Posts from Awakening of Evil

Well, maybe fewer, but definitely about the gems. Later on, the devils will ask for something like crystals.

If all else fails (I vaguely remember), you can just kill them.

Greetings, I want to share my walkthrough of this campaign (so far only the first mission, due to its impressive scope). I've heard about this author (but not sure) something like "Master's campaigns, but I won't complete them" (a remix in my opinion). For now, a few words about the first mission – despite some nuances, I thoroughly enjoyed it. The map is huge, with tons of locations, everything is beautifully detailed and well-crafted, some things are cleverly hidden, plenty of leveling spots, and a vast number of artifacts. In short, there's room to stretch out, and I won't lie – I managed to beat it in 12-13 months of in-game time. It might seem like a long time, well, that's how I managed. All in order...

I'll divide it into conditional stages: The Start (where we need to get to the surface), The Surface itself (side quests, evading scouts, etc.), The Second Part of the Surface (digging up the Grail, going into the underground), And finally, the Underground...

Our antagonist is Sigrif, and according to the map's lore, some Warlocks have returned to their old ways and want to destroy Ygg-Shail, backed by the Horned Ones, naturally. We, as a super solo hero, want to travel through the elven lands and deal with these traitors (maybe not exactly one-to-one, but that's the main gist of the first mission).

Mission 1 – A New Threat (Start)



Our GG starts his journey in a dungeon – specialty: -Initiative + Dragon Summoning (the secondary one initially seemed like trash, but after understanding how it works, specifically where the extra dragons come from, it's pretty okay). Let's call him Railag on steroids. Our task is to get to the surface. The location itself is quite small, but you'll need to hustle here. For the starting bonus, I took Furks, I think. After looking at the stacks and running around a bit, I realized the first fight is kiting a zombie stack with Furks to quickly level up. While we are weak, my plan was that I needed Fire Warriors; they're essential, seeing the strength of neutrals. And strange as it sounds, I didn't have to wait long – on the first try, I summoned Fire Warriors, and at the very start, I found a Belt of Elementals (what luck!). But there's one catch – with Knowledge 1, you can't summon many multi-elements. I wasn't very lucky, and most stat gains went to Attack (until level 11, I think).


There's a cool magic school – let's call it that – where we can be given one of the magic schools to choose (or improve existing ones). I chose Summoning to get Expert Summoning as early as possible for the Fire Warriors...


Also, near the exit, there are 12 buttons (I think). Stepping on them can either make you lose something or gain something. Nothing complicated – take a piece of paper, write down each button, and follow the optimal route...


Before exiting the dungeon, there's a Witch Hut guarded by a stack of (undead) dragons. It's worth conquering because, in my understanding, without Logistics on the surface, there's nothing to do. And then we head out to the surface, where the real fun begins.

Stage 2 – The Surface



And a bit of frustration when you already have a high level, but your GG doesn't look like a Warlock...


In the Prophet's Hut, we get the first side quest. It sounds simple and straightforward: capture all the peasant huts on the map and you will be rewarded. But don't be fooled – almost every hut owner wants something from you, and for the hut to turn your color, you need to do something (find my wood, pay the treasury, kill zombies, kill wolves, burn a village, bring an artifact, etc.).


That would be fine, but after some time passes, the first scout appears (I don't remember exactly when, but nevertheless). This adds a new feature to the gameplay. Right away, we don't quite understand what it's about – okay, a scout and a scout. However, we cannot engage him in battle, and even if we do, he has strong armies that will simply trample us (although later you could amass enough power to destroy the scout, but it would only stroke your ego; the mission would be failed...).


At first glance, it seemed quite difficult – you need to do things and run away from them (yes, later there will be two of them). But thankfully, there are safe zones where they (the scouts) don't go, and they don't just stand around guarding the zone. The first one is the Sanctuary...



You need to sit tight for about 3 days to have room to maneuver, and then continue doing your business...

We will also visit a second prophet, who will say we need to destroy all the ruined human cities cursed by the undead, and he will reward us.


Damn, it looks beautiful...


There are also small side quests we encounter along the way. One is to free some units from an Assassin ambush; a similar one involves Furks (the places where they are being attacked are highlighted). We simply beat the attackers, the saved stacks join us, and their creature dwelling is built (Military School / Bloody Arena).


Below is just a screenshot from the moment when I didn't understand why, at my level, I had so few summoned Drakes...


And actually, nothing seems too difficult, until the point where you gather enough mass that enemy piercing doesn't cause issues. But at some point, a second scout appears. Leveling up mostly stayed that way until the end of the mission.



And here a problem arose. I actually thought for quite a long time about how to complete the quest for the red key. The key won't be given to us until we bring the Necromonate set. Doesn't seem too difficult, but there's no safe zone there, and we simply don't have time to clear that area and avoid falling into the hands of the elves. I tried this way and that, until it dawned on me that it's basically impossible to do with Sigrif. And no one said it had to be him, so it could be done with, say, the cockroach Sinitar.


Hopelessness...


And jumping ahead a bit, I need to say that you don't necessarily have to open the red guard. To be more precise, I advise against opening him because then two elves will enter that zone, and you'll have to flee from them there. In reality, you can enter that area from the top left corner, where the sands are, and where we saved the Furks – there's a passage. If we enter there with Sigrif, the elves mostly patrol the sand area and don't go further. But if you open the guard, they will roam everywhere.

About SAFE ZONES – any fenced-off farm field; the bots don't go there. Also, if you stand on a green marker, like the ones in front of ruined castles or in front of graves. Oh yes, this is another side quest where we need to go to the cemetery and, to complete it, stand on the marker and fight an undead stack...

About Sinitar. After thinking for a long time, I realized that Sigrif should just run around in areas where he isn't pursued, while Sinitar clears the zone. For this, I leveled him up in the Magic School with the set for elements: Axe + Armor (to strengthen elemental chains) + Pendant of Icy Embrace (until you find something better).

And so, our guy, poof-poof, ololo, manages to retrieve the four artifacts with difficulty. Then we can calmly bring them and get the key. But I repeat, I advise you not to open the guard...


What's most interesting is that any hero can turn in these side quests. And since the elves are mostly interested only in the GG, this works in our favor (they aggro on cockroaches if Sigrif is not present, or if they are not in a safe zone, or if you expose yourself; but if Sigrif and a cockroach are standing together, the first one they run at is Sigrif).


Further along the way, we will encounter Archangels and Crystal Dragons, who will ask for resources for passage. I didn't have the resources, but without much thought and with relative ease, I destroyed them...



A few battles that I think are worth attention:

vs DwarfStack

vs 750 Crystal Dragons

vs ElfStack

Phoenixes for passage to the dungeon entrance

vs Phoenixes (for the Mentor)


One more thing that might be useful: one of the peasant huts will ask you to find its ore. You'll see a cart, but no bandits themselves. An alt hero will help here – in the trees, a stack of Brutes will be highlighted. Or here are those same "bandits".


And let me say this right away about something I don't understand: why is it like this? If you find any Tome of Magic, don't think to rejoice. Because as far as I understand, they only contain spells of levels 1-3, or maybe even nothing at all (since I couldn't judge spells properly without them). But the fact is that TOMES OF MAGIC are USELESS here. If you urgently need a specific spell, you'll only find it separately by defeating Mage Towers; there you'll be given scrolls and wands (Resurrection, Blind, Vampiric, Shock of the Earth, Freezing Stop, Berserk, Heavenly Shield, etc.). Maybe it's a feature of the map, but man, why the hell...?


