Terrible Player.

[Sombre]

He'll try it and it won't work and he'll talk about 125 pd some more and then gandalf will post?

[/crystal ball]

[Gandalf Parker]

Or he could jump right to the end by logging into IRC.

To Iry: IRC (Internet Relay Chat) is online chat rooms. There is one for Dominions 3 which is where a number of the experts that have commented hang out. The information on getting there is in the sticky posts at the top of the forums. They can take you step-by-step thru a winning game.

[Iry]

Since the last time I posted I've played 6 games. Two were wins, and four were losses. My record seems to be improving! In all of the accounts below I was playing with Independent Strength 9 per one of the suggestions from a previous poster.

The first loss was playing Niefelheim with an N10 Bless using Jotuns. I amassed 10 Jotuns before I began to conquer independents than stampeded them until I ran into Helheim. The computer presented no military resistance to my seemingly undefeatable Jotuns and I plowed ahead in search of his capital. It was my hope to land on his Capital and let his military trickle back home to try and oust me to their ultimate doom. Unfortunately, this was not the case. While I siege their capital, the enemy AI went for my provinces and claimed about two per turn (easily beating the PD of 10) until I bought more Jotuns at my capital and tried to fight back the independents. While I chased their offensive down with my secondary force of Jotuns, their army + pretender siege my capital. I used my secondary force of Jotuns to try and remove them but their pretender killed my blessed Jotuns and I ended up losing every province but the enemies capital (which I had finally claimed) I ended up being Dom Killed.

The first win was playing Niefelheim with an N10 Bless using Jotuns. I created groups of 10 and went on a conquering frenzy until I ran into the computer playing C'tis. I began to create numerous groups of 10 Jotuns with a blessing capable commander to defend each front-line province and this successfully repelled the enemy. The enemy also apparently lacked a combat pretender this time around and had nothing that could beat the Jotuns. At this point the computer did absolutely nothing but throw troops into the Jotun meat grinder and I steadily advanced and made sure I never gave the computer an opening. The computer died a horrible death and offered no real resistance.

The second loss was playing Mictlan generally using one of Baalz strategy guides. I created gobs of Mictlan priests and conquered territories with Jaguar Warriors. I was losing quite a few Jaguar Warriors with every battle, so I apparently wasn't using enough chaff to defend them. I finally ran into the computer playing Niefelheim and I tried to protect my borders and start blood sacrificing so I could explore the Blood spells. Apparently you shouldn't blood sacrifice in your capital because I totally tanked my income within a couple of turns of solid blood hunting. Regardless of this, Niefelheim hit one of my defended provinces and tore me apart. I had placed chaff with shields in front of the Jaguar Warriors, but the enemy rock hurlers threw rocks at the Jaguar Warriors and ignored the chaff. The enemy Jotuns ate my chaff alive and they claimed province after province until they conquered me. I never got to explore the Blood spells significantly and it was like watching my last game in reverse.

The third loss was playing Sauromatia. I waited a couple of turns until I had about 8 Hydras and a Tamer then conquered an independent province every turn until I ran into Abysia. Abysia apparently was using a decent fire bless because they tore apart my Hydras with Burning Ones and I had to stop expansion. Luckily, Abysia got distracted by another enemy AI and didn't come for me. This gave me a chance to rebuild Hydras with some shield-chaff in front of them. I claimed most of the territory around me and felt like I was doing pretty solidly. I decided to experiment with blood again (which is why I picked Sauromatia) which quickly tanked my income once again. I thought I had a decent number of provinces, and I made sure to only blood hunt provinces that were away from my capital but I guess I have to take it lighter next time. Finally, Abysia finished killed his opponent and turned its attention towards me. It was a slow battle, but I was losing more than I was winning. Whenever I got enough troops to defend one province they attacked a different province and I had to rush over there to defend it. In the end I decided I couldn't keep it up and rushed behind their lines to try and claim their provinces and I traded them one for one until I had accumulated too many loses and finally lost. My conquered provinces were conquered back and I was overwhelmed.

My second win was playing Sauromatia again. I waited a couple of turns until I had about a hundred Androfangs lead by a couple of Witch Kings. I proceeded to march around the countryside conquered everything as I added more and more of both Androfangs and Witch Kings. Once I hit around 400 Androfangs I started having starvation problems so I split the army up and continued to conquer until I ran into Marverni. I spent a couple of turns not attacking as I build Endless Wine for each of my Witch Kings and bulked up to 1,000 Androfangs. I then proceeded to kick the crap out of Marverni. Suddenly my Witch Kings started being shot by arrows from Caelum. Every. Single. Turn. About half the time they even killed them. This caused all kinds of supply issues and I couldn't even see Caelum yet. I had a good 30 provinces by this time and I was doing respectably by money so I had every one of my Witch Kings craft a Skull Mentor and started researching, just replacing each Witch King that was killed by arrows (which was about every other turn). Even so, I felt pretty confident in my victory with 30 provinces and I made my Witch Kings all blood hunt one turn, patrol the next turn, blood hunt the turn after that and repeated until I had enough blood slaves to make about 10 Vampire Lords. This was purely experimental, since I felt I could have won with Androfangs alone. I used Blood Sacrifice to push my dominion outward and advance with Vampire Lords just to see how cool they were. I even summoned a Demon Lord just to see what he looked like. All in all I think this took a gross amount of time that probably wouldn't be valuable in a competitive multi player game. Finally, I 'accidentally' dom-killed my opponent since I was trying to spread my dominion for Vampire Attacks.

