Can I get some cheese with that...
 

Well, the current whine du jour seems to have moved off somewhat from VQs and clam hoarding to "castle spamming."

Whether or not any of these activities may be broken, why does it seem that the first reaction of people unhappy with these is to propose nerfs, rather than strategies to deal with the tactics in question?

Or has everyone proposing nerfs done extensive testing of the various strategies and proven that they can't be beaten?

Or are some players just wishing that the game was designed differently--to suit the fact that they don't like playing against a given strategy?

Re: Can I get some cheese with that...
 

<font size="2" face="sans-serif, arial, verdana">I agree (tho I would not have said it using words like cheese and whine).

It seems like some people dont yet understand Dom2 balance. When they say "it works everytime" what they mean is that it works everytime against Ulm (or whatever their favorite nation is). They dont understand that this game doesnt balance every nation against every nation. Yes some things are going to have a 90% effectiveness against Ulm, and crumble horribly against someone who knows how to play Pangara (or the other way around)

[ May 26, 2004, 18:59: Message edited by: Gandalf Parker ]

Re: Can I get some cheese with that...
 

Being one of the non-VQ-whiners, but clam, blood and castle-whiner, I beg to differ.

I'm not whining because a strategy is unfair, unbeatable or similar. I'm whining because I HATE micromanagement, and all those strategies requires a lot of it.

To paraphrase. I wouldn't mind clams if the damn pearls showed up in the lab, or the blood slaves did, or if castle spamming did not remove or reduce my ability to create a few production centers to manage instead of every single province.

Is this quite clear? Please don't impose motives to other people http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/images/icons/icon9.gif

Thank you.

Re: Can I get some cheese with that...
 

<font size="2" face="sans-serif, arial, verdana">I am always amazed at how many people don't know about the gem pooling buttons that are available in the gem income summary screen. These allow you to pool all of your pearls and blood slaves(in labbed provinces) with a single mouse click.

Re: Can I get some cheese with that...
 

I've never really seen anyone successfully execute those strategies besides Norfleet so I don't know if they really are broken or if he's just good. I do know, though, that in the late game, anyone who doesn't have any clams or a castle in every province will be at a significant disadvantage to someone who does.

<font size="2" face="sans-serif, arial, verdana">All you have to do is press F7, pool slaves, and pool astral pearls. Not much micromanagment unless you are doing a lot of blood sacrificing and then have to put the slaves back on the priests.

Re: Can I get some cheese with that...
 

<font size="2" face="sans-serif, arial, verdana">There's a "pool" button for clams....blood slaves remains somewhat of a sore spot, if you're simultaneously hunting and sacrificing, as the sacrificers then have to have their slaves manually replaced. This is somewhat annoying. Pooling for clams, fetishes, and earth bloods is simple and one-click, though.

<font size="2" face="sans-serif, arial, verdana">Castle spammers don't have production centers because they tend to favor mages over troops: Troops lack the mobility needed to effectively respond to a sudden threat before your cheap paper castle collapses, so you need teleportation, gatewaying, or trapezing. Thus, you WON'T have production centers: Instead, you'll be pumping out mages from your cheap towers and not building very many of your national troops except the really cheap ones at all. The sacrifice you make for castle-spam is that you give up access to national troops as a meaningful fighting force, and become dependent on summons, SCs, and mages.

Re: Can I get some cheese with that...
 

I was reading where it's 300_Gold per castle... and it can be as much as 450_Gold per castle. In any case just 10 provinces each with castles is over 3000 gold ! A very deadly army can be made with 3000 gold. That's 20 Hunter Knights from Machaka with 500 gold to spare.

Also a good strategy for stopping the castle strategy is removing the control of the province during construction. It takes 3 turns to build... a stealth army or ghost riders or call of the wild... etc.
Another idea is if you are currently the strongest... send a message thru the game to your opponents saying,"If you build a castle on our borders then I will consider this an act of war." Even someone of equal strength could be intimidated as a result.

The biggest part of multiplayer is diplomacy not some VQ or castling strategy. Players should be focusing on stopping the strongest player. If players A and B combined are the same strength of player C... then player A & player B should make an alliance against player C and make an agreement based on honor not to fight each other for 10 days or so. Peace Treaties... part of history.

[ May 26, 2004, 19:34: Message edited by: NTJedi ]

Re: Can I get some cheese with that...
 

<font size="2" face="sans-serif, arial, verdana">If somebody were to say that, I would immediately deploy for war, since that is obviously his intention anyway: The only reason you'd be concerned about your opponent building castles is if you plan to imminently attack him, and thus want him to be weak and exposed: Otherwise, an opponent who castles is actually working in YOUR favor, since he will not be able to effectively conduct an offensive operation against YOU without rendering his castles irrelevant. Given that such a message obviously indicates an imminent desire to invade you, appeasement is out of the question. I think we learned enough about that in WW2.

