Tir na n'Og and Eriu

[Kristoffer O]

So, here is a teaser on Tir na n'Og and Eriu

Tir na n'Og is a blessed isle surrounded by wispering mists. It is the home of the Tuatha, a highly magical race descendant from the Nemedians that once warred with the Fomorians. The Tuatha has made themselves lords and masters over the Fir Bolg, a lesser race descendant of the same Nemedian ancestors. With the aid of the Fir Bolg the Tuatha attacked the fomorian giants and almost succeded were the Nemedians failed, but eventually the Fomorians proved too powerful and the Tuatha were driven back to their blessed isle. The Tuatha and their sidhe descendants have turned to crafts, poetry and magical arts, but some have chosen the path of war and have become warriors and generals of great renown. The Fir Bolg, inferior to the Tuatha, buit still far superior to ordinary men, compose much of the population and serve as farmers and lowly warriors.

---

When men came to the land of the Tuatha and the Fir Bolg there was an outdrawn battle wich ended with the defeat and total withdrawal of the Tuatha. The Land of the Ever Young was forever lost to this world and Avalon was taken by the Witches of Man. The Sidhe, descendants of the Tuatha, retreated into strange twilight realms with entrances hidden in ancient mounds. The land of the Fir Bolg was split by the invading forces: Man and their Witches, and the Milesians. The Milesians named their land Eriu. Most of the Eriu population is composed of humans of Milesian ancestry, but a few Fir Bolg still survives in remote villages. With the coming of the new God the Daoine Sidhe have reemerged from their magic mounds to lead the Milesians. Eriu is now a nation of humans and Fir Bolg led by the awakening Sidhe.

[Edi]

Awesome! Can't wait for them. http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/images/smilies/happy.gif

Kristoffer, both of those descriptions are absolutely crawling with spelling errors. I have fixed them in the quote box below.


Fixed descriptions said:

Tir na n'Og is a blessed isle surrounded by whispering mists. It is the home of the Tuatha, a highly magical race descended from the Nemedians that once warred with the Fomorians. The Tuatha have made themselves lords and masters over the Fir Bolg, a lesser race descended from the same Nemedian ancestors. With the aid of the Fir Bolg the Tuatha attacked the Fomorian giants and almost succeeded where the Nemedians failed, but eventually the Fomorians proved too powerful and the Tuatha were driven back to their blessed isle. The Tuatha and their sidhe descendants have turned to crafts, poetry and magical arts, but some have chosen the path of war and have become warriors and generals of great renown. The Fir Bolg, inferior to the Tuatha, but still far superior to ordinary men, compose much of the population and serve as farmers and lowly warriors.

---

When men came to the land of the Tuatha and the Fir Bolg there was a drawn out battle which ended with the defeat and total withdrawal of the Tuatha. The Land of the Ever Young was forever lost to this world and Avalon was taken by the Witches of Man. The Sidhe, descendants of the Tuatha, retreated into strange twilight realms with entrances hidden in ancient mounds. The land of the Fir Bolg was split by the invading forces: Man and their Witches, and the Milesians. The Milesians named their land Eriu. Most of the Eriu population is composed of humans of Milesian ancestry, but a few Fir Bolg still survive in remote villages. With the coming of the new God, the Daoine Sidhe have reemerged from their magical mounds to lead the Milesians. Eriu is now a nation of humans and Fir Bolg led by the awakening Sidhe.

[Meglobob]

Excellent, so we have 2 new nations? Great can't wait to try them out. http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/images/smilies/biggrin.gif

The Daoine Sidhe I assume will have excellent stealth, which is good and national recruitable Fir Bolgs? Great. I wonder if they still have there enchanted spear as a default weapon?

Roll on the next patch...

[normalphil]

They're (firbolgs) in Edi's unit database already. Basically really good humans, not supernatural humans.

[Dedas]

Hurra för Kristoffer! http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/images/smilies/happy.gif

This is great!

[BandarLover]

Yay!! Two new (forth-coming) races!! But I still haven't tried all the others yet!! http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/images/smilies/eek.gif

[Gandalf Parker]

Some interesting notes from Kristoffer in the other thread:



Sidhe are quite similar to the Vanir, an ancient magical race superior to men skilled in the use of glamour and illusions. It could be that they share the same ancestry.

Tir na n'Og do indeed split into Man and Eriu. Eriu being somewhat similar to the Last of Tuatha from dom2 with humans (milesians) ruled by reemerging Sidhe Lords.

Fomoria will emerge eventually. They too have Fir Bolg inhabitants, but will have some other more sinister allies as well.




