The city building/economy part of Dominion is like a million times simpler than the one planned for Elemental.

You don't have to address this case, there are papers published in the "Journal of Magical Research" that show that minor magics enchanted into inmaterial objects can't compete with the energy radiated from pure magical beings. The tests done with flaming spears and ice elementals showed than the flames would just freeze and the spears would behave as normal weapons.

And that should be a reason for the combat system in Elemental to be a million times simpler than the one in Dominions?

We should push for this game to draw the best parts of existing ones, improve them and meld them together. Shoot for the stars, reach the Moon!

Congratulations, you've defeated the a good deal of the point behind having customizable units.

Not really.

Looking at some of the other threads, I've noticed Frogboy can say something like 'Soverign Death is Non Negotiable' and then... the thread will be filled with people trying to negotiate ways to get around it. There's people with conflicting opinions on every topic.

Ultimately, the developers have to make a choice based on what they think makes a better game. And that's what they get paid for, so I'm sure they're most qualified to actually make the decision. I can just say what I think, and there's enough different opinions being thrown around that I don't feel the need to argue too strenuously. But even so...

But that's just it... there's two sides to this whole thing and *both* are getting trumpeted as reasons why this sort of system (the rock-paper-scissors relation between elements, not simply having damage types. I admit I'm off on a tangent from the conversation here) works.

One person's saying 'I can make Amulets of Fire Resistance, and protect my troops from fire magic!' And you heard my response to that - if it's so easy to make something that protects from one element, then you're better off dabbling in all five. It is always the case in these rock-paper-scissors arrangements that specializing puts you at a disadvantage because your opponent can always counter with whatever option beats you.

But on the other hand, you're absolutely right. It can easily be that 'fire resistance' is a rare and difficult thing to get, and you can't produce amulets of sufficient power or sufficient quality to protect your troops. But in that case the amulets themselves are worthless, because you spent extra turns and extra resources building a unit that still got destroyed by a volcano. May as well not have had the fire resistance at all.

Neither of these are particularly interesting scenarious, are they? I certainly lean towards the latter, because I'd rather have a choice of which element I'm going to utterly dominate my opponents with than be stuck trying to figure out which element their current batch of troops is weak against. Because these simplistic models always, always result in one optimal strategem, which is 'use whatever element beats the element your opponent is using'. In the long term, I can't see how a strategy of 'keep using Fire magic, because I like Fire Magic, and I don't want to split my research' can be successful when the other guy can switch to another type of magic that beats it.

I think the logic of having elemental damage types is actually quite transparent. It's, hey, this old game that I liked used a system like that, so it must be a good idea, we should do it. The idea makes a degree of sense, it's got traction in plenty of other games, and it's an easy thing to do, so why not, right?

But I do sort of think the arguments that are being put forth for how important it is are... well, based on some pretty tenuous assumptions.

Okay. So.

Fireball, fire elemental. Reasonable enough. Assuming any Fire Elementals that are in the game are probably summoned by Channelers with Fire Magic in the first place.

If Dragons are supposed to be powerful they should be resistant to more than just fire, shouldn't they? Give them 'magic resistance' and that will do the job, won't it?

Now Ents. Don't get me wrong, I love Treemen, but Ents.  In a blasted post-apocalyptic world mostly drained of magic? Where are they supposed to be hiding? Where do we get the idea that they're a part of the world that the game should be designed around them?

Desert-Dwelling Humans with Fire Resistance? I think it's a silly fantasy trope. Starving children in africa are not mysteriously imbued with inflammability because they happened to be born in a hotter climate. But that aside, I've seen the list of civilizations for Elemental, and none of them look like they're candidates for this sort of super-specific bonus.

Armor that has an effect on whether or not the character feels a chill wind. Is it really feasible or desireable to have the game model weather conditions to the degree of having characters experience personal discomfort? Unless we're talking about a sorcerous chill wind, in which I question whether or not air magic is necessarily going to care what you're wearing.