Re: Can I get some cheese with that...
 

<font size="2" face="sans-serif, arial, verdana">Rather than make an exhaustive list of all potential "motives", I chose to start this thread by proposing a few. I don't deserve a frown for that! http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/image...s/rolleyes.gif

You've added another motive, which is great--and I find it quite curious:

You don't want ME to "castle spam" because YOU hate micromanagement.

Without more, this appears to be a non sequitur.

Re: Can I get some cheese with that...
 

<font size="2" face="sans-serif, arial, verdana">Well if player A, player B or player C were all the same size... and myself was twice the size of any of them then sending such a message to all players is usually effective. There will be the one player(player_C) who says hey I will utilize my gold for other resources/investments delay on building castles. And then there will be the player such as yourself that says "F.. You.". As a result you would be the first in the path of my expansion while player C has a longer time of peace and building.
And if our strategies were equal then you would most likely lose... unless one of the others came to your rescue.

As a result I would also make a peace treaty with player_C for 15 days or so.

[ May 26, 2004, 20:10: Message edited by: NTJedi ]

Re: Can I get some cheese with that...
 

The Caster doesn't need an army.

Machaka spiders? Uh what a good lunch for my SC ...

Try to play against Norfleet at least once, after we can talk again about that.

I mention Norfleet cause he's a skilled player, that adopt (if not invented) this strategy.

Re: Can I get some cheese with that...
 

<font size="2" face="sans-serif, arial, verdana">I wasn't talking about the cheap spider knights

and I'm sure my SC could easily tango with your SC

[ May 26, 2004, 20:19: Message edited by: NTJedi ]

Re: Can I get some cheese with that...
 

<font size="2" face="sans-serif, arial, verdana">Unless, of course, that the gems you have on your commanders are there for a reason. In which case you have to reassign gems to every commander who happened by a laboratory each turn. Result: Extensive, pointless micromangement.

Re: Can I get some cheese with that...
 

<font size="2" face="sans-serif, arial, verdana">Yes if player "C" was retarded. All 3 of them should attack you immediatly if they know what is good for them. You are twice their size. If they don't gang up now then all is lost. Comming in 2nd is still losing.

Re: Can I get some cheese with that...
 

<font size="2" face="sans-serif, arial, verdana">You'd be surprised at just how effective webs, especially web spit, can be against a lone SC. They bring the SCs defense down to 3, and force it to spend one of its moves breaking free, so they half the effectiveness, and make it so that all of your units can hit. Tangle vines work in much the same way.

Re: Can I get some cheese with that...
 

I think Cohen misunderestimates how effective Machaka Spiders backed by Mandragorae are.

Re: Can I get some cheese with that...
 

<font size="2" face="sans-serif, arial, verdana">Yes if player "C" was retarded. All 3 of them should attack you immediatly if they know what is good for them. You are twice their size. If they don't gang up now then all is lost. Comming in 2nd is still losing. </font><hr /></blockquote><font size="2" face="sans-serif, arial, verdana">I completely agree... but the strongest player should still use his strength to try and intimidate the others. The biggest rebel should be the first one to go down.
Another method the strongest player can use is providing a good trading market for one or more players thus helping convince them to follow his demands.

Re: Can I get some cheese with that...
 

I am sorry I misinterpreted you sentiment(?) I am only human.

<font size="2" face="sans-serif, arial, verdana">Let me bend that in neon, then http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/images/icons/icon7.gif

I really do not like games where "caring to do lots of micromangement"="winning". I hope you can understand this sentiment. I also thought that dom2 was one of the games where this was not the case. Alas, I was wrong.

I should have left it at that, yes. But then I thought that we could mod us out of this. I have realized an hour ago that the server implementation does not allow that in several ways.

And now I'll leave these forums to cool off. Send me a private email if you need me for anything.

Re: Can I get some cheese with that...
 

<font size="2" face="sans-serif, arial, verdana">Quit lab-spamming, then. http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/images/icons/icon10.gif

Re: Can I get some cheese with that...
 

Frankly I do not understand what the problem with
castle spamming is. I play Vans. If you go to
war with me, you will lose every single
unfortified temple in, oh, about five turns.

There are some people on this thread who are
familiar with the experience. At least one
of them has taken up castling religiously, so
now instead of burninating his empire, I
am besieging three castles, and gambling on his
Vampire Queen not being called up from the dead
too quickly.

Do you honestly propose that we start using rules
that _enforce_ leaving your provinces
vulnerable? Or do you accuse people building a
castle in each province of playing a cheap game?

Personally I do not build castles extensively.
Not because I am ashamed of it, or because I do
not think it is a good idea. Mostly, it is
because I cannot afford it, or because I am
hoping that I can get away with it unless I am
facing Vanheim, Man, Ulm, Pangea, Caelum, ...
you know, what, nevermind! :-)

Once the game gets going, and supercombatants
raise their ugly heads, having provinces without
a castle is a waste of your 200 gold coins, and
of most of the income you can get from the
province.

