Multiplayer - which nations are being chosen?
 

I am not sure if this has been done before but I have started to go through the multiplayer games listed in the forum to see which powers are most often chosen to be played in each age.

I am not sure that this information is of any use other than interest and of course it is not complete yet.

People do not always pick the most powerful nation (in their opinion) but from the data there are certainly some nations that are far more popular than others and few that are extremely unpopular. And I am sure that I am not the only one who has wanted to join a game but seen that the nation I wanted to play (and often my 2nd, 3rd and 4th picks too) had already gone. So I am interested to see if people in general pick the power nations (Good double bless nations, nations powerful in astral or blood etc.) or if any other trends would appear.

So far I have only looked at the first three pages of the multiplayer forum, but I intend to continue on and go further back. This sample includes many of the newbie games set up by Llamabeast and others in the New Year. I have made no distinctions between newbie games and those with more experienced players.

Apart from Blitz style games (which are completely excluded from these numbers) I have also excluded some other games from the analysis. This is because what I am interested in is people’s choices. So where the choice was very limited I have excluded the game. So the following types of games were excluded:

1) Games that had the nations assigned randomly to the players. Obviously the players made no personnel choice in this case on which nation to pick.

2) Games that included nearly all the nations in an age. The people choosing last would obviously have little choice and many people will play if the time/game is right regardless of what nation they have. But I am interested in who people want to play. There was no hard limit here. The eras have different numbers of powers and many LA games exclude Ermor and R’lyeh as well so limiting choice.

3) Games that were not yet full up. As these may be added to the data later I have not included these.

4) Games that spanned multiple ages. There were few of these in any case and I think they make the game play quite differently. The advantage of certain LA nations is their magic diversity or of EA nations is their armour or better bows that is lost if you play against other era nations where they can become merely average or even bad in those areas in comparison. Plus my analysis was on an age by age basis so these would have messed this up http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/image...ies/tongue.gif

There were games that I have included but the options may change people’s picks. I do not think any changes the game radically enough to fundamentally influence the nation choices. Some make nations more viable but I don’t think that players are purely power gaming when choosing nations. These include the following:

1) Significant mods such as CBM and Epic Heroes. Apart from Worthy Heroes games with mods seemed rather rare. CBM mod certainly makes a lot of changes and could make some nations more interesting or powerful (LA Pangaea for example by restoring the Carrion Woods). But it does not radically alter the nature of many nations, perhaps only LA Pangaea? It tweaks rather than balances the nations in most cases as it does not radically affect magic paths on national mages or drastically nerf or boost national troops.

2) Research speeds and indie strengths. Both can change the game and make some choices better or worse. But there were few of these and the changes were not extreme in most cases. Indie 6 rather than indie 9 etc. Hard rather than Very Hard research.

3) Team games were included unless they failed on one of the above four tests (which most did fail on). Some nations can be weak on their own but be far better in multiplayer, specifically those that have slow starts wcan be shielded to a degree in a team game. But not all team, games even place the teams together so I am not sure how significant this would be so I have included them where possible.

4) Games with mod nations. I have not included the mod nations themselves in the numbers and these games were rare. But I do not think a mod nation in the game drastically changes which nations others will pick. No more than the presence of other sea or blood nations (in particular) influences a player’s selection of another. So I have included the none-mod nations in the figures.

5) Games with a small amount of exclusions or certain picks. Especially the LA games that ban Ermor and R’lyeh, but there were some games that insisted on a certain number of sea nations etc too. While these obviously influence the picks (or none picks) of these nations they probably don’t affect the choice of the other 10 or so other nations so I have included them all.

6) I have included the ‘new’ nations such as Bogarus and Hinnom. Although in some cases these were not available when the games started. So especially with these the figures are suspect. Sometimes they could not be picked and then once they could be everyone wants to try them.

Games included and the results to follow....

Re: Multiplayer - which nations are being chosen?
 

