[Loren]

3 games so far against the AI:

#1: I got rush by Ermor. While I could deal with him I found myself too far behind in the expansion and threw in the towel.

#2: Strange--everyone declared war on me on turn #1. Perhaps a relic of the previous game not cleared out of memory??? Again, I found myself right next to Ermor. He didn't go for me right away but he spreads like cancer. Most of my territory was taken from Ermor and not all that productive, I wasn't in position to deal with the two others that came at my capital from the opposite direction.

#3: Finally, I didn't start next to Ermor! (I've always been weak at the initial expansion in 4x games.) It turns out I was hemming in Caelum and Ulm, they both went to war. My dragons made quick work of them. On the other side was R'yleh, I went on a temple-building rampage to keep their insanity at bay. (I *HATE* their dominion!) At this point I was in the SE corner and had a mostly water border with Atlantis expanding through the water. Someone was to the north, I forget who, this was peaceful. My contact with R'yleh was on a narrow front to the NW, there was a little empire to the W and Atlantis was on land to the SW.

I was doing ok in the research department but the lack of boosters hurt--I didn't have the gems to blow on empowerment and needed cauldrons to feed those hungry dragons. My imprisoned oracle finally showed up (yeah, you suggest dragon pretenders--this race doesn't need an awake SC, I wanted the points for scales.) and I had less need of astral so I empowered him to 5 to make a ring of sorcery so I could forge cauldrons. No sooner had I done this than a plague dragon showed up in my capital--he can make them without boosters.

Thus the game sort of settled down. I was making army groups with 36 bone biters, the guy in charge had a wineskin and cauldron, this grouping need not worry about supply.

I finally push my dominion across the last territory of the little empire to the west. (Why he was still alive I don't know, he must have had a candle somewhere. The game needs to tell us *WHOSE* dominion is in a province, not just friendly/enemy! This is especially important when it's R'yleh dominion!) I have enough groups available that I pounce on every province he has. Two turns later he's gone.

Atlantis decides to get frisky. Next turn half is land is gone, two more turns and he only has a couple of land provinces left--then he pops. (The fact that I had leapfrogged over some of his territory and claimed a few indies and put temples on them probably helped kill him off this way.)

At this point I still have the peaceful contact to the north and war with R'yleh, no other neighbors. My temples are pushing his dominion back, every province that goes white I take. This is going easy but I don't really want to open a new front yet.

My neighbor to the north pops. I send in my dragons and claim 90% of the land and what do I find but Ermor. Strangely enough he's not the big cancer he usually is. He picks a fight anyway, though. I'm producing about one new group per month at this point and I send each group after him. I'm sort of surrounding Bogarus in this and he pops, also. Soon after I finish claiming that territory I finish off Ermor.

Jomon decides to come after me at this point despite being a bit player. This war takes longer because I don't know what black candles are his and what belong to R'yleh.

At this point I have driven R'yleh off the land and have quite a few candles in his water although I don't attempt to take the water. I have up Gift of Health and just put up Gift of Nature's Bounty and I'm summoning the big guys in the capital. (I have not cast a single battlefield spell, nor made any equipment beyond food. I decide I can squander gems to get to the good guys.) My neighbors are R'yleh, Arco (peaceful), C'tis (peaceful) and a little empire in the NE corner. I decide to munch it. I take all the provinces not being seiged by C'tis and get:

Nagot gick fel!
myloadmalloc: can't open ./mods/./dominions 3000/3020_Dragon_Of_Fate_1.tga.

I assume this is a summoning gone wrong.


Comments:

1) I have a problem with the PD. It's got a powerful commander with wimpy units. This results in routs when it could win, making it weaker than the force mix would say.

2) I think the combat power is too great. Other than those bad starts it's been basically a cakewalk. I have yet to lose a commander other than to deliberate suicide. (I was getting rid of a few R'yleh had messed up.) I have had only two forces rout, both when facing pretenders--and in one of those I won anyway.

3) The slot limits make the magic on the commanders less useful than their apparent ability would say and it feels too weak given the theme.

4) The vine dragon shares an image with the non-magic commander.

5) I'm not sure what's up with the ghost dragon assassination. Never once did it actually assassinate anyone, although it's possible this was just bad luck and there weren't any commanders there to hit.

What I would do:

1) Increase the cost of at least the bone biters.

2) Do something to improve the dragon's magic a bit. Perhaps this should take the form of race-specific boosters that fit in misc slots. (Can you do race-specific magic items?)

3) What would be really interesting if it can be done is a spell "Age Dragon". Each dragon would have a set of forms (not the usual Dominion's multiple forms, though) that it would age through. Cast the spell on a dragon and you get one of the next age. (I'm thinking it would really get rid of the old one and make a new one of the new type.) Perhaps this should only be self-targeted, although this would require having multiple spells. This would replace the summons.

4) I'm not sure what to do with the PD.