Now, of course the reasonable answer to all of the above is 'Well, obviously somebody is going to want that. Let them mod it in and put elemental damage types in the base game to make it easier.' I'm fine with that. But the sort of game these examples hint at is really fitting with the image I've got of the setting. -

I think I explained why I don't like Rock-Paper-Scissors. But just to go into more detail with the magic...

Obviously the idea here is 'well, water beats fire because fire is extinguished by water'. But you can also put out a fire by covering it with dry sand, and I'm sure you've blown out candles before. Why don't Earth and Air get bonus damage against Fire? The only element that doesn't defeat Fire is Fire, except, wait... you can start a back-fire which steals oxygen from a fire and makes it burn out more quickly.

And on the reverse, Fire can boil away water into steam, so fire should just as logically get bonus damage against Water. Fire absorbs oxygen and creates smoke, so maybe it should get a bonus against air? And stone will burn just like anything else if you get it hot enough, so... you get the point.

If Water beats Fire, what does Fire beat? Ice? That's not one of the 6 elements, and besides, it's just silly. Ice melts and becomes... water. Which beats Fire. Wood? Also not an element, unless maybe you shoehorn it into... Life, or Earth. And then what beats Water? Air? Earth? And which of those beats the other? The thing is, there's not some clear-cut elemental cycle that fits in with your ice-creatures and your wood-creatures and the rest.

So really... I'm totally willing to go along with, yeah, this creature or that creature can have a particular elemental weaknesses. But those would probably be rare, and in any case they're specific to that creature, rather than part of some generalized rock-paper-scissors scheme where you give a damage bonus to element X when attacking element Y.

There seems to be two camps here:

A ) Putting the most complex systems out there for every part of Elemental will create a great game.

B ) Putting the most complex systems out there for every part of Elemental will create a horrible game.

I'm in camp B. Dominions has a very complex combat, and extensive units and spells because that's all the game is about. Colonization has a really complex resource producing because that's all the game is about too. But trying to put everything in is going to make Elemental a horribly complicated game (and a design nightmare).

Nope, only of magical damage types and resistances and the "logic" behind "fire makes more damage to water" and so on.

Ok, I understand where those of you saying "it's not original" are coming from. That's true, but, think about this. Why is Elemental what it is? Why was AoW what it was? All these games are based after MoM and the other old school strategy games right? Those games all did SOMETHING right. If they didn't we wouldn't have played them and we wouldn't be looking forward to Elemental now. All these strategy games follow some kind of rudimentary formula. All 4X strategy games do. You build, you research, you expand, you win. Yes they may go about it in different ways, but they all do more or less the same thing.

Those of us who enjoy these games want games that do a certain thing. "Niche" games like this are Rare and too few and far between. There aren't a lot of Fantasy Empire building games out there really and out of the ones that do exist there is only a small handful of good ones. Those of us who grew up playing D&D all expect certain things to be in games like this and if it didn't or wasn't there we wouldn't be here either. We'd be off looking for another game that combines the aspects we're looking for.

This is Exactly why many of us want "Certain Aspects" of Elemental to be EXACTLY like other games. Because those other games (MoM, D&D, AoW) all did what they do at the Very Best Quality for what they do respectively. Since they were the Best of the Best we want and expect those successful elements from those games to be in a even bigger and better game for us to enjoy completely (Elemental).

Those things that were done right, that are considered "Cannon" that are common to all our favorite games, we want left intact and brought over from game to game. This is the same as someone having a favorite type of game. People who play Medieval/Fantasy RPG's expect Elves and Dwarves and Dragons. People who play Flight Sims expect and want Jet Fighters and Realistic Flight Physics. Those who play shooters want to use guns with realistic ballistics...etc etc etc. You see where I'm going with this? This is why we want and expect certain damage types and other things that apply to Elemental to be the way we want them to be. Because they were done right before. They work in the genre. They are traditions that must stay current in theme for the game to be successful in our eyes. That's why we fight and argue so hard for things we want.

