this was a bummer...

[parone]

i was reading on this forum(i think it was in "the future of dom III) that basically, in the upper level games, everyone plays the same(scales set to high magic, sloth-all players using the same summoning spells, national troops/summons basically ignored). is this true? the best thing about dom has always been(in my opinion) so many options. what a shame to think at the highest levels there is only one way to play.

is this true? if so, would it effect me, a newbie? and also, are there any newbies left? i mean, the game has been out awhile.

just some musings...

[Gandalf Parker]

YES it is absolutely true.

If by everyone you mean everyone on this forum. The other forums with Dom3 populations also tend to play the same, but not the same as this forum. Also the are the various Dom3 IRC channels. Part of the problem isnt just that they play the same but that they tend toward playing the same game all the time. The same game settings and the same size or style of map tends to define what nations and tactics are strong or weak.

There is a thread here about game variations but its rare to see one of them tried.
http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/showthread.php?t=35083

[Squirrelloid]

err... what?

Absolutely untrue.

There is a set of spells which sees frequent use in lategame. However, this set of spells comprises multiple distinct strategies. Especially since mods like CBM and EDM have actually increased the range of plausible options.

FWIW, the SA community uses a rather similar array of options in lategame as this forum's community, with certain predictable changes based upon differences in mods. (Ie, stuff that sucks outside of CBM doesn't get used in non-CBM games. The awesome mod series by ninjadebugger has made certain units viable that weren't before).

Current CBM has multiple known viable endgame strategies.

Now, certain battlefield enchantments are basically required lategame, but stuff like Fog Warriors is simply too powerful to be ignored and nothing else does anything remotely like what it does (and it stacks with everything else). Of course spells like that are going to be used by everyone who can.

Midgame is even more diverse, with piles of different strategies.

And all of that is before even considering nation-specific spells.

Gandalf, afaik you haven't played an MP game in *years*, I don't know why you think you can say that MP games always end in the same spells being used.

[elmokki]

Also for game variants not being used, yeah, sure, CBM (and maybe vanilla on this forum?) are dominant, but there is at least one Cataclysm and one Randomocalypse game up on this very forum and one Cataclysm game on the other one. There are also other games, some of which I'm pretty sure run one of the two mods. Sure though, same strategies will apply (especially in Cataclysm) in the endgame, but early and mid game are wildly different in both of those.

Now I need to get utterly frustrated with my current coding project so I can get the motivation to finish the sprite-generating NationGen for even more interesting random nations. Current iteration generates some pretty interesting results (for example black human samurais, oriental lizardmen (see my avatar!), cavalry with battleaxes and naked tower shield crossbowmen) along with stuff that's pretty much the same that's in the game already. It just lacks proper mage and sacred generation (with sacreds especially being potentially fairly wild) and needs varying rewrites in other areas. Sadly developing Dominions 3 content isn't very rewarding.

[Bullock]

Wow i'm surprised by your answer Gandalf.
I think it's totally untrue to say that it's always the same dom & spells used.
Concerning the dom there is some popular pick (for instance +1 magic scale) but dom settings are usually set to fit the nation choice but also the strategy you are planning.

Now concerning spells there are the popular ones (such as fog warrior mentioned earlier) but finally i think 90% of the spells are usable, some ofc only in niche use.

However i haven't the experience of many ppl here, but dom3 sounds to me complex enough in MP so you can't win by just applying a common guide (such as Baalz's) despite his high quality.

[llamabeast]

Gandalf, I wish you would stop repeating unfounded comments like this. It's very frustrating. I understand that you were just using the question as a platform to advertise the diversity between communities, which is one of your favourite points, but you ended up basing your answer on misinformation.

To answer the question, early in dom3's life it was a bit like that. However, changes in subsequent patches, along with the Conceptual Balance Mod*, have greatly improved things. There is now an extremely diverse range of options available regardless of player level.

As to whether there are any newbies - yes, there seems to be a surprisingly steady stream of newbies, which is great. If you look in the MP forum then a lot of the games are described as "for newbies".

* - I think I can still trumpet CBM despite being its current maintainer, since the large majority of the work in it was done before my time.

[Bwaha]

Heh.

Don't believe a word you hear about a grand unified field theory...

Some joker will set you up if you don't change your tactics from time to time...

And that's in the game, not just the start...

[Gandalf Parker]

So many disagreements Thank you.
But no one here is going to nibble and start up an extreme alternative game setting to PROVE the point? The surprise at how such games totally trash the usual "everyone knows" about what is great or what sucks is so much fun (which isnt really obvious unless you play outside a specific group). We could use abit more creativity around here from the same size maps and same game goals which obviously sparked the original comment. Review the games options. Think outside the menu.

[Peter Ebbesen]

Originally Posted by Gandalf Parker

So many disagreements Thank you.
But no one here is going to nibble and start up an extreme alternative game setting to PROVE the point? The surprise at how such games totally trash the usual "everyone knows" about what is great or what sucks is so much fun (which isnt really obvious unless you play outside a specific group). We could use abit more creativity around here from the same size maps and same game goals which obviously sparked the original comment. Review the games options. Think outside the menu.

Been there done that, burned the T-shirt and sacrificed the designer.

The little group I play Dominions MP with, which mixes Dom3 veterans and newbies from the Paradox forums, experiment with settings, not to prove points, but to find out what suits us - and achieve interesting results thereby. Some things that are touted as conventional wisdom in these Shrapnel forums work as well for us, some worse, and some much worse, because our culture of diplomacy is different - and successful diplomacy is at least half the route to victory.

I would be deeply surprised if other smaller groups don't do the same on a frequent basis and don't see any reason whatsoever to tell you so on the official boards.

But we probably don't play different enough that you'd consider it proving any points.

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


That said, the 11 human/7 mighty AI player game on GreeceStain that ended in a turn in the 80's or 90's when the opposition saw me and my (temporary) ally teleporting in SCs all around the capital of one of our enemies (temporarily allied against the temporar alliance of the two of us), raising a fortress in one of the provinces by magic the next turn, followed by the dominion-crushing blow of my sending 17 Juggernauts into the fortress next to his capital next turn... was pretty awesome - and not too shabbily done for a player who had 2 fortresses and less than 6 provinces to his name for most of the turns 28-42, when he was under attack by three players and all alone in the world while his troops deserted.

Who needs blood sacrifice when you have the Arcane Nexus?

-- This, incidentally, is one of those examples where giving only the bare bones of the story will cause many Shrapnel forum MP veterans who recoil in disgust or suspect incompetence on the hands of other players for not bringing down the Nexus the moment it first went up.

I assure you that it was brought down once by one half of the other players cooperating as soon as they could, and they did it when I didn't have enough astral pearls to bring it up again, only to return 15 turns later at my hands, at which point it was opposed by the other half of the players, but not by those that brought it down the first time and, diplomatically speaking, it made excellent sense at the time for everybody to act as they did both times.

In the end, the Arcane Nexus was up for almost half the game without a single armageddon being cast.

--------

Currently we are trying out cumulative VP games with 10-15 VP to win, 1 VP per capital, no AIs to inflate the ranks, and no shared victories. Those are, not surprisingly, interesting too, just like all the previous games we have played regardless of settings.

[llamabeast]

People already do that Gandalf. I don't know where your comments come from.