Problems in demo exist in regular game?

[Jack_Trowell]

... cavalry are fewer in numbers (because they cost more than infantry), and thus the enemy can usually swarm them.

It's not only that they cost more : normal cavalry units are size 3, versus size 2 for normal (human-sized) infantry.

A a cas can only contain up to a total of 6 point of size, it means that you can only have 2 cavalry per cases, versus 3 infantry. So even in equal numbers, infantry will have the advantage in number of units fighting.

Of course, heavy cavalry have one advantage : the hoof/bite attack of the mount means that 2 units of cavalry make in fact 4 attacks, versus the 3 attacks of a normal infantry.

But those secondary atacks usually don't do mch damage (10 damage for a heavy cavalry), and are most used to decimate light and medium infantry (a cavalry charge on a squad of archer is not a pretty thing to see - if the archers are yours -).

[TruePurple]

I see what you mean jake, still interesting/nice to have things like pikes do extra damage to riders. You could make riders a little nicer to compensate. Of course that would obligate enemy troop information access even more... What do you mean by "case"?

Please don't miss my "Saving when you want to" post bottom of last page.

Along the line of providing stats for enemy units.. providing stats of summons when you middle click or left/right click.. what ever.. summon spells as well a number showing how many you will get.(or put that information in spell description)

You could then cut out a number of pages of manual with that information.. which would save money and tree resources..and make things easier for players not to have to look it up thumbing through a manual. And make it more mod friendly since if someone wants to mod different stats for summons the manual becomes worthless.

Granted then you can't "brag" about having 300 pages (or 292, the demo and web site pages say 300) manual. But other then that silly bit and if it were taken out of the manual one couldn't browse said info outside of the game..and the manuals alteration would require existing copies to run out and enough reason to change the print. Otherwise its a win win for everyone.

How often do those two read the forum? It would be nice to hear directly from them what they think of this stuff.

Do blessed units cost half upkeep like sacred troops?

[Jack_Trowell]

TruePurple said:
I see what you mean jake, still interesting/nice to have things like pikes do extra damage to riders. You could make riders a little nicer to compensate. Of course that would obligate enemy troop information access even more... What do you mean by "case"?

Sorry, english is not my first langage, i didn't use the correct word.

I was writing about the combat grid (you can show it in combat by pressing 'g' I think) : one box/zone can only have up to 6 size of unit (yes, it means that jotuns, having size 4, have lost space, unless you mix them with smaller units)

Please don't miss my "Saving when you want to" post bottom of last page.

Along the line of providing stats for enemy units.. providing stats of summons when you middle click or left/right click.. what ever.. summon spells as well a number showing how many you will get.(or put that information in spell description)

The number of units summonded is already shown : see the "number of effets" value in the spell description.

If there's a "+" after the number, extra levels in the spell main magic will summon additionnal units.

(...)

Do blessed units cost half upkeep like sacred troops?

???

a blessed unit is just a sacred unit under the effect of one of the blessing spells, so I don't understand the question.

The prophet is special, being always blessed, but as the prophet he doesn't cost *any* upkeep at all.

You're maybe wondering about the items that give blessed status to the weared (their are 2 : the shroud of the battle saint, and an artifact armor).

I was thinking of using it to halve the upkeep of some non sacred national mages, but equiping it doesn't show any change in the total upkeep cost (unless you have to wait for a turn first before the change show ? I didn't check yet)

[mivayan]

TruePurple said:
Please don't miss my "Saving when you want to" post bottom of last page.

It's been talked about: Would be very nice for new players. Would cause some to quit because they couldn't resist the temptation to reload when things to wrong. Since it's still first of all a game for one turn per day multiplayer, the devs prefer to focus on other features. You can mimic it by backing up your save directory.

