“Newcomer – 2016. Summer”

I'll start by saying that this was the most intense match in my short gaming career (2-2-6!).

The sweating began with restarts. My opponent rejected the very first deal almost automatically (I had Gunnar and Vistan with 2 stacks in the tavern), and persistently tried to re-roll the rest. After the first deal, I started getting some awful stuff - blocks at the castle exit, lack of gold, and basically nothing to hold onto.

So one restart remains, and the deal doesn't look as bad as the previous ones. I run through the roads, check the "Griffin Conservatory-one". It would be a sin to test fate and waste the last restart.

There's plenty of wood lying around - on the first week, cows and ducks come up. I didn't place the cows for nothing - I revealed an external dwelling, but along with it was a Griffin Conservatory and boots for 50-99 greased orcs. I decided not to break it on the first week. On the second week, I went in with lizards under Vistan (he, by the way, leveled up nicely - got Air, Offense, and later Tactics). There turned out to be 99 orcs, so in total 1 duck, lizards, and a few cows barely survived on the last HP, bleeding out.

Not far away there was a secondary Dungeon, where I immediately built a portal, which, together with the external dwelling and the Castle, provided 13 cows per week. In the middle of the second week, the cows were upgraded, the Griffin Conservatory-two fell, and it was decided to break into one of the nearby treasure zones.

One of them turned out to be literally empty. The remaining treasure zones were in the swamp (now try to run with an angel through the swamp) and, naturally, in the snow. The swamp treasure zone was chosen, and the entrance to the snow treasure zone was controlled by a chain.

On the third week, I notice Crag diving into the snow treasure zone. I turn the army there (barely got out of the swamp, thankfully Pathfinding came in), defeat the beautiful Vistan, and block the entrance to the treasure zone, cutting off reinforcements. There are 20+ ducks and 20+ Thunderbirds visible there. Crag briskly runs to the end of the treasure zone, managing to peek into hives and pick up some artifacts along the way. I catch up with him in the corner near the unclaimed Sandals (guess he couldn't take them anymore). I attack - there are only 21 ducks. Apparently, the guard of some object or artifact really wiped him out badly.

I cast Haste on the cows, pile on with Dragonflies, cows, ducks (Mass Haste was a couple hundred XP short of being leveled up). I take out 16 ducks, the opponent concedes - we continue.

After the events described, Crag disappears into some underground treasure zones, and his stats grow before my eyes (from about 11-8 at our meeting to 22-12 by the end of the game).

I can't afford to go into uncleared swamp and snow treasure zones because I've captured all the castles and am trying to control them, while the opponent's scout heroes with 2 dragons or 15 Thunderbirds snatch 1 castle each from the most unexpected places, constantly resetting the counter.

I want to figure out where exactly Crag is wandering, frantically searching for View Air for Vistan - not a single scroll, not a single shrine anywhere in the vicinity. I do some scouting from one castle with Aeris, and discover he has View Air in his spellbook (where did he get it??), but there isn't a single Sage in the hero pool - only Apprentices.

This running around lasts about 4 weeks, and I'm already terrified to imagine what kind of army and stats the well-fed Crag has. Suddenly, the opponent takes the farthest Citadel on two dragons, where I'm heading with my army. Crag starts from there, gets defeated, and the army is transferred to the other end of the map near Inferno. Well, I think, I've been tricked again. Nagash catches up to my scout Aeris with his entire army, threatening my hope of using View Air at least once in this game, but the cowardly elf on 7 Devils manages to escape.

I calculate the chain. I had left Vistan in advance not far from a convenient break point. The chain comes together with room to spare, Vistan gets defeated, pops out of Inferno, and crushes all of Nagash's army (that's about 20 ducks, 30 Thunderbirds, hundreds of Wolf Riders) with stats of 8-3. I position with Tactics, prepare to cast Mass Haste, but my opponent concedes.

Thank you to my opponent for a very intense game! Good luck further in the tournament.