Some basic questions

[MartinT]

I have a few questions that I hope will make some necessary information clear to me. I appreciate any help that you can give me, and in the interest of being succint, I'll jump right into it.

1) Scales. I think I understand them, generally speaking, except for one: Growth and Death. Specifically, can Death be anything else but crippling? It seems possible to ultimately attain a decent economy with negative scales in other categories, but even death-1 seems like it'll lead to some serious economic consequences in any game of decent length. Are there other determiners of population growth other than the scales? Is there a benefit or workaround for picking a death scale? Am I blowing it out of proportion?

2) Spells. I know it varies per strategy, per nation, and per pretender, but can anyone think of a short list of bread and butter spells, just to get me on the right track?

3) Magic. If I want a rainbow mage, should I focus on compensating for the magical weaknesses of the nation I pick, or should my magic picks focus on pre-planned spells/magic item construction? Is it situational? Are rainbow mage pretenders combatants, or are they non-combatant casters? Are Super Combatants ever casters?

4)More Magic: How does fatigue work with spellcasting? Should I script my mages with fatigue in mind? Can my mages kill themselves through fatigue? I know there are spells in the Astral and Blood school that spread fatigue around; are those necessary for mage-focused combat?

5) Balance: Seems impossible in a game as big and nuanced as Dominion 3. That being said, are there any nations that just have nothing go for them at all, and ought to be avoided on that basis?

[claes]

These are excellent questions, and as a newcomer myself I don't mind boosting the thread in hopes of an answer(s) from a more experienced player(s). In other words, the OP is not alone in his desire to know the answers to these questions.

[Soyweiser]

1) death can work if you can leverage the end game lack of cash into quicker early game growth, or can just use summons late game.

2) There was some info on the old wiki. Sadly it is dead for now.

3) Imho rainbows are overrated. Your pretender can do only one thing each round. So it can be hard for them to sitesearch + use all their paths. But some weakness compensation is a viable strat. (Getting dwarven hammers for example, if you play vanilla, or summoning other mages of a specific path (the troll king has earth 3 for example)

4) that is pretty complex. Normally fatigue is not deadly in itself. But if you have a communion the slaves can get killed by the masters casting spells. And yeah you script with fatigue in mind. Communions (and sabbaths, which are the same thing, and work in the same way (And can be combined)) are vital for some nations, and really powerful. Experiment with it.

5) yeah there are. Sadly I have no clue atm which are the hard nations. EA an MA agartha. CBM tries to give them some options at least.

[Soyweiser]

It seems this guy is a spambot: http://www.desura.com/games/dominion...asic-questions