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Originally Posted by Micah
I disagree, rand is great.
I think a lot of the vets like the RAND format precisely because it prevents crazy ganging. Artifacts was just a continual gang-bang of whichever player was doing the best, and that's a pretty frustrating mechanic. Eliminating diplo makes playskill matter more, not less, and in normal Dominions playskill is completely eclipsed by diplomacy, so it's nice to be able to get away from that mechanic if desired.
Granted, nations could be better balanced, but Dawn Rand has some pretty interesting contenders. Sauro is down and out, and the top 3 nations are Atlantis, Ermor and Kailasa...not exactly a usual suspects list. It's not like diplo helps out the crappy nations very much either, everyone knows you're just free territory. Nation-balancing is a mod discussion, not a format discussion, although some reroll capability on nation choice wouldn't be bad to keep out some of the really out-of-line nations.
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Even with Rand, a lot still comes down to ganging up on nations. I don't think any one-on-one wars remain that way for long in MP. In Dawn RAND as I recall, Atlantis and Sauro fought a bit back and forth until large Ermorian armies arrived on the Sauro border poised to invade – soon after Sauro went into free fall. Not to say Sauro wasn’t outplayed, but its pretty tough to escape the ganging up mechanic in MP. RAND format just makes it less structured and saves the hassle of diplomacy.
btw - whatever happened to Dawn RAND - talk about a game languishing...