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Re: Kristoffer\'s encouragement thread
I also vote to not care for balance when adding new nations. If they are really imbalanced mods/houserules can solve this issue for mp. But for sp somewhat imbalanced nations are a good thing imho http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/images/smilies/happy.gif.
Though i have been rather quiet lately i have played a lot of sp recently http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/images/smilies/happy.gif. With every new patch i like Dom3 more, especially thanks to the much improved modding and new nation(s). I am looking forward to the new nations also, especially to the new machaka and pythium nations http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/images/smilies/happy.gif. |
Re: Kristoffer\'s encouragement thread
Many kudos on Dominions 2 and 3. I am playing a multiplayer right now that is so dramatic that I find myself holding my breath while taking a turn. I have to remind myself to breath. Dom 2+3 are most likely the best games I have ever played, possibly just behind Fallout 1+2.
Anyway my vote is give some good national spells to Marverni, they are very weak right now IMHO. I really like them thematically however. |
Re: Kristoffer\'s encouragement thread
There's a mod adding new spells to Marverni in the mod forum. Just so you know.
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Re: Kristoffer\'s encouragement thread
The movie 300 has been released in the USA this weekend... not sure how long before it arrives in your country, but watching this movie might also spring new ideas for the upcoming patches.
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Re: Kristoffer\'s encouragement thread
I was thinking of doing a blood-favouring war-hungry EA arco replacement nation myself. Not inspired by 300, but similar themes I suppose.
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Re: Kristoffer\'s encouragement thread
If you do then you have two choices (probably more if I thought about it).
(1) a balanced nation suitable for playing against other unmodded nations in the game (2) a wildly unbalanced nation meant as a more powerful AI opponent Both have their difficulties. With (1) its hard to do good balance. With (2) its hard to get it to make best use of the AI code. |
Re: Kristoffer\'s encouragement thread
I like the descriptions the most. I don't actually have time to play much now, and haven't actually played that much in years - but I've enjopyed the stories and the developing world quite a lot. While modding has added a little to this since DomII, most of it has been done by Kristoffer, not Johan.
As for what I'd like to see, I'm most curious about between-ages things like what really happened with the Seal in the caves of Agartha, or some explanation about the origin of the Umbrals. Heroes are the simplest way of adding nation-spesific, semi-hidden descriptions, of course. *hint hint* P.S. I'd like to add that there was a really cool piece of news about Sweden in Finnish television today. Your country has a great immigration policy, and I'm not sure if Finland would be ready for a black woman as minister. Finland is a long, long way behind Sweden in accepting different people. It seems Vanheim is overpowered even in the real world. http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/images/smilies/wink.gif http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/image...ies/tongue.gif |
Re: Kristoffer\'s encouragement thread
http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/image...s/confused.gif That's a strange thing to say to me Gandalf. There are several mod nations which attempt to be balanced against the vanilla standards, including my last 3. I haven't seen any which were designed to be used only by the AI (although Amos' nations aren't balanced to vanilla standards).
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Re: Kristoffer\'s encouragement thread
Wasnt it DrPraetorious that did a bunch of nations which sparked balance discussions. Based on back-and-forth discussions I thought he had decided to leave them unbalanced. In fact, I thought the whole thing culminated in
Mass Mod |
Re: Kristoffer\'s encouragement thread
Right, but I don't think he's working on it any more because of the graphics limitation coded into dom3. I could be wrong.
