Small suggestions for the next patch
 

Hi!
I am pretty new to Dominion 3 but I did notice some things that could be done to make the player's life a little easier (and sorry if I bring up things that were discussed a hundred times here, I did read a lot of threads, but not all of them, so just don't hit me http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/images/smilies/wink.gif http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/image...s/confused.gif):

1. An "infinite recruit" setting/button to the army recruit screen of the dominions
Sometimes it can be very time consuming, when you have to go to every province to recruit your troops at every turn, especially if you have a lot of dominion.
It would help to reduce the micromanagement a lot, if you could just set some to train the maximum troops that can be trained there at the begining of every turn

2. Some graphical representation of some important values in the game
I noticed that when I check the dominions for their income or population, it takes a lot more time to "decode" the numbers, that are there, then it was in, well, in Master of Magic.
There when I clicked around the cities, I could immediately tell, if I get a low or high income from it, just by waching the gold coins.
If there were something like that in Dominions, like, a gold coin for every 50 gold income next to the accurate number, you could get the feeling about the more and less important dominions much quickly.

3. A dismiss command to release the not needed soldiers from their duty
I don't think that needs any explanation, I think everybody met that situation, when you got stuck with "once so important but now so useless" troops, like an undead elephant (behemot), that don't let you use its summoner's magic, or a lot militia after a large, "I need as many man as possible" - fight.

4. Something to help me sort out the spells
Well, as I said, I am a pretty new player, so everything is new to me. And when I saw the spell research/ritual casting/spell library window, I nearly cried. There was like, a ton of spells, but I needed to ckeck them one by one, if I wanted to know, if a specific one is casted on the battlefield, or it is a ritual, if it is a ritual, it is a summoning spell or an enchantment, thing like that.
Please, just let me sort them by type, cast level, or gem need. It will really could make it easier to find a spell for a specific job.


So, that's it.
I know it is nothing serious, but sometimes, these thing could add up, and become very annoying.
And I will continue to play, because it is a fun, even if sometimes very time consuming game

Re: Small suggestions for the next patch
 

There's such an option, that I activate each new game I start : in the menus, near the option where you show the neighbours connections, there is one option to show a "box" for each province, the box showing gold coins , hammers, and candles to let you have a global view of income, ressources, and dominion of a province without having to select it first.

Re: Small suggestions for the next patch
 

1. You can queue up the troops as much as you want, as long as you have the gold for it. The resource will go negative, and so will the holy count for sacred troops, the ones that can't be recruited will be done the turn after.

Try going to your capital, hold down shift, and click a dozen time on your favorite troops (to add 10 per click), and it'll continue to recruit them until it's done. You have to have the gold to spend on them though. XD

2. There are income and dominion icons on the map, it's just disabled most of the time. Try hitting "4", or go into "Map filters" and check "Income box".

3. A dimiss option is sorely needed, I definitely agree. Right now the best way to kill worthless troops is to astral gate into the ocean with a shambler skin armor (late game solution). You can also walk into the ocean with a sea king and abandon them there to drown earlier in the game.

4. Spell sorting would be useful I suppose, although having played for a while, I've kinda gotten used to all of them, so I don't really notice it anymore (kinda memorized most of them). Still, it's always nice to have the option... especially when you got one of those wishers... XD

Re: Small suggestions for the next patch
 

I agree dismiss would be nice. You shouldn't have to creatively kill your own troops to 'retire' them.

I do have to say that I have very seldom wanted to dismiss troops. Even the low level random event troops make good chaff for armies or for individual spell casters, asumming they are generated reasonably near the front.

Regarding the behemot, they aren't great, but I wouldn't say they are useless. If I remember correctly you can transfer them to another weaker death mage, and you can have more than one commanded by a single mage. If you have the time to get a decent sized group of them they can cause some significant trample damage.

Re: Small suggestions for the next patch
 

As for queueing:

You can only queue up 100 units. I have actually had a situation where I could--and wanted to--recruit more per turn than this (I had been trying for a long time to get into the water and finally found a Shambler Reef.) Furthermore, you're limited by the amount of gold on hand.

How it should work:

You should be able to recruit without regard for gold just like you can recruit without regard for resources or holy points. Anything beyond what's available will be shaded just like what happens now for resources.

