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| Thread: Dragon Slayer - Faerie Dragon strategy |  This thread is pages long: 1 2 · NEXT» |
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acedrian
Tavern Dweller
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posted April 03, 2011 09:06 AM |
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Edited by acedrian at 09:09, 03 Apr 2011.
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Dragon Slayer - Faerie Dragon strategy
Just finished this level and wanted to share my experiences.
I reckon this is the hardest level of the entire heroes 3 series and it requires careful strategy to get through it.
This level can be divided into two parts: 1. epic battles against faerie dragons and 2. epic battles against naga/naga queens. Each of these need to be fought in different ways.
prerequisites
The only really essential thing you need from the previous levels is expert earth magic + town portal - the most important spell of the quest. Don't even think about attempting this mission if you don't have expert town portal. This will be available in one of the towns from the second mission.
I completed the level without doing the whole diplomats ring + collar of conjuring deal. I figured it wasn't essential, and evidently it wasn't.
In hindsight, life would have been a lot easier for me if I had got fire magic skill and reached expert level. This is because one of the spells you need is beserk, but as it turns out I completed it with just basic beserk.
The third spell which is very useful but not essential is water walk. This enables you to capture one of the towns without having to confront 35 faerie dragons.
This level can actually be attempted as the second mission. I figure this is a crazy idea as you would be attempting it as level 8 with few spells (no town portal) and much lower skills.
walkthrough
Without going into every step, basically at the beginning there are 2 towns which need to be captured as quickly as possible. The first is right on the southern border. The second across to the west. A couple of tips when travelling: 1. flag every gem pool that you find - you will need gems for hiring titans, 2. Take every opportunity of collecting money - so not just the treasure chests, but also visiting the naga banks and medussa stores.
The land access to the second town is blocked by a magic box which contains 35 faerie dragons. If you have water walk spell, bypass this and head south to the coast. There is one point along there you can do a water walk (requires two walks). From here you can north-east and capture the town. With three towns, build city centres for money, as well as cloud temples for titans as fast as you can. You will also need mage towers for enchanters.
You now need to collect as many troops as you can from the 3 towns, importantly though, spend your money on these creatures: golems, titans and enchanters. I collected around 15 titans and just over 100 enchanters, which is enough. Try and get at least 200+ iron golems. Get a few other creatures, but don't spend too much money - you will need to save it for later. You should consider also purchasing an ammo cart for the epic battles.
Head north until you reach a border gate into the non-snow area in the middle of the map. IMPORTANT: hire another hero from the town you left, and follow Dracon. Take both heroes south-east until you see the light blue tent guarded by a legion of nagas. Very important, that before you attack the nagas, make sure Dracon's morale is high - visit one of the rally flags nearby. Move your new hero next to Draco and take all creatures from him except master gremlins, Titans and enchangers. Now we are ready for epic battle number 1:
There are about 3500 nagas, and basically you have no hope of killing them all on your own. You have to get them to mostly kill themselves - for that you will use the beserk spell. But the first spell you should cast is 'slow' - which will reduce their movement to 2 hexes. IMPORTANT - be aware that this spell will eventually end, which I believe is the number of power points Dracon has. The battle will most likely last for longer than the spells effect, so remember to cast it again at some point. Besides beserk, another crucial spell that you might not think of is 'sorrow' - you just can't take the risk that they one of the stacks will get 2 turns in a row - plus you get the added advantage that they will sometimes suffer from low morale and miss a turn. Now you basically just keep casting beserk on the stacks and moving your units around so they are out of reach from attack. I figured the best way was to cast it so they keep attacking the weakest stack - in that way you quickly reduce the number of stacks - less chance of getting trapped. Since you will also be attacking with your two ranged units, be mindful of how many shots they have left. You will probably run out - at least for the titans - if you shoot at every opportunity. If you do it right, you should be able to defeat them without losing anyone.
