Auto-translated
I also decided to write about online play for the second time, but then I thought it would be easier to copy full reports from the last "Autumn" season on the Portal, since games are played on fixed maps and players can understand how to play by repeating what is written in the report:
Deep Mike (blue, host, wizard, barbarian) def Dust (red, warlock, barbarian), 3-way cros, 1-4-7
On the first day, I only dug up a barbarian with my 5th hero; the other 4 were native wizards. Because of this, on the first day, I didn't even have enough money for a well, and since there were no boars, giants along with the well were already out of reach in the first week. However, I decided it wasn't that important to build them in the first week, as gathering money for their upgrade and full buyout would be unrealistic anyway. Mages guarded the path to the gold mine; since there was no gargoyle, I had to lose 45 halflings out of a hundred available—I was one cell short of placing the mine on day 3. At my own respawn, there wasn't a single stat artifact except for a scroll, which, among other things, was given to the leader and taken only in the second week. But there was a compass. There were enough gems; by day 7, the question arose whether to build giants without a well or a well to increase the growth of mages and others. I chose the latter, as I needed to hit the horde of elementals on the path as soon as possible, so I saved money on buying out troops and strengthened the same-stack of mages. On 1-2-1, I broke through the elementals without much trouble, losing some boars, and headed for the dragon dwellings. They were guarded by medusas and champions; unfortunately, on their very first move, the champions caught and killed almost all the boars. Behind the teleport, I finally found the only stat artifact—a spiked shield; everything else was irrelevant again. Three level 3 artifacts turned out to be resource bags, plus a wizard's hat that nobody needs—basically total trash. There wasn't nearly enough money for building giants, their upgrade, and buying one to take the dragon cities, and without dragons, there were no chances at all. I had to take a risk. In the underground, I took experience chests, leveled the hero up to level 10, visited Xanadu, upgraded golems, and with them, birds, halflings, mages, and boars, I stormed the dragon dwelling. For magic, I had haste; I figured there were many halflings and the black dragon would attack them, so I placed a boar in front of the mages and hastened the birds, who closed off the mages from the front on the second move. Also, the mages with luck immediately killed one green. In short, losing halflings and birds, I took the dragon dwelling and hired 2 reds to take the second dragon dwelling. By the end of the week, due to buying out all troops and hiring 3 dragons, no money was left for building giants. Here I made the only mistake in the game, although in a difficult-to-calculate situation. I should have ignored the giants and immediately stood before the titans so that on 1-3-1 with 6 dragons I could break them and rush to the barbarian. Instead, I acted straightforwardly: exchanged resources and built giants, and sat in the castle as leader. I stood before the titans the next day and broke them with 5 dragons (couldn't scrape together money for one more) and mages on 1-3-2; killing them with the loss of 1 dragon, I saw that the opponent had just broken through to the center himself the day before with a bunch of dragons, which he managed to build in the first week—which he apparently spent perfectly—and also managed to buy out and bring all reds from the dragon dwellings. His stats were significantly higher than mine as shown by the oracle, which was obvious anyway, since stat artifacts had to be somewhere ). Going on the defensive made no sense; there was no money for titans, so the only solution was to seek a last meager chance at the barbarian. I galloped toward him. It also helped that the opponent, seemingly feeling close victory, relaxed a bit and didn't notice that I ran to the barbarian. So instead of catching my hero, he went to take my castles; meanwhile, I managed to capture 2 dragon dwellings from the barbarian, almost losing another one of my dragons, took red boots there (there was nothing for stats in his teleport either), visited the second Xanadu, and then on the way to the barbarian's castle, his upgrades. As a result, I leveled up with the opponent in power stats. Finally, I got lucky with artifacts when killing the comp; it gave 3 defense artifacts totaling 6 units. My indicators became 15-16 against 16-10 for the opponent; having maximum morale and positive luck, there was a chance for a successful outcome of the battle even against 13 dragons if I got lucky. And here the opponent made a decisive mistake. Now he played straightforwardly: instead of waiting just 1 day and bringing the weekly growth of dragons to kill me for sure—since on this map there is nowhere to escape via bypass—he immediately galloped to the barbarian and gave me a chance to attack him. I had 8 reds, 3 stacks of wolves, and 5 trolls; he had 6 reds, 7 greens. And I got lucky in battle: in the first round after his reds hit, mine responded with luck, wiping out 3 units. As a result of the battle, the opponent bought himself out (he also had a feather) with 3 greens; I had 4 reds left. But here was a crucial moment: he had growth in reserve, but my teleport at home where there were 3 red dragons was blocked by his pawn. And here I got lucky again; thanks to logistics and boots with the compass, I barely managed to reach this pawn a day before the opponent arrived and gave the leader 3 reds. Now the advantage was mine due to stats; I threatened to catch the nearby opponent with 6 greens. He took a risk, brought 6 giants and 8 mages from my castle using a pawn, picked them up with his leader, and attacked himself. He had 6 greens, 6 giants, 8 mages, and 2 stacks of gargoyles. I had 7 reds and 3 stacks of boars. I blinded the mages and hit them by throwing ice rings on 120 at the giants, then the greens. The opponent bought himself out again with 1 giant and mages; I have 4 reds left. Here the outcome was clear: neither money nor reserves except for 2 reds behind the teleport remained for the opponent. First, I took back my castle so as not to chase the opponent through the rear later—luckily, with my speed, there was time before the end of the week to reach the opponent's capital. Then in the center, I caught him with 1 red dragon; it seems he wanted to seek luck in the untaken pyramid and find an elemental challenge there. He bought himself out again, but a day later I attacked him in the castle; 1 red, 1 giant, and 10 hydras offered no resistance with mages. Thanks for the exciting game.
