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Re: New Dom3 races! Post suggestions here!

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deccan said:

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Kel said:

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PashaDawg said:
Or some sort of race that normally inhabits another plane of existence/dimension but has managed to manifest themselves on �this� plane/dimension. I'm thinking of something supernatural, but not undead.

You mean...like R'lyeh ? http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/images/smilies/happy.gif
- Kel

Perhaps he means something more like Ether Lords / Warriors instead of weird indescribable monsters, drawing on D&D planescape.

R'leyh seems like aliens or Call of Cuthulhu (sp?) /Lovecraft. "Ether Lords" is on point, because I was getting some "inspiration" from the "pale" race in the game "Etherlords." They are an odd sort of mix of an Indian/Persian/Native American race of beings that are commonly only a shadow on this plane of existence, unless they use magic to materialize themselves on this plane, and they can be sent back to their own plane (but not die) unless magic is used to trap them here and then kill them... well, I am making this up... In fact, there could be two races: a guardian type race and an evil malevolent race... maybe that's too much...

\"Return of the Ether Lords\"

Hmm. I like a "Return of the Ether Lords" theme as an idea. Start with human followers (astral/death mages, recruitable everywhere, best mage SSD? capital only), default priests, weak light/medium infantry with independent strength archers (shortbows).

To use a mechanism already in place, give them a summoning site (akin to R'lyehs) in their capital which allows an astral mage to summon in reinforcements. The stronger the mage in astral, the stronger the Ether reinforcement.

A mage of astral skill S and death skill D will receive one pack at random from the categories allowed by his skills from the following list per turn.
<font class="small">Code:</font><hr /><pre>
ReqS ReqD
1 0 1d6+S Troopers
2 1 1d6+S Warriors
3 1 1 Champion[leader SSD?]
4 1 1d6+S Troopers + 1 Champion
5 1 1d6+S Warriors + 1 Champion
6 2 1 Lord[leader SSSDD?] - make lords produce 1 astral gem and 1 death gem/turn
7 2 1d6+S Troopers + 1 Lord
8 2 1d6+S Warriors + 1 Lord
9 3 1 Prince[leader SSSSDD??] - make princes produce 3 astral gems and 2 death gems/turn
</pre><hr />
Chance of insanity depending on astral strength. (Ether beings being nearly immune)

Then give them two special spells, "Summon Ether Troopers" (SSD, 10 Astral Gems for 5 Ether Troopers) and "Summon Ether Warrior" (SSSD, 3 Astral, 1 Ether Warrior"). Alternatively, give the leaders "Summon Allies" ability. (Champion->1xTrooper, Lord->1xWarrior, Prince->2xWarrior), though that would perhaps be too powerful given the substantial odds of getting an extra leader per turn for somebody who made an Astral 9 pretender.

Together with Ether Gate, that should allow the player to summon ever larger Ether Armies.... Either slowly through the gate back in the capital (a steady trickle of good to excellent forces) or through summoning at the cost of a lot of astral gems.

One completely sick idea would be to give them a base income of 10 astral gems/turn and the handicap of automatically changing all gems to astral gems (1 astral for each 2) corresponding to automatic use of alchemisation after site-income has been added to the pool each resolution phase. They do drain the world of other magic than themselves, right? If you want to use other types of gems, you'll just have to alchemise back and use them during the same turn (or store them on scouts...) http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/images/smilies/happy.gif

A letter to the Dominions I and II fans

One of the reasons why Dominions II rules, I believe, is the CREATIVITY put into it by the makers. Sure, they didn't come up with Jotunheimen or Atlantis or Dragons. BUT they implemented new cultures that were not old cliches such as the "classic" "Man-Dwarf-Elf-Orc" universe.

Dominions II is a great game because the developers dared implement "new" cultures instead of cowardly resorting to cliches like Tolkien because such things guarantee sales.

"Abysians? Spider-mounted.. Africans? R'Lyeh? Acrose-who? Never heard of 'em, fans won't like 'em, hand me the Elves."

Implementing new cultures also allows for much more creative game play. Instead of being stuck with "Orcish", Elven, Dwarven, and Tolkien-Human behaviour, diplomacy, culture, and history, for example, you can bring in a whole new cultures and actually be creative, thus creating a new gaming experience.

Illwinter Productions actually took their time to work on new elements for their game. Granted there's a lot of old stuff, like the fire ball and the dragon. But the huge amount of new things overrides that.

I'm a fan of D&D, Warhammer, Lord of the Rings, and all those games as much as you are. But Dominions II isn't the place for those universes. So for the fans of the good ol' cliche universe: I urge you to reconsider. Just that the Skaven were in a best-selling games doesn't qualify them for Dominions II. In my eye, it goes a long way towards disqualifying them, however.