Re: Introduce yourself!! :-)
 

Hi folks,
I've been a member for a while but obviously not very active. I tend to research a game I'm interested in and then "explore" play it while looking into the game files and enjoying interacting with the game itself. Bartles test helped me recognize my desires in and with gaming. I explore so don't expect me to go multiplayer unless I feel really sociable and don't mind getting thumped.

I started serious gaming in HS during the early '70s. I played chess and a member of our HS team brought a copy of S&T's USN which we mostly looked at but this got me to subscribe to S&T (Strategy & Tactics) for several years. In college I not only played Napoleonic minatures (Column, Line & Square: 25mm) but when in Army ROTC went to Jump school and learned D&D with the small boxed set and the AD&D Players Manual that had just come out. The army when at Ft Bragg decided to train me on the Apple II+ in the very early '80s and I bought one of the first Macs in Feb or Mar '84. I had games on both my Apple II+ and Mac but eventually surrendered to PC popularity and moved on to PCs & their games. I've MMO'd EQ, AC, & SWG. I tend to play MMOs to explore but I will group with friends. I've explored (dissected?) games from the start looking at hexcode all the time. I've bought Austerlitz & SE IV here and I am looking at Dom 3. I've got a lot of Strategy First, Paradox, and Total War games and have enjoyed editing them. I'm not dedicated enough to really 'mod' a game but enjoy exploring the mods other players have made.

I'm 'here' to see if Dom 3 is interesting enough for this explorer. I don't like suffering through tough learning curves so I like to quickly learn to edit a game so I can stumble along enjoying the very weak competition while I see how the game plays. If I can't hexedit or find tools to allow me to stumble along easily I probably won't buy Dom 3. But I'm willing to put a fair amount of time into puzzling through game structure and editing to enable me to roll along in game.

Re: Introduce yourself!! :-)
 

KermNelson, you sound a lot like me. You will definitely enjoy Dominions 3.

Re: Introduce yourself!! :-)
 

KermNelson, you can make Dominions as easy as you like if you want to. The AI on Easy is not too tough, but you can make it even easier by playing on a large map, doing a super-simple map change to give yourself extra gold, etc..

Re: Introduce yourself!! :-)
 

Thanks for the welcome Panpiper, details?

llamabeast ... is that with included tools or something from the modders forum. I've been searching and reading some of the posts with 'editor' and other mod tools.

Recommendations?

Thanks again!

Re: Introduce yourself!! :-)
 

Well, the maps and also mods are just plain text files (the maps actually consist of one image file, with a pure white pixel for each province to tell the game where they're located, and one text file), so the only tool you need is a text editor. The game comes with PDF modding/mapping manuals, and while they're now slightly out of date there is lots of help in the modding forum.

It is all astonishingly doable actually - it's really quite a moddable game.

Re: Introduce yourself!! :-)
 

Thanks llamabeast ... I like text based files because I don't have to do as much guesswork in hex. I've pretty much decided to 'jump' in with a online order. Sounds like I won't be able to patch until I get the hardcopy???. I was hoping that something like a province editor would allow me to really cheese my starting province to eliminate my frustration while stumbling around learning the game.

Panpiper ... heh heh I went looking for your intro. Unfortunately I didn't use my head and start looking from page 30 backwards. So after several hours today of reading everyones introduction from page 1, I found yours on page 30. There seems to be a few of us near 50 somethings. Lots of D&Ders, strategy boardgamers, and early computer users.

I also like the multi-national community here(one of the great pluses of internet/online gaming). Now I need to go find my coupon from Shrapnel and my credit card.

Thanks !!!

Re: Introduce yourself!! :-)
 

Hmmm,
"I'm sooo confused." http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/image...s/confused.gif
Somewhere I got the impression I could d/l the full game once I bought a copy from GamersFront. Oh well it looks like I will wait for snail mail. http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/images/smilies/frown.gif

At least I can play the demo !!! http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/images/smilies/wink.gif

Hey llamabeast can I get away with editing the demo to cheese my gold, base resources, et al ?

Re: Introduce yourself!! :-)
 

If you play on a large map, just one enemy and increase the gold/resource/supply multiples (and magic site chance) you'll get more stuff. Independents won't benefit from it, so for most of the time you can play around as much as you like. Once you meet your enemy you could be in trouble, or you might have your full game already.

Re: Introduce yourself!! :-)
 

Hi Endoperez,

Yeah I've been trying odds & ends in hexediting and I think I'll add some text commands to a map file duplicate.

