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Re: Here there be mantas!
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Re: Here there be mantas!
I hereby fully endorse manatees!
We need manatees for MA Oceania! |
Re: Suggestion for new Oceana units
Baalz,
Just as a comment: In the glory game, the oceania player cast burden of time - which was enormously effective strategy. So, whereas I formally empathized with the oceania position, I now see several new angles to play the race. Twas a brilliant strategy, actually - all his units recuperate naturally. |
Re: Suggestion for new Oceana units
Certainly an interesting strategy on Oceania's part... as far as I know, they don't have national access to death, however, so they will pretty much have to take it on their pretender. Further, Burden of Time does have that nasty side effect of making everyone want to kill you.
I don't really think being able to cast BoT relatively unaffected if your pretender has fairly strong death magic in any way minimizes some of the other weaknesses Oceania has. |
Re: Here there be NO mantas!
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And I love to read old books - but they aren't always accurate... http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/images/smilies/frown.gif And the fish often called "the sea devil" is actually one of deep-sea ones: deep-sea angler or monkfish are English names, I believe. They look quite scary, but can't be effective troops in the game also. http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/images/smilies/wink.gif |
or maybe....
I like the idea of Charybis (wandering whirlpool). Kindof like a water version of Eater of the Dead.
Global Warming spell? All shore provinces become susceptable to hurricanes, flooding of inland water provinces, global food supplies go down, and maybe temperature shifts? National spell? global spell? Riotous Reefs Blocks all ship traffic. Seagoing Nations are docked, Mercs, equipment, etc. Also increases food supplies in water provinces. Holy Water Gives water a semi-blessing vs undead. Not sure if this should be a global, national, or province or battlefield. The effect could be instant and major damage or something along the line of the thing in the game that keeps telling you that your undead units in a certain province have taken damage. Coral Castle Like the one creating the kelp castle but stronger Humidity (better name needed). Improves the abilities of amphibious while on land. Global? National? Battlefield? Grindylows These water demons were first mentioned in British folktales in the county of Yorkshire. Parents told their children stories of grindylows to prevent them from getting in the cold water in the area. Grindylows supposedly had long fingers that would drag children into the deep. Lowers population in coastal provinces? Could be Oceanias initial action to less the power of nations keeping it from getting onto shore. |
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Re: or maybe....
Well for the "Storm on the Sea" subtheme, or "Raging Ocean" or whatever you want to call it, I agree with Wrana that some "pack of jellyfishes" summon (a simple one, with a couple of poisoning attacks) and a manta (maybe not a real one, but what about a BIG one? http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/images/smilies/wink.gif ) would be imaginative and inspiring http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/images/smilies/wink.gif
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Re: or maybe....
Why not give oceania's top mage a 'forge' bonus toward casting hurricane, rain of toads,
Or, give each mage a different forge bonus. Lastly, why not give them a "part water" command, which would give them sailing. This should allow them to "skip" the first water terrain, allowing them to strat move 2. That should be all the change they need to ... rock. |
Re: or maybe....
My point, Wrana, is that this is about suggestions for a game based on mythology and imagination, so whether or not rays are the vicous scourge of the ocean, or nature's equivalent of the Care Bear, doesn't really have any bearing on the conversation. They look cool. They could potentially kill a man-(and so could a donkey! Ever heard the expression, "kicks like a mule"? That's because those animals tend to kick people, and the people kicked have a habit of dying) That's all that's required of them.
To give you an example of how it works: An ostrich is a potentially more vicious and dangerous animal than a tarantula, but you don't see Machaka riding around on gigantic ostriches, do you? |
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Deer kill more people in the US than bears, sharks, and rattlesnakes combined
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That's just cause there are more deer.
And the deer rarely come out of it well... |
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They're not deer, they're moose in disguise!
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Re: or maybe....
