Dominions 6

[solops]

Dominions 6 is announced and has a page on Steam!

https://store.steampowered.com/app/2511500/Dominions_6__Rise_of_the_Pantokrator/

Many of the planned new features are detailed there, which I am grateful for as I do not do Discord, which has left me out of Grog associated Dominions stuff for the last year.

Anyway, lets discuss it here, too!

And, taken from the Steam discussion of new features:

https://steamcommunity.com/app/2511500/discussions/0/3807281445020039925/

"Dominions 6 new Features and Changes
As most people won't be on the Discord channels where the beta testers are teasing stuff, I will put here a compilation:

Scales

Scales by default now go from -2 to +2. Pretenders modify those limits as explained below, and nations can have modifiers on top of that (like Berytos being Heat +1 or MA Ermor being Death +2, or Yomi Turmoil +1). Some spells and random events can also modify a province beyond the default limits, going up to -5 and +5. However, extreme scales like these are not natural and will have negative consequences, even when we are talking positive scales, like Order 5 making mages less creatives reducing their research, or Magic 5 horror marking people in the province.

Pretender

Pretender choice is a bit more important, because they can modify the scales default limits (toward the positive or negative side). One can move the max limit to growth+1 (meaning, the limit will be 3 instead of 2), another can give you turmoil and death +1. some pretenders give a bonus starting site (even if imprisoned), usually +1 gem. Apart from that we can expect the typical changes (new Pretenders, rebalanced existing ones).

Provinces

Provinces can change more. Heat/Cold 4 and 5 make neighboring provinces have the chance to modify their temps up to +3 and +4, respectively. Strong death scales can transform a province type from forests to plains, and from plains to waste (or the opposite with Growth). There are some spells to change province scales too, and even the type more directly, like flooding a province.
Provinces now have a very small population growth by default, with Growth 0, btw.
Finally, indie armies in neutral provinces will be somewhat stronger than before, to compensate for the bigger armies we will have.

Blesses

Blesses are more flexible, because any magical points give bless points, and they all go to a common pool. 2 Fire, 3 Astral => 5 bless points, for example. Blesses themselves still have adequate prerequisites, so you need high nature to get regeneration. That said, you don't get the 'extra' points for having 3 in all sorcery paths or all elemental paths.

+stat blesses are cheaper but weaker, generally 2 points for +1 rather than 3 for +2 (att, def, mr). HP is still 1-for-1, and Undying is 1-for-2. Swiftness still gives +1 def, +30% combat speed but costs A4 rather than A3. Flaming weapons does 8ap damage.

Finally, take in account that you will have less sacreds in the game, proportionally speaking (see Economy changes). Some new blesses can give stealth, others give you glamour, others counter glamour, one gives fear aura but it doesn't work against people who see through the glamour.

Economy

You start with 50% more gold (600g). You gain around 30% more gold than before, as provinces have a bigger population, however, Infrastructure is more expensive, with temples being 50% more expensive, labs 20% more, and forts 70% more (aprox. numbers, it may change per nation!), and mages are 30% more expensive. The net result should be having a bigger ratio of mundane troops vs mages/sacred (as sacred are still limited by sacred points), also a bit more of use of indie troops and non-forts national recruits. About sacreds, the more expensive ones like big Giants and Zhadeyans cost 2 and 3 sacred points, respectively.

Cavalry

Cavalry has been reworked. Mounts and riders are different units, with different stats, and they can die and the other survive. Mounts can be affected by buffs, in fact they are specific spells for them. They have barding, with a magical slot for magical barding items. They can have different weak and strong points than the riders (say, low MR and lower max age, or lacking cold or heat resist the rider have). If the mount is killed, the troop can be rehired at the home province with a 50% discount. Some horses have more protection, others are faster.
There is a new unit trait that is fairly common for elite cavalry, Skillful Rider, gives a defense and morale bonus to the mount. Less effective with heavy barding.

Combat

As you have more gold to recruit troops, battlefields are also larger.
Unit Size scale changed to 1-10, from 1-6, to have more granularity. Goblins are size 2, Humans are size 3, cavalry is size 5, giants can be size 9, dragons are size 10. This makes harder to hit the torso and head of giants by humans.
Piercing damage type nerfed to -15% prot (with the reduction rounding down). blunt to +25% damage BEFORE protection, instead of 50% after prot (still head hits only!)
The battlefield can have props (trees, rocks), which disrupt formation, and have HP and be destroyed.

Some other misc changes:
-poor amphibian att/def penalties are reduced to -2/-1
-Bark/Stone/Iron spells are slightly less effective for units that rely on armor. Details:
Barkskin: +7 nat prot up to 10, +1 if 9 or higher. (Dom5: nat prot 10, +1 if already 10 or higher)
Stoneskin: +10 up to 15, +3 if 12 or higher. (Dom5: nat prot 15, +2 if already 14 or higher)
Ironskin: +13 up to 20, +5 if 15 or higher. (Dom5: nat prot 20, +3 if already 18 or higher)

-Ethereal tramplers deal half damage
-Human average hp and strength is slightly higher than before.
-Poison will reduce attack and defense (but kill less, I guess?)
-Sleep resistance is a trait.
-Chaos Power benefits more of unrest.
-Frost Brand is Const 6 and no longer does AoE damage. It does do AN cold damage.
-New item: vine sword. Like vine whip but with higher damage.

