I haven't noticed the video playlist before, that's really a good idea. This allows for much easyer consult when trying to use the same tricks somewhere else. Thanks.
Good news!
I've recorded up until 245.
I've roughly tested until week 9~10 so I have a rough understanding of when certain events will occur
Bad news!
I didn't do deep-testing until after I had recorded to 245... I revised one small but significant event to be done during 243 instead of 244. There will thus be some syncing problems with 1 event because I don't want to record 244 again - replaying the whole turn is already plenty of extra playing time without making videos on top of that.
243
First thing first, Friend completes the signpost "maze" and lands next to Brewster with still quite a bit of movement points left.
I exchange armies a bit, Brewster having been left with most of the army on the preceding turn. To break through the nearby Gold Dragons, only bring along Archdevils.
Go in a corner so that only 2 stacks can target you and cast 'Shield' to resist more damage.
To hasten the battle a bit, you can use 'Counterstrike' to kill the Goldies faster. Afterwards, cast 'Resurrection' every turn to keep losses down.
Finally when only 1 enemy stack is alive and slightly weakened, summon some Water Elementals to tank the damage. Gold Dragons are now afraid of Archdevils retaliation and judge they will do more damage by attacking the summons... take this opportunity to resurrect all devils.
This fight could have been done with Friend but the experience is not so great. Furthermore, the terrain here is "Snow" so I would waste movement.
Because I had planned on coming here before (obviously), Friend has already visited the Swan Pond on 241 which allows him to go through without wasting his remaining movement.
At the end of the signpost maze there is a Sea Bottle that warns you about traps. Traps in this map means -999 spell points. Checking with map editor will show you their location.
The author was kind enough to give a warning as well as show their location in-game. Every 'hole' is placed where these traps are. The 2 westernmost are more difficult to spot but if you look carefully, they are clearly present.
Knowing this, we can tell that the base movement suggested by the game is not very wise.
However, you can easily go around at the expense of some 59 movement points.
Finally, we set up to fight Mr. Canoli. For this fight, I again use max-speed setup. Also, don't bring all Archdevils, just 1 is enough. They are not the key unit this time around.
First, manipulate the Archangels into a favourable location. This is why I don't need more than 1 - it's their only purpose
Now the Ghost Dragons can move to the location next to Cyclops. Enemy move order is shown... because only 1-hex tiles are left open by the Archangels, the Death Knights can't break the pin on the Cyclops. This enemy knows 'Teleport' so make certain that the Ghost Dragons are the juiciest target. He would, for example, teleport outside to attack your Titans if they weren't blocked behind Magic Elementals.
Round 2, enemy inevitably casts 'Slow'.
This is where the Magic Elementals come in. Because they are immune to all spells, they will maintain their speed + artifacts.
I am guaranteed to act before Cyclops from now on which allows me to raise the Ghost Dragons.
The reason for Ghost Dragons is that 'Animate Dead' costs 10 SP while 'Resurrection' costs 14 SP - with Archmage. Spell expenses to block the Cyclops is therefore reduced by almost 30%, which is significant because this is a long battle.
From now on, Titans will force enemy to exhaust by attacking Pit Lords and Cyclops. We spend 10 SP for the enemy's 18 SP.
The moment Canoli's SP fall below 18, it's time to kill the Archangels. This is fairly difficult because enemy has 'Elixir of Life' so the process takes a long time. Enemy will typically waste his remaining spell points with 'Dispel' and 'Slow' again.
When Archangels are almost dead and Cyclops very low in numbers, you could kill off the Archangels first to avoid any further issues. Cyclops will get a few free shots however and you'll lose out on some easy experience.
I attack Cyclops and enemy finally thinks I have the stronger shooters, sends his Archangels out.
Kill the Archangels (Titans will take a rock to the face) and step on their corpse. If you don't, 4000 Demons will appear and wreck your fight.
Next round kill the Cyclops while Pit Lords make 4000 fresh Demons. Ahhh, fresh meat!
The rest is recovery and cleanup...
I lost only the Magic Elementals, but I hardly have any use for them anyway.
A new level for Friend!
After the battle, Brewster can collect some artifacts while paying attention to traps. There are some Dendroids in the way (trivial) and a quest guard that (by mistake in English v19.3) does not have any objective. As I mentioned in post #1, I corrected this by requesting the death of Mr. Canoli.
