Re: Skill vs. strength and parrying
 

Was wondering if anyone else was _ever_ going to rebut Twan's " I still can't understand how some strategy gamers may be so convinced that the D&D approach is only a weird RPG thing, and the second the best for strategy games, when it's very clearly the contrary IMHO."

D&D's HP system was retarded even for a pen and pencil RPG from day one, and games that came out at roughly the same time handled the issue _far_ better. (Runequest being the main one that came out at roughly the same time, but also AH's Powers and Perils, Hero Systems (ie Champions), etc.)

One of the most blatantly retarded aspects was that HPs supposedly represented luck, fatigue, etc, and yet, HPs recovered at the rate of roughly 1 HP a day, WITH rest and treatment! Under D&D's system, Conan could've fought an army single-handedly one day - and then required 90-some days to recuperate, not to mention weeks before he could've safely gone against a 1st level foe. Imagine the Three Musketeers requiring weeks between battles, instead of simply needing a chance to sit down and quaff a bottle of wine before re-entering the fray. http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/images/smilies/wink.gif

And of course, the flip side to the retardedness was the AC system, where platemail and agility (dexterity) both made you harder to _hit_, instead of plate armor making you easier to hit, but harder to significantly _hurt_.

Other games separated fatigue-type damage from actual bodily harm, and/or handled armor as reducing the effect of blows. Dominions to a large extent does this also, and contrary to Epaminondas's "If anything, that shows that a lot of people do agree with me in feeling that there is a problem with the base human commander or hero HPs", an awful lot of people have no problem with the base human commanders dying like flies - it's only the fact that heroes (without Turin's mod) are so useless that we have a problem with. (And some people don't even have a problem with that http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/images/smilies/wink.gif )

Re: Skill vs. strength and parrying
 

Hmmm. A weapon that's both a weapon and a shield... makes sense, so long as the engine handles multiple 'shields' reasonably. The use is fairly obvious so long as there's only one shield, but if there are multiple shields with different prot values it becomes important to have a way of deciding which ones get checked for which hit rolls.

Re: The problem of low hit points on humans
 

Considering that he'd be out of the battle after the first "deadly" hit, the near immortality wouldn't be too overpowering (besides he could die if the army lost). Idea was to make human heroes more useful without using unthematic means.

Re: The problem of low hit points on humans
 

For human melee heroes, I'd just add a 'chosen' attribute (with an icon resembling the pretender/prophet icons) which makes them immune to curse, horror mark and serious afflictions. Handy, but not overwhelming.

Re: The problem of low hit points on humans
 

Yes, you're basically right - The way it currently works, many of the randomly-arriving heroes are just above-average and slightly unique. They only live up to their descriptions if they survive to get experience and items and/or heroic abilities or are made prophets or whatever.

I don't really see that as a big problem, though I think they could be several levels better in abilities like fighting skills without breaking balance. On the other hand, if the mundane heroes were to be given boosts so that they arrived much better than average commanders, I'd miss having the kind of heroes we have now - the "hero material" guys. Though those could be added too as regenerating heroes for all nations. Especially now that we can mod two types of those in for every nation... http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/images/smilies/happy.gif

As for Marius Lorca, just to annoyingly quibble about your example, he may not be much better than an Emerald Lord, but Emerald Lords are some of the best human melee foot commanders in the game, so adding a bunch of +1's to one of them is actually quite good from a mortal human perspective. Vanheim's Vanlade is even less impressive compared to typical Vans (he's about the same), though again, mounted Vans are some of the best mounter human combat commanders (and they have magic too).

PvK

Re: Skill vs. strength and parrying
 

IIRC hp were supposed to be given back by cleric spells and at the level your Conan would have 90hp his cleric friend was supposed to be able to give him back 90hp in a day or two. Of course the fact that these priest spells were called "cure" and "heal" aggravated the confusion about the hp definition, but they could easily be seen as the need to be in good terms with a god to regenerate the hero/luck/fate part of the points.

Anyway dominions has a system which is closer from rolemaster with its open ended dice rolls allowing with extreme critical hits to one shot anybody or give severe afflictions, but rolemaster hadn't a limited by size hp system, it used a light form the D&D hp concept with the possibility to develop them with leveling, so there is no real need of chaosium systems limitations to make heroes mortal.

Note that I don't think there is a problem with humans hp in general (out of heroic characters and eventually very experienced commanders) I was just tired by the nonsense of some D&D-hp-concept* bashing arguements (*I don't remember having defended the way they modeled armor, recuperation or other parts of the mechanics) when it was far more able to model med fan heroes without making them unbalanced than one in which the GM was forced to cheat to avoid to see "Conan" one shoted in each fight (runequest), and when boosting stats like defense or giving luck instead of hp risks to make heroes far more overpowered in case a lucky roll never happen (some suggestions for dominions).

Re: The problem of low hit points on humans
 

Marius Lorca is one of the few units in Dominions who has base Attack rating over 15. He has 16. Bane Lords, Scorpion Men, the Devourer of Souls, Devata, Dai Oni, one Heliophagus - 14. Firbolgs, Tartarians, at least 3 of the elemental royalty, Arch Devil, Abomination, angelic Seraph - 15. In a quick browse through the manual, I found only Wraith Consuls, Wraith Lords and the Ashen Angels (from Manifestation), and Horrors (from Send Horror). Horrors had attack 18, the three others had attack 16.

Marius Lorca is impossibly skilled - unfortunately, that doesn't help him to survive in battles. Not much. He'd need expensive equipment, and could still easily die. He'd be easy to kill as well, if he did survive to become enough of a threat.

Re: The problem of low hit points on humans
 

Well, Marius Lorca is a hero, but lets talk Emerald Lord (who is nearly as bad-***.)