Once the nagas are defeated and you touch the light blue tent, move both heroes north until you see another border gate. Remember again to boost Draco's morale before you reach the gate. Before you attack the gate, hand over your titans and enchanters to the other hero. They will simply be decimated by the faerie dragons at the gate. Now you are ready for epic battle number 2.
This battle will be won by the golems - why? Because faerie dragons fight with magic, and golems have 75% magic resistance. I can't remember if I needed more creatures than just the golems, but just try it with the golems first and take more creatures from the other hero if needed (but avoid taking titans and enchanters).
After this battle, continue on through the gate, where you will be ambushed by about 15 more faerie dragons. Head east through the border guard and hit the green tent. Also there is a seers hut there, which you should go to as you will get a free 10 titans. Now head back down through the gate and collect all the creatures you just gave to the other hero. This is why you take the second hero with Dracon - its a long way back to the nearest town to swap units around. Go through the green border gate, capture the town and hit the red tent. Now go around all the town collecting troops - but concentrate only on enchanters and titans (you will run out of money trying to get everything).
Now you can continue: portal back to the town you just captured and go back through the border gate (where the faerie dragons were) and head east. Keep going along that trail until you reach the coast. There is a town there, but don't bother capturing it as it is guarded by too many faerie dragons. take the boat and head south. Bypass the first island (can't land on it) and land on the second island further south. Take the town in the north and do the rounds again collecting only master gremlins, titans and enchanters. To win the next epic battle you need a lot more troops than the first naga battle. I think I had about 400 enchanters, 80 titans and 1600 master gremlins. Leave all creatures in the town except Titans, enchanters and master gremlins. Head south where you will see a legion of naga queens guarding a portal. Before you attack them, see the seer next door and he will give you the ogres club. Incidentally, by now you should have also built artefact merchants in all the towns and armed yourself with as many artefacts as possible. As always, remember to boost Dradon's morale before battle. Now you are ready for epic battle number 3.
Basically you want to employ the same tactics as the first naga fight - cast slow, sorrow and beserk. Being naga queens, they will be able to move 4 hexes under the slow spell. I actually found this relatively easy with the troop numbers I had, so possibly you don't need that many. Expect to lose the master gremlins.
After this battle the hard work is done. With all the creatures you will have accumulated, the final epic battle should be easy. Go through the portal where you will see three lots of faerie dragons. only one needs to be killed. There will be a message from a leprechaun to indicate which is the right one.
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angelito
Honorable
Undefeatable Hero
proud father of a princess
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posted April 04, 2011 12:45 PM |
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Edited by angelito at 12:45, 04 Apr 2011.
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First of all, thanks for your walkthrough.
Second, it IS the better idea to make this faerie dragon scenario as SECOND.
Why?
- You can still easily win this scenario end of month 3 / start of month 4, even though you start as level 8 hero. You won't be much faster if you do it as 3rd.
- The Rust dragon scenario is soooo much easier when done as 3rd. You can win it end of FIRST month!!
- Townportal can be learned in First scenario in starting town. You may restart the scenario a few times until it is present in your mage guild.
- The naga fights can be done easily without berzerk. The battle field has such a great "design", you can blind some stacks so they block the others which are then unable to reach you.
All you need is an ammocart(!!) and clone (to shorten the length of the battle). The Titans and Enchanters do the job. Take 4 single master genies with you (for distraction and for casting good spells on your 2 archers like precision or bless!) and 1 archmage (to reduce speccosts by 2!).
Just try it and post your experience here 
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Better judged by 12 than carried by 6.
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heroes_player
Known Hero
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posted April 06, 2011 07:53 PM |
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Quote:
First of all, thanks for your walkthrough.
Second, it IS the better idea to make this faerie dragon scenario as SECOND.
Why?
- You can still easily win this scenario end of month 3 / start of month 4, even though you start as level 8 hero. You won't be much faster if you do it as 3rd.
- The Rust dragon scenario is soooo much easier when done as 3rd. You can win it end of FIRST month!!
- Townportal can be learned in First scenario in starting town. You may restart the scenario a few times until it is present in your mage guild.
