Dominions 4 LINKSTRAVAGANZA

Here Are Some Links


Here are some links! They are to things about Dominions generally, and mostly about Dominions 4.


First, the official page on Illwinter. This page includes some links itself, perhaps the most notable of which is the free manual download; worth reading if you want to play the game, of course, but also for some cool narrative bits. Page 111 is a detailed breakdown of Bogarus (one of the newer nations) in terms of both strategy and background, and starting from page 123 the manual also contains a brief primer on the themes behind and inspirations for each nation.

The Bogarus guide is written by Bruce Geryk (who wrote the rest of the manual too); the first bit, about the nation's cultural background, can be read on Quarter To Three. He has also written an interesting article about how weird a game Dominions is, which is over on his website Wargame [space]. These sites are both treasure troves of interesting pieces about computer games, board games and strategy games in general, so go wild.

The official community for Dominions 4 is hosted on Desura, in the form of a 'forum' which I think is a kind of internet thing. Here is it. Of special interest may be the Scrying Pool, a recently-created subforum for things like this blog. I've singled out a blog or two you may be interested in reading below, but there's also lots of Youtube videos of people playing Dominions which I can't really comment on as I haven't watched many but which might be Your Kind Of Thing.
The strategy section is also lots of fun; shouts to baalz for his guide to Ur, which inspired me to try and get to grips with them myself.

It's in the Scrying Pool but I'm also gonna link separately to sum1won's Dominions blog, which contains some stuff about a game called Gudclub (from sum1won's perspective and also from that of one of his enemies), and also one called BigBlogClub which was intended to provide the perspective of every player in a multiplayer game. The links menu is here; they vary greatly in detail and completeness, but all are interesting. Machaka and Agartha are the most complete (and Machaka gets special mention because the player, Wizzzargh, keeps dropping in nice bits of narrative detail).

BigBlogClub was I believe inspired by a classic Dominions 3 multi-perspective Let's Play, which can be found here. Also on the Let's Play Archive is The Elephantine Armies of Mrs. Butterworth, another Dom 3 report by someone called ZorbaTHut.
These, along with BigBlogClub and some of the other AAR-type-things you can find online, are mostly focussed on multiplayer strategy, which is dark and raw and interesting; ZorbaTHut's is probably the most complete overall, in terms of mechanical detail and also how it goes right to the end, and it was from reading that that I learned how to play Dominions (3). A few things have changed in Dom 4 but it's still a solid way (perhaps the best way?) to acquaint yourself with the fundamentals of the game.

BONUS CONTENT

Learning Curve, which I linked to in a post somewhere and which is worth a look for the detailed analysis of the Bandar Log caste system alone. I also covet the nation headers, and would have stolen the one for Ur for this blog if there had been one for Ur (but there isn't).

The Kohen Gadol Has Horns, which is an analysis of HINNOM (and their successor nations, Ashdod and Gath) in terms of their mythical background and themes and such. Similar to what I'm trying to do here but a) without much gameplay and b) apparently written by someone who knows what they're talking about.


I'll try to remember to update this page with anything else relevant that I link to in the main blog. For Your Convenience. Here also is all the things linked to so far in simple webaddress form in case there's a reason to do that:

http://www.illwinter.com/dom4/

http://www.quartertothree.com/fp/2014/01/06/ivan-terrible-vs-cthulhu-dominions-4/

http://www.wargamespace.com/2014/05/05/confessions-of-a-dominions-manual-writer/

http://www.desura.com/games/dominions-4-thrones-of-ascensions/forum

http://www.desura.com/games/dominions-4-thrones-of-ascensions/forum/board/scrying-pool-aars-lps-videos

http://www.desura.com/games/dominions-4-thrones-of-ascensions/forum/thread/a-guide-to-ur-the-sleeping-giants-its-a-trap

https://sum1won.wordpress.com/

https://silvercoyne.wordpress.com/

http://lparchive.org/Dominions-3-%28by-Lilli-et-al%29/

http://lparchive.org/Dominions-3/

http://www.desura.com/games/dominions-3-the-awakening/forum/thread/learning-curve-a-multi-perspective-dominions-3-lets-play

http://www.gameology.org/essays/the_kohen_gadol_has_horns_the_fates_of_t


I guess this way you can just scroll directly to the link and not have to read what I've written about it again and again. But then you still might end up reading this little bit by accident, so.