Auto-translated
Map: 魔幻世代I Magic Generation I (Magic Generation I)
Author: leaon888
Can be found here https://www.cnblogs.com/diystar/archive/2010/02/10/1667220.html
Walkthrough Overview
Another map from the Chinese collection. I searched for the map author online, but the search only returns this single map by him.
Having considerable experience completing Chinese maps, I can confidently give this map a solid 9/10. The map might not be unique (it's dated 2005!), but it's been a long time since I've had such pleasure from a walkthrough; the reasons to praise the map are as follows:
1) an extremely interesting start, and interest is maintained through the mid-game and finale,
2) during the walkthrough, especially in the first 1-2 weeks, you have to very carefully plan the movement of your heroes; they act in tandem, and you must think through who will be needed where,
3) the presence of quests for heroes with a "one-way ticket," requiring an assessment of who is needed where and whom to send on a mission,
4) throughout the map, the widest possible arsenal is used to defeat enemies (victories using only magic, micro-battles, battles without resurrection, victories with archdevils, victories with shooters behind a force field, victories in castle defense and attack, "wall-to-wall" battles, battles on cursed land, battles in anti-magic garrisons, etc.). The variety of victory conditions is very high, which distinguishes this map from walkthroughs that rely, for example, only on same-stack shooters and archangels,
5) gathering giant forces is difficult; the AI has to be beaten using some strategy. Only closer to the finale are decent stacks of archdevils and angels/archangels gathered, and eventually wizards, but in the final battles this isn't very important,
6) "switching" from one unit type to another during the walkthrough.
7) the absence of a written walkthrough; all solutions must be found by yourself.
In general, everything I looked for (and still look for) in maps was found here. Regarding the map's difficulty, I wouldn't say it's too hard; it's quite beatable and of medium difficulty.
The following description will contain SPOILERS, so if you wish to figure out the map yourself, it is better to read my review after your own completion.
Author texts or hints are of no significance. Everything on the map works; no bugs were noticed.
The rest of the review is accompanied by screenshots showing the date and opponent, making it easy to determine which event they refer to.
Our Heroes
At the start of the walkthrough, we have two heroes:
Dessa – our main from start to finish; she has Intelligence, Fire Magic, and Tactics. All three skills proved indispensable during the map completion.
Orrin – second hero, a shooting specialist. He could have become a second main, but during the walkthrough it wasn't possible to get him Intelligence, so he cannot lead complex battles where mana is required.
Kirry – another logistician with Navigation, Scholarship, and Diplomacy. The latter two skills can be very helpful. She is extremely useful for capturing objects, clearing a respawn, and retraining spells.
Thorgrim – resistance specialist. Unfortunately, he is released from prison with preset skills, and Intelligence is not among them. This again limits his use in the game.
Dragon – a completely zeroed hero. After some leveling and buying him Intelligence, he became useful for hit-and-runs and gathering troops from castles.
1. Start (111 – 117)
At first, we are given the opportunity to choose the opponents' castles. I mainly chose human Castle and Tower, as I intended to complete the game with archangels and shooters (fanatics, archers, mages, titans). Also, I bet on Dragon and converting units into Wizard. But this is not fundamentally important. Yes, the number of castles gives a greater growth of archangels, but they and the clone will be available VERY soon, and until then it's hard to use them. So you can freely choose Castle, Stronghold, or Inferno as starters, since both bears and archdevils were in my army almost all the time. There is variety here; choose whoever you prefer playing.
For Orrin's starting artifact, I took +1 morale; with this artifact, a good skill tree worked for Dessa and Orrin.
It also matters which monsters are on Dessa's path, as she cannot break through all of them even with her crystal dragon. And the heroes' skill tree is important, more on that below.
At the start, we have 2 heroes in different locations: Dessa in enemy territory, surrounded by 3 enemy heroes in limited locations, and Orrin with a starting undeveloped castle – in his own mini-location.
I had to restart several times to best organize hero movement, construction, and their interaction. As a result, the optimal 1st week could be as follows:
1) Dessa on 112 should stand right by the passage guard post, take the hidden rider's gloves artifacts and the +1 emerald artifact, and on 113 spend her last move overnight at point 0-17-129, where an event gives us 25k experience, 10k gold (for Orrin's construction), and expert Earth and Water magic. Thus, until 113, Dessa doesn't need to level Earth and Water as she gets them for free. It is very lucky if Dessa gets Intelligence, Fire, and Tactics during leveling. Alternatively, you could take Offense instead of Tactics or Fire, but I like that idea less. On 114, definitely capture the giant dwelling and buy one there, and optionally capture the naga bank (Orrin still needs money for castle construction). On 115, you need to take the Barbarian castle, which has a grail (+10 attack). The previously bought giant takes the volley from towers and shots from cyclops and orcs, as well as another tower shot in the second round. We use 6 shooters dealing 100 damage each to kill archers and weaken the bear. Then we try to lure out his units and aggro them onto our ballista. In this scenario, the crystal dragon has enough HP and we capture the Barbarian castle. The castle is FUNDAMENTALLY important because it gives +5000 gold per day from the grail, and only in this castle can you build the only tavern on the map to buy our 3rd hero – Kirry with Diplomacy and Scholarship (extremely important, will be needed later).
It's desirable to have the Quicksand spell in the Stronghold; it will be needed later.
As you can see, the variety of starting saves is extremely high; you might "struggle" choosing the right one.
