Popkill nations

[archenemy]

I know they can be countered, the problem is that the game stops being fun when you face one. If I meet one early, I can rush&kill it to mitigate the damage, but if it starts on the other side of the map, and covers half of the map till I get there, I just give up that game. I know it could be winned, but it becomes a dreadful micromanagement-intensive frustrating whack-a-mole. Supply items, defending 0-pop provinces, etc.

Please give something to counter popkill. I don't mean mods, I know mods are great but they always feel to me like not the "true" game. But it feels stupid that once you conquer a province, and you are an arch druid of life with 3 growth, you can't somehow put people there.

I could imagine settler units (available if a province has over 20k population, costs 100 pop and some gold and resources to create, has a special command "settle", that destroys the settler and adds 100 to the pop of the province), nature spells that add population, summons that add population (like a beautiful dryad drawing people from far away). These all could work such a way that they only work when the province population is below 1000 or so, so they don't unbalance the other aspects of the game by stacking population or whatever.

I really, really enjoy dominions and I really hate when I am in a game for a while and I realize that now comes the whack-a-mole part. Just my 2 cents.

[Cruxador]

Originally posted by 2spooky4me:

A game in which you have to ban nations from multiplayer, has an issue with balance.

You don't have to. They're not that strong, except Ermor, and that's not as strong as it was. People don't like fighting them, but people don't like fighting raiding nations (elves, birds) either. You can't argue that this isn't a game flaw simply because of tradition. There should be *choices* in diplomacy. The game shouldn't be decided before it even starts because you started next to a popkill nation that your nation doesn't counter.[/quote]These things I agree with, but I think what you're saying should be the case already is.

There is literally no value to playing out a multiplayer game in which you start next to Ermor and can't kill him before the end of the second year.

This I disagree with for two reasons. The first is that you think failing to kill Ermor means you lose. I disagree, I think you greatly underestimate how much gamestates change, and furthermore I'd like to point out that while Ermor won a third of all dom4 games it was in and that's a vwry high win rate, it's still far less than automatically winning every game. The other thing I disagree with is that a losing game isn't worth playing through. Even if you can predict that you'll probably lose, that doesn't mean you'll definitely lose. The struggle to lose as little as possible is fun in its own right, and is a good way to learn more about the game as well.

[2spooky4me]

I don't think most popkill nations are all that strong. Most have early game weaknesses that make them difficult to win with. Ermor is obviously an exception. But every popkill nation ruins their own lands and that is what makes people not want to play against them. Raiding nations, yeah, they're a pain, but beat them and you add their power to yours - so there's light at the end. Beat a popkill nation, however, and you have provinces that are economically worthless, and which will almost certainly make you lose the game, because of the resources required to take them out are all specialized and by the time you do it, the other nations in the game would've become too strong through conquering economically useful provinces.

But personally, I think this issue is incidental to whether popkill nations offer enjoyment in multiplayer. It's a larger problem where the game has counters for almost anything - but not population loss. All combat spells can be scripted around. All rituals can be dispelled. All armies have their counters. Super combatants can be killed by thugs. Thugs can be killed by counter thugs. Flying units can be forced to the ground. Ethereal and mist form units can be hurt by magic. But a spell or popkill dominion that kills people? Can't do anything about it. Tough.

That's the central flaw that I think a lot of people are observing, and it's made worse by the fact that unless you have a strong growth scale, even 1,000 population dying in your production provinces is a huge deal, and the spells that kill thousands of population each turn are CHEAP.

[Mount Nomad]

It'll be interesting to see how well Ermor performs in 5 with the bless and attack rear changes.

[Mardagg]

Originally posted by Mount Nomad:

It'll be interesting to see how well Ermor performs in 5 with the bless and attack rear changes.

Knights of the unholy sepulchre significantly benefit from this imo

[Mardagg]

Imo, Blood Magic, Domkill nations and communions are among the hardest things to master in Dominions.
Thats why you see Ermor banned in maybe around 50% of newbie MP games but only in maybe 10% of veteran MP games.
Next thing on the list will be : Ban all blood nations
Then: Ban Underwater nations
Then: Ban communion nations.
Then: Forbid early rush

In the end we have like 6 nations left per Era and a much simplified game.
Dominions, though, is all about diversity!

[Mardagg]

Originally posted by 2spooky4me:

But personally, I think this issue is incidental to whether popkill nations offer enjoyment in multiplayer. It's a larger problem where the game has counters for almost anything - but not population loss. All combat spells can be scripted around. All rituals can be dispelled. All armies have their counters. Super combatants can be killed by thugs. Thugs can be killed by counter thugs. Flying units can be forced to the ground. Ethereal and mist form units can be hurt by magic. But a spell or popkill dominion that kills people? Can't do anything about it. Tough.