Magic

Some AoE spells are larger, to make sense in the larger battlefield, too. However, the 100% battlefield wide spells are harder to cast and more expensive (for example, Foul Vapours is one more path and one more gem). Instead, there are some new similar 'mid range' spells, with biggish AoE but without reaching 100% of the battlefield. We can imagine a lesser 'Fog Warriors' that is "just" AoE 50.
There is a new magical Path, Glamour, the magic of illusions, phantasms, dreams and the stuff of forgotten legends. It has its own new gem type.
The three types of communions are not shareable anymore. You can't use a crystal matrix to join a blood communion.

Glamour spells: New battle spell to make someone invisible, there are spells to grant true/spirit sight. A new spell, Astral/Glamour, to make horrors ignore a province, regarding Magic Duel, there's a glamour spell that ensures you only get brain damaged instead of killed. Glamour also has 'false damage' spells, the damage will evaporate if there is no glamour mage on the bf. Wailing Winds is Glamour/Air now.
Air new spells: +patrol ritual, AoE pure damage (low, but decent AoE), levitation, a high-precision high-damage (but not AP/AN) projectile, +% range buffs, several new spells that improve Precision, air mailing gems/items between commanders. There are new mid tier AoE versions of air shield/mistbody.
Nature new spells: You can animate Vine Men in battles from local vegetation (will feel familiar to CoE players), there is a new interesting non-unique, high-level Nature summon, dark-vision buffs, high single-target poison (like Frozen Heart but with poison)...

-There are a new glamour magical item that 'feeds' you but it's an illusion, it only serves to 'not be sad until you starve to death'.
-There is a new global spell similar to DE 'Acid Sea' that kills things in the oceans.
-There is a new spell/site to travel through the Astral Nexus (bit like stygian paths, it's a virtual trip)
-Charm animal is MR easy now.
-Elementals are harder to summon and/or has been nerfed.
-Burden of Time is Thaum 9 spell.
-Legions of Steel has been split in three versions of it, with different amount of power.
-Flaming Arrows spell that affects the entire BF is moved to Ench 7, there is a lesser version that is normal AoE x.
-There is a new Poison Arrows spell, similar to Flaming Arrows.

Layer/Planes

There is a second layer in the strategic map, for a caverns 'plane', a bit like in Conquest of Elysium games with their multitude of planes. We don't know if there will be extra planes too, it hasn't been announced, by in a screenshot in the Steam page, you can see a third icon. Some nations start in the cavern layer, like Agharta, Xibalba, etc.

UI/QoL

-remote spell attacks can be watched on the battle screen, as part of the battle report
-Magic attacks & magic movement are indicated by icons/arrows on the strategic map
-some possible way to see diplo status against AI has been hinted (diplomacy screen??)
-different sized arrows for different army sizes, improved side menus in the UI
-PD starts at 1
- new table screen to manage your magical items and who owns them
- y key shows people who will be in the target province, not the ones inside a fort
-You can preview the possible forgeable items, and filter by path.
-Click on treasury will tell you how much you are spending this current turn on various stuff (commanders, troops, buildings...)
-clicking on income will show income by province and upkeep per unit.
-The score graphs for gem income now display income from things other than magic sites and globals
-New filters on the F1 screen.

Nations

There will be new nations, we know so far only Pyrene, inspired by Basque Country. We know it's at least EA and MA, and we know there will be new ones (plural) in LA, so that's at least 4 new nations.
Pyrene has some unique blood spells or summons.

Multiplayer

There will be a new lobby system so people can more easily find and join games. Most probably, it will be the same lobby system that exists in Conquest of Elysium 5, the other Illwinter series.

edit: I'm not a beta tester, so this is all semi-official hearsay. Chances are, I misunderstood some stuff here and there, even if the changes are real, so take all with a pinch of salt.
Last edited by Turin Turambar; 1 hour ago"

[JasonPratt]

Man, I knew my cost-effective calcs were increasingly pointless, but these new tweaks really hammer that attempt dead!

 

[Fetrik]

Looking forward to this

[bobarossa]

I guess it's time to start playing the Dom 4 I purchased years ago.

[Tanaka]

Very nice! This is the best summary I've seen so far. Really looking forward to this!

[Tanaka]

[W8taminute]

^Watched that video over lunch break.  Still feeling good about getting this game on day one. 

[Tanaka]

^Watched that video over lunch break.  Still feeling good about getting this game on day one. 

Same Dominions is one of the few games I feel that way about!

[FarAway Sooner]

That's a great summary, Solops!    I might give it a try again when Dom 6 comes out.

I do miss a game where I have access to hundreds of spells, and/or the spell effects vary dramatically depending on whether I'm a Chaos-Monger, an Earth Mage, or a Holy Magic kind of guy.

[solops]

That's a great summary, Solops!    I might give it a try again when Dom 6 comes out.

I do miss a game where I have access to hundreds of spells, and/or the spell effects vary dramatically depending on whether I'm a Chaos-Monger, an Earth Mage, or a Holy Magic kind of guy.

To be clear, I did not write the summary. I was barely clever enough to quote it.

[Boggit]

I guess it's time to start playing the Dom 4 I purchased years ago.

Same. It's getting a bit like playing Civilization #24 when I still have Civ #5 as the same basic game. I feel much the same towards the reworks of Paradox too, which basically repackage the same ideas without doing much in the way of originality.

[FarAway Sooner]

That's a great summary, Solops!    I might give it a try again when Dom 6 comes out.

I do miss a game where I have access to hundreds of spells, and/or the spell effects vary dramatically depending on whether I'm a Chaos-Monger, an Earth Mage, or a Holy Magic kind of guy.

To be clear, I did not write the summary. I was barely clever enough to quote it.

Dude, if you'd just played along with where I was going, you could have at least been clever enough to plagiarize it!!