[Squirrelloid]

Originally Posted by Amadamus

My point is these spells propose a gamey element not that they can't be used or countered.

So you're saying there's no way, in world, a mage couldn't contact a powerful being and send it to kill an enemy commander? Or try to find his mind from afar and snuff it? Seriously, they make as much sense as anything else...

So what is the point of having the spell if every one will jsut band to gether to dispel it? Isnt that just a micromanagment issue? When the game is humming along nicely out comes BoT - great, now we have to organise a caster and gems etc... It doesn't add to the game experience it detracts from it and forces players to go through the hastle of getting rid off it. Mean time a player with a half decent start enjoying a competitive war gets crapped on and all that potential evaporates becasue of one spell.

Diplomacy. Diplomacy is the point of the spell. If you can't get the requisite gems together it means: (1) Your opponent is winning anyway and the spell lets him do it faster, this is good. (2) Your diplomacy failed. He has too many allies who'd rather have his spell stay up (possibly because you or someone else is scarier), and thus won't contribute to dispelling it. If neither of those is true, you should be able to bring it down. Its not micromanagement though, diplomacy is a critical aspect of the game, and you should be forced to conduct it to deal with sufficiently dangerous threats.

Removing the gem gens in CBM removes a few head aches and micro issues, but the real benefit of it is that to get more gems you have to conquer more lands. Globals just provide gems for nothing really. Sure you have to make a sacrifice to put it up, but they pay for themselves quickly so its not that big a risk.

Gems from globals are (1) not invisible and (2) are vulnerable to 'attack', either by being overcast or by killing the caster or by being dispelled. And if you put it up with more gems than minimal, the risk of not making back your investment is very real.

The issue of the games finishing quicker is moot if you adopt different ending conditions. I don't believe there needs to be full domination - 50 or 60% of capitals will suffice for victory. Pulling out big globals and remote spells is a crap way to finish a long strategic struggle.

So put them up first? If your opponent manages to distract you from the big picture by complicating the little picture, and then throws up a game changing global, whose fault is it that you weren't prepared to deal with it? Oh right, yours. You can pre-emptively occupy all the global slots to prevent people from throwing up globals, you know.

A big part of the fun in dominions is watching the battle replay - seeing if your tactics prevail - hoping your heros survive another battle, These spells ensure that the outcome of the game is determined by impersonal mechanics - I am struggling to see how their inclusion benefits the game.

Because a lot of these spells fill necessary niches. Stealth raiders would be pretty broken if not for mindhunt. Oh no, the horrors, it makes you forge AMAs for all those stealth raiders. Making raiding more costly over time is a good thing - your opponent should be able to fight back, after all!

Finally, a lot of these spells add a real strategic element to the game. Some of us enjoy the strategic aspect at least as much as the tactical aspect. Wars are not just fought with armies, they are fought with propaganda, information, morale, production, key leaders, etc... all of these things should be open to attack.