Heir to the Throne (hard) - Shydes only playthrough

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Heir to the Throne (hard) - Shydes only playthrough

Post by Remellion »

I recently finished a meme run: Heir to the Throne, on hard, with only shydes. Who needs loyal soldiers when you have an entourage of shydes?

Here is a synopsis/walkthrough of the campaign, with some comments that may be useful for regular playthroughs as well.

Campaign: Heir to the Throne, game version 1.15.14. I've actually played it many times since Wesnoth 1.6, but it's also definitely not my favourite campaign. In terms of writing and gameplay, there are better campaigns out there. HttT is just easier than most, and has plenty of meme run potential (someone did a scout-only run I think?)
Difficulty: The hardest, Lord (Challenging).

Ground rules:
Saveloading: Only from the start of each scenario.
Recruits: Only elvish shamans.
Recalls: Only elvish shamans, druids, and shydes. Nothing else.
Advancements: Shamans -> Druids -> Shydes. That's all we'll ever need.
Other units: I'll take whoever the game automatically gives me in a scenario, but we don't recall any of them. This essentially means the main cast are very important to level (Konrad, Delfador, Kalenz, Li'sar), while everyone else is completely expendable (including all other loyal units.)

Why shydes?
The reason this run is possible at all is because shydes are awesome.
- They have sustainability with +8 heal and cure.
- They have 6 MP (7 with quick) and the flight movement type, so have excellent movement and decent defense on almost any terrain. This includes water (The Ford of Abez) and caves (all the underground scenarios).
- Their unit line has a ranged slow, which makes it safer to approach enemies.
- They have impact damage to bash undead and pierce damage to poke mounted units (Test of the Clan).

That said, their main shortcoming is that they are squishy. 46 HP at level 3 and flat resistances (-10% arcane isn't really relevant) mean that they rely on their slow and on travelling in pairs to stay alive. Their melee attack is also unimpressive, so we'll be relying on Konrad and Kalenz for melee damage where needed (Li'sar too, but she'll be holding the Sceptre of Fire and be a general destruction machine).

Campaign strategy
On paper, the hardest scenarios on paper are: S6 (The Siege of Elensefar), S17 (The Sceptre of Fire), and S23 (Test of the Clan).
Elensefar has always been a challenge, the early campaign check to see if the player has enough veteran units and/or skill to pass it. Since we can only get shydes, we want to have a good number of them by this point to tip the odds in our favour.
The Sceptre of Fire is a randomly-generated map which can vary in difficulty. Our shydes don't move too well underground despite their flight, and can be flattened by troll warriors in one turn.
Test of the Clan is a brutal open field fight against highly destructive charging horsemen. Fragile shydes with poor melee retaliation don't do well; we need to engage well and accept some losses here.

So for the branching paths, the choices will be Muff Malal's Peninsula to level more shydes before Elensefar, and Swamp of Dread for the void armour and good xp. (Cliffs of Thoria was a bit too unbalanced on the easy side the last time I played it after the nerf, and besides, we're not going to recruit/recall merfolk.)

Li'sar will get the Sceptre of Fire, because that gives her a ranged attack while Konrad is just fine with a bow. Also everything will be trying to kill Konrad, so Li'sar will have free rein to roam around roasting things with fireballs.

Given that we only have one unit type, traits become a big factor in deciding who gets xp. Dextrous and resilient are the best traits here for more damage and tankiness, although we do still want a few quick shydes. Intelligent is not great here - with all our xp already going into making shydes, we won't have a shortage of levelled units. Ultimately though, it still comes down to whichever shaman is lucky enough to land killing blows.

There will be a lot of AMLAs, since most of our effective damage will come from the main cast + shydes. With some allocation and luck, we can get a number of AMLA'd shydes with good traits, as well as our main cast with maybe 2 or 3 AMLAs each (helpful against e.g. trolls, and especially for Test of the Clan). Kalenz in particular wants AMLAs, as he has less HP than the others and will appreciate the extra survivability.

A zip file containing replays of all the scenarios is included with this post.

Well then, let's get into it!
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Re: Heir to the Throne (hard) - Shydes only playthrough

Post by Remellion »

Images aren't working for me :oops:, so here are the images used for this post: https://imgur.com/a/0Zg7nqT
Scenario 1 - The Elves Besieged
The campaign begins with the first scenario. I'd actually prefer starting with the third one, but the game's the boss.
(Note: My fourth attempt at this scenario on 1.15.14. The scenario is slightly different from what I remember, and I had to change my strategy.)

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Konrad has to run for the signpost. The timing's pretty tight, we only have about 3 turns to spare. Our meta-objective is to get some xp for whoever is lucky enough, although it's also fine if nobody does.

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It's good practice to review the sides (alt-S) at the start of a scenario, if we have vision. It gives a very rough estimate of how dangerous the enemies are and how much we need to recruit/recall.

We start with 100 gold - enough for six recruits. The orcs are rich and dangerous. Blue (south) is too far away to bother us, but pillagers make it hard to farm xp off them. Green (northwest) tends to get in the way of our flight, but are the weakest orcs; Chantal's troops tend to do enough to keep a path open for Konrad. Purple (northeast) recruits dangerous level 2 and 3 orcs and trolls, and tend to be too dangerous to approach. They usually kill Galdrad and his forces on the hardest difficulty - Galdrad usually wastes his gold on elvish rangers which still die easily to level 3 trolls.

