The Dominions 3: "Wishlist"

[Oelfwine]

Endoperez,

Thanks. Deccan, perhaps barbarian attacks are less likely under Order 3 than Turmoil 3? I would be perfectly happy with that. I generally prefer scales to affect the chances of certain things happening, with the absolutes reserved for the strongest effects (rich prince, etc.)

[Agrajag]

Oelfwine said:
Thanks. Deccan, perhaps barbarian attacks are less likely under Order 3 than Turmoil 3?

Considering that the Order scale decreases the chances of a special event happening, its an obvious yes...

BTW, here is a nice wish (that has been mentioned plenty of times): Either let us dissmiss units or get rid of the militia/flagellant-granting events.

[atul]

Oelfwine said:
perhaps barbarian attacks are less likely under Order 3 than Turmoil 3? I would be perfectly happy with that.

In the previous discussions about the subject devs have said (IIRC) that there are two kinds of good/bad events: common and rare (not related to common/rare random event settings, though, my English just fails me in search for synonyms). For example, huge barbarian attack is a rare bad event, but with turmoil 2 or high unrest it becames a common bad event.

And of course there's the order/turmoil effect on event frequency.

[Sandman]

My wishes:

Reworked Pretenders

I've never been that happy with the various pretenders available. A lot of them are really pretty useless, and could be easily removed from the game - the various Egyptian-style pretenders, especially, and some of the mages as well. A lot of the pretenders are rather ugly and drab, as well.

Let's dump the seldom-used pretenders, give the good ones a graphical sprucing up, and create more genuinely useful new pretenders. More immobiles would be nice, for starters, like a Yggdrasil 'World Tree' with nature-3.

Another thing about the pretenders is how, well, secular they are. Apart from the bless effects, they don't interact that much with the priests and the sacred units of a nation. The pretenders need to be more, well, holy. There are lots of potential ways to do this. What if bless effects applied to the pretenders as well? Overpowered at the moment, yes, but it does make sense thematically.
Or what if the magical choices of a pretender gave priests extra spells? Say, holy fire to priests of a strong fire pretender, or holy armour to priests of an earth deity. These would generally be somewhat weak, but also very low fatigue, like all priest spells.
How about if pretenders (and maybe prophets) could derive extra power from bringing their priests into the battle? Maybe there could a special buff that priests could cast to help their deity, or a communionish effect that only worked between priest and god.

Reworked Fortresses

The fortresses could use a shot in the arm as well. Many of them are worthless or nearly worthless, and the others are quite boring. My ideas to make fortresses cooler include:

Make fortresses dependant on terrain. It seems obvious that a mountain citadel should not be buildable on farmland.

Create many more nation specific fortresses.

Give fortresses extra abilities. For example, a wizard's tower gives +1 research to all units within. A holy city increases dominion spread and gets a defence bonus based on dominion. A dark citadel weakens besieging enemy morale. A forest citadel can't be seen from adjacent provinces, and regrows quickly. A tribal encampment can be disbanded to yield 80% of the gold it took to set up, and is always destroyed when captured. A maritime city allows sea travel to units stationed there. And so on.

Indie units built at a fortress you own should wear your colours, within reason. Maybe not amazons, but longbowmen and knights, for example.

[Nagot Gick Fel]

Sandman said:
What if bless effects applied to the pretenders as well? Overpowered at the moment, yes, but it does make sense thematically.

It does? Not my opinion. Blind faith is really what makes an unit holy, and thus eligible for bless effects. Pretenders are merely a bunch of egocentric maniacs with an unextinguible thirst for power, and enough charisma to fool others into believing they're gods. And that's it - I have a hard time imagining they share their followers' faith in themselves.

Or what if the magical choices of a pretender gave priests extra spells? Say, holy fire to priests of a strong fire pretender, or holy armour to priests of an earth deity.

Holy fire, holy armour - that's sort of Fire 9 and Earth 9 give you already.

Give fortresses extra abilities. For example, a wizard's tower gives +1 research to all units within. A holy city increases dominion spread and gets a defence bonus based on dominion. A dark citadel weakens besieging enemy morale. A forest citadel can't be seen from adjacent provinces, and regrows quickly. A tribal encampment can be disbanded to yield 80% of the gold it took to set up, and is always destroyed when captured. A maritime city allows sea travel to units stationed there. And so on.

Some good ideas here. What about the nation/theme bringing flavour to fortresses instead? After all, Ulm fortresses already get a production bonus. Eg, if you've ever read Lovecraft, you probably know that the architect who designed R'lyeh (the city) had a very unusual sense of geometry - and because of that R'lyeh caused insanity to people who were unfortunate enough to visit it. Maybe in Dominions R'lyeh fortresses could get a chance to cause feeblemindness to non-mindless, non-Illithid and non-Starspawn units who happen to be in the province. Pangaean fortresses could have a 'Beckoning' effect on besiegers. Diabolical Faith fortresses could have a 'Looming Hell' effect on besiegers. Pythium fortresses could grant a +1 strat move bonus, and ignore terrain penalties in castled provinces. And so on.

