Another idea that struck me while writing an AAR.

[JaydedOne]

Can we watch the tone of this discussion? It's verging on antagonistic and I'd like to think we can have a back-and-forth discussion of new ideas without things getting too heated.

[PDF]

Yep, JaydedOne, you're right, he should have said more ploitely that it looked like a bad idea to me ...

[Graeme Dice]

JaydedOne said:
Can we watch the tone of this discussion? It's verging on antagonistic and I'd like to think we can have a back-and-forth discussion of new ideas without things getting too heated.

If somebody is going to both promote micromanagement as though it is good gameplay, and directly contradict themselves in the very same post, then they deserve whatever flames they get. The internet is not the personal playground of people who are too delicate to deal with criticism.

[Kristoffer O]

> they deserve whatever flames they get

No one deserves flames. Polite answers will often clear up misunderstandings, faulty logics and bad english.

[Gandalf Parker]

Flames also endanger the threads. Not to mention the flamers login. Keep in mind whose forums these are and why they have them here. Chasing away newbies is not the goal

[Mindi]

Graeme Dice said:

If somebody is going to both promote micromanagement as though it is good gameplay, and directly contradict themselves in the very same post, then they deserve whatever flames they get. The internet is not the personal playground of people who are too delicate to deal with criticism.

Graeme, maybe you need to read the Board Rules. A couple of excerpts you need to familiarize yourself with:

3) USER FIGHTING:

If you post in this forum, we expect you to contribute positively to a conversation. If you disagree with someone, great, explain your point of view, have an open discussion. Please do not disparage the other person. Personal attacks are unacceptable. They just lower the brow of all involved. If you don't like someone, talk about it on ICQ, MSN, AIM, YIM, your journal, or your blogger, but not here. People who bait or bash members or mods may be banned without notice.

Flaming, humiliating, ridiculing, or belittling other members will not be tolerated. This includes blatant disrespect of others whether it is through negative language or general attitude. We see no difference between straight out calling someone stupid and using creative language and attitude to imply that person is stupid.

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If you get out of hand you will be warned, if the negative behavior continues you may be banned. Nobody likes it when this happens, so play nice! What actually constitutes out of hand or negative behavior is at the discretion of the staff.

and

And finally if this is your reaction to these rules are:

I have a right to free speech! What right do you have to delete/edit/move/etc my messages?
Yes, you may have a right to free speech, but not here. When you signed up for the Shrapnel Community’s message boards, you voluntarily gave up the right to certain kinds of speech in return for the ability to use the boards. Shrapnel Games is a private business, and if you'd actually read the Bill of Rights, you'll see that "Freedom of Speech" applies to the government, not here.

With the upcoming influx of new people and activity on these forums, I am not going to tolerate flaming, trolling, baiting, etc. So everyone needs to remember to treat one another with respect or be prepared to be booted.

[Ballbarian]

That seems much more fitting than auto-killing of brigands ...

I could have misunderstood, but I do not believe that he was suggesting that the population was killed as is the case with patrolling. Simply that unrest decreased out of awe OR fear depending on how you want to look at it. The dominion of the pretender (to me) reflects his/her influence and renown among the populace there. This is good, but the divine presence walking the lands in which you live would seem logically to have a more obvious and immediate impact on the willingness of nay-sayers to speak out.

[BigJMoney]

Yeah, I know about the autotax feature, which is one of the reasons I got caught in a semi-contradiction above. On one hand, I was trying to place my idea in the light of Dominions 2 when I said, "all you have to do is play with the tax rate ..." and on the other hand, I was trying to place my idea in context with Dominions 3 by saying there would effectively be no micromanagement involved. I should have proof-read my post a little better and cleaned it up. With the autotax feature, there would be no micromanagement. Really, this means I have nothing to reply to Graeme Dice about.

@PDF
That wasn't even a coherent statement. Nobody has suggested anything contrary to the way things work right now. In essence, all I said is that it seems thematic that when a peoples' god is physically present, they are less likely to misbehave. Think about it. Right now, there are absolutely no inherent bonuses for having your pretender god present among the people. That's probably why the idea came to me in the first place; to fill a "realism" need.

=$=

[PDF]

BigJMoney,
Which of my statements weren't "even coherent" ? They may have been rash, but they look coherent to me...
As for your statemenyt that

Right now, there are absolutely no inherent bonuses for having your pretender god present among the people

it's just untrue : presence of the pretender raises faith (dominion) and this dominion makes the province tilt stowards the pretender's scales, so people work harder if it is order or productivity, are more healthy if it's Growth, get cold if it's cold and die more if it's Death !

This suits me perfectly. I like the idea that the Pretender is a godlike being not even bothering himself with unrest and not a kind of awe-inspiring sherif making the brigands surrender arms and going back to their fields. That's what good admin (low taxes) or patrollers are for.
Maybe I'm more clear now ?

[alexti]

PDF said:
it's just untrue : presence of the pretender raises faith (dominion) and this dominion makes the province tilt stowards the pretender's scales, so people work harder if it is order or productivity, are more healthy if it's Growth, get cold if it's cold and die more if it's Death !

This suits me perfectly. I like the idea that the Pretender is a godlike being not even bothering himself with unrest and not a kind of awe-inspiring sherif making the brigands surrender arms and going back to their fields. That's what good admin (low taxes) or patrollers are for.
Maybe I'm more clear now ?

I think PDF is making a good point here. From thematical point of view, it may be more interesting to have have priests powers increased when the god-pretender is in the same province - for example, priest level for preaching purposes could be raised by 1. Intuitively, it seems that ability to demonstrate the god would simplify the task of preaching (unless the god is hiding, I suppose). From tactical point of view it may be interesting to raise priest levels for the purpose of combat casting if the god is participating - it can make a big difference vs undead.