Wishing for snatch?
 

I'm puzzled..

My completely awesome almost ultimately equipped SC Earth King just got teleported out of his province, right into a wickedly set up trap of a host of Blood spell casters, killing him with a couple of life for a life spells before my King could even blink. There was a lvl 9 astral pretender present as well..

How did that happen?
Can't have been Winged Monkeys or Wind ride, as the King is a size 6, ethereal (in my case), earth 4 mage.

Could this be a Wish for that particular King?

That would be a quite horrible unstoppable counter to any unique SC...

Re: Wishing for snatch?
 

Yes it was probably a wish, yep there's not much you can do about it. What's even better is if those blood casters were casing hell bind heart...they land that and they've not only snatched your Earth King but also all the equipment (artifacts?) that you equipped him with (they can always follow up with life for a life after they've tried just to make sure). This is my favorite use for wish, and one of the reasons why I usually take an astral bless with Mictlan.

At the stage of the game that wish and life for a life are both researched though, every SC is expendable....

Re: Wishing for snatch?
 

Yes, but not my Aegis and Mage Bane and other nice stuff..
darn..!

Does that tactic also work against pretenders?

Re: Wishing for snatch?
 

Nope. Pretenders can only be wished for by their monster type (e.g. Vampire Queen) and you just get a base, no-frills version as a troop. Even with something like a Wyrm, that's pretty badass without more than the starting level of magic, it's an expensive way to get a fighter.

Re: Wishing for snatch?
 

Whats the wording for a wish like that?

Re: Wishing for snatch?
 

Wish for the exact base unit type, ex. 'King of Deeper Earth' or 'King of Banefires'.

Heh -- the Wish(er) could also have wished that Aegis or Magebane out of the King's hands, first. :p Doesn't work too well for cursed gear, 'tho, unless the Wish(er) doesn't have the appropriate slot.

Re: Wishing for snatch?
 

I would like to say that this thread is misleading. Wishing for snatch has nothing to do with super combatants.

Jazzepi

Re: Wishing for snatch?
 

But it should get you a succubus...

Re: Wishing for snatch?
 

exactly where my mind was when i first read the topic.

Re: Wishing for snatch?
 

Wish + clams = unbalanced game.

When an astral race gets to the point that their clam income allows them a wish per turn, it really makes the game not fun to play against them.

Basically either forces you to have a tedious clam income or concede defeat.

Re: Wishing for snatch?
 

Actually by the point you're dropping a wish every turn non-unique tartarians are probably taking over most of the SC duties, so this tactic doesn't work.

Besides, with a reasonably priced gear setup on the SC blowing 100 pearls to take down a single unit isn't really a particularly good value unless you're sure you can steal it, not just kill it.

Re: Wishing for snatch?
 

you can still wish for every good artifact. And it is free money with clam income.

Re: Wishing for snatch?
 

Again, not really worth it in most cases. The only artifacts I'd really consider wishing for would be the Chalice, Gate Stone, Mage Bane, and maybe the Boots of the Planes. Maybe a couple others in really odd circumstances, like if I could have a headless caster grab the Amon Hotep off an SC the same turn I was expecting to engage it. The majority of artifacts are good because they're really efficient, not because they're hugely powerful (aside from the 4 mentioned).

Re: Wishing for snatch?
 

1. Chalice is game changing. I do not think someone should be able to wish for it.

2. Aegis is definitely worth a wish. You have to realize that when a player is getting over a 100 astral gems a turn from their clams, it is basically free.

Though they could be getting an Angel a turn as well. Or casting Armageddon every turn. Overpowered imho to let a player have a wish per turn based on clam income.

If the Astral gems are saved from sites, globals etc, I think it is much more balanced. But when you basically have unlimited Astral gems, Wish is overpowered.

Re: Wishing for snatch?
 

Erm, so it's more fair for the unique artifact (Chalice) to be unobtainable if you're not the first person to hit construction 8? That seems a hell of a lot more unbalanced than being able to steal it for 100 pearls, precisely because it IS really good. The Aegis also happens to be incredibly overrated.

I'm also not sure this is the correct thread to be discussing clamming in...

Re: Wishing for snatch?
 

It sounds like it is not wish that is unbalanced, but clamming. Personally i would prefer if calmming was taken out of the game, or weakened. Currently there is no way to counter it. Global Enchanments you can counter, clams you can't. Clams force you to either do clamming of your own, or lose. There is no alternate strategy. If the number of clamming you can do is limited, such as only one clam being effective per province, it would be better.