These 4 artifacts are used to access the seer huts behind Rust Dragons. You absolutely need to take the south path because there are 3 quest guards asking for 'Bird of Perception' on the northern path.
There are 4000 Rust Dragons here but this fight is pretty trivial because they are not immune to any spells.
Cast 'Blind' on two stacks such that you create a safe haven.
The others can't reach you so wait+attack and 'Teleport' strategies.
A sweet 3M experience for LLLB. We're now getting several high levels heroes, every level helps each of them tremendously. Each of them becomes specialized in certain types of fights... for now each level makes LLLB a lot stronger than Friend or Sepello because there is no easy access to 'Magic Spring' to double spell points.
Visit the two bottom Seers, the one on top can only be visited by 'A Friend'. Our army suddenly got immensely stronger although a lot of work was needed in getting to this stage!
With some careful planning, LLLB has enough movement to leave this area via Town Portal.
We now shift region completely. To the underground with Vertigo. Open the Red border guard and steal this free town called 'El Dorado'.
This allows Sepello to come by after obtaining artifacts from LLLB (via Brewster).
The terrain underneath is a mix of 'Snow' and 'Desert' which explains Tower+Neutral+Nomad creatures choice.
Two mini-fights for Sepello. First, this garrison with 1500 Azure Dragons.
The terrain is interesting, a small obstacle allows good protection of shooters and Ammo Cart. The Pegasi are negligible and will suicide.
For this fight, I will have 6 chances creatures so that I can cast 'Resurrection' on the 7 MGenies stack so it is very safe. If you bring a stack that is too large, the Azures will probably ignore it towards the end and use firebreath which guarantees at least 1 loss.
This is otherwise a free 1.5M experience.
Before the next fight, I remove all unnecessary troops. Keep Titans, 2-1-1 MGenies and 1 Nomad.
As I said previously, terrain here features quite some desert... make your way down the narrow corridor to 'Gene Dobbs'.
Second mini-fight might look like much at first glance. Enemy troops are massive and I barely have anything! The terrain is disguised Magic Clouds so we get expert Air Magic spells, notably Haste.
As we are now faster than enemy, I can set up some targets for the enemy. There's a small mistake in order. Titans act #2 but the result is the same. AI is greedy and goes for juiciest target first.
Titans couldn't do anything other than killing a blocker... so as round 2 starts, our Titans can easily eliminate the others. The top Scorpicores went for the juiciest target but now there is nothing left for them to reach... so they will stand in place forever. This prevents all access by the Minotaurs!
Enemy wears the Recanter's Cloak so all level 3-4-5 spells are off the table. No Resurrection for instance. There will be some losses at the end.
Because of Magic Clouds, Sepello can also cast Expert 'Disrupting Ray'. Reduced cost and increased effectiveness. 1 shot was spent on killing enemy Titans, 4 for each Minotaurs and 7 for each Scorpicores... leaves you with 1 spare even.
It's a very easy battle and another 1.7M experience for Sepello.
She gets to level 46! Damage reduction is now 49.5% from Armor secondary skill.
Before ending the turn, set up Friend in 'Acre5'. There will be a visitor during the night... Pendant of Negativity is a must but Orb of Silt is not really necessary.
frifix was released after we visited the Red Keymaster's tent (see 241 when Orange player was allowed to visit it as well).
Another battle that looks difficult but is in fact, quite easy. Some smart placement of Archdevils keeps the Azures from our important troops in the top corner.
Enemy Archdevils are greedy and go after juiciest target... in doing so they provide me with all the safety I need to win this fight...
... as enemy is susceptible to 'Blind'.
Titans kill the Liches (could handle 1500 of them in a single shot!) while the Archdevil that started in the 2nd creature slot move 1 tile forward during Wait phase.
With this placement, the Azure Dragons decline to move on Round 2, fearful of Dragonbreath and Meteor Shower... to be absolutely certain that the Azure Dragons can't do anything again, a carefully placed 'Frost Ring' takes out the Ammo Cart.
With this auto-destruction, the Azure Dragons cannot cause firebreath on Titans or the large Devils stack They will defend until they are dead.
Now that all threats are neutralized, enemy will go into exhaustion by spamming Earth Elementals. Keep their numbers down with Meteor Shower so that he keeps spamming them.
