Posts from Revived

Name: Reborn
Map name: New_life
Map type: Single Mission
Two-level map: yes
Number of players: 4 (1 x 1 x 2)
Size: Small
Map author: Markel The Imperor
Map version: 1.4
Required: game version 3.1

Description: Nicholas, the prematurely deceased king of the Holy Griffin Empire, has now been reborn as a Greater Vampire. However, it takes time to turn him into a true killing machine. Markel understands this, and for starters, he tasks his future commander with dealing with the unrest in the area around the Hall of Heroes...

From the author: The map tells the story of the events leading up to the war with the elves - the confrontation between Nicholas and Archbishop Randall and their supporters (as we remember, it ended in Randall's defeat and the flight of him and his supporters to Irollan). In the future, it is planned to make it the first mission of the campaign, with a possible deviation from the canon - what if Markel had managed to maintain power, and he would have built the Immortal Griffin Empire?

INSTALLATION
Download the map archive, unzip it, and find the new_life.h5m file in it, which you copy to the Maps folder in the directory where the game is installed.

The archive also contains the VampireCommander.H5U mod, which is copied to the UserMODS folder. All it does is change the name of the vampire specialization from Princess to Commander, adds to Koly's biography, and changes his combat to melee.

The map itself is a mod, but it does not affect the balance. It uses and modifies heroes from dialogue scenes.
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Version 1.5 has been released.

It turned out that before making a sequel, I had to return to this map and refine it a little more.

1) Perhaps the main change is the introduction of a direct dependence of the number of enemy troops (Monk, Exorcist, Glen the Engineer, Duncan, to some extent Guard and Grol, Archbishop Randall, and wolves) on the difficulty level.

2) Most of the mobs, on the contrary, have ceased to depend on the difficulty level, because a paradox arose - it was more difficult to play on Recruit than on Hero, due to the lack of experience, and the reinforcements that joined almost disappeared. The number of hydras in the Temple has been reduced.

3) Some artifacts have been added, and some of the ones dropped by bosses have been changed. Now almost all of them are transferable, and Koly's cloak is also.

4) The schedule of enemy visits at the beginning is slightly less dense, giving more time to explore the map. At the same time, it has been somewhat randomized.

5) The Boots of Levitation have become even more useful (how exactly - think about it).

6) A couple of minor bugs with combat scripts have been fixed, and the "possibility" of playing as other races has been removed.

7) The development limit has been raised to level 27.

8) Ships have become more useful.

9) The garrison to Duncan has been weakened.
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I played. I killed Duncan, and on the next turn, he was standing there again. I killed him again. I captured his castle. The quest wasn't marked as completed. Yes. And what's next? How do I get to the other side?

I played. I killed Duncan, and on the next turn, he's standing there again. I killed him again. I captured his castle. The quest wasn't marked as completed.

I think I understand what's happening. You probably killed him, the script for his resurrection started, and then you captured the castle, but he hadn't resurrected yet.

Wait a couple of days; he should respawn near the tavern one last time, and then kill him. I'll fix this in the next version. I'll just put him directly in the tavern, in the castle.

Did you get the sword after capturing the castle?

You can get to the other side by either building a Mage Guild in your castle to learn the spell to summon a ship, or by trading with the prophet on the meadow for levitation boots in exchange for a bag of gold.

Just in case, I'll ask (just to check from the outside if everything else is working)

What week is the game currently in? Have Erathial and Glen arrived? Did you resurrect Stefan? Was Schultz there?

I played a bit – as recommended, I used a “hero” and, in the first two weeks, managed to capture everything before entering the portal, defeat the Red Demon, crush the monks, enter the portal, and capture my Castle.
First impressions:
1. I didn’t notice any particular hardcore difficulty. Rather, the difficulty was there until I realized that you can hire Death Knights in the mausoleum. At first, I did everything the same way but without Death Knights – I defeated everyone except the Archangels guarding the tent (including the Red Demon and the monks) and crawled into the portal with a couple of ghosts, but then I discovered that further progress is impossible without defeating the Archangels guarding the turquoise tent :(, so I had to replay. After hiring the Death Knights, repeating all of this with almost no losses turned out to be much easier.
2. I really didn’t like that I had to have the addict learn Light magic – for him, this is a violation of his nature; in other words, it’s a waste of several levels, because “light” is useless to him in battles against light creatures – it’s like giving a fish an umbrella. Darkness, logistics, attack, and chaos would be most effective for him (at worst, summoning could replace chaos).
3. The outposts guarding the portals from which the Red Demon can appear are very uneven in strength. The one without Archangels is much stronger in battle against this opponent because it has griffins that know “Strike from Above” – they more than compensate for the demon’s artillery. With them, you can easily defeat the demon’s fire elementals and imps, and the archers, protected by swordsmen, can easily take down the Archdevil from close range. After that, everything depends on your desire – you can defeat the demon, or you can let him emerge with a couple of demons to be torn apart by Nicholas.
But if the Red Demon emerges through the outpost with the Archangels, he will break through it in any case because it has no artillery for fighting at a distance (archers against the demon himself, and ballistas and fire elementals are generally “useless”). And then, in order to defeat him (the demon with the remnants of his army) without losses, Nicholas has to work hard.
4. There is a lot of rigidity in development – in order to avoid losses, you have to follow only a strictly regulated combat path: 1. mages – 2. demonesses – 3. golems – 4. gremlins – 5. dogs – 6. imps – 7. crusaders (after that, it depends on where the demon appears).

