Posts from Shades of Darkness

Crashes during loading are not directly related to either mods or even the map itself. The map file is very large by the game's standards, and it is quite extensive. For the game, this is a significant reason for memory issues, and therefore, there is a high chance of a crash when loading the map from within the game. This is a relatively harmless bug, but it can be annoying. The battlefield is generated as usual, i.e., randomly.

field
strange "coincidences"... I have one cluster of mushrooms with a passage for a Fury, sometimes on the right, sometimes on the left, and Remix reloaded the battle about 100 times, and it always has several clusters of mushrooms scattered chaotically.
crashes
this is not only on your maps... I don't even know what to think... I've already reduced the quality and removed all sorts of "hero trails," the battle grid, etc... maybe it's because I have a 2K 165Hz monitor? I noticed that if I save in one part of the map, I load normally... in another part, it crashes, and the highest percentage of crashes occurs when I load after a battle, not when I start the game. Here is my computer ibb.co/CwFkByx

Even if you assemble a top-of-the-line computer costing a million, crashes will still occur. This is due to the amount of memory the game itself uses. It's insufficient. Sometimes, it's not even enough for the normal operation of maps of the maximum size generated by the map generator.

Even if you assemble a top-of-the-line computer for a million, there will still be crashes. It's the amount of memory the game itself uses. There's not enough of it. Sometimes, it's not even enough for the normal operation of maps with the maximum size generated by the map generator.

I understand... the optimization in Heroes is terrible.
...
I realized that I'll have to mentor for the third time! ...The first time, I discarded the log and chose Darkness...
The second time, I discarded the defense and chose attack...
Now, because of the knight-junkies, I'll have to choose Light only because of regeneration and resurrection.
And I also have to counter Darkness with the mutant Frederick and his horde ability... what a mess?)) Are we going to give the computer everything so that it won't be overwhelmed?)) Essentially, it's like in a detective series... where from the first episode, it's clear that Vasya was killed by Petya, but you still need to release 300 more episodes so that it's worth watching. Initiative is cranked up for everyone (even for random stacks of creatures) as if they have rings of speed on their hands and feet, and I have an ability that increases speed, plus 2 rings that increase initiative.... I killed a knight, and he has only one brooch.)) Is he under a screw, or did they attach a motor to him somewhere?)). No... this is called playing against a cheater, it's too frustrating, and there's no Heroes mechanics here.

Right. I liked the third mission more than the other two... and I also disliked it more than the other two. Let me tell you why.

The first half is actually solid; running away from all the guards is more or less simple, except for the second one—that's just brutal. You can't even enter a single turn even with level 3 movement and green boots; he immediately squeezes you into a vice and there's NOWHERE to run.
I chased him for about 3 weeks, got tired, turned on cheats, completed all activities, and zipped into the portal. I played through the rest of the "first part" without cheats and without any particular difficulties. Chaos on Railag is just wild. I really liked the bit with the dwarf city, how the Faceless tricked Railag again. But as for the final battle with Jorgen, it made me scream, disappointed, and angry all at once. The battle itself is very simple—after all, you only have to kill 200 Faceless in 2 squads; they just crumble from a meteor strike as if they were made of clay. I put ONLY jarl golems in the corner and simply pelted those poor souls with meteor strikes—I lost only 5 golems in the end.

And then I was very surprised to find that, as it turns out, the mission is only just beginning... and only then did it hit me that I had removed movement from the old man and removed the mentor in education—since I thought the mission would be over. AND THE OLD MAN IS NOT IN THE SECOND HALF OF THE MAP. Oh, what I suffered, oh, what I suffered. Railag barely plods along, and the idiots on his payroll—a pathetic level 1—can't even protect the Castle. To top it off, there are no reinforcements... I would have put a mentor at the first castle purely out of pity, rather than by Jorgen.

Breaking through neutrals was hard, but possible. In general, the elf army near the bow and those guarding the underground city—I only broke through these two armies... after about 40 attempts probably...

But overall everything went smoothly and I liked the mission more and more. And then I stepped onto the lands of men, and that was it: darkness, nightmare, and gloom. The game surprised me with a most unpleasant surprise. Priest Pederaast didn't leave the caves—he settled in the nearest castle and respawned EVERY time he died. I suffered absolutely brutal losses from his divine vengeance, because the creature just wouldn't stay dead. BUT THE WORST PART is that after this man's death EVERY SINGLE TIME!!!! a cutscene from the caves played, which skipped 50/50, because sometimes if I skipped it, the game crashed to hell! https://imgur.com/a/ZVDCvsD
Oh, how angry I was at this Hamburg rooster. Just trash. And as a bonus—after I captured both human castles, those two guys appeared with Laslo's icon and Tiera's icon. It really made me smile that the general with Laslo's icon wanted to "die with honor," because these scumbags ALSO RESPAWNED. Ugh, I suffered with those two even more than with Priest Pederaast. https://imgur.com/a/ZVDCvsD - the 3rd screenshot is a battle that I replayed about 80-90 times, for 1.5 hours straight. I was starting to have a breakdown over it. But eventually, I managed to play perfectly... losing my entire army except for those loser black guards from Dark Messiah. Then Miv appeared, and I also activated Ruthger's appearance...