As you complete side quests, you are given hints about the Grail's location, and parts of the map are revealed. Advice: if you want to read the hint properly, either screenshot it or quickly skip the map fragment reveal, because while you're looking at it, the message with the hint will be unreadable (besides this, we are given an army and various goodies). To avoid major spoilers, I won't say exactly where the Grail is. Let's just say that when you have a few fragments left, you'll understand where it is, but you won't be able to approach it... I initially thought it was some kind of bug, but no, it's a feature that adds even more edge to this map...


Funny thing: when we approach this zone and go to the prophet, he says, "You must have spent quite a lot of resources to get here, didn't you?" I thought to myself, "Certainly, a whole lot of '0'." Oh well. His quest is to capture all three nearby mines, and then you can return for a reward. And if resources are really tight, you can sacrifice a hero for a small amount of resources. It's amusing, but I think I'll keep my hero.



Also, on the way to the center, there is a refugee camp (which again will give a side quest to capture all dwellings and will give a hint that it's the 12th one). This shouldn't be a problem either – if you've done everything, there won't be any issues...


Next, we reach the center, but don't rush to the Prophet's Hut. Instead, go straight to the Tavern (or Thieves' Den). There, for a certain fee, the last fragment of the map riddle will be revealed, and you'll know for sure where the Tear of Asha is. Also, while Sigrif is here, either pay the Phoenixes or destroy them (I destroyed them, battle record above).


Let's summarize this stage: everything is cool and great, lots of quests, everything is well-crafted. The only thing that gets a bit annoying is having to frequently upgrade units. When your army slots are full, and there's a stack of the wrong upgrade, it's not a huge problem if you have cockroaches with Logistics, but it does happen. Even the extra army given from side quests may not always suit you, so be careful. Tomes of Magic are useless. So it seems we've succeeded, now we'll enter the underground soon, and everything will be fine. But not so fast... let's move on.


Stage 3 – For the Grail and into the Underground


As I said earlier, don't rush to take the Hut because we need to prepare. Jumping ahead: it's the Key Guardian. For him to give us the key, we must prove our strength by bringing him the Tear of Asha. We already know where it is, we know we can't reach it, but after watching the cutscene, we'll be allowed to stand in that spot and dig it up... According to the lore, Fhaiden will send Ossir and Anwen (new scouts). However, one of them will be roaming around (with an enormous army), and the other will be waiting for us just past the guardian (and this is the exception where we are allowed to beat the green one).



And before activating this script, I recommend preparing and doing it like I did. What do I mean?
We have a total of 4 heroes. Any of them can approach the Hut, so I left a cockroach there, and positioned the other 3 closer to the Tear. My strategy was simple: create a chain so that the GG with the Grail could get as close as possible to the path to the center.
All actions take place on day 7:
- One cockroach at the Hut activates the script.
- Another is almost at the excavation site of the Tear; after activation, we are allowed to get to the required position.
- The GG + another cockroach stand at a stable so they can take it the next day.
Skip the day. Place the cockroach on the excavation site. Place another cockroach in the chain so that the day after the excavation, he passes the Tear to the next one. Position Sigrif within the movement range of the second cockroach who will pass the Tear. Ideally, Sigrif will go through several portals and end up in a grassy area. There, we need to stand in a specific spot so that Ossir can't reach us.
- Then grab the flag and rush back at full speed.



Ideally, we stand here, literally one cell away so he can't reach us. A few save/loads and it will work (all cockroaches have Expert Logistics with Pathfinding).


Next, thanks to the stables, we gain a little distance. Then we continue the path to the center. We can pick up the Grail with a cockroach and turn in the quest. We will be given the key. But don't forget to upgrade your dragons from the Black ones to Red ones because of the Dungeon stack before the entrance to the underground. You'll see the stack yourself and compare it to yours to avoid losing unnecessary units.


At this stage, with such an army, there were no problems with Anwen at all, so I won't focus on it too much.
Sigrif vs Anwen


We enter the underground, see a cutscene, and move on to the next stage...


Stage 4 – Entering the Underground + Finale of the Scenario



According to the lore, we've made it and must take everyone out. But our friend in stockings calls through a portal to daddy Railag and tells him about our doings. To prevent a leak of information, we need to eliminate Ossir, who is about to report to the capital. And so, long story short, bring in Railag.



As they say, auto-combat is auto-combat...



Actually, nothing terrible. A couple of bestowals and the job is done (I think I handled it slightly better overall).

Railag vs Ossir


There are a couple of nuances here too. Ossir stops moving from the moment Sigrif enters the underground, and starts moving again from the moment Railag exits the underground. Therefore, before Railag exits the underground, skip a turn to have all your movement points. Do this on day 6-7 so you can reach a stable next week along the way, and head towards Ossir. No problems here. The only thing is that there's nothing else to do after this except go into the underground. Unfortunately, no one can do that except Sigrif... (


And finally, the Underground finale. There are no issues here, in my opinion. Our task is to wipe everyone out. There are several castles and heroes here. In reality, only Letos might seem strong in terms of army. But if you encounter them in the field, the enemy has no chance. If the enemies are in a castle, you'll need to mess around a bit, but not too much...


This was the main build. The only thing is, when I found the last part of the Dragon set, I abused dragon growth, and sometimes took a Vampirism scroll.



And finally, I saw the normal working of the specialty with summoning extra dragons.


Namely, that it's a percentage of the core ones...


In the underground itself, we collect 1 Dragon artifact so we can abuse the set. We have 4 Dungeon towns and 1 Demon town. None of them posed any particular problems. We methodically clear them all and finish the mission.
At the end of the mission, my army looked like this:



And a few battles that I saved:
Sigrif vs Sorgal

Sigrif vs Deleb

Sigrif vs Letos


Actually, they are quite strong. But at this stage, with such a GG, there are no problems anymore. It all depends on you how many units you want to lose...


Let's summarize the mission overall: I really enjoyed it. Despite the fact that there seems to be too much of everything, and everything takes too long, damn it, it doesn't feel repulsive. On the contrary, it's a challenge to complete everything, and you want to play it. Downsides I noticed: I don't know about others, but I had quite frequent crashes. That was a bit frustrating. Not during the game itself, but during the save/load phases. Yes, that had to be done a lot and often, but sometimes it was infuriating, especially when you fail, you try to load, and the game just crashes. It happened maybe about 10 times or more. Not exactly a huge problem, but it was annoying...

And another downside: one of the Dungeon towns in the underground is not labeled at all. Not critical, but it's a thing...

And on that note, moving on. Depending on the size of the missions, it will be either one post per mission or one post for two missions.

Greetings, ladies and gentlemen. Well, I have FINALLY overcome mission #2 - "The Outcast's Path" and want to share my vision of this scenario's walkthrough. In short, two feelings were fighting inside me: damn, this is BRILLIANT and damn, how it has gotten on my NERVES... Let's take it in order...

Lore-wise: Our protagonist's actions, while effective, actually yielded little results. Humans and elves united in an alliance against Ig-Shail, and Sigrif, despite all our efforts, is exiled to the Outcast Lands, from which there is supposedly no escape, and we will be there until the end of our days...


At the start, we are greeted by a cool cutscene, and as a farewell, our brother Sinitar (strangely enough, in the previous mission he actually played a significant role for me) gives us the Traveler's Boots. I'll say right away about the starting bonuses, you can safely skip the green boots, because you will find them later, so feel free to ignore them...

From the start, we are offered to take one of two paths. One is supposedly easier, and the other supposedly more difficult (although it turned out to be exactly the opposite).

I'll start with the easier option (as it seemed to me at the time).

From the start, there are a few small breakthroughs, a mini-quest to increase the army from the Prophet's Hut for bringing him a clover, which is located right on the path in front of it. Oh yes, I forgot to mention, right from the start, we are asked to choose a simple version of the game or a harder one. I chose the tougher one, so I can't tell you how it plays on normal. Probably on normal there are smaller stacks guarding various loot, but I don't know, maybe someone who played the simple version can tell.


