some balance questions
 

- the master alchemist is still at 100 gp whereas the other rainbow mages decreased quite a lot. I find that (despite his transmute gold) he is now very costly compared to others.

- the blood of human theme for Abysia dont do much for Humanbreds. They are still at 15 gp, whereas I read somewhere that they were cheaper. What his the interest of the theme in fact? (aside for a new humanbred with axe)

- the castles are somehow tweaked, but I think there is perhaps not enough emphasis on the importance of admin (and there is too much emphasis on the importance of defence strength in cost evaluation). The preferred castle of doms I, named 'Castle' in doms II, is still a sure bet.

Perhaps just a minor bug, I have my dragon pretender named after my prophet each time he acts in battle, rather strange. (well his name dont change, but in the 4 lines where the xxx cast yyy spell, he is labelled as my prophet).

Also, I miss the auto center feature of doms I, when you right clicked in a province. You can only scroll with arrows keys now?

back to my tests http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/images/icons/icon7.gif

[ October 28, 2003, 14:30: Message edited by: Pocus ]

Re: some balance questions
 

<font size="2" face="sans-serif, arial, verdana">Hmm, 100p is wrong. Apparently he didn't get the cost decrease when the other arch mages did. Thanks.

I thought they costed 12. I must take a check.

It is not defence as much as the physical design of each castle that is weighted. Have you been besieged yet? Citadels and hill fortresses are devastating to grounded troops.

That dragon prophet thing sounds strange.

F1 nation overview can center things. I can't remember if there is a center key available otherwise.

Re: some balance questions
 

I just double-checked and the humanbred troops cost 13 gold apiece. They range from 11-30 resources in cost, depending (of course) on equipment.

I play with dragons a lot (I just like 'em http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/images/icons/icon10.gif ) and I haven't seen the weird name thing, or at least didn't spot it if it happened. Could it be related to a demo-specific issue, such as a pointer being out of place due to a shift in content layout?

There's no centering key (it'd be nice if right-click would center though - hint-hint!) unless you count Home centering you on your home province. You can hit # and then type in a province number to center there immediately, but I've only used that to test it. The way I do it is to either use the Center on Province option from the relevent news-of-the-turn entries (i.e. Messages), or use F1 for the super-handy Nation Overview.

Tip on Nation Overview, BTW. You can hit Tab to toggle commmander display. I often turn them on to check orders, turn them off to check provinces, and so forth. You can also hit Tab on the Army Set-up screen to hide Researching commanders. (It'll tell you in a line on the top of the screen how many hidden researchers you have in that province.)

Re: some balance questions
 

I have few, well, issues too:
Is the physical design that makes Mountain Citadel usefull? It has very poor admin value...

If you make an Anathemant Dragon a prophet, you get description of a Warlock.

Ummmm, what is the point of Blood of Humans theme? You get less design points(you can only take Heat 2), troops that don't radiate heat, awfuly restricted commanders and only 4 gems per turn. It felt like i was hurting myself when i played Blood of Humans...

But i must say that the spell AI performs quite good. I just saw an Anathemant Salamander to cast Phoenix Pyre in order to pump up the Holy Pyres he casted! Earlier today i saw a single Niefel Jarl routing 30 Barbarians just by casting the rigth spells(Quickness-2X Sailors Death-2X Frigthen).

Re: some balance questions
 

Blood of Human : newbie mistake. It seems I reverted to standard Abysia theme somehow (I think this must be the heat+3 that disabled Blood of human automatically, and I didnt notice).

Alchemist : checked again & confirmed.

prophet and pretender name mess : I dont have kept the save. If I encounter it again, I will zip the files, if not, then it must be newbie illusionary bug syndroma http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/images/icons/icon7.gif

no I have no stormed fortress, true. Bad habit of doms I in discarding completely the value of sieges towers (because of storm/arrow fend).

