First newbie game: first impressions!!!

[lillumultipass]

So, I have just finished my first demo game and here are my first impressions. First, I want to thank all those that have answered me in my previous post. Anyway, back to my game.
I was playing Jotunheim as I said; I took a Niefel Giant, 8W 5E, a dominion of 6, Cold 3, a special dominion Nifelheim, and I think Productivity +1, and a castle.
Here is a picture I took (hope you will see something!) just to show you the end of my game; (in the attached file)



All the marron provinces are mine. As you see I was surrounded by Atlantis ans Chtis (don’t know how to write it!). My final upkeep is 302, income is 496, population (in Jotunheim) is 29600. Ok, on to what I liked, what I disliked, my problems...
First, obviously, when you start the game, you are overwhelmed, even with the advices of the FAQ, the newbie guide, help from the forums...for instance, as I said before, I didn’t know how often I should search for sites, and with which mages...I was lucky to have a kind of “rainbow mage” that came to assist me, such that he became my site searcher late in the game...but much to late I think...at first I didn’t want to waste a turn searching with my pretender instead of attacking a province.
What I really really really really liked is the creation process of your pretender; I could just create one and let the computer play just to see how it works. Here too I didn’t optimize everything I think, but I was not too unhappy (I took advice from the newbie guide). Anyway, I really love this phase.
One thing that I didn’t really like (I guess it’s because I didn’t play long enough) is the number of units; I felt that you don’t have that much really different units to build; most of my Jotun were more or less alike (the soldiers I mean) and I can buld a priest, 2 magicians, the niefel giant, one scout...coming from the heroes series, I felt that you had more units, but that they were not very “sexy”, like when in heroes you recruit cyclops, dragons, phoenixes...they are all very different...ok, this is just my first impression, I might be wrong! I guess I am, I have only played once!
Another point is magic; I was rather lost here; I was researching schools rather aimlessly...and as I didn’t watch many battles, I couldn’t feel the impact of magic; moreover, I only understood rather late in the game that I could take some gems with me and cast some rituals, so I have only summoned a few creatures.
One problem that I got late in the game is when I started being attacked; as you see in the map, I am completely surrounded by atlantis, so he kept attacking my coastal provinces (and I didn’t know how to attack underwater...), and in the South, the C’this kept attacking also; so during the Last, I don’t know, say, 12 turns, I kept losing provinces, winning them back...without being able to do anything else; my pretender kept attacking, even some of magicians were attacking; so I found it hard to do anything else than wage war, so I never casted any rituals, or forge items, search for sites...
Another problem was with unrest, as some of provinces that were far from my capitole (like Loria, Shade forest...) had unrest in the 80’s; and I didn’t know what to do; I tried to patrol a little, but it was very efficient; so I built a castle in a nearby province, but I am not sure it helped...
Well, for the moment, I really enjoyed playing, I guess I am going to play another game, before deciding whether I buy the game!
Any comments are appreciated!

[Alneyan]

Yes, the game can be indeed overwhelming when you first start playing (I have been lucky to first hear of Dominions when it was Dominions I). Here comes a few answers in no specific order:

- There is a *lot* of units in Dominions, but the differences between your national units are rather unstressed. For example, you may have several kind of infantry troops, with various equipment (armour and/or weapons), and they would not serve the same purpose (light infantry serves as cannon fodder or as a swarm whereas heavy infantry is here to give some punch).

Other differences include the sacred units. These are expensive, often capitol-only, but they will cost twice as less to maintain per month, and you can give them a blessing. To bless a sacred unit, order a Priest to cast the Blessing (or Divine Blessing if available) spell. The actual effects of the blessing depend on your Pretender magic skills; in your case, your troops would have had a +3 bonus to defence because of your Water 8, (if memory serves; it may be a bit more) and a Reinvigoration 3 because of your Earth 5.

If you want truly impressive units, rituals are indeed the way to go; there lie everything ranging from puny skeletons to Archdevils or Titans.

- There are quite a few ways of going under water. For example, a Water mage can bring several friends with her under water (only a few though), there are items with the same effect (such as the Manual of Water Breathing, available at Construction 4 with Nature 3 and Water 1; it allows 25 units to go underwater), a special Dominion allows all sacred units to go underwater within friendly dominions, and so on. Any unit with the special ability "Poor Amphibian" or "Amphibian" will also be able to go underwater, without the help of any kind of spell.