Well, anyway, we don't seek easy paths...


Later, we can either go through the portal (which will allow us to get to the surface right away; I did this the first time and regretted it later, as it was easier to replay) or, following the outcast's path, go through the labyrinth.


There is actually nothing difficult there, just beat up 4 stacks of Swine (Minotaur upgrade). Just in case, here's the battle:

vs 4 stacks of Minotaurs

And according to our hero's token, he gets quite heavily downgraded, turning from our OP character into this. Oh yes, on top of everything, the stats are like a level 1 hero...


But at least you are immediately led to the surface exit, bypassing the labyrinth. And it would seem, hey, that's good, because our main goal is to get out of here as quickly as possible, not wander through labyrinths. Well, I stopped at that point and decided to quickly see what would happen if I chose the other path.



As a result, it seemed even worse... namely, the stats were the same, and they took even more levels away.


Looking at this, I thought, "No, this is some nonsense, they made him even dumber. I'd rather reload to where I am at the exit and explore the labyrinth. Why did the author make it if you can skip it? You need to explore it..."

UNDERGROUND LABYRINTH

Actually, it's very well done, as much as possible to implement in a turn-based strategy. Well, if it seems easy to you (it actually isn't difficult), you can skip the mini-map, and then it will be oh so fun to wander in it. What I liked was that, roughly speaking, we go through it in one day, namely, in the labyrinth the turn is infinite (well, you will stop when you run the full distance, but whatever). And here's a tip right away: before being "reset," leave more mana, because stat-wise we will be a level 1 hero. Yes, over time we will gain something, but for now, save it. This can be abused later with the "Dark Ritual" when you have used all your mana, and you have some amount of knowledge, and roughly speaking, although there are wells, they can be used once, but here, use the ritual as much as you like.

I'll continue. Why was my choice wrong? Nevertheless... I don't know if it's a bug or a feature, but if we explore the labyrinth from the exit, and not the other way around, then the level-up boosters we collect don't give us stats immediately for some reason. Why am I saying this? As a result, I ended up with a level 28 Sigrif, I think, with very low stats. And in the end, I realized there was nothing for us to catch on the surface, especially since there will be an obstacle there that will be quite annoying at first...

And if you skip the labyrinth, you will miss a rather interesting site quest, "Chronicles of Predominance" - a story that will tell about a certain Dominion. Well, I won't spoil further; I'll just say that we will meet an old acquaintance who will conditionally help us in this matter.




Well, anyway, in the underground, I think there are 4 such places where you need to find the story, and it's actually useful to remember the info, because you will need it.

And so, the underground itself ends up looking like this...



And what kind of hero I ended up with when I explored the entire labyrinth from the exit. Well, at that point I didn't lose heart and moved on...


Agreed, a very, very powerful guy, almost level 30....(

Let's move to the next part — the surface, and it's something else... from the category of MILLIONS OF BILLIONS OF QUESTS — which are cool, but the running around was a bit tiresome. Here I tried to complete everything and everyone, but I'll just say I only didn't complete a couple. Maybe someone who played can tell me.
1. Where the Alchemist (Adept) in the human city needed to find three ingredients. Two of them are obvious (meadery, winery), but WHERE ARE THOSE DAISIES? (southwest of the castle). I searched and searched, clicked and clicked, didn't find them...
2. Steal the ARTIFACT from the Centaur Watcher — also didn't understand how to do it. Maybe because my brain was already melting, but no matter how you approach, he's always like "Oh, you villain!" etc...
3. Find "Sita" (I think) — some thief who stole a cool artifact
4. Join the Thieves' Guild (probably if I had stolen the artifact from the centaur and found this "Sita," the quest would have been completed).

Well, that's jumping ahead. Now let's continue from the moment we emerge onto the surface.


On the surface, briefly lore-wise. No one knows the Outcast Lands or how to get out of here. This patch of land continues to be divided among Humans, Elves, and Orcs.

In a nutshell, there is a very COOL (almost bug-free) system here where we gain reputation in each city to progress further in the story. But what's the point of working for someone when we could just leave and finish the mission? It would be easier if that were possible...

On my first attempt, I basically found the exit right away and met our old acquaintance Dawson (the monk from the previous mission, who is by no means a monk [but that's not in this mission]), who, out of the kindness of his heart, tells us what's what and what to do...


In short, there is a portal that will lead us out of these lands, but there is a BUT. You need to insert 4 stones (I don't remember the name) into the portal. Simply put, you need 4 stones from each faction:
- from Humans
- from Orcs
- from Elves
- from Demons (easiest to get, in my opinion)

To get them, we need to achieve a high reputation with one of the sides to reach the final quest. You can't be good with everyone because some quests, one way or another, overlap with another race, forcing us to choose where to earn reputation points — with them or with those.

Let me show you some battles from the first attempt, and what Sigrif looked like the first time...

stack of Messengers/Banshees

undeadStack

And a battle that isn't difficult, just takes a LOOOONG time (like most battles up to a certain point).

Kiting 200,000 Peasants/Militia/Landlords

Everything would be fine, all fun and games, until a certain point when Deleb comes out, whom we cannot possibly defeat with such a hero. And actually, I tried many different options. Yes, there are safe zones where she doesn't follow you, you can try to bait her a bit (if you capture the gold mine in the center with the help of the humans), but at that time none of this helped me, and I realized I needed to go a different way — specifically, to go through the labyrinth from the START, not from the FINISH.

Minor detail: the perk = hidden reward (or whatever it's called) in the character tree — don't take it, because the second time it won't give us a bonus, since I had it from the previous mission. On this cheerful note, I skipped it and started over, but taking the other path...

I won't beat around the bush; I'll show you right away the protagonist that came out if you go the outcast's path (from the beginning of the labyrinth).




Now this, in my opinion, looks more like a dominator daddy. Much more pleasant and, how to say, more playable).

for the green key

200k peasants ver2

Now for the most interesting part — namely, the gameplay on the surface with a more playable version of the protagonist.

In short, I went the Human + Elf route. If I understood correctly, it's generally nearly impossible to get maximum reputation with all three, but it's quite feasible with two.
Jumping ahead, based on my feelings, reputation was gained fastest with the Elves, then Humans, then Orcs.

The first city where I settled more firmly was the Human one...
Along the way, I completed a couple of quests just lying around on the map — namely, taking the gold mine from the Orcs and completing the Sphinx's tasks. I'll try to be in order...



And actually, there are quite a few minor quests where we need to choose one side or another just by traveling on the map.



Most of these places have a leader you can talk to, and he will tell his story and what he wants from you. One way or another, if you have a quest for these objects and you haven't spoken to them before, but are encountering them for the first time, then after the dialogue you will be offered to attack or not; the choice will be yours...

After entering the Heroes' city, we go in and pick up quests everywhere they are given (and they aren't given everywhere, because to get a more advanced quest you need more reputation, but they will tell us that when we approach the building).

From the Humans, I picked up:
Quest from the owner of the meadery — "Go, have a look, see what's what. You haven't tried my honey?"
- The meadery is not far from the castle. Actually, when approaching it we will see trappers burning it. Overall, nothing difficult, just take them out. Then water elementals spawn; after killing them, the meadery fire goes out, and the quest is completed. You just need to return to turn it in and get the reward (mainly reputation).
Nearby, from the Adept (Alchemist), a quest to poison the weapons that will slay Orcs on the spot (which I actually didn't do) — I found the easy things, but not the daisies...

Also a quest from the monk: "We've run out of booze; go to the winery and bring some."
- Again, nothing difficult. Just go to the winery; it's located more to the east in the center. They will tell us there that they only have this many barrels; bandits stole the other barrels. The bandits are trappers located not far from the portal (which we need to go through at the very end). We take the barrels from them and deliver them to the client.

