Vector1 (Mages, Ogre) lost to twaryna (Mages, Raziel), Shield build, huge without Metro, 2-3-7
He wanted a mirror match, and he got it, although his opponent suggested not doing it :). At the start, Raziel was his main hero, while Vector had Nur and Ogre. On day 4, he also recruited Deleb and made her his second hero. By day 7, he had a level 10 fire mage, and everything was going smoothly. He explored, took over some mines, acquired a couple of valuable artifacts, and took a secondary castle (League). On day 4, they met in my adjacent zone, and Ogre moved towards my castle. He was defeated, but he put up a fight and earned about 20,000 gold, which came in handy. He learned the Portal spell (he was already level 20) and went looking for the Treasure. In the end, instead of finding the Treasure, he found his opponent's starting zone, teleported to the city, and ran again. He emerged from the portal on 2-3-2 (it wasn't defended), killed a Roach (-30 Archmages and 8 Rakshasa), and took the castle (-growth). And then he waited. On day 7, he easily won in the castle. Both were level 25, Ogre had slightly better stats and good artifacts, but I also had decent items (helmet and shield from the Dwarf set, ring +10 initiative, ring +20 initiative, staff -20 initiative...).
P.S. I'm a well-known cheater and rusher, but you still need to know how to lose ;)