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Hunt11 posted:Doesn't pan have blood sacrificing as well? No!  At this stage of the game blood sacrifice is just insanely strong and good, and Man's player shouldn't have had a hard time convincing Pangaea and/or Caelum to join him in an alliance against us. But, he didn't put in that diplomatic legwork and here we are.
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Feb 25, 2017 10:42
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Only EA Pan has blood sacrifice. MA and LA don't, but you can always use stealth preaching dryads to push dominion.
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Feb 25, 2017 18:47
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Ramc posted:Only EA Pan has blood sacrifice. MA and LA don't, but you can always use stealth preaching dryads to push dominion. This is probably less effective in a MoMoney game where you can just put 60 wolves on patrol in every province to go along with the obligatory Fort/Lab/Temple.
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Feb 25, 2017 21:54
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Voyager I posted:This is probably less effective in a MoMoney game where you can just put 60 wolves on patrol in every province to go along with the obligatory Fort/Lab/Temple. Sort of. In MA Pan games, which have the nasty stealth sacred White Centaurs I have been sneaking through lands and been found, only to murder the entire province defense because White Centaurs are good. LA Pan has fewer stealth unit options.
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Feb 25, 2017 22:46
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What are these MA EA LA acronyms?
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Feb 25, 2017 23:48
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Cathode Raymond posted:What are these MA EA LA acronyms? Middle Age, Early Age, Late Age. While some nations only exist in one age, several of them exist in two, or even three ages, and while they tend to share some common themes, they never have exactly the same selection of units, and sometimes nation-specific spells vary as well. The usual "theme" is that the early ages have more "magic" and fantastic creatures, while the later ages are slightly more down to earth(for a given meaning of that term, a bit less high fantasy). And a given game being played can only feature nations from one of the three ages.
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Feb 25, 2017 23:55
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early middle and late age. variants for each race. early age is normally more magical and barbaric, late is more advanced/degenerate, I think?
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Feb 25, 2017 23:56
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Middle and late have more blood, more population fuckers.
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Feb 25, 2017 23:58
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It also influences the map itself: Early Age has generally less population and therefore less gold income then the later ages, for example. And wasn't it that the composition of independent province defense is also changing depending on age? Early Age has more barbarians and tribesmen, later ages have more stuff like crossbows and heavy cavalry.
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Feb 26, 2017 00:10
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Late age has fewer magic sites and mages are weaker but have more path diversity since they've gotten organized under the growing civilized nations. Most troops are some flavor of a human in armor, so the troops that aren't have a huge impact. LA Atlantis and LA Mictlan have famously powerful sacred troops for their opposition, but "powerful sacreds" is Mictlan in a nutshell anyway. Ulm can still win with massive pike blocks.
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Feb 26, 2017 00:37
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Also "plot" wise Early Age is the slightly happier age and as time goes on the world approaches the inevitable apocalypse. Think of each age as a stopping point where the players turn up; if the players don't show up to play an EA game -> MA will happen, if they don't show up to play MA -> LA happens. So in EA along with the more powerful mages there are those more fantastical beasts, beast-men, barbaric technology for most nations; though some like Scaleia are doing fair well as a happy Not-Rome. People are learning how to better use magic, get bigger results and start building their empires. MA though things are starting to go to hell for some; but others are reaching their peak. Examples include Not-Rome becoming a undead hellscape with half the empire bailing (Not-East Rome) and the other half attempting to stem the tide (Not-West Rome); Atlantis falling to global cooling (?) and the slow rise of Not-Cthulhu/Ithlids from D&D; Not-Jewish Giants losing their kingdom; Fire-elemental Not-Persians losing their empire to low birth rates. But then also Good Not-Indian Monkeys beating the bad ones, Not-Medieval Europe rises (while West Rome also somehow exists), Not-Aztecs become less insanely blood thirsty. LA everything is hosed forever. Not-Greek Nature Mythology is torn between angry undead FEEL NATURES WRATH and the technology using dwindling species. Not-West Rome has fallen and is now one big nasty undead empire. Not-Spanish Inquisition have turned to worshiping full on devils just to survive. Not-Germany is not Not-Dracula (which is cool and good and they aren't evil they are just vampires). Not-Aztecs have returned to their old ways cause lol 2012ish Apocalypse. And Not-Cthulhu threatens to turn the world into a staging point for the invasion of the 4th dimension if not stopped.