First of all:
The enjoyment of playing a domkill nations yourself(!) in MP(or SP) should not be forgotten.
There are always 2 sides of the coin.
Personally I enjoy a ton playing them from time to time.

Second, the counter for pop loss is a strong dominion and many priests preaching and/or blood sacrifice.
Yes, there still will be quite some provinces near to Ermor capital that will have 0 pop.
No, its more often than not the mistake of the opposing player that did chose too low dominion strength at pretender desgin.
If you start with like 3-5 dominion strength in a game where Ermor is allowed you are basically suiciding yourself if you meet Ermor early.
There are rather simple countermeasures that solve most of the "non-enjoyment" of MP battles vs domkill-nations.
The problem is: instead of trying to get better with the game some people prefer to simply ban a complicated mechanic.

[Sombre]

Popkill dominions/spells can be countered (though the counters for the spells are pretty inefficient if the opponent is willing to be inefficient with the spells, since you can't practically dome everything). It seems like the issue is more about it being practically irreversible than uncounterable. You could say the same thing about the enemy cursing your units. There are counters, but it probably upsets some people that it's practically irreversible.

[archenemy]

Could someone answer please? I have no experience in this. Are other nations or strategies also banned in MP, like sacred rushes, or sneaky troops or blight or rain of toads or whatever?

If they aren't and people still accept them even though they can be hard to deal with and frustrating to play against, maybe there is something inherently wrong with popkill.

And for the comments with meaning like "oh but you can solve it, you can install a mod/ban them, let the rest of us enjoy the game the way it is", thank you, I know you want good to me, but again, my problem is not really MY problem, I can solve it, but I think Dominions as a game would profit from it if the players themselves wouldn't cut out large and fun content from the game because of the frustration it causes.

The other problem with the "you can solve it on your part" is how many people does this affect? If 80% of people don't like to play against popkill, then perhaps it is not the 80% who should use a mod, but the game should be that way where empty provinces can be still useful somehow. Because, you know, Dominions as a game would profit from it.

[archenemy]

"Next thing on the list will be : Ban all blood nations"

That is a fallacy called slippery slope. Are blood nations banned from a lot of MP games?

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Slippery_slope

"The problem is: instead of trying to get better with the game some people prefer to simply ban a complicated mechanic."

Now I don't play Dom MP, but I played a lot of MP games in the past, I was diamond in SC2 for example (top 10%). And I know that if a specific strategy, though it CAN be countered, requires very specific steps from the first second of the game (in this case even while you are making your pretender), then that strategy is broken, no matter if it can be countered. It just dominates the game too strongly.

This was the case with the 150 cost spawning pool in Starcraft 1, it made 4pool zerg rushes incredibly effective. 4pooling was balanced in a sense that it didn't was that much present in high level play, it was possible to counter it by doing very specific steps, and it didn't have a super high winrate.

The problem was, the mere possibility of 4pooling dominated the first few minutes of the game just too strongly, supressing any other tactics, ultimately making the game LESS rich, so the cost was increased by devs and 4pooling stupped being that dominant. Other kind of early rushes were still possible (6pooling, yeah), but since these did not require thouse very specific defensive measures, just general defense, they weren't as loathed, even though they were just as deadly.

Again, I am stating that I do not want to go against the will of many. If people find this fun, then it is me who should adapt. But the least I can do is to voice my concerns.

[Mormacil]

Originally posted by archenemy:

Could someone answer please? I have no experience in this. Are other nations or strategies also banned in MP, like sacred rushes, or sneaky troops or blight or rain of toads or whatever?

If they aren't and people still accept them even though they can be hard to deal with and frustrating to play against, maybe there is something inherently wrong with popkill.

And for the comments with meaning like "oh but you can solve it, you can install a mod/ban them, let the rest of us enjoy the game the way it is", thank you, I know you want good to me, but again, my problem is not really MY problem, I can solve it, but I think Dominions as a game would profit from it if the players themselves wouldn't cut out large and fun content from the game because of the frustration it causes.

The other problem with the "you can solve it on your part" is how many people does this affect? If 80% of people don't like to play against popkill, then perhaps it is not the 80% who should use a mod, but the game should be that way where empty provinces can be still useful somehow. Because, you know, Dominions as a game would profit from it.

I rarely see pop-kill nations banned outside complete noob games. Noob games aren't the most common of games and a poor guide in that regard. There plenty of games with custom rules like no UW nations or no Xibalba or whatever they feel like. I actually just lost a game against both MA Ctis and MA Ermor. Was it a good start, sandwiched between them? No it was terrible but it wasn't without fun.

Neither Blight or Rain of Toads are remotely OP, I never saw anybody claiming to ban or nerf those. If anything blight feels a bit expensive. Your ideas what is banned, annoying and hated by the community seem to be completely different from mine. I assume one of us is using faulty data.

