The 3rd stage of the annual John Van Caneghem Tournament (2007).

Good day to you. I played this map for the last 12 hours before the end of the tournament, just once, and I enjoyed it! The map is simply superb! Because I wanted to reach the artifact that grants victory, I developed until I had enough strength to defeat the 260-unit stack guarding this artifact. I would like to share a description of my last battle with the map, including where everyone went, and of course, the save file. For those who are interested in how I did it. My army consisted of 147 snipers and 17 dryads. ************************************** I chose a simple tactic for fighting the stack: Maximize snipers, moderate dryads (minimum 6), cast "Power Field," and determine the approximate amount of mana needed to cast the required number of Power Field spells, which cost 9 mana each. I had 180 mana – I thought 20 times whether it would be enough, and I even had some left over :) Also, taking into account the terrain and terrain objects, I positioned the "meat" (dryads) so that the dragon would eat only one stack of dryads at a time. BATTLE. /TACTICAL PHASE/ 1. Snipers (S) on k12 2. Dryad 1 (D1) on k3 3. D2 on k4 4. D3 on k5 5. D4 on k6 6. D5 on k10 7. D6 remains on k1 /BATTLE/ 01. Stack attacks with its front paw on k8, attacking D2* - it's finished. 02. Cast: "Accuracy." S -> Stack (-10*) //(Stack is defeated) 03. D1 -> Stack (-1*), in response - D1* is finished. 04. D3 -> Stack "Roots!" 05. D4 on k11 -> Stack "Roots!" 06. D5 on k9 -> Stack "Roots!" 07. D6 on k7 -> Stack "Roots!" 08. Stack -> D4*, but the "Roots" spell works from 4 stacks of dryads, so the dragons are stuck! 09. S -> Stack (-11*) //In the future, all dryads stay in place so as not to remove the roots. 10. Stack -> D5* 11. S -> Stack (-12*) 12. Stack -> D6* 13. S -> Stack (-11*) 14. Stack -> D3* 15. Here comes the tactic - dragons-meat. Cast: "Power Field" on k2. The point is that the Power Field lasts for one full turn; if you repeat it every turn before shooting, the dragons won't reach! It surrounds the snipers either closely or with a one-cell interval. This is enough to use it as an obstacle for a two-cell dragon. S -> Stack (-12) 16. Cast on k1 S -> Stack (-11*) 17. Cast on k2 S -> Stack (-11*) 18. Cast on k1 S -> Stack (-12*) 19. Cast on k2 S -> Stack (-11*) 20. Cast on k1 S -> Stack (-12*) 21. Cast on k2 S -> Stack (-11*) 22. Cast on k1 S -> Stack (-11*) 23. Cast on k2 S -> Stack (-12*) 24. Cast on k1 S -> Stack (-11*) 25. Cast on k2 S -> Stack (-12*) Morale! S -> Stack (-11*) 26. Cast on k1 S -> Stack (-12*) Morale! S -> Stack (-11*) 27. Cast on k2 S -> Stack (-10*) 28. Cast on k1 S -> Stack (-10*) 29. Cast on k2 S -> Stack (-11*) 30. Cast on k1 S -> Stack (-10*) 31. Cast on k2 S -> Stack (-10*) 32. S -> Stack (-6*) - this was the last shot... The battle is over. The losses are commensurate. 260 Stack against 17 dryads :). In the end, I even had 21 mana points left. After the battle, the hero's stats became 20 20 16 18. And the walkthrough took more than 50 days! :smile49: (from the end) :D :D :D **Map 79 Kb** **Save file 104 Kb - if there are problems opening it, rename the extension to *.rar**