Preparing for game delivery
 

Hello people!

As you might have read in the introductory thread I am new to Dominions and to these boards.
The game has been ordered and in the mean time I have to settle for the demo to get my D3 fix. ;)

Anyway, in order for the real meat when the game gets delivered I was wondering if there are some tips to get prepared.
Of course downloading the latest patch will be a sure thing to do, but maybe there are also 'must-have' mods to download which enhance the game one way or another, great guides to download and read and utilities to download.

Of course any advice you might have for me is more than welcome. By reading through threads on these boards I have come across dozens of abbreviations and terms which are all abracadabra! :doh: But I guess it'll all become clear in time.

I am looking very much forward to meeting some great people and playing a wonderful game!

Re: Preparing for game delivery
 

Well, for general database and what-to-do you might want to refer to lch's wiki here.

For mods, I'd suggest finding CBM 1.6 (Conceptual Balance mod), and perhaps the magic site mod, though that one is more of a personal preference. It's somewhere in the scenarios & mods forum, too lazy to dig it out at the moment.

Oh, and come over to visit the IRC if you haven't already :)

Re: Preparing for game delivery
 

The FAQ is a good place to start as a new player.
http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/showthread.php?t=33869

About abbreviations, there are a lot of them but the key ones you need to know are the magic paths:
A - Air, E - Earth, F - Fire, W - Water, S - Astral, N - Nature, D - Death, B - Blood.

And also, SC - SuperCombatant. These are commanders (usually very strong summoned ones) that when equipped with magic items are capable of defeating entire armies by themselves.

Most other abbreviations are just for specific spells or items. You will learn those over time...

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Incidentally, if you pop in, be warned it can be quite slow moving sometimes, so don't be surprised if it takes a few minutes before anyone says anything...

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If you plan to participate in multiplayer games, and you should because that´s where the fun is, get used to playing with CBM right from the start. Most MP games are using this mod. What it does is basically minor changes to make more different strategies and units viable, balancing too weak and strong nations a bit and altering a few mechanics that are considered "broken".

A good way to start learning the trade is to play some nations using the strategies outlined in any of the guides in the strategy index.

Don´t hesitate to start a newbie game yourself in the multiplayer forum if there is none recruiting.

Read the manual. Yes seriously, read the manual.

Re: Preparing for game delivery
 

Eh, I dunno about that. While I'm a big fan of CBM, I wouldnt suggest a new player use it from the get-go. They should see the game as the devs made it. Then, once they have some understanding of how things work, they can apply the mod and appreciate the changes.

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Id have to agree with IronHawk on some points.

I dont particularly like CBM but many find it an interesting variation on the game. There are also other mods which can change the games play quite abit. But the vanilla game is also fantastic. It can take up to a year to play all of the features of the game and get tired of it. Then you can decide what variations you would like to try.

As to "most MP games are using this mod" that isnt true. Altho most of the games in the IRC chat room seem to. But in general, in the mp forum, on LLama's server, and on my server it doesnt seem to be. However most of the games do seem to like the Banners, and the Worthy Heroes mods.

A couple of hints I would give:

1) The nations are all fairly unique. They each have strong and weak points. Also this game is not 1-on-1 balanced. Its more rock-paper-scissors. So dont be quick to tell us that a particular nation is unbalanced by being too strong or too weak. Chances are that later you will come back and say that you have discovered that nations particular ability vs another nation. Also what seems strong/weak has alot to do with your playing style. Try them all and find the nation that fits your style. Armored? Research? Defensive? Stealth? Barbarian Horde? When you finally decide what nations are strong and weak, dont announce it because yours arent going to match other peoples. :)

2) If you find your games too hard to win in the beginning then there are two things which can help slow down the AI. Make the maps abit larger. And set the independents to a higher setting. For some reason new players always feel that setting the indepts weaker will make the game easier. You can make smarter decisions about attacking independents than the AI can. Setting the independents stronger helps to keep the AI from swarming you early in the game.

Gandalf Parker

Re: Preparing for game delivery
 

I would definitely recommend playing with CBM. It's a great mod that really keeps your options interesting in terms of what's viable and allows for very interesting and varied play.

Re: Preparing for game delivery
 

A lot of advice, some contradictory but that's the nature of preference I guess. ;) All tips are welcome, though, so don't hesitate to throw in your 2 cents.

I received a message today that the game has been shipped. Should be here within a week I hope. :)

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Indeed. Like Gandalf said, just playing the vanilla game can keep you occupied for long, and Streamers and Standards -mod and Worthy Heroes (latter comes packaged with CBM) are very useful mods. But still, I'll have to agree with llama, I recommend playing with CBM on, since it fixes things here and there, and makes plenty of more options available for nations that might not have them otherwise. Mainly it makes few vanilla-unusable things somewhat more useful. I feel it as an important part of my games. If a MP game wouldn't use CBM, I'd think twice about joining it - but like said, it's a preference issue. There are few things I disagree with qm in CBM, but mainly it's a very solid modification to the game that enhances the gameplay.

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I'd play with CBM on from the very beginning. I can't really see any reason not to. That way you never have to go through an adjustment period when you do pick it up. It's used in a lot of MP games.

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Here's some advice which hasn't been mentioned:

1) 98% of the time ignore the arena death match because anyone you send has a good chance of dying, afflictions, curse, etc., . The arena death match is a great idea from the developers, but unfortunately the prize rarely makes it worth risking the life of a good commander/mage.

2) Never summon eater of the dead. This is another great idea from the developers, but unfortunately this creature has many disadvantages thus never worthwhile.

