does anyone else think province defense can be levied to quickly?
 

sorta mest up that you can levi a screen load of troops in one round. and if you dont kill them all with one attack, they all respawn. is there gonna be any fixes to this?

thanks

Re: does anyone else think province defense can be levied to quickly?
 

<font size="2" face="sans-serif, arial, verdana">The troops from province defense tend to be of extremely poor quality, and their only advantage is that they will reappear if the battle is won. It's not really a problem at all, as the only real use for a province defense force is to catch sneaking units, and to prevent your provinces from being taken over by call of the winds type spells.

Re: does anyone else think province defense can be levied to quickly?
 

They are, however, cheap militia. Moreover, you need to spend at least 190 gold to get it up to a decent level (20). The only thing they're good at is catching an odd spy/assassin or killing off a bunch of Atlantian/Caelian raiders. Any decent force will totally smash them (unless you contribute regular troops to province defense, of course).

EDIT: Damn, too late http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/images/icons/icon7.gif

[ March 29, 2004, 02:33: Message edited by: Alexander Seil ]

Re: does anyone else think province defense can be levied to quickly?
 

they might be "cheap" defense, but you can hire alot of it in one turn.

Re: does anyone else think province defense can be levied to quickly?
 

<font size="2" face="sans-serif, arial, verdana">They really aren't cheap at all. Beyond level 10 or so it starts to become extremely expensive for what you get out of it.

Re: does anyone else think province defense can be levied to quickly?
 

<font size="2" face="sans-serif, arial, verdana">WOW how much defense are you putting in that you think this is out of balance? If its an important province I set it to about 11. Mostly its 1-6. Surely if a province of 4000 people has their local defense militia killed off they should be able to round up another 6 guys right away to replace them.

Re: does anyone else think province defense can be levied to quickly?
 

I don't think it's a balance problem, but in some cases it can be a little implausible. If you have a ton of cash reserves, it can make a bunch of troops appear instantly, often with nation-specific equipment/type. And, it can be done even in isolated provinces that don't have a ground route to the main nation. So in some cases, say Ulm summons some black hawks behind enemy lines, and when the enemy comes to reclaim their province, they find a bunch of Ulmish arbalesters and if enough was spent, heavy infantry of Ulm.

The free regeneration seems a little bit artificial/logically-strained compared to the costs of recruiting regular troops of the same type, too. For provinces connected to your homeland, though, it can sort of make sense following the apparent assumption that there are men with national equipment and training floating around but not part of the usable army until paid for. Assuming that, it's sort of like a reserve militia, national guard, or something. Still a little weird that their losses have no effect at all (except maybe the dead body level, and the experience levels of enemies that kill them).

It's not perfect, and a little gamey or illogical in unusual circumstances, but for the most part I think it works out reasonably.

PvK

Re: does anyone else think province defense can be levied to quickly?
 

Okay, interesting point regarding PvK's example with Ulm. In my present game, I have taken a sea province which can now no longer trace a path back to my territory, thanks to the Atlanteans and their strange desire to reacquire conquered territory. I cannot enlist defense in this isolated province, which I assumed was a game mechanic based on said isolation. Is it something else, or does the "behind the lines" effect prevent the sudden application of local militia?

Jonathan

Re: does anyone else think province defense can be levied to quickly?
 

Only Atlantis and R'lyeh (and maybe one more nation) can put province defence under water.

And I don't think it would be good to make it so that you can't put provincial defense in an isolated province. What if you've lost your capital and only have two provinces that aren't touching? Which one is isolated? What if your captial is isolated from the rest of your provinces?

[ March 29, 2004, 05:11: Message edited by: Yossar ]

Re: does anyone else think province defense can be levied to quickly?
 

You could just institute a rule where you can only buff up to the number of turns you've held the province, squared. Seems like a pretty reasonable fix to me, even though i kinda like the tactic of jumping behind enemy lines and bumping up PD even if it is 'gamey'.

Re: does anyone else think province defense can be levied to quickly?
 

<font size="2" face="sans-serif, arial, verdana">I wouldn't like that rule either, but if Illwinter wanted to put it in, they could just say that any province not connected (however distantly) to a castle is isolated.

Re: does anyone else think province defense can be levied to quickly?
 