The emerald lord costs *80 gold*.

That's roughly equivalent to a four or five gem summoned monster. The emerald lord, on average, smacks a wyvern like a red-headed stepchild. So, the emerald lord doesn't need more than 15 hit points - if he had 25, he'd beat the wyvern almost every time, which would be unfair.

Now, it's true, the niefel lord is a *way* better chassis than he is. This is why the niefel lord costs six times as much.

So, I'd agree that -
Mantle of Life (Constr 6, NNEE) - Body Prot 13, +20 hp.
Blood Vigor Charm (Constr 4, BB) - +10 hp. That's 1 hit point per blood slave.
Equinox (Constr 8, AAAANNN) - Sword, poisonous, does lightning damage, resist poison and lightning, +30 hit points.
etc. would be fair and reasonable.

Re: The problem of low hit points on humans
 

Well, Marius Lorca is a hero, but lets talk Emerald Lord (who is nearly as bad-***.)

The emerald lord costs *80 gold*.

That's roughly equivalent to a four or five gem summoned monster. The emerald lord, on average, smacks a wyvern like a red-headed stepchild. So, the emerald lord doesn't need more than 15 hit points - if he had 25, he'd beat the wyvern almost every time, which would be unfair.

Now, it's true, the niefel jarl is a *way* better chassis than he is - but, without items, six emerald lords chop him at the knees until he dies, and the niefel jarl costs six times as much.

But, if you're really set on letting people use human heroes into the late game, I think it would be reasonable for blood/fire/earth/nature (in various combinations) to add hit points - I notice no-one has requested a "bonus hit points" power for magic items in the modders wishlist.

Re: The problem of low hit points on humans
 

That indicates not that Marius Lorca has a fabulous attack skill but that attack skill doesn't vary much in Dominions. He hits about 3-4 times as often as a smuck human. If he had "heroic" skill, akin to fiction, you'd be looking at a 50-100-fold ratio. Absolutely nothing in Dominions fights anything like Bruce Lee or Fafhrd.

Re: Skill vs. strength and parrying
 

Which simply forced parties to have a druid or cleric if they wanted to get anywhere. And it was _still_ retarded that a lvl-1 who got beat to within an inch of his life (-9 HPs) could be completely healed and ready to go (as ready as they ever were) within 3 weeks, while Conan would feel he needed to rest for 3 months.

Didn't keep me from spending man-months or years playing and writing up adventures for AD&D, but that was mostly because of the difficulty in finding a group that'd play Champions/Hero Systems, or Powers & Perils, or Rolemaster, or Runequest, or half a dozen other far better systems.

D&D was damn near the most retarded, stupid system, and so, like MacDonalds, it succeeded hugely. Never underestimate the poor taste of the American people. http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/images/smilies/wink.gif

Re: The problem of low hit points on humans
 

Originally D&D hit points were the ability to take damage. "Cure", "heal", "rest" were all based on that concept. I don't remember if it was explicit (the original books were just pamphlets and lacked extensive discourses on concepts and design philosophy), but it was pretty obvious. However, from the start, D&D took a lot of flack from the ridiculous results, like competent characters easily being able to survive being squashed by a large boulder. The patch for this was to reinterpret "hit points" as an abstraction reflcting the ability to survive by any means, not just to able to take the damage. This was made "official" in AD&D in 1980 although many (including me) had already come up with it on their own. I remember this pretty well as I'd had numerous arguments with people over reinterpreting hit points and really enjoyed shoving that passage under their noses when it came out. http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/image...es/biggrin.gif

Unfortunately "cure" spells and the like were never reinterpreted in light of the reinterpretation. In fairness, D&D is a game, not a sim, and the HP abstraction works pretty well for having fun regardless of the bizarrities simulating certain events.

Re: Skill vs. strength and parrying
 

Hey! I like D&D... Also, it's not 1 HP, but 1 HP per level. So a level 20 fighter resting with treatment would heal 20 HP instead of 1. Then you factor in how item-based D&D is, and it likely becomes much more. Potions are also fine in the absence of a druid or cleric.

Though I'll agree, the HP system is messed up as far as suspension of disbelief goes. Still, as far as gameplay goes, I find it works.

Re: Skill vs. strength and parrying
 

It was more a network effect than stupidity. Lots of people saw the flaws, but everybody knew how to play, everybody had the manuals, there were a gazillion scenarios, etc.

The other systems had their flaws too. Runequest was like a horror movie sometimes with multiple limbs flying off in a typical combat. Rolemaster (sometimes called Rollmaster http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/images/smilies/wink.gif ) had those critical hit tables that were very entertaining to read but not so entertaining when characters experienced them so often. Hero systems was IMO the best but it was pretty late to the game - non-superhero versions didn't come out until 10 years after D&D and the fad aspect had faded.

Re: Skill vs. strength and parrying
 

Eh, _if_ it's 1 HP per level, that's a very recent change in AD&D's rules - for more than 20 years, it was essentially 1 HP per day of _rest_, period. IIRC, every week you may've gotten a bonus bit of healing equal to your constitution bonus. That was it - if you were traveling, you weren't healing.

As far as potions go - they might've been fine in a Monty-Haul campaign, but generally speaking healing potions were rare, expensive (if they could even be purchased), and used in the direst of circumstances. Oh, and let's not forget, most of the potions were relatively useless for most characters who weren't very low level. The "common" potions healed something like 1-8, 2-16 and 3-18 HPs. Not really meaningful when your fight is down 70+ HPs, and then rolls a 2 out of possible 16.

