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| Thread: Mystic Vale v2.31 (2-3 week map) and Battle Reports | |
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darkprince
Adventuring Hero
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posted January 15, 2013 06:02 PM |
bonus applied by Elvin on 17 Jan 2013. |
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Mystic Vale v2.31
download the map
An edited version of Mystic's Vale, aiming at a 2-3 week strategy game between all factions. Its balance has been tested for a couple of years. Empty your H5 Maps folder and UserMODs folder before using it.
A couple of things were built in the map design to limit the power of war machines and casters.
1. Since war machines can only fire once per round, increasing the number of troops reduces its threat. Therefore, dwellings lv 1-3 are built in town and dwellings lv 1-7 could be found nearby. Any faction should be able to fend off a triple flaming ballista rush with two-week lv 1-7 troops.
2. Dwellings lv 4-7, Hill Fort, and a gold mine are guarded by a group of creatures (1 Black Dragon, 10 Succubus Mistress, 30 Stalkers, and 136 Imps). These creatures are meant to challenge the casters since the Imps drain 34 points of mana during the battle. 5 Earth Elementals in front of the guards will come to your aid to ease the battle.
All factions should be able to take the high-level dwellings on Day 3. The first battle between two players could be fought as early as on Day 6. Main heroes typically reach lv 16-18 before the game ends.
Recommended rules:
1. Havez and Kaspar limited to lv 5.
2. Restart if Shackles of the Last Man is seen on Day 1.
3. Difficulty level: hard.
The following behaviors are ALLOWED:
1. Using Wyngaal
2. Mentoring
3. Hit and run
4. Week 1 Armageddon/Curse of the Netherworld
And etc...
So far, the general understanding of this particular map is still very limited--it is very time consuming to try all pairs of factions between players of similar skill levels. I have played many factions and my hunch is that Necropolis, Stronghold, Inferno, Haven, Dungeon, and Academy belong to the first tier, while Sylvan and Fortress belong to the second tier. I could be wrong but that's the fun part of this game--if there is no clear-cut advantage, we have balance among the factions.
BTW, some best players around me found that Dungeon has a very difficult time facing Stronghold on this particular map.
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darkprince
Adventuring Hero
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posted January 15, 2013 06:10 PM |
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For a typical 2-3 week map, the 8 heroes of each faction can be classified into major ones (easier mf, faster leveling, and better at player encounters) and minor ones (supporting role compared to the major ones). Notice that the minor ones in one faction can be major ones in another faction, and minor ones in a 2-3 week map could easily become major ones in 5-10 week maps.
Hero classification in a 2-3 week map
* Knights
Major: Vittorio, Dougal, Lazlo, Rutger
Minor: Klaus, Ellaine, Maeve, Irina
* Rangers
Major: Ossir, Wyngaal, Dirael, Gilraen
Minor: Vinrael, Ylthin, Talanar, Anwen
* Wizards
Major: Havez (possible ban or limit to lv 5), Nur, Nathir, Jhora, Narxes, Faiz
Minor: Razzak, Galib
* Runemages
Major: Ingvar, Karli, Erling, Inga
Minor: Svea, Brand, Ebba, Helmar
* Demon Lords
Major: Deleb, Grawl, Grok
Minor: Nebiros, Marbas, Jezebeth, Alastor, Nymus
* Necromancers
Major: Kaspar (possible ban or limit to lv 5), Vladimir, Naadir, Zoltan
Minor: Lucretia, Raven, Orson, Deirdre
* Warlocks
Major: Lethos, Sinitar, Yrwanna, Eruina, Vayshan
Minor: Kythra, Yrbeth, Sorgal
* Barbarians
Major: Haggash, Kragh, Telsek, Urghat, Garuna
Minor: Gorshak, Kilghan, Shah`Kuruhat
What you can easily notice is: except Demon Lords, at least 50% of each faction's hero porfolio are majors who can start a 2-3 week map without huge penalty. Therefore, if you want to randomize your starting hero, you have less than 25% chance to get two minor heroes and request a restart. The reality is, you often pick your favorite hero to start with--and there are at least a couple of them in each faction you can choose from, allowing enough variation and fun.
For MV2.31, the starting hero and second/third heroes are as important as many other random factors (e.g., starting artifact, refugee, 2nd and 3rd town factions, etc.). I'd recommend starting with the major heroes that I listed earlier--starting with minor heroes of each faction could be quite a challenge when fighting the Hill Fort guards.
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darkprince
Adventuring Hero
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posted January 15, 2013 06:15 PM |
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Battle Report #1: Darkprince's Nathir vs. Realyashiro's Deleb
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D1: Gather as much information as possible. The relics in the middle, not shown in the pics, are Cloak of Death's Shadow (with Shield of Crystal Ice on Nathir's side) and Sandro's Cloak (Deleb's side). Magic Guild Level 1 built.
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End of D2.
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D3: Hit the Hill Fort guards.
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D4: Snapshots of two leading heroes and what's going on in the middle.
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D5: When Nathir was wondering why Deleb hadn't hit the main garrison from the other side, simultaneous turn finished. Dirael saw Deleb at 3:00--too bad, could get hit by Deleb on the next day. At the same time, Nathir hit the player-controlled main garrison head-on.
As expected, Deleb drove Dirael off. It was obvious that Deleb had sacrificed the War Machine skill tree for Last Stand.
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D6 and D7.
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W2: First clash between Nathir and Deleb. Deleb with Last Stand is indeed very tough!