After buying Kirry at the tavern, we open the post in the north and send one of those two on a water journey. We only have one boat! I tried sending both Kirry and Dessa. The former sails better (expert Navigation) but runs slower (level 1 vs Dessa's level 16). After several tests, I still sent Dessa by water, although it now seems Kirry should have been sent as she would have arrived faster.
Kirry stays at the respawn, levels up a bit while trying to escape from 3 enemy heroes simultaneously.
Orrin. This is also very interesting. Orrin has a very small location, and the experience available at the starting respawn is limited. Therefore, you need to level up so that you are ready for simultaneous attacks by several enemy heroes. In the map editor, it's visible that neutrals on our territory are "aggressive" but can join; checking this with 1 thief in our castle helps. I was lucky and archers and spearmen joined me, greatly strengthening the starting army. Orrin's task for 7 days: level up and build the castle (Stronghold), placing horses there and buying them from an external dwelling. As a result, on 121 we will have 10 horses (6 – castle growth, 2+2 from external dwelling). Orrin's leveling: get Logistics if possible, visit the witch's hut, and level Tactics (then we can beat fanatics at the respawn for experience and +5000 gold).
At the end of the 1st week on 117:
1) Dessa sails to landing point 0-54-8, simultaneously gathering wood and gold and visiting beacons for speed.
2) Kirry spends the 7th day overnight near point 0-17-129, specifically at the water mill, so that on the 1st day of the second week she can capture an enemy Tower with growth.
3) Orrin prepares to break through fanatics and return to the castle.
So, the entire first week was preparatory; it was necessary to get artifacts, level our heroes, and build Orrin's Stronghold.
2. 2 Weeks of Relay (121 – 137)
The action shifts to Orrin. On 123, Nimus breaks through from the west and attacks us in the castle; we kill her and get speed boots. On the same day, using last moves, we reach the eastern Rampart and capture it with growth, buying grands, 3 gold dragons (!), and unicorns. On 125, we catch the dungeon hero Enova and kill her. Then we defend the castle and kill Kreg, and on 131 "reach" the Inferno in the west and get growth of +4 devils and 5 ifrits. On 133 I kill Sephinorof, and on 135 – Mirlanda. As a result, the western Inferno and eastern Rampart are captured, and arriving enemy heroes are killed. All this was possible only because Orrin had a sufficiently developed castle, shooters, 10 horses, and Logistics. Without them, "clearing" would have taken longer and we wouldn't have received growth from enemy castles. Without delay, we head north to capture the Barbarian castle at the end of the 3rd week.
Dessa sails for an eternity toward the landing point; on 132 she lands, and on 133 in 1 move visits a blue tent, someone else's castle, buys shooters and angels there, and still manages to escape from an enemy hero, thanks to him being limited to 8 movement cells. On 134 we jump to the Inferno, build Castle Gates in it, meet Orrin through the gates, buy all archdevils, and on 135 at point 0-42-93 kill 250 neutral horses with 7 archdevils (using Quicksand). This whole marathon was needed to learn Summon Boat after killing the horses. We break ourselves on the nearest guard on the same day.
Kirry spent all of weeks 2 and 3 escaping enemy heroes by any means necessary; with 3 titans and djinns bought in week 2-1, we retake the Barbarian castle, then escape from opponents again. As a result, on 135 she buys Dessa at the Stronghold, retrains Summon Boat, and both escape from the initial southwest respawn!
Such and only such an arrangement was needed because we cannot afford to lose any of these heroes, as there is nowhere to buy them; there is only one tavern in the Stronghold at point 0-1-104.
Kirry is needed for retraining magic; without her, Resurrection or Teleport would be known by only one person. And Dessa also cannot be lost because she is needed to open the passage guard later. Therefore, someone must manage to learn Summon Boat and save all heroes using the trick of breaking and retraining magic.
Then the saved Kirry lands on a neighboring respawn, opens the passage guard, and clears the respawn, joining whoever she can with Diplomacy and capturing external dwellings of angels (1) and bears (3) to increase growth.
Dessa again sails home via the old route, fortunately now faster with beacons.
Orrin captures the northern Stronghold on 137 since Dessa has already visited the blue tent.
3. Power of Armageddon, Killing Catherine and Bron (141 – 227).
On 145, Orrin captures the swamp castle; everything is slow so far because Orrin just learned Pathfinding, meaning he has to travel through swamps and rocks with a large penalty. On 215 we take the red Dungeon.
Dessa and Kirry return to Orrin's respawn and level up; Dessa especially doesn't miss Knowledge and Spell Power.
In one of the Infernos, we have the Armageddon spell!
With Dessa, we attack Bron with 9 gold dragons and 2 pegasi, and fire Armageddon for 1020 damage. This is where Fire Magic and Intelligence came in handy! We lose only 3 gold dragons from castle tower shots. 215 – Bron is killed.
216 – the same trick with Catherine, but she poses a threat with 50 archangels and 450 knights.
That is, it's unlikely Bron or Catherine could have been killed without adequate losses in any other way, since we HAVE NO Resurrection yet, and enemies surpass us both in stats and army, especially while defending in a castle! True, Sacrifice is in the arsenal, but I never used it.
Dessa and Kirry with their abilities manage to clear respawns as quickly as possible. Unfortunately, Orrin's leveling didn't go according to the best scenario; he failed to get Intelligence. Without this skill, he remained a support hero until the end of the game, see screenshot. It would be better for him to get Intelligence instead of Offense.
The following weeks we level up on boosters at the respawn, although as I see now, one could have continued rushing the opponent.
