29-06-2004 15:17									#1
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After having lots of fun with AoW: Shadow Magic, I've decided to give Dominions II a try. It looks like D2 is on a much bigger scale than SM, which is very appealing to me. Currently just trying out the demo, but wow, so many choices to make before you even get into an actual game.

I like Ulm because Black Knights are cool and I'm thinking of going the military conquest route. So for those of you who got the game, what do you recommend as far as physical form, magic paths, etc. go? Some kind of magic expert like a mage seems sensible since new paths are cheap, but I'll defer to those of you who've mastered the game.

	29-06-2004 16:40									#2
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I like to roleplay with the game a bit, and when playing Ulm I typically do one of two things;

Pick the Monolith pretender (and name if something like "Stone of Ulm") and choose the iron faith specialty, then put a few points into earth and maybe another spell line.

Or, go with an alchemist and the golem cult specialty and raise the production and order aswell as choosing a variety of magic lines.

	29-06-2004 23:12									#3
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I like Ulm, although I have to admit they're not the strongest nation around.

Whilst Black Knights are effective, I find that you get a lot more bang for your buck from Ulmish infantry; one Black Knight has the same upkeep as seven soldiers.

A rainbow pretender is a good bet with Ulm; if you don't want to role-play, don't take any earth; your smiths can cast gnome lore, whilst your pretender searches for other paths.

	30-06-2004 09:40									#4
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In the case of Ulm, I would indeed choose a rainbow pretender. However, my choice would be one such as the Ghost King, who can also be used to combat entire armies when configured right. The key is 'buffing' spells, like mirror image, mist form, quickness, and fire shield. While rather useless on a normal mage, they can be quite potent on a pretender with good stats and abilities.

I also strongly advise taking an order scale; it greatly increases your gold income. The point cost is often defrayed by taking misfortune. Order makes events less common, so misfortune is less of a problem.

	30-06-2004 12:39									#5
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"Rainbow" pretender?
By this you mean having proficiency in multiple magic paths, right? Because at first I'm looking through all the different forms thinking, "Which one looks like a rainbow?" Seriously, that's how much of a noob I am here.

Ok, here's what I picked:
- Monolith looked good all-around, except for lack of mobility (gets one level of Astral and Nature magic)
- Iron Faith theme (requires one order scale and one drain scale)
- dominion: 5 (Monolith starts with 4, added one more)
- took one productivity scale and one growth scale
- fortress-type: Castle
- magic: Earth 5, Astral 5, Nature 4
That leaves me with 13 points, which will have to remain unused since it's not enough to buy anything else.

	30-06-2004 15:35									#6
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Hmm...perhaps I shouldn't completely overlook fire magic. Some pretty nifty spells there.


*Beavis voice*
Fire! Fire!

	30-06-2004 16:07									#7
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I'm goign to hijack this thread for my own purposes.


I was thinking about making a "full conversion" mod that replaced all the races with more traditional fantasy races - dwarvves, elves, orcs, ect...

It's really just a pipe dream at this stage, but if you have any suggestions or ideas for what races I could put in to replace all the current ones, feel free to throw them out.

	30-06-2004 22:33									#8
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Bah. What makes Dominions good is the lack of shameless Tolkien rip-offery.

I'd steer clear of Iron Faith. It's a rather weak theme IMO.

As regular Ulm, it's a total no-brainer to go for maximum drain; your smiths are immune to it. It'll raise your magic resistance (a weakness for Ulm) and make things more difficult for non-smith mages.

Maxing out order and production is also pretty essential for Ulm. What you do with growth and luck is more flexible, although you should probably avoid taking death or luck scales. Misfortune is manageable, if annoying.

Choose one of the small mage pretenders; the master alchemist if you want money and to roleplay, the sage for research or the druid for stealth. Give him/her lvl2 in several magic paths, and use that to search for magic sites. You'll soon find plenty of them.

	30-06-2004 23:38									#9
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quote: Originally posted by Sandman Bah. What makes Dominions good is the lack of shameless Tolkien rip-offery.

I wasn't talking about "Tolkien rip-offery", but just more traditional fantasy races. Aside from the tolkien things like elves and dwarves, I was also thinking about minotaurs, perhaps draconians, and other things like that. I can't say the nations in Dominions 2 inspire me very much.


But what about Pratchet rip-offery - would you be interested in my pictsies mod if I ever got around to finishing it?

I've lacked the motivation needed to keep tweaking the units, ect...

