Scenario Review: DiD 6 - Return to Parthyn

Feedback for the mainline campaign Descent into Darkness.

Moderator: Forum Moderators

User avatar
Content Feedback
Battle for Wesnoth
Location: Wesnoth.org
Contact:

Scenario Review: DiD 6 - Return to Parthyn

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)
(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?
Mainline Campaigns: Scenario FeedbackDevelopment & Overall Feedback
User-made Add-ons: Feedback
Gothmog77
Posts: 0
Joined: May 13th, 2008, 6:44 pm

Re: Scenario Review: DiD 6 - Return to Parthyn

Post by Gothmog77 »

(1)
Difficult (the hardest setting)
(2)
6
(3)
clear
(4)
story/dialog was fine
(5)
Killing the human leader before anybody else was a bit tough, but I managed to sneak some shadows around and get him. The real challenge was being able to hold off the humans until I killed the orcs, then turn the tide against the humans and feed my necrophages for a while. I needed to spend all my gold on recruit/recall to beat them and ended up with negative gold when the scenario ended. On turn 115. Yeah, it seems that this map has no turn limit. This would not be a problem if the humans were unbeatably powerful (which they weren't, even on Difficult) or if necrophages were not also broken. The feeding ability is supposed to give them +1 max hp per kill. I was getting +2 to +7 max hp per kill for a while, then it jumped to +17 and occasionally +34 for a single kill! :shock: I still don't understand how it is actually calculated, but it seems that the amount of increase goes up gradually. This would not be noticed normally, as a necrophage would only be getting a handful of kills throughout the campaign, but on a level like this with no turn limit I was able to get all 3 of my loyal necrophages to 600+ hp! Obviously this made the rest of the campaign brokenly easy. On the map where you have to sneak into the city and go down a trapdoor to steal a book, I sent my necrophages into the town to distract the enemies and got in easily with no casualties. I probably could have taken the town with my necrophages alone if there were more than 12 turns.
(6)
7
(7)
Add a turn limit of 15 or so to keep people from staying and leveling forever.
(8)
The first time I played this campaign (on easy) I had no shadows/nightgaunts and had a hard time with the first objective. I managed it after a few restarts, though, and made sure to have 2+ shadows for that map the next time I played the campaign.
(9)
N/A
miekka
Posts: 62
Joined: December 30th, 2007, 2:48 pm

Re: Scenario Review: DiD 6 - Return to Parthyn

Post by miekka »

1. easy
2. 4.
3. clear
4. There are some problems: Even if I defeat the orcs (as I did), Malin's sister says that she must stay to fight the orcs. Otherwise it was very interesting.
5. killing the traitor quickly (I had a Spectre to do that)
6. 7 it was very entertaining.
7. Some reward for killing the orc leader? After all, the Necromancer told you not to leave them without justice?
8. nope
thepinkpunk
Posts: 3
Joined: July 25th, 2007, 6:04 am

Re: Scenario Review: DiD 6 - Return to Parthyn

Post by thepinkpunk »

I'll post this here (probably incorrectly):

I killed Bela Keshar (Malin's sister) with a Soulless and
1) No new unit
2) She came back to life in 'Alone at Last'.

Just because the storyline states that Malin isn't strong enough to wipe out both orcs and townsfolk doesn't necessarily mean I believe it!

[NOT whingeing: DiD is my favourite scenario.]
If wishes were horses, beggars would ride...
Londo
Posts: 1
Joined: June 27th, 2009, 6:31 pm

Re: Scenario Review: DiD 6 - Return to Parthyn

Post by Londo »

thepinkpunk wrote:I killed Bela Keshar (Malin's sister) with a Soulless and
How did you do that???

In the mission "Return to Parfin" has decided not to run amain in the north west of the 2 armies (Orcs, people), but stupidly drank them. On the orcs was easy with people, it was difficult, but the moment when the map has only one "Border Baroness Dela Keshar " Level 2, the leader of the people. Within 5 turns cold beat her necromancy - she is invincible! In shock!!

Use it as a training doll prokachal and all its units to a maximum levels :) But it does not even scratch :(

Tell someone killed her? I would not like to keep witnesses on the map :)
blue
Posts: 26
Joined: July 8th, 2009, 11:43 am

Re: Scenario Review: DiD 6 - Return to Parthyn

Post by blue »

1) Evoker (Challenging) 1.6.4
2) 5
3) Clear
4) Very nice
5) None. The Lieutanet got out of his keep so i killed him on second turn it was easy after that
6) 7
7) None
8) None
Zubb
Posts: 13
Joined: October 13th, 2009, 6:25 pm

Re: Scenario Review: DiD 6 - Return to Parthyn

Post by Zubb »

(1) 3/3
(2) 6/10
(3) 5/5
(4) 3/5
(5) Well, simply getting away from human forces was relatively easy, so, being a hardcore-lover as i am, I've put myself up for destroying them all. I was using ghosts as main fighting forces for the whole campaign. But in this scenario I've started with recruiting some new ghouls and recalling a Necrophage. I've used them as a cannon fodder to stall humans' advances as my elite shadow forces dispatched orcs on the river crossing. To buy myself even more time, I've sent a 1st lvl ghost down map to occupy Parthyns' villages and halt reinforcements. A full-grown Spectre was dispatched to patrol the river, threatening nearby villages and wounded or lone human fighters. After dealing with orc threat and killing that what was left of humans vanguard after they chopped through my ghouls, I slowly pushed S-W destroying separated human forces busy with repelling my flank attacks. The disappointment came then my own sister was found invincible :( after 3 hours of gaming.
(6) 6/10
(7) Make sister killable. This accomplishment would prevent her from turning up again later.
(8) Yep, a couple of times I was careless and a lost a 3rd lvl Ghost. Btw It really helps later to finish this scenario with five 3rd llvl "Backstabber" Ghosts/
(9) n/a
Benefuchs
Posts: 54
Joined: February 24th, 2009, 9:40 pm

Re: Scenario Review: DiD 6 - Return to Parthyn

Post by Benefuchs »

(1) medium, 1.6
(2) 6
(3) clear enough, if you read them carefully
(4) nice, logical picture of Malin turning bad. Anyway some comment on killing the orcish leader would be nice.
(5) Killing only the leader in the beginning. I recruited mostly corpses in the beginning and killed him with shadows, when he left his keep. In my first attempt, though, I tried not to kill him but to assasinate the orcish leader in order to "keep Malin a good guy