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## Dominions 4 Teasers

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Ikeren
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Post by Ikeren » Thu May 25, 2017 5:42 am

Haha, didn't know it was yours Red_Rob. Coolio
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Red_Rob
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Post by Red_Rob » Thu May 25, 2017 1:19 pm

> maglag wrote:Couldn't, you know, release the spells in small batches instead of "here's several hundreds of new spells dumped in one go, hope I didn't mess anything up"? Because by literally adding hundreds of new spells at once, simple statistics are that you're gonna mess up something big.

The problem with releasing small amounts of content for a game like Dominions is it could take a long time before it even gets seen. I mean, Poison Earth was included in the very original Endgame Spells mod in 2015 and it took until the middle of 2017 for it to be reported as a problem. By releasing content in large chunks everything gets a chance to be tested and issues are identified earlier.
Also, as everything in the mod is eventually going to be included together it doesn't really make sense to release things in small bitesize pieces. If thing A works well when combined with thing B and is kept in check by thing C you won't get much useful feedback if you just release thing A on it's own.
I would highlight that Dominions itself isn't a hot-bed of pre-release testing - it isn't as if Illwinter hasn't included gamebreaking bugs in releases (Attack of the Norsemen?) or degenerate strategies such as Supaya-geddon. In balance terms, don't forget that the game has undergone 10 years of feedback to get to where it is. If you check the early patch notes you can see things like Lesser Elementals not costing gems, or Ermor having a spell that grants Fear to all its sacreds. These were things that were tried, and found to be too much. As ME gets more testing and the outliers are identified and pruned it too will become a more quantified and balanced experience. I am constantly working on improving the balance and the next few releases will be focused on that rather than adding much in the way of new content.
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Red_Rob
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Post by Red_Rob » Fri Jun 09, 2017 8:25 am

Magic Enhanced got an update to 1.45:
http://z7.invisionfree.com/Dom3mods/ind ... topic=2927
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maglag
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Post by maglag » Fri Jun 09, 2017 7:00 pm

> Red_Rob wrote: I would highlight that Dominions itself isn't a hot-bed of pre-release testing - it isn't as if Illwinter hasn't included gamebreaking bugs in releases (Attack of the Norsemen?) or degenerate strategies such as Supaya-geddon. In balance terms, don't forget that the game has undergone 10 years of feedback to get to where it is. If you check the early patch notes you can see things like Lesser Elementals not costing gems, or Ermor having a spell that grants Fear to all its sacreds. These were things that were tried, and found to be too much. As ME gets more testing and the outliers are identified and pruned it too will become a more quantified and balanced experience. I am constantly working on improving the balance and the next few releases will be focused on that rather than adding much in the way of new content.

Thing is, Illwinter isn't adding new spells to a bunch of nations every couple months. But you keep doing it. You just did! If Illwinter has trouble reaching balance after 10 years while holding back on adding more magic willy-nilly, how exactly do you hope to reach any semblance of balance before we all die of old age?

> FrankTrollman wrote: Actually, our blood banking system is set up exactly the way you'd want it to be if you were a secret vampire conspiracy.

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Red_Rob
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Post by Red_Rob » Sat Jun 10, 2017 12:13 pm

> maglag wrote: Thing is, Illwinter isn't adding new spells to a bunch of nations every couple months. But you keep doing it. You just did! If Illwinter has trouble reaching balance after 10 years while holding back on adding more magic willy-nilly, how exactly do you hope to reach any semblance of balance before we all die of old age?