4. Freeing Thorgrim, Obtaining Restoration, Killing Caitlin and the Green Tent (231 – 237)
For further progression, we need to jump into a one-way teleport located behind the Rampart at point 0-108-102. Then the map gives us more puzzles: should everyone jump, how to kill enemy Caitlin on the new respawn, etc.
Here, returning to the start of the game, I encountered the fact that the passage guard requires Dessa's presence, and retraining spells with Thorgrim and the scholar requires Kirry's presence!
On 234, it turns out possible for Dessa to jump into the teleport with a run-up and reach Caitlin's castle, receiving all growth of 30 angels, not counting archers etc. But entering the castle was no longer possible. Caitlin attacks us with far superior forces (250 archangels, 302 riders), but the whole trick is that using Tactics we block 23 archdevils, and then in 2 moves first blind her archangels and then the horses. Then a Destruction Beam, and strike/blind until Caitlin is completely killed. Out of 640 mana, only 6 remained!
On 236 we free Thorgrim, learn Water Walking from him, and immediately send him into the one-way portal:
1) for leveling
2) blocking the one-way teleport
3) visiting the green tent.
Thorgrim receives 250 wizards and 52 fairy dragons for free, with which he breaks through neutrals and visits the green tent.
While the teleport is blocked, Kirry learns "Resurrection" at point 0-37-56 from the scholar and retrains everyone in it.
From this moment on, our main Dessa, as well as Kirry and Orrin, know Resurrection and can conduct more complex battles.
5. 241 – 347. Return of Our Lands, Purple Tent, Killing Turis, Obtaining Town Portal
We descend through the one-way teleport into the underground with Orrin and a golden bow; with wizards and fairy dragons, we easily dismantle Dragon. All killed are resurrected.
Then another interesting trick: learn "Forgetfulness" with Thorgrim and get himself killed by an enemy hero.
At the same time, Dessa and Kirry sail to Kilgor's Stronghold respawn, where Dessa with 30 archdevils kills more than 1020 (!) bears under Kilgor! We dismantle our ballista and Kilgor's small stacks with Armageddon for 1370 damage, cast Quicksand across the whole map, destroy castle towers with Earthquake, and then "manually" kill the bear legion with 30 archdevils. Sultan-Ifrits are in battle as insurance against a misclick (possibility of teleport or restoring archdevils). Victory!
Kirry uses Water Walking to reach the island with the tavern Stronghold. On 314 we capture the Stronghold, buy Thorgrim, learn Forgetfulness, and attack Yoga, see screenshot. Here we use a different strategy: hypnotize cyclops, hide devils behind them. Then exhaust Yoga's mana using pegasi, kill birds, again cast Quicksand across the map and calmly kill 800 bears.
On 322 we aggro Rizzu to the castle and kill her from defense; take plenty of meat to kill her hundred titans. And Pirry is killed very easily on 326. In the end, the entire respawn where Dessa started is captured.
On 334 with Armageddon + black and gold dragons we kill fairy dragons and visit the purple tent, see screenshot.
On 344 we capture another Inferno (guard requires killing Pirry), and on 346 we kill Turis*; she has a very large army, so it took some effort. For her same-day death, we learn and retrain everyone in Town Portal. At this point you can take a breather; further map completion becomes a matter of time.
On 347 we learn Anti-magic and clear the Dragon Utopia.
Generally from this moment we have enough external dwellings of angels, devils, bears, mages, fanatics to receive very significant growth with such a number of castles. Therefore it's important to capture them all as quickly as possible; as a result, we get much larger growth in a shorter period of time.
6. Mid-game 411 – 447. Clearing the Underground and Attacking the Snowy Respawn
Kirry sails on 411 to the snowy respawn in the east, where she takes the Tower.
411 – Dessa starts the week by killing Clancy in the underground, see screenshot. Here we try to kill our ballista and Clancy's flying units. Since he has no teleport, we can then simply shoot him down. Immediately send Dessa through the underground bypass; by killing neutrals we get +1 +2 and +all stats. Since Dessa is our main, only she should go there. On 415 we kill Zubin on cursed land, on 421 – Tazar and release Boragus, since beating him on cursed land without losses is impossible. On 422 Boragus is killed by us from defense in the Stronghold he jumped into. On 424 we kill Josephine on cursed land (need to take a couple of snakes to block her titans while our bears kill the rest of the army). On 425 we kill Christian, fortunately blindness also works on him. On 427 – Roland is killed (+1 more angel castle).
On 431 we enter the northern snowy respawn and kill Torosara on 433. Here a tactic of teleporting bears to enemy titans in the castle helps.
Orrin sails north on 43x and visits the black tent there, while Kirry and Dessa again pull off the author's puzzle (albeit not very difficult) to release Tunnar with forces from cursed land, and kill him on 441 in the castle from defense. It took a lot of effort with bear morale (2 hits), blinding his fairy dragons etc., but in the end it worked.
We still have no clone or archangels!
445 – we find the phoenix and open the guard further to the snowy respawn in the east, killing Theodore. Even auto-battle wins this fight! :) on 447 we take another Stronghold with all growth.
7. Ending (Months 5-7)
On 511 one very difficult battle in an anti-magic garrison, see screenshot. There is no magic, so with health elixir, speed etc., we feed the remaining gold dragons, tent, cart etc. Cows try to damage azure ones and kill as many as possible. The rest are finished by bears. Losses were quite small, and it was worth it! Dessa receives +40 to each stat. No one other than Dessa can get such stats.
