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My point, Arryn, was that the idea of anyone making an argument that a given mod that does not touch the current spells in the game, or the balance between recruitable and summonable units, is in danger of 'unbalancing' the game is ludicrous.

I was not saying that Cherry or Zen or anyone else who is trying to balance the game does not care.

For the record, I use Cherry's and Zen's mods at all times now. And I only play SP (because I don't know anyone who'll play MP).

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I am not offended.

<3

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BTW, Zen, could you mod some pretenders to have some path combinations that are seen nowhere in the game with any use? Such as, Fire/Water or Air/Earth? Earth/Astral on anything but the Shedu would be nice, too.

Oh, I still find the Humanoid Pretenders to be not so useful.

Finally, is that the 'kami' kanzi?

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I like blood and holy priests. I don't think that blood magic has anything to do with unholy. Quite the opposite, I think that Blood magic is about life, and unholy magic is decidedly about dead things. Blood is life afterall.

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Holy and unholy *should* be about "good" and "evil" (except in Dom 2, where unholy magics mainly boost death-related powers and holy magics mainly counter unholy). Necromancy is about death, which does not inherently have a good/evil inclination, though the practicioners of necromancy tend to be opportunistic and amoral, hence often "evil". *Unwilling* sacrifices, which is what most blood nations perform, is an "evil" behavior. But since Dom 2 doesn't tag behaviors as "good" nor "evil", holy and unholy have been redefined by the game's designers to revolve around death magics. Since this is so, then holy should also enhance nature (life) and unholy should degrade them, which they at present do not.

Personally, I'd like to see holy/unholy decoupled from life/death and be given more of their own unique powers. I'd mod something along these lines (as well as adjust all blood nations to unholy) except that to my understanding, it's not currently possible to do what I envision with the mod system.

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Y'know, anyone who can say Blood magic deals with life sickens me.

I agree with Arryn that Unholy priests are much more thematic for Blood nations than Holy priests.

I mean, come on. If you kill people for their blood, a logical next step is to use the bodies for SOMETHING, right?

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Arryn seems to think of it like I do. Blood magic is evil and all, but has nothing to do with necromancy (and thus the current unholy magic). The manual describes blood magic on page 25.

So I suppose you're not a big fan of the devs? http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/images/smilies/wink.gif

I can see why the devs decided not to focus on good and evil. After all, We're Good and They're Evil. It seems to me like angels in the same armies as demons, and the commanders leading the demons banishing undead and bolstering morale is kind of silly. I would rather see some form of morality implemented.

Edit : I can't spell.

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Yes. Since when do demons and zombies need their morale bolstered? I also think that having angel-summoning spells in "astral" rather than in "holy" is silly. It only makes sense from the perspective that since summoning devils is via Blood (and not Unholy), then the counterpart of summoning angels must be something other than holy, ergo Astral. It also relates to the mechanic of using up some "object" (pearls or slaves) in the summoning process, which cannot be done in holy/unholy as those two magics have no related consumable objects.

Holy (or unholy) power should derive from a nation's dominion strength (not its max candle height, but the sum total of all its candles). The bigger and/or more devout the nation, the more holy/unholy power it should be able to wield. Alas, I don't think I'll see such a change even in Dom 3.

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Well, I certainly dont see anything 'evil' about digging up my old Kings and ancestors and their pet snakes, and giving them false life. However, taking my loyal peasants 13 year old daughter and sacrificing her blood to summon devils out of hell does seem a bit, er, less than good.
I must say that what I really do like about Dominions is the more realistic 'Im good everyone else is Evil' stance. After all, history is written by the winners http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/images/smilies/happy.gif And theres nothing more fun than backing up your devils with some priests casting smite daemon on the 'evil' enemy...

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I very much agree, I would hate to see some kind of rigid good and evil system as in other fantasy games. Death magic is not really any more evil than any of the other paths that summon things that kill people. According to Illwinter's description of blood magic, it is not the magic itself that is evil, simply that for most spells so much blood is required that it is impossible without killing people.

And I don't have a problem with angels taking astral magic, they are simply one more type of magical being that can be bribed/bound with magic gems