There should also be a "repeat" checkbox on the screen. If checked the units are not removed from the queue when recruited, thus you will get the same thing each turn until you cancel it.

The queue needs to be expanded to at least 400 items. There are units that cost one resource point so the queue needs to contain at least as many slots as the highest number of resources a province can produce.

Re: Small suggestions for the next patch
 

A little trickier than it sounds.

Consider: Assume I have 400 gold on hand and 400 income.
I queue up 500 gold worth of troops in 2 provinces.
Which get bought this turn?
If you base it on which was selected first, which would seem reasonable, what about next turn? I still don't have the cash for all of them. Who gets bought?

I like the repeat idea better, but it runs into the same money allocation problem.

Re: Small suggestions for the next patch
 

There are a lot of user-friendliness improvements that can be made, but I don't know if we'll see there in Dom3. I'd like mercenary renewals to be automated. When I'm playing a fast SP game checking my mercs is a fairly substantial part of many turns. It's also prevents me from really getting lost in the fun parts of the game, because I have this niggling voicei n my head wondering if I've checked the mercs.
There's also some stuff from Dom2 such as the ability to grey-out researchers and remove them from the unit assignment screen that'd be really nice to see again.

I do agree that queuing could be improved. I prefer short games so it's not a huge issue for me, bit it'd be nice. As for the 'money allocation problem'... ideally how it was allocated would be up to the player. For example, provinces could be given a priority level and money would be divided equally among each province at the highest level until all troops are bought, then the next.

The ability to queue commanders would also be of huge benefit

Finally, I think that some of the messages, in particular battle reports could be improved a lot. The main offender is "We captured the fortress!" but even regular reports could give more info. I sometimesl ike watching battles, but if I lose a commander in a fairly dull battle I don't want to watch the whole thing just to figure out which one. I'd like it if battle reports gave a full list of casualties on both sides by commander name and type (e.g. "Ariulf the priest") and by unit number and type ("8 militia").

As I said, I don't know if this sort of thing is a realistic expectation for a doms3 patch. UI is an area that illwinter have mostly improved in further versions of dominions, but of course it's a very important part of the game and I'd hope to see continuing improvements for as long as any issues exist.

Re: Small suggestions for the next patch
 

Would be neat, especially for commanders.

Yeah. Would be usefull.

The behemot description is confusing. *Your* mage, the one that casts the Behemoth spell, is free to do whatever afterwards. The spell reanimates both an elephant and a little mage guy who will sit on the elephant and control it, in game terms you'll never notice the mage.

The manual helps a bit with this. If all you have is fire mages, you can look for battlefield spells-fire at page 246.

Edit for more replies:
Those in the province with the lowest number probably, but to me it doesn't matter since I'd have to be careless for it to happen.

Pressing tab at the unit assignment screen will remove researchers, but the grey-out option on the main screen is sadly missing. It was awesome.

Re: Small suggestions for the next patch
 

re: 4

you can already sort spells - by their main spell type (i.e. astral, blood, nature, etc.) just press "a" for air, "s" for astral, all the others are the first letter of the spell type.

Also they are broken down by research path already - both of these were not present in DOM 2, and it really makes it a LOT easier.

Re: Small suggestions for the next patch
 

That's good to know!! I think it may mention the sort in the manual (or somewhere I read, but I never remember.

Re: Small suggestions for the next patch
 

All of them. When you queue units, your "gold on hand" goes down. You can't queue up 500 gold worth of troops if this would but your "gold on hand" to -100 gp.

Re: Small suggestions for the next patch
 

The suggestion was to allow you to queue units past that. That would be paid for on later turns.

I was pointing out conceptual difficulties with the idea.

Re: Small suggestions for the next patch
 

Indeed you were. Sorry for that, I skimmed the thread rather quickly and didn't notice the post you replied at.

Re: Small suggestions for the next patch
 

You get the ones in the lower-numbered province. No big deal.

