The next patch

Truper · #1 April 9th, 2004, 12:22 AM

Clams, clams, clams, clams,
Clams, clams, clams, clams,
Lovely clams, wondeful claaaams!

AhhhFresh · #2 April 9th, 2004, 12:26 AM

Quote:

Originally posted by Graeme Dice:

quote:
Originally posted by AhhhFresh:
It all comes down to Wish.

The more I think about it, the more I think that this is correct. Wish for example, allows you to buff a vampire queen up to 150 hitpoints, with all stats (other than MR) in the 30's. With decent items, it can become a nightmare to kill such a beast.

So we see that Zen is smarter than we think he is.

(No offense Zen)

Obviously I agree, since I posted the original quote... but allow me to expound.

Clams are nice, Clams are good... I make them myself. But what do they really do?

They let you chain cast WISH while possibly having an unassuming amount of territory in an MP game. IE You can come out of nowhere and win the game... because that is what WISH was meant to do. Change the game.

We're talking a Vampire Queen every turn.

The old rules don't apply.

HOWEVER

If you can't cast WISH what now? Well, you can chaincast Ethergate, which is pretty sweet... but not worth it. I love Ethergate, but I can't imagine commiting that much, if all I'm gonna get is a buncha big dudes with moonblades.

You can also convert those pearls to other denominations pretty easily... which is nice, but not a game breaker.

[ April 08, 2004, 23:28: Message edited by: AhhhFresh ]

Nephelim · #3 April 9th, 2004, 01:40 AM

Quote:

Originally posted by AhhhFresh:
We're talking a Vampire Queen every turn.

Hrm... Why a vampire queen instead of a doom horror?

I played with wish a bit, and really couldn't find a better bang for my buck than a doom horror... GOR him and send him to take just about anything. Stat move of 10, and apparently impossible to kill. If he had hand slots he could take fortresses with a couple gate cleavers... sadly, he does not.

Is there some fatal flaw in the doom horror that I haven't seen? I generally give him a pendant of luck and an amulet of magic resistance.

Well, I often don't get up to wish before a game is over, so 'generally' might not be accurate.

Yes, these are SP games... My skills aren't up to taking on human opponents yet..

Zapmeister · #4 April 9th, 2004, 01:47 AM

The thing about WISH is that it has a seriously high coolness factor. It would be a real pity to lose it, and I would prefer any other solution that works.

Maybe alter the wishes themselves? No more asking for specific creature types - maybe you could wish for a "saviour" or somesuch, and get a random creature from a pool of pretty-good critters.

Maybe also do something about chain-casting Armageddon. In general, have wishes that improve the position of the wisher, rather than trashing everyone else.

Or just make clams water-1, nature-1

Graeme Dice · #5 April 9th, 2004, 01:55 AM

Quote:

Originally posted by Nephelim:
Hrm... Why a vampire queen instead of a doom horror?

More item slots, and immortality. Think of a vampire queen pretender with rainbow 5, astral 10, and 150 hitpoints in a dominion 10 province. Give her a sword of swiftness or some other weapon, charcoal shield, starshine skullcap, elemental armour, quickness boots, luck pendant and anti-magic amulet. A wish for power brings your attack, defense and magic resist up to over 30, and you are completely immune to the elements. There are very few spells that will get through at this point. You'll also regenerate something like 15 hitpoints per turn. I've had one wipe out an army with about 15 deep seers, 5 kings of the deeps, and 50+ sea trolls.

The doom horrow on the other hand, suffers from a relative lack of item slots, and is still vulnerable to elemental damage. They definetly are superior raiders to undefended provinces in my opinion, since its a rare map that they can't traverse in one turn.

[ April 09, 2004, 00:57: Message edited by: Graeme Dice ]

Daynarr · #6 April 9th, 2004, 02:22 AM

Quote:

Originally posted by Cainehill:

quote:
Originally posted by Alexander Seil:

quote:
Originally posted by Cainehill:
Just to illustrate the absurdity of this - think of Vanheim, or Pangaea. You can't even _see_ their troops, but somehow you know their military strength? The graphs, as they are, are fine for SP games, but not for MP.

So? You could simply disable the graphs. Besides, as far as "military intelligence sense" goes, it's not like army commanders, modern or ancient, didn't know locations (and thus the number) of major enemy fortifications or the general composition and size of their enemies' forces. In Dom2, however, you don't even have reliable information as to the physical location of the other nation, let alone their army movements or positions of their forts, unless you actually send spies out to investigate.
You missed the gist of my point, such as it was. Other people were saying that you could, by looking at the graphs, tell if someone was hiding away just building clams, and set forth to wallop them before the clam-hoarding turns into Wishing.

Which isn't possible if the graphs are turned off, and as I attempted to point out, there's many reasons why the graphs would be turned off in a MP game.

Actually, your point seems to be that graphs are too accurate, and it was responded such way.

As for turning off graphs in MP game there are lots of reasons not to turn them off so it comes down to personal preference.

The thing is graphs are only one (and easiest) way to discover if someone is turtling in a game. Other method would be using scouts or diplomacy (finding out info from another player) to name a few.

BTW. has ANYONE pulled that tactic off in MP game?

As for the Wish - it's level 9-alteration spell and by the time you research it and get enough gem income to cast it, it will be late game. If you fear someone might pull it off, just increase research cost and make SURE it will be cast in (very) late game.

Norfleet · #7 April 9th, 2004, 02:22 AM

Quote:

Originally posted by Graeme Dice:
A wish for power brings your attack, defense and magic resist up to over 30, and you are completely immune to the elements. There are very few spells that will get through at this point. You'll also regenerate something like 15 hitpoints per turn. I've had one wipe out an army with about 15 deep seers, 5 kings of the deeps, and 50+ sea trolls.

A wish for power does not grant improved magic resistance. It is impossible to improve magic resistance in such a way: Power only is +50 HP, +20 Str, +10 Atk/Def/Prec. And 15 deep seers, 5 Kings of the Deep, and sea trolls are weaklings anyway. They are by far not equal in cost, so it's hardly a surprise that they failed.