The Rituals

Realms of Dominion, commonly referred to RoD (or “Rod”), is an online base building game of conquering others, not unlike games the original Warcraft games and the Civilization series, but it also has some RPG elements, making it an MMO as well. In the world their ten continents, some bigger than others, and about half a dozen archipelagos and island chains, some of which are their own territories while others are part of existing territories, with numerous factions. In the game, players take control of one of 21 different factions as a “Demon King/Queen” and set out to conquer the hundred or so other factions, including those of other players. The hundreds of Nonplayer factions are ruled over by pregenerated rulers of their perspective nations, the most popular play type of this is the setting called “Conquering Queens” where all the NPC factions are ruled over by Queens and Empresses (almost all of whom seem to have very attractive character models). Due to its popularity, this is the default setting for the Mature player base. The game is actually rated for Teens and older, but everyone under 18 is stuck playing what many refer to as the censored version, while the 18 and older crowd are playing the “complete experience” version where you can put the NPCs (and sometimes yourself) into naughty and sexual positions, and you’re practically spoiled for choice when that happens. Each player faction is tied to a different type of monsters or threat that heroes would take on in a more typical fantasy setting. Among the many factions, the deceptively simple looking “Bug” faction (which includes arachnids and other creepy crawlies along with more true insects) and Dragon faction are considered the most powerful due to how they perform in both the latter half of the early game and late game, seemingly regardless of how you choose to advance their development. But the “Beast” faction (which includes anthropomorphic animals, which can sometime include dinosaurs in that grouping, along with a number of prehistoric and mythological beasts and creatures from across the globe) is considered the weakest due to it being perceived as not really coming online until the latter half of the mid-game. Players have 3 main ways they can advance. There’s the Demon Lord Skill/Ability tree (which has most of its advancements locked behind the development of the other trees before they can be accessed), Town/City tree (what is used to advance most of the cultural development of a player’s territory), and the Military tree (which is where all the military advancements are kept, but some are locked out until you reach certain development points/milestones with the other trees). You can play as the individual Demon Lord going about conquering the surrounding area as part of their mission of conquest, which does help unlock a number of components in the Demon Lord tree, in their mission of conquest. And by doing so, you are able to gain access to more materials faster, and even acquire artifacts that could be outside of what could normally be available to you without conquering the appropriate territories or forces. But you still need to devote time to more than the power fantasy of being a wandering Demon Lord if you want to do well at the game.

Updated on May 10, 2025 by dracone
Created on May 8, 2025 by dracone