Posts from Gray Alliance

It's hard to say why you're experiencing such a strange bug. The first thing I can suggest is to temporarily remove all other maps/mods/campaigns and try starting the mission again (this is the most likely solution, as the loss is recorded upon the death of the main hero, and some map or mod might change the hero's scripted name and break the map's logic). Secondly, try starting the game with a different game profile (but in this case, you'll have to replay the first 2 missions, which isn't ideal).
If that doesn't help, I'll send you a save file for mission 3 after defeating the starting Necromancer in the evening.

I uploaded 3 maps and one third-party campaign, then I deleted all the mods, the campaign, and the maps. I tried to launch a mission – the situation is the same :/. I would be very grateful if you could send me a save file after the initial battle, as I really like the campaign and want to complete it. Thank you in advance!

Here is a save file after the battle with the Necromancer. The profile name for this save is: Andrei

P.S. This save will affect the first 2 maps, and it's hard for me to say which artifacts are collected and what the level of the other two heroes is.

Hello, I can't launch your campaign. The game can't read the h5c file type, but it can read h5m. Is there a version of the campaigns in the h5m file type?

Hello, I can't launch your campaign. The game can't read the h5c file type, but it can read h5m. Is there a version of the campaigns in the h5m file type?

Hello! Is there a way to slow down the videos?
Or could you tell me where to read the text? The plot is interesting, but not everything is clear.

*One power outage and a message rewrite later...*

I decided to check out these campaigns, especially since there's a reward and a guide from the author. I chose the Grey Alliance because it's a truly important part of the lore of Ashan, about which only a few facts are known, such as Alex being abandoned by his allies and the fact that, according to those same allies, Alex was foolish and short-sighted, which Godric greatly disliked, always raising the main question: who was really wrong, the "stupid" Alex or the cowardly allies, considering that later, Kha-Beleth was defeated by an alliance of several armies, but not even entire states. However, this didn't stop him much... but that's a completely different story.

So far, the first three missions.

The first mission. A small, corridor-like map. Very simple, but to level up Alex more, you'll have to think about tactics. This is good. The dialogues are the least laughable, but there are still typos in the latest videos. I didn't fully clear the map (it's quite difficult); Alex arrived in Irollan at level 14.

The second mission. Strange fruit. A lot of typos, and I laughed like crazy at the Red Alpha's lines. Okay, okay, all mapmakers aren't masters of dialogue in their youth; I remember my own attempts six or seven years ago. It comes with literary experience. At least it's funny here. But the texts need to be proofread. The typos are noticeable and not related to the Russian language; they're just typos. The mission itself is boring. You just have to grind for a long time and defeat the sweet dark elves first, and then the Red Alpha, who, however, is weaker than Iranna after a couple of in-game months. Difficult starting conditions that make the first month extremely passive for the player until a decent group of archers is gathered. At the same time, there are no restrictions at all: the dark elves play with each other in "visit the creature hiring building," and the lower city is much easier to take than the upper city because, besides Sinithar level 1, there's no one else there. But he has artifacts and is quite powerful, so it's very profitable to take his city first, rather than Iranna's. However, Iranna is very easy to catch outside the city, which greatly simplifies the battle with her, because she quickly runs away from a pumped-up Alaron, and Sinithar doesn't come out of the walls. I cleared the entire map; Alaron went to beat up the demons at level 31.

The third mission. Almost a copy of the second, but you get a squad of orcs, which allows you to start normally, rather than struggling as in the previous mission. Fewer typos, but they're still here. A beautiful map, and at some point, it puts Alex in the company of Cyrus. Alex leveled up to 23, Cyrus to 28; I was too lazy to kill a couple of neutrals. The tactic is as old as the world: titans, regeneration, summoning magic. Thanks for the building with colossi (on the map), which is easy to get in the first week by luring the orcs guarding it. But there are 0 sulfur mines in the player's zone. What treachery! The lack of sulfur, of course, hurt the rakshasas. I barely gathered a hundred of them from two cities, while there were more titans. I didn't use mages much either, because I don't know how to play with the first tier, I'm used to combat mages. The final boss is easy. When Cyrus came to beat up the necromancers, they just cowered in horror and fled in the first rounds of the battle, regardless of the army. But overall, the missions are much better than the second, because there's a good pace here.

All in all. It seems like the demons and their sweet dark elf friends are attacking everyone, but in fact, the campaign looks something like this: "We captured the city! Hooray! Oh no, they're coming to take it back... defend, stand to the death!!!" Too defensive and passive AI for a campaign about a demon invasion. It feels like Alaron came to attack innocent dark elves, and the Red Alpha was trying to save them. Or that Cyrus attacked the Voidwalkers, and not they, as Agent M. recommended, attacked the mages from behind. Look at the fourth mission: three cities in the corners, three heroes (even four, Cyrus got an orc with excellent troops), and I suspect the demons will also be sitting in a deep defense there. 10 treacherous alliances of invaders who attacked peaceful demons, out of 10!

