Problems in demo exist in regular game?

[TruePurple]

BTW, I applied a number of the things you guys told me about things. Especially about upkeep. My game improved notably in both skill and fun factor. Still find things lacking. I still love AoW and got endless numbers of other games to play.

Like #2. being able to see stats of enemy units you see in enemy domain is a big one for me to prevent game headaches and make the game more enjoyable.

@ mostly PhilD

3. Thats interesting about attacking and retreating with a scout, though seems a bit exploitive. Rather see that closed up as a option (like enemy troops being invisable to the battle screen unless you get close enough) And instead a option for more active scouting where you can try to find more information, most specifically invisable-hidden units with increased risk of detection/destruction. If the unit doesn't make it back you don't get the information. But I suppose if the other way sorta works for the game, just not nearly as well IMO.. but its not as big of a issue for me.

But it doesn't cover that scouts unfortunitely don't seem to garner land information (like is it lucky/unlucky, growth/death etc)nor can they be instructed to check it out for increased risk.

4. Information in unit stats about what they cost per turn.

That information about the general rule of thumb for unit cost and that summons are free is very helpful. But sometimes you get units for free from an event or other circumstances where you simply don't know how much it costs. (like you don't know if a summon unit is also purchasable or not) Also like being able to see enemy unit stats outside of battle, it saves you from having to look things up or memorize them.

Does inkspot allie or other negative sites act even if you haven't found em?

5. Being able to dismiss troops

PhilD said:you can always send them out on suicidal missions

Unless their units, then you have to make a commander and go through the hassle of meeting up and switching units and finding something to suicide against.. too much hassle.

PhilD said:real life rational

Come on, pensions?! Thats a modern concept. More likely would be compensations to family for soldier loss. But if we really wanted to get realistic we would have units be drawn from general population (population goes down when units recruited) and population gets more unhappy when units from there get killed. Which actually would be good ideas but are not in the game AFAIK.

As of yet noones mentioned a game reason for not being able to dismiss units. Or have quibbled with my logic that programming a dismiss command in would be a cakewalk for any programmer. It baffles me that its not in there and makes the game look amaturish in design IMO.

7. Units stay together in battle.

PhilD said:But this has a cost in micromanagement

You and I have a very different Phil on what micromanaging is it seems. My definition is more time spend on settings to compensate for what can be done simplier or by the AI or design. So when I can order troops to stay together by command or just have them do so automatically.. thats less work then having to figure out how far back I need to put faster units with or without pause so they don't get too far ahead in a battle and place them there.

So to me a option to have units stay together is less micromanaging as far as I see it. I got no idea what your idea of micromanaging is.

Q5. Yet I've read a number of exploitive technics that allow you to have more then one prophet.

Gods can change their mind about who they favor, else they wouldn't be gods (think of biblical god.. god) Rather have an option to change prophet with delay perhaps.. and measures to prevent one from having more then one prophet.

You don't pay upkeep on prophets right?

[Ironhawk]

PhilD said:
Basically, the Illwinter devs are real nice guys, but they're a bit headstrong. If they don't like your idea, or they don't feel like doing it, they don't. There are a lot of UI features like the ones you suggest that would be a great thing to have, but that have been suggested since at least Dom2 (probably the very first even, though I wasn't really around in these days) and that I'm not holding my breath for.

Well put, PhilD. That is a really accurate description of the IW devs. Additionally tho, you have to consider that they are only 2 guys (only one programmer!) so they must make really hard decisions about what to program. That said, as TruePurple points out (and we all know) there are many small improvements that could be made. At some point tho we just have to accept that this really is an independent game and tolerate any flaws in order to get at the awesome gameplay.

[Shovah32]

Just wondering, how exactly would a scout looking at enemy troops from any sort of distance be able to tell their stats? The only real way to do this would be watching them fight but we can already see their stats when they fight so...

