Dominions 6 - by end of year

[Tanaka]

Seen some posts on other forums expressing disappointment with the game save capabilities, where someone implied no/limited save feature.  They don't really go into details as to what they mean.  What exactly is the limitation of the save feature and why are folks having an issue with it?

Dominions has always been this way. Iron man mode. But you can manually go into the folders and save yourself.

[Grim.Reaper]

Seen some posts on other forums expressing disappointment with the game save capabilities, where someone implied no/limited save feature.  They don't really go into details as to what they mean.  What exactly is the limitation of the save feature and why are folks having an issue with it?

Dominions has always been this way. Iron man mode. But you can manually go into the folders and save yourself.

Can you explain iron man mode, what does that exactly mean?  When are you able to save your progress?  Does it just save your progress at preset times and you lose progress if you end a session before then?  I assume there is some kind of save and not expected to completed a full game in one session.  Sorry, just haven't seen it so not really sure.

Not sure going into the save folders and doing things manually is appealing, but at least an option.  I am not at all saying the save system is bad or good, just trying to understand what it is.

[rss334]

I can only speak to 5 but assume 6 works the same way regarding saves.  Each time you press end turn that turn is over, you can't go back and replay it.  If you save and quit at that point you will come back to an option to continue game.   It's iron man mode in the fact that you can't go back 3 turns and do something differently from a save, unless of course you use the method mention above of manually manipulating folders and files. 

I get the comments, your on turn 100 of game and realize you screwed something up on turn 90 and can't go back and redo it - really your only option is to play it out and try to fix it or start over on a new game.  Personally I like it because it forces the player to think about their choices and you learn more if you have to live with your choices vs always going back to a save. I've never used the manual save process even though I know it's there.

[Grim.Reaper]

I can only speak to 5 but assume 6 works the same way regarding saves.  Each time you press end turn that turn is over, you can't go back and replay it.  If you save and quit at that point you will come back to an option to continue game.   It's iron man mode in the fact that you can't go back 3 turns and do something differently from a save, unless of course you use the method mention above of manually manipulating folders and files. 

I get the comments, your on turn 100 of game and realize you screwed something up on turn 90 and can't go back and redo it - really your only option is to play it out and try to fix it or start over on a new game.  Personally I like it because it forces the player to think about their choices and you learn more if you have to live with your choices vs always going back to a save. I've never used the manual save process even though I know it's there.

Perfect, I now understand it.  Likely not a huge deal for me.  Thanks.

[solops]

First patch later today!

[Grim.Reaper]

Patch released....

This is a quickly made bug fix patch to address some of the problems found after release. Hopefully this will fix the most serious problems. Thanks for reporting the bugs you find. We will start to work on the next update right away, so expect another update in the near future.

General
Carrion Lady got an added random path (DG)
Carrion Lord got an added random path (WEND)
Carrion Commander was missing recuperation
Slight change to Black Dryad description.
Asphodel regrowth didn't work, fixed
Praefectum Equitus got his priest skill.
Orb of Elemental Fire got proper fire gem generation.
Miasma (and other spells that target swamps) were unable to target swamps
Xibalba foreign recruit fix.
Liquid body could only affect demons
Invisibility spell didn't work properly
Fix for lost mount tag lingering after transformation
Bean Sidhe was missing her sprite
NAP doesn't affect arena battles.
Global enchantment attack no longer cares about NAPs
Sailing didn't work properly, fixed
Attackers could retreat into defender's fort
Eriu's recruit in mountain/highland didn't work
Abysia wall defenders tweaked
Better at disabling cave layer if using map with many provinces
Right-click to move didn't work on cave entrances
History playback crashed if pressing '4', fixed
F1 screen could crash the game, fixed
Well of Urd glamour gem instead of nature
The Throne of Earth gnome now costs gold.
Some mounted units with missing unmounted sprites fixed.
Imp Pets didn't have claws
Burning ones didn't have correct bad formation fighter value
Stat fixes
Typo fixes


Modding
AI didn't care about #disbless, fixed
Fix for blood slave generation from sites


Map Making
New command: #nodeepchoice

[JasonPratt]

Gosh, I don't recall the last time I played solo! -- maybe on Dom3?? Or 4 more likely.

In multiplayer, 'iron man' is obviously normal so I never noticed/recalled that something similar happens in solo.

This lack of solo-play must be rectified soon.....

[W8taminute]

Patch released....

This is a quickly made bug fix patch to address some of the problems found after release. Hopefully this will fix the most serious problems. Thanks for reporting the bugs you find. We will start to work on the next update right away, so expect another update in the near future.

General
Carrion Lady got an added random path (DG)
Carrion Lord got an added random path (WEND)
Carrion Commander was missing recuperation
Slight change to Black Dryad description.
Asphodel regrowth didn't work, fixed
Praefectum Equitus got his priest skill.
Orb of Elemental Fire got proper fire gem generation.
Miasma (and other spells that target swamps) were unable to target swamps
Xibalba foreign recruit fix.
Liquid body could only affect demons
Invisibility spell didn't work properly
Fix for lost mount tag lingering after transformation
Bean Sidhe was missing her sprite
NAP doesn't affect arena battles.
Global enchantment attack no longer cares about NAPs
Sailing didn't work properly, fixed
Attackers could retreat into defender's fort
Eriu's recruit in mountain/highland didn't work
Abysia wall defenders tweaked
Better at disabling cave layer if using map with many provinces
Right-click to move didn't work on cave entrances
History playback crashed if pressing '4', fixed
F1 screen could crash the game, fixed
Well of Urd glamour gem instead of nature
The Throne of Earth gnome now costs gold.
Some mounted units with missing unmounted sprites fixed.
Imp Pets didn't have claws
Burning ones didn't have correct bad formation fighter value
Stat fixes
Typo fixes


Modding
AI didn't care about #disbless, fixed
Fix for blood slave generation from sites


Map Making
New command: #nodeepchoice

You gotta love Illwinter.  Although they're a small team they give good support.

