Dragons in combat
 

Hi, I just created my first dragon pretender ever.

He appeared in the form of a modest druid. I supposed that as soon as I launched him in battle (attack order) he would turn into beast shape and superbly fly upon his enemies. Instead he kept his human form and leisurly strolled towards the front line, while the infantry bore the brunt of battle. The fray was over by the time he reached it.

How am I to activate the dragon form? Does the dragon pretender need to receive damage in order to change shape?

All help appreciated! :)

Re: Dragons in combat
 

they have a 'change shape' command. both in the tactical orders menu and on the strategic map.

Re: Dragons in combat
 

Re: Dragons in combat
 

crap like this is what makes dominions so great. spend an hour building a pretender, do something like this, he gets killed on the first expo(or wounded and picks up some awful affliction) and there you are.

luckily, it sounds as though no harm done here.

anyone ever have luck with dragon pretenders? i seem to get mine killed an awful lot.

would love a "dragons for dummies" post...

Re: Dragons in combat
 

you have to have awe. without awe they get killed really quick. don't bother with a dragon without a dominion of 9 unless you want to be VERY selective in your choices of provinces or unless you want to always work with allied armies.

Re: Dragons in combat
 

seriously Immac, is it that simple? cus man, i am like the dragon slayer. only problem is, i am always killing my own dragon!

Re: Dragons in combat
 

I was wondering why everybody pick the green one? Is he better than others ?

Re: Dragons in combat
 

Is that particularly Dragony, or just for any flying Pretender you intend to unleash?

Re: Dragons in combat
 

On paper? No. In theory he is the worst dragon as he brings no diversity that you can not get from indies and his breath only does damage over time. A red dragon with F4-5 would allow you access to Zmeys and such and is also quit popular.

No, the main reason why the green dragon is popular is because of a "bug" in CBM were he gets dom 2 and the other dragons only gets dom 1. (Working as intended and will not be fixed apparently) This difference is not visible when looking at the dragon. Only by choosing it and looking at the scales menu.

And dragons are perfectly viable to use without dom 9+. In fact, the reason why they only start with dom 1 is because they were intentionally designed to not need Awe. I think all dragons I have seen in MP have had less than 9 dom actually.

Re: Dragons in combat
 

Also blue dragons can have huge defense ratings because water adds to defense. And obviously the fire dragon will have huge attack rating. What does the nature dragon get? He makes supplies. So yeah, worse breath weapon and ****ty secondary effect from the magic rating so they gave him more awe.

I like the awe 9 green dragon for a turn 1 SC.

I feel they need awe but i am maybe not careful enough in choosing who they fight and who they don't when facing indies.

Re: Dragons in combat
 

The nature dragon's also worse from a bless perspective, since most of the time you're more likely to go for a high water or fire bless than a nature one.

Re: Dragons in combat
 

The green dragon has the following pros also:

N4+ is a good minor blessing for many nations, especially those with old mages.

High nature increases the regeneration you get from personal regeneration and items, so a high N high dom green dragon can get insane regeneration going, which in turn reduces afflictions immensely. At that point I think the green dragon is by far the toughest dragon to kill in friendly dominion.

If you take a secondary path for the green dragon you can take E4, which would give you a light thug bless (N4E4), and with earth power, personal regen scaled by the nature path and the protection bonus from earth it will be very hard to kill even without awe. The other dragons could do the same but not with the same synergy.

I also find nature to be a very useful path to have on a pretender, mainly because of the nice globals and GoR.

Re: Dragons in combat
 

Wow- did not realize that regen scaled with nature score.

Re: Dragons in combat
 

what about the carrion dragon? how does he match up?

Re: Dragons in combat
 

I was uncertain of the details of regen scaling with Nature magic so I tested it.

The scaling of regen with nature magic skill seems to be 1 point of regeneration per level, regardless of hitpoints. So for example a Pan with N4 casting Personal regeneration will regenerate 7 Hp per turn (10% of 27 + 4 Nature skill)

This scaling works for the spell effect and blessing, not for items.

The Path bonus is only applied once per unit, so casting personal regeneration on top of a blessing does not double the bonus. So for example a N2 Warrior sorceress with N4 blessing will get regeneration 3 (1 from bless + 2 from Nature skill), but casting personal regeneration only increases this to 4.

This actually means that it's more significant for low HP thugs like Oreiads than it is for big dudes like the green dragon, but the green dragon still gets a significant boost from it. A Green dragon with N7 (9-2) fighting in friendly dominion with Personal regeneration and Ring of regeneration clocks 40-60 regen/turn depending on dom strength. Not easy to kill with pointy objects.

Re: Dragons in combat
 

Also, the bonus is not applied to natural regeneration. So for example a ***** queen with N6 will need to cast PR to get her bonus, but when she casts it she will end up with a very high relative regen for her HP.

One possible use for this is to make "rainbow thugs" like the ***** queen and Freak lord viable. If you take relatively high Nature on them with some air you can turn them into a viable thug on the fly. For example the Freak lord with N6 gets 10 regen in neutral dominion. Also an argument to take Nature on a Vampire queen.

Strategically I'm not sure what the point is, I suppose they would site search mostly but be a viable backup thug in emergencies. Probably rarely worth it anyhow.

One more thing about the green dragon, which I find quite significant. It's mage form is stealthy, so it can sneak away from assassination spells into a neighboring province, then change shape and attack again, than sneak away etc. The carrion dragon has the same advantage too.