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Part of the problem here is that many of the powerful world-altering water spells have very high research requirements and therefore don't help Oceania when it most needs it: at the time when they have finished taking over all or almost all seas reachable from their start location, but now need to expand onto land to compete with the land nations. You just don't have access to Thau 7 or Ench 8 spells in the midgame (it wouldn't be the midgame if you did). I think the biggest help would be to make many of their national units/mages less useless on land. Losing some water power to gain another path (air for sirens, nature or earth for capricorns, etc.) is reasonable - losing *all* paths and gaining *nothing* is horribly crippling. Basalt kings and starspawns don't have to put up with that crap - which is a large part of why *those* nations can put up quite a decent fight on dry land. When MA Oceania's units come out of the water they have to face MA military technology: longbows, crossbows, pikes, lances. They're just not up to it. Maybe a smaller version of the Asp Turtle, that they could group-summon (like wolves, tigers, etc., and at a similar research level) - something like an amphibious cave drake, statwise. Turtles are slow, and without the Asp Turtle's trample they wouldn't have much firepower, but if their shells acted like natural shields against missiles, they could provide some cover against the ranged weapons so common on land, and at least let your other units get into hand-to-fin combat. Another possibility would be making sea serpents amphibious (like asp turtle, they could only be summoned in the sea, but then could go on land). They're just big snakes, so why shouldn't they be able to slither up on land like other snakes... Sea serpents are scary, poisonous and low research, they'd be a very nasty addition to any sea nation's land army, if you could. Asp turtles themselves are quite cool, but too high research to help at the crucial time. All amphibious/poor amphibious summons should be castable underwater unless there's a *really* good reason why they aren't. The fact that this isn't already true is particularly annoying when your mages get weaker on land. Since the quickness nerf, water mages aren't as useful on the battlefield as they used to be. Maybe other water spells could be re-examined in light of that fact? A water mage on land will never have access to a booster spell like Summon Earthpower or Phoenix Power - you can't bring the right conditions with you via item like Air can. |
Re: or maybe....
Amphibious Sea Serpents ++
A global that allows all aquatics onto land ++ |
Re: or maybe....
JimMorrison: That global isn't a bad idea. There's something a bit fatalistic towards the oceanic nations about a late game spell that allows all the land units to go into the water, but not the reverse.
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Re: or maybe....
Yep, mainly because Thetis' Blessing is mainly castable by underwater units, as they have tons of water gems, but those are the nations that really DON'T want, in the vast majority of the cases, to find in their peaceful seas hordes of knights and elephants http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/image...es/biggrin.gif
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Re: or maybe....
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Also, I think that the fact that Atlantians don't lose paths when they crawl on land, while Oceanians do, was meant to be - the Oceania was initially pictured as "the most water of water nations". I don't really know whether they are actually stronger in water than, say, Atlantis of the same era, but it looks like that was initial concept. Maybe it would be better to work around it (with summons, e.g.) than drop it outright. Another possibility could be some transformation-type spell which would preclude Capricorns, etc. losing paths - or change these... |
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I've seen reverse Thetis' Blessings talked about a lot on these forums, but I don't really get the feeling that it's ever likely to be added. Especially since people really want a version you could cast relatively early.
What if, as an alternative, we got something like: Flood. Floods a province for 1+x turns, allowing aquatic creatures to enter the province and gives poor amphibian modifiers to non-amphibious creatures. Costs 5w, pay one extra water gem per turn to make it last longer. It wouldn't be nearly as powerful as a reverse thetis' blessing so it could be castable fairly early, probably by a mage with no more than 3 water... evocation 4/5? |
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Would be good, but I get a hunch that it's impossible to mod. http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/images/smilies/frown.gif
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Re: or maybe....
Mmh, this seemed me nice at a first glance, but surely I have some problems to conceptualize it... is it supposed to give all water units "amphibious" trait because they can breath here and there? or what?
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Re: or maybe....
It's easier to conceptualize as a global than as an item that only affects few troops. Water-breathing pills or a Manual of Water-Breathing? Fine. Amulet of the Fish -type "I'm in a bubble of water"? Hard to do on an army scale, except if you just flood and everyone non-amphibian gets Sailors' Death'ed.