I've personally come to the conclusion that it's sort of pointless as well - combining Amos' mods with other mods doesn't make that much sense and you can simply find or edit mods that work together as combos. Plus there actually aren't that many 'serious' nations added for each age - for example the late modcombo I listed is only missing Frank's Amazons (excluding Amos' LA nations, which I believe should be used as a seperate combo). As for the doctor's nations - I only see the two recently released ones, both of which are in beta, lacking graphics etc. The nations he listed in the combined mod proposal, as far as I know, haven't been released. It's possible that there are a great many mods which people have half finished or not gotten around to posting up, many of which could be very good. I prefer to let people play while I knock up new versions, but some people prefer to wait until they're completely (or very nearly) finished before uploading, such as Zepath. |
Re: Kristoffer\'s encouragement thread
To return somewhat to the original theme: Kristoffer was hoping for some inspiration to get him into writing some fun new background stuff for Dom3. A couple of ideas that spring to mind (dunno if they're practical but hopefully they're at least slightly interesting):
1) how about a nation which worships horrors? complete with the option to take a pretender based on a horror chassis. 2) how about a nation based loosely on the Wizard of Earthsea series? I realise copyright is an issue, but in any case there would have to be significant modification to fit it into the Dom3 setup, so it would be more in the way of inspiration. But you could (for example) combine it with Greek legends of sailing to beef out the land troops and so on. The basic idea would be a sailing nation with strong wizards. The wizards would be air/earth/water, perhaps with a bit of death thrown in. Perhaps you could make it an undead nation in one of the ages, say a necromancer has been successful in subjugating the archipelago, and the dead now rule. The best wizards should be capital only, to keep them expensive (and rare), but much weaker witches and warlocks should be easily available. Priests should be average or weak, but capital wizards should have weak priestly powers as well (to represent their powers over spirits, and the respect in which they are held). If you brought in inspiration from sources like the Odyssey and Jason and the Argonauts, or even Sinbad the Sailor, I would have thought you could have a nation with a really interesting background. |
Re: Kristoffer\'s encouragement thread
I like the horror worship idea.
I think if a nation worshipped horror, the horrors would not care. It would be cool to have the nation a little over powered and balance it with all commanders starting with heavy horror marks, to reflect the intrinsic danger of worshiping the astral sociopaths who dont even understand the concept of loyalty. |
Re: Kristoffer\'s encouragement thread
How much of an issue is copyright? I believe Illithids are copyrighted by WotC, for one thing.
I think someone suggested some nations based on middle-eastern mythology (or was it the arabian nights... I forget) a while back. i don't know much about it myself, but I think it'd be cool. |
Re: Kristoffer\'s encouragement thread
Kristoffer, do you have anything general in mind for the other nation nbrs you've reserved? If you've cooled to whatever ideas you had originally, we might have suggestions (or just "no, that's cool! Do it!").
Generally, whatever Kristoffer does is cool - I've been looking forward to the new nations. New ideas? Hm... One example that was raised: Amos' horror-worshipping nation is quite good. It needs playtesting, balancing, etc. There are some additional mod commands needed (units recruited horrormarked, units who are technically horrors in addition to magicbeings,) but does Kristoffer need to do another horror nation? Amos is the only one who does pixel art which is up to Kristoffer's standards, so I don't think so. What do I think is *missing*? Persians (Caelum, Abyssia and Marignon all show some degree of persian *influence*, but it's not the same), Sumerians/Babylonians/Arabs, Korea, Indochina, Phoenicia/Carthage, Russia (Jotunheim sorta), Two more nations of China (for romance of the three kingdoms), insect people, fire giants and goblins. If *I* were to put those together, I'd add: - arabic jinn, children of Catharsis. Everyone is ethereal, so your light cavalry are survivable (also they live on bones and dust, so no supplies). Ifrit are evil jinn, fallen children of Anthrax. - persian and/or phoenician fire giants. You get white robed mages, fire/water/astral. - russian goblins. Lots of wolf riders. In the LA, inherits the magic of the spheres from pythium - is a communion power. - thai/chinese bug people. The males are big six-limbed warriors and the females are hot