Gynnar (yellow, warlock, barbarian) def Deep Mike (green, warlock, barbarian) Teleports 1-2-4
The first days of the game brought only disappointments; gargoyles weren't there, the starting hero also arrived without gargoyles (with only centaurs), and below lay only many piles of ore instead of other resources. Furthermore, it was later discovered that a few titans guarded the passage to the treasury, and cursed druids stood on the path. The only pleasant thing was that not only small chests were encountered, but also large ones, and they gave only one artifact in them. But by the end of the week, I realized that if I didn't break through the same-path, there would likely be no money. I attacked—losses were surprisingly small. Further it was discovered that gargoyles guard the path; I decided to break them too and enter the comp's territory to loot. The comp immediately attacked me, but luckily there was only a pawn there, and he died, killing almost all my halflings from the external dwelling. Then I brought dragons and killed the other comp (who turned out to be native, also a warlock; hydras were built, two not bought, as well as many unbought centaurs + had 2 levels of magic). Then I stalled; for two days the leader ran with a pack of dwarves (couldn't decide whether to fire them—they were the main striking stack before dragons), but in the end, prudence prevailed over greed and I fired the dwarves. Then I chose the wrong direction with the leader and instead of the path came out to a neutral village that was above the path. Then I made another mistake. I remembered that near this village there should be a path to the red comp, and searched with the leader to break it. But the path turned out not to be so close, and when I discovered this—I decided to break it anyway, and go to Mike with leader № 2. But after breaking the path—I couldn't return the dragons, and the other barbarian had to return to pick them up. But despite my stupidity, Mike gave me a gift by bringing a pawn with the whole army to the path from the other side. I break the guard of the path, attack Mike, and after that comes news of capitulation (although Mike had already broken through to his treasury and was making himself at home there)
Gynnar (yellow, black dragon, barbarian) def PPRReeeDDSS (green, black dragon, knight) 1-4-5 Teleports
The layout was not great initially, little money (gave either 3 artifacts or 4 in chests), but on the good side—free guard in the treasury behind liches. On the first I slotted dragons (the opinion formed that for yellow they slot with a probability of about 97 percent, as even with a super bad layout this always succeeds, and often calmly without trading any resources). Then I ran to reclaim the treasury and this was a mistake, because due to this I came out late to the blue comp, and there Pred was already making himself at home, devouring money and sulfur by placing two mines. I took the blue (while stupidly exposing two of my wizard-scouts to Pred with the remnants of the first week's army; considering that they had to be bought back and there was no money at all—it was tragic). Then I rushed up to another treasury (seeing that on the second I clearly wouldn't make it to Pred). There I cleared another treasury; I was a super-speedster, having a compass, a pair of boots, and logistics. Then I decided to go for Pred, but wanted to do it unexpectedly, as he had long since had black dragons, while I had greens and reds from the external dwelling. Also messed up: I should have just run—I would have reached in 3 moves from the red comp—but for some reason decided that I'd sail in a boat—it would be more unexpected. In the end, I surrendered to Pred's pawn, bought myself out in the blue castle, went up to visit +1000 experience and back to the castle—sat in the boat (that was my crazy move). Then for a couple of days (or maybe more) I sailed toward the green; he saw this, transferred troops, though not all. Upon arriving, I attacked the castle, and despite the stupidest setup (I placed red and green dragons together, Pred's defender sat with black dragons and gargoyles; in the end, first he attacked the green dragons with one gargoyle, they responded with luck and burned the reds, killing one dragon, and then he attacked my red dragons with another gargoyle, they also responded with luck, burning the little greens and also killing one of my green dragons). Well, after that Pred surrendered, as my skills were higher, many dragons remained even with a super-loser loss of two, while the defender sat with only three or four blacks; and most importantly, with all artifacts—and in case of castle capture, the game no longer made sense for Pred (considering my speed and the fact that all treasuries were already cleared). I think Pred could have won if he hadn't chased me to the red comp but immediately, as soon as black dragons appeared, rushed to my home castle. I would have had to surrender to the comp, buy myself out, which would be profitable for Pred since I had no money at all, and then I wouldn't even have made red dragons, while he could calmly gallop and kill the red comp, and clear the treasury up there as well, where they gave a compass and boots (+ skills).