- Unrest reduces both the income and the resource production of your province; high levels of unrest (100 and above if memory serves) also prevents you from recruiting any unit. Patrolling decreases unrest, but kills a small part of your population. Reducing your tax rate decreases unrest as well, but will reduce your income in the short run. Unrest is caused by battles, enemy dominions, events and special sites (the most common being the Brigands' Lair).

- If you want to know more about magic, you can browse the various magic schools in the demo. When creating your Pretender, double click on "View Magic Schools" near the end of the process, and you will have access to all spells in the game. When playing a game, you can also double click on the school you are interested in to bring up the list of all spells available in this field.

[Graeme Dice]

lillumultipass said:
One thing that I didn’t really like (I guess it’s because I didn’t play long enough) is the number of units; I felt that you don’t have that much really different units to build;

Well, Jotunheim has a good number of choices actually. Javelin troops have great range and damage because they happen to be giants. Boulder-hurlers are a decent way to kill elite units with lots or armour like knights. Spearmen are your general purpose troops. Axeman are a good choice if you have to go up against something like a monolith that's got a very high protection value. The hirdmen and other troops don't tend to be as generally useful as spearmen, but they do have their place. Niefel giants abnd woodsmen are your elite troops that can become much more powerful with appropriate blessings.

Skratti are your water mages and blood hunters. Gygia are your sorcerors. They are both expensive, but necessary for research and other magical purposes. Niefel Jarls are your supercombatants. Give them a wraith sword, and have them cast quickness, breath of winter, blessing, attack. Then you get to watch the carnage.

Your other commanders are all fairly tough, so you can always consider building one of them every turn just to boost your forces.

Another point is magic; I was rather lost here; I was researching schools rather aimlessly...

As Nieflheim, try researching alteration till you have quickness, then construction to level 4. This gives you wraith swords, which your jarls can use to great effect.

One problem that I got late in the game is when I started being attacked; as you see in the map, I am completely surrounded by atlantis, so he kept attacking my coastal provinces (and I didn’t know how to attack underwater...),

That is Atlantis' major advantage. However, any water mage can go underwater and bring a couple of troops with him. Your Niefel Jarls are a good example.

and in the South, the C’this kept attacking also; so during the Last, I don’t know, say, 12 turns, I kept losing provinces, winning them back...without being able to do anything else; my pretender kept attacking, even some of magicians were attacking; so I found it hard to do anything else than wage war, so I never casted any rituals, or forge items, search for sites...

Niefelheim tends to have a shortage of mages thanks to how expensive they are. The most effective way to search for sites probably would have been to dedicate a single mage to each path of magic. Have them cast the site searching spells on mountain provinces first, then forests and wastelands, then plains, then farmlands. The site searching spells are located under conjuration: (water (voice of aspu) and death(dark knowledge)), evocation: (astral(arcane probing)), bloodbowl of blood), and thaumaturgy which has everything else.

Another problem was with unrest, as some of provinces that were far from my capitole (like Loria, Shade forest...) had unrest in the 80’s; and I didn’t know what to do; I tried to patrol a little, but it was very efficient; so I built a castle in a nearby province, but I am not sure it helped...

The easiest way to reduce unrest is to lower taxes. Lowering them by 5% for every 5 points of unrest will clear most unrest in about two turns. If it doesn't go down, then there's probably an unrest generating site there. Have a blood mage search there and you'll find it.

[lillumultipass]

Ok so as to the "going under water problem": if I don't have a 3N mage, I have to empower him till he's level 3 to forge the item is that right??? But then I need a lot of nature gems...I guess there's a spell that allow to go under water, no???
As to the number of units: yes, i have seen that there are a lot of units (thanks to the 17 nations) but I felt that each nation individually didn't have much; well, they have a few, but they are not that much different; I guess that as you said the really "sexy" units are made with rituals.
But I guess these are high costs spells...

