History VideoGame / Dominions

* EldritchAbomination: Multiple kinds, actually. R'lyeh is in the service of the Great Old Ones from beyond the stars, while the spell "Horror mark" allows you to draw Soul-Eating StarfishAliens from the Astral Plane to attack your enemies' commanders, the most powerful of which are the brutal Doom Horrors. In the Early Age, when the Star has not yet fallen, R'lyeh is instead ruled by the aboleths, a race of TimeAbyss sea creatures that dominate the minds of the lesser aquatic races.

* AnimalMecha: The Iron Dragon summon.

** The ''embodiment'' of this would be Well of Sorrows, a world spell that creates Death gems by siphoning all the misery and pain in the land into the Pretender's body, resulting in death, disease, and old age being much less painful. The congratulatory text implies that this is a minor HeroicSacrifice on your part.

* DemonLordsAndArchDevils: Five [[PlayingWithFire Arch Devils]], six [[AnIcePerson Ice Devils]], and four [[CastingAShadow Heliophagi]], along with the four Demon Lords.

** Human nonmages try for this. They don't measure up, though, and almost never become [[OneManArmy One Man Armies]], especially when compared to [[OurGiantsAreBigger giants]] and summoned Super Combatants.

* CrapsackWorld: The Late Era. More and more factions are using [[BlackMagic death and blood magic]]. The last remnants of [[TheEmpire Ermor]] have become Lemuria, a realm of the free roaming dead. Ulm is a realm of vampires and wolves. R'lyeh is a land of insanity and death, where the Veil between reality and the madness of the Void is breaking down. And then you and the rest of the Pretenders come along and start unleashing supernatural monsters and undead horrors over the land. Not to mention that magic is fading from the lands as a whole.
** That said, there's evidence that this is a AWorldHalfFull. Jomon has fully thrown off the grip of their Oni oppressors, and Patala is just on the cusp of a Golden Age under the benign rule of the Naga. Humans are also gaining ascendancy in other kingdoms as well, by virtue of the fact that their divine protectors / oppressors are growing less powerful and numerous as a result of [[TheMagicGoesAway the magic gradually fading from the world]]. ''Capitalizing'' on that hope depends on who wins.

* CriticalExistenceFailure: Played with, on one hand individual units have hit points, and units only die when their hitpoints run out. On the other hand units have a chance to acquire wounds whenever they are damaged. Additionally armies do not usually fight to the death, instead they will flee the battle field after being injured or sufficiently frightened.

Made by Illwinter Game Design and published by Shrapnel Games. An unusual TurnBasedStrategy game series in the classic FourX style. Fifth game Domions V: Warriors of the Faith was released November 27, 2017. In the wake of the apparent death of the [[OurGodsAreDifferent one true high god]], various entities (Pretender Gods) attempt to attain the vacant position through the expedient method of wiping out all competition.

Not to be confused with the BoardGame ''TabletopGame/{{Dominion}}'' or the tv show ''{{Series/Dominion}}''.

* FantasyKitchenSink: Nations draw from pretty much every imaginable mythological source. As a result, a war between, for example, the Nephilim of Jewish apocrypha, the FairFolk of Irish legend, and Japanese [[{{Youkai}} oni]] is pretty par for the course.

* AuthorAvatar: Bogus and his adventurer pals, taken from the game designer's home-brewed ''TabletopGame/Earthdawn'' campaign.

** Ermor's lore in ''5'' is basically this, too. In the Early Age, Jesus just died and they're spreading his message. In the Middle Age, they tried to resurrect Jesus but messed up and released Death instead. Not the concept, the ''entity''. Ermor becomes a land of the dead, and a splinter empire called Scelaria forms a cadre of death mages in an effort to fight fire with fire. By the Late Age, Scelaria has repeated Ermor's mistake and become Lemuria, a realm of ghosts and wraiths pouring through on massive Soul Gate.

