design just ONE province

[Gandalf Parker]

DESIGN A PROVINCE.
Dont you get irritated at fighting lots of undead only to find that there was no reason for them to be there? Or find a magic site that allows you enchanters and wonder why there WASNT any to fight? Or a province with an interesting name that turns out to be nothing more than just an interesting name?

This is your chance to create that province. Where should they be living? Why are they there? Is there a magic site or structure that they were all drawn to? Or a specific commander with a specific item? Can you create a province that makes sense AND would be an "interesting" surprise to whoever attacks it?

If you could name and build a province specifically selecting units, population type, buildings, monsters, any equipment on the commanders, and any magic sites.
Then what comes to mind for a province built around a

Temple:
or shrine
grove
altar
stonehenge
monastery
Forts:
Wizards Tower
Dark Citadel
Jeweled City
Lab:
in the forest
on a lonely mountain
experimental lab in a swamp
Poptype:
raptors
hoburg
crystal amazon
atavi apes
trolls
groups:
paladin
rangers
druids
clerics
thieves
items:
black hearts
whip of command
thunder bow and lightning spear
slave and master matrix
Monsters:
hydra
gorgon
mother of monsters
undead such as ghosts or wights
king of the deep
spiders
living plants
devils
locations:
forest
mountains
swamp
wasteland
farmland
lake
island
seashore
volcano
cave

There are multiple projects going on (2 have been publicly announced at this time in the maps/mods subforum) which can use those designs. If you say that HarpaKazi is the name of a province, with forest, that has Harpies carrying those exploding amulets; then that would be one possible random province. The software will run thru a map file and try to match up locations with designed provinces.

If you dont want to tackle designing a map, or you are interested but want something smaller first, then just design a province.

Lists are available at
http://www.Dom3Minions.com/docs
Think what it would be like if we all created just ONE province. http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/images/smilies/happy.gif

Gandalf Parker

[Gandalf Parker]

-------
Landname : BlackWood Forest
required terrains : forest
Commanders :
"Centaur Hierophant" with "Black Bow" [x5]
-------
Landname : Forest of Shafts
required terrains : forest
Commanders :
"Centaur Hierophant" with "Bow of war" [x6]
-------
Landname : HarpaKazi
required terrains : forest
Commanders :
"Black Harpy" with "Medallion of Vengeance" [x8]
---------

[Sandman]

I'll give it a go...

Landname : Duncorum (anagram of the mineral Corundum)
Required terrains : mountain
Units: Heavy infantry, heavy cavalry, heavy crossbows
Commanders : Heavy cavalry commanders with black steel plate
Sites: Mine of Superior Iron

[Ballbarian]

This is great!
Sandman, I took the liberty of adding yours to the library here:
http://www.dom3minions.com/~semirand/

Gandalf, I already hijacked yours from another thread and they are already included with the program files. http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/images/smilies/evil.gif http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/images/smilies/biggrin.gif

[Jack_Trowell]

Yes, some more provinces for my project ! ^_^

@Ballbarian : maybe we should exchange and combine our special provinces list ?
My list is available at http://dominions.realites.org/?action=list_special_provinces (If you want I could make a perl script that extract my list to whatever format your program use)

[Edi]

Couple of errors in those ready-made provinces:

#additem "Black Bow" does not work, because the name of the item is "Black Bow of Botulf"

#commander "Conjuror" does not work because the monster name is "Conjurer". The number is either 93 or 94 (one is conjurer, the other is circle master).

Edi

[Jack_Trowell]

Thanks Edi, I will fix them once I'm back home.

[Ballbarian]

Certainly Jack, feel free to use any that I have collected/created. (I can't speak for Edi's Faerun provinces that I used.) Nice program btw. http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/images/smilies/happy.gif

Edi, Thanks for the heads up. http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/images/smilies/happy.gif

[Edi]

One more helpful tip: If you need the numbers of items in a hurry, you can get them the same way you do the unit numbers. In a game where you've maxed out construction research and have mages that can forge most stuff, look up a mage that can forge what you want, select forge orders, take a look at the item in question and hit Shift-I, it'll give you the item number.

Edi

[llamabeast]

In the example provinces, the commanders are specified, but not the troops themselves - how do you specify that?

Does poptype determine what kinds of units can be recruited once you capture it? Is there a list of poptypes anywhere?

[Gandalf Parker]

llamabeast said:
In the example provinces, the commanders are specified, but not the troops themselves - how do you specify that?


Its diffrent for the different programs but the map commands they are using are
#commander
#bodyguards
#units

So putting
#commander "Legionnaire"
#bodyguards 5 "Gladiator"
#units 20 "archer"
#units 30 "militia"
#units 10 "knights"
would create a nice little group to bolster the defences of a province. It can also be done using the numeric ID instead of the name of the unit.


Does poptype determine what kinds of units can be recruited once you capture it? Is there a list of poptypes anywhere?


Yes and Yes. Magic sites can also add to what can be recruited.

There is a variety of lists here that can be handy for this.
http://www.dom3minions.com/docs/

[Edi]

llamabeast said:
In the example provinces, the commanders are specified, but not the troops themselves - how do you specify that?

Does poptype determine what kinds of units can be recruited once you capture it? Is there a list of poptypes anywhere?


In addition to that, the defenders of a province depend on whether the #land or #setland command is used to place the troops there.

#land kills everything in the province and only those units that have been specified will appear there.

#setland does not kill the indies and others and any troops specified will be in addition to the native defenders.

The list of poptypes is available behind Gandalf's link, here. (http://www.dom3minions.com/docs/Forts_Poptypes.html) Unfortunately the list does not name each unit, but I will make those additions later.

Edi

[Jack_Trowell]

Sandman said:
I'll give it a go...

Landname : Duncorum (anagram of the mineral Corundum)
Required terrains : mountain
Units: Heavy infantry, heavy cavalry, heavy crossbows
Commanders : Heavy cavalry commanders with black steel plate
Sites: Mine of Superior Iron



Ok, I added your province. ( see http://dominions.realites.org/?action=list_special_provinces )

This is what it will look like in the map file :


-------------------------------------------------------
-- Required terrain type(s) :
-- mountain (16)
-------------------------------------------------------
#setland XXX-- province by Sandman
#landname "Duncorum"
#poptype 47
#commander 21
#bodyguards 5 21
#units 10 21
#units 20 40
#units 25 49
#additem "Black Steel Plate"
#feature "Mine of Superior Iron"


Note that I added the poptype 47 (heavy cavalries and crossbowmen), so they will be recruitable once you take the province. Moreover, the #setland command (instead of #land) means that the natural poptype units will still be there : the heavy cavalry commander and his units will be *added* to the province defences. But if you think that's too many units I can remove the original units, or put less additional ones.

[Jack_Trowell]

Edi said:
Couple of errors in those ready-made provinces:

#additem "Black Bow" does not work, because the name of the item is "Black Bow of Botulf"

#commander "Conjuror" does not work because the monster name is "Conjurer". The number is either 93 or 94 (one is conjurer, the other is circle master).

Edi



Ok, both have now been fixed, thanks Edi.

[Edi]

Jack_Trowell said:
Ok, I added your province. ( see http://dominions.realites.org/?action=list_special_provinces )

This is what it will look like in the map file :


-------------------------------------------------------
-- Required terrain type(s) :
-- mountain (16)
-------------------------------------------------------
#setland XXX-- province by Sandman
#landname "Duncorum"
#poptype 47
#commander 21
#bodyguards 5 21
#units 10 21
#units 20 40
#units 25 49
#additem "Black Steel Plate"
#feature "Mine of Superior Iron"


Note that I added the poptype 47 (heavy cavalries and crossbowmen), so they will be recruitable once you take the province. Moreover, the #setland command (instead of #land) means that the natural poptype units will still be there : the heavy cavalry commander and his units will be *added* to the province defences. But if you think that's too many units I can remove the original units, or put less additional ones.


Slight correction here: You have assigned indie poptype 47, but the autogenerated defenders could be ANY poptype that can appear in that terrain. The reason for that is that when Dom3 generates the actual game, it will first randomly assign all provinces some poptype and defenders according to that poptype and will also place all magic sites.

Only after that will it start parsing the map file and will add everything specified there (and also kill any indies in provinces governed by #land and remove sites from provinces with #killfeatures). This means that the defenders for that province could be e.g. Onyx Amazons and Nightmares augmented by the scripted heavy cavalry units, but when you finally do manage to defeat the indies, you will only get to recruit optype 47 instead of the amazons you expected to be there (because they appeared as provincial defenders).

I wish the map file parsing happened before random assignment since it would give far greater control over map files, but unfortunately it doesn't.

Edi

[Jack_Trowell]

Slight correction here: You have assigned indie poptype 47, but the autogenerated defenders could be ANY poptype that can appear in that terrain. The reason for that is that when Dom3 generates the actual game, it will first randomly assign all provinces some poptype and defenders according to that poptype and will also place all magic sites.



Aaargh ! Totally counterintuitive !

Ok then id killed all population on this province and a few others with a thematic poptype, so at least there won't be any strange mix of units from there.

Once again thanks for your help Edi.

[HoneyBadger]

I guess I'll give it a try...