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Feb 26, 2017 00:59
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While the population starts the highest in LA, it's generally the premier point thematically for apocalyptic events, such as massive blood sacrifice rituals or insanity-spreading dominion or (in Dom3) blighted undead dominion turning the world to dust. Also it should be stated that the chronology of the Dominions world is a little muddled. EA is clearly followed by MA which is clearly followed by LA, but the Ascension Wars JUST KEEP HAPPENING. Half or more of the big-ticket summons are explicitly servants of the/a previous Pantokrator, and there's ways of calling on previously banished and defeated Pretender Gods among other powerful, sealed-away beings. In fact, there's no practical limit to how many you can get. The overall implication is that the world is in some hellish cycle of death and rebirth that keeps churning out new Gods who then disappear creating a power vacuum that everyone else rushes to fill over and over again. It's like some incredibly convoluted way of implying that every game of Dominions is canon, even the ones won by turkeys. Especially the ones won by turkeys.
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Feb 26, 2017 01:10
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Asphodal is MA.
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Feb 26, 2017 01:14
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The icon for one of the Dominions games was the Eater of Gods, one of the Doom Horrors who live beyond the veil of sanity and reality. Every time you start the game, the Pantokrator gets eaten by the Doom Horrors, and the war starts anew.
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Feb 26, 2017 01:41
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Much of the flavor text provided by the games suggests that Pantokrators eventually feel the pull of something greater, elsewhere, and just sort of gently caress off, but that's definitely a plausible fate for them. I don't expect it's called the Eater of Gods for nothing. ...then again, Scabriel is called the Maker of Ruins and does approximately gently caress-all of that.
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Feb 26, 2017 01:58
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Gridlocked posted:LA everything is hosed forever. Not-Greek Nature Mythology is torn between angry undead FEEL NATURES WRATH and the technology using dwindling species. Not-West Rome has fallen and is now one big nasty undead empire. Not-Spanish Inquisition have turned to worshiping full on devils just to survive. Not-Germany is not Not-Dracula (which is cool and good and they aren't evil they are just vampires). Not-Aztecs have returned to their old ways cause lol 2012ish Apocalypse. And Not-Cthulhu threatens to turn the world into a staging point for the invasion of the 4th dimension if not stopped. ...except for LA Pan! The madness and revelry has gone and the magic is in decline, but a new social structure and civilization is developing amongst the beastmen, less rigid than the caste structure that was there before. They've got a better grasp on metalworking and other technologies, and as was mentioned before have turned away from blood sacrifices. Basically I'm the good guys. Root for me!
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Feb 26, 2017 02:24
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Shady Amish Terror posted:While the population starts the highest in LA, it's generally the premier point thematically for apocalyptic events, such as massive blood sacrifice rituals or insanity-spreading dominion or (in Dom3) blighted undead dominion turning the world to dust. I think the idea is that, as someone said, if there's no ascension war then the ages progress, but they never get past late age because an ascension war always happens. And after it does, presumably the setting reverts to pre-Early Age, where the Pantokrator's magic beasts roam everywhere and under their watchful eye populations rebuild from the apocalyptic events of the last war, until some indeterminate amount of time later the Pantokrator disappears again and slowly humanity takes over again as the magic from the old Pantokrator's reign slowly fades away, until another ascension war breaks out perpetuating the cycle.
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Feb 26, 2017 02:30
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Yes, even LA Caelum, the nation of flighty birdmen, is marching off to doom and gloom. That wasn't always the case and in the patch were LA Caelum was reworked to be less like MA Caelum and more like the gloomy gloom gloom nations of the Late Age I was in the middle of a game with them and my strategy got completely hosed over thanks to the sudden changes. (I'm still bitter about that.  )
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Feb 26, 2017 02:31
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AfroSquirrel posted:...except for LA Pan! The madness and revelry has gone and the magic is in decline, but a new social structure and civilization is developing amongst the beastmen, less rigid than the caste structure that was there before. They've got a better grasp on metalworking and other technologies, and as was mentioned before have turned away from blood sacrifices. This sounds like propaganda and I can't be fooled by your propaganda because I've already bought in to the vampire horde propaganda  One day the vampire hordes will get elected and bring back all the coal mining jobs to my town or so is my understanding.
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Feb 26, 2017 02:33
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AfroSquirrel posted:...except for LA Pan! The madness and revelry has gone and the magic is in decline, but a new social structure and civilization is developing amongst the beastmen, less rigid than the caste structure that was there before. They've got a better grasp on metalworking and other technologies, and as was mentioned before have turned away from blood sacrifices. Not knowing anything about the future of this LP, but seeing someone pronounce themselves as the "good guy", I'm guessing we're about 3 turns away from them casting Burden of Time or some other heinous thing.
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Feb 26, 2017 02:54
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Cathode Raymond posted:This sounds like propaganda and I can't be fooled by your propaganda because I've already bought in to the vampire horde propaganda "I didn't think Vampires would drain MY blood!" says area man who voted for Vampires Draining People's Blood Party.