So lets see. Why do people whine about castling?
1. Because they do not like micromanaging, and
want to deny others the benefits of doing it?
2. Because they like their administration bonus,
and do not want to give it up?
3. Because they have trouble to keep supply
adequate without a fortified city?
4. Because their strategy is not able to support
the expense of castling?
5. Because they like being able to raid
indiscriminately?
6. Because they need something to whine about?

Guys, castling is not only the one in-game answer
to raiding, it is also perfectly realistic. I am
from Europe. In most places, it is enough to
look at the highest place in sight, and you will
see a castle. This is certainly the case in
France, Germany and Spain. Why? Because building
a castle that allows you to protect your villagers
and lifestock, and strike at the invaders, should
they separate for pillaging, WORKS!

Now, people are proposing solutions to alleviate
the need of castling. I'm all for that! Make
temples take a turn to demolish. Make it
impossible to bump taxes unless you have held the
province for a whole turn. Make it a bit easy to
intercept a moving army. Fine! Thank you very
much! I do not want to pay 500 coins for my
temple. I could use some ressources. But the
problem is not castling. The problem is the
wack-a-mole approach to handling an army moving
in your lands.

My way of handling this? Introduce loyalty in
provinces. Make those who move between loyal
provinces move first, as opposed to those moving
between occupied provinces. This simulates the
army supported by the population having access to
better logistics, better recon, and not being
harrassed by loyalists. Hell, introduce a new
command 'move while intercepting' that will
deflect the path of the army to coincide with the
targeted invader's destination.

Of course this is complex, and will not happen in
a patch. But do NOT cripple castling without
coming up with an answer to raiding first, or the
next whine fest will be:

So his IMPOSSIBLE TO SEE Vans slaughtered my 400
coins strong PD, burned my 200 coins temple,
jacked the taxes to net 200 coins, and then left
me with 50% unrest. Oh, they hid on the next
turn, so there WAS NOTHING I COULD DO!

WHAAAAAAH!'

Re: Can I get some cheese with that...
 

I think I've just had a revelation.

If labs were more expensive, requiring you to plan out which of your provinces will become magical centers, you can effectively stop Norfleet's mage-dependant strategy, right?

Or, there could be different types of labs. Smaller and cheaper ones reduce your ability to research, or multiplies mage cost, either handicapping your ability to field the best summons before everyone else with your mage army or making it more expensive to pump mages. It does, however, have an advantage of expensive labs which divides mage cost and improves research because in the better labs, you're keeping all of your eggs in a couple baskets and you can't pump mages as well. Cheap labs also allow you to blood hunt in virtually every province but one.

What do you think?

Re: Can I get some cheese with that...
 

I personally still believe the problem lies in the supercombatant instead of castling. If your opponent could not teleport in a force capable of defeating your besiegers in 1 turn then castling would no longer work. His castles that he made in all his provinces would subsiquently become YOUR castles because he would not be able to afford a large army since all his money has been going into hi..YOUR castles. I think the ability to intercept raiding armies better would be a definite plus, but if you think about it, if you actually had to move an army around to defend your castles, suddenly castling everywhere is alot less effective. I think commanders should be capable of inflicting massive losses on the enemy, but should not be so good at becoming completely invulnerable to endless hordes of anything that isnt elite.

Yes, castling is a problem, but its only made possible because of Supercombatants that can defeat your besieging army by their lonesome.

Re: Can I get some cheese with that...
 

<font size="2" face="sans-serif, arial, verdana">I thought the whine du jour was whining, and the fact that the forums don't support killfiles? http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/images/icons/icon12.gif

<font size="2" face="sans-serif, arial, verdana">Norfleeting, er, mad castling, has always struck me as a beatable strategy. As someone (NTJedi?) also posted here, Machaka could have a -bunch- of its best troops for the cost of 10 cheap castles.

From what Norfleet in particular has said, mad castling relies on not building troops. (In order to afford the castles.)

So, my theory is that if you haven't been castling, you should be able to build, say, three armies each capable of taking a castle. (Or at least a watchtower http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/images/icons/icon12.gif ) Striking multiple provinces, preferably each too far apart for a VQ or other flyer to get from one to another inside of a single turn means that a lone SC can only respond to a single attack; in the meantime, you've acquired two provinces and two castles without having to build the castles yourself.

And the troops aren't there to respond to the other two attacks, in theory. http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/images/icons/icon12.gif

Where I think this breaks down is with summoned troops and commanders, which the mad castler can often manage if sie's concentrating on mages, research, and finding magic sites.

The other thing is that the castles typically used are pretty worthless for the other player - watchtowers, or worse, Ermor's 0 admin keeps.

