Musings on immortality

[Taqwus]

Immortality, as is, seems to have a few different effects.

* Death within one's dominion results in immediate resurrection in the capital, if the latter is still in friendly hands.

* Immortal commanders within their dominion do not retreat. Immortal units, however, may, regardless of dominion.

* Immortality provides some form of recuperation, although I do not know how strong this is relative to the separate recuperation inherent to assorted mortal units.


It occurs to me that the first ability is, in some cases, a bit strange when taken in conjunction with in-game ideas. For instance, the Vanheim fay boar is a boar meant to be repeatedly eaten, much like Thor's goats. Kill them, cook them, eat them, let them miraculously reconstruct themselves from their remains. Hence, they provide a significant supply bonus.

That's all fine and good, but what does this porcine respawning have to do with dominion? Outside of their dominion, should it grant a supply bonus? It does now. If it can reconstruct itself after death even outside its own dominion, and presumably without requiring it to make its way back from the capital at incredible speed, then why is the immortality flag appropriate in that it's a dominion-linked way of reviving it in its capital?

The same goes for vampires, if you consider the Version of immortality as-is versus, say, the vampire found in western European lore. Those vampires could be incapacitated, if with difficulty; once done, there were ritualistic methods for permanently finishing the job (typically involving holy wafers, decapitation, dismemberment, wooden stakes, or some combination thereof). Thus, if one managed to take down a vampire, it -could- be finished if you were aware of its nature and took the appropriate means; otherwise, if you just buried it as if it were an ordinary mortal, it would eventually be back.

These suggest that perhaps there should be a separate ability, with something like the following rule --

* A unit possessing this ability, when slain, will be revived in the very same province at the end of the turn regardless of dominion but if and only if at no point in that turn was the province (or castle interior, if the unit was inside a castle) outside of friendly control.

To me, recuperation would still seem to make sense in as much anything that can reconstitute it from death through massive damage is probably pretty good at healing (certain exceptions might be made involving entities that can possess others, but cannot voluntarily leave a still-living host. Dominions II does not currently have any monster fitting this description). Having fanatical morale in one's own dominion, however, is no longer applicable since getting killed while being on the losing side in a battle would be the usual permadeath regardless of dominion.

Of course, this would affect balance and thus other factors such a cost would need to be examined. The infamous vampire queen, for instance, might not be as likely to tempt fate by making suicidal in-dominion attacks. And, for some units (perhaps a demilich's spirit can flee back home and reconstruct a body?) the current form would be more appropriate.