PPRReeeDDSS (yellow, warlock, knight) def Gynnar (green, warlock, barbarian) 1-3-7 Teleports.
Well, what can I say. I drank away a layout where I simply should have won. I played the first week almost perfectly, buying a bunch of heroes (either 7 or 8), clearing everything possible with them, and also on day 6 breaking through to the comp and capturing the sulfur mine. As a result, I achieved the nearly impossible—slotted dragons in the first week, trading only 3 sulfur (and still had about 6 thousand money left, even though not all chests were collected and there were so many heroes). But then my wife called me to drink wine brought to Dyutik from Egypt (just arrived yesterday), then I continued without her—as a result, a whole cascade of errors. The barbarian with first-week troops galloped to the red comp through cursed mummies, while another barbarian (candidate for leader) was supposed to clear the treasury guarded only by unicorns. But as a result of a foggy head, I forgot to hasten him and he ran for a couple of moves with a goblin; then I sent the hero with dragons (sorceress) in the opposite direction than needed—as a result, the leader effectively just lost a day, having been hastened while waiting for dragons at the teleport. And then—the main mistake. Entering the teleport and opening the opener—I saw that the treasury was trash, artifacts only for magic (which are not needed at all, considering battles of leaders due to dragons), and at the very end of the respawn lay the only worthy artifact—red boots. And so, for some reason I galloped after it, without logistics, with green dragons, and having a scout only with the barbarian-leader. As a result, while I spent several days collecting junk there—Pred arrived with green dragons, and phoenixes were following behind. In the end, I wanted to buy a boat with 7 black dragons and sail somewhere (since navigation was given instead of logistics), but in my drunken state, I forgot about this (just as I forgot to build dragons in the nearest village from the home castle, which was also Warlock's—that's the kind of luck I had, only drank it away; I simply kept forgetting to do the building and remembered it after passing the turn, some kind of nightmare :yes). As a result, for some reason I attacked Pred with black dragons, killed one green, and that's exactly what Pred wanted, as there was nothing more for me to do, and here was just a teleport with troops where needed (he had seas of money). Then again a critical error. For some reason in my foggy head the idea was born to take the castle with phoenixes (why on earth did I need it—I still don't understand ? :abuse; in the end, instead of galloping to the red comp and trying to find either meat or at least something for fighter stats, I galloped to the blue comp's place, but while forgetting to transfer the boots). And as a result—fell short by a couple of cells on day 7 from the castle (and Pred prudently placed a couple of heroes in my path). Here I got really upset and started stalling further; then seeing that the sorceress carrying phoenixes rushed toward the orange comp (and into the last remaining treasury), and I was one cell short of exiting the captured castle, buying a hero there and transferring dragons to him to catch the sorceress. After this, I just started running back and forth, not knowing what to do, and then decided not to waste time and surrender, as in the second castle I still hadn't slotted dragons, logistics were not given to the leader, and among fighter artifacts there was only +1 defense; and chances against Pred, who cleared 2 treasuries and dragon cities in them, plus had 7 phoenixes on top of that—were almost none (especially in the state I was in)
Gynnar (blue, mage, mage) def Lovelas (orange, barbarian, barbarian) 3way cross, 1-3-5
In the first days of the game due to thought-out chains, I captured all mines (except gold and gems) in 3 days; then I got lucky, mass haste was given in the third magic booth, which allowed me to wipe out mages (including a stack of archmages) guarding the path to the gold mine almost without losses. Then I messed up by buying an artifact (a bag bringing 1000 per day) for 3000 + 5 precious stones; in the end on day 7, if I had exchanged all resources, I was short 1 precious stone (there were also troubles with wood, I exchanged it almost every turn at the market). Because no fighter artifacts were visible, but there were 3 decent magic artifacts—I decided to level up the mage. On day 7 I built a second tower (they gave ice and blindness), on the second I upgraded mages (while the mage who was given