	01-07-2004 01:54									#10
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quote: Originally posted by General Ludd I wasn't talking about "Tolkien rip-offery", but just more traditional fantasy races. Aside from the tolkien things like elves and dwarves, I was also thinking about minotaurs, perhaps draconians, and other things like that. I can't say the nations in Dominions 2 inspire me very much.

Each to his own, I suppose. What is so inspirational about 'traditional' fantasy races, compared to, say, the Viking nations of Dominions? I want to see new ground broken, not tired old cliches churned out for the umpteenth time to satisfy some miniscule fanbase.

quote: But what about Pratchet rip-offery - would you be interested in my pictsies mod if I ever got around to finishing it?

Someone desperately needs to do a Discworld map for Dominions.

	01-07-2004 03:24									#11
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quote: Originally posted by General Ludd I'm goign to hijack this thread for my own purposes. I was thinking about making a "full conversion" mod that replaced all the races with more traditional fantasy races - dwarvves, elves, orcs, ect... It's really just a pipe dream at this stage, but if you have any suggestions or ideas for what races I could put in to replace all the current ones, feel free to throw them out.

Yes, Precious, we must have orcses, elveses, and dwarveses to complement nasty men. And don't forget filthy, dirty Hobbitses! Trixie! False! Wring their scrawny, little necks, yes! And then we will take the Precioussss....

	01-07-2004 06:12									#12
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To threadjack a second time... is anyone interested in joining an Apolyton dominions game?

	01-07-2004 06:16									#13
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I'll play if some others are interested.

	01-07-2004 07:23									#14
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Dominions related threadjacks are allowed.

quote: Originally posted by Sandman I'd steer clear of Iron Faith. It's a rather weak theme IMO.

How come? How about Ceremonial Faith then? That's available for only one order scale.

quote: As regular Ulm, it's a total no-brainer to go for maximum drain; your smiths are immune to it. It'll raise your magic resistance (a weakness for Ulm) and make things more difficult for non-smith mages.

Yeah, I should've paid closer attention to Ulm's description. Smiths are not affected by drain.

quote: Choose one of the small mage pretenders; the master alchemist if you want money and to roleplay, the sage for research or the druid for stealth. Give him/her lvl2 in several magic paths, and use that to search for magic sites. You'll soon find plenty of them.

How come only level 2? Aren't you stuck with the levels you purchase at the beginning? It seems to me that's limiting the spells you'll be able to research. Or am I then supposed to rely upon the magical items forged by my smiths, which will be powerful?

I'm starting to get the impression that having played D&D at some point in your life is a prerequisite for understanding this game.

	01-07-2004 11:11									#15
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Like I said before, full order scale is a must, for almost any strategy.

And yes, there are many 'booster' items. High astral in particular gives rings of wizardry which raise your level in all paths. Infact, each path has at least two booster items for them (fire skull and flaming helmet for fire, winged helmet and bag of air for air, ect.).

	01-07-2004 12:21									#16
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Introducing....

Ugoff the Great Sage (thank you, Burger King! )
Level 2 Fire, Air, Water, Earth, Astral and Nature
Dominion strength: 6
Order: 3
Productivity: 3
Growth: 1
Misfortune: 1
Drain: 3
Fortress type: Castle

	01-07-2004 15:50									#17
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quote: Originally posted by Jules Aren't you stuck with the levels you purchase at the beginning?

You can further enhance a spell line, but it costs a large amount of gems to do so. Especially if you don't already have any points in it. You can do this for any commander, too.

	01-07-2004 23:15									#18
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quote: How come? How about Ceremonial Faith then? That's available for only one order scale.

Since Iron Faith black priests are not drain immune, it's very risky to take drain-3 for Iron Faith. This means that Iron Faith, for all intents and purposes, costs 80 points more than regular Ulm.

Just skip on themes. You generally don't need them.

quote: How come only level 2? Aren't you stuck with the levels you purchase at the beginning? It seems to me that's limiting the spells you'll be able to research. Or am I then supposed to rely upon the magical items forged by my smiths, which will be powerful?

You can power up your casters (including the pretender) in a variety of methods; spending gems on empowerment or forging empowering items (earth boots are a must for Ulm). On the battlefield you can use communions and cast empowering spells.

You can research any spell; it's casting it that's the hard part. I will admit that a rainbow mage won't able to cast the really badass spells later on in the game without some serious buffing; you'll just have to try and win beforehand.

It's not the power of items that Ulm's smiths can forge, but their efficiency; items forged by a smith cost 25% less in gems. Add to this dwarven hammers, which Ulm can easily get, and you can churn out items for half price.

Items which make your mages more powerful are generally a better bet than swords and stuff.

Ulm is probably the best bet to learn the game from; solid troops, priests and blessing strategies are irrelevant, generous scales and a single, focused mage type.