I did one small map 1v1 and found I had one province between me and Ulm with lots of useless plains and water around. Large map sounds good ... after I tinker with some map commands on a duplicate of the small map I may move one to bigger and better things. I've spent some time looking in Map & Mod subsection with "Editor" as my search criteria. Found lots of stuff for 3.10 but most is probably questionable on the demo while I wait for snail mail to get here during the Christmas season. (I am too tight on cash to buy high price delivery.) Since I'm bored I wouldn't mind suggestions on modding the demo if that is an allowed topic since there should be legitimate concern on expanding the 'free' demo too much. Maybe our Illwinter guys have that covered - let me know what policy or even 'good' advice is on whether tinkering with demo is taboo.

Thanks!

Re: Introduce yourself!! :-)
 

Hey everyone,
I'm new to these forums and to Dom 3. So far I am liking the game. I am a fan of 4x games so Dom 3 is an amazing game in that regard. Strategy games in general is one of my favorite genres for gaming. And yes, I plan to contribute to the modding community here as well.

Fed Slayer is in the house
 

Heya!!! Been SPing and am trying a little MP Dom3 over the last month or so. It's begining to look like either a lifestyle change or an addiction.

Good to see so many different countries represented on this forum, and this looks like a respectable crowd, well until now anyway.

Like KermWilson I began war gaming in high school in the 1970's (and done some role playing along the way). In my case it started with Avalon Hill's Panzer Blitz and Luftwaffe.

Re: Fed Slayer is in the house
 

Welcome Lord_Neko and FedSlayer!

Re: Fed Slayer is in the house
 

Hi Lord_Neko & Fed Slayer,

I've got ol' PanzerBlitz around here somewhere ... I picked up a lot of ASL too but never used it much (I even have AH's Rail Baron which the family likes to play occasionally.) I've been enjoying full Dom3 (3.10) did two all nighters over the weekend (I'm getting too old for those.) Been mapping away but I've not touched the mod files yet.

Merry after Christmas!

Re: Fed Slayer is in the house
 

Hi all - a pleasure to be here!

I, for the life of me, have no idea how i managed to overlook this fine game. On a random whim i downloaded the exceptionally generous demo; needless to say i am totally blown away! I have placed my order and waiting patiently for it to arrive.

Looking forward to getting involved with the multiplayer aspects of Dom3 - and that is saying something, seeing as i generally shy away from multi play. I can really see the possibilities of this game. In a way it reminds me of the old play by mail games of old, you know the ones? used to see the ads for them in Dragon magazine and the like.

Anyways here's to you and i must remark on the great community here - this last week i have read the forum front to back, top stuff!

Re: Fed Slayer is in the house
 

Welcome!

*counts*

All 84 pages?

Umm, sleep, eat, work, go to school or anything else while you were at it? http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/images/smilies/wink.gif http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/image...ies/tongue.gif

Re: Fed Slayer is in the house
 

Well, i didn't read absolutely every thread.. but yeah, does make me sound like a capital no life geek. http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/image...ies/stupid.gif

Re: Introduce yourself!! :-)
 

Hi All,

I just ordered dominions 3 yesterday.

I'm 24, from Belgium, working for a car manufacturing company.

Regarding video games I've always been attracted by strategy/tactical games... but with time I'm moving to turn based games... (my brain is getting to slow for str :p).
Actually this is not only for video games since I spent lot of time playing (but mainly painting and building army list :d) warhammer fantasy battle and 40k when I was teenager.

I also did some AAR for a game not really much know but really deep : supreme ruler 2010

I also like big story games like... the final fantasy serie (mainly the old ones... and the 7), Mass effect, Bioshock etc...


To close my description I'll simply list some of the games that I really enjoyed and that, I think were good of innovative.

Final fantasy (3, 5, 7), Secret of mana, Starcraft 1 (edit: indeed... thanks :d), Age of Empire, Warcraft 2, Supreme Ruler 2010, Fire Emblem, Civilization, Galactic Civilization, Fallout 2, Mass Effect, Hearts Of Iron, Fantasy general, Marie Bros, Command and Conquer, ... and all the ones I forgot !

