wowa
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chose computers - Conflux, Tower and Rampart.
We played without rests, although I saw Mephala and Gundula in the opponent's tavern, I decided to play anyway - an external dwelling of cats and a Dragon Utopia right next to the castle, decent money. The only thing was, no other decent heroes besides the Miner were offered in the tavern on the first week. Also, the computers turned out to be very far away - the native respawn was reeeeally huge.
By the second week, it became clear where the Grail could be dug, but the center was on a mountain, and in the end I was digging around the near side, which turned out to be wrong. On the third week, Gunnar appeared in the tavern, I started leveling him up, just in case, which turned out to be very farsighted :).
On 132 I took the first Dragon Utopia, but like many subsequent ones, there was nothing useful there except money. I was pleased with the Pandora's Box covering the entire land and the found Dimension Door scroll, because magic developed terribly in Tower.
Then, on 136, the opponent appeared out of the darkness through the central ГО and took my main hero with all unrecruited troops, and I was only buying cats and Troglodytes :(.
And my army was small - 18 Manticores, 4 Angels, and about 20 Wyverns. They clearly had more there. I started actively leveling Gunnar, after all, I needed to ramp up the army and stats; fortunately, there was a place to buy Air and Earth magic, and I saw the second pair of Boots.
The opponent was superior in parameters, about one and a half times. Later, after a series of castle exchanges, the Miner didn't manage to teleport out of the danger zone, I had to leave him with a Phoenix with Armageddon, hoping he'd manage to escape if anything, but at the cost of his life he revealed that Vova had prepared both the Bracers and the КШ.
And right then he was recruited by the opponent in the tavern!
Later, this "sleeper agent" played an important role in the match.
The first final battle happened between the Miner :) and Gunnar on 214.
Roughly equal stats, both had AotD and КШ, but Gunnar had the Elixir and the Armor with Archery and the Golden Bow (I was leveling the hero with an eye on a final battle in КШ) - 54 Wyverns vs 65 upgraded Wyverns, 7 Angels vs the opponent's 4 (strange, but they never built Angels), 4 Phoenixes, 5 upgraded Nagas (why did I take them?), 40+ Lizardmen and 24 Air Elementals vs 70 Medusas, 30 Evil Eyes, 30 Lizardmen and 20+ Crusaders. In short, even though my three main stacks missed their turns, the Elixir and Armor, plus the endless arrows, decided the outcome of the battle, from which I emerged with 8 Wyverns and 9 Lizardmen.
There was still Gundula, but now only I had AotD, and despite the opponent's advantage in stats, the advantage was clearly mine from then on.
The next final battle 4 days later was already a formality.
Thanks for the game, I haven't had such a game and such impressions in 15 years.
First round game.
first I wanted to capture the nearest castles, from which the opponent could reach in one turn (and did reach, by the way, taking them back with Gundula, only she could reach them) and only then build them in the evening, and upgrade them in the morning))
in general, it was extremely difficult -- it was without Boots, 2 main heroes crippled: Vala without Logistics until the end of the game, and Gundula with Logistics but without Earth (she stubbornly got either Fire or Water) against 2 full-fledged Logisticians with 2 pairs of Boots, one of whom was Gunnar :mad:
i.e., the opponent could reach my towns, but I couldn't reach his, which prevented me from capitalizing on my advantage -- I could only afford to get stuck on the map on the way to the blue castles after finding the КШ
I managed to do that, and also took Conflux from them, killing the Miner in the process and buying Earth/Air for everyone who needed it, including Gundula
in short, things were looking up
alas, besides the Boots, the opponent's side of the map brought the Elixir and the Cloak of Speed, and the artifacts I collected for stats ultimately gave nothing, because the final battle was still under AotD from both sides: the freshly dug-up Miner was supposed to take Tower, which threatened my main, but was attacked at night
Vala and Gundula would most likely have won that fight, but the Miner turned out to be poorly leveled, a real sleeper agent indeed! :D
after that, the opponent just had to avoid making a mistake until the end of the week, which he managed, and with the blue player recruiting the weekly growth, the new final battle was indeed a formality))
gg, thanks for the engaging game! despite the result, it was truly the most interesting match in recent times! :smile20: :smile12: :smile20:
"...the personal strengths and weaknesses of a leader are no true indication of the merits of his cause"
(с) Roger Zelazny
(с) Roger Zelazny
