Re: Dominion effects
 

<font size="2" face="sans-serif, arial, verdana">All the scales influences the events in some way. For example you need a death scale to get death gems or the plague. I do not remember for certain but you probably need at least growth 0 for exceptional harvest etc. I do not remember most of them but there are many events that requires a specified scale or some other circumstance. There are even more of these types of events in dom 2 where there are events that only take place if a certain unit is present in the province or if the terrain is of a specified terrain etc.

[ October 18, 2003, 11:19: Message edited by: johan osterman ]

Re: Dominion effects
 

You have to keep in mind that +growth will only get maximum influence at the capital and your core nation area. Out at the borders and inside post-enemy territory the effect won't get you as much, unless the ex-enemy also had +growth.

In comparison +order will pump taxes as soon as your dominion pushes the scales up.

With the weakening of growths tax influence, the scale has lost a huge amount of it's potency.

I suspect we will see many players taking +0, and possibly even -3.

My gut feeling is that both growth and production scales have been diminished to the point that they aren't very important. I hope I'm wrong, and that it turns out to be better balanced than I'm guessing.

Re: Dominion effects
 

<font size="2" face="sans-serif, arial, verdana">This is not a problem, hopefully the changes in growth and production will make it viable to not have growth and production +3.

Re: Dominion effects
 

<font size="2" face="sans-serif, arial, verdana">you dont like the whole idea of population growing right? I wonder why. Having to invest 120 design points to get a +18% increase in the population of a province, after 30 turns, is not that interesting.</font><hr /></blockquote><font size="2" face="sans-serif, arial, verdana">It is appr 23% after 30 turns. And you get the 6% flat income increase, and the supply bonus, and are not eligeble for certain bad luck events. Growth scales were by many considered one of the no brainers in dom 1, now its effectiveness is reduced by giving it 3% less of an income increase per step, I still think it is a useful scale.

Population growth in excess of 9% a year seems absurd to me.</font><hr /></blockquote><font size="2" face="sans-serif, arial, verdana">dunno, for me 30 turns @ 1.006 give 19% , perhaps there is a base 0.1% at growth 0 (thus giving 22%) ?

higher pop growth would be absurd, but you need to balance scale cost with advantages given. oh well, minor point anyway, there is no that many way to increase economy. I just regret that you had to give growth a blend of pop increase and econ increase, and not only pop increase, just because you felt a too high growth rate would not be realistic.

Re: Dominion effects
 

<font size="2" face="sans-serif, arial, verdana">Higher growth rate is NOT absurd. This is a land of magic, remember? Not to mention that high-growth provinces are lush, beautiful, attractive places to live, and should draw immigrants (pop increase is never defined as "through births only"). Lastly... who says months are 30 days long (or days 24 hours)? That's an Earth thing. If months represent more time, population growth per month could be arbitrarily high, yet still realistic.

Re: Dominion effects
 

<font size="2" face="sans-serif, arial, verdana">9% Growth a year is very high even for a magical world, the population in a province more than quadrouples every generation. Besdides, I like that population is by and large a diminishing resource, it makes the game more apocalyptic.

Re: Dominion effects
 

Originally posted by johan osterman:

Quote:

Besdides, I like that population is by and large a diminishing resource, it makes the game more apocalyptic.

<font size="2" face="sans-serif, arial, verdana">That explains spells like Wrath of God, Illwinter, Second Sun and summoning of Demon Lords...

[ October 18, 2003, 18:24: Message edited by: Nerfix ]

Re: Dominion effects
 

100% agreement with Saber on this. This is a fantasy game. Balance is more important that realism. Besides you can always explain growth as immigration or increased number of people now prosperous enough to pay taxes.

I understand the intention behind making Production +3 less needed, however my fear is that we will end with the exact opposite situation where competive players will almost always favor -3. Again I haven't seen the new game in action... but this is my concern.

In Dom I, I would often take Prod +3, Drain +3. If that has now changed to Sloth +3, Magic +3, we have a shift, but there is still imbalance. The idea is to inspire the use of all scales, not to rotate problems.

With the information at hand (which is limited) it appears that Order +3 is almost required. Production and Growth look watered down to the point that I'm not sure I care about them. Luck looks the same as always. Magic looks like the new place to toss the extra nation points.

With less gold but lots of points to spend on magic and magic scale, my thought is that players are going to go crazy making super combatant pretenders.

I'd like to hear from some of the beta testers, as you guys have much more experience in this matter than I. What scale choices have you been inspired to use? How does the balance between military and magic feel, in your opinion.

We don't have a demo to examine yet, please throw us a bone. http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/images/icons/icon7.gif

Re: Dominion effects
 

<font size="2" face="sans-serif, arial, verdana">I dont quite follow, how you deduce from a 0.6% growth a turn that you get 9% a year? Correct me if I'm wrong but you have decided that a game turn is a season no?

<font size="2" face="sans-serif, arial, verdana">I know that, and this is why I feel you are biased against growth, whatever our arguments could be. The game is sufficiently apocalyptic with the end game magical arsenal we have, you dont have to diminish the growth rate to induce this feeling, frankly. With tidal waves, black plagues etc., raising the growth rate to an acceptable level (ie to the point that 120 design points are worth spending) would not change much the resilience of provinces against these spells.

Re: Dominion effects
 

<font size="2" face="sans-serif, arial, verdana">It was hanging in the air little in dom 1, turns might even have been refered to as alternatively months or seasons within the game. In dom 2 a turn is defined as a month.

<font size="2" face="sans-serif, arial, verdana">I guess all my preferences constitute biases, so yes I am biased against growth. In the end dominions is the way it is because of JK and Kristoffers different biases, one of these biases which I share is a bias against growth. http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/images/icons/icon7.gif

[ October 18, 2003, 19:48: Message edited by: johan osterman ]