Template for reducing late game MM hell

[WraithLord]

Hi,

Last year I went through quite a few end game phases. Even now, I'm involved in a very MM intensive game - Asia Twist - in which the last turns take me more than 7 hours (I actually measured the time). Granted, I am quite pedant when processing turns and like to have every fine grained detail just so but still I estimate that end game turns are MM hell to every player who got there. Personally I find the end games painful, I can't avoid that, If I know that I can min-max I will do so and that results in extreme MM.

So, I'm looking to compile a list of mods and/or house rules geared towards the reduction of MM in end game.
I'm bringing this to discussion and once a general consensus is reached I personally have no intention of ever creating or joining a game that doesn't follow MM reduction guidelines.

EDIT: compile with current responses.
EDIT: Please note that the items are stated b/c of how they influence MM. It doesn't mean all games should adhere to them but rather that they are guidelines for creating games with lesser endgame MM. Consensus means that it is agreed that these items effect MM. Not that everyone wants to remove them from now on.
The mandatory items are one that I believe have such a drastic influence on MM and relatively harmless side effects that they can safely be removed from new games (that aim at less MM).

Guideline for reducing endgame MM that are generally acceptable:
1. No gem gens.
Note: Efforts are being made at modding for compensating gem gen reliant nations.

2. Determine an upper limit on map sizes, # of players and reasonable victory conditions. Consensus
10-12 players, 10-15 provinces per player, 40% capital VPs victory condition.
Note. MM is in direct relation to how many provinces one controls at end game. Worst case scenario (MM wise) is 2 powers each controlling 30-40% of the map making war.
# of players and victory conditions have similar effect.

3. No Diplomacy. i.e. RAND.
Diplomacy is not directly related to MM but cutting that part of the game results in faster turn processing. Plus, it allows for different patterns of gaining victory (no alliances, NAP turtling, dog piling etc) which could be refreshing on it's own right.


The list below are controversial ideas, they may work for reducing MM but can have side effects on game balance or feel.

1. Ban MM intensive nations. Like blood dom spreaders. LA R'lyeh.
Note that some nations increase MM for neighbors (LA R'lyeh)

2. Ban MM intensive spells. Like astral corruption and Forge.
Note, I consider AN, utterdark and BoT to be actually MM reducers b/c they end games faster.
AC causes everyone to go crazy with body guards and returning (and managing the astrals on mages) so contributes to heavy MM.
Forge caster essentially needs to forge and distribute 60 items per turn. In some cases a portion of the items needs to be sent to allies or investors. IMO, it's better if its removed from the table.

3. CBM increase gem cost of spells and items.
Note: I'd say increasing cost of tarts is a must. Not MM related - just boring same same end game every-time.

4. Low gem income (like LA settings).
Reason: more gems = more forge/rituals = more MM
In end game this gets to insane levels. You forge 50-60 items per turn. You summon lot's of tarts and other SCs. You equip and change equipment as needed. You cast and protect from artillery and assassination spells. Enormous amount of work.

5. Ban blood.

6. Ban dwarven hammers

[chrispedersen]

Wraith,

My Balance mod has following components

NoGen - removes Generators.
Boosters - makes boosters more expensive (things like skull of fire, thistle mace)

[Sombre]

I totally agree with point 1. because I don't think gem gens add anything good to the game and they can indeed promote and reward really tedious play style.

I also think point 3. is entirely sensible - I would never join a game on a map over 200 provinces. Even 200 provinces for me is a bit too big. With that size in the midgame I'd be hoping I wasn't doing well, so I wouldn't end up fighting in the 200 prov endgame. I realise I'm a bit drastic on this front, just personal preference.

Not sure about 2. because it seems further reaching than just reducing micro. Have you considered the other effects this would have?

The optional ones,..

1. If someone wants to play this nation, maybe they have a micro free way of doing it, or they can manage the micro - you don't have to worry about it too much do you? I guess LA Rlyeh itself causes other people micro due to the insanity, but then there are counters to that.

2. Yeah, seems reasonable in a mm reduction game. There are a few globals that absolutely dominate and also involve a lot of micro - I'm surprised at how often forge flies under peoples banhammer radar, given how nuts it is.

3. You mean, no research above level 5 or something? This seems a bit drastic. Especially if you're losing micro nightmare spells already.

4. Yep, RAND is good times.

[WraithLord]

- So a no gens mod is mandatory.
- Less magic income makes for a different game. Where mundane armies are viable for much longer. In which spells are more rare (like GRR Martin universe). So more advantage besides less MM.

- 200 province limit sounds reasonable.

RE. optional ones

1. In RAND game a MM intensive nation may be assigned to you anyway. Better they be identified by name so they could be banned from games.

So, what are the MM intensive nations?
LA Ermor, LA R'lyeh, EA/LA Mictlan.
more?

2. MM Global list:
Forge, AC
more?

3. I meant like level 7/8.

4. yes. RAND can evolve into RMRAND :)

[vfb]

Mandatory list:

1. Agreed
2. Agreed
3. Maybe 12 nations is probably the upper limit to keep things sane on a normal map? What makes it ugly is if one nation doesn't manage to run away with the game: a battle between two powerhouses can go on forever.

Optional:

1. Do you mean to reduce micro for other nations, so they don't have to set up a bunch of temples/preachers? Or is it the blood hunting/slave buses micro? One thing you might want to do is eliminate all blood mage summons. Otherwise they are almost as bad as gem generators. Maybe make 10 unique Vampire Counts or something, and 6 unique Vamp Lords, and something similar for Mictlan's summons?

2. The killer globals can be good for ending games faster, in some cases.
Forge: painful for the caster, since he needs to micro a lot of forgers
AN: Good for ending the game faster (if you can keep it up)
AC: Painful for everyone, having to deploy bodyguards and/or script returning. But 10 earth attacks a month has the same effect.
Utterdark/BoT: Good for ending the game earlier.

3. How about making all mid/upper level summons, (even trolls and golems) unique?

4. RAND is great (I've only had a bit of RAND experience, as a sub, but I liked it), but no diplomacy (including no trading) might suffice. It's a bit easier to set up and the admin can play.

[Kuritza]

I am 100% sure I will not join a game with expensive boosters, because boosters are the only saving grace of many nations, otherwise worthless. Also, everything that diversifies your nation is fun. Less opportunities to diversify, less fun.

As for no gem generators, I have mixed feelings about this idea. It may tone down MA Pythium and Rlyeh, which is a good thing. It will also kill Oceania, Bandar Log etc. Good luck winning with your mighty ichtycentaurs and markatas.
Etc, etc. You wont be able to make clams and counter recruitable SCs with Golems, for example. One nation will have Niefel Jarls / Gadols / you name it, other nation will be reduced to one or two Golems and, well, combat evocations; good luck again.
And I wont even touch the blood magic issue. :)

[vfb]

Well, 1 in 4 Yakshas can lay down some pretty nasty Gifts from Heaven, always a nice counter to Nief.

[Mardagg]

I have played dozens of Dom 2 MP games,won a few and went to end game hell there quite often.
Now, i just started playing Dom 3 several months ago and its pretty obvious to me,that this is even worse now,due to increased income/supplies/sheer size of the maps.

Imo the biggest problem however is,that the research system stayed the same while everything else has been geared towards larger battles.
That way the end game is reached much faster and Early game/mid game ,the most fun parts ,are of less importance/length.

Solution:
By making research difficult and on the biggest maps very difficult u can at least cut down the end game part by increasing early game/mid game parts.

no gem gens and less gem income obv lead to less micro,which is also good.U could also set the money multiple lower so that everyone will have less armies/mages= less micro.

[Calahan]

1. No Gem Gens - A definite. I do have reservations about how much it hits certain nations a lot harder than other, and the loss of the Earth booster is an issue. But I believe the downsides are far outweighed by the positives, and the downsides can also be addressed with modding.

Clam dependent nations, like Bandar Log / Kailasa for example could have the cost of their Astral heavy national summons reduced to compensate for the lost clam income. And the non-unique Earth booster could possibly be shifted to the Pebbleskin Suit (being trial-run in a game at the moment I think).


2. Low gem income settings - Not so sure about this. I know I spend a lot of time fine-tuning scripts and battle positions for any large armies I have, and any lack of gems just means the armies get bigger and the scripting/positioning will take longer due to the delayed transition to Thug/SC.

But if the aim is to increase the longevity of regular armies, then a gem income nerf certainly has that affect. But not convinced of it's MM limiting affect at all. I know for me it would probably result in an increase in MM on the army front. Although a lack of gems would indeed result in less MM on the forging/ritual front.


3. Upper map size limit - It would be a shame I think to see an end to all nations (from one era) games, which a 200 province limit would probably result in. Since I do find games that feature all nations (from one era) to be amongst my favourites. But there's no doubt more map provinces does eventually result in more MM towards the end. Maybe if the limit was 250 provinces, then that would allow an all-nations game based on a 10-12 provinces per nation ratio (less than 10 starts hitting blitz territory), while still being within a reasonable limit for the endgame MM to not reach insane levels.


Optionals

1. Ban MM intensive nations - I really don't agree with any nation ban what-so-ever for MP games, not even the regularly seen choices of Ashdod, LA Ermor/R'yleh. So I certainly wouldn't like to see a ban on MM intensive nations. Maybe this issue should be re-examined once the full effect of the other MM reducing options have had some actual MP feedback to work off.

Since the blood nations for example can certainly be MM intensive, but maybe that is only as a result of the blood work being heaped on top of all the usual MM work from gem gens, mass forgings / rituals, huge province counts etc. Once some of these are taken out of the picture, then maybe the MM from a blood economy won't seem that much of an MM problem. And I think this applies either to playing one, or facing the blood sacing effects of one.

So lets take things a bit slower if possible, and wait to see the effects a few changes makes to MM levels, rather than trying to make a huge load of changes in one go. As maybe banning MM nations will be an unnecessary step too far.

And an attempt to limit endgame MM by various nation (or spell) bans may accidentally kill off a lot of options, tactics, strategies etc. in this game, which would take away a lot of the games unique flavour. And could result in making the game more stream-lined and more repetitive, so probably less fun overall :(


2. Ban MM intensive globals - Not a fan of spell bans either, again for a lot of the reasons mentioned directly above.


3. Research Caps - I'd prefer a difficult or very difficult research setting to a capped one personally. Although there may be a need to address certain rush nation issues then. Especially if the map/province per nation size is getting reduced. Difficult research on a small map just says 'rush nations rule' to me. Maybe some of the popular Level 3/4 anti-rush spells could be reduced to level 1/2 for games with a difficult or very difficult research setting.


4. RAND - RAND games just rule for me at the moment. So nice to not have to deal with diplomatic issues every turn, and you get to live or die mostly due to your own abilities. Plus players are forced out of their "I must always take powerful/favourite nation each game. Then choose someone to rush, while NAP-ing all my other borders" comfort zone I often see happening in non RAND games.

Although at least for me, RAND games do result in a lot more thinking time being required, as instead of just asking your neighbour "Hey, are you going to attack me, or can we get an NAP?" you have to constantly re-assess every turn which nations may be attacking you that turn. So if thinking time is considered a part of MM, then RAND games don't always result in reduced MM.

[Stavis_L]

3. Upper map size limit - It would be a shame I think to see an end to all nations (from one era) games, which a 200 province limit would probably result in. Since I do find games that feature all nations (from one era) to be amongst my favourites. But there's no doubt more map provinces does eventually result in more MM towards the end. Maybe if the limit was 250 provinces, then that would allow an all-nations game based on a 10-12 provinces per nation ratio (less than 10 starts hitting blitz territory), while still being within a reasonable limit for the endgame MM to not reach insane levels.


Just FYI, there are 67 vanilla nations currently, between all 3 eras. So at 10 provinces per, that's a 670 (!) province map, assuming all nations are playing...

[Calahan]

3. Upper map size limit - It would be a shame I think to see an end to all nations (from one era) games, which a 200 province limit would probably result in. Since I do find games that feature all nations (from one era) to be amongst my favourites. But there's no doubt more map provinces does eventually result in more MM towards the end. Maybe if the limit was 250 provinces, then that would allow an all-nations game based on a 10-12 provinces per nation ratio (less than 10 starts hitting blitz territory), while still being within a reasonable limit for the endgame MM to not reach insane levels.


Just FYI, there are 67 vanilla nations currently, between all 3 eras. So at 10 provinces per, that's a 670 (!) province map, assuming all nations are playing...
That's why I specifically said "all nations (from one era)" and not "all nations (from all eras)" or simply "all nations". As having just all the nations from a single era in a game should fit into the 250 province limit I suggested, regardless of the actual era. Although maybe I should have said "all nations (from just one era)" to avoid confusion.

An all nations, all eras game would be insane MM regardless of the settings.

[Burnsaber]

Maybe some of the popular Level 3/4 anti-rush spells could be reduced to level 1/2 for games with a difficult or very difficult research setting.


I *really* want to see this mod. Harder research without the rush-vantage would be an ideal solution, IMHO. Ugh... Just what I need to start up my university studies, a modding project. Well, at least this one will be quite easy, just moving the spell researchlevels around.

Anyone intrested, keep an eye at the modding section, I'll start up a brainstorming thread within few days.

[Sombre]

Although at least for me, RAND games do result in a lot more thinking time being required, as instead of just asking your neighbour "Hey, are you going to attack me, or can we get an NAP?" you have to constantly re-assess every turn which nations may be attacking you that turn. So if thinking time is considered a part of MM, then RAND games don't always result in reduced MM.

But that is strategy at a macro level, absolutely not micro management. Macro level strategising isn't something anyone wants to cut back on.

I prefer RAND style (or at least no diplomacy) games because they reduce the horrible 'nap with neighbours, 2 on 1 the weakest guy, repeat' thing you get with diplomacy. Just as you described. I don't think it's so much a cut back on MM, just a way to reduce slightly turtley strats which all seem to lead right to MM hell endgames.

[Psycho]

I agree with removing gem gens, but some nations will need to get compensation for that. Reducing the cost of Kailasa summons that someone suggested is a good idea. Other nations need similar boosts.

Banning some nasty globals like AN or AC is also a good idea.

A map for 12 players is the biggest I've ever played, because I never wanted to own too much provinces in the late game. A lot of larger games break due to players losing interest. I'd say 12 is a good upper limit.

With other things I don't agree. Low gem income is not a good idea. The problem is not in abundance of gems, but in the fact that CBM makes some spells too cheap.

Also, removing higher research levels would remove much fun from the game - bad idea. For the games where you want longer midgame, just set difficult research. Personally, I like the pace when games reach endgame sooner and finish sooner.

There is no need to ban any nation, unless it is considered overpowering. Just don't pick the nation you find needs too much MM. In RAND games, you should be able to give a list of nations that you don't want to play.

[WraithLord]

vfb:
"1. Do you mean to reduce micro for other nations, so they don't have to set up a bunch of temples/preachers? Or is it the blood hunting/slave buses micro? One thing you might want to do is eliminate all blood mage summons. Otherwise they are almost as bad as gem generators. Maybe make 10 unique Vampire Counts or something, and 6 unique Vamp Lords, and something similar for Mictlan's summons?"
Reduce both the nation MM and the MM it induces on other nations.

Kuritza: I understand your sentiment. Nations that need gem gens to survive should be addressed in CBM mode or something. The MM hell they cause plus the income inflation loop-back with wishing is big no-no for me.

Mardagg: Yes difficult research instead of research cap.

Calahan:
"2. Low gem income settings - Not so sure about this. I know I spend a lot of time fine-tuning scripts and battle positions for any large armies I have, and any lack of gems just means the armies get bigger and the scripting/positioning will take longer due to the delayed transition to Thug/SC."
I think army mgmt is much less MM than forging/rituals. You can copy scripts and give in 10 secs complicated scripts to lots of mages in army.

"Maybe some of the popular Level 3/4 anti-rush spells could be reduced to level 1/2 for games with a difficult or very difficult research setting."
That would be great!

[Calahan]

Maybe some of the popular Level 3/4 anti-rush spells could be reduced to level 1/2 for games with a difficult or very difficult research setting.