As a global, though... just change the rules. All battlefields everywhere are affected by a Mist effect, because the very air is changed. I really like the global idea. The only thing I'm not sure about is if Thetis' Blessing should work both ways, or if there should be a new global for underwater-to-land effect. |
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I think Thetis' blessing should work both ways. That way if EA Rlyeh or EA Oceania wants to clamber up onto land using it they at least have to expose themselves to counterattack automatically.
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Now that idea of you seems to me the nicest Sombre. A Thetis' Blessing which becomes something you must consider very well before doing both as an underwater nation than as a land nation, because it can make you attack the enemy easily but even be counterattacked on your own territory! And it seems very fitting the Dominions 3 "magic mood", as many spells of this game affect everybody, empowering the enemy too, or damaging you too, and as side effects that must be considered carefully. Nice nice nice idea imho!!
P.S. In effect, the actual Thetis' Blessing as well as a reverse version seem a little too cheap and easy to me. But a version that has both the effects is so strategically interesting I can't find words for it http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/images/smilies/wink.gif |
Re: or maybe....
Actually USING Thetis Blessing (normal, the proposed reverse version, or the proposed 2-way version) makes you horribly vulnerable to having it dispelled, because whole armies of units (and possibly SCs too) drown/suffocate.
So that alone isn't going to solve the problems of water nations unable to compete on land (of which we seem to agree MA Oceania is the biggest example), especially given the high research requirement, and the fact that being a water nation doesn't necessarily give you tons of water gems to protect it from dispel. A weaker cave drake that you could summon in your secure underwater labs and *then* take up on land would be a useful alternative to ice drakes that you need to capture a land lab (and put your mages in it) *before* summoning, and even then they're largely useless against a variety of cold-resistant races and units. (If it's weaker than a cave drake presumably it would also be cheaper.) Amphibious sea serpents would have the same benefit - the summoners can stay in the safety of the water, while someone else leads the beasts onto land, and unlike much of your battle magic, they don't rely on cold to be effective. Since most maps are mostly land, a nation that is severely disadvantaged on land is doomed, even if they have a secure powerbase in the water. (If their land disadvantage is that bad, any non-coastal province is equally secure against them.) |
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Agree to Chris_Byler: summons/transforms are probably better. Sea snakes are excellent example. Considering turtles - I believe just the name of snapping-turtle is worth it. http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/images/smilies/happy.gif And crocodiles. http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/image...es/biggrin.gif Considering hyppopotams - I remembered them initially because the name means "sea horse" in Greek, so they can be freely hybridized with denisens of ancient bestiaries... http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/images/smilies/wink.gif
As for mantas - now I think that I see where they can be placed - they can be a theme of sadly absent LA Oceania! By the way, spells which actually changed terrain type were among my favorites in old Master of Magic, but I'm almost sure that they can't be implemented under current engine. Which is a pity - gods and god-like magicians should have an ability to move or raise mountains... http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/images/smilies/frown.gif |
Re: or maybe....
it is "river horse" http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/images/smilies/wink.gif
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Do any current ocean units have Stealth? Because there's a whole lot of really weird deep-sea creatures that have remarkable stealth adaptations.
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Thanks, Tifone. My Greek is somewhat mishmash, I know. But the idea stands. http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/images/smilies/wink.gif
To HoneyBadger: unfortunately no, iirc. Except maybe some Bogarus summons. I agree that such should be present and can add much versatility to Oceania. Actually, even well-known octopuses have pretty effective camouflage system... http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/images/smilies/wink.gif |
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Actually I've seen octopuses on tv and even in real life a couple of times scuba diving. They *instantly* change their colour according to the surface they're over, even when they're swimming at fast speed on different coloured surfaces, it's just amazing and very beautiful O.O
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Ancient Kraken with stealth...now that would be a lot of fun.
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How about a swarm of tiny, fast piranha for in-combat only, that only do 1 point of damage each, like underwater versions of Dragonflies.
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Water elementals probably should gain a Stealth form as a water shape. There could also be more powerful creatures/summons that strictly come from mythology, such as Marids, river demons, and sea hags, that would be easy for the ocean-based nations to cast.