Re: Small suggestions for the next patch
 

1 : Or it could just be an equal proprtion in every dominion, like, if you only has 300 gold, but it should be recruited 500 gold, then in every province, it should buy the 3/5th of the set troops (rounded down, I think)

2 : Sorry, didn't noticed, that it is already in the game

3 : After I summoned the behemot, I noticed that in battle my litch, who summoned it, didn't cast any spell, so I figured that the spell description, when it says that a mage must use all of his energy to control it, must mean that he then can't cast any spell. I didn't know it made his own mage

4 : I usually don't keep a printed manual next to me when I play, I mean, if it is sorted in the manual, then why it isn't sorted out in the game too?

Re: Small suggestions for the next patch
 

maybe you missed the post were I pointed out this is already in the game, too.

Re: Small suggestions for the next patch
 

I'd just like to add that, if we ever do see a "dismiss" button, I think Sacreds should be exempt. 2 reasons for this: 1, it's thematic, these guys aren't in it for the money, and they aren't going to stop believing, or being sacred, so long as they're alive. 2, it's a nice balance against the advantage of Sacreds costing half the upkeep. Yes, they cost less in the long run, but the long run can be very long indeed.

that's my 2 cents.

Re: Small suggestions for the next patch
 

You know what would be great with mercenaries: a nation event on the month that you'd have to renew a merc. ("Mercenary X wants to know if you're going to renew his contract" (Go To Province)) Would that be hard to do?

Re: Small suggestions for the next patch
 

But disbanding random event Flaggelants would be the other major use of this feature (besides random events militia)

Re: Small suggestions for the next patch
 

Maybe, but not for most people. Because flagelants are sacred, their unkeep cost is miniscule. Not only that, but for many gods that have a halfway decent blessing, they are fairly decent troops. I'm not sure its unthematic to be unable to send sacred warriors home again, but I don't see any real problem with exempting them from the 'dismissable' troops.

Re: Small suggestions for the next patch
 

Flagelants are somewhat okay troops, but they usually die quickly even on the side with attack rear. It's too bad 95% of them have afflictions because I always seperate the diseased and battle fright ones from the others which takes a good chunk of time when 55 suddenly appear.

Re: Small suggestions for the next patch
 

For throwaway troops like flagellants, diseased really isn't that big a deal. Crippled and lame are much worse...

Re: Small suggestions for the next patch
 

NTjedi, you do know that if you just select one of them and hit 'w', this will select all those with afflictions, right?

Now, of course if you want to separate them based on what afflictions they have, it will certainly take more time.

Re: Small suggestions for the next patch
 

I think a dismiss option isn't a good idea. It would change far too many things affecting balance (importance of afflictions, starving, diseases, aging, summons not asking for money, ability to reorganize your empire when you have a new war to deal with).

If something is to be changed to reduce the "lack of dismiss button feeling" I think it's events (ie : no event giving troops without a leader, far less militia events, more events giving average/good troops or troops not asking for money instead).

Re: Small suggestions for the next patch
 

and a shortcut for "forge montly" like the ctrl+M will also be great and very useful.

Re: Small suggestions for the next patch
 

1. A summon hero spell

2. I would like a choice of at least 2 heroic abilities when one of my commanders goes into the hall of fame. A heroic ability should never be a bad thing, but obesity with extra encumbrance is bad for a pure caster. Or limit obesity to pure melee.

3. An in game help menu where you can type in "shield" "death weapon" etc. and get detailed information of the topic.

4. Let over points when making your pretender: There should be some items that cost 5 points each. So when you are left with 25 points you can spend them somewhere. Maybe 5 points increases chance your heroes appear by 1 percent, or increase number of short bows in your castle defense, or increase the number of people in your starting province by 500. Something.

Re: Small suggestions for the next patch
 

1) This would be nice.

2) Bullcrap. They get what heroics they get and that's that. If it's not directly useful in optimally boosting the hero, too bad. He's a hero, but he might be most famous for something not actually related to his main occupation (e.g. mages with heroic strength). Otherwise I'd want 3rd Eye for all of my mages and either Heroic Agility or Awe for all of my other heroes.

3) No. The manual is there for a reason and we don't actually need things that encourage piracy, which is what a Civilopedia type help system would do.

4) This is something that has been discussed and it would be nice to have some small bonus from the leftover points.

Edi

Re: Small suggestions for the next patch
 

The in game help would be nice, but i was not thinking of piracy issues. just making play more convenient.