It's not that we don't want to stray and try new things. Of course we do. For us though we want the same old traditions AND the new things mixed in with them. Without the basic functions and play styles that made Strategy games and Fantasy games fun in the first place though, Elemental will be a mish mash that misses the mark on what All Of Us want it to be, and it will fail miserably... NONE of Us want that.

I don't remember MoM having elemental  damage types....

No, you've wiped out the whole thing. What are we going to be customizing, exactly? We've got one kind of offense units can do (physical). So we have one kind of defense (physical). So, you want to optimize those two stats, and you're done. Its actually a lot like the customization we have in the last beta (and probably the current one, though it doesn't work for me so I can't look). That is, a novelty item that doesn't actually do a whole lot.

This early in beta, thats to be expected. But when its that simple at release? Why bother?

Are you really so unimaginative that elemental damage types/resistances are the only cool types of unit creation you can come up with?

No, but...

Brad has already said we won't have physical damage types. Unless they're imbued, your units aren't casters, so magic is out. Take away other damage types. We now know everything is doing physical damage, and has some armor to defend against it.

There's no indication either way at this point that I've seen if you can give units abilities or not. Assuming you can, that is where the main focus is. Feel free to enlighten me on what I've missed.

Whoa. Hold up.

You just said yourself. Your units aren't channelers, magic is out. 

So have I missed something, or where are we getting the idea that normal units are going to be running around with magic weapons that deal elemental damage? Heroes and Channelers I can see, sure, but your entire army? That's a pretty big thing to have. Maybe for a rare elite unit.

So it's not like 'elemental damage' was ever likely to be a primary factor in distinguishing one unit from another. All the discussion I've seen so far gives me the impression that unit customization is 'spearmen or bowmen' rather than 'fire spears or ice spears'.

Like I've said, I'm cool with different damage types depending on how it's handled. But if the whole process of creating units ends up hanging on which type of elemental damage you do... that's a pretty sad state of affairs. To me, that would defeat the point of unit design, because you're making the whole thing about 'which enchantment do I put on these guys' rather than what armor, weapons, mount, training, and other miscellaneous equipment.

Yeah, you're likely right. It's not supposed to be a common thing. But lets assume it is possible to manufacture magical arrows (one of the early pre beta example paths involved using some crystals that were a resource to make +2 potions which went on a sword to make a +2 magic sword). You could put those on an elite squad, so you do have some normal units capable of doing some other damage type.

The secondary effects of other types of damage kind of dropped out of the discussion at some point, but that kind of goes along with this. Arrows that can do frost damage? Eh. Arrows that have a chance to freeze things when they connect? That would be handy to have in the elite guard of some other sovereign's daughter, since I'd rather she have a chance to escape a losing battle and not die (that tends to cause diplomatic problems).

Just brainstorming, I dunno how much sense that actually makes.

Honestly, it's been about 10 years since I played it (which is sad because I still have the disks). I can't remember if it had specific damage types for magic or not. When I think of magical damage types D&D (Dungeons and Dragons) comes to mind and that's what I use in most of my ideas. AoW Incorporated magical damage types to some extent too though.

In MoM each of the sorcery schools had its own effect type.

and if you were for instance at a node for a certain element (i.e. Fire) then only Fire spells would work.

Units however had either physical or magical damage types to be resisted by physical defenses or magical resistance.

At some point as the Elemental beta moves along I see myself finally deleting MoM off of my secondary hard drive.

P.S. - here is a video to trigger the old memories

No, you missed my point. There are four extremes of the spectrum in this scenario. Magic resistance equipment is:

1) cheap/abundant but fairly ineffectual. This accomplishes nothing and therefore may as well not exist, like you said. If it isn't going to save my troops from a fireball, let alone a volcano, then there is no reason to bother.

2) cheap/abundant and very effective. This results in your original doomsday scenario of specializing being the Wrong Move.

3) expensive but fairly ineffectual. This is just stupid, as it defeats its own purpose before even getting out the door.

