Re: what about the future?
 

So, where are we with the Dominions franchise? Johan and Kristoffer still care about it or not?

Reason I ask is that while the game has potential it's still unnecessarily tedious and tiring to play. But why bother making UI suggestions when there there is no further development planned.

Consolidating the lab activities would help a lot. Years ago I suggested that there be a status for commanders for needing new orders, never done.

The most dangerous things my army faces in battle are still my own archers and mages. My battalions still line up horizontally twelve deep on trivial targets instead of attacking the obvious threat just in front. And they all still blithely walk into obvious hazards. There's no point in in vesting in a single shot sure kill weapon when it's used on orcs.

The change in the magic system from Dom1 to Dom2 and retained in Dom3, that is the consolidation of the spell casting types into a global point system really killed the idea of specialized mages. You just throw point at it till you know everything.

I have what I think are thoughtful suggestions on the UI and magic issues but, again, is there anyone there to listen?

Other things I'd like are more fully realized, and growing, independent provinces, a better divine political system than just 'there will be only one', and more ways to develop your kingdom beyond just filling the map with your standard and candles.

Always potentially, a great game. But it's never going to be more than a nitch product until the UI is more responsive to the needs of the player.

Re: what about the future?
 

Yes, they still care. In the sense that they are still patching the game to fix bugs and add new content. They also sometimes make minor improvements to mechanics, like adding new mod commands.

In this case you are right, there is no use demanding big changes like a revamped UI. The game was essentially finished years ago, and the developers are working at a new game of a different type. (as the rumors go) We will unfortunately have to live with most of the major design flaws.

Pressing the N key cycles between idle commanders.

There are other shortcuts and mechanics that help too. Like monthly cast etc. Learning the shortcuts, using F1 for overview and so on makes a big difference.

With all due respect. The placement and scripting system is certainly a bit unintuitive, but you CAN do quite a lot with it. It is certainly not impossible to avoid the problems you mention.

I don't quite follow here. I find the mages extremely specialized, to the point where most mages are suited for widely different tactics. Some strategies are only possible with a special type of mage. In fact, the highly complex and specialized magic system is what makes the great for me.

I'd like those things too, but I wouldn't have high expectations for anything to change in this game. I'm just happy to fit into the niche that loves it.

Re: what about the future?
 

I agree with Fantomen that large scale changes in the game are extremely unlikely (I actually can't recall any UI changes since D3 was released). But that doesn't mean feedback isn't good. It may not have any impact on D3 but perhaps it can be incorporated into IW's new project and, who knows, maybe one day there will even be a D4 (I think this thread is a good example such feedback helping other projects).

As far as the devs taking notice, they aren't as active in the forum as they once were but even if they don't see your post I think good ideas might be pointed out to them by some members of the forum that have contact with them.

So, I think you should make your suggestions!

Having never played D1 I'm curious what you mean here. How did the magic system used to work?

Re: what about the future?
 

I played D1 quite a lot and not sure I dig what you mean buy that comment.

Bless was different, there were no themes nor eras, maps dynamically changed according to dom effects and the GUI was much more limited. Magic system was more or less the same minus new spells if memory serves.

Re: what about the future?
 

Gandalf is very good at this, and does deserve a lot of credit for it. It's a lot easier to tear a conversation apart than it is to keep it together, nor is it always very satisfying to maintain
a politic disposition towards someone, or several someones, that don't give you a great many reasons to want to get along with them.

I imagine that it's resulted in more than one emotional sacrifice for him. I can't recall ever witnessing the guy get really angry. As someone with anger issues, I can only suppose he hides it well.

What does that sacrifice get him? Well, on the positive side, the Forum is a more pleasant place than it might otherwise be, especially for new people. Gandalf can also definitely say that he's personally responsible for atleast some of Illwinter's good reputation. And he's got my respect.

I'm not sure it's a trade I'd make, and continue to make on a pretty much daily basis.

Re: what about the future?
 

I think the problem is that when you become the voice box of "the man" everyone knows that you're just saying what is expected of you. I don't recall anyone having warm feelings for Metatron either, you know?

You also have this consistent habit of playing devil's advocate for inscrutable reasons. I don't think you've ever just agreed with anyone about anything. Kind of makes it hard to be amiable when you always take the opposite point of view just because.