3) When playing with AI opponents use the map edit commands to provide AI opponents with a growth scale and luck scale... otherwise they might end up with death and/or unluck causing them to slowly suffocate.

4) During multiplayer games you'll find Diplomacy as the greatest means of attack and defense.

5) Practice building and using SCs(supercombatants)... when you find combintations which seem unbeatable then using map edit commands give those to one powerful AI opponent which starts on the opposite side of the map as you. Now you must find ways to kill these SCs because you will be facing them and others in multiplayer. A supercombatant is a single unit equipped with items which can kill hundreds of troops for multiple battles.

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The game has arrived!! I am now an official apprentice in the Dominions world! :)

What a wonderfully written manual. by the way! Great job!

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They took a suggestion.
Instead of the developers writing the manual, it was written by a player. And a NEW player at that. Devs are too deep in the game to write manuals for newbie players IMHO. Someone learning it fresh will find the questions that need to be asked, and the answers that most helped.

Even as thick as it is, it still only touches the surface. Each nation is so different that discussions of tactics and strategy would fill a book for each one. I also highly appreciate the game company providing us this forum to fill past the manual.

There is also a great new player-created wiki out there.

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Yeah well it does suit my newbie needs for now, just fine it seems.
However some pages on the manual have spots on them where the text is faded up to the point where it's unreadable.
Is this a common thing with all manuals?

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Mine has no faded text ...

Re: Preparing for game delivery
 

Mine doesn't have either. If it's a big issue (ie. lot's of important text unreadable, such as forging/spell references), I'd contact customer support. The strategies and such given in the manual are not much when compared to what you can find on the forums (namely Baalz' and others guides, discussion about game mechanics) and so on, but still they are fun to read through. And the Pretender design thoughts on page 53 should be learned thoroughly ;)

Re: Preparing for game delivery
 

I haven't gone through the whole manual yet (unsurprisingly! ;) ), but so far every other few pages have white spots in the text. Some are still readable, others aren't.
I shall go through the whole manual tomorrow and see if I should contact customer support. Its good to know that other manuals don't have this issue and it looks like a problem with printing/copying my manual.

Re: Preparing for game delivery
 

Ok the grimoire seems to be free of faded text, luckily.
The biggest spots are on the following pages:

p119 - Description of Man, Tower of Avalon
p99 - Description of Agartha
p79 - Example box 'Duration'

Then there are several smaller spots throughout the manual with faded parts of words, however these can still be read.

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You still might want to report that to Shrapnel. They should know there is a problem with their latest printing. They would probably be grateful

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If you pm me the specific passages and pages that are unintelligible I'd be willing to tell you the correct versions of them.

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Back to CBM briefly: Dudes are saying use it, other dudes are saying not to; so maybe the most important thing you need to know now is that your choice of whether to use it won't hurt you either way. And if you're gonna play against the AI, I think the effect of the mod doesn't matter too much anyway--the balance tweaks it makes will easily be swamped by the severe difference between your human abilities and the AI's abilities.

Re: Preparing for game delivery
 

I too am a newcomer here, and only just received my copy today (although the University Post Office only notified me of it after I had walked back to my housing...

Hmmm... just flipping through it, I too have some spots where the ink seems to have run dry during the printing process :(

They arn't consistent with the pages Yskonyn reported, but in mine there are random spots of faded/no text. None of them seem horribly crippling, although I am a bit disappointed as I paid for a new product... :mad:

I look forward to playing against all of you one day (one day after I get this all figured out!).

Re: Preparing for game delivery
 

Hey welcome Alehkhs!

Luckily my whole 'grimoire' section is free of printing errors. rdonj provided me with the missing texts via pm and I have updated my manual manually. (pun intended) ;)
If you like we can start up a newbie game with the help of a few other willing people?

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A newbie game would be cool! We should start a topic on it or something to fish for some other newcomers.

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There are a couple of sticky threads at the top of the multiplayer subforum about how to start a game.

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Thanks for the heads up Gandalf. I guess that will be our first stop then. ;)

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Hehe, today seems like the day to be getting dominions 3... I also got my copy today (after having it shipped all the way out here to Australia!)

I don't know if you guys have started your newbie game yet, but i'd like to get in on it if possible :) Cheers.

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No not started yet. There's quite a lot to discuss before we setup a game so it seems. Maybe we should just start a thread in the Multiplayer area of the forums to have a consolidated place to discuss our plans.

I'll open a new thread called: "First Newbie game, let's discuss how we proceed here"
Let's continue over there.

Re: Preparing for game delivery
 

Play without the mod. I was gone for two years and when I returned and played a CBM I'm lost.

Re: Preparing for game delivery
 

I too was gone for 2 years then came back, and I am sort of lost as well.

Nothing to do with CBM I think; just that dominions isn't exactly like riding a bike; I have forgotten a lot.

Luckily I have not forgotten how fun and addicting the game is.

I suggest learning the game without CBM. You can play a lot of singleplayer without it and get the hang of the game, then start understanding the modifications. It is easier to go from regular to CBM, than get used to CBM and play in an MP without it.

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Hello again FAJ! Good to see you back! I believe we were both in my first ever MP game (probably your first ever as well).

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Indeed!

Was that the one where you were sauromantia? And we tried to ally against the leader, tien'chi, and failed miserably? haha

I believe you were in both of my first MP games, one where I was abysia, one where I was shinuyama.

I am back again for another stab at abysia! This time hopefully I will not be an epic failure :D