Suddenly in the 5th month a seer at point 0-124-100 offers Dessa expert Necromancy, even though all of Dessa's slots are full! :) perhaps theoretically it was possible to "not fight" with Dessa all this time and get Necromancy in the last slot with the prospect of making liches for the finale, but that's some kind of wrong plan since the map is heading toward the end.
On 512 we kill Solmir, again teleporting bears onto titans where we kill them, and on the same day Daremih. Dessa already has 4000 mana, enough for everything. Dessa's stats are near 99.
On 515 we kill Galtran. Since we cannot blind his necroes, we leave him a minimal number of liches and resurrect all our forces. When he runs out of strength, we just finish Restoration and defeat him.
On 517 we kill Xeron, also an easy battle; you can blind him. On 521 – Monera*; she has a ton of meat, but it's important to destroy our ballista while her magic elements stay stuck in the castle. With a clone of archangels this battle is not difficult either, although I had to replay it a couple of times. On 522 we kill Pasys using a similar strategy.
And on 522 we free Dragon from prison, who can convert all our fanatics and mages into Wizards. Leveling Dragon is not necessary; it's enough to give him just a couple of Knowledge + Intelligence skill at the university so he can fly from castle to castle.
On 526 a difficult battle with Vokial*; he has way too much meat, "wall-to-wall" won't work. Therefore we take only archdevils into battle (+pegasus, mage for mana and archangel to block the castle exit). Then our archdevils try to cast speed+prayer+anti-magic on themselves and hide behind a force field until Vokial runs out of mana. Simultaneously you can cast Destruction Beam on enemy stacks and kill his clones. A long battle, but the strategy worked; Vokial is killed.
On 532 I arrived at Zidar, but it was impossible to kill him at first because there's TOO much meat and he immediately casts Armageddon. Killing 10k ifrits in the field and fire birds seemed unrealistic. Then I did this: took devils, mage, pegasus into battle as usual. Equipped all speed artifacts. In the 1st round hid devils behind a force field, received Armageddon. 2nd round cast prayer, received Armageddon. 3rd round again force field / Armageddon, and only in the 4th round cast anti-magic. Almost half the devils died. Then with explosions of 128 units each I killed 10k ifrits, then the birds. Blinded him with 3 devils, restored myself and thus won this battle. Later I repeated this battle by giving Zidar the castle, and it was easier there since he didn't fly out of the castle.
On 543 a difficult battle against Malekith. I took 1200 imps. In the first rounds I destroyed the ballista and set up shot protection for devils. Then I managed to loop Malekith so that he blinded my devils, who were then hit by tower shots, and so on in a circle. As a result, imps drained more than 200-300 mana from him, and when the AI ran out of mana, the devils behind the force field slaughtered his entire army. A long battle.
On the same day 543 we kill Brissa from defense; even auto-battle handled it :) Blue is killed
On 545 we kill Tamika. Her forces are also very large. I have to spend my entire army to kill her shooter stacks and vamps, use devils to kill her forces, leave only horses, then resurrect everyone.
On 546 another author's idea: release another enemy hero from cursed land – Kalt. The problem with this hero is that he has a cloak against magic above level 2. Therefore the battle is fought on morale, luck, fear from our azure dragons, and tactics to minimize losses. We take a small hit to titans.
Then we are offered a choice by the seer: take the sphere of vulnerability or the sphere of prohibition. Usually I would take the sphere of vulnerability as it's almost ALWAYS more profitable on maps. But this time I chose the sphere of prohibition because right behind the "fence" we have a very difficult battle with Moandor on cursed land, meaning resurrection won't work. Moandor himself knows Haste, and the battle against him just wasn't working. So I equipped armor of the damned + sphere of prohibition, see screenshot, and fought the battle almost without losses. Main thing: block as early as possible, then destroy his liches, weaken bone dragons and black knights, and use phoenixes to lure his forces in the castle so he doesn't come out. Result: battle almost without losses, except for 12 phoenixes used as fodder and damage from castle towers.
At the end of the 6th month I arrived at Gel, but the number of his dragons and more than 10k snipers is a lot. So I had to outsmart him (see screenshot), burning all snipers, fairy dragons and reducing azure and crystal stacks. Berserk didn't work on his dragons. 647 Gel is killed.
Using the same scheme we outsmarted Astral a couple of times, and on 716 I killed him. Very lucky that under the effect of berserk (old bug) azure ones didn't move because his blinded nagas were behind them. With such luck, it was possible to finish the battle very quickly.
On 717 and beyond we outsmart Mutare's dragons (main thing is to kill fairy ones), and then with our azures behind a force field and wizards we kill Mutare without problems. Mutare knows no magic dangerous to us and only blinds wizards. Fortunately mana runs out quickly.
On 723 we have the path to the final castle! And here are 2 paths:
1) guard requiring sphere of prohibition gives us the chance to kill 70k fairies in a normal garrison, which is not very difficult with 739 archdevils (anti-magic, AOTD, blindness on fairies – not a hard battle),
2) guard requiring sphere of vulnerability leads through an ANTI-MAGIC GARRISON with 6000 crystals.
As for me, option №1 is significantly easier than option №2. Although if we had used the sphere of vulnerability in early battles, we wouldn't have had to outsmart opponents. But breaking 6k crystal dragons without losses is a question, even taking phoenixes as lures and using AOTD during attack.
Immediately after passing the fairies we are given the medal of vulnerability, and with it taking the final castle on the same day becomes child's play; the main thing is to lure all dragons into one pile for berserk. Final castle captured, victory!