So, you were stuck with needing a cleric in your party, in a game with the most insane ethical/moral framework of "alignment" (*), where most players would have throttled someone attempting to roleplay a cleric properly (ie, preaching and attempting to convince everyone to do things as their deity would wish).

* Yes, insane. When an entire alignment (Chaotic Neutral) is described as being likely to flip a coin to decide whether or not to follow a suicidal plan of action, that's more insane than the CN characters are supposed to be. It also ignores that CN might simply mean that a person didn't care much about good or evil, didn't like laws and conventions and cared more about individuals than the swarming masses of people. Oh, and evil alignments, as described (especially CE and NE), meant that you should be flaying puppies, openly torturing and killing, etc.

Re: The problem of low hit points on humans
 

Things with stacked abilities (magic, blessings, experience, heroic abilities, spells, etc.) do. Do you really think you want supercombattants to simply show up for free and not need to take any risk or investment before they start wiping out entire armies without risk? If so, it can easily be modded in.

BTW, comparing Marius Lorca with _no_ experience and no magic items to a plain trained heavy infantryman (#38) (skills at 10, equipped a spear, ringmail, shield) spear-carrier: Looks to me like Marius hits him and not the shield 76% of the time averaging 10 points of damage after armor (the man has 10 HP). If such a man tries to hit minimal Marius Lorca, he has a 6% chance, and even if he hits, has only about a 14% chance of doing any damage at all through Marius' armor. That's before Marius gets any experience or abilities or magical help, etc.

PvK

Re: The problem of low hit points on humans
 

At any rate, healing potions (and potions in general) are cheaper now as well, and it's not so much that clerics/druids are necessary anymore as that they're grossly overpowered. (Particularly Druids) I wouldn't know much about AD&D, I've only gotten into it a couple of years ago. (3.5 edition)

Re: The problem of low hit points on humans
 

What items are you planning to give the Ulmish heroes so that they aren't killed by the first A2 mage they meet that casts lightning bolt twice? Melee commanders have nowhere near as much effect on the battlefield as the equivalent gold cost in mages, and that's part of the problem.

The problem is that it's not good enough from a game mechanics standpoint. As a random guess, Emerald lords should probably have basic attack and defense stats of around 20 if you want to use them in a battle situation. This is necesary if you don't want them to die in the very first battle they ever see, especially with the extremely granular fatigue system that Dominions uses.

A basic van commander is about how powerful in combat without boosting spells or blesses as I would like to see most human commanders. Skilled enough to take on a dozen or so untrained or even well trained normal humans.

Re: The problem of low hit points on humans
 

So, in other words, when he experiences 30 attacks in ten rounds of combat against size two opponents, he's not particularly likely to survive.

Edit:Size two opponents, not size three.

Re: Skill vs. strength and parrying
 

Thinking about, priest of Odin might be quite useful in various situations http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/images/smilies/happy.gif

Re: Skill vs. strength and parrying
 

I repeat, a little common sense please.

No one has mentioned "Wish" to buff a commander.
"Power" : the caster gets +20 strength, +10 attack, +10 defence, +10 precision, and +50 hitpoints

Does that not qualify?

What you should do is ask the programers to change the effect so you can wish "Power (Commander's name)" and buff the leader you want without having to get him to astral 9.

I still feel you people are focusing on the wrong things. I like the fact that a human is not going to take a giant with out buffing just like I like being able to buff him till he can.

Re: The problem of low hit points on humans
 

Yah, this is the point I get stuck on too.

An Emerald Lord or something who gets unequaled obesity or the other HP boosting heroic ability and hangs around in the hall of fame for a while can gain a decent cushion of HP and will indeed survive hits that would kill a normal man.

If he can do it, why can't some of the national heroes do it? Why is it that the only way to get that HP up is via a random ability?

Re: The problem of low hit points on humans
 

Usually either Ring of Tamed Lightning, or Copper Plate.

True (though heroes generally cost zero, and I tend to use both). I do see this as an issue for my own tastes, and am continuing my mod which rebalances the magic costs.

Whether it's "good enough" depends on what you want, and what tactics you use. If your Emerald Lords die in the first battle, then you are either exaggerating or using bad tactics, since my C'tissian commanders and utterly non-elite Ulmish commanders tend to survive battles quite often without any experience or magical help, and get into the HoF, etc.. See the tactics I mentioned below.

Sounds like a nice mod to me. Though, I assume you will tweak the costs so a commander costs what? 20 x what a normal soldier costs?

Re: The problem of low hit points on humans
 

Yes, which only makes complete sense, if he is getting ganged up by a steady stream of enemies at 3:1 odds. That's why you don't send him out alone, but assign a few men to stay with him on Guard Commander, and place him near other blocks of troops, etc.

Re: The problem of low hit points on humans
 

Other, non-random, ways are Prophetizing and Wish.
Heroic abilities are a bit exaggerated, especially when some of them get to high levels. People with high heroic abilities are more like the characters some people are wanting to see. I prefer to get legendary Defense skill to legendary ability to not die when butchered (i.e. Hit Points), personally. I agree that it's too bad it requires the attention of the gods who oversee the Hall of Fame to get them, and that they are a bit much in some cases. I'd like to see more minor abilities, and a different way to earn them besides the HoF.

Re: The problem of low hit points on humans
 

That is, I'm afraid, a fundamental misconception about how Dom3's system represents its world. If hp represented abstract damage avoidance ability, units wouldn't get afflictions based on damage dealt.

In Dominions, hp quite explicitly represent raw physical durability. Basically, meat and muscle! Even human "heroes" are still human, and will still die if they take an unlucky sword to the face. That realistic lethality is a core conception of how Dominions' mechanic works. If you find that particularly annoying, I'd recommend playing any of the numerous nonhuman races with higher-hp commanders. (Although you can replicate the general idea quite well with Summon Firbolg.)