Without restrictions, I'd send a scout or two south to grab villages, and a mix of fighter and shamans northwest to grab xp, maybe with an archer. On 1.12 and before, this usually gave me two level 2 units (or level 1 units about to level up), sometimes including Konrad. One glorious time I even managed to kill both northern leaders within the turn limit - an early captain or sorceress advancement can snowball.

Of course here we get six shamans. Shamans are an essential part of the xp farming in any run, as they slow the dangerous enemy level 2 units and make it more likely our units survive. They also level surprisingly quickly just from the 1-2 xp they get with each attack or being attacked.

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After recruiting, Konrad runs west along the flat path towards Chantal. The scenario seems to have changed since I played on 1.12. I'd always crossed the river at the tree tile (black path) and headed northwest with Delfador and Konrad. Now the safest path seems to be to run Konrad west past Chantal, avoiding most of the engagements (white path).

The enemy AI will make a beeline for Konrad and Delfador. By running Konrad west and Delfador north first, the northwestern orc leader's troops will veer towards Chantal's elves in the forest. This gives her enough time to fend off the orcs by the time Konrad tries to cross the river in the west. If Konrad and Delfador instead both go north then west (black path), the orcs tend to meet them before Chantal's forces can arrive, and the campaign ends early.

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Turn 2, we send four shamans north and two south to grab villages. The two village grabbers are intelligent/strong and quick/strong - the least useful combinations of traits for us at this point. The quick one can grab two villages efficiently before going back north. They will get less xp, as the survivable fighting will be in the north. The south orcs can mostly be ignored, as they don't reach us within 12 turns, and the pillagers are dangerous foes anyway.

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Turn 4, two shamans slow a wolf rider at dusk. We can't afford to wait for daylight as the scenario goes by too quickly. It's fine to treat all recruits as expendable here until they get a kill. There's plenty of time to properly build a roster in scenarios S3 and S4.

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Turn 6, we get a kill on Nëthea (dextrous/resilient), and slow a troll. Trolls and orcish warriors are great targets for shamans, giving 2 xp per combat relatively safely. Delfador heads further west to draw the enemy away from our shamans and into Chantal's elves.

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(Spoiler alert: they do fight Galdrad, and they do get further.)
It's generally not profitable to help Galdrad with the northeastern orcs as the risk of our units dying is far too high. He tends to die to the level 2 and 3 units sent his way. Instead, it's better to hover around Chantal's elves and help to slow enemies, picking off kills where possible.

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(I'll ask nicely too, please kindly let him through)
If Konrad can get a kill en route to the signpost, it's a nice bonus. Getting Konrad to level 2 (or even level 3) is a high priority, as he is almost useless at level 1. The leadership he gains will also help grow our army faster.

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(Woah there, what did I ever do to you?)
Delfador on the other hand kills units too well in the early campaign, depriving our units of xp. Later in the campaign he will gain HP naturally via AMLAs, which is nice. Here he left Brokhub the orc with 13 HP, which Chantal's elvish fighter finished off to become a captain.

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Turn 8, Nëthea gets a second kill, and goes to 30/32 xp.

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With only two level 2 trolls nearby, she is guaranteed to survive whatever happens (she levelled to a Druid on the enemy's turn after being attacked). The slow from the shamans goes a long way towards making our units safer.

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Turn 9, Delfador leaves a troll at 2 HP, letting Dasya (quick/dextrous) kill it to reach 28/32 xp. We also retreat Léra (intelligent/quick, 10/26 xp) to a village.

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Galdrad, affronted that the orcs treat him like a door and walk right through, is dodging like a champion here. He survives a goblin knight, troll, and assassin to live with 8 HP while poisoned on a village. We can already tell this run is blessed.

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Turn 10, Konrad reaches the signpost, but not before we do some "suicidal" xp gathering. Léra kills a level 2 orc for exactly enough xp to level up, and our other shamans attack the level 3 troll warriors that came our way from the east for 3 xp each.

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We end up with two druids, a 31/32 xp shaman, and one kill each on another shaman and Konrad. A fairly successful first scenario.

Oh, and Galdrad survives. That's quite rare.

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Our units going into Blackwater Port: a pretty healthy list already.
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Reason: fixed the image links
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Re: Heir to the Throne (hard) - Shydes only playthrough

Post by Inky »

Whoa, that's so awesome, I gotta check it out! And I love how you have a detailed walkthrough of the first scenario with screenshots. If you make posts for the other scenarios as well I'd love to read them! :D

I fixed the image links in your post, you were using the direct link url instead of the url for embedding the image: the direct link looks like https://imgur.com/kC21yG5 and the corresponding link for embedding looks like https://i.imgur.com/kC21yG5.jpg. I think there's an option called "embed post" when you view an image on imgur that copies that link.
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Re: Heir to the Throne (hard) - Shydes only playthrough

Post by Remellion »

Thanks Inky, I'll keep that in mind! Part of the inspiration for this format was of course your three playthroughs in your signature, which actually made me go beat Dead Water back in the day, and in fact I'm rereading your AtS walkthrough right this moment :P

I'll do the other scenarios too since there are in fact a few things to say strategy-wise, but slowly (this is slow work, even with the replays at hand).
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Re: Heir to the Throne (hard) - Shydes only playthrough

Post by Remellion »

The second scenario is just about as exciting as the first - that is to say, not very. We also get the first character in the campaign trying to sell us something we don't need - a non-shaman unit.
Scenario 2 - Blackwater Port

We arrive at Blackwater Port, defended by the former horseman, Grand Knight Sir Kaylan. After a brief introduction, we agree to help them defend the port (not really).

