Re: Template for reducing late game MM hell
 

I'm amused that all the suggestions for removing MM in endgame all involve neutering anyone's ability to achieve game-ending dominance in the endgame, thus insuring the game goes on longer and there is more MM required.

Globals and gem-producing items and forging and SCs are all ways that players achieve asymmetric power, and removing them guarantees that games will be bogged down in stalemates and endless diplomacy as people decide who to gang up on.

Re: Template for reducing late game MM hell
 

I believe the frustration is that these tools no longer provide game-ending dominance, and do not provide asymmetric power, because everyone has them (saving the globals, of course; I think the objections there are a little odd, other than the spells that are just broken because they aren't really designed for large games.)

Re: Template for reducing late game MM hell
 

I believe his point is that these are all options for endgame power, and as two players are unlikely to choose the same ratio of investment in each then their power develops asymmetrically.

If you remove some pathways as valid choices, you vastly increase the odds that two players make identical or sufficiently similar investment choices and thus their power does not really diverge in any category.

(Of course, there is the distinction between possession of power and application of power, but such contests can go on a long time if neither side can actually attack the other's real power base.)

Part of the problem is that an existential threat for a large nation is much different than an existential threat for a small nation. To make a nation of 50+ provinces even *blink* you have to take ~5-10 more provinces/trn than they can take from you. (or do an equivalent amount of damage to their production structure - gem gen holders, summoners, etc...).

Re: Template for reducing late game MM hell
 

The biggest asymmetry gem-gens provide is when you've got someone pulling in 60% of their former gem income with 10% of their former provinces when you're slogging through a war with them. It makes finishing people off in the late game incredibly difficult when they can concentrate their income so heavily and just worry about defending a single province with all of their forces, first turn defender advantage, layers of domes and a huge gem income.

Re: Template for reducing late game MM hell
 

Well, domes are actually part of the problem here. At least the ones that actually block spell effects. (Getting to attack the casting mage but always letting the spell through would be fine). More of a problem than gem gens in my opinion, because it makes turtling and defense too easy.

Edit: from a balance perspective, just removing domes with spell blocking effects from the game would have a lesser effect than removing gem gens on game balance, and severely discourage the turtling everyone whines about.

Re: Template for reducing late game MM hell
 

I don't see how it would severely discourage turtling. I doubt it would have much effect on turtling at all, since turtling is primarily a gem gen based strat and gem gens aren't really be hurt by the removal of domes. Scouts carry them after all.

Besides the guy with the clam farm can out remote the guy without one.

Re: Template for reducing late game MM hell
 

No way. Remote spells are already extremely effective, suggesting that the only line of defense against them be removed is foolishness. The damage domes are also useless, it's trivial to slap a couple of resistance items on the casting mage.

Turtling isn't a problem without non-province-based income, whereas gem gens introduce a host of problems into the game.

Re: Template for reducing late game MM hell
 

I'm not sure I understand. You're opposed to defensive play but removing something which makes defensive play powerful is bad?

Re: Template for reducing late game MM hell
 

There is nothing wrong with playing defensively. The problem is that if you have loads of gem gens losing territory means nothing to you. One fort is all you need. Raiding means nothing to you. It is very hard to defeat such an opponent. Eventually, the one with most gem gens wins, because as we all know, gem income is the most important thing. You are forced to forge them if you want to win. Thus they reduce versatility.

Re: Template for reducing late game MM hell
 

Fixed your post. ;)

-Max

Re: Template for reducing late game MM hell
 

gem gens recap:
1. Everybody does them. So nobody gets a serious advantage. I forge lots of them with every nation I play, even ones w/o paths. I just invest some and get/empower mages to needed paths. Everybody does it. The secret is out. All that's left is:
2. Tedious, mind numbing work of forging them and defending their holders.
3. They prolong end game since it's very hard to kill nations by taking their provinces. In-fact province are not that important when you have those 60 clams and 60 blood stones on scouts or what not.
4. They indirectly contribute to making end game turns longer by allowing a much higher gem income - thus more spells, SCs, forging work.
5. Coupled with wish the game just breaks.

Missed anything?

BTW, I have read somewhere that IW originally intended them to be used for battle. If there was a way to enforce that (not allowing their income to leave the holder) then they could be of use.

Re: Template for reducing late game MM hell
 

Well, there's a way to enforce it, but it involves coding unfortunately.