Actually, early on in Dom4 development Illwinter was in fact adding whole new nations including spells in patches every few months. The mod has only just been out for a year, therefore new things are still being added. Although Illwinter was never that concerned with absolute balance in the first place. I think Kristoffer is on record as saying they put out things they think are fun and they trust balance mods to tweak things for people that want a more competitive experience.
If you check the patch notes the majority of this release was actually balance changes based on feedback. Even the majority of the new spells were to boost weaker nations or neglected crosspaths. That said, the mod is still more about new toys than balance. The intent is "here's a load of new things, and none of them break the game in half". If the idea of not knowing every permutation or combination of options offends you, it probably won't be for you.
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Ikeren
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Post by Ikeren » Sat Jun 10, 2017 5:47 pm

Balance is pretty obviously not a design goal in Dominions. This is a very different game from Starcraft.
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angelfromanotherpin
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Post by angelfromanotherpin » Thu Jun 15, 2017 2:43 am

Can someone recommend a Pretender build for MA Jotunheim? I'm not sure what to do with them.
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Ikeren
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Post by Ikeren » Thu Jun 15, 2017 6:38 pm

I've played MA Jotunheim a bit; Playing them in a game right now.
Bless is an option; Imprisoned N9, or N9E4, makes your recruitable sacreds + summoned sacreds (heat small tramplers and fear wolves) decent (but everything needs protection buffs), helps thugging with shrouds on Skratti, and helps turbo communions with regenning skratti as slaves.
N9 Garmharmdig can slaughter indies in groups of 6-8, which makes your expansion awesome, and people sometimes say Jotunheim has the best expansion in the game.
Some magic is excellent to improve the research capacity of your Vaetti hags.
The other option is going like, pure scales and just relying on the Jotun Hirdmen, but they're more line holders than damage dealers. Actually, overall, you're troops just have 1 attack and are large, so getting into battlefield magic that helps them trade more favorably is important.
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Red_Rob
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Post by Red_Rob » Fri Jun 23, 2017 7:15 am

Dominions is now 66% off in the Steam Sale:
http://store.steampowered.com/app/25906 ... Ascension/
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Red_Rob
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Post by Red_Rob » Mon Sep 11, 2017 10:21 am

Dominions 5 just got announced:
http://www.illwinter.com/dom5/
Current ETA is November, apparently a beta has been running for the last few months.
Looks like a much more radical rework than Dom3 > Dom4. Real time battles, changes to recruitment, design your own blesses...
Simplified Tome Armor.
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“Those Who Can Make You Believe Absurdities, Can Make You Commit Atrocities” - Voltaire
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maglag
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Post by maglag » Mon Sep 11, 2017 1:07 pm

Next-gen graphics!
Also spells will have different casting times so seems like you can't just air-drop a lone uber mage to nuke an army lacking fliers to intercept.
All forts will start as pallisades but you can then upgrade them to higher tiers that allow you to recruit stuff faster. And nations like MA Ulm can recruit "builder" commanders that are needed for the most pimp castles.
Winter (cold scales?) will slow down troop movement.
Priests get different holy spells depending on your god's path!!!!!
Also extra bless options like some need your pretender be awake and alive to work and others are always active even if the troops weren't blessed. Some nations outright get more points for building up their blesses because yes.
So yeah the meta's gonna be completely changed. That's gonna be some fun months finding out what works or not, but overall I like the look of it. In particular several mentions of buffing cavalry like making them cheaper gold-wise and should be able to get accross the map better.
Last edited by maglag on Mon Sep 11, 2017 1:08 pm, edited 1 time in total.

> FrankTrollman wrote: Actually, our blood banking system is set up exactly the way you'd want it to be if you were a secret vampire conspiracy.

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Shatner
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Post by Shatner » Mon Sep 11, 2017 1:11 pm

Also, research queues
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Red_Rob
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Post by Red_Rob » Mon Sep 11, 2017 4:55 pm

New customizable bless effects:
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maglag
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Post by maglag » Tue Sep 12, 2017 7:26 am