Dominions isn't the kind of fantasy setting where the badass human singlehandedly slays the dragon. It's the kind of setting where an army of humans with greatswords and mage support kills the dragon.

As an aside, though, I do agree that it'd be nice to have HoF bonuses try to be appropriate to the commander type. Mages with boosted attack skill are pretty sad heroes!

Re: The problem of low hit points on humans
 

They are ulmish heroes, so there's no ring of tamed lightning until you've bought a huge amount of master smiths. The copper plate just means that they'll die to a couple of smites, or a fireball instead.

Heroes cost you a good portion of the 120 design points you'd otherwise get if you took misfortune 3.

As I expected, you sound like one of the players who are happy with the dumbing down of Dominions 3 compared to Dom2 and the general reduction in the power of magic.

I want the elite commanders with no added equipment to be able to survive nearly any battle that their side wins. These are supposed to be experienced frontline soldiers, not rank and file cannon fodder.

The commander would see no change in cost at all, since that's the bare minimum to make them anywhere as useful as a battle mage.

Re: The problem of low hit points on humans
 

It's clear that you don't have much understanding of the battle mechanic from this statement. It doesn't matter if you give him bodyguards, or supporting troops, since melee attacks are effectively all concentrated on the most survivable unit in a square. In a single combat round, every single attack will be dealt to him (or to friendlies in the same square until they are dead) until he dies and they move onto the next target. 3:1 odds are almost exactly what a unit needs to be able to survive when supported by other troops because three units ganging up on a single other unit is the norm in dominions.

Re: The problem of low hit points on humans
 

Ewierl : (longely explained in other messages of the thread, the question is how to boost heroes and I support an use of D&Dian hp for them it's why there is a "here" in the sentence and why I've also suggested to be logical and to give them a way to avoid afflictions as their extra hp wouldn't be "real hp" but hero points ; muscle can't give a sufficient number of "real" hp to make humans heroes worth to give them gear IMO).

Re: The problem of low hit points on humans
 

For the people who can´t accept a bit higher hp for heros:

Consider this:
a run of the mill human unit has 10 hp.

The most skilled recruitable human fighters already have 15+hp(Emerald Lord,Warrior Chiefs, Boar Lord etc). So clearly skilled fighters can gain more than the ordinary amount of hps. Why does it break immersion then if Hero units, i. e. the best of the best have ~20 hp?
After all it would be only the logical progression from
standard soldier---->elite soldier---->Hero

Re: The problem of low hit points on humans
 

Ah, so what you want is humans to survive three-meter radius (give or take) orbs of fire. Besides, they rarely hit their intended square anyways. http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/images/smilies/wink.gif

At any rate, between 'assassin' spells and combat magic, magic is pretty much the bane of heroes. I don't deny that, it's just the way Dominions works.

I get enough crappy events with Order 3 Luck 0, thank you. I haven't even dared try a misfortune scale.


First-off, I fail to see how Dominions 3 was 'dumbed down' compared to 2. All I can think of off the top of my head is the inability to choose a Pretender's castle, (I'll admit, that was a neat feature, but I find it restricted the flow of the game. You shouldn't have to build an ultra-expensive citadel as a defensive precaution on the frontlines that will be abandoned soon enough, or a low-admin Mausoleum where you want to crank out former Independent Knights.) special dominions being replaced with ritual spells and new ages, (I'm sort of indifferent on this one, honestly) and auto-setting the taxes (Which I'll assume you weren't referring to).

If magic was weakened any between Dominions 2 and 3, it's still pretty damned tough. You cite it as pretty much the #1 way of killing generals, summons are the real 'heroes' of Dominions, national spells shape nations, and six E3 mages and a small team of heavilly armored men can fend back 120 somewhat skilled and decently armored troops (Happened to me once, my Nagarishis and Bandars vs. Jomon's samurai. I ended up losing, but only due to sucky morale checks. Jomon had no more than 10 units left, which were commanders, by battle's end. They massacared my sleeping mages). I'll admit the researching is a hit, but I don't see how it was weakened aside from that.

You sound like one of the players that would rather be playing Dominions 2 if it had an active modding community.

That's sort of ridiculous to my way of thinking. Many times you'll be fighting elite, possibly F9-blessed men, combat mages, (which are many times the price equivelant of 'elite commanders' themselves, despite having no commander talents) and summoned monsters that are simply more powerful than humans. The kind your 'rank and file cannon fodder' would be torn to shreds by, even outnumbered 3 to 1. Expecting one elite soldier to fend off groups of three somewhat less elite soldiers for an entire battle might be asking too much.


But you forget one thing, that commanders command. Commanders may be elite warriors, yes, but that's not what most people recruit them as. Most people just prefer recruiting elite warriors to serve as elite warriors. One can recruit battle mages instead of commanders, but then battle mages would be all you have. Maybe a few men as well, but it would be a small enough amount that it wouldn't be able to hold off a commander or two with any respectable amount of men. Commanders will always have that talent, which Battle Mages can never take.

When it comes down to it, this entire argument is a matter of taste. The way I see it, human commanders aren't meant to be on the frontlines. One doesn't recruit a Myrmidon Commander instead of a Myrmidon to put it on the frontlines and expect it to somehow fare better than warriors of equal skill, but worse commanding ability.

Re: The problem of low hit points on humans
 

I have little problem with somebody who's survived decades of combat against armies that routinely lob fireballs around being able to survive those hits.

The way that the system works though is that human combat mages can gather a couple of doezen kills over their career without any gem investment and with fairly minimal danger. A human commander is virtually never going to reach that goal.

