Once I tap and cast a combat spell ..and maintain the hands used on it how long does it last ... say If I stop on a square that has 3-4 monsters on it and I fight them all one after another?

Is it only good for the first one or is it good for all of them? The book states that spells are basically more powerful and versatile weapons than regular stuff but if you only get one shot per turn that's not very versatile at all...

Another situation would be the Terrible experiment where you can also fight a ton of monsters all in a row.

Just curious as we had been allowing the spell use for the multiple fights ... didn't seem any more unbalancing than the tramp with the named magical sword

Once it's exhausted, it's only good until the end of that combat or until you give up the hand(s). Each monster is its own combat. So only good for 1 monster.

Well why would you cast a spell and then give up the hands in the same combat? ... That seems to be a possibility in the rules ... but I'm not sure what it would do for you.

Say you were banking on Shrivelling's +6 to see you through the combat, wanted to save Dynamite's +8 for the 2nd monster in the area. Unfortunately, you failed in your first combat check and took some damage, leaving you close to unconsciousness (let's say you're fighting a non-resistant monster like Cthonian). +6 is nice, but since you don't want to get knocked out, you decide to use Dynamite instead for the 2nd combat check. Sure it's only 2 more dice, but could be the difference. What you'll then do regarding the 2nd monster, well, that's a another story .

Gsmack said:

You can swap combinations of items until you have no more free hands for the combat. Suppose that a phantom and a warlock share with you the same location. One has phisical immunity, the other magical immunity and you have to fight both. You can cast a spell, like a dreaded curse of Azatoth, to defeat the one with phisical immunity, but this spell is useless against the second one. If the spell should last for fighting both monsters, it would be never worth casting, because you won't have any free hands for using a phisical weapon against the second monster. One spell - one monster, after the first one, switch strategies for all the others.

Turambar said:

Turambar, he specifically asked about "in same combat", not between 2 combats with 2 monsters.

Turambar said:

That's outside the rules, but wouldn't be correct anyway. You can always choose to free up your hands.