Poll: Is Clam Hording Too Good?

Xietor · #1 September 15th, 2007, 12:46 AM

The issue is they are unbalancing when being made at 2-3 a turn and start to number well over a hundred, amounting to a free wish every turn.

Micah · #2 September 15th, 2007, 12:49 AM

Yes, my point was that by the time that happens any nation can have 90 clams, compared to the 100 that a naturally-clamming nation can have. Not a big deal.

Xietor · #3 September 15th, 2007, 12:52 AM

Not everyone wants to clam though. Personally I find it boring. And i do not like to see any one strategy as necessary to win a game.

And not every race can use the astral gems. It takes s9 to wish.

Micah · #4 September 15th, 2007, 01:16 AM

Xietor - When you're talking about popping wishes every turn the cost to empower a wisher is pretty trivial. Assuming you can find an S1 mage to start with it's only 210 pearls to get to S5, which is about the highest nationals go...2 wishes, or 2 turns of income at that point of the game. I can't see how this could POSSIBLY be a realistic argument given your proposed gem income.

Likewise, you not liking a tactic is not a valid reason for it to be removed. Some people don't like SCs, some people don't like blood magic (which, incidentally, is a much bigger MM issue than clams, especially if you want to blood sacrifice), some people don't like blesses. I'm sure people don't like a lot of other stuff in the game as well, but each of these things adds more variety and complexity to the game. If clamming was *broken* then there would be an issue with it, but it's not unbalanced, it's just something you don't like.

Also, given the moddability of Dominions it's a very easy fix to get rid of the clams with a simple mod for the games you play in, so I'm not sure what the big crusade to get rid of them entirely is about, since they're not really unbalanced (incidentally I think the aquatic nations need the help given their very limited expansion options during the midgame.)

Xietor · #5 September 15th, 2007, 01:20 AM

Micah,

your points are all valid. I am just stating my opinions, but obviously every player has different opinions on issues-and they are all valid. How to make a game "better" is all subjective.

I have made my last post on this thread.

Velusion · #6 September 15th, 2007, 12:55 PM

Quote:

Micah said:

Likewise, you not liking a tactic is not a valid reason for it to be removed.

This isn't directly related to clams (since I agree that mods fix the problem I have with larger games and think they are fine in smaller games) but...

Not liking a tactic *is* a valid reason for you to advocate for change. Everything is subjective. If a tactic is easy/boring/etc... I don't see why someone shouldn't champion change if they feel it improves the game.

Again I'm not saying I completely agree with Xietor in this case...