Hope to see you in a coming MP game http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/images/smilies/happy.gif

Re: Introduce yourself!! :-)
 

Welcome! I'd suggest editing the 2 out of "Starcraft 2", as otherwise you'll get lots of korny welcomes about you being a visitor from the future or some such. http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/image...ies/tongue.gif

Re: Fed Slayer is in the house
 

Hehe, I didn't read every page on the forum, but I have to admit I can relate to him, among other things I:
1) Read the entire archive of ~15 different webcomics, from back when the comic started and up to the current days. (And now I just check them daily.)
2) Read the entire (409 pages long) archive of bash.org (and am still checking for updates regularly.)
3) Read most of the archive of straightdope.com (and am still checking for updates regularly.)
4) Am in the middle of reading the entire archive of thedailywtf.com (going from today and backwards. I only got to March 2007 so far, but I only started yesterday.)

I also read the entire Dom3 manual http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/image...ies/tongue.gif (except for the spell lists of course)

Re: Fed Slayer is in the house
 

Agrajag, you just made me waste loads of time reading bash.org. I'd not heard of it before - have to say, it is pretty funny. Reading all 409 pages is quite impressive though! So far I've only read 1.

Edit: 2

Re: Fed Slayer is in the house
 

Hi there!
I've been hanging around on this forum for a while so it's about time I make a proper introduction.
I'm currently 16 years old and live in Sweden. Not Swedish by nationality but have lived here since I was 7.
I have been a gamer since my dad brought me a Nintendo 64 with the game Wipeout. Since then I have played quite a lot of games, my favorite genres have to be strategy and platform. I specially enjoy turn-based strategy games and have played Age of Wonders 2(which I didn't enjoy),most of the Heroes of Might and Magic series and Disciples 2(one of my favorite games actually) amongst others.
Other interests of mine are art(mostly comics and fantasy-based art, but hey; it's still art), literature(mostly fantasy, but hey; it's still
literature), music, history and drawing.
Oh, and I also hate sports... except for ping-pong, that sport rules. But other than that I hate sports.
Well, that's about it I guess.

Re: Fed Slayer is in the house
 

Hi theenemy. Sounds like you have a prosperous future. You have all the right interests and you live in Sweden http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/images/smilies/happy.gif

Re: Introduce yourself!! :-)
 

Japp, framtiden är så utstakad som den kan bli http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/images/smilies/happy.gif

Re: Introduce yourself!! :-)
 

Hi! My name is Florian I'm 29 years old and I live in Trier, Germany. I've been playing Dom since Dominions II and I've had Dom3 since it came out but I only really got into it just recently. So I joined the Forums and have started playing my first multiplayer games which is a lot of fun. Before that I played some network games with my brother, who is also on this forum as rasko.

I've always liked Role-Playing games and that's probably my favorite aspect of Dominions. I also like good Real Time strategy games like Age of Empires 3. My favorite game that came out recently is Mass Effect, but I don't really have time to play a lot besides Dominions nowadays. Besides PC games I like to play board games, my favorite one right now is Twilight Struggle even though that can be really frustrating! I'm also into movies and music and some other stuff!
Hope to see meet some of you in MP games and in the forum!

Re: Introduce yourself!! :-)
 

Well hi,
I'm from Vermont USA. Big And Scary introduced me to DomII and I've been hooked since. I've finished my first multiplayer game. I just started looking through the forums (other than multiplayer) recently which is why I'm a little late introducing myself.

See you all around!

Re: Introduce yourself!! :-)
 

Im from Finland. Currently 25yrs studying in Oulu Polytech. Started playing dom3 only recently and finding this game to be good killer of all available time. Strategy games have always been close to my heart so dom3 was quite natural choice fer me.

Gona get some sp experience b4 getting beaten by veterans on pbem games.

Re: Introduce yourself!! :-)
 

Hi everyone! I'm a 43-year-old stay-at-home dad with a wonderful wife and 3 great daughters — the youngest, Claire, is just 2 1/2, so she's my primary job. We're in Bloomington, IL, USA.

Most of my free time the last 2 years has been totally absorbed into Diablo, specifically, the Eastern Sun mod. In fact, I am still a moderator for that forum and have run over a dozen different Eastern Sun tournaments over the last 2 years.

I'll be bowing out of Diablo and my Eastern Sun moderator duties very soon. I'm looking for something new and exciting. I just ordered D3 this morning from Inside Mac Games and I'm very excited to dive into it.

I know the learning curve is steep with this game, so be prepared for plenty of questions...

Talk to you soon.

Metro

PS — DominionsFan, I see you're a fan of martial arts. I am too, though I don't practice any forms myself. I'm really enjoying the new TV series Fight Quest.

Re: Introduce yourself!! :-)
 

MetropolisMan, I think DominionsFan left us a year ago.

