Wishes

[Shovah32]

If you think wish gives people too many gems then try casting arcane nexus on a map with 10+ other players.

[HoneyBadger]

I'd like to see wishes at level 15, with spells of level 10-14 in between I think it would be nice if even the most magically gifted pretender had something worthwile to strive for, not just in terms of magical skill, but raw magical power as well. I know that the game is set up so that you can empower up to level 15, but spells only go up to level 9, and with 15 levels, some of the current spells would ofcourse have to be pushed back to retain balance and flavor. If there were a comprehensive, and balanced, magic system that went up to level 15, then I would suggest that there be a way for empowerment to grant abilities in-game, not just in pretender creation, and I'd like to see a larger variety of special abilities, and possibly even a larger variety of magical paths. Right now, it seems that Dominions is just a bit hung up on old dungeons & dragons standards, and it couldn't hurt at all to move a bit further beyond that admittedly comprehensive, but decidedly limited, game, in terms of scope. Getting back to the wish-theme, and still giving the nod to D&D out of respect to the game that started me on this twisted road, perhaps limited wish could come at level 9 and wish at level 15? Limited wish could perhaps allow you to wish for forged items, but not artifacts, to produce 75 gems of whichever type for the price of 100 astral pearls, and to reproduce any spell of level 6 or below, etc. It could grant you maybe 1500 gold. It wouldn't allow you to wish for bloodslaves and could only grant you +1 in a single magical path. Limited wish could cause the caster to become lost in time and space for a year. An unlimited wish could allow everything the current wish does, maybe even more, but casting it would age your caster 100 years and/or cause him/her to become lost in time and space for 5 years, and/or get sent to one of the Hells, and/or recieve a particularly nasty curse/disease/affliction/horror-mark, etc etc etc, at the discretion of the fates. If you tried casting it more than three times, the mage who cast it would permanently be destroyed, even if immortal, every mage with astral magic in your nation would recieve a horror-mark, and your pretender would turn into a sphinx and lose all magic levels.

[Endoperez]

Currently, Wish can't duplicate spells of level 6 or less. What was this you said about Dominions being a bit hung on old D&D standards?



EDIT: "being a bit hun on" I'm going to use that.

[HoneyBadger]

Quite a few of the ideas in Dom were taken from D&D. The creators seem to be well aware of the fact, and it's certainly not a bad thing, except when conventions, such as 9 levels of spells, and quite a bit of the way the magic system is structured, for that matter, get in the way of Dom's uniqueness. I love this game, but I love it from the perspective of mythology, not so much conventional roleplaying, especially Dungeons & Dragons, which has the same appeal for me as Captain Morgan's spiced rum-I used to love it, but I got very sick on it, and now I don't drink much these days, and when I do it's wine or tequila. Right now, Dom 3 is coming from D&D. It's better, a lot better, but that's the path it took. If you want a good magic system, try Ars Magica. I'd like to see Dominions evolve in that direction, while retaining as much as possible from real-world myths and original thinking, like H.P. Lovecraft, Clive Barker, Fritz Lieber, Michael Moorcock, and Robert Jordan (even though he killed Conan), roleplaying games like Talislanta, The Empire of the Petal Throne, and Legend of the Five Rings. Also, I'd like to mention the much, and sadly, ignored D&D Dark Sun, Spelljammer, and Ravenloft settings. Nothing wrong with a little rum now and then, in the right recipe, for flavor.

[Twan]

Personnally I consider wish balanced as national mages can't cast it without many empowerements. Wish is 1 spell/turn that only a specially designed pretender will cast in most cases. For the same number of gems and research level, 6 mages a nation like Machaka can have without any empowerement can cast Volcanic Eruption on the richest provinces of their ennemies, killing about 60k pop a turn, (or the same number of just a little equiped death mage can cast Black death for an even bigger effect), 4 mages with some equipment any astral nation can have can attack any province on the map with their troops via astral travel, 3 immortal demi-lich or 60+ wights can be summoned by a death nation, 5 siege golem by an earth nation (500 siege bonus !), etc... And all these spells are usable even if the pretender is dead or had lost magic levels. There is an excellent counter for wishes, killing/feebleminding the only guy able to cast.

[Endoperez]

HoneyBadger said:
Quite a few of the ideas in Dom were taken from D&D. The creators seem to be well aware of the fact, and it's certainly not a bad thing, except when conventions, such as 9 levels of spells, and quite a bit of the way the magic system is structured, for that matter, get in the way of Dom's uniqueness. I love this game, but I love it from the perspective of mythology, not so much conventional roleplaying, especially Dungeons & Dragons, which has the same appeal for me as Captain Morgan's spiced rum-I used to love it, but I got very sick on it, and now I don't drink much these days, and when I do it's wine or tequila. Right now, Dom 3 is coming from D&D. It's better, a lot better, but that's the path it took. If you want a good magic system, try Ars Magica. I'd like to see Dominions evolve in that direction, while retaining as much as possible from real-world myths and original thinking, like H.P. Lovecraft, Clive Barker, Fritz Lieber, Michael Moorcock, and Robert Jordan (even though he killed Conan), roleplaying games like Talislanta, The Empire of the Petal Throne, and Legend of the Five Rings. Also, I'd like to mention the much, and sadly, ignored D&D Dark Sun, Spelljammer, and Ravenloft settings. Nothing wrong with a little rum now and then, in the right recipe, for flavor.

I wrote a nice message yesterday, but I had some technical problems and it has vanished.

In short: I think Dominions magic system is inspired more by Ars Magica than D&D. In game logs (generated with command line parameter -ddd) magic gems are called Vis.

I think I first learned of Ars Magica via Illwinter.

Bogus & co are from Dying Earth IIRC, not D&D. I just noticed that D&D magic system and Dying Earth RPG are based on the same author (Jack Vance).

[Belcarl]

Quite a few of you might already have noticed this. But in Dom3, wishing for "Doom Horror" still brings one, the difference is that your caster will be attacked by it.

Personally I usually wish for blood slaves, pretenders, artifacts or one of the Demon lords (if I lack any blood mages/research). This is singleplayer though, since I have yet to use Wish in a MP competitive game.

[Endoperez]

Belcarl said:
Quite a few of you might already have noticed this. But in Dom3, wishing for "Doom Horror" still brings one, the difference is that your caster will be attacked by it.

Personally I usually wish for blood slaves, pretenders, artifacts or one of the Demon lords (if I lack any blood mages/research). This is singleplayer though, since I have yet to use Wish in a MP competitive game.

Sometimes they won't attack, but even then they only stay for a few battles. Or just vanish on their own. Most follow your orders.

[CharonJr]

Ah, Ars Magica, I really liked that one...

CharonJr

[Gandalf Parker]

Just as any of the other lists, since Dominions doesnt encrypt its text its rather easy to find this info and copy it out of the game. But I dont think I want to provide a complete wish list.