[Sandman]

Blessable pretenders: Well, this all a bit theological, but surely it's not a simple question of personal faith and sacrifice that confers blessability? What about void summons or those sacred dogs the Tuatha have? I'd say that it's as much a question of the society at large believing in the sanctity of certain units, not just the individual creatures themselves. And who does the society believe in more than anything? The pretender, that's who.

Extra holy spells: True enough. I just thought it might be interesting to have more holy spells available, based on choices the player makes.

Fortress Types: With regards to the Ulmish resource bonus, the way I would do it would be for there to be at least two Ulm-specific fortress types, which would grant the resource bonus, as well as being very good forts in their own right. But there'd also be other forts available, with their own specific bonuses.

So whilst there would be one or two R'lyeh-specific forts with insanity effects, there could also be other ones they could choose from. It would be like choosing a pretender, really.

Some special fort types would available to more than one nation, for example, forest citadel would be available to Pangaea and Man, at the least. Pangaea, Machaka and Mictlan would certainly be able to select tribal encampment.

[Endoperez]

I like Sandman's suggestions about reworking pretenders and fortresses, but unfortunately that quite a lot of work...
Differentiating the pretenders from each other is, IMO, one of the things that would help the game a lot. The descriptions are wonderful, but unfortunately all pretenders don't stand up to it.

About holy spells:

Some national/theme-spesific holy spells would really do wonders on ceratin occassions. Think Iron Faith Ulm, as an example. "By the faith in iron shall the people of Ulm survive"... Holy 3 Legions of Steel would be the physical manifestation of such a spell.
Other nice spells that would be nice to see as holy include some summons (esp. those of Tien Chi), Magic Duel ( Don't you dare to expect The Inqusition! ), Holy Pyre, Banish Demon (with 5+ priest requirement), even blindness and/or curse for some nations.

[Nagot Gick Fel]

Sandman said:
Blessable pretenders: Well, this all a bit theological,

Perhaps 'theological' is a bit too strong a word here - well, who knows, maybe Kristoffer teaches his students Dominions mythology in real life.

but surely it's not a simple question of personal faith

Personal? Where did I write 'personal'? Your words, not mine.

and sacrifice that confers blessability? What about void summons or those sacred dogs the Tuatha have? I'd say that it's as much a question of the society at large believing in the sanctity of certain units, not just the individual creatures themselves.

It's true we have two kinds of sacred units, the 'zelots' (flagellants, KotC, etc., who are usually recruitable units) and the 'divine beings' (like Angels, Celestial Servants, void monsters, etc., who are usually summoned - I'd put Cu Sidhe in this Category). I don't think many in a sane society would believe in the sanctity of flagellants, although they probably would believe in the sanctity of Angels.

So what? The 'zelot' types get their holy status from their own (personal) faith, and the 'divine' types from the faith of commoners who consider them as sacred - just like football aficionados put faith in the players of the team they support. I see no real difference here: one cause (faith), one effect (holiness).

And who does the society believe in more than anything? The pretender, that's who.

I think you look at all this the wrong way. Pretender gods draw their power from their own magic, and from their followers's beliefs. The blessing system is just a way for gods to grant their most devout followers a part of their power. Eg, a pretender skilled in fire magic will get bonuses to his attack rating, and so will his blessed troops. A pretender skilled in nature magic will regenerate faster when casting the apprioprate spell, and thus if he's skilled enough, his sacred troop may gain regenerative powers. The blessing effects may not always match spell effects, or abilities/stat bonuses gained from magic skills, for many obvious reasons - anyway it's also obvious the pretender is the source of these blessings. And now you want him to get a part of this gifted power back - to me it's just like you want to make the sun shine brighter by refecting its own light back with mirrors.

And BTW, I completely forgot to address this other point:

How about if pretenders (and maybe prophets) could derive extra power from bringing their priests into the battle? Maybe there could a special buff that priests could cast to help their deity, or a communionish effect that only worked between priest and god.

You're just asking for something that already exists in the game. Pretenders get extra power and buffs (in the form of stat increases) in provinces where lots of people believe in them (IOW, where their dominion is high).

Fortress Types: With regards to the Ulmish resource bonus, the way I would do it would be for there to be at least two Ulm-specific fortress types, which would grant the resource bonus, as well as being very good forts in their own right. But there'd also be other forts available, with their own specific bonuses.

Makes sense to me. Having to raise a full fortified city where you only need a watchtower is something I've always found... odd.

[andvare]

I'd like to make a small contribution to the wish-list... For some time now I have been playing with the thought of introducing handguns in Dominions.

I know there have been a few threads about the idea as well as a mod or two that included them... But well, it would be nice with official balanced rules as well as graphic and sound. And if you don't think they work that well in a fantasy oriented world I beg to differ, think of how well they go with the dwarfs in Warhammer for example. (note: I'm not asking for a debate on how serious the fantasy in Warhammer is here).

Anyway, think of it.

[Zooko]

"based on choices the player makes"

Ooh! Ooh! Different dominion scales give you different holy spells!