I tested the limits of provincial defenses in a SP game I had full control of. I'm not sure if scale settings impact this, but in my game I could "only" bring the defense number up to 125, which costed a fortune.

I'm pretty sure 125 was the limit as I had well over 3k in my saving when trying to increase to 126.

Perhaps someone with more knowledge of such things can add to my findings.

Re: does anyone else think province defense can be levied to quickly?
 

<font size="2" face="sans-serif, arial, verdana">Yep, one other nation can obtain PD in water provinces. I'm not sure what _kind_ of PD it gets, because I haven't yet had it attacked to see what troops are there. It'd be kind of amusing if it was a couple of corpses floating in the water on guard duty. http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/images/icons/icon12.gif

For those wondering (since no one answered when I asked in another thread), the land nation is :

.
.
.
.
.

T'ien C'hi gains a certain amount of PD when order
in the province is high enough. I've not seen it go above 2 personally, but I have seen 2 PD show up in the ocean.

Re: does anyone else think province defense can be levied to quickly?
 

good idea Cheezeninja, this should be some sort of option in the game. it really is [deleted] trying to get back a castle you lost, with 50+ defense in it, right after it gets captured.

(note to devs, please fix!)

[ March 30, 2004, 00:30: Message edited by: Zen ]

Re: does anyone else think province defense can be levied to quickly?
 

<font size="2" face="sans-serif, arial, verdana">Uh, for one thing the computer NEVER spends nearly as much money on province defense as that, and for another thing if you're playing multiplayer and someone has the money to drop on THAT much province defense, you've already lost and getting that castle back won't do much for you anyway. 50 PD is 1275 gold. For 50 (in most cases) units, most of them with cruddy equipment and equally cruddy morale. The nations that get more than one unit per point of PD get that many because their PD is even worse than normal.

Re: does anyone else think province defense can be levied to quickly?
 

<font size="2" face="sans-serif, arial, verdana">im not talking about computer players, but human players blocking important choke points. im making the same amount as my buddy also, both using alchemy to get that amount in one round (or around there). so i havent allready lost. and yes, getting that castle back is an important area to own. its the top-middle area on the map "Karan". you can push easily throughout that area of the map if you own a castle there.

Re: does anyone else think province defense can be levied to quickly?
 

<font size="2" face="sans-serif, arial, verdana">Then your buddy is being foolish. For the same 1275 gold, you can recruit a MUCH stronger army that can move (for instance, 10 Knights and ~60 Longbows, which will beat nearly any province defense... would have problems vs 50 Jotuns and possibly vs Ulm's pd, but that's about it). Province defense isn't useful enough to buy 50 points of it vs humans unless you literally have nothing else to spend it on.

Re: does anyone else think province defense can be levied to quickly?
 

Or by not using alchemy and keeping 1275 gold worth of fire gems you could summon 15 summer lions which would most likely rip up that PD as well.

Re: does anyone else think province defense can be levied to quickly?
 

PD essentially represents feudal/provincial levies, hence you can have "national" troops in recently conquered provinces, representing local lords/ex-governors adapting to their new masters.

Re: does anyone else think province defense can be levied to quickly?
 

Ok, so spells like Horde From Hell, Call of the Wild, and Black Hawks (forgot exact name) must simply include extra non-combat logistics summons or post-combat flights, which if their distant attacks are successful, will transfer any amount of gold and/or national equipment (and in some cases, transport or summon national creatures) to equip the new militia appropriately. Or, their is a world-wide courier service for such tasks, if and when the price is right, which is also used by deathmatch attendees, mercenaries, etc.

PvK

Re: does anyone else think province defense can be levied to quickly?
 

the thing is you would have to move that army to the front... with PD you have it exactly where you want it if you have the money to spend(Fever fetisches, blood stones)

Re: does anyone else think province defense can be levied to quickly?
 

<font size="2" face="sans-serif, arial, verdana">so true, why do that when you can levi a pile of PD that you dont have to pay upkeep on, can be levied in one turn, and respawns if not killed in one turn

<font size="2" face="sans-serif, arial, verdana">you can summons all those in one turn? and they are all in the choke point also?

<font size="2" face="sans-serif, arial, verdana">you can recruit that army in one turn in a castle that is pulling resources from one other province? please tell me how

Re: does anyone else think province defense can be levied to quickly?
 