* AIBreaker: The computer is completely incapable fighting against poploss/domspawn (dominion kills population and spawns free units) nations like MA Ermor, MA Lemuria, and LA R'lyeh. The endless mook hordes and lack of supplies render it completely unable to launch effective attacks against those factions.

** Arguably Late Age Ermor and Late Age R'lyeh could also be considered strong candidates for this trope, with seemingly endless undead hordes coming from the former and Lovecraftian astral horrors from the latter.
** In ''Dominions 4'', Lemuria takes over Ermor's ''Dominions 3'' role in the Late Age (Lemuria's undead are ghosts instead of skeletons, but it's still undead legions with a descent hailing from the old empire of Ermor). In the ''Middle'' Age, Ermor is ''definitely'' this -- it is like the Late Age Ermor of ''Dominions 3'' (the role played by the old Middle Age Ermor is taken up by Sceleria, a splinter empire of Ermor), and was (as revealed in Late Age nations descriptions) the arch-enemy to ''two'' other nations -- one of which ended up doing a DealWithTheDevil to gain the power to actually bring down Ermor.

* CrapsackWorld: ''Dominions 3''[='s=] Late Era. More and more factions are using [[BlackMagic death and blood magic]]. [[TheEmpire Ermor]] has become a realm of the dead. Ulm is a realm of vampires and wolves. R'lyeh is a land of insanity and death, where the Veil between reality and the madness of the Void is breaking down. And then you and the rest of the Pretenders come along and start unleashing supernatural monsters and undead horrors over the land. Not to mention that magic is fading from the lands as a whole.

** The Middle Age is ''less'' of a crapsack, without any of the truly horrific evils of Early or Late, but that doesn't make it a nice place by any means. Here, you see where many of the terrible evils of the Late Age started, most notably the decline of Ermor.
** ''Dominions 4'' is basically the same, though with some details different -- the Early Age gets a bit more positive (Ur is building a civilization without any overt evils, and Berytos is relatively non-bad for a civilization that has fallen under the influence of a blood cult), the Middle Age gets one more horrific evil (Ermor is already its Dominion 3 land of the dead incarnation -- though the splinter empire that covers the Dominions 3 Middle Age Ermor territory is presented in a more positive light as well), and the Late Age is pretty much the same, except 'Ermor' is called Lemuria and the dead are ghosts (Ermor got destroyed, but the aforementioned splinter empire managed to repeat some of its mistakes. Oops).

** Explicit in some units, such as the C'tis Sauromancers, who practice the magic of death responsibly. Implicit, if you're a particularly nice god who just happens to have undead generals. Can be argued to be the case even of Mictlan's virgin sacrificing priests. Generally not the case in the [[CrapsackWorld the Late Age]]. ''Definitely'' not the case for Late Ermor and R'lyeh (or Mid Ermor and the Late Age Lemuria in ''4'').

* TheEmpire: Any state ruled by a Pretender God, but in terms of the lore, Ermor between the Early and Middle Ages was a quite successful example, with no less than ''five'' successor and break-away states confirmed after the First Fall of Ermor (the now-undead Ermor itself, the splinter empire Sceleria, Pythium (which rules over the territories that were once Sauromatian), Marignon (the province that once had the Marverni tribes) and Ulm).

* GodsNeedPrayerBadly: The faith of people in various provinces is represented by a candle. This affects the knowledge you have of the province, the level at which you can affect it and, should you move it into the area, the hitpoints of your Pretender God. Any God who loses all their belief is eliminated from the game. [[FridgeLogic Then again]], considering that regions with 0 population can still hold dominion, and omnicidal factions like LA Ermor and LA R'yleh thrive on them, it seems that dominion involves a more generic "divine influence" rating rather than outright popfaith.
* GreyAndGrayMorality: With some {{Black|AndGrayMorality}} thrown in, like Late Age Ermor. No single faction is unambiguously good, and all of them have the potential to research and use spells with horrible effects.

* HellOnEarth: MA Ermor, LA Sceleria, and Asphodel are all undead factions that have breached into the realm of the living and are trying to take it over.