Anyway, the end of the game came for me... would have come, if I hadn't discovered the fact that if I only have a hunter in invisibility in my squad—the enemies start grouping up under my meteor strike, gathering in a bunch. I discovered this when there was absolutely nothing left of the army, not even the black losers. Somehow I cleared out all this rubbish, and then the druid and Laslo respawned again... I lost it, but I managed to defeat them. Under-Laslo started casting berserk on his warriors while my hunter was in invis, and I simply defeated the elf with 4 groups of Cuckolds using hypnosis.

Reached the hellish land. Very tired and already wanted the ending, so I just ignored the neutrals too; hope I didn't miss any interesting interactives. Didn't feel the boss—he flew off from ONE ultra-freeze for 25k damage. You can see it in the chat log on the screenshot. And that's without even collecting all the boosts for the caster. Running past Sareth is too easy, especially if you don't try to collect the scattered idiots. For interest's sake, I turned on cheats and killed Sareth—(I was shocked that 10,000 witches were not enough, had to cheat in 100k), nothing happened after his death... oh well. Rolled back the save, captured the demon castle—laughed at how they give 100 dragons. And just stomped Isabel—100 dragons are too many for such a battle. Especially when with a lucky enhanced meteor strike, 5 out of 7 units of Isabel's army fly off)) I wondered how Tiera as a spirit managed to hold back the enemy, which wasn't shown in the cutscene, and that's basically the end.

So, plot-wise, I really liked the whole campaign, although in my opinion, if Sareth had opened the hell prison—it would be like a gamma-ray burst, everything living would have died within a week or two from constant demon raids. But that's just nitpicking.

I really liked the references and jokes. I REALLY liked the models and animations of the new creatures, especially the soulless ones and dark guards, but I didn't like the scumbag knights with earth shock. There is some kind of fucking imbalance here. These are practically tier 8 creatures. I'm afraid to imagine what army this Angel lady wants to take in mission 4—it's scary to even imagine how she'll kick my ass in the future.

I really disliked the technical execution; I watched the cutscene with Priest Pederaast too many times, it burned me out completely. And even without it, for some reason the mission sometimes crashed when loading a "quick save." Just brutal.
I feel very sorry for Agrail; in one mission they made him some kind of pathetic loser—lost his love, saw the fruit of cuckoldry with Kha-Belekh, and lost his battle companion. And through all this, he seems to not care at all, didn't even bat an eyelid)))) Just drifting with the current.

Um, Revera was never supposed to be redeemable by the AI. More than that, he can't appear in the tavern anymore. So, for me, it doesn't make sense that he's available for the blue player. Do you have any mods that affect hero recruitment? In principle, if there was a mod for campaign heroes, maybe the AI could redeem him.

Added 22 minutes ago
I even checked, although I have no doubts: Revera hasn't changed since I created him, and there have been no such glitches in the history of the map.

Revera (who is actually Alaric with changes) is a story hero, which already means that he cannot appear in the tavern on his own.

Alaric is not in the list of available heroes for the blue player, which eliminates one of the two possible ways for him to appear in the tavern.

There is also no function in the scripts to return Alaric to the tavern after defeat. This eliminates the second option.

So, the question is: why did the blue player redeem Revera if it's impossible on the map itself?

Added 9 minutes ago
As the most stubborn person in the world, I quickly checked the blue player's recruitment using cheats by eliminating his heroes, and there are no Revera there. Only standard Knights of level 1.

Added 31 minutes ago
Next, 25k cold damage to the boss... I respect Chaos League, but 25k damage with luck against an opponent with magic immunity... yes, Railag, as a true Warlock, won't spare even his own black dragons, but nevertheless, the damage to a unit with magic immunity should be lower than usual, even with a masterwork amulet. Railag doesn't have any League cities on the map at the moment to incredibly boost his elemental affinity. Where did that much damage come from? This is beyond my understanding. I would believe in ten thousand, and even then with great doubt, but 25... That's a total damage of about 35k, if we take into account the amulet again.

