Scenario 2: Blackwater Port

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Scenario 2: Blackwater Port

Post by Content Feedback »

(1) What difficulty level and version of Wesnoth have you played the scenario on?
(2) How difficult did you find the scenario? (1-10) [1]
(3) How clear did you find the scenario objectives?
(4) How clear and interesting did you find the dialog and storyline of the scenario?
(5) What were your major challenges in completing the scenario?
(6) How fun do you think the scenario is? (1-10)
(7) What, if any, are changes you would have made to the scenario to make it more fun?

[1] preferably, this should be rated relative to other scenarios in the campaign, such that the easiest scenario in the campaign is rated '1', and the most difficult '10'. i.e. even if you didn't think the campaign is very hard, you should still rate the hardest scenario '10'.
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Elvish_Pillager
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Re: Scenario Review: Blackwater Port

Post by Elvish_Pillager »

(1) Easy, Medium, Hard
(2) 1
(3) Not the best
(4) Very
(5) Leaving the forest to attack at night... gah, that was stupid...
(6) 4
(7) Have Sir Kaylan recruit Lancers
It's all fun and games until someone loses a lawsuit. Oh, and by the way, sending me private messages won't work. :/ If you must contact me, there's an e-mail address listed on the website in my profile.
Dacyn
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Post by Dacyn »

1=Medium
2=1
3=somewhat
4=very, but I don't really like the idea of "tips" in the dialog
5=horsemen getting killed when charging, and allies stealing my XP
6=7
7=same thing as Elves Besieged: AI who steals less XP

BTW does it matter which version we played it on?
Bandobras
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Post by Bandobras »

(1) Easy, Medium
(2) 1
(3) clear
(4) clear, but see (7)
(5) surviving the first night. To make horsemen more viable I suggest moving the start of the scenario to, like, Second Watch, so that the horsemen are able to reach the orcs at the begining of the day. Then the hard thing was finding a good strategy for gold/XP and using the help of the ally without much XP loss.
(6) 8, small map so you can finally find your perfect strategy and then joyfully reap the fruits, this is very welcome after Elves Besieged, where not much depended on you.
(7) my perfect strategy was to recruit no horsmen until the few last turns, and use the lone horsemen to harvest villages. This is against the stryline, though. I used the recalled (cheaper) elves (riders+druids+shaman) and Delfador (i play with (5HP/100XP) to hold the forest+village near the orcish keep. When I was badly beaten the ally used to move ahead and take a huge beating, leaving my troops to kill the wounded foes and milk their leader.

Also I had no incentive to finish before time, because I hold all the villages (so 2 more gold than the bonus) and I harvested XP to the end (and at last recruited horsemen, finishing with 0 gold). Perhaps the bonus could be #of villages +2+20% on all scenarios?

The scenario was a bit too random IMO. First, the time when the ally arrives depends on whether the village east of his keep is taken by the leader or a unit --- I ended up taking the villages with my horseman to speed up their arrival at the front. Second, when I tried to attack with the horseman, sometimes the orc recruiment was such that they evaded fight on the first turn and I could not help it (and on the next, daylight turns, they evaded fight even more unless with huge forces).
Le Gnome
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Re: Scenario Review: Blackwater Port

Post by Le Gnome »

(1) Medium
(2) 3
(3) clear
(4) clear
(5) Keep my horsemen alive while still gaining XP, not use heavily
Delfador for instant killing of trolls.
(6) 7
(7) Reduce distance between ally's castle and frontline (rough terrain +
forest near the orcish castle), although there will perhaps be too many
allied horsemen in frontline after that. So better keep it such :)
Nothsa

Post by Nothsa »

(1) What difficulty levels have you played the scenario on?
Medium and Hard. Probably played it close to 10 times now, as I try to replay each level on each new version. Haven't d/l 0.83 yet, though.

(2) How difficult did you find the scenario? (1-10)
2 - this is one of the easier ones; however, learning to keep horsemen alive is the main challenge. It's certainly possible to lose Konrad or Delfadore with reckless play, and I have gotten in difficulty with the number of turns. Generally though it's straightforward to bottle the orc up.

(3) How clear did you find the scenario objectives?
Fairly clear. First time through (back in 0.7-something) I wasn't real clear on the allies concept at first.

(4) How clear and interesting did you find the dialog and storyline of the scenario?
Clear, and pretty interesting. Reminding about recalling is a good idea here.

(5) What were your major challenges in completing the scenario?
I already mentioned the problem with horsemen. I got better at using them only after much play, as they are really different from elves. Terrain near the orcish keep is mostly clear (and the hills really benefit the orcs), so approaching it can lead to casualties. I learned about the importance of time of day playing this one!