I feel all thrilled & strange to be lost again in the complexity of dominions. How enjoyable it is http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/images/icons/icon12.gif

Centering : the way doms I centered was handy, you would scroll with that easily.

thank for the tip Psi, handy too to filter commanders.

edit : 2 new notes:
1) in windowed mode the keyboard is in qwerty (painful for us french) and no capital letters are available (and you cant type ? for shortcuts). In fullscreen mode, it is in azerty, and all work well. Strange.
2) you can script #commander, dont know if we are supposed to be allowed that. very minor I think.

re-edit : forget about this right click centering. Just saw the thread on moving the map with scroll button.
scroll button dont work for province defence buying btw.

[ October 28, 2003, 15:51: Message edited by: Pocus ]

Re: some balance questions
 

The Blood of Humans is the first step of the downward path of Abysia http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/images/icons/icon7.gif

Fire resistant soldiers for 13 gold is not bad.

4 gems is of little importance.

Good point on the 2 heat points loss.

Most mages only at home, but new cheap mage.


We have tried not to make themes more powerful than the default. It is better to tweak up weak ones later than having a overly strong theme that affects MP balances.

Re: some balance questions
 

@K.O
I kinda figured that out http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/images/icons/tongue.gif
What next, "Age of Pink Skinned People"? http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/images/icons/icon10.gif

Normal Humanbreds cost only 2 Gp's more.
Ok, 13 Gp Fire Resistant troops aren't bad.
Their sacred unit was also quite decent.

They don't need so much money though, so it migth be balanced. Or not.

Uhhhh, sir! http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/images/icons/shock.gif You say there is no real impact on the game when Pythium swims in gems and BoH Abysia is starving from the start?

Yeah, i suppose the Newt is one of the best things you can get with 90 Gp...

[ October 28, 2003, 16:04: Message edited by: Nerfix ]

Re: some balance questions
 

I have not tried it, but maybe "Blood of Hunams" should cost -25 or -50 to compensate for the -1 fire gem, -1 heat scale, and fewer Abyssians. Do any themes cost negative points?

Re: some balance questions
 

None i am aware of.

Re: some balance questions
 

<font size="2" face="sans-serif, arial, verdana">the 40 pts reduction in design is costly, except if Abysia get a (growth) benefit from growth scale with the theme? That would compensate.

Re: some balance questions
 

<font size="2" face="sans-serif, arial, verdana">I also was hoping for more spread on the castles. There is obvious effort there but the choices seem automatic. I really wanted the first two to be cheap and fast.

If its a worry about balance then I can understand it but if its "why would anyone use that" then I think the devs went the wrong direction. The devs dont have to understand what purpose something would serve if you provide enough variety. Provide it anyway please, watch for balance problems, and be pleasantly surprised with what we come up with.
Im beginning to be afraid that some changes might be about writing a proper marketable game instead of a fun this-might-not-work game. IMHO

[ October 28, 2003, 17:02: Message edited by: Gandalf Parker ]

Re: some balance questions
 

<font size="2" face="sans-serif, arial, verdana">Whoa! We have adopted to the market! Just about time http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/images/icons/icon10.gif

They are cheap and fast. 2 turns is fast. Anything faster is devastating to game balance as a very early Version of dominions I showed. The only pro was for the player using these fast castles. There were more cons in that particular case http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/images/icons/icon12.gif

Cheap? in gold or design points. Gold cost is 150 times turns to build.

What kind of spread do you want?

The rest of your post i do not understand http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/images/icons/icon7.gif

Re: some balance questions
 

another balance issue :

the Ctis hierodule has climbed in cost, whereas in my mind he was already too pricey! What do I'm missing in his interest? Now you have - for a nation which is supposed to have powerful priests - a level 2 priest, which is only recruitable in castle, that command no units, and which has the same price than the indep priest!

so please, give him either a commanding ability, or reduce his cost. In doms I it was 30 gp, but even with that the no command made him of few interest. His limitation to castle will make him seldomly recruited also. I would have proposed either a 25 gp price, or a 30 gp with 10 command.
Compare him to Marignon friar (30 gp, sneak, command 25).

Also, the undead hierodule in Tomb of the Deserts cant command undead, dont seem logical (and practical) to me.

Re: some balance questions
 

I think there are a host of balance issues, but if I had to pick just one; why did you guys cut the base damage of Star Fire?