Re: Wishing for snatch?
 

Aegis is overrated. It's nice enough, but it paints bullseye on SC that has it, and it does not help much with smart targetting.

Mage Bane and Chalice cannot be rated enough high. If I have Wish, Chalice is first thing I steal. Mage Bane I steal after I have someone worthy... not everyone can hold to that sword ;-) 100 pearls are too much to steal other stuff. You are doing better if you invest in a non-unique titan with level 6 equipment.

Re: Wishing for snatch?
 

"Erm, so it's more fair for the unique artifact (Chalice) to be unobtainable if you're not the first person to hit construction 8?"

1. It takes a significant risk to go to constr 8. Not many combat spells in that line. So if you get ambushed and you are at constr 6 and another player is at evoc 6, then you may pay for that risk dearly. So yes, if a player takes the risk and makes it to constr 8 1st, I think he should be able to keep the chalice until it is taken from him.

2. The Chalice is not "unobtainable" because you cannot wish for it. Killing the person holding the chalice is a tried and true method of getting it as well. Just like killing the caster who puts up a global is another method to bring it down. You do not always need to cast dispel or overwrite it.

Many const 8 artifacts have become available every turn as races kill the holders of these artifacts in the Big Game.

Re: Wishing for snatch?
 

Right, you're going to somehow kill the guy that has the chalice, even though he's likely a Tartarian, so no remote spells can touch him, and he's got access to a lab (in a fort) that can whisk the item to any other commander in the nation, or the the completely safe lab area, or to any other nation in the game. Why don't you go ahead and kill all the guys holding those clams you hate so much while you're at it? Problem solved.

Also, a lot of nations just don't have the research potential to hit construction 8 first, even if that's the only path they researched, or nature magic to get GoH up. I think it'd be a bit unfair to completely deny them access to tart-healing.

Re: Wishing for clam snatch
 

Clamming has been greatly weakened since Dominions 2. This is the first I've seen anyone posting that it is overpowered in D3.

Are you guys talking about mega-games, or is this a normal-sized map? I can see clams being annoying in a mega-game, but:

If someone has invested in clamming in a normal-sized game, they deserve to reap the benefits if no one has put paid to them by the time they are able to drop a wish a turn from the proceeds.

Re: Wishing for snatch?
 

The Chalice is not an overpriced ring of regeneration. Very few people are likely to go galavanting around the countryside carrying it. It will mostlikely spend turns circulating amongst various forts and strongholds, where it will be almost uncapturable because: A) It will be difficult for enemies to locate the chalice before it gets spirited away to some other diseased tartarian B) the player with the chalice may not lose in a well defended province C) The mage with it may sruvive D) The commander with it may die to well crafted assassin plans, but the assassin might subsequently be killed.

Wish is highly overrated. The best wish by far, if you have 100 pearls a turn, or an alteration site, is gems. Abominations, Ehter Gates and 1000 gem nexuses are also possibly better uses of the pearls. I agree that clam hording is somewhat imba, especially for patala, who also get hammers, but wish isn't a major factor in that.

Re: Wishing for clam snatch
 

You can have a clam income of 100 a turn on a large(not mega map) by turn 60.

Re: Wishing for clam snatch
 

My point is even if the Chalice is on a race's pretender, you can take his capital and kill his pretender. If he does not want to defend his capital with his best mages and troops and artifacts-that is his business.

Re: Wishing for clam snatch
 

NO! On the turn before you storm, he puts the chalice back into the lab, or if he forged the chalice himself, uses his astral magic to teleport out.

Re: Wishing for clam snatch
 

Then you take all of his castles and labs.

I mean if you are not playing an astral race, that is your only option anyway. Why should astral races, some of the most powerful mp races anyway, get an easier path to grabbing the chalice than say MA Ulm?

Re: Wishing for clam snatch
 

There is some themetic problems with gem producing items. If in the world of dominions anyone could create these items, woudn't the world get so overpopulated with these gems that everything except astral and fire becomes irrelevant? As it is, it seems that the world naturally produces gems at a steady rate, which keeps a balance. Magical energy seems to come from somewhere. Where does it continuously come from for these items. Shouldn't they have to suck life out of the surrounding coutry side, or something equivant, in order to get the needed energy to create the pearls?

Re: Wishing for clam snatch
 

I agree with Xietor on this. Astral magic is dominating enough. It is not fair to also give it the power to steal items and summons that are the special strengths of other paths.