** Late Age Ermor has an enormous amount of these. A quick grab includes Leprosy, Carnage, Childslay, Venomspew, Plaguestorm, Hopevoid, Quickdeath, Soulrend, Skullbreaker and Wormfeast.

* ObviouslyEvil: Late Age Ermor and R'lyeh. Various pretender gods as well. And the various breeds of demons, of course.
* OmnicidalManiac: Late Age Ermor and R'lyeh, again, both of whom slowly kill those in their dominion. Ermor seeks a world ruled utterly by the undead, while R'lyeh wants to haul the world straight into the Void.

** Ermor's lore in ''3'' is basically this, too. In the Early Age, Jesus just died and they're spreading his message. In the Middle Age, they tried to resurrect Jesus but messed up and released Death instead. Not the concept, the ''entity''. A new religion, the Death Cult, tries their best to keep Death contained, more or less by channelling it into lots of undead. By the Late Age, the Death Cult has mostly failed, Death is loose and, well, give it half a year before the entire population of Ermor is completely wiped out. And that of all the lands around it, to be replaced by an endless stream of undead.

* ZombieApocalypse: Ermor by the Late (in ''3'') or Middle (in ''4'') Age is the embodiment of this trope. 4's Late Age nation Lemuria is a ''Ghost'' Apocalypse.

* OurGiantsAreBigger: Several varieties. The Neifel frost giants are just the most infamous.

Made by Illwinter Game Design and published by Shrapnel Games. An unusual TurnBasedStrategy game series in the classic FourX style. Fourth game Domions IV: Thrones of Ascension was released December 5, 2013. In the wake of the apparent death of the [[OurGodsAreDifferent one true high god]], various entities (Pretender Gods) attempt to attain the vacant position through the expedient method of wiping out all competition.

* CoolVersusAwesome: This is basically the game's main selling point. You want [[AncientEgypt Ancient Egyptian]] LizardFolk [[TheNecromancer Necromancers]] ruled by a [[ScaryScorpions half-man, half-scorpion]] [[GodEmperor god-king]] fighting [[EverythingsBetterWithMonkeys evil monkeys]] who worship a [[GeniusLoci sentient]] [[BloodBath blood fountain]]? You can do that!

** Also, there's [[Creator/HPLovecraft R'lyeh]] and [[TabletopGame/{{Earthdawn}} Horror marks]].

* AIBreaker: The computer is completely incapable fighting against poploss/domspawn (dominion kills population and spawns free units) nations like MA Ermor, MA Lemuria, and LA Rlyeh. The endless mook hordes and lack of supplies render it completely unable to launch effective attacks against those factions.

* ArtifactOfDoom: Gift of Kurgi, which provides sizeable physical powers but destroys its carrier's mind.

* AuthorAvatar: Bogus and his adventurer pals, taken from the game designer's home-brewed EarthDawn campaign.

* BadassNormal: Alongside such pretenders as [[Franchise/CthulhuMythos underwater squids]], [[Myth/ClassicalMythology lords of thunder]], and [[OurDragonsAreDifferent dragons]], you can also be a [[CoolOldLady crone]]. Granted it's bad sense not to give her magic powers, but you can theoretically have a BadassNormal goddess.

* BigBad: In the BackStory, the Rimtursar ice giants, ancestors of the Neifel race. The Illwinter that accompanies their reawakening is supposed to be [[{{Gotterdammerung}} the ultimate catastrophe]], though that should be taken with a grain of GameplayAndStorySegregation.
** Arguably Late Age Ermor and Late Age Ryleh could also be considered strong candidates for this trope, with seemingly endless undead hordes coming from the former and Lovecraftian astral horrors from the latter.
** In Dominions 4, Lemuria takes over Ermor's Dominions 3 role in the Late Age (Lemuria's undead are ghosts instead of skeletons, but it's still undead legions with a descent hailing from the old empire of Ermor). In the ''Middle'' Age, Ermor is ''definitely'' this -- it is like the Late Age Ermor of Dominions 3 (the role played by the old Middle Age Ermor is taken up by Sceleria, a splinter empire of Ermor), and was (as revealed in Late Age nations descriptions) the arch-enemy to ''two'' other nations -- one of which ended up doing a DealWithTheDevil to gain the power to actually bring down Ermor.