Since we're now also discussing spells, as well as units, maybe a set of spells could be created that are generic only to underwater nations, and inaccessible to others? |
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Also, Marids aren't linked to the sea. They were neutral regrading that, like Djinn, but were later (perhaps for D&D?) linked into water, probably because latin mare=sea.
Dr Praetorious tought me that, and to also read Wikipedia discussion pages. |
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And yes, a set of spells unaccessible to other nations could surely be made. And I at least think that summons. etc., discussed in this thread are planned as such. However, iirc, spell can currently be restricted (by mod commands) to 3 nations only - so if you want to make it "underwater nations only" you should probably make 2-3 spells with varying names...
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Re: or maybe....
They can have the same name, even. Some vanilla spells already do that. Spells like Sloth of Bears, for example, which Ulm and Jotunheim of all or most ages have, IIRC. Or then it was Pack of Wolves and Vanheim/Jotunheim of most ages.
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Re: or maybe....
Actually, I think some of them might as well be made EA/MA Oceania only - Atlantis and R'lyeh don't seem to need the help, or at least, not as much. And it might be more thematic for them to have different ways of crawling up on land than Oceania does, anyway.
Changing Sea Serpents to amphibious wouldn't require changing the spell at all, only the monster. |
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Or a new Wyrm monster.. like the pretender but weaker as a medium level summons?
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Re: or maybe....
You and DrPraetorius are both absolutely correct, Endoperez. The meaning of the word 'Marid' in Arabic is debatable, I've seen where it means bad, disease, sickness, poison, etc. Or 'giant'. Or 'rebellion' (from the Arabic word 'Maradah', apparently). Or it can just be somebody's first name (I've seen this twice so far). Apparently, it's hard to define. What I do agree with is that Marids are associated with water because of the 'Mar' (mer) part of their name being the Latin word for 'Ocean'
But, all that said, I've always liked the D&D version of Marid. And I don't believe we have any in the game. Also, I was trying to think of some powerful summons of more mythological, and less fishy, origins. I'm all for going with the mythically correct though, when it comes to Dom3. |
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Considering more mythological I would sooner look at some Chinese/Japanese dragons. Though they would probably look better in nations completely based on these mythologies. Oceania is mostly based on Greek mythology and classicistic art, after all. Though here we have the possibility to include more kinds of Nymphs and their relatives (Nereios the shapechanger comes to mind...), also dolphins (and Orcas already mentioned), plus Triton shell chariots (though these maybe would look more appropriate for EA?) and some other things. For one, I would add triton shell-blowers which would act as standarts (with possible additional effects of causing fear?).
Considering Marids - I would prefer to see them in separate nation. Though to be fair, I saw mentionings of Jihn being able to swim or appearing from sea. But this, I think, would be more indication of their general power rather than specific affinity to seas... By the way, this discussion begins to repeat itself. Maybe we should begin to take some tasks each and work on it? Namely aiming for mod which would make Oceania competitive without becoming too strong? http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/images/smilies/wink.gif I can try to make Triton Chariots and shell-blowers, for example... |
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Not a bad idea, I could probably knock out some weird fish art, even on my work computer.
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Summarizing
I would try to summarize what this "suggestions thread" has proposed at the present time.