I even ran a small test. I took Railag, level 37, gave him an amulet, maxed out Chaos and racial skills with a super ability, gave him 50 spells... and got 3500 damage to black dragons with luck and 4500 to a regular target. Of course, this was enhanced cold damage). It's still far from 25k, even if we multiply the damage by three, imagining an incredibly powerful elemental chain. Now I suspect some kind of mod even more.

Added 19 minutes ago
Well, now we can go over the rest.

And first of all, another question: why is Railag so good with Chaos if his specialty on the map is +initiative for his units? I have a small theory that you had Railag with a different specialty. This is quite consistent with the reappearing Revera. And no, Chaos magic is really a must-have in the first part of the map, but then it loses its relevance due to insufficient damage.

I had no problems dealing with the second guardian even without green boots, and with proper grinding, you can even beat him without logistics, with just one stable, but that's already an advanced level. I don't recommend it). The Guardian is just a Guardian. The stable and objects help a lot to gain an advantage over him, although you will need extra rounds in the labyrinth from time to time.

The old man is there in the second half. He's chilling with the elves. If you need to transfer perks, you can return to the battle with the Faceless, as it's really simple.

The Faceless didn't deceive Railag: you can get an army!

The endless cutscene is endless for a simple reason: Revera dies exactly once and will not appear again.

Map crashes when loading are due to game optimization. From the point of view of Heroes 5, this content weighs a ton, and therefore the game often overloads when loading from the map.

Spoiler: the elite troops of the Empire are green humans from Red Haven. Tough guys. Knights with double speed... archers with double shot and retaliate on ranged attacks... they will appear at the end of the fourth mission.

I don't even know how to summarize this walkthrough, because it's very strange, but thank you for playing and there will be a sequel soon.

Added 2 minutes ago

understood... Heroes optimization sucks
...
realized that I have to mentor for the third time! ...the first time I dumped the log and took Darkness...
the second time, I dumped defense and took attack...
now, because of the knight-junkies, I have to take Light only for regeneration and resurrection
and also, the mutant Frederick with the horde ability to counter Darkness... what a mess?)) Should we give the computer everything so that it doesn't overwhelm him?)) In essence, this is like in a detective series... where from the first episode it is clear that Vasya was killed by Petya, but you need to release another 300 episodes so that it will be interesting to watch for a year. Initiative for everyone (even for random stacks of creatures) is cranked up as if they have rings of speed on their hands and feet, and I have +2 rings of initiative with my speed ability.... I killed a knight, and he has only one brooch.)) Is he under a winch or did they attach a motor somewhere?)). No, this is called playing against a cheater, it's too frustrating and there is no Heroes mechanics here.

Hmm. I didn't notice that you added more text to the message. This is not obvious, strictly speaking. No, there are no initiative boosts for enemies. I don't use additional modifiers, only standard perks and stats. I don't even know how initiative is boosted. It seems to be done through a combat script.

Hmm. I've never seen Reveran being available for purchase by the AI. Moreover, he can't appear in the tavern at all. So, for me, this is nonsense for the blue player. Do you have any mods for hiring heroes? In principle, if there was a mod for campaign heroes, maybe the AI could buy him.

Added 22 minutes ago
I even checked, although I have no doubts: Reveran hasn't changed since I created him, and there have been no such glitches throughout the map's history.

Reveran (actually Alaric with changes) is a story hero, which already means that he cannot appear in the tavern on his own.

Alaric is not in the list of available heroes for the blue player, which eliminates one of the two possible options for him to appear in the tavern.

There is also no function in the scripts to return Alaric to the tavern after defeat. This eliminates the second option.

So, the question is: why did the blue player buy Reveran if it's impossible on the map itself?

Added 9 minutes ago
As the most stubborn person in the world, I quickly checked the blue player's recruitment using cheats by eliminating his heroes, and there are no Reverans there. Only generic Knights of level 1.

Added 31 minutes ago
Next, 25k damage to the boss from cold... I respect Chaos League, but 25k damage with luck against an opponent with magic immunity... yes, Railag, as a true Warlock, will not spare even his own black dragons, but nevertheless, the damage to a unit with magic immunity should be lower than usual, even with a mastery amulet. Railag currently has no cities in the storyline to incredibly boost his elemental affinity. Where does this damage come from? This is beyond my understanding. I would believe in ten thousand, and even then with great doubts, but 25... This is a total damage of about 35k, if we take into account the amulet again.

Added 19 minutes ago
I even ran a small test. I took Railag, level 37, gave him an amulet, maxed out Chaos and racial skills with a super ability, gave him 50 spells... and got 3500 damage to black dragons with luck and 4500 to a regular target. Of course, this was enhanced cold) It's still far from 25k, even if we multiply the damage by three, imagining an incredibly powerful elemental chain. Now I suspect some kind of mod even more.