logistics ran down to the elementals) and on 122 broke the horde of elementals almost without losses. Then into the teleport; couldn't enter the library—level too low, though luckily a couple of defense artifacts were lying there (+4 from two artifacts, the third was trash). Then I decided to take dragon cities; Mike's description of how he also took Dragon Utopia without giants helped a lot. Black dragons (and others, for more than one round) started hitting halflings; at the same time archmages pounded them, closed off by boars and birds (I did mass haste last before battle and then put protection on birds). In the end, I took the city with losses of all halflings, all birds, 4 golems, and a couple of boars—archmages all turned out alive; and immediately to the second city with an army of 15 centaurs, 4 golems, 2 red dragons, a boar, and one more centaur. No mana left. In the end, I took the city, but very stupidly lost one dragon when only two green dragons were left—one had 37XP, the other 2XP; and the one with 2XP killed one (wasn't very lucky in battle, no morale and seemingly almost no luck, although both expert was had and in other battles all units practically moved and hit under luck twice). Then the mage-leader finally gets level 10 and visits the university, then crashes against titans, buys himself out in the castle, visits the well, and with magic power 17 and 5 red dragons runs at the titans. I break the titans losing 34 halflings, then to the center—really want to visit pyramids with my expert wisdom—but according to rules it's probably not allowed, so I don't visit. Broke cyclops, poked into teleport—yep, closed. Well, whatever, took it, closed from the other side and ran to the castle as leader with 10 archmages, 5 red dragons, and boars; behind me were several mage pawns with single-unit boars and magic power 5; I left birds and golems for the mage at the teleport so no pawn could drive them off (considering that with my 40 mana and power 5—crap—it would be problematic to do). Then took the castle (at the castle reclaimed a sulfur mine and defense artifact from nomads, which for some reason hadn't been reclaimed); barbarian scout discovered a pawn with 8 trolls, mage-leader reached him and killed him; after that Lovelas surrendered (since he would have sat in his teleport forever until a week passed without a castle and his hero with troops disappeared)
Gynnar (green, warlock, barbarian) def Brennan (yellow, warlock, barbarian)
1-4-5 Teleports from Dust (with dragon city at green's) (played long ago)
The first week was same-bad; sulfur only at the mine and even then a minimal pile (for 3 sulfur); in the end, even to place hydras—had to use the market and exchange so that there was sulfur. The teleport was guarded by cursed paladins, and on the path—cursed vampires; because of this (and also the fact that I only slotted hydras on day 7)—I had to hit the path only in the second week, but still managed to devour money and resources in the center before yellow while he dealt with the comp; then, seeing that yellow already had green dragons—sent part of the army to red, and sent part to break paladins; broke through after a couple of days, then grabbed a bunch of experience chests with barbarian in the snows, took a couple of fighter artifacts (though weak—+1 defense and seemingly +3 attack)—and went for the dragon city with hydras, minotaurs, gargoyles, and archers from the external dwelling. Took it, almost without losing hydras and minotaurs. Just as the third week arrived, immediately bought reds + built second dragons in home and immediately made them red—and rushed to the comps at the top of the map. Meanwhile, the opponent came to me, who had galloped to my main city (galloped for a long time, via bypass, several days; in the end reached it only on the first day of the 4th week). I, meanwhile, by the third reached the dragon city at the top, broke the path there (djinn guarded, was very afraid) and managed to take another dragon city on the third. When on the 4th week the opponent captured an empty castle (carried out growth from there (sailed away), and transferred dragons from this growth to the leader, sailing to the treasury at the top (to the teleport)). The next day the leader crashed with an armada of red dragons against the comp, bought himself out in the middle castle, and after a couple of days Brennan attacked him with the main hero with black dragons (which he upgraded and built for me in the castle). In the end I killed him (all his blacks, although I only had reds), losing only one of my dragons, several gargoyles, and one minotaur....