* BurnTheUndead: Most undead(except the Dust undead from Hidden in Sand) are vulnerable to fire, and fire magic is one of the main sources of anti-undead spells.

* ClapYourHandsIfYouBelieve: Although there are a few sacred units that can be recruited on the map or through summons, by and large they are Sacred because your nation's population believes they are -- lore-wise, that is. Mechanically it is just a matter of putting the "holy" tag on a unit.

** Dominions 4 is basically the same, though with some details different -- the Early Age gets a bit more positive (Ur is building a civilization without any overt evils, and Berytos is relatively non-bad for a civilization that has fallen under the influence of a blood cult), the Middle Age gets one more horrific evil (Ermor is already its Dominion 3 land of the dead incarnation -- though the splinter empire that covers the Dominions 3 Middle Age Ermor territory is presented in a more positive light as well), and the Late Age is pretty much the same, except 'Ermor' is called Lemuria and the dead are ghosts (Ermor got destroyed, but the aforementioned splinter empire managed to repeat some of its mistakes. Oops).

* CrutchCharacter: Pretty common. Niefel Jarls come to mind: they're awesome bless rushers, but if you have nothing but Niefels in the late game, they'll be overwhelmed.
** The community term is "thugs," which refer to easily-recruited low-end [[OneManArmy One Man Armies]]. Highly useful in the early and midgame, but they don't usually have the staying power to fight the real [[PersonOfMassDestruction Super Combatants]] that get summoned in the endgame.

* DarkIsNotEvil: Explicit in some units, such as the C'tis Sauromancers, who practice the magic of death responsibly. Implicit, if you're a particularly Nice God who just happens to have undead generals. Can be argued to be the case even of Mictlan's virgin sacrificing priests. Generally not the case in the [[CrapsackWorld The Late Age]]. ''Definitely'' not the case for Late Ermor and R'lyeh (or Mid Ermor and the Late Age Lemuria in ''4'').

* DidYouJustPunchOutCthulhu: Can happen with pretender gods, if they die particularly ignominiously. Particularly embarrassing is losing to ''blood slaves''... which are roughly the weakest unit in the game and really only exist to give Blood Mages something to sacrifice in combat.
** The way the damage calculations work is that a 'die roll' from 1-6 is made. Every time the computer ''rolls'' a 6, it makes a another roll, adding the result to the damage total. This means that it's quite possible, though extremely rare, for "David and Goliath" events to occur, where, say, a lowly militiaman with a sling kills a dragon with a single hit.
*** Also with certain mods that allow you to pick Cthulhu as a Pretender.

* EasyLogistics: Strongly Averted. There are tons of ways to circumvent the supply or resource limit -- but all of them are expressly magical. However, arrows are always free.
** While each province has it's own supply limit that can't be manually transferred, fortifications send out supplies to nearby provinces, with those farther away receiving less. This being in addition to greatly increasing the supplies in the province of the fortress.
* EldritchAbomination: Multiple kinds, actually. R'lyeh is in the service of the Great Old Ones from beyond the stars, while the spell "Horror mark" allows you to draw Soul-Eating StarfishAliens from the Astral Plane to attack your enemies' commanders, the most powerful of which are the brutal Doom Horrors.
** In the Early Age, the Star has not fallen, and R'lyeh is instead ruled by the aboleths, a race of TimeAbyss sea creatures that dominate the minds of the lesser aquatic races.
* ElementalEmbodiment: Each of the elements (Fire, Water, Air, Earth) have six different sizes of elementals and royalties (Queens for Water and Air, Kings for Fire and Earth) to be summoned.

