Why am I not able to win the Orania Map ?

[JimKnopf]

Saxon said:
The other thing I would mention is how long do you spend on a turn? If I try to play this game quickly, I get my butt handed to me and I am pretty good at all the games you mention. You have to take your time with this and look at everything. In terms of cards, this is Bridge and MOO is Go Fish. Really. Take your time, use the F1 screen, look at your taxes and unrest every turn. Plan ahead for spells, units and magic items. Learn your nation and how they work. If you are playing Arco, look at Astral magic very closely before you start, all of the spells. Learn the crystal matrix and understand fatigue. Power up your mages and cook the enemy with mind burns.

Saxxon you hit my weak spot I am one of these impatient guys. I already learned that Dom II needs more diligence thanother games. But I have to admit that I still forget recruiting troops or casting a spell here and there.
I want to thank you especially for your honesty admitting that this game is a challenge for you, too.
I think most of my frustration came from feeling stupid.
Because most people always seemed to be complaining that the game is to easy. And I should not be able to beat it on Easy ?
That was more than I can take.

[JimKnopf]

DominionsFAN said:
Yeah Saber is absolutely right. Also, keep in mind..only use national troops in the early game, since they are kinda weak from mid game [I plan to make a Dominions 3 total conversion mod after the game is released -> you will be able to summon strong national troops in that, -> level 2/3/4 based -> better equipment and stats after each new level.]. Focus on spells/summons/crafting magic items/equipping comanders and SCs.

The probabilty that I will buy Dom 3 has risen considerably during the last 24 hours. So I am looking forward to yor mod and will in the meantime follow your advice.

[DominionsFan]

JimKnopf said:

The probabilty that I will buy Dom 3 has risen considerably during the last 24 hours. So I am looking forward to yor mod and will in the meantime follow your advice.

Dominions 3. is a must have of course.
I hope that you will like my mod, it wont be easy to make it, since I plan it as a "total conversion" mod, so basically everything will be changed in it compared to the vanilla game. The hardest part will be the balacing, but I already have some mathematical plans regarding the balancing question. I will basically add for each unit stat/ability and items a basic value, and the values will be added together. The spell/gold/resource cost will depend on those values.
OF course all units will have new graphics, I wont use the Dominions 3. races, but "normal" fantasy races, such as the elves, dwarves and so on.
As for spells, I have an idea there also, but I keep that for myself for now...I am still thinking about that method.

[Endoperez]

Most players here wouldn't choose Turmoil/Luck for competitive multiplayer, but I've found it's good enough, and very fun and enjoyable, in single-player games against the AI.

Restless Worshippers spreads your dominion faster. Dominion 6 or 7 should be enough, and I think it'd give you a scale more. Probably Production, to give you little more income and to help with your hoplites.

Astral 3 Oracle is fine, if you want to base your strategy around scales. However, relying on Fortune might be costly if you have a streak of bad luck - you won't have a pretender to help you through tough times. You might want to consider e.g. Manticore instead. As Arcoscephale, your Priestesses can heal any afflictions he might get, and if he has no magic you lose only time when you call him back to the realm of the living. Some items and spells also help immensely. Body Ethereal has AoE: 1, which means one square in the battlefield, which means it can be cast on nearby units. Even those that totally fill one square (size 6 monsters, like Manticore). He can't use many items, but e.g. Cat's Claw Talismans, Horror Helmets, Burning Pearls and Antimagic Amulets are worth their price. Amulet of Luck is also very, very good, and Ring of Regeneration would be even more important if you didn't have priestesses to heal wounds. Regeneration doesn't heal afflictions, but makes them less common.

[Graeme Dice]

Turmoil: 1

Never take turmoil unless your theme requires it. Similarly, do not take restless worshippers.

Growth: 3 (More people = more money = more troops, temples etc. Besides I like the thought of an empire of life as counterpart to Ermor)

Growth provides little to no benefit in the unmodded game unless you plan to play for several hundred turns. Order 3 provides a far greater boost to income.

But even relatively small armies ofJotunheim were able to defeat local defenfes of 25 ord annihilate mercenary bands.

Besides that the strength of local defences in the nortwest had become up to 80 and 90 to counter the amassing of C´tis troops.

These are mistakes. You spent hundreds or thousands of gold on province defense instead of building a castle or buying mobile troops with greater combat effectiveness.