Re: Wishing for clam snatch
 

I only play in large game (usually full of nations for that age) and clam whordeing is almost always done by the winner(s). I'm sure it's completely ridiculous in the megagame as well. I wouldn't be surprised if LA R'lyeh and EA Oceana (each who have natural mages with the paths to forge calms) don't already have at least 75-100 clams up and running and it's only around turn 65. You usually can't compete in the late game of large games unless you invest in a clam, fever, or stone factory.

Gem producing items do not scale well. I have no problem with them in shorter games though.

And there have been complaints in quite a few MP threads and here in the forums (quite a few - do a seach).

Re: Wishing for clam snatch
 

Ok, you play large games. Isn't that a bit like complaining about the fact that Ulm sucks in the late game. If you reqularily play on maps wiht 500+ provinces, balance changes enourmously. I don't think that's the most common form of game here though.

As for complaints, I just searched the forums, and I found, uhhh, two threads on it, and assorted mentions in the MP and AAR category. Of course, there are a huge number of incidental hits. The two threads, I should note, were on a clam-related bug and the worth of empowering to forge clams. Not a huge complaint about balance. I'll try and start a poll, if I can figure the code out, to find out how unbalancing people think they are.

Re: Wishing for clam snatch
 

I cannot understand how someone may at the same time suggest that killing the
Chalice holder is a plausible way of getting it, and have a problem with clams.
I have never, ever lost the Chalice to anything but a wish, and I very seldom
get it any other way, either. Clams on the other hand, I have looted, lost,
ravaged with remote spells, etc...

As for clams being unbalanced, I'm not quite sure where I stand. I would prefer
if the chance of a clam popping a pearl was something like

NumberOfProvincesOnMap / (5 * NumberOfClamsInGame) rounded down to 1

This way, the clam income will never be too much of the total gem income, and
a player who didn't clam early will be able to weaken his enemies' clams.

But I do not dare hope that the developers will want to put time in this. I have
also found out that I do not enjoy big games at all, so I do not care much.
Anyone starting a game on a map bigger than 150-200 provinces is asking for
a late game that is in many ways out of whack.

Re: Wishing for clam snatch
 

I usually play about 14-16/provinces per player. The game considers that "medium" though in the MP world it's considered large. The average map I play on is probably around 250-310 provinces with about 20 players.

Most of the complaints are in MP threads or scattered in other threads (like this thread for example).

As far as the amount of large MP player games, true there are fewer of them but there are usually about 3-4 going on at a time (at least) and they usually involve 2-3x more players than a smaller game. The Perp game alone had 62 players - and there will be another mega game starting. I think you underestimate the amount of MP players/games that are affected by clam whoreding.

Re: Wishing for clam snatch
 

I giggle a little every time i see the title of this thread.

Re: Wishing for clam snatch
 

The more I read about the various 'combos' one can put up to win a MP game, the least I wanna play MP, apart from blitz on a small map.
Do all big MP games end up in a 'gem producing item'rush ?
I haven't played a lot of late games(I love testing everything), but it does not seem that easy to have access to all paths, or am I missing something important ?

Re: Wishing for clam snatch
 

No, you have to realize Humakt that the only thing people complain about are the extremes. The game is so complex that clever guys who spend a lot of time on it are invariably gonna find very potent combos, you can play in some newbie games until such stuff isn't so intimidating. Also, keep in mind that all the really scary stuff only comes about very late game as the game is usually about to be over and it keeps the game from dragging on forever. Plenty of games end before gem producing items can gain critical mass.

It is indeed not too hard to get access to every path by the time the map is divided into 4-5 large empires who have site searched fairly well and have hundreds of gems coming in per turn, can empower, summon most everything, forge most boosters, etc. Obviously you're not usually going to be strong in every path, but you can do a lot with a single guy able to cast spells in a path.

Re: Wishing for clam snatch
 

I'll concentrate on one game so to see one day an empire like the ones you describe.

Re: Wishing for clam snatch
 

If you're not enthusiastic about these hypotheticals, consider staying in smaller games. 15 provinces per player, max, 8 players or less.

Smaller games do have some advantages over large in fun factor. While I'm trying out a large game (for curiosity's sake), I'll probably return to playing in smaller games once thats done.

I haven't seen huge, 100 pearl factories in the games I've played in so far, though I expect that may (I'm not certain, now) change with the Big Arse (20 player) game I'm starting up, and will almost certainly be something to keep in mind with one of the 72 player megagames.

Re: Wishing for clam snatch
 

Me too.

Be careful what you wish for...just when you thing you're going to score some beaver, you end up with a badger in your shorts instead.