The moment he is drained of SP, kill the Azures.
Cast 'Slow' and resurrect the Enchanters, we now have absolute speed advantage and no risk of 'Fear'.
Use 'Blind' tactic to get rid of Ghost Dragons and Archdevils.
Recover and clean up...
If you survive Round 1 of this fight (risk of Fear is annoying), then it's a piece of cake.
We gain an interesting artifact and a new level.
During the night, Resus completes the exploration of his small prison and will sleep in the circled tile until I give him something to do - not quite sure what day yet. It'll be another pretty easy battle once you know how to handle him.
Finally, the previously problematic hero 'ScytheScroge' boards a boat. Sometimes movement RNG can be affected with small events... in this case I've done something (not sure really) which changed her movement compared to my previous testing. It's even more favorable now
Small but important change
After some testing, I found the best time to release Double Bert was on 243 so that I can kill him on 247.
In videos I had not even released him by 244 so he will 'appear' out of thin air at 245. I'll keep a small section showing his actual progress until sync is re-established.
Overall location of heroes
This is taken at the start of 244.
Friend finished off frifix the second, so still resting in Acre5.
Vertigo and LLLB are chilling near R'yleh... with obvious idea of boosting movement with the disguised Oasis.
Sepello used the last of remaining movement to trade with Friend after her two battles, standing by in Uruk.
Brewster has a very long trek ahead so I placed her as close to destination as possible.
Mr. Fat still keeping watch near the Tavern, but I've had him go around since Double Bert is now allowed to come ashore.
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Because I need to replay 244, don't expect next update soon even though videos are done.
Once again, very brief details about movement and logistics. Watch videos if you want more than what I will show here!
244
First thing I do is bring a slow golem to Brewster with Sepello. This is to maximize Brewster's already high movement...
...because there's a very long way to go. After landing Brewster must stand by as reinforcement will come slightly later.
After this, there's quite a bit of logistics going on, like refreshing Friend's spell points and managing creatures which are getting a bit too spread [not shown]
Skipping through all this, we find Friend, Vertigo and Sepello in Whipwhoop. Sepello was on messenger duty this day. Vertigo is on Pathfinding duty. Friend is on town capture duty.
There's an hilarious moment in video #1 where I accidentally dismiss Phoenixes instead of Thunderbird. Keep the Phoenixes!
With all non-neutral and non-Tower creatures, Vertigo starts heading towards the 3 Quest Guards.
The first asks for the death of frifix #2 - Orange hero who attacked during previous night and slain by Friend.
Second wants death of Elf near 'Sharp Corner' who was hiding behind the garrison containing 5x300 Azure Dragons - slain by Sepello.
Last one wants Speculum which is obtained by killing the Elf from above.
Because I need to save some movement on Friend in order to do all that he needs on this day, Vertigo can gain a bunch of experience he doesn't need by capturing the 'Celestial Necklace of Bliss'.
It's a very simple kiting fight and gives him 3 useless levels. (36-37-38)
If you look closely at the minimap, you may notice a thin line on the two swords. This is a line of desert terrain. Carrying a Nomad is essential for Friend if you want to accomplish everything.
Meet up with Vertigo and give Friend tower+neutral creatures as shown below. Elixir of Life can prove useful in saving some spell points.
Fight set-up. It may look like a lot of spell points will be needed but in fact, it will take about 40.
Unlike video where I simply took first try, you can reload a few times until Archangels decide to attack MGenies instead of Enchanters. Because the enemy cheats and knows what spells I have (here it's Meteor Shower that matters), the Archangels dare not put two of themselves in danger. They will wait in place because they calculate that I can do more damage to them with Meteor Shower on 2 stacks compared to the damage they can do to me: 1 Archmage.
To maintain status quo, blind the Archangel so it remains in position! Now all you have to do is slowly kill the Archangels as they stand by, afraid of Meteor Shower.
Use the Blind tactic for the last Archangels, making sure your Enchanters are faster than the AAs.
Very easy fight
One would think the contents of this Pandora could be more heavily guarded
All right! One of the most powerful spells and we just doubled our Enchanters!
We must share these good news with everyone, naturally.
As we prepare to take the nearby Rampart town, we will introduce a new tactic: hit and run. You will see quite a bit of this from now on. I give 7 AAs to Vertigo and a bunch of Dragonflies with +3 speed.