Thanks for the game
Deep Mike (blue, host, wizard, barbarian) def Dust (red, warlock, barbarian), 3-way cros, 1-4-7
On the first day, I only dug up a barbarian with my 5th hero; the other 4 were native wizards. Because of this, on the first day, I didn't even have enough money for a well, and since there were no boars, giants along with the well were already out of reach in the first week. However, I decided it wasn't that important to build them in the first week, as gathering money for their upgrade and full buyout would be unrealistic anyway. Mages guarded the path to the gold mine; since there was no gargoyle, I had to lose 45 halflings out of a hundred available—I was one cell short of placing the mine on day 3. At my own respawn, there wasn't a single stat artifact except for a scroll, which, among other things, was given to the leader and taken only in the second week. But there was a compass. There were enough gems; by day 7, the question arose whether to build giants without a well or a well to increase the growth of mages and others. I chose the latter, as I needed to hit the horde of elementals on the path as soon as possible, so I saved money on buying out troops and strengthened the same-stack of mages. On 1-2-1, I broke through the elementals without much trouble, losing some boars, and headed for the dragon dwellings. They were guarded by medusas and champions; unfortunately, on their very first move, the champions caught and killed almost all the boars. Behind the teleport, I finally found the only stat artifact—a spiked shield; everything else was irrelevant again. Three level 3 artifacts turned out to be resource bags, plus a wizard's hat that nobody needs—basically total trash. There wasn't nearly enough money for building giants, their upgrade, and buying one to take the dragon cities, and without dragons, there were no chances at all. I had to take a risk. In the underground, I took experience chests, leveled the hero up to level 10, visited Xanadu, upgraded golems, and with them, birds, halflings, mages, and boars, I stormed the dragon dwelling. For magic, I had haste; I figured there were many halflings and the black dragon would attack them, so I placed a boar in front of the mages and hastened the birds, who closed off the mages from the front on the second move. Also, the mages with luck immediately killed one green. In short, losing halflings and birds, I took the dragon dwelling and hired 2 reds to take the second dragon dwelling. By the end of the week, due to buying out all troops and hiring 3 dragons, no money was left for building giants. Here I made the only mistake in the game, although in a difficult-to-calculate situation. I should have ignored the giants and immediately stood before the titans so that on 1-3-1 with 6 dragons I could break them and rush to the barbarian. Instead, I acted straightforwardly: exchanged resources and built giants, and sat in the castle as leader. I stood before the titans the next day and broke them with 5 dragons (couldn't scrape together money for one more) and mages on 1-3-2; killing them with the loss of 1 dragon, I saw that the opponent had just broken through to the center himself the day before with a bunch of dragons, which he managed to build in the first week—which he apparently spent perfectly—and also managed to buy out and bring all reds from the dragon dwellings. His stats were significantly higher than mine as shown by the oracle, which was obvious anyway, since stat artifacts had to be somewhere ). Going on the defensive made no sense; there was no money for titans, so the only solution was to seek a last meager chance at the barbarian. I galloped toward him. It also helped that the opponent, seemingly feeling close victory, relaxed a bit and didn't notice that I ran to the barbarian. So instead of catching my hero, he went to take my castles; meanwhile, I managed to capture 2 dragon dwellings from the barbarian, almost losing another one of my dragons, took red boots there (there was nothing for stats in his teleport either), visited the second Xanadu, and then on the way to the barbarian's castle, his upgrades. As a result, I leveled up with the opponent in power stats. Finally, I got lucky with artifacts when killing the comp; it gave 3 defense artifacts totaling 6 units. My indicators became 15-16 against 16-10 for the opponent; having maximum morale and positive luck, there was a chance for a successful outcome of the battle even against 13 dragons if I got lucky. And here the opponent made a decisive mistake. Now he played straightforwardly: instead of waiting just 1 day and bringing the weekly growth of dragons to kill me for sure—since on this map there is nowhere to escape via bypass—he immediately galloped to the barbarian and gave me a chance to attack him. I had 8 reds, 3 stacks of wolves, and 5 trolls; he had 6 reds, 7 greens. And I got lucky in battle: in the first round after his reds hit, mine responded with luck, wiping out 3 units. As a result of the battle, the opponent bought himself out (he also had a feather) with 3 greens; I had 4 reds left. But here was a crucial moment: he had growth in reserve, but my teleport at home where there were 3 red dragons was blocked by his pawn. And here I got lucky again; thanks to logistics and boots with the compass, I barely managed to reach this pawn a day before the opponent arrived and gave the leader 3 reds. Now the advantage was mine due to stats; I threatened to catch the nearby opponent with 6 greens. He took a risk, brought 6 giants and 8 mages from my castle using a pawn, picked them up with his leader, and attacked himself. He had 6 greens, 6 giants, 8 mages, and 2 stacks of gargoyles. I had 7 reds and 3 stacks of boars. I blinded the mages and hit them by throwing ice rings on 120 at the giants, then the greens. The opponent bought himself out again with 1 giant and mages; I have 4 reds left. Here the outcome was clear: neither money nor reserves except for 2 reds behind the teleport remained for the opponent. First, I took back my castle so as not to chase the opponent through the rear later—luckily, with my speed, there was time before the end of the week to reach the opponent's capital. Then in the center, I caught him with 1 red dragon; it seems he wanted to seek luck in the untaken pyramid and find an elemental challenge there. He bought himself out again, but a day later I attacked him in the castle; 1 red, 1 giant, and 10 hydras offered no resistance with mages. Thanks for the exciting game.