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Feb 26, 2017 03:31
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The nation of Gath is a Just and Good nation walking the Straight Path of Righteousness. The State would never ask for your blood! we will take the blood of your virgin daughters and murder you with wolves if you complain. have a blessed day, loyal patriot.
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Feb 26, 2017 14:33
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Turn 63 On turn 63 we reach Enchantment 9, and poo poo is about to go down. We cast the normal spells of the turn: wolves are summoned, Vampire Lords (Tarshish, Kittim), Se’irim too. We teleport several Kohen Gadol from our capitol to the front to sit in newly renovated forts (thank you, Man) and sacrifice slaves to pump our Dominion.   The classic Thug chassis. I guess it makes for a robust Prophet? We see that Bogarus declares a new Prophet, meaning that he lost the old one somewhere down the line. This one is a Bane Lord. Bane Lords are a commander Death summon. They have no magic paths but are a very robust and tough undead lord, usually used as a thug chassis. Interesting, I guess. We see a couple of scouted battles between Pangaea and AI Ragha far to the South. Pan invades a Ragha province with a very small force and gets beaten for it, and then Ragha invades the Throne province that Pangaea took from them a turn or two ago and puts the fort to siege. The AI loves playing province tag. There are a whole slew of messages informing us that barrels of rainwater have been leaping to attack my commanders in Mannish Dominion, the consequences of Man's Vengeful Waters global. This is extremely irksome, as it indicates that we are -not- doing a good enough job of pushing Man’s dom out of the way. Hopefully our handful of new Kohen Gadol joining the sac teams will ameliorate this problem.  Our Yeddeoni capable of summoning skeletons are just fine.  Even our Gittite Commanders are OK. They're tough enough to defeat a small water elemental in single combat. Also, look at that beard! We only end up losing a Scout and an Isacharrite Sybl to the angry waters, but it is still annoying. The front with man is made up of two sieges at this moment: Thorn Woods and Solam. I desperately want to crack and storm one of these forts so that the freed army can advance towards Man’s final Throne province. If Pan beats us to that Throne I will be extremely vexed and I am not sure what we would do. If we could simply obliterate Man’s Dominion we could fly Vampires right over to start sieging the Throne, but that is just not happening at the rate we need.  Just a couple of provinces away from having that Throne! The Throne province is just North-West of Noranthion, hidden by the game UI. So, the forts are under siege and we’re hoping for the best. The real highlight of this turn is that we are casting Arcane Nexus:  It is such a powerful spell that I am honestly a little bit afraid that casting it will turn Pangaea against us. If Pan decides to ally with Bogarus and they begin a joint attack I am unsure how we’ll fare. On the other hand, this spell -will- go up at some point in this game, and we can’t afford to let somebody else beat us to it. Thusly, we liquidated the majority of our gem supplies to cast it. All gems other than Blood Slaves can be alchemized to and from Astral Pearls. Two non-pearls make one pearl, and two pearls make one non-pearl. We alchemize the majority of our Fire, Water, and Air stockpiles into Pearls, and then take a big chunk out of our Death and Earth supplies as well. Nature gems are too useful for summoning wolves to feed the Blood engine, so we can’t spare any of those. In total we are putting 535 Astral Pearls into this spell. There are currently zero free slots on the global spell board, so Nexus is guaranteed to have to attempt to bump something off. When all the global slots are full, any attempted casting of a global works like this: The new global spell is pitted against a randomly chosen spell from the current list. If the new global is stronger in cast strength than the randomly picked existing global it overwrites the old spell and takes its place on the board. We’re throwing everything we have into this cast because we have no idea how many gems Man has put into his globals. Mother Oak is likely a low-ish cast, as is Vengeful Waters since Man doesn’t have a ton of native Water access. Enchanted Forests, on the other hand, could be hundreds of gems strong since Man had Mother Oak up for dozens of turns and a very strong Nature income to begin with. Bogarus has Gift of Health, which is also a Nature spell and so maybe isn’t super strong since Bogarus is not a Nature heavy nation. Fingers crossed, if this cast fails then we’ll have sunk just about our entire gem supply into nothing at all. If it succeeds the rest of the world may turn on us. If they don’t, we may very well have made the move that will eventually win us the game. Next turn: Arcane Nexus
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Feb 26, 2017 14:52
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Oh boy. You are all-in now.