So, my theoretical counterstrategy requires work. Probably it'd be best to attempt to strike the Mad Castler early in the game, before a preponderance of summonings are brought to bear. Obviously, this can be unfeasible with huge maps.

The other tweak would be to rely heavily on flying troops yourself, for mobility and the ability to quickly reduce enemy forts. Again - difficult to do save for a very few nations / themes.

Re: Can I get some cheese with that...
 

<font size="2" face="sans-serif, arial, verdana">In addition to a good description of Europe, where castles, forts, and towers large and small can be found almost every square mile in some parts, for good reason, Tuidjy has a really good point about the temples.

Why does it take a nation a full month of a commander's time to destroy their _OWN_ temple, but an invader, even an attack and immediately go poof spell invader, destroy it immediately?

Really seems to make more sense that it would require one month of a commander's time to destroy it. Otherwise - the original temple is still there.

Maybe it still benefits the original deity. Maybe it doesn't, since the priests and temple-tenders are presumably at least in hiding. But having to devote a commander to destroying the temple only makes sense. And it means that a commander is there, visible, for that turn, and thus vulnerable to Magic Arrows, Ghost Riders, Call of the Wild, teleporting / air trapezing mages, etc.

Destroying the temple would thus be risky, but important - you can't build your own temple while that temple is there, and you also don't want to leave the enemy's temple there for them to recover by retaking the province.

Re: Can I get some cheese with that...
 

I think the initial post is a bit inflammatory and unneccessarily one sided. Normally, I wouldn't post in response to one person's point of view but your post was a good example of one extreme 'side' of every balance argument that goes on so I wanted to post my thoughts. This isn't aimed at you so much as the statements that are represented here (which you happened to make in this case).

<font size="2" face="sans-serif, arial, verdana">People said what they had to say. Is it a whine du jour because they didn't keep beating it into the ground for a month ? Those people still feel that way so calling it a whine du jour lacks foundation and is inflammatory (as opposed to if it was inflammatory but had a valid point behind it). Would it be better if they said something about it EVERY day of every week of every month so it would no longer be a whine of the day ?

<font size="2" face="sans-serif, arial, verdana">Why does it seem that the first reaction of people that use the strategies is to call everyone else a whiner or a newbie rather than make a point about the actual subject ?

<font size="2" face="sans-serif, arial, verdana">Representing extremes is fine lawyering and good drama but it isn't really fair. Don't you think it is likely that the truth is in the middle ? That *most* people probably have tried several different things but it was neither their 'first reaction' nor have they done 'extensive testing and proven they can't be beaten' ? Honestly, don't you think the truth is in the middle here ? Do you really think that every complaint comes from a single game experience ?

And if it can be beaten, why would people equate that with it being balanced, other than that they have run out of logic ? I mean, if you want to use that argument, every single unit in the game is exactly as good as every other unit because there are open ended dice rolls and anyone could win any combat at any specific time.

<font size="2" face="sans-serif, arial, verdana">I think it is inappropriately disrespectful to assume that everyone who brings up a balance discussion is wrong, not because of specific points but rather to dismiss them and assume negative character traits about their personalities. Why do they all have to have ulterior motives, based on being weak willed, rash and whiny ? I mean, that is basically the answer that some people use for every balance discussion.

Tthis is probably true in some cases, don't get me wrong, just as there are people on the OTHER side who don't want changes in their game for the *exact* same reasons. For either side to dismiss arguments based on anything other than actual, valid points, on the subject itself, demonstrates both a lack of respect and a losing argument, imo.

- Kel

Thank you for enduring my brief rant.

Re: Can I get some cheese with that...
 

Kel - nice post.

I agree. The constant superior attitude, arrogance, and cynicism of some posters gets old. Sure there is some whining but I think some of the points raised about DOM2 play balance are valid and they get grouped immediately into the "whining" Category. Whatever.

--John

<rant>
P.S. What is this "we don't suffer fools" cr*p? Get off your high horses. Sheesh.
</rant>

[ May 27, 2004, 06:00: Message edited by: JJ_Colorado ]

Re: Can I get some cheese with that...
 

<font size="2" face="sans-serif, arial, verdana">Not especially. You only need one lab to summon and forge and you don't need that many to hire mages. Although, maybe Norfleet is hiring more mages than I expect. It would hinder teleporting SCs but most of them can fly which is almost as good. Expensive labs would also break any nation that depended on lots of cheap mages - R'lyeh, Abysia Blood of Humans, etc.

Re: Can I get some cheese with that...
 

<font size="2" face="sans-serif, arial, verdana">The reason it's a "whine du jour" is because it only recently appeared. If it was an actual, serious issue, it would have been apparent for a long time, but because it only appears shortly after somebody dishes out a merciless beating to the aforementioned whining party, it's a "whine du jour": There aren't even people who can reproduce the results.

