Actually Dominions has a fairly good level of tactical control; you can position your groups in formation on the battlefield before battle. You can also set the order from a drop down list for each group. You can set orders for archers (for example) to shoot archers, shoot nearest, shoot cavalry, etc, you can position leaders where you want them, etc .. And you can change everything based upon different opponents & different needs.

Any more control than that would probably swing game balance far to the human player's favor as the AI typically cannot compete, as shown in other games. I'd rather sacrifice ultimate player control & have a good AI than have ultimate control & beat the AI everytime; that'll sink the game everytime. Dominions has a good marriage of player control & AI ability on the tactical level using the RT mechanism. I kind of enjoy the post game "combat rewind" which is kool. I wouldn't change a thing, it works well in that game & that's the way I like it. The only problem with dominions is you can beat the AI pretty much everytime (on the strategic level) if you can make it past turn 50 or so & expanded sufficiently. Unfortunately, the same old AI weakness as 99% of all strategy games. It's otherwise a very good fantasy level strategy game, and I wouldn't change anything except improve the AI & a couple of other things (some of the aquatic nations had problems & there were some glitches with underwater combat as I remember). It has a good mod capability.

Dominions is fairly unique in the way it does battles. Games allowing you direct & complete control in RT type combat (aka: Age of Mythology, empire earth, age of empires, etc..) are a dime-a-dozen in comparison to Dominions type combat or even TB systems in general (which, unfortunately, usually have severly crummy tactical AI). It seems RT tactical combat is the only way of equalizing the AI & human as other systems tend to favor the human too much (much more often than not) and make a mockery of the AI, which is unfortunate but true. I might add that even in RT type tactical combat you still don't have 100% control, as you can't physically move guys around fast enough and react .. it's a hand-eye coordination issue more than strategy. 

Basically, it's nice to have some variety as to types of combat systems to choose from. Dominions offers that. It's not the same old dime-a-dozen RT type tactical combat mechanism that's used in 99% of all strategy games nowadays.

Another thing I might add about Dominions. This game has had the best manual I've ever seen in a PC since ... hell, have to go back to the late 80s & early 90s when they actually made quality manuals for PC games. Blow-by-blow explanation of how tactical combat works & castle' resource gathering zone, all the way down to the numerical math formulas used by the game system. A friggin awseome manual there and A+ as far as that aspect of game review is concerned. This is how all PC game manuals should be. I wish elemental had a manual that was even half that in-depth.

Recently, my friend gave me Romance of the Three Kingdoms.  It is fantastic.  It seems simple at first, but there is so much going on with politcs, marriages, titles, etc.  If you  love unnecessarily complex strategy games with roleplaying and minor magical elements, I really can't recommend it enough.

You are a low ranked governer and must win the three kingdoms and unite them under a single banner.  You can do this with propaganda, assassinations, public debates, duels, spreading foul rumours, and so much more.  I'm loving it.

If you love Turn Based games, get a Nintendo DS. The thing has a MASSIVE amount of TB games. Most of them pretty darn good.

I find myself playing more and more on the DS.

Actually it was version 4 that blows and that's when they got bought out not the 5 version. Plus it was versions II & III that are the best not 3&4. I personally like version II the best I like the large graphics and I like the way you can setup the AI before the game starts. Many different settings instead of just a handful of diffuclty levels like III onward.

It was a very good game for it's time and would love to see a remake. However IMHO AOW:SM is better. I do still have the game but don't have a machine that I can play it on.

IMO it does not feel like a war game like CIV or AOW/MOM it feels more like a complex version of battle chess which is still good and fun to play. The TC battles pretty much have that Battle Ches feel.  I love the game but I would not put it in the same class as AOW/MOM/CIV. It is not a very "Serious" stratagy game.

tac battles played out by the PC?  Actually, i think I might like this appraoach to tac battles.  Too bad the game doesnt include a 'switch' that allows users to have the game ALSO allow user to play out the tac battle directly, in turn based mode, or unit based mode.  But I like the idea of the leader giving general commands to units, and then, people being people, they do their best in the trenches...

I concur. I recently bought both Master of Magic and the Age of Wonders Trilogy with the soundtrack.

Best $26 I ever spent.

I am having a lot of fun and am even more excited about Elemental's future.

Dominions 3 rocks hard, you guys should play my mod nations!  Why?  Well, they are not that great, but they are from me!  I need to update them...

Gog also has the AoW series available.

I have 3 up I think, "Ul'Darath" EA and LA, going to put up the MA later today I think. And I also have a LA "Volcanus" which is a pale one nation.  I need to do some more work on them, especially the sprites and balancing, but they are not the absolute worst ones you could play...well I hope not.

I think the tactical combat of Magic: The Gathering - Tactics (http://www.magicthegatheringtactics.com) is great, because the units have different special abilities and the spells are powerful.