Added 19 minutes ago
Well, now we can go through the rest.

Added 2 minutes ago
And first, another question: why is Railag so good with Chaos, if his specialty on the map is +initiative for his units? I have a small theory that you had Railag with some other specialization. This is quite consistent with the reappearing Reveran. And no, Chaos magic is really a must-have in the first part of the map, but then it loses its relevance due to insufficient damage.

I had no problems running the second guardian even without green boots, and with proper grinding, you can even beat him without logistics, with just one stable, but this is already a high level. I don't recommend it) The Guardian is just a Guardian. The stable and artifacts help to gain an advantage over him, although you will need extra rounds in the labyrinth from time to time.

The old man is there in the second half. He's chilling with the Elves. If you need to transfer perks, you can return to the battle with the Faceless, as it is really simple.

The Faceless didn't deceive Railag: you can get an army!

Added 2 minutes ago
The endless cutscene is endless for a simple reason: Reveran dies exactly once and will not appear again.

Map crashes when loading are due to game optimization. From the point of view of Heroes 5, this content weighs a ton, and therefore the game often crashes when loading from the map itself.

Added 2 minutes ago
Spoiler: the elite troops of the Empire are green humans from Red Haven. Tough guys. Knights with double move... archers with double shot and retaliate on ranged attack... they will appear at the end of the fourth mission.

Added 2 minutes ago
I don't even know how to summarize this playthrough, because it's very strange, but I guess, thank you for playing and there will be a sequel soon.

I haven't installed any mods; I generally don't like all this modding because it breaks maps and game balance. Why was the priest bought, and these two generals - I have no idea, I'm not good at coding. Maybe I should have launched Bandicam, because that's why I downloaded it... I even launched it once - on the dragons, from which the miracle bird is obtained. There I spent about 5 minutes near the lava dragon near the mushrooms and attacked with my hand while the song of the Village of Idiots was playing. If I don't forget, I'll upload the video during the day. So, why were they bought - well, I honestly don't know. I'll just say that the priest was bought only in the 2nd castle of humans, and Laslo and Tieru - in the castles of elves.

Added 33 minutes ago

https://imgur.com/a/FpBsL7Z

Here's a video of the Priest, he's chilling near the castle. I tried to do 25k damage with Avatar, but I couldn't even get it with 70 spells, lucky spell, amulet, and with the elemental chain being fire, the maximum was 5k damage. It's not clear why I managed it the FIRST time. https://imgur.com/a/ZboUBfB because I only have graphic mods, sound mods, and mods to prevent the opponent from running away. Maybe it's because of them? Even if I calculate the damage on a calculator, it's 30+30 *60 spells = 2000+-, add 50% from the amulet = 3000 x 2 from luck = 6000 and multiply by 2 due to the racial ability = 12000, if the elemental chain can multiply the damage by 2 more, then we get the necessary 24000 damage as in the screenshot, but the Avatar also has resistance, like the black dragons. So, in general, I don't know, and what the hell, the campaign is already completed, and only I have such glitches, apparently.

Did you have all three of my maps running simultaneously? If so, please don't repeat this trick. Because my maps conflict with each other. And even more so than with some very large mods. They use the same files, but modify them differently.

I found the cause. I looked at the mod that prevents the AI from fleeing (completely useless on my maps, because the AI is already prevented from doing so) and it turned out to be the culprit. It clutters the console with errors in single missions like mine and makes all AI heroes respawn. Tested on my new map. So with it, the AI can buy back absolutely anyone if that person was killed on the map. This mod interferes with the AI much more than it seems. Judging by the file names, this is part of MegaAI and there is quite a lot written in the scripts that have nothing to do with fleeing.

Frederick and Orion were supposed to respawn, but only with their respective owners and in their own cities. Reveran, on the other hand, is a one-time opponent; his AI is completely disabled, so when bought back with the anti-fleeing mod, he just sat in the cities and "delighted" you with his special ability for revenge. And he was bought back in a city where only Frederick is allowed.

Forget about the 24k damage; let it remain a secret. Malaassa must have buffed Railag herself.

Here are a couple more interesting facts: Godric is supposed to respawn in the first mission, but only for the blue player. I allowed it for some reason, although the AI doesn't get much more out of him than from any other level 1 knight. But Bertrand doesn't respawn in the second mission, even for his owner. Thank goodness Wessel couldn't be bought back. Otherwise, it would have been even worse than with Reveran.