Beta testers are speaking on the mod forums and giving out a bunch of juicy details:
-Most assassins only cost 1 commander point and capital forts often have 3, so spaming assassins for expansion is kinda of a viable plan now. Basic mages cost 2 commander points, uber mages cost 4, then those in between cost 3.
-Production/Sloth now has a 3% effect on income, and Order has only 2%. Growth has 4% effect. The explicit intent is making Order less of an auto-take for any non-chaos nation (and also buff chaos nations).
-Skull talismans no longer allow you to cast animate skeleton, but amulets of reanimation do.
-Rain of stones changed to an ongoing spell that deals 1 damage to everything on the field, capped at 1 damage. Main use (if any) is disrupting spellcasting concentration.
-More changes to fatigue and armor interaction, making thugs and SCs more viable as they're less prone to be mobbed to death.
-Pillaging should be worth it now, in particular for Yomi.
-Invisible units that cannot be found by patrols unless said patrollers have spirit sight.
-Immortality split in two types, old one where it only works in your dominion, and new one that works anywhere but your commander takes some turns before returning. New type most used for undead like vampires and liches.
-Flying isn't instantaneous movement anymore, instead fliers spend one turn going up to the skies and only descend to attack on the next, meaning you always have a chance to self buff.
-Each magic path gives you one bless point (need at least 4 on the same path as before). This means you can't replicate the current dom4 full blesses. Like E9 is now divided in reinvigoration (2 bless points per 1 reinv) and Hard Skin (8 bless points), but you can only get a max of 10 bless points for earth stuff, so at best +5 protection from Hard Skin and 1 reinv.
-Elemental resistances now apply after DRN, so a small/medium resistance may now be overwhelmed. Example of somebody with fire resistance 15 may still be put to sleep when surrounded by abyssian infantry, and you can't just take on a swarm of spring hawks with just a storm pool. Abyss would indeed benefit a lot since as soon as you get a bit of fire resistance on your army they're crippled.
-Pretenders benefit from their own bless while on their own dominion, making awake expanders a lot more tempting.
-Pretenders brought back to life lose less and randomized. Could lose a point of dominion, or one level on a magic path, or may actually gain Death magic.
-Generic cheap disease-cure spells. Two mentioned, one nature for 4 gem at Thau 5 (was in one of the screenshots) and a fire one that also burminates the caster so hope you have good fire resistance.
Overall seems like awake pretenders with multi-path blesses are all the rage now.

> FrankTrollman wrote: Actually, our blood banking system is set up exactly the way you'd want it to be if you were a secret vampire conspiracy.

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K
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Post by K » Sat Sep 16, 2017 3:25 am

I bet everyone $1 that Dom5 won't have the one thing it always needed: an actual system that enforces Pacts and Treaties (see Alpha Centuari for a model of how it can be done).
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maglag
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Post by maglag » Sun Sep 17, 2017 12:33 am

There already are. They're called "have an army" and "other players are watching". If you double cross somebody in dominions, you risk them deciding to expend their strength hindering you the rest of the game and/or other players being less likely to negotiate with you.
I actually take Dominions lack of artificial diplomacy limitators as a breath of fresh air. You can propose alliances at will, you can have said alliances be secret, you can secretly hinder your allies and then launch a massive profitable backstabs (or receive a crippling backstab yourself if you understimate your opponent).

> FrankTrollman wrote: Actually, our blood banking system is set up exactly the way you'd want it to be if you were a secret vampire conspiracy.

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Ikeren
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Post by Ikeren » Sun Sep 17, 2017 9:28 pm

I'm playing a fair bit of Dom4 at the moment, it'll be interesting to see how quickly people switch over.
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Hicks
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Post by Hicks » Tue Oct 03, 2017 12:30 am

> K wrote:I bet everyone $1 that Dom5 won't have the one thing it always needed: an actual system that enforces Pacts and Treaties (see Alpha Centuari for a model of how it can be done).

That's a pretty harsh bet K. Everyone is a lot of people; seems like if you lose you'll be out ~7.5 billion dollars. My standard wager is a nickel, but even then I'd be hard pressed to raise 375 million bucks in the admittadly long shot of that bet.
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Axebird
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Post by Axebird » Tue Oct 03, 2017 12:50 am

Dom5 is coming out in November (probably) and the teaser page doesn't mention anything about diplomacy, so it seems like it was a shrewd bet.
Last edited by Axebird on Tue Oct 03, 2017 12:50 am, edited 1 time in total.
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Red_Rob
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Post by Red_Rob » Tue Oct 03, 2017 8:17 am

Does Dominions really need formalised diplomacy options though? I haven't really noticed their absence. I know Den games tend to devolve into acrimony and finger pointing, but I thought that was just because we are all assholes ^_^
Some form of in-built trading system would be nice though.
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K
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Post by K » Fri Oct 06, 2017 9:32 pm

> Red_Rob wrote:Does Dominions really need formalised diplomacy options though? I haven't really noticed their absence. I know Den games tend to devolve into acrimony and finger pointing, but I thought that was just because we are all assholes ^_^
> Some form of in-built trading system would be nice though.

