The Dominions 3: "Wishlist"

[Molog]

200% taxes will give around the listed income on the site. 100% will give around half.

[Alneyan]

Silly me, the differences I had noticed were simply linked to the scales (Ermor doesn't exactly have scales that increase gold production).

[magnate]

CJN said:

Use .dominions3 instead of dominion3 as the name of the savefile directory under Unix/Linux systems. It is convention to create all top-level computer generated files in the user's home directory as dotfiles.

Please do NOT implement this.

1. It's incredibly annoying. The save directory should be visible, and should be in the same directory as the game. If you are on a genuine multi-user system, you could specify "personal savegame dirs" as an installation option.

2. It's inconsistent with the behaviour of the MS-Windows version. Both should behave the same way. (It could be possible for the MS version to put savegames in /My Documents/Dom3saves or similar, if personal save dirs is chosen.)

CC

[magnate]

Gandalf Parker said:
Since the beta-test group from Dom2 still exists Im not sure if there will be any mass additions for a Dom3 test group.

I'm not at all sure that having Dom3 beta tested by exactly the same people who tested Dom2 is a good idea. Yes, you want some of the same people, who have expert and in-depth knowledge of Dom2, who can really try to break it and find its weak points. You also, I would think, want some total newbies who have NOT played Dom2 (or hardly at all), but who are otherwise gamers and who can give you a fresh view of the product.

Sadly I don't fall into either category. Ho hum.

CC

[magnate]

Well, it's about 27 pages since I first contributed my wishes to this thread, and reading everybody else's has given me a pretty good idea of what's important to me. I'll try not to go on too long - it seems to me that there are only three really important principles here:

1. Information, in as few clicks as possible. So make the main map screen show terrain types, site search status, age of latest intel etc., with no more than one click. Ditto for wounds, experience, items, food status, waypoints on units. Battle reports should name dead commanders and list exact numbers of unit types killed. Basically, my view is that if you need to implement the "post-it" note system that some have suggested, then you haven't provided enough paths to information. I shouldn't have to make a manual note on the map that there is a library here or a bunch of indie knights there, I should be able to see this in a pop-up or with a single click. Perhaps map overlays are the answer.

2. Flexibility - never underestimate the diversity of the user population. Some love randomness, some hate it. Some love precision/exposure of formulae, some hate it, etc. Try to make as many settings as possible configurable and/or moddable, yet without cluttering the setup screens. A single master config screen (the current Game Settings) is enough, with some possible additions in this thread (turning off mercs etc.) and the rest configurable in text files, for AI modding or themed games etc. For example, I would like to be able to specify which theme the AI plays when it plays a certain nation. I'd also like better scripting features - I accept the argument for limiting the amount of scripting, but stuff like spells not to cast, gems not to use, conditional retreats etc. Also more variety in victory conditions - multiple VCs, cumulative VCs etc.

3. Micromanagement, reduction of. In a game of such vast possibilities you can never get this exactly right, but lots of the suggestions here are helpful - shortcuts for cycling through types of commanders, tax management, gem management, research, forging, group movement etc. Someone's idea of virtual taskforces (ie. a user-chosen set of commanders who need not be in the same province and can be given orders as a group) would be really helpful in long games.

The combination of these means reworking the F1 display and the army screen to show items/wounds/etc. without having to click down into individual units. Some people will want to see provinces listed by income, others by garrison size or army size, others by type of castle., others by spells paths or holy levels etc. etc. This is what I mean about the combination of info and flexibility - every info screen must have plenty of different ways of being formatted/presented. User-programmable tax heuristics are a must - please DON'T create an auto-tax function that follows an unchangeable formula. Ditto forging orders, ritual spells and other repeatables.

Anyway, all this is effectively about improving the Dom2 interface and assumes that Dom3 will be at least similar. I've not said much about actual content changes, largely because I think Dom2 is so fantastically rich that I will repeat my plea not to have yet more of everything just for the hell of it. I particularly and vehemently disagree with Dr Wotsit who did the big summary a while back and wanted 10x as much of everything or Kristoffer's head on a plate ... as any experience of roguelikes will tell you, more stuff leads inexorably to more junk, and the debates about light cavalry and other national units will tell you we don't want more junk. Some more types of helms & boots would be good though, there are so few compared with weapons & miscs.