psychadelically-colored human women with butterfly wings for no reason. In terms of nations that play differently- - A nation that freespawns troops, but still pays money for mages (and maybe for sacred elites or something.) Like Pangaea, except that the maenad-equivalent makes up 90% of your army. - A nation that pays money for troops, but only summons mages for gems never money. LE Ulm is almost like this. But if he's got a cool drawing, that's probably a better basis for a new nation than all of this comparitive folklore or game mechanics. aside: WotC tries to exert some amorphous IP control over illithids. They might try to stop you from using the term in a title but they can't stop you from using the term otherwise (Johnson and Johnson can't stop me from calling something a Band-Aid in my fictional setting, for example.) |
Re: Kristoffer\'s encouragement thread
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Re: Kristoffer\'s encouragement thread
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In the case of MODs where it was clear that they used items from other games they were either deleted from shrapnels forums or the person got permission to use the images/sounds/names etc. |
Re: Kristoffer\'s encouragement thread
i rather would like to see more undead nations, blood nations, in general more evil stuff. http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/images/smilies/happy.gif
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Re: Kristoffer\'s encouragement thread
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First era could be "pre-Islamic" type, camels and nomads, Moon-worshippers with djinn summons... their magic site could be Irem, City of Pillars, as described by Lovecraftian lore - it would add a touch of Death to an otherwise Astral nation. The Middle Era could be inspired by 1001 Nights and the Caliphate: Sinbad and Sheherazade-esque heroes, elemental mages on flying carpets, horseback sheiks, assassins, lesser djinni, ghouls, etc. The Late Era nation, finally, might be based on the Barbary Coast, with pirates and Beys... perhaps with sailing? It would of course be primarily a Water nation, but Blood or Death could be added along with slave traders, or there could be a further emphasis on the "desert" aspect to add Fire magic. |
Re: Kristoffer\'s encouragement thread
I'd like to see a blood nation who has taken Crossbreeding to a whole new level. I love the randomness mechanic that crossbreeding brings to certain blood nations as it is, but I'd like to see some nation which went overboard with it, such that their nationals are crossbred units themselves (not necessarily the same units as those created by the crossbreeding spell, but with similar attributes). Many gameworlds include a faction/nation which uses biology/fleshcrafting in favor of chemistry/physics; Dominions could use one.
Blood/Nature/Astral are obvious schools, to make and dominate life. National spells would obviously include improved versions of Crossbreeding (perhaps as simple as versions which include effective Luck bonuses already, perhaps something more complex), Flesh Golem summons, a hierarchy of single-to-AoE spells which would warp and mutate enemy soldiers into maddened amalgams. I'd also like to see a "selective crossbreeding" spell with which two units of the caster's choice have their attributes randomly merged, but that seems risky and like it might stretch the code. Their key (likely capital only) mage should freespawn crossbreeds similar to how Pangea gets Maenads (although I'd think basing their numbers on Growth, rather than Turmoil, would be more thematically appropriate) - clearly, you wouldn't want to allow for Basilisk / Dracolion / etc, but the basic crossbreeds are still kind of cool. Their more generic mages might be based physically on the Freak Lord. I'd also like to give them a Doppleganger character which is both assassin and spy at once, with excellent stealth and fear to make up for fairly normal physical attributes. Missile troops should be limited to poison spitters (perhaps a light skirmisher unit, and a more artillery-like unit capable of multiple poison shots/round). I'd love for them to have biological weapons as well (similar to Plague), but that seems much too powerful for a recruitable. Maybe their heavy regular troop could have poison spines similar to Armor of Twisting Thorns. Ermmm... that's all for now. |
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Re: Kristoffer\'s encouragement thread
How about a race of cat people, who look like the Egyptian Godess Bast or God Sekamat. They could be in the Persian culture. Very good with ranged and stealth, Would have assasins and spies. Warriors would be lion headed and slow, but capable of beserk.
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Re: Kristoffer\'s encouragement thread
call me a purist, but ancient Egypt != Persia.
