Enough whining!

[Tuidjy]

Recently, there has been a deluge of 'Balance' whining. It seems that some
people feel that they should be able to win the game by playing the way they
feel is right. Instead of trying to figure out counters to whatever their last
opponent used to humiliate them, they whine and moan in order to 'balance' the
game, which, in their opinion, should be done by taking features out.

They left a huge army in the open, and they did not insure that it can rout or
kill a mage squad before the battlefield spells do their magic? Let us castrate
Wrathful Skies, Flame Storm, Astral Tempest, Fetid Vapors, etc!

Their favorite elite army, or worse yet, their pet supercombatant got bogged down
in lifeless battlefield summons? Let us cripple the Raise Skeletons/Drain Life
combo, or make False Horror prohibitively expensive to cast!

A specifically equiped supercombatant wiped out the pride and hope of their
empire? Let us nerf the protection items, lifedraining weapons, or buffs that
made it possible!

They used their pretender in a way that left him unprotected in the magic phase,
and he got taken out by a teleporting task force tailored to kill him? Let us
introduce teleport sickness which makes magic ambush unviable!

They never invested in any gem generating items, allowed their hoarding opponents
to reach turn 120 unmolested, and were obliterated by remote spells and highest
level summons? Let us give idiotically high path requirements to clams,
fetishes, and blood stones!

Their besieging army got hit by artillery spells, decimated by Ghost riders, and
ultimately wiped out by defenders who teleported inside the castle? Let us make
sure that castles cannot, Gods forbid, be used to hinder an opponent's advance!

They need the great scales, they need expensive high administration castles, they
need rainbow pretenders, they need powerful national troops, but they sure as
Hell don't want to allow their opponents to gain advantages from depriving
themselves of the above.

They had no scouts to warn them that their opponent was massing devils or
vampires, and were completely unprepared to deal with them. They left their
rear unprotected, and a stealthy army wiped their temples. They tailored their
nation for early strength but where hopelessly outclassed in the end game. They
aimed for late game power, but were wiped out by a supercombatant pretender
before they got their second castle up. They did not bother with answering
diplomatic overtures, and got mobbed by all they neighbors. They, they, they...

And they sure as Hell will never learn. Instead, they will do their best to
cripple Dominions II by removing options or making them irrelevant, until the
game consists of building as many heavy infantries as one can, making a big
block of them and setting them on 'Attack closest'.

Oh, and if any of them whiners think that they are anything but poor, lazy
players, I dare them to come forward with their set of moronic house rules and I
will still smear their *** all over the map, one on one. Of course, they won't
mind me picking my race first, not with their perfectly balanced rules, will they?

-------------

By the way, I do not claim Dominions II is perfectly balanced. Personally I
think that Zen's Pretender mod is awesome, that the scales mod is shaping up
very well, and that the magic mod will eventually be well tuned. But note that
instead of making sure that nothing works well, he just tries to give everything
a chance to shine or at least be useful.

[Turin]

that was funny

[Heironeous]

While your tone is a little harsh, I can understand your frustration. I'd much rather play the game that exists than complain about how it should be. If some particular tactic or combination of spells is very effective, use that knowledge to your advantage.

Note that the settings of the game can have a big impact on how it plays out - easy magic/many sites/rich world is a very different beast than difficult magic/no sites/poor world. I like to change up the settings quite a bit from game-to-game just to keep things interesting.

[Jurri]

Whining about whining is still whining, you know. I don't mind if people express their opinions on gameplay; in fact I rather enjoy it, why else would I peruse this forum? I'm sure many have found helpful suggestions to enhance their enjoyment of the game on the forum, and I'd be surprised if nobody has found the various 'balance'-mods pleasurable. Thus I maintain that the threads for suggested tweaks serve a purpose, and as such are indeed desirable content for a forum such as this.

If your worry is that the game devolves into something you do not enjoy, nobody is forcing you to pay any attention to the mods and special houserules people use to derive more pleasure from the game. Indeed, you can ignore 'official' patches or mods, too, should their content be not to your liking.

If the problem is the perceived whininess in the tone, I'd suggest either taking it like a man or discussing it privately with persons in question. In any case, it hardly is a matter that is proper for a board such as this.

Lastly, if you just wanted to vent your frustration, I'm sure there are more suitable ways to do it. It hardly is polite or productive to do so on a public forum, in my opinion.

[Aku]

I enjoyed the starting post by Tuidjy. Especially this statement:

They never invested in any gem generating items, allowed their hoarding opponents
to reach turn 120 unmolested, and were obliterated by remote spells and highest
level summons? Let us give idiotically high path requirements to clams,
fetishes, and blood stones!

Boron is known to be an extreme hoarder but yet NONE of his neighbors ever attack him. But then people will complain saying they need to nerf clams. It is like saying nerf Ermor because you decided to ally with him but are mad that his dominion went into your lands ruining it.

[Boron]

Yeah good post Tuidjy .

Continuous "balancing" which is nerfing normally only ruins even the best game .

If ppl want a who has the bigger block game they should play Aow 2 SM or Heroes 4 and not Dominions .

Hopefully Illwinter remains strong enough to not listen to the whiners anymore . I already fear though that irreperable damage was done as shown with the ocenia mod where clams cost 3w 1n . If that is how dom 3 will look then goodnight

[The_Tauren13]

Awww... poor wibble boron afwaid of wosing his cwams? My heart bleeds. The people who whine about getting their favorite strategies nerfed are no better than those proposing the nerfing... Besides, the forums wouldnt be half as lively or interesting. Good, healthy debates are always fun.

[quantum_mechani]

That some strategies are better than others is a given. But when something is agreed on by veteran players as a must or unusable, then it can limit the potential of the game. While some of this may be due 'jumping on the bandwagon', there are many options that would be very hard to argue as viable options. Some people are implying that balancing means reducing dominion's complexity. IMO, quite the opposite is true, more usable options means more complexity.

Take as an example treelords, few would argue that they are equal to the value of a fire king (let alone an air queen). Would the game be harmed by making them better?

[Verjigorm]

Actually, I rather liked the idea of changing the paths of clams. Not to 2W1N, but to 1W1S Same amount of total gems, but making them diminishes your stock of pearls just like the fever fetish, but that's just my opinion

[Jack Simth]

Not just like a fever fetish; to cascade fever fetishes, you have a 25-turn break-even (ignoring such costs as a ring of Regeneration to maintain your scouts (or the scout's maintenence costs), or summoning black servants to carry them without penalty) via alchemy - 25 Fire -> 10 Astral, 5 Fire -> 5 Nature, 5 Fire; with clams as they stand, it's a 20 turn break-even: 20 Astral -> 10 Water; 5 Water, 5 Astral would reduce the break-even time to 15 turns - 15 Astral -> 5 Water, 5 Astral, and thus increase it's attractiveness.