(6) How fun do you think the scenario is? (1-10)
4. It's really straightforward, which lowers the fun quotient a bit. However, variations are possible. The last time I played I rushed a ranger into the little patch of trees next to the orc leader and just picked him apart. Finding new strategies pretty fun - neat that it's possible even on a small, simple level like this.

(7) What, if any, are changes you would have made to the scenario to make it more fun?
It's a good level 2, especially since this is the first time novice players have really been on the offensive. It could be made a little easier if a few more trees were put in.... but given the difficulty upgrade offered by the next level, I won't recommend that. One fun addition might be to add in some weak enemy units in other parts of the map for the horsemen to spear. Otherwise it's simply too dangerous for the novice to learn about horsemen, since they (horsemen) aren't very robust against massed orcs.[/i]
pjr

Re: Scenario Review: Blackwater Port

Post by pjr »

Dave wrote:Our review of the second scenario in Heir to the Throne[/i]:

(1) What difficulty levels have you played the scenario on?

Easy and Normal
Dave wrote: (2) How difficult did you find the scenario? (1-10) [1]

3
Dave wrote: (3) How clear did you find the scenario objectives?

Very clear and straightforward.
Dave wrote: (4) How clear and interesting did you find the dialog and storyline of the scenario?

I find the instructions on how to use horsemen rather tedious. That kind of thing belongs in a tutorial. Fine otherwise.
Dave wrote: (5) What were your major challenges in completing the scenario?

Finishing quickly.
On easy, the allied horsemen and knights tend to kill too many orcs and trolls if I'm not careful, thus making it difficult to gain XP. This is not a fault! I like such fiendishness!
Dave wrote: (6) How fun do you think the scenario is? (1-10)

7
This one's fun to play.
Dave wrote: (7) What, if any, are changes you would have made to the scenario to make it more fun?

I don't think any changes are needed.
Gimli
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Post by Gimli »

(1) Medium
(2) 2
(3) Very obvious: kill, kill, kill (and let your allies be killed :twisted: )
(4) Nice. As a Wesnoth newbie I've appreciated the quick tutorial on horsemen.
(5) Holding the village between the forest and the enemy castle during the first night: if my units survive, then the orcs are dead.
(6) 9, because it is nice to do some easy killing, expecially considering the tough levels ahead.
(7) It's OK. Maybe a little too easy, but the player really needs gold+XP for the later levels.
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turin
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Post by turin »

(1) easy, medium
(2) 1. this was, by far, the easiest scenario in the campaign... even if you want to defeat the enemy leader.
(3) pretty clear, but i wasn't sure if you could just last until end of turns to win (at first), i thought you had to defeat the enemy.
(4) ~5. (i can't remember it. ;) )
(5) um... getting more than 3 advanced units
(6) 4. not the most interesting one in the campaign.
(7) I guess give the enemy more gold.
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Na'enthos
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Post by Na'enthos »

(1) Medium
(2) Easy once you figure it out. (3)
(3) Clear, even though I couldn't help but attack. :wink: :P
(4) Er.. I'll go replay and come back, okay?
(5) Troop placement (what terrain, mostly) and recruitment.. not to attack too quickly (overextending with weak forces)
(6) Not sure.. it is a lot of fun trying to figure out how to setup your forces and start the attack. I'll give it a 7. -edit- No, after thinking over it a bit.. I'll go a bit lower. And give it a.. 5. It doesn't make it less fun, but gives a better perspective..

(7) Not sure.. see point 4. The various troup recruitment of the enemy can really change the difficulty of the battle, I seem to recall. But perhaps I was just too impatient. :wink:
Last edited by Na'enthos on September 9th, 2004, 6:30 pm, edited 1 time in total.
Integral
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Re: Scenario Review: Blackwater Port

Post by Integral »

Dave wrote:(1) What difficulty levels have you played the scenario on?
Easy (long ago) and Medium.
(2) How difficult did you find the scenario? (1-10) [1]
4 -- a bit harder than the previous one, but not much.
(3) How clear did you find the scenario objectives?
As I mentioned elsewhere, I have trouble seeing "Objectives: A, B" as meaning "A *or* B". It appears, though, that a decision was made at some point that objectives are disjunctive.
(4) How clear and interesting did you find the dialog and storyline of the scenario?
Fine.
(5) What were your major challenges in completing the scenario?
Someone gave the enemy leader a lot more money since the last time I played this level! :shock: If I hadn't had a number of level 2 units from "Elves Besieged", I might actually have had trouble holding off the hordes of orcs with only 100gp.

The main problem I had was preventing the orcs from killing my experienced units at night...but the suicidal horse allies helped with that :).
(6) How fun do you think the scenario is? (1-10)
7
(7) What, if any, are changes you would have made to the scenario to make it more fun?
I think it's a decent second scenario, although it left me with no money for Anduin...

