Some ideas: raiding, seiging, spell AI and more..

[alexti]

baruk said:
The bugbears:

- Defending unfortified provinces from raids is too hard.
Solution: Initiative system for movement.

- Defending from raids using castles is too easy.
Solution: Castle speedbump effect removed.

I'm not sure if making defending unfortified provinces from raids easier is a positive thing. Some strategies rely on raiding rather than taking on the clash of armies. And I'm on receiving end of such strategy in one of my MP games. I keep winning major battles with minimal losses and a good loot from the enemy, but I'm still losing the game, because of massive raids. That's an interesting experience, and one thing that makes Dominions 2 great is the variety of different strategies that can lead to success.

In any case, this kind of change would affect the game a lot and it wouldn't be easy to rebalance other things to keep everything in balance.

baruk said:
- The spell AI ignores my orders.
Solution: Change AI, and the way gems are used in battle.

Actually, it was changed in one of the patches (was it in 2.12?) Before, AI tended to waste gems without a reason. Now it is much smarter and uses the gems sensibly (in most cases). The one problem that I see is that sometimes the mages won't use extra gems to bring their fatigue lower. But this is one is not easy to resolve. Sometimes I'd give the mage extra gems, so that he can lower his fatigue and in another situation I'd give more gems because I expect to fight 2 battles in the same turn. Making it configurable would add even more micromanagement, but if AI would just use spare gems only in the castle battles (storming or defending vs storm), which are bound to be the Last I'd be glad.

Generally, spell-casting AI is not that bad if you brought right mages and gems. Several times I was surprised by AI switching to his own plan (better than mine) after running through my scripts.

baruk said:
- Gem generators, used every game, by everybody, yawn.
Solution: Add a dominion based per-province limit.

Is there actually a problem here? I highly doubt that there's a problem with bloodstones, fever fetishes is not likely to be a problem either, so only clams are candidates, but there's no agreement on that issue. Maybe the latest change (non-stacking gem generators) will be sufficient to close the whole issue.

baruk said:
- Sphinx lost teleport. Effectiveness of magical movement over standard movement for defence and offence.
Solution: Planar sickness.

Personally, I like Sphinx being non-teleportable, it makes him a unique pretender. Magical movement really helps in the late large games. Just imaging dragging that large army of yours across of 15 provinces just to get anywhere close to the enemy. And then the enemy can avoid you infinitively. So in the end it may become just a matter of filling all provinces with a large armies (sooner or later one will have enough gems to do it). But this will cause "army-size-inflataion". Those "large" army will be considered a small forces, while the real "now large" armies will have to be dragged across the map again. So the magic movement is needed at least to avoid horrible micromanagement. If there're too many penalties for teleporting (stands for any kind of magic movement) armies, nobody will use them to engage in a serious battle, which will result in all that extra micromanagement.

Suggested 20 fatigue per size is too much of a penalty, in my opinion. Though just 20 fatigue (or some similar number) can be an interesting option. Another option would be to make teleporting defenders lose initiative, meaning that in this case the turn sequence would be: defending garrison - attacking army - teleported defenders. Dom2 engine probably doesn't support such a sequence, but it can be emulated by making teleporting defenders skip their first round. Attackers (whether they move magically or not) are already at disadvantage, so I'm not sure that any extra penalties would be good.

baruk said:
It is arguable whether these concerns are necessarily valid or important. Its likely the solutions would provoke as much outrage and gnashing of teeth as the problems they are supposed to fix.

[baruk]

alexti said:

I'm not sure if making defending unfortified provinces from raids easier is a positive thing. Some strategies rely on raiding rather than taking on the clash of armies. And I'm on receiving end of such strategy in one of my MP games. I keep winning major battles with minimal losses and a good loot from the enemy, but I'm still losing the game, because of massive raids. That's an interesting experience, and one thing that makes Dominions 2 great is the variety of different strategies that can lead to success.

In any case, this kind of change would affect the game a lot and it wouldn't be easy to rebalance other things to keep everything in balance.

My suggestion is more of a tweak to the movement system, than an attempt to hurt raiding.

An example: a raiding party is attacking Nation A. It can attack one of 5 provinces. The defenders have one army trying to intercept the raiders. Under the current system, to force a fight, the defenders have to move into the correct province being raided, a 1 in 5 chance of success. Using my suggestion, and assuming both forces are equal, the defenders can attempt to force a fight by moving into the province currently occupied by the raiders. They would have an almost 50/50 chance of moving first, and striking the raiders before they move. Note that in the case of the raiders winning the battle, they would still carry out their movement order and raid their target province.

