Poll: How much will the new bless effects affect your pretender design?

[Psitticine]

Originally posted by Chris Byler:

quote:

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Originally posted by Psitticine:
The best solution to things like this is usually to allow people their choice in the matter. A good idea might be to have a system where players could set how expensive magical power is to suit their own tastes. The problem there, however, lies in the UI: that choice would need to be made before or during god design, and yet the game and its settings are chosen after the god design is completed.

I have a quick fix for that: instead of capping god designs at 500 points, just have each god record its total point value. Then when you start a game you would set the maximum point value of gods that are allowed in that game.

So if I want to see more powerful magic and blessings on everyone I could play with 600 or 700 point gods.

Of course, this would probably go better if the suggestion to record multiple gods per nation (in the newlords folder) were implemented.

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I like that idea. Possibly one setting for max. points allowed in the game and another for setting the proportion that needs to be for scales vs. Pretender magic? You could set up some very interesting games that way.

[Aetius]

(long)

I was not aware of the revisions to the Dominions 1 blessing effect until I read this thread, in particular Nerfix's breakdown of the modifiers. Playing the demo I have had only one pretender that was successful with the blessing effects, this pretender was a red dragon leading Ulm with the Iron Faith Theme. I must admit that the black templars are devastating with flaming weapons. However, late game it remains to be seen how effective a potent blessing pretender will be.

As pointed out in Chris Byler's post the cost of creating the potent blessing pretender are very high. For my Ulmite pretender I had to take significant negatives in the drain (-2) and misfortune scales (-3),if I recall correctly. The misfortune was partly balanced out by the strong order scale (+3). However, I was shall we say magically challenged and R'leyh in particular caused my nation fits.

I have noticed that the Dominion increasing effect of purchasing temples increases the number of holy troops that you can have. This observation made me wonder if it would be appropriate to have the pretender's blessing effect increase if additional magical empowerment is performed. I think the gem cost alone would balance things. Lastly, I noticed that rival AI pretenders frequently had one magical area in the 9+ range to obtain the greater blessing benenfits.

[HJ]

Originally posted by Aetius:
This observation made me wonder if it would be appropriate to have the pretender's blessing effect increase if additional magical empowerment is performed. I think the gem cost alone would balance things.

I think that it would equalize things too much, as everybody would in the end get the same bonuses, and therefore diminish the variability inherent in the present system. Furthermore, it would make the sacrifices that you have to make while creating a pretender unneccessary, as you can always make up for it later. This way it's deterministic, and either you sacrifice the points to get a good bless or you don't, but there's no going back - a tradeoff that you have to live with. Also, it would put too much focus on empowering your pretender, as opposed to doing other things with the gems.

[ November 06, 2003, 23:49: Message edited by: HJ ]

[Aetius]

Originally posted by HJ:
I think that it would equalize things too much, as everybody would in the end get the same bonuses, and therefore diminish the variability inherent in the present system. Furthermore, it would make the sacrifices that you have to make while creating a pretender unneccessary, as you can always make up for it later. This way it's deterministic, and either you sacrifice the points to get a good bless or you don't, but there's no going back - a tradeoff that you have to live with. Also, it would put too much focus on empowering your pretender, as opposed to doing other things with the gems.

I disagree - your approach seems too deterministic. There are many things late game to pump gems into, powerful summons, global enchantments, even some of the more powerful battle spells. And thus there would still be tradeoffs late game as opposed to a one time only decision at the start of the game - maybe that approach suits you but for myself, no thanks.

[Keir Maxwell]

Originally posted by geo981010:
The shroud would still be great for some supercombatants though, especially for Ice Devils. Their base armor of 15, up to 20 in the cold, so the armor effect is icing. Getting regeneration, Beserk + 3, 50% poison res, and possibly other bonuses too (reinvig seems like a good choice and a Great Mother allows this) and you have a supercombatant that only takes 5 gems of equipment. I hacked a map and made an Ice Devils (I got Nycafor) with just the shroud, and he was really nasty even with the new tweaks to reduce supercombatants.

I can't wait to play Pythium with an Earth +4 mage, too

I wouldn't quite describe extra protection for Ice Devils as icing. Close to essential in a province with heat scale as they can melt away before even feeble opponents and there will be tough stuff around by the time you can summon one. I agree the Shroud is a damn good idea - especially for the earth 9, nature 9 earth mother option of Jotun. The Ice Devil has alot of slots and with a limit on how many Ice Devil's you can use I would fill alot-to-almost all of the slots. With regeneration and a Wraith Sword the ability to recover HP's should be quite remarkable.

The reinvigorated sacred Pythium mages could be insane I want to try with Abysia, I have always had a prejudice against the Romans, but I don't think that side of the design will be anywhere near as impressive as Pythiums uses.

Don't worry, be happy . . .

Keir

[HJ]

Originally posted by Aetius:
I disagree - your approach seems too deterministic. There are many things late game to pump gems into, powerful summons, global enchantments, even some of the more powerful battle spells. And thus there would still be tradeoffs late game as opposed to a one time only decision at the start of the game - maybe that approach suits you but for myself, no thanks.

To me it seems that everybody would be getting the same bless bonuses later on, and therefore blur alot of things that make each game distinct now. In addition, it would diminish the incentive to try out new pretenders with different sets of bless effects.

I guess we'll have to agree that we disagree on this.

[geo981010]

I'm glad this thread is still active - it's been fun!

Seems like the blessings are starting to be appreciated, and maybe only some tweaking should be done. Niefel is pretty nasty as long as you can keep things cold, and I've been having a lot of fun with the 9 Earth 4 Nature Sacred Serpent Pythium. I think that is a very good starting race, and the Serpent mages are really suited for to win a research war. Not as powerful as Arch Theurgs, but are recuitable anywhere, much cheaper (3 holy, 3 magics plus 1 random for only 190 GP), and half upkeep from holy. +magic scale and you will be Foul Vapouring by turn 10, and Beserking Hydras and SMs are immune to boot.

One area I don't think anyone has argued for though - Level 10 magics. Cost from raising 9 to 10:
80 - (initial magic strength * 8)

And what do you get? +1 Attack/Defense/Reinvig/etc! There effects are totally not worth that cost, and the highest spell only requires level 9 to cast, so I can't see this being anything but a trap for newbies to sink points into.

How about a second bonus for getting +10? There are some good potential specials that would be viable: Fire Shield, Charge Body, Water Shield, Stoneskin, Luck, Life Stealing Attack, Barkskin, Harm effect on hits, etc. OK, some of these would need balancing, but give me a reason to try a +10 pretender!

[ November 08, 2003, 02:53: Message edited by: geo981010 ]

[Sammual]

Originally posted by geo981010:
One area I don't think anyone has argued for though - Level 10 magics. Cost from raising 9 to 10:
80 - (initial magic strength * 8)

And what do you get? +1 Attack/Defense/Reinvig/etc! There effects are totally not worth that cost, and the highest spell only requires level 9 to cast, so I can't see this being anything but a trap for newbies to sink points into.

How about a second bonus for getting +10? There are some good potential specials that would be viable: Fire Shield, Charge Body, Water Shield, Stoneskin, Luck, Life Stealing Attack, Barkskin, Harm effect on hits, etc. OK, some of these would need balancing, but give me a reason to try a +10 pretender!

I have asked for the same thing. There is NOTHING worth the points to take level 10.
I would like to see the cost drasticly lowered or the 10th level made worth it.

Sammual