I think Persia would be more Zoroastrianism - though some of those aspects are incorporated into arcosephale. There was actually a fairly decent persia mod for dom 2. If you want to do an ancient egypt, have it be egyptian - all animal headed sacreds and pharoahs or son of the sun for pretenders. |
Re: Kristoffer\'s encouragement thread
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Making the Persians Cat people is no less arbtrary than having the egyptians as lizard men. None of the major egytian gods were lizards withthe possible excetion of SET. Apep was an egyptian demon, and a serpent. It was never worshipped however. Anyway in D&D there was the Persian Cat people where they called Rakasha ? that was the inspiration for the suggestion. |
Re: Kristoffer\'s encouragement thread
Sobek.
I'm curious why you want cat people. As a visual, I suppose it's nice, but similarly potent nations already exist. Unless you want to go up against Ermor so you can stage Lion-O battles vs. Mumm-Ra, the Invincible!!! |
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Re: Kristoffer\'s encouragement thread
(also already mictlan has c-c-cat people. Alright!)
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Re: Kristoffer\'s encouragement thread
I made a mod (Avernum) which contains several catmen (nephil) units. Just so you know.
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Re: Kristoffer\'s encouragement thread
Wrong, Endo. Palankasha is a tiger-headed demon, and the Manyusha Rakshasi has a leonine mane, even if it has little resemblance to lions otherwise.
If we wanted to have a Persian/Egyptian type cat people nation, the Tigrans from AoW2 and AoW:SM were pretty much that style, so something similar might work, with FAS magics being the most common, having assassins and spies. |
Re: Kristoffer\'s encouragement thread
Rakshasas and Rakshasa Warriors are both Lankan summons.
DnD does indeed have the Rakshasa. It's natural form looks like a humanoid tiger. Stats below. http://www.d20srd.org/srd/monsters/rakshasa.htm The Tigrans were a savage race - if I recall they had some of the strongest domination/enslavement abilities in the game, with an extra focus on illusion as well. |
Re: Kristoffer\'s encouragement thread
RE: New nation themes.
I'm currently re-reading Steven Erikson's Malazan novels, and cool ideas there include: 1.) T'lan Imass: Humanity's predecessors (think Neanderthals) turned themselves into undead to prosecute a genocidal war against their tyrannical oppressors, the Jaghut. 300,000-year-old Neanderthal zombies obsessed with fighting tyranny. They use Tellann, once the Warren (magic-source, kind of) of Fire but now the Warren of Ash. They've outlived their own gods and most of their purpose and pretty much want to declare victory and fall into dust. Very tragic. Their shamans are called Bonecasters and each have a totem animal they can transform into--think giant undead gorillas, panthers twelve feet long, etc.--in addition to being fierce spellcasters. Oh, and T'lan Imass (before the undead Ritual of Tellann they were just called the Imass, and the glottal stop in T'ellan seems to mean "broken") can also turn into dust (which they should have been long ago, were it not for the Ritual) and travel quickly on the winds that way. They fight with giant flint swords and occasionally giant undead prehistoric wolves called T'lan Ay as allies. 2.) The Jaghut are few, powerful and solitary, but respond to blood ties and reunite when a family member comes under attack. They mostly use Omtose Phellack, the Warren of Ice. They're also all dead except for a handful in hiding, and a number of half-breeds called Jhag. They average 7 feet tall or so and have tusks and green skin. 3.) Teblor are giant barbarian horse-warriors with slow regeneration and four lungs (and perhaps other differences from humanity), who reach maturity at 80+ and live for hundreds of years. They live by raiding each other but are starting to discover the world beyond their borders. Early on when you first meet them they're talking about their desire to kill hundreds of children; turns out that's their term for humans, because of their relative size. Also turns out they're the remnants of a fallen civilization called the Thelomen Toblakai, and were originally contemporaries with the Imass 300,000 years ago. Pureblood Thelomen Toblakai were bigger, though, 18+ feet tall instead