I'm still waiting like a jackass for Skies Above the Great War to get patched because quite frankly, it's unplayable in its current state.

[solops]

Huzzah! I got my hard-copy manual! Now it will be a lot easier figuring out just how dangerous some of this stuff is!

[Tanaka]

Huzzah! I got my hard-copy manual! Now it will be a lot easier figuring out just how dangerous some of this stuff is!

Nice how does it look? Can you post a pic?

[solops]

I'll try to get a pic up.

But, the big news is that I have rediscovered Hotkeys!!!
It has been so long since I played I had not only forgotten them, but I could not find them once I did remember....all the useful stuff I did in Dom5 at the push of a key or two forgotten and rediscovered. It took 30 minutes for me to figure it out. That is one complaint I would make to the Devs. Nowhere in the manual are hotkeys mentioned. And unless you know where to look, they are sort of hidden in the game. Once you know about them, it is easy-peasy.

For the uninitiated on any screen push the "?" button. Different Hotkey lists pop up for different screens. For me that is "Shift + ?" and a hotkey menu pops up. And it gets even deeper. On some screens you have to ? different parts of the screen. Such as on the battle scripting screen where you tell your guys what to do in battle (attack, hold, target this or that, etc). You have to mouse-hover and ? the word "spells" to bring up the help hotkeys for repeat copying spells, copying all of the 5-slot spell schedule into one of 9 slots or pasting a saved spell schedule to another spellcaster.

And some game functions are impossible to do without hotkeys. That really aggravates me. Not that you have to use a hotkey, but that it is undocumented. You have to "discover" it. An example of this is coordinating a simultaneous attack from multiple zones.

Anyway, just venting. Dominions, all of them, are great, great games. But, the hotkey thing really is poorly done insofar as documentation goes. I started playing in Dominions 3 and I never had a clue you could do some things until, in my first MP game ever in Dom5, one of the players mentioned it to me. Wow... I had played the game for YEARS (Dom3 and 4) and had no clue that some things were possible. I mean really, would it be so hard to at least mention a few things about hotkeys in the manual or in one of the drop-down menus? Just a mention of the hotkeys and some of the things you can do so that a player will go look for them and discover a few things.

The words "Hotkeys" and "Shortcuts" do not exist in the manual anywhere that I could find. Not in the Table of Contents or the Index, nor anywhere else that I could find. Perhaps a mention is made in passing, somewhere, but I have not seen it.

Again, you can stumble across them on your own, but why should you have to? Two or three sentences in a short section called "HOTKEYS" would open a new world to new players without them having to stumble over it or have another player tell them about it.

[Tanaka]

I'll try to get a pic up.

But, the big news is that I have rediscovered Hotkeys!!!
It has been so long since I played I had not only forgotten them, but I could not find them once I did remember....all the useful stuff I did in Dom5 at the push of a key or two forgotten and rediscovered. It took 30 minutes for me to figure it out. That is one complaint I would make to the Devs. Nowhere in the manual are hotkeys mentioned. And unless you know where to look, they are sort of hidden in the game. Once you know about them, it is easy-peasy.

For the uninitiated on any screen push the "?" button. Different Hotkey lists pop up for different screens. For me that is "Shift + ?" and a hotkey menu pops up. And it gets even deeper. On some screens you have to ? different parts of the screen. Such as on the battle scripting screen where you tell your guys what to do in battle (attack, hold, target this or that, etc). You have to mouse-hover and ? the word "spells" to bring up the help hotkeys for repeat copying spells, copying all of the 5-slot spell schedule into one of 9 slots or pasting a saved spell schedule to another spellcaster.

And some game functions are impossible to do without hotkeys. That really aggravates me. Not that you have to use a hotkey, but that it is undocumented. You have to "discover" it. An example of this is coordinating a simultaneous attack from multiple zones.

Anyway, just venting. Dominions, all of them, are great, great games. But, the hotkey thing really is poorly done insofar as documentation goes. I started playing in Dominions 3 and I never had a clue you could do some things until, in my first MP game ever in Dom5, one of the players mentioned it to me. Wow... I had played the game for YEARS (Dom3 and 4) and had no clue that some things were possible. I mean really, would it be so hard to at least mention a few things about hotkeys in the manual or in one of the drop-down menus? Just a mention of the hotkeys and some of the things you can do so that a player will go look for them and discover a few things.

The words "Hotkeys" and "Shortcuts" do not exist in the manual anywhere that I could find. Not in the Table of Contents or the Index, nor anywhere else that I could find. Perhaps a mention is made in passing, somewhere, but I have not seen it.

Again, you can stumble across them on your own, but why should you have to? Two or three sentences in a short section called "HOTKEYS" would open a new world to new players without them having to stumble over it or have another player tell them about it.

Yes Dominions has always been about finding out things and figuring things out. Like you said for the longest time the keys were not even in game. Now the ? key finally puts them all together. And yes so many things could be added to the manual. It sounds like they continue to update it as the game gets updated.

[Tanaka]

We are recruiting for a Grogs game!

https://www.grogheads.com/forums/index.php?topic=27348.0