4) expensive but effective. This is the case I was putting forth. It is rare, so your opponent won't be equipping a whole army with it, but it is effectual so that he can indeed impart good protection against your magic to a small portion of his troops (maybe his elite troops that he doesn't want to lose, for example).

So no, I don't buy your argument. It's fundamentally flawed because it fails to consider the options.

So? Without magic resistance, how are you going to have your elemental be immune to fire? If all you have is an overall magic resistance, it's all or nothing.

Well that's just stupid. So now all powerful units are going to be equally resistant to all magic types? What about physical defense? Why bother separating that from magic? If they're supposed to be powerful just make the equally resistant to everything that anyone could possibly try to do to them. What if there's a fire dragon? It might brush off fire spells like nothing, but might not be so keen on being hit with a tidal wave. Or maybe you have a water dragon, and the reverse is true?

Now you're just ducking the question entirely! Whether or not Ents will or won't be in the game is irrelevant. Additionally, the world has been blasted but there are still pockets of habitable land, who's to say some small portion of an ancient and powerful forest didn't survive? If Ents are in the game, how would you make them particularly vulnerable to fire over everything else? Answer: you wouldn't. Result: non-intuitive garbage.

And pray tell, what do you we know about the list of civilizations? Answer: nothing. Civilization descriptions and abilities in the current beta are entirely place-holders... My point is, if they want to include such a faction (or something equivalent for, say, a tundra-dwelling peoples), how would they do that without magic resistance types? And whether or not something like this is realistic in Africa is completely unrelated to the point: this is a fantasy game. Magic isn't possible in african either (unless you talk to shamans I s'pose), nor are there dragons there. They shouldn't be in the game either, then, right?

I meant a magical chill wind, of course... And why should a magical wind's effect on someone be independent of what that person is wearing? A magical chill wind could very well just be a regular chill wind with magical origins, it needn't be magically penetrating.

Again, my point is not that each and every one of these games should be planned for Elemental. My point is merely that none of the above scenarios can be done without magic resistance types, except possibly via horrendously contrived and convoluted means (which would be significantly more complicated and confusing then just having 5 or 6 magic resistance types).

I'm not so sure I'd want a universal fire beats water beats earth beats wind or what-have-you. Now, we know that system works, and it's not totally contrived, but as you say equally valid logical arguments can be made to rearrange that in all sorts of ways and even to make it non-cyclic. Fire and water would logically both be effective against each other, earth can put out fire and absorb water, and so on. But having damage resistance types doesn't necessitate falling into a RPS element system. It merely allows for the following, which you're apparently ok with:

That's all we're saying. Whether or not they're rare is irrelevant. It is easiest to give examples like fire elementals being vulnerable to water and immune to fire, it doesn't mean that' the only relevant scenario for resistances to be used. 

[quote who="pigeonpigeon" reply="67" id="2421503"
Again, my point is not that each and every one of these games should be planned for Elemental. My point is merely that none of the above scenarios can be done without magic resistance types, except possibly via horrendously contrived and convoluted means (which would be significantly more complicated and confusing then just having 5 or 6 magic resistance types).
[/quote]

I thought you wanted magical Damage types!

Make up your mind man.  (this smiley is equipped with his sarcasm detector)

Carrying as a basic statistic elemental resistances is unnecessary.  Even carrying elemental damage types within an attack is unnecessary.  I can think of several other ways to figure out if something is immune to a particular spell that are far more versatile than just elemental immunity.

You could have creatures with immunities carry a list of the spells it is immune to.

You could have the spells carry within themselves a list of the creatures that are immune to it.

Probably about a bajillion ways to do it other than simply elemental resistances.  

When there are supposed to be customizable units and spells? That would be an interesting adventure of trying to keep up when somebody creates a new creature, adds it to the servers, and it gets downloaded into your game. Nothing except the built in stuff would have immunity to anything since nothing new can be included on a spells list without constantly updating the spells.

"Fire Resistance 30" as an ability is a lot simpler then having lists on every spell, or lists of every spell on creatures (which if we ever get a spell editor has the same problem).