Star fire was a very basic defense versus super combatants. Dom II is very super combatant oriented (more than I think you guys intended). Slashing one of the basic defenses versus this tactic make things much worse.

Re: some balance questions
 

<font size="2" face="sans-serif, arial, verdana">Does she cost more? 25 might be OK.

She also follows the tradition stating that female lizards do not command male lizards, dead or alive http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/images/icons/icon7.gif She can wake them up.

Re: some balance questions
 

<font size="2" face="sans-serif, arial, verdana">Because it was too powerful for such a low level spell. I wasn't aware that it was the supercombatant slayer spell of choice. Why and would you like another like it on higher research?

Hmm, in what ways supercombatant oriented?

Re: some balance questions
 

>I wasn't aware that it was the supercombatant slayer spell of choice.

It was one of them. It was awkward to use, but it was possible to mass enough to drop super combatants sometimes. There is no ward or immunity to Star Fire. Most super combatants are stacked with immunity. Many super combatants have incredible protection values, and Star Fire was armor negating. It gave many nations the ability to deal when they had no other options.

In Dom I if an enemy showed up with a pumped up Ice Devil, you could respond with a stack of witch hunters, lizard shamen, crystal sorceresses, or anything with a shard of astral magic. Massing the needed mages wasn't easy, and star fire tended to be painfully inaccurate, but it was a response that could work. Loading up a bunch of mages in Dom II is harder due to a weaker gold economy. Less mages and weaker star fire is going to make life more difficult for players.


>and would you like another like it on higher research?

Absolutely.


>Hmm, in what ways supercombatant oriented?

I'll get you a detailed list of reasons later, but for now:


*Low value to nation scales inspires pretenders with more magic.
*Gold economy weaker than Dom I. Harder to afford mages, and mages are one of the things that handled super combatants.
*Gold economy weaker than Dom I. Harder to afford troops. Super Combatants trump conventional armies. Less conventional force plus magical pretenders equals players using super combatants.
*Star fire no longer as potenet a defense versus super combatants.
*Many super combatants are high end blood summons. These are now 'demons' and not 'undead'. Nations with death magic can no longer use dust to dust, wither bones, control the dead, or any anti-undead magic to deal with these bad boys. This makes them dramatically more potent.
*Not sure about solar rays (and herald lance) but it may suffer from the same ineffectiveness versus 'demons'. Used to be that a few commanders with herald lances and totem shields could offer an army some defense versus the big undead.
*Elemental summons have been rendered impotent (double fatigue plus gem cost!). A basic defense versus super combatants was swarming them with elementals. Not any more.
*there are a few more reasons but I can't think of them off the top of my head. I'll make a list. http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/images/icons/icon12.gif


Thus defense versus super combatants is at an all time low, while game mechanics inspire players to use magically endowed pretenders.

My fear is that multiplayer is going to turn into "Super Combatant battle arena".

Re: some balance questions
 

<font size="2" face="sans-serif, arial, verdana">Does she cost more? 25 might be OK.

She also follows the tradition stating that female lizards do not command male lizards, dead or alive http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/images/icons/icon7.gif She can wake them up. </font><hr /></blockquote><font size="2" face="sans-serif, arial, verdana">it was at 30 gp in doms I, and raised to 40 gp in doms II (as the indep priest with command ability).

I strongly suggest (it is a minor issue but well) that he should be of interest to a Ctissian player compared to an indep priest. To outweight the fact that he dont command, 25 gp seem good (versus 40). Alternatively, a small command ability (just 10 ) would be of great interest, but it is up to you.

Star fire :

wow, didnt saw that! I concur with Alex, star fire was one of the few spell which worked against tetra immune super combattants with high prot.

You toned down enormously the spell : 4 times more fatigue, nearly two times less damages, precision dropping from 5 to 2. You hate this spell or what? http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/images/icons/tongue.gif

I fear too that doms II will be super combattant arena. That damage dealing shields doest damages after an attack is far from sufficient in equilibrating the whole thing. What are the other compensating new mechanisms in place?

Re: some balance questions
 

Star fires was indeed a cheap early counter.

My standard anti-rush procedure when playing Jotun in Dom I was to recruit 6 cheapo witches in the 8 or so initial turns. If some Combat pretender came banging at my door early on he would be met with a curse & 23xStar fires castings directed by eagle eyes.