So apparently Tir na n'Og are early era (Man with Tuatha?). In mid era they split to Man and Eriu (basically Dom2 "last of the Tuatha" theme with Sidhe returning to the game?).

And the Fomoria are still to come as another early era nation.

[Foodstamp]

This is great news. I guess this means I can scrap my Domnann mod I had planned for a Firbolg race http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/images/smilies/wink.gif

I am very excited to see the Tuatha making their return, and to see your take on the Fomorians. Very cool!

[Taqwus]

Hm. So 'Summon Firbolg' will probably become a national spell... now what should I use for snipers? :p

[Wish]

nah, they'll probably get some other summons, or maybe recruitable firbolgs.

[Kristoffer O]

> Kristoffer, both of those descriptions are absolutely crawling with spelling errors. I have fixed them in the quote box below.

Yep. Haven't run them through any kind of spell check yet. Thought I could send them to you http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/images/smilies/happy.gif, but I will wait until all are finished. I might do some heroes today. Cu Chulainn fits ok in Eriu, but should probably be removed from Tir na n'Og. They need some other guy instead. Otherwise the descriptions are finished.

[Foodstamp]

For The Tuatha, A Dagda type pretender would be absolutely incredible.

For Eriu, if it is going to be based on Red Branch lore, you will have no shortage of national heroes for that nation http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/images/smilies/wink.gif

Cuchulainn
Cathbad the Druid <-----Please Please!
Emer
Etaine
Deirdre <-- very good choice for a heroine unit #awe etc.
Naoise

[Kristoffer O]

> For Eriu, if it is going to be based on Red Branch lore, you will have no shortage of national heroes for that nation

Yep.

Eriu has Cu Chulainn and his friend Ferdiad so far. A druid might be useful, as the other two are warriors.

[Novi]

I apologize for veering off the topic but I was wondering if LA Pangaea has any other perks than its superior troops?

[Foodstamp]

Kristoffer O said:
> For Eriu, if it is going to be based on Red Branch lore, you will have no shortage of national heroes for that nation

Yep.

Eriu has Cu Chulainn and his friend Ferdiad so far. A druid might be useful, as the other two are warriors.



Cuchulainn is no surprise. He is the superman of the Celtic universe. I imagine him on a chariot, javelins, spear, change form after damage to sword and shield warrior unit, exceptional strength, increased ability points, a true heavy tank.

I hope you find an interesting way to add Cathbad. He had such a great impact on nearly all the Ulster stories yet when people talk about late Celtic mythology, you rarely hear mention of his name.

It really sounds like you did your homework for these two nations, but that is to be expected if you take a look at all the other nations http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/images/smilies/happy.gif.

A quick question, is Fomoria going to be a water based amphibious nation?

[Taqwus]

I could see the Wild Hunt also being a national spell for the Celtic tribes -- isn't this sort of Gwyn mab Nudd and crew?

[Kristoffer O]

There are lots of different Wild Hunts, primarily in german/celtic traditions (there are examples from other myths as well). Herne, Arawn (IIRC), Odin/Wotan, but there are others. The one in dominions is quite celtic, but I'm not sure I wish to limit it since it is a cool spell.

[LDiCesare]

Would Tir na n'Og use heroes from the battles of Moy Tura/Mag Tured? The Dagda and Morrigan for instance? Though they could be alternate pretender builds? Or Sreng, the Fir Bolg champion?

[Sandman]

Kristoffer O said:
There are lots of different Wild Hunts, primarily in german/celtic traditions (there are examples from other myths as well). Herne, Arawn (IIRC), Odin/Wotan, but there are others. The one in dominions is quite celtic, but I'm not sure I wish to limit it since it is a cool spell.



Why not tweak it so that it's slightly different depending on the nation that casts it?

[Gandalf Parker]

That would be confusing. Is there any case of that being done in the game now?

Hmmmmm... but you could make it so that certain pretenders have extra bonuses with the spell. Thats been done. And it would help make some of the thematic pretenders have a reason to use them.

[Reverend Zombie]

Gandalf Parker said:
That would be confusing. Is there any case of that being done in the game now?




Reanimation and raise dead battlespell.

[Shovah32]

Any idea of when we will be playing these two, fun nations?

[Kristoffer O]

Not too far into the future. We will make some early age fixes as well.

[MaxWilson]

Like toning down Helhirdlings a little so I can play Helheim without getting mocked? : )

-Max

[Kristoffer O]

Changes to helheim are on the agenda. Some have been implemented. We're experimenting with glamour right now. Quite important as there is about to be another glamour nation.

