02 - Hostile Mountains

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02 - Hostile Mountains

Post by Content Feedback »

Hostile Mountains is the second scenario of The Legend of Wesmere. Feel free to reply to this thread and answer the following questions about it so that we know the opinion of the user base about the scenario.

(1) What difficulty levels and what version of Wesnoth have you played the scenario on?
(2) How difficult did you find the scenario? (1-10)
(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 meeting the objectives of 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?
(8) Was there any event that caused you to lose the game and forced you to reload or restart the scenario?
(9) If you know a bit of the Wesnoth Markup Language - do you think that the WML of this scenario is clear and well commented? If not which part would you like to be documented better?
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taptap
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Re: V1.9/1.10 SP - Scenario Review: LoW 2 - Hostile Mountain

Post by taptap »

(1) What difficulty levels and what version of Wesnoth have you played the scenario on?

High Lord (Hard), 1.9.9

(2) How difficult did you find the scenario? (1-10)

8

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

Very clear.

(4) How clear and interesting did you find the dialog and storyline of the scenario?

Good.

(5) What were your major challenges in meeting the objectives of the scenario?

Time limit, limiting losses, hitting trolls in mountains, appreciating marksmen - without them it is nearly impossible to finish in the time limit, indirect cooperation with dwarves.

(6) How fun do you think the scenario is? (1-10)

7 - I hate killing trolls after playing Sojournings of Grog :(

(7) What, if any, are changes you would have made to the scenario to make it more fun?

Let me kill ogres instead of trolls :)

(8) Was there any event that caused you to lose the game and forced you to reload or restart the scenario?

Not finishing in time.
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HenryPlainview
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Re: V1.9/1.10 SP - Scenario Review: LoW 2 - Hostile Mountain

Post by HenryPlainview »

taptap, could you post your replay? I'm stuck on this level on hard on 1.9.10 and I cannot figure out how it is possible. Looking at a 1.8 replay, it seems in 1.9 we lost the ability to recruit shamans and scouts and the AI pours all his gold in Troll Warriors. The elves' high defense is not enough compensate versus level 3s when I can't have slow and healing support...
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taptap
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Re: V1.9/1.10 SP - Scenario Review: LoW 2 - Hostile Mountain

Post by taptap »

I have a replay, but it is corrupted. The double leader thing somehow messes it up, it shows the two recalls by Landar, but not the recruits of Kalenz :(
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HenryPlainview
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Re: V1.9/1.10 SP - Scenario Review: LoW 2 - Hostile Mountain

Post by HenryPlainview »

Thanks for looking, I meant to post in this thread earlier but I forgot. I did manage to make it through, and I seem to have had a better time of it than you did. Since my replay is also corrupted, for those of you in the future: by watching Maiklas3000's replay in the 1.8 thread I discovered that, for whatever reason, if you stay on the northern half of the island, the trolls will primarily attack you from the water, and they will also split up to attack the dwarves from the water and mostly ignore troops on your side of the shore once they are sufficiently committed. My problem earlier was that I was trying to occupy the whole island, which led to the trolls swarming me, and you really need the dwarves' help on hard. With all archers I managed to finish it by turn 20 and got like a 300 gold bonus for the next scenario, but I can't help but feel like I got really lucky. I didn't even saveload, but there were a lot of times that I could have easily gotten smashed, even with the elves' high defense ratings, but I escaped unscathed.

I was initially very frustrated with this scenario, but once I got that AI trick I really enjoyed it, it made me feel like I was overcoming a vastly superior power by taking down level 3 trolls with level 1 archers. However, I don't like it when scenarios rely so much on the whims of the AI--if the trolls don't stay in the water and if the dwarves are dumb and jump into the water (why does the AI consistently love jumping in water so much?) you're pretty much sunk. I don't know how to solve that without drastically changing the scenario, though.