of 8-9. Corruption of the bloodlines is a big theme for them. 4.) Tiste Andii, Tiste Edur, and Tiste Liosaan are three branches of long-lived beings who've fled here from a civil war on their own world. They represent Darkness, Shadow, and Light respectively. The civil war has something to do with the Andii feeling betrayed that Mother Dark created Light and Shadow. The three branches don't get along. Tiste Andii are fatalistic and uncaring, Tiste Liosaan are arrogant and inflexible, Tiste Edur are primitive and bloodthirsty. Tiste Andii have a reputation as deadly assassin/mages, and are skilled at magics of darkness and destruction, but don't go in for reanimating undead or anything. 5.) The Malazans are a recently-risen human empire which ideologically kind of resembles the Communist revolution in China (purges of the bourgeois nobility are still ongoing) and militarily resembles the Roman Empire (esp. in attitude, either offering friendship to a beaten foe and removing the causes of strife, or else destroying it utterly: no better friend and no worse enemy). Kind of light on the mage artillery, but with very professional troops. There are several other races/factions in the Malazan story, too. Anyway, at the very least it would make a very cool mod, and might stir the creative juices. The actual powers of e.g. the T'lan Imass aren't anything especially novel (well okay, frozen ice zombies are more common than fire zombies), but their motivations for becoming undead ARE novel and that's what makes a good story. Or Dominions theme, as the case may be, with e.g. the war between the Vanir and the Niefel giants. -Max |
Re: Kristoffer\'s encouragement thread
This has already been pointed out somewhere else by several people, but just as a reminder... There's currently a limit cap of ~110 new sprites for mods, game crashes if there are more than 110. Can this limit be raised to, like, a lot more?
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Checking the dom3progress html...
25th march
* Can use monthly cast multiple site search spells of the same type. * Some monsters were not always unparalyzed properly, fixed. 21st march * Ritual of Rebirth didn't work with 15 size Hall of Fame, fixed. * Wild Hunt and some more spells were buggy when attacking besieging armies, fixed. * Magic site fixes, armor fixes, age fixes, hero fixes, unit fixes from edi's list * Y-fix * No looming devils under water * Summon barghest & black dogs switched * Province defense overflow fix * Esc works when right side menu is hidden * H-shortcut didn't work * Marverni & me Man temples cost 200 * TC nation descr fix I see much spiffiness here. |
Re: Kristoffer\'s encouragement thread
First, please let me say that this game is incredibly cool! And I've just barely scratched the surface.
One thing that I did some across was that my Wyrm was afflicted with a 'limp' battle wound. I'm not sure if it is intentional to have limping Wryms. It's not like it 'lost an arm', but it does make me laugh when I try to come up with a mental picture of a limping Wrym. |
Re: Kristoffer\'s encouragement thread
I also wanted to say that this is the most complex turn-based strategy game I've ever played, and that its successful in that endeavor is a masterstroke. Any additional work done by the developers is just icing on the cake for us.
That being said, I'd pay another $40 if a diplomacy screen was implemented on par with Alpha Centauri (or even MOO, really). |
Re: Kristoffer\'s encouragement thread
Hi, I'm in the mood again. I have a one week easter break. http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/images/smilies/happy.gif
Finished last two days: Tir na n'Og - Land of the Ever Young. Firbolg ruled by Tuatha. Eriu - Last of the Tuatha When men came (Man and the Milesians) the Tuatha withdrew. One part of their kingdom became Man. The lands conquered by the milesians became Eriu, a nation of humans, Fir Bolg and Sidhe. |
Re: Kristoffer\'s encouragement thread
I'm quite fond of the Malazan books. There is a vague reference to the T'lan Imass in the spell 'Hidden in Snow' and the unfrozen.
I will not make a nation based on the books, but I would love to see a mod on in that setting. |
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What does that do to Fomoria? Still coming? |
Re: Kristoffer\'s encouragement thread
Wow! This is really exciting. Really looking forward to seeing them.