Name: Mount Caldera
Required terrain: Mountain + Firesite
Commander type: Lord of the Forge with Dwarven Hammer, Rod of the Phoenix, Black Steel Plate, Amulet of Anti-magic x1
Commander type: Golem with Hellsword, Jade Armor, Horned Helmet, Eye of Aiming, Bow of War, Marble Boots, Amulet of Protection Against Missles X4
Commander type: Cyclops with Black Steel Helm, Black Steel Armour, Black Steel Tower Shield, Piercer X8.
Bodyguard type: Iron Dragon x4
Unit type: 16 fire elementals
Unit type: 16 earth elementals
Unit type: 16 air elementals
Unit type: 16 water elementals
Unit type: 16 devils
Unit type: 80 magma children
Unit type: 160 imps

Ancient Forge
Fountain of Fire
Magma Cave

[HoneyBadger]

Here's another one:

Name Ashanti
Required terrain: grassland/plains
Commander type: Great Fetish armed with Gate-Cleaver, Amulet of Luck, Amulet of Vengeancex1
Commander type: Lion-Tribe Witchdoctor armed with Skull Talisman, Amulet of Anti-magicx12
Bodyguard type: Kithaironic Lionx4
Unit type: 64 Lion-Tribe Archers
Unit type: 96 Lion-Tribe Warriors

Pyramid of Life
Gold Apple Tree
Mine of Superior Iron

[HoneyBadger]

And a third...

Name: Aapep
Required terrain: desert
Commander type: Dragon Lich armed with Amulet of Luck, Amulet of Antimagic, Wraithcrown x1
Bodyguard type: Mummyx4
Unit type: 66 bone devils

Desert of Bones
Crypt in the Sand
Orychalcum Mine

[Ballbarian]

Are these sites in a mod or something? I did a quick search of my list (pulled from the exe text) and can't find them.
Great themes. I started to add them until I ran across the sites.

(OT: I really wish site modding was part of the map instead of (or in addition to) mods.)

[HoneyBadger]

Nope, I came up with them as I wrote up the provinces.

I think one could safely create a mod which deals specifically with site addition. A good one of the type would be very welcome, I'm sure.

I will have to sit down and think specifically about provinces which could be added without any new sites, but right now, I'm too tired to limit myself to what's known, since I don't know every site currently in the game.

[HoneyBadger]

Name: Thing Woods
Required terrain: forest
Commander type: Carrion Dragon armed with wraithcrown, ring of regeneration, amulet of antimagicx1
Commander type: Undead Pan armed with vine bow, medallion of vengeancex24
Bodyguard type: witchx4
Unit type: 12 darkvines
Unit type: 18 mandragoras
Unit type: 36 vine ogres
Unit type: 260 vine men

Witch's Bog
Whispering Woods
The Mammoth Forest

[Jack_Trowell]

HoneyBadger said:
I guess I'll give it a try...

Name: Caldera
Required terrain: volcano




There's no "volcano" terrain type in dominions.

Existing terrain typesn as shown in the dom3 official map editor are :

"small"
"large"
"sea"
"somewater"
"mountain"
"swamp"
"waste"
"forest"
"farm"
"nostart"
"manysites"
"deep"
"cave"
"edgemount"
There's also those "hidden" terrain types :

"firesite"
"airsite"
"watersite"
"earthsite"
"astralsite"
"deathsite"
"naturesite"
"bloodsite"
"priestsite"


Their exact effect is not fully known, but it is supposed that they increase the chance of a magic site of the corresponding nature (the same way a forest increase the chance of a nature site for exemple)

Note that those types are already used by the random map generator : when you see a province with a small icon that doesn't match the usual terrain types, its's because the province has been set with one of thos 'hidden' types.

For exemple, sometimes you get a province with the type 'firesite', and the random map generator draw on the province ... a volcano


So we say that this province will require the terrain type "firesite" ?

Maybe both "firesite" and "mountain" ?



Commander type: Lord of the Forge with Dwarven Hammer, Rod of the Phoenix, Black Steel Plate, Amulet of Anti-magic x1



Woaow such a big guy ...
(do you want him with increased magic too, or just the base F1E1 ?)


Bodyguard type: Cyclops with Black Steel Helm, Black Steel Armour, Black Steel Tower Shield, Piercer X4.
Bodyguard type: Iron Dragon x4
Bodyguard type: Golem with Eye of Aiming, Bow of War, Amulet of Protection Against Missles X




<cough> ... only commanders can be equipped with magic items, units set as bodyguards/units have no custom slot and came with the standard equipment.

But of course there might be several commanders in the province.

Do you want for exemple you Golem to be added as a commander ?


Unit type: 16 fire elementals
Unit type: 16 earth elementals
Unit type: 16 air elementals
Unit type: 16 water elementals
Unit type: 16 devils
Unit type: 80 magma children
Unit type: 160 imps





Water and air elementals ? I would think that such a province would only have fire and earth unit.

Whatever, that's a lots of units, so the province will be very hard to take, even late game. For such a province, a fixed fire-4 site would probably be a great idea.


Give Item: Hellsword




There's not way to have a *province* give an item when you take it. However, when you kill a commander with magic items, and win the battle, there's a chance that your commanders (if they have the corresponding slots free) will get some of those items (the greater the item (in teme of construction research level), the higher the chance)

So currently if you kill the Forge lord and take the province in the same battle, you have a chance to get parts of his equipment.

If you want a chance to get a hellsword, just equipe one commander with it.


Anvil of Daylight-plus25% forging bonus, increases Heat and Growth in province.
Eye of Rhuax-increases heat in province, produces 1 fire gem per turn, fire mage: enter to recruit magma children
Devil's Chimney-increases heat, turmoil in province, produces 1 fire gem per turn. blood mage: enter to recruit imps




I suppose those are 'custom' magic sites ?

From what I know, forge bonus can be modded on an item but not on a magic site.

Moreover, while it is possible to mod magic sites and then use them, it would meant that the province would require a separate mod else those sites wouldn't be available.

You should instead chose existing sites , see http://www.dom3minions.com/docs/sites.txt for the list.

If you have question about what is possible or not I will be glad to answer.

[Jack_Trowell]

HoneyBadger said:
Name: Thing Woods
Required terrain: forest
Commander type: Carrion Dragon armed with wraithcrown, ring of regeneration, amulet of antimagicx1



Commander type: Treelord x3 armed with thistle mace, hydra armor, vine shield, ring of regeneration, amulet of reinvigoration, marble boots, horned helmet




Two problems here :

- treelords are unique summons. If I put all 3 of them in this province, they won't be available for summoning. Maybe make it only one treelord, so 2 are stil available ?
- treelords have only misc slots, so no weapon, no shield, no armor, no helmet, and no boots.

Or maybe you were thinkin of some other unit ? One that is of humanoid form and is not unique ? (vine king maybe)



Bodyguard type: Undead Pan armed with vine bow, medallion of vengeancex24



No items on bodyguards.

Maybe this undead pan as a commander ?


Bodyguard type: witchx12



From the map manual, the #bodyguards command is supposed to be limited to 5 units, si I don't know if setting more will works or not.

Has somebody here already tried that ?


Unit type: 12 darkvines
Unit type: 18 mandragoras
Unit type: 36 vine ogres
Unit type: 260 vine men

sites: I think Forest Primeval is in the game, and it should be combined with the site that allows the recruitment of witches (or something nastier if it feels right for Thing Woods-ideally a site that allows recruitment of Vine Ogres, or better yet, Dark Vines) and a site that produces 1 death gem per turn.

If I could, I'd make it have a site that would allow a nature/death mage to enter and summon undead Pans, but since I don't think that's possible, any good Nature sites would work here, so put whatever you'd like.

Like everybody else, I'm waiting and hoping for the sites database to be complete soon. I think Edi's working on it, along with others.




Yes, it's one of the reasons why I asked for help, I don't have enough time to both code the new features and search for provinces ideas.

It means too that I need the exact magic sites names, as I don't have the time to check it.

use the list at http://www.dom3minions.com/docs/sites.txt , or just play the game and when you see an interesting site, note its name and description to create a province around it.

[llamabeast]

HoneyBadger's provinces seem _extremely_ tough. Presumably in general the idea is that we design provinces with a similar difficulty to the current independents, just a bit more interesting? The odd difficult-but-valuable province would be cool, but having too many of them would make for a very different game I think.

[Sandman]

More:

Landname : Great Linton
Required terrains : Farmland, large
Units: Various Hoburgs, small numbers of Daoine Sidhe, a handful of Wooden Constructs.
Commanders : Various Hoburg commanders and mages, a Sidhe Lord, a wide variety of low level nature items.
Sites: White Man Hill

Landname : Trinabago
Required terrains : Mountains, Forest, Coastal
Units: Mercenary Crossbows, lots of Pirates
Commanders : Pirate captains, an Inquisitor with an air shield item, a Kokythiai with a water ring.
Sites: Increased chance of water sites.

[Jack_Trowell]

llamabeast said:
HoneyBadger's provinces seem _extremely_ tough. Presumably in general the idea is that we design provinces with a similar difficulty to the current independents, just a bit more interesting? The odd difficult-but-valuable province would be cool, but having too many of them would make for a very different game I think.



As you say, having a few provinces that are really difficult to conquer, but with good rewards (such as a rare level 3/4 site), is cool.

We'll just have to make sure that the special provinces list is not overloaded with those.

[Gandalf Parker]

Please dont add mod things.

Possibly a new category for difficulty can be added to the files. I have some that would be a major challenge, and even a real problem to the game if you DONT attack them. On the other hand Id like to see many that would be rated zero but just add flavor to the game (farmlands with names and benefits of farmlands, swamps, wastes, just added flavor).