For instance, consider the current whine-du-jour: castle-spamming: how many people do it and are actually SUCCESSFUL? Of the people who complain about it, how many of them were introduced to it by being my victim....and if it's so great and wonderful, why are more people not doing it with better success?

Re: Can I get some cheese with that...
 

<font size="2" face="sans-serif, arial, verdana">The answer to this is actually quite simple, but it may be difficult for you to uderstand Norfleet. (no insult intended here, but I think you just don't think in the same way as most of the other people who play Dom2. )


You see, lot of people (fortunately) don't want to use your strategy. You are obviously under impression that all people play this game just like you Norfleet - to win at all cost, using every exploit allowed by game mechanics. No tactic is too cheesy, abusive or boring for you as long as it allows you to win the game.


The truth however, is that a lot of people don't want to use your lame strategy, no matter how efficient it is. They are playing this game to have fun first, and the wining is secondary.


I don't think you can understand this idea though, since for you using same exploits in every game seem _to be_ fun. But for other people it is not. That's why they are creating houserules to prevent known abuses and preserve interesting and differnt gameplay, instead of having 16 VQs playing mad castling and clam hoarding just like you do.


I think you can be considered to be beneficial to the community, from certain point of view, since you seem to be pretty good in finding exploits and pushing them to the limit. Maybe developers will notice it and do something about it in next patches. If not, there are always houserules, which are being used more and more every week. The harder and more often you and your copycats will use your strategy, the stronger the rejection reaction will become, and the more often games will be created to prevent the abusive strategy that you are using.

Obvioulsy you may flatter yourself thinking that this houserules are created to prevent _you_ in game, since you are so good. But you are clearly wrong, and you can easely see it for yourslef, if you want proof for it - I'll tell you how. http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/images/icons/icon12.gif


Asking "why I can beat people who are using the same exploits as I do " is meaningless. Instead try for once beat competent opponents _not_ using your only strategy, but trying anything else. If you win, that it'll be the best and only proof that you are wining not because of you standard exploitive strategy but because you are actually strong player on your own, and I'll publicly admit it myslef. But frankly I don't think you will, based upon what what I saw in our Last game.


I do not deny that you have knowledge of the game, but so are many other people on this forum. 95% of your success though comes from your only exploitive strategy, that you perfected. Of course you don't want to admit it, since it would deflate your huge ego. Frankly if I would be in your shoes I would find it extremely boring and mindboggling, but you seem to be geting thrill from just wining the games no matter how, and that overweigh everything else.

*shrug*

[ May 27, 2004, 09:16: Message edited by: Stormbinder ]

Re: Can I get some cheese with that...
 

<font size="2" face="sans-serif, arial, verdana">Perhaps you believe that, but the truth is, I've seen people attempting to adopt it...and getting nowhere with it. I am not the only VQ player. I am not the only castle-builder....but I'm the only one who does well with it. Why is that?

<font size="2" face="sans-serif, arial, verdana">You mean, like, say, a water-9 Vanheim bless strategy? Just won a game with that. No VQ involved.

Re: Can I get some cheese with that...
 

<font size="2" face="sans-serif, arial, verdana">Perhaps you believe that,</font><hr /></blockquote><font size="2" face="sans-serif, arial, verdana">It doesn't matter that much what I believe, it's what more and more people believe. As you can see a lot of people are creating games with houserules to specifically prevent the very same exploits you are using. (not to mention specifically baring you for cheating and dishonest behaviour, but that's completely different matter http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/images/icons/icon7.gif )


Literally speaking you are diging your own grave by making your exploits more and more prominent, and I think that it's a good thing for Dom2 community.


<font size="2" face="sans-serif, arial, verdana">*shrug* Because you are more experienced with your exploits than other exploiters who are copycating it from you? Is this something to be proud of?

I told you already, it doesn't prove anything. YOU have to beat other competent players by NOT using some combination of your standard madcastling+VQ+clamshoarding. That will be the strong and the only proof that you are wining not because of your lame exploits. Nothing else can archieve such results. It's simple logic, I don't know why are you not geting it.


<font size="2" face="sans-serif, arial, verdana"> <font size="2" face="sans-serif, arial, verdana">You forgot to mention mad castling. Did you play without it as well?

[ May 27, 2004, 09:41: Message edited by: Stormbinder ]

Re: Can I get some cheese with that...
 

<font size="2" face="sans-serif, arial, verdana">The castles were built to keep out pesky enemy VQs, since everyone knows vampires can't come inside unless they're invited. Besides, what ELSE would you build in a province? Temples would explode constantly. Plus that annoying sacred troop limit requires castles to enable their churn-out, temples to increase the rate at which they can be churned out...and castles again to protect said temples.

Everything in Dom2 boils down to those temples, after all, and when your production bandwidth depends on those temples, even losing control of one temporarily as suggested in a proposed solution would be unacceptable.