There are a number of reasons. The morale system is still broken and still autorouts commanders when their troops die, and still kills troops that don't have a province to retreat to, yet now it even affects beings that aren't even hurt by the attacks they are experiencing. Quickness no longer affects spells, so all those mages (and there are a lot of them) that cost extra gold for W1 no longer see any benefit from that extra path. Research is at the very difficult setting by default, so that pushing armies around the map, especially armies composed of undercosted sacred troops is the best strategy for the majority of the important turns of the game.

I would. Other than the obvious interface improvements and additional nations, I think that Dom2 was a better game than Dom3.

Commanders are not just slightly more elite than your normal troops. They have such supposedly impressive abilities that you can only recruit a single one per month.

If he can't, then there's no point in his existing in the first place. That's why people use independent commanders who are cheaper and just as good at standing behind the troops.

That's a game mechanic convention, nothing else.

I wasn't aware that recruiting battle mages prevented you from recruiting independent commanders to move your troops around, becaue that's what you're arguing here.

Then the elite versions might as well not exist for all the gameplay effect that they have. You get more survivability and more utility out of three independent commanders than a single black lord, and they both have the same cost.

Re: The problem of low hit points on humans
 

There seem to be some straw man arguments going on. Has ANYBODY suggested human melee commanders should be able to take on dragons, high-end summons, or real giants (not Jotunheim chaff) with a nontrivial chance of success? I can't find anybody who's said that but there seems to be a lot of people arguing human heros shouldn't get another 5-10 hp because they'd be able to trash dragons.

On a side note, it's an overdone fear anyway. My last effort at human melee commanders was with EA Ulm. With a forge bonus, earth, and 16 hp commanders, they are as good for human melee commanders as you'll ever see. And, against the human nations, scripted to fight along with the troops, with about 4 items each, they were acceptable and didn't die too much, although still distinctly inferior to commanders with artillery gear in terms of bang for the buck and the PITA factor of setting them up. However, even against Jotumheim chaff, they started getting squished in droves.

Based on my experience, 16 hp human melee commanders is about right - not 10. They survive well against human-level troops, and poorly against superhuman troops, which is about what a top fighter should do. I actually think they should be a sniff better than that, to make meleeing commanders more competitive with artillery commanders. 10 hp is way too little.

Part of the problem is that, in spite of some claims here the Dom melee system is not realistic. In particular, humans are far tougher than the game gives them credit for. A single dagger blow by an ordinary person on an unarmored man will usually kill in Dom - and that's way too easy. Even a sword blow will not usually really kill somebody although it will probably result in a nasty wound (i.e., an affliction). There are legit game reasons for this variation, mostly that fights don't take so long, and with disposable units the inaccuracies are pretty ignorable. But when we're talking about a kitted out melee commander, the inaccuracies are pretty noticeable. 15 to 20 hp would much better model how much punishment it takes to kill somebody - a single weapon blow, unreduced by armor, can, but usually won't.

Re: The problem of low hit points on humans
 

I think the intension was to replace the castle choice with the awakening choice. I always thought having a 'national castle type' was pretty weird. I like the way Dom3 does it better personally, and I like the idea behind the choice of awakening. I think there's a big problem here due to balance though ... with Dormant being overpowered in a lot of cases.

In general, when one (or a few) simple strategies are the most effective, a game has a lot less depth and interest to it. But much of this is just balance issues right now, which can be fixed over time.


I think part of the issue here is people not distinguishing between 'Troop Commanders' and 'Heroes' and 'Melee Commanders' enough. Being able to command a large number of troops doesn't necessarily mean you are any tougher than the troops you command. In the real world, troop commanders tend to stay out of the way of harm when possible so that they can keep the troops organized and issue orders.

Perhaps these 'troop commanders' who aren't anything special physically could stand to be improved in the commanding department. More commanders with the Standard ability, and perhaps increase the effect of the Standard (or otherwise increase the morale effect of 'troop commanders' as compared to other commanders, like mages or SCs).

Mages can make for powerful and effective battle mages. Troop commanders can lead large numbers of troops and inspire them. But there is no real melee commander unit to recruit.

I would see this as a difference in the races though ... humans would need to use other strategies because they couldn't use normal recruitable commanders as super melee units. They could rely more on summons or avoid using super melee units in general.

Differences in the races are a good thing, as long as it works. You have to consider Balance first of all... if a race performs poorly, then they need improvements. You also have to consider depth and width of strategy... a race that does exactly 1 thing from start to finish is boring, even if it is effective. A race who only has 1 potential game plan is limited, and probably will have a lot of bad matchups too.

'Heroes' are a different story, they are supposed to be heroic in some way. For them, they SHOULD be substantially better/stronger or more able to survive, depending on what makes them special.


Yes, I agree with this. Like I said, humans don't (and shouldn't) have recruitable melee commanders of considerable strength. But a hero should be someone who has been through a lot and is a lot more experience than an ordinary commander. You could, for example, think of a hero as a commander who already has 5+ stars of experience, and thus would already have his stat bonuses from those.

Re: The problem of low hit points on humans
 

I have to agree with GD that magic is considerably less important than before. Because resources were roughly doubled but the number of castle lab complexes wasn't you can recruit many more troops per mage and because of the supply increases (which are huge) you can field them too. Finally, the morale check changes seem to have made it harder to break troops. Before low-level artillery was useful because you could make and field enough to break a supply-limited army. Now it's pretty much hopeless until you've got a half-dozen castles because you've got twice as much to fight and you've got to dish out more per unit on top of that.