But from the rest of us I wish you a nice stay at our forum and do not be shy at asking questions. People are very nice unless it is questions regarding piratecopied games.

Re: Introduce yourself!! :-)
 

Welcome MetropolisFan. Wow, I was born in Bloomington, IL, lived in Normal until I was 14 (I'm 39 now living in CA). It's good to see people from my hometown here. I still have family back there, lots of them.

You'll enjoy this game, trust me. While I don't play it often enough it's still quite amazing, I learn something new all the time.

Shmonk

Re: Introduce yourself!! :-)
 

Hey, Shmonk — that's awesome. It's a small world, isn't it? My wife is an attorney for Country Companies, so you probably know exactly where that is.

I finally received D3 in the mail yesterday and promptly patched up, so hopefully if I have some spare time this weekend I can dive into the Tutorial and manual.

Re: Introduce yourself!! :-)
 

Hi DominionsFan,

I'm new to the Dominions series, but not new to gaming. I like playing turn-based strategy and especially games with interesting concepts (rules and designs that focus more on the effects of conditions in a battle and less on the mechanics involved).

I am 43 and live in Germany. I have been playing strategy games since I was a teenager and mostly of the boardgame variety, but like so many others switched to the computer as soon as I got tired of stacking (and restacking) counters. I have recently been playing the GalCiv series from Paradox/Stardock. I highly rcommend it if you like space-based strategy.

BTW I'm a big-time Michigan Fan --- Go Blue!

Thx for the thread.

---Ray

Re: Introduce yourself!! :-)
 

I like Paradox games, but are they really in the galciv development. Never heard such a rumour before. And then DimionsFan seems to know all the new people coming here but is long gone himself. I smell a conspiracy.

Hello Raymo! Welcome to our forum.

How do you mean more focus in effects then mechanics? Sounds like the same to me.

For boardgames may I suggest Imperial. Look at www.worldofboardgames.com or gamegeek. Really interesting game. To give more favour to the game see the movie The Money Masters (google videos) before playing. But then I guess you are more into the heavy stuff like OCS or WiF. Can only play one game a year if playing them. But they can be really fun.

If it was less then ten years ago you switched to computers you might like Master of Orion. Probably the best game made so far for single player. Take a look at http://www.the-underdogs.info/game.php?gameid=688 .

Re: Introduce yourself!! :-)
 

Hello Folket,

what I meant by 'focus on the effects as opposed to te mechanics involved' was the use of abstract rules constructs or a creative sequence of play/events to lead players into playing under the same pressures and with same motives as the actual commanders involved in the battles.

So many complex games, it seems, are laden with a lot of detailed machanics that cause us players to get lost in counting factors and calculating modifiers. I like to be able to see a game design that creates the effect in a simple straightforward way for me without being confronted witha fifteen phased turn.

I used to really enjoy, for example, reading the old Third Reich design notes where they would explain why Air/Naval Factor limit on Malta caused the Germans not to be able to deploy more than one 4-6 Armor to Libya. It was simpl, abstract, but still on target.

It seems like in Germany alot of games get designed that way too.

Regards,

---Ray

Re: Introduce yourself!! :-)
 

That sounds very reasonable. But remember that Dominions have like 20 phases, but you will not notice them to much as a beginner since you plan for them all at the same time.

Re: Introduce yourself!! :-)
 

Well hello.

Nice to be here.

Re: Introduce yourself!! :-)
 

Hi Ylvali!

Re: Introduce yourself!! :-)
 

Hi everyone, here an other dominion addicted, i've started two weeks ago, so i'm very very late in my work ( approximatively, two weeks late ^^ ), but i can't wait for my first MP game ^^

I've 28, i'm graphist and french, and you know how awfully we speak english, so now read that message with that unique and so crapy accent that we have and i shouldn't wait too long to find players who want to exterminate me soon XD

Thanks to the dev' too for making such great game running under linux !
And thanks for all those precious informations present here.

See ya o/

Re: Introduce yourself!! :-)
 

Welcome. Never mind the accent. So long as we understand what you're saying, it's all good.

Re: Introduce yourself!! :-)
 

I am Krec, a wargaming player for years , i also enjoy playin fantasy TB games. Played Homm for years along with AOWSM. I must say this is one heck of a game. i got hooked by the demo. I have enrolled in a couple of mp games to help hone my skills. See you on the battlefield.

Krec

Re: Introduce yourself!! :-)
 

Hi Krec!