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ott
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Post by ott »

Relative to wesnoth-0.8:

(1) Levels: medium, easy, hard

(2) Difficulty: 2-6 (hard the first few times I played, easy once I'd started to exploit ZOC and the day/night cycle)

(3) Objectives: clear.

(4) Dialog/storyline: OK, but the lecture on horsemen would be better in the tutorial.

(5) Challenges: after turning the tide, keeping enemies from killing themselves against the ally or Delfador before I could score XP off them.

(6) Fun: 8. Nice scenario, requires strategy. However, it's very easy to wipe out the enemy early, which isn't worthwhile (the early finish bonus is only 1GP less than sitting on all the villages and scoring XP off the remaining enemies). The enemy leader likes to come out and play far too much.

(7) Changes: enemy leader should be more circumspect in rushing out into grassland to attack the player's army.
daloser
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Re: Scenario Review: Blackwater Port

Post by daloser »

Dave wrote: (1) What difficulty levels have you played the scenario on?
(2) How difficult did you find the scenario? (1-10) [1]
(3) How clear did you find the scenario objectives?
(4) How clear and interesting did you find the dialog and storyline of the scenario?
(5) What were your major challenges in completing the scenario?
(6) How fun do you think the scenario is? (1-10)
(7) What, if any, are changes you would have made to the scenario to make it more fun?
1 - E,M
2 - 1 on E, 2 on M
3 - Clear
4 - Okay
5 - None really, maybe learning the strengths/weaknesses of Horsemen the first time ya play it.
6 - 5
7 - Kind of a one-strategy only map. Maybe a bigger map and more turns?Doesn't generate a lot of gold for the next scenario.
allover
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Re: Scenario Review: Blackwater Port

Post by allover »

Dave wrote: (1) What difficulty levels have you played the scenario on?
Easy, Medium
Dave wrote: (2) How difficult did you find the scenario? (1-10) [1]
2 - I only figured out how to lose when I played it on Medium for the second time. (You hide in the forest til daybreak; the orc recruits zillions of archers; Sir Kaylan charges down to be surrounded and killed). When the orc didn't recruit all those archers, it got easier, but the horsemen weren't quite as useful (read "not at all").
Dave wrote: (3) How clear did you find the scenario objectives?
Very clear. It's a bit weird you only need to resist - turns ran out while I was about to kill the orc (I took my time) and I won anyway.
Dave wrote: (4) How clear and interesting did you find the dialog and storyline of the scenario?
Pretty clear. It's kind of weird to find horsemen guarding a coastal outpost, though. Really, light cavalry like these guys should be riding around the steppes, and defending a fixed base is not really their strong point. Knights I can see, though, defending a castle.

The instructions are a bit annoying, particularly since they don't really tell you anything non-obvious: horsemen can't shoot (you find this out as soon as you click on one), horsemen charge (all right, this needs explanation), horsemen aren't so good in forests (obvious upon clicking), horsemen are lawful (the whole day/night thing needs attention drawn to it, I guess). Pointing out that horsemen are destructive but easily killed would be good; suggesting that they're best against enemies they can kill in one charge would be very useful (but maybe too much?).

Perhaps:

Konrad: "Thank you! I am sure your horsemen will be a tremendous aid to our cause. How are they best used in battle?"

Sir Kaylan: "Horsemen can charge, inflicting a great deal of damage but risking great injury in return. They can kill enemies quickly, but in a prolonged battle can be killed quickly. They are also lawful, so they are much stronger during the day. Beware of the orcs when night gives them strength!"
Dave wrote: (5) What were your major challenges in completing the scenario?
Keeping Sir Kaylan at home and alive. If you capture all the villages, his knights wander into the meat grinder one by one; if you leave him some, his knights spend a while taking them and are more likely to arrive together.
Dave wrote: (6) How fun do you think the scenario is? (1-10)
4 - it's okay; it's not really too hard on the settings I played at.
Dave wrote: (7) What, if any, are changes you would have made to the scenario to make it more fun?
No suggestions 'til I finish the campaign...
Glowing Fish
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Post by Glowing Fish »

1. Easy
2. 1 or 2
3. Very clear. Destroy enemy leader. Nice and simple
4. A bit wordy, but it tells you stuff you need to know.
5. On easy, the computer would eventually destroy the enemy even without your help. The challenge comes in using this as an opportunity to level up your units.
6. 7 or 8. I like surrounding the orcs and riding them down. In general, I like scenarios that let me command an army, rather than running like a cornered rat.
7. Maybe give the player more of a role in winning the victory, as opposed to the allies doing so much work.
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