And like taptap I am now kind of stuck on the next scenario of this campaign. It wouldn't be so bad if you didn't wrest control of those original elves from me, the AI is not a good steward of mission critical units...
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taptap
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Re: V1.9/1.10 - 02 - Hostile Mountains

Post by taptap »

I played it once more, it was easier this time :) This scenario would be much more interesting if there were some self-preservation coded into the AI of all sides. Dwarves attacking trolls at night from water first when there is another dwarf fighter sitting on a mountain that didn't move yet. In general some prioritizing among attacks would help the AI tremendously but it seems to consider every unit on its own. In other situations it isn't so bad, but here it leads to horrible results. I would have loved to cowardly run for the sign post, but the time limit effectively forced me to go for the kill instead. Marksmen are the only way to achieve this somehow reliably (although they easily fall to a double hit that isn't so unlikely even when attacked from a single troll).

The AI recruitment choice (only troll warriors) seems to be the well-known ai recruiting bug to me as the code reads

#ifdef HARD
recruit=Troll Whelp, Troll, Troll Rocklobber, Troll Warrior
#endif

ignore-bad-combat should be a yes once more (even if it would probably make it much harder on hard).
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bobby
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Re: V1.9/1.10 - 02 - Hostile Mountains

Post by bobby »

(1) What difficulty levels and what version of Wesnoth have you played the scenario on?

Medium, 1.10.0

(2) How difficult did you find the scenario? (1-10)

6, a lot easier than in 1.8, it also helped that I got a lot more money from the first scenario (6 turns win)

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

Clear, I played this before a few times.

(4) How clear and interesting did you find the dialog and storyline of the scenario?

Good.

(5) What were your major challenges in meeting the objectives of the scenario?

Rotating injured units from the front line. I got really lucky holding onto the southern village on the small island, and trolls and dwarves fought each other without any effort from me. All I had to do was leave space for them.

(6) How fun do you think the scenario is? (1-10)

9, one of my favourite, exciting when beseiged on that island, and satisfying when gradually gaining the upper hand

(7) What, if any, are changes you would have made to the scenario to make it more fun?

More type of troll/enemy? There used to be rocklobber too. The run-to signpost is too far away. The run-up to the mountain base felt a bit of a slog.

(8) Was there any event that caused you to lose the game and forced you to reload or restart the scenario?

Not really. I reloaded maybe twice from unfavourable diceroll.
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Ninjuri
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Re: V1.9/1.10 - 02 - Hostile Mountains

Post by Ninjuri »

(1) What difficulty levels and what version of Wesnoth have you played the scenario on?
easy 1.10.2
(2) How difficult did you find the scenario? (1-10)
3
(3) How clear did you find the scenario objectives?
Clear
(4) How clear and interesting did you find the dialog and storyline of the scenario?
This one was one of my favorites, this was the first time i had seen dwarves, and i was scared to death of stepping on their land, because i knew i couldn't take on 2 foes at a time. I was hoping that one of the trolls would step over there, and they did, then all hell broke loose. In fact, the dwarves probably killed more trolls than i did.
(5) What were your major challenges in meeting the objectives of the scenario?
I was just bogged down for a while in the bottleneck because i was afraid of getting my units in the water and making them vulnerable. If this was the plan when designing this, it worked.
(6) How fun do you think the scenario is? (1-10)
9
(7) What, if any, are changes you would have made to the scenario to make it more fun?
It's already good.
(8) Was there any event that caused you to lose the game and forced you to reload or restart the scenario?
Nope
Fate is against me.
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NoQ
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Re: V1.9/1.10 - 02 - Hostile Mountains

Post by NoQ »

v1.10.4, hard difficulty.

I'm surprised that nobody seems to notice the easy way here: sending Kalenz straight through the dwarf villages on the east (as if specially painted to give you a hint). You can start moving out at around turn 9 or 10, when dwarfs are completely occupied with their battle and won't follow you, this brings you safe and sound to the destination around 5 turns earlier than required. If a single dwarf follows you after all, you can usually easily intercept him with archers. You can use up the rest of your army to lure into a trap and almost-safely kill a few lonely trolls that will try to attack you anyway, gaining some xp, even though it'd be less then if you kill them all; you'll be fighting them close to your camp, in a forest, a bit away from the main battle, but close enough to attract their attention.

