magic site searches

paplan · #1 November 29th, 2006, 01:31 AM

Is there any way to see which provinces have been searched by which skill levels from the main map?

I know you can hit F1 and look it up. But it would streamline things immensely if you could determine this from the main map.

Also, as long as I'm making suggestions................

Please add a save feature. Most people play strat games to figure out which strategies work. Its a pain to start over from scratch because a strategic decision didn't work.

Patriot · #2 November 29th, 2006, 02:18 AM

Maybe it would work if those Site Search cubes were shown like the income box from the map options, but I still think it's just plain laziness to not want to hit F1 or just click a mouse to view your national statistics.

Also, I don't think a save feature is necessary. I'm not saying that there shouldn't be a choice; I just think it's not really necessary. If you just want to test a strategy, it really doesn't matter if you win or lose.

Sorry if I came too harsh.

UninspiredName · #3 November 29th, 2006, 02:28 AM

If you select an already-searched province, there should be some colored boxes with numbers inside them below the PD listing. The color represents the path, (if you're not quite sure which color means what, hover your mouse over the suspect box) and the number the level.

Or you could hit F1.

Oh, yes, and until someone makes a save feature, (Though it's unlikely) you can make a copy of the game file (look in C:\Program Files\dominions3\savedgames) and paste it elsewhere, then paste it back where it belongs to 'reload' the file. Not the most user-friendly thing in the world, but it works nonetheless.

Endoperez · #4 November 29th, 2006, 06:20 AM

There already is an unofficial program that saves the turns. I think it can even be set to save them automatically at each hosting.

paplan · #5 November 30th, 2006, 01:05 AM

Thanks for the help. I didn't realize that the earches are shown on the province screen. Thats a big help. Contrary to some opinions, it really is a hassle to go to the F1 overview and scroll through all your provinces to figure out what has been searched.

Yeah, I know I can save by copying the folder (I just drag it to the desktop). But it is a bit clumsy.

UninspiredName · #6 November 30th, 2006, 02:56 AM

I actually also find the F1 screen troublesome.

Saxon · #7 January 5th, 2007, 10:32 AM

Not to grumble but I will anyway...

The first province offered to be searched does not have a full search at 9 done, which is nice. However, once you pick it for a search, the next mage you use to cast the same search spell (in the same turn) gives you the same first choice. It would be great if you were given a choice of all provinces not searched to 9 when you cast a spell. Further, since I am already asking, it would be cool if that choice indicated that you had already issued orders to search a given province.

While you are at it, I would like free beer every Friday afternoon, preferably ice cold.

llamabeast · #8 January 5th, 2007, 12:37 PM

It would definitely be a lot better if the automatic choice of province when site searching was more carefully done. Ideally, it should:

- Choose wastelands, mountains, forests and not-farms preferentially
- Avoid any captured capitals (unsearched but you know nothing will be there)
- Choose sites you've searched to a lower level last, searching those already searched to level 1 first, then 2, then 3
- Most importantly, take account of other site-searching orders already given (I understand this might be difficult).

If it took all these things into account, then you could just give a couple of people monthly casting orders on the site-searching and leave them to it, and they'd make the same decisions you would. When there are no sites left to search they should cancel the order.

This might all be a bit over-optimistic

. But there's no harm in describing the ideal solution, even if it would be hard to implement.

Loren · #9 January 5th, 2007, 04:07 PM

How do you make it automatically pick search targets anyway??

thejeff · #10 January 5th, 2007, 05:52 PM

If you assign a mage to cast a site search spell as a monthly ritual (Shift-M), he will pick a new province to target every month.

As I understand it, he picks the first province that, when he chooses his new target, is owned by you and not searched yet. There are two problems. The most obvious is that it doesn't consider provinces that are already being targeted this month, so only one auto searcher can be used per path.

The more subtle is in that "when he chooses his new target". This is done during the ritual casting phase, apparently right after he casts.
If other mages are also using that searching spell, targeted manually, they may or may not have cast already. Thus a province searched later in the turn may be targeted.
Also, since battles occur after the new target is chosen, provinces conquered that turn are not considered and provinces lost can be searched.

Whatever is being used to determine whether a province is a capital seems broken as well. Some capitals are searched, some are not. Sometimes non-capital provinces are skipped for no apparent reason.

All told, it's still worth using, but I hope it can be fixed.