- The naga fights can be done easily without berzerk. The battle field has such a great "design", you can blind some stacks so they block the others which are then unable to reach you.
All you need is an ammocart(!!) and clone (to shorten the length of the battle). The Titans and Enchanters do the job. Take 4 single master genies with you (for distraction and for casting good spells on your 2 archers like precision or bless!) and 1 archmage (to reduce speccosts by 2!).
Just try it and post your experience here
I have not try this. But I have played this faerie map as third and all I could say is that it is not hard. If I remember correctly, I passed the pandora's box in the first week with blind+ressu+implo. I think if I choose this map earlier I will have less mana and maybe no ressu and implo at all. So I will lose a lot of troops and map becomes harder..
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angelito
Honorable
Undefeatable Hero
proud father of a princess
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posted April 07, 2011 09:14 AM |
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Yes, map will be a bit harder, but on the other hand, the RUST dragon scenario will be a piece of cake. You can fight against those swarm (I think they were around 500) of archmages who guard the fly spellscroll to the west on day 2 or 3!! Then you fly to the prison where Crag hack is held, who carries troops and a fly spell scroll too. From there on, the scenario is extremely easy.
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Better judged by 12 than carried by 6.
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MacMasterMC
Known Hero
Resurrected Loreweaver
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posted June 16, 2011 09:36 PM |
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Quote:
- Townportal can be learned in First scenario in starting town. You may restart the scenario a few times until it is present in your mage guild.
Hey Angelito, how can you do this without playing through for a while? And how can you be sure you keep the game where it is present?
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...a shimmer in the woods, with
an expectant feel to the air...
...a figure takes shape...
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angelito
Honorable
Undefeatable Hero
proud father of a princess
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posted June 17, 2011 03:17 PM |
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At the start of the first scenario (crystal dragons), mage guild in your starting town is completeley prebuilt. Just check the spells and if you do not find resurrection / townportal, just restart scenario.
BUT.,..do not forget to visit this town AFTER you have learned advanced / expert wisdom again, so you have the spells placed in your book...
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Better judged by 12 than carried by 6.
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MacMasterMC
Known Hero
Resurrected Loreweaver
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posted June 17, 2011 05:24 PM |
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Well that is surprisingly helpful. Is it set from the final save of the previous part of the campaign, or generated every time you enter the next scenario from the last save? You don't have to change how you beat the last scenario to change it do you?
Note: Hey Angelito, I was reading another thread and saw you had an archangel ranking in the high scores? perhaps it's just me but that is a bit insane. How do you play that well? I play ok, but I have never gotten anything in the 6 or 7s of the rankings. Do you ever help people learn to play better? If you do I would like to try some games with you.
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...a shimmer in the woods, with
an expectant feel to the air...
...a figure takes shape...
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angelito
Honorable
Undefeatable Hero
proud father of a princess
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posted June 17, 2011 06:33 PM |
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Archangel rating means palying on 200%.
Playing on 200% means...RUSH!
The faster you reach your enemy, the weaker he is, the easier he is defeated.
The 2 main problems of players are always the same:
- They underestimate the strength of their army
- They fight with TOO strong army on their side!
Just 2 examples:
1. Fighting with 1 angel only, and casting 4 or 5 times cure turns out to be equal to having TWO angels..
2. The stronger you are, the lesser stacks are created on opposit army. What is easier: fighting vs ONE stack of 7 Monsters, or vs 7 stacks of ONE monster?
Try it...
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Better judged by 12 than carried by 6.
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PinkFlamingo
Adventuring Hero
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posted June 17, 2011 06:50 PM |
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Faerie Dragon level was really easy. All you need is Anti-magic and Blind. You anti Magic your Titan, destroy all faeries except one stack, and then blind and keep defending until Anti-magic wears off. Then you resurrect and kill.