[ May 27, 2004, 09:41: Message edited by: Norfleet ]

Re: Can I get some cheese with that...
 

<font size="2" face="sans-serif, arial, verdana">The castles were built to keep out pesky enemy VQs</font><hr /></blockquote><font size="2" face="sans-serif, arial, verdana">http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/images/icons/icon10.gif http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/images/icons/icon10.gif http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/images/icons/icon10.gif

So much for playing differently and proving the point. Whom do you think you are fooling?

[ May 27, 2004, 09:54: Message edited by: Stormbinder ]

Re: Can I get some cheese with that...
 

<font size="2" face="sans-serif, arial, verdana">The reason it's a "whine du jour" is because it only recently appeared.</font><hr /></blockquote><font size="2" face="sans-serif, arial, verdana">That really isn't evidence to dismiss something without giving it any more thought than that. Everything that occurs...occurs for a first time at some point.

New strategies can reveal new problems. They should be given consideration on their merits or lack thereof.

- Kel

Re: Can I get some cheese with that...
 

So if suddenly everyone starts playing games with House Rules that you can't play with Undead then suddenly Undead are overpowered?

Norfleet's 'strategies' get the incredible whine factor because they take the fun out of the game in as much it becomes a grind to play. That can happen with any game, many of which are balanced. Certain extremes will always be boring and more effort than is fun to play.

That doesn't mean it's inbalanced, only that it creates a situation of frustration to the point of not playing because it's more aggrivating than fun.

That is not a balance issue that is just someone using their advantage of playing a mind-numbingly boring style in order to eventually frustrate and have people quit instead of actually fighting.

Edit: For a very visible Example: Imagine playing D&D and you're the type of player who plays less about the rules and more about the roleplaying and other aspects and on the other end of the table you are playing with 4-5 Rules Lawyers with Books Strapped to their hands and a sour disposition to the way their character is going. Every minute is an instant bickerfest about any and every interpretation.

[ May 27, 2004, 13:59: Message edited by: Zen ]

Re: Can I get some cheese with that...
 

It used to be a standard statement that everyone gangs up on Ermor first because they are so hard to beat later. Now I guess it will be standard game to gang up on Norfleet first, then play.

Of course that leads to new strategys where you manuever to end up in the best provinces while investing the least amount of troops into the "wipe Norfleet" project.

Re: Can I get some cheese with that...
 

<font size="2" face="sans-serif, arial, verdana">Yes, the other whine du jour is whining about whining. Or perhaps we should call it meta-whining? http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/images/icons/icon12.gif

Re: Can I get some cheese with that...
 

I like what Tuidjy and Cainehill are saying, which I sum up as "the problem isn't castles, the problem is raiding." For that matter, this is one of the main reasons Norfleet gives for pursuing a castling strategy, although I don't know that he considers castling or raiding to be "problems."

Anyway, if it wasn't so easy for enemy armies to get into your territory and wander around, avoiding battle with your armies, while burning down your temples, ramping up your unrest, and forcing you to devote disproportionate forces to pinning them down and destroying them, then castling would cease to be such an attractive strategy. It would still have its uses, but as folks have pointed out, it has its drawbacks as well. However, so long as it is the best (almost only) way to stop raiders, trying to do anything to limit the strategy would be a mistake, I think.

I like Cainehill's suggestion that it actually require effort of some sort to destroy an enemy temple. Although I'm not sure if the game can handle the idea of a temple and the land it is built on belonging to different people. Tuidjy's suggestion about loyalty is also a good one.

My own sugestion us that the movement rules be tweaked such that it is possible to intercept an enemy army in the space that it starts the turn in, even if it has orders to move somewhere else. In other words, make it possible to catch raiders. You could start with some sort of base chance of getting to the province before the enemy leaves it (33%?), and then modify it by comparing the strategic movement speeds of the armies involved. Alas, I have no idea if Illwinter is interested in making changes like these at this point...

Re: Can I get some cheese with that...
 

<font size="2" face="sans-serif, arial, verdana">I believe that there is a burden to provide evidence if you are proposing changes, and that burden should fall on the "whiners" and not on those who are more or less happy with the game as it is.

(And, by the way, I have never used any of these tactics myself.)

Re: Can I get some cheese with that...
 

That's a really good point Vynd. You could argue that the unbalanced strategy is raiding, and castling is just the best way to defeat that.

There are actually two ways to see this:

Raiding is the problem, it won't let you build temples (because they get destroyed really easily) and you need those temples to defeat other peoples dominion. Castling just helps you defeat raiding. People should be able to build temples in every province and guard them. It's frustrating having someone just turn up and trash 200gp worth of temple.