* EvilIsNotAToy: Wishing for a Doom Horror will give you one with a 50% chance of it turning against you. The Eater of the Dead, if allowed to consume enough corpses, will eventually break your control.

* TheFairFolk: Many nations boast summons and recruitables that fit this role. Also, you can summon actual Faerie Queens, plus entourage. Finally, the nation of Tir Na N'og (added in an early patch) is based on that particular mythology, with Sidhe commanders, banshees, etc...
** This applies even more strongly to the Norse nations of Helheim and Vanheim, considering their use of BloodMagic and HumanSacrifice.

* {{Feelies}} the game's manual is over 300 pages thick.

* GodsNeedPrayerBadly: The faith of people in various provinces is represented by a candle. This affects the knowledge you have of the province, the level at which you can affect it and, should you move it into the area, the hitpoints of your Pretender God. Any God who loses all their belief is eliminated from the game.
** [[FridgeLogic Then again]], considering that regions with 0 population can still hold dominion, and omnicidal factions like LA Ermor and LA R'yleh thrive on them, it seems that dominion involves a more generic "divine influence" rating rather than outright popfaith.

* {{Hobbits}}: Hoburgs are about a meter tall, [[JokeCharacter can't fight to save their lives]], and live only in farmland provinces.
** [[LethalJokeCharacter In the fourth installment there are Hoburg crossbowmen who cost half as much as normal human soldiers, with crossbows that are statistically identical to those used by humans.]]

* HyperspaceIsAScaryPlace: The travel spell Stygian Paths allows travel to distant provinces, but exposes anybody doing so to attack by the spirits of the dead. Also, beyond the Veil lie the realm of Horrors.

* {{Immortality}}: Units with the immortal tag will resurrect in their capital if they die - provided they die in friendly dominion.
* JerkassGods: This can certainly apply Pretenders, but it seems to have been the case for the previous Pankrator as well. A number of Pretenders' backgrounds involve them being sealed away by the Pankrator for perceived slights or simply because [[YouHaveOutlivedYourUsefulness they were no longer useful]].
** From the description of the Titan of War and Wisdom: ''[[AndIMustScream She was eternally imprisoned]] for her impudence of [[FelonyMisdemeanor giving the Pantokrator a headache.]]''

* LightIsNotGood: And how! Astral Magic, among other things, can allow the mage to lobotomize the subjects of an enemy Pretender and force a rebellion among the populace. Astral Magic is also the magic that one uses to call forth [[EldritchAbomination Horrors]].
** Horrors need astral magic coupled with blood magic though, so it's kind of a mixed case about those horrors.

* LightningBruiser: Most giants, especially the ones with armor. Not as fast as cavalry, but much faster than equally well equipped humans.
** Giants don't generally have a better to-hit or number of attacks than a comparable human unit. Perfectly applicable to high-end summons, though, which are tougher, smarter ''and'' more agile than any regular unit.

* NamesToRunAwayFromReallyFast: Late Age Ermor has an enormous amount of these. A quick grab out of a current game: Leprosy, Carnage, Childslay, Venomspew, Plaguestorm, Hopevoid, Quickdeath, Soulrend, Skullbreaker and Wormfeast.

** DemonLordsAndArchDevils: Five [[PlayingWithFire Arch Devils]], six [[AnIcePerson Ice Devils]], and four [[CastingAShadow Heliophagus]], along with the four Demon Lords.

* RightUnderTheirNoses: Most magic sites must be searched and found before their effect, be it magical gems, gold, recruitable mages or cheaper magic can be used. Negative effects are always active.

* SavageWolves: Winter and Dire Wolfs are enemies.