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MacMasterMC
Known Hero
Resurrected Loreweaver
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posted June 21, 2011 07:59 PM |
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Quote:
2. The stronger you are, the lesser stacks are created on opposit army. What is easier: fighting vs ONE stack of 7 Monsters, or vs 7 stacks of ONE monster?
Try it...
When you said this, it sounds like to me you are saying that the best strategy is to try to only bring what you need to a fight instead of overpowering. In other words, to try to be a minimalist with what troops you have to use in any given situation. But how do you determine what troops are sufficient to minimize or entirely prevent losses, and still have just enough to conquer? That is something I don't know anything about...
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...a shimmer in the woods, with
an expectant feel to the air...
...a figure takes shape...
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angelito
Honorable
Undefeatable Hero
proud father of a princess
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posted June 21, 2011 10:26 PM |
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This is what this game is about.
Knowing about the ability of all creatures in different situations. Therefore, you should play many single player maps or random maps, just to recognize how strong your creatures are, before you start playing complex things like a campaign.
Also learn how to use magic at its best (mass benefit spells are much more powerfull than single damage spells for example!)
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Better judged by 12 than carried by 6.
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Bones_xa
Known Hero
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posted September 02, 2011 03:15 PM |
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Edited by Bones_xa at 15:25, 02 Sep 2011.
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I recently played through all the heroes 3 campaigns.
This one did have some minor challenges/surprises to it, such as that legion of nagas guarding the tent, but generally it didn't strike me as all that hard. Well, compared to some of the other scenarios from other campaigns this one was rather easy. There was no computer player.
From what I remember, I used resurrection a lot, and blind when there were very large stacks of faerie dragons. Faeries are fast so they will strike early and decimate my weaker units, but near the end I'd cast blind on the last stack and resurrect all my units before killing the that last stack.
On another note, I don't remember using berserk against the nagas. In fact I don't even remember if I had berserk or not during this scenario. I killed the nagas with slow, then blinding each stack I could, while concentrating all my shooters (titans, mages, enchanters, gremlins) on one stack at a time. I think I may have had another group of shooters like maybe one that joined me but I don't remember.
Nagas also helped with their wait/strike because of their no retaliation. Near the end I remember my gremlins and maybe another stack running out of ammo, but I'm quite sure I still completed this battle with no losses as the end result.
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kringled
Hired Hero
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posted April 20, 2012 04:39 AM |
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I just played these two through for the first time recently. I of course did the opposite order of what angelito recommended here, but having played them through I can see his point if you are trying for a high score. As it was, I had the enemy hero stomped in about week 6,
and took just a bit longer to wrap up mines and have Dracon visit stat enhancers. It was harder to use Crag Hack effectively than I expected; the mage guild with Town Portal was a long way away and I did not have a secondary with Expert Scholar to start with. Dracon's mobility was so much higher as well (for me, Exp. Logistics+Exp. Pathfinding) as well as Exp. Air, Dimension door, and lots of SP that for any fight I wanted, it was almost always quicker to get Dracon there than Crag.
I never ended up with Berserk (so am glad I didn't take Fire magic in the first scenario), although I didn't build up Mage guilds in the faerie dragon scenario very much. I do wonder if it would be possible to shortcut big chunks of the Faerie dragon level with Summon Boat (and of course, Exp. Water). I sort of suspect the spell is banned from the mage guilds on this and earlier maps, since Dracon has never acquired it but when I first started it, Gem was in the tavern, and she starts with Summon Boat, so all I would need to do is hire her and a hero who starts with scholar (unless she acquired it quickly). Has anyone tried that sort of a route?
Keith
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Ghost
Undefeatable Hero
Therefore I am
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posted April 20, 2012 05:04 AM |
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Sorry!
I do not understand! If you would like Fear, no need to touch Naga, otherwise a very expert haste was enough! Berserk do not do (I do not ever play with the search for artifact), because the AI can not be used. Draco just need to Mysticism Shh!
