Posts from Four Lakes Auto-translated

Sorry, SandroXXL, I just don't have time to participate in the tournament. I have a lot of other things to do on my computer. :(
So, remove me from the list of participants.

Unfortunately, due to a valid reason (see the ninth stage of the Van Kanigem tournament), there is absolutely no time left for a replay. So, I'm sending the save file as is)). If I end up last, that's fine too)).
Thank you again for the tournament));)

I've sent everything)). Here you go)).

Starhan, I caught the save. Lu41k, either my hands are clumsy, or you threw it too hard, but this save missed. Please throw it again. General ZeT, I'm waiting for the correct save. There's one day left, there's still time. If not, don't eat, don't sleep.... :) OptiMAL, no problem. I was putting off playing the eighth stage myself - I waited, the tournament is over.

SandroXXL, I apologize too... I just couldn't make it work. Thank you very much for taking the initiative. Special thanks for the map; I really liked it. It's a shame we couldn't play it properly. But in the end, quite a few people showed up, don't you think? IronAxe himself :D ;) even honored us with his presence... :)

SandroXXL, I apologize too... I just couldn't make it work. Thank you so much for the initiative. Special respect for the map, I really liked it. It's a pity that we couldn't play properly. But in the end, quite a few people showed up, don't you think? IronAxe himself :D ;) honored us with his participation... :)

Well, it's not a big deal if we don't get enough players. First of all, we play for the sake of the game itself, not for the rating ;) So let's all show up for the ninth stage of the tournament, Kanigema! Four-player games! ;) Let's go on board! :)
PS. And don't put off playing until the last day, or the frigate will leave and you won't catch up!

Dear tournament participants. This is my first tournament, and I'm sure I'll be in last place. I've never played for speed before. Please don't laugh at my result. I'll try to win faster in the next tournament. If anyone wants to share advice, please do; I'd be very grateful.

Dear tournament participants. This is my first tournament, and I'm sure I'll be in last place. I've never played for speed. Please don't laugh at my result.

:) No one has ever laughed at anyone's results here (even if they were very slow), or at being in last place. Everyone can make mistakes and lose, so what now?

In the next tournament, I'll try to win faster. If anyone wants to share advice, please do, I'll be very happy.

We'll share advice when the tournament officially ends and the discussion of playthroughs begins. Otherwise, the leader might find a way to share their save files, at least one save from the end of each day.

IronAxe, I've heard that you're a strong player. I enjoyed participating in a tournament with you. I hope you'll give me some advice after the tournament. Best regards, General Zet.

IronAxe, they tell me you're a strong player.

:) I'm getting old, and the armor is heavy. Sometimes, in offline games, I can still do something in Heroes 4. :)

It was a pleasure to participate in a tournament with you. I hope you'll give me some advice after the tournament. Sincerely, General ZeT.

It's a shame that not many people made it to the finish. As for a couple of pieces of advice – what kind of advice are you looking for? You need to play more often in tournaments. Then, if you have any questions about reaching the leader, don't hesitate to ask about any unclear moments in the gameplay. The leaders' answers will then be good advice for you. That's the only way. ;) If you already have any questions about Heroes 4, ask them in the thread. Probably, you can ask them here too.

So, the Tournament of Four Lakes is over. Not everyone made it to the finish. And I never received a save from Lu4ik. I don't know what kind of glitches these are, but the saves from the other participants were all there (except for Lu4ik, whose save didn't arrive once). Be that as it may, we need to summarize the results. Lu4ik, you did well to send the save to Alan; I hope he will respond and inform everyone about the outcome. For now, all the results are preliminary, and the final results will be presented when news arrives from Alan.
For now...

Rank Days Full HP Player Nickname
1_____9____710___IronAxe
2_____12___665___LeSHiJ MaX
3_____59___680___Starhan
4_____79___980___Arandor
5_____144__920___General ZeT

And here are the in-game results for Heroes 4 in the attached file, for clarity.

As can be seen from the results, the most effective tactic was to choose a Chaos mage and use destruction spells, as well as strong units - Goblins, for a quick start and to eliminate the opponent in the early stages, before they have developed. A Dragon King was also available in the center of the map; for 20,000 and 8 gems, he would serve you faithfully, but, as practice has shown, it was possible to finish the game quickly even without him. Finally, I want to thank everyone who participated in the tournament (including those who didn't submit a save), and now I will leave the tournament topic for a while (until Saturday). I hope that this unpleasant situation with Lu4ik's saves will still be resolved, and we are waiting for Alan with his review.