The games analysed so far

Apologies in advance for the inevitable mistakes I have made. I have largely trusted the initial post on which nations were in the game as usually this is updated with the final list. Please let me know if you see any mistakes or games you think should be excluded. Table reads Shortened game name / Age / Number of eligible nations

Peccary EA 8
Jotunland EA 10
Glory MA 15
Crow Road MA 10
BlitzKrieg EA 8
TucoTuco MA 8
FreshMeat EA 10
Darwin EA 12
Stasis MA 17
Aquarium MA 15
Bering EA 7
Beer EA 17
Corruption LA 11
Playtime EA 12
Primea MA 12
Feohtan EA 12
Tigerstripes MA 10
DkParadise EA 8
Silvan MA 8
Strolling 2 EA 12
LA game LA 14
Paladin EA 8
Alexandria LA 12
Forseti MA 12
Vanilla LA LA 11
Newbtopia EA 8
Mega'rium MA 9
EmpiresRis MA 8
Ascendant EA 15
Acouchi MA 16
NEW EA EA 18
Uakari MA 9
Victoria LA 15
New Dawn EA 12
LeafNBat EA 8
Fracture LA 16
Manatee EA 16
FrMeat2 EA 12
FunnelBat MA 8
FruitBat EA 8
VesperBat LA 15
GhostBat MA 8

Re: Multiplayer - which nations are being chosen?
 

The results so far

The below results tables read Nation / number of times played/ Quantum Mechani’s amalgamated nation rating. The last figure is of QM’s total points rating (adding his valuation of Early/Mid/Late/SP & Ease of MP use). This is purely for interest sake and although not created for this purpose gives some indication of how powerful the nations are relative to each other.

The EA gave the most games so far (20) and here are the scores:

Lanka - 16 - Not rated (!)
Sauromatia - 15 - 14
Niefelhiem - 13 - 23
Arco - 12 - 14
Fomoria - 11 - 16
Marverni - 11 - 11
Helhiem - 10 - 21
Mictlan - 10 - 19
Pangaea - 10 - 15
TC - 10 - 13
Hinnom - 9 - 19
Aby - 9 - 15
Tir an Og - 9 - 15
Caelum - 9 - 14
Agartha - 9 - 14
Ermor - 8 - 16
Kailasa - 8 - 14
C'tis - 8 - 13
R'lyeh - 8 - 13
Ulm - 7 - 13
Vanhiem - 6 - 18
Oceania - 5 - 17
Atlantis - 5 - 15
Yomi - 2 - 14

So Lanka is the most popular from the games I looked at, followed by Sauromatia, then Niefel. Yomi was spectacularly unpopular. Nor did Vanheim or many of the Water nations prove popular picks. Apart from R’lyeh the water nations were unpopular in other eras too.

For the MA nations there were less games but it was still a popular age with 15 games

Vanhiem - 11 - 20
Abysia - 11 - 15
Ulm - 10 - 13
TC - 10 - 13
R'lyeh - 9 - 17
Pangaea - 9 - 15
Bandar Log - 9 - 15
Ermor - 8 - 22
Pythium - 8 - 17
Arco - 7 - 18
Eriu - 7 - 15
Mackaka - 7 - 14
Caelum - 7 - 14
C'tis - 7 - 12
Agartha - 7 - 10
Jotunhiem - 6 - 19
Marignon - 6 - 15
Mictlan - 6 - 15
Shinuyama - 5 - 16
Oceania - 4 - 18
Atlantis - 4 - 13
Ashod - 3 - 16
Man - 3 - 14

Perhaps no surprise that Vanheim was the joint winner in the popularity stakes but Abysia being picked so often surprised me. Ulm and TC were both surprisingly popular as neither are exactly powerhouses although TC’s magic variety makes them interesting to play.

Ignoring the new nation, Man and none R’lyeh water nations were unpopular. Yomi’s MA stable mate Shinuyama was also fairly unpopular.

In the LA there were far fewer games. Only 7 made the cut. And of these most had a lot of nations playing so it is hard to tell how popular the choices actually were. Also Ermor and R’lyeh are low due to being excluded from 2 of the 7.

So for completeness I have included the figures for LA but little can be drawn from them.

Utgard - 6 - 20
Mictlan - 6 - 17
C'tis - 6 - 14
Abysia - 6 - 13
Bogarus - 6 - 13
Pangaea - 5 - 18
Marignon - 5 - 17
TC - 5 - 17
Patala - 5 - 12
Ulm - 5 - 11
Jomon - 5 - 10
Ermor - 4 - 24
Agartha - 4 - 18
Arco - 4 - 17
Caelum - 4 - 16
Man - 4 - 15
Atlantis - 4 - 12
R'lyeh - 3 - 22
Pythium - 3 - 14
Midgard - 2 - 19
Gath - 1 - 17

[Edited for formatting]

Re: Multiplayer - which nations are being chosen?
 

Very interesting stuff! http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/images/smilies/laugh.gif Some of the results surprise me a little, including the fact that 5 of 7 LA games allowed Ermor and R'lyeh. http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/image...ies/tongue.gif

Re: Multiplayer - which nations are being chosen?
 