Incipit: MA Oceania would probably benefit thematically and in nation strenght from a slight improvement, hopefully towards an appealing "raging sea/storm" subtheme (tnx Baalz). Valid proposals: - More sea summons: giving the oceans a wider amount of natural, wild creatures to summons, like the land nations get. Just some things from a list including Orcas, jellyfishes, manta rays, a sea serpent, amphibious sea turtles (for an high protection longbows-crossbows counter to start conquering the land), swordfishes, narwales, barracudas, manatees (?)... - 1/2 recruitable (coral?) chariot(s) lead by dolphins/ hyppocamps for an underwater shock force. (Spendios) - Ichtycentaurs to become a good (possibly better on land than on sea) amphibious unit. (cleveland) - Shell blower: this could be a national summon (as recruitables would be probably unbalanced) which acts as standard and can cast panic 1 or 2 times before going melee. (Wrana) - Selkies. Those are the main piece of the raging sea/storm subtheme suggestions, as they would provide the "storm" (A/W strong mages) factor we're looking for http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/images/smilies/wink.gif (Baalz) Somehow discarded suggestions + explanation: - Scylla: it is already in game as the (lovely) Drakaina pretender - Hyppos and crocodiles: Nice, but they live in swamps, so they better fit C'tis or the other "swamp-nations" - Piranhas: nice suggestion but they live in rivers, not oceans - Ammonites: I think everybody agreed they fit more as a death/water summon, nice but a little far from the air/water suggested subtheme. General, IHMO quite nice, suggestion from different people: - Thetis' Blessing working both ways: so strategically interesting i wouldn't bore anybody talking about it http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/images/smilies/happy.gif Peace |
Re: Summarizing
That bit about sea turtles gives me an idea-how about a giant sea turtle with a ballista built onto/into it's back? Since ballistas would probably be pretty effective in the water.
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Re: Summarizing
Mmh nice, but goes against the assumption that in Dominions 3 there aren't battlefield siege-weapons (I know ballista isn't exactly a siege weapon, but you know what I mean)... or there should be even the normal ballistas for land armies and so why not catapults throwing flying shards? And catapults throwing cows? And trebutchets? And trebutches throwing Greek fire? And trebutches throwing zombies for LA Ermor? And we don't finish anymore ^^
I was really gonna say this was nice and thematic, HoneyBadger, believe me, but this logical flaw came to my mind so... dunno http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/images/smilies/frown.gif |
Re: Summarizing
A turtle with ballista I would also think more of LA unit. Just snapper or something like old AD&D Dragon Turtle which breathed heated steam may be more... eh, on equal footing with all else.
There was also a thought about some "storm-demons" (summons, units or commanders), but I'm not very sure where we should steal them from. :embarassed: |
Re: Summarizing
Yeah there was that one but I thought it has not been developed. How should they be different from the /actually existing/ storm demons? And aren't demons mostly blood summons? Maybe some big Storm Triton or such would be more fitting, even if we've plenty of tritons...
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Re: Summarizing
Well, there is that, but the flaw in that line of logic for me, is that there really should be some more seige engines available, possibly as Construction summons. Especially since we already have the ever popular chariots for many different nations.
I can see where large seige engines might be out of bounds though, but not small mobile ones, that would have tactical advantages. These have already been added to mods (Rhinox in Sombre's excellent Warhammer Ogres), so it's certainly not unestablished as a practice. Also, I'd be very doubtful of any seige engine in the Dom3 universe that would be capable of performing as well as magic. Atleast better than a very low power spell like Flying Shards. In which case, for balance purposes, it should really be there to fill a gap in that nation's power structure, and wouldn't be as versatile, and probably cost a lot more resources than, a mage, to be feasable. But that really can be an issue for a separate thread, and doesn't necessarily need to be dealt with here. |
Re: Summarizing
Maybe icthys mounted on giant snapping turtles? Crocs could probably serve as pretty good mounts too.
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Re: Summarizing
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There are a couple of nations who have demons summonable outside of blood, but I would think that for Oceania, you aren't even looking for "demons", per se. Something like Storm Nymphs or something, playful chaotic spirits who inhabit large bodies of water - who have little concern for mortal life, and who delight in causing mayhem more than harm, but don't really see a moral dilemna in people dying because they've gone and sunk another ship - it was too much fun to care. http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/image...ies/tongue.gif Obviously aside from just not being demons, they'd also be different from the actual demons in weapon selection. They should have a Water Strike ability probably, and perhaps have a single target Sailors' Death ability for out of water. I'm not married to those spells, just throwing them out there to get the ball rolling. http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/images/smilies/wink.gif |
Re: Summarizing
Yeah, the demon tag just means a non-undead unit that's adversely affected by holy spells. My Partha mod will include "demons" that are just humans of the "untouchable" class (and thanks to JimMorrison for that inspiration http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/images/smilies/happy.gif ).
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