[TruePurple]

For that matter how could a unit know its exact strength level to report it as a number in the stat screen? Oh brother, its a game. Lets just chalk it up to gods knowing the stats of all unit types.

Regardless its a important feature of being able to see enemy unit stats outside of combat for avoid lots of headache. Especially in a game with primative graphics as it is which makes it more of a chore memorizing units. And in a game with lots and lots of different units, even variations on those units. I don't want to have to memorize lots of crap I shouldn't need to! Then to have to memorize new stuff in case of mod?! No way!

One programmer? Sheesh then they are really overcharging for the game or D3 has a small buyer base or something..

[Jack_Trowell]

About one previous question, you can have different units with different speed grouped : give the squad the "guard commander" order, and use a commander with good enought survivability.

That way, you could, for exemple, have a hoplite commander leading a mixed group of hoplites, or better the sacred version, and elephants.

The hoplites are hard to kill, an almost invulnerable to arrows (very heavy armor + shield), but versus other ultra heavy infantry they might lack offensive ability (longspear is a good weapon versus lightly armored troop, but lack damage to pieace the heavier armors)

Moreover, the better morale on your hoplites will be averaged with the low morale of the elephants if they're in the same squad, so you have less chance of them routing and smashing your own troops (could still happen, so careful)

For the commander's orders, you can have him hold 0-5 turns before making him attack (better control that the "hold and attack" order that always wait for 2 turns)

If you have the better ranged attacks , you can haveyou heavy units keep the center while your bows and spells hurt the opponent's army.

You can protect you flanks by using other units, often with better mobility.

Classic army with MA man :


rear - center : mages

rear - left : squad of longbowmen, set to "fire archer"
(note that this give them sometimes a good chance to hit enemy mages)

rear - right : another squad of longbowmen, this time without specific target , expect if you know what your next fight will be against and wish to target some specific units.

front - center : lord Warden with squad of wardens (MA man sacred units) set to guard commander. The Lord Warden himself set to hold x3 and attack closest
You can of course make without the Lord warden and use the standard hold and attack orderd, but then you wardens will start advancing sooner.


front - right and left : squad of knights (or knights of avalon) set to hold and attack -> rearmost

By waiting for the ennemy army to advance , your knights will have a chance of ignoring them and going for the easy kill of ennemy archers and commanders/mages.

If the ennemy has a big squads in the center, your flanking units will probably attack them by the flank instead of attacking the rearmost units (this is not a bug, in the middle of a battle, if a large squad is near you, you will find hard to ignore it), but them it will probably be a welcome addition to your wardens that could have been overpowered with a trully large force.
And sometimes you will win the day because your knights have managed to kill all ennemy commanders while your wardens were being killed by a larger force.

You can also use a knight commander or other fast commander on the flank and use the "guard commander" order to have your flankiong units wait for a different number of rounds

[Endoperez]

TruePurple said:
For that matter how could a unit know its exact strength level to report it as a number in the stat screen? Oh brother, its a game. Lets just chalk it up to gods knowing the stats of all unit types.

Regardless its a important feature of being able to see enemy unit stats outside of combat for avoid lots of headache. Especially in a game with primative graphics as it is which makes it more of a chore memorizing units. And in a game with lots and lots of different units, even variations on those units. I don't want to have to memorize lots of crap I shouldn't need to! Then to have to memorize new stuff in case of mod?! No way!

One programmer? Sheesh then they are really overcharging for the game or D3 has a small buyer base or something..

Dom3 is very good in some things, quite poor in others. Graphics and sound are weak. Content is very good. Modding capabilities are good. At the moment, it's one-of-a-kind in turn-based fantasy strategy games, and it sells well. Shrapnel Games (who publishes the game and decides the price) has sold many copies of the game. The amount of resources used to make something shouldn't affect the price, just the quality of the product. Because Shrapnel Games is still in the business, I guess they know the value of Illwinter's small team's product.