Volcano isnt a recognized item on one program but it is on another. Basically its "mountain surrounded by not-mountains". There is also some recognition in some of them for lake "water surrounded by land" and for island "land surrounded by lake". I think that one recognizes penninsula, seacoast, lost (no connections) and mega-province (more than 6 connections). The "cave" is worked in abit as a province that has only way into it and its surrounded by mountains so it looks on the map like its a short entry into a mountain range.

[Cor]

I am not yet ready to spend the time to learn how to mod provinces, maybe soon. However I will throw my ideas out and see if anyone wants to do the actual work.

Provinces are like nations. So what about a nation that was like Switzerland in WWII? Every citizen is expected to take up arms against attack. I would use 2000 thralls to represent peasants and after you conqure it the population would be very small, in the hundreds. I could have magic sites that produce gold , gold mine etc.

[Jack_Trowell]

Gandalf Parker said:
Please dont add mod things.



Don't worry, I don't plan , at least initially.

And even if later i add some, I will always keep available a no-mod version/option



Possibly a new category for difficulty can be added to the files. I have some that would be a major challenge, and even a real problem to the game if you DONT attack them.




Hum, maybe something like the rarity of features : 1-2 being commun, and 3-4 being rare.

Provinces of level 1 would be flavor ones, level 2 would be for province with one or two minor features, and an average defence, 3 for hard provinces with a potential good reward (site that allow to recruit some unit (except for the more powerful ones), minor sites with bonus to magic, or maybe good gem income), and 4 would be for the most massive defence (with hoppefully at least one great site, probably unique, or several making the province a good one to capture)


On the other hand Id like to see many that would be rated zero but just add flavor to the game (farmlands with names and benefits of farmlands, swamps, wastes, just added flavor).

Volcano isnt a recognized item on one program but it is on another. Basically its "mountain surrounded by not-mountains". There is also some recognition in some of them for lake "water surrounded by land" and for island "land surrounded by lake". I think that one recognizes penninsula, seacoast, lost (no connections) and mega-province (more than 6 connections). The "cave" is worked in abit as a province that has only way into it and its surrounded by mountains so it looks on the map like its a short entry into a mountain range.



As for "volcano", I remind that the random map generator add a volcano to provinces with the special type "firesite", so we could use "firesite" as a prerequired terrain type for such province (or maybe "firesite" + "mountain")

And I already have the number of land and sea province for each province, so I could use "lake", "peninsula", "island", "last/hidden" and mega province without problem.

I didn't get the number of mountain neighbours, seems like maybe too much for now, but it could be added easily if the need is really there.

About caves, I remind that cave provinces have already been added to the game.

[Jack_Trowell]

Cor said:
I am not yet ready to spend the time to learn how to mod provinces, maybe soon. However I will throw my ideas out and see if anyone wants to do the actual work.

Provinces are like nations. So what about a nation that was like Switzerland in WWII? Every citizen is expected to take up arms against attack. I would use 2000 thralls to represent peasants and after you conqure it the population would be very small, in the hundreds. I could have magic sites that produce gold , gold mine etc.



Hum, too few population with 2000 units would make them starve ... unless we equip some commanders with supply items of course.

[Taqwus]

It should be noted that I have a weird sense of humor.


Landname:
New Innsmouth http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/images/smilies/laugh.gif
Required terrains :
Coast
Units:
Mad Deep One x10
Madman x20
Mad Hybrid x20
Commanders :
Mad Priest x2
Hybrid Cultist x1
Sites:
Strange House in the Mist
Haunted Village

~~~
Landname:
Rossum's Retreat
Required terrains:
Land (any)
Units:
20x Mechanical Men
Commander:
1x Mechanical Man with a Crown of Command
Sites:
The Factory
The Abandoned Laboratory