Gynnar (yellow, warlock, barbarian) def Deep Mike (green, warlock, barbarian) Teleports 1-2-4
The first days of the game brought only disappointments; gargoyles weren't there, the starting hero also arrived without gargoyles (with only centaurs), and below lay only many piles of ore instead of other resources. Furthermore, it was later discovered that a few titans guarded the passage to the treasury, and cursed druids stood on the path. The only pleasant thing was that not only small chests were encountered, but also large ones, and they gave only one artifact in them. But by the end of the week, I realized that if I didn't break through the same-path, there would likely be no money. I attacked—losses were surprisingly small. Further it was discovered that gargoyles guard the path; I decided to break them too and enter the comp's territory to loot. The comp immediately attacked me, but luckily there was only a pawn there, and he died, killing almost all my halflings from the external dwelling. Then I brought dragons and killed the other comp (who turned out to be native, also a warlock; hydras were built, two not bought, as well as many unbought centaurs + had 2 levels of magic). Then I stalled; for two days the leader ran with a pack of dwarves (couldn't decide whether to fire them—they were the main striking stack before dragons), but in the end, prudence prevailed over greed and I fired the dwarves. Then I chose the wrong direction with the leader and instead of the path came out to a neutral village that was above the path. Then I made another mistake. I remembered that near this village there should be a path to the red comp, and searched with the leader to break it. But the path turned out not to be so close, and when I discovered this—I decided to break it anyway, and go to Mike with leader № 2. But after breaking the path—I couldn't return the dragons, and the other barbarian had to return to pick them up. But despite my stupidity, Mike gave me a gift by bringing a pawn with the whole army to the path from the other side. I break the guard of the path, attack Mike, and after that comes news of capitulation (although Mike had already broken through to his treasury and was making himself at home there)
Gynnar (yellow, black dragon, barbarian) def PPRReeeDDSS (green, black dragon, knight) 1-4-5 Teleports
The layout was not great initially, little money (gave either 3 artifacts or 4 in chests), but on the good side—free guard in the treasury behind liches. On the first I slotted dragons (the opinion formed that for yellow they slot with a probability of about 97 percent, as even with a super bad layout this always succeeds, and often calmly without trading any resources). Then I ran to reclaim the treasury and this was a mistake, because due to this I came out late to the blue comp, and there Pred was already making himself at home, devouring money and sulfur by placing two mines. I took the blue (while stupidly exposing two of my wizard-scouts to Pred with the remnants of the first week's army; considering that they had to be bought back and there was no money at all—it was tragic). Then I rushed up to another treasury (seeing that on the second I clearly wouldn't make it to Pred). There I cleared another treasury; I was a super-speedster, having a compass, a pair of boots, and logistics. Then I decided to go for Pred, but wanted to do it unexpectedly, as he had long since had black dragons, while I had greens and reds from the external dwelling. Also messed up: I should have just run—I would have reached in 3 moves from the red comp—but for some reason decided that I'd sail in a boat—it would be more unexpected. In the end, I surrendered to Pred's pawn, bought myself out in the blue castle, went up to visit +1000 experience and back to the castle—sat in the boat (that was my crazy move). Then for a couple of days (or maybe more) I sailed toward the green; he saw this, transferred troops, though not all. Upon arriving, I attacked the castle, and despite the stupidest setup (I placed red and green dragons together, Pred's defender sat with black dragons and gargoyles; in the end, first he attacked the green dragons with one gargoyle, they responded with luck and burned the reds, killing one dragon, and then he attacked my red dragons with another gargoyle, they also responded with luck, burning the little greens and also killing one of my green dragons). Well, after that Pred surrendered, as my skills were higher, many dragons remained even with a super-loser loss of two, while the defender sat with only three or four blacks; and most importantly, with all artifacts—and in case of castle capture, the game no longer made sense for Pred (considering my speed and the fact that all treasuries were already cleared). I think Pred could have won if he hadn't chased me to the red comp but immediately, as soon as black dragons appeared, rushed to my home castle. I would have had to surrender to the comp, buy myself out, which would be profitable for Pred since I had no money at all, and then I wouldn't even have made red dragons, while he could calmly gallop and kill the red comp, and clear the treasury up there as well, where they gave a compass and boots (+ skills).