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Sir Kaylan grants us what he thinks are the best units in Irdya, the mighty horsemen. Maybe he's just a little biased.

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Konrad has his doubts too. Shamans and shydes are so much better, right?

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My good Sir, how often do you find yourself on the open plains at midday? You sound a little jealous of the elves, honestly.

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Delfador diplomatically tells us that shydes are superior.

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Oh, we'll be using our loyal units very wisely this campaign. :twisted:

For the second scenario in a row, we don't get to do anything particularly exciting. Survive nine turns against an enemy we could probably take out within 15? Our meta-objective is to again gain xp for our units and the wee lad Konrad, but... hang on, what's that?

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The "special bonus" is Simyr, a loyal knight only available on the hardest difficulty. Utterly worthless to us here, but I can talk a little about my experiences getting Simyr.

Getting Simyr
To get Simyr in this scenario, we'd need to punch a hole through the enemy forces at night, then take out the level 2 orcish warrior (probably on the 9th and last turn). The turn limit and unfavourable time of day means we have to play very aggressively, use veterans (after just one scenario), and accept the possibility of losses.

Delfador is instrumental in blowing up enemy units, but he needs backup. I did say in S1 that getting two levelled units isn't unusual; having a sorceress and a marksman here is extremely helpful for the raw firepower, and supporting them with fighters (cheap fodder, good melee) and shamans (slow on a stick) is essential to keep them alive long enough to take a shot at the leader.

It's not impossible to get Simyr, but it's also not a game-changer. Another loyal unit is nice to have but unnecessary.

(In a normal playthrough of HttT, you'll get a ton of loyal units which may be helpful. The loyal trait is a tradeoff: in exchange for no upkeep, they lose one slot for a good stat-affecting trait. The best loyal units in campaigns are automatically recalled ones like the main cast, which not only have no upkeep, but also save you 20 gold recalling them. "Ordinary" loyal units are nice, but not as useful unless gold is particularly important.)

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The orcs will be throwing a lot of stuff our way with 200 gold; Sir Kaylan won't recruit much with 80 (knights already cost 38). Most of his value comes from the swordsmen already on the map. Also, note the turn order: Sir Kaylan goes before the orcs, so he can steal kills and/or potentially make our position safer after we end our turn.

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The scenario begins at dawn. Following the day/night cycle, turns 8 and 9 will be full daylight (morning/afternoon), but the likely first confrontation with orcs will be at night. Since we're not going for Simyr, we'll just hang back for maximum safety until turn 7 (dawn), where we start to push aggressively for experience and kills. Considering the day/night cycle is an essential part of playing Wesnoth, be it for campaigns or multiplayer.

We'll do two rounds of recruits and recalls, level 1s first to save on upkeep. One shaman and Haldiel (who is not a shyde, and not even an elvish scout) will grab a few villages for gold, while everyone runs north to Sir Kaylan for protection before the orcs arrive. I'm sure he won't turn down a small boy, an old man, and a platoon of elvish ladies.

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One wolf rider wants to say hello to Konrad. I'd really like the quick/resilient shaman on the south village to not get cut off from the main army, so I'll send some support to deal with the wolf rider.

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The intelligent/quick shaman (not great traits, very squishy) attempts and fails to slow the rider, Haldiel bodyblocks without attacking (tip: conserve HP at night), and a druid comes to help heal. The village is also conveniently just out of reach of the wolf rider now.

Sir Kaylan's knights will do what they do best: they fail to kill the archer by hitting 1/4 charges, and get hit for 7/7 orcish arrows this turn.

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Our four units slow and surround the wolf rider, bringing it down to 2 HP in a team effort. One of Sir Kaylan's horsemen tries and fails to steal the kill, while the injured knight moves to the swamp to get a better angle on that dying orcish archer.

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Meanwhile the rest of our units go around knocking on doors asking if they'd like to give their money to a better cause. Would you rather support the natural world, or pay money for heavily armoured soldiers to squash their poor horses?

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Turn 6 and we have an interesting situation. A 2 HP wolf and 3 HP grunt are tantalisingly close to our units, but the main host of orcs is nearby. What do we do?

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Showing enemy moves with ctrl-v is a useful tool. It's clear killing the wolf rider from the lower hexes is safe, as only the dying (soon dead) wolf and grunt can reach there. The grunt is a trickier proposition, as the unit killing it would be exposed to multiple enemies.