~~~
Landname:
Titan's Doom
Required terrains:
Mountains
Units:
Six Lammashastas (former jailers)
Six Ashen Angels (former jailers)
Commander:
One Tartarian Titan with the Tartarian Chains, a Pendant of Luck, and a really bad 'tude
Sites:
Broken Tower
Banefire Braziers
Mount Chaining (!)

~~~

Landname:
Taghaza
Required Terrains:
Wasteland
Units:
20x Machaka Hoplites
20x Machaka Archer
20x Machaka Militia
Commanders:
One Colossal Fetish
One Black Sorceror
One Voice of the Lord
Sites:
The Forgotten City
The Temple of the Raging God

[HoneyBadger]

Ok, I've gone back and edited the provinces, so hopefully they can be added without too much difficulty.

I wasn't 100% sure about some of the sites I added, so if any don't feel "right", please let me know.

I do want them to be powerful, though, and I've actually increased the danger of some of the sites, significantly. These are intended (since that's the kind of game I like) to be played on very large maps with lots of opponents. I intentionally left the Forge Lord alone, he's mostly there for show, and he's got a Rod of the Phoenix to use for offense/defense.

The rewards are large, but it requires a large, and human, commitment to take them. That's another thing-these are designed to be difficult for a human to take, and they should repel any single AI attack, however large.

That's just the way I roll.

[Jack_Trowell]

Thanks HoneyBadger and Taqwus, I have copied your provinces infos and will add them soon to the online tool.
(sorry I don't add them immediatly, but I'm currently in a coding phase for my map editor)

[Cor]

Name Gaia's Throne
Required terrains : forest large
Units: Kathartic Lions, Bears, wolves, giant spiders, moose etc.
Commanders : druids, Earth mother
Sites: Level 4 Nature

[HoneyBadger]

Name: Forest of Avarran
Required Terrain: forest
Commander type: druid armed with bloodthorn x9
Commander type: boar lord armed with axe of sharpness, black steel armour, horned helmet, black steel tower shield, ring of regeneration, amulet of reinvigoration x18.
Unit type: bloodslave x27

Mother Oak

[Cor]

Jack_Trowell said:
Hum, too few population with 2000 units would make them starve ... unless we equip some commanders with supply items of course.



Thanks, I did not know indy troops could starve.

[NTJedi]

Cor said:

Thanks, I did not know indy troops could starve.



Yes, when creating a map just give one of the commanders the enormous broth and/or the bag of wine... depending on how many units you've placed. Or adding a nature mage if it fits the theme of the province.

[Edi]

Warning: Do NOT put lammashtas in a province as garrison. They have special behavior, just like Bogus and company who can target commanders and mages. The lammashta special behavior is to kill EVERYTHING in the province other than lammashtas, so they will start with the nearest and work their way from there. Much like the lobsters that result from Atlantean war lobsters having their riders killed. They'll attack anything and everything (including each other)

Ashen angels also have special behavior, and theirs is annoying: They, like gladiators, will leave after battle. You can't keep them. Couldn't in Dom2 anyway.

Edi

[Jack_Trowell]

Cor said:
Name Gaia's Throne
Required terrains : forest large
Units: Kathartic Lions, Bears, wolves, giant spiders, moose etc.
Commanders : druids, Earth mother
Sites: Level 4 Nature



Thanks, but I would need the list to be somewhat more precise : what units do you want as commanders/bodyguards/normal, and how much of each .

For the special site(s, you have the list at http://www.dom3minions.com/docs/sites.txt (or you can just note the name of a site you liked when playing the game)

[Jack_Trowell]

Edi said:
Warning: Do NOT put lammashtas in a province as garrison. They have special behavior, just like Bogus and company who can target commanders and mages. The lammashta special behavior is to kill EVERYTHING in the province other than lammashtas, so they will start with the nearest and work their way from there. Much like the lobsters that result from Atlantean war lobsters having their riders killed. They'll attack anything and everything (including each other)

Ashen angels also have special behavior, and theirs is annoying: They, like gladiators, will leave after battle. You can't keep them. Couldn't in Dom2 anyway.

Edi




Thanks for the info, we'll have to find something else for this province idea then.

[HoneyBadger]

Name: Crystal Lake
Province Type: forest, some water, water site (astral site too, if possible)
Commander type: Ancient Kraken with amulet of the fish, ring of regeneration, amulet of magic resistance (magic can be pushed up, but I'm not sure what the limitations of this are)

Bottomless Lake
Ancient Temple

[Jack_Trowell]

HoneyBadger said:
Name: Crystal Lake
Province Type: forest, some water, water site (astral site too, if possible)
Commander type: Ancient Kraken with amulet of the fish, ring of regeneration, amulet of magic resistance (magic can be pushed up, but I'm not sure what the limitations of this are)

Bottomless Lake
Ancient Temple



Note that I can identify a province as a "lake" (ie : it's a sea province will land neighbours and no other sea province as a neighbour), so I could put "lake" as a required terrain type, and your kraken would not need te amulet of the fish.

You don't have any specific site to add to the province ? A province with a kraken should have at least one minor site guaranteed, don't you think ? http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/images/smilies/wink.gif

[HoneyBadger]

Name: Cave of the Women
Province Type: cavern
Commander type: Great Mother with ring of regeneration, amulet of magic resistance, marble boots, hydra skin armor, hellsword, wraithcrown x3
Commander type: Caveman leader armed with berserker pelt x9
Unit type: caveman x123
Unit type: wolf x65

Gem deposits
Ten Thousand Things
Litter Skull

[HoneyBadger]

I want it to appear that there's a lake in the province on the map, if possible, but I want it to be overland. The point is that the ancient kraken lives in the bottomless lake but comes out to feed-and an ancient kraken isn't something you'd normally expect on land.

As far as sites go, I'm not sure what you mean. The province should include: bottomless lake, ancient temple, plus one site which could be water or astral.

If it isn't possible to visually show a small lake on the map, that's ok. The province will still work as a forest, and the bottomless lake just happens to be too small to show up on the map.

If it were possible, I'd LOVE to name the kraken Jason, but that's just me http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/images/smilies/happy.gif

[HoneyBadger]

If you want, the third site could be a waterfall, that would be fine. I like the idea of an idyllic sylvan setting with a pristine sapphire lake and glorious waterfall-the perfect place to bed down...and then in the night the horror from the depths rises up to silently consume sleeping soldiers, left and right, dragging them thousands of feet down into a lake so deep that-even though the water is crystal clear, the bottom is pitch black at high noon.

Oh and the Ancient Temple is there just to give you the idea that somewhere in the vague past, the kraken was worshipped as a god by some people, now long-vanished (or long-consumed)

[Taqwus]

So something being omnicidal is coded into the unit, and not the spell? Interesting... especially if that's included in the copyunit commands. Might be useful for funky summons, or if somebody wants to mod a unique hero or mercenary to be slightly mad.

Elric's back, and Prozac hasn't been invented yet. :p

[Jack_Trowell]

HoneyBadger said:
I want it to appear that there's a lake in the province on the map, if possible, but I want it to be overland. The point is that the ancient kraken lives in the bottomless lake but comes out to feed-and an ancient kraken isn't something you'd normally expect on land.

As far as sites go, I'm not sure what you mean. The province should include: bottomless lake, ancient temple, plus one site which could be water or astral.

If it isn't possible to visually show a small lake on the map, that's ok. The province will still work as a forest, and the bottomless lake just happens to be too small to show up on the map.



Hum, I suppose that with the "somewater" terrain type, supposed to be a river or small lake, it should do the trick then.


If it were possible, I'd LOVE to name the kraken Jason, but that's just me http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/images/smilies/happy.gif



Yes it is possible (command #comname). I used it in my exemple province "Castle Marko" to name the commander "Duke Marko" (yes, it's just a normal commander, without any magic, with some normal units, and a small fortress (no set magic site, the fortress is the reward) )

So yes you can have your ancien Kraken named Jason.

[HoneyBadger]

YAY!

mwoohahahahaha!

[Agrajag]

Hmmm... Can you change the paths of a commander with the map commands?

[Jack_Trowell]

Agrajag said:
Hmmm... Can you change the paths of a commander with the map commands?



Yes :

#clearmagic will remove all existing magic path (if any)
and you can use #mag_astral, #mag_fire, ... to set the different path and their value.

Note that with the map command you can create a computer opponent and choose yourself its pretender, starting province, specific magic path on the pretender, and even the scales.

With this you can make your own custom opponent, for exemple Vanheim with a F9W9 blessing, or even if you want a full elemental blessing (E9F9W9A9), as there is no point limit.

[Endoperez]

HoneyBadger said:
I want it to appear that there's a lake in the province on the map, if possible, but I want it to be overland. The point is that the ancient kraken lives in the bottomless lake but comes out to feed-and an ancient kraken isn't something you'd normally expect on land.

As far as sites go, I'm not sure what you mean. The province should include: bottomless lake, ancient temple, plus one site which could be water or astral.

If it isn't possible to visually show a small lake on the map, that's ok. The province will still work as a forest, and the bottomless lake just happens to be too small to show up on the map.

If it were possible, I'd LOVE to name the kraken Jason, but that's just me http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/images/smilies/happy.gif




It can be done. You'd have to mod in a new unit graphics for the Kraken, though. First sprite would be an image of a lake, the second would be of tentacles swirling around the lake. #copystats Kraken, add Air Shield 60% and change defense to 16, change graphics.

[HoneyBadger]

Name: Koprul
Province type: swamp
Commander: Bog Mummy (the Niefel Pretender) armed with skull talisman, medallion of vengeance, axe of hate, totem shield x 27
Bodyguard: behemoth x 4
Bodyguard: leviathon x4
Units: longdead jotun x 134

Tar Pits
the swamp of the dead

[HoneyBadger]

It's ok if the Kraken comes out on land, but I like your idea for the graphics, Endoperez. I think though, if I were going to that amount of trouble, I'd tweak the kraken up into something else even more nasty.