This enemy has a LOT of shooters. While he is vulnerable to mind spells (Blind, Forgetfulness), he is also very fond of the 'Cure' spell and 'Clone' spell. Given the strength of his numbers, hit and run is a very good solution to the fight.
The Armor of the Damned!
Well guess what... we took Ballistics on Vertigo. Alll the way back in the beginning of the map. It's time to pay your dues. On Magic Plains, all spells are cast at Expert level... mass haste!
7 Archangels are the minimum needed to destroy the First Aid tent...
Rust Dragons and Dragonflies are at a speed tie. But because Azure Dragons acted after AAs, my 1st stack acts first. It's fairly easy to predict where the AI will move when you count the shortest path and consider attack direction preference.
Now that Rust Dragons have taken the bait, my four remaining Dragonfly stacks get to move. 2 of these will trigger dragonbreath to annihilate the Sharpshooters and Enchanters.
Next round, use the Catapult's turn to cast 'Resurrection' on AAs
Because I've taken some +Power artifacts, I can resurrect exactly 7! Now that the enemy has been 'hit', it's time to take your winnings and run.
I call this a solid win. Without a doubt.
This opens the door for Friend to destroy 'Bunzenburn'. Use +4 speed and attack him.
Same as with Vertigo, the enemy still has Armor of the Damned... reply with 'Haste'.
After Azures wait, we can force the Rust Dragons to move to a suitable location
Ouch... nasty reply.
Thankfully, Ballista likes to kill clones.
Round 2, summon some Earth Elementals for survivability.
Efreets move before Rust Dragons [13+4+5], more firebreath.
Titans will finish off our creatures, leaving only Elementals alive. Every turn during Catapult's action, Resurrect Archangels. Titan will methodically attack them every round...
...until they can't anymore.
The reason for drawing firebreath on Titans is to speed up enemy exhaustion. There is no way I can have creatures survive from this many Titans.
When Titans are almost all alive, enemy will stop casting 'Resurrection'. Instead, he will attempt to counter the damage being done by the Ballista
7 SP every turn while we spend 0.
After a while, he will cast his last spell.
That's your cue to resurrect your Devils and use 'Frenzy'. The enemy is so strong that he will not even exit his garrison despite the gate not being blocked!
Unlike the previous fight using this tactic, this time I brought along a creature that is immune to fear and which is also faster than Azure Dragons. Teleport the Archdevils out to avoid nasty surprises.
Repeat as necessary, leaving only Titans alive. Because they will have 7 speed after being slowed, I can't do traditional kiting without losing something. Friend's spell points are not as high as LLLB's so it's a bit tight - cast only a few Quicksands until you can manage to stump the Titans.
Recover everything and finish off the enemy.
In video's attempt, rng was a bit inconvenient I and finished with only 32 spell points!
No losses besides war machines - which can always be bought again.
We capture some very good artifacts!
And a level for Friend.
Once the fight is done - unlike video - Friend should step on the nearby Swan Pond.
Sepello continues messenger duty, taking artifacts and army from Friend and also collecting 1 Wraith.
These are brought to LLLB who will bring reinforcements to the still standing-by Brewster.
One more slow golem, Titans, Archdevils, Wraith, Pegasi and 6 dragonflies and we're set.
LLLB follows in Brewster's wake.
Because LLLB doesn't have Expert Navigation or Logistics specialty, Brewster has quite a bit more movement available at this point. Help out LLLB by taking the slow creatures before landing on the shore - thus reducing lost movement on LLLB.
I had to look at this area carefully to decide where I wanted to set up for the next fight. It turns out this spot was great and in range of LLLB's movement.
Here it is in terrain viewer. Note the very handy obstacle.
(71,112,0) is right where Bellpell starts. There is no indication of where to fight him but after looking a bit around, this proved to be one of the best spots.
Another trade between Brewster and LLLB. It might depend on where Bellpell is standing but in my case having the war machines and 4 Dragonflies let me carry my plan.
Speaking of which, Brewster executes 'hit and run' tactic on Bellpell.
With +3 speed, Dragonflies [13+3] are tied with Black Dragons [15+1] which lets me move first, but also third and fourth. Same as with Vertigo, we force the enemy's movement by abusing its greed and knowing movement rules.