The map is definitely worth attention! Give it a try!
Author: leaon888
Can be found here https://www.cnblogs.com/diystar/archive/2010/02/10/1667220.html
Walkthrough Overview
Another map from the Chinese collection. I searched for the map author online, but the search only returns this single map by him.
Having considerable experience completing Chinese maps, I can confidently give this map a solid 9/10. The map might not be unique (it's dated 2005!), but it's been a long time since I've had such pleasure from a walkthrough; the reasons to praise the map are as follows:
1) an extremely interesting start, and interest is maintained through the mid-game and finale,
2) during the walkthrough, especially in the first 1-2 weeks, you have to very carefully plan the movement of your heroes; they act in tandem, and you must think through who will be needed where,
3) the presence of quests for heroes with a "one-way ticket," requiring an assessment of who is needed where and whom to send on a mission,
4) throughout the map, the widest possible arsenal is used to defeat enemies (victories using only magic, micro-battles, battles without resurrection, victories with archdevils, victories with shooters behind a force field, victories in castle defense and attack, "wall-to-wall" battles, battles on cursed land, battles in anti-magic garrisons, etc.). The variety of victory conditions is very high, which distinguishes this map from walkthroughs that rely, for example, only on same-stack shooters and archangels,
5) gathering giant forces is difficult; the AI has to be beaten using some strategy. Only closer to the finale are decent stacks of archdevils and angels/archangels gathered, and eventually wizards, but in the final battles this isn't very important,
6) "switching" from one unit type to another during the walkthrough.
7) the absence of a written walkthrough; all solutions must be found by yourself.
In general, everything I looked for (and still look for) in maps was found here. Regarding the map's difficulty, I wouldn't say it's too hard; it's quite beatable and of medium difficulty.
The following description will contain SPOILERS, so if you wish to figure out the map yourself, it is better to read my review after your own completion.
Author texts or hints are of no significance. Everything on the map works; no bugs were noticed.
The rest of the review is accompanied by screenshots showing the date and opponent, making it easy to determine which event they refer to.
Our Heroes
At the start of the walkthrough, we have two heroes:
Dessa – our main from start to finish; she has Intelligence, Fire Magic, and Tactics. All three skills proved indispensable during the map completion.
Orrin – second hero, a shooting specialist. He could have become a second main, but during the walkthrough it wasn't possible to get him Intelligence, so he cannot lead complex battles where mana is required.
Kirry – another logistician with Navigation, Scholarship, and Diplomacy. The latter two skills can be very helpful. She is extremely useful for capturing objects, clearing a respawn, and retraining spells.
Thorgrim – resistance specialist. Unfortunately, he is released from prison with preset skills, and Intelligence is not among them. This again limits his use in the game.
Dragon – a completely zeroed hero. After some leveling and buying him Intelligence, he became useful for hit-and-runs and gathering troops from castles.
1. Start (111 – 117)
At first, we are given the opportunity to choose the opponents' castles. I mainly chose human Castle and Tower, as I intended to complete the game with archangels and shooters (fanatics, archers, mages, titans). Also, I bet on Dragon and converting units into Wizard. But this is not fundamentally important. Yes, the number of castles gives a greater growth of archangels, but they and the clone will be available VERY soon, and until then it's hard to use them. So you can freely choose Castle, Stronghold, or Inferno as starters, since both bears and archdevils were in my army almost all the time. There is variety here; choose whoever you prefer playing.
For Orrin's starting artifact, I took +1 morale; with this artifact, a good skill tree worked for Dessa and Orrin.
It also matters which monsters are on Dessa's path, as she cannot break through all of them even with her crystal dragon. And the heroes' skill tree is important, more on that below.
At the start, we have 2 heroes in different locations: Dessa in enemy territory, surrounded by 3 enemy heroes in limited locations, and Orrin with a starting undeveloped castle – in his own mini-location.
I had to restart several times to best organize hero movement, construction, and their interaction. As a result, the optimal 1st week could be as follows:
1) Dessa on 112 should stand right by the passage guard post, take the hidden rider's gloves artifacts and the +1 emerald artifact, and on 113 spend her last move overnight at point 0-17-129, where an event gives us 25k experience, 10k gold (for Orrin's construction), and expert Earth and Water magic. Thus, until 113, Dessa doesn't need to level Earth and Water as she gets them for free. It is very lucky if Dessa gets Intelligence, Fire, and Tactics during leveling. Alternatively, you could take Offense instead of Tactics or Fire, but I like that idea less. On 114, definitely capture the giant dwelling and buy one there, and optionally capture the naga bank (Orrin still needs money for castle construction). On 115, you need to take the Barbarian castle, which has a grail (+10 attack). The previously bought giant takes the volley from towers and shots from cyclops and orcs, as well as another tower shot in the second round. We use 6 shooters dealing 100 damage each to kill archers and weaken the bear. Then we try to lure out his units and aggro them onto our ballista. In this scenario, the crystal dragon has enough HP and we capture the Barbarian castle. The castle is FUNDAMENTALLY important because it gives +5000 gold per day from the grail, and only in this castle can you build the only tavern on the map to buy our 3rd hero – Kirry with Diplomacy and Scholarship (extremely important, will be needed later).
It's desirable to have the Quicksand spell in the Stronghold; it will be needed later.
As you can see, the variety of starting saves is extremely high; you might "struggle" choosing the right one.