First you have to make all gem-generators cursed.

Then IW would need to add code everywhere it's checking if gems cannot be taken off a commander because he's a merc, and also check that the commander is not wielding any gem generator.

Re: Template for reducing late game MM hell
 

vfb, I really like your suggestion. One can have a dream that perhaps one day in the future IW would give us a shining new patch with that implemented :)

Re: Template for reducing late game MM hell
 

Would it be possible to make an item that created a gem at the start of combat?

(I'm sure such a thing would be abuseable, but it would be much less so).

Re: Template for reducing late game MM hell
 

Via mod commands? No. Kinda sounds like it would be even more of a micro headache when you have a ton of them and start casting indy farsummons on your guys in order to get them.

Re: Template for reducing late game MM hell
 

1. So they are not unbalancing the game. That's a flaw?
2. Yeh, and defending provinces, castles, mages, etc is so tedious.
3. The funny thing about the endgame is that you can take 90% of a person's provinces in a few rounds with thugs and SCs and then you have to actually fight their armies. It's actually good that the win doesn't always go to the sneak attacker.
4. Yes, having a gem income adds a level of complexity to the game. This is the wrong game for you if you don't like complexity.
5. Let's face it, any gem income and Wish causes weird things to happen. I once ended a game just by using my non-Astral, not gem-gen, gem income to Armageddon the place to death to force the end of the game because 15 players were stuck in terminal turtle mode and the game was never going to end.

Gem gens only cause MM when you spend a lot of time turtling and have extra gem income and mage time to spend on them. The fact that you want to hit people early and hard before they can build a hundred gem-gen items actually means that the endgame should be shorter if people are not stuck in terminal turtle mode.

If you spend a lot of time fighting, scripting a single large complicated army can take an hour or more. That and incentives to turtle should be the place where people should be spending their energies if they want to cut down MM.

Re: Template for reducing late game MM hell
 

Seriously?!? :mad: :shock: :doh:

I'm beginning to see why it's so difficult to reach any real consensus on these forums... this game is so varied and complex that different players will enjoy the game for completely dichomotic reasons.

I enjoy the strategic elements of Dominions 3, but I LOVE the scripting and placement... it's only painstaking when I actually care about the results - and caring about the results means it's worth the time invested - so it's not tedious to me.

Re: Template for reducing late game MM hell
 

K, your view is very interesting. I don't think we can reduce this to a factual disagreement since it's very much about taste and preference of players. So clearly there's no black and white here :)

I guess a lot of ppl share my feelings towards gem gens as contributing to significantly raise end game MM. Perhaps in small games they can be ok, but certainly not for moderate to large ones. It’s a very delicate balance but for now I think I’d rather go w/o them.

Re: Template for reducing late game MM hell
 

I think it's pretty obvious wraithlord is concerned about the potentially fatal effects of arguing with K.

May we all learn from his example.

Re: Template for reducing late game MM hell
 

:lol

You got me there Sombre ;)

Re: Template for reducing late game MM hell
 

WL: there actually is a factual disagreement here. K is positing that gem gens make the endgame more fair because you don't just lose to a massive sneak attack - ie, the fact that this income is hard to take away is better for balance. Whereas it's been posited by a number of people that gem gens are unbalanced because its gem income that can't be taken away. That's a major factual disagreement about what constitutes fair and balanced in the game.

Re: Template for reducing late game MM hell
 

You have a valid point, but i have to disagree. I think that no gem gens means
-Less SC / thugs able to beat PD
-More summoned units on field from defender, because no gem investments in gem gens.
-National units are more important than before. Easier to defend with, but difficult to blitz with.

I would say that it's harder to sneak/blitz if no gem gens...

Re: Template for reducing late game MM hell
 

If you're right, then gemgens actually allow nations with weaker national units to compete against nations with stronger armies. Thus, gemgens make this game more balanced. :)

Re: Template for reducing late game MM hell
 

When the end game comes, you need to castle and dome yourself. You need to protect important provinces. If you let your enemy take them so easily, you deserve to lose.

Re: Template for reducing late game MM hell
 

Hey i didn't say that :smirk:
I meant from the point of view of sneaking/blitzing the game would be slower. Of course if no gem gens nations with strong armies/bless strat would be even better than now.

Re: Template for reducing late game MM hell
 

MM != Balance

This thread is about MM reduction in end game.
Any balance discussions are a side track as far is this thread is concerned.

