what the heck is this
 

and why is there no product info on the rest of shrapnel's site? somebody have links with info?

Re: what the heck is this
 

Dominions II is a rather "HC" fnatsy strategy game. You are one of the pretendeing gods, and your goal is to become a real god by destroying your enemies and spreading your Dominion, the embodiment of your divine power. Dominions I has huge batles, incredible amounts of depht, and i believe so will Dominions II have.

You can always try the demo of Domiions I. If you liek the demo, you'll like Dominions, and then you'll propably like Dominions II also.

http://www.illwinter.com/dom2progress.html
Dominions II progress...

See screenshots at Dom II Preview

I believe Shrapnel will give more atleast when the game goes gold.

Re: what the heck is this
 

Thursday err- today, mid morning you will have the product pages, be able to pre-order if you wish, everything but the demo, which is in beta now and will be released as soon as its stable.

Sorry if we confused anyone.

Re: what the heck is this
 

camping on the forum.

Welcome everybody to the sequel to the most enjoyable game ever devised since antiquity ! http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/images/icons/tongue.gif

Re: what the heck is this
 

wow, looks wild. is it mod-able? can we expect fervent shrapnel fans to turn it into a SE4 ground combat game?

this definitly goes on my shopping list.

Re: what the heck is this
 

I must confess that Dominions I was not that must geared toward text files with bunch of parameters to tweak...

Re: what the heck is this
 

I like the screenshots, the map screens are pretty nice. The Last one though, the sprites are kinda, well, pixelated. Its pretty good looking overall, but the troops look to be tiny when zoomed out. Of course, this is a game with what looks to be huge battle involving lots of units, so that might not be a huge issue.

Re: what the heck is this
 

The images look like the Dom I images, but scaled for perspective.

Having over 600 different units in Dom I is great. I would much rather use my imagination with simpler graphics, than have "pretty" sprites but be limited to fewer unit types, as in other games in the genre.

If they eventually add a way to import user-made images at higher resolution, then perhaps the fans could come up with nice graphics without sucking all the developers' time away from doing gameplay-relevant work.

PvK

Re: what the heck is this
 

I wonder how many new units there is in Dominions II...
Or new spells...

Re: what the heck is this
 

Just above 1000 units.

Spells. Hmm. Not sure. 50-100 new ones perhaps.

Re: what the heck is this
 

Above 1000???!!!
http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/images/icons/shock.gif
My god, that is incredible amount of new units!

Well, it's 400+ new and 600 old...

[ September 19, 2003, 06:58: Message edited by: Nerfix ]

Re: what the heck is this
 

There are 19 nations, all of which can be human or computer controlled (BTW, the game is ultra-multiplayer friendly), and each of the nations has special Dominions (themes) that give them varient units, among other things.

I've been playing for weeks, but I haven't even seen all the units, let alone explored them all. The spells and items that you have access to are equally amazing. It is . . . highly pleasing. http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/images/icons/icon10.gif

Re: what the heck is this
 

Actually there are 17 nations, but do not forget the themes.

Themes enables national variations. Most themes only slightly changes the nation, but some themes have fargoing effects on the way a nation works.

Re: what the heck is this
 

Then there are units from independent territories, those that appear from random events, summonings, summonings that summonings can summon etc. http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/images/icons/icon12.gif

Re: what the heck is this
 

I love it when Flagelents appear as part of a random event. http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/images/icons/icon7.gif

"Uh, High Lord? There seems to be a group of masochists outside the castle. They're whipping themselves in between begging to join your armies."

"EXCELLENT, SLAVE. PLACE THEM IN FORE. THEY'LL ENJOY IT MORE THERE."

Re: what the heck is this
 

(preparing the question...) Flagellants were rather fragiles in Doms I, altough their good morale was handy in some situations. With the additional holy effects, perhaps they will be more often used...
(question prepared, launching...)
so, can we get some details about high level blessing effects, like if I take a pretender with astral 7 or fire 7 with Marignon, what would become of my Flagellants?

Re: what the heck is this
 

Your flagellants would have an additional magic resistance (+2) due to your astral skills and increased attack (+3) due to your fire skill.

With astral and fire of 9 you will have flagellants with +3 MR, an automatic twist fate (first hit is a miss) +4 attack and burning weapons (remember that flails have two attacs - each will strike enemies with fire). Devastating I assure you.

A God of the sky (Air 4+) would protect the flagellants from incoming missiles. Very useful when you have no protection to speak of.

[ September 20, 2003, 09:06: Message edited by: Kristoffer O ]

Re: what the heck is this
 

*info snippets taken*
Hum... What would a pretender with 4 Air/4 Blood have?

Re: what the heck is this
 

Increased Strength (+2) and Air shield (20% protection)

Re: what the heck is this
 

Also, I don't know if it was in dominions 1, but magic skills also increase some of the attributes of the wizard. For example, each level in air will increase wizards precision by 1.

Re: what the heck is this
 

This holy bonus is a very cool idea. Generally speaking, alteration of units stats depending of external factors are always a nice twist in games, and are very appreciated from the players (well, the ones I know). In Dominions II there will be national themes, and Holy Bonus. good, very good !!!