Another trick is to make sure you control all the northern mountain villages, which seems to decrease the troll production significantly.
The Flight of Drakes, Only Death Behind, ??? (not yet sure how the third part will be called).
flyswatter
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Re: V1.9/1.10 - 02 - Hostile Mountains

Post by flyswatter »

1.10.4 Hard

I played this scenario, and I was surprised to see that the dwarves didn't join the battle, so I was on my own. I had played this scenario in 1.8 and remembered that the dwarves are supposed to be a huge help. After I watched the replay, I realized that maybe I was just particularly unlucky, that is, two trolls did pass through the dwarf's territory, but it seems he doesn't mind trespassers as long as they keep moving and don't stop to look around. I don't know if there is anything tha player can do to make the dwarves help him out if this happens, so unless someone more knowledgeable convinces me otherwise, I consider this a game breaker which should be addressed. I don't know how often this happens, but for someone who hasn't played the scenario before, it can be very confusing I guess, as it makes the scenario impossible with seemingly no mistake made by the player.

Anyway, it was still fun to play against level 3 trolls with level ones, and with some luck (but no reloads) I managed to put together an anti-troll elite unit and by the end it was getting quite easy. If there were a few more turns, I could have won without problems. Also, I rather liked the change that unlike last time I couldn't recruit shamans to weaken the trolls.

I post a replay just in case:
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santi
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Re: V1.9/1.10 - 02 - Hostile Mountains

Post by santi »

One of the tricks when designing this scenario was to entice the trolls to step on dwarvish land, for example by placing an expendable unit where it is easiest attacked from dwarvish land(i.e. in the water); but the AI has changed a lot since then, so I 'm not sure this can be guaranteed to work
oea
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Re: V1.9/1.10 - 02 - Hostile Mountains

Post by oea »

maybe i am extremely unlucky but this level isnt working for me as it was designed. playing 1.10.5.
i have been reading the walkthru (which doesnt seem to have been updated in quite awhile) so i had brought some troops to island initially taking the villages there and going no further at this point there are already some trolls starting up the west side of the river and the dwarfs have been triggered but they only have a leader still.
on ending the turn all the trolls just continue north and alot of dwarfs spawn, so 5 trolls are on the west side of the river moving north and 5 are on the island or the water leading to it. i fall back and the dwarves advance to their shore and all but 2 of the trolls just continue north after me. so i go back 2 turns and dont take the villages on the island just having 2 units on the far north tip of the island, this time 3 trolls are diverted to the dwarves.
so i go back even further now i do not go past the little ridge of mountains that extend toward the river and just wait till most everyone (except me elves who have to struggle over the mountains from capturing those faraway villages) is just bunched up waiting.
this works to some extent as only 5 of the trolls are still just coming straight for me up the west side of the river so i can set up my lines and the battle will start on the 7th day of the mission in the area just north of that ridge of mountains where is can deal with so many trolls all at once in such unfavorable terrain (i didnt get any troops leveled last scenario but have 2 nearly there so this will be super tough. there are some dwarves about to cross to the north point of the island who will probaly help me and any further troll spawn will probably go straight for the dwarfs. but i gotta say this was completely frustrating i almost ready to give up and just do what another poster above suggest and take the village path thru dwarf territory and just toss the map away with no xp (i still will if i cant handle the trolls).
anyway i am pretty sure this wasnt how it was planned to happen. might i suggest one of two things either make the west side of the river less troll friendly so that they are less likely to head straight up it or have dwarves already on the map who move as soon as the trigger takes place. quite frankly with the map design i dont know why the trolls havent always just taken the west side of the river straight towards the player it is faster and the lone dwarf leader doesnt seem to be targetted by the ai even when the dwarfs appeared all over the fortress area none of the trolls went towards them it was only when some reached the river edge and could actually be attacked that the trolls diverted (by the way it was only the 3rd or 4th troll that reached the end of the hill path from their spawn that crossed the river to trigger the dwarf response. the first ones just went on the west side.)
well thought i should let you know. wish my troll hunting luck i will need it.
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Elfarion
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Re: V1.9/1.10 - 02 - Hostile Mountains