This creates perfect opportunity for firebreath!
This hero wears 'Recanter's Cloak' so we can't cast Resurrection. Run while you can!
Another decisive win.
As the turn ends, some heroes moved a bit around. Vertigo went to Kalryhwater with some Archangels and Dragonflies. The others are either already covered or visiting stat boosters.
Hit end turn. Double Bert real position, as he landed on 243 he now moves ahead towards my undefended towns.
The "problematic" hero ScytheScroge decided to be convenient and landed right next to Vertigo. Previously he went everywhere but here - really happy with this outcome.
There's another Orange hero on the move, it's Bellpell! He's angry about his lost Grand Elves. Too bad for him - I've been expecting him. Blind his shooter.
With [+4] speed, all dragonflies get to move before his +1 Black Dragons. Set up in the corner with previously shown obstacle.
Dragons are greedy and kill 4 Dragonflies. Predictably, Silver Pegasi attack my Pegasus as it's the juiciest target for them. Unicorns will move next and kill the bottom Dragonfly.
Round 2, Unicorns are right where I want them, so cast Blind. In order to prevent 1-hex creatures from entering my fortress, I need to force the Pegasi 1 tile further... so send the remaining Dragonfly above the First Aid Tent.
After the fly moves, Dragons act but cannot reach any of my creatures - so they move next to Cyclopes. Next enemy that moves is Pegasi! Sealing off my area.
Round 3, Blind the Pegasi and close all 2-hex spaces with your creatures before the enemy Dragons get to act.
The enemy will alternate spell casting between 'Blind' and 'Curse'.
Answer 'Curse' with 'Bless' to slowly whittle away at the Black Dragons. If you attack ANYTHING else, enemy will reply with 'Cure' to heal the wounded unit. Otherwise, the blinded units are simply invisible to the enemy and he will not try to Cure their status.
If both 'Blind' and 'Curse' are active on your units, cast 'Cure' so that he has to start over. I could technically wear Badge of Courage to block Blind but it would only make the exhaustion of the enemy's SP longer.
Archdevils can use wait tactic to strike at Dragons...
The enemy is 1 Blind away from being spent. Our Pegasus and Wraith greatly sped up the process.
Finish off the Dragons and then use Blind tactic to take out the enemy. After using 'Slow' wraith will always act immediately after Titans so there is no danger.
For the Battle Dwarves - who have Magic Resistance - simply kite. At this stage you can sacrifice the wraith as Blind tactic is over. Plus, we'll have more movement next turn.
Thanks to Brewster, this turned out in a pretty simple fight. Long, but simple.
Collect Recanter's Cloak, it will help a lot with a not-so-distant enemy.
As I've previously mentioned, these videos are not 100% representative of actual progress. Most notable change was earlier release of Double Bert. Syncing issues will be resolved next turn as I record new videos with the up-to-date saves.
I've been noticing you seam to like a combo of Earth/Water/Archery plus Intelligence, leaving Air out. On the other hand Maretti, an amazing player on the Multiplayer spectrum of the game, once told he would prefer to get Scouting then Water on main (in SoD, not HotA).
I tend to look for Air/Earth combo and to start with Offense, Logistics or Armorer specialists, pick Water if offered and even try to get it for Barbarians if I'm using one but I never pick Intelligence (unless is a magic hero and my calculations point to the need to get a new skill before the magic school exceptions have to offer me a new magic school).
Also, in the map I'm making I use Gundula for the biggest fights but my build is Offense+Fire (custom starting skills - spell Frenzy)/Earth/Air/Water/Wisdom/Logistics and Pathfinding, again no Intelligence. He will have to fight custom pandora boxes and other traps with legions of high level creatures. Should I go for something else?
Are there any other toughts you want add about this?
There are maps and maps. Such maps as Metataxer (and one I play right now, Ice Arrow) where AI forces are dozens of times bigger, require an exhaustion strategy, which means waiting AI to deplete his mana. But for this you must be able to counter his spells so he has to recasts them, therefore you need an enormous mana pool, given by intelligence skill.
Or then give to AI heroes 300-500 max mana then intelligence is not absolutely required.
____________ Era II mods and utilities
Salamandre said:Or then give to AI heroes 300-500 max mana then intelligence is not absolutely required.