I haven't had much time to play the demo yet, but I have been browsing the spells and noted a number of interesting additions. Nature battle magic in particular seems to have been boosted some, and Earth can do some funny stuff with castle walls.

Before we conclude whether supercombatants will be stronger in Dom II some of these new spells need to be tested.

[ October 29, 2003, 16:37: Message edited by: Wendigo ]

Re: some balance questions
 

<font size="2" face="sans-serif, arial, verdana">There is a few flip sides to some of your arguments as well as other ways in which supercombatants have been toned down. Sure supercombatants might have become more powerfull, but at least the case is not as open and shut as you make it out.

1 Resistances are harder to come by. Most items no longer provide 100% resistance. Resistances are important to supercombatants
2 While mages where a good counter against supercombatants, their site searching and forging of magical items where also a vital part in decking out supercombatants. So if mages are harder to come by this will also affect the effectiveness of the supercombtants, not only the effectiveness of counters against them.
3 The high end bloodsummons are more expensive, there are demon combating spells and items.
4 Fire shields and astral shields are slightly toned down.
5 Some units commonly used as supercombatants now has additional suspectibilities. Such as Arch Devils taking extra damage from cold etc.
6 And Lastly if the magically endowed pretender is the supercombatant that is fielded it is not so bad, first of all he is expensive to loose, secondly he is only one, thirdly it is ever so much more appropriate with a pretender supercombatant actually able to cast a few spells compared to the magically impaired pretenders often encountered in dom 1.
There might be more but these are the reasons I can think of at the top of my head.

[ October 29, 2003, 17:34: Message edited by: johan osterman ]

Re: some balance questions
 

>1 Resistances are harder to come by. Most items no longer provide 100% resistance. Resistances are important to supercombatants

Most items?
Rings of frost/fire/tamed lightning seem to offer the same immunity as before.
The elemental armor gets a user all the immunities.

What items are we talking about?


>2 While mages where a good counter against supercombatants, their site searching and forging of magical items where also a vital part in decking out supercombatants. So if mages are harder to come by this will also affect the effectiveness of the supercombtants, not only the effectiveness of counters against them.

A bit harder to make items versus a massive lack of counters... still comes out in favor of the super combatants.

Also plenty of super combatants need few if any items.


>3 The high end bloodsummons are more expensive, there are demon combating spells and items.

While the blood summons are higher cost, you must also account for the fact that the gold economy is much weaker in Dom II. As such everything is more expensive, the blood summons are only keeping pace.

In Dom I blood magic was completely out of hand. In Dom II the non-blood nations can't get into blood easy since they can no longer use SDR's, however the blood nations are just as abusive if not more. I have found blood hunting easier in Dom II than Dom I. I predict it will be a major issue in multiplayer.

I only have the demo so I can't check items well. At level 4 construction there are no anti-demon weapons. The only anti-demon spell I can find is 'banish demon', but that requires blood skill, so not much help there. Might I ask what demon items and spells you are refering to above?


>4 Fire shields and astral shields are slightly toned down.

Slightly being the operative term.


>5 Some units commonly used as supercombatants now has additional suspectibilities. Such as Arch Devils taking extra damage from cold etc.

1- Arch Devils were never popular super combatants.

2- If an AD had a ring of frost...


>6 And Lastly if the magically endowed pretender is the supercombatant that is fielded it is not so bad, first of all he is expensive to loose,

This is the crux of why the situation is bad.
Players will need to use super pretenders to compete. When they encounter each other one will die. It's not just expensive, it's NOT FUN. Players will lose their pretender and quit in frustration. We play for fun. The trend I anticipate is not fun (super combatant battle arena).


>secondly he is only one,

One good super pretender is enough to steam roll independent provinces and powerfull enough to blow away 95% of conventional armies.

One is enough.
One is needed.
In multi-play without your 'one' I predict a swift demise.


>thirdly it is ever so much more appropriate with a pretender supercombatant actually able to cast a few spells compared to the magically impaired pretenders often encountered in dom 1.

It depends how you look at it.