[MaxWilson]

I see that Svartalfs are now capital-only. I presume this is for thematic reasons, because otherwise you wind up with a nation of little dark dwarves and a smattering of Vanir leaders. : ) I'm a little disappointed because I haven't found any other good recruitable-anywhere mages so far in my limited playing time, but I guess this will just be the motivation I need to try out some other nations. I guess Marverni and LA Agartha might be interesting.

-Max

[JonathanCrane]

Kristoffer O said:
Changes to helheim are on the agenda. Some have been implemented. We're experimenting with glamour right now. Quite important as there is about to be another glamour nation.



I'd love to see "strategic glamour" ie units not showing up on the stragic map, be limited to the dominion of the nation in question. That way, you don't want to venture into the territory of helheim, because they might be hiding anywhere, but if the vanir march into the desert, you would see exactly where they are. Thematic, and a bit more balancing.

[DrPraetorious]

An aside on how undead animation appears to work:

The internal code supports unit-lists from which you can summon units. If you want to do this with spell modding, take a summoning spell and set the damage to -1 or -2 (depending on whether you want soulless or longdead), or -3 (if you want to summon the things you get from the Soul Trap). I haven't experimented fully but I would think this works for anything that takes a unit ID in place of a damage value. Those unit lists, in turn, can vary from nation to nation, which is why Animate Dead etc. gives different units for different nations.

So, for the wild hunt to work this way, the internal data on global 75 (the id for wild hunt) would need to be altered so that instead of making unit #780 and a bunch of whatever else, it made a draw from unit-list -X and a bunch of draws from unit list -Y. Those unit-lists could then be defined differently for different nations.

It could be done but it's a lot of work for Johan.

As for bonuses when casting spells - I believe that this bonus only exists as "spell #,bonus # of effects", and since Wild Hunt is a global, it can't have a # of effects increase. This I'm not sure of, though - might be code that enables discounts or something by spell ID buried in there.

--

Are there going to be a lot of tweaks or just a few?

[normalphil]

I enjoy ribbing on Helhiem as much as the next man, but to be honest I'm not exactly invested in doing more than that. It's a nation.

And I wouldn't like to see glamour itself acted against... it's just so damn /usefull/ as a game mechanic, as is. Strategic stealth and battle-field cloaking. Keep it in there so that it'll be available.

[Kristoffer O]

There is currently no change to the strategic use of glamour. Although Jonathan's suggestion was quite nice from a thematic perspective.

[MaxWilson]

Does glamour disappear on a shield hit? The manual makes it sound like it should, but in practice it doesn't seem to. Hirdmen have a defense of 13 + shield parry 4, but the glamour seems to stay on until they take actual damage. Every once in a while the glamour drops without taking damage, but at a frequency which suggests that it's just a zero-HP hit.

-Max

Edit: I guess my point was that if glamour is being fixed anyway, this should be addressed too.

[HoneyBadger]

I'm really excited about the Fomorians. I'm hoping decent, monstrous, evil giants who go south for the winter and don't have problems watching 3-d movies.

Nuada Airgetlam (Nuada Silverhand) would be an excellent hero for Tir'na'Nogu(a)a (or however we're spelling it).

Once the king of the Tuatha, he lost his position when his arm was cut off in battle against the Fomoeri, since you can't be king and be "unwhole in body"-kind of like the Masons.

He's got a replacement arm made from living silver, and a magic sword.

I'll be happy to provide more details if anyone's interested, but I don't feel like extensively researching it right now, since I just woke up and I've got a bit of a headache.

[HoneyBadger]

It would be nice if the Fomorians got Ettins as national troops, since I'd guess that Tir'na's getting Fir Bolg, although admittedly, Ettins make nice independents and "monstrous creations", so it might be very appropriate to keep the two separated.

Still, I really hope we get some kind of giant monstrous sacred thing-beasty that can stand toe-to-toe with a Niefel-besides Basalt Kings, ofcourse. And really, intensely, wickedly evil, as Fomorians-I think-should be.

Please?
Pretty please?

[DrPraetorious]

Have you guys read any of Michael Moorcock's later Corum books?

They've got these knights who have replaced their blood with pine-sap, People of the Pines I think they are called.

They thrive in cold provinces, they're cavalry, they wear heavy armor and have a natural prot of 12 (bark skin), as well as a lot of HP for a human sized unit.

I was going to add them as a national summon for Niefelheim, but since they fought Corum Silverhand, I think they'd be more fitting as Fomorian units.