	02-07-2004 05:22									#19
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Will drain affect my pretender?

Can there be more than one magic site in a province? Or should I wait until I capture a few provinces before setting my pretender to search? I'd have him do research in the meantime.

How about army design philosophy? Stay away from the knights and stick to infantry? Guardians to garrison the castles?

And anything else you can suggest that might be helpful.

	02-07-2004 06:11									#20
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quote: Originally posted by Jules Will drain affect my pretender? Can there be more than one magic site in a province? Or should I wait until I capture a few provinces before setting my pretender to search? I'd have him do research in the meantime. How about army design philosophy? Stay away from the knights and stick to infantry? Guardians to garrison the castles? And anything else you can suggest that might be helpful.

Drain will effect your pretender, but except in the first few turns, he should have better things to do than research anyway.

There can be up to four sites in a province; the most magic you need to find a particular site is also four.

When I play Ulm, I like to use most my gold to produce as many smiths as possible, while using my resources on the most resource intensive infantry. Infact, as a guideline for any nation, the troops that use the least gold and the most resources are generally a good choice.

	02-07-2004 22:28									#21
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I, on the other hand, think that regular Ulm infantry is just fine. Particularly the shielded ones - they seem to have more durability. Black Plate stuff has a high armour rating, sure, but they're slower, have weaker defence and get tired more quickly. Guardians I have never been particularly fond of.

Ulmian arbalests have their uses, but they have a nasty habit of hurting your own troops, since they fire armour-piercing shots. It might be worth developing a source of independent archers; their arrows will have no effect on your heavy units, but will hurt anything with a low armour rating.

Black Knights are undoubtably good, but they're too expensive in my view for the early game. Their speed is not so much of an advantage when you're killing independents. Later on, it may become crucial to have a quick-moving force of knights to dispatch to trouble-spots in your empire, flank enemy armies and exterminate routed troops.

One piece of advice which I think is important is 'always keep your upkeep in mind'. Normal units cost 1/15 of their hire cost every turn in upkeep, whilst sacred units cost 1/30. Pretenders, prophets, heroes and mercenaries have no upkeep cost, as far as I'm aware. Province defence, fortresses and temples are free as well. So plan your spending with that in mind.

	07-07-2004 03:23									#22
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Bump to see if anyone else who wants to play a PBEM game...


2 player Dominions doesn't sound so fun, but maybe I'll give it a go if there's no one else who's interested, quantum_mechani.

	07-07-2004 22:29									#23
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I'll play, I suppose.

	09-07-2004 08:01									#24
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Well, we could make a three player game, but those tend to stalemate.

Another option is joining a PBEM I was already starting, which has another three players. It has a few special rules, but ones that I think would be advatanageous for those who have not done MP Dominions before.

The rules:

1) No magic on the pretender beyond what it starts with.

2) No positive magic scale.

3) No 300 gold castles.

Because of the unique set-up of the game, certain nations would be ovepowered if used. Of the remaining nations, only Desert Tombs C'tis and default Ulm are still open.

If anyone is interested (in a new three player or joining the other one) post here, and I will PM you the address to send your pretender files to.

	09-07-2004 18:08									#25
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I might be interested in that game... the Desert Tombs C'tis sounds like fun.


Not being able to put any points toward magic in either the dominion or the pretender is a bit strange though, I'm not even sure what I can put the other points towards.


What other nations are in the game?

	09-07-2004 18:39									#26
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Oh, and what are the settings?

What are the other players like - roleplayers, powergamers?

Fill me in.

	09-07-2004 22:12									#27
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I'd be interested in playing as default Ulm.

When you say "no magic on the pretender beyond what it starts with", do you mean empowering after the game starts, or adding any magic to it during the design phase?

	10-07-2004 06:47									#28
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Empowering during the game is fine, just don't spend any points on the magic paths for the pretender.

The game experiment in limiting magic in order to give more conventional tactics a chance, since most dominions games have them totally out-classed by around turn 30.

The settings:

Research: Very difficult
Magic sites: 10
Richness: Poor
Independants: 7
Map: Cirlani (you may need to download it from Illwinter)

The other players are Broken Empire Ermor, New Era Pangaea, Serpent Cult Pythium, and Barbarian Kings T'ien Ch'i.

	10-07-2004 06:51									#29
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Sounds good to me... I'll make my pretender and such tommorow. Who do I send it to - you?

And is there a date for when it'll start, or anythign else I should know?

	10-07-2004 07:09									#30
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Already PMed the E-mail address, I will start as soon as I have the pretenders.