After buying Kirry at the tavern, we open the post in the north and send one of those two on a water journey. We only have one boat! I tried sending both Kirry and Dessa. The former sails better (expert Navigation) but runs slower (level 1 vs Dessa's level 16). After several tests, I still sent Dessa by water, although it now seems Kirry should have been sent as she would have arrived faster.
Kirry stays at the respawn, levels up a bit while trying to escape from 3 enemy heroes simultaneously.
Orrin. This is also very interesting. Orrin has a very small location, and the experience available at the starting respawn is limited. Therefore, you need to level up so that you are ready for simultaneous attacks by several enemy heroes. In the map editor, it's visible that neutrals on our territory are "aggressive" but can join; checking this with 1 thief in our castle helps. I was lucky and archers and spearmen joined me, greatly strengthening the starting army. Orrin's task for 7 days: level up and build the castle (Stronghold), placing horses there and buying them from an external dwelling. As a result, on 121 we will have 10 horses (6 – castle growth, 2+2 from external dwelling). Orrin's leveling: get Logistics if possible, visit the witch's hut, and level Tactics (then we can beat fanatics at the respawn for experience and +5000 gold).
At the end of the 1st week on 117:
1) Dessa sails to landing point 0-54-8, simultaneously gathering wood and gold and visiting beacons for speed.
2) Kirry spends the 7th day overnight near point 0-17-129, specifically at the water mill, so that on the 1st day of the second week she can capture an enemy Tower with growth.
3) Orrin prepares to break through fanatics and return to the castle.
So, the entire first week was preparatory; it was necessary to get artifacts, level our heroes, and build Orrin's Stronghold.
2. 2 Weeks of Relay (121 – 137)
The action shifts to Orrin. On 123, Nimus breaks through from the west and attacks us in the castle; we kill her and get speed boots. On the same day, using last moves, we reach the eastern Rampart and capture it with growth, buying grands, 3 gold dragons (!), and unicorns. On 125, we catch the dungeon hero Enova and kill her. Then we defend the castle and kill Kreg, and on 131 "reach" the Inferno in the west and get growth of +4 devils and 5 ifrits. On 133 I kill Sephinorof, and on 135 – Mirlanda. As a result, the western Inferno and eastern Rampart are captured, and arriving enemy heroes are killed. All this was possible only because Orrin had a sufficiently developed castle, shooters, 10 horses, and Logistics. Without them, "clearing" would have taken longer and we wouldn't have received growth from enemy castles. Without delay, we head north to capture the Barbarian castle at the end of the 3rd week.
Dessa sails for an eternity toward the landing point; on 132 she lands, and on 133 in 1 move visits a blue tent, someone else's castle, buys shooters and angels there, and still manages to escape from an enemy hero, thanks to him being limited to 8 movement cells. On 134 we jump to the Inferno, build Castle Gates in it, meet Orrin through the gates, buy all archdevils, and on 135 at point 0-42-93 kill 250 neutral horses with 7 archdevils (using Quicksand). This whole marathon was needed to learn Summon Boat after killing the horses. We break ourselves on the nearest guard on the same day.
Kirry spent all of weeks 2 and 3 escaping enemy heroes by any means necessary; with 3 titans and djinns bought in week 2-1, we retake the Barbarian castle, then escape from opponents again. As a result, on 135 she buys Dessa at the Stronghold, retrains Summon Boat, and both escape from the initial southwest respawn!
Such and only such an arrangement was needed because we cannot afford to lose any of these heroes, as there is nowhere to buy them; there is only one tavern in the Stronghold at point 0-1-104.
Kirry is needed for retraining magic; without her, Resurrection or Teleport would be known by only one person. And Dessa also cannot be lost because she is needed to open the passage guard later. Therefore, someone must manage to learn Summon Boat and save all heroes using the trick of breaking and retraining magic.
Then the saved Kirry lands on a neighboring respawn, opens the passage guard, and clears the respawn, joining whoever she can with Diplomacy and capturing external dwellings of angels (1) and bears (3) to increase growth.
Dessa again sails home via the old route, fortunately now faster with beacons.
Orrin captures the northern Stronghold on 137 since Dessa has already visited the blue tent.
3. Power of Armageddon, Killing Catherine and Bron (141 – 227).
On 145, Orrin captures the swamp castle; everything is slow so far because Orrin just learned Pathfinding, meaning he has to travel through swamps and rocks with a large penalty. On 215 we take the red Dungeon.
Dessa and Kirry return to Orrin's respawn and level up; Dessa especially doesn't miss Knowledge and Spell Power.
In one of the Infernos, we have the Armageddon spell!
With Dessa, we attack Bron with 9 gold dragons and 2 pegasi, and fire Armageddon for 1020 damage. This is where Fire Magic and Intelligence came in handy! We lose only 3 gold dragons from castle tower shots. 215 – Bron is killed.
216 – the same trick with Catherine, but she poses a threat with 50 archangels and 450 knights.
That is, it's unlikely Bron or Catherine could have been killed without adequate losses in any other way, since we HAVE NO Resurrection yet, and enemies surpass us both in stats and army, especially while defending in a castle! True, Sacrifice is in the arsenal, but I never used it.
Dessa and Kirry with their abilities manage to clear respawns as quickly as possible. Unfortunately, Orrin's leveling didn't go according to the best scenario; he failed to get Intelligence. Without this skill, he remained a support hero until the end of the game, see screenshot. It would be better for him to get Intelligence instead of Offense.
The following weeks we level up on boosters at the respawn, although as I see now, one could have continued rushing the opponent.