I don't think these are supposed to use mods, though, is the thing.

[HoneyBadger]

This requires a water-filled cavern, can we make that happen?
Name: Deep Throat
Province type: cavern, water filled
Commander: Ancient Kraken (named "Azathoth" earth15, water15, death5, astral5, nature5, fire5) with ring of regeneration, amulet of magic resistance, amulet of reinvigoration.
Unit: 48 krakens

Water Filled Cave
The Sea Underneath
Kraken Pit

[HoneyBadger]

Name: Whitechapel
Province type: plains, death site, blood site
Commander: Destroyer of Worlds (blood3, death 3) with Hellsword, sword of swiftness, lucky coin, wraithcrown, jade armor, marble boots, amulet of magic resistance
Bodyguard: 5 shadow vestels

[HoneyBadger]

Hey what are those guys with pitchforks that hang out with vampires called?

[HoneyBadger]

Name: Drakovia
Province type: hills
Commander type: necromancer (named Victor, with 2 blood and 2 air, armed with a lightning rod, ring of regeneration)
Commander type: ettin (named Monster) armed with 3 piercers, black steel armour, horned helmet, wraith crown, boots of quickness, ring of regeneration, amulet of reinvigoration.
Unit type: 16 corpse man
Unit type: 33 foul spawn
Unit type: 12 blood slave

Abandoned Laboratory,
Cracked Tower,
Gallows

[Strages Sanctus]

neat idea!

[Taqwus]

HoneyBadger said:
Hey what are those guys with pitchforks that hang out with vampires called?



Goths. Just kidding -- they're Thralls.

[Edi]

HoneyBadger said:
Name: Whitechapel
Province type: plains
Commander: Destroyer of Worlds with Hellsword, sword of swiftness, lucky coin, wraithcrown, jade armor, marble boots, amulet of magic resistance

Inkpot End


Bad idea. Inkpot End is going to give the DoW disease, which will eventually kill him though it'll cripple him with afflictions first. If you intend to combine disease sites, you need to use either undead or demonic creatures with it.

Edi

[Agrajag]

land name: Magrathea
requierments: Waste
population: 10
commanders: Archmage (named Slartibartfast) with S9A4W4E4F4 with Barrier, Shield of the Accursed, Robe of Invulnerability, Spirit Helmet, Boots of Calius the Druid,Pendant of Luck,Amulet of Missile Protection
Troll Commander x3
units: 70 trolls
hidden sites: Sunken City

[Jack_Trowell]

HoneyBadger said:
This requires a water-filled cavern, can we make that happen?




Hum, I can require both "sea" and "cave" terrain types, but I'm not sure thatthey will really work together (I d'ont know if the battlefield will be a cave (with darkness), undersea, or both)

Will have to try



Name: Deep Throat
Province type: cavern, water filled
Commander: Ancient Kraken (earth15, water15, death5, astral5, nature5, fire5) with ring of regeneration, amulet of magic resistance, Master crystal matrix.
Commander: Mind Lord with amulet of reinvigoration, amulet of magic resistance, Slave crystal matrix x 12



Isn't that a little ... excessive ?

Moreover, with such huge magic path already on the kraken, the communion will not be really useful, and will make the mind lors sitting target (communion slaves don't do anyhtin more)



Unit: 48 sea troll slaves

Water Filled Cave
The Sea Underneath




Have Sea trolls the darkvision ability ? If not, and the cave type is used (ie : combat will be under the darkness effect) they will fight almost blind.

[Jack_Trowell]

Edit : sorry double post

[Jack_Trowell]

HoneyBadger said:
Name: Whitechapel
Province type: plains
Commander: Destroyer of Worlds with Hellsword, sword of swiftness, lucky coin, wraithcrown, jade armor, marble boots, amulet of magic resistance

Inkpot End



interesting, but do you know that "inkpot end" is a negative site that give nothing but has a chance of spreading diseases to units in the province ?

With such a site known do be in a province named "Whitechapel" with a destroyer of world , it would make human players ignore this province most of the time when it's near them.

... hum, or maybe not : killing the destroyer of worlds could bring good loot if one or more of hit magic items are found after the battle.

Maybe I could also put the "manysites" terrain type as required, so that the province has one known bad site, but a greater chance of other sites ?

[Jack_Trowell]

HoneyBadger said:
Name: Drakovia
Province type: hills
Commander type: necromancer (named Victor, with 2 blood and 2 air, armed with a lightning rod, ring of regeneration)
Commander type: ettin (named Monster) armed with 3 piercers, black steel armour, horned helmet, wraith crown, boots of quickness, ring of regeneration, amulet of reinvigoration.
Unit type: 16 corpse man
Unit type: 33 foul spawn
Unit type: 12 blood slave

Abandoned Laboratory,
Cracked Tower,
Gallows



At last ! One interesting province without using a pretender type unit, with a good concept and not too hard to take. http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/images/smilies/shock.gif

I like having some very hard province with good rewards in SP, but having some moer normal ones from you is refreshing.
http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/images/smilies/tongue.gif

[Jack_Trowell]

Agrajag said:
land name: Magrathea
requierments: Waste
population: 10
commanders: Archmage (named Slartibartfast) with S9A4W4E4F4 with Barrier, Shield of the Accursed, Robe of Invulnerability, Spirit Helmet, Boots of Calius the Druid,Pendant of Luck,Amulet of Missile Protection
Troll Commander x3
units: 70 trolls
hidden sites: Sunken City




Isn't Sunken City an underwater site ?

[Agrajag]

Jack_Trowell said:

Agrajag said:
land name: Magrathea
requierments: Waste
population: 10
commanders: Archmage (named Slartibartfast) with S9A4W4E4F4 with Barrier, Shield of the Accursed, Robe of Invulnerability, Spirit Helmet, Boots of Calius the Druid,Pendant of Luck,Amulet of Missile Protection
Troll Commander x3
units: 70 trolls
hidden sites: Sunken City




Isn't Sunken City an underwater site ?


It might be, but it will still work if you place it in a none-watery province. (I did a little test and placing it in plains or forests works just fine, alteast with the knownfeature command)

[Edi]

You can place any site in any terrain with the #feature and #knownfeature commands. This can also result in more than one instance of unique sites appearing on the map, because random assignment happens before parsing the map file.

By the way, the Drakovia province needs to have the unit "corpse man" changed to "Corpse Construct" because that is the proper name for the unit. "Corpse Man" will produce absolutely nothing or will screw up the unit assignment in the map file. If you want a variety of foul spawns, the common ones are numbers 453 - 460. The others I don't remember and I don't have the DB at work.

Edi

[Jack_Trowell]

Thanks Edi.

About all those province suggestion, they are still not listed online because I'm currently working on massive updates on the map editor, but I have noted them all and they will not be forgotten, do not worry.

[Ballbarian]

Thanks for all of the province suggestions. Now I would like to request that somebody (with the time and the want) build the province files for SemiRandom using some of these great ideas. I tried to design it so that anybody that can edit a map file, can build a gan file. I don't mind scripting some myself, but I have no intention of doing them all. http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/images/smilies/tongue.gif

A simple gan sample:

@1 landname
"Forest of Mir"
-- Forest of Mir
#commander 890 -- Hunter Lord
#units 15 886 -- Spider Knight
#commander 890 -- Hunter Lord
#units 8 889 -- Black Hunter



A more complex gan sample:

@RANDOM landname FOREST
#poptype 78 --Tribals, Wolf

#commander 400 --Skin Shifter
@RANDOM comname COMMANDER
#randomequip 1
@13 xp
100
100
100
200
200
300
300
400
500
600
700
800
900
@8 bodyguards
5 123 --Wolf Tribe Archer
5 124 --Wolf Tribe Warrior
10 123 --Wolf Tribe Archer
10 124 --Wolf Tribe Warrior
5 399 --Werewolf
5 400 --Skin Shifter
5 399 --Werewolf
5 400 --Skin Shifter
#commander 1596 --Wolf Tribe Shaman
@RANDOM comname COMMANDER
#randomequip 0
@13 xp
100
100
100
200
200
300
300
400
500
600
700
800
900
@8 bodyguards
5 123 --Wolf Tribe Archer
5 124 --Wolf Tribe Warrior
10 123 --Wolf Tribe Archer
10 124 --Wolf Tribe Warrior
5 399 --Werewolf
5 400 --Skin Shifter
5 399 --Werewolf
5 400 --Skin Shifter
#commander 124 --Wolf Tribe Warrior
@RANDOM comname COMMANDER
@8 bodyguards
5 123 --Wolf Tribe Archer
5 124 --Wolf Tribe Warrior
10 123 --Wolf Tribe Archer
10 124 --Wolf Tribe Warrior
5 399 --Werewolf
5 400 --Skin Shifter
5 399 --Werewolf
5 400 --Skin Shifter

#commander 124 --Wolf Tribe Warrior
@RANDOM comname COMMANDER
@8 bodyguards
5 123 --Wolf Tribe Archer
5 124 --Wolf Tribe Warrior
10 123 --Wolf Tribe Archer
10 124 --Wolf Tribe Warrior
5 399 --Werewolf
5 400 --Skin Shifter
5 399 --Werewolf
5 400 --Skin Shifter

@2 commander
1596 --Wolf Tribe Shaman
--no commander
@2 commander
399 --Werewolf
--no commander
@2 commander
400 --Skin Shifter
--no commander
@2 commander
1596 --Wolf Tribe Shaman
--no commander
@2 commander
399 --Werewolf
--no commander
@2 commander
400 --Skin Shifter
--no commander

@4 units
15 123 --Wolf Tribe Archer
15 124 --Wolf Tribe Warrior
20 123 --Wolf Tribe Archer
20 124 --Wolf Tribe Warrior

@4 units
15 123 --Wolf Tribe Archer
15 124 --Wolf Tribe Warrior
20 123 --Wolf Tribe Archer
20 124 --Wolf Tribe Warrior

@3 units
10 284 --Wolf
15 284 --Wolf
20 284 --Wolf

@3 units
10 400 --Skin Shifter
15 400 --Skin Shifter
--no Skin Shifter

@12 units
5 1224 --Dire Wolf (rare)
10 284 --Wolf
15 298 --Phantasmal Wolf (rare)
10 399 --Werewolf
10 400 --Skin Shifter
5 511 --Winter Wolf (rare)
--no additional squads
--no additional squads
--no additional squads
--no additional squads
--no additional squads
--no additional squads




There are "how to's" in the readme here:
http://www.dom3minions.com/~semirand/sub_pages/ReadMe.txt

and there is an email account dedicated to receiving uploads:
semirand -AT- dom3minions.com

and a place online for others to download your creations here:
http://www.dom3minions.com/~semirand/

[Ballbarian]

As for "volcano", I remind that the random map generator add a volcano to provinces with the special type "firesite", so we could use "firesite" as a prerequired terrain type for such province (or maybe "firesite" + "mountain")


My SemiRandom program currently recognizes the PATTERN volcano as any province with the "firesite" flag set, or if it finds a single mountain province with no mountain neighbors.


And I already have the number of land and sea province for each province, so I could use "lake", "peninsula", "island", "last/hidden" and mega province without problem.


SR already recognizes island, lake, peninsula, lost, valley, coast & cave patterns. Feel free to have a look if it will be any help to you.


About caves, I remind that cave provinces have already been added to the game.


I have never seen the random map generator set cave terrain for a province. Maybe I am just really unlucky, so somebody correct me if I am wrong. That's why my SR project looks for this pattern and changes it to cave. http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/images/smilies/happy.gif