Usually, you don't have to know the details of the spesific units. While details differ, the same counters generally work against all heavy infantry, massed medium/light infantry, massed archers, armored archers/crossbows, etc. In most cases, remembering if the unit has less than 10, more than 15 or somewhere in between protection is enough.

[TruePurple]

Content might be good but design and mechanics leave something to be desired.

If these units are so generic like you describe then wheres the content? Whats the point of having so many different races? If there are many different types of units you can encounter, you need a option to be able to see enemy unit stats. I have a terrible memory as it is, stats of a hundred different units and variations there of is not something I wish to try to fill it with. One should also be able to see spheres of magic users and artifacts of commanders.

[TruePurple]

An elaberation of my simple suggestion of a dismiss command.

For injured units.
Option for groups ordering themselves in injury first, putting them first on the list by most injured. You highlight all the units you see has having the most injury and dismiss them together enmass with a hot command.

For just dismissing units you can't afford you would have the highlight units and dismiss enmass option.

Flexibility, yet reduces micromanaging. No fretting with moving units to squads for killing or having to bother to send commanders on suicide missions.

I know, they probably won't do it else they already would have.. or something like that. Just thought I'd express my hope for things.

[Endoperez]

TruePurple said:
Content might be good but design and mechanics leave something to be desired.

If these units are so generic like you describe then wheres the content? Whats the point of having so many different races? If there are many different types of units you can encounter, you need a option to be able to see enemy unit stats. I have a terrible memory as it is, stats of a hundred different units and variations there of is not something I wish to try to fill it with. One should also be able to see spheres of magic users and artifacts of commanders.

I said usually, and that counters [g]generally[/b] work against the same types of units. Ulmish non-shielded basic infantry is almost tough enough to ignore normal archers, black plate infantry is pretty resistant to crossbows; the shields still help against crossbows, and especially against special missiles (Banefire Archers, Jotun Javelinists, normal archers with Flaming Arrows active). And of course, Ulmish infantry is all very cheap (10 gp) and tougher and stronger than normal humans, if a bit more vulnerable against magic. Marignonian infantry doesn't have shields and is vulnerable to arrows, and especially to crossbows, but they have higher morale (11 instead of 10). Marignonian Man-at-Arms have shields, but are a bit more expensive. Machaka's Hoplites have good armor, but their Great Hide Shields are weaker in melee than most other shields - on the other hand, they are very good against missiles. Agarthan medium and heavy human infantries use Kite Shields instead, and are the only infantry to do so, giving them slight edge against missiles and against heavy weapons. Their own weapons have rather low damage, though, and they themselves will have trouble against heavy units. Their encumberance is also rather high, due to enc 2 of the Kite Shield. Their Darkvision also makes able to fight under Darkness. Pale Ones of MA are medium infantry with very poor attack and defence, and only Bucklers to protect them from missiles, but they have lots of hp, good strength and an array of useful special abilities. They are vulnerable to missiles, though, and are prone to losing their only eye and thus becoming useless. Satyr Hoplites have very good base skills and stats (14 hp, 13 def, 13 magic res), but their archaic bronze armor causes them to fatigue quickly and their body protection is rather weak; however their ability to heal battle afflictions means that you can have them get lots more experience than infantries of other nations.

Magma Eruption works against all of these. Lighting spells work against all of thies. Massed crossbows work against all of these, but with wildly varying results. Crossbows with Flaming Arrows cast works pretty well against all of these and devastates most. All of these get fatigue rather quickly, and you might be able to beat them if you can tire them somehow.

The counters are similar. The uses, the strengths and particular national bonuses vary.

[TruePurple]

You can tell by their stats whether they would be good against missles, special missles or melee, etc?

If they vary in their strengths and weaknesses, don't they vary in what you want to use against them? From what you say it sounds like yet more reason to make enemy unit stats visable.

Theres definitely no downside at least other then programming time. Since theres already a unit stat screen its a matter of making a new access point system for it. It doesn't sound that hard to program.