SC Arena Competition Over! Results on page 9

[Potatoman]

I was poking through the archives of ancient wisdom (aka. DomII forums) the other day and unearthed a nifty thread about people sending in SC ideas for a giant deathmatch. It sounded so fun that I decided to resurrect the concept for Dominions 3!

Sound interesting? Build a SC and send him in to me! I'll start a test game, recruit and equip everybody's SC, and wish for a giant deathmatch that will determine the victor!

Edit: SC Arena Competition 1 is over, but was plagued by replay bugs and I have consequently taken it down. The make-up contest will be re-run on December 22nd or 23rd, with several small refinements to the original ruleset.
- The new 5 path rule has been adopted, detailed in the rules list. This discourages "insta-death" spellcaster types and should result in more entertainment for viewers.
- Pretenders will no longer possess the #pretender tag, which provided them with immunity to mind spells.
- All paths will be researched for all players before the contest takes place. This provides a familiar, baseline level of risk for the "Cast Spells" command that people have requested.

By default, all combatants from contest 1 will be entered in contest 2, unless they violate the 5 path rule. Combatants who violate the 5 path rule will be modified to conform with it in the way I deem least foolhardy, unless their creator contacts me with specific instructions. If you wish, you can send me an updated combatant and I will replace your old one. If you'd like to bow out completely, pm me and I'll remove you.

Your SC may be of any almost chassis in the game (GOR is allowed), may be empowered up to 3 times, may wield any non-unique equipment, and may script any spells known to it. You may only carry 10 gems/blood slaves into the arena, however! Pretenders may choose up to 2 magic levels in addition to their empowerment options.

Your combatant only has to conform to the following rules:

• No Seraph
• No Doom Horrors
• No artifacts
• No Blessings allowed
• No prophets
• Aquatic contenders must take Amulet of the Fish as a misc item. However, I will mod in an extra misc slot to any Aquatic chassis that you choose in order to compensate for this disadvantage.
• Your combatant may have no more than 5 magic paths in total, after empowerment and pretender picks. If you end up with more, then I will mod your chassis to remove excess picks (you may choose which paths are removed, if you wish.)

PM me your combatant with the following information:

• Chassis
• Magic empowerment
• Magic picks to be removed to confirm with the 5 path max rule, if necessary.
• Script
• Gem/slave choice
• Equipment
• Nation (in case you need a specific pretender chassis or national spell)
• Name (something tough!)

Clarifications:

• Note that Claws of Kocytos and Banish to Inferno do not work in arena fights, and are therefore useless. Do not script them.
• You don't get 5 empowerments from the 5 path rule. Literally put, your final paths (after pretender magic picks and empowerment) must be less than or equal to 5.
• You contender may boost their magic above 5 using items such as Earth Boots or Robe of the Magi. This is not prohibited by the 5 path rule.
• Priest levels do not count towards the 5 path limit.
• For purposes of complying with the 5 path rule, you choose which paths are removed. These can be base magic paths. For instance, if you pick an Anathement Dragon as your combatant and decide to empower it to 3 water (total 3 water, 3 fire) you could choose to remove either 1 water level or 1 fire level.
• The 5 path rule doesn't allow for removing more paths than is necessary to get your combatant down to 5. So you could not, for instance, choose to remove all magic levels from your Anathement Dragon combatant.
• Only 1 combatant per person, please.
• The contest will take place on the night of December 22nd or December 23rd. The deadline for submissions goes right up to the minute I start setting up the contest (likely 8:00 Pacific Time.) If you want to enter, I'd urge you to have your combatant submitted by then.
• Immobile pretenders normally cannot enter the arena. However, if you'd like to choose an immobile, I will mod it to possess a mapmove of 1. They are not banned.

Edit: Here's my combatant for round 2, which, in the interest of fairness, should be public knowledge.
Void Lord
Blood Thorn x2
Wraith Crown
Hydra Skin Armor
Boots of Quickness
Ring of Regeneration
Lifelong Protection Contract
3F, 2S
Phoenix Pyre, Luck, attack large.

The contest is now over. The turn file, and the mod required to view it, can be downloaded on page 9 of this thread.

[Rytek]

What about Tartarians? they come in so many varieties...

[vfb]

Sounds fun! I'll go with:

Name: Very Furious Bastard
Chassis: Angel of Fury
Magic: F3
Script: Attack Closest
Gems: 10 blood slaves
Placement: Far Lower Left-Hand Corner
Equip: Shadow Brand, Eye Shield, Rainbow Armor, Starshine Cap, Boots of Quickness, Lycanthrope Amulet, Lifelong Protection

Edited to add placement

[Baalz]

What about random magic paths? I guess Rytek was probably asking about that in regards to the Tartarians, but lots of chasises have random picks which varies them quite a bit. Also for clarification, I'm assuming gems/slaves are not replenished between fights?

[Cor2]

OoOOHH! I am on it... Need time to plan....

[Jazzepi]

Baalz said:
What about random magic paths? I guess Rytek was probably asking about that in regards to the Tartarians, but lots of chasises have random picks which varies them quite a bit. Also for clarification, I'm assuming gems/slaves are not replenished between fights?

My guess would be that you could configure a unit with random picks to any viable random output.

Jazzepi

[Potatoman]

Right, you can pick your randoms. Posting your build to the forum is a disadvantage that is not required btw; if you just pm it to me then it will remain top secret.
Gems/slaves are not replenished between battles- I will wish for deathmatch and throw everything in together.

I will post the turn file when everything is ready.

Edit: while you ponder your kick-*** SC builds, feel free to check out some of the new sprite graphics from my Ch'uan Qi mod, which makes available a nation loosely based on the legends surrounding the five sacred mountains in China and the Shaolin temple! This sprite (attached) is the Jade Dragon Master... So far, I have made all my sprites completely from scratch. Look ok?

[WonderLlama]

If pretenders are allowed, are any of the normal pretender options (extra paths and awe) allowed? Or just the base paths (with 3 empowerment)?

Is there any way to avoid the effects of Banish to Inferno/Claws of Cocytus? If not, are those spells allowed?

[quantum_mechani]

What happens if two people pick the same unique?

Also, as I recall, anything without hands cannot enter the death match, so people should take that into account when designing.

[vfb]

I don't think anything should be banned (well, glyphs and vastnesses etc impossible as QM says). I think the combat order of the Arena is not designed to be "fair", and also damage from one combat carries over to the next fight (but not afflictions).

I think the idea is that this is supposed to be fun. You can take it seriously if you want, but if an unseeded harpy scout wins the initiative, and flies over and pecks you in your eye for your last single HP after you defeated 10 opponents in epic battles, you might be disappointed.