POLL: Scales, Magic Paths, and Dominion

[SelfishGene]

They seemed like interesting questions that haven't been asked yet.

Although of course there are some nation and build specific strategies it seems like there are some bare minimum scale and dominion choices that carry over from every game.

I also threw in a Pretender-type choice just to see what all these scales and magic choices are being used with.

[Meglobob]

Another day, another poll, cool.

[SelfishGene]

Did i do something funky with the polls? Why in a question does out of 6 answers the choice register as something like 4%?

[Atreidi]

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

[Folket]

In my next game I will play with 1 dominion and see how competitive I get.

[SelfishGene]

I find it curious few chose the magic scale as the most powerful. Although i also voted for order, having +1 magic seems nearly essential to be competitive in most games because it totally changes the cost effectiveness of researchers. Take 3-Drain (-2 research), for example, and Tien Chi is virtually crippled, as it's non-capital mages are cheap, low MR point guys.

If i had to take 3-Drain with 3-Order, or vice versa, there's no doubt i'd choose the magic over the money. Of course, since you choose the scales, you can have your cake AND eat it, since you're the one who baked it! http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/images/smilies/happy.gif.

[Szumo]

Dominion result surpised me. It seem i'm the only one who selected 7, which is the absolute minimum i'll choose, and everyone else thinks you can take even lower :S

[Folket]

I have played in several games and been mighty with dominion 4.

[DrPraetorious]

For *most builds* Order is the most powerful scale, but there are other circumstances where Turmoil+Fortune (or even just Turmoil) is viable.

There is no single scale that is least important - it varies from nation to nation tremendously. I generally take a lot of Sloth, but that reflects my nation preferences, there are a lot of nations for which Productivity is very useful.

Water is the most powerful blessing for most sacreds, but there are notable exceptions that don't care or would rather have other blessings.

"Death Curse" is a joke, but I think +4 strength is usually better than the increased affliction chance and death weapons, on actual combat units. On spellcasters, totally different story.

Astral pwns u.

I think Blood on pretenders is greatly underrated, especially since the poll question allows us to include the minor blessing (+2 str, not at all shabby) in our consideration.

Dom 3 or 4 works fine against CPU but other players will tend to recognize your weakness and capitalize on it. It's a moot point since even on a dom1 chasis, dom 5 is not that expensive.

I generally use an Oracle, Cyclops, Prince of Death or Wyrm.

[Warhammer]

I think blood can be great on pretenders, but most nations cannot make great use of the blood. I typically have better uses than having my pretender blood hunt to empower people.

[Evil Dave]

How much dominion your pretender needs depends on how much everybody else has. I usually choose 6 because I like bless tactics, and 6 is an OK tradeoff between number of sacred units/province and the design cost of high dominion... but if I'm playing with people who often take 9 or 10 for awe on their pretenders, I'll choose more.

[Maraxus]

Well, if I should look at this as a test, I sored good. Almost only hit the top scores. http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/images/smilies/wink.gif

Interesting:

Which magic path is the least useful for a Pretender to take in general, under all circumstances, on average?

I don't think blood should be that high, because of the "on average" part.
Sure, you never need blood, if you are not going to do bloody thinks. However, if you are going to do into blood, thins skill imediately becomes top importance unless you want to spend hundrets of blood slaves into empowering one of your national casters.
I've choosen fire, because fire is what you either won't invest much into anyway, or what your national caster will be able to handle okay, allready.
In 7 out of 8 cases, fire will still be more useful for the pretender, but in the 8th case, blood will be more useful, ten times as strong.

[thejeff]

But blood is easy to empower in, since blood slaves are easy to get if you have good hunters. If you don't who needs blood on the pretender anyway. Now I might take blood if I was playing a blood nation that didn't get a particular combination on it's nationals. A water/blood pretender for Abyssia to summon Ice Devils for example. Of course, you could just take the water and empower in blood and use boosters your nationals can make.

You take fire on a pretender for the bless, not the magic. If I have national fire mages, but no death, I'll sometimes take a fire/death pretender for flaming skulls.

[Humakty]

A blood bless can be nice for the strength bonus, that some sacreds can put to good use.
Reading the results, I see my favored built seem nonsense to most people.
Two options for me :
-Consider all those people to be nuts.
-Change my building choice.
I wonder which one is the less painful.

[sum1lost]

I'm surprised that earth didn't get more votes as a strong blessing. Then again, I tend to use sacred caster/thugs.

[Velusion]

Szumo said:
Dominion result surpised me. It seem i'm the only one who selected 7, which is the absolute minimum i'll choose, and everyone else thinks you can take even lower :S



As someone who almost selected 3 (but settled on 4) I think it's possible (though rare) to create a competitive nation with a relatively low dominion under the right circumstances if you go for a good bless and lots of money bonuses to crank out lots of temples.

However, typically I never go below 5 though and usually stick with between 6-7.