Re: Template for reducing late game MM hell
 

Any changes to reduce MM should attempt not to unbalance the game even more.

Re: Template for reducing late game MM hell
 

Yes, you can protect a few sites. But if all your gem income is tied to sites you can lose an awful lot of it to a blitz attack. And then you've basically lost the game. A reduction of gem income by 50% is game losing at that point, because then your opponent outspends you substantially.

Hiisi:
Some nations have sneakable armies that can take PD without being especially strong. Or have thugs that don't actually need equipment. Or purchaseable SCs. etc... Removing the option for others to summon them just makes the ones who can purchase them better.

Re: Template for reducing late game MM hell
 

Agreed. This is the chief reason why some items were removed from the recommendation list.

Now, does anyone seriously claim that removing gem gens unbalances the game?- Not taking into account gem gen dependent nations.
If so, please elaborate the rational behind this claim.

Re: Template for reducing late game MM hell
 

See K here:
What more elaboration do you need?

Re: Template for reducing late game MM hell
 

IMHO, if anyone loses 90% of provinces to a sneak attack, they likely just had some PD in those provinces and thought "I bought 3-5 pd and now I never have to worry about anything happening to them, ever!".

If that is the case, that guy deserved to lose. That lose was a result of that guy's own stupidity, not because he didn't have any gem gens.

Re: Template for reducing late game MM hell
 

Lets assume that I'm playing Eriu and you're playing someone with notoriously bad PD. (Agartha maybe?) There is no amount of PD that will stop a sidhe lord with a vine shield and a frost brand, a decent bless, and appropriate buffs. (Mistform generally) I can have a lot of Sidhe Lords - more than you have provinces. Those sidhe lords can sneak and cloud trapeze. Its completely reasonable an Eriu attack deprives Agartha of every province that doesn't have a castle or army sitting in it before Agartha even knows there's a war on, plus as many armies as their main armies can destroy. (Eriu can even field armies that sneak, and are glamoured so you'd never know they were at your door regardless).

Even if Eriu can't take your fortresses/armies for a large number of turns, you've lost the game right there because you just lost most of your gem production, and Eriu is hardly the only nation who can do that.

Re: Template for reducing late game MM hell
 

In fairness knowing that Eriu can do that, you'd expect Agartha to have done something about it. If they can't do anything about it, realistically, that's a national balance thing and doesn't really belong in this thread.

Re: Template for reducing late game MM hell
 

@Wraithlord: I don't claim that removing gem gens unbalances the game (except for a few nations that should be compensated somehow). I am all for removing them. I just replied to your post about MM and balance.

@Squirrelloid: No, you won't protect some sites. You will protect most of them. You really need to be popping castles everywhere as lategame approaches as well as patrolling provinces (with your mages and thugs also) and putting domes all over the place. If you protect critical resources, provinces with many neighbors, chokepoints, then you will hamper Eriu's ability to raid you a lot.

Re: Template for reducing late game MM hell
 

Attacking gets you income but leaves your forces spread out and vulnerable. That's the tradeoff. Taking 90% of someone's lands in a turn means a huge investment of either time/money (sneaking) or gems (teleporting/trapezing) for the attacker, and then the defender has full knowledge of what each of those attack forces consists of and can prepare their counter attack accordingly. If they don't have the gems banked to survive for a few turns without their unforted gem income that's a play choice they decided on. A single SC kill by the defender can be worth a full turn's gem income, and the defender can take their pick of targets.

Re: Template for reducing late game MM hell
 

...

A single SC kill is worth your gem income... ok... except your opponent is *getting* your gem income, so attacking you just paid for itself in gems alone. And if you can't take everything back in one turn (unlikely), he'll net profit in the long run even in the corner case where he refuses to engage you while you take your lands back.

How many multiples of your lost gem income in SCs do you have to be able to kill for it to be worth it? What if it's merely thugs with cheap gear?

And of course the entire time you're fighting in your territory, which may have morale bonuses for dominion, but that means its your land getting crapped on. 200% taxes, pillaging, and your economy is in shambles if you ever repel the attack and regain your provinces.

-----------

Psycho: so, you want people to spend their money on castles everywhere and make ending the game even more tedious than it already is? Not to mention funneling cash into making useless fortresses and not into units that could be winning the game for you?