Re: Dragons in combat
 

What I like about Carrion Dragon and Pangaea is that Pangaea can field an entire stealth army. Mounted, infantry, mages, flyers, etc. You can use the flying scouts to find an opponent quickly in the game. Use the Carrion Dragons stealth mode to ignore the independents in between and march an army into the other guys capital. Then just change him on map command into a dragon. The next turn he and all of his followers will break stealth to attack.
SURPRISE

Disclaimer: all comments by this poster is to be considered referring to solo play unless specifically stated otherwise.

Re: Dragons in combat
 

gandy,ever try that in MP? i don't know if it'd work(you'd have an army on someone's cap, but nowhere to run/reinforce) but it'd be a ton of fun to try it

Re: Dragons in combat
 

Maybe it would work ONCE as a surprise. So it would be a maybe tactic for games where everyone thinks they know how things are going to run. But thats a really big maybe.

I think of it as more of a fun RPG thing to do in solo games. :)

Re: Dragons in combat
 

u r probably right.

but god it'd be fun to try it. especially against some uber vet who was going to annihilate me anyway.

Re: Dragons in combat
 

Someone with his early expansion locked down and unarguable?
Someone who marches pretty much everything out of his castle in the early game for maximum expansion figuring he doesnt need to worry until mid-game at earliest? Who figures he will see someone coming and can worry about defense then?

Why would such a person need to worry about Pangaea's invisible army?

The problem with it as an MP strategy would probably best be answered by some spreadsheet strategist. Im not that good with numbers so I cant quibble over the difference in costs of a few gold. I am sure that those folks can show you that the cost of creating and fielding an army that could take a castles basic defense AND be able to hold it against the returning home army MIGHT be possible but it would cripple you from actually being able to WIN the game so it is therefore a stupid strategy. :target:

Re: Dragons in combat
 

Brilliant strategy. Best I've heard. Bound to work. /wink wink/
Where do you come up with these things? And why?

Re: Dragons in combat
 

This is why I often have the most fun playing when winning is no longer an option. Once the pressure to make every turn as efficient an effective as possible is off, you can relax and focus on whatever smacks your fancy; win just one more battle, kill an adversary's favorite SC, sack the lead nation's capital...

Re: Dragons in combat
 

Yeah I still have a lot of fun in Solo play.
Breaking things down to the most efficient path to a win doesnt interest me as much as coming up with fun twists. Dom3 is great for that. Lots of mods and maps and 3rd party programs to increase solo play.

Altho to be truthful I am spending most of my time now in the new Illwinter game Conquest of Elysium 3 which seems even more so. At least I am hoping it will be. So far it is still suffering from the change of location.

Re: Dragons in combat
 

yeah. callahan and i were talking about that over on the other side. i personally don't really like efficiency/minmaxing etc. i understand it is how you become a really good player, but im not that interested in that. i just want to have fun.

unfortunately, some folks think that means you aren't playing 'right'. and i guess i understand that. if you were in a game with 5 serious players and you pulled that stunt with Pan, whoever you did it to might say, "why would you do that-you messed me up and gave yourself no chance to win-you are an idiot!!!)

my response would be "but it was FUN!!!"

but i guess if me having fun ruins it for someone else, that's no good either.

Re: Dragons in combat
 

Understood.
I have often been told what type of game dominions REALLY is, what the forum is REALLY for, and what should REALLY be done to make them that way. :rolleyes:

Since Ive been in a position to affect such things, I have tried very hard to politely listen.

Re: Dragons in combat
 

Well, usually people will want to play MP with those with a similar mindset. If 9 players out of 10 have decided on the type of game they want to play, and 1 is a troll who wants to ruin their game enters, there's clearly a conflict of interest. That's why people usually specify what sort of game it is they are hoping to play when they host a new game. :)

After all, competitive people find the most fun in playing competitively. To ruin the fun of another player is not a nice thing. If everyone else is in agreement as to what is the way to play they want to play, and have gathered around for the express purpose to play the game like that and have publicly announced it, it's incredibly rude to join their game and spoil it by playing in a way that's counter to that. It's equally rude for a super minmaxer to enter a game that's casual and leisurely, and just crush everyone with his unbeatable skill and abusing tactics.

In short, it's nice to play by the same rules as everyone else. :)

Re: Dragons in combat
 

There's no reason you can't both have fun and try to win. I've pulled off lots of fun stuff with stealthy raiders/elite forces while I'm trying to at least make a respectable showing. I'm no vet but I've had my share of victories. Stealth is extremely powerful, don't let anyone tell you otherwise.

Just don't be naive about being able to stealth entire armies around. It's just not really possible. You're going to get detected if you're moving more than a group of 10 or so units around with most leaders.

Stealthy armies just don't really work in practice. Resign yourself to that fact, and then go have lots of devious fun with Skaven's Vermin Lords, Man's powerful warden raiders, or Mothers leading teams of Moose around to hold up castle walls, or pangea's revelers leaving unrest in their wake, or flying morrigan teams plunging out of the clear sky.

Stealth is awesome and one of my favorite parts of the game, just be realistic about what it can do and can't do.

Re: Dragons in combat
 

Part of the problem seems to be that the great scouts and stealth armies of Pangaea dont mean much unless there is some extensive wilderness between the players capitals. The same with Pangaea Pan/Assassins which takes some time to do. Even their built-in preference for casting distance attacks.

OR using Caelums ability for checker-board movement. or the ability of some nations to use ships.

Most MP games are on maps too small or just not setup for such tactics. Some nations just strike me as more fun solo than effective mp. Just IMHO of course.

Re: Dragons in combat
 

If the purpose of your stealth is to be hidden, I don't really see the point in SP. The program knows where you are so the AIs know too. In MP of course it's fine.