Castling is the problem, because it does let you build lots of temples. This means the only way to fight the dominion of a castler is to have lots of temples yourself (because you can't destroy his easily). Raiding is needed when people build temples too close to borders, or too many temples. People shouldn't be able to build temples in every province and guard them. It's part of the game to intelligently choose where to invest in your 200gp worth of temple.

I suspect these aren't "right" and "wrong". But (assuming one of these needs solving, which may not be true) the one to solve is the one which solving will make the game more fun. I'd 'solve' the castling, as I think I prefer the style of game this would lead to.

Of course, there may also be other problems associated with each strategy on top. In fact I'm sure there are. I suspect some people will still castle everywhere even if it is reasonably possible to intercept raiders anywat. Don't you love how even the bits that might need fixing in Dominions 2 are so complex :-)

Addendum: Solution to raiding strategy without castling: Lower the cost of PD. Bigger armies are now needed to overcome reasonable cost PD, and so raiding costs more.

Re: Can I get some cheese with that...
 

<font size="2" face="sans-serif, arial, verdana">I agree... it sounds like people are playing these games with very little diplomacy. Players should be sending Messages(from within the game) to other players for trading, setting up alliances and secret attacks... same as we've seen in history. Perhaps Norfleet is the only one using diplomacy to influence gamers.

Re: Can I get some cheese with that...
 

Exactly how much are you going to lower the cost
of PD defense? I take capitals with my
standard raiding party (herse + 8 Vans) and no
losses. That without a high blessing (a6w4s4d4b4)
Except for Ulm and Jorunheim, PD is useless. And
frankly if PD, costing less than a castle, were
able to stop one of my late game raiding parties
(Drott + 5 Herse), PD would be a problem.

BTW, I have taken down 51 points of Jotunheim PD
with (High Seraph + 5 Seraphs + Couatl)

And frankly, what is the problem with castling
and VQs? In one of my games right now, I am
rolling up my opponent's castles. Maybe I should
write a journal about what is happenening (he has
a VQ, I do not) And no, it is not boring to play
catch with the queen. It is actually quite
entertaining.

Especially in flux-dominion.

Re: Can I get some cheese with that...
 

<font size="2" face="sans-serif, arial, verdana">I believe that there is a burden to provide evidence if you are proposing changes, and that burden should fall on the "whiners" and not on those who are more or less happy with the game as it is.

(And, by the way, I have never used any of these tactics myself.) </font><hr /></blockquote><font size="2" face="sans-serif, arial, verdana">That's the whole problem. People often provide evidence which is then dismissed based on these illegitimate tactics. You can't say they didn't provide a 'burden of evidence' if you can't refute it, logically.

- Kel

Re: Can I get some cheese with that...
 

<font size="2" face="sans-serif, arial, verdana">No, you have yet to prove it. Lets see some hard #'s, that don't rely on any combination of events and strategies that any one single aspect of whatever evidence you are bringing.

Long ago I did a breakdown of Clam's and later Peter (may he rest in peace with many women and large tracts of land) gave another breakdown. With the #'s presented it was shown that you can abuse it, but only in specific circumstances with a specific gameset and only really viable for a very slim selection of circumstance.

I have seen no instance of this for castling and the only time for VQ's in beta testing. Apparently the proof is 'sounds like to me' or 'what I've seen' or 'from the games I've played with 1 person' not conclusive facts. Fear a Justice system where proof and evidence is presented by gamers who either don't have the time or willing to back up their arguments with any sort of reasonable statements.

[ May 27, 2004, 16:45: Message edited by: Zen ]

Re: Can I get some cheese with that...
 

<font size="2" face="sans-serif, arial, verdana">You CAN intercept raiders as the game is now. If a raiding army is moving to another one of your provinces, you move in before he moves out if you army is faster or smaller. In addition, you can cast distant summons (ghost riders, call of the winds, etc.) that attack before movement.


<font size="2" face="sans-serif, arial, verdana">I think people are referring to raiding parties costing 800 - 1500 gold (if I can calculate the above listed rading parties based soley on memory). Of course an army costing that much should wipe out PD. Imagine a rading party costing 1200 gold attacking your empire. They wipe out 5 temples, but on the seventh try you catch them with a large army and kill them. Then it's a wash. You lost 1000 gold in temples, plus some province income each turn for 5 turns, they lost a 1200 gold army.

I find that building too many castles is often a stupid idea for any living race. There is no way to defend so many castles, so you are guaranteed to give up some to your enemy. Then, your enemy has a new supply center, a fortified position, and a place to recruit and summon new units inside your empire. If someone wants to spend 300 gold on a castle in every province, that's fine. I'd rather spend that money on armies to seige and claim those castles for my own.

Re: Can I get some cheese with that...
 

<font size="2" face="sans-serif, arial, verdana">That's the whole problem. People often provide evidence which is then dismissed based on these illegitimate tactics. You can't say they didn't provide a 'burden of evidence' if you can't refute it, logically.