I *really* want to see this mod. Harder research without the rush-vantage would be an ideal solution, IMHO. Ugh... Just what I need to start up my university studies, a modding project. Well, at least this one will be quite easy, just moving the spell researchlevels around.

Anyone intrested, keep an eye at the modding section, I'll start up a brainstorming thread within few days.
Yeah, I much prefer high research level myself in games, but always wary of the huge bonus it gives to rush nations. Have picked up some modding skills myself (thanks to you Burns :)) so was going to look into this once my current high number of games dropped a bit. But would be more than happy to see a genuine modder undertake the project though.

Not that I want you to think I'd push you into doing that it in any way Burns ;)

[Calahan pushs Bursnaber very hard in the make "Difficult research with Anti-Rush spells tweak mod" direction]

Although at least for me, RAND games do result in a lot more thinking time being required, as instead of just asking your neighbour "Hey, are you going to attack me, or can we get an NAP?" you have to constantly re-assess every turn which nations may be attacking you that turn. So if thinking time is considered a part of MM, then RAND games don't always result in reduced MM.

But that is strategy at a macro level, absolutely not micro management. Macro level strategising isn't something anyone wants to cut back on.

I prefer RAND style (or at least no diplomacy) games because they reduce the horrible 'nap with neighbours, 2 on 1 the weakest guy, repeat' thing you get with diplomacy. Just as you described. I don't think it's so much a cut back on MM, just a way to reduce slightly turtley strats which all seem to lead right to MM hell endgames.
I don't consider additional thinking time to be a part of MM either, but I am sure there are some player who would. Which is why I gave it a mention.

Since losing the ability to seal up several borders for X turns with a simple "Do you want an NAP" message, would certainly constitute extra work to some players. With "extra work" being incorrectly translated as meaning "extra MM".

You are of course correct saying it is a macro level decision. And Dominions is probably the wrong game for people if they don't like things revolving aroung making macro decisions.

EDIT:


Calahan:
"2. Low gem income settings - Not so sure about this. I know I spend a lot of time fine-tuning scripts and battle positions for any large armies I have, and any lack of gems just means the armies get bigger and the scripting/positioning will take longer due to the delayed transition to Thug/SC."
I think army mgmt is much less MM than forging/rituals. You can copy scripts and give in 10 secs complicated scripts to lots of mages in army.
ooohhh, I must be super anal on the fine tuning MM then. No wonder my turns always take me so long :) I'm always tinkering with individual mage scripts, mixing up casting orders every turn in case anyone seen my fights, tweaking placements to avoid opponents settings aimed against my last know placements. If I tried I'm sure I could happily spend half an hour just arranging 3 mages and 40 troops.

Knew I was obsessive about MM, but guess I didn't realise just how high my level was :shock:

And I find forging and ritual casting to be a lot easier MM wise by keeping notes each turn, and simply ticking off things as I issue their casting or forging.

"Maybe some of the popular Level 3/4 anti-rush spells could be reduced to level 1/2 for games with a difficult or very difficult research setting."
That would be great!
[Wraithlord pushes Burnsaber in the make "Difficult research with Anti-Rush spells tweak mod" direction]

[WraithLord]

updated first post

[chrispedersen]

I also have a component called...

NoGenCompensation.

It boosts the nations most affected by the loss of generators - abysia, agartha, oceania, yomi.

Sorry haven't gotten to machaka or bandar log. I didn't think bandar were particularly bad.

[Zeldor]

I didn't read through posts here, so I will just comment what you made in first one.

Mandatory ones:

1. Gem gens banned - of course, it should be part of CBM really.
2. Why? It's nothing about map size. It's about number of players and victory conditions. I wouldn't join 200 prov map with 30 players. 15 provs per player is what I like. And reasonable victory - 30-40% caps.
3. No way. You want what? Bless nations only games? You cannot play difficult res without serious rebalancing. I will never join a game like that. Playing normal nation would be unfun. Playing bless nation would feel like cheating.
4. Sure, CBM needs more extreme tweaks, but they won't be popular. Like more expensive Mind Hunts and tarts.
5. Nope. Low magic settings are simply boring. Put here instead a mod to ban overpowered sites [discount ones]. Even banning dwarven hammers would make more sense.

Optional ones are well... just for those that like that format. I like diplomacy, but I love RAND too. But I would stop playing Dominions if I had to play only RAND games.

[Sombre]

With other things I don't agree. Low gem income is not a good idea. The problem is not in abundance of gems, but in the fact that CBM makes some spells too cheap.


Wait, what?

Which problem? The problem of micromanagement? Which spells made cheaper in CBM increase micromanagement? I guess there are a few, a couple of the globals might force you to assign more bodyguards,...

Wasn't expecting CBM spells to come up in this thread as a problem.

[Psycho]

With other things I don't agree. Low gem income is not a good idea. The problem is not in abundance of gems, but in the fact that CBM makes some spells too cheap.


Wait, what?

Which problem? The problem of micromanagement? Which spells made cheaper in CBM increase micromanagement? I guess there are a few, a couple of the globals might force you to assign more bodyguards,...

Wasn't expecting CBM spells to come up in this thread as a problem.

Well, Wraithlord said: more gems = more forge/rituals = more MM (thinking about site frequency). I don't particularly agree with that, but CBM lowers costs for some spells too much, so it could be a part of the problem. Off the top of my head: devils and domes.

[Psycho]

@Wraithlord: Take a look at the rules for Momentum2 game

[Valerius]

People always say that if you remove gem gens you have to compensate certain nations. I assume the reason for this is that those nations don't have a strong late game (if the argument is that they have a weak early game, well then clams aren't going to help them with that). But there's lots of nations that don't have a strong end game. Given that the end game is dominated by SCs, if you don't have recruitable/national summon SCs or get the Chalice/GoH you pretty much don't have an end game (maybe with the exception of someone like R'lyeh).

So rather than fix nations one by one, why not just have an SC that everyone can summon late game? In particular, I think the whole Chalice/GoH --> tart mechanic is broken so why not just have tarts as a normal SC summon? No afflictions, commander status. And if not them, then another unit. But I think tarts are a good candidate because you can't beat the efficiency of summoning an SC for 30 gems (27 CBM) - probably even if you have national summons. Basically I think there should be a default end game SC. Some nations will have SCs that are better and that's an advantage of that nation. But even if you don't have national SCs there should be something you can summon to have a fighting chance.

A word about RAND games. I think the no-diplomacy is a helpful idea but I don't think the nations have to be random. Calahan's point is a good one but if there's only certain nations you enjoy playing being stuck with a nation you don't like takes the fun out of the game. Anyway, I think settings like RAND or map size are separate from decisions about the mod contents. Guidelines could be helpful but it's easy enough to change that on a game-by-game basis.

[Sombre]

Well domes probably do increase MM, yes. I don't have that much experience of domes in cbm but I believe the philosophy was simply to make the worse ones actually be worth the cost as a defensive measure. I don't think any summon you can stick on monthly cast causes big MM problems though, compared with forging etc.

[Sombre]

So rather than fix nations one by one, why not just have an SC that everyone can summon late game? In particular, I think the whole Chalice/GoH --> tart mechanic is broken so why not just have tarts as a normal SC summon? No afflictions, commander status. And if not them, then another unit. But I think tarts are a good candidate because you can't beat the efficiency of summoning an SC for 30 gems (27 CBM) - probably even if you have national summons. Basically I think there should be a default end game SC. Some nations will have SCs that are better and that's an advantage of that nation. But even if you don't have national SCs there should be something you can summon to have a fighting chance.

I think this runs pretty much counter to the philosophy of, say, CBM, where the idea is to increase the breadth of strategic options, but it could definitely make for an interesting experiment in a game. I don't personally think the answer to the tart problem is to accept that the endgame /should/ just have 1 default SC castable by all - I prefer the route taken by llamabeast in his as yet unreleased mod which added a variety of SCs in different paths, to try and break the dominance of the tartarian and the necessity to pursue death and nature like crazy.

[Sambo]

Here's another idea to reduce micromanagment. In my limited experience, the problem isn't the forging, moving guys around, hoarding gems, etc.; it's the fact that you have to do it in a million provinces!

Solution, shamelessly stolen from poker: raise the blinds.

After 40 turns (or whenever), reduce the provinces by half. Seriously, just mash them together. Do it again after 80 turns, and again at 120 if it goes that far. The big 400 province map, necessary when you started with 24 nations, is now a maneageable 100. Like in poker, the little guys get screwed, but that's kinda the point. ::D

Dunno if it's possible. There would be a large issue of merging sites, fortresses, units, etc.

[Gandalf Parker]

Here's another idea to reduce micromanagment. In my limited experience, the problem isn't the forging, moving guys around, hoarding gems, etc.; it's the fact that you have to do it in a million provinces!

Solution, shamelessly stolen from poker: raise the blinds.

After 40 turns (or whenever), reduce the provinces by half. Seriously, just mash them together. Do it again after 80 turns, and again at 120 if it goes that far. The big 400 province map, necessary when you started with 24 nations, is now a maneageable 100. Like in poker, the little guys get screwed, but that's kinda the point. ::D

Dunno if it's possible. There would be a large issue of merging sites, fortresses, units, etc.

A very interesting idea. But at first glance Id be tempted to say its not possible. Of course then I immediately remind myself that impossible is just a technical term for "more trouble than its worth" so I will think about it abit.

Personally, the fix I find for any irritating re-occurring actions in any game at all is the same. Every game eventually sees players come up with a way to automate boring micromanagement actions. Ive seen it from MUDs to WoW. A macro scripting software such as AutoHotKey will allow you to record your mouse moves and typing then assign them to a keypress such as Ctrl-Alt-A. I havent played with some of the fancy latest programs along that line but I do know that good old AutoHotKey works fine with Dom3 on WinXP.


Gandalf Parker
--
To some people, unlimited options seems to them to be zero options.
Without a menu of choices, they are lost.

[Kuritza]

People always say that if you remove gem gens you have to compensate certain nations. I assume the reason for this is that those nations don't have a strong late game (if the argument is that they have a weak early game, well then clams aren't going to help them with that). But there's lots of nations that don't have a strong end game. Given that the end game is dominated by SCs, if you don't have recruitable/national summon SCs or get the Chalice/GoH you pretty much don't have an end game (maybe with the exception of someone like R'lyeh). If you have national summons, but dont have the gems to summon them in sufficient quantities, you are still in trouble. A whole one thug wont save you. Even whole two thugs are often not enough. :)

[spathi4tw]

Even banning dwarven hammers would make more sense.

I'm surprised that this hasn't been put forward as a more formal suggestion. The hammer has a drastic multiplicative effect on the number of forging commands that have to be issued each turn. It also doesn't seem to me to really offer much in the way of strategic choices since it earns it's cost back faster than any of the gem producers (potentially in only a single turn).

The balance tweaking that would be required to eliminate it would be small in my opinion (although the strategy changes would be large, it would only be nations that depended on the hammer for early game success that would be disproportionately affected).

[Ironhawk]

Just catching up to this thread - pretty interesting!

However, I have to dissent on the issue of RAND. I think that it takes a lot away from the game to remove diplomacy. If its your preference to play without then thats fine. But to say that there is consensus that it should be used is crazy IMO. RAND/ND games, while being the new fad, are not the most common game, nor the most interesting.

[DonCorazon]

Agree on 1 and 2.
3 just makes the games last longer and favors bless nations.
4. is going to make nations with recruitable SCs even more powerful
5. might be the same as 4. - make it harder to get enough summons to fight recruitable SCs when you are playing a human nation

I have a draft post on some of what I dont like about Dominions that involves MM, but also things beyond MM - maybe I will dig it up.

PS getting rid of hammers would save a lot of time - i like that idea.

[Gandalf Parker]

I totally agree with IronHawk.
Every once in awhile I see someone saying that a particular game type or mod has become "standard practice". I always try to check just to be sure but I have rarely seen anything approach at MOST 50%. And thats usually on a specific server or a within a specific group of players. (so far Streamers and Standards seems to be the winner). I tend to put such comments in with the best nation, worst nation, game killer strategy, etc comments. Everyone seems to agree that they exist but there doesnt seem to be an agreement on what it is so it all seems to balance out.

On the other hand...
There is an interest at the moment in the RAND games. I have played around with the idea of an even deeper anonymous game. Since I do have my own server I could create a huge game called Anon and provide email addresses to each player. That and since it would be on my server I could monitor the connections and game logs to insure (as much as possible) that no multiple players and in-game messaging is going on. So far each time I come up with another way of monitoring it I come up with another way to get around it so for now its just a bunch of notes in the game-types folder.

Gandalf Parker

[LDiCesare]

1. No gem gens.
Agreed, they are MM hell. Remember to remove gem gens from pretennders and sea troll kings too while you're at it.

2. Determine an upper limit on map sizes. Consensus
Say 200 provinces?
I think that most games are played with too many players, and therefore too many provinces, to avoid late game MM. You're probably better off limiting the number of players to maybe 8 if you want to avoid MM and have room from a gut feeling, so that'd be more like 100-120 provinces imo.

3. Difficult research. Consensus
I can't see why it should be mandatory. Just get smaller maps.

4. CBM increase gem cost of spells and items.

Don't like it at first glance.

5. Low gem income (like LA settings).

I think it's just removing options.

1. RAND. Consensus
No way. War is a side effect of diplomacy. Removing diplomacy from games is fun sometimes but unrealistic and unfun if it's made general. Forbidding trading of gold/gems/items is more interesting than forbidding any kind of diplomacy imo.

2. Ban MM intensive nations. Like blood dom spreaders. LA R'lyeh.

No. If people want to play them, let them do so. If you want a random nation, you just have to accept it when you get a bad one or you don't play full-random nations.

3. Ban MM intensive spells. Like astral corruption and Forge.

I miss the point about astral corruption.

4. Cap research levels
Do you mean reduce research ability off some units? So Magic will become the best scale? No.

Overall, I'm sorry to say that I think the game is designed for less players than it's being played with often. 4 player games generally have all that you like: No late game MM, not much in terms of diplomacy. The issue is that, well, you don't reach "end game" and the game is over faster, which is exactly what your changes try to accomplish.

[Sombre]

Just catching up to this thread - pretty interesting!

However, I have to dissent on the issue of RAND. I think that it takes a lot away from the game to remove diplomacy. If its your preference to play without then thats fine. But to say that there is consensus that it should be used is crazy IMO. RAND/ND games, while being the new fad, are not the most common game, nor the most interesting.

Well this thread isn't about how ALL games should be - the thread starter is just trying to assemble the needed changes to create games which avoid MM hell.

Is there consensus that RAND helps avoid MM hell? That's the question.

[quantum_mechani]

4. CBM increase gem cost of spells and items.

I am personally fine with CB doing nerfs like this, however I think there would be a lot of resistance. And, on a related note, if anyone thinks some spells are made too cheap in the current CB, I'd appreciate the feedback in the CB thread

And on gem gens, yes they will be unique items in the next CB.

[Zeldor]

I don't think it does. Knowing you have NAPs and that you can buy some items rather decreases the time you spend on your turns. So I'd say that RAND style games increase MM [unless someone claims diplomacy is part of MM].

[Valerius]

I think this runs pretty much counter to the philosophy of, say, CBM, where the idea is to increase the breadth of strategic options, but it could definitely make for an interesting experiment in a game. I don't personally think the answer to the tart problem is to accept that the endgame /should/ just have 1 default SC castable by all - I prefer the route taken by llamabeast in his as yet unreleased mod which added a variety of SCs in different paths, to try and break the dominance of the tartarian and the necessity to pursue death and nature like crazy.

I agree with the CBM philosophy. The problem is that if you don't have recruitable/summonable SCs your only option is tarts. My suggestion was a quick and easy way to give nations access to some kind of SC and at the same time fix the tart problem.

But opening up other SC options through llama's mod is a much better option. It might be interesting to combine that with a mod adding national SCs to nations that lack them. With other options in place the cost of tarts could be made more realistic. As I recall QM didn't want to make them too expensive since it would make things even harder for nations without GoH/Chalice. With other options now available tarts could be priced accordingly (not necessarily on base CBM since it probably wouldn't include the new summons).