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Since the wolf kill was safe, we tried with the resilient/quick shaman but failed; the druid was the backup there, and Haldiel stays with them. The grunt was killed by the other shaman, and we pray that Sir Kaylan's horseman Satharlyn distracts the orcs well. In hindsight, the shaman should have used the southern hex to kill the grunt, keeping a better formation and being exposed to only 2 hexes, although she'd probably still die anyway.

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Predictably, the horseman and shaman both die. Haldiel still has some potential to soften orcish archers and shield units during the day, so using him to shield a 10 xp shaman at night didn't seem like the best option. (Remember though, he's completely expendable.)

Dawn breaks, so our units continue posturing in a line just out of reach of the enemy forces - except Haldiel, who holds a village in the south. He's got to earn his keep! (Which is zero, as a loyal unit, but don't tell him that.) We'll go all-out in the last two turns when enemy retaliation is minimised.

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Yran the swordsman has somehow survived getting ganged up on by 5 units, dealing nice retaliation damage but still alive to steal kills from us. Oh well, we can't have it all. Delfador softens a troll whelp which seemed like the most obvious play from him so we did it first; two shamans also slow the north part of the enemy frontline.

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Nëthea the druid, instead of slowing, tries to set up a kill for Konrad, who needs to hit 3/3 - but only gets 2/3, so Yran will probably steal the kill. Worth a shot though.

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Léra the druid gets a kill on the troll Delfador weakened, and the other shamans and druids just slow everything else on sight. Shamans can be surprisingly bold, relying on slowing everything in sight to stay alive, and their mutual +4 healing to stay healthy on top of that. Haldiel for his part hits 1/2 perfectly, softening an orcish archer for hopefully a free kill next turn.

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Yran indeed stole a kill on the levelling archer but promptly died to another one, hence the orcish crossbowman. Everyone else survived though, and it's our turn to try getting kills.

We already have 3 druids, so more levelling more shamans aren't necessary for now; we want to prioritise a shyde for the Bay of Pearls to support the merfolk, and get Konrad to level 3 for his leadership.

I have a vague hope of feeding the crossbowman to Konrad, so Léra the druid is designated to take the free orcish archer to the south.

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Haldiel softens the crossbowman nicely with one hit. The grunt blocking one hex is dropped to 2 HP by Dasya the druid, but refuses to die to two different shamans. Konrad decides to take the safe 8 xp from the grunt (1/3 hits needed) over the risk of the crossbowman kill (3/3 needed); a shaman slows the crossbowman so there's only one open hex on Konrad.

No more kills are likely, so everyone else just leeches combat xp from whatever's around and we end our turn.

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Ah yes, the orcs get a turn too. Haldiel the horseman dies. On the open plains. At midday. But hey, our superior shamans and druids survive!

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In this rather unimportant scenario bad luck doesn't even matter, but we do get one more advancement and some xp on Konrad. We'll head to The Isle of Alduin next for the first real scenario this campaign.
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Re: Heir to the Throne (hard) - Shydes only playthrough

Post by beetlenaut »

I used the same rules once except for allowing sylphs. I thought shydes only was impossible because you would need sylphs for the damage on a few scenarios--particularly the last one. However, I failed to consider that one sylph costs as much as 2.8 shydes, so you can end up with a much larger air force than I did and deal enough damage through sheer numbers. Good job!
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Re: Heir to the Throne (hard) - Shydes only playthrough

Post by Remellion »

In scenario 3 we finally get a standard Wesnoth battle - 1v1 against some very ordinary orcs. Two scenarios late, but we have us some gameplay!

Although this is a meme run, I still tried to include little bits of advice and information for less experienced players on normal runs. Hopefully it makes up for the lack of entertainment value until we get a squadron of shydes up.
Scenario 3 - The Isle of Alduin
I have no snarky remarks to make about our tour group and their elderly guide waxing nostalgic, so let's just dive in.

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One objective: kill enemy leader. This is what we play Wesnoth for.

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The orc starts with 50 gold and +38 per turn from base income and villages. In most Wesnoth campaigns, the hardest part of a scenario will be surviving the initial wave of units from enemies; here with just 50 starting gold the orcs will get routed. The high income only means that level 1 enemies will trickle in piecemeal, ready to be turned into xp.

On our side, 134 gold allows us somewhere between 8 fresh recruits and 6 recalls (120 gold either way). 5 recalls + 2 recruits = 130 gold is just nice for turn 1, so we get all 3 of our druids and recall 2 experienced shamans.

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Quokea (resilient/quick) is recalled on the southernmost hex to reach the furthest forest village next turn (highlighted). We send the three southern units (both recalls are quick) to the south to grab villages and handle the odd wolf rider that sometimes goes there, while everyone else heads west to meet the orcs.

Up north, Delfador finds a loyal/resilient Elrian in the village. Elrian's importance to this run is demonstrated by the lack of an accompanying screenshot.

(On a normal playthrough, recalling a captain + druid for leadership and healing will help fresh recruits in the west, although not necessary; 1 or 2 scouts will help grab the southern villages. Getting Elrian levelled up here is not urgent, but having him at level 2/3 soon is nice. I'd make him a silver mage for the 6 MP, since 5 MP mages are a full hex slower underground or in swamps. A loyal/quick or resilient/quick mage would be an ideal candidate for mage of light, though.)

