The next patch

I'm still of the opinion that Clams are of a very slight imbalance (only situational in one type of game or one type of player).

The reason I made the Mod is because I got tired of the lure of Wishing. It was for a very specific game (with Easy Magical Research) and we didn't want it to turn into a wishfest as that is very, very boring.

I don't have the file on me, but I'll be happy to Email it to anyone who wants it to try for some different starting settings of games.

Edit: I think that the reason Jasper and Pepe and a few others feel the way they do is they are of a similiar temperment (as I am) of aggression, I don't believe ethnic and religious cleansing should have alot of peace and at the very least vicious backstabbing to find the one true God. With that kind of temperment, having someone be able to sit by and make Clams unmolested until the game is more boring than fun is hard to imagine happening enough to be imbalanced.

[ April 02, 2004, 22:43: Message edited by: Zen ]

[Graeme Dice]

Originally posted by Wendigo:
Really, the unballance in this game seems to be the R'lyeh-Atlantis alliance, rather than the clams.

Well, it's not like there's anything that R'Lyeh can spend water or astral gems on in great numbers that will help them in underwater battles against Atlantis. R'lyeh has virtually no capacity for casting ritual spells, and the number of underwater spells that cost either kind of gem is very low.

[Stormbinder]

Originally posted by Wendigo:
[QB]

quote:

---

Originally posted by Stormbinder:
and the fact that your tastes lies in some particualar settings doesn't mean that everybody should play it, or that any unbalances that manifest themself outside of these settings does not matter.

You are not going to get a game with nations perfectly balanced for both the long & short term.

It may be true, but it doesn't mean that there should be no attemts to improve the overall balance of the game, even considering the fact that the ideal balance can not be archived because it doesn't exist. In particular case with clams, you seem to admit that they are very unbalancing in long games. If this is so, and if they are as uneffective as you claim they are in short games, than why not make them harder to forge as suggested earlier?

Short games that you like to play will not be affected in any signifcant degree according to you, and medium and long game where clam hoarding can be a big issue will definetly be improved. I see it as clear win-win situation.

I asked you specific question that you haven't answered - you were refering to some other strategies that were as effective/abusive as clam hoarding. Can you name any?

Check this one for example for another 'economic strategy':
http://www.shrapnelgames.com/cgi-bin...=001570#000004

Others with a similar focus: Anything blood-slave related or concerning hoarding the Elemental kings/queens that produce free (and good!) troops-> It does not feed on itself as gem generators+ alchemy, but the troops provide gems+coin by giving you the provinces of your enemies.

---

I think you've answered your own question. These strategies that you describe with blood and King/Queens summons are just what you said - some free troops. But because none of these tactics, as you put it, are "feeding on itself" it's very different in its nature from clam hoarding as I think you reilize yourself.

In mathematical terms Clam hoarding is geometric progression. What you descibing are ariphemetic progressions. As you probably know they are very different.


The argument that using thess strategies will give you more provinces is not really relivent. So would any other good strategy, that allow you to conquer enemy territory and by doing this would allow you to become more powerfull. These are just efficient strategies, some of the many available ones. But because they don't have "snowball" effect ("feeding on itself" in your own terms), which is the main attribute of geometric progression, they are not abusive, but instead are just good valid strategies that can be countered with others equaly good ones - and that's what this game is about after all.

In the end, you should not forget that the game is won & lost by winning & losing battles. The economy is not everything.

True. But the economy matters a lot as well. And if one decent player have 10 times more economic resourses than the other, than he will very likely win even aginst expert opponent, not by superior tactic in battles but because of his economic might that will alow him to have 10 times more soldiers, summons, etc.

[ April 02, 2004, 22:57: Message edited by: Stormbinder ]

[Stormbinder]

Originally posted by Zen:


I don't have the file on me, but I'll be happy to Email it to anyone who wants it to try for some different starting settings of games.

Perhaps you could send it to Gandalf and he would be kind enough to host it on his brand new "Dom2minions" website? It's would be nice to have some link from where those who don't have it could download it before the start of the game. (if it has to be installed on every player's computer - is it?)


