Quick Poll: Is the production scale weak?
 

I'm just wondering about this since I see most experienced players tend not to take much production even with resource heavy nations. Gold just seems like more of a limiting factor most of the time in my experience.

Re: Quick Poll: Is the production scale weak?
 

One issue I would like to point out about the Production scale is that it, unlike almost every other scale in Dominions, is nation-dependent. There are several, if not many, nations in Dominions 3 which don't need resources whatsoever, which makes taking Sloth a comparatively easy decision. (That is, Sloth-2 or -3 still provides all the resources they need.)

By way of contrast, Order provides a very large increase in income, Luck can provide diversification options, Growth provides the same income differential as Production with a more universal ancillary benefit, and Magic is more useful for longer than Production. The Heat/Cold scale is slightly different, but one could argue that the level of income loss from that scale makes it less susceptible to optimization than the Production/Sloth scale.

Re: Quick Poll: Is the production scale weak?
 

i've read that sometimes production saves you gold because you don't have to always be building and stocking units to put together your armies; you can raise and use them quicker and so don't have as many just sucking upkeep.

Re: Quick Poll: Is the production scale weak?
 

Very nation dependent. Some nations don't seem to be viable without high Production. Such as Jomon which only has a single shieldless spearmen that costs less than 20 resources. You just can't build armies quickly enough without it.

But most nations - even those with high resource costing troops - seem to be able to take some sloth. Once your capital has all the surrounding lands resources are not usually the limiting factor except for occasiional emergency builds. So while most nations can pick Sloth and spend their points elsewhere there are some nations - like Jomon - who just seem to need maximum production.

Production does allow a lot more independent chaff to be recruited. But I doubt many people (sp or mp) see this as central to their strategy. And of course for the resource expensive stuff like Heavy cavalry and Heavy Infantry you probably have good national alternatives if you have picked a nation needing Production.

Re: Quick Poll: Is the production scale weak?
 

Hoplosternum:

But then getting awake SC pretender may be much better idea. You conquer provinces around capitol fast that way and get resources. With no provinces around it really doesn't matter if you have Prod0 or 3. And with all provinces around you do not have enough gold to use resources coming from Prod3.

Re: Quick Poll: Is the production scale weak?
 

Production lets you recruit more units, and units become weaker and weaker as time goes on. Furthermore, to get most out of production you need the provinces around your capital, which are usually enough by themselves. As such, Production is weaker than other scales by definition. It's still important for certain nations and strategies that rely on units that are heavy in resources but cheap in gold. The nations and strategies that benefit from production usually are somewhat less competitive than other options because if you need production you'll lose 120-200 points compared to nation that can go go neutral or take sloth.

There are some more nations coming in the next patch which might want to take production, though, so that might change.

Re: Quick Poll: Is the production scale weak?
 

Well I just did a SP game start with MA pyth and followed some advice I read... -2 sloth.. that sort of gives you only 5 troops/turn.. which kinda such the first 10 turns http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/images/smilies/laugh.gif

Re: Quick Poll: Is the production scale weak?
 

I think production scale should have a additional benefit.

That additional benefit could be reducing castle construction times. So prod 1 should reduce castle completion by 1 turn, prod 3 by 2 turns. So, yes that does mean a 3 turn hillfort (or whatever) only takes 1 turn to build with prod 3. Gold cost remains the same.

Re: Quick Poll: Is the production scale weak?
 

There was discussion about that already and 99% people agree that prod scale is really useless. Just few nations need them and it is just considered losing a lot of design points as a cost of playing that nation.

Re: Quick Poll: Is the production scale weak?
 

I don't like the fact that ressources 'force' you to constantly build units, regardless if you need them or not. This way I get high upkeep costs even if I don't intend to fight (yet). With gold dependent units I can build large reaction forces very fast exactly when I need them. With some nations like Ulm I found production very usefull in the early game, but in mid and late game it looses a lot of its advantages.
I'd prefer it if the resources would stack like gold. It shouldn't be a problem to build large amounts of armour pieces and store them in an armoury.

Re: Quick Poll: Is the production scale weak?
 

Other benefits high productivity could have -
a) Reduce castle build times.
b) Reduce build *costs*, for castles, labs, temples or all of the above.
c) Reduce province defense costs, or provide free periodic province defense.
d) Provide a reduction in maintanence costs for units (not commanders.)

I'd be 100% in favor of more rewards for productivity, but I don't think Sloth needs to be made any worse. There are certain positions for which Sloth is a no-brainer, but I don't think it's needed (for inter-nation game balance) to *punish* those positions.

Re: Quick Poll: Is the production scale weak?
 

I never take more than construction 1 and that is for the most resource intensive race. Usually I am a sloth -3 guy.

