Strategy Index - Guides for Dominions 5

[Taorec]

“Knowledge is knowing ... or where to find out.”
- Alvin Toffler

Similar to the threads for Dominions 3 and 4, this is a quick reference list to Dominions guides.

Did I miss valuable references? Just post them here or PM me, so I can add them.

Table of Contents

1. Strategy Indices & Information Sources
   
2. Dominions: Why play it? What is new in Dominions 5 and is it worth it?
   
3. Tools of the Trade & Hotkeys
   
4. Beginner Guides
   
5. Nation, Pretender and Scales Guides
   
6. General Strategy & Guides
   
7. Magic Sites and Site Searching
   
8. Magic, Spells and items
   
9. Combat, Thugs and Super Combatants
   
10. Mods & Maps
    
11. Multiplayer
    
12. Informative YouTube Channels

1. Strategy Indices and other Information Sources

Information Sources

• Dominions 5: Wiki[illwiki.com] (recommended reading)
  
• Dominions 5 - Community Resources covered by Lucid
  
• Dominions 4: Wiki[dom4.fandom.com]
  
• Dominionmods Forum[dominionsmods.com]
  
• Dominions 5 Steam Forum
  
• Dominions 5 Reddit
  
• Dominions 5 Patch Log[dominionsmods.com]

Some games have manuals you can ignore. Dominions isn't one of them.

Manuals

• Dominions 4 Manual[www.illwinter.com] (explains a lot of Dominion concepts, with in depth spell descriptions & formulas, dated)
  
• Dominions 5 Manual[www.illwinter.com] (updated for Dominons 5, but lacks detailed spell descriptions)

Strategy Indices

• Dominions 4: Guide Overview (dated, 2013-2017)
  
• Dominions 3: Strategy Index[forum.shrapnelgames.com] (very dated, 2008-2013)

Abbreviations & Terminology

• Dominions 5 Wiki - Commonly Used Shorthands[illwiki.com]
  
• Dominions 5: Basic Terminology / Slang Guide[gameplay.tips] (by Shinuyama)

2. Dominions: Why play it? What is new in Dominions 5 and is it worth it?

Why Dominions?

• One rocks fight to become the top deity (by Tom Senior)
  
• Gods go to war (by Tom Senior)
  
• Wot I Think: Dominions 4 Single Player (by Adam Smith)
  
• Elvira: Drama Mama[devnada.wordpress.com]

What is new?

• Dominions 5: New Features[www.illwinter.com]
  
• Dominions 5: National and Mechanic Changes

Blesses
[img]https://i.imgur.com/7QY2fue.png[/img]

Is it worth it?

Yes! If you are short on cash, wait for one of the Steam Sales[steamdb.info], the best was 40% off.

• Topic 1
  
• Topic 2
  
• Topic 3
  
• Topic 4
  
• Topic 5
  
• Topic 6
  
• Topic 7
  
• Topic 8

3. Tools of the Trade & Hotkeys

Software to help your daily Dominions needs:

• Dominions 5 Inspector[larzm42.github.io] (your first reference and most important tool, kudos to larzm!)
  
• Dominions 5 Inspector - A Power User's Guide (by Lucid, highly recommended)
  
• Dominions 4: Combat and Communion Calculator[dedas.github.io] (by Dedasen)

A Short Guide to Hotkeys

Hotkeys can save you a lot of clicks and time! To view all available hotkeys of a screen press ?
The list below contains a few shortcuts, for the full list see Illwinter's Quick Reference Guide pdf[www.illwinter.com] or this guide with pictures[illwiki.com]

• Pretender Creation (under Main Menu > Tools/Manuals): b: view all blesses, s/F5: view research / spells, n: see national units
  
• Campaign Map - Menus F1: empire overview, F2: score graphs, F5: Research, F8: item treasury
  
• Campaign Map - Provinces c: province combat reports, v: see province battles, r: recruitment, t: army setup, b: mercenaries
  
• Campaign Map - Commanders n: select next idle commander, a: select all commanders, ctrl-click: add commander to selection
  
• Campaign Map - Gem/slave transfer, PD: +/- change amount by 1, Shift +/- change by 5
  
• Campaign Map - Blood Hunting: V: transfers blood slave to selected commander, Z: places all slaves of commander into lab
  
• Campaign Map - Unit Orders: R: Research, W: wait (wont show up as idle), S: site search, F: forge item, C: cast spells
  
• Army Setup: Ctrl + 1-9: (saves orders under mouse pointer), 1-9 assign orders, g: guard commander, a: attack, h: hold & attack, C: closest, r: rear
  
• Battle orders: x: copy last order
  
• Combat: c: colored squares, 1-3: detailed combat logs, v: see selected units combat log