The best artillery strategy I've found so far is Pythium Communioned Smite. It was fun, sure, but even 4 communioned Theurg acolytes pitching Smite just didn't make a big difference with 200+ troops on the field. Only AOE or strong summons make a big difference now and prior to level 6, that's pretty much Strength of Giants, Bladewind, Wind Guide, Flaming Arrows, and a couple of level 4 summons like Fall Bears. Those mostly require gems, which mean you need to be searching too and in any case most nations can't generate a good supply of mages for any of those spells without path boosters, which means Con 4 or 6 too.

On top of that, your cost-benefit wasn't too good there. You lost 6 mages at about 180 = 1080 to kill 100 troops at, say, 15 = 1500. That's ahead, but not by much. Even if you can get some of the stronger early magic going it's possible to be overwhelmed by sheer force of numbers, as you experienced.

I play SP, against 10 or so computer opponents, and by the time I can start using the magic that really makes a difference the game is effectively over. Either I'm on the exponential growth curve with mostly vanilla armies or there are huge AI armies rampaging through my heartland and I've given up.

Re: The problem of low hit points on humans
 

But a human commander shouldn't be trying to reach that goal. They're an entirely different breed of unit. Asking for them to kill enemies in melee combat while being in minimal danger seems, again, ridiculous. Once, I had a skinshifter commander on the frontlines who racked up a large number of kills unequipped, but as I was playing as Patala it technically cost me 10 nature gems for the Lycanthropos Amulet, and either way it was certainly not safe for him. He even turned the tide (or so it seemed from the video) of a few 20-30 men per side skirmishes.

I'll go back to the Patala vs. Jomon battle from before, in which the enemy definitely fled. I even got the 'The armies of Jomon are routing' message up top, and the battle continued for maybe ten turns after that up until his commanders destroyed me. Of course, I wouldn't be surprised if it was a glitch in that case, but I'm sure I've seen non-mage commanders linger while the entire remaining army flees.

I'll give you that one, as I haven't had any Dom2 experience with that sort of situation.

It allows searching for water sites, which shouldn't be underestimated, as well as limited item forging and easier empowerment, which you can take for what you will.

The ever-so-popular F9/W9 bless only really helps for melee combat. (and reaching ranged combatants, I suppose) They still wither under attack spells, most outstandingly Blade Wind, and projectiles, and other blesses have similar weaknesses. Still, I'll admit it can cut through independents like butter.


It's not that they have such impressive abilities, just look at the many relatively crappy level-one priests that also take up that precious slot. I don't know about you, but I'd usually take a commander over one of them. It's that they're not run-of-the-mill military that stops mass-recruiting.

Whether they have a point in existing or not depends on the commander in question. Some have standards, a couple are stealthy, some are priests, some have limited magic capability, and many have a much higher Leadership score than the generic human Commander.


Perhaps, but it's a cruicial one. Unless you're suggesting they remove the Leadership mechanic from the game altogether, Leadership is at least somewhat valuable.

Your arguments sort of suggested that battlemages were solidly 'better' than commanders. I'm simply saying that's not the case. I apologize if I read between the lines too much.

I'm not familiar with the Black Lord unit, and you could very well be right. Still, there are plenty of other cases where human commanders can be more worthwhile than their independent counterparts.

EDIT:
I didn't plan on them dying. http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/images/smilies/wink.gif
I was actually against another human in that game, and we had agreed for various reasons to call the game once we defeated CPU Abysia (Down to one province and outnumbered), so I decided to go out with a bang.