Interesting!

I wondered about this just a few days ago, and then you make this list http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/images/smilies/happy.gif

Jim, likely they were started before the discussion on power levels started in full earnest.

Re: Multiplayer - which nations are being chosen?
 

I believe that it is likely that a nation gets additional players when it gets a remake, minor or major. People want to try new stuff out.

Marverni, Ulm, TC have all received alterations after the MP games started. As have MA Mictlan with 6 players, which was more than I thought it would have.

Yomi is possibly the one nation I am most bothered by myself. I played it a bit in Kingmaker to get some inspiration. I have some Ideas, but they require JK's attention. Apart from that I'm a bit bothered by their appearence. I dislike their looks. Not individually as much as a bunch of units.

Re: Multiplayer - which nations are being chosen?
 

Interesting. I'm surprised to see Hinnom scoring so high since the nation is a very recent addition. I suppose they'll end in the top 5 within some months.

As for Yomi, I am also surprised by their impopularity. I found this nation very fun, although rather difficult to play. And I'm eagerly curious to hear more about your ideas for the Oni Kings, KO http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/image...ies/tongue.gif

Re: Multiplayer - which nations are being chosen?
 

i wanna give yomi a whirl too. i love their concept and they actually look like a lot of fun. plus i love playing underplayed nations, and finding ways to make them work. consequently, i hate playing the "superpowers", and really don't like it when people choose them in MP games, unless they are real new (i've noticed, though, that most players are this way, vets tend to shy from the 'strong' nations, and newer players often jump on them).

i think the main thing that turns people away from yomi is the fragility of their units combined with their high price; their all demons with low protection and often not good enough MR to really stand up to a lot of banishing or demon smiting. yomi just loses too easily in the wars of attrition.

I think what would make them tons more attractive is giving their main researcher +1 RP and all demon troops +1 to +2 MR. Units are a little more robust to banish/smite demon and players have the option of taking a drain scale to help them even more. As is, they are too easy to banish, and their researchers are so terrible that a drain scale is suicide.

Re: Multiplayer - which nations are being chosen?
 

KO

I'm playing yomi in a new MP game, it's a newb game and I was about to play Hinnom there but llamabeast pointed out that that might not be entirely fair... well I've only gotten weak games so far so I don't really think I'm a good player but anyway I decided to go for a nation I didn't know and which looked weaker than Hinnom... so I got Yomi.

Yomi.. what can I say, personally I think they really suck.. their troops are weakish (and this is WITH CBM) and their mages not that good for EA. The Dai-oni is nice.. but then again very much GC, and probably not as good a SC as other with the same price and no other very good battle mage.

I also think that for a demon nation there isn't much incentive to buy demon troops. that should be changed. The ghost thing is nice but the ghosts are so weak that once they are ghosts most troops die anyway (seems like the etherealness doesn't really help them at all.

Personally I do like the background and my 2 advices would be
1. improve the oni
suggestions on this
- give the flame throwers more range and more ammo so you can actually USE them as archers and when in close as combat troops
- a bit better precision wouldn't be bad either http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/images/smilies/laugh.gif
- AOE damage is another option but probably to much
- +1 MR for oni
2. strengthen the ghosts (of course this also buffs the oni in total so balance is an issue there)
- maybe more HP as ghost
- give them flying and low morale so they break fast but the troops can flee ASAP and live?
- random ghosts with once in a while a very strong one?
3.
maybe buff the mage a bit with a random
4.
cheaper dai oni OR lower enc OR magic weapon

Of course not all changes... that would maybe even overpower them (though not likely) but a selection

new pics are never a bad thing http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/images/smilies/laugh.gif
a whole new troop isn't bad either, I'm not much into oni, but a chinese dragon oni would be nice http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/images/smilies/laugh.gif

Re: Multiplayer - which nations are being chosen?
 

You should factor in that many new nations have been added in patches and the games have started before they were available. Then again, people tend to pick the new nations in games as soon as they become available just to try them out. So, besides being a nice statistic, I wouldn't start drawing any conclusions from these lists.

Re: Multiplayer - which nations are being chosen?
 

I would just like to say the most popular nation at the moment is Hinnom by along way.

Its being snapped up first in most games and games are being started just so players can play Hinnom in MP.

So, please leave Hinnom alone for a few patches before hitting it with the nerf stick.

Also, proof positive that people like powerful races and not neutered balanced ones (translates to boring).

Re: Multiplayer - which nations are being chosen?
 

