Wish-List for Dominions 4

[SCKnight]

Morkilus said:
Have you tried modding, SCKnight? You can get pretty much all of points 1, 2, 3, and 5 with some creativity. 4 already exists, but you have to play with other people 6 has been shut down repeatedly by Shrapnel. Well, maybe for Dominions 4, but don't hold your breath.

Oh yeah... You can get a building that raises the morale of troops in the province, and eventually that of surrounding provinces. It's called a "temple"

I'm not really that good with modding. Still, I can't wait to see what Dominions 4 has in store for us!

[Edratman]

I would like an option on the menu screen to make all AI's allied.

[HoneyBadger]

Speaking of meteorite guards and their heavy armor, it would be nice if there was a "Bulky" creature ability or class of armor that would grant normal movement in the air, but half movement under the water, and a "Finned" ability/class of armor, that did the opposite.

If you can breathe under water, it hardly matters if you're 10 feet from the surface, or 50 feet, except for questions of water pressure. Heavy metallic armors would actually be useful, since they would help you be more stable and less affected by currents, buoyancy, and momentum.

It would also be useful to have creatures with the ability to "fly" under water-I've heard this did exist at one time, but no longer does.

[sansanjuan]

Apologies if these have been previously discussed or dismissed… Some certainly may not be “DOMish” so they might be toggled.

DOM4 all on/offs

Capture and roleplay statistical anomalies during battle
e.g. a militia man inflicts massive damage and kills a Pretender just based on chance rolls. Capture the battle and promote the unit in some special way. Show a toe to toe replay of just that slugfest.

Map changing spells (certainly high very level)
Raise Land
Sink Land
Wall Province
Change Province type
Etc.

Lairs
Like sites but guarded specifically inside a province. Often contain magic items.

Assassin banding
Allow assassins to coordinate a simultaneous attack on a commander and/or allow a “henchman”

Quests

Tailorable magic items based on gem cost

[Endoperez]

sansanjuan said:
Capture and roleplay statistical anomalies during battle
e.g. a militia man inflicts massive damage and kills a Pretender just based on chance rolls. Capture the battle and promote the unit in some special way. Show a toe to toe replay of just that slugfest.


Lairs
Like sites but guarded specifically inside a province. Often contain magic items.

Quests


Map changing spells (certainly high very level)
Raise Land
Sink Land
Wall Province
Change Province type
Etc.


Tailorable magic items based on gem cost

Few comments:

Dealing the killing blow against certain types of units should be better rewarded. Actually, the experience you get from killing anything could be changed to depend on size of the killed creature: 2 points for humans, 3 for cavalry, 4 for Jotuns, etc. Killing prophets could net you a little bonus, and killing a pretender could give a little more, perhaps something like 25 points of experience. It shouldn't be too much, because otherwise your ally will keep on sending his immortal pretender to be killed by your champion.


Lairs and quests: these could both be done if sites could be made to disappear. There are already at least two sites into which you may enter to try and discover treasure; you'll probably face traps and fight horrors or undead, depending on if you enter The Forgotten City or the City of the Damned, but if you survive you come back with gold, gems or magic items. If these could disappear after a set amount of turns, or after the quest was completed, it'd be close enough. Some "quests" would be solved by magic (a nature site with "mage may enter for adventure", higher magic = better chance of success), by fighting capability, etc etc.


Dominions-type maps are static and can't change, because the map graphics can't change. Two of Illwinter's games could do this. Conquest of Elysium II was tile-based; the tiles based with seasons, you could burn down forests or craft golems out of mines or lakes, destroying them in the process. Dominions: PPP, the first one, had maps where provinces were pixel porridge. Every pixel marked a terrain of spesific type. Growth dominion changed the pixels into green (forest), heat into yellow (waste), etc. I don't think there were any spells that would change provinces' terrain, but it would have been possible. If the Dominions engine is too clumsy to be adapted, the next Illwinter game might allow for something like this.

Tailorable magic items are very easily unbalanced. At the moment, it's impossible to get all the good abilities on a supercombatant. Three immunities, luck and a two-handed weapon is only possible via spesific items: Amulet of Luck is the only non-hand-slot item for Luck, Rime Hauberk gives cold immunity, Ring of Tamed Lighting for shock immunity, Brimztone Boots for fire immunity. If you could just slap luck into Rainbow Armor and shock immunity into Wraith Sword, it would be worth it even if the price doubled, because now you could also give the combatant amulet of anti-magic and regeneration, or change brimstone boots to flying boots and a ring, or something similar. Custom items would be too good.

[sansanjuan]

E,
Thank you for the thoughtful responses.

I didn't think of the Immortal ally trick. Bet that would be a challenging scenario to reconcile for a roleplaying purist.

I understand the nuance of SC being very strong but not in an unbalanced way. Though I am very new I really like the way many "I Win" spells and conditions can be countered by former foes teaming up, sharing gems, etc. Very realistic and beautiful for roleplaying.

On item tailoring...I enjoyed that in the old Masters of Magic but that certainly could spoil the soup here.

You reminded me of perhaps the most important new feature which I forgot to mention (I'm sure a variant is in the long thread). A "Seamless Ally" feature where Dominion penalties don't apply to allies and unstealthy troops can move unhindered through ally lands. Then I could probably talk to wife into playing Dom4 as an ally and get lots of "Spousal Points" for later redemption. That's win-win.
Thanks again,
-SSJ

edit : fixed MoM sentence

[moderation]

Not sure if this has been mentioned, but something needs to be done about the number of idle commanders that is accumulated by mid to late game. Pressing 'n' to cycle through them is incredibly confusing and tedious.

Being able to queue up multi-stage movements for them would help, as would a special command like "idle" which would allow you to bypass them with 'n' and maybe select them with a special "find idle commanders" command, maybe by pressing 'i'.

A global recruit menu with distinctions for castles and "favorite" provinces (e.g. the ones that produce sages) would be great too.

[moderation]

Back / Forward buttons on the game creation screens would be nice too when setting up SP games.

[lch]

moderation said:
Back / Forward buttons on the game creation screens would be nice too when setting up SP games.

Yeah. I've been asking for that a year or so ago, too. The clunky interface is probably the first thing that sets off potential new users, any improvements there would be crucial.

[HoneyBadger]

Just a show of support to Kristoffer and Johan that we still really, really want Dominions 4!