Along the line of providing stats for enemy units.. providing stats of summons when you middle click or left/right click.. what ever.. summon spells as well a number showing how many you will get.(or put that information in spell description)

Would be nice if clicking on the text 'The army consists of mainly emerald guards' in a province description, showed the info a pythium player gets when right clicking on a unit on the recrutment screen. And for 'heavy infantry' it shows one of the many heavy infantry, randome one every time. Same for spells, show the stats for one of the 3 air queens from a link in the spell description.

You could then cut out a number of pages of manual with that information..

Nah... I like having stuff in the manual.

[paradoxharbinger]

iirc, and i don't know if it's been mentioned yet, you can back up a game much the same way as you could in roguelikes, by copying the save directory to somewhere else. if you screw up, just drop it back into the dominions directory

[TruePurple]

Would cause some to quit because they couldn't resist the temptation to reload when things to wrong.

You mean quit playing the game? Seems the traditional saving is intentionally not there. Putting it in might not be much work, suppose putting in a ironman option could be a bit of work. But the ironman option is best of both worlds. If it reflects in scoring, someone could easily choose it for extra challenge rather then quit the game.

You can mimic it by backing up your save directory.

I know that but..

Not easily, since I have issues with the game where when it loads and I click it minimizes, I have to refocus to the game twice and then switch resolutions over and back and do this every time I alt tab and all that takes plenty of time. To do this ever so often.. So your solution is a hell of alot of work and waiting.

Then when you want to load the save you got to remember which one you hadn't used. Which is hard since copying the save requires either different names or different directories.

for 'heavy infantry' it shows one of the many heavy infantry, randome one every time.

Because you figure it would be easier to program that way? Well that would definitely be better then nothing, its about the less generic units anyways. But really its confusing and silly to have so many units with the same name. Like the better druids (the ones that cost 380, not 120 or so) should be called "master druids" or something. These units should have more specialized names in my opinion, least some of them.

Not a real big thing for me but it would be nice and in some examples its just plain absurd for them to have same name IMO.

I like having stuff in the manual.

Sure, but if it was a choice between having the information in the manual where you flip around and find it and having the information at a click in the game. I'd much prefer the latter. Especially since it makes the game notably more mod friendly. And in my experience players can make some real nice mods sometimes. And as a bit of an environmentalist.. anything that saves resources. Plus savings in manual costs might be extra incentive for the developer to put it in the game.

Speaking of, how often do they (the developer/programmer pair) read the forum? Might I ever hear from them on these issues?

What are their names anyways? Is it Mindi & Annette? (both girls right?)

[Edi]

The devs are Kristoffer O and Johan K. They'll respond to you if they feel like it, but believe me, you are NOT going to get universal unit stat visibility as per AoW. More important issues than that have been brought up in the past without a response.

As for unit stats, once I get done with the Dom3DB project, the stats for every unit in the game will be available and make things much more mod-friendly than being able to see everything in the game would do.

Edi

[TruePurple]

Those two would be the ones to come onto the forum and apply gamer feedback to the game? How often to they come onto the forum and give consideration (with feedback showing they have)?

I suppose you mean accessing enemy unit stats from map screen and summon unit stats from spell screen as "universal"?

Are you familar with AoWsm BTW?(so I can know if we are speaking on the same wave length)

Please tell me more about this dom3db project and how its to work for showing unit stats and what else it would do if anything else.

[Endoperez]

Dom2DB was a group of Excel and other files (OpenOffice files too IIRC) that listed the stats of all units, pretenders, nations, etc in the game. It has everything, is easy to browse, etc.

[Edi]

TruePurple, yes, I'm familiar with all three incarnations of Age of Wonders. Back when we still only had the original AoW, I was very active. I've got the same username on the HG forums as I have here, but I've not been active there in ages.

I also did mean precisely that, accessing enemy info on the map screen. We're not going to see it.

If you want an idea of what the Dom3DB will approximately look like, go here and scroll down until you find the Dominions 2 Unit DB and Magic Site DB files that list me as author. Only the Dom3 ones will be improved from that.

Edi