I think a change to the movement system would be a step forward. At the moment the simultaneous movement system gives the advantage to raiders. With an initiative system, players would have to plan raids more carefully to be successful. They would gain initiative advantages from using faster troops, which would add variety to the game.

baruk said:
- The spell AI ignores my orders.
Solution: Change AI, and the way gems are used in battle.

alexti said:Actually, it was changed in one of the patches (was it in 2.12?) Before, AI tended to waste gems without a reason. Now it is much smarter and uses the gems sensibly (in most cases). The one problem that I see is that sometimes the mages won't use extra gems to bring their fatigue lower. But this is one is not easy to resolve. Sometimes I'd give the mage extra gems, so that he can lower his fatigue and in another situation I'd give more gems because I expect to fight 2 battles in the same turn. Making it configurable would add even more micromanagement, but if AI would just use spare gems only in the castle battles (storming or defending vs storm), which are bound to be the Last I'd be glad.

Generally, spell-casting AI is not that bad if you brought right mages and gems. Several times I was surprised by AI switching to his own plan (better than mine) after running through my scripts.

Fair enough. I would agree that making spell AI more configurable would help. I just sense that Illwinter want to keep the system as simple as possible.

My argument is basically that players cannot adequately control gem usage of their mages over several battles in one turn. Ideally there would only be one battle a turn for each mage to be prepared for, or fresh orders could be given in between battles. Consider a mage in a lab province, with a stack of gems. He gets involved in a fight, and uses all his gems. He will have no gems for the next fight that turn, as I can't give him the gems until the turn is finished processing, even though he has a lab available. Either a super-AI, more configurable orders, or battle-usage-friendly gems are needed to resolve this.

baruk said:
- Gem generators, used every game, by everybody, yawn.
Solution: Add a dominion based per-province limit.

alexti said:
Is there actually a problem here? I highly doubt that there's a problem with bloodstones, fever fetishes is not likely to be a problem either, so only clams are candidates, but there's no agreement on that issue. Maybe the latest change (non-stacking gem generators) will be sufficient to close the whole issue.

Perhaps.

Gem generators are not much of a problem to me. However, some dominions players like to limit their use in games. I have (hopefully) suggested a fun, creative, in-theme way to do this.

The non-clam of pearls gem generators are less of a problem, but it makes sense to put the same limits on them, as otherwise the "problem" simply moves to another item. In any case, if they are not produced in large numbers, they are not affected by my limitation, which affects the total number of productive generators in each province, rather than the ability to produce them. Only the wild-eyed, frothing-at-the-mouth horde fetishists should be hurt by my proposed change.

baruk said:
- Sphinx lost teleport. Effectiveness of magical movement over standard movement for defence and offence.
Solution: Planar sickness.

alexti said:
Personally, I like Sphinx being non-teleportable, it makes him a unique pretender. Magical movement really helps in the late large games. Just imaging dragging that large army of yours across of 15 provinces just to get anywhere close to the enemy. And then the enemy can avoid you infinitively. So in the end it may become just a matter of filling all provinces with a large armies (sooner or later one will have enough gems to do it). But this will cause "army-size-inflataion". Those "large" army will be considered a small forces, while the real "now large" armies will have to be dragged across the map again. So the magic movement is needed at least to avoid horrible micromanagement. If there're too many penalties for teleporting (stands for any kind of magic movement) armies, nobody will use them to engage in a serious battle, which will result in all that extra micromanagement.

Suggested 20 fatigue per size is too much of a penalty, in my opinion. Though just 20 fatigue (or some similar number) can be an interesting option. Another option would be to make teleporting defenders lose initiative, meaning that in this case the turn sequence would be: defending garrison - attacking army - teleported defenders. Dom2 engine probably doesn't support such a sequence, but it can be emulated by making teleporting defenders skip their first round. Attackers (whether they move magically or not) are already at disadvantage, so I'm not sure that any extra penalties would be good.

Good suggestions.

Late game army movement would not be affected by my changes, just the offensive use of some of the magical movement spells would be curtailed. The late game, research level 8 and 9 spells would not have a fatigue penalty. And I suggested in another post that level 8 or 9 fatigue-free Versions of teleport and cloud trapeze would be available.

[alexti]

baruk said:
- The spell AI ignores my orders.
Solution: Change AI, and the way gems are used in battle.

alexti said:Actually, it was changed in one of the patches (was it in 2.12?) Before, AI tended to waste gems without a reason. Now it is much smarter and uses the gems sensibly (in most cases). The one problem that I see is that sometimes the mages won't use extra gems to bring their fatigue lower. But this is one is not easy to resolve. Sometimes I'd give the mage extra gems, so that he can lower his fatigue and in another situation I'd give more gems because I expect to fight 2 battles in the same turn. Making it configurable would add even more micromanagement, but if AI would just use spare gems only in the castle battles (storming or defending vs storm), which are bound to be the Last I'd be glad.

Generally, spell-casting AI is not that bad if you brought right mages and gems. Several times I was surprised by AI switching to his own plan (better than mine) after running through my scripts.

baruk said:
Fair enough. I would agree that making spell AI more configurable would help. I just sense that Illwinter want to keep the system as simple as possible.