Quest from the head of provisions:
- "We are low on supplies. Could you collect some barrels and bring them to me?" Again, nothing difficult. If you look closely, near the farms there are barrels that don't have a target highlight, but when you approach them they disappear and you get a corresponding message. Collect them all and deliver them to the client.

I don't remember who gave the quest: "The peasant owes money; get it back."
- This peasant is located near the winery, and there are different options. a) Either near the elven city there are elementals; beat them up — they owe more than I do — and give me the rest, keep the rest. b) Or mug the guard (Orcs) and be done with it (I think I did both).

Arena (there is one in every city):
- Since the Human one was first, it was relatively difficult, but I'll come back later.

Ore quest:
- I don't remember where I got it, but I remember needing to give 200 ore to a guy. Nothing difficult, but you need to run around.

Weapon delivery:
- As far as I remember, we take weapon crates from the elven city and bring them to the humans.

Well, anyway, I gathered all this stuff, completed the meadery quest, then went to do the Sphinx quest, because in my opinion it's a must-have for effectively fighting Deleb. To get to it, you need to break through a portal. I just might not be able to insert the right replay now (either this breakthrough to the Sphinx or to the demon castle + other battles I didn't mention but decided to save).

vs Hunters (I think at the request of the Druids)

1200 Assassins (for the gold mine, but I'm not sure)

When we get to the Sphinx, he will say: "I won't help you for nothing; take down the demon castle, and then we'll talk." We're like, "OK, with great pleasure" (probably one of the easiest battles).

Demon Castle

And here we get the first sphere (needed to activate the portal).
Taking advantage of the moment while Deleb is hesitating, thinking whether she should capture the mine or not, we build up our strength as much as possible. But anyway, what about the Sphinx? I won't beat around the bush; I'll attach all the answers below...




After all these answers to the questions, we get a hefty boost in experience and stats, our army is doubled, and most importantly (in my opinion), what reduces suffering, we get the Tome of Darkness, which spawns near the destroyed demon castle. By that time, we are already quite sturdy, and Deleb isn't targeting us yet, so we go and grab the tome. It's good in itself (though there's no sub-faction for some reason, probably a map feature). Well, no matter. And here I realize that Law isn't really that necessary for us, so why not take Darkness, since the opportunity presents itself...

I don't remember the exact timeline of my walkthrough (earlier or later), but of course, near the human city, there are two trees that give +levels, and I really wanted to try beating them, which is exactly what I did.

vs 500 Phoenixes (for the tree closer to the meadery)

vs 800 Elven Dragons (for the tree north, near the peasant dwellings)

And some periodic battles before meeting Deleb:
- After the meadery, I went down the western side, so to speak. There was a stack of Mages that I couldn't defeat yet, but there were artifacts that would eventually make up the Empathy set. I really wanted them, but it wasn't possible yet...

vs 10k Griffins

vs DwarfStack

Returned to the arena and managed to defeat Iris, but couldn't manage Dugal yet.

Sigrif vs Iris

50k Dwarf Milkmen

vs 5k Ents

Let me pause on this battle for a bit. It's not difficult, but again, quite long. Especially since I'm still without Darkness (with the tome but without the magic). After I took them out, I moved on, and then I got ambushed — and I'm out of mana(( And after the battle, I didn't save. I spat on it and decided I'd replay it another time...

Battles closer to the Mentor (although I think the Mentor was guarded by 10k Griffins, but that's beside the point).

vs 2k Devils (for the Staff of the Netherworld)

vs MageStack (for the Empathy set)

And after these battles, I finally meet Deleb.
- Let me tell you a bit about the tactics. Actually, the first battles with her were needed; later I could just ignore her. So to speak, use Trappers + Pendant of Frozen Embrace + Magic Armor. All so that on the first turn, I could use the Empowered Ring of Frost to take out the ballista, because that's one of Deleb's main advantages, taking out nearly 100 Trappers on the first turn. I do not recommend berserking her stacks, because the AI isn't stupid, and it almost immediately (sometimes immediately) casts Vampirism, and then our berserk effect is ruined. Take out the ballista, then cast Celestial Shield + Vampirism on the Trappers and pound the enemies. You can also summon Fen (Fen and the shield were taken from the Mage Tower [or whatever it's called, you get it]).


A pretty tough lady. But to not dwell on her too long, I'll upload all the battles with her that raised any questions, so I don't have to stop on her again. Jumping ahead, I'll say that if we don't finish her, she will maniacally head for our castle (well, that will be later). And since I didn't have a town portal yet (hadn't built the guild) — and later, when I did have one, having captured one human city but being far away, I couldn't make it back in time — I ended up losing 50-60 dragons, even though I wasn't using them anyway.

vs Deleb 1

vs Deleb 2

vs Deleb 3

After the first battle with Deleb, I reached the Mentor, and it became clear that I don't really need Chaos here, so I switched to Darkness, and so on, piecemeal.


I'll say right away that I leveled up to 35, ran around with the Loincloth of Enlightenment, then took those two trees that I had beaten earlier, and then ran around with the half-set of Sar-Issa (Ring + Loincloth).

After the Mentor, there is an option: either go to the bottom-left corner (I think a Dwarf is there and gives 200 ore), there are Dwarves there, and a ruined castle, and further to the right, where we will meet the Druids who give a quest to capture mines. Further along the path will be a Dragon Utopia, opposite which there is a portal, inside which there is a Nagac city...


Oh, we will have some meat income, YAY. True, resources are quite limited. But as they say, little by little we build it up...

At this stage, there will be fewer precise details; I'll speak approximately as it was...
Battle that was eye-catching and gave +stats

vs 500 Colossi/Titans

Then I returned to the human city to give Dugal a beating, whom I couldn't defeat without losses earlier.

vs Dugal

Then we have enough reputation, and they give us the human city + Elaina. Nothing was bought up in the castle, so we buy out the peasants, and presto — almost no money problems...

We also approach the leader, and he gives a quest to take out the Orc army standing in front of the city. Nothing difficult at this stage; auto-battle finished them off.

Next, we can take the Paladin Order quest. At first, they don't really trust us, but our argument that Sigrif has done enough for the Humans decides it.
- His task: find the Tears of Asha and find the Paladins on the map. I think there are 5 stacks of them. They are fighting someone there — well, whatever. We watch carefully, and after defeating those they were fighting, a map fragment is revealed. There are 5 of them (I think). Find the Tears, give them to him. He is delighted, will give us some combat stats and raise our reputation.
And if I'm not mistaken, by this point we already have enough reputation to go to the leader and storm the Orcs, but more on that later...

Next, I'm approaching the elven city. Actually, I don't really remember their quests, because I unknowingly completed most of them without even taking them.
Accordingly, at this stage when our hero is a real big boss, the arena was no problem.
vs Vingael

Though their leader wouldn't talk to me until I had cleared all the arenas — Human, Elf, Orc.

Well, okay. It's worth mentioning another quite interesting quest chain — the Temples of Ancient Evil (4 pyramids, containing parts of the Sar-Issa set).

- The quest itself is quite simple. The only thing is I didn't bother until I had collected all the keys, and only then started visiting the pyramids.


I can't not mention one imbalanced building, in my opinion)). Yes, yes, that's the one that allows you to increase troop growth by up to 15%, depending on the town's level and faction... Well, thanks for that, it's truly OP)).


Another interesting battle, or rather a long one, is for the Cloak of the Deadly Shadow.

5k Mummies, 2k Knights

Well, and the last city I visited was the Orc city. Actually, they also have plenty of quests, though I didn't study it in detail...