I've found that, win or lose, Dominions games devolve into finger-pointing and acrimony. Usually it happens after three nations in a secret alliance start taking out nations one at a time, the ending of almost every Dominions game ever, but it also happens because people in messages are sometimes unclear if an alliance was ever made.
I've been accused of pact-breaking in situations where a pact was offered and I never answered, but I didn't attack either. They just assumed that I agreed.
Honestly, the involved messaging in multi-player Dominions is the worst. If my turn already takes an hour or more, I don't have the time to spend several more hours writing and responding to people's Game of Thrones LARPing just to avoid getting gang-banged in the gang-bang lotto that is MP Dominions.
-K
Last edited by K on Sat Oct 07, 2017 1:45 am, edited 2 times in total.
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Hicks
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Post by Hicks » Sat Oct 07, 2017 3:55 am

In all of the one (1) actual dominions 4 multiplayer game I've played, that diplomatic messaging and posturing was the best part. Though I will admit my sample size is too small to know for sure.
"Besides, my strong, cult like faith in the colon of the cards allows me to pull whatever I need out of my posterior!"
-Kid Radd

> shadzar wrote:those training harder get more, and training less, don't get the more.

> Lokathor wrote:Anything worth sniffing can't be sniffed

Stuff I've Made
Mage
Dread Necromancer
Spell Breaker
Scaling Magic Weapons
True Dragon
AVATAR: THE LAST RPG
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Ikeren
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Post by Ikeren » Sat Oct 14, 2017 6:06 pm

> I've been accused of pact-breaking in situations where a pact was offered and I never answered, but I didn't attack either. They just assumed that I agreed.

And then there was that one time you were playing Lanka and I was playing Hinnomnomnom, and you forgot I was your only neighbouring ally who didn't offer you a NAP
Also, the games I am in seem to be dying to burn out faster than acrimonious finger pointing can happen; I'm in several games late in the game with constant staling of 2-3 nations.
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Zinegata
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Post by Zinegata » Thu Nov 02, 2017 8:03 am

In my opinion Dominions Diplomacy is really for people who are willing to put up with the backstabbing and high level of social interaction. If you want multiple players involved but absolute certainty with regard to alliances then I feel that team games - particularly with Disciples - are a superior game mode.
That said I'm a bit concerned with the game's current state. It's becoming buried in a lot of "veteran" concerns but isn't doing very much to ease the entry of new players.
The Steam release - and favorable press coverage - really helped Dominions 4 get a much wider audience, but without substantial improvements to helping newbies get over the learning curve I don't anticipate a lot of repeat purchases from people who played only a couple of Dom 4 games and then gave up on it. Instead the official forums seem a bit too obsessed with new arguments over relatively minor issues like bless powers and nation balance while ignoring more basic playability issues.
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Red_Rob
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Post by Red_Rob » Wed Nov 08, 2017 9:35 am

I actually agree with a lot of your concerns Zine. However, given the 2 man Dev team and the fact they steadfastly refuse to hand even the boring donkey-work over to anyone else, I think we have to be resigned to incremental improvements rather than the ground-up redesign of the UI that is obviously needed at this point.
I'd really like to see a Dominions that was redone from scratch, keeping almost all of the content but with a modern UI shell.
Simplified Tome Armor.
Tome item system and expanded Wish Economy rules.
Try our fantasy card game Clash of Nations! Available via Print on Demand.
“Those Who Can Make You Believe Absurdities, Can Make You Commit Atrocities” - Voltaire
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