Post by Elfarion »

oea wrote: i had brought some troops to island initially taking the villages there and going no further at this point there are already some trolls starting up the west side of the river and the dwarfs have been triggered but they only have a leader still.
on ending the turn all the trolls just continue north and alot of dwarfs spawn, so 5 trolls are on the west side of the river moving north and 5 are on the island or the water leading to it. i fall back and the dwarves advance to their shore and all but 2 of the trolls just continue north after me.
It's extremely important to have all your units, including Kalenz and Landar, on the island or in the water north or west of it. Have as many units as possible get on the island and wipe out the Trolls that may have reached it before you. Then put more Elves on the Island. You will certainly suffer losses, especially at night. Make sure, your losses are fighters and try to use levelling to heal units. When I played it, sooner or later a Troll would always step on the darves' side of the river, and Olurf joined me in battle.
It really helps having an Elvish Captain, but the sceanrio can be beaten without one.
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oea
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Re: V1.9/1.10 - 02 - Hostile Mountains

Post by oea »

@elfarion
your advice considering the situation i described makes no sense.
i had max moved so only had two on the island itself, but on the turn i could i could have moved several more onto the island.
reinforcing this position would have meant losing a unit at least (unless super lucky) one of which would have probably been a loyal. this would have meant my forces on the island would have only slightly outnumbered the trolls and in order to attack them i would have left many in the water. also there were 5 on the west bank some of whom dould have then attacked my troops in the water (at least some of mine would have had to attack on the west side of the small island); now certainly i would have had strong support from the dwarves flanking the trolls, but i would still have lost units and taken much damage).
take not it takes at least 3-4/1 to take out a 2nd level troll at level 1.
as it turned out by holding my line where i did i only had to take on 2 trolls on land in the west (took 7 units to take them down), the other 3 trolls i was able to engage in the water, so first turn of the engagement i was able to take out 3 trolls and seriously wound another. next turn the west side was mine (the 2 dwarves on the island itself took out one the other suicided on me). meanwhile the dwarves on their side of the river where handily dealing with their own 5 trolls (though is was able to catch one in the water at the south end of the island as i swept down).
if i had not returned to earlier saves either; i would have followed your advice and had an extremely bloody and tactically hard battle on the small island with little mobility, or i would have retreated and had to deal with most of the dwarves on the west side of the river( i am assuming trolls would have followed me retreating as i would still have been just as close as the dwarves to them).
i choose right in that i didnt not get swamped with trolls that i could not deal with, and as the feast/famine of spawning and battleing go in this game, once the initial forces were gone i was able to sweep down easily. of course the dwarves (who did entirely too well) beat me into the mountains, and i ended up having to save/load in order to get the final kill on the troll leader. with more time then i expected left to go.
the main reason i had posted the first post is that, thought that perhaps too many of the trolls had used the west side of the river making an actualy battle on the small island untenable (which i think is how the designer of the map intended).
(ed:i am playing thru on the middle difficulty by the way)
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Elfarion
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Re: V1.9/1.10 - 02 - Hostile Mountains

Post by Elfarion »

I played on middle difficulty as well and had no problems beating the scenario using the strategy I described above.
reinforcing this position would have meant losing a unit at least
So what? This happens from time to time. If you think you can beat any scenario, that includes battle, of an intermediate campaign on medium difficulty, without losses, you're either an absolute pro, or you should lower your expectations. If you have to leave units on the west side of the river, make sure they stand in the woods, and have them join your forces on the island ASAP.

Edit: I can provide a replay, if requested.
Last edited by Elfarion on February 9th, 2013, 8:36 am, edited 1 time in total.
"Each of mankind's steps towards tomorrow is a breaking of today's laws."
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