If you think of your pretender as a person that walks around a battlefield and zaps troops, then yes a pretender with magic is a sight to see.
However the "impaired" pretender with little personal magic are 'magical' or 'divine' by virtue of their ability to mold the world by their dominion. That's plenty "godly", in my opinion.

Re: some balance questions
 

I tested a bit Abysia. Wow... blood slaves everywhere! With several Ice Devils (I dont know there exact stats, what I know is that some are less fit for battle than the doms I incarnations) at your disposal, the super combattant problem appears to concentrate mostly on native blood nations which will abuse the system.

Sure you can counter bet and steal an Ice Devil (or perhaps he is dispelled, I will have to wait for the retail to know that), but who will emerge as winner? Abysia, Jotunheim, Pan, Vanheim. The others will just have to pray that their toned down star fires, or some herald spears will be sufficient to kill them.

The only safeguard to these nations will be to have their pretender as a super combattant.

The toning down of star fires is very detrimental here. Was SF considered overbalanced? I seldomely saw it used in battles where no super combattant was present. I would like to know which spells are new that function somehow as star fire. Those which are elementals, are not armor negating, or ask for a MR check, have few chances of finding a use against a SC.

Anyway, star fire is only part of the issue.

Re: some balance questions
 

>I tested a bit Abysia. Wow... blood slaves everywhere!

The new mini-warlock is amazing. http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/images/icons/icon12.gif

>With several Ice Devils (I dont know there exact stats, what I know is that some are less fit for battle than the doms I incarnations)

You can't have Ice Devils if you are using the demo. Perhaps you were using frost fiends? The ID are research level 5.

Re: some balance questions
 

<font size="2" face="sans-serif, arial, verdana">I'll want to see more of the game before responding to the full post, but I would like to address this point: although lesser elementals are no longer as abusable as they were in Dom I, I think they are far from ineffective. Super combatants are expensive (aside from gods, the *cheap* ones start at 50+ slaves before equipment - and remember, part of your gem income doesn't depend on hiring mages, while *all* of your slave income does unless you are Mictlan; the effect is even bigger for rainbow mages, which aren't hurt at all by the increased difficulty of hiring more mages fast). I don't think many opponents will have much trouble coming up with 20 or so gems to swarm them with elementals (which should be plenty if your nation has any level 2+ elemental mages). That's not even counting the new high level "elemental swarm" spells.

Elementals are now a situational tool, not a "win every battle without casualties" tool. But I expect them to still be effective.

Re: some balance questions
 

I like that Star Fires has been toned down, as IMHO it's power was way out of line with it's level of research, skill requirement, power, low fatigue cost, no resitance, no MR save, everything. Astral shouldn't have the best evocations IMHO.

Still, I do fear that Super Combatants are a bit more powerfull. It seems to me there are several problems behind this:

1st, the blood summoning engine is still out of whack, with a ridiculous income possible out of a single province. It's output should scale with the sight frequency, should give fewer slaves on average, and there should be a hard ceilling.

One idea is to have blood slave stem from hidden sites representing "blood lines" that you have to find, with one blood mage able to enter each site each month to get it's payoff. Another is to just let one mage blood hunt in each province.


2nd, The combination of good defense, protection, luck, etherealness, Life Stealing and Regeneration. None of these things by themselves are really a problem, but their synergy is great.

Protection has enough counters I think it's fine as is, although I would like to see the accuracy and damage of missiles increased (along with cheaper light troops, and one unit per space).

Defenses in the 30-40 range are easy to come by. This could be offset by lower defense by 2 per attack instead of one, especially if the highest skill attacker were saved for Last. In particular this would help deal with Tramplers.

Luck. It's good that giving luck to others is now higher research, but perhaps it just shouldn't be possible? Barring that, make it take Astral 3+ to cast.

Etherealness. Perhaps there could be some low to mid level spells that give a group of soldiers magic weapons with minor effects?

Life Draining. Make life drain increase strength and fatigue, rather than health and fatigue. Very much in line with Elric, etc.

Regeneration. Seems fine to me, especially since without it the incidence of fluke afflictions is way to high.