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kringled
Hired Hero
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posted April 20, 2012 02:31 PM |
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Just finished the campaign, with a 1555 (Cyclops King) score, 323 days. Azure dragons were interesting; one of the only times where neither Mass Slow nor Mass Haste was my first spell. (mass haste alone would not have improved any of my stacks to be faster than the Azures; even Haste (cast by enchanters) and Prayer together left me with half my stacks faster and half slower). I had an excess of spell points left over; I'd been very conservative early in the map and not tried to resurrect minor losses; I hadn't completely thought through that I would be limited by # of battle rounds in terms of how many times I could cast resurrection. Losses were ~ 5% of my enchanters and master genies to the 50 Azures; maybe about 20% of those two and archmages to the 100 Azures. The last Azure was one of the only times I opened up with a damage spell in the entire campaign. I'm sure I could do it faster (maybe I'll go back and try in Angelito's suggested order after I finish some other campaigns).
Keith
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markmasters
Famous Hero
Dragon of justice
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posted September 04, 2013 03:39 PM |
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You don't really need berserk, it quickens the game but another option is using Force field against the naga queens. The battlefield has always the same design, just close the 2 gaps constantly and the naga quens won't ever be able to reach your army
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heroes_player
Known Hero
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posted June 13, 2014 07:07 PM |
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I just replayed the Dragon Slayer campaign because it is the best campaign that 3D0 had done in my humble opinion I thought something though... I think the campaign will offer a great challenge if you play WITHOUT any elemental magic schools  I mean, Dracon would not be allowed to learn earth, fire, water and air magic. This might be a big problem in the Faerie scenario because you can't resurrect your army back after the 'heavy rain' made by faeries and also the nagas are kind of tough too... Or maybe not a great challenge, but impossible ?
Since this is my favourite campaign for ever I have considered doing a video walkthrough in the future... maybe
Just my 50cents
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Ebonheart
Famous Hero
Rush the rush
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posted June 13, 2014 07:42 PM |
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heroes_player said:
I just replayed the Dragon Slayer campaign because it is the best campaign that 3D0 had done in my humble opinion I thought something though... I think the campaign will offer a great challenge if you play WITHOUT any elemental magic schools I mean, Dracon would not be allowed to learn earth, fire, water and air magic. This might be a big problem in the Faerie scenario because you can't resurrect your army back after the 'heavy rain' made by faeries and also the nagas are kind of tough too... Or maybe not a great challenge, but impossible ?
Since this is my favourite campaign for ever I have considered doing a video walkthrough in the future... maybe
Just my 50cents
I too enjoyed the Dragonslayer Campaign a lot. But I always found the first scenario to be most annoying since I never wanted to lose any troops.
As for your challange, I think I tried it once. The key thing was to use the enchanters to get the right mass spell (slow/haste) which of course lead to a ton of reloads.
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heroes_player
Known Hero
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posted June 13, 2014 08:46 PM |
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Hmm that's true, enchanters are definitely a weapong against nagas I think I will try without them for the biggest challange ever 
Also, I think that the 3rd mission (rust or faerie) is completely possible to win without ever building any building or units from your town... only with your starting troops and the recruitable units from the maps and your magic since Dracon is so overpowered at that time this is also good challenge for everyone
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Kicferk
Known Hero
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posted June 14, 2014 04:14 PM |
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heroes_player said:
Also, I think that the 3rd mission (rust or faerie) is completely possible to win without ever building any building or units from your town... only with your starting troops and the recruitable units from the maps and your magic since Dracon is so overpowered at that time this is also good challenge for everyone
I am pretty sure that it is quite impossible to win faerie dragons mission without recruiting anything. It is because faeries have greater speed than you, and in late stages of your mission(like garrison to second snow area, or city before reaching boats, or even final fight) they can destroy you before your turn. Maybe if you have resistance and some artifacts and quite a bit of luck you would be able to survive, but it would be too annoying for me to try
Besides, there is a guard wanting you to give him some titans and naga queens, and I'm not sure whether it is possible to get so many of them without recruiting. Actually, if it is the third mission, I am quite sure you will have to recruit some naga queens to pass that guard
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