The one intangible is that having those resources will become obsolete pretty early in the game but can provide an early edge that builds on itself. It may also be useful when you have death - helps keep your ability to recruit (in particular elite capital units) up while population, and thus resources dwindle.

Those are all the pros I can think of. The fact is production is the first thing that gets cut in the DC budget.

I like Dr. P's suggestions to improve it.

Re: Quick Poll: Is the production scale weak?
 

Why don't we just change the gold coefficient on the scale, like I suggested before? Sure, it's not nearly as fun or cool or whatever as DrP's suggestions for it, but it's easy to implement and would help make the scale less sucktastic. 3.5% or so as opposed to 2% would make a hefty dent in its comparison to other scales IMO.

Re: Quick Poll: Is the production scale weak?
 

Luck/Production is a pretty good combination, though. The castle events might need order, but traders' guilds and mine events are pretty common, and both produce permanent increase of income.

Tien Chi already has Order-based Conscription ability that slowly increases PD. It might or might not be easy to implement similar, Production-based ability for all nations.

Re: Quick Poll: Is the production scale weak?
 

The problem with resources is that mages are recruited with gold at castle labs built with gold. I think building castles with resources instead of gold might be a good thing. Stone is even more local then weapons after all.

Re: Quick Poll: Is the production scale weak?
 

In most cases, even with resource intensive nations, the answer is to build more castles and/or build one an iron mine. So as is, it's really only usefull if you have cap-only resource heavy units and/or for the rare heavy metal quick start plan. Micah's suggestion seems like the easiest fix, though the castle suggestions would be more fun.

I've strained my brain trying to think of a another thematic additional effect, and auto-PD build is the only thing i came up with. TC has that as a dominion benny, so there's some code for that already, but i dont' have any idea if would be easy to implement.

Re: Quick Poll: Is the production scale weak?
 

One other possibility is just to play with a lower resource multiplier. Sloth hurts worse and productivity is less likely to be excess, for everyone. (Except nations that *really* never need resources, like Yomi or LA Ermor. But it's thematic for them to have sloth anyway.)

I think the most fundamental problem is the obsolescence of troops, and therefore resources, in the later game, while gold is good for everything, all the time, at all stages of the game. Tougher research combined with lower base resource production and a high indy strength (high enough to endanger awake SC-pretenders that try to solo provinces unequipped, and to force almost everyone to have some losses that need regular reinforcement) could make sloth's slower starts really dangerous. The resulting game would have the emphasis shifted away from late-game SC and spell combo strats toward early expansion and getting the most out of troops and low-level spells, though, which some players might not like.

Or, of course, you could just make troops cheaper or mages more expensive in gold; the fact that IW didn't do that along with changing the base resource/supply amounts is largely (IMO) responsible for the fact that troops vs. mages decisions haven't shifted as much since Dom I/II as you might otherwise expect. You *can* make many more troops now, but it's still not necessarily a good idea compared to using Dom 3's more abundant gold to simply make even more mages.

Re: Quick Poll: Is the production scale weak?
 

Resources sort of *are* gold.

If you boil all issues down to survivability and killability, a 10GP/20Res unit is far better than a 10GP/1Res unit. So you could view a Res-heavy unit as worth X Res-light units. In every game I've played in even in the midgame there are still large armies being thrown around. Shields and armour are still making troops more survivable from all manner of spells, arrows and so on, and decent weapons are still enabling troops to kill enemies faster.

Consequently res-intensive units save you gold because you need fewer units to make an effective army, and save more money because you don't have to replace losses to the same extent. That money can go to castles, mages, and all the other funky things money can buy.

Yes, Res becomes steadily less useful as the game goes on. But it allows you to pack more punch for an equivalent gold cost (or pack the same punch for less gold), which makes it potentially a very useful tool for a head start.

Re: Quick Poll: Is the production scale weak?
 

High resource troops don't necessarily survive longer at all stages of the game. All the armor in the world won't help if you run up against AN attacks like R'yleh's and heat and cold auras will still kill your troops, not to mention SCs and thugs. Ulm has really high resource high protection troops, but they will still be squashed by tramplers. A lot of times low resource, high damage units might be more appropriate.

Armor works some of the against some things. Sometimes it's better to have blockers like MA R'yleh's 5GP/1Res Lobos. And units with natural protection like crab hybrids and hydras are fairly durable while only costing 1 resource. Of course, high resource troops can be useful, but since you have to mass them over many turns, you'll have to pay upkeep and you will have to plan ahead to have enough troops on the field.

There are pros and cons to high resource troops and productivity, but it's hard to say that resources are nearly as useful as gold the way the game is right now. If castles had to be built with resources, as others have mentioned, production might be useful.