Dominions 3: Speculation Wars

[Nerfix]

Kristoffer O said:
There are UI changes. All commanders' items are shown above each commander in the main menu (very small, but discernable).

That's really neat.

But what about scouts?

[Truper]

You can already find scouts with the "N" key.

[Endoperez]

And also, with the F1 key. Still, it would be nice to see a small Cloak icon on the main map screen above all provinces where sneaking units are present.

[Ironhawk]

Ha ha. Yeah we all know about the hotkeys and menus. But there really does need to be a visual indicator for scout locations. Its a pain to cycle through all the scouts which I know are already in place in order to find the ones that still need to move.

[Chazar]

Or a way to mark units to be left out of the 'n'-key loop for this turn (like in Warlords), e.g. an alternate hide/defend command or simply an alt-n key or so which means 'n' plus do not get back to the current unit/group unless is exit&reenter this turn somehow.

[Chazar]

Apart from technical issues like user interface improvements or new server options, or to-be-expected stuff like new unit types & new spells, or the three flavour-variants of the game in the form of the eras, what will be the most significant change to gameplay itself?

• Perhaps a renaissance of the terrain changing dominion like in Dom1, somehow superimposed on the new graphical maps?
• Maybe the introduction of terrain features and obstacles to the tactical map?
• The splitting of tactical combat in phases of 24 rounds, each representing a single day (hence round = 15min) and the possibilty of battles stretching into several days, with part fatigue recovery in between days and the reformation of non-routed troops for consecutive days via a special tactical setup (initial placement, secondary placement) and the restriction of some battlefield spells like storm, army of lead, etc. to last only a limited number of days as well of the delayed arrival of troops on the second day or third day depending on the number of provinces and speed the units moved? (i.e. Arco attack a province of Caelum. On the first day, Arco battles the PD and the wingless who moved in from an adjacent province, while the high seraphs flying in from the distant captial wont appear on the battlefield until the third day has dawned...

Just some thoughts, so what else would we not expect for Dom3?

[Kuritza_Dru]

Speaking of the Man-Tuatha.
Chronologically 'Last of the Tuatha' theme comes *after* the regular Man, AFAIK. You can safely call it 'Return of the Tuatha'. So what I had in mind, is the 'Golden age of the Tuatha' theme, that is, NO humans and lots of magic, then humans only and still a decent magic, then 'last of the Tuatha' - great mix of units, and somewhat worse magic (because these Tuatha, the only ones with a random pick, are some damn expensive)

[B0rsuk]

New nations: So far, only one new nation is specified, althrough squirrels claim we'll get several new nations total.

I like arms. Most Indian gods have several. Thus I like Indian gods. This month I have delved into Srimad Bhagavata Mahapurana, some other books, and Online resources to find more about Indian spirits and supernatural beings. Bandar Log, a new Indian inspired nation will have themes with additional mythological content and unique summons. Celestial apsaras and gandharvas as well as malign rakshasas and daityas will be available for the Bandar player.

So, we are getting at least Indian nation.

Furthermore, to my post suggesting Arabic and Slavic-like nations (wishlist thread) Kristoffer replied (more less)
- there will be no slavic nation, because he didn't research the area well enough. It could come in a mod. (doh)
- to "arabic" suggestion, he repplied with silence. This makes it perfect speculation that we are going to get arabic -like nation, too.
---------
Shameless self-promotion: Motivated by Kristoffer's repply, B0rsuk has begun researching slavic culture a while ago. Stuff from before christianity. Funny fact: Polish people were christianised (by force) starting with 996 (after Christ). Poland is often regarded as one of bastions of christianity.
In XVIII century, Church wanted to examine the situation. They sent people to several remote villages in the woods. Result: villagers never heard of Jesus and Maria !
This is because nobles and peasantry actually lived in separate worlds. Feudal system survived much longer in Poland than in rest of Europe. Even today, if you adress an adult without "Pan/Pani" prefix, you're perceived as being overly familiar. Remains of feudal system, no less.

Blah blah blah... This means B0rsuk is going to mod a slavic-inspired nation to Dominions3. Not to Dominions2, because B0rsuk owns only a demo. B0rsuk believes he'll be able to buy Dominions3.
For people with clue<=0: records on pagan Slavs are in bad shape. Church tried to do it's best to erase all trace. But here's short summary of what I found:

-tribal structure similar to democracy or even anarchy. MOst importand decisions were made by elders. Words describing rulers come from other languages. Priests were respected, but didn't have excessive power.
-many worshipped gods, most important of which was probably Perun, god of fire, sun, thunder, and warriors. There are other fire gods, too. For this reason sunday is a holy day. It's still a holy day because Church had tendency to overwrite pagan holy days. Sources say all slavs worshipped sun and fire. (fire magic)
Affinity for nature, it was also very important for ancient Slavs. Wise women possessed good knowledge of herbs and healing (...) (nature magic)
Deep belief in fate, curses, charms, "evil eye", fate...One of major gods - Weles/Wolos dealt with oaths, mysticism, spells... Don't get on a bad side of a witch, or she'll curse you. (a bit of Astral magic)
- worship of warlike gods - they weren't exactly most peaceful of nations.
- national heroes will include Baba Yaga for sure, possibly Likho, too.
- lots, lots of spirits and demons - ones associated with homestad, wilderness...

PM me if you'd like to help or can provide some info about pagan Slavs.

[Edi]

Regarding Ulm, I do not see any need for a separate branching timeline.

Base Ulm is obviously the first one. I have always seen the Iron Faith theme as a short-lived corrupt transition stage between standard Ulm and Black Forest.

Even the descriptions lend some support for this. In base Ulm, magic is solely in the hands of the master smiths and the nations trusts its brawn and military might to stand off its enemies.

In the Iron Faith theme, the control of magic has passed from the master smiths to the priest orders who are fanatic zealots with little grasp of how magic works and whether it is safe. They have little magical training and compensate with religious dogma and persecution to rival the Marignon inquisition.

Black Forest is the logical outcome of this setup. With the Iron Faith priesthood infiltrated from within and corrupted, civil war flares out when there is an attempt to return to the more traditional ways of the standard era Ulm. This allows the agents of the corrupting power (Ermor or whoever else) to do their malign work unnoticed and their scheme culminates in the destruction of the Keep of Ulm, the death of the god of Ulm and teh corruption of the land when they unleash the Malediction.

It makes for a relatively seamless story that has no alternate timelines.

What I'd like to know is what the devs think of this little interpretation and how close it is to what they envisioned.

Edi

[Nerfix]

B0rsuk's idea sounds pretty intresting, but what about units?

I had a project to make a Kalevala based nation for Dom II but I lost my intrest after I quite heavily reworked it. It had warrior-poet-mages with Nature-Air-Fire magic, wise-men with 1 random magic and light-medium infantry...

Also, arabic nation is quite possible as Dom III seems to follow Dom II's path of expanding the nations out of Europe and I'm sure that the area is quite rich in the magical mysterious of old times.

Edi's theory also feels quite correct...