[HoneyBadger]

Ok, I've gone back and edited the provinces, so that they're a little more reasonable-or atleast, function a little bit better.

I'm still learning, and getting some of the meaner provinces "out of my system" as it were.

I'd like to suggest a rule for province design though, if I may?

If an artifact or unique unit/summons is present in the province then 1: there will be only 1 artifact and/or unique summons in that province, and 2: the province will be built thematically around that unique artifact/summons.

I think this is a good idea, because it imposes a limitation which will keep all the "eggs" from being in one "basket" and should improve province design (since if you add something unique, you have to build the province around that uniqueness, rather than adding a bunch of stuff purely for purposes best defined as "Monty Haul").

[HoneyBadger]

Ballbarian, I really appreciate all your efforts, so thank you.

I promise I'll make a bunch of low-powered provinces eventually.

As per your Gan files readme (above) it's really difficult for me to read.

And this is coming from the master of writing really difficult things to read.

I'd be happy to edit it for you (I really can edit semi-grammatically when I put my mind to it) and send it to you in an email.

In the meantime, I've got the day off (and I earned it too, dammit) so I'm going to add as many provinces as I can come up with.

I'm willing to continue tweaking what (above provinces) I already have done too, if you don't think it would become too confusing and/or irritating.

[HoneyBadger]

Name: Ferran Forest
Province type: forest
Poptype: hoburgs EA
Commander: Crystal Sorceress x 7
Bodyguards: 5 hog knights
Unit type: 93 Iron Pigs

Iron Woods
Forest of Truffles

[Ballbarian]

If an artifact or unique unit/summons is present in the province then 1: there will be only 1 artifact and/or unique summons in that province, and 2: the province will be built thematically around that unique artifact/summons.


I really like that as a rule of thumb.


I'd be happy to edit it for you (I really can edit semi-grammatically when I put my mind to it) and send it to you in an email.


That would be appreciated. http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/images/smilies/happy.gif
I would especially like to have had an html version with topic links within the document, but I have so many irons in the fire that I dare not add any more items to the list, or none of them will get finished.

(Sorry for going off-topic!)

[Gandalf Parker]

The GAN files started out simple. Just a short text file of the map commands that should go into the .map. The only thing it did originally was find a location, and paste that file in on that number.

Im afraid that I made it go nuts. The random name files. And using the @ sign for a random. So instead of having the province always show up as "#landname Dragons Den" I could set a random of 3 names for "Dragons Den" "Draco Lair" "Here There Be" by saying
@3 landname
"Dragons Den"
"Draco Lair"
"Here There Be"

Once that worked it was obvious that any command could be done the same. You can create a small variety in the number of units, the type, the equipment, etc instead of creating a dozen copies of the file.
Surprise! http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/images/smilies/happy.gif

You can even have a special prize show up only once in 5 times by something like
@5 additem
"Enchanted Shield"
"Enchanted Shield"
"Enchanted Shield"
"Enchanted Shield"
"Sun Shield"

[HoneyBadger]

Name: Hills of the Watchers
Province type: hills
Commander: Firbolg armed with longbow of accuracy, black steel plate, black steel helm, boots of long stridesx12.
Bodyguards: 4 crushers
Unit type: 165 earth gnomes

Gem deposits

[Edi]

I guess some people are again going to tear their hair out now that I chime in, but for monsters 399 & 400, these are really the same one. 399 is the werewolf form of the skinshifter (400), so the first time those babies go to battle, the surviving ones will come out if it as skinshifters.

Edi

[HoneyBadger]

Name: Ancient Downs
Province type: forest
Commander: Firbolg with sword of sharpness, lightning bow, fire plate, horned helmet, boots of long strides x1
Commander: Firbolg with hammer of the mountains, black steel armour, black steel helm, boots of long strides, amulet of reinvigoration, ring of the warrior x1
Commander: Firbolg with gate-cleaver, jade armour, dragon helmet, boots of long strides, amulet of reinvigoration, bear claw talisman x1
Commander: Firbolg with Faithful, weightless tower shield, weightless scale mail, lightning bow, boots of long strides, amulet of magic-resistance x1
Commander: Firbolg with flambeau, hydra-skin armour, horror helmet, boots of long strides x1
Commander: Firbolg with sword of sharpness, black steel plate, black steel tower shield, boots of long strides, ring of fire, ring of frost x6
Commander: Firbolg with longbow of accuracy, black steel plate, black steel helm x16
Commander: Firbolg x25
Bodyguard: Watcher x5


The Cedar Forest
Firbolg fortress

[Ballbarian]

I guess some people are again going to tear their hair out now that I chime in, but for monsters 399 & 400, these are really the same one. 399 is the werewolf form of the skinshifter (400), so the first time those babies go to battle, the surviving ones will come out if it as skinshifters.


Oops. Should have used 633 instead of 399.
Thanks again Edi!

[HoneyBadger]

Province name: Enkidu Wastes
Province type: desert
Commander type: demi-lich with rod of the phoenix, rune smasher, amulet of magic resistance, amulet of reinvigoration
Bodyguard type: 4 giant mummies

The Desert of Ptah

[HoneyBadger]

Province Name: Sangobar
Province type: grassland/plains
Commander type: Vampire Queen (blood 1, death1, astral1, water1) armed with 2 blood-thorns, ring of the warrior
Bodyguard type: 5 vampire counts
Unit type: 16 vampires
Unit type: 264 thralls

Farm of Plenty
Farm of Plenty
Farm of Plenty

[HoneyBadger]

Province Name: Desert of Shunn, The Wastes of Amok, Set
Province type: desert
Commander type: demi-lich with amulet of magic resistance, rune smasher
Bodyguard type: giant mummy x4

Crypt in the sand.

[HoneyBadger]

Province name: Redgrain, Marrowvale, Sangria
Province type: grasslands, plains
Commander type: vampire count
Unit type: 12 vampires
Unit type: 95 thralls

Farm of Plenty

[HoneyBadger]

Province name: The Scurve
Province type: forest/jungle/swamp
Commander: carrion lord with skull talisman
Bodyguard: 5 darkvines
Units: carrion beast x 16
Units: carrion beast x 12
Units: carrion beast x 8
Units: carrion beast x 14
Units: carrion beast x 22
Units: carrion centaur x15

Overgrown Graveyard

(note: there are 5 types of carrion beasts, please feel free to use your own judgement as to which particular beast the numbers apply to)

[Agrajag]

Land Name: Fields of Vanishing
Terrain: Farmlands
Population: 0
Absolutely no units or commanders guarding it.


I really like the idea of this province - due to some mysterious magical event in the past - everyone in the province just vanished instantly.
Is it possible to make it so you also can't recruit anything from it?

[Gandalf Parker]

I dont think you can make it non-recruitable. But I think you can set the unrest to some monstrously high number which would serve the same purpose.

[Etaoin Shrdlu]

On the other hand, with nobody there, there'd be no resources... or at least no resource collection... right?

[Taqwus]

The combination of the Rainbow Shroud, the Doom Cloud, Chillsick Swamp and the Vale of Infinite Horror would explain 0 pop... :p

[Edi]

Agrajag said:
Land Name: Fields of Vanishing
Terrain: Farmlands
Population: 0
Absolutely no units or commanders guarding it.


I really like the idea of this province - due to some mysterious magical event in the past - everyone in the province just vanished instantly.
Is it possible to make it so you also can't recruit anything from it?


Yes, it is. Assign poptype number greater than 87 and you will not be able to recruit absolutely anything out of there. This is another one of those bits that I found out when testing poptypes for the DB.

Edi

[Gandalf Parker]

Wow thats a cool tidbit. That means that I can create a game-maker program that removes all recruitments from a map and then places scattered ones back. So something like 1 out of 50 provinces allows any recruiting at all. A very diffrent game to have to cope with.

And someone might create an MP map that evens out the luck of recruiting. Make them all the same, or remove it from the game completely.

[NTJedi]

Edi said:
Yes, it is. Assign poptype number greater than 87 and you will not be able to recruit absolutely anything out of there. This is another one of those bits that I found out when testing poptypes for the DB.

Edi



I was wondering if this was possible and was going to recommend it as a map feature request, but since it's already possible it saves making the post.
This does open some new map combinations and can help prevent the computer opponents from buying the stupid populations.

[DrPraetorious]

I've attached a bunch of treasure provinces in a .txt file. I've written up a bunch more but they've, gah, got bugs in them. These ones, I've fixed.

The six cities are variations on a theme - big army, big population, communion slaves, guarding victory points.

The minor provinces are better defended than standard indies and are guaranteed to have useful, but not outstanding, sites in them, and/or poptypes that make good units.

[Ballbarian]

Thanks DrPraetorious! http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/images/smilies/happy.gif

Would you mind adding notes on terrain and/or climate preference for each province? That would make it much easier for us to add them to the sets. Of course some are obvious, but every bit helps.

[DrPraetorious]

Oh, sure.

-- Burning city!
#landname 99 "The Smouldering Ruins of Agash-Va!"
(waste)

-- Jewel of the desert.
#landname 215 "Saelin, Jewel of the Desert"
(waste)

-- City of tears.
#landname 233 "Rohas, City of Tears"
(coastal)

-- The amber city.
#landname 17 "The Amber City"
(sea)

-- City of Great Learning.
#landname 291 "Pushtun, City of Wisdom"
(plains or farmland)

-- Dread City of Darkness.
#landname 103 "Kar-Vadhagh, The Black City"
(plains or farmland)


The remainder have no terrain preferences yet because I haven't set them, but they should probably be -

-- Vale of the Aesir.
(any land)

-- TROLLS! (pack 2)
(mountain)

-- GOBLINS! (pack 1)
(any land)

-- Valley of the Enchantresses.
#landname 208 "Vale of the Enchantresses"
(forest)

[mivayan]

Gandalf Parker said:
Wow thats a cool tidbit. That means that I can create a game-maker program that removes all recruitments from a map and then places scattered ones back. So something like 1 out of 50 provinces allows any recruiting at all. A very diffrent game to have to cope with.


But any castle would still give access to all national units?

[NTJedi]

mivayan said:

Gandalf Parker said:
Wow thats a cool tidbit. That means that I can create a game-maker program that removes all recruitments from a map and then places scattered ones back. So something like 1 out of 50 provinces allows any recruiting at all. A very diffrent game to have to cope with.


But any castle would still give access to all national units?



Correct

[Gandalf Parker]

NTJedi said:

Edi said:
Yes, it is. Assign poptype number greater than 87 and you will not be able to recruit absolutely anything out of there. This is another one of those bits that I found out when testing poptypes for the DB.

Edi



I was wondering if this was possible and was going to recommend it as a map feature request, but since it's already possible it saves making the post.
This does open some new map combinations and can help prevent the computer opponents from buying the stupid populations.


Unless of course Johan sees it and decides to fix it as he has some of my other game-making finds. You know what they say "One mans bug is another mans feature"

[DrPraetorious]

I assume that the "extra" poptype numbers are there for modding - one hopes that you'll be able to leave a poptype empty - or empty an existing poptype - if desired.

[Edi]

Poptypes have never been moddable. So I suspect the empty ones are there so that the devs can add more if they want or need them.

Edi

[Ballbarian]

DrPraetorious,
I have converted your provinces over to "Gans", but it will be tomorrow before I get them uploaded to the library.

I am looking forward to more of your sets. http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/images/smilies/happy.gif

(I worked them in before the others because they were already in map format which made them easy to add.)

[Ballbarian]

Added to library here (http://www.dom3minions.com/~semirand/semi_random/GAN_LIBRARY/).

[HoneyBadger]

I'm still working on the readme, Ballbarian. I'm about halfway through but it's going to take me longer than I thought since there's a lot of dense text to go through, some of which is taking me a while to decypher. At the very least, it should help me to understand how your fine program works http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/images/smilies/happy.gif

[Ballbarian]

That is great news HB! http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/images/smilies/happy.gif
I will be uploading a new version (likely this weekend), but everything in the readme still applies. If there is anything that you need me to clarify, just drop me a PM.

BTW, I updated two of DrP's provinces on the server to correct a couple of my typo's. I have also updated some of my own junk province's, and added some more, but I will save them for inclusion with the next version upload.

In keeping with the spirit of the thread, here is one of them in GAN format:

Terrain: Penninsula, Unique, Large, Plains


@RANDOM landname COAST
#population 15000
#poptype 65 -- Ichtyid
#killfeatures
#lab
#knownfeature "Navigators Guild" -- recruit navigator
#feature "Flesh Eater's Isle" -- summon ghouls

#commander 870 -- Captain
@5 comname
"Blackbeard"
"Jack"
"Pirate Pete"
"Waterlog"
"Sinker"
@RANDOM additem HELMET
@RANDOM additem 1HANDWEAPON
@RANDOM additem SHIELD
@RANDOM additem ARMORHVY
@RANDOM additem BOOTS
@RANDOM additem MISCITEM
#additem "Ring of Warning"
#bodyguards 10 871 -- Pirate
#units 40 871 -- Pirate

#commander 869 -- Navigator
#comname "Chartmaster"
@RANDOM additem ARMORLT
@RANDOM additem BOOTS
@RANDOM additem MISCITEM
#bodyguards 5 871 -- Pirate

#commander 976 -- Ichtyid Lord
#bodyguards 10 975 -- Ichtyid Warrior
#units 30 974 -- Ichtyid
#units 20 975 -- Ichtyid Warrior

#commander 976 -- Ichtyid Lord
#bodyguards 10 975 -- Ichtyid Warrior
#units 30 974 -- Ichtyid
#units 20 975 -- Ichtyid Warrior

#commander 869 -- Navigator
#additem "Enormous Cauldron of Broth"
#units 198 40 -- Ghoul
#commander 869 -- Navigator
#units 198 40 -- Ghoul

[Ballbarian]

I uploaded a map for viewing all Dom3 magic sites. Anyone interested in designing provinces might find it useful until Edi's spread sheet is complete.

It can be downloaded from HERE (http://www.shrapnelcommunity.com/threads/showflat.php?Cat=&Number=492854&page=0&view=collap sed&sb=5&o=&fpart=&vc=#Post492854).

[Gandalf Parker]

The SemiRandom project is coming along quite nicely.
Im afraid that I havent been able to look at it lately. Where are we now?

Do we have enough provinces?
Do we have enough semirandom gods?

[Aezeal]

Lair of the Pack
1x Commander Son of Fenris
5x Commander Werewolf Add magic to these E4A4 to some and N4D4 to others so they can buff the rest a bit
10x Commander Werewolf
50x Wolf

What I notice in this thread is that most provinces made seem very very strong so if there are only these strong provinces in that program and it randomized them to 25% of your lands won't that be... well annoying and possibly causing the AI to loose precious commanders etc on the province and setting themselves back a lot. Apart from the fac that empire expansion might be very hard .

Sounds like I don't like a challange if I read this back.. which is not the case I just think a few thematic yet easy provinces might be nice to.

[Gandalf Parker]

Things seem to be slowing down in this department. Come on people. We need more provinces. They dont have to be killer provinces that it takes the whole game to kill (thats what themed scenario maps are for). Just design some interesting place to come across using the normal Dom3 populations, sites, units, etc.
:bump:

[Aezeal]

I'll create another province if you create a dom3000 nation :D

[HoneyBadger]

If you had a province with regular units, say Blood Druids, and lesser horrors, would the lesser horrors attack the Blood Druids?

What I was thinking was: your army just walked in on a failed Summons. There'd be an immobile monolith Pretender chassis, surrounded by several Blood Druids and a bunch of lesser horrors, and you'd think "oh no! they're going to eat my army!" except that the horrors start eating the blood druids and attacking the monolith-turning what might otherwise be a fairly tough encounter into a fiasco for the enemy and an easier encounter for you.

[Endoperez]

If you had a province with regular units, say Blood Druids, and lesser horrors, would the lesser horrors attack the Blood Druids?

What I was thinking was: your army just walked in on a failed Summons. There'd be an immobile monolith Pretender chassis, surrounded by several Blood Druids and a bunch of lesser horrors, and you'd think "oh no! they're going to eat my army!" except that the horrors start eating the blood druids and attacking the monolith-turning what might otherwise be a fairly tough encounter into a fiasco for the enemy and an easier encounter for you.

It might work if the Blood Druids had horror marks. It would have to be tested, though. Some non-unique, horror-marking items:
Lifelong Protection, Crystal Sphere, Lightless Lantern, Robe of the Magi. The Robe would be very useful if it's found, so perhaps a single normal-sized Horror should be added.

[HoneyBadger]

Maybe Lifelong Protection, since the imp spam would be a nice cover fire, giving the Blood Druids time enough to be eaten by the Horrors. A regular Horror would work too, I just don't want Doom Horrors present.

Also, it might be fun to have a 'Stonehenge' province with just 9 immobile Monolith-chassis Pretenders present. They don't start off with much magic, so it wouldn't be overpowerful, just difficult to take out because of their resistances.

For that matter, a Sphinx province would be fun, with a single Sphinx modified to produce Mummies in combat. Maybe equip the Sphinx with a ring of regeneration and an amulet of MR to make it all the harder to take out. The province could also include a smallish force of horsearchers, as guardians *against* the Sphinx and it's mummies, ala "The Mummy" (one of my favorite movies).

[HoneyBadger]

Couple of ideas-hopefully funny, as opposed to over-powered:

'Land of the Blind'
Plains province: This consists of 12 cyclopes, each equipped with one of the 'Eye' artifacts (so they're blind), and a Hammer of the Mountains. They're led by another cyclops modified to wear a crown, to have 100% Darkvision, and to cast 'Darkness' at the beginning of battle.

2 'Grave of the Ancestors': This is a mountain province containing a single giant head Pretender (as per Mictlan-I forget their names). The giant head Pretender is modified with a Secondform, so that if it's destroyed, it turns into an Ancestral Spirit (as per the Tien'Chi national). This Ancestral Spirit is furthermore modified to produce more Ancestral Spirits, which are themselves modified to produce Ancestral Spirit-producing Ancestral Spirits. The province itself contains 4 Graveyard magic sites.

Thirdly, I'd like to see a forest province named 'Bel'Shamharoth', that would consist of an independent Temple, an 'Ancient Temple' magical site, a group of icthytosians-some modified to have Holy/Blood magic, a handful of bloodslaves, and an Ancient Kraken (named Bel'Shamharoth) with 8 levels in Astral magic, equipped with an amulet of the fish and a ring of regeneration, modified to have only 1 eye (not disabled, just modified in this manner from the standard Ancient Kraken).

So you'd have:
64 blood slaves, just milling around
48 regular Icthys,
32 armoured Icthys, as guards
16 Icthy captains (these might be equipped with Stingers to give some magic weapon support, but it's unnecessary)
8 Icthy captains modified to have 2 Holy magic and 1 Blood magic,
and the ancient kraken itself.

A challenge, admittedly, but not something that would require an alliance of several late-game Nations, I wouldn't think. And a fun Terry Pratchet reference.

[rdonj]

In reference to the horrors, in Amos' horror scourge mod I noticed that my horrors would attack each other when I used them together. My theory is that horrors will always attack all units on the battlefield. Of course, giving units horror marks would make the horrors go after them first.

[Gandalf Parker]

Some interesting ideas but unfortunately modifications of units falls into mods, and is not possible by the map commands we can use here. Basically we can only place things already in the game (sites, units, equipment), name things, and decide which units are gods/commanders/troops/bodyguards.

[HoneyBadger]

Well, I have a thought that might get you more "business", as it were. I can't currently look at the names of actual Provinces on the Dom 3 maps, but I know there were some really evocative ones-ones that I've been drawn to take over, just because the Province name made me wonder what was there. If you were to list a selection of those, say half a dozen at a time, and ask people to match the names up with what they think should go there, it might help motivate and inspire people to come up with ideas, since it would give a starting point (and also, allow them to recognise Provinces they themselves have found familiar and/or interesting).

The 'Land of the Blind' (should read 'Country of the Blind', by the way, but I can't edit it any longer) can work just fine as it currently is, if you just ignore the modding suggestions. Same thing with the 'Bel'Shamharoth' Province. I made up both of those before I thought of ideas to mod them. The icthy priests could be replaced by Atlantis priests, or some other suitably "fishy" units.

As far as the 'Grave of the Ancestors', you could replace the single giant head with maybe 3-6 of them, and give each one a skelly spammer amulet, and maybe a MR amulet, too.

[Endoperez]

The 'Land of the Blind' (should read 'Country of the Blind', by the way, but I can't edit it any longer) can work just fine as it currently is, if you just ignore the modding suggestions.

Perhaps "Cave of the Blind", in Cave terrain, in an underground castle. That way you get Darkness without having to mod anything. IIRC cave castles cause darkness but normal caves don't. I think the King inside should have Eye Shield. :P

You could put a host of mechanical men, enlivened statues and such defending the outside of the castle, with another blind Cyclops and an Iron Dragon and perhaps some Troll Kings or something leading them, so that the whole defending force doesn't evaporate with just two deaths.

[HoneyBadger]

All those things would be good, Endoperez, but they'd also make the provinces quite a bit more powerful than is really necessary. I think Gandalf wants some lighter weight independents-things that make sense that they'd be there, or are fun and interesting, but don't take a late-game alliance to beat.

[Endoperez]

All those things would be good, Endoperez, but they'd also make the provinces quite a bit more powerful than is really necessary. I think Gandalf wants some lighter weight independents-things that make sense that they'd be there, or are fun and interesting, but don't take a late-game alliance to beat.

There'd be one army outside the castle, and a second inside it. The outside forces would be mechanical men and such; they are tough, but that's not too bad when the battle isn't fought under darkness. The Cyclops would be inside the castle, just like in your original idea.

[chrispedersen]

Elephant Graveyard....

Respawning Long Dead elephants with the Elephant King able to protect them.

Site gives Ivory (100 gold), 2 death gems. Can only be found in +heat forest.

Elephant King scripted for flight and etherealness on the undead, trampling elephants. Plus if he raises dead he gets more elephants.

[Gandalf Parker]

Time for a :bump:
We now have online games running which automatically incorporates the SemiRandom program.
http://www.dom3minions.com/HostedGames.htm
And I would like to also incorporate the SemiRandom feature of giving the AIs logical gods/scales.

We need more provinces. More variety.

And more gods. At the moment we have A GOD for each of the middle era nations. But we need early and late nations, and some variety in the middle era.

Gandalf Parker
--
the Socializing Soloist, the Mad Mapper and the Minimalist Modder, the Lord of Chaos, the Prophet for Random, Experimenter of Extremes, He Who Will Not Normalize Standardize Specialize (or Finalize), He Who Public Domains All.

[cleveland]

Province Name: "The Golem Heights"

#commander "Golem Crafter"
#additem "Starshine Skullcap"
#additem "Crystal Coin"
#additem "Lead Shield"
#additem "Amulet of Antimagic"
#additem "Earth Boots"

#units 10 "Golem"
#units 10 "Siege Golem"

Magic Site: Meteorite Cliffs (#605)

Poptype: random

Sitemask: Mountain / Boardermountain

[chrispedersen]

Awakened Quarry

5e: (You'll see why).


Crusher Commander (copy of Father Illearth, toned down a tad).
Lead Shield
AMR
Blood Stone
Boots of Earth Power
30 earth gems.

Defenders: 40 crushers, set on Hold and attack in far rear.

Script: Curse of stones.

Angle: Crushers move incredibly slow. Combine with Curse of Stones, and earth meld opponents will rack up the exhaustion, and risk timeout. The slower crushers will not face these problems.







Lab

[Tifone]

Father Illearth with Boots? :confused:

[Stavis_L]

And more gods. At the moment we have A GOD for each of the middle era nations. But we need early and late nations, and some variety in the middle era.


Not that I want to toot my own horn, but all the .GOD files I submitted were for late age, and so I believe there should now be at least 2 for each nation in LA. Of course, you may have opted not to use one or another set (one set was "purchasable" at the vanilla point cost, if Imprisoned, whereas the other set was not.)

More would be definitely be better though :-)

[Gandalf Parker]

Sorry Stavis. I thought I had all the add-on zips.
But you are right, we can always use more. However if you did 2 for each LA nation, and we have 1 for each MA nation, then it appears we need mostly EA gods.

Also I want to make the point that we have many "killer" provinces. IMHO we need to water down the mix abit with just some interesting and logical ones. Same point I guess for the gods. Do not be afraid to turn in a god build because you dont think its a killer god. As long as its better than a purely randomly created god then it will be good to add in. I feel we mostly need variety.

It wouldnt be a bad idea to have each nation-guide represented. Those who did guides, and those who have favorite guides, should make an effort to see that its god/scales are included.

[thejeff]

I'd disagree about including gods from most of the guides. Those are often very focused on a particular strategy that the AI isn't going to implement. If you take that god, then build troops haphazardly like the AI does, you're not going to get decent results, possibly worse than random.
Example: Baalz's Eriu guide. The god design is all about getting a bless for Sidhe Lords, so that with minimal gear they can be impressive raiders. The AI simply won't do that, so the bless will be wasted. Used occasionally on the troop sacreds who it isn't designed for.

The AI generally does better with more generic high-scale builds than the more optimized and focused designs.

That said, there are guides that are more general, whose suggestions would make good pretenders.

[Gregstrom]

Plains of the Lion Tribe

Good numbers of lion tribe warriors and archers, plus several lion tribe witch doctors and a dozen or so lions (and maybe even a couple of Summer Lions)

Forests of the Wolf Tribe could be similar.

[Gandalf Parker]

Now that the terrain for CAVE has started showing up on player-created maps (and I manually add them to the generated maps I offer at my site) we have a need for some interesting cave provinces that are JUST caves. Surely some magic sites and units in the game would be uniquely suited to being found in a cave.

[chrispedersen]

Conclave of wyrms (see balance mod for sprites)

1 D
1 W
1 F

[Gandalf Parker]

Interesting.
But SemiRand uses map commands, no mod commands.
And I dont think there is a version for CBM.

[Squirrelloid]

A site with recruitable mooseknights, duh. Wasn't it obvious? Mooseknight poptype would be ideal. (To hire mooseknights you must prove yourself in mortal combat!)

[Gregstrom]

Colonies of olms or cave drakes would seem logical. Or a tomb of forgotten horrors (othernesses or the like).

[Sombre]

A site with recruitable mooseknights, duh. Wasn't it obvious? Mooseknight poptype would be ideal. (To hire mooseknights you must prove yourself in mortal combat!)

I don't think there is a mooseknight poptype.

[Squirrelloid]

A site with recruitable mooseknights, duh. Wasn't it obvious? Mooseknight poptype would be ideal. (To hire mooseknights you must prove yourself in mortal combat!)

I don't think there is a mooseknight poptype.

Maybe there should be <.< >.>

[Ballbarian]

#poptype 71
Troll King, Troll, War Troll & Troll Moose Knight
:)

[Warhammer]

Only problem with the Moose Knights is that it would have be run on a NI map.

[Gandalf Parker]

OK the SRAND games on my server
http://www.dom3minions.com/HostedGames.htm
have gotten popular again. And the Faerun map has always been popular for its special provinces. But both have some limited play if there is no variation.

So I am back to asking that everyone create ONE province. Build it around a particular magic site maybe. Name the province, choose its population, its sites, its defenders, its gains and its dangers. This is not modding (not making new things). Use any sites, population, structures, units, equipment that is already in the game.

[Jack_Trowell]

Hi Gandalf, I have recently added some predefined provinces in my map randomizer at http://dominions.realites.org, you can use them if you wish :


-------------------------------------------------------
-- Required terrain type(s) :
-- mountain (16)
-------------------------------------------------------
#land XXX -- province by Jack Trowell
#landname "TrollHeim"
#population 6450
#poptype 71 -- Troll King, Troll, War Troll & Troll Moose Knight
#commander "Troll King"
#comname "High King Bronarh"
#additem "Earth Boots"
#bodyguards 5 "War Troll"
#units 10 "War Troll"
#units 5 "Troll Moose Knight"
#commander "Troll King"
#units 20 "Troll"
#commander "Troll King"
#units 20 "Troll"



-------------------------------------------------------
-- Required terrain type(s) :
-- mountain (16)
-------------------------------------------------------
#land XXX -- province by Jack Trowell
#landname "Land of the Cyclops King"
#population 1984
#poptype 67 -- former subjets of the cyclops
#commander "Cyclops"
#clearmagic
#additem "Midget Masher"
#additem "Hydra Skin Armor"
#additem "Girdle of Might"
#additem "Amulet of Antimagic"
#knownfeature "Gold Mine"
#knownfeature "Iron Mine"



-------------------------------------------------------
-- Required terrain type(s) :
-- farm (256)
-- edgemount (4194304)
-------------------------------------------------------
#land XXX -- province by Jack Trowell
#landname "Peaceful Valley"
#population 11250
#poptype 76 -- Hoburgs
#commander "Hoburg Priest"
#units 20 "Hoburg Militia"
#units 20 "Mechanical Man"
#commander "Horticulturist"
#units 10 "Hoburg Militia"
#units 20 "Clockwork Horror"
#commander "Horticulturist"
#units 10 "Hoburg Militia"
#units 20 "Clockwork Horror"
#commander "Horticulturist"
#units 10 "Hoburg Militia"
#units 20 "Clockwork Horror"
#feature "The Grey Tower of Nexus"



-------------------------------------------------------
-- Required terrain type(s) :
-- any land province
-------------------------------------------------------
#land XXX -- province by Jack Trowell
#landname "Land of the Asmegs"
#population 3514
#poptype 69 -- recruit Asmegs & Asmeg Jarl
#commander "Asmeg Jarl"
#units 15 "Asmeg"
#commander "Asmeg Jarl"
#units 15 "Asmeg"

[Gandalf Parker]

Much thanks. Those look great. I particularly like that they are flavorful and theme based without being killer. We have lots of killer provinces.

Yesterday one of the Dom3 IRC channels went off on the subject also. I have 4 pages of notes! Im really going to try and flesh them out.

[Gandalf Parker]

Yes, I know. I still have to create the Goons suggestions on specials for RanDom.
OR if one of the goons wants to play with map commands to do it, I will gladly help. See me in IRC

Does anyone else have a pet peeve they have hit when playing? A province where the province name, magic sites, defenders did not seem to make sense together? Something that made you say "if I FIGHT it I should GET it!". then feel free to design the province completely the way you feel it SHOULD have been, and upload it here.