As an aside, I think at this point it is unlikely IW will be adding much content to the game (especially revisiting existing nations). If it seems like there's an interest in adding national SCs to nations that lack them I'd be willing to coordinate and put together the mod, but I'd need help with graphics.


If you have national summons, but dont have the gems to summon them in sufficient quantities, you are still in trouble. A whole one thug wont save you. Even whole two thugs are often not enough. :)

With the removal of gem gens I'm not against adjusting the costs of some summons downwards. The last thing you want to do is give nations with recruitable SCs even more power. My point was directed more towards the fact that there are some nations that currently don't have an end game SC option if they don't luck into the Chalice or GoH. And towards the fact that tarts are out of line with other SC costs.


Here's another idea to reduce micromanagment. In my limited experience, the problem isn't the forging, moving guys around, hoarding gems, etc.; it's the fact that you have to do it in a million provinces!

Solution, shamelessly stolen from poker: raise the blinds.

After 40 turns (or whenever), reduce the provinces by half. Seriously, just mash them together. Do it again after 80 turns, and again at 120 if it goes that far. The big 400 province map, necessary when you started with 24 nations, is now a maneageable 100. Like in poker, the little guys get screwed, but that's kinda the point. ::D

Dunno if it's possible. There would be a large issue of merging sites, fortresses, units, etc.

Interesting you should mention this. I had the same thought a while back but didn't see any way to implement it.

You know, there's a cap on how many units you can recruit due to upkeep costs. I wonder if a lot of the late game drudgery would be eliminated if summons also had an upkeep cost - paid in gems, not gold. This would limit the number of summons you could field. Having to make tough decisions on how to allocate limited resources is what makes the game interesting to me. But barring IW making that change that seems impossible.

[Calahan]

Catching up on the thread. I must say I really like the sound of getting rid of Dwarven Hammers (by making them unique). As besides the MM relief involved, it could result in a lot of new strategies evolving for several nations if they no longer had to concern themselves during the build phase with how they are going to aquire Dwarven Hammers during the game.

[Illuminated One]

[shameless selfadvertising]

Concerning Research, I was working on a Mod that sets research output to a fixed number.

http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/showthread.php?t=43679

I don't have the time to work a lot on it currently, but there is a "finished" version for SP EA games.

The features (beyond not having to mm your researchers) are:
Faster research in the early game
Slower research in the late game
Starting armies are out also, you could mod them in without commanders, but I haven't much bothered because with a few exceptions every nation has a way to get an acceptable start without awake SCs with the current settings.

At this point playtesting would be helpful

[/shameless selfadvertising]

[Illuminated One]

You know, there's a cap on how many units you can recruit due to upkeep costs. I wonder if a lot of the late game drudgery would be eliminated if summons also had an upkeep cost - paid in gems, not gold. This would limit the number of summons you could field. Having to make tough decisions on how to allocate limited resources is what makes the game interesting to me. But barring IW making that change that seems impossible.

Indeed. :)

[Squirrelloid]

Re: Banning Dwarven Hammers
This has a profound effect on strategy because it can severely limit how quickly a nation can diversify its items (by gem type), and thus makes it much harder to start forging useful items in magic paths you don't have easy access to site-searching spells for.

Yes, the hammer earns its gem cost back quickly. But if that isn't in earth gems then its not just an accelerator - its also a diversifier. I mean, forging RoW for full price is fine and dandy if you have astral mages standard, but if you don't getting to cut the cost down makes it much easier to get to the good magic items in that path. Effectively, lack of a hammer makes diversifying your magical paths on your pretender less viable, because you'll have a much harder time generating the gem income for him to do anything with it.

Removing hammers would also unfairly benefit some nations, because they have easy access to the paths which have the critical expensive items. Rlyeh with good Death and Astral strikes me as being high on the list of nations who benefit relative to others.

(Making hammer unique would be far worse - its good, but at least everyone can use it).

On why some nations need compensation if gem generators are removed:
Since someone asked...
The reason why some nations need some tweaking is that they rely on gem generators to be effective in the late game. Bandar Log, for example, needs to clam like mad to afford its national summons. Substantially reducing their cost would certainly help.

Some other nations, like MA Oceania, have nothing else going for them in the late game except they are prime candidates for forging boatloads of gem generators. I'm playing MA Oceania in Water Total War right now, and while i've taken steps to help me have a real endgame, let me tell you the lack of clams is severely hampering me. (In particular, EA Rlyeh totally outclasses me in combat magic, and while there are some things I could certainly have done to have improved that last attempt at storming his fortress, it would have been a difference of number of units killed. I need something to answer his astral battle magic, and water/nature doesn't really have it - summons are the only real way for me to diversify my casting base.)

Re: Diplomacy leads to ganging up on weaker players
Only if the players in your game allow that to happen. Two things need to happen to stop this. (1) Binding agreements are stupid, except for agreements of trade (and even then, not necessary). It leads to situations where a player in a poor position can't bargain his way out because his opponents are locked into NAPs or similar. (2) Weaker players need to sell their survival as an advantage against a more powerful rival, or at least that the threat of the rival is great enough that he needs to be taken down a peg now rather than later. (Being able to break NAPs without warning makes this more possible, because chances are the weak player is trying to turn one assailant on another one, and they likely have an NAP agreement).

[P3D]

In the game Bloodless, I limited MM by
- eliminating blood magic altogether (well, spells items and sites)
That of course reduces the number of playable nations, and we are playing in MA
- removed gem gens, some bonus sites, some rituals (AC, AN, UD, Forge) and Tartarians
- limited the number of players (starting with 6) therefore the number of provinces.
We increased magic site freq though.

http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/showthread.php?t=43298

[P3D]

If you want to decrease forging for thug/SC equipment, decrease the need a bit. Equip more of the summons/recruits with some basic equipment (ench sword, shield, armor and helmet) so one would not need to spend 40 clicks to equip them (like 7-8 clicks per item).

[Valerius]

If you want to decrease forging for thug/SC equipment, decrease the need a bit. Equip more of the summons/recruits with some basic equipment (ench sword, shield, armor and helmet) so one would not need to spend 40 clicks to equip them (like 7-8 clicks per item).

Nice idea, but I don't think the game engine would count this as magic weapons/armor so someone would hit you with Armor of Achilles and you'd no longer have any armor.

[Sombre]

Hmm. Interesting question that. I wonder if that's true.

I think you're probably right and it checks where the item is coming from - inherent or via item.

[Squirrelloid]

Can you just make them spawn with an item?

[Sombre]

Nope.

[Valerius]

On why some nations need compensation if gem generators are removed:
Since someone asked...
The reason why some nations need some tweaking is that they rely on gem generators to be effective in the late game. Bandar Log, for example, needs to clam like mad to afford its national summons. Substantially reducing their cost would certainly help.

Some other nations, like MA Oceania, have nothing else going for them in the late game except they are prime candidates for forging boatloads of gem generators. I'm playing MA Oceania in Water Total War right now, and while i've taken steps to help me have a real endgame, let me tell you the lack of clams is severely hampering me. (In particular, EA Rlyeh totally outclasses me in combat magic, and while there are some things I could certainly have done to have improved that last attempt at storming his fortress, it would have been a difference of number of units killed. I need something to answer his astral battle magic, and water/nature doesn't really have it - summons are the only real way for me to diversify my casting base.)

Yes, without clams it's much harder for Bandar to afford its national summons. But it's harder for every other nation without recruitable SCs (or the Chalice/GoH) as well. And in any case, isn't a Bandar without gem gens still in a better position than Man, who has no national summons at all? My point was that we shouldn't be concerned with just compensating clamming nations for the loss of gem gens as with trying to give each nation some kind of end game. No, they don't all have to be equal but there should be some kind of SC summon available to everyone.

So I'm not against adjusting the cost of national summons. If the cost of Bandar's summons is inflated on the assumption that the player will clam then that's an argument for reducing them. But I would just like to offer something to the nations that don't even have national summons. And, honestly, some of the nations that are mentioned as needing compensation if gem gens are removed (for example, MA Abysia) just don't make sense to me.

But I think this is getting off topic so let me throw out a more on topic idea. A not insignificant part of micromanagement is moving gems around. I know you can't eliminate the game mechanic of using gems to boost effective level and in some cases you'll want to have a spell use gems (i.e. touch of madness), but what about eliminating gem requirements for almost all combat spells? It seems like not having to drag around scouts and restock every mage's gems each turn could make combat planning less tedious.

I think CBM may have already taken some steps towards this (the elemental protection spells perhaps?).

[MaxWilson]

Nice idea, but I don't think the game engine would count this as magic weapons/armor so someone would hit you with Armor of Achilles and you'd no longer have any armor.

This is true. Armor of Achilles/Destruction/Iron Bane/etc. destroy all inherent armor, leaving only armor which comes from forged equipment.

-Max

[MaxWilson]

No, they don't all have to be equal but there should be some kind of SC summon available to everyone.


Why? In an ideal world, you merely want some type of endgame strategy potentially available to anyone, but it doesn't have to be SCs. In my limited experience, SCs tend to dominate the endgame mostly because they're more mobile than armies or summons (slap on a pair of boots and/or cast Teleport) and because they're good at taking out PD and unsupported armies--but serious battles always come down to the mages anyway. National summons along the lines of Iron Dragons/Ophanim/storm demons would be an acceptable substitute for SC access in my opinion, provided you had enough possibilities to make it nontrivial to counter (i.e. preserve flexibility). Either you send them out raiding or you use them as blockers while your mages rain down evocations--the same as you would do with SCs.

-Max

[chrispedersen]

Nice idea, but I don't think the game engine would count this as magic weapons/armor so someone would hit you with Armor of Achilles and you'd no longer have any armor.

This is true. Armor of Achilles/Destruction/Iron Bane/etc. destroy all inherent armor, leaving only armor which comes from forged equipment.

-Max

No they dont.

[Valerius]

Nice idea, but I don't think the game engine would count this as magic weapons/armor so someone would hit you with Armor of Achilles and you'd no longer have any armor.

This is true. Armor of Achilles/Destruction/Iron Bane/etc. destroy all inherent armor, leaving only armor which comes from forged equipment.

-Max

No they dont.

It looks like they do. I ran a test where I hit a tart cyclops equipped with Weightless Scale and an Enchanted Shield with Armor of Achilles and the armor and shield were destroyed. Ran the same test with a Vanadrott with Lightweight Scale Mail and got the same result.

[Valerius]

No, they don't all have to be equal but there should be some kind of SC summon available to everyone.


Why? In an ideal world, you merely want some type of endgame strategy potentially available to anyone, but it doesn't have to be SCs. In my limited experience, SCs tend to dominate the endgame mostly because they're more mobile than armies or summons (slap on a pair of boots and/or cast Teleport) and because they're good at taking out PD and unsupported armies--but serious battles always come down to the mages anyway. National summons along the lines of Iron Dragons/Ophanim/storm demons would be an acceptable substitute for SC access in my opinion, provided you had enough possibilities to make it nontrivial to counter (i.e. preserve flexibility). Either you send them out raiding or you use them as blockers while your mages rain down evocations--the same as you would do with SCs.

-Max

SCs have one more important attribute: they're tough. In my experience you don't see many human mages out in the field during the late game. They're simply too fragile. If you run into a couple of castings of rain of stones or earthquake before you can buff there go your mages.

Demons make good late game troops because they've got the HP to take a hit and good enough MR that being hit with master enslave before you buff won't result in losing your army. But your opponent will have those, or a comparable unit, in addition to his SCs so it seems to me you'll come up short if you don't have SCs of your own.

[chrispedersen]

This is true. Armor of Achilles/Destruction/Iron Bane/etc. destroy all inherent armor, leaving only armor which comes from forged equipment.

-Max

No they dont.

It looks like they do. I ran a test where I hit a tart cyclops equipped with Weightless Scale and an Enchanted Shield with Armor of Achilles and the armor and shield were destroyed. Ran the same test with a Vanadrott with Lightweight Scale Mail and got the same result.

I'm not quibbling that they don't destroy a lot of armors. They do. There are more exceptions than max said, is all I'm alluding to.

[Gregstrom]

So why not state the exceptions?

[Kuritza]

Yes, without clams it's much harder for Bandar to afford its national summons. But it's harder for every other nation without recruitable SCs (or the Chalice/GoH) as well. And in any case, isn't a Bandar without gem gens still in a better position than Man, who has no national summons at all?

Man still has combat evocations and decent troops (esp. with CBM, which makes it possible to mass cavalry). Also, Kinnaras are so frail that even as Bandar Log I often end up using Golems instead of them, so having Kinnaras is not much of an advantage. (Kinnaras can be effective raiders with less equipment, though)
Only Rudras and Devatas are really unique, and these are high in the research tree and expensive.
Perhaps Bandar Log are better than Man in the endgame even without the gem generators, but how about comparing them to some *good* nation? :)

Anyway, I hope that 'no gem generators' mod wont become an integrated part of CBM. :) After all, Oceania and Bandar Log (aka clammer nations) do not dominate all MA games, do they?

[WraithLord]

Updated first post.

[Micah]

I think sticking to the current top two (map size and gem gens) plus possible rand scenarios is probably going to be the best plan, since I don't really like the theoretical "feel" of a lot of the optional listings, and I think getting as many people on-board with gem-gen elimination will be doing everyone a favor. I also don't think Forge is particularly egregious mm, so trying to hash down the global list would probably be difficult.

[Meglobob]

I like reducing map size and RAND games, those will reduce MM and not really effect how fun the game is.

Gem generators, fine make them unique (not eliminate them totally) but EA & MA Oceania and MA Machaka need some serious boosting. Even with gem generators those nations are poor.

Banning astral corruption, arcane nexus, utter dark and burden of time have been around for some time and are ok with me, they spoil the endgame and create alot of MM.

I don't like banning the Forge.

Also, I would not join a MP game with the other options/nerfs in place.

[vfb]

How does AN cause micromanagement?

Under Utterdark you just need to reclaim provinces you lose to shades, it's just like you are being raided.

I suppose BoT causes micro because you have to take items off your old mages before they croak, and you might have to double-check for Mute/Feeblemind when heading into battle.

I think these spells are good for hastening victory, and getting the endgame over with.

[Squirrelloid]

I agree with vfb.

I think people who ban most globals are just being whiny because they haven't figured out how to deal with that global. I will not join a game that bans global spells. (I say this having gotten to my first end game in Water Total War, of course...)

Especially Burden of Time - I have no idea why this spell gets banned. Oh no, my opponent cast a global which effects me! Might as well complain you were being mindhunted/seeking arrowed/etc...

Edited to disassociate my comments from my agreement with vfb.

[vfb]

Hey, I never said anyone is being whiny! :)

I think I'm pretty much on the record for saying AC is fun. I just love those doom horrors!

Utterdark/BoT can be pretty exciting too.

AN is kind of not-so-fun, especially if you get into 999-gem AN battles, where no-one is using their gems for .. uh.. fun stuff. But I still don't think it increases MM.

How come no-one has brought up Wish? Not being able to recruit anything anymore is also kind of not-so-fun.

[WraithLord]

Related to latest comments in updated first post.

[Raiel]

If it's true that removing gem-gen items cripples some nations, then the solution seems pretty simple: Give those nations gem-gen summons. What little I know of modding suggests that the mechanics are there for water, earth and nature gems... can that be expanded to the other gem types?

Edit: Now I see that Fantomen beat me to this idea and has it in another thread... nothing to see here. Move along.

[LDiCesare]

In terms of Victory Conditions, cumulative victory points more or less guarantee that the game will end at worst at turn X, so they could be used more often. Although they only provide 1 cumulated point per year, so you need to control the VP province on the good turn (last winter or first spring?), they force games to end faster.

[Sombre]

Really? I thought it was once a turn. Man that sucks, it being once a year.

[Zeldor]

Cumulative VPs just don't work. They are added only in the mid summer turn. So you are not rewarded for keeping it, just having it on one specific turn.

[P3D]

Can gem gens made cursed and unaffected by forge bonus? Then increase the price?

