[Tournaments-SoD+FreshMod] Favorites, to battle! - 12 - The Battle of Favorites! - 12

Again, a good, rich start: I clear the external dwelling of phoenixes on day 115, burn the ogres for +2 speed, AI... I do something stupid on nerves (God knows why), losing a couple turns of tempo. I place a wall wrong in the maze, I don't leave the cloak and the chest for the moon for the Griffin Conservatory on days 3-4 with Town Portal (+2 speed gives the 'elementals' priority). Then a split with 18 Storms dies on a miner with a cloak because of blocks, the computer drives off Adrian on a bird with 5 cats on day 121 who hadn't reached the castle yet. Reluctantly, I buy back all the negligent ones with artifacts and take a max Griffin Conservatory on 5 birds, and slowly try to make up for lost ground. In terms of expansion, I was solidly behind until about day 125, when I took 3 castles at once, and the next turn I capture 2 more villages, life improves. I get Town Portal from the last one on day 127 (a berserker from the 3rd rebuild bugged out and stayed in the Fortress), but overall, it wasn't critical: because of the burnt expansion, and due to the lack of other heroes with earth magic except for the moon, I could only use it from day 126. The only annoying thing is that I didn't get any resources during all this time; the bug with the stuck berserker might have somehow affected it. On the other hand, Dimension Door was given immediately this time, i.e., from the first rebuild. I was also lucky that without the University, the heroes leveled up decently, and the moon caught air magic itself. In HotA, you can build something in parallel while rebuilding control, but here the rebuild takes a turn of construction, so as much as I wanted to pop a University or Market – I couldn't.

As a result, Gunnar jumps/flies in on day 133, with a Chaos Hydra in full battle readiness. I lose Conflux and the Monere with Armorer and Wisdom, who was left there just for the University the next turn.

This was very unpleasant and unexpected. In the only Dragon Utopia that I had taken by that point, there was Crystal Ore. Clearly not great against a Chaos Hydra. Plus, now I can't leave Sappers on a bird everywhere. Well, this is often the strength of logisticians. Without Conflux, I'm helpless: I can't buy the elemental I wanted, the upgrade for Psychics and Birds is cancelled. I have to take a 2-minute AFK break to think about how to proceed: finalizing is clearly not in my interest, and I still have to try to reach Conflux (2 full turns with 2 Dimension Doors). I make a decision to urgently scout something, and, by the grace of Baratorch: near the villages there are 2 Dragon Utopias with hefty stats, which gives my thin army hope. I set up for an attack. The next turn, Gunnar stays in a dungeon, Adrian checks him for a Recanter's Cloak and Orb of the Firmament: all empty. It turned out the opponent was very unlucky with earth magic; this probably caused such a fast rush on Conflux.

Thanks for the games!

2-1.