EDIT: NM, I misread your post (geting tired). I though you took out Wish _and_ Clams. My fault.

Guess I'll have to wait until Clams are fixed (hopefully) in the patch. Or if not than perhaps somebody would make a mod for it. Or maybe I should do it myslef - how difficult it can possibly be?!?

[ April 03, 2004, 00:04: Message edited by: Stormbinder ]

[johan osterman]

Originally posted by Stormbinder:

... But because they don't have "snowball" effect ("feeding on itself" in your own terms), which is the main attribute of geometric progression, they are not abusive, but instead are just good valid strategies that can be countered with others equaly good ones - and that's what this game is about after all.

Any effective investment of resources will have what you term a snowball effect. If you poor gems into summons these summons will allow you to conquer more provinces which will lead you to gain more available searchable provinces as well as income and resources, which in turn will allow you to earn more and summon more to conquer more which will let you ... etc.

[LintMan]

Originally posted by Zen:
Now if I could find a way to mod away the whining of people who build 'forts' then it would be 'balanced'.

Just curious, this statement lost me. What's wrong with 'forts', and why are people whining about it?

[Stormbinder]

Originally posted by johan osterman:

quote:

---

Originally posted by Stormbinder:

... But because they don't have "snowball" effect ("feeding on itself" in your own terms), which is the main attribute of geometric progression, they are not abusive, but instead are just good valid strategies that can be countered with others equaly good ones - and that's what this game is about after all.

Any effective investment of resources will have what you term a snowball effect. If you poor gems into summons these summons will allow you to conquer more provinces which will lead you to gain more available searchable provinces as well as income and resources, which in turn will allow you to earn more and summon more to conquer more which will let you ... etc.

---

Thank you for reply Johan, I really appreciate it.


Certanly, I agree with your statement. After all
in any strategic game that I can think about once you begin to win territory/resourses from your opponent(s) and get stronger each new conquest is theoretically easer for you because now you have all your old resourses plus resourses of newly conquered
territory/country/province/colony/whatever. And it doesn't matter that much what tactic you are using while doing this because the result still the same.


But what I strongly feel makes clam-hoarding special case is the speed with witch it is happening. Once you have it really going you can double your gem investments very quickly (every 5-8 turns, depending on avaliablity of hammers/forge sites/mages). Look at Peter's two tables below for example, which describe the evolution of just _5_ astral gems invested into clams in the begining of the game. And of course in real game you often invest other water/astral gems into clams once you get additional income from searching your provinces, so it is even faster.


So the speed with wich the "snowball" grows once it gets rolling is much faster(mainly because it is geometrical progression) than with regular linear progression when you conquer enemy provinces. Also when you conquer province in your example you often suffer losses - and that slows your expansion. When you are siting in your castles mass-forging clams there are no losses, other than a bit of lost reseach, since it's just pure mathematic and doubling your investment every N turns.


But there is another factor that you and Kristofer are the only people quilified to comment about.

Please tell me this - when you designed this fantastic game, with all these different unique magic sites, as well as high-level spells for all magic schools - was it you intention that the Magic (gems) that power these spells would come mostly from these uniques sites of yours, from the territory that your Pretender God controls, perhaps with small addition of item-generated gems? Or your vision for the end-game was that by the end of medium and long games anywhere from 90-99% of your magic gems would be coming from hundreds and hundreds of clams siting in your magical treaury? Because as of now, as even opponents of clam-changes agree on this thread, more often than not it is 2nd situation by the end of many of long MP games.

I am sorry, I just can't help but feel that this is not the way it was intended to be by you, designers, since massive clam hoarding that person currently has to do to stay competitive against other clam-hoarders in long games feels so... boring.


Now if you tell me that everything is working the way it was intended in regards of Clams than I'll just shut up and will not bring this topic again on this Boards, I swear!

[ April 03, 2004, 01:52: Message edited by: Stormbinder ]