So FF would generate like 1 gem every 4 turn on demons.
Say a Clam would cost say 15W10N (not 14 total with hammer), so it'd take 50 turns to pay for itself.
Blood Stone - increase cost to 15B15E.

Curse would make them destroyable.

[Micah]

Burden of Time is problematic because it's very low research, cheap, and unable to be countered aside from a direct gem-war with a dispel (boots of youth and other anti-aging items don't work against it). It also works the turn it is put up, so it can do some nasty damage even if it is immediately dispelled, especially if the caster chain-casts it.

It's also in the "dispel or lose" category for certain nations, and the mechanic is uses isn't at all fun or interactive.

[Sombre]

Can gem gens made cursed and unaffected by forge bonus?

Nope.

[LDiCesare]

Cumulative VPs just don't work. They are added only in the mid summer turn. So you are not rewarded for keeping it, just having it on one specific turn.

I slightly disagree with the "don't work" but I agree they are flawed. If Illwinter could award them every month that would make a very valid change however. I doubt they will, but if they ever plan a patch, I don't think it would be too long to code and it would probably make this victory condition usable and popular.

[WraithLord]

Burden of Time is problematic because it's very low research, cheap, and unable to be countered aside from a direct gem-war with a dispel (boots of youth and other anti-aging items don't work against it). It also works the turn it is put up, so it can do some nasty damage even if it is immediately dispelled, especially if the caster chain-casts it.

It's also in the "dispel or lose" category for certain nations, and the mechanic is uses isn't at all fun or interactive.

But does it contribute to significantly raise endgame MM?
I'm not looking at this from balance or fun angle, only to reduce MM.

[Zeldor]

Dealing with lots of afflicted commanders increases MM for sure.

[DonCorazon]

Seriously, Zeldor's suggestion to get rid of hammers would save a ton of MM. In games with diplomacy/trading, everyone ends up with hammers anyway so the relative advantage is limited but the pain of having to swap hammers is limitless.

[Squirrelloid]

Seriously, Zeldor's suggestion to get rid of hammers would save a ton of MM. In games with diplomacy/trading, everyone ends up with hammers anyway so the relative advantage is limited but the pain of having to swap hammers is limitless.

I'll reiterate - hammers allow for much more varied strategies because its not just cost savings - its cost savings in particular gems. Say for gems that you don't have many of because you have few mages (pretender, non-nationals) with those paths and no native gem generation at your capitol in that type.

Basically, lack of hammers limits nations to their national magic types far more than at present, at which point certain nations get better relative to other nations because they have better inherent magic paths/gem generation.

[DonCorazon]

i understand your point, but don't agree that the benefits of hammers are worth the tradeoff in MM pain. true magic diversification will depend primarily on luck anyways, in terms of finding indies in paths you need and once they site search adequately, your gem income should be fine. while i agree hammers make it easier to forge items in non-national paths, i don't think they are so crucial strategically. further, removing hammers might actually help improve one aspect of game balance. for example, nations with recruitable thugs which are generally OP relative to human nations won't be able to kit out their thugs as prolifically, which might make these nations more vulnerable to human troops and thus help even the scales a bit.

[P3D]

for example, nations with recruitable thugs which are generally OP relative to human nations won't be able to kit out their thugs as prolifically, which might make these nations more vulnerable to human troops and thus help even the scales a bit.

Most recruitable thugs are kitted out already to some extent - save a few thuggable spellcasters.

Good idea to remove hammers (including the uniques). Just remove Forge and the bonus sites too- generators might even stay.

[Illuminated One]

Say a Clam would cost say 15W10N (not 14 total with hammer), so it'd take 50 turns to pay for itself.

The problem with that is it doesn't fix the unlimited exponential increase.
Either you make them so costly that they don't pay off - supposing I expect the game to last 70 turns, I would hardly forge anything that pays of after 50 (*) turns after turn 20. And I will hardly forge any before that because I can't afford them. If I'm in an extremely large game that's unrealistic to be decided before turn 150 than clams ftw again. Unless you make their price dependent on the size or time of the game.

(*) but 15W10N pays of before 50 turns, because in late game each pearl is worth 2 gems. If you can wish quite literally because wishing for gems gives you 150 gems for 75 pearls.
If you can't, there's just 1000s of things to spend pearls on every turn, water gems are much less useful.

[DonCorazon]

Most recruitable thugs are kitted out already to some extent - save a few thuggable spellcasters.

Good idea to remove hammers (including the uniques). Just remove Forge and the bonus sites too- generators might even stay.

i'm talking about the kind of gear that turns recruitables into human army wrecking machines - items that give awe, fear, luck, brands, shrouds on sacreds, etc.

[Squirrelloid]

i understand your point, but don't agree that the benefits of hammers are worth the tradeoff in MM pain. true magic diversification will depend primarily on luck anyways, in terms of finding indies in paths you need and once they site search adequately, your gem income should be fine. while i agree hammers make it easier to forge items in non-national paths, i don't think they are so crucial strategically. further, removing hammers might actually help improve one aspect of game balance. for example, nations with recruitable thugs which are generally OP relative to human nations won't be able to kit out their thugs as prolifically, which might make these nations more vulnerable to human troops and thus help even the scales a bit.

Why don't we consider who the winners and losers are here?

First of all, its been my impression that Astral, Death, Nature, and Earth are where most of the good gear is.

Rlyeh: winner (MA and LA especially)
Good Astral, Death, Earth access, good site searching for all 3, capitol S income. National mages can forge all astral boosters without empowering. Here's a nation which doesn't really need the boost... And aquatic, so it gets to bundle most elemental site searching into water gem useage anyway.

Ashdod: winner
Astral, Death, Earth, good site searching for all 3, has capitol income for S,D at least. Here's another nation that really doesn't need a boost. I imagine Hinnom/Gath are in similar boats?

MA Oceania: Loser (probably EA too, but not familiar)
Nature, but otherwise only really water (with small amounts of earth and air - they generally have to beg or trade for a hammer, or put earth on their pretender). Pretender is only real way to get access to anything else - low gem input will severely hamper Oceania's ability to diversify. (And since removing gem gens is definitely on the table... there goes clamming for Oceania to actually do anything in the endgame as well).

Basically, most of the winners are already really strong nations, and the losers are generally weak nations.

If you want to rebalance the game to make human nations stronger, you almost need to rebalance magical paths to make them more equal, or rebalance races so human nations tend to get more and stronger access to the good paths than non-human nations. Taking hammers away won't help nearly as much as you think.

[Meglobob]

I am not very comfortable with the ban this, ban that and ban the other mentality that this thread is now full of, happens all the time with these sort of discussions.

Seems to always come down to nerf everything, especially if its good or popular.

[Sombre]

The topic of taking away hammers in this thread is really about reducing micro, not rebalancing.

I also think your logic is a bit weird. Taking away hammers has the greatest impact on a nation that does a lot of forging and that would previously have used a lot of hammers. Since you say astral, death, nature and earth get the best gear, nations with access to these strong paths would arguably lose out more than others with no hammers, because they're the ones doing the most forging. This seems particularly true of earth powers, who can forge a bunch of hammers rather than having to trade for them or take the points hit on their pretender build.

I also don't really see how hammers help nations that need to diversify more than those who are already have access to the stronger paths. You say it allows lesser amounts of gems in those off paths to be used more effectively, but since it equally allows S/D/N/E to be used more efficiently when they're your main gem income, which in terms of raw gems is going to be far more of an impact,... I don't get it. Clearly it does help forge that N booster to try and bootstrap into nature, but it helps an equal amount (proportionately) with an N powerhouse forging the best N gear.

[Squirrelloid]

The topic of taking away hammers in this thread is really about reducing micro, not rebalancing.

I also think your logic is a bit weird. Taking away hammers has the greatest impact on a nation that does a lot of forging and that would previously have used a lot of hammers. Since you say astral, death, nature and earth get the best gear, nations with access to these strong paths would arguably lose out more than others with no hammers, because they're the ones doing the most forging. This seems particularly true of earth powers, who can forge a bunch of hammers rather than having to trade for them or take the points hit on their pretender build.

I also don't really see how hammers help nations that need to diversify more than those who are already have access to the stronger paths. You say it allows lesser amounts of gems in those off paths to be used more effectively, but since it equally allows S/D/N/E to be used more efficiently when they're your main gem income, which in terms of raw gems is going to be far more of an impact,... I don't get it. Clearly it does help forge that N booster to try and bootstrap into nature, but it helps an equal amount (proportionately) with an N powerhouse forging the best N gear.

I'm assuming that, in general, the first instance of item X is more powerful/game changing/whatever than further instances of item X for your nation. Or to look at it another way, the improvement in performance of your nation improves at a decreasing rate with an increasing quantity of item X.

This is tautologically true sometimes - there can be only one of each artifact.

This is easily proveable other times. The first RoWizardry is amazing. The second one is still awesome, but not nearly as awesome because you can already pass the first around to cast the globals you need. I guarantee it is not the only item of that type.

I would argue it is true for every item though. Basically, the law of diminishing returns applies at some point, and that point isn't ridiculously far along. Ie, the first fully-equipped thug is better than the nth one for some n. He's better than the second because he gives you increased capability. The second lets you apply that capability multiple times or gives you new joint capability. But the third is more of the same, and so forth. Now, there are certainly benefits to having thugs work in parallel, but each additional one is less advantageous to you strategically than the one before it (especially since your opponent will probably develop a counter to whatever you're doing with it).

So taking hammers away from power nations has more impact in raw gems, but less strategic impact. (They can still do it, they just do it less... vs. they probably can't do it at all, or at all reasonably).

[Illuminated One]

Well, at least one thing is quite sure that banning hammers will negatively affect earth nations (Ulm, Marverni, Yomi, Agartha, Vanheim, Machaka, Atlantis, out of Memory there is only Hinnom where a nerf would be good).

Maybe it would be better to just note down exactly where the most time is spent.
Taking the dwarven hammers if I understand it correctly the reason why you are considering them MM nightmare is that you have to collect them from 300 mages in 100 provinces?
That's a fact, but if you blame that on the hammers that's only a perspective.
Why not blame it on having to have 300 mages or a too large map?
I mean seriously, you have zero problems with managing your dwarven hammers if you set up a couple of forging provinces into which all your dedicated forgers go (and they are not used for generally spamming mages). The only problem is that the gold could have been spent on additional research centers and you loose some research turns moving around. And this is - I repeat myself I know - the really broken mechanic imo. Virtually every strategy game encourages you to organize your empire (like building cities in sensible locations or choosing the right amount of research and industry centers) while dominions punishes you for it.

[Psycho]

Hammers are not a part of MM problem. On reasonably sized maps without gem generators you will have 10-15 of them at most. If you don't earn enormous amounts of gems, you can't spend them on forging.

[Zeldor]

They are a part of MM - simply because everyone must have then and everyone gets them and everyone uses them. You either screwed smth [trade? pretender design?] or are really pressed if you forge smth more expensive without hammer.

Micah is right though that removing hammers would spoil rituals-forging balance. And it would make some nations weaker for sure. Removing them would surely improve gameplay, but costs are too high.

[DonCorazon]

WraithLord asked for ways to reduce MM. Looking for, and transferring 10-15 hammers every turn is my definition of MM. In other words, it is not fun. My argument was not to ban them for balance. I just made a note that it might add some balance as a response to squirrelloids points. As for having forging centers, that doesn't usually work when you have variable paths and indies - certain path requirements will end up in remote locations etc.

I also don't like banning things, but the point of the game is to have fun, and i personally don't find swapping hammers every turn to be that enjoyable. Since usually everyone is doing the same thing, there is no relative advantage. Anyway, maybe w/o gem generators its not as bad.

[Illuminated One]

As for having forging centers, that doesn't usually work when you have variable paths and indies - certain path requirements will end up in remote locations etc.

That's why I said a couple. :)
And sure you have to run around a bit, but that's my point it's not good to penalize players for moving their mages around.

I also don't like banning things, but the point of the game is to have fun, and i personally don't find swapping hammers every turn to be that enjoyable. Since usually everyone is doing the same thing, there is no relative advantage. Anyway, maybe w/o gem generators its not as bad.

True to a point, if they could just be accounted for and give you the forging bonus automatically...
Otoh hand it doesn't really take much time (<4min) if you go my route so I'd hardly find it justified to take them out.

[Calahan]

Gathering all your forgers in one or two places just to save on MM is a guaranteed way to get yourself in major trouble to stuff like lab fires or mass remote killing spells (flames from sky). With the former event putting the majority of your hammers and boosters out of commission for a turn, and the latter losing you said hammers and boosters. And domes won't help against a concentrated ritual attack, which is all the more likely to happen if you enemies notice your gathering all your important mages in one place.

Common sense says to have your forgers spread out more to avoid them becoming the lucrative target they become when gathered together. But the more spread out they are, the more MM increases. Hence the claim being made that banning Hammers will reduce MM. (and this is a thread about reducing MM after all)

[Gandalf Parker]

I am not very comfortable with the ban this, ban that and ban the other mentality that this thread is now full of, happens all the time with these sort of discussions.

Seems to always come down to nerf everything, especially if its good or popular.
Old wisdom from admins of many online world projects. The people placed in authority over game balance tend to come in two types. The adders, and the subtractors. Those who fix by building up the low ones, and those who fix by taking down the high ones. As long as you dont let one group get too out of control you are usually ok. Of course nor should you allow both groups unlimited control or you end up with everything equal in the middle which is boring. I am again amazed at how well the two-man crew of Illwinter did with that basic problem altho if you look at the history file you can kindof see that they have one of each. :)

But Im with you. Id rather see more options than less. As long as there is an in-game strategic response then Id be afraid to nerf for fear of creating a new imbalance in some other nation needing a new nerf.

Altho.. as long as its all mods and game setting choices then its just more options. No problem there.


Gandalf Parker
--
Some people NEED menus.
All options open with no menu list appears to them to be no options at all.

[Sombre]

It's usually bad to remove options, but that doesn't necessarily equate to removing or changing elements. You could quite well be increasing game options by removing a feature which distorts the game or prevents other features from being realised as intended.

In terms of this thread, the fact that some dominant strategies tend towards micromanagement can remove the option of playing competitively if you simply don't have the time or willpower to deal with the MM.

[Illuminated One]

Gathering all your forgers in one or two places just to save on MM is a guaranteed way to get yourself in major trouble to stuff like lab fires or mass remote killing spells (flames from sky). With the former event putting the majority of your hammers and boosters out of commission for a turn, and the latter losing you said hammers and boosters. And domes won't help against a concentrated ritual attack, which is all the more likely to happen if you enemies notice your gathering all your important mages in one place.

That would require my enemy to know exactly where I have my forgers without me having any idea of it, which should be something near impossible as he can't see my paths (as I have maybe 15 other castles with a lot of mages sitting in).
But there is of course a truth in it that remote spells (and I actually like them) are really bad MM for the victim.

But the more spread out they are, the more MM increases. Hence the claim being made that banning Hammers will reduce MM. (and this is a thread about reducing MM after all)

Yeah sure, banning hammers will reduce MM. But removing all gems will also. I'm not even very much opposed to removing hammers, but they are hardly a core problem. Unless of course everyone needs 3h only to hunt his hammers, but therefore working out where the time is wasted is much better than suggesting bans that can save some micro.

[Sombre]

Hammers removed to eliminate micro makes sense because hammers themselves add virtually nothing to the game but are incredibly common and powerful to the point that you essentially have to use them.

Not many things like that.

[Micah]

I disagree that hammers add nothing to the game. It may look like it at first glance since virtually all forging uses them, but they do have an effect.

Hammers enforce a steady flow of forging. Without them you could have all your mages churn out items at the drop of a hat with no penalty. Thus I think they do add some depth to the game, since you're rewarded for planning your item needs in advance.

I also think the amount of MM they cause is overstated, most of my hammers stay on the same mage turn after turn, and when they don't the addition of the l hotkey makes swapping them a breeze (it was a lot nastier when you had to navigate the scroll menu, especially since forging tends to be done where there are a lot of units.) Most of the mm-intensive forging headaches I run into are due to booster shuffling, not hammer shuffling.