Indy commanders vs. national commanders vs. mages
 

Hm. It's a valid point that, in terms of pure leadership, plain vanilla independent commanders may be significantly better deals than national ones.

~~~

Some ideas which would shift various balances:

Making most mages absolutely lousy commanders of normal troops -- perhaps only able to have a few bodyguards. Most have studied magic, not men.

For the same reason, giving troops led by mages less free staying-alive experience than troops led by more military-minded commanders. This could be made dependent on the normal leadership value. Better leaders drill more effectively. One might argue for similar effects on siege and patrol efficiency, or even supply usage; a great military leader would do more with the same army and logistical support, where one accustomed to alchemy and moldy tomes might be hamper the army with poor decisions (resulting in waste, confusion, et al).

A morale bonus for national troops (normal or capital site) being commanded by a national commander (normal, pretender, hero, or capital site); a morale penalty for national troops commanded by a non-national commander. This would reflect different confidence, pride, loyalty, et al.

As a side note, this could be further augmented by a bonus for being commanded by a national commander from the same home province.

Re: The problem of low hit points on humans
 

Have to say I agree - Dom3 took a number of steps backwards, gameplay-wise. I (and others) have ranted enough about the age system, but some people like it. But the new shield mechanic is essentially broken (as per the mathematical analysis of shields vice air shield against missiles), the old flawed morale system was replaced with a new morale system that's bug-ridden as well as flawed (1), the removal of themes _diminished_ variety (2), and improvements to balance (such as the CB mods) were ignored, while long standing bugs and issues still haven't been addressed.

Instead, we got a bit more content that in _theory_ increased variety, but effectively reduced it by restricting each nation to a different age. (3)

Some of these things may be fixed in patches (or more likely, things that can be fixed will be fixed in mods), but given past history, the bugs and core issues seem unlikely to be fixed. (4)

1) Admittedly, the old morale system had its bugs too, as _sometimes_ troops kept fighting when all commanders had died and vice versa.

2) For instance, in Dom2, knowing that Marignon or Ermor was in a game didn't help you know _which_ Marignon/Ermor you'd be up against, as each has themes that drastically change the nation. Even without the major themes (Machaka, etc), a player could take Water Cult or some other theme that had an impact on how they'd play. So, instead of letting us finally choose those minor themes in conjunction with major themes (ie, Niefelheim or Carrion Woods with Water Cult, etc), the themes were eradicated.

3) Yes, it's possible to get nations from other eras into the same game, but it requires _map_ commands - hardly something that allows you to sneak in an unlikely variation like Return of the Raptors, since the game-host has to do it for you.

4) Supporting evidence, problems that have been around for _ages_ have never been addressed, such as the bug that sometimes kills immortals dead in friendly dominion, or the lack of _any_ battle summary for castle stormings.

Re: The problem of low hit points on humans
 

Oh. *that* is a point. Perhaps something like +1 morale and attack for units under a commander with 100+ leadership? (80 base + one or two experience stars) would be neat?

Edit, in stead of doublepost:
Oh... that's right. Double gold income isn't *nearly* double amount of mages compared to dom2, at least for the first two dozen turns.

Re: The problem of low hit points on humans
 

* I play Ulm frequently, and if my pretnender lacks Air-1, I typically find someone with Air-1 by the time I need to worry about lots of lightning.

* Heroes are not the only thing gained with Luck. Having heroes is not (or at most, not merely) an investment of 120 points I would otherwise have gained by taking Misfortune-3.

* I don't see how Dominions 3 is a "dumbing down" of Dominions 2, unless you mean the reduced magic skill levels. And yes, I am happy with the somewhat reduced access to overpowered magical effects. The mods I'm working on for my own tastes further "weaken" magic by making it cost appropriate amounts relative to other elements such as mortal armies, etc.

* You seem to be still missing my point. Commanders generally do survive battles when their side wins, as long as they deploy sensibly so that they don't fight alone against a mob of foes.

* If you mod commanders to be as effective as battle mages without changing their costs, then what about the foot soldiers, as especially the common troops, who will now be even less cost-effective? Divide most of those by 5 or so?

PvK

Re: The problem of low hit points on humans
 

Maybe a new Heroes mod wherein a new unit could be created that is a thematically appropriate commander who costs much much more than what a normal commander would? Give him two heroic traits and double his cost, three and triple it.... Something like this Tank who sacrifices leadership ability for personal power, at extremely high expense:

#newmonster 2865
#name "Seasoned Champion"
#descr "Seasoned Champions have learned/developed unusual and exotic tricks/abilities/skills to ensure their battles are triumphant."
#ap 10
#mapmove 2
#hp 30
#prot 5
#size 2
#str 25
#enc 0
#att 10
#def 15
#prec 10
#mr 15
#mor 15
#gcost 300
#rcost 1
#armor "full plate mail"
#armor "full helmet"
#armor "tower shield"
#regeneration 10
#fear 0
#end

Re: The problem of low hit points on humans
 

It doesn't require a map command. It's a very easy mod to make to allow all nations from all eras in the same game. Isn't one posted to the public forums yet?

Re: The problem of low hit points on humans
 

Why not just give him immortality and be done with it? http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/image...s/rolleyes.gif

This thread is really confusing me. Forget notions of "realism" and "thematic correctness" for a second... what are people really asking for in terms of game mechanics? A recruited 30hp commander? Um, ok, a bunch of nations have those already. If that's how you want to play, play them, or make up a new faction.

"Human" is just a label on an arbitrary game piece, there's no reason to get hung up about it.

Re: The problem of low hit points on humans
 

It's a dumbing down because the part of the game that took practice, good decision making, and the ability to apply strategies, which was the magic part of the game was replaced by pushing armies around the map. That's something that the AI can manage to do.

So you are increasing the power of magic and/or reducing the cost of mages? Because that's where the balance currently lies. Magic doesn't become powerful enough to even be worth sending many nations' mages onto the battlefield till about level 5 research arrives, which is long after the balance of power in the game has been decided.

You are still labouring under your previous misunderstanding of the Dominions battle mechanics. Any unit that fights against a full grid square of size 2 units is fighting a 3 to 1 battle, even if it has two other friendly units in the same square. If the commander is to be useful, ie. be able to kill his own gold cost in units and still survive the battle, then he has to be able to survive against three to one odds.

I want commanders to be as effective for their gold cost as mages are for their gold cost, and I'd leave the gold costs for heavy infantry alone, since they are probably about the right cost. Light infantry would have their price quartered to represent their actual battlefield utility.

Re: The problem of low hit points on humans
 

Jotunheim is almost the only nation that has non-mage commanders with 30 hitpoints. The Jotun Herse would also be necessarily boosted in hitpoints and defense so that they would be proportionally as powerful and able to survive against troops as human commanders.

Of course, a better solution would probably be to boost hitpoints universally by about three times, leave weapon damage the same, and make the combats last for 150 turns. The only problem then is that you run into the overly granular fatigue system.

Re: The problem of low hit points on humans
 