Not necessarily. MA Ulm is one of the most played races of its era, which tells either that new/remodeled nations get chosen more often or that even weak nations are played. In addition, both MA Vanheim and MA Ermor are commonly chosen, and both of those nations' sacreds have been "neutered balanced".

Re: Multiplayer - which nations are being chosen?
 

Interesting post Hop.
-SSJ

Re: Multiplayer - which nations are being chosen?
 

I think MA Ulm gets played because there is a myth that it is a good choice for new players since you don't need to deal with as much complexity with magic. At least that was why I chose it for my first MP game (before it got the upgrade). I actually disagree that it is good for noobs since you don't learn as much without access to more magic / communions / path boosting, etc.

Re: Multiplayer - which nations are being chosen?
 

MA Ulm is a very hard nation to play competitively as it leaves no room for mistakes. Less options and you have to do perfect with those you've got.

Re: Multiplayer - which nations are being chosen?
 

Excellent work. And very useful.
Thank you.

Re: Multiplayer - which nations are being chosen?
 

I think my very first race that I started playing in both SP and MP has been Ulm, mostly because it fits the medieval theme so very well. And the ulmish soldiers definitely waltz through indies with very little opposition. That they have very big drawbacks, too, was something I found out later in MP.
MA Ermor's vestals are just very very good. But while I think that EA Vanheim is quite strong, MA Vanheim doesn't really get me excited because they seem less powerful.

Re: Multiplayer - which nations are being chosen?
 

Even before the 3.10 change?

* MA van home only. Gold cost increase.

Any way, I was just pointing out that ALL of the players who chose Hinnom might not have done it (only) because it's powerful. New nations get chosen a lot, even if they are weak, although there aren't that many weak new nations.

Re: Multiplayer - which nations are being chosen?
 

Thanks for the kind words and I am glad some of you are finding it interesting.

I have gathered some more data but I am going to gather up some more before I add to the figures. Not much changes with the new addition although Yomi does get a few more picks and MA Vanheim loses it's MA leader crown (so far!).

Many of the more recent games have a lot of inexperienced mp players in being newbie games. MA Vanheim is a pretty straight forward nation to play and so is likely to appeal there. I know when I chose them it was to try a mp game with one of the much vaunted double bless strategies and they seemed a very easy one to try it with. I wasn't expecting to win and was eliminated fairly early. So even if the nerfs have made it far less of a powerhouse it is still a fairly straight forward power to play.

Another trend that becomes clearer the more games I add is the unpopularity of Atlantis and Oceania. Even in EA they are far less popular than the weaker R'lyeh. In the MA R'lyeh's popularity is perhaps more understandable. But even in EA it is much more popular. Perhaps it is the theme? Or maybe the ease of use of the mind blasting amphibious missle troops they have that makes them so much more popular?

Re: Multiplayer - which nations are being chosen?
 

I think Rlyehs popularity is probably down to the powerful astral magic it has, especially in Ea.

Obviously in Ma/La the 'gate thing' which you can enter to bring creatures back from the void is a huge attraction.

Ea/Ma Atlantis have problems with 'poor' troops and high encumberance.

Ea/Ma Oceania suffer from losing mage levels, suck really bad on land and if clams/fever fetishes have been nerfed are virtually completely pointless to play.

Re: Multiplayer - which nations are being chosen?
 

I think that just what nations HAVE been chosen isn't a full indicator of popularity. While I can't think offhand of how to rate which nations were chosen first, while others were taken only as 2nd/3rd pick, it would be probably good to include.
Also, I can attest that TucoTuco, e.g., was initially started with no water nations. It's possible that a possibility of such starts itself speaks for something - maybe about weakness of Oceania, as was said. But it surely subtracts from their popularity index...

Re: Multiplayer - which nations are being chosen?
 

it'd be interesting to see a whole host of water nations designed, and then maps with the land/water ratio reversed; add some additional underwater land types.

that would actually be more realistic. right. earth is 75% water. Shouldn't dom3 earth be too? coincidentally then, dom3 earth should have lots more underwater denizens; given that they have underwater civilization and culture.

looks like the nature of our existence flavors our fantasy, even when conditions in our fantasy logically dictate other than what our own fantasy is.

Re: Multiplayer - which nations are being chosen?
 

Actually, Earth being about 75% water-covered doesn't mean anything for fantasy universe. That's the same as most fantasy authors place their adventures in the North hemisphere of their worlds. Just an economy of thought (sp?). Actually, fantasy world can have almost no seas and even be a Mars-like desert one.
What I agree with is that more aquatic nations would be fun - but I guess that there are just not much good ideas of such in the developers' minds at the moment. And I don't remember much mod nations which are aquatic, too... It's possible that some Polynesian folklore would be helpful, but I don't know this enough...