Is there anything saying that you have to do all of it one turn? Patience, people, patience. This isn't the clickfest type game. Sometimes you have to allow losses to happen. Next time he pulls something like that, let him buy 50 PD. Don't bother attacking that province!

He just sunk 1200+ Gold (51*50/2, to be exact... gotta love Gauss) into defending somewhere you won't attack, and you can hit him somewhere else.

Also, what race is he playing?

Wyatt

Re: does anyone else think province defense can be levied to quickly?
 

The existence of this thread really surprised me. I have never considered PD to be all that overpowered.

And as pointed out it's immobile. Not only that but often the leaders are wimpy. Look at the priest that leads low-level ulm PD. Not exactly my leader of choice unless I'm facing undead. And if the leader dies the rest retreat as you know...so with good PD, I still usually put another commander there.

My usual PD is in Gandalf's range, except I pay for 21 defense wherever I have a castle. That's probably overkill, but I really dislike losing castles.

Re: does anyone else think province defense can be levied to quickly?
 

to Wyatt Hebert: he is using Mictlan

<font size="2" face="sans-serif, arial, verdana">i guess we are more proficient dom 2 players. choke points are a major advantage. we push through land like nothing to get to these, and send out searchers behind. we dont seem to do much magic study untill we find a sage magic site, or if we have cheap researchers. after gaining control of major points and feel sucure, we will get other units to capture the land we skipped. no time for making temples, unless they are worth 100gp (man/pang) untill we got the map tied up.

Re: does anyone else think province defense can be levied to quickly?
 

<font size="2" face="sans-serif, arial, verdana">NOW you're just trolling. LMAO, there are people on this board who could school you ten times at this game before you'd even get to log into the server. http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/images/icons/icon10.gif And you're "more proficient" because you see an imbalance where there isn't one?

I'm sorry. You win the flamebait of the day award. Here's a virtual cookie.

Re: does anyone else think province defense can be levied to quickly?
 

to fahdiz: try to control your ignorance please

<font size="2" face="sans-serif, arial, verdana">i never said anything like that

[ March 31, 2004, 01:32: Message edited by: carpet herpes ]

Re: does anyone else think province defense can be levied to quickly?
 

<font size="2" face="sans-serif, arial, verdana">Then he just utterly wasted 1200 gold for 50 slaves, and 50 armorless warriors. You should be able to rout them with minor battlefield spells and about 20 heavy infantry.

<font size="2" face="sans-serif, arial, verdana">I take it you don't play with flying troops much. They can completely bypass choke points.

<font size="2" face="sans-serif, arial, verdana">Sounds like you're asking to have your empire beaten down by someone who concentrates on fast expansion along with a massive research push and maintaining your dominion.

Re: does anyone else think province defense can be levied to quickly?
 

mictian pd is worthless yep

Re: does anyone else think province defense can be levied to quickly?
 

This is a bizarre thread, havent seen its like on this forum before; almost has this odd aggressive feeling I have only seen on WarcraftIII and similar Boards. Why, for example, must Fahiz bridle his "ignorance"? I don't see why you write that, Carpet Herpes. (What an... interesting... moniker.)

I agree with the people who don't feel that PD is overpowered. I basically ignore it when playing with or against Mictlan and Machaka and others with useless PD; PD can be quite effective, however, with some races, such as Jotunheim or Abysia sometimes. I do play Abysia quite a bit, and I usually try to get somewhere around 11-20 if I can afford it (because I usually have an upkeep problem); this lets me supplement defense with just a few units and a caster nicely. Actually, I like PD and often try to boost it up to 20 unless I am playing Mictlan or Machaka; I just feel safer against those Call of the Wilds and whatever sends those harpies, not to mention spies and whatnot.

I don't think there is ever any sense, however, in spending 1200 gold on defense. Even if you got three amazing +500 GP events and there are no mercs available and you have maxed out your resources in every province and cant build any temples, labs, or fortresses -- I'd save that money for when I could do some of those things. But I suppose to each his own. But I certainly wouldnt want Illwinter to "nerf" PD, I think it is fairly decent as it is now.

Re: does anyone else think province defense can be levied to quickly?
 