But in general, the saga is quite good so far. There are plenty of pleasant emotions.

I'm continuing to play.

But I think the inability to leave the territory is intentionally given by the AI in missions 2 and 3. So, it's already a concept of the map itself. And I haven't played the fourth one much yet, so I don't know what's what. And no, I didn't take the advice about the mentor from the comments into account. Swimming for years is swimming for years. I'm only worried about Alex; he's weaker than Alaron and Cyrus. In this mission, you definitely need to level him up first. But he has machines, so he's not a pushover anyway. And once you pump up his soldier's luck, his special ability works every other time.

Fifth mission. As always, the Dungeon faction is strong.

Continuing...)

Fourth mission. This is where I understood what the advice about the mentor in the third mission was for, because by the time my heroes had been running around the map, so much time had passed that the map had turned into a simulator of fighting thousands of neutral creatures. Perhaps this is the most important mission in the campaign, because here you need to prepare our valiant rulers for the final battle, which requires a lot of hero development. In principle, the mission is very simple, but long, and if you drag it out too much, it will happen like it did with me. The enemies are weak. The Dark Elf is not a real opponent, and the Red Demon, although equipped with considerable forces, has level 1 heroes. Both can be defeated very quickly if desired. In general, just level up the heroes, collect as many spells, stats, and artifacts as possible for all three. Orange Demons are already serious opponents, but most of them don't have spells. In general, heroes of the AI often don't have magic, and that's a bit strange. Don't be afraid of the development in three places (Master with four castles and heroes at the start says hello): this is not a problem and you can quickly find a way between the locations of Alex, Alaron, and Cyrus. I ended up with Alex at level 32, Cyrus at 32, and Alaron at 31. I gave Cyrus and Alex the Dark magic as a mentor, and after getting acquainted with the fifth mission, I had to add it to Alaron as well, and also get the Tome of Darkness for Alex, because he was incredibly unlucky with Subdue. The side quest with the Tear of Ashi is very long and not very useful: most likely, it will be built too late unless you get it at the beginning of the game, knowing its location in advance. Maybe it somehow affects the fifth mission, but hardly: it lacks an economic component. In general, the sea is too big, because there are not so many loot and islands in it compared to the free space. In general, it's a good mission if you fix the AI.

Fifth mission. A remake of the final mission of the original game, but without the siege of the city with Biara. We enter, get beaten by Kha-Beleth, and go back to the fourth mission to adjust the hero development. Due to the huge stats of the father and son, Isabel's outcome of the battle largely depends on the correct use of magic, so pure builds for damage and defense are not effective. Kha-Beleth himself deals little damage, and in essence, you just need to defeat the sequentially appearing demons, who have a lot of attack and defense. Alaron unexpectedly turned out to be the weak link: you can't win much here with just Light magic. But Darkness works, as always. There are not many artifacts, but they are there. Kha-Beleth, casually sending Agrael on a trial (apparently a reference to the same-named scenario), immediately after they tried to defeat him with a crowd of people, mages, and elves, is included. The mission itself is a good test of medium difficulty.

General conclusions. In general, it's a good campaign, the main drawbacks of which are the AI and typos in the dialogues. The plot is good, there are even interesting ideas, like the intrigues of the Voidwalkers with a hint of a sequel. I also noticed that the creature weeks are not disabled, which can be very annoying in story missions. And there is another drawback: sometimes there is an imbalance in the protection of objects/mines, when the same thing can be guarded by a great army and some trifle. Or +1 to attack is guarded by dragons for the last coin. The strengths of the campaign are the level design, the landscape, and the ideas.

7.5 offended Godricks out of 10

Sincerely,

AstralLein

Added 9 hours 18 minutes ago

By the way, thank you for the hard work in map creation)

And I remembered another point, as alternative upgrades in the campaign are not available to the player (orcs don't count), but there are a lot of neutral creatures with alternative upgrades on the maps. And I would close my eyes to this, but I was given these alternative upgrades several times, and then it was very sad to refuse these units)

I played without Darkness. 240 archers on Alex one-shot everyone up close, even through defense. Alaron kills everyone with one Holy Vengeance.

(342 days on the campaign with a hero, exploring all the upgrades)

P.S. in the original, where the combined artifacts were moved, they could not be bought and found randomly (from Dragon Utopia, etc.)