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Old March 21st, 2008, 06:21 AM
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AFFLICTIONS

Q: My units have one or more red hearts in their display screens. What does that mean?
Your units have accumulated afflictions. Afflictions are permanent wounds that hamper the unit in some way and there is a wide variety of them, some more severe than others. Each heart indicates one affliction.

Q: How do units get afflictions?
They may get afflictions if they are hit and suffer damage in battle. They may also get afflictions from old age. Accumulation of old age afflictions is checked at the end of each game year (i.e. every 12 turns). Any unit with the affliction Diseased has a high chance of getting one or more additional afflictions every turn until it dies. Undead and demons are not affected by disease. Being cursed will double your chances of getting a battle affliction. Having regeneration will reduce your chance of getting a battle affliction. The reduction is dependent on the amount of regeneration, the greater the regeneration as percentage of hitpoints, the less likely the unit is to get an affliction.

Q: How do I tell what afflictions my units have and what the afflictions do?
Right-click on the heart icon. It will tell you what penalty that affliction gives to the unit (e.g. Chest Wound: -1 str, +5 enc)

Q: I want to place all of my units with afflictions in a separate stack. How do I do that quickly?
Click to select any unit in a stack. Press 'w' and all afflicted units will be selected. Put them in a separate squad. Remember to check whether the unit you first selected had an affliction or not and put it back if it didn't.


Q: Can I get rid of afflictions? How?
Yes, but it depends on whether the unit with the affliction is undead, non-undead or non-undead suffering from old age. A short summary of how afflictions can be removed:
  • Units with the special ability Recuperation heal afflictions on their own over time. So do creatures with immortality. Recuperation apparently does not work if the creature is suffering from old age.
  • Units that have an involuntary shapechange ability, such as Mictlan's Jaguar Warriors, may heal afflictions when they change back to their normal shape after battle. This is checked every time they change from their secondshape back to their firstshape. It is not a reliable method of healing afflictions, but can sometimes give you pleasant surprises with shapechanging commanders (e.g. Machakan Black Sorcerer)
  • Battle afflictions can be healed by units that have the Heal troops ability. Units with this ability have an icon (since patch 3.14) that says 'Healer (value)'. Some units with the Heal Troops ability are Priestess (Arcoscephale, all ages), the Faery Queen (a Lv 8 Conjuration summon, requires Lv 4 Nature) and the Mother of Serpents (a pretender goddess available to certain nations). There are other units with this ability as well, but they are mostly restricted to certain nations.
  • The chance to heal a battle affliction differs for each of these units and some afflictions are more difficult to heal than others (Never Healing Wound being the most difficult). Healing works so that the number you see is the chance to successfully use a healing ability that turn. If the check is successful, it checks against the difficulty of the affliction and if that succeeds as well, the affliction is removed.
  • Units with Heal troops command CANNOT heal afflictions on undead units or non-undead units who are suffering from old age.
  • Afflictions on undead units can ONLY be healed if you have cast the global enchantment Gift of Health or have built the artefact The Chalice and equipped it on a commander in the same province as the afflicted units. Without Gift of Health or The Chalice, you're out of luck.
  • Afflictions on non-undead units that are old can only be healed within the same limitations as afflictions on undead units. However, if you can make a unit young again its afflictions can be healed normally. You can make a unit young by empowering it with the appropriate type of magic (see aging mechanics later in the FAQ) or if it already has that kind of magic, by giving it a path booster. Depending on how much younger you need to make it and how much its base maxage is, an increase of one point may not be enough.
  • You can prevent afflictions caused by old age by forging the magic items Boots of Youth or Elixir of Life, which freeze the aging process on the owner.
  • There are also two magic sites that heal afflictions: Healing Spring and Lyfjaberg. It is unknown if they heal old age afflictions as well as battle afflictions, but they probably only affect battle afflictions. It is also unknown if undead are healed of afflictions, but probably not.
  • Finally, afflictions caused by items such as Black Heart or Eye of Aiming cannot be healed in any way. They can be healed only if the item is removed, which is very difficult in most cases.

Q: How do I remove cursed items that cause afflictions?
These are the currently known methods:
  • Shape change (and alternative form must not have the slot the cursed item is equipped in, e.g. Armor of Thorns on a Dragon's human form because the Dragon form has no body slot) - Cursed items get placed into lab.
  • Transformation spell (again new form must not have the slot the cursed item is equipped in) - Cursed items get placed into lab.
  • If the cursed item is unique, it can be wished away by using the spell Wish - Cursed item is lost (if wished away by another player) or transferred to the mage that cast Wish (if it was the player who wished it away)
  • A Wished for item can replace the cursed item in some instances. - Cursed items get placed into lab
  • Dying and being brought back to life. Either via Call God (if Pretender) or resummoned (if unique unit) or automatically if died in positive friendly Dominion for Immortals - Cursed items are not placed into lab.
  • Ritual of Rebirth for mummified version of the unit if it's in HoF - Cursed items are not placed into lab.
  • Twiceborn should also work, the unit must die before being reborn as a wight mage - Cursed items are not placed into lab.