Right at the entrance, there is a fence with prisoners. You can take a quest to watch over the prisoners.
- And here there are a couple of options: either turn in the one asking for help, or free him.

Before reaching the Orcs, we took a quest on the map to find a human spy in the Orc city. And it looks a bit cringe when Sigrif tells everyone, "I'm from Axel," etc., etc. I'll stop right here. The human spy is Daughter of the Sky, who also gives quests. Through a chain, you can free the prisoners by luring them out of the castle under the pretense of hunting, and then killing them like fools.

Repairing the portal:
- I think you just need to bring a certain amount of resources.

Arena (no problem):
Sigrif vs Hagesh
Sigrif vs Kigan

Steal the artifact:
- I didn't understand how to do it, actually, so I gave up.

Arrows for the Centaur:
- Got them from the Elves in the machine hiring building.

Deliver weapon crates to the squads.

Get rid of the unclean forces in the cemetery:
- For this, you need the Ring of the Sinners. You can get it from a crypt not far from the portal (which we need to exit through in the end).

Hunting Guild:
- Bring bear, griffin, and wolf pelts (also somewhat hidden, but can be found).

Get the boat blueprints for the Logistician:
- Actually, it's a whole chain. We come to the shipyard in the elven city, it's not there. We ask the elven leader; he tells us his friend, the arena champion in the human city, might know where it is. We go to him; he tells us the location, and we find him. We rescue him and in return get the blueprint.


Quests with artifact traders:
- They will ask you to go check on a shop west of the castle. We've seen it before, but no one was there. After getting the quest, we go there again, return to inform the client about the situation. He suspects it's his competitor, so without much thought, we kill him.

Also, Urok asks you to explore the ruins in the bottom-left corner of the map for an artifact. We go there, kill a stack of undead, they give us a Feather Cloak, we return, and in the end he says, "I don't need it, keep it."

Quest with the Centaur: answering questions to swindle him for money and a golden horseshoe.


And at this stage, I thought it was time to finish and move towards the finale...

So to speak, you can still take quests, get an additional Orc hero, then get Kragh + castle, then Gashak + castle. It all boils down to kill, kill, etc. Yes, there is some variety, but I'm speaking generally...

From the Elves, you can take a quest where you need to take out the Orc camps, two of them on the map (with buildings), etc., etc. But I was a bit tired, so I went to the Humans, took the final quest, went to the Elves, secured their help. However, a bug popped up — they said "yes, we'll help," but when I moved one square away, they offered to take out the Orc camps (which is already impossible because movement is restricted).

Later, a beautiful cutscene appears, namely, in front of the Orc castle, everyone we helped shows up (we don't need them at all, but Elaina gathered them all).


Upon entering the city, we take them out with auto-battle.


We take out everyone inside there without any problems either.
Sigrif vs Tylsek

And having gotten the last part for the portal, we head towards it...

There we are met by Ilaya who tells us that Ygg-Shail has fallen and everything is very bad (though how she got here is a good question).

Also, if you don't rush headlong forward but go back a bit, you can learn the last fragment of the story about the "Ring of Omnipotence."

In the end, we move further towards the exit. There will be a demon castle, which is taken down with auto-battle, and the entrance to Hell, guarded by 8k Devils, which we won't even feel either, because Sigrif looks like this by the end of the game...

Well, let's sum up: Did I like the second scenario of this campaign? Actually, very much so. But despite all the positives, it is exhausting. If only they had restricted Deleb so that you slapped her 3-4 times, and that's it, okay. But sometimes I felt like using cheats to wipe her out instead of running after her. Well, these are all minor things. A huge number of quests, which can't help but please, but on the other hand, can't help but be exhausting. And of course, the bane of it all is that token that, in the 3rd mission, turns us into an AMOEBA, only now we don't have the opportunity for a light boost. And that is straight-up annoying. I'll probably take a break from the campaign altogether... Yes, I understand you don't have to play on Heroic difficulty, but damn, since I started on Heroic, I want to finish it on that difficulty. After running around for a couple of days, I realized it's... difficult. Well, that's mission 3.

And maybe, before tackling it, I'll try to do what I didn't do in this one, just for the sake of completion. Or maybe someone can tell me where to find what I couldn't. But overall, it's very cool. An incredible challenge, in my opinion, on the edge of coolness and madness. Good or bad — that's up to everyone to decide. Well, someday I will finish this))

p.s. A minor bug, but still: even if Sigrif dies, the mission doesn't fail...)) (I hope I won't get banned for such a number of posts)).


p.p.s. After taking a break for some time, I want to tweak mission 2 a bit (updated).

- Found the corpse of that thief. Turns out he was near the Sphinx, and I just needed to right-click on the skeleton and it was obvious that it was the very corpse.

- Then, returning to the Thieves' Guild, they said to catch the Elusive One (forgot his name). The whole gimmick is that he respawns in a different place every day. To catch him, you need the Manacles of Inevitability, which we get from that guy's corpse. I caught him near the peasant huts. The main thing is to be able to catch him in one turn, because the next turn he will escape.

- Then, following the guild chain, go to the Dragon Utopia. Nothing difficult.

- Return and pay them money immediately. At that point, everything was fine too, and then they gave us a stat bonus to the army and some items, I think.

Regarding the quest chains, in this case for the Humans, no matter how hard I tried, my reputation ended up at 96 (including the final quest). Although I still don't understand why they wouldn't let me into the Treasury when I had a ton of reputation. The only thing I blame is that I didn't get to the Orcs and didn't steal the gold, because I had little rep and couldn't grind any more. But if I had grinded reputation with the Orcs, how would I have achieved such high ratings...? Ah well, that's definitely it for this mission. On to mission 3.

Greetings ladies and gentlemen, I finally got around to it. To thoroughly tackle mission number 3, and I’ll say briefly that despite a rather difficult start (personally for me) and naturally the fact that our MC is again a level 1 OMEBA, while the starting stacks are quite strong, well, it is what it is, grinding our teeth at first, then chilling, and squeezing the maximum out of it, but let's take it one step at a time....

Mission 3 - Into the Depths of Shio

According to the lore of this mission: After Sigrif and Ilaya escaped from the lands of the outcasts, we end up in the center of Ashan, or more simply put, in hell, and our main task is to get out of here alive. According to the opening cutscene, Ilaya and I split up to find an exit. And that's where our gameplay begins.


And naturally, our MC, after passing through the portal, becomes level 1(( probably in all 5 missions of this campaign we are destined for pain and suffering to fully feel the power, well, anyway, just thinking out loud. At the start, we are given a decent army, however, right away after the red boots, we encounter a stack of Pit Fiends (and depending on luck, with a Pit Lord upgrade or without). Naturally, no matter how much you want to play beautifully and with maximum efficiency with a level 1 hero, it doesn't quite work out, and you have to go for trades

Start vs Pits

- yes, I understand this fight is far from ideal, maybe it could be better, but after several tries, I settled on this one and thought, forget it, I need to play instead of trying to come out unscathed

Forget these Pits for a moment, we move on across the bridge, and from the Gates emerge 3 stacks of Archdemons numbering "Many" and here, again, like it or not, you go for a trade. I didn't save replays for these fights, I'll just show how I handled them. For these battles, I got lucky progression in my opinion (let's say I didn't stress too much, and the progression tactic from previous missions worked for me, so I leveled up the same way here)


I didn't touch the 3rd stack of Archdemons, I thought I'd go to the hut, and what was my surprise, there was someone alive here) He will briefly tell us about the local area and ask to bring an item guarded by Phoenixes. I thought, okay, I'll try, why not. We go and take out the 3rd stack of demons, I upgraded Hunters to Assassins just in case, and the losses were smaller