<font size="2" face="sans-serif, arial, verdana">And my supposed ignorance is manifesting itself...how, exactly? If by "ignorance" you mean "irritation", I must say that your choice of words is rather poor...and it is difficult *not* to be irritated with a forum troll.

<font size="2" face="sans-serif, arial, verdana">No? You believe PD to be imbalanced, in that you feel it can be levied too quickly in choke points. When others disagreed with you on the value of PD, you told them all that you must simply be a "more proficient" Dominions II player. It's all right there in the thread if you'd like to go back and reread what you wrote.

Re: does anyone else think province defense can be levied to quickly?
 

I love using chokepoints but like many things in this game there is a balancing factor which keeps them from being a killer strategy. Dom2 is designed as a PBEM multiplayer game which plays on many operating systems. Thats something to keep in mind when pointing out things that are "broken".

Like MANY things about this game, PD and chokepoints can be very effective against certain nations but as long as other nations have a counter for it then the overall multiplayer balance is achieved. PD and Jotun go hand in hand. One of Jotuns built-in advantages is their ability to make the most effective use of PD of any of the nations in the game (though its also a balance to Jotuns difficulty in massing armys of its own national units). Ulms I believe comes in second. But flying armies, sneaking armies, and armies that can be summoned directly to an enemies province; are all built-in advantages to certain other nations.

In small games or solo games against few AI's there will always seem to be imbalanced features. Some nations are just going to have a tremendously hard time against certain nations and an easier time against others. But if everything was smoothed out vs every 2-nation possibility we would end up with vanilla units that differ only in color. There are already too many games like that.

[ March 31, 2004, 15:44: Message edited by: Gandalf Parker ]

Re: does anyone else think province defense can be levied to quickly?
 

Sounds like somebody needs to experience the utter joy of watching multiple Imprint Souls, Ghost Riders and Army of the Dead attacks per turn. Astral and death magic in particular make choke points far less of an issue, as do flying/'port-capable SCs.

Re: does anyone else think province defense can be levied to quickly?
 

Um, MICTLAN PD?

*lol*

Okkaay...

I may be new to this game, but I can handle 50+ Mictlan PD without a sweat. Geez, 10 HC or 30 HI will walk over that...

I think someone has an overinflated sense of their capability. I know how to use chokepoints, trust me. My point is that you can't sacrifice everything in a strategy (particularly in a game like this) just to occupt certain pieces of ground.

That's sheer idiocy. That allow the _map_ to control where, when, and how the battles take place.

My point was to use the opponent's idiotic focus on a particular province against him. Sure, he has a chokepoint. So what? Take every province around him. He can't do that everywhere. Hell, for the cost of the Last 10 points of PD, he could have put 10 PD in 7 different provs (I think... didn't do the math explicitly).

I think, with all respect, that you should try playing the game against a larger crowd. That will probably teach you much more than you are learning currently.

Wyatt

Re: does anyone else think province defense can be levied to quickly?
 

Wow, Mictlan PD? I think I only ever spend like 5 points for mictlan PD, and that just for some fodder to lose to Call of the Winds so that real troops don't have to die. Mictlan is at the very bottom couple of rungs of the PD ladder, right down there with C'tis and Machaka.

You could rout 50 Mictlan PD with a couple death mages casting Terror in like 3 rounds, if that. You don't even need more than a handful of bodyguards.

Or you could recruit 20 longbowmen. None of Mictlan's PD have any defense at all against arrows.

Or you could summon a few vine ogres. Mictlan PD would have a hell of a time killing 10 vine ogres.


Or......


There's about a million ways of dealing with PD as crappy as Mictlan's. Now, if you were talking about *Jotunheim* or *Ulm* PD, you might have a leg to stand on (though both do have their weaknesses - Jotun PD is succeptable to being swarmed by high defense attackers, and Ulm PD is easily killed with magic). As Gandalf pointed out, however, PD is a particular strength of those nations, to balance out the difficulty of amassing a considerable number of national troops.

Re: does anyone else think province defense can be levied to quickly?
 

I don't mind Mictlan PD. Seems as good or better than that of Man or Machaka. PD is a lot better when combined with other units. Some of those "worthless" mobs of PD get a lot more dangerous when they're in addition to a regular army, or have spells on them that make up for their weaknesses.

PvK