DOM III is one of the best strat games ever. MOO II was right there also. But, the one thing I think could add a lot more to the game is having heroes that can be customized a bit. Yes, you can give a bane lord a fiery sword, a shield that gives him a flame shield, boots quickness, trinkets for luck and regeneration, and he will cut stuff down with impunity.

But, it would add some rpg element if heroes could be built up in a heroes of might and magic sense. With certain exp comes choices for new heroic abilities. Also maybe even a smaller type boost for regular troops that perform heroically. I know they get experience boost, but it would be cool to give them a bronze, silver, and gold star also for kills etc.

The game is awesome as is. And it may be too hard to implement changes of this magnitude.

But at a min., I think adding more heroes to each race, and
making them worthwhile to get, would add more flavor. And I do not think heroes should show up old. Unless they tell battle stories that boost morale or something.

Re: Small suggestions for the next patch
 

I agree that in game help is important. It can be dramatically more convenient than a printed manual, especially for newcomers to the series who want to just jump in and play.

Re: Small suggestions for the next patch
 

in-game help pop ut with left click on something. Is somewhat intuitive because previous games of other companies had the same system of help.

Re: Small suggestions for the next patch
 

Gotta disagree with that one. While it would indeed be too good to be able to choose heroics, the current system sucks, because certain heroic abilities (most notable obesity) can actually screw the hero involved. My mage would never have become a famous wizard if he were always so fat he can't cast many spells. No player should ever be thinking, "Oh no, please don't let this mage become heroic..."

If nothing else, Unequaled Obesity should be kept off mages; other heroics can be no worse than useless, unless I'm forgetting some other esoteric one.
While it's hard to automatically determine whether a commander is a fighter or a mage, I would really like to see UO forbidden from any commander with any non-Priest magic paths. Or, frankly, removed from the game, since it's at least as likely to be bad as good.

Re: Small suggestions for the next patch
 

If you have ever seen the writing styles of the developers, you might change your mind asking for in-game help. Johan, the programmer, tends to know the game too deeply and answer questions using very few words. The results are not all that helpful. Kristoffer, the designer, writes most of the test that you see in the game. Its great role-playing storyline stuff but maybe abit much for a help file.

The best documentation and manuals have been done by players all thru Dominions. And I think for most games. The developers are just too deep to think like newbies. Maybe a way to access an external help database from inside the game (the way many of the Windows programs do) so that the help file could be bamintained by users. But that seems like alot of overhead to add to a game that already allows shelling out pretty easily so you can access player-created help files now.

Re: Small suggestions for the next patch
 

There is Heroic Stupidity, I think it reduces magic.

I disagree about limiting unequelled Obesity. It's never worse than +3 enc, and more hp might save a mage from spells or arrows.

But it's so neat to get it on an undead thug, like a black serveant...

Re: Small suggestions for the next patch
 

Heroic abilities don't necasarily have to help you. its just like a random event. usually it is nice, but there is often a price for fame and success. I cand efinitly see an experianced mage becomeing indulgent and becoming obese and having it affect him adversly. I think the randomnness is nice.

also,
I think in battle replays you should be able to click on the messages in the top left to be able to find the commander that cast the spell and the spell description.

Re: Small suggestions for the next patch
 

Wishful improvements

1. Dismiss - already mentioned

2. Monthly forging - already mentioned

3. Improved gem usage AI - or just a simple max gem usage 1,2,3,4,5, etc

4. rearmost = rearmost

5. Spell sorting by level - press a for all air spells, press 2 for all 2nd lvl spells

6. Some sort of option, and I don't even know what - but if I have a 2E2A mage and a bunch of path boost items I'd like to see in the forging screen somehow to denote POSSIBLE forged items kind of like the grey'd out spells. Flipping through the manual can get annoying for potential constructables

7. Ability to add items to carcator, nethgul, hrolgar, tin knight - they have the slots methinks

8. Fine with UO on mages - oh noes, STOP eating!

9. Improved experience display system - kind of mentioned - click, see kills/wounded/wins/losses,shrug

10. Better game end - Scorecard would be an easy improvement a la galciv (use better equations!). i.e. total killed, total produced, total forts taken, total forts produced, total heroes, total hero killed, total killed by melee/magic (probably impossible), best research (maybe per path), most globals, globals dispelled, total pretender kills/deaths, total constructed, total gems spent, etc, etc... with a few equations and a line/bar graph or final number. Game Over Quit! is just anticlimatic.