There were also a couple of fights along the way, with Fire Elementals, but I couldn't break through the Phoenixes themselves, because I think there were 20-30 of them, and I have no idea how to beat them, so I gave up on that quest and moved on (I only returned to it after I had already reached that location)

And we go to the first altar, where a dialogue starts, giving us the first clear and concise objectives:
- Namely, to free the souls of imprisoned heroes in the altars
- Destroy all Inferno castles
- Find information about the ancient artifact (the Ring of Dominion later on)


Further along the path, we meet the little devils, who cannot be killed, but you can interact with them, and they give a side quest
- They need a total of 200000 gold, and in return they give us souls of Dark Elves. Probably one of the most vile quests - they take gold once a week, and it doesn't matter if you have 20000 or 500 coins, they'll deduct it anyway. However, when it reaches 200000, it will stop. If you don't have money at the start of the week, they will raise the threshold to 5000, and if you don't have 5000 the following week, nothing happens))(at least nothing happened in my case)
Admiring the scenery


I don't remember why I highlighted this battle, but let it be here anyway

vs Hell Stallions

So we approach the first castle

Outpost before the 1st castle

And we move on to the first opponent, Alastor, and respectively, the first castle



Sigrif vs Alastor

We go for a small trade, nothing terrible. Near the castle there are demon dwellings, and we are offered to capture them. I sacrifice experience, thinking, what do I need them for, but it will probably come in handy later...

A quick note, or maybe, if you play through it, do this: Don't approach the devils at the start, because right after leaving the portal, there is an artifact merchant, and you might be able to get something useful (in my case, it was the Ring of Sar-Issa, it's not certain I'd have enough gold, but hypothetically, after a week, I could have come back and bought it, and then taken the quest. But as it is, you don't really have that time, because the devils will steadily take your money)

So we move on. There's a shop here; if you have money, you can get a gold pouch to pay off the 200k faster, start accumulating money faster, and avoid the situation where those extortionists raise the threshold to 5000 per week. Ah well...

Here we meet the second tier of creatures - Elder Demons, whom you can chat with. They tell us something - basically asking us to bring them the Ring of Haste, which is located in one of the crypts (ironically, the last one). Well, we take the quest and move on...

vs Crypt1

And OH YES, there's reinforcement here worth fighting for. It might be a bit uncomfortable at first, but then it's no problem

vs 100 Devils

We move on, and along the way we encounter a gate. When approaching it, information is shown about what's what. In short, you can fight and get something good, or vice versa (although I didn't encounter the negative outcome in the entire game). Naturally, we're all for that kind of action. Another cool detail is that we see who we're fighting; they seem to be in a burning cauldron, and after defeating the stack, they fall. It seems like a small thing, but damn, it's so well done

vs PortalStack



Here along the way we encounter the second altar, in which Talsai is imprisoned. He tells us that we need to capture all the demon structures (ah, so capturing the dwellings earlier came in handy). And in general, all altars are somehow highlighted with the circle of the faction whose hero is imprisoned within them

So, we slowly approach castle two. Something useful here for us: since I'm playing Summoning, I gladly take the Phantom from him by solving the secret (though how he cast it is another question)

Also, not far from the second castle, there is a library. If you have acquired gems and are playing Summoning, you can buy a Phoenix there, luckily there's a market for these things if you lack resources



Sigrif vs Nibros

A few periodic battles, and along the way we'll encounter Succubi and Hell Hounds, who in turn will give quests. One task involves a Unicorn Horn Bow, the other, Traveler's Boots



Crypt2

Dragon Utopia

Further on, we encounter an obstacle in the form of strong stacks of Archdemons



Actually, the thought crossed my mind to try and break through them, and I sort of attempted it, but unfortunately, I lacked the mana pool (if I had that Ring of Sar-Issa from the start that could have been bought, maybe it would have worked). But understandably, you don't have to fight them; you can give up, I think, 100000 experience, and a boulder falls on them, removing the obstacle from the passage...


By this point, our MC looks like this


Next, along the way, we encounter a third altar, located on the grass. There is a nice mana source plus a couple of +level trees. Here we are asked to free the souls of Archangels, and they are highlighted on the map accordingly

Traveling between the second and third castle, we meet the Nightmares - whom Sigrif teases a little, "yes yes you need the artifact" and so on... They ask us for a Golden Horseshoe. Well, why not, horses means horseshoe))

And without further ado, we approach castle 3, guarded by Deleb, where I probably had to improvise the most to minimize losses



Sigrif vs Deleb

Moving on, admiring the scenery again + reinforcements for us)



What can I say about the path to castle 4? We encounter another altar, this time of the Necromancers. Here we are told we need to bring the Staff of the Netherworld + the Cloak of Deadly Shadow, so we can slow down enemies, and "don't worry, we won't take them from you." Okay, you won't take them, good, thanks for that. In between all this, there was this battle

vs 12 Nightmares

First things first, we clean up another castle here, I think we free another stack of Archangels, and then we head to the meat grinder)) or rather, the bone processor)
Regarding castle 4, we are met by Grol, but it's easier here because we have Berserker, so we can have a feast))


Sigrif vs Grol

After the castle, we exit into such a location (by the way, around here I settled accounts with the little devils, and they stopped taking money; plus there's an artifact shop here, which is very tasty)

Here we essentially have two options immediately: clear the crypts (to find the ring for the Elder Demons) + clear the markers (to find the staff and cloak)...

As I said above, ironically, the ring was in the last crypt. Oh well, we clear all this stuff, approach the altar, get the goodies (army bonus), and move to the next castle. Along the way, we also capture dwellings and rescue the Archangels

In castle number 5, we are met by Marbas

At this stage, there are almost no problems anymore)

Sigrif vs Marbas

Moving on, according to the plan, we have one castle, and it seems like the game is in the bag, except we don't know anything about the mighty artifact yet. Ah well, they'll tell us later...

Next, the path to the following castle. Nothing special here; along the way we'll meet Pit Lords who ask us to take out other Pit Lords, because "the Overlord's army won't have them, oh dear"))

We'll also meet Archdemons - I kept thinking what they would want, and they're like, "what makes you think we want anything?" I'm like, "oh, so there's an option to TAKE THEM OUT." Perfect, we take them out feet first without any problems))

Along the way, we reach the final castle from the initial quest. In castle number 6, we are met by Nimus - absolutely no problems with him anymore. We have Vampire Lady + Red Dragons, and go go go


Sigrif vs Nimus

We also rescue the last stack of Angels here, get the goodies, and move on)

So, Ilaya can be seen in the distance. There's one more demon left to kick (not counting the Devil himself, of course), that's Grol. I didn't even save the fights with him; it was a beating, nothing to watch)
I thought I'd approach Ilaya and something would happen. No, nothing. When trying to enter the portal, it says "you don't have the ring," like "where are you going?" There's still one move to make, let's go...



Going back to the one-way portal earlier, a little running around and we learn information about that very great artifact, which we actually heard about earlier, in the second mission, from the side quest about the history of Dominion. The Ring of Omnipotence itself (I even felt some kind of reference to the ring from The Lord of the Rings)


After the dialogue, we are returned to the beginning, and here it's purely for sporting interest, to see what that staff was that could have been obtained at the start


Seems like an interesting stick, but as I understand it, its maximum impact would have been if I had taken it at the beginning, as the map designer intended. And I understand this artifact allows you to Town Portal from the altars back to the start. Well, anyway, let's return to the first altar to find out where the Ring of Dominion is...


We are told that thanks to our actions, they can unlock the passage to the volcano summit, where the Soul of Dominion guards the ring (we saw this passage as such, guarded by a stack of Undead Dragons, but we couldn't go there). A beautiful mountain; we spiral upwards and meet the one we were told about earlier...


