The next patch

[Jasper]

Originally posted by Graeme Dice:
No, growth from conquest is _not_ exponential, and neither is growth from clams. Growth from conquest is linear. Growth from clams is geometric. You capture a province, search it for magic sites, and once you've done that you've received all the benefits you are ever going to receive from that province. Your gem income from there does not double every few turns, and your gold income does not either. The clams on the other hand, double in the amount of gems they produce without requiring any expansion whatsoever.

You're right, geometric is definitely the right word, not exponential. However, conquest growth is every bit as geometric as clam investment: just as you can reinvest a clam's astrals into clams, so can you reinvest conquered gold income into conquest. True, there is a ceiling for returns from conquest, but as this comes when you've conquered the _entire_ map IMHO it can be safely ignored.

Why don't you explain just how, exactly, making clams from astral and water gems hurts your ability to defend yourself? Please don't mention spells such as murdering winter, since it is useless even when combined with wolven winter in a heat dominion, and even more useless once the clam hoarder has put multiple domes over their capital.

Simple: spending your gems on water summons is effective, and not doing so will give you a weaker army. Researching Construction right off is a very real cost as well, as typically other paths are more usefull for expansion. Similarily, Astral gems have uses better than losing half of them to alchemy in order to make more Astrals in the distant future.

Also, in my experience Murdering Winter is quite effective; one can always find or make a cold dominion in which to use it. Domes are a very limited defense against it, and aren't limited to clam hoarders anyway.

Honestly, I've tried the Clam strategy, and found it just too slow -- even on a fairly small scale, when I defintely had use for Astrals and had no immediate use for Water gems. I would have done better if I had saved them and either forged Frost Blades or summoned Sea Trolls/Water Queens.

Yes, Clams kick *** if you can count on everyone leaving you peacefully alone for 40 turns, and nobody else conquering much. I haven't yet seen this happen in Dominions, but I have seen games that were effectively decided by 40 turns.

The biggest advantage I see from Clams is that they let you have some secret growth (assuming statistics turned off) without the diplomatic problems that can come with conquest. They're also a good deal if you're planning to transmute water gems to astrals anyway.