My fourth loss was playing as Yomi. I started off with a rainbow pretender to try and be effective at Site Searching but since I had no idea how many ranks of magic I needed to site search effectively I just went with Fire, Water, Earth, and Air at 3 ranks each. This was also important because I wanted to practice spell casting. I tried out some of those fire-throwing Oni at first but they seemed to do almost no damage to the enemy independents. I switch to the freezing oni and had tremendous success. I build up a ton of the freezing-yomi just like I had done Androfangs from the previous game and conquered a province every single turn until I ran into Vanheim and Ulm almost simultaneously. They were busy with each other, and apparently R'yleh was somewhere I couldn't see (but participating in death matches to great success. I started to beat down Ulm until something very weird happened. My troops were starving. I was eating up nearly 400 supply in the province I had my major army in. I checked and found nothing but food-less oni. The next turn my troops were diseased! Still nothing in my army but freezing oni. My army of Oni, who needed no food, apparently starved to death. From that point onward ALL my oni were eating supply despite the fact that it said they needed no food. Well, Vanheim finally beat Ulm and turned on me and they had an absolute ton of dwarven smiths that kept spamming Blade Wind that ate my army apart. I built some chaff-with-shields and marched my own significant amount of mages to combat them and I guess I should have spaced my mages out more because Vanheim used Blade Wind on my mages and ignored the chaff until after the mages were dead. In the end, I only uncovered about three sites and wondered what I was doing wrong, there.

I promise that my next game will try using the E9N4 Abysia Bless tactic.

[chrispedersen]

Well there are counters to every tactic.
the trick is not pound your head against the wall trying the same thing. Adapt.

a few comments.

Mictlan: Forget chaff. priest + 7 jags will take almost any indy. (AND YOU WANT TO).

If you run into something you think is too hard. It isn't.
Ok. The exceptions are deer archers. But if you really get nervous, use 2 groups of 7.

Sauromatia: You can't afford to expand with hydras, in ea.
build a dozen spearmen, and 30 -40 androphags. That will handle virtually anything.

You're still attacking way too slow, and giving the AI time to mass huge forces.

Yomi: don't sweat losing with yomi. But SP you should attempt to make SC's with the Dai Oni's.


Hint: My rule of thumb for acceptable MP play is *15* provinces conquered before the end of year 1.

You should have your first fort built, as well, and ideally a second one started.

[sector24]

I am reading a lot of "I waited until I had an overwhelming force..." It will take some time, but you need to get better at gauging how many units you need to win a battle, and beating the enemy with smaller groups, which increases the # of provinces you can take per turn.

It also sounds like a couple times the computer beat you with guerilla tactics of trading provinces with you until you were defeated economically. Expanding faster will help with some of that, but if you are in a situation where you have to trade provinces, make sure you're standing on the high income lands. If you are going to lose a province, jack the taxes up to 200.

It sounds like you are doing better though. I think I put 80 hours into the game before I was starting to feel confident in my abilities. It's worth it though, I enjoyed both my wins and losses.

[Gandalf Parker]

In solo games I dont try "too hard" to take every province. Especially in early game.

I try hard to take every province that connects directly to my home province since my castle will draw resources from them increasing what I can recruit each turn.

Then I get picky. The farmland (aks if you dont know how to tell) usually give the most gold. The mountains tend to give resources but thats only useful for that one province in the early game if its not directly next to a castle.

I tend to zig-zag my way toward the enemy going around provinces with lots of knights and elephants. I let the AI run into those then I jump him when he is weakened. Later in the game I will go back and clean up the other provinces.

I try to avoid taking the last province between me and them. I sit and buildup in a province one-away and hit him after he has just attacked the indepts. Hopefully a hard one.

Of course my favorite tactic is to leave no direct path back to me by jumping completely over indept provinces instead of zig-zagging thru weak provinces. But thats a tactic that only works for nations such as Caelum (flyers) or Pangaea (stealth) which doesnt seem to match your playing style. And Dominions is definetly a game where matching a nation to your style is your best bet. Also I do tend to play larger maps than many other people because I really like the "search and discover" part of the game.

[SlipperyJim]

Originally Posted by Iry

I promise that my next game will try using the E9N4 Abysia Bless tactic.

Remember to use Early Age (EA) Abysia. That'll give you the best experience.

I have to second this advice. EA Abysia is a very straightforward nation. Your chief mages (Anointed) are powerful and not old. You have heavy infantry in an era that doesn't have a lot of heavy infantry, which usually gives you military superiority over most of your opponents. Lastly, fire evocations are heaps of fun, and all of your national troops are immune to any friendly fire. What's not to like?

The only "catch" to playing Abysia is how you mix your national troops with independent troops, like those tribal archers that you can hire in nearly every province. Here's the short answer: Don't do it.

The long answer is that Abysians all radiate heat. That heat is part of why they're so scary to fight in close combat. But the heat can also be a problem for any friendly troops who aren't immune to it. So if you recruit 50 tribal archers and group them around your Abysians, the archers will risk bursting into flame. Not good. If you're careful, you can use battlefield placement to keep any flammable troops away from your Abysians. Careful placement should prevent the problem, but it doesn't always work. Sometimes your guys move around, and suddenly your troops are spontaneously combusting like the Spinal Tap drummer. I usually don't bother with it. Abysians are plenty tough on their own, so you don't really need independent troops.

Happy BBQing! Let us know how it goes!