Let's skip ahead a little bit to first contact.

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An orcish archer pokes Delfador with a dagger and a wolf rider tries to bite him. With 60 HP, Delfador will be our designated frontline tank for a while until we can get enough gold for spamming fodder shamans.

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We slow the units with druids and set up a conservative line. The shaman on flat is expendable, preventing the druid on the village from being exposed to 3 hexes (3 hexes is my rule of thumb for when bad things start to happen). Delfador does the same for the shaman. Konrad attempted a kill on the archer needing 2/3 hits but only getting 1/3 - he really needs to level up to be less useless.

Meanwhile, the druid and two shamans keep grabbing villages in the south. They'll head towards the village in the mountains just south of the lake to cut off enemy reinforcements to our main force once they're done.

Elrian is grabbing villages up north, out of screenshot range again.

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Some units have come towards us, but having two healers means we shrug it off. It's morning, and we want to start clearing some of those units near us for xp.

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Konrad cuts down the archer, and Nifë entangles the wolf to death. Our druids then slow everything else, and Delfador just takes a village as we don't want him hogging xp with his overkill lightning.

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An orcish archer kindly attacked Konrad to level him up, while our other units took a couple of hits; the expendable shaman slowed both archers on retaliation and is still alive. The great thing about a shaman-only run is that basically all our units will heal each other for 4-8 HP per turn, which helps us stay in fighting shape.

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The now-buff Konrad easily gets another kill on the archer on flat. Léra the druid slows a wolf rider to try and preemptively shield the next risky move: Nifë tries and fails to slow the orcish archer on the mountain, eating two arrows and now has a decent chance of dying next turn from 2 hexes (oops), so we enter damage-control mode.

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The injured druid Nëthea rotates onto the village for better defense, and slows one archer. The expendable shaman continues to stay on the hills slowing one archer and maybe act as bait. Lastly, Delfador ZOCs the other unslowed archer and bonks them with his staff for good measure (he misses).

Nifë (15 HP) is thus exposed to just an archer (5x3 ranged) and a slowed wolf rider (2x3 melee), and can possibly slow the archer on retaliation, so the odds of death are not zero, but have been improved significantly.

While slowing gives us a surprising amount of safety, it's not a guarantee every turn, so we still want to eliminate these enemies before nightfall.

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(If you look hard, you can see Elrian's feet.)
On the enemy's turn, Nifë gets hit for 12 by the archer (5+5+2, slowed by Nifë for the last hit) and 2 more damage from the slowed wolf rider, barely surviving to level up. The resilient/quick fodder shaman successfully soaks damage and keeps Konrad healthy. Delfador eats a few bites from a wolf rider. No, that does not mean what it sounds like.

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At this point fodder shaman Rësea actually has some respectable xp, so she goes to rest in a village. We go around killing units, and Delfador attempts to shield our druids with his good looks and high HP.

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Meanwhile in the south, our village-grabbing squad has succeeded in boosting our income by a ridiculous amount, and position themselves to lure and kill enemies one by one. This will lessen the pressure on our main forces at night.

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The orc invaders had seen fan posters of Delfador the Great (TM) everywhere on the island, and so seeing the real person in the flesh, they mob him for his autograph.

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Delfador's bouncers knock out one fan (the brave Elrian appears in frame, having attacked an orcish archer in ranged at night), and Delfador steps back zapping another. He is actually pretty safe at 23 HP - the archer won't want to attack him in ranged (7x3, not a kill), and the wolf rider has exactly 1 HP so will probably die to retaliation before getting in full hits.

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Meanwhile in the south we slow the grunt and chip away at its HP. The three units can pretty safely and slowly kill it, but we avoid attracting further attention for now.

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Our units rip through most of the injured orcs in front of them. In the south, the grunt is killed and Quokea pokes her toe out, luring another grunt over.

We're going to skip to the end here because the rest of the scenario is us running over the remaining forces, and farming the level 2 leader for xp.

A basic note on xp farming:
Often it's better to finish a scenario fast and get the early finish bonus, since in campaigns we tend to have more veterans to recall than we have gold to do so. Sometimes though this doesn't apply:
- When the carryover is irrelevant, e.g. the next scenario is too easy, or when the scenario after that is the important one (40% * 40% = 16% carryover to the following scenario);
- When we are already so negative in gold it doesn't matter, e.g. when we overrecruit in the current scenario, or if it's just plain hard;
- When the early finish bonus is simply not worth it, e.g. very few villages on the map.

In these instances, or when it's early in the campaign and we really need veterans, we should consider xp farming. Surround the enemy leader (ideally on a village) and pelt away with weak attacks, not trying to kill but just getting 2 or 3 xp per combat interaction, depending on its level.

Here on Alduin, we have massive amounts of gold generation from the villages and a lot of shamans to level up - ideal conditions for xp farming, so we go ahead. That much gold is only going to give us diminishing returns anyway, since we have more than enough to crush the next scenario.

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We finish on turn 16, with Léra getting the leaderkill and becoming our first shyde! Although generally in campaigns you'd want more level 2 veterans before getting a level 3 unit, this particular advancement is actually very nice for the next scenario.