Regardless, it seems from the various responses that the issue is contentious enough to make their removal in any sort of widely-used mod a failure, though I suppose they could be included in the optional section if Wraith wants.

[Valerius]

But removing all gems will also. I'm not even very much opposed to removing hammers, but they are hardly a core problem. Unless of course everyone needs 3h only to hunt his hammers, but therefore working out where the time is wasted is much better than suggesting bans that can save some micro.

Yes, exactly! Gems themselves are a big cause of MM. In CBM summoning individuals demons is cheap - the logic being that the real cost is mage time, not blood slaves. If this logic could be extended to everything you could do away with gems. So aside from perhaps globals or unique items everything would be free (or as close to free as the game will allow). But the only way I can see to do that is to limit the number of mages and that drastically changes the balance and nature of the game (though it could make for a fun, quick playing, mod).

In addition to that, the game doesn't scale well. The more units you have, the more MM you'll have. If there was a way to have the game scale from x units at the beginning to 100x (instead of 1000x) then you could really reduce MM. The best you can do to simulate this is to have smaller maps with fewer players.

In the end, I think you can only change things around the periphery - the cause of the vast majority of MM is built into the game itself. I don't mean that to sound negative: trying to change the things that we can control is worthwhile but it won't solve the bulk of the problem.

[Illuminated One]

Adding to that I mean maybe the main thing is simply that above a certain point it becomes to much for anyone to manage.
I mean seriously, you are not memorizing what paths even 50 mages have and where they all are.
Or how are you sorting your items when they are not in a lab? Do you just plan 3 weeks ahead so that the 60 new forges don't destroy your order? Sort anew almost every turn?
Or do you just scrap the sorting and start endless searches for that thing you know you had somewhere?

[Gandalf Parker]

If less gems is at least a partially acceptable answer, then dont we already have that by setting sites to a very low setting when creating the game?
--magicsites X Magic site frequency 0-75 (default 40)
Setting events rare would help also.

That would lower everyone equally. Of course some nations have a naturally high gem income from national sites, which could be boosted by pretender selection, but that is part of the balance for those nations which they pay for in other areas (that people usually complain about). That all just amounts to a different game-feel for us all to enjoy. And its already been built-in by the developers.

[Sombre]

You mean MA Pythium? LA Ermor? They certainly are weak to make up for their extra gem income.

I can't think of any others which differ in national site income. I certainly haven't seen people complaining about the way these nations pay for their higher gem income in other areas.

[Psycho]

MA Pythium is weak?

[Sombre]

Sarcasm is possible?

[Calahan]

Weak as a day old kitten.

[MaxWilson]

If less gems is at least a partially acceptable answer, then dont we already have that by setting sites to a very low setting when creating the game?
--magicsites X Magic site frequency 0-75 (default 40)
Setting events rare would help also.

That would lower everyone equally. Of course some nations have a naturally high gem income from national sites, which could be boosted by pretender selection, but that is part of the balance for those nations which they pay for in other areas (that people usually complain about). That all just amounts to a different game-feel for us all to enjoy. And its already been built-in by the developers.

Not to mention that it would make some of the globals less pointless, like... what's that spell that gives you 5 pearls a turn by collecting solar light?

-Max

[Squirrelloid]

Yes, lets set events rare and make there be absolutely no reason to take anything but misfortune 2-3...

Seriously, Luck isn't good enough as it is, lets not make it any more tempting to get points off the luck-misfortune scale.

[Makinus]

It appears more or less agreed that forging is one of the bigger MM causes in the game, and it was suggested to eliminate hammers... what about increasing forging costs? would not that decrease the forging rush? In this way forged itens would be more rare and you would give artifacts only to the most important units.

[thejeff]

Increasing forging costs just makes hammers more critical. And since you can only increase costs by increasing path levels needed, also increase the need for shifting boosters around.

It's not the few high level expensive artifacts that add to MM. It's churning out the dozens of cheap ones for your thugs & mages.

[fantasma]

hammers allow for more forging which causes more MM. Removing them has two positive effects on managing:
1. Forging cheap stuff costs 67% more -> up to 40% less items
2. no need to find that mage with the hammer, anybody with the path can do it.

I think hammers introduce micro.

Reducing site frequency has a drastic influence, while reducing overall gem flow it makes finding specific gem types really unpredictable. I remember that game when - after searching all my provinces, 30 provs - I ended with a total of 1w! That was at 45%

[NTJedi]

It's not the few high level expensive artifacts that add to MM. It's churning out the dozens of cheap ones for your thugs & mages.

We should try and convince the developers to provide an automatic forging command the same as we have for magic site searching. This would definitely help.

I have found increasing the gem cost of gem generators prevents them from being forged as often because it requires more gems even with the hammers. The end result is instead of having 10 mages forging gem generators the higher cost means only 3 mages or less. In some cases other summon spells are viewed as more worthy because each gem generator has a longer period of time before it's paid its own cost.


In regards to SCs... such as the Tartarians and recruitable SCs, I believe new spells should be introduced to provide strategic strategies against them. For example I created one game where I created a summon spell where the creature generated horrormarks when struck... naturally not important against an army, but very important against SCs. Also I created a long range summon spell which was a summon specific for fighting SCs and then after its arrival a horror would appear. Another spell which can be introduced for handling SCs would be twisting the internal alchemy spell into a new spell so it only sends insanity instead of the decrease in aging. Another idea spell which comes to mind is creating a spell which uses cursed luck... currently it's almost impossible to even encounter a game which will have cursed luck. These will give armies a better chance against the heavy usage of SCs during late game.

[Sombre]

All strategies are strategic!

[NTJedi]

All strategies are strategic!

When the number of strategies are few it's less strategic and more linear.

[Illuminated One]

Hmm, I think the tartarian thing would be quite easy to fix if there were some other nonunique SCs with about equal price and power.

[Squirrelloid]

hammers allow for more forging which causes more MM. Removing them has two positive effects on managing:
1. Forging cheap stuff costs 67% more -> up to 40% less items
2. no need to find that mage with the hammer, anybody with the path can do it.

I think hammers introduce micro.

Reducing site frequency has a drastic influence, while reducing overall gem flow it makes finding specific gem types really unpredictable. I remember that game when - after searching all my provinces, 30 provs - I ended with a total of 1w! That was at 45%

Does anyone really not know where all their hammers are all the time? Does anyone really move them around all that much? I mostly give hammers to mages and set those mages to permanent forge duty, unless i have something special that needs making. And, surprise surprise, they're often the only mages not researching. I've never found forging to be annoying, and equipping items is quick and straightforward.

I find figuring out which paths a mage has is more micro, and that's important for things other than crafting. (Who can site search (manual or remote), who should go with the army, forging, ritual spells, etc...). It would help if, instead of having to rename all my casters A2W2D3 and the like there was a display on the overland commander view that listed all their paths, or it would come up on mouseover.

Finally, any removal of hammers would have to address how much this straightjackets nations into using nationally available magic types for items compared to default settings.

[Squirrelloid]

Hmm, I think the tartarian thing would be quite easy to fix if there were some other nonunique SCs with about equal price and power.

So, it seems to me that Tarts should be cheaper than other equivalent options because you need research in 3 schools (Thaum for GoR, Constr for boosters - often significant boosters) and gems of two types, so the current 27 (12d + 15n) pricetag is cheap because they're harder to rush. Plus you need the Chalice or GoH or other healing options.

A straight-up SC without GoR that is equivalent should probably cost more on the order of 40-50 gems. A slightly weaker but less hassle SC could cost around 30-35 gems, and could help counter the rush to tartarians (or encourage runs to it solely because its less hassle).

[MaxWilson]

I find figuring out which paths a mage has is more micro, and that's important for things other than crafting. (Who can site search (manual or remote), who should go with the army, forging, ritual spells, etc...). It would help if, instead of having to rename all my casters A2W2D3 and the like there was a display on the overland commander view that listed all their paths, or it would come up on mouseover.

You're aware that magic paths are listed on the F1 screen, right? It's not hard to spot the only H3 priest, or to find an A2 mage, etc.

-Max

[Squirrelloid]

I find figuring out which paths a mage has is more micro, and that's important for things other than crafting. (Who can site search (manual or remote), who should go with the army, forging, ritual spells, etc...). It would help if, instead of having to rename all my casters A2W2D3 and the like there was a display on the overland commander view that listed all their paths, or it would come up on mouseover.

You're aware that magic paths are listed on the F1 screen, right? It's not hard to spot the only H3 priest, or to find an A2 mage, etc.

-Max

I'm thinking more I'm looking at a territory with 20+ mages and i want to find all the ones with A4 or W3 or whatever. Figuring out which province he's in is not the hard part. And I want to be able to do it in the context of commander selection for forging/casting/moving, or army setup screen for spell scripting.

[Micah]

You can click on commanders from the F1 screen and it will select them and go to their province, so I never bother right-clicking my guys to check for paths if there are a pile of them, I just hit F1 and click from there. Same for tracking down boosters or hammers, though the display IS pretty small...hammers and gate cleavers are petty indistinguishable, for example.

[Illuminated One]

Hmm, the latter could probably be changed quite easily by giving hammers or cleavers a different icon.

And how about a costless useless unit with only as much slot as possible for holding stuff when the lab is full?

[fantasma]

my point about hammers was more in the line of you have significantly more forging going on with them, and more than 25% nominal savings. And it makes a difference as it delays the time you forge close to 50 items/turn.

Removing hammers has effects on balance, mainly for earth and thug-reliant nations, I guess, but that is a different question altogether.

[WraithLord]

This extract from the first post is what ppl think reduces MM w/o having serious side effect on balance/fun:
"
1. No gem gens.
Note: Efforts are being made at modding for compensating gem gen reliant nations.

2. Determine an upper limit on map sizes, # of players and reasonable victory conditions. Consensus
10-12 players, 10-15 provinces per player, 40% capital VPs victory condition.
Note. MM is in direct relation to how many provinces one controls at end game. Worst case scenario (MM wise) is 2 powers each controlling 30-40% of the map making war.
# of players and victory conditions have similar effect.

3. No Diplomacy. i.e. RAND.
Diplomacy is not directly related to MM but cutting that part of the game results in faster turn processing. Plus, it allows for different patterns of gaining victory (no alliances, NAP turtling, dog piling etc) which could be refreshing on it's own right.
"

I plan to participate in future games that follow these guidelines (1+2 for sure) and so be able to test first hand how they influence endgame MM.
Thanks for all the feedback!

[Hiisi]

Hi, im wondering that?

Is it possible to make spells that create gem sites?

[Sombre]

No.

[WraithLord]

Hi, im wondering that?

Is it possible to make spells that create gem sites?

While this will remove one part of gem gens incurred MM (making sure the mages carrying them survive and passing them around at times) it doesn't cover the other part of MM they cause: getting to end game with tons of gems, which means you can (and so must) summon/forge/cast that much more. Plus it will encourage turtling and castling.

[Illuminated One]

Hmm, I think it would solve a lot.

Gem Income is visible.
Sites can be taken over.
Sites can be limited.

And you can certainly do it.

[Sombre]

Really? How can you do it? Enlighten me please.

[OmikronWarrior]

Really? How can you do it? Enlighten me please.

Though I know almost nothing of modding, I do know random events can create magic sites (usually +gold or resources, though), and spells can cause random (or not so random events). If Random events can be added... I think you see where I am going here.

[Hiisi]

Hi, im wondering that?

Is it possible to make spells that create gem sites?

While this will remove one part of gem gens incurred MM (making sure the mages carrying them survive and passing them around at times) it doesn't cover the other part of MM they cause: getting to end game with tons of gems, which means you can (and so must) summon/forge/cast that much more. Plus it will encourage turtling and castling.

As Illuminated One said that sites can be limited, so maybe 2 sites per province. Combines total spell made gem gens in a large game of 150 provinces = 300 gem gens total. Currently 1 player can have same amount of gem gens in late game. So in end game 100 gems from gem gens would be huge.

With number of gem gens restricted by provinces, no more turtling with gem gens. 10 provinces total 20 gem gens = sweet target tag for conquest.

IMHO hammers are the reason for late game hell. Hammers reduce cost of gem gens over 25%. At the same time they reduce baypack ratio of gem gens by 25%. In long run with hammers increase gem gen income by 35-40%. With +35% more gems 1,35*1,25=1,69 more forging with hammers. Playing nation that has natural forging bonus gem gens will skyrocket even more! So remove hammers.

With higher cost of gem gens (no hammer bonus) the cost of opportunity raises significally (also now they could be taken over). I think current gem cost for gem gens are quite ok.

Games would no longer be forging competitions, they would have more strategy (more sites on map = more tactical opportunities, scouting even more important)

-No need for hundreds of indy scouts running around.
-No need for pool gems, if the income is map based.
-No need to huge balance changes for nations that needs gem gens
-As Illuminated One said "Gem Income is visible".

[Sombre]

Random events can't be modded or added.

Seriously, how can spells to create sites certainly be done?

[Micah]

Why are people so keen on preserving the gem generation mechanic?

From my experience playing without them it makes for a much better game, IMO. I'd like to hear why people are so reluctant to get rid of them.

[OmikronWarrior]

As an alternative to removing hammers, increasing the requirement to Earth-5, and thus the cost to 40 Earth gems, would have a similar effect. Only a handful of nations would be able to forge them, and those that do would have other objects competing for Earth gems. Forging a few to get a discount on really expensive items, such as Rings of Wizardry, would make them worth it, but not for mass producing the little stuff.

[Squirrelloid]

As an alternative to removing hammers, increasing the requirement to Earth-5, and thus the cost to 40 Earth gems, would have a similar effect. Only a handful of nations would be able to forge them, and those that do would have other objects competing for Earth gems. Forging a few to get a discount on really expensive items, such as Rings of Wizardry, would make them worth it, but not for mass producing the little stuff.

You sure about that? Saving 2 gems/forging, it takes a mere 20 turns to pay off one of those, and that's assuming you never forge anything better than a 5 gem item with it. And you pay it off in 4 turns forging more hammers, who then pay themselves off in no more than 15 turns. (And did I mention the gems they're paying themselves off with don't have to be earth? You might have earth to burn, and those earth are otherwise worth at best half a gem to you - like me right now in Water Total War.)

Doing this is just going to make the disparity between the haves and have-nots even bigger. As it is now, virtually everyone has access to hammers, so everyone benefits from the ability to rapidly diversify on limited gem totals. At 40e hammers become much more limited to those nations who can amass a lot of earth, and thus other nations get correspondingly straightjacketed into national path forgings.

The only way changing hammers is at all realistic is if you make all the magic paths equally good. As I highly doubt that's going to happen...

[Sombre]

People also get very, very tetchy about the changing of forge requirements for oft forged items. I think they get less tetchy about them being removed entirely tbh.

[Zeldor]

Gem gens must go. They made late-game rot. I really prefer to just use higher magic site settings.

There won't be any other acceptable way to replace gem gens. They simply must go. There won't be anything done with forging either, unless someone wants to adjust prices for ALL rituals to match new situation. And I doubt people would like to play that.

New CBM is coming. CBM with nation balance fixes. It will be whole new world, new game then. So revolution is coming.

[Trumanator]

And Zeldor, His prophet, hath spoken the gospel, and the people found it good, and it was good.

:D

[Illuminated One]

Really? How can you do it? Enlighten me please.

http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/showthread.php?t=43892

Look at the example mod in there.
It doesn't create sites, but I does change the gem income of one of sauromatia's home sites.
Remove some "super sites" (discount sites and special indies) and replace them by sites where the player can increase the gem income through his actions (or maybe pay for a discount).
(You can also create sites, not by changing the mod, but by changing the savegame files)

Why are people so keen on preserving the gem generation mechanic?

From my experience playing without them it makes for a much better game, IMO. I'd like to hear why people are so reluctant to get rid of them.