Clearly we have very different perceptions of this game series, Graeme.

Regardless of your perception, though, it is clearly a gross exaggeration to say that the magic part of the game was "replaced" by armies. Magic still seems to me far more powerful AND far more cost-effective than mundane armies in Dom 3, though the point were it gains a decisive advantage may be delayed more than in Dom 2. It's always been influenced by the scenario settings (nations, map, settings) but even moreso now that one can easily set the gold/resources/supplies on game creation. So if you like the Dom 2 pacing better, you can of course do things like set faster research, higher magic sites, or even lower the gold/res/supply multipliers.

Personally, I find the non-magical military side of the game to be quite interesting and prefer the magical and fantastic elements to be exceptions that gain their meaning by contrast to the mundane norm, and not by completely dominating it, as I thought was the case in vanilla Dom 2.

"So you are increasing the power of magic and/or reducing the cost of mages?"
- No, I'm increasing the gem costs and path requirements of the strong magical effects so that they require much more investment to amass, and thus become rarer.

As for your argument about how I "misunderstood" combat mechanics is unconvincing. Even with all attacks during a turn concentrating on one fighter at a time, it is still quite helpful to have guards for a commander. Also, as I've been playing with melee commanders and watching their combats for years, and mine generally do survive and achieve good success, while you say yours generally die, I would say that practical experience shows that proper placement/orders/guards definitely make a large difference in their survival rate.

PvK

Re: The problem of low hit points on humans
 

I dunno. One of the major points of mods seems to me to give the ability for individuals to tailor the game to their own desires. E.g. to modify your favorite nation/race to have 15hp--or even 30hp--commanders.

I don't see it making that big of a difference as long as each of the players in that particular game agree to the change/s.

With my previous offering of the "Seasoned Champion" I was just offering a concrete example of such, and proferring the view that for each "heroic" trait (such as hugely increased hp or def) the cost of such a recruitable unit be doubled. E.g. 30gp commander with 20hp would be 60gp; if you add a standard to him it becomes 120gp; if you then give him def 20 he costs 240gp; and then if you add minor regeneration he would cost 480gp. None of this is outside the bounds of the game, and none of it would ruin the game. Mods alter the flavor on an individual basis--which I feel is appropriate here. OTOH, if you were to double or triple the HP of all human commanders (as some have suggested), then you would fundamentally change the game itself.... It might be interesting, but then it would be "Dom IIIb" or "Dom IV: Warlords" or somesuch.

Re: The problem of low hit points on humans
 

That explanation makes it clearer what you were suggesting, Uh-Nu-Buh, and it sounds quite reasonable to me when explained that way.

Re: The problem of low hit points on humans
 

Rather than argue for or against humans with more/less hp, I thought I'd put forth an alternative system for dealing with hp. because I enjoy designing role-playing and game elements better than I do arguing about them (which I end up doing a lot anyway http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/images/smilies/happy.gif ) I'm not sure what the copyright laws have to say about things posted to this forum, but to the extent the forum rules and the law allows, I'd like to retain the rights to the following:

Size: expanded, 1-12
hp: based on levels of size, each unit recieves 1-12 hp per size level. This means that a Hoburg unit (for instance, not taking into account any rebalancing necessary with size increase) can have between 1 and 12 hp. Very weak Hoburg children have 1 hp, while mighty Hoburg warriors with mutant genes and adamantium bones have 12. The same thing applies to size 12 titans, except that with every increase in size level, the unit gains a minimum hp base of their size PLUS the minimum hp they could otherwise have, thus size 12 titans have between 24 and 144 hp, while size 2 humans would have between 4 and 24 hp. and size 1 hoburgs actually have between 2 and 12 hp, despite what I just said in the above example. In addition:
Commanders, not because of their own personal, physical body, whether they're Alexander the Great, Ajax, Hercules, or Napoleon, but because of A: their status on the battlefield, B: the unseen but present national network of support they gain by being commanders-better equipment, better food, better triage, all that stuff, and C: because they are better able to both understand and to determine their place on the battlefield, have double hp. Example: a human commander could have between 6 and 48 hp.
This system allows for a wide range of variation between the very weak and the very strong up to heroic levels, allowing an extremely mighty buff human to go "toe-to-toe" with an extremely weak, scrawny, out of shape, but still size 12 titan, atleast in terms of HP. The greater size variation is there for personal preference, and to add a greater range of sizes for purposes of demonstrating that there's a big difference between what is very small and what is very large aka scale. Also, it helps this system cope, in terms of sheer numbers of hp and gradiants of size, with both a wide range of hps in the game and a wide range of units, and the effect they would have on a battlefield. Lastly, it enables the general advice that most races in the game have members which will vary in size by 1 level. Thus you can have humans from size 1 (Verne Troyer) to size 3 (Andre the Giant) and heroic abilities/disabilities could raise or lower size by a step without being unrealistic.

As far as legality goes, if Illwinter wants to use this system in Dominions, they are more than welcome to, and I'd probably be open to others using it as well. I just would appreciate it not blatantly being stolen, since it is something I came up with a long time ago, for my own gaming purposes, and am rather proud of. If you want to use it, feel free to let me know, (and I really have no problem with anyone using it as long as they don't plan to publish it, or plan to publish it without my name on it, and once again Illwinter/Dominions is free to use it regardless) and we'll talk about it. Thanks!

Edited because the first time through I didn't really understand the rule I was espousing, but now I think I do.

Re: The problem of low hit points on humans
 

HoneyBadger, while your idea is generaly speaking a good one (thuogh very reminicent of D&D rules), I'd have to say that (again, sorry http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/image...ies/tongue.gif) it doesn't really fit into Dominions.
Such a huge variation as you are suggesting would simply make the game much too random, as you can't even estimate what unit you will get when you purchase it.
Furthermore, this will shift the balance of power much in the favour of mages, since a mage's HP isn't very important (sure, its nice to have more HP to survive a battle that has gone bad, but more often than not, your mages are sitting safely at the back of your army).
My idea as to how something similar could be made to fit into Dominions is to:
1) Keep all the stats exactly as they are right now.
2) Make it so each unit/commander recruited will have a random amount of HP between (HP + Size) and (HP - Size), when recruited.

Though either way, I'd rather see Dominions stay as it is right now, because I like knowing exactly the stats of the unit I'm about to get when I'm purchasing it :X

Also, as far as the idea goes thematically, while it seems to make sense to have such a wide range of HP because people can be really puny or really big and strong, practically, you'd expect anyone that has been recruited into the military and is being payed to fight will atleast go through some screening process and training, which should weed out "very weak hoburg children". Atleast in all grades of unit besides militia (which already has -1 hp IIRC) and PD (which traditionally is made up of the local population of fat unemployed people http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/images/smilies/happy.gif)