Understandably, at this stage, it's just another punching bag to kick)


After defeating the Soul of Dominion, we get this ring, and only the final boss remains



But before moving on to the finale, let's pause a bit on what the MC turned out like in the end, before mentoring, because even though I didn't want to mentor, I realized that with this progression it's not great.. But still, before the battle with the Devil



And just take a quick look at this beauty))


And a bit of foreshadowing: I thought, "I'll just beat him, what's this boar for us?" But I realized my 1000-something mana is a bit low, because the little devils eat almost all of it. And so, I decided to reload earlier and do another run from the start to visit the fountain to ensure enough mana. Plus, Hunters aren't needed here; Assassins are more important. Well, anyway, we'll skip this part. Let me show you the Devil




Actually, I wanted to get Light magic, but after getting Mentor, it just wouldn't give it (the Dwarf set would be perfect). Well anyway, we equip the set without Light, focusing on Attack + Defense. In the end, the MC turned out like this



With this setup, to be honest, I hardly felt this guy, so for those interested, the fight is below

Sigrif vs The Devil

After the victory, we are shown beautiful cutscenes of who we freed, and how we beat the Devil with a mob))




Something like that) Let me sum it up...

Visuals - very cool. Damn, despite playing on a weak machine, and there are places where it lags unplayably, if you turn the camera where there are fewer objects, everything becomes quite normal...
Start - what burned me the most, but then, once you endure it and level up, everything goes smoothly
Concept - very cool. The souls of heroes spiraling downwards towards the center of all this action... damn, it's great. Though, I wonder how it will affect things that all the scum we killed, etc., in the original returned. Certainly a shock of sorts. But I think it will play out somehow. Or maybe they'll just live their lives there
In general, despite everything, this is still my favorite map in terms of feeling, even though it burned me, I put it off for a long time, and overall it seemed impossible...
And looking ahead, of course, it burns that our MC is again an OMEBA in the fourth mission. Probably, in all missions, he is destined to start from 0. Who knows, we'll see. As they say, on that note, a big part of the campaign is behind us. Let's see what plot twists lie ahead and how this story will end. Despite being difficult, I like it) Onwards...)

p.s. The outcome of this mission (yes, it took a while, but it is what it is; without the extra trip through hell to visit the fountain, it would probably have been faster))

Greetings, so the milestone of mission number 4 has been passed, and as tradition dictates, I'll share my opinion. In a nutshell, it didn't click for me... No, that doesn't mean it's bad, it's just that compared to the previous ones, it looks a bit weak, and I'll try to explain my position on this matter...

Mission 4 - Return of the Hero
- lore-wise: Sigrif and the other guys got out of Hell (including various Biara Markels, etc., whom you'd rather not see, and it's a pity that Nicholas remained a vampire, but oh well). We know Igg Shail has fallen, but instead of saving our lands, we decided to strike at the very heart of the elven capital to force their capitulation, so the Alliance would fall apart, blah blah, save Igg Shail, etc., etc., you get the idea...


There are plenty of beautiful and, in my opinion, quite logical cutscenes, from the skirmish at the border to the discussion of the plan of action by our heroes Thralsai, Sigrif, Shadia, and Ilaya. I especially liked the logic that we can't put on the imba ring because we have some kind of connection with the light elves and Faidaen would sense something amiss... It sounds like some kind of nonsense, for crying out loud, we just crawled out of Hell, where we were chilling and having fun. It's clear these are all emotions, and there's no other way to balance it so that each mission is hard and interesting to play... And the escaped elf who later reports to Faidaen about us, etc., etc. And naturally, the fact that our Sigrif forgot everything after passing through Hell. Should I burn over this or not? Apparently, I need to accept that all missions will be like this (and that's probably almost the case). But not only that, they also add the fact that we forgot all our spells)) Well, naturally, it was funny to watch Sigrif try to cast spells and nothing happen, and in the end, he barely managed to beat the druid with two "bare-handed" strikes))





Our witch tells us this is a very strong curse and she cannot remove it, but who always knows everything, right, the local prophet))
After fighting off the fairies with, in my opinion, minor losses, the next battle is against the boars in the Free Guild. Then, little by little, I find out there's a town in the underground and, without much fighting anyone, I head there. Well, I'll tell you everything in order


They tell Faidaen that, like, the TEs are attacking and Sigrif is leading them, and Faidaen asks Sinithar (our brother) how that's possible, to which Sinithar says I personally escorted him to the Outlaw Lands... I don't remember which scene it was, but I liked Faidaen's jab: "I told you not to eat those mushrooms")) Well, okay, let's move on)

I didn't save the opening fight, but just to have some replay at this stage, let this one be it)

Kite Gidor

Now, what about the prophet, who will we meet in the Hut? Dosson. And here I don't understand the lore logic. Dosson is not a monk, but one of the 6th Plastelin, whom we presumably killed in mission 3, or how should I understand this? Overall, he was cool in all missions except 3rd, although in the 3rd he was probably in the starting hut for sure.
In short, getting magic back the traditional way won't work (well, almost), because, knowing of our arrival, supposedly all Mage Guilds in all towns were destroyed (okay, understood, but what about the town of the League and the Undead, why isn't there a Mage Guild there, or did the Light Elves help there too?)
-But magic can be learned through runes scattered across the map + we can buy them (looking ahead, I managed to fully learn 2 schools if I abused the rune for 200,000 gold; come to think of it, you could probably learn the whole spellbook, but it would take too much time)


It looks decent, and indeed, there is not a single Mage Guild in any of the castles...
Overall, a cool mechanic, well done, and I actually quite liked it, though I didn't know that "Phantom Creation" from the summoning branch is at Level 4, and also if you already have a spell, it would be logical not to learn it again if you unlocked it through a Scholar or by solving a riddle...

A small exploit that helped me a bit to catch up with a hero I really didn't feel like chasing... You can only enter the Library if you have taken a rune (bought or got from the mage tower). For example, Sigrif has no movement points left, but you'd like to move him... We need a button that any hero can stand on (specifically the runes we are collecting). Sigrif will teleport to the Library. If we just enter one of the branches, select a spell, and say go back, movement points will stay as they were. But if you enter the school portal, then don't select a spell, but exit to the main hall (via the league marker), then select the desired school and spell and agree to exit, voila, we have full movement without skipping a day)

Thralsai, in principle, was hardly used as a hero, only for scouting. Overall, my logic was this: I understood we were weak, the town is a must-have, and the sooner the better)

After a while, they show us another cinematic, where the Elves capture Nicholas, and he says that Sigrif is stronger than you))

And we are warned that the human troops will arrive in a couple of months... Well, okay)
I saw the entrance to the underground and rushed there as fast as I could)
Once in the underground, I went roughly upwards, saw a garrison that needed to be broken through
Dark Elf Outpost

And then after the outpost, I see a castle, seemingly someone's, but there's no army in it, no hero nearby either. I thought, we don't mind getting one without a fight) What's cool is that the other two outposts came under our command. It's a pity you can't just take an army like that, but oh well)
And right away, using the good old method, I check Faidaen's info to understand what awaits us)


I think it's a decent little guy, but I figured it would be easy, especially with my playstyle)

Let me probably get straight to the first and main stumbling block that I had to struggle with for quite a long time, and I didn't want to replay the map, although ideally I probably should have, but I managed to pull through...
I mean the encounter with Winrael. Yes, actually, he was the one who was mostly annoying)

Our Main Character looks like this


And this creature came to us))


So you understand, Sigrif has 4 or 5 knowledge, and although I had the Plague spell pulled out by Thralsai from Letos, and then through Thralsai to Sigrif, I didn't have its mass version. So I had to work really hard, especially since my build ultimately sacrificed the charisma that was needed but didn't fit here...