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We levelled a druid, a shyde, and a Konrad (39/60 xp to level 3), and we have yet more about-to-level shamans and an experienced druid.

The next scenario will be the Bay of Pearls, which as the name may or may not suggest, is just filled with xp for us.
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Re: Heir to the Throne (hard) - Shydes only playthrough

Post by Paulomat4 »

Great read Remellion, really enjoyed it. Please keep it up.
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Re: Heir to the Throne (hard) - Shydes only playthrough

Post by lhybrideur »

Very nice to read. I cannot wait for the other scenarios.
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Re: Heir to the Throne (hard) - Shydes only playthrough

Post by Inky »

Great work, I love reading these! Poor Haldiel and Elrian, we barely knew them...
You mentioned in the first post that someone did a scouts only run, I think that might have been me :mrgreen: However I did allow recalling of the loyal units (I didn't think the poor little scouts would have made it on their own) so it's not as interesting as your challenge run.

I recently saw someone on the wesnoth discord post about finishing HttT with only merfolk recruits/recalls, on the easy difficulty. That got me wondering though, could it be possible on normal or even hard? Well, only one way to find out!
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Re: Heir to the Throne (hard) - Shydes only playthrough

Post by beetlenaut »

Inky wrote: July 14th, 2021, 2:55 am someone did a scouts only run, I think that might have been me
I've done scouts only too. I've also done horsemen, mages, and shamans. I did a no-recalls run as well. (It sounds like a lot, but they were years apart.) I usually allowed recalling loyals. Horsemen is the hardest because of the underground levels.

I'm going to say right now that merfolk only on hard would not be possible. There are a number of scenarios with a lot of heavy hitters, and no strategy or tactics can keep you off of terrible terrain. You would have 30% or worse all the time.
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Re: Heir to the Throne (hard) - Shydes only playthrough

Post by Remellion »

Thanks for all the comments! Glad to see that even this very well-trodden campaign playthrough can still provide a little entertainment.

And now for the Bay of Pearls, filled with delicious pearls fish orcs xp.

For some reason I'm always afraid of the sea battle in this scenario, but I can consistently win it barring very bad RNG. Probably a hangover from when I was new to Wesnoth and attacked with the mermen at night.
Scenario 4 - The Bay of Pearls
In the previous scenarios, we've proven that we can run away, beg others for protection, and beat an orc "army" which has half our starting gold and half our total levels. A very convincing show of strength thus far.

Now there are many orcs in front of us, and it actually seems like there's danger, doesn't it?

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Delfador agrees and ditches us at the first opportunity. One doesn't live to his age without a good self-preservation instinct. (I would've used him as a damage sponge too, so well played Delfador.)

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At least we don't need to worry about him dying now. We will of course aim for the double leader kill, even if that takes the full 21 turns.

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We face two orcs, blue (sea) and green (land). (How conveniently colour-coded.) The sea leader will appropriately recruit level 1 nagas and level 0 bats, while the land leader sends us assorted level 1 orcs and trolls, and level 2 orc warriors. Definitely a step up from the previous scenario.

On the other hand, we have more starting gold than the two of them combined. Four rounds of recruiting/recalling land troops (12 units total) should be enough here, using about 200 gold. We actually don't need any sea troops because what the scenario provides us is sufficient, but a healer can be nice.

Overrecruiting is an avoidable mistake; it's better to have 6 more gold available next scenario than a 3 xp shaman that we'll never recall again, so we're not going to use all our gold.

Since our tour guide has escaped, I'll take you through the Bay of Pearls in his stead. We can divide the scenario into a land battle and a sea battle that are more or less completely separate.
The scenic Bay of Pearls (scenario overview)
Sea battle

The sea leader is inaccessible to land troops except via a long path of shallow water and coastal reef. In other words, the sea leader is effectively inaccessible to land troops. (Why would you want to send land troops swimming that way?)

The sea battle is instead fought with loyal merfolk, freed from cages around the map. Three cages are visible near the starting keep; a fourth is just south of the blue leader's island, and a fifth is behind two level 2 nagas (blue dots) in the northwest.

I find the following strategy to win the sea battle surprisingly consistent as long as we give injured fighters time to heal, and we respect ToD. (Although nagas are neutral, our merfolk are terribly weak at night and should conserve HP by not attacking.)

The first four cages give us eight merman fighters on the hardest difficulty - this is enough to beat back the sea leader's initial wave of recruits on the second day, then head north to open the fifth cage, luring the guards out one by one.

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The nagas guard a cage of two fighters, an initiate, and a javelineer, the latter two being our only loyal ranged merfolk attackers. Slightly north of the nagas is a storm trident, which gives the merfolk unit that picks it up a magical ranged fire attack - good on a fighter, to give us a third loyal ranged merfolk.

After picking up these goodies, we swing down to the sea orc leader, and take him out in daytime when it's safest, usually on the third day.

Land battle

The land battle is mostly on flat terrain against a standard mix of orcs and trolls, with some level 2 orcish warriors thrown in for good measure. There are many ways to approach this, using some mix of healers, mages/archers for damage, elvish fighters to tank, maybe some charging horsemen or elvish captains for good measure. Shamans to slow the level 2 orcs are a good investment too.