Re: Multiplayer - which nations are being chosen?
 

I do have one aquatic nation in mind, but it's not very high on the agenda atm

Re: Multiplayer - which nations are being chosen?
 

it's a good post.

But i think instead of adding QM total score to the nations, you should add only the first 3 scores (leaving "easy to learn" an "easy to play" behind) if you want to show a hint of "how powerful they are". A nation that score 5-5-5-1-1 is way more powerful than a nation that score 1-1-5-5-5, and both get 17 points.

Yomi is the best example of how "coolness" is not such a popularity factor when playing MP. I cant think of a nation "cooler" than Oni Kings. But they are perceived as a rather weak nation (being weak or not, they are perceived as such), and therefore they are left for last pick. Nobody want's to start a MP just to be trampled to death in turn 9 before you can even start to self buff Dai Onis.

Re: Multiplayer - which nations are being chosen?
 

Well, I must disagree to that. I personally don't like Oni Kings at all, as well as Jomon. The first one could be interesting to try, but I don't like Japanese folklore much.
For "coolness" factor I would rate Helheim most high, or probably EA Pangaea. EA and LA Ulm being close behind. Though this is for separate thread... http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/images/smilies/wink.gif

Re: Multiplayer - which nations are being chosen?
 

EA Mictlan, Agartha and Abysia (and maybe TC) - and LA Ermor and R'lyeh, on the way to ascension by coolness to me http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/images/smilies/wink.gif

Re: Multiplayer - which nations are being chosen?
 

Caelum, Mictlan, Ermor and Agartha are my very cool nations. Across all ages.

Agartha is considered on the weak side in MP but the excellent storyline/theme and good summons make Agartha cool. http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/images/smilies/cool.gif

Re: Multiplayer - which nations are being chosen?
 

Maybe a way to increase the appeal on aquatic nations could be to add some spells/items allowing a certain amount of aquatic troops to become amphibians ?

Re: Multiplayer - which nations are being chosen?
 

Yes, a bigger version of amulet of the fish which allows sea only units access to the land.

Also, perhaps a new ability on leaders that allow them to bring a set amount of sea units on dry land.

Even if they get poor amphibian, it would be alot better.

Sometimes as a sea nation you are praying for a bad random event where 1 of your provinces gets attacked. So you can feed your unneeded and expensive upkeep sea only troops in to it slowly. Just to get rid of them.

Re: Multiplayer - which nations are being chosen?
 

Yeah a lot of people have asked for something like that, allowing aquatic only units to get on land in the mid-late game. A global or an item basically.

Re: Multiplayer - which nations are being chosen?
 

The best (obviously absolutely IMHO) thing discussed about this matter so far is Thetis' Blessing working both ways, really. It opens so many strategic possibilities my mind just blows. But I don't wanna go off-topic http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/image...es/biggrin.gif

Re: Multiplayer - which nations are being chosen?
 

Interesting. Lanka came out pretty high.
I wonder if its one of the nations that can be duplicated by MOD. Then I could offer Lanka-vs-Lanka blitz games.

Re: Multiplayer - which nations are being chosen?
 

It can't quite be done, because of the reanimation.

Well actually it could - you'd just have to base the copy nation on MA Ermor.

Re: Multiplayer - which nations are being chosen?
 

yeah but the massive amount of sea surface has an important role in sustaining life... not the least of which is acting as a carbon sink.

without it, it is hard to speculate how any human-like lifeforms could exist. Since dom3 fantasy, and basically 95% of all fantasy for that matter, is based around human-like life, it seems quite necessary to have a large sea.

Guess I'm just nitpicky http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/images/smilies/happy.gif
its like the time one of George Lucas' writers or actors or somebody pointed out that one of his alien species was physically impossible to explain, and asked how him how it could possibly exist; he replied "well, it was a long time ago, in a galaxy far far away..."

EDIT:
also, at any rate, it would be fun to have games with different dynamics than current. underwater has little to no missile fire, lots of stabby weapons (daggers, spears, and harpoons) nets, poison, very little non-natural armor, and whole different types of magic use. would make for completely different types of balance. I think it might be a lot of fun to experiment and play with

Re: Multiplayer - which nations are being chosen?
 

I have not read the whole thread:

The only game I am in now where i chose the race I took MA Pythium.