Mmmh, they aren't stand still or set to patrol so they tend not to have their pool fill. Their numbers are still a problem, I'm not finding enouch people that want to test it and while I am (knowing every trick of the map) able to fight all my battles against AI players with plently of army advantage, the same didn't happened to the two volunteers I found till now.
The fact that I'm giving AI progressive bonus to resources and growth also plays a role here, the more you get dellayed the stronger your enemies become.
This was the initial objective of the map, invert Impossible difficulty setting in a way that it's easier in the beginning but you pay a price for not behaving as a skilled player, each week that passes your enemies recieve better bonus to a point where one single city in AI's hands will produce more units then the rest of the map in yours. Personally I never took 5 months to reduce AI to a sitting duck so I hardly can testify about the latter but none the less I get to fight harder battles then if just playing a simple HotA random map.
I guess the problem of knowing what player and AI have at a given moment in time is preciselly what makes so many mapmakers opt for stand still AI heroes and predefined paths but I hate that kind of maps, I fill like I have Big-brother's Eye watching me all the time, so I don't want my to go that way. Plus I have plenty of map advantages for AI too, advantages that will tend to accumulate penalizing slower players.
Do you have any sugestion?
bloodsucker said:I've been noticing you seam to like a combo of Earth/Water/Archery plus Intelligence, leaving Air out. On the other hand Maretti, an amazing player on the Multiplayer spectrum of the game, once told he would prefer to get Scouting then Water on main (in SoD, not HotA).
MP and SP are two very different beasts. In SP, you have the mapeditor available to you and for some maps, you are almost forced to study it in mapeditor for some sections when there are too many directions to take and some deadlines. Moreover, the Skyship means Scouting is even further useless here.
Water Magic provides Prayer which gives +4 speed (vs 5 for Haste) but +A+D as well. What's not to like? Factor in Bless, Dispel, Cure, Clone, Teleport, then it's not even a contest regarding which is better for SP. In MP, there is no time to develop Water Magic quickly enough for it to be better.
All this being said, the only secondary skill choice decision on this map is between Artillery and Ballistics for Vertigo. All other permanent heroes automatically get all secondary skills.
bloodsucker said:I tend to look for Air/Earth combo and to start with Offense, Logistics or Armorer specialists, pick Water if offered and even try to get it for Barbarians if I'm using one but I never pick Intelligence (unless is a magic hero and my calculations point to the need to get a new skill before the magic school exceptions have to offer me a new magic school).
Also, in the map I'm making I use Gundula for the biggest fights but my build is Offense+Fire (custom starting skills - spell Frenzy)/Earth/Air/Water/Wisdom/Logistics and Pathfinding, again no Intelligence. He will have to fight custom pandora boxes and other traps with legions of high level creatures. Should I go for something else?
Are there any other toughts you want add about this?
Offense is situational, it really depends what composition forms your army. In this map, I just only acquired decent stacks of melee creatures (Archdevils, Archangels, Behemoths) and I've been fighting for nearly 2 months... more than halfway if I can tackle red heroes fast. Even in 'Unleashing the Bloodthirsty', Offense is a useless skill. By the time you finally get melee creatures, the map is over because they're behemoths. Basically, offense is good when you're comparing similar armies - same for armor.
Pathfinding is a very good skill and it is a must for heroes. But not providing Pathfinding is also a way to make the player work his head some more. I used to dislike that Friend did not have it but now I don't mind. Logistics OTOH is just a must unless you design your map accordingly.
I really like Fire Magic as well. Expert 'Frenzy' is ridiculously overpowered, it adds 200% of your defense to attack rating. Also expert 'Blind' removing the retaliation is very handy even though blind is not a prominent tactic in this map.
Air Magic is very situational. 'Haste' is really not that fantastic as I've already said. Expert 'Disrupting Ray' is very handy and I use it freely with LLLB. Precision adds +3 attack rating or +6 at expert... 'Air Shield' is rarely useful because the enemies' armies are usually so large that reducing their damage by 50% isn't enough - we'll see one use for it soon. 'Hypnotize' proved useful here but it's definitely not worth a Air Magic skill when you can just reduce the enemy creatures a bit more. Counterstrike is only useful vs. wandering creatures. You're dead if you plan on using it vs AI. The real power of this school of magic is 'Fly' and 'Dimension Door'. Problem is, they are either not available or given at the last 3% of the map. All in all, Air Magic is good for 'Disrupting Ray' and in some situations where some other spells are suited.