(1) I'm virtually certain this loses to the person who only builds a reasonable number of castles for unit production and in strategic locations, because they have more mages and thus more mage turns (forgings/ritual castings/RPs) with which to work.
(2) Isn't the whole point that endgames which last forever are obnoxious? Needing to siege every single province is just pointlessly turtly.

I have to agree with K on at least one point, its the tendency of people to Turtle which leads to unfun gameplay.

Re: Template for reducing late game MM hell
 

Any investments in gems (spells or lost SC/thugs) of the attacker is immediately paid by the seizure of 90% of an enemies sites. Only in the most extreme cases would it take more than a single turn of income from those sites to pay off that investment.

Also, now the defender is an attacker, so those thugs get to move first in those provinces that they now own and can move to a safe location where the defending nation cannot reach them.

There really is no way around the fact that without gem-gens, the sneak attacker always gets a killing blow against the defender. When the defender retakes some small portion of his lands, the attacker can now focus his forces to wipe them out having fatally crippled the defender's empire.

As an aside, I'm amused that no one thinks turtling is a cause of MM in the late game.

I'm also amused that people think they can remove things from the game and not have a balance discussion.

Re: Template for reducing late game MM hell
 

I don't want people to do anything. I am telling you how to play the endgame if you aspire to win. Empty fortresses are not useful, you are very wrong there.

Re: Template for reducing late game MM hell
 

edit: Sorry, OT
(Of course fun gameplay has nothing to do with MM. Some MM can be fun, it's only the repetitive actions that could be automated that's bad.
Fixing the MM thing doesn't stop with clams, everything where you a forced to do a repetitive action just to stay competitive should be changed imo)

Yes, you are right. However that's not due to the player's character (genuine turtlers won't survive into the late game, with gem gens or without, if only for the reason that the weakest looking nation is often on the receiving end of the dogpile). Let's look at some late game facts:
1) Taking a single province means 1% or 2% of the enemies income go to you
2) except for discount sites, which are not a good strategic option as they can either be hidden (summon something, move it away, don't call your mages D5 (*), don't build special forts...) or defended just by concentrating forces and exploiting turn 1 or turn limit defender advantage.
3) Loosing on of your "big guns" >= loosing 10 raiding parties.

So what do you do?
You don't use nuclear weapons on peasant villages, so even if you are on the offensive you use the cheapest thing that reliably routs the PD and keep your SCs and SC counters in reserve to drop on the enemies counteroffensive.
That's all fine if you are fighting an enemy who moves around his SCs or giant armies without expecting you to pick them off one by one. Or when you have a huge advantage through artifacts, uniques, recruitable SCs, or simply income (Well, I guess clams have been widely used in the 3 years the game is out. Only now everyone knows about them).
But when fighting a player of equal skill and situation this is rather a mess.
So, how to fix lategame?
Add a operational component into the game. Make the map so that strategical goals can be formulated (when I take this mountain range I will deprive the enemy of 90% his earth-gem income and his low prot thugs look rather poor), forcing both the attacker and the defender to bring their real forces into play (i.e. it shouldn't come down to just having to concentrate on a single province, it shouldn't need taking 90% of the enemies territory, more like 10-20%, and it should be worthwhile - i.e. research and magic diversification should be hard enough that noone can just change his strategy spontaneously).

(*) Sorry mate, you know who you are. ;)

Re: Template for reducing late game MM hell
 

Are you by chance referring to VPs?- Raid all you want, if you don't bring your heavy guns out and take those VPs you are toast anyway.

Re: Template for reducing late game MM hell
 

Hmm, no I didn't think of them. Good point, I should play a VP game some day.

Although I guess, they fall into the category of singular provinces that can be forted and defended by concentrating forces, too.
I was more thinking of the player having to defend areas (and spreading out) for a specific gain.

Re: Template for reducing late game MM hell
 

Even without VPs it is always enough to take those 10-20% of provinces, anyway. Once your opponent sees that you can take his lands bit by bit, it becomes evident that you will win eventually and futile to continue the game.

Re: Template for reducing late game MM hell
 

You sum up the advantage of a sneak attack pretty well, but I don't see how that relates to gem items.