11. Probably Dom4 - Basic Diplomacy!!! Bribe, Demand, Ally, Declare war, Declare Peace, no allied wins as we are striving for godhood. Probably included - monthly "tribute". Galciv has a great diplo system, probably more than I'd actually like to see here (don't think you should be able to trade spells, or troops, but provinces, items, gold, gems). "I'll give you xxx province if you leave me alone"

12. Sad to say - but a tutorial for the tutorial. Got a few friends that are ADD or something, they can't deal with the learning curve. Maybe 5 tutorials, each pre-set for a few types of action. Small map - recruit, form army, adjust, attack.

13. Turn memory - mentioned many times in other places. But I think it would completely add another facet to the game if modders could script - in turn 10 event such and such happens, in turn 20 Enemy AI gains x bonuses.

14. On kill events - i.e. quest rewards - got a nice indy you've been bulking up for, finally win...but the pretty items routed away! no fear, you still get a better reward than a 1D gem site. Especially cool on Faerun map (which is fun as hell once randomized - if i could just keep the names right)

15. Anything that reduces micro near end game for SP.

16. Anything that makes a modder's life easier - a scenario builder (a la turn memory, events) would be awesome!

17. Maybe events (rare!) that mess around with neighbor settings to a limited extent? Landslides, short term astral portals, ether vortexes, whirlpools.

18. More treasury slots

EDIT: 19. Sortable/filter treasury by slot/type

Love the game as it is, but improvements are always cool!

Re: Small suggestions for the next patch
 

this would be really nice. maybe with an option to set the mages to dont use any gems if not scripted by hand. on the other hand it would be nice if the mages cast their spells i script, even if they cost gems.

at least the variant with the elements is in, on the research menu you can press the key of the element and it only shows the coresponding spells.

maybe a function that you can specify in a castle wich unittype you want to recruit, and then it automatically recruits the maximum possible of this unit. Army movement over multiple turns would be nice also

most other things you mention are nice also, but i dont quote them as it would make a huge post.

What i personnaly would like:

1. More control over what the mages do, either more than 5 slots or to give the mage a spell to cast repeatedly (somehow most of my mages manage to cast crap if not scripted)

2. A Possibility to avoid friendly fire, maybe an option for the archers only to fire on enemys more than 2 squares away from your units. (and if nearer only if they d hit for sure)
Its annoying to take big losses from friendly fire, especially while the enemy is routing.

Re: Small suggestions for the next patch
 

Agree on the friendly fire.

One more thing:

Categorize all spells as either Offensive, Defensive or misc (or something).. hmm and probably add caster only target spells somehow

Then have a script be cast offense, cast defense, cast any, DON'T cast defense, DON'T cast offense.

Just annoys me that unscripted mages in a huge army spend 4 turns buffing, then dish it out... increases micro by a lot as you have to change scripts as you research new spells.

Heck a simple "no caster only" would be cool

Re: Small suggestions for the next patch
 

Those are all good but some hints for now...

Most peoples problem with rearmost is that they arent looking at the battlefield thru the eyes of the units. You can improve rearmost by giving your units a clearer view of the battlefield. Far flanking positions, hold commands to allow most of the battle to move past them, then attack rearmost. Attacking archers for one round and then attacking rearmost can work well also.

You can also improve picking up items by having more commanders with empty slots be nearby when their commanders die. Having all of your commanders on "stay at rear" or loaded with items doesnt get you much. Also increasing luck by scales or items might help altho I havent tested that.

Friendly fire can also be helped by taking on the view of the units. Positioning shooters to the flanks helps, or where they can do long arching shots such as at enemy archers.

Re: Small suggestions for the next patch
 

Any evidence that finding items is affected by more commanders or closer commanders?

I've had mages at the rear of the field pick up stuff from people killed in the enemies back field, so I'm a little skeptical.

Obviously having empty slots is necessary.