My aim here is to keep Super combatants viable, but to make it much more risky to field them alone. Then, one defense against them would always be to strip them of their bodyguards.


3rd, one of the primary threats of a Super Combatant Pretender is an early rush, where the Pretender sits on your only castle. If you allowed games with more extensive starting positions there would be both more defense against this, and less damage done.


4th... Well, that's probably way more than enough . ;-)

Re: some balance questions
 

<font size="2" face="sans-serif, arial, verdana">The only items giving 100% resistance where originally intended o be the rings, for some reason I do not recall the elemental armor also kept its 100% resistance. Fire brand and the dragon armors and the burning pearl are items that now give 50% resistance, there are more but these are the one I can think of at the top of my head.

The tuning of the fireshield does have a notiecable effect, the lucky grunts landing an occasional blow without being fried by the fireshield occasionally get a high open ended damage roll.

Well Ice devils are susceptible to fire. I do not recall how susceptibility interacts with resistance but it well might be that the sysceptibility reduces the resistance, Ill check it out.

The problem with pretenders and magic in dom 1 wasn't that they occasionally were magically deficient, the problem was that to play competitively you were discouraged to invest magic in your pretender, this was never an intention. It is one thing for a Manticore or Wyrm to rampage around with no magic, it is another for a Great mother to be out magicked by a common druid.

Re: some balance questions
 

<font size="2" face="sans-serif, arial, verdana">no I was speaking of ID, I cant recruit them in the demo (this is why I was saying I didnt knew their exact stats), but I know something like 6 are available, with a tempering mechanism that they function like global enchants (dismissable).

What I see, is that with hundred of blood slaves in stock, Abysia, and to a lesser extent other blood nations, will have no problems fielding several super combattants. The problem of SC domination is then perhaps worse in doms II compared to doms I because only an handful of nations will be able to field them, and the non blood nations will be forced to field their pretender as SC too , so to counter act a bit the 'problem'.

we will see with retail, but it does no harm to discuss the supposed problem before...

edit : Alex you can see their stats. I have not done that, because I dont want to spoil the fun of discovery for me, but the #commander command is not interdicted in the demo. http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/images/icons/tongue.gif

[ October 30, 2003, 07:10: Message edited by: Pocus ]

Re: some balance questions
 

<font size="2" face="sans-serif, arial, verdana">One blood hunting mage per province sounds like a good solution, IMO.

<font size="2" face="sans-serif, arial, verdana">Starting positions are defined in the map file. Or rather, the provinces where you can't start is defined there. This should allow mappers to make sure that no side start too close to another one (assuming that this was what you meant?).

Re: some balance questions
 

<font size="2" face="sans-serif, arial, verdana">Hmmm... I don't like that too much... it sounds artificial. I'm thinking that each turn, each province gets a hard cap on blood slaves, of ((2d6*)+(population)/2000). And each blood slave taken reduces the population by 1, or 5, or 1d6 (not 1d6*). You can search with as many commanders as you want, but there will only be so many slaves to find per turn per province... so you would avoid using too many commanders in a given province.

-Cherry

Re: some balance questions
 

the Pythium battle deacon rose in price, from 80 to 90 gp. I wonder what motivated the change?

Can someone tell me how he is supposed to be used by the way? A prot 12 priest is fine, but I prefer a theurg mage/priest for the same price, any time.

I would have though, on the contrary, that he would be tweaked down to the 50-60 range (compare it to an indep priest, not armored, but costing 40).

Re: some balance questions
 

<font size="2" face="sans-serif, arial, verdana">Equip them with a cheap magic weapon (Enchanted Sword, Sword of Sharpness, whatever), bless and go kill things. The new bless effects can be better for this if your god has enough magic, so he's more expensive.

I agree that he suffers by comparison to the theurg acolyte, though. Theurg acolytes are one of the most cost-effective researchers in the game (sacred halves their upkeep), especially in a magic scale.

Pythium doesn't really have that much need for priests on the battlefield anyway - they have standards. (Except vs. undead/demons, or when using sacred troops.) Frankly my only concern about seeing something of Pythium get weaker/more expensive is "will it be enough to knock them down to a level with the other nations".