Very true Raven! Like Mandelik has said:

Correct.

You might be surprised, but I have played Dominions 3 as well as some titles from Generals series, I even played Historyline, battle Isle, Battletech... And I have to admit that I didnt play them for long. After some time I find tactical battles not fun. I would say that Dominions is somewhere between those tacticals and Civ - you can still replenish your army, tactical is somehow limited (compared to eg Generals), empire building is present yet very simple - enjoyed it for a little longer than those titles before. (dont get me wrong, I like complexity and sims - simEarth, simLife, GooGrid , DF ftw)

I think that again this all boils down to question what should be main aspect of Elemental. Goal of Elemental is to be moddable so I assume we all will be happy after some time but obviously Elemental cannot be niche game (Dominions, cough).

this! Game has to be easilly playable by casual players - those who I assume are not much represented on this forum. Yet it has to offer space for improvement ("easy to learn, hard to master"). This doesnt neccessarily has to be done by huge amount of rules, variables etc. These mostly achieve "not easy to learn". Having to have printed spreadsheets with values and doing computers work to find best match is indeed "hard to master", but just plain dull (for me).

System has to offer multiple UNIQUE paths. And by unique I dont mean fireball vs. waterball. There should be significant difference - eg. nature magic (summoning) wont simply have direct damage spells etc. (btw. Battleforge is new nice try in that direction). Playing fire magic should be very different experience requiring different playstyle than playing death magic. Difference in damage type does not provide that.

krejci your post makes no sense again. Example: Why shouldn't nature magic have DD spells? Because you say so? Why shouldn't fire magic have protection spells? etc. Multiple, unique paths? Once again: Dominions 3. spell system = perfect. That being said, I understand that you prefer the KISS principle [Keep It Simple, Stupid] in regard to combat mechanics, I just don't agree with you...because Elemental should be complex enough and fun...this is my opinion. I am a serious strategy gamer. If I want to play with a dumbed down & primitive game, I just load up Civ4. or Wesnoth.

Wow, man that was amazing. I noticed a few funny things.

A: When the person playing defeated the VooDoo chick she was completely Topless. BOOBS!!! lol Lets hope Elemental keeps up that tradition. hehe

B: Why was that Guardian Spirit so powerful? I thought I remembered using those to take over Nodes? It's been too long since I played good ol MoM.

That'll be a good way to get a rating bump from the ESRB.

Make up your mind man.    (this smiley is equipped with his sarcasm detector)

Carrying as a basic statistic elemental resistances is unnecessary.  Even carrying elemental damage types within an attack is unnecessary.  I can think of several other ways to figure out if something is immune to a particular spell that are far more versatile than just elemental immunity.

You could have creatures with immunities carry a list of the spells it is immune to.

You could have the spells carry within themselves a list of the creatures that are immune to it.

Probably about a bajillion ways to do it other than simply elemental resistances.  

There should be damage types... What's the point of resistance types if there aren't damage types for them to apply to? The existence of damage types and resistances does not necessitate a universal RPS mechanic. I will never be fighting "the water element," I will be fighting units. Specific units can have specific strengths and weaknesses and they don't have to all follow along a "fire beats water beats earth beats air" path.

And your suggestions for workarounds to achieving the natural result of magic damage types and resistances are crazy! So when you mouse over a spell, you want to see a list of every unit in the game and that spell's effectiveness vs. each one? Or, when you mouse over a Fire elemental, you want to see a list of nearly every single fire spell, plus some other miscellaneous ones (perhaps mind spells, for example), because it's immune or highly resistant to them all? And nearly double that list because of all the spells a fire elemental would be more vulnerable to?

That is a ridiculously contrived method of achieving the exact same result in a confusing and completely unwieldy manner. It'd be bad enough with just predesigned units, but considering we can customize and design our own within the game, and mod in even more complex creatures... Just no...

Like I said:

And you just swooped in and proved my point better than I ever could.