If you lose 90% of your territory in a turn and can't reclaim it quickly you're sunk either way...there's still a large gem swing in favor of the attacker and your income will drop below your upkeep. In either situation you've got to rely on what you have on-hand to orchestrate your counterattack, not what your income is providing. Once the attack is sprung the difference between having 20 gem income versus your opponent's 80 without gens and having 70 versus your opponent's 130 with them is of little importance, you're still way behind and unlikely to catch up, even if the proportions are comparatively better. At that point the defender is reduced to protecting the few castles they have left, since an offensive push against a superior opponent that is expecting it is folly. Which leads us back to extreme cases of turtling, which it seems no one likes.

Re: Template for reducing late game MM hell
 

Well, if you can take my provinces bit for bit and I can't do nothing about it, then you already have some advantage that I can't beat, I wasn't talking about that.
However if I can do something and you are just advancing with your real forces (instead of holding them back or making a trick switch whenever you take a province etc.) I can just equip my counters and teleport them on you/let you run into them. Especially as I don't care about particular provinces I can just have 1 less SC as you and 10 cheap raiders to take exactly as many provinces from you as you from me.

Re: Template for reducing late game MM hell
 

I think that the gem gen income is important, which is why people attach so much importance to it.

I mean, you can lose 90% of your provinces and take most or all of them back after a few turns of thug summoning and forging (both of which require some gem income); it's folly to believe that a sneak attacker is a superior opponent and will defeat you just because they attacked you while your attention was directed elsewhere.

Re: Template for reducing late game MM hell
 

Summons and forging don't require gem *income*, they require gems, which can be saved and aren't subject to being attacked by other players. Taking out gen items doesn't prevent you from keeping a strategic reserve on-hand.

Re: Template for reducing late game MM hell
 

But sustaining a meaningful counterattack does require an income. Basically, an income is the difference between a sneak attack always being a fatal blow or being simply very damaging but something you can fight your way out of.

I doubt anyone truly minds if an opponent is running on a reserve while they have an income because its a simple fact that someone on reserves has a limited number of turns before they become powerless. This means the win will always go to the sneak attacker if they show even a little sense to just wear out that reserve.

There is a pretty clear consensus that having gen-gems makes it harder for an aggressor to steamroll a defender. You've been arguing that it doesn't, AND that having a reserve is like having gem-gens and it does. Pick a side of the debate, because you can't have it both ways

Re: Template for reducing late game MM hell
 

Just to get my two cents in, I'm all in favour of (1) sneak attacks, and (2) making it easier for an aggressor to steamroll a defender.

Re: Template for reducing late game MM hell
 

If your counterattack is "meaningful" you'll be reclaiming provinces and hence income quickly. If you can't recover a significant portion of your provinces you're screwed in either case.

And my "side" of the debate is that gens make it harder to root out a defender from his last few forts, since his income isn't eliminated, but doesn't facilitate a meaningful comeback. It's a bit more nuanced than you make it out to be.

Due to a plethora of factors (first turn advantage, shelter in a fort and having concentrated force being the major ones) the defender's force in Dominions is much stronger than an attacker.

This additional effectiveness of the defenders' units due to defensive advantage combined with a disproportional, concentrated income, leads to what is, IMO, an undesirable situation in which it is neither feasible for the defender to mount a successful counterattack due to losing their defensive advantage, or for the attacker to risk a frontal assault on the defender's stronghold, leading to a non-interactive standoff.

If the defender tries to actually DO anything the fact that his income is still a fraction of the attacker's will quickly catch up to him and he'll have to either abandon his gains or have his forces picked apart since he is then forced to spread them out and risk offensive movement.

I suppose if you think that these kinds of standoffs are a plus we'll just have to disagree, as it is ultimately a matter of opinion, but I'm fairly confident in my analysis of the cause-and-effect game, especially after my experience dealing with Calmon's last stand in Artifacts...After trying to attack his last fort a couple of times and losing significant forces each time I finally stopped trying. He eventually thought he had a moment of weakness to exploit and attacked me, but was easily crushed without his defensive advantage, which concluded the matter. My only mistake was trying to finish him off instead of waiting from the beginning, and waiting isn't a very exciting game IMO.

Re: Template for reducing late game MM hell
 

Of course empty forts are useful.

Raiders like Sidhe lords (how did Eriu survive till the late game anyway?), golems etc wont break the walls. And as soon as they move away, province is yours again.

If they dont walk away, you can teleport a golem inside and kill whoever is trying to besiege your castle. Or several golems, and wipe whoever is trying to storm your castle. You will have a decisive advantage of knowing the numbers (and even the names) of the attackers, while he doesnt know what to expect inside.