[Gandalf Parker]

Originally posted by DominionsFAN:
I am very new to Dominions, so I have some strategic questions:

1. What is the best combination of magic schools to make a decent pretender? Take lot of astral levels? I read something about those magic duels but I don't understand it at all.

There is no best. There is only Pros and Cons. The game has excellent balance (the opposite of "best"). Each of the magic schools has some great points to it but it depends alot on your style of play. I might say that certain choices are "best" but it would only be best because I have a certain style of play (in my case a jack of all trades going for surprise and unusual slim-chance tactics). Do you play continually aggressive barbarian horde style? Sneaky assassin style? Defensive to do alot of research style? build-up and rush out style? Diplomacy?

As far as astral there is a fairly common agreement that if you take any of it, you need to take a really good amount of it because it makes you susceptable to some attacks.

2. What is better? Recruit and summon the strongest armies what you can, or mass the weaker units?

Again this depends on your style. And "better" would depend on also who you are going up against. One of the great things about this game (and one of the irriating things) is that no one tactic works the same against all of the opponents.

3. Is it worth to take 6+ levels in a magic school -> Specialize? Or take 3-4 levels from more?

There are those who prefer both of these. The 6+ levels usually means pushing fast for a particular spell that you use really well. The other usually means doing searching for sites. Both have pros and cons often depending on the size of the map, how many opponents, are the human or AI players, etc.

4. What is the purpose of Dominion strength?

Ahhh excellent question. The dominion is represented in the game by the candles which is really a good choice. If you turn on the dominion highlighting on the map while you play a game you will see the "light" in your strong dominion areas get bright, and a spreading darkness caused by enemy dominions. The dominion is the "light of your power" spreading across the land.

The stronger that light in a province, the more benefit it recieves. The choices you made in the scales will affect more. Your prophet and your pretender both receive benefits in things like hit points. Certain spells are stnger in your dominion and some wont work at all unless your dominion is strong there.

Notice that the strength of your dominion does not have to agree with what provinces you control. A darkness inside your provinces might mean a site is affecting it which you have not yet discovered. Or it might mean that another player is pushing in toward you. Your dominion extending past your owned provinces will give you information about them such as population and defences.

5. How the supply is working exactly? Is it good to build castles in all provinces? Castles are sucking the resources away from other provinces???

Not all provinces. Im not sure if there would be a working strategy around that. I do wish the two smallest castle options were cheaper since there are races where having alot of castles quickly would be good. Generally, you can place a few castles strategically to gain more benefits than just the admin stuff. Bottleneck positions, particular local troops that you wish you had more resource points for, protecting important sites/labs/temples.

6. How can I raise the amount of the resources in a province?

Building a castle that has admin bonuses. Having certain scales kicked up and putting temples or priests there to raise the dominion strength.

This is all so far.

So far is right! heehee. Sounds like you are getting into the first phase of it all.

Sorry if I overdid the answers. Im an out-of-work Customer Support person.

[ October 07, 2003, 16:16: Message edited by: Gandalf Parker ]