- Kel </font><hr /></blockquote><font size="2" face="sans-serif, arial, verdana">How are these tactics illegitimate, and what is the evidence?

It's hard to refute opinions, and other than reports of "I hate playing against a castlespamming VQ clam-hoarder" I have not seen much evidence put forth that any of these are in any way illegitmate.

I will grant that VQs appear to be underpriced compared to some other Pretenders, or rather, some of the 125 pt. Pretenders are probably overpriced.

But...how can buidling castles be illegitimate? Where does that particular line of thinking stop? Should we limit the number of temples a player can build? Number of labs? Number of uber summons? Number of mages? Number of provinces to take a turn? Why not, and how is it different for the reasons given for outlawing castlespamming?

Re: Can I get some cheese with that...
 

<font size="2" face="sans-serif, arial, verdana">Heh, is that so? You know, I think I've heard so many complaints about how impossible it is to catch raiders before they move on, that I never actually tried this. Or if I did, it didn't work under those particular circumstances.

Re: Can I get some cheese with that...
 

An interesting discussion, as always.

First, a suggestion for improvement based on reducing micromanagement, to help Mosehansen.

Is it possible to enable a switch, on a commander-level, to stop the pooling of gems from them? The 'large-scale' issue is one of blood sacrifices, but it would also help to avoid the pooling of gems from someone you don't want, which might increase the possibility that gem-requiring battle magic is used (I don't use it in my games primarily for this reason.)

I envision something of a toggle on the Commander orders box, or a toggle box on the Commander's information screen. I don't know how hard this would be to implement, but I just wanted to make a suggestion.

To reduce castling is actually very simple: increase the cost of all castles. I would think that doubling the cost would be about the right amount. With that, I doubt anyone could put a Castle in every province and hope to defend them.

Now, how to avoid the raiding issue? Well, I think the fair way would be to have Move orders processed based on the relative Supply values for each player in the Province being moved to. That is, the closer you are to your supply base, the earlier you would move. Therefore, the deeper you raid into Enemy Territory, the easier you are to catch (theoretically). As a side effect, that would encourage two other historically accurate points. First, castles would be built on borders, both to reduce the enemy's ability to raid and enhance yours. Second, expansion would involve more 'circular' motion. That is, it would be better, from a defense standpoint, to expand in all directions, rather than in a line fashion. This is already strengthened by other game factors, so it shouldn't be a problem.

If this were to happen, raiding would be, essentially, in-and-out. You would raid 'borders', basically. Those nations that are built to raid (e.g., Caelum) don't lose those advantages under this system.

Another minor point is that this would strengthen those castles with better Supply values that have other trade-offs (Fortified City and Wizard's Tower), as they would support more in-depth raiding. It would also boost the Growth scale, which currently is not nearly as useful as certain other scales.

OTOH, Nature magic would _not_ benefit raiding, as Supply bonuses from Nature Magic/items subtract from Supply Used, not add to Supply. Thus, this idea makes the most use of already in-place mechanics.

Anyway, feel free to comment. I'm sure I missed a lot of problems with this idea. http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/images/icons/icon12.gif

Scott Hebert
Newbie

Re: Can I get some cheese with that...
 

<font size="2" face="sans-serif, arial, verdana">I hadn't really thought about it from this second angle, Tris, but it seems to me that you're right. One could call raiding the "solution" to the "problem" of too many temples, and thus see castling as a "problem" because it allows people to maintain too many temples too easily, despite raiding. However, I still think that raiding is a big part of what makes castling attractive, so if castling is a problem then raiding is part of it.

Also, it is a mistake to fixate on how raiding makes temples vulnerable, as if all raiders did was destroy 200 gold temples. For one thing, temples represent more than 200 gold, they also represent the time and effort involved in getting a priest over there and having him spend a turn building the temple. This, as Cainehill pointed out, is in contrast to the free, no action required, destruction of the temple. Furthermore, raiders do a lot more than destroy temples. They deprive you of income and gems, gain them for their owners, spread unrest in "your" territory, wipe out PD and/or isolated units, and require you to track them down with superior forces and destroy them if you want them to stop.

Re: Can I get some cheese with that...
 

<font size="2" face="sans-serif, arial, verdana">See, this is an excellent suggestion that addresses a number of issues. It is also historically and thematically pertinant and visible.

It not only makes protecting territory less of a hassle, but adds another element of randomness (especially if you blank out the Supply factor from other players visibity (except maybe spies) and add in a random roll to it).

Now I don't know how easy it would be to code, or if it's even viable with code constraints. But a very good suggestion and well thought out.

Kudos to Scott.

Edit: This will still not affect the CT/Teleport/flying raiding SC's, but for the amount of gems that are used to create them for that purpose, they should have an advantage of mobility.

[ May 27, 2004, 18:07: Message edited by: Zen ]