Sep 5, 2018
Warrior Wednesday #4: Reduce, Reuse, Scavenge
This week, we’ll be talking about the other ability that every level 1 warrior should have: Scavenge!
Upon killing an enemy, a thirty second timer begins. For that period of time, a warrior may say “Scavenge” and repair one point of armor in a location, a weapon, or a shield. It has been clarified that a warrior may only repair armor that they are wearing, and only weapons and shields that they are holding. The incant must be said more than 10 feet from any living enemy, and may only be activated once per kill.
Why is Scavenge important?
Longetivity! The pool of available abilities diminishes as a battlegame progresses for most players. While this is somewhat true for warriors, Scavenge enables one to get a lot of mileage out of each life. As long as you have at least one point in each location, you can always trade a hit with any unarmored player and break even by activating scavenge afterwards. (And feel a lot safer even against other armored players.) If you expend many of your armor points in a difficult melee, you can repair it by moving to a part of the field with easier matchups where you can build your points back up without losing field presence by retreating to be mended.
On that note, being resurrected and then getting a mend on your broken location is a great way to maintain effectiveness within a single life. It’s a lot easier to turn one point into four than to start from zero.
The Sick Tricks
Scavenge is a fairly simple ability, but the 30 seconds timer leaves some room for advanced strategies. If you die after killing one or more people, normally you cannot activate scavenge because you are dead. However, try using True Grit and then Shake it Off to give you the opportunity to use those kill triggers. The activation of both of those abilities should take less than 30 seconds, so if your opponents have left you alone, you can activate Scavenge for your kills. This is especially good because True Grit doesn’t repair your armor — the points from Scavenge can put your armor back where it needs to be for you to keep rolling along.
Another cool trick is borrowing your friend’s broken sword or shield within 30 seconds of felling a foe so that you can fix it for them. As long as you’re holding it, it’s a valid target for the repair. Note that this does not work with armor, since armor is rated at the beginning of the game and shouldn’t really be swapped around mid-game.
There exists a high-risk, high-reward strategy that involves using your kill trigger timer to aggress towards a player who has the means to destroy your equipment. It is a rare opportunity, but I will occasionally try this when I see a high-level wizard with a sphere of annihilation in hand. Once your 30 second kill trigger timer starts, you can close towards the caster. Block the sphere with your sword, hopefully from outside of 10'. If you succeed, repair your sword and stab the wizard. This also works against fireballs, force bolts, and arrows. You can also try it if you know a wizard has Shatter Weapon handy and is looking to use it on you, though it is not a commonly-seen spell. This tactic is very risky, but tends to be very unexpected.
A Non-Magical Sorcery
Scavenge is an extraordinary ability, which means that you can activate it without a free hand. It is also of the sorcery school. While this rarely comes into play, I have encountered the misconception that an adaptive protection against sorcery (or otherwise being immune to the entire sorcery school) will prevent you from scavenging. Fortunately, scavenge affects your equipment, and nothing currently exists that makes your equipment immune to your own verbal magic. You can always scavenge! Neat, huh?
What if your opponents are being tricky with enchantments, and don’t die when you hit them?
The wording of the Kill Trigger activation has you covered! If an opponent cheats death with an Undead Minion, Greater Undead Minion, Song of Survival, Troll’s Blood, Phoenix Tears, True Grit, or similar abilities, you may still activate Scavenge as per normal, though remember to stay at least 10 feet away from that actually-alive enemy! Gift of Air is a notable exception, as bearers of that enchantment treat wounds as if they did not happen, unless delivered by a shield crushing or armor breaking attack.