4. Freeing Thorgrim, Obtaining Restoration, Killing Caitlin and the Green Tent (231 – 237)
For further progression, we need to jump into a one-way teleport located behind the Rampart at point 0-108-102. Then the map gives us more puzzles: should everyone jump, how to kill enemy Caitlin on the new respawn, etc.
Here, returning to the start of the game, I encountered the fact that the passage guard requires Dessa's presence, and retraining spells with Thorgrim and the scholar requires Kirry's presence!
On 234, it turns out possible for Dessa to jump into the teleport with a run-up and reach Caitlin's castle, receiving all growth of 30 angels, not counting archers etc. But entering the castle was no longer possible. Caitlin attacks us with far superior forces (250 archangels, 302 riders), but the whole trick is that using Tactics we block 23 archdevils, and then in 2 moves first blind her archangels and then the horses. Then a Destruction Beam, and strike/blind until Caitlin is completely killed. Out of 640 mana, only 6 remained!
On 236 we free Thorgrim, learn Water Walking from him, and immediately send him into the one-way portal:
1) for leveling
2) blocking the one-way teleport
3) visiting the green tent.
Thorgrim receives 250 wizards and 52 fairy dragons for free, with which he breaks through neutrals and visits the green tent.
While the teleport is blocked, Kirry learns "Resurrection" at point 0-37-56 from the scholar and retrains everyone in it.
From this moment on, our main Dessa, as well as Kirry and Orrin, know Resurrection and can conduct more complex battles.
5. 241 – 347. Return of Our Lands, Purple Tent, Killing Turis, Obtaining Town Portal
We descend through the one-way teleport into the underground with Orrin and a golden bow; with wizards and fairy dragons, we easily dismantle Dragon. All killed are resurrected.
Then another interesting trick: learn "Forgetfulness" with Thorgrim and get himself killed by an enemy hero.
At the same time, Dessa and Kirry sail to Kilgor's Stronghold respawn, where Dessa with 30 archdevils kills more than 1020 (!) bears under Kilgor! We dismantle our ballista and Kilgor's small stacks with Armageddon for 1370 damage, cast Quicksand across the whole map, destroy castle towers with Earthquake, and then "manually" kill the bear legion with 30 archdevils. Sultan-Ifrits are in battle as insurance against a misclick (possibility of teleport or restoring archdevils). Victory!
Kirry uses Water Walking to reach the island with the tavern Stronghold. On 314 we capture the Stronghold, buy Thorgrim, learn Forgetfulness, and attack Yoga, see screenshot. Here we use a different strategy: hypnotize cyclops, hide devils behind them. Then exhaust Yoga's mana using pegasi, kill birds, again cast Quicksand across the map and calmly kill 800 bears.
On 322 we aggro Rizzu to the castle and kill her from defense; take plenty of meat to kill her hundred titans. And Pirry is killed very easily on 326. In the end, the entire respawn where Dessa started is captured.
On 334 with Armageddon + black and gold dragons we kill fairy dragons and visit the purple tent, see screenshot.
On 344 we capture another Inferno (guard requires killing Pirry), and on 346 we kill Turis*; she has a very large army, so it took some effort. For her same-day death, we learn and retrain everyone in Town Portal. At this point you can take a breather; further map completion becomes a matter of time.
On 347 we learn Anti-magic and clear the Dragon Utopia.
Generally from this moment we have enough external dwellings of angels, devils, bears, mages, fanatics to receive very significant growth with such a number of castles. Therefore it's important to capture them all as quickly as possible; as a result, we get much larger growth in a shorter period of time.
6. Mid-game 411 – 447. Clearing the Underground and Attacking the Snowy Respawn
Kirry sails on 411 to the snowy respawn in the east, where she takes the Tower.
411 – Dessa starts the week by killing Clancy in the underground, see screenshot. Here we try to kill our ballista and Clancy's flying units. Since he has no teleport, we can then simply shoot him down. Immediately send Dessa through the underground bypass; by killing neutrals we get +1 +2 and +all stats. Since Dessa is our main, only she should go there. On 415 we kill Zubin on cursed land, on 421 – Tazar and release Boragus, since beating him on cursed land without losses is impossible. On 422 Boragus is killed by us from defense in the Stronghold he jumped into. On 424 we kill Josephine on cursed land (need to take a couple of snakes to block her titans while our bears kill the rest of the army). On 425 we kill Christian, fortunately blindness also works on him. On 427 – Roland is killed (+1 more angel castle).
On 431 we enter the northern snowy respawn and kill Torosara on 433. Here a tactic of teleporting bears to enemy titans in the castle helps.
Orrin sails north on 43x and visits the black tent there, while Kirry and Dessa again pull off the author's puzzle (albeit not very difficult) to release Tunnar with forces from cursed land, and kill him on 441 in the castle from defense. It took a lot of effort with bear morale (2 hits), blinding his fairy dragons etc., but in the end it worked.
We still have no clone or archangels!
445 – we find the phoenix and open the guard further to the snowy respawn in the east, killing Theodore. Even auto-battle wins this fight! :) on 447 we take another Stronghold with all growth.
7. Ending (Months 5-7)
On 511 one very difficult battle in an anti-magic garrison, see screenshot. There is no magic, so with health elixir, speed etc., we feed the remaining gold dragons, tent, cart etc. Cows try to damage azure ones and kill as many as possible. The rest are finished by bears. Losses were quite small, and it was worth it! Dessa receives +40 to each stat. No one other than Dessa can get such stats.