* SealedEvilInACan: The spell Tartarian Gate allows you to summon dead gods imprisoned in Hell. An imprisoned pretender can fit too.
** Blood magic spells that summon unique Arch-Devils, Ice Devils, Heliophagii and Demon Lords also count.
** Ermor's lore in ''3'' is basically this, too. In the Early Age, Jesus just died and they're spreading his message. In the Middle Age, they tried to resurrect Jesus but messed up and released Death instead. Not the concept, the ''entity''. A new religion, the Death Cult, tries their best to keep Death contained, more or less by channelling it into lots of undeads. By the Late Age, the Death Cult has mostly failed, Death is loose and, well, give it half a year before the entire population of Ermor is completely wiped out. And that of all the lands around it, to be replaced by an endless stream of undead.

* SuccessionCrisis: A divine one, no less.

** PokeInTheThirdEye: Fate of Oedipus, which will cancel the enchantment and blind the caster.
* ShoutOut: Early age Ulm is basically Conan the Barbarian, with Conan(s) serving as the nation's Sacred unit.
** Also, there's [[Creator/HPLovecraft R'lyeh]] and [[{{Earthdawn}} Horror marks]].

* ThereCanBeOnlyOne: Only one pretender can ascend to true divinity. The game mechanics literally do not allow for allied victories.
** In ''4'', a new game mechanic has been introduced that allows for allied victories. Still can be only one, since it involves pre-existing alliances where all players except one play as 'disciples' instead of a Pretender God (your Dominion is for most purposes your master Pretender God's Dominion. On the plus side, that does mean you can put all your points in making your Disciple powerful instead of diverting some to modifying your Dominion's effect...). Story-wise, only the Pretender ascends to true divinity, while his/her Disciples presumably gets rewarded for their loyal service with power and influence.

* WeCanRuleTogether: Averted. While temporary alliances and co-operation are pretty much needed to win multiplayer game, there can only be one victor in the end.
** In ''4'', there can be multiple victors, but alliances are set-up in advance, and storywise only one player gets to be top dog and ascend to true divinity -- the others are his/her/its disciples, who presumably get rewarded with power and influence after their master ascends.

* BadassNormal: Alongside such pretenders as [[CthulhuMythos underwater squids]], [[Myth/ClassicalMythology lords of thunder]], and [[OurDragonsAreDifferent dragons]], you can also be a [[CoolOldLady crone]]. Granted it's bad sense not to give her magic powers, but you can theoretically have a BadassNormal goddess.

* TryToFitThatOnABusinessCard: When created, a Pretender gets titles assigned to them depending on their magic and scales, meaning a pretender's full name will be something like "Wercrata, the Leaflord, Patron of Soldiers, the Divine Shepherd" or "Odia, [[ObviouslyEvil Queen of Darkness, Goddess of Fires, Persecutor and Destroyer of Youth]]."

''Dominions'' is a turn-based game on the continental scale, but a very extreme form of simultaneous resolution for tactical battles: You aren't actually allowed to give any orders when battle (and sometimes hilarity ensues). Instead, you can only give standing formation and conditional tactics orders to a unit of soldiers in the strategic view, then sit back and hope for the best whenever they come into contact with the enemy. This allows the game to be played by email, or over longer periods of Real Life time.

''Dominions'' is a turn-based game on the continental scale, but a very extreme form of simultaneous resolution for tactical battles: You aren't actually allowed to give any orders when battle (and sometimes hilarity) ensues. Instead, you can only give standing formation and conditional tactics orders to a unit of soldiers in the strategic view, then sit back and hope for the best whenever they come into contact with the enemy. This allows the game to be played by email, or over longer periods of Real Life time.

** Arguably Middle Age Ermor and Late Age Ryleh could also be considered strong candidates for this trope, with seemingly endless undead hordes coming from the former and Lovecraftian astral horrors from the latter.

* AIBreaker: The computer is completely incapable fighting against poploss/domspawn (dominion kills population and spawns free units) nations like MA Ermor, Lemuria, and LA Rlyeh. The endless mook hordes and lack of supplies render it completely unable to launch effective attacks against those factions.

** Arguably Late Age Ermor and Late Age Ryleh could also be considered strong candidates for this trope, with seemingly endless undead hordes coming from the former and Lovecraftian astral horrors from the latter.