[Alneyan]

There are other magic items to give water breathing abilities to your armies; however, I think the other items require more than Construction 4, and so cannot be forged in the demo. I had forgotten about the global enchantment which allows *all* troops to go underwater as well. It is called Thetis' Blessing, require 5 water, and Enchantment 9 (making it a end game spell, and unavailable with the demo). There is another similar spell which prevents travel between land and sea, thus forbidding Atlantis from invading you (it requires Alteration 7, and so cannot be used in the demo).

If you are interested in knowing more about summoned creatures and/or magic items, there are two PDF guides showing everything that can be obtained during the course of the game. However, viewing these files is unadvised if you would rather discover spells on your own. These guides are linked to on a couple of websites, including Arryn's available here.

Edit: There are also a couple of magic items which enable a commander to breathe under water. Among these are the Shambler Skin Armour (requires Water 1 and Construction 2) and the Amulet of Breathing (Air 2 and Construction 2). It might be enough if you have a powerful commander able to take provinces on her own.

[lillumultipass]

I have started my second game Last night, with Machaka, I took a Great enchantress with 2 in most magic paths (all but blood and water I think...), and 6 in astral...to have a site searcher...anyway, it's strange to have normal units after having used gian with Jotuhneim; I actuallay lost some battles!!! But one was very surprising: I had my pretender, a black sorcerer, I had lost of animals (through the spell), horned serpents, a wyvern, and a few archers, and machaka warriors, and I lost! I was facing something like 25 crossbowmen and 15 heavy infantry with a commander...and I watched the replay, and I saw that during the battle, my pretender, that was supposed to cast spell, just came forward into the melee to get slaughtered...I don't understand why...
I find it hard to know when I have enough firepower to win a battle...with Jotunheim I knew I could win all battles versus independents...but here...

[Alneyan]

- Magic sites do not require more than 4 in any given path, and most of the sites need 3 and less. However, having a high level of Astral is not a bad idea (quite an understatement here) when playing multiplayer, because of the workings of Magic Duel. I am not sure if the AI can actually do the same.

- Did you give your Pretender a Last order of "Cast Spells" (in the bottom half of the commander orders screen)? Spellcasters may cast poor spells from time to time, but they should definitively not be rushing to the frontlines, unless you have ordered them to do so.

- Since you seem to be outgunned in this battle (25 crossbows against your few weaker archers), you should consider putting all your troops as forward as possible in the battle setup. It will help them get in the fray more quickly, and so avoid losing too much due to enemy fire. You may still have a hard time breaking through the enemy infantry line, however.

- The Wyvern is a flying unit, and can go anywhere in the battlefield in a single turn. It is quite likely she will fly straight to the enemy alone, and so will get overwhelmed by all the defenders there. An order of "Hold and attack Rearmost" (making her wait two turns before attempting to attack behind the lines) might make her more effective, but having a few more Wyverns would not hurt in this case.

- I am sadly not an expert on Machaka, and so cannot give you any actual advice on how to win battles without too much trouble. In fact, I am having a tough time playing this nation, and so you definitively do not want my help on "how to play Machaka".

[lillumultipass]

well, in the set battle orders screen, I have just set "cast spells"; so I supposed that she would cast spell for the whole battle...she also could have casted "Returning" to avoid her death, no????

[Arryn]

lillumultipass said:
I find it hard to know when I have enough firepower to win a battle...with Jotunheim I knew I could win all battles versus independents...but here...

I assure you that if you set indy strength to 7+ (perhaps even as low as 5-6) you won't win all indy battles using Jotuns. Not unless you prepare carefully to counter the troop types that the indies have. The ability of even a large bunch of Jotuns outnumbered 2:1 or more by indy knights (a common ratio in the early to mid game) is by no means certain without strong magical support (or help from a SC pretender). You can also have a great deal of trouble with large amazon Groups, non-human special troops, massed archers, and hordes of small creatures that can swarm your giants and inflict many small wounds. Large numbers of small wounds may not kill your troops, but they'll rout and you'll lose the battle.

[Arryn]

lillumultipass said:
she also could have casted "Returning" to avoid her death, no????

Not unless you specifically scripted that spell. The spellcasting AI will preferentially cast defensive buffs or offensive spells. I've never seen it cast any of the "save my ***" spells.