Suddenly in the 5th month a seer at point 0-124-100 offers Dessa expert Necromancy, even though all of Dessa's slots are full! :) perhaps theoretically it was possible to "not fight" with Dessa all this time and get Necromancy in the last slot with the prospect of making liches for the finale, but that's some kind of wrong plan since the map is heading toward the end.
On 512 we kill Solmir, again teleporting bears onto titans where we kill them, and on the same day Daremih. Dessa already has 4000 mana, enough for everything. Dessa's stats are near 99.
On 515 we kill Galtran. Since we cannot blind his necroes, we leave him a minimal number of liches and resurrect all our forces. When he runs out of strength, we just finish Restoration and defeat him.
On 517 we kill Xeron, also an easy battle; you can blind him. On 521 – Monera*; she has a ton of meat, but it's important to destroy our ballista while her magic elements stay stuck in the castle. With a clone of archangels this battle is not difficult either, although I had to replay it a couple of times. On 522 we kill Pasys using a similar strategy.
And on 522 we free Dragon from prison, who can convert all our fanatics and mages into Wizards. Leveling Dragon is not necessary; it's enough to give him just a couple of Knowledge + Intelligence skill at the university so he can fly from castle to castle.
On 526 a difficult battle with Vokial*; he has way too much meat, "wall-to-wall" won't work. Therefore we take only archdevils into battle (+pegasus, mage for mana and archangel to block the castle exit). Then our archdevils try to cast speed+prayer+anti-magic on themselves and hide behind a force field until Vokial runs out of mana. Simultaneously you can cast Destruction Beam on enemy stacks and kill his clones. A long battle, but the strategy worked; Vokial is killed.
On 532 I arrived at Zidar, but it was impossible to kill him at first because there's TOO much meat and he immediately casts Armageddon. Killing 10k ifrits in the field and fire birds seemed unrealistic. Then I did this: took devils, mage, pegasus into battle as usual. Equipped all speed artifacts. In the 1st round hid devils behind a force field, received Armageddon. 2nd round cast prayer, received Armageddon. 3rd round again force field / Armageddon, and only in the 4th round cast anti-magic. Almost half the devils died. Then with explosions of 128 units each I killed 10k ifrits, then the birds. Blinded him with 3 devils, restored myself and thus won this battle. Later I repeated this battle by giving Zidar the castle, and it was easier there since he didn't fly out of the castle.
On 543 a difficult battle against Malekith. I took 1200 imps. In the first rounds I destroyed the ballista and set up shot protection for devils. Then I managed to loop Malekith so that he blinded my devils, who were then hit by tower shots, and so on in a circle. As a result, imps drained more than 200-300 mana from him, and when the AI ran out of mana, the devils behind the force field slaughtered his entire army. A long battle.
On the same day 543 we kill Brissa from defense; even auto-battle handled it :) Blue is killed
On 545 we kill Tamika. Her forces are also very large. I have to spend my entire army to kill her shooter stacks and vamps, use devils to kill her forces, leave only horses, then resurrect everyone.
On 546 another author's idea: release another enemy hero from cursed land – Kalt. The problem with this hero is that he has a cloak against magic above level 2. Therefore the battle is fought on morale, luck, fear from our azure dragons, and tactics to minimize losses. We take a small hit to titans.
Then we are offered a choice by the seer: take the sphere of vulnerability or the sphere of prohibition. Usually I would take the sphere of vulnerability as it's almost ALWAYS more profitable on maps. But this time I chose the sphere of prohibition because right behind the "fence" we have a very difficult battle with Moandor on cursed land, meaning resurrection won't work. Moandor himself knows Haste, and the battle against him just wasn't working. So I equipped armor of the damned + sphere of prohibition, see screenshot, and fought the battle almost without losses. Main thing: block as early as possible, then destroy his liches, weaken bone dragons and black knights, and use phoenixes to lure his forces in the castle so he doesn't come out. Result: battle almost without losses, except for 12 phoenixes used as fodder and damage from castle towers.
At the end of the 6th month I arrived at Gel, but the number of his dragons and more than 10k snipers is a lot. So I had to outsmart him (see screenshot), burning all snipers, fairy dragons and reducing azure and crystal stacks. Berserk didn't work on his dragons. 647 Gel is killed.
Using the same scheme we outsmarted Astral a couple of times, and on 716 I killed him. Very lucky that under the effect of berserk (old bug) azure ones didn't move because his blinded nagas were behind them. With such luck, it was possible to finish the battle very quickly.
On 717 and beyond we outsmart Mutare's dragons (main thing is to kill fairy ones), and then with our azures behind a force field and wizards we kill Mutare without problems. Mutare knows no magic dangerous to us and only blinds wizards. Fortunately mana runs out quickly.
On 723 we have the path to the final castle! And here are 2 paths:
1) guard requiring sphere of prohibition gives us the chance to kill 70k fairies in a normal garrison, which is not very difficult with 739 archdevils (anti-magic, AOTD, blindness on fairies – not a hard battle),
2) guard requiring sphere of vulnerability leads through an ANTI-MAGIC GARRISON with 6000 crystals.
As for me, option №1 is significantly easier than option №2. Although if we had used the sphere of vulnerability in early battles, we wouldn't have had to outsmart opponents. But breaking 6k crystal dragons without losses is a question, even taking phoenixes as lures and using AOTD during attack.
Immediately after passing the fairies we are given the medal of vulnerability, and with it taking the final castle on the same day becomes child's play; the main thing is to lure all dragons into one pile for berserk. Final castle captured, victory!
The map is definitely worth attention! Give it a try!