I also want to say that I will be preparing "winter" maps of my own creation (if I have enough time) by the end of November. This will be a kind of gift for the forum members for the New Year. I will create a separate thread so that, if desired, each player can send a save file with the map's results and be included in the list of top players. This will not be a tournament; it will simply be a general player rating where each player can compare their result with another player's result, and save files can be sent repeatedly. Cheating will be suppressed, but I still hope for your conscientiousness ;).

:) I'm getting old, and the armor is heavy. Sometimes I can do something in offline mode in Heroes 4 :)
Well, the leaders' answers will then be good advice for you. Just like that ;) If you have any questions about Heroes 4 now, ask them in the thread. Probably, you can ask them here too.

Can you show your walkthrough in videos? :rolleyes:

Dear SandroXXL, IronAxe, may I suggest that you test my map and give me your feedback? The initial goal is simple: choose a hero and survive. And then try to win. P.S. Leshij-Max, I think I sent it to you.

I'll write about the results of saving Luchik later this evening; if I remember correctly, it's around 25 days.

A Dragon King was also attached in the center of the map; for 20000 and 8 gems, he would have served you faithfully, but as practice showed, it was possible to finish the game quickly without him.

:) That's funny - I didn't notice that 8 gems were also needed for him. And I had barely scraped together 20000. Simply put, in my walkthrough, if I had bought the Dragon, I probably wouldn't have had to give two chaos dweller graves to the Grove hero who was heading to the last fortress where the Gargantuas were. But it seems that wouldn't have improved my result anyway - it just might have been less of a hassle. Then, in reality, I got a bit lucky. I couldn't beat the last AI with the Grove hero. I used a trick. The Grove hero was moving on fairies accelerated in the stable (which he summoned himself during the turn transition). After the fairies visited the stable and are moving with the Grove hero
you need to make sure that during the turn transition he doesn't summon fairies, but summons wolves, which can simply be discarded/dismissed. Otherwise, a summoned non-accelerated fairy will merge into one slot with the one accelerated in the stable, and the fairies' move points will align with the one that is not accelerated. Then the walkthrough time will increase by 1-2 days. So
I gave the Grove hero two chaos dweller graves, and upon approaching the fortress, the Grove hero hid in a sulfur mine. Otherwise, the last AI's heroes would have set up a defense in the fortress and I wouldn't have taken it for the life of me :) But it seems that precisely because I hid in the mine, the stupid AI with all his shaman came out and moved away from the fortress. On the next turn, my Grove hero came out of the mine, reached the empty fortress, resurrected two chaos dwellers there, bought another Grove hero with fairy summoning, and they, gathering all available units, came out and crushed the last opponent, whose main forces consisted of 2 Grove heroes (one of whom was powerful) and 3 Gargantuas. The essence of the battle - never let the gargantuas shoot. For this, both of our chaos dwellers have blindness magic, the Grove hero has fairy summon to block the shooters, and there were a couple of natural fairies. That was enough. The mushumba was scary :)

Added after 12 minutes

Can you show your walkthrough in movies :rolleyes:

Definitely. I just think it's easier than writing a detailed walkthrough. That way, anyone interested can watch the movies having saves from the end of each turn and, if necessary, ask specific questions about where and what they don't understand about how it was passed or how a battle was won. Let's discuss where to upload the saves. I think last time there were problems here with the saves from the 4th stage of the Kanigem Tournament, and I posted them on some file exchange whose address I've forgotten. Maybe someone can suggest where it's better to put the saves.
Imho, the hardest battle was for the Evil Eye spawning ground. It was defended by Black Horses and Minotaurs. I lost three fairies there, I think, not counting the summoned ones. By the way, the battle was not from the loop series.
And at the initial stage, the Grove hero bought in the fortress with fairy summon was greatly helped by the Ring of Speed artifact, to win tedious long battles with summoned fairies. From the prisons, a female chaos hero was chosen as an assistant to the main hero.
PS. Thanks to the organizers for holding the tournament!

Added after 3 minutes

Dear SandroXXL, IronAxe, may I suggest that you test my map and evaluate it? The goal is simple at first - choose a hero and survive. And then try to win.

You can send the map to me at BigAxes@rambler.ru As for how quickly and when I'll test it - that's a question depending on actual free time.

Added after 7 minutes

Can you show your walkthrough in movies :rolleyes:

You've bugged me a little. Did you use the tavern in the center of the map, which the dwarves guarded, AND the resurrection point near the Dragon King quest in your walkthrough? I don't think you did? Further, I saw three paths - this hero buys the Dragon King and deals with the last opponent himself with a bunch of bottles and artifacts, or he is given two chaos dweller graves, but as I already said, you need to be lucky here and the opponent must leave the fortress undefended. The third path is via the bridge and entering the gargantua spawning ground. You could hire one there. But this third path is the least preferable because one gargantua was not enough for this hero to defeat the last opponent, imho.