Q: My units in <province> are getting diseased. How?
  • If your troops are starving due to lack of supplies, they will get diseased
  • Troops can get disease if you're getting random events indicating that somebody is hammering the province with disease causing spells or there is a sneaking enemy commander equipped with Bane Venom Charm or possessing the equivalent intrinsic ability in the province.
  • You may have a magic site in the province that spreads disease. Disease causing sites will cause them even if they are not discovered. There are four sites that spread disease: Inkpot End (always visible), Chillsick Swamp, Leper Fens and Crown of Darkness. Only undead and demonic troops will be safe in that province.

Q: My units in <province> are getting cursed/horrormarked. The whaa-at?
Congratulations. You seem to be the proud owner of a province that contains a site which gives out curses/horrormarks. Curse/horrormark is checked separately for each unit in the province every turn. Consult the magic site section of the Dom3 DB by Edi for a list of probable culprits and the chance of curse/horrormark for each. It's best to keep units out of those provinces or they will eventually get curse/horrormarked.

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CURSES & HORRORMARKS

Q: My unit has been cursed. What does that mean?
It means that the unit will be twice as likely to get battle afflictions if it's hit in combat and suffers damage. See the manual for details on how afflictions are accumulated and what the normal chance of getting an affliction is.

Q: How do I remove the Curse?
You don't. Curse is permanent and will stay with the unit for the rest of the game. There is NO way to remove it. At all. Removing curses will NOT be added in a patch.

Q: How do I avoid getting cursed? If I can't, how do I avoid getting my god cursed?
Don't attack provinces with lizards as the independent defenders with your god. Especially if the god is a titan, wyrm or other large monster. Mages capable of casting curse will generally always target the biggest monsters first, so your pretender will get hit first. Generally, you need to be careful and pay attention to what you're doing. That way you can stave it off for some time at least. Unless of course you get hit by a random event that curses your units.
In multislayer games with other people, your god WILL get cursed sooner or later if it's a super combatant (SC) and your opponent has access to nature and astral magic on the same mage.

Q: My unit has been horrormarked. What does that mean?
It means that the unit is now a magnet for astral creatures called horrors. Horrors summoned into battles will attack the horrormarked units before they consider any other targets. Horrormarked units also have a chance of being attacked by horrors every turn. Such attacks are treated as assassination attempts.

Q: I heard that horrormarks are different in strength. What does that mean?
It means that horrormarks are not binary attributes (i.e. on/off). Horrormarks have varying strength. Generally when a unit gets its first horror mark, the horror mark will be weak and will only attract weak horrors, most often lesser horrors. Note that 'weak' is a relative term. Lesser horrors are perfectly capable of having most recruitable human-sized commanders for lunch unless the commander is a powerful mage or is properly equipped with magic items. If a unit is hit by a horror in combat, the strength of the horrormark increases. Some items also increases the strength of a horrormark. A stronger horrormark will attract stronger horrors, which typically results in either the unit dying or having its horrormark strengthened if it survives, trapping it in a vicious circle of an increasingly strengthening horrormark that results in attacks by increasingly stronger horrors.

Q: My commanders are getting attacked by <insert description of ridiculously powerful horror here>. How do I get them to survive?
These monsters are collectively known as Doom Horrors and they are unique. The answer to your question is that generally your unit will not survive, period. If it's a strong unit such as one of the unique summoned creatures, a SC and/or a powerful mage, is properly equipped, with proper bodyguards, properly scripted and gets very lucky, it may survive one of the weaker Doom Horrors. Most of the time getting attacked by a Doom Horror means that the target might as well bend over and kiss its backside goodbye. Unless there is a spell like Returning scripted or the unit is immortal and in friendly dominion. If the unit in question is your god, too bad. Bringing him back will just get him attacked again and again.

Q: How do I remove a Horrormark?
You don't. A Horrormark is just as permanent as Curse.

Q: How do I avoid getting my units horrormarked?
The same way you avoid getting them cursed. Pay attention and be careful. Mages with level 2 in Astral magic can cast a spell that horrormarks units and they tend to prioritize targets the same way mages casting Curse do. So avoid tangling with them.
In multislayer games, your SC is going to get horrormarked sooner or later when you run up against an opponent with access to Astral magic. That's a fact of life in Dom3.

Last edited by Edi; December 4th, 2012 at 02:52 AM.. Reason: Clarification
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