Indeed, some priests seem overpriced now (others have mentioned the hierodule got a price hike - why? Cheapness was her only asset. Now she's only useful in Miasma, or at the very beginning of the game when you don't have any other temples.)

Re: some balance questions
 

<font size="2" face="sans-serif, arial, verdana">Hmmm... I don't like that too much... it sounds artificial. I'm thinking that each turn, each province gets a hard cap on blood slaves, of ((2d6*)+(population)/2000). And each blood slave taken reduces the population by 1, or 5, or 1d6 (not 1d6*). You can search with as many commanders as you want, but there will only be so many slaves to find per turn per province... so you would avoid using too many commanders in a given province.

-Cherry </font><hr /></blockquote><font size="2" face="sans-serif, arial, verdana">Provinces already do have a cap on how many slaves can be taken, based on their population and current unrest level.

That second part can be the more important part. Blood hunting causes unrest in itself, and the more people doing it, the more unrest. That makes the hunt progressively harder and, eventually, fruitless until you bring the unrest down.

You can't rely on patrolling to curb unless you want to kill off your tax base and, in this case, your supply of new slaves. You just have to (temporarily) cut your taxes and wait for the masses to calm down again. If you "over-hunt" a province, it can totally destroy its value for a good while.

You can only squeeze so much blood out of the turnips . . . http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/images/icons/icon12.gif

Re: some balance questions
 

<font size="2" face="sans-serif, arial, verdana">He has only 11 HP and prot 12. I'm unsure I would put a magical item on him.

I overlooked something though : the indep priest is now down to command 10, whereas the deacon remained at 25. Can explain why someone rose his price from 80 to 90. But I think he was overpriced in dom I, so letting him remain at 80 was just putting him again in balance.

Psitticine :
Will the province limit on blood harvest be published in the manual

Re: some balance questions
 

<font size="2" face="sans-serif, arial, verdana">Hmmm... I don't like that too much... it sounds artificial. I'm thinking that each turn, each province gets a hard cap on blood slaves, of ((2d6*)+(population)/2000). And each blood slave taken reduces the population by 1, or 5, or 1d6 (not 1d6*). You can search with as many commanders as you want, but there will only be so many slaves to find per turn per province... so you would avoid using too many commanders in a given province.

-Cherry </font><hr /></blockquote><font size="2" face="sans-serif, arial, verdana">Provinces already do have a cap on how many slaves can be taken, based on their population and current unrest level.

That second part can be the more important part. Blood hunting causes unrest in itself, and the more people doing it, the more unrest. That makes the hunt progressively harder and, eventually, fruitless until you bring the unrest down.

You can't rely on patrolling to curb unless you want to kill off your tax base and, in this case, your supply of new slaves. You just have to (temporarily) cut your taxes and wait for the masses to calm down again. If you "over-hunt" a province, it can totally destroy its value for a good while.

You can only squeeze so much blood out of the turnips . . . http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/images/icons/icon12.gif </font><hr /></blockquote><font size="2" face="sans-serif, arial, verdana">Blood Hunting also reduces population somewhat.

Re: some balance questions
 

<font size="2" face="sans-serif, arial, verdana">He has only 11 HP and prot 12. I'm unsure I would put a magical item on him.

</font><hr /></blockquote><font size="2" face="sans-serif, arial, verdana">Well, it depends on your bless effects (and on the item - most weapon items have better DEF than built in weapons, in particular since he doesn't have a shield (IIRC) you can give him a 2 handed weapon like thorn staff, which has +5 DEF.)

He's obviously overpriced if you're just using him to build temples and preach; even for the occasional bless and banish he seems expensive. If he has any use, it has to be his ability to fight somewhat.

I guess if you have a really killer blessing (like fire 9) you don't need a magic weapon, even against ethereals.
<font size="2" face="sans-serif, arial, verdana">The independent priest also got a cost hike to 50. Hierodules are thus still cheaper than indep priests (albeit with no command - but then, if you wanted a priest that could command you'd probably take a High Priest or Liz King anyway, because they can cast the morale boosting spells).

I don't know why cheap priests aren't as cheap as in Dom I. But at least it's across the board.