[Gandalf Parker]

It seems awfully early to plan a complete changing mod for Dom3. But I guess I cant really speak since I will release a Dom3 version of my Poke_in_the_Eye scenario, and a randomize everything module, early after its release. And most likely a "play against every single nation in one giant game" scenario.
All of which tends to make Johan shake his head at me.

[DominionsFan]

Gandalf Parker said:
It seems awfully early to plan a complete changing mod for Dom3. But I guess I cant really speak since I will release a Dom3 version of my Poke_in_the_Eye scenario, and a randomize everything module, early after its release. And most likely a "play against every single nation in one giant game" scenario.
All of which tends to make Johan shake his head at me.

Hehe, nah it is not early. We must design everything in our head before the game is out. I am playing with many ideas still, not to mention that I must start to work on the unit gfx also...

[Saxon]

The provincial defense issue appears to be a big problem for you. A couple of points on that might help. First, the troops you get for the money are generally pretty weak. I think of them as a deterrent to keep out very small armies and some cannon fodder to support the real defense army when it arrives.

Second, look at the cost of those weak troops. For each step in provincial defense, you pay one more gold than the current defense. That means to upgrade from 3 defense, you have to pay 4 gold. Not to bad. But to upgrade from 22, you have to pay 23 gold. That is getting pricy, especially compared to what you can get for that kind of money at your castle.

Now, if you were pushing provincial defense up to 60 or 70, you were paying 60 gold for each weak unit. A lot of your resources were not utilized in the best possible fashion.

Sure, there is no upkeep, but you also can not use these troops for anything except the defense of one province. Regular units can move on both offense and defense and are much more flexible. I keep my defense at 11 unless it is a active boarder, where I try to put it to 21. You get an extra commander at these two cut offs, so it is worth going up from 10 or 20.

The money I save goes into mobile troops, temples, labs and castles.

My other comment is about the immobile pretender. I personally prefer a mobile pretender, as it give me more flexibility. For the “super players” they can plan turns in advance and handle tricky things. I get things wrong on many occasions and sometimes need to rush a pretender to battle to help out. Again, I am not saying it is not possible to do it, but for those of us who need extra help, a mobile pretender is a nice extra resource. They don’t need to be a Super combatant (SC), just their spell powers can tip a battle.

One Ermor tip is that Eyes of Aiming put into the normal priest make them pretty good at cleaning up large numbers of the lesser undead. The normal one misses a lot, but the boost to precision increases their kill rate.

You mention you didn’t want to recruit Astrologers. They are one of Arco’s trademark magic units, which in Dominions is usually a clue that you should pay extra attention to them. They are strong in astral magic. With a starshine cap and the banner of the northern star, you can boost these guys to five astral, which is huge. (speaking of which, small is big in this game. A single extra level of magic goes a long way, it is different than games with huge bonuses that don’t mean much) If you get lucky and get a mage with four astral to start, you can boost him up to six. Have a look at the crystal matrix and slave matrix. You can turn these mages into powerful killing machines that do not tire. I mentioned mind burn, but should have said soul slay. I have created a firing squad of about 20 astral mages that will kill just about anything and can teleport in to do it. Dominions has lots of ways to power up mages and some commanders and the more you find, the more you will win.

I like the other unit, the Mystic, but they can not be powered up as far. I would suggest building only Astrologers and Hearts Companions at your home castle and recruit your mystics at secondary castles. If you do not have a bless strategy, you might ignore the Hearts Companions. Sorry, I don’t remember their cost compared to the regular Hoplite units.

Finally, sure, lots of people say the game is easy. But usually it is the hard core who post and not the normal folks like you and I. The postings are biased. Also, it is a human thing. Most folks don’t like to admit they get their butt handed to them by a game, so they don’t post their failures, they post their successes.

[Morkilus]

I've failed plenty of times against the AI, usually when there's an AE Ermor or C'tis involved. Dunno why I lose to C'tis. I find that I have alot more fun playing when there ISN'T a death theme to have to deal with, since the other AI nations never have a chance. It's pretty much given that you'll be fighting Ermor and probably be crushed. It's not cheating to leave them out, but if you want to fight them you better beat them early in the game, and have a solid plan to do so. In multiplayer, it's not unusual to gang up on a death theme just so the dominion doesn't spoil the... spoils

[Sandman]

Dominion Theme: Restless worshippers

I'm not sure if this even works. Ceremonial faith is better, IMO.