Playing on L-shaped maps.

There are, however, a couple of objections. (c)

It's no secret that the layout varies and you can't play optimally in a single attempt. "Skill in the here and now" can also be nullified due to the variance of morale and luck.

I think the skill of an online player is precisely the ability to foresee and account for everything, including the variance of morale and luck; knowing when to take a risk and when to tread carefully. That is, it's the ability to produce a result as close to optimal as possible. And don't think everyone just blindly follows the same "crypt-gnomium-conservatories-artifacts-Utopias" template and gives up if the neutrals suddenly get moral. The same Dirty, in an online game with me, takes a 114 conservatory-minimal with 7 fakes. Explain to me how I, a noob, can bring him to his knees, even if I have not just a max conservatory, but a Dragon Utopia right next to my castle!

At the same time, in Heroes, morale and luck at the right time and in the right place can decide a game.

For some reason, almost nobody takes the Leadership/Luck skills.. I don't remember a single final where these factors decided anything, though I've seen it in reports. But it seemed to me like another attempt to justify one's defeat by bad luck :) Although I recall a case with wild anti-morale on the opponent's troops, but I didn't force him to take troops from every castle in a row or push him into that grave :)

It would be one thing if it were only about morale, but even a basic mini-conservatory versus a max one often affects the result. So where's the skill here?

I already gave the example with Dirty's conservatory (taking it, by the way, is in his signature). And I'll also say this: if you're dealt something bad, and your opponent something good... go and take it from him :) That's where the skill is. If some Paladin takes 7-8 Dragon Utopias by week 3, it's unlikely that each one will give him junk, right? Although again, there will be those who like to argue that Paladin was lucky in some way. Lucky scoundrel, no matter what you say.

To summarize - no matter how much you try to neutralize external factors on templates, they haven't gone anywhere. Ordinary luck can bring a super-monster to its knees before a noob.

To summarize. If you want to play without them - you're welcome, there are fixes, TK3, campaigns, offline tournaments - who's stopping you from playing all that? And I really don't remember a noob ever bringing a super-monster to its knees.. Well, unless the latter got a lot of upgraded vampires at the start of the castle or something like that

Thanks for the archive, I'll find time to check it out.
If it gets me hooked - I'll play through it; if it seems uninteresting - I'll drop it. I've been kind of lazy lately, I still can't get around to even playing offline.

P.S. I'm not strong in chess, I only know what some pieces look like and how they move