Re: Small suggestions for the next patch
 

Cav I can understand - I usually do hold and attack rear for cav to let it clear a bit. What bugs me are flying units. I try to position them back corner or extreme flank even with the front - either hold or cast 3 spells then attack rear. If i even make it back to the archers I'm generally surprised, and not shocked at all when he drops smack dab in the center of the melee. Is flying restricted by AP's by any chance?

Does actual distance from the item holding enemy matter? or just empty slots in the army? i.e. if the enemy commander is killed by a full flyer at rear (ha!) will the items go to someone with empty slots stanying behind troops?

I've always figured it was just a crapshoot what items you actually got - I'm usually happy if they are full and I get 1 or 2 out of it.

Friendly fire - yeah, i pretty much just fire at archers (better chance of commander hit) or prepare to take a friendly fire beating. Someone mentioned at some point that shielded units make a difference and I have to agree.

Re: Small suggestions for the next patch
 

I know that "Fire Archers" is better for friendly fire, but there are situations when there are no archers on the field and your archers are happily firing into your own units. So even if "fire archers" makes it better, a command for archers so that they rather dont shoot, than to risk friendly fire would be a nice addition. (and i think that in bigger battles, there should be always a target to fire at without risk for the own troops)

Re: Small suggestions for the next patch
 

real men don't use friendly fire:off

Re: Small suggestions for the next patch
 

this is one of the reasons, why real men dont get old

Re: Small suggestions for the next patch
 

Personally, I would like MORE heroic "abilities" with tradeoffs (like Obesity) I love the flavor, and like having the chance to tweak strategies to accomodate the unit's personality.

Some sort of "Accept Collateral Damage" setting for groups with ranged or AOE (heat, frost) abilities would be VERY handy though. A toggle with 3 settings: "HEY! be CAREFUL with that thing." "Just try not to hit TOO many friendlies, k?" and "Let god sort'em out." would be perfect (assuming, of course that the AI chose targets and movement appropriately)

After outlandishly oversized melee weapons, Lack of friendly fire damage is one of my biggest Fantasy Game pet peeves. I'm glad it's there in this game. However, that doesn't mean I don't get annoyed when my Children of Rhaux lose a battle for me by charging right into the middle of a pile of my own militia or whatnot setting em all ablaze. A little bit more control would be really nice )

Re: Small suggestions for the next patch
 

Having archers set to fire at archers works better if they are flanking. Even if there are no archers, they are at least firing at the side of the enemy with more chance to hit them than your own guys. I find that most AI set their archers on their right flank (high on the combat field) so I set mine on the left flank (also high on the combat field). Alternately, cavalry flankers set for attack rear seem to work best on my extreme right (low on the cormation screen).

It may be that the attacking commanders to get items only works better because it tends to make me put more commanders into battle than just what I need to lead the troops, thus increasing my chances. Also, I tend to use a cavalry commander with cavalry guards and the whole group set for hold-and-attack-rear which tends to take out more commanders before they can flee. Either way, the logic seems to work altho I havent done hard numbers.
It feels right in an RPG way. http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/images/smilies/happy.gif

Re: Small suggestions for the next patch
 

Hmmm. Currently when an independent flees they have no where to go and thus die. Would it be cool or obnoxious to allow them to flee to another indy province? Or have undefeated indy's recruit slowly (a la late game instead of push overs they're hordes). They'd only get their province income and supply so they'd stay on the small side.

Or to be greedy, have the fleeing indys die and drop their items http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/images/smilies/happy.gif

I'll try out the flanking archers...generally i keep them centered (although playing tien chi now and they're devestating with wind guide and flame arrows)

Re: Small suggestions for the next patch
 

Some of these aren't exactly small suggestions anymore... would belong better to NTJedi's old request thread.

Re: Small suggestions for the next patch
 

I might compile and re-post later just to clean it up. Maybe get ambitious and do a tiered survey or something. I just like the discussion personally and hope some of the ideas filter up eventually. Its not like the games broken, so I still waste most of my playing hours on it http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/images/smilies/happy.gif

Re: Small suggestions for the next patch
 

I haven't installed the most recent patch due to bugs, but LA Mictlan's PD underwater needs a-fixin.

Re: Small suggestions for the next patch
 

thought land troops couldn't create underwatr PD?