I intend no offense, I just think that Gandalf's online personality is not a great match with your average opinionated passionate forum visitor. Possibly others feel the same, although I don't want to speak for them.

Re: what about the future?
 

I agree, it's hard to talk much about Gandalf and be polite.

Re: what about the future?
 

LLOL
Literally Laughed Out Loud

Re: what about the future?
 

No, it cycles between commanders defending. If there are 40 defending commanders and another 40 doing something else but only 10 you want to give new orders you still have to find and look at all 80 of them unless you can keep track of them in your head from turn to turn or start up the next day. There is no dedicated status to indicate which ones YOU want to give orders to next. This is a non issue, for decades of development, in all other games, I can't even begin to understand why it's a problem here.

In Dom1 the Mages had to be individually targeted on each spell casting method. But instead of evolving to where the mages had to learn the methods individually (like the gem stuff) the method mutated into a general pool of point buckets when everyone instantly learned everything. Have your mage farm fill the buckets to level 9 and you get to do everything.

Yes there are existing some specialized mages and early in the game they make a difference but the most common thing to do is make rainbow mages.

There is no advantage to specialize. There are no real difficult choices when you can just research a method and all you mages can use it instantly.

The opportunity was to make the mages learn the methods individually even as you acquire the technology. The second thing to have done was to give mages who specialize in, method and gem, special related abilities and titles, which go away if they stray from the path. Getting a new, meaningful, title for your commander would be interesting.

Going further you could have specialized labs for, say, researching 'Alteration' or making potions or items.

Doing this give the player exclusive choices, which makes the choices both difficult and meaningful. It makes the 'rainbow' mage far less powerful and more difficult to come by.

Yes there is complexity, but it lacks an 'economy', rules that force choices. I want mages that learn and act like mages not magic mushrooms.

I know all those. It doesn't substitute for poor design. Keeping all relevant information and actions together is what the design philosophy should be. But even in something as simple as casting a spell the amount of gems scrolls up out of sight as you scroll down the spell list.

Often, when doing something magical, you need to do some alchemy but then you have to back out of the lab and re-enter it to do that. Or put some rock in some mage's pocket to help with the lab activity.

The Gem information, Alchemy, Spell Casting, Item Production and list of available mages should all be right there. Available mages includes ALL mages with Lab access, not just the ones in the province.

Then you can do everything you need to do very quickly without jumping in and out of screens each and very time for each and every step of each and every activity.

For that matter, there's no reason why something the Alchemy Stone has to leave to lab to function as all alchemy occurs within the player turn.

I understand placement and scripting well. What happens is that if an orc runs up to my commanders on the right side of the field my mage on the left side of the field drops a nuke on them to kill the orc. And usually misses the orc while he blows up everyone else. Instead of aiming at the mass of archers far in the rear of the front line he drops bombs on the guys in melee. Which would be not horrible if he would center of the rear so undershoots don't wipe out the line. And there is no script that tells troops not to stack up.

There's a Paradox game, Chariots of War, which also does program resolved battles that you set up. Their algorithms don't exhibit this behavior, it it is possible to do.

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There have been some minor tweaks to the GUI from D2 to D3, including making the background dark so un-highlighted units fade into it but it hasn't really changed in a way that makes communicating with the program less difficult. It was behind the times when it was originally written and it's ten years older.

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Misc.
Have the ability to tell commanders how many gems they should be carrying and let them pick up or drop gems based upon that.

This is the idea of 'automating' micromanagement. Same with the build queues, state how many of what should be in production and for how long.

Allow complex plotting of movement, beyond one turn. As a good example HoI2 AoD, or Trade Empires. Those are RTS but it should be simple to do in a TBS.
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I love the complexity but there has to be a way to manage it without burn out. And complexity alone doesn't give you the kind of meaningful choices that are needed.

The game isn't nitch because it is complex, it is nitch because the interface discourages participation by all but the most dedicated and pain tolerant.

Solving these problems instead of excusing them will make the difference between the effort being a hobby and something that can earn money for the authors.

Re: what about the future?
 

Sorry, I'm missing something here. You have 80 commanders. 40 are idle (because defend=idle - defend is the default behaviour for commanders with no orders) and 40 are following orders already. Do you want to assign new orders to 10 of the 80, or just 10 of the 40 who are otherwise unassigned?

Either way, this 'I want to give this commander orders' status is a little confusing to me. Is it something you set manually?