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All this being said, the hero who can tackle the most enemies out of my main ones right now is LLLB - Intelligence hero. He has a regular spell pool of over 3000 while my second best maxes at 1300. You can do attrition wars with this and never fear to lose. Magic really tips the scale in favour of humans, so the more you have the easier it is to bring down large forces. If I had a close-by Magic Spring to double spell points, Sepello, Friend and Brewster would be able to take a lot more fights which I postpone because LLLB is busy elsewhere. For example, I could kill Resus for a few days now but I need ~2000 spell points to do it because he has millions of hit points [2000 Golds, 2000 Blacks, 1000 Azures, 1000 Rusts, 1000 Faeries] and shackles. As it is, it takes Brewster 1 day to reach it and every other hero 2 days - not time I can afford.
When I get Clone (soon) and a decent number of Archangels (very soon), then LLLB's spell points pool won't be quite as significant because I can resurrect everything at a fraction of the cost.
RoseKavalier said:Water Magic provides Prayer which gives +4 speed (vs 5 for Haste) but +A+D as well.
So you think Prayer is a better choice then Haste. I was used to think that before I joinned the community then I was almost brainwached to think the opposite by people that mostly play MP. I have been learning with you that my initial choices (Wisdom+Air+Earth+Water+Intelligence+Logistics) are closer to my needs as a single player then the MP Combo (Wisdom+Air+Earth+Tactics+Armorer+Offense+Logistics) I've been looking for lately.
Offense and Gundula have a special meaning, she is Heracles and has to fullfill the 12 labors. While for many battles other specialties would be clearly better and Offense a wasted skill in terms of RPG it makes enouch sense that Heracles is Offense and not Intelligence specialist to sacrifize some playability, don't you think?
RoseKavalier said:Water Magic provides Prayer which gives +4 speed (vs 5 for Haste) but +A+D as well.
So you think Prayer is a better choice then Haste. I was used to think that before I joinned the community then I was almost brainwached to think the opposite by people that mostly play MP. I have been learning with you that my initial choices (Wisdom+Air+Earth+Water+Intelligence+Logistics) are closer to my needs as a single player then the MP Combo (Wisdom+Air+Earth+Tactics+Armorer+Offense+Logistics) I've been looking for lately.
Offense and Gundula have a special meaning, she is Heracles and has to fullfill the 12 labors. While for many battles other specialties would be clearly better and Offense a wasted skill in terms of RPG it makes enouch sense that Heracles is Offense and not Intelligence specialist to sacrifize some playability, don't you think?
MP and SP are really different beasts. The extra 1 speed is usually not important in SP but in MP it's the difference between win/loss a final battle if you play your cards right. In SP the extra A/D lets you deal a lot more damage when attacking a much stronger opponent. It's really a matter of the situation you face.
There are some very good maps where Intelligence is not available to all heroes. The Lone Knight and Xiedu for example - only a few heroes can get it. You will need more testing of battles if you don't include Intelligence because it means there is less room for player errors. Battles will appear less 'epic' in terms of size and are over more quickly but difficulty is ramped up imo.
Skill specialties are an exception of course. Offense specialty can be quite viable but it's often weaker than Armor/Archery/Intelligence/... specialty unless you tailor your map accordingly.
But if you make really big battles (thousands of enemies), then offense specialty loses a lot of potential. Each 20 levels grants an extra 30% damage so that at level 60 you're doing 190% damage or 46% more than a regular hero with Offense. Having Intelligence which grants 200% spell points is probably still better. Archery specialty scales up a lot more, at level 60 you deal 300% of damage or twice as much as a regular hero with Archery.
Offense specialty shines more in smaller battles while regular Intelligence is better in big ones. Instead of forcing Intelligence on hero you can always give some Magic Springs for big battles. Just my $0.02.
I already noticed there is no point in using an Offense specialist cause the only battles I'm able to do with minimal army are the ones I can use Archdevils, shooters and Forcefield or Archangels and Clone, so I'm sure Intelligence would serve me better.
But if you have an hero called Heracles, Offense specialist looks much better then anything else don't you think?