4. Beginner Guides

• Beginner's Guide[illwiki.com] (by bcnoexceptions)
  
• Dominions 5 Quickstart Tutorial (Youtube Intro to Dominions 5 by Attica with some nice magic showcasing)
  
• Beginner-Intermediate Guide to Dom4 (by Reekris)
  
• “A complete game in one sitting” (Youtube Intro to Dominions 5 by DasTactic)
  
• Dominions 5 Beginner's Guide (Very detailed tutorial videos on many aspects of Dominions by DasTactic)
  
• Dominions 5 - Guide to Expansion (by Shinuyama)
  
• Dominions 5: Expansion Guide[illwiki.com] (by Naaira)
  
• Good turn habits[docs.google.com]

5. Nation, Pretender and Scales Guides

Nation Guide Collections

• Dominions 5: Nation Categories[dominionsmods.com] (by taorec)
  
• Dominions 5: Guides for 70 nations, with pretenders[dominionsmods.com] (by taorec)
  
• Dominions 5: Nation Guides and others on Steam
  
• Dominions 4: Nations Guide Overview (by Hawk, dated 2013-2017)
  
• Dominions 3: Nations Guide Overview[forum.shrapnelgames.com] (by Valerius, very dated 2008-2013)

Pretender Design

• Dominions 5 Pretender Calculator[pretenders5.testingmagic.ovh] (by bsielski)
  
• Dominions 5: Pretender Design and Bless Strategies[dominionsmods.com] (by taorec)
  
• Dominions 5: How to Pretender, Bless, and Thug Design (by CrabNicholsen)
  
• Pretenders And Their Uses (by Shinuyama)
  
• What Pretender Titles mean[dominionsmods.com] (by Indract)

Scales

• Scale Analysis for Dominions 5[dominionsmods.com] (by taorec)
  
• Dominions 5 - Temperature Scales (Math!) (by Lucid on Youtube)
  
• Calculating Luck - Statistical Analysis of Luck Scales[docs.google.com] (by SirToma#8442)
  
• Dominions 5 - Luck Scales Analysis (by Lucid on Youtube)

6. General Strategy & Guides

• Turn Resolution Sequence[illwiki.com] (must read, explains when things happen in a turn, e.g. magic movement then normal movement)
  
• Dom5: Temperature scales and turn order (by entropius, Guide to influence the temperature in your favor)
  
• Blood hunting analysis[/b] (by Mandarbmax)[docs.google.com]
• Dominions 5 Strategy - Unit Efficiency And You (Youtube video by General Confusion)
  
• Province population reference sheet, compiled by Pymous
  
• Fort Statistics Spreadsheet by Vir[dominionsmods.com]
  
• Dominions 4: Tips, tricks & random mechanics thread, share[dominionsmods.com]

Warfare

• Dominions 5 Multiplayer Guide (Youtube video by Lucid)
  
• A Guide to Blitzkrieg[forum.shrapnelgames.com] (by Baalz)
  
• Rej's Guide to Winning Wars
  
• An In-Progress Guide to "Snowballing"[dominionsmods.com] ( by TheDemon)

7. Magic Sites and Site Searching

• Dominions 5: A Look at Magic Sites[dominionsmods.com] (Magic sites and tips for site searching)
  
• Dominions 5: Magic Site Generation[dominionsmods.com] (by Loggy)
  
• Dominions 3: Site Searching Strategies

8. Magic, Spells and Items

Magic Primer

• Basic Magic, a Primer (by Shinuyama)
  
• Blood Magic Primer (by Shinuyama)
  
• Communion Guide (must read if you want to use communions / sabbath, Note for Dom5: slaves now always take 1 damage for master spells when over 200 fatigue and fatigue can kill mages when casting big spells!)

Spells by Use

• Dominions 5: Art of Magic[dominionsmods.com](Useful mage items, high level spells, buffs & counters, rituals & globals)
  
• Transformation Chassis[dominionsmods.com] ( by Ohlmann)
  
• Dom 5: In Depth Video on Transformation & Twiceborn (by Attica)
  
• Transformation Results (by Wonko)
  
• Quick test of crossbreeding with bonus[dominionsmods.com] (by Ohlmann)
  
• A Guide to Wish[web.archive.org] (by Maerlande)

Spells by School

• Dominions 5: Spell Schools Videos (Yakri evaluates spells, sorted by schools)

Spells in Combat

• Spamming Elementals (A mini guide) by Shinuyama
  
• Magic Scripting for Beginners[web.archive.org]
  
• Spell Combos

Items

• Dominions 5: Magic Booster & Path Access[docs.google.com] (by MelficeBelmont)
  
• Dominions 4: Magic Path Booster & Mage Summons by telos (Astral Rings now S6/S7, Robe of Magi A5B5)
  