Re: Multiplayer - which nations are being chosen?
 

Reverse thetis' blessing is really unlikely to ever happen, partly because it doesn't really make sense. The problem is, conceptually there are only two ways it would work. 1) by flooding the surface world with water while simultaneously causing all creatures on the map to be capable of breathing water, or 2) by physically altering all aquatic-only creatures so that they can breathe air and actually move on land. Now, option 1 almost sounds viable until you realize that for it to be true, it makes no sense that there wouldn't be a version of the spell that doesn't cause air-breathers to breathe underwater.... Option 2 would require too much dev-work, creating new sprites and forms for the aquatics to take, so that's pretty unlikely.

That's part of why I suggested a quasi-domelike flood spell in another thread, you could imagine raising the water level enough that an aquatic creature with no means to get around on dry land could at least be there, and without drowning and killing everyone in the province.

Re: Multiplayer - which nations are being chosen?
 

I don't know how you'd possibly have enough water to allow aquatic creatures to get around on land without killing everyone there.

Just a little bit of water goes along way to killing things. And just a little bit of water ain't near enough to let aquatic creatures survive.

I don't know why reverse thetis makes any less sense then normal thetis. The only reason we can't breath water is because our bodies use more oxygen than gills can possibly draw in through water. So thetis must magically enhance lungs to allow them to draw in massive amounts of oxygen from water. Now you face the problem of the fact that water probably doesn't hold enough oxygen for that to even happen. So Thetis has to make the water magically hold more oxygen. Now oxygenated water has different bouyancy, and nothing could float or swim in it. So thetis magically makes water retain its same bouyancy despite all the extra oxygen. Let's not get into the matter of magically creating oxygen and how that relates to conservation of mass and energy.

Given all that magical finagling. I think a reverse thetis is quite imaginable. It would actually take far fewer broken laws of nature to accomplish. In fact, all you need to do is magically keep gills from every drying out, and they would pull oxygen out of air just fine. You also need to give the fishy people legs.

EDIT: this also gets into the fact why no underwater species with higher thought functions than an octopus ever evolved, despite that fact that life has been present in water far longer than on dry land. Also why mammalian aquatic creatures, like dolphins, are the most intelligent; since they actually breath air. Basically, the amount of oxygen in water is not enough to support higher brain functions. Thinking, it appears, requires a lot of air.

Re: Multiplayer - which nations are being chosen?
 

Giving the fishy people legs is all well and good until you have to start making 4-legged shark knights and fungi.

Re: Multiplayer - which nations are being chosen?
 

maybe it could give them hover powers and cause the air around their bodies to be the same viscosity as water.

Re: Multiplayer - which nations are being chosen?
 

To Omnirizon:
Yes, making gills work in air is actually relatively simple. As for lungs underwater - well, they have enough area to emulate gills - the main problem (besides lung surface is adapted in different way than gills' ) is that breathing muscles are too weak to regularly move water back and forth... but this can be fixed in a number of ways.
As for carbon sink - swamps can do this work quite well... and actually they did it in some eras. I don't want to go into calculations now, but there are possibilities to have human-like creatures on a planet with less active water surface than Earth has - even without making universe with slightly different physical laws... and fantasy worlds are such by definition. And as for Lucas - iirc he actually placed some marks in the film which say that SW universe is also slightly different from our own... http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/images/smilies/wink.gif

Re: Multiplayer - which nations are being chosen?
 

My house rules give Yomi troops furs (average Prot is then ~10, but it adds 1 to enc) and decreasing morale of the spirit form so they run away to fight another day. Also, slightly improved Precision to help their aimed attacks (because immortal demons have time to practice). Seems to work pretty well.

-- Improved Onis.
-- Better precision, wears furs, lower morale on spirit form.
#selectmonster 1275
#mor 6
#prec 11
#end
#selectmonster 1274
#prec 11
#armor "Furs"
#end

#selectmonster 1273
#mor 6
#prec 11
#end
#selectmonster 1272
#prec 11
#armor "Furs"
#end

#selectmonster 1261
#mor 6
#prec 11
#end
#selectmonster 1260
#prec 11
#armor "Furs"
#end

#selectmonster 1265
#mor 6
#prec 11
#end
#selectmonster 1264
#prec 11
#armor "Furs"
#end

#selectmonster 1267
#mor 6
#prec 11
#end
#selectmonster 1266
#prec 11
#armor "Furs"
#end

#selectmonster 1317
#mor 6
#prec 11
#end
#selectmonster 1316
#prec 11
#end

-Max