A basic approach suffices: keep a solid defensive line or ZoC line towards the enemy, retreat wounded units to the plentiful villages or healers behind the line, and by the third day there should just be a handful of enemies left.

Or we can just spam shamans. Shamans will solve all your problems. (Although we only have druids and shamans, so we may be slightly lacking in the damage department. Sorceresses would help with this.)

Crossing the river

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To actually leave our keep we have to cross a small river. This part is slightly annoying, so maybe it deserves its own section. Crossing efficiently can give us an extra turn or two to set up first contact with the land orcs.

Most of our unit types (not just shamans) need 2 MP for sand, 3 MP for shallow water, and 1 MP for the village in the middle.

A unit with 5 MP (fighters, shamans, mages) will take 3 turns to cross: ending in shallow water the first turn, shallow water on the other side the next turn, then on solid ground the third.

A unit with 6 MP (quick units, or base elvish archers) will take 2 turns to cross: ending on the island the first turn, then on the opposite side the next. (Horsemen need 4 MP for shallow water but have 8 base MP, so they behave like quick units.)

An efficient way for the 3 recruits/recalls to cross each turn is to have one 6 MP "quick" unit, and two "normal" 5 MP units. This way, they don't clash with each other on the island or in the water when crossing. Clever ordering of recruits (random traits) and recalls (known traits) can help us get the ideal quick/normal unit spread each turn.

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This screenshot shows a nice crossing. One quick unit goes on the village per turn, and as far as possible the non-quick units are the ones in the shallow water.
Turns 1-6 (start, sea battle)
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We start by recalling our shyde Léra and recruiting two fodder shamans. Léra is going to guarantee that we win the sea battle quickly and with no losses. Normally, merfolk healing in this scenario is limited to the villages near the shoreline, so even in ordinary runs I'll send a shaman or a druid to enter the water and provide extra hexes for the merfolk to heal. Having a shyde is certainly overkill, but she'll make the sea battle a cakewalk.

Konrad moves to the first merfolk cage, which starts a chain reaction of freed merfolk, releasing our first five fighters; the two easternmost ones move towards the fourth cage, which will be opened on turn 3.

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I've never seen the sea leader recruit six bats before. Bats are annoying when they steal villages and kill wounded units in the back lines. But recruiting six fragile bats with no nagas for damage and tankiness... sure, I'll take it.

We'll skip the land part for quite a few turns since we're just unloading the tour bus onto dry land.

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The flock of bats comes out and one new bat is recuited (???). Since it's still afternoon and our mermen are still extended forward, I wonder if we can't try something aggressive for a change.

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We free the fourth merfolk cage (three more fighters). Because there are still no naga recruits, we can afford to be aggressive and do a ZOC surround of the flock of bats, killing one bat along the way. This way, they can't fly out and be annoying.

It's like shooting fish in a barrel... except the fish are bats and the barrel is fish.

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On the orcs' turn, one bat suicides into the mermen and Bugg the orcish archer becomes a Sea Orc (capitalised).

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We reform the ZOC boundary and kill another bat. A small detail is that we try to use the 60% shallow water and 70% reef as much as possible, rather than 50% deep water. It's the little things like this that make a big difference in Wesnoth - shallow water instead of deep reduces the expected damage received by 20%. As we say in chess, you win by accumulating small advantages.

Léra the shyde takes the long way around to the island. Although she can fly, shydes have 40% on shallow (1 MP) and 30% on deep (2 MP), so while shydes do acceptably in water they're at a disadvantage compared to true water units (cf. the Ford of Abez).

On land, we finish recruiting and Konrad leaves the keep. Nothing exciting happening yet.

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Three more bats suicide into our merfolk, and finally the sea leader decides to recruit a level 1 naga. (He's literally battier than Bugg.) At this point we've pretty much won the sea battle (already!?) so we simply retreat at night, ready to jump the leader next morning.

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Annoyingly, a wolf jumped in the bay for a swim. Normally we'd want the wolves to go straight towards our land forces so we can cleanly take them out before the main orc army arrives. We don't look gift wolves on 30% in the mouth though, so Léra and a merman go say hi.

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We keep up the ZOC on the sea units, and with backup from a shyde can even attack a little (although usually it'd be better to just leave the units there without attacking, maintaining ZOC and relying on retaliation damage at night). The sea battle is all but over already, and with a shyde we'll get the leaderkill soon even without the storm trident or the northern merfolk cage. That's never happened to me before.

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Meanwhile our land forces form up and prepare for contact. Perfect timing too; we'll turn our attention to the land battle now. Next turn will be dawn, and we can start pressing on land.
Turns 7-21 (land battle)
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Dasya the druid got bitten by a wolf, but she heals right back up to full HP. Because the wolf went so far into our formation, the last troops to be recruited are in range, and Konrad takes the kill.

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We then advance further, putting our fodder shamans on the front lines.

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To the north, two troll whelps also decide to take a swim for no good reason. More worryingly, the group of three orcish warriors hang further back, daring us to come to them.

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Since it's day, we have to try to be as aggressive as possible, but our shamans just aren't having the best luck today. We manage to slow one of the level 2 orcs (strong/resilient!) and kill two injured wolves.