PPRReeeDDSS (yellow, warlock, knight) def Gynnar (green, warlock, barbarian) 1-3-7 Teleports.
Well, what can I say. I drank away a layout where I simply should have won. I played the first week almost perfectly, buying a bunch of heroes (either 7 or 8), clearing everything possible with them, and also on day 6 breaking through to the comp and capturing the sulfur mine. As a result, I achieved the nearly impossible—slotted dragons in the first week, trading only 3 sulfur (and still had about 6 thousand money left, even though not all chests were collected and there were so many heroes). But then my wife called me to drink wine brought to Dyutik from Egypt (just arrived yesterday), then I continued without her—as a result, a whole cascade of errors. The barbarian with first-week troops galloped to the red comp through cursed mummies, while another barbarian (candidate for leader) was supposed to clear the treasury guarded only by unicorns. But as a result of a foggy head, I forgot to hasten him and he ran for a couple of moves with a goblin; then I sent the hero with dragons (sorceress) in the opposite direction than needed—as a result, the leader effectively just lost a day, having been hastened while waiting for dragons at the teleport. And then—the main mistake. Entering the teleport and opening the opener—I saw that the treasury was trash, artifacts only for magic (which are not needed at all, considering battles of leaders due to dragons), and at the very end of the respawn lay the only worthy artifact—red boots. And so, for some reason I galloped after it, without logistics, with green dragons, and having a scout only with the barbarian-leader. As a result, while I spent several days collecting junk there—Pred arrived with green dragons, and phoenixes were following behind. In the end, I wanted to buy a boat with 7 black dragons and sail somewhere (since navigation was given instead of logistics), but in my drunken state, I forgot about this (just as I forgot to build dragons in the nearest village from the home castle, which was also Warlock's—that's the kind of luck I had, only drank it away; I simply kept forgetting to do the building and remembered it after passing the turn, some kind of nightmare :yes). As a result, for some reason I attacked Pred with black dragons, killed one green, and that's exactly what Pred wanted, as there was nothing more for me to do, and here was just a teleport with troops where needed (he had seas of money). Then again a critical error. For some reason in my foggy head the idea was born to take the castle with phoenixes (why on earth did I need it—I still don't understand ? :abuse; in the end, instead of galloping to the red comp and trying to find either meat or at least something for fighter stats, I galloped to the blue comp's place, but while forgetting to transfer the boots). And as a result—fell short by a couple of cells on day 7 from the castle (and Pred prudently placed a couple of heroes in my path). Here I got really upset and started stalling further; then seeing that the sorceress carrying phoenixes rushed toward the orange comp (and into the last remaining treasury), and I was one cell short of exiting the captured castle, buying a hero there and transferring dragons to him to catch the sorceress. After this, I just started running back and forth, not knowing what to do, and then decided not to waste time and surrender, as in the second castle I still hadn't slotted dragons, logistics were not given to the leader, and among fighter artifacts there was only +1 defense; and chances against Pred, who cleared 2 treasuries and dragon cities in them, plus had 7 phoenixes on top of that—were almost none (especially in the state I was in)
Gynnar (blue, mage, mage) def Lovelas (orange, barbarian, barbarian) 3way cross, 1-3-5
In the first days of the game due to thought-out chains, I captured all mines (except gold and gems) in 3 days; then I got lucky, mass haste was given in the third magic booth, which allowed me to wipe out mages (including a stack of archmages) guarding the path to the gold mine almost without losses. Then I messed up by buying an artifact (a bag bringing 1000 per day) for 3000 + 5 precious stones; in the end on day 7, if I had exchanged all resources, I was short 1 precious stone (there were also troubles with wood, I exchanged it almost every turn at the market). Because no fighter artifacts were visible, but there were 3 decent magic artifacts—I decided to level up the mage. On day 7 I built a second tower (they gave ice and blindness), on the second I upgraded mages (while the mage who was given logistics ran