Well, I think you are right that they do not enhance the game as they are now. But it's the only mechanic that allows to affect your nation's economy besides the scales that you set on the very beginning.
Sure you can say that you want only battles but imo there is a much greater sense of archievement in creating and maintaining the economy that fuels your war than without it.
And then if you went down that direction (i.e. all that should be of strategic importance are battles) then I don't really see for what reason you'd want to keep the strategic map at all, since it only waters it down with luck (Ha! You underestimated me. Didn't quite expect that wrath of the sky from the air mages I found somewhere, huh?) or silly metagame stuff (Player X is known to go AI after some light raiding but Player Y makes sure whoever attacks him doesn't win the game, now, who should I attack). I guess in that case you could just give every player x rp and y gold and z gems to assign as they like before the game and then let them duke it out on some (completely) barren wastelands. That would even make for a fun game, I'm sure, but that's not for the long haul that dom3 games normally are.
So to come to a point, gem gens are broken, but I'd rather change them and see what happens instead of removing them.

[Psycho]

I know I won't be playing in another game with gem gens.

[MaxWilson]

Well, I think you are right that they do not enhance the game as they are now. But it's the only mechanic that allows to affect your nation's economy besides the scales that you set on the very beginning.

Let me see if I'm understanding your point correctly: 4X games typically have Explore, Expand, Exploit, and Exterminate phases. Dominions has a more limited set of options for Exploit than MOM or MOO/MOO2.

1.) Site-search (costs mage time and/or gems, may permanently increase the gem-production of that province)
2.) Build forts (increases resource and gold output of that province, allows recruitment of national units)
2b.) Build labs/temples (may be necessary to allow you to exploit certain indy pop types and/or sites)
3.) Forge gem-generators

I think you're arguing that the options available to Exploit are so limited that eliminating #3 cripples the Exploit phase to the point where it's not really worth playing as a 4X game. Is that right?

-Max

[Squirrelloid]

well, building forts mostly allows recruiting of national units and pooling resources. The cost of the castle relative to the gold boost is so low as to be unnoticeable, basically.

[MaxWilson]

well, building forts mostly allows recruiting of national units and pooling resources. The cost of the castle relative to the gold boost is so low as to be unnoticeable, basically.

True in most cases, and in fact I personally DON'T build forts to increase gold income, but it is a form of Exploit that can potentially increase your gold revenues by up to 25%. The main reason it isn't done is not because the gold increase is negligible but because fort costs are so high relative to per-province income, in a normal-settings game.

I'm AFB, but IIRC building a fort gives you (baseIncome*admin/200) extra gold per turn, so you need to hold a province for (200*fortCost/(baseIncome*admin)) turns in order to show a positive cash flow. Depending on the province that may or may not be worth bothering with. From memory, here's some examples:

130 gold province, Tel City (Admin 40, 1400 gold): +26 gold. You need to hold the city for 54 turns to show a net profit.

390 gold province, Tel City (Admin 40, 1400 gold): +78 gold. You need to hold it for 18 turns to show a profit.

130 gold province, Hill Fort (Admin 20, 800 gold): +13 gold, 61 turns.

390 gold province, Hill Fort (Admin 20, 800 gold): +39 gold, 21 turns.

A 21-turn payback isn't short, but it's in line with the payback times for many buildings in other 4X games like MoM--although of course those games may go on for hundreds of turns and Dom3 usually caps out in the 80s.

Playing on smaller but richer maps (x3 or x4 and high gems) is one way of reducing micro, by effectively consolidating provinces into larger and richer metaprovinces. It tends to emphasize normal armies slightly more over summons/thugs, and it also makes fort-building a strategic option for economic development.

None of this changes the fact that Exploit plays much less of a role in Dom3 than in most 4X games--I'd actually submit that Dom3 isn't really a 4X game at all. It's mostly 2X, Expand and Exterminate, although research plays a big role and the Exterminate phase is unusually rich because of all the unit/spell variety.

-Max

[Benjamin]

I'm so pleased at this thread. I had just posted at QT3 about thinking of giving dominions another go, but how much I hated the MM, especially from gem gens. I thinks to myself, why don't I go over and see what's going on at official dominions 3 forums, and I find this thread. I'm so pleased.

Anyhow:

1)I'll be happy to see gem gens go. Mechanics that drive players to be tedious to win stink, and an overwhelming late game gem income is bad gameplay even without tedium.

2)A mod removing gem gens does or does not currently exist? I see people in the threads recalling games without gem gens, was that simply an honor based ban?

3)If push comes to shove, it's really the fever fetish I hate.

[Benjamin]

Making gem gens "discount ignoring" like contracts/lifelong protection might also be a good compromise position. Or finagling required paths.

[quantum_mechani]

2)A mod removing gem gens does or does not currently exist? I see people in the threads recalling games without gem gens, was that simply an honor based ban?
You can find the unique gem gen mod here:

http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/showpost.php?p=699040

And as mentioned it will be integrated in CB 1.6.

[Illuminated One]

Let me see if I'm understanding your point correctly: 4X games typically have Explore, Expand, Exploit, and Exterminate phases. Dominions has a more limited set of options for Exploit than MOM or MOO/MOO2.

1.) Site-search (costs mage time and/or gems, may permanently increase the gem-production of that province)
2.) Build forts (increases resource and gold output of that province, allows recruitment of national units)
2b.) Build labs/temples (may be necessary to allow you to exploit certain indy pop types and/or sites)
3.) Forge gem-generators

I think you're arguing that the options available to Exploit are so limited that eliminating #3 cripples the Exploit phase to the point where it's not really worth playing as a 4X game. Is that right?

Well, not exactly, although along these lines.
I think with large maps and an extremely long timeframe it should contain 4X mechanics, but it really lacks in the exploit field (but I don't think gem gens as they are now are a good replacement) - and just relying on the castles and sitesearching (I don't care so much about terminology but I'd see them as explore personally) it's better to play it as a pure "duel" game imo.
Even if your wannabe god is completely uninterested in building or shaping his empire - your gem income/magic access has a great effect on your battles. Like you're not going to use much earth magic with 5 e gems income total and many nations are just not flexible enough to really cope.

Well about castles I think the general consensus is just to build the cheapest researcher factory possible. 400 gold are much early on, but +30 gold after turn 50 isn't really much when 50 gem scs are running around.

[Juffos]

If you wish to reduce micromanagement by eliminating diplomacy, please don't. Limit it to ingame messages. Diplomacy is necessary for the weak nations to unite and counter the strong.

[Snacktime]

Why not just have the gems generated by clams and other items or units go to the national inventory rather than to the unit wearing the item, so as to avoid the gem MM?

[Squirrelloid]

Why not just have the gems generated by clams and other items or units go to the national inventory rather than to the unit wearing the item, so as to avoid the gem MM?

Well, there are times you want the gems on the commander in question. Ok, not so much with fever fetish, but I could see bloodstone and clams used for such a purpose. Heck, *I've* used clams for such a purpose.

[Snacktime]

I agree that there are times you want the gems to appear on that commander, but I'd venture to say this is relatively uncommon, usually you just have a bunch of folks in your various castles holding the items to gem gen. losing that very minor tactical option would cause no balance issues that i can think of and have a pretty high return in terms of eliminating MM.

[Sombre]

Solutions which we ourselves cannot do aren't that useful though. I mean there are many ways the problem could theoretically be solved, but I don't think identifying them all makes sense.

[WraithLord]

If you wish to reduce micromanagement by eliminating diplomacy, please don't. Limit it to ingame messages. Diplomacy is necessary for the weak nations to unite and counter the strong.

Yes. What I listed are 3 items that are confirmed to increase MM and can be removed w/o a serious effect on balance/fun. It doesn't mean that all game must be w/o diplo, only that those that would be w/o diplo would have less MM. Or more precisely - less time spent on chats, mails, PMs etc so that turns process considerably faster.

Gem gens, the way they are currently, just plain suck in MM respect. Perhaps if it was possible to "curse" their income so that it can't be moved from the owning mage to the lab then they'd be ok (income only for battles). As they currently are they are tedious, boring, MM intensive and cause income inflation in end game.

Smaller maps and less nations clearly reduce MM.

[thejeff]

Of course, without diplomacy you have to spend more actual in-game time preparing to counter war from all your neighbors, not to mention relying even more heavily on managing scouts to get info you can't get from others.
(Not that you should rely entirely on diplomacy for defense, but you certainly don't guard a border with an ally as strongly as you'd have to if you didn't have a deal.)

[WraithLord]

Usually w/o diplo one concentrates on deterrence to avoid wars. It may actually be more reliable then NAPs. As I have seen once and again that in diplo games you'd get nations dog-piling the leader while in RAND that's a rare occurrence and even when it happens you'd see 2-3 smaller nations banding as opposed to much more in diplo games. Also, when you're smaller and weaker in diplo games you may easily get to end game while in RAND it will all be over much sooner (so the whole game is much shorter as well).

I speak from personal experience of playing both game types. For me removing diplo considerably shortens turn processing.
EDIT: Again, I'm not saying diplo is bad, not fun or what not. It's perfectly viable and I'll surely play diplo game in the future. However I think that games w/o diplo require considerably less time investment.

[Sombre]

Oh I should point out NI maps also greatly reduce micro, simply because there are far, far less commanders - most notably scouts you have to cycle through with n.

[K]

I'm amused that all the suggestions for removing MM in endgame all involve neutering anyone's ability to achieve game-ending dominance in the endgame, thus insuring the game goes on longer and there is more MM required.

Globals and gem-producing items and forging and SCs are all ways that players achieve asymmetric power, and removing them guarantees that games will be bogged down in stalemates and endless diplomacy as people decide who to gang up on.

[Stavis_L]

I'm amused that all the suggestions for removing MM in endgame all involve neutering anyone's ability to achieve game-ending dominance in the endgame, thus insuring the game goes on longer and there is more MM required.

Globals and gem-producing items and forging and SCs are all ways that players achieve asymmetric power, and removing them guarantees that games will be bogged down in stalemates and endless diplomacy as people decide who to gang up on.

I believe the frustration is that these tools no longer provide game-ending dominance, and do not provide asymmetric power, because everyone has them (saving the globals, of course; I think the objections there are a little odd, other than the spells that are just broken because they aren't really designed for large games.)

[Squirrelloid]

I'm amused that all the suggestions for removing MM in endgame all involve neutering anyone's ability to achieve game-ending dominance in the endgame, thus insuring the game goes on longer and there is more MM required.

Globals and gem-producing items and forging and SCs are all ways that players achieve asymmetric power, and removing them guarantees that games will be bogged down in stalemates and endless diplomacy as people decide who to gang up on.

I believe the frustration is that these tools no longer provide game-ending dominance, and do not provide asymmetric power, because everyone has them (saving the globals, of course; I think the objections there are a little odd, other than the spells that are just broken because they aren't really designed for large games.)

I believe his point is that these are all options for endgame power, and as two players are unlikely to choose the same ratio of investment in each then their power develops asymmetrically.

If you remove some pathways as valid choices, you vastly increase the odds that two players make identical or sufficiently similar investment choices and thus their power does not really diverge in any category.

(Of course, there is the distinction between possession of power and application of power, but such contests can go on a long time if neither side can actually attack the other's real power base.)

Part of the problem is that an existential threat for a large nation is much different than an existential threat for a small nation. To make a nation of 50+ provinces even *blink* you have to take ~5-10 more provinces/trn than they can take from you. (or do an equivalent amount of damage to their production structure - gem gen holders, summoners, etc...).

[Micah]

The biggest asymmetry gem-gens provide is when you've got someone pulling in 60% of their former gem income with 10% of their former provinces when you're slogging through a war with them. It makes finishing people off in the late game incredibly difficult when they can concentrate their income so heavily and just worry about defending a single province with all of their forces, first turn defender advantage, layers of domes and a huge gem income.

[Squirrelloid]

The biggest asymmetry gem-gens provide is when you've got someone pulling in 60% of their former gem income with 10% of their former provinces when you're slogging through a war with them. It makes finishing people off in the late game incredibly difficult when they can concentrate their income so heavily and just worry about defending a single province with all of their forces, first turn defender advantage, layers of domes and a huge gem income.

Well, domes are actually part of the problem here. At least the ones that actually block spell effects. (Getting to attack the casting mage but always letting the spell through would be fine). More of a problem than gem gens in my opinion, because it makes turtling and defense too easy.

Edit: from a balance perspective, just removing domes with spell blocking effects from the game would have a lesser effect than removing gem gens on game balance, and severely discourage the turtling everyone whines about.

[Sombre]

I don't see how it would severely discourage turtling. I doubt it would have much effect on turtling at all, since turtling is primarily a gem gen based strat and gem gens aren't really be hurt by the removal of domes. Scouts carry them after all.

Besides the guy with the clam farm can out remote the guy without one.

[Micah]

No way. Remote spells are already extremely effective, suggesting that the only line of defense against them be removed is foolishness. The damage domes are also useless, it's trivial to slap a couple of resistance items on the casting mage.

Turtling isn't a problem without non-province-based income, whereas gem gens introduce a host of problems into the game.

[Squirrelloid]

No way. Remote spells are already extremely effective, suggesting that the only line of defense against them be removed is foolishness. The damage domes are also useless, it's trivial to slap a couple of resistance items on the casting mage.

Turtling isn't a problem without non-province-based income, whereas gem gens introduce a host of problems into the game.

I'm not sure I understand. You're opposed to defensive play but removing something which makes defensive play powerful is bad?

[Psycho]

There is nothing wrong with playing defensively. The problem is that if you have loads of gem gens losing territory means nothing to you. One fort is all you need. Raiding means nothing to you. It is very hard to defeat such an opponent. Eventually, the one with most gem gens wins, because as we all know, gem income is the most important thing. You are forced to forge them if you want to win. Thus they reduce versatility.

[MaxWilson]

No way. Remote spells are already extremely effective, suggesting that the only line of defense against them be removed is foolishness. The damage domes are also useless, it's trivial to slap a couple of resistance items on the casting mage.

Turtling isn't a problem without non-province-based income, whereas gem gens introduce a host of problems into the game.

I'm not sure I understand. You're opposed to defensive play but removing something which makes defensive play powerful^H^H^H^H^H^H^H^H^H^H tedious is bad?

Fixed your post. ;)

-Max

[WraithLord]

gem gens recap:
1. Everybody does them. So nobody gets a serious advantage. I forge lots of them with every nation I play, even ones w/o paths. I just invest some and get/empower mages to needed paths. Everybody does it. The secret is out. All that's left is:
2. Tedious, mind numbing work of forging them and defending their holders.
3. They prolong end game since it's very hard to kill nations by taking their provinces. In-fact province are not that important when you have those 60 clams and 60 blood stones on scouts or what not.
4. They indirectly contribute to making end game turns longer by allowing a much higher gem income - thus more spells, SCs, forging work.
5. Coupled with wish the game just breaks.

Missed anything?

BTW, I have read somewhere that IW originally intended them to be used for battle. If there was a way to enforce that (not allowing their income to leave the holder) then they could be of use.

[vfb]

Well, there's a way to enforce it, but it involves coding unfortunately.

First you have to make all gem-generators cursed.

Then IW would need to add code everywhere it's checking if gems cannot be taken off a commander because he's a merc, and also check that the commander is not wielding any gem generator.

[WraithLord]

vfb, I really like your suggestion. One can have a dream that perhaps one day in the future IW would give us a shining new patch with that implemented :)

[Squirrelloid]

Would it be possible to make an item that created a gem at the start of combat?

(I'm sure such a thing would be abuseable, but it would be much less so).

[Sombre]

Via mod commands? No. Kinda sounds like it would be even more of a micro headache when you have a ton of them and start casting indy farsummons on your guys in order to get them.

[K]

gem gens recap:
1. Everybody does them. So nobody gets a serious advantage. I forge lots of them with every nation I play, even ones w/o paths. I just invest some and get/empower mages to needed paths. Everybody does it. The secret is out. All that's left is:
2. Tedious, mind numbing work of forging them and defending their holders.
3. They prolong end game since it's very hard to kill nations by taking their provinces. In-fact province are not that important when you have those 60 clams and 60 blood stones on scouts or what not.
4. They indirectly contribute to making end game turns longer by allowing a much higher gem income - thus more spells, SCs, forging work.
5. Coupled with wish the game just breaks.

Missed anything?

