Patch Improvements

[Chazar]

Cainehill said:I suspect map-creation can be sped up significantly if the graphics / message updating code is tweaked.

Yep, I too experienced that progress bars or indicators can slow down things enormously.

...but can't someone who has the full version yet easily try this out by running a graphicless server and connecting locally to it (and disconnect before hosting)? Or does even the graphicless server spit out useless progress comments?

[Manuk]

I think that the +3 attack +3 defense bonus of quickness is too much, should be removed. Acting 2 times the same turn is enough bonus. Right now it´s the same as dom2. no-brainer.

[Cainehill]

Manuk said:
I think that the +3 attack +3 defense bonus of quickness is too much, should be removed. Acting 2 times the same turn is enough bonus. Right now it´s the same as dom2. no-brainer.

Are you talking the spell? Or the blessing? Because the blessing isn't +3 attack / + 3 defense, nor is it really 2 actions per turn.

As far as the spell goes, it no longer allows casting two spells per turn, so it's already been down-graded. And it makes no sense for someone moving more quickly than everyone else to _not_ be harder to hit & have an easier time hitting foes.

[Manuk]

didn´t know of the downgrade done so far. I was talking about the spell. even then the bonuses are an unneeded plus.

[Cainehill]

One improvement that would really be nice : An option to _not_ have any mercenaries show up for the first 10 (or X) turns. An awful lot of Dom2 games had to use "no hiring mercenaries the first 10 turns" as a house rule, just because early game mercs could be so imbalancing.

And it's looking just the same with Dom3 : the nation that gets the first mercenaries is often getting the first three or four mercs, because of the leg up on expansion & thus gold income it gives.

And it should be trivial to implement, along the lines of :

IF NoEarlyMercs AND TurnNumber LESSTHAN 10
...SkipMercenaryCheck
ELSE
...CheckForMercenaries

The mercs are wonderful for SP games, but can add too much of a luck factor to MP : getting a full 20-60 temporary troops in place of 3-10 regular troops is a huge boost.

[JaydedOne]

Cainehill said:
One improvement that would really be nice : An option to _not_ have any mercenaries show up for the first 10 (or X) turns. An awful lot of Dom2 games had to use "no hiring mercenaries the first 10 turns" as a house rule, just because early game mercs could be so imbalancing.

And it's looking just the same with Dom3 : the nation that gets the first mercenaries is often getting the first three or four mercs, because of the leg up on expansion & thus gold income it gives.

The mercs are wonderful for SP games, but can add too much of a luck factor to MP : getting a full 20-60 temporary troops in place of 3-10 regular troops is a huge boost.

I can readily understand your point and might even agree. I do tend to find that the mercs really -do- make a huge difference in early expansion. That said, one balancing factor might be that the bidding system helps check this somewhat. If I put half of my starting gold towards a mercenary, I'm necessarily also gutting my magic research or my early expansion if I -don't- win the bid. Even though I get the money back, that's a turn of research I've lost or, worse, I have the cash to buy soldiers but not the resources. So that makes it less of a no-brainer to buy mercs as you may have to overpay just to be sure you don't get the shaft of not only not getting the mercs, but slowing down your growth even further by not winning.

I'm not convinced that this is -enough- balance, mind you. But it's a thought.

[Cainehill]

JaydedOne said:

I can readily understand your point and might even agree. I do tend to find that the mercs really -do- make a huge difference in early expansion. That said, one balancing factor might be that the bidding system helps check this somewhat. If I put half of my starting gold towards a mercenary, I'm necessarily also gutting my magic research or my early expansion if I -don't- win the bid.

Which is yet another reason why the person who wins the mercs gets a big leg up : anyone else who bids is generally setback compared to if they hadn't bid. Mind, I'm not sure that losing 4 points of research is gutting research, especially with the longer research times in Dom3.

I think an awful lot of people bid, because of the large advantage, and for a good merc it might just be the person who alchemizes his or her fire gems to bid 415 instead of 400 who wins the mercs.

[JaydedOne]

But then, mightn't a smarter starting strategy for people who know they don't have the money to put out towards mercs (particularly without alchemizing) be just to not bid at all and instead use your money to buy national units?

I agree, though, that it's probably far too much of a no-brainer to hire mercs in the early game. Heck, given their relative cheapness, I tend to default to hiring mercs more often than not simply because of how quickly they arrive. It's perhaps something to be saved for Dom4, but maybe mercenaries should have a delay of a few turns before showing up when first hired or hired away from another nation. Maybe that'd counteract their element of benefit, as I know that I've often felt it a bit cheap to siege a castle and then begin hiring every mercenary band available into that province to quickly blow through the siege.

And hey! It can be up to 8-10 or so research lost, depending on eras or scales.

Okay, okay. You're likely right in that that's not at all "gutting" anything.

[Graeme Dice]

Manuk said:
I think that the +3 attack +3 defense bonus of quickness is too much, should be removed. Acting 2 times the same turn is enough bonus. Right now it´s the same as dom2. no-brainer.

Why shouldn't it be a "no-brainer"? It's a low level buff spell, one of the only ones for water magic, and a 3 defense boost is eaten up by the now increased defense penalty of 2 for every consecutive attack against a single target in a turn.

[Manuk]

well, if you have unit with 2 or more attacks they get multiplied by 2 and each attack gets you a +3 attack. and more defense (+3) there´s no reason not to cast it in a SC or thug, better if it´s the mass quickness (quickening?) in a group of units with multiple attacks.