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A brief cut back to the sea: because we happen to have a shyde, we can push to kill the sea leader now, instead of getting the storm trident and ranged units from the northern merfolk cage and waiting for the next day/night cycle 6 or 12 turns later. The shyde's slow makes it far more viable to whittle down the leader's HP with melee attacks. (And losses are acceptable, because merfolk are not shydes.)

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On the land front, we've lost one shaman already, and luck saved another one (although already two fodder shamans seem not long for this world.) Pressing forward with our full force, we attack and slow relentlessly.

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...and manage to make a whopping one kill on a heavily injured archer. Shamans and druids just don't do damage very fast. We really want more enemies dead soon or those orcish warriors are going to shred us at night.

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Ouch! Rësea (fodder last scenario, now a druid) drops to 4 HP as even the slowed enemies just keep landing hits. Now that it's dusk, the orcish warriors now hit for 10x3 or 11x3 (strong), and still have huge HP pools. This is not looking good. (Delfador would definitely be of use here, but he's off frying other fish.)

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We only manage to kill one enemy and left four unslowed units. It's clear more fodder shamans will be expended next turn. Maybe three more fodder shaman recruits wouldn't have been a bad idea...

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At least the sea battle is won. Léra and two merman fighters finish off the last of the sea leader's HP. We'll go finish off the nagas and grab the storm trident for completion's sake, but we're not going to see the merfolk in later scenarios.

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Well, there go two of our fodder shamans. The more shamans we lose, the fewer slows we have. We have 8 units with slow, and 7 enemies to slow...

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Priority of course goes to slowing the level 2 orcs, even if it does take four units to slow one of them. Also, Quokea is now a druid, and Konrad who was a wee lad just one scenario ago is now the mighty Lord of his soon-to-be shyde army.

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We lose another shaman. One thing going for us is that a line of druids prety much heals itself.

Among the various things not going for us, a critically injured orcish warrior retreated out of range so we can't slow him. One unit is probably going to have to offer itself as bait and likely die - and we are running painfully short on fodder shamans.

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Konrad kills his favourite prey, the orcish archer, but does so from a very exposed hex. The intention is to give leadership to the druids that are trying to slow the troll whelps.

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The druids then make their moves, killing one of the orcish warriors (finally!) and slowing what they can. Quokea the new druid has the least xp, so steps forward to the most exposed hex.

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Ouch. There goes Quokea, and Dasya the druid is also on the verge of death. On the bright side, the orcish warriors are finally at death's door, and we help push them through.

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A shaman takes one kill, and Nëthea takes the other to become our second shyde. Lord Konrad kills yet another orcish archer, leaving just four troll whelps standing. The battle is finally under control.

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In a splendid display of marksmanship we fail to kill any of the troll whelps this turn. Turns out druids and shamans really don't do a lot of damage. We'll get half of them next turn though, and the rest of the scenario is just us steamrolling everything else on the map, so we'll skip to the end.
Scenario end and stats
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Aside from levelling another druid, nothing of note happens. The merfolk jumped up on dry land to steal villages and damage the orc leader. They could have easily finished the leader themselves of course, but we want the xp for our land troops, which arrived on the very last turn. Dasya the druid is now on the cusp of becoming our next shyde.

Meanwhile, the merfolk want to come along and all. Thanks, but you're not shydes.

Also not a shyde is Delfador, who only now reappears. Hi Delfador.

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Of course you are. You would have been perfectly safe with us too. :whistle:

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Delfador gives us a mission. Suddenly our tour has become a war party of some sort.

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An astute question, Konrad.

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Delfador continues to exercise his better judgement and finds an excuse to stay out of harm's way.

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I don't know if you've looked in the mirror recently Konrad, but you're looking pretty buff since we saw you last scenario. Also...

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GOOD POINT NËTHEA, ALL WE NEED ARE SHYDES

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5 losses (4 fodder shamans, one druid), but 6 advancements (none merfolk) so overall a good scenario.
Diverging campaign path
Since we beat both orc leaders, we have a choice of which scenario to head to next: by land to Muff Malal's Peninsula (S5a) or by sea to the Isle of the Damned (S5b).

Let's compare our choices.

Muff Malal's Peninsula
  • Almost unlimited walking corpses = lots of xp (for shydes)
  • Lots of villages for good carryover into Elensefar (more shydes)
  • Easier scenario (easier shyde creation)
Isle of the Damned
  • Loyal white mage Moremirmu, with special arcane melee attack (who is not a shyde)
  • Loyal outlaw Delurin (who is also not a shyde)
  • Only chance to recruit outlaw units who are good in caves (but who are not shydes)
  • Experience for merfolk ranged units (who are not shydes either)
  • Scenario has no impact on gold for Elensefar (which means fewer shydes)
  • Challenging scenario (impossible to recruit/recall shydes)
Our choice is clear here.

(On regular playthroughs, I typically go to the Isle of the Damned for all the special units, but both options are good; the Peninsula will give an easier time for Elensefar, which is a challenging scenario.)
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Paulomat4
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Re: Heir to the Throne (hard) - Shydes only playthrough

Post by Paulomat4 »

Funny that Shydes go on different speeds, depending on how deep the water they are flying over is.
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