Starcraft is a terrible game to compare to Dominions. SC is all about speed and razor sharp balance, Dom thrives on options and choice to counter poor balance. That's comparing a Michael Bay blockbuster movie to a black and white arthouse film.

[Mardagg]

Blood Nations are not banned and, depending on the era, this would affect simply too many nations.
I can tell you from own MP experience though for sure, that to me its much harder to deal with a blood nation in mid/late game when I am not strong in blood myself than to deal with popkill.
The thing with popkill is: its the hardest to deal early to early/mid game...afterwards popkill nations have a hard time unless able to cast decisive spells like burden of time.
This is because nations like Ermor dont have many options later on in a game apart from overwhelming by numbers whereas most other nations in the hands of good players can grow very strong in later stages, unless it was willingly designed as rush strat nation,

I will never forget a game where i was neigbour with non aggression pact to strong player in LA that apparently was going for dominion victory, a pretty rare thing.
He did probably chose starting dominion 10 and after initial expansion stage he was turtling strong, building castles in every single province, started blood hunting and then was blood sacrificing with level 3 blood priests in each and every province. That caught me pretty much off guard and after losing like 30-40 candles each turn to his dominion i was almost out of the game...i was forced to build temples and not dozens, but actually hundreds(!) priests to counter him. Much more scary than popkill from Ermor, I can assure you!

But most popkill nations right now dont even have a good early game, with MA/LA Ermor being one of the exceptions. This does make popkill nations rather weak actually
So , the truth in my opinion is, that most people that ban Ermor from MP, are people that struggle to counter it in early game not realizing that in later stages of the game other nations can be of much higher danger...because they simply didnt make it to later stages in MP games yet.
Furthermore, having played Ermor myself in MP, i can guarantee you:
All other people will form alliances and gang up on you.
Its a fun experience but vs decent players a victory is very hard to accomplish!

Also, as mentioned before, I highly doubt that like 80% of the player base hate popkill.
Actually I believe your opinion is clearly the minority opinion.
Its just that you see Ermor banned in many newbie/intermediate game because these players want a more casual game for a start. Once they have played casual games and gained experience they usually start participating in more competetive games, where Ermor usually is allowed.

Ermor is one of the nations that always have been there in the dominions series, always with domkill effect. I can tell you also from my own experience, that in Dom 2 , it was much harder to deal with Ermor when played by good player. I renember the dreaded Vampire Queen pretender castle spam strat...later on they nerfed the vampire queen and even later on they didnt allow the vamp queen at all for ermor.

You are essentially voting to change one of the most important things that make out dominions as a whole, just because you dont like it....yet(!!!!!).
Much better solution is to stay with mods or just leave Ermor out in your SP games or only play in MP games without domkill.
Also,there is a huge difference regarding domkill between the different Eras.
It seems to me that your preferred Era should be EA...thematic wise a prospering Era.
Whereas LA is an destructive Era...probably not for your liking too much.

You should know that the different Eras have not always been there in Dominions.
They came up with this (great) idea exactly to make Dominions suit for everyone`s taste!

[Sombre]

I think rain of toads (and other unrest causing remotes) was actually banned in a duel tournament because its ability to shut down the capital was a bit too strong and many games ended before any additional forts went up.

[Red_Rob]

It was reported during the Beta test that spells causing events (such as Wolven Winter and Rain of Toads) had in fact been nerfed and now you could only trigger one such event in the targeted province each turn regardless of the number of spells cast. No more 5 x Rain of Toads to shut down capital production immediately, or shifting a Heat 3 province to Cold 3 in one turn.

I'm not a fan on this change personally, spamming these spells was the main reason they got used and I can't see something like Hurricane getting much use if it can't be stacked.

One of the things that hasn't been mentioned about Popkill nations is that they are one way to emphasise the importance of your Dominion score. There have been a few changes that have reduced the importance of having a high Dominion (Dom spread change in Dom4, removal of inherent Awe for Dom9/10 in Dom5), but as long as there is a nation in the game that has a destructive Dominion you will have an incentive not to drop your Dominion too low.

[Cruxador]

Originally posted by Red_Rob:

One of the things that hasn't been mentioned about Popkill nations is that they are one way to emphasise the importance of your Dominion score. There have been a few changes that have reduced the importance of having a high Dominion (Dom spread change in Dom4, removal of inherent Awe for Dom9/10 in Dom5), but as long as there is a nation in the game that has a destructive Dominion you will have an incentive not to drop your Dominion too low.

Despite these changes, I don't think we're in any danger of dominion score becoming unimportant. The change in Dom4 didn't decrease the importance of the stat, it just broadened the range of viable choices. And awe was never the main reason to take high dominion except in very specific builds.

[Mormacil]

Wait unrest spells no longer stack?