Well, it seems the answers have been found

Did you have all three of my maps running at the same time? If so, please don't do that again. Because my maps conflict with each other. And even more so than with some very large mods. They use the same files, but modify them differently.

I found the reason. I looked at the mod that prevents the AI from fleeing (completely useless on my maps, because the AI is already prevented from doing so) and it turned out to be the culprit. It clutters the console with a lot of errors in single missions like mine and makes all AI heroes respawn. Tested on my new map. So with it, the AI can buy back absolutely anyone if that person was killed on the map. This mod interferes with the AI much more globally than it seems. Judging by the file names, this is part of MegaAI and there is quite a lot written in the scripts that has nothing to do with fleeing.

Frederick and Orion were supposed to respawn, but only with their owners and in their cities. Reveran, on the other hand, is a one-time opponent; his AI is disabled, so when bought back with the anti-fleeing mod, he just sat in the cities and "delighted" you with his special ability to seek revenge. And he was bought back in a city where only Frederick is allowed.

Forget about 24k damage; let it remain a secret. Malassa must have buffed Railag.

Here are a couple more interesting facts: Godric is supposed to respawn in the first mission, but only for the blue player. I allowed it for some reason, although the AI doesn't get much benefit from him compared to any other level 1 knight. But Bertrand doesn't in the second, even for his owner. Thank goodness Wessel couldn't be bought back. Otherwise, it would have been even worse than with Reveran.

Well, it seems the answers have been found.

It clutters the console with a lot of errors in single missions like mine and makes all AI heroes respawn. Tested on my new map.

I was quite surprised. That such a small mod could have such a big impact on the gameplay - and it seems that this happened in all campaigns, not just yours, but also in Andrey_21's, where the AI also liked to pull pranks. And I didn't understand why everything was fine for everyone else, but for me, everything worked through a mess. In short, I'll remove all these bad mods, and even better, I'll reinstall the game from scratch, and in the future, if I need to play a campaign where the AI flees, I'll just use the console to apply the "shackles of inevitability" to them. (I was also amused that I was playing a very complicated version of both of your campaigns (yours and Andrey's), and still didn't complain about the hardcore difficulty, although some people were really struggling, even without the extra endless priests of Erebus well, I mean, without their constant spawning).

Added 8 minutes ago

It just dawned on me why the avatar died from a single spell. Before casting "frost nova" on her, I hit her a couple of times with furries, which dealt the missing 412 damage; if you test it and hit twice with furries, they deal about that much damage. The rest was probably from the "deadly chill" special ability, which always kills at least one creature in the stack.

Apparently, this bad mod that prevents the AI from fleeing disabled the poor avatar's passive ability, which is why she died so comically. In short, I guess I'll have to replay ALL of your campaigns/scenarios, etc., because my playthrough was simply ridiculously ruined by this mod. I'll start again on the weekend.

Decided to replay the original campaign as the Tribes of the East, but your map was installed. I hope you'll change the hero's perk in the next map, as it's quite generic.

This is a hero whose name comes from one of the cutscenes. The fact that she has a backstory and some development is already a miracle.

But playing through the campaign promises to be fun... The Shades of Darkness have a rather specific effect on humans. I don't remember exactly, but either there won't be a first-tier unit in the city at all, or it will be quite unusual.

I deleted the map from the folder and recreated it because of that ability, and also noticed that on the first level, all stats are 50, and regarding the replacement of creatures, I noticed that instead of 1 swordsman at the beginning of the campaign, a black knight from your map was given.

By the way, it’s impossible to complete. The script names don’t match, and the mission scripts don’t work. The heroine in Shades of Darkness is called Elessara. I worked so hard on this hero. I really put my heart into it. I even changed the script name.

Added after 49 seconds

I deleted the map from the folder and recreated it because of that ability, and also because on the first level, all stats are 50, and I noticed about the replacement of creatures, as instead of 1 swordsman at the beginning of the campaign, a black knight from your map was given.

That’s correct. The map wasn’t designed to be left in the game after completion.

Actually, I was even surprised that the hero has a description, so you could say I got a small spoiler for the next mission.

I hope we can all play it soon, as your maps are of a very high level, and it's always enjoyable to play them, even though I'm not the most skilled player, and they can be challenging for me.

Actually, that's not the case: the hero from Elissar will have a slightly different model, and the next mission is dedicated to the war in Grimheim, so she won't appear there.

Please ask Astral to upload the map to another resource. Google Drive is somehow providing a corrupted archive; it cannot be opened. At least upload it to Yandex Disk. Or, perhaps someone else can upload this map (along with "Price of Loyalty" and "Path of the Necromancer," as they are in the same situation on Google Drive). I would be grateful.