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15A swift-aura Nymus fended Faiz away from 9:00. Deleb should have owned 3 towns by now.
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W2D3: Got Armageddon at home. Deleb was coming back.
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Nathir and Dirael retreated from the middle.
Let's see what the nearest Artifact Merchant carries.
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Crazy swift-mind Sinitar wielding Meteor Shower. What a surprise!
Faiz did not even get a chance to run...
At this point, both Nathir's economy and front line collapsed. Although the all-powerful Nathir had Mentoring, Armageddon, Logistics, and Defense (no Evasion), nothing could have saved him at the strategy level.
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No pics were saved from the final clash between Nathir and Deleb at the end of W2. But it was all too predictable. Nathir never got a chance to obliterate Deleb's troop with one good Armageddon shot and those Magnetic Golems fell easily under the armor-breaking effect of Nathir's own firewall (a side-effect of self-healing).
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Zenithale
Promising
Famous Hero
Zen Mind
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posted January 16, 2013 05:07 PM |
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SKPRIMUS
Promising
Supreme Hero
The One and the Prime
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posted January 17, 2013 02:51 PM |
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Edited by SKPRIMUS at 14:52, 17 Jan 2013.
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Nice descriptions, thanks!
Very rare to find such good detailed descriptions of games anywhere nowadays [+ with pics!] (I suppose more common in your forums).
I presume replay of 2nd Nathir v Deleb battle wasn't interesting enough & players may not want to reveal all their strategies (like possibly griffin dives and/or arcanes to kill those saboteurs after they disabled Deleb's ballista's first attack?), although more interesting would be size & composition of armies (to compare against fireball/armageddon damage of course).
Having secondary hereos such as a swift-minded Sinitar would be special,... and an aura of swiftness Nymus with 15 attack & Sylvan army is a great first striker  {while those secondaries on your side seemed weaker}
The map is extremely interesting for me & it would have been good to know the existence of better balanced 2-3wk maps years ago... any more?
[big difference in balance to original Mystic Vale for sure]
I used to think that it wasn't right to artificially boost heroes/gold/resources at the beginning of maps with free stuff etc.
But now I really think more balanced short 2-3wk maps which allow multiple important heroes, multiple fights, & multiple routes
would make Heroes MP more interesting from the very beginning.
I can't help but notice that Deleb in those pics look a bit different to my game...
[And I thought Zenithale had uninstalled H5 long ago...]
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Hope defeats despair - "a blatant clue"
too many idiots in VW
"to lose is to win, and he who wins shall lose"
bashing orcus 
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Elvin
Admirable
Omnipresent Hero
Endless Revival
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posted January 17, 2013 03:24 PM |
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A great initiative I really wish more maps like this had been present back when I played, I am sure that this one would have been a hit. Fast paced games were my favourites, such as rat race, let's fight and heritage of Deleb  And it is clear that the map has been edited with great care and a good grasp of balance. Also glad to see some diversity in the first encounter
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H5 is still alive and kicking, join us in the Duel Map discord server!
Map also hosted on Moddb
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Zenithale
Promising
Famous Hero
Zen Mind
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posted January 17, 2013 04:59 PM |
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(
Quote:
[And I thought Zenithale had uninstalled H5 long ago...]
Eh, really? H5 is installed on my new computer, and even if I don't play often anymore, I watch Replays from time to time.
)
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TWITCH|YouTube | NewArenas2023 MOD
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darkprince
Adventuring Hero
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posted January 18, 2013 09:39 AM |
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@Zenithale
I did not save the replays because I thought there was enough information in the pics for you to imagine the battle. If you are interested in a particular battle, I can certainly describe it in more details.
@SKPRIMUS
Battle reports are indeed rare these days and they are usually treasured in the forums I frequent. Most players don't bother to document their battles nor take the time to elaborate them with texts/pics. That's why I thought a series of historical battle reports would be of interest to you guys (possibly any Heroes fans) and worth while posting.
The 2nd Nathir vs Deleb battle wasn't interesting because Nathir had already lost at the strategic level. Deleb had two lv 15 lieutenants (Nymus and Sinitar) who can beat Nathir's lv 6-7 mentored disciples easily. It was 3 towns vs. 1 town. Nathir had no chance but to take out Deleb with one fatal blow. Trying to hit Deleb with surprise, Nathir did not reveal Armageddon during the battle. However, Deleb fought the last battle very carefully, as if Nathir got Armageddon at hand (which Nathir did). Griffins or not, 69 goblin saboteurs (+3 hp) just were not enough to take casualty and disable Deleb's ballista for more than one round.
Most players around me don't mind sharing their strategies because it helps the H5 community to grow--who wants to slaughter newbies all the time? Cultivating competitive players goes a long way. The only problem: it is too time consuming to share.
There are a couple of other balanced 2-3 week maps but none is as popular as this one. The beauty of this map is that everything is so straight forward--no script, no event, no mod--universal. As long as you have H5 3.1, you can play it free for all--you don't even need to understand English. The other maps tend to have scripts and special events that need explanation--I will try to introduce them and do some translation when I get time.
The Deleb icon in my game is borrowed from Might and Magic: Heroes Kingdoms. I thought she looks way cooler in that game, so I modified the icon file of my H5. She's the only hero to get such special treatment.
@Elvin
My plan is to expand this thread with at least a couple more battle reports. If you guys have tried it, feel free to chime in and share yours.
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