Are heavy bless strategies the best ones ?

[Gandalf Parker]

Even with MP I would be leary of an absolute answer that didnt also mention map sizes, number of players, and victory conditions. Though it is likely that it would reflect small maps, under 6 players, and kill-all victory since those games play quick and therefore are the most common.

Have we had an extreme contest yet? In Dom2 I achieved all 4's with 2 or 3 9's while taking all harsh scales (no sleepers back then). It would be interesting to see how that works against a pretender with just 2 9's and scales that allowed stronger troop building

[KissBlade]

Graeme Dice said:


Their main strength before turn 20 is blessed warriors of the five elements. Before turn 20, which is when the eventual winner of the game is decided, magic plays virtually no role in Dom 3.

Agree for the most part on most points save this one. I find once it gets past the nitty gritty early game, even dual bless nations use magics to augment their armies. For example, alteration tree for luck/body eth, summons such as jag fiends and river demons, etc. However, if your nation doesn't have strong expansion abilities (of which heavy bless strategies /is one/), it is harder to compete in a normal game without at least a good solid awe or dragon pretender. Effectively enough, good players who stumbles upon you early will recognize you have no real credible threat to them by choosing a "late game" path, and just attack you. Often it only takes 4-6 turns to meet your first neighbor, 8-10 roughly for borders to solidify. Once borders solidify, there are almost NO more expansion into indies. Which generally means at this stage, people start looking for "soft targets" to hit. You don't want to be one of them by having no bless, a human pretender and only average national troops. All the scales in the world won't help you then.

[FAJ]

Graeme Dice said:
If you want to get a massive early game advantage over every other player, then the only way to do that is to use a dual-bless strategy.

[...] national troops are obsolete from the very first turn in Dominions III [...]

[...] magic plays virtually no role in Dom 3 [...]


[...]Death 3 has almost no effect whatsoever on your game[...]

[...]the no-brainer choice of drain 2[...]

So, why do people bother playing dominions if it is so formulaic? is winning MP games so important that people are willing to throw out the variety in the game to use the same duel bless strategies over and over?

I think you have a pretty cynical outlook on the game.

[Teraswaerto]

KissBlade,

What you say is true, however in larger games diplomacy can keep a soft target from getting into early wars. Granted, it's a gamble, and you're leaving survival up to things you can't really control.

[Gandalf Parker]

On larger maps most of that becomes untrue also. Drain? magic plays no role? Death has no affect? Im not sure if Victory Point games might also make a difference on some of it and since the devs love VP games I sure wouldnt write those off. And thats not to mention games that might crank up the magic, or crank down the resources, or boost magic sites.

Some people tend to play Dom3 with the same settings all the time. Same map size, same number of players, same victory conditions. That cant help but paint a "do this and always win every game" feeling.

Interestingly many of the same people tell Solo players that staying inside that limitation will get old and ruin the game for them.

[Graeme Dice]

Gandalf Parker said:
Drain? magic plays no role?

Magic plays a very large role if the game lasts to turn 40 or so. The drain scale, on the other hand, has almost no effect on the power of magic.

Death has no affect?

The death scale has precisely the effects I just listed. It reduces your population in your home province by 24% over 50 turns, and by a lesser amount in other provinces. Otherwise it has little effect on any nation other than those with mages that were made old arbitrarily (ie. the fire nations).

Im not sure if Victory Point games might also make a difference on some of it and since the devs love VP games I sure wouldnt write those off.

Victory points make games finish sooner, not later.

[Graeme Dice]

FAJ said:
So, why do people bother playing dominions if it is so formulaic? is winning MP games so important that people are willing to throw out the variety in the game to use the same duel bless strategies over and over?

If you are playing competitively, then play to win, and don't you dare complain when somebody else uses a more effective strategy than yours.

I think you have a pretty cynical outlook on the game.

Yes, I do, but that's because it's balance took a giant step sideways, and another small step backwards from Dom 2. The devs balanced the game in a manner that's similar to throwing wet pasta at a wall. Some of it will stick (which is equivalent to what gets used by players), but the majority just falls on the ground and is ignored.

[Meglobob]

Teraswaerto said:
KissBlade,

What you say is true, however in larger games diplomacy can keep a soft target from getting into early wars. Granted, it's a gamble, and you're leaving survival up to things you can't really control.

I agree with Teraswaerto here.

Also, the highly blessed nations after be very aggressive in the early part of the game, this is a disadvantage as it can lead them getting into multi front wars. Also you can easily end up with two players who have taken a high bless strategy (I define high bless startegy as 2 lvl 9+ blesses), fighting each another. Either of which suits the player who has a cheap dragon or wrym and good scales.

Like everything in MP its a caculated risk.

The player who takes a high bless is relying on capturing double the normal land and crushing 1 or 2 players in the first 30 turns without encountering serious trouble.

The good scales player is gambling on being left alone to develop for the first 30 turns and will give land, offer to forge items, supply/trade gems, offer non-aggression pacts here there and everywhere in order to achieve that.

[Gandalf Parker]

I think that most of the Dom3 changes (from my point of view) were geared toward expanding solo play which makes up nicely for Dom1 and Dom2.

[Dedas]

Well, when I'm playing, I try to pick up that pasta that other ignore and use it. Sometimes I'm surprised how well it actually works in combination with another piece none cares about.

For example, the "repel" ability that units with long weapons almost always get a chance to use seems to be something that people frown at. "Why buy these pikemen with lower damage when I can get these - though more expensive but holy - guys with broadswords instead?". Well, combine them with some simple spells like "Agony" and watch them work. And remember, you get a lot of these guys as they are much cheaper than most holy units; this wall of spears can actually rout a force much more costly, with better stats and blesses in combination with simple low level magic.
Agony = low morale
Low morale = More difficult to overcome repel
Possible outcomes in combat:
Totally repelled = no high level blessed augmented attack taking place
Overcoming repel = 1 hp damage on a now low morale unit
No repel = counter with more numbers and cheapo spells like earth meld/slime/entagle or why not extremely cheapo netters with spears?
Add to this ordinary attacks from the repellers + repellers outnumber the attackers = Less defense on attackers for each attack = more successful repels.
All those 1 hp damage + ordinary attack damage + low morale (agony) makes it more difficult to overcome repel - this makes them take a lot of morale tests. Combine them with some good fast units and/or holy blessed units attacking rear and you have a blast.
What if agony is resisted by all the units in its area of effect? Just throw it again and again and again. It is cheap.

Or why not iron/stoneskin/ethereal/etc one of your mages and send him/her into the fray with a group of units with guard commander command scripted. Let the mage cast a lot of those almost no fatigue close combat spells; they are extremely fatigue cheap, high damage, and some have a rather big area of effect. Use a lot of low magic mages why don't you? Take care of expensive blessed Vans with fatigue 5 burning hands. It does 13+ fire damage in the square next to the caster. 5 stoneskin + luck or whatever mages will take care of a lot of Vans. Why not combine them with repelling spearmen?

This game has way more possibilities than first meets the eye.