I got the sword after capturing the Castle. I resurrected Stefan. I defeated Erathia. Glen appears every ten days. I'm tired of chasing him. I'll continue playing in the evening. Although, no, I'll try again. I didn't develop the hero in the right direction. But Glen appears too often.

You get the sword after capturing the Castle.

Duncan appeared, was killed, and the quest was completed?

Duncan appeared a second time, was killed, but the task remains uncompleted.

Okay, if that's the case, I'll fix it and upload it as soon as possible. The main boss won't appear without the Duncan quest...

Added after 14 hours and 19 minutes
A new version has been uploaded.

Decided to replay the game – the question is, what will happen if I only develop Stefan, because unlike Nicholas, he is free from the "light hassle" and develops much more promisingly.
Starting from the beginning, I freed Stefan on the third day, captured my castle on the ninth day, and freed the green ally on the eleventh day (before she could be ambushed). Now I'm considering taking the green outpost. But I can't shake the thought that I will later need to use Nicholas (and he is only level three) – it will be painfully frustrating to waste time and effort for nothing.

No, the plot isn't really tied to Nicholas.
I think I need to strengthen the monk hero (increase his spellcasting skill so that he can deal more damage with Holy Word), since he's being killed so quickly.

But it will be difficult with just one hero. An orange hero will come and attack the castle, then more demons and an archpriest will arrive. So I advise you to also level up Kolya in parallel, for example, by fighting hydras in the temple.

...I think I need to buff the monk hero, (increase his spellcasting skill so that his "Holy Word" deals more damage...

The monk already deals decent damage with "Holy Word" (he could wipe out an entire army with it), but he's not very bright – he casts "Surveillance," then "Prayer," then "Blessing." After these three turns, he's left without an army, and only then, when the angel revives the remaining monks, does he try to cast "Holy Word" (if he has time) :)
There's no difference whether you attack him on the 8th day or the 13th – the hero won't get any stronger, as all those who could be defeated have already been defeated, and Nicole only has to collect the loot.

Probably, I'll need to change the task – to study dark spells instead of light ones, and generally switch light to dark. Never mind. This will be in the next version. Monk. Yes, that's how his script is. Although, I could make it so that he first attacks with holy words, and then, when his mana runs out, he prays, just to make it more fun. It's just hard to test the map only by myself, and it's the first time in my life that I'm making a map :smile13: And the AI, in principle, doesn't cast mass spells or special abilities like "Watch" and "Prayer." Unfortunately. So, I have to script it.

I guess I'll have to change the quest – to study dark spells instead of light ones, and generally switch from light to dark, whatever.

And that's good! Because a drug addict's nature is dark – there's no point in forcing him to study light. If Hottabych were on the map, I wouldn't hesitate to switch from light to anything.
It's a pity that Stefan can't be given the Cloak of Darkness, otherwise he would become a truly terrifying monster.

P.S. The map is great and the plot is interesting – thank you!

Added after 19 hours and 3 minutes
I captured the outpost guarding the entrance to the green territory, defeated Dunkin, and headed towards the city. While I was walking towards it, Dunkin reappeared and almost caught up with me near the city. I decided to experiment – what to do first – kill Dunkin or capture the city – and realized that the game has a continuation, but only with the second option – first capture the city, and then kill Dunkin; otherwise, it turns out as described by elizbar1967.
P.S. By the way, it's funny – I captured the castle with Stefan, but Kolka got the sword. :)
After capturing the green castle and defeating Dunkin, Stefan urgently returned home, and with the help of Iris, he managed to transfer his troops to Kolka before the arrival of the third orange "G..." (I forgot his last name), although this wasn't very important – Kolka had already managed to gather an army of six dozen wampires there (most of which were made of griffins and wolves) + skeletons and zombies from the castle and creature generators. As a result, the redhead showed up and was brutally defeated – he was crushed with almost no losses (a dozen skeletons and a couple of ghosts don't count).
P.P.S. Then I put Stefan in charge of guarding the city with all the zombies, and Kolka went to deal with the hydras, got the boots, and when a new orange "G..." appeared again, Kolka met him again, but this time he didn't reach the castle – they met at the entrance to the portal, and this time it all came down to beating up the babies – he dealt with his army with vampires alone, without any losses, and Kolka's level is now almost at its maximum.
And the red demons are quite peaceful if you block their exit from the teleport with a powerful hero (Kolka) – they just dig around on their island and don't bother me, and their danger level is always "very low."

I decided to experiment – what to do first – kill Dunkin or capture the city – and realized that the game has a continuation, but only with the second option – first capture the city, and then kill Dunkin; otherwise, it turns out as described by elizbar1967.

Is this on the very first version, or on the corrected one?

Regarding the red demons, they are peaceful for now. Soon they will come, as they gather an army, I hope. Next, I will try to make them more warlike. Moreover, since the emphasis will be on Darkness and not on Light, we won't have to be stingy with the number of armies. :smile13:
Although, then I will give the demons and the final boss anti-darkness, so there won't be any easy wins: smile16:

We will also strengthen the redhead, since that's the case. Maybe we should even ban the temple of the underworld?

On the very first one – I started playing when there weren't any others yet, and I don't feel like replaying it for the fourth time.

The redhead needs to be strengthened in stages 3 and higher.

... Maybe completely ban the Temple of the Underworld?

It's not worth it – it will destroy the nuance that makes the game interesting, but if it were possible to build it only after completing some kind of quest, that would be a good idea.