That's why I asked if you fell it's ok to sacrifize playability for plot convinience in a map that doesn't have much of a storyline.
I can also find an excuse to put an hero with specialty in Intelligence somewhere in a prison and if a player felt that was what he wanted he could develop this hero also. With altar of sacrifize in starting town and all possible powerups exausted the map allows to build pretty much as many heroes as one can possibly want.
P.S. Sorry if I'm flying away from the thread objectives but your opinion is important to me.
I think the intelligence trick makes battles less interesting, as AI will fall too fast and is too predictable. After watching Metataxer's amazing rush, I applied its tricks to a battle I usually fear, Ice Arrow/Dark lord. And what used to be almost impossible battle, tricky to drive, is now a cake, so I am sure I won't use them again. But also in wog creatures have way more immunities so I prefer wog when comes to pumping more diverse battle situations.
As for Heracles, you can call you hero Einstein too, then intelligence specialist
Salamandre said:As for Heracles, you can call you hero Einstein too, then intelligence specialist
Or Odysseus, Athena, etc... there enouch characters in greek mythology that are famous for their intelligence but why should they fullfill the 12 works of Heracles? And those are the path to get a ton of Azure Dragons, probably necessary for the last fights.
I agree Era is a much better development platform then HotA but I wouldn't try to make an Accumulate Creatures abusing Diplomacy map for WoG.
Are you sure you need to cast Earth Elementals? I think if you keep ressurecting the Titans you can save spellpoints with the same result.
Two reasons to that: 1st I am lazy, as resurrect needs two moves from my side, find titans corpses, then 2dn my titans have full 1-5 spells immunity so I prefer elementals so he can cast some spells when his shooters miss from fear.
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Ah, ok. I was precisely thinking why skilled scripters would use those two in their maps without any modifications, when both have some serious flaws.
I've been thinking of remaking the Palace with pages for clones and summonings for long but it's still a bit above my skill. For the Emerald Tower I already made what I fell like a pretty cool alternative and another one that is completly OP and I am a total noob.
RoseKavalier, I updated Advanced Battle Hints. Now you bring that box with Ctrl + right click (was left click and could mislead to attacking the creature instead.
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Salamandre said:RoseKavalier, I updated Advanced Battle Hints. Now you bring that box with Ctrl + right click (was left click and could mislead to attacking the creature instead.
Fantastic. Can't tell you how this helps ... I was taking so much precaution to avoid misclicking
I've just seen your post on maps4heroes regarding army storage as variables rather than in army slots. That would be ... incredible. Solving such an old bug with which I could go haywire in one of my maps (really needs more smilies around here)
Salamandre In maps4heros you said: Si tu laisse un hero avec plus de 2000 creatures se promener sur la carte, il y a des chances que le jeu se glace.
This is any 2000 creatures? It's equal to have 2000 pikes or 2000 AAs? Does this happens also when all AI is allied or only when they can get involved in AI hero X hero fights?
I was aware this happened but by too big armies I was thinking more like 32000 in one stack.
A small sugestion, would it be possible to make it display like Dracoliches legion in all slots or something, so one can guess is a treatning army? I remember to play an Heroes IV map that had a battle like that and its a pain if you misread it and attack with a lesser hero...
@Rosekavalier, I already stored BIG armies in variables only, then put armies on hero when attack him. I use that for Tew3 because of freeze problem. But for that to work your map need to be Era and use erm, I don't know a way to do that in SoD.
I see this as optimal way to control AI growth, instead of giving him town events which are set in stone. So you use a var then multiply its growth with the month of the game.
Let's say you want hero x to have black dragons in slot 1 but if you put too many, player which goes very fast will find battle too hard, player which fights there month 18 will find it too easy. So you set dragons to 500 (or whatever) for a start then up to month 3 multiply by month * 2, between month 3 and 6 multiply with 4 and so on, to follow player expansion. And this is kept in vars, so on map the guy will have nothing in army slots and no dnager to freeze even if months gives him 1 million dragons. ofc for that he must be set to stand up, if you let him roam he will die.
@Bloodsucker, I have no idea how many creatures freeze, actually there are very little infos about that bug. But one thing is sure, heavy armies make it.
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This thread is pages long: 
posted April 22, 2016 01:04 PM
They will defend until they are dead.
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(really needs more smilies around here)