Well, I'm not to highly ranked on these forums http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/image...es/biggrin.gif but I just wanted to say that I salute you(and all the new guys around here). http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/images/smilies/wink.gif

Re: Introduce yourself!! :-)
 

Hi everybody! ^_^

T(oo)L(ong); D(idn't)R(ead) version at the very end.

Arcaani may not be my name, but it is, among other things (Arcanus, Eirik, Bottle(!), other "wierd" (weird) stuff), what I am called on the internets.

I'm a not-so-long-time-player and forum-lurker, slightly-shorter-time-legitimate-Dom3-buyer, and I generally love halfway-RTS games (Rome:Total War and the mod Europa Barbarorum, CivIV, Romance of the Three Kingdoms 4 (on the SNES), etc), though all most good games get plenty of playtime in my house. And yes, I did kind of download the full version of Dominions 3 before deciding to buy it.

My first encounter with Dominions 3 (and the Dominions series in general) was through a foreign exchange student (and eventually (luckily), friend) from the Philippines. I was playing on his computer at the time, and I didn't really get it. I played as Ermor, mostly because I enjoy studying Roman culture, but I didn't really "get it". Looking back, that may have been because the learning curve is a bit steep... or because Ermor/the Roman Republic relies on more than its Hastati and Triarii in this game (Undead! "Top notch, wot wot wot, my gel?" (a cookie if you can put the reference in context. And it isn't a verbatim transcript))... or perhaps because I just didn't have enough time. I can't even remember which kind of Pretender I used.

Nevertheless, roughly a month or so ago I... acquired the game. Yes, I did download it. Sorry. I don't endorse "piracy" (though I do endorse piracy! Arrrr)... Don't kill me. <_< I did end up buying it... That makes it okay... right? Anyway, I fired it up. It was great. I can't quite recall which faction I played as first, but it didn't take long before I started a game on that 221-tile map as an Allfather (called lsildur. I was unable to use capital letters, so I had to choose something that started with an I. Because small L's look like capital i's) of the Vanheim (I live in Norway, so I found them and their mythos rather irresistible). It rocked. I still haven't finished that game, and I never will http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/images/smilies/frown.gif . "Moar" on that soon.

I got my copy of the game today. I ordered it a week ago. It takes roughly a month to receive books from Amazon.com (Not an endorsement, don't kill me). It took a week for you guys to get it all the way to Norway. Epic wins and free internets for all.

And it just "feels" great. I installed patch 3.14 and I'm currently browsing the manual (this thing is BIG! ^___^ I mean, I though the AoE2 manual was good. This thing is equally interesting... and it's sooo big too! Q(^_^Q) ) and running the tutorial. I'm learning some things I didn't know before (F1 is your friend mid-through-late-game), and it contains valuable tips on kicking *** and takings names in Dom3 in general.

Anyway. I hope to be a productive member of this community - at the very least, I won't incite rebellion (wut?). It's been a pleasure writing this. It won't be a pleasure reading. But that's what you get for trying to accumulate knowledge! ^_^ Have a good day.

TL;DR: Hai guise! Amovi, amavi, emi. Evidently that means "I took/stole [downloaded illegally - Don't hurt me]. I liked. I bought.". And that's the story of Dom3 and me.

Re: Introduce yourself!! :-)
 

I think it's established on this forum that we like ninjas.

Re: Introduce yourself!! :-)
 

I think this is the time to show a real ninja.

http://ulm.illwinter.com/larp.jpg

Re: Introduce yourself!! :-)
 

There are actually twelve ninjas in that pic.

Re: Introduce yourself!! :-)
 

Re: Introduce yourself!! :-)
 

Hi, everyone!
This is Donny, new to the game.
I'm a college student in Chicago.
I'm from China, so I love T'ien Chi a lot. :-)

Re: Introduce yourself!! :-)
 

My God! I hope I can't find you in that picture, Kristoffer. http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/images/smilies/happy.gif

Re: Introduce yourself!! :-)
 

Obviously! http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/images/smilies/happy.gif

Hi and welcome, Donny!

I hope you will have a good time.

Re: Introduce yourself!! :-)
 

Unfortunately not http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/images/smilies/happy.gif

I can't stop laughing when I see it. They are just great. The barbarian with wellington boots http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/images/smilies/happy.gif And then there's the ninja, looking ..., well, just looking.

Re: Introduce yourself!! :-)
 

They're all wearing wellington boots! (I think.) It's the undies on the barbarian that kills me. Wellington boots and underpants. http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/image...es/biggrin.gif http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/image...es/biggrin.gif Classic!