I must confess that a big reason why I really like dominions, tons of intricate mechanisms aside, is that the devs have many good ideas. Take for example Age of W... the game is good, true, but speaking of game design on the other hand, it is far less imaginative. Kinda like a vanilla ice cream, compared to dominions which would have exotic flavors http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/images/icons/icon7.gif

Re: what the heck is this
 

forgot to reply to the post. Yes in doms I each magical level gave a bonus of a sort. Nature give +5 supply, air +1 precision, and so on. I think it has been left untouched in doms II ?

About rainbow mages (archmages), how will they get compensated from not giving holy bonuses? I heard they could cost less, but is it sufficient in your experience?

Re: what the heck is this
 

Ummmm...
If i can go with 4 Air/ 4 Blood 2 of the rest R.B Mage in Dominions I, why not in Dominions II?

Re: what the heck is this
 

<font size="2" face="Verdana, Helvetica, sans-serif">Its pretty expensive to have 9 in one, let alone two paths, so if you want good bless effects you need to plow down some points into the pretender. The old bless effect from dom1 would correspond to a pretender with 6 in both blood and fire in dom 2, which is higher magic values than most dom 1 players used to put on their gods, at least judging from usenet Posts. This might make the archmages less useful to the nations that relies on holy troops, such as vanheim, but at least as competitive as before for nations that put less reliance on them, such as some of the Ermorian themses and the standard Ulm theme.

And even if you inted to rely on holy troops you might want to have several different bless effects archmages might still be worth considering. For example a medusa with 9 9 in earth and nature would pay 512 points for the magic while an archmage starting with 1 in one path ccoul have a score of 4 in six different paths for a somehwat cheaper cost.

The respective bless effects could be.
Medusa
Reinv. +4
prot. +4
berserk +3
regen. 10%

Archmage,
reinv. +2
strength +2
attack +2
defense +2
berserk +1
fear -4

Anyway, I am sure there are still uses for the archmage.

Re: what the heck is this
 

really good play balance it seems. The higher you reach in a single field, the higher is the bonus, with some new effects appearing. On the other hand, as you show us, having several paths lead to several and differing advantages. This is where the studying of what you really want to do in your game is very important, before actually playing.

This recall me of old mom (Master of Magic) where you would spend hours (well at least me) thinking hard before playing, to try to arrange combos, like having rapidly the magic which transformed your troops into brutes with the right enchantments cast early.

Re: what the heck is this
 

Nerfix : you have an added incentive in concentrating your magic in a single path in doms II : some effects only appears in the Last magical level of power. So taking 4/4 in air and blood will protect you a bit from missiles and give a bit of bonus in strength, but taking only air 6/7 would protect you better against missiles, and give you an added advantage, unobtainable from any other source.

well this is what I understand...

Re: what the heck is this
 

MoM!!!!! I loved that game!!!!

Man, I wish they'd made a sequel . . .

Oh, wait, they did . . . Dominions II. http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/images/icons/icon10.gif

(OK, not really, but Dom II has captured me just like MoM used to!)

Re: what the heck is this
 

MoM ... an hell of a game! the magical spells combos were so rich ... so abusable ... http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/images/icons/icon7.gif

like the dreaded invisible flying galley, throwing boulders against a defenceless foe http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/images/icons/icon7.gif

or your halflings slingers so boosted that they could rip thru a missile invulnerable unit.

muhahahaa, it was good time. Aaaah yes, now I do quite the same thing with dominions. Behold my flying etheral regenerating elephants http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/images/icons/icon7.gif

[ September 21, 2003, 08:21: Message edited by: Pocus ]

Re: what the heck is this
 

<font size="2" face="Verdana, Helvetica, sans-serif">You want real abuse? Two advantages: Artificer and Runemaster (I think those were their names, anyway), with a heavy investment in Sorcery (for Time Stop). Between the two advantages, artifacts cost 25% of their normal cost to make. The fun part, it doesn't affect the 50% of normal cost recycling. Thus, you could make an artifact, and recycle it for double your investment. Once you've researched TS, and have an effective skill over 200, you could cast TS and use the artifact trick to maintain the TS forever. Moreover, no maintenence is needed while a TS is in place - any excess generated from recycling can be used to summon magical creatures at no penalty. Nobody else can cast, build, or summon (except in combat) so, eventually, you win.

Sure, with the cost of the needed advantages, you are going to be at a bit of a disadvantage until then, and there is a chance you won't end up with TS. Still though, it is a killer combo.

Re: what the heck is this
 

MOM is such a great game. It has a lot of disadvantages but buttom line it feels great to play it. I still do today. I wish one of the projects to create a MOM clone by fans would have succeeded, or that one day a sequel will be made.

Re: what the heck is this
 

wow this combo is EVIL ! I like it!

we liked MoM because of combos and the richness in spells. I think dominions is closer than any other game to MoM because of this same aspect, even if it is province based. On the other hand even if AOWSM is nearing MoM because so much mechanisms are the same (cities dev, hex, etc) I dont feel it is the heir to MoM, because there is too few combos to put forward.