweaked, yes, the damage you can inflict while dwarfed was significantly raised (as a small knight with dwarfism, when it was first implemented, my jj wouldn't hit anyone). Perhaps reducing the effectiveness of physical attack once again, in a trade off for a way to prevent dwarfism would be an adequate compromise.

Written by my hand on the 5th of Eleuthral, in the year 1131.