My argument is basically that players cannot adequately control gem usage of their mages over several battles in one turn. Ideally there would only be one battle a turn for each mage to be prepared for, or fresh orders could be given in between battles. Consider a mage in a lab province, with a stack of gems. He gets involved in a fight, and uses all his gems. He will have no gems for the next fight that turn, as I can't give him the gems until the turn is finished processing, even though he has a lab available. Either a super-AI, more configurable orders, or battle-usage-friendly gems are needed to resolve this.

I find it good to have mroe than one battle per turn. It gives more interesting options. Concerning the mage near the lab, it maybe reasonable to replenish gems between the battles, but what is supposed to happen if there isn't enough gems? And in any case 2 battles in the province where you control the lab is really uncommon.

baruk said:
- Gem generators, used every game, by everybody, yawn.
Solution: Add a dominion based per-province limit.

alexti said:
Is there actually a problem here? I highly doubt that there's a problem with bloodstones, fever fetishes is not likely to be a problem either, so only clams are candidates, but there's no agreement on that issue. Maybe the latest change (non-stacking gem generators) will be sufficient to close the whole issue.

baruk said:
Perhaps.

Gem generators are not much of a problem to me. However, some dominions players like to limit their use in games. I have (hopefully) suggested a fun, creative, in-theme way to do this.

The non-clam of pearls gem generators are less of a problem, but it makes sense to put the same limits on them, as otherwise the "problem" simply moves to another item. In any case, if they are not produced in large numbers, they are not affected by my limitation, which affects the total number of productive generators in each province, rather than the ability to produce them. Only the wild-eyed, frothing-at-the-mouth horde fetishists should be hurt by my proposed change.

What I don't like about your idea is not the limitation, but "per-province" basis. If now you can just slap clam on the third from the left researher, with your idea you'd have to count how many clams are already in this province (meaning scanning all mages there) and then to take into account possible dominion change. And all these efforts don't really add anything to the game experience. With overall limit, you'd typically know that you're well below the limit, so no worries and counting. I'm still not sure if the overall limit would be a good idea or not.

[Cheezeninja]

Regarding Doom Horrors, I just encountered them for the first time in a MP game, playing against Zapmeisters R'yleh using Jotunheim. While they ate everything (including many Jarls) that I threw at them for awhile I was eventually able to make huge headway against them to the tune of massed vampires and counts (free immortal chaff/disintigrate or drain life or skeleton casters) along with Jade amazons and Gyjas fitted with rune smashers, thistle maces, spell foci, flying boots, and AMA's set to mass cast charm. I was able to pay for my own gear with my own stockpile of clams and fetishes, which gave me enough gem capital to completely create the charm strategy in ~3 turns, which was quick enough to allow me to survive. While its quite likely I will still eventually lose, right now i've killed 3 horrors and brought one over to my own side, complete with ring of regen and AMA of his own.

Doom Horrors are far from invincible, if I was going to spend a hundred astrals on something it would probably be wishing for bloodslaves and mass-casting Vampire Counts.

[baruk]

alexti said:
I find it good to have mroe than one battle per turn. It gives more interesting options. Concerning the mage near the lab, it maybe reasonable to replenish gems between the battles, but what is supposed to happen if there isn't enough gems? And in any case 2 battles in the province where you control the lab is really uncommon.

Multiple battles (per army) in a turn are not bad in themselves. It seems a little easy to me for a knowledgable player to use the system against gem-wielding mages. Players can always use their familiarity with the AI against others.

Labs may usually be in fortified provinces, but also consider the more common situation when people use scouts as gem carriers for large armies. It doesn't make sense to me that a mage wouldn't try to replenish his gem supply mid-turn before a major battle (having spent his gems in a magical battle). I doubt that an AI would accomplish this satisfactorily, though (but maybe worth a try). With a limited gem supply, gems may go to the wrong mages, or be distributed in insufficient numbers.

alexti said:
What I don't like about your idea is not the limitation, but "per-province" basis. If now you can just slap clam on the third from the left researher, with your idea you'd have to count how many clams are already in this province (meaning scanning all mages there) and then to take into account possible dominion change. And all these efforts don't really add anything to the game experience. With overall limit, you'd typically know that you're well below the limit, so no worries and counting. I'm still not sure if the overall limit would be a good idea or not.

Its true that it would add a lot of micro-management. Being a veteran of dominions-PPP, I have built up quite a tolerance.

Gem generation would happen before dominion change under my system (not sure what the turn order is currently), so your number of active generators would be predictable from turn-to-turn.

An overall limit may be better in terms of micro-managing. It would, however, allow more of an all-eggs-in-one-basket type approach for the hoarder, made effective by use of domes. A simpler limit could be that any null or enemy-dominion province has a limit of one active generator.

Dominion pushing as a tool against hoarders could be interesting, might add something to the game.