BTW, I have read somewhere that IW originally intended them to be used for battle. If there was a way to enforce that (not allowing their income to leave the holder) then they could be of use.

1. So they are not unbalancing the game. That's a flaw?
2. Yeh, and defending provinces, castles, mages, etc is so tedious.
3. The funny thing about the endgame is that you can take 90% of a person's provinces in a few rounds with thugs and SCs and then you have to actually fight their armies. It's actually good that the win doesn't always go to the sneak attacker.
4. Yes, having a gem income adds a level of complexity to the game. This is the wrong game for you if you don't like complexity.
5. Let's face it, any gem income and Wish causes weird things to happen. I once ended a game just by using my non-Astral, not gem-gen, gem income to Armageddon the place to death to force the end of the game because 15 players were stuck in terminal turtle mode and the game was never going to end.

Gem gens only cause MM when you spend a lot of time turtling and have extra gem income and mage time to spend on them. The fact that you want to hit people early and hard before they can build a hundred gem-gen items actually means that the endgame should be shorter if people are not stuck in terminal turtle mode.

If you spend a lot of time fighting, scripting a single large complicated army can take an hour or more. That and incentives to turtle should be the place where people should be spending their energies if they want to cut down MM.

[Raiel]

...If you spend a lot of time fighting, scripting a single large complicated army can take an hour or more. That and incentives to turtle should be the place where people should be spending their energies if they want to cut down MM.

Seriously?!? :mad: :shock: :doh:

I'm beginning to see why it's so difficult to reach any real consensus on these forums... this game is so varied and complex that different players will enjoy the game for completely dichomotic reasons.

I enjoy the strategic elements of Dominions 3, but I LOVE the scripting and placement... it's only painstaking when I actually care about the results - and caring about the results means it's worth the time invested - so it's not tedious to me.

[WraithLord]

K, your view is very interesting. I don't think we can reduce this to a factual disagreement since it's very much about taste and preference of players. So clearly there's no black and white here :)

I guess a lot of ppl share my feelings towards gem gens as contributing to significantly raise end game MM. Perhaps in small games they can be ok, but certainly not for moderate to large ones. It’s a very delicate balance but for now I think I’d rather go w/o them.

[Sombre]

I think it's pretty obvious wraithlord is concerned about the potentially fatal effects of arguing with K.

May we all learn from his example.

[WraithLord]

:lol

You got me there Sombre ;)

[Squirrelloid]

WL: there actually is a factual disagreement here. K is positing that gem gens make the endgame more fair because you don't just lose to a massive sneak attack - ie, the fact that this income is hard to take away is better for balance. Whereas it's been posited by a number of people that gem gens are unbalanced because its gem income that can't be taken away. That's a major factual disagreement about what constitutes fair and balanced in the game.

[Hiisi]

3. The funny thing about the endgame is that you can take 90% of a person's provinces in a few rounds with thugs and SCs and then you have to actually fight their armies. It's actually good that the win doesn't always go to the sneak attacker.


You have a valid point, but i have to disagree. I think that no gem gens means
-Less SC / thugs able to beat PD
-More summoned units on field from defender, because no gem investments in gem gens.
-National units are more important than before. Easier to defend with, but difficult to blitz with.

I would say that it's harder to sneak/blitz if no gem gens...

[Kuritza]

You have a valid point, but i have to disagree. I think that no gem gens means
-Less SC / thugs able to beat PD
-More summoned units on field from defender, because no gem investments in gem gens.
-National units are more important than before. Easier to defend with, but difficult to blitz with.

I would say that it's harder to sneak/blitz if no gem gens...

If you're right, then gemgens actually allow nations with weaker national units to compete against nations with stronger armies. Thus, gemgens make this game more balanced. :)

[Psycho]

WL: there actually is a factual disagreement here. K is positing that gem gens make the endgame more fair because you don't just lose to a massive sneak attack - ie, the fact that this income is hard to take away is better for balance. Whereas it's been posited by a number of people that gem gens are unbalanced because its gem income that can't be taken away. That's a major factual disagreement about what constitutes fair and balanced in the game.

When the end game comes, you need to castle and dome yourself. You need to protect important provinces. If you let your enemy take them so easily, you deserve to lose.

[Hiisi]

You have a valid point, but i have to disagree. I think that no gem gens means
-Less SC / thugs able to beat PD
-More summoned units on field from defender, because no gem investments in gem gens.
-National units are more important than before. Easier to defend with, but difficult to blitz with.

I would say that it's harder to sneak/blitz if no gem gens...

If you're right, then gemgens actually allow nations with weaker national units to compete against nations with stronger armies. Thus, gemgens make this game more balanced. :)

Hey i didn't say that :smirk:
I meant from the point of view of sneaking/blitzing the game would be slower. Of course if no gem gens nations with strong armies/bless strat would be even better than now.

[WraithLord]

MM != Balance

This thread is about MM reduction in end game.
Any balance discussions are a side track as far is this thread is concerned.

[Psycho]

Any changes to reduce MM should attempt not to unbalance the game even more.

[Squirrelloid]

WL: there actually is a factual disagreement here. K is positing that gem gens make the endgame more fair because you don't just lose to a massive sneak attack - ie, the fact that this income is hard to take away is better for balance. Whereas it's been posited by a number of people that gem gens are unbalanced because its gem income that can't be taken away. That's a major factual disagreement about what constitutes fair and balanced in the game.

When the end game comes, you need to castle and dome yourself. You need to protect important provinces. If you let your enemy take them so easily, you deserve to lose.

Yes, you can protect a few sites. But if all your gem income is tied to sites you can lose an awful lot of it to a blitz attack. And then you've basically lost the game. A reduction of gem income by 50% is game losing at that point, because then your opponent outspends you substantially.

Hiisi:
Some nations have sneakable armies that can take PD without being especially strong. Or have thugs that don't actually need equipment. Or purchaseable SCs. etc... Removing the option for others to summon them just makes the ones who can purchase them better.

[WraithLord]

Any changes to reduce MM should attempt not to unbalance the game even more.

Agreed. This is the chief reason why some items were removed from the recommendation list.

Now, does anyone seriously claim that removing gem gens unbalances the game?- Not taking into account gem gen dependent nations.
If so, please elaborate the rational behind this claim.

[Squirrelloid]

Now, does anyone seriously claim that removing gem gens unbalances the game?- Not taking into account gem gen dependent nations.
If so, please elaborate the rational behind this claim.

See K here:

3. The funny thing about the endgame is that you can take 90% of a person's provinces in a few rounds with thugs and SCs and then you have to actually fight their armies. It's actually good that the win doesn't always go to the sneak attacker.

What more elaboration do you need?

[Burnsaber]

IMHO, if anyone loses 90% of provinces to a sneak attack, they likely just had some PD in those provinces and thought "I bought 3-5 pd and now I never have to worry about anything happening to them, ever!".

If that is the case, that guy deserved to lose. That lose was a result of that guy's own stupidity, not because he didn't have any gem gens.

[Squirrelloid]

gem gens recap:
1. Everybody does them. So nobody gets a serious advantage. I forge lots of them with every nation I play, even ones w/o paths. I just invest some and get/empower mages to needed paths. Everybody does it. The secret is out. All that's left is:
2. Tedious, mind numbing work of forging them and defending their holders.
3. They prolong end game since it's very hard to kill nations by taking their provinces. In-fact province are not that important when you have those 60 clams and 60 blood stones on scouts or what not.
4. They indirectly contribute to making end game turns longer by allowing a much higher gem income - thus more spells, SCs, forging work.
5. Coupled with wish the game just breaks.

Missed anything?

BTW, I have read somewhere that IW originally intended them to be used for battle. If there was a way to enforce that (not allowing their income to leave the holder) then they could be of use.

1. So they are not unbalancing the game. That's a flaw?
2. Yeh, and defending provinces, castles, mages, etc is so tedious.
3. The funny thing about the endgame is that you can take 90% of a person's provinces in a few rounds with thugs and SCs and then you have to actually fight their armies. It's actually good that the win doesn't always go to the sneak attacker.
4. Yes, having a gem income adds a level of complexity to the game. This is the wrong game for you if you don't like complexity.
5. Let's face it, any gem income and Wish causes weird things to happen. I once ended a game just by using my non-Astral, not gem-gen, gem income to Armageddon the place to death to force the end of the game because 15 players were stuck in terminal turtle mode and the game was never going to end.

Gem gens only cause MM when you spend a lot of time turtling and have extra gem income and mage time to spend on them. The fact that you want to hit people early and hard before they can build a hundred gem-gen items actually means that the endgame should be shorter if people are not stuck in terminal turtle mode.

If you spend a lot of time fighting, scripting a single large complicated army can take an hour or more. That and incentives to turtle should be the place where people should be spending their energies if they want to cut down MM.

IMHO, if anyone loses 90% of provinces to a sneak attack, they likely just had some PD in those provinces and thought "I bought 3-5 pd and now I never have to worry about anything happening to them, ever!".

If that is the case, that guy deserved to lose. That lose was a result of that guy's own stupidity, not because he didn't have any gem gens.

Lets assume that I'm playing Eriu and you're playing someone with notoriously bad PD. (Agartha maybe?) There is no amount of PD that will stop a sidhe lord with a vine shield and a frost brand, a decent bless, and appropriate buffs. (Mistform generally) I can have a lot of Sidhe Lords - more than you have provinces. Those sidhe lords can sneak and cloud trapeze. Its completely reasonable an Eriu attack deprives Agartha of every province that doesn't have a castle or army sitting in it before Agartha even knows there's a war on, plus as many armies as their main armies can destroy. (Eriu can even field armies that sneak, and are glamoured so you'd never know they were at your door regardless).

Even if Eriu can't take your fortresses/armies for a large number of turns, you've lost the game right there because you just lost most of your gem production, and Eriu is hardly the only nation who can do that.

[Sombre]

In fairness knowing that Eriu can do that, you'd expect Agartha to have done something about it. If they can't do anything about it, realistically, that's a national balance thing and doesn't really belong in this thread.

[Psycho]

@Wraithlord: I don't claim that removing gem gens unbalances the game (except for a few nations that should be compensated somehow). I am all for removing them. I just replied to your post about MM and balance.

@Squirrelloid: No, you won't protect some sites. You will protect most of them. You really need to be popping castles everywhere as lategame approaches as well as patrolling provinces (with your mages and thugs also) and putting domes all over the place. If you protect critical resources, provinces with many neighbors, chokepoints, then you will hamper Eriu's ability to raid you a lot.

[Micah]

Attacking gets you income but leaves your forces spread out and vulnerable. That's the tradeoff. Taking 90% of someone's lands in a turn means a huge investment of either time/money (sneaking) or gems (teleporting/trapezing) for the attacker, and then the defender has full knowledge of what each of those attack forces consists of and can prepare their counter attack accordingly. If they don't have the gems banked to survive for a few turns without their unforted gem income that's a play choice they decided on. A single SC kill by the defender can be worth a full turn's gem income, and the defender can take their pick of targets.

[Squirrelloid]

Attacking gets you income but leaves your forces spread out and vulnerable. That's the tradeoff. Taking 90% of someone's lands in a turn means a huge investment of either time/money (sneaking) or gems (teleporting/trapezing) for the attacker, and then the defender has full knowledge of what each of those attack forces consists of and can prepare their counter attack accordingly. If they don't have the gems banked to survive for a few turns without their unforted gem income that's a play choice they decided on. A single SC kill by the defender can be worth a full turn's gem income, and the defender can take their pick of targets.

...

A single SC kill is worth your gem income... ok... except your opponent is *getting* your gem income, so attacking you just paid for itself in gems alone. And if you can't take everything back in one turn (unlikely), he'll net profit in the long run even in the corner case where he refuses to engage you while you take your lands back.

How many multiples of your lost gem income in SCs do you have to be able to kill for it to be worth it? What if it's merely thugs with cheap gear?

And of course the entire time you're fighting in your territory, which may have morale bonuses for dominion, but that means its your land getting crapped on. 200% taxes, pillaging, and your economy is in shambles if you ever repel the attack and regain your provinces.

-----------

Psycho: so, you want people to spend their money on castles everywhere and make ending the game even more tedious than it already is? Not to mention funneling cash into making useless fortresses and not into units that could be winning the game for you?

(1) I'm virtually certain this loses to the person who only builds a reasonable number of castles for unit production and in strategic locations, because they have more mages and thus more mage turns (forgings/ritual castings/RPs) with which to work.
(2) Isn't the whole point that endgames which last forever are obnoxious? Needing to siege every single province is just pointlessly turtly.

I have to agree with K on at least one point, its the tendency of people to Turtle which leads to unfun gameplay.

[K]

Attacking gets you income but leaves your forces spread out and vulnerable. That's the tradeoff. Taking 90% of someone's lands in a turn means a huge investment of either time/money (sneaking) or gems (teleporting/trapezing) for the attacker, and then the defender has full knowledge of what each of those attack forces consists of and can prepare their counter attack accordingly. If they don't have the gems banked to survive for a few turns without their unforted gem income that's a play choice they decided on. A single SC kill by the defender can be worth a full turn's gem income, and the defender can take their pick of targets.

Any investments in gems (spells or lost SC/thugs) of the attacker is immediately paid by the seizure of 90% of an enemies sites. Only in the most extreme cases would it take more than a single turn of income from those sites to pay off that investment.

Also, now the defender is an attacker, so those thugs get to move first in those provinces that they now own and can move to a safe location where the defending nation cannot reach them.

There really is no way around the fact that without gem-gens, the sneak attacker always gets a killing blow against the defender. When the defender retakes some small portion of his lands, the attacker can now focus his forces to wipe them out having fatally crippled the defender's empire.

As an aside, I'm amused that no one thinks turtling is a cause of MM in the late game.

I'm also amused that people think they can remove things from the game and not have a balance discussion.

[Psycho]

I don't want people to do anything. I am telling you how to play the endgame if you aspire to win. Empty fortresses are not useful, you are very wrong there.

[Illuminated One]

edit: Sorry, OT
(Of course fun gameplay has nothing to do with MM. Some MM can be fun, it's only the repetitive actions that could be automated that's bad.
Fixing the MM thing doesn't stop with clams, everything where you a forced to do a repetitive action just to stay competitive should be changed imo)

I have to agree with K on at least one point, its the tendency of people to Turtle which leads to unfun gameplay.

Yes, you are right. However that's not due to the player's character (genuine turtlers won't survive into the late game, with gem gens or without, if only for the reason that the weakest looking nation is often on the receiving end of the dogpile). Let's look at some late game facts:
1) Taking a single province means 1% or 2% of the enemies income go to you
2) except for discount sites, which are not a good strategic option as they can either be hidden (summon something, move it away, don't call your mages D5 (*), don't build special forts...) or defended just by concentrating forces and exploiting turn 1 or turn limit defender advantage.
3) Loosing on of your "big guns" >= loosing 10 raiding parties.

So what do you do?
You don't use nuclear weapons on peasant villages, so even if you are on the offensive you use the cheapest thing that reliably routs the PD and keep your SCs and SC counters in reserve to drop on the enemies counteroffensive.
That's all fine if you are fighting an enemy who moves around his SCs or giant armies without expecting you to pick them off one by one. Or when you have a huge advantage through artifacts, uniques, recruitable SCs, or simply income (Well, I guess clams have been widely used in the 3 years the game is out. Only now everyone knows about them).
But when fighting a player of equal skill and situation this is rather a mess.
So, how to fix lategame?
Add a operational component into the game. Make the map so that strategical goals can be formulated (when I take this mountain range I will deprive the enemy of 90% his earth-gem income and his low prot thugs look rather poor), forcing both the attacker and the defender to bring their real forces into play (i.e. it shouldn't come down to just having to concentrate on a single province, it shouldn't need taking 90% of the enemies territory, more like 10-20%, and it should be worthwhile - i.e. research and magic diversification should be hard enough that noone can just change his strategy spontaneously).

(*) Sorry mate, you know who you are. ;)

[WraithLord]

Are you by chance referring to VPs?- Raid all you want, if you don't bring your heavy guns out and take those VPs you are toast anyway.

[Illuminated One]

Hmm, no I didn't think of them. Good point, I should play a VP game some day.