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Feb 26, 2017 15:26
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Black Balloon posted:Oh boy. You are all-in now. No joke. Here's our gem reserves from turn 62 -> turn 63:  
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Feb 26, 2017 15:38
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Caelum Turn 62 My Pale Ones are still moving into position for the next underwater-attack into AI-Jomon's territory. And I've amassed a terrible, but huge army to deal with AI Mictlan once and for all. And Bogarus has taken that Mictlan-fort which had slowed him down, so now it's a race to the south to see which one of us can nab Mictlan itself. Older turns Edit: Turn 63 has to upload first, but is incoming soon (tm)! Libluini fucked around with this message at 16:42 on Feb 26, 2017 |
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Feb 26, 2017 16:35
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I still like Vengeful Waters because it can still potentially kill commanders and wizards, if not reliably, and that uncertainty makes anyone invading you commit additional resources or risk having their army stranded. You can pair Vengeful Waters with Foul Air- the global that causes anyone not-underwater taking damage to become diseased (stopping healing and making them lose about 10% of their max hp every turn). That way all the water elemental needs to do is tag the victim once, win or lose, to ensure eventual death.
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Feb 26, 2017 16:44
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Caelum Turn 63 has finished uploading. This video and turn is basically just the aftermath of one giant battle against Mictlan and me discussing its repercussions. Also, surprise: My Pale Ones are attacking AI Mictlan, not AI Jomon! Underwater-feint executed.  You probably don't need this link Libluini fucked around with this message at 18:48 on Feb 26, 2017 |
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Feb 26, 2017 18:13
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Does Enchantment 9 unlock any other cool stuff? And what's the next research direction?
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Feb 26, 2017 18:27
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So if I am understanding this right, Gath is a nation with a ruling class dominated by literal giants, a soldiery dominated by vampires and demons, and a police force made up almost exclusively of wolves? Like, feral wolves? And their economy is completely dependent on - and centered around - the execution of ordinary humans? Giants and vampires and wolves seem like an unlikely coalition, and I can't imagine why you would stay in Gath if you were just a farmer or something. But I guess the wolves probably make pretty effective emigration police too if there are enough of them.
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Feb 26, 2017 22:30
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Cathode Raymond posted:So if I am understanding this right, Gath is a nation with a ruling class dominated by literal giants, a soldiery dominated by vampires and demons, and a police force made up almost exclusively of wolves? Like, feral wolves? And their economy is completely dependent on - and centered around - the execution of ordinary humans? Yeah but he's cut taxes. e: to the bone
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Feb 26, 2017 22:37
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In the grim darkness of the Ascension Wars, there is only blood sacrifice.
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Feb 26, 2017 22:39
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All the peasants just grumble about how it was much worse in their day which in Gath's case is quite true. For the original giants that the ruling class are descended from started to eat humans on a truly massive scale as well as occasionally eating each other.
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Feb 26, 2017 22:43
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Pretty much every winning nation ends as an unholy alliance of whatever, wolves and vampires. Maybe some partytime horrors too.
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Feb 26, 2017 22:45
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Cathode Raymond posted:So if I am understanding this right, Gath is a nation with a ruling class dominated by literal giants, a soldiery dominated by vampires and demons, and a police force made up almost exclusively of wolves? Like, feral wolves? And their economy is completely dependent on - and centered around - the execution of ordinary humans? There are not necessarily better places to go in Dominions 4. EDIT: I would play a Dominions 4 themed game of Papers, Please.
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Feb 26, 2017 22:46
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How are u posted:The nation of Gath is a Just and Good nation walking the Straight Path of Righteousness. The State would never ask for your blood! Not just virgin daughters. Neckbeards are even easier to find and gather. 
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Feb 26, 2017 23:19
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Easier to find and gather? Sure, but far less useful.Dom 1 Manual posted:But arcana is not the sole source of magic power. The life blood of the living is inherently magical. It is the magic in the blood that allows heroes to perform great feats, babies to be born and emotions to stir. Blood magic is the mastery of this power. Unfortunately the magic in the blood is diluted at best. Few mages can tap enough strength from their own blood to be able to perform magic feats. To do so the blood mage must spill the blood of other people.
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Feb 26, 2017 23:33
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Cathode Raymond posted:So if I am understanding this right, Gath is a nation with a ruling class dominated by literal giants, a soldiery dominated by vampires and demons, and a police force made up almost exclusively of wolves? Like, feral wolves? And their economy is completely dependent on - and centered around - the execution of ordinary humans? #notallevilcannabilisticgiants
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Feb 26, 2017 23:37
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Dominions feels like a computer game interpretation of Glen Cook's The Black Company. Sure, these horrific godlike beings can cause the entire forests of the earth to give birth to horrific vine men that will attack anything that doesn't worship said godlike being. But get one of those fuckers alone against enough heavy cavalry? It'll go down.
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Feb 26, 2017 23:38
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Their believers can pray them back to life, but you're absolutely right. Of course some of them are immortal and would have to be trapped outside their dominion for it to stick even that much. And of course, the quantity of 'enough' heavy cavalry varies a touch. Sure, some Pretenders are just weak old mages who know how to keep their health up and run a cult, but a dragon is no laughing matter for pikemen...nor a Sphinx, for that matter.
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Feb 27, 2017 00:33
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