• Temporary Gem Items

9. Combat, Thugs and Super Combatants

Combat

• Dominions 3: (Very) Basic Battle Tactics[forum.shrapnelgames.com] (by Raiel)
  
• Combat Calculations
  
• Defense and Protection Stacking
  
• Damage Table[www.magmadev.com]
  
• Dominions 5 Damage table[www.magmadev.com] (by Silence, min. damage chance & avg. damage vs protection)
  
• Average damage against a given protection level. Average hits to kill. (By Kyso4ek)
  
• Dominions 3: How to deal with Elephants[forum.shrapnelgames.com]

Thugs and Super Combatants

• Wiki: Building Thugs & SCs[dom4.wikia.com] (Spells, items and example chassis)
  
• Zen and the art of Thugging[forum.shrapnelgames.com] (Building and countering Thugs & SCs by baalz)
  
• Zen and the art of Thugging (Youtube video by Lucid)
  
• Killing Super Combatants - 101 (Youtube video by Lucid)

10. Mods & Maps

Catalog and Tools

• Dominions 5 Mod Catalog[dominionsmods.com] ("A list of all Dominions 5 mods - with pictures!")
  
• Modding Tools[dominionsmods.com]
  
• Map Maker - Corbeau's Cartographic Revision[corbeau.itch.io]
  
• Map Maker - Automated Improved Dominions Starts[nuke-makes-games.itch.io]

Popular Mods

• Worthy Heroes[dominionsmods.com] (“A popular mod buffing weaker heroes and adding many new heroes")
  
• Pretender Extended[dominionsmods.com] (”A pair of mods adding over 100 new Pretender chassis to the game, with Pretenders Enhanced also providing rebalancing of existing Pretenders.")
  
• Lucid's Thematic Gem Gen[dominionsmods.com] ("A mod adding various tempgem items to each path" reducing gem micro)
  
• AI No Recruit[dominionsmods.com] (”A mod preventing the AI from recruiting most independent and weak national units.")
  
• Debug Mod[dominionsmods.com] (For testing purposes, all spells are researched and Wish / Divine Name are 1 gem)

Maps

• Dominionsmods Cartographers Guild[dominionsmods.com]
  
• Dominions 5 Steam Maps

11. Multiplayer

• Differences between SP and MP (by Lucid)
  
• Joining and Setting Up Multiplayer Games (by sum1won)
  
• Discord Communities
  
• Multiplayer Rules Variants (By ✏pencils✏)

12. Informative YouTube Channels

Active

Attica
Dom5 Basic Nation Analysis:

• EA Caelum, Machaka, Mictlan, Therodos, Ur
  
• MA Ind, Marignon, Naba, Ys
  
• LA Erytheia, Jomon, Midgard, Ragha, Vaettiheim

GeneralConfusion (Dom5 SP and MP for beginners and intermediate players)
Dom5 Series:

• EA: Fomoria, Hinnom, Lanka, Machaka, Mekone, Rlyeh, Ulm
  
• MA: Ashdod, Ind, Machaka, Marignon, Naba, Phlegra, Tien Chi
  
• LA: Bogarus, Jomon, Tien Chi, Phlegra

Dom5 Nation Analysis:

• EA: Abysia, Ctis, Ermor, Fomoria, Marverni, Niefelheim, Rus, Tien Chi, Ur, Xibalba, Yomi
  
• MA: Agartha, Bandar Log, Ctis, Jotunheim, Machaka, Marignon, Phaeacia, Phlegra, Rlyeh, Sceleria, Tien Chi, Ulm, Xibalba
  
• LA: Bogarus, Erytheia, Jomon, Lemuria, Mictlan, Phlegra, Pythium, Ragha, Tien Chi, Ulm

LucidTactics: (Multiplayer Action for intermediate and advanced players, Nation Analysis & MP strategy videos)
Dom4 Series: EA Hinnom, Tien Chi; MA Agartha, Ermor
Dom5 Series:

• EA Hinnom, Lanka, Marverni, Mekone, Pangaea, Sauromatia, Yomi, Xibalba
  
• MA Agartha, Atlantis, Bandar Log, Ctis, Ermor, Machaka, Marignon, Sceleria, Ulm
  
• LA Lemuria, Mictlan, Man, Ulm

Dom5 Nation Analysis:

• EA Hinnom, Lanka, Pangaea, Machaka, Mekone, Rus, Sauromatia, Vanheim, Yomi, Xibalba
  
• MA Atlantis, Bandar Log, Ctis, Ermor, Marignon, Phlegra, Sceleria, Ulm
  
• LA Arcoscephale, Bogarus, Lemuria, Man, Mictlan, Pangaea (Intervention), Ulm

Dom5 Tournament:

• Tournament Final Casting (2019/2020)
  
• LA Man (Tournament 2020/21)

Perun (Multiplayer action for intermediate players)
Dom5 : MA Nazca, MA Rlyeh LA Atlantis

Saquenay (Multiplayer action for for beginners and intermediate players)
Dom5 Series:

• MA Eriu, Tien Chi, Ulm
  
• LA Man (2x), Utgard

Tokshen (many singleplayer roleplay series)

Inactive

Marcus Aurelius (Dom4 & Dom5 singleplayer roleplay series)

Nuclearmonkee (Multiplayer action for intermediate and advanced players)
Dom4: MA Marignon, Xibalba; LA Patala, Pythium
Dom5: EA Sauromatia; MA Ctis, Ryleh, Phaecia; LA Utgard

Sy (Multiplayer Action for intermediate and advanced players)
Dom4: LA Agartha, Lemuria,
Dom5: EA Mictlan, MA Nazca

Yakri: (Bless and Spell tutorials)
Dom5 Nation Analysis: EA Ctis, Kailasa, Lanka, Yomi, MA Ermor, Ryleh, Shinuyama, LA Ulm

[terve886]

Should you make this into a guide?

[Tzyder]

You are missing an active Youtuber named Perun who posts guides and plays in GC's circle. Awesome work...how do you get things to line up so nicely in Steam? Also youtubers Wadestar and Dastactic hosted a Youtubers only MP series of games from each of the eras and I understand they will be starting another some day.

[mazirian72]

Fantastic. Thank you for putting this together. Surprising how relevant some of that old content still is.

[Catowl]

*Clap clap clap*

Mah man! Great job!

[Althaea]

This warrants a pin and has been given one. Many thanks for your work in creating this list.

[Andrej_S.]

Such topics discourage interest in playing, interest in finding new ways. Reducing everything to a manual and other guides and "do as that type did and you will have everything
in openwork" reduces interest in the game and the work of your own brain. At one time, the introduction of a more yellow text describing the mechanics of spells changed the approach to the game. Now you do not need to think, look in the manual for how this or that works ...

[Catowl]

Just so we are clear, the spells DO have some specific way they work. If there's no explanation, then it's just harder for most players to know what does what. Like flaming arrows. It says it adds fire damage. If I don't know how much, and how it works I won't be able to make good judgement calls on when it's appropriate to use. What's wrong with having an explanation of exactly how flaming arrows work for example?

[Dast]

I think you are worrying a little much Andrej, when I am new to a game I avoid strategy guides like the plague for the same reasons you are hinting at. (In many games figuring out the game is the game), but other people are not like that and that is fine.

Most of the people you are worried about are (1) not the sort to go on the forums and (2) not the short to open this discussion if they did.

[✏pencils✏]

The multiplayer community craves the highest level of play possible. Anything that facilitates this is very welcome :)

[Taorec]

Originally posted by Andrej_S.:

Such topics discourage interest in playing...

I think, those who don't want spoilers and want to discover the game for themselves, will avoid guides anyway. For those who are new, stunned by the many choices Dominions offers and want help, the manual and guides prevent frustration and possibly giving up on this wonderful and complex game.

Originally posted by Andrej_S.:

(Such topics discourage...) interest in finding new ways. Reducing everything to a manual and other guides and "do as that type did and you will have everything in openwork" reduces interest in the game and the work of your own brain. At one time, the introduction of a more yellow text describing the mechanics of spells changed the approach to the game. Now you do not need to think, look in the manual for how this or that works ...

Contrary to you saying more information stumps the development of new ideas, I think it supports them. If every researcher in the world had to start with inventing the wheel again, we'd still be in the Stone Age. They always build on the knowledge of those before them. The manual and guides will quickly give basic information to players, on top of which they can develop more advanced strategies and tactics. As Dominions is very situational, using your brain is the only way to be competitive, as no manual or guide can capture all possibilities.

[horstjens]

I made a LA Panagea guide on steam, please add to your list:
https://steamcommunity.com/sharedfiles/filedetails/?id=1975964256

[Taorec]

Greetings horstjens,

thank you for the contribution, I added the Steam Guides to the list where your guide can be found.

[indraf]

I haven't seen a terminology guide, which I myself found really useful for a beginner wanting to transition to mp players. Is there a similar guide already posted? This is the one I found on the web

https://gameplay.tips/guides/7085-dominions-5.html

Edit: typo and phrasing

[Taorec]

Hi indraf, the guide is also here in the guide section, but I hadn't linked it, so thanks. There are are also acronyms / shorthands on the wiki. I put both under 1.) Abbreviations & Terminology.

[indraf]

Ah, I also just noticed the shorthand guide, gonna check that out. Thanks Taorec!