Although I guess, they fall into the category of singular provinces that can be forted and defended by concentrating forces, too.
I was more thinking of the player having to defend areas (and spreading out) for a specific gain.

[Psycho]

Even without VPs it is always enough to take those 10-20% of provinces, anyway. Once your opponent sees that you can take his lands bit by bit, it becomes evident that you will win eventually and futile to continue the game.

[Micah]

You sum up the advantage of a sneak attack pretty well, but I don't see how that relates to gem items.

If you lose 90% of your territory in a turn and can't reclaim it quickly you're sunk either way...there's still a large gem swing in favor of the attacker and your income will drop below your upkeep. In either situation you've got to rely on what you have on-hand to orchestrate your counterattack, not what your income is providing. Once the attack is sprung the difference between having 20 gem income versus your opponent's 80 without gens and having 70 versus your opponent's 130 with them is of little importance, you're still way behind and unlikely to catch up, even if the proportions are comparatively better. At that point the defender is reduced to protecting the few castles they have left, since an offensive push against a superior opponent that is expecting it is folly. Which leads us back to extreme cases of turtling, which it seems no one likes.

[Illuminated One]

Even without VPs it is always enough to take those 10-20% of provinces, anyway. Once your opponent sees that you can take his lands bit by bit, it becomes evident that you will win eventually and futile to continue the game.

Well, if you can take my provinces bit for bit and I can't do nothing about it, then you already have some advantage that I can't beat, I wasn't talking about that.
However if I can do something and you are just advancing with your real forces (instead of holding them back or making a trick switch whenever you take a province etc.) I can just equip my counters and teleport them on you/let you run into them. Especially as I don't care about particular provinces I can just have 1 less SC as you and 10 cheap raiders to take exactly as many provinces from you as you from me.

[K]

You sum up the advantage of a sneak attack pretty well, but I don't see how that relates to gem items.

If you lose 90% of your territory in a turn and can't reclaim it quickly you're sunk either way...there's still a large gem swing in favor of the attacker and your income will drop below your upkeep. In either situation you've got to rely on what you have on-hand to orchestrate your counterattack, not what your income is providing. Once the attack is sprung the difference between having 20 gem income versus your opponent's 80 without gens and having 70 versus your opponent's 130 with them is of little importance, you're still way behind and unlikely to catch up, even if the proportions are comparatively better. At that point the defender is reduced to protecting the few castles they have left, since an offensive push against a superior opponent that is expecting it is folly. Which leads us back to extreme cases of turtling, which it seems no one likes.

I think that the gem gen income is important, which is why people attach so much importance to it.

I mean, you can lose 90% of your provinces and take most or all of them back after a few turns of thug summoning and forging (both of which require some gem income); it's folly to believe that a sneak attacker is a superior opponent and will defeat you just because they attacked you while your attention was directed elsewhere.

[Micah]

Summons and forging don't require gem *income*, they require gems, which can be saved and aren't subject to being attacked by other players. Taking out gen items doesn't prevent you from keeping a strategic reserve on-hand.

[K]

Summons and forging don't require gem *income*, they require gems, which can be saved and aren't subject to being attacked by other players. Taking out gen items doesn't prevent you from keeping a strategic reserve on-hand.

But sustaining a meaningful counterattack does require an income. Basically, an income is the difference between a sneak attack always being a fatal blow or being simply very damaging but something you can fight your way out of.

I doubt anyone truly minds if an opponent is running on a reserve while they have an income because its a simple fact that someone on reserves has a limited number of turns before they become powerless. This means the win will always go to the sneak attacker if they show even a little sense to just wear out that reserve.

There is a pretty clear consensus that having gen-gems makes it harder for an aggressor to steamroll a defender. You've been arguing that it doesn't, AND that having a reserve is like having gem-gens and it does. Pick a side of the debate, because you can't have it both ways

[vfb]

Just to get my two cents in, I'm all in favour of (1) sneak attacks, and (2) making it easier for an aggressor to steamroll a defender.

[Micah]

If your counterattack is "meaningful" you'll be reclaiming provinces and hence income quickly. If you can't recover a significant portion of your provinces you're screwed in either case.

And my "side" of the debate is that gens make it harder to root out a defender from his last few forts, since his income isn't eliminated, but doesn't facilitate a meaningful comeback. It's a bit more nuanced than you make it out to be.

Due to a plethora of factors (first turn advantage, shelter in a fort and having concentrated force being the major ones) the defender's force in Dominions is much stronger than an attacker.

This additional effectiveness of the defenders' units due to defensive advantage combined with a disproportional, concentrated income, leads to what is, IMO, an undesirable situation in which it is neither feasible for the defender to mount a successful counterattack due to losing their defensive advantage, or for the attacker to risk a frontal assault on the defender's stronghold, leading to a non-interactive standoff.

If the defender tries to actually DO anything the fact that his income is still a fraction of the attacker's will quickly catch up to him and he'll have to either abandon his gains or have his forces picked apart since he is then forced to spread them out and risk offensive movement.

I suppose if you think that these kinds of standoffs are a plus we'll just have to disagree, as it is ultimately a matter of opinion, but I'm fairly confident in my analysis of the cause-and-effect game, especially after my experience dealing with Calmon's last stand in Artifacts...After trying to attack his last fort a couple of times and losing significant forces each time I finally stopped trying. He eventually thought he had a moment of weakness to exploit and attacked me, but was easily crushed without his defensive advantage, which concluded the matter. My only mistake was trying to finish him off instead of waiting from the beginning, and waiting isn't a very exciting game IMO.

[Kuritza]

I don't want people to do anything. I am telling you how to play the endgame if you aspire to win. Empty fortresses are not useful, you are very wrong there.

Of course empty forts are useful.

Raiders like Sidhe lords (how did Eriu survive till the late game anyway?), golems etc wont break the walls. And as soon as they move away, province is yours again.

If they dont walk away, you can teleport a golem inside and kill whoever is trying to besiege your castle. Or several golems, and wipe whoever is trying to storm your castle. You will have a decisive advantage of knowing the numbers (and even the names) of the attackers, while he doesnt know what to expect inside.

[Psycho]

I meant that the fortresses are useful. I didn't express myself well. It was the response to Squirrelloid saying they aren't useful.

[K]

If your counterattack is "meaningful" you'll be reclaiming provinces and hence income quickly. If you can't recover a significant portion of your provinces you're screwed in either case.

And my "side" of the debate is that gens make it harder to root out a defender from his last few forts, since his income isn't eliminated, but doesn't facilitate a meaningful comeback. It's a bit more nuanced than you make it out to be.

Due to a plethora of factors (first turn advantage, shelter in a fort and having concentrated force being the major ones) the defender's force in Dominions is much stronger than an attacker.

This additional effectiveness of the defenders' units due to defensive advantage combined with a disproportional, concentrated income, leads to what is, IMO, an undesirable situation in which it is neither feasible for the defender to mount a successful counterattack due to losing their defensive advantage, or for the attacker to risk a frontal assault on the defender's stronghold, leading to a non-interactive standoff.



Having an income is the same as having a reserve in that you are still spending gems at a fixed rate per turn, and the natural result of no gem gens is that people will keep greater reserves. This seems obvious now and thanks for pointing it out.

But, this means that the very situation you are trying to avoid will still happen.

The only difference is that people will give up and go into "revenge mode" earlier where they decide they can't win and that they are going to try to grind up as much of your forces as possible. They'll do this because without an income they'll have to make that reserve do as much damage as possible, so turtling is the natural choice due to the very advantages you discussed.

Calmon would have still ground up your attacks on his fortress with or without a gem gen income (going into an endgame fortress is always dicey, and it sounds like you were using an "army fighting" army and not a "fortress busting" army). The only difference is that he probably would never have tried to escape since he would have no hope of turning his reserves into the income he'd need to get his provinces back.

Your position is not more nuanced .... it just makes no sense. To achieve the result you want would require modding out fortresses or maybe using that one fortress that has no walls as everyone's fortress. You'll still get ground up by mage-heavy armies, but the only way to fix that is to mod out mages.

Removing gem gens only makes the game less interesting as people horde gems for inevitable sneak attacks (or they auto-lose because their reserve in insufficient).

[Micah]

My still-limited experience with genless games argues to the contrary on your last point, the latest RAND game is perhaps the best game of Dominions I've been involved in.

If the defending player wants to hole up in their fort in supposed "revenge mode" without gens they're welcome to do so, the world will pass them by, and eventually a player with income will be able to muster a force strong enough to crush them without significant casualties.

With gens the defender is able to constantly bolster their forces and have the effectiveness of their reinforcements multiplied by their defensive advantage, and/or the defender can fire off 10 earth attacks a turn from their blood stone income.

Gens cause the attacker to have to take stupid risks to eliminate the threat of an opponent with significant resources/income, but don't allow the attacker the benefit of being able to capture those resources. In fact, the defender can send those gem items to the attacker's enemies if it becomes clear that they're doomed, creating a double-jeopardy situation. Late game this can easily result in the winner of a hard-fought war ending up with less to show from it than the loser's ally, since the gen income can exceed the province income. I don't see how that is in any way a desirable mechanic to have. Do you disagree?

[WraithLord]

K, you present plausible arguments that makes sense.

However, I must say that my experience with gems gens agrees with Micah's assertions. I found myself in the situation he describes on a number of occasions. It boils down to penalizing the attacker which increases turtling. A partial remedy to that is adding house rules that disallow sending gems but I personally think that such a rule will have negative impact on the "fun" factor in diplomacy. Removing gem gens altogether seems like a cleaner solution. You know you've lost and want to give all your gem income to your attacker's enemies, better (for game balance) that it be 100 instead of 1k gems.

I still have very little MP experience w/o gem gens so I can't tell whether or not the perceived issues with gem gens are indeed solved when removed.

[K]

Gens cause the attacker to have to take stupid risks to eliminate the threat of an opponent with significant resources/income, but don't allow the attacker the benefit of being able to capture those resources. In fact, the defender can send those gem items to the attacker's enemies if it becomes clear that they're doomed, creating a double-jeopardy situation. Late game this can easily result in the winner of a hard-fought war ending up with less to show from it than the loser's ally, since the gen income can exceed the province income. I don't see how that is in any way a desirable mechanic to have. Do you disagree?

In parts.

You've correctly identified the problem of sending magic items to your ally, but again your solution does not solve the problem. The same problem exists if I send say....20 Phoenix Rods to my ally; my ally just gained a pile of power and the attacker is not going to take any part of that power if he conquers me. The solution to that is to remove forging altogether.

Heck, the very issue of allies creates unfairness where good players are dogpiled by lesser players and a skilled attacker might be crushed by not just the troops of his foe but the spells of his foe's ally. I personally have fought bloody wars with an opponent and over many turns eventually taking 95% of his provinces only to have his turtling neighbor come in and take all his provinces back for him. Again, this is not an issue that is fixed by killing gem gens.

I disagree that sneak attackers should have an easy time killing off other players. There is a short list of ways to take an entire empire in a few turns, and I'd prefer if the win did not always go to the few players lucky enough to be playing the right nation that neatly dovetails into one of those tactics.

You should have to take a person's fortress to end them as a threat, and I think it's shear laziness that prompts people to want the thugs they use to kill province defense to be the same thing they use to take a fortress. There should be a price to take another nation that you pay up front, and the pay-off takes several turns to mature.

It should take a while for people to get used to playing games without gem-gens, so I expect at least a good 6 months before people get used to keeping stockpiles.

[Micah]

Please, your comparisons to other items don't hold up. Most of them need to be *risked in combat* to be useful, meaning the attacker gets a crack at taking them out any time they're actually used. Boosters and the like for rituals are an exception, of course, but those generally take up a minor fraction of a nation's forging, and aren't nearly as useful to duplicate en masse, hence shipping them to an ally is much less unbalancing. Clams of course never want to see a battlefield and have *increasing* returns as you leverage wishes to make more of the things.

Additionally, if you ship off items that don't yield gems eventually the income of the provinces that were conquered WILL catch up in favor of the player that's actually attacking, making the attack worthwhile as at least a longterm investment. With gem items you can simply eclipse the value of the territory altogether.

[vfb]

In parts.

You've correctly identified the problem of sending magic items to your ally, but again your solution does not solve the problem. The same problem exists if I send say....20 Phoenix Rods to my ally; my ally just gained a pile of power and the attacker is not going to take any part of that power if he conquers me. The solution to that is to remove forging altogether.

...

I think a better solution is to disallow trading/sending of items (and might as well disallow sending of gems and gold stockpiles too) (and while we are at it, disallow intentional gifts/trades of units through charm/enslave).

[WraithLord]

I think three types of games are possible:
1. No diplo games. e.g. RAND. nothing can be sent between players.
2. All allowed diplo games.
3. Diplo games that disallow transfer of gems/income/units/VPs etc.

All have their place. The important thing is to make the ground rules clear from the get go.

[Sombre]

I think you can run a game with no diplo which isn't RAND but just ND. You just have to play with people who are trustworthy. Note that many of the problems with untrustworthy players (or general disagreements) stem from the huge size of games.

[WraithLord]

RAND can easily enforce the ND part due to A factor.
In ND games that would be much more difficult and may also become a source of disagreement between players. I can already imagine such disagreement at game end like some endless exhange:
while true:
Player A: That was completely unfair. Players B and C had an all game alliance and worked together against me so that B would win.
Players B,C: nonsense.
end while

At least ND games can inherently enforce the rules of no transfers of goods (so long as game turns are kept for later revision).
Anyway, I'd say ND games go to the first option.

Now, I must ask myself what does all that have to do with end-game MM? ;)

[Sombre]

No diplomacy does reduce endgame mm in my opinion, so that's what it has to do with it.

There are disadvantages to the A part of RAND games as well as advantages. I personally don't like the A part and I don't think it would actually prevent two people from colluding if they really wanted to. It might reduce the temptation for people, but if you're playing with players you trust you don't need to worry too about that temptation anyway.

[LDiCesare]

There are disadvantages to the A part of RAND games as well as advantages. I personally don't like the A part and I don't think it would actually prevent two people from colluding if they really wanted to.

Did anyone ever rename a commander into something like 'NAP3' and attack you with them?

[Sombre]

You could just send a message. If you want to cheat you'll cheat.

That is a funny idea though.

[Calahan]

Did anyone ever rename a commander into something like 'NAP3' and attack you with them?
That is one of the reasons why "renaming off" is an essential part of any good RAND game.

[Illuminated One]

The army appears to be commanded by "Hey Bogarus lets gang on Mictlan" the Indie commander who radiates power...

[Squirrelloid]

Renaming off is such a pain in the ***. I hate not being able to see paths from the world overview while looking at commanders in a province. Or from the army setup screen while scripting mages.

[Sombre]

It's something of a mood breaker to run into commanders called 'F1D3E1' or 'W Access' when you're playing though. It matters to some people (me included). I prefer renaming off for this reason.

[WraithLord]

I find it more painful to waste precious minutes looking for that specific mage with desired paths. For the sake of MM reduction I change all random path mages names.
The prohibition in RAND game hurts but I can understand why it's required.

[Illuminated One]

Well ... the big problem with renaming is that the enemy can see your names sometimes. Might just be the little extra intel your enemy needs when arming against your SC.
And might just be the thing that gave your cheating away in a RAND game when a message would never be seen.

[Micah]

The F1 key is really awesome. =)

[Squirrelloid]

Yes, sadly it doesn't help when you want to mass paste mage orders from a couple of pre-set options, and you want to see each mage's paths and you run down the caster list in army prep.

[WraithLord]

The F1 key is really awesome. =)

Sadly, It could have been *much* better. In the past I have proposed to IW the following improvements:
1. Make it sortable by columns. This will allow you to work on top 5 income provinces or top 5 unrest etc.
2. Make it filterable.

And I think these would be cool as well:
3. Allow to see long text strings, like teleport orders. Now you see "X is teleporting to long-" when he's teleporting to long-province-name.
4. Allow to generate reports. All spells cast at province # N. This actually would be quite awesome in late game.
5. Set marks (like in VIM) for "favorite" locations in F1 report.