[Ironhawk]

I'm amazed that people think Astral is the best 9-path to use on a Pretender. I admit that its exceptionally useful and powerful but the risk of your opponent getting a lucky Mind Duel victory, IMO, outweighs any of that value when comparing one path to another.

[Nikolai]

Dueling a S9 is a far shot. Impossible with less than S3, and not worth I think. Pythium, Rlyeh, maybe Arco? Who would waste S3s on a 10% chance?

I often take S4 or S5 with my god, and just use it to hilt early, then keep him/her hidden and casting. If I had native S9, I would not worry about duel AT ALL.

By the way, my friend says it is impossible with less than S4, and with S4, the best you can hope is murder/suicide. Is that true?

[Lazy_Perfectionist]

Sunray's Virtual Library

# Magic Duel : each side gets to add his astral skill to a (not open ended) d6. Ties result in the death of both mages.
A +3 differential gives you a 1 to 6 odd. +5 gives you a 100% chance of killing the opponent but you still die about 3% of the time, and you have to be 6 levels higher to always win and never die.
Magic Duels use base astral levels, spells and items do not seem to have any influence.
There is no saving throw. This is an area effect spell (1 square), so you better disperse your astral mages. Mages without astral magic are unaffected.




4+d6 -> 5 to 10
9+d6 -> 10 to 15

[SelfishGene]

I should have but forgot to add a poll for the least powerful 9-path as far as casting/rituals/globals go. Many off the off-paths like Nature and Earth can summon large numbers of effecient troops if you have high magic in that particular path.

Generally though i'd say 9-Water or 9-Nature are the least useful 9 paths you could take as far as non-bless strategies go; except that, without some Water, you'll miss a way to easily enter the sea, and having that 9-Water is a great gurantee for an easy late game solution. 9-Nature is kind of less impressive but there are at least 3 great Nature globals. 9-Fire or 9-Air are less useful global spells, but even they have some pretty impressive if rare globals; and both are excellent at battle magic.

[DrPraetorious]

Thetis blessing is a sick joke, and in MP I found exactly one use for it.

I cast it and let R'lyeh think I was using it to survive under water (I wasn't, I had enough WB items to keep everyone alive). He wasted some huge number of astral pearls bringing it down after I cast it at minimum strength http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/images/smilies/happy.gif.

That was a pretty unusual circumstance, however. The spell is basically a trap for the unwary.

[Ironhawk]

Lazy_Perfectionist said:
4+d6 -> 5 to 10
9+d6 -> 10 to 15



Ah! Didnt know that Mind Duel was NOT open ended. Huh, unusual to find something not OE in the dom world.

[Velusion]

Ironhawk said:

Lazy_Perfectionist said:
4+d6 -> 5 to 10
9+d6 -> 10 to 15



Ah! Didnt know that Mind Duel was NOT open ended. Huh, unusual to find something not OE in the dom world.



Also - in larger games being able to cast Arcane Nexus and Wish is very, very handy.

[thejeff]

But you still don't need 9S to cast Arcane Nexus or Wish. That's what boosters are for.

Do people really take 9 in any path for any reason other than the bless?

[Tuidjy]

> Do people really take 9 in any path for any reason other than the bless?

Not I. In any case, S5 is the highest I have taken. By the time you can cast Wish
repeatedly, you usually can afford to empower to S6, and making three S boosters
is trivial at that point.

I have also never played a MP game with any path higher than six. High blessings
are a great trick - just not my cup of tea. I always play rainbows, but with my
favorite nations, those rainbows are also titans ;-)

[Kristoffer O]

Do people really take 9 in any path for any reason other than the bless?

I do! I wanna feel like a God http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/images/smilies/happy.gif

Edit: And it has come to my knowledge that a great many people like my ideas http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/images/smilies/happy.gif So now you'd better boost your pretenders to thematic levels, and not just utility levels!

[Lazy_Perfectionist]

I made a father of winters with a 10 in water (it might have been just a bit overkill). My ridiculous defense served me very well.

[Dedas]

Yes! Thematic gameplay is what gives me most joy! Please give us more maps like Dawn of Dominions to play on. http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/images/smilies/happy.gif

I have more demands, but those will have to wait until I calm down... http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/images/smilies/happy.gif

[SelfishGene]

Well, part of the rationale here is the "what else do you get" when taking a 9-bless Pretender. A 9-Astral bless is meh, but otoh, you get a powerful late game option that's easy to employ. A 9-Water bless is great, but then your stuck with a magic path that is mediocre.

[Humakty]

I usually take a bit of W or A on my pretender, so to be able to go underwater easily. I have a very thematic moloch with W6 ! http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/images/smilies/happy.gif(playing aby)

[Dedas]

Maybe water is his wet and dark desire? I mean, love for the flame is just square in Abysia. http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/images/smilies/happy.gif

[Humakty]

Yes, he is supposed to be perverse, he is a demon after all.