Good map / scenario for SP

[Numahr]

Do you know good maps / scenarios for SP, offering a good challenge without resorting to the difficulty levels? For example by giving an unbalanced starting position to the player, by making AIs allied, etc. ...?

[rdonj]

Not really, no. The best way to go about this would be to find a map that you like, and then use map commands to make such a map for yourself.

The only real currently existing map like that I can think of is legends of faerun. I don't believe it makes the AI any more challenging, but it has special indy provinces that can be very challenging.

[Gregstrom]

Antilarium can be an entertaining experience too.

[Gandalf Parker]

I have maps on my site that are more for solo play than mp play.
http://www.dom3minions.com/maps.htm
such as the Tower maps. Or maps with lots of chokepoints.

Also for AI boosting there are NI maps around (No-Independents) which force the AI to fight for provinces but not recruit there. That forces it to use its elite units more. There are also some PI (partial indepents, such as 1 in 10), or BI maps and mods (Better Independents, making cheap flak units too expensive for the AI to use). Or just setting resources lower on your games can force the AI to build more at its castles instead of spending gold in the provinces.

Another setting to be aware is the Independents Strength setting in games. It would seem reasonable that you set it down to make it easy, and up to make it hard. But its the reverse. Setting it up damages the AI more than it does you, and setting the Indepts low creates a rushing game with the AIs hitting you all at once.

The SemiRand program can boost AIs by giving them randomly selected AI builds (so that Caelum gets cold, Ulm gets resources, Mictlan doesnt get scales that kill it in the first 3 turns of the game before anyone even attacks it)

[Gandalf Parker]

I could generate lists to add to maps that ally all AIs. But Id probably have to do it by era. It would be HUGE if I did it for all 73(?) nations, or all 93 to cover modded nations that might be in the game also.

[Numahr]

I can't help thinking that some specifically designed SP scenarios would be nice... like one where you play an undead Nation (LA Ermor... or the vampire mod, or skavens, or...) against human nations allied to contain you (or maybe 2 thematic alliances), with all nations having custom good Pretenders... a kind of LOTR scenario where the player is Sauron (or Saroumane!)

Something like this. I will maybe try one day if I find time, does not seem too complicated to create.

[Gandalf Parker]

Unfortunately the #scenario tag in Dom2 is broken in Dom3. You cant create a scenario that enforces all the settings (like forcing a nation to be AI and not let players take it). It can be accomplished as a server game, but not a downloadable scenario

Now that the door is open again for variations on the game, Im planning some scenario games

[Numahr]

Originally Posted by Gandalf Parker

You cant create a scenario that enforces all the settings (like forcing a nation to be AI and not let players take it).

Well, on a SP game, you don't have to be afraid of players "cheating", after all they are free. So not being able to force some settings on the player is not really an issue, some can even be prescribed as "recommanded settings" or house rules.

I think there is no way to give AIs more provinces to begin with. But one can stale voluntarily a few turns, and use the resulting save as "point 0" of the game. Then you have this feeling of being "imprisoned" �* la Sauron, having cumulated gems and gold but being late in the race for building armies and conquering provinces.

[rdonj]

Numahr - What you want to do is perfectly doable with the current tools available. And if you are willing to use pre-set nations you can give the AI extra provinces via map commands. If you do end up creating a scenario along these lines, feel free to upload it. I'm sure other SP players would be interested in playing it as well.

[Numahr]

OK here is the concept I will try to implement:

"The Fall of Ermor"
A mixure of D3 and Tolkien elements to create a game that will be challenging and give the impression of a real world evolving around the player... at least that is the goal.

Short background:
After defeating the Enemy, for centuries, Ermor the Reunited Rmpire brought peace and prosperity to the known world. But the cursed God had not been vanished for ever and bid its time, while Ermor's pantheon and gathered cultures gradually forgot the bonds that had allowed them to win the war. Manipulating from the shadows, the Cursed God created the conditions for a civil war within the Empire, along cultural and faith dividing lines:

- North of the Empire, a new Faith rejects the beliefs of old (Pythium MA, plains of Rohan)

- On the Western Coast, the old Arcoscephans, who retained their old civilization, developed a new belief based on the lost "Golden Age" predating Ermor's conquest (Arco MA);

- In the South, Ermor's heartland remains true to the empire's value (Ermor EA);

- The Empire's three major cities (located at Minas Tirith, Isengard and Dol Amroth) have developed degenerated cults of these three beliefs and follow their own gods (1-province nations with very strong basis, LA Pythium, MA Ermor and LA Arco);

- In the peripheries, various nations scattered all over the disintegrating empire, conquered but never fully assimilated, follow one of the main 3 factions (each main faction has 2 allies of lesser power, on in the West one in the East, creating chaotic fronts between alliances);

- In the far East, rumors speak of strange creatures emerging from the mountains, unleashed by an audacious semi-savage tribe (alliance of EA and MA Yomi-Shinumaya + MA Mictlan);

- On the North-Western coast, feudal structures re-emerge with an obsession for doctrinal purity (MA Marignon);

- Far in the North, a strange race, long forgotten, re-emerges (EA and MA Agartha, neighbors but separated by impassable mountains)

- ... in this chaos, who has noticed that the Cursed God has returned in the barren steppes of Mordor? (player nation, should be LA Ermor, but can be replaced by any remaining nation with a little less consistency of the background story - almost any non-human nations are available)

See the following map, based on Ballbarian's Middle-Earth map



- Black = Player
- Other colors = Alliances (orange = 1-province Nations out of any alliance system)
- Numbers = nations based on Mapedit commands
- White circles = normal independent
- SP in white circle = special independent provinces, generally strongly defended with nice reward, for flavor or balance

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Notes on gameplay: this is intended for a SP game, but with minor changes, it could be a MP scenario:
- the 3 main factions could make a (weird) 3-players game (alliances with minor nations would be removed)
- the 6 minor Nations could make a quite classical 6-players game, with a chaotic combination of player vs player and player vs AI;
- etc.

Also playing any Nation could actually be quite challenging in its own right, even the major ones, I believe.

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Any feedback and help welcome. In particular, I will have to prepare custom provinces and customs Gods adapted to the background.