down to the elementals) and on 122 broke the horde of elementals almost without losses. Then into the teleport; couldn't enter the library—level too low, though luckily a couple of defense artifacts were lying there (+4 from two artifacts, the third was trash). Then I decided to take dragon cities; Mike's description of how he also took Dragon Utopia without giants helped a lot. Black dragons (and others, for more than one round) started hitting halflings; at the same time archmages pounded them, closed off by boars and birds (I did mass haste last before battle and then put protection on birds). In the end, I took the city with losses of all halflings, all birds, 4 golems, and a couple of boars—archmages all turned out alive; and immediately to the second city with an army of 15 centaurs, 4 golems, 2 red dragons, a boar, and one more centaur. No mana left. In the end, I took the city, but very stupidly lost one dragon when only two green dragons were left—one had 37XP, the other 2XP; and the one with 2XP killed one (wasn't very lucky in battle, no morale and seemingly almost no luck, although both expert was had and in other battles all units practically moved and hit under luck twice). Then the mage-leader finally gets level 10 and visits the university, then crashes against titans, buys himself out in the castle, visits the well, and with magic power 17 and 5 red dragons runs at the titans. I break the titans losing 34 halflings, then to the center—really want to visit pyramids with my expert wisdom—but according to rules it's probably not allowed, so I don't visit. Broke cyclops, poked into teleport—yep, closed. Well, whatever, took it, closed from the other side and ran to the castle as leader with 10 archmages, 5 red dragons, and boars; behind me were several mage pawns with single-unit boars and magic power 5; I left birds and golems for the mage at the teleport so no pawn could drive them off (considering that with my 40 mana and power 5—crap—it would be problematic to do). Then took the castle (at the castle reclaimed a sulfur mine and defense artifact from nomads, which for some reason hadn't been reclaimed); barbarian scout discovered a pawn with 8 trolls, mage-leader reached him and killed him; after that Lovelas surrendered (since he would have sat in his teleport forever until a week passed without a castle and his hero with troops disappeared)
Gynnar (green, warlock, barbarian) def Brennan (yellow, warlock, barbarian)
1-4-5 Teleports from Dust (with dragon city at green's) (played long ago)
The first week was same-bad; sulfur only at the mine and even then a minimal pile (for 3 sulfur); in the end, even to place hydras—had to use the market and exchange so that there was sulfur. The teleport was guarded by cursed paladins, and on the path—cursed vampires; because of this (and also the fact that I only slotted hydras on day 7)—I had to hit the path only in the second week, but still managed to devour money and resources in the center before yellow while he dealt with the comp; then, seeing that yellow already had green dragons—sent part of the army to red, and sent part to break paladins; broke through after a couple of days, then grabbed a bunch of experience chests with barbarian in the snows, took a couple of fighter artifacts (though weak—+1 defense and seemingly +3 attack)—and went for the dragon city with hydras, minotaurs, gargoyles, and archers from the external dwelling. Took it, almost without losing hydras and minotaurs. Just as the third week arrived, immediately bought reds + built second dragons in home and immediately made them red—and rushed to the comps at the top of the map. Meanwhile, the opponent came to me, who had galloped to my main city (galloped for a long time, via bypass, several days; in the end reached it only on the first day of the 4th week). I, meanwhile, by the third reached the dragon city at the top, broke the path there (djinn guarded, was very afraid) and managed to take another dragon city on the third. When on the 4th week the opponent captured an empty castle (carried out growth from there (sailed away), and transferred dragons from this growth to the leader, sailing to the treasury at the top (to the teleport)). The next day the leader crashed with an armada of red dragons against the comp, bought himself out in the middle castle, and after a couple of days Brennan attacked him with the main hero with black dragons (which he upgraded and built for me in the castle). In the end I killed him (all his blacks, although I only had reds), losing only one of my dragons, several gargoyles, and one minotaur....
Thanks for the game