In spite of that, there are some content suggestions I really like: more building options, specifically taking castles out of pretender design and having them race- and terrain-related - hey, and how about path-related - buildings only buildable by a mage with specific paths ...
er, where was I ... balancing SCs by changing the routing rules so that they can use troops and not have to go in alone, introducing more anti-buffs etc. I also really like the suggestion of moving from whole-race-knows-all-researched-spells to individual spell learning, so you can focus mages on specific suites of spells for different types of battles or for other purposes (blood hunting, forging, castling, etc.). There would obviously need to be some interplay between the two, for global enchantments etc. This would need quite a lot of thought. As would Saber Cherry's decimalisation suggestion, but I like that too.

Finally, one big and potentially quite simple improvement for the AI: basic diplomacy. Currently you can specify alliances for the AI in the map file at the start of the game, but you can't change them, right? Well, if the AI could be coded to make simple strategic decisions on war/non-aggression/alliance with other races it would make SP immediately a lot more interesting. In an MP game people naturally ally against a leading player (esp. if graphs are on), but the AIs never do, even when there are two of them left and I control 90% of the map. I know it would be quite a lot more hassle to introduce human-AI diplomacy, but surely it wouldn't be too much to have the AI make (and break) alliances with each other. It would be particularly neat if your scouts could find this out ...

Ho hum. Back to work. Well, back to thinking about my next turn ...

CC

[Nerfix]

I remember wanting these to Dom II and I'd be thrilled to see them in Dom III:

- Map that changes with the dominions. I really loved the "ugly pixel" maps of Dom I. It was thrilling to see small white-blue and green dots appear in provinces under my dominion...

- Dominion displayed in diffrent shades of white if you want to ala Dom I. I have hard time paying attention to those candles in Dom II.

- Populations ala MOM and MOO 2...

- Diplomacy!

- Magic sites displayed on the map (like in some current maps) if known.

- Neat special effects popping on provinces when they are hit by a spell. Magic sites on map and huge bursts of energy when some bigger spell was cast were the two best things in AOW 2...

- I also wish that IW doesn't ignore the changes done in some of the popular mods (Conceptual Balance, Recruitable Rebalance). From the time I spent with HOI I learned that the very popular mods (CORE, SR) we're somekind of a vox populis, a less hinting suggestion about what is wrong in the game...

[Cainehill]

One thing I think would add a lot to Dominions 3, and yes, it's greater variety. A few more terrain types, special terrains if you will, to allow greater diversity and tactical/strategic nuances in maps.

True "Port" provinces, which would allow sailing to other ports but would not be usable by fliers. (This might also be done via a new type of neighbor command.) Reason for this : currently maps which attempt to implement ports are abusable via flyers, a la Cradle of Dominion. In addition, I think strategic movement should both begin and end in a port - ie, cavalry can't move across a sea and extra provinces beyond.

Chokepoint provinces : land provinces that can't be bypassed / flown over.

Portals : to allow movement to another portal, but without the provinces being considered neighbors for purposes of scouting, dominion, castle admin, etc. These could be two-way or one-way, and require a troop to at least begin movement on the portal province.

Another variation on "neighbors", to indicate provinces which aquatic / amphibian troops can cross between, but which non-amphibians can not. This would solve some issues with maps using rivers/bays/lakes as barriers between provinces, where logically amphibians should be able to go across. (Also possibly for flyers to cross - a half-mile wide river might be a near-complete barrier to infantry and ground troops, but not to flying troops.)

I'm sure there are other possibilities others can think of, but these would really add a lot to facilitate the ingenuity of the Dominions community's mapmakers.

[Truper]

Graeme Dice said:

The problem with this order is that what it actually accomplishes is to make a staff of storms required for any group of mages.

I agree with FM here. I think what it actually accomplishes is having to put some thought into protecting mages. You might need to provide bodyguards. You might need to forge them some basic armor. You might need a force of archers set to attack flyers. A Staff of Storms is an all-purpose solution, but its not the only solution, and it must be remembered that the Staff cuts both ways.

As it stands now, mages can cast until they pass out in perfect security, knowing that they will never be targeted by anything. Ever.

[Endoperez]

Would Fire Rear be enough? That can't be interecepted by simple units, and most battle spells' range is low enough to put the mages to danger of atleast some conventional missiles...

I think there should be more possibilities of actually attack enemy armies' back/rear, but don't think Attack Magic Users or Fire Magic Users commands need to come back.

[Nerfix]

I would also fancy seeing stuff from Conquest of Elysium, namely the Dopplegangers and out of player control summonables/crusades.