Here's the Sigrif vs Winrael 1st encounter) my dream battle)

Somehow, through gritted teeth, we finally took down that guy, and then we continue leveling up and exploring the map)

And then we stumble upon the spell library, and the first thing you want to know is if it's a freebie or not. Naturally, it's not (there are no freebies anywhere), and a funny dialogue ensues. But essentially, all you need to know is that he sells runes, the ones that give you access to the library. The only thing worth knowing is that when the rune price is 200,000, even if you buy the rune, it won't teleport you to the library. But if there is a rune on the ground and you buy it before picking up the one on the ground, you will have 2 runes. In general, you can abuse all the spells, but the main thing is that there is a rune on the ground)


And we keep chilling, exploring. Here they give us some more info...


The joy of getting "Quick" education...


Somewhere in between, I encountered this guy again

Moving on. For me, one of the turning points comes when we break through here (lots of goodies + Tome of Darkness, which in my opinion is somewhat underpowered, but whatever):

There are essentially two battles here:
1) 8k Death Knights

2) Against 12k Liches

And a funny picture, especially when the Lich stacks get smaller and the dragons are hitting them from all sides. They are not the main damage dealers, but still))


In my opinion, after these battles, our Main Character is maximally fed and feels great....

Another small digression about the library: as much as you might want to quickly learn high-level spells of one school while ignoring everything else, you won't be able to, because the author took care of that too. As unpleasant as it is, it's actually quite logical and balanced


And so, as you understand, my main biter of everyone and everything was Letos. I gave him the Plague boots, and at first, he just bit, but later, he blocked the exit and simply kept hitting Winrael on cooldown, but we'll get back to that...

A small breakthrough, and just a screenshot of the number of armies Letos bit)



Next, we meet one of the humans, namely Gabriel, and our Main Character deals with her (after weakening her, although it wasn't strictly necessary, just the opportunity was there)

Regarding my further gameplay: collecting everything, leveling up the main guys (I thought at least in the last mission they would carry over, no such luck)
And already Letos is ready to bite all sorts of enemies)

Also, while exploring the surface, our Sigrif has a "vision" and sees something others don't, although it's strange that the devil is alive, but oh well, we'll probably find out in mission 5 what it is we're seeing and what it leads to...


I also noticed a quite interesting location on the map that we know from the original campaign, but its purpose here is not yet clear to me. Nevertheless, we'll find out later


Overall, we have established ourselves quite firmly on the surface. The only real problem was Dirael. Not that she was hard to defeat, but because of the Shackles of Inevitability, you couldn't really bite her, and I didn't particularly want to lose Letos. But no problem, we approach her with Sigrif and take her down without any major issues)

Well, I thought, maybe it's time to visit the Undead and see what they're up to, and why they are even on this map. We come to them, and they give us a side quest, like, "If you want our trust and help, it's simple – buy it"))


I think, okay, go ahead. And right away, one step forward, one step back, we complete the quest. Then we go to the town, and they tell us there's a project for a super catapult, but it needs resources: wood and ore. These are easy to find, even if the mines are already captured. The ore near the ore mine is highlighted on the ground, the wood is not. Nevertheless, to collect them, all you need to do is, after getting this quest, approach the mines again. The mines are in the north, down below...

Nothing complicated here. We take the quest, complete it, and when we've gathered the resources from the mines, we approach the castle with any hero, and they'll tell us our uber catapult is ready)

We smoothly transition to meeting the main human hero, namely Valeria. I'll say this: I didn't fight her with Sigrif; Letos handled her just fine, though it took 3 attempts. But, as they say, no big deal)


One of the bites

Finishing off Valeria

Oh yes, I almost forgot, one of our primary objectives was: Liberation of Railag. There's not much to stop for here. The prison is located in the northwest. We break through the Death Knights and simply free him. No cutscene, no dialogue, just like freeing some no-name)

And later, I just messed around, leveling up the main guys (thinking that by mission 5, they wouldn't take away everything I worked for). And I placed Letos at the portal exit, and he killed almost everyone there, except the dwarf...)

Thralsai, meanwhile, settled in the Undead castle and, using the little vampires, slowly cleared out the entire area)

And after some time, the Dwarf comes out of the portal. Letos meets him, but doesn't kill him in one go. To get rid of him, I had to chase him with Sigrif, and I was one day behind.

But right then, I managed to exploit the movement trick with the Library, as I mentioned above, and Sigrif caught up with him

Now nothing stops us from moving towards the finale, but again, I decided to clear everything and everyone.
Thralsai, having gathered some little vampires, took out the last key warden and got the key

And to finish, we need to assemble the key. For this, we get a quest from the hut above the key warden in the northwest. He will tell us: "I need the Dragon's Flame Tongue, which is in the Dragon Utopia. But to get there, you need to assemble the key from the very place we saw earlier, but couldn't interact with until we took this quest."


After the key was restored, we head to the Utopia, clear it, obtain the Flame Tongue, and go to the prophet. He will give us a Ring of Teleportation, with which we can enter the gates, and later fight Faidaen.

Another side quest is the Sphinx. There, we are asked to hold all the gold mines for (I think) a month and a half. The reward for completing it is... As they say, the main boost here is +25% army, which is not bad, especially since my army was mixed)


Let's approach the finale. After we received the ring, we approach the gates. We are offered to teleport, and told that we cannot return, etc., etc. (they take some artifacts from us, particularly the Town Portal scroll. I thought of giving it to Ilaya so Faidaen wouldn't kill her, although he doesn't aggro on her). And the most pleasant thing is that Ilaya joins us not empty-handed, but with the Ring of Dominion, and we realize that the finale will be a walk in the park)


Let me say a couple of things right away:
- Right after we are teleported beyond the gates, Sigrif and Ilaya have 0 movement points, which means we need to skip a day. After we do that, Faidaen uses Astral Gates to teleport closer to us.
- In general, we can just take the ring, skip another day, and Faidaen will attack us himself. We don't even have to go fight our way to the capital.
- But if we do use our movement and go to the capital, we will see that thanks to the super siege weapon against the gates, they tell us we destroyed them and didn't lose any troops (so without this weapon, we would have lost some army).
- The guards, although they look strong, at this stage, especially with the ring, are completely auto-combatable without losses.
- Even if we get right up to the castle, we cannot capture it. Not because we lack movement points, but because 4-5 tiles away from the castle, our movement bar resets to zero...
- And after skipping a turn, Faidaen attacks anyway)

Faidaen wasn't a problem at all, especially with an army like that. You just need to know that units you don't need should be placed in the bottom row, because remember his special ability where all shooters attack. In my case, these were Nymphs...
Well, a couple of replays of the battle with Faidaen are attached

First battle

Just for fun)

And just for the record, I leveled everyone in vain (yes, in vain), but I'll show all the main heroes as they were at the end of the mission)







Oh, what cool heroes they would have been to start mission 5 with)

Let's sum up: I said at the beginning that I didn't really like the map. Not because it's bad, it's cool. But compared to the 3 previous ones, it looks a bit duller, in my opinion. Many actions were quite unnecessary, but I wanted to do them. Our next task is to storm the human city, but that's for the fifth mission. However, from the cutscenes, we understand that something is fundamentally wrong. We see Biara being killed, and also the Overlord with the devil (the one we killed, so why is he alive?). I understand that she played her part. This is all the Overlord's scheming from the beginning, including Biara helping us escape from Hell. And in general, everything is not going according to our plan, as we think. Well, we'll see, we'll see) As for the ending of mission 4, we achieved our initial goals: the escalation of the elves so they would return our lands and help us fight against their former allies. Well then, the final push and the concluding mission of this awesome campaign are ahead)