So I guess Tir na n'Og is EA, and Eriu is MA. So Tir na n'Og isn't called EA Man because it splits into both Man and Eriu? What're Milesians? Are Sidhe faeries in Dominions? Or something else? All very exciting. |
Re: Kristoffer\'s encouragement thread
Sidhe are quite similar to the Vanir, an ancient magical race superior to men skilled in the use of glamour and illusions. It could be that they share the same ancestry.
Tir na n'Og do indeed split into Man and Eriu. Eriu being somewhat similar to the Last of Tuatha from dom2 with humans (milesians) ruled by reemerging Sidhe Lords. Fomoria will emerge eventually. They too have Fir Bolg inhabitants, but will have some other more sinister allies as well. |
Re: Kristoffer\'s encouragement thread
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-Max |
Re: Kristoffer\'s encouragement thread
This is just a bump to show Kristoffer O that we're still here http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/image...es/biggrin.gif
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Re: Kristoffer\'s encouragement thread
While I have been a long time player of dominions, the only encouragement i can give is, make dom IV, with some of the improvements and i will personally buy 3 copies!
Improved scripting for the mages, ie only using gems if scripted option, only casting offensive spells as an option, etc, and improved ai, not casting touch of madness on other mages and missile troops, alone would be enough for me to buy dom IV. |
Re: Kristoffer\'s encouragement thread
Add in a cheesy plastic maenad and i'll buy 2 copies http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/image...ies/tongue.gif
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Re: Kristoffer\'s encouragement thread
I'll either buy 9 signed copies, or I'll convince others to do so.
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Re: Kristoffer\'s encouragement thread
I might buy one. But only if the game is substantially advanced from Dom3 and not just a big patch. Call me the voice of reason ;]
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Re: Kristoffer\'s encouragement thread
Well we havent been disappointed yet.
You know I have to have my 5 copies. |
Re: Kristoffer\'s encouragement thread
I'm a very reasonable person-however, the whole of my reasonable nature is channeled and focused into maintaining a successful marriage. I just don't have anything left over.
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Re: Kristoffer\'s encouragement thread
I /will/ pay you 10 bucks for the vanilla graphics in a big zip though ;]
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Re: Kristoffer\'s encouragement thread
An ancient Egypt variant not focused on cat-men (or variants) could be fun (though I like the cat idea mentioned early for another variant http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/image...ies/tongue.gif). Perhaps heavy on archers through early and middle at least, with better bows in the middle period. Light chariots with archers in early and middle. Mix with "successor" forces in late period, adding phalangites (perhaps with lesser quality than Arcosephalae) and elephants. Most troops (at least early and middle) would be lightly armoured, perhaps armoured archers in middle as an option, and some heavy infantry at least by middle period (Royal Shardana guards, perhaps an axe and khopesh-armed variant here). Regular infantry would be spears early and middle. Priests/priestesses might vary with astral and death specialities. Could add some baboons, snakes, scorpions etc. for more fantasy element, whatever seemed fun to work with. Sacreds would include chariot archers (perhaps prince as sacred chariot-archer general, and/or Pharaoh as another general or as another Pretender option). Could keep chariots into late period just to have a sacred, but otherwise something else for sacreds, maybe one of the fantasy troop options.
Also I'd suggest an addition of some kind of light horse for Arcosephale (modelled on Athenian light horse early, lancers and Thessalians later?), would add a bit of fitting colour to the Arco forces without unbalancing so far as I could see at least. It would be nice to have more of the random personalities show up also, not stronger heroes but just more variety? At least I find that one fun aspect of the game, more for colour than "power" as heroes I get seem weak but a fun addition anyway http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/images/smilies/happy.gif I'm sure ideas for more nations could be endless, but not sure how many extras might be added to Dominions III? Don't want to overload with suggestions that are not wanted/needed at least. Thanks for asking for the input/encouragement btw, & creating a very fun and different turn-based strategy game http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/images/smilies/happy.gif |
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