[HoneyBadger]

I haven't, actually. I think that would be a great idea, DrPraetorious. I love Michael Moorcock-the books he's written and what he stands for-but I haven't read many of his books, aside from the Elric saga. He's a very inventive man and a real role-model for how fantasy should be written, but it takes me a long time to get through one of his books, and subsequently I haven't read very many of them all the way through. I just bought his Jerry Cornelius collection and I'm working on that, but it's modern stuff.

I feel his work is a gold-mine for Dominions themes and units, though.

Dammit, now another nation idea (a tribe of various kinds of giant, poisonous frog-people) just popped into my head...

[DrPraetorious]

If there's one thing I know about frogmen, it's that they lust after human women.

So the frogmen come in all kinds of psychedelic colors (probably by clan), and so do the half-naked spear-wielding swamp women.

http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/images/smilies/happy.gif

On a more serious note, LE Mictlan already does frogmen, so another nation of frog people would need an additional hook. Anyone know anything about the cultures of precolombian Brazil?

http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/e/e3/Kuarup3.jpg

Those guys certainly have the requisite bright color scheme.

[HoneyBadger]

I know just a little bit about the Tupis. They were excellent jungle-fighters in Portuguise Brazil. Apparently, they may have engaged in ritualistic cannibalism. Here's a nice "showpiece" of Native tribes in the Americas, the Tupis are at the very bottom:

http://aoe3.heavengames.com/gameinfo/aoe3/civs/index.shtml#natives

If you have trouble getting here, let me know, the tribes are in the bottom half of the page.

Since I borrowed it from a Civilization link, it even lists some appropriate units for each tribe-an added bonus.

[HoneyBadger]

oh nevermind the above, it's actually Age of Empires 3. I googled Civilization for the link, but that's where it took me.

[HoneyBadger]

You've got exactly the right idea, Dr. Praetorious.

I'm thinking the frog-nation will have access to human Maenad-types, Tupi (maybe hoburg)hunters, and some kind of psychadelic hashishiin.

They'll have a couple Nature and Death/Blood oriented national summons and National troops that consist of lots of different kinds of frogman. The most powerful (black with yellow-orange warts) will be sacred and have the most HP of any national unit in the game (a natural berserker/regenerator).

They'll probably be middle era, also.

[Kristoffer O]

Hmm, seems Fomoria will make it into the patch as well. They are almost finished. Still no descriptions and a few attack sprites missing, but otherwise ready.

[Shovah32]

I love you KO...

[HoneyBadger]

I love you too, KO

[Meglobob]

I love you more than shovah32 and honeybadger put together, KO!

[HoneyBadger]

That's not true! he's a dirty liar! I love you most of all, KO!

[Shovah32]

Both of you blasphemers shall be cast into inferno! now begone and leave my KO alone http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/images/smilies/tongue.gif

[Edi]

Stop spamming and dragging the thread off-topic, please. I know you're all enthusiastic, but let's not derail this, okay?

[HoneyBadger]

Relax, Edi. Nobody's derailing anything-or for that matter being serious.

[Shovah32]

Thats what you think! But really, i cant wait to get these 2 nations and formoria. Firbolgs are fun http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/images/smilies/happy.gif

[HoneyBadger]

Well ofcourse I'm serious about that. And about my love for Kristoffer O.

[Shovah32]

Dont make me go all formorian on yo *** honey.

[Kristoffer O]

http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/images/smilies/heart.gif

[HoneyBadger]

See? Kristoffer and I have a special kind of love.

[Shovah32]

Well 'special' IS the word that comes to mind when i think of you, HB http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/images/smilies/tongue.gif

[HoneyBadger]

awww that's so sweet, Shovah. I think YOU'RE special too! /threads/images/Graemlins/Lips.gif

[VedalkenBear]

And here I thought we actually had more information on this. Guess not.

Do we have a firm ETA on when these are coming out?

[Gandalf Parker]

They are on the progress page
http://ulm.illwinter.com/dom3/dom3progress.html
which means they will be in the next patch. But there is no such thing as an ETA for patches.

[VedalkenBear]

Ah well. I for one am really looking forward to them. In the meantime, I guess I could look into making that Heian mod...

[vfb]

After a couple of Fianna heroes, and I seem to remember one or two Firbolg heroes (that died in battles), I finally got Cu! He looks pretty cool, so I really regret that Eriu is not going to last very long in the game I got him in. Here's his picture. Dude's got a harpoon!

http://i175.photobucket.com/albums/w148/vfb_dominions/Cu.jpg

[BigDisAwesome]

That guy is pretty awesome. He just screams to be made into a thug. Perhaps make him your prophet to supplement his hit points, then gear him out.

[Sombre]

I much prefer his graphic to the mess that is the longhanded guy.

[vfb]

There's no way to change prophets other than to kill off my current one and wait six months, is that right?

And yeah, I agree, Cu's graphic is very nice!

[Saulot]

Yes, that's right.

I have to concur that the new graphics that are being released are truly top notch. It's also nice to see that some older graphics are being redone (like the hydra as posted on dom3progress).
Personally, I hope the vampire and vampire lord get redone at some point (The hydra sprites looked fine to me).

[llamabeast]

Vampire and vampire lord stand out in my mind as the weakest sprite in the game. They just look so disappointing.

And yes, the latest sprites (in fact almost all the sprites in the game, but the latest ones especially) are really great.

[Kristoffer O]

As I said in the encouragement thread I have lots of time nowdays, and will likely redraw some stuff. Feel free to point out outdated and ugly graphics.

T'ien Ch'i infantry comes to mind. And the couatl (got one in my curent MP) is rather unappealing.

[Kristoffer O]

Now I'm of to buy some weissbier for the evening barbeque. http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/images/smilies/happy.gif

[Sandman]

Kristoffer O said:
As I said in the encouragement thread I have lots of time nowdays, and will likely redraw some stuff. Feel free to point out outdated and ugly graphics.

T'ien Ch'i infantry comes to mind. And the couatl (got one in my curent MP) is rather unappealing.



It's T'ien Ch'i's mages and priests which are the drabbest. Just the same guy recoloured. Give the Celestial Master a big long beard, a staff and a cloud to ride on.

[Morkilus]

I'm thinking that some of the more popular older sprites should get special attention, specifically the Niefel and other giants.

[Edi]

King of the Deep seems to be DomPPP vintage and could really use a brushup. Same for Shambler Thrall and some of the older R'lyeh troops. T'ien Ch'i as well.

[Foodstamp]

Sombre,

The graphic fits him perfect. The reason the spear looks odd is because in Celtic mythology, the spear attacked independently of Lug. I have not received Lug as a hero yet, but I bet the spear is a bonus attack.

Kristoffer,
I was pretty harsh on your take on Tir na Nog and Eriu to begin with. But after seeing the current progress log, it sounds like you are really putting a lot of effort into making these two nations fit the mythologies they are based on. You have Cuchulainn as a hero, I can't be too harsh!

As an aside, Tir na Nog is my favorite nation I have ever played in multiplayer.

[Kristoffer O]

> I was pretty harsh on your take on Tir na Nog and Eriu to begin with.

I didn't realize. Sorry http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/images/smilies/happy.gif

> Tir na Nog is my favorite nation I have ever played in multiplayer.

Thats good. Now play other nations MP http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/images/smilies/happy.gif

[Sombre]

Foodstamp said:
Sombre,

The graphic fits him perfect. The reason the spear looks odd is because in Celtic mythology, the spear attacked independently of Lug. I have not received Lug as a hero yet, but I bet the spear is a bonus attack.




Yes he has a bonus attack. Since he has no description I hadn't figured out what the hell he was supposed to be - with his weird collection of skills he just looked like a big mess or an unfinished unit to me.

I personally think Tienchi infantry looks ok - I mean it's just basic infantry, it doesn't need that much detail. Some of the pretenders look pretty ropey though.

[Foodstamp]

Sombre,

The Celts were really big into jack of all trade type characters being included in their myth cycles. Lug is one of those figures. He forged weapons for the Tuatha, was skilled in combat, had an aura that radiated like the sun. He has many other feats attributed to him as well. You can probably find something on wikipedia for him.

Btw, I am currently learning Spanish and noticed the word "Sombre". In Spanish it means "Shade". Is that where your name comes from? http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/images/smilies/happy.gif

[Foodstamp]

Kristoffer O said:
> I was pretty harsh on your take on Tir na Nog and Eriu to begin with.

I didn't realize. Sorry http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/images/smilies/happy.gif

> Tir na Nog is my favorite nation I have ever played in multiplayer.

Thats good. Now play other nations MP http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/images/smilies/happy.gif



Oh, I play all kinds of nations in MP. I like Tir Na Nog because of the stealth raiding. After reading Gandalf's take on Pangaea, I tried playing them in that manner and fell on my face. With Tir Na Nog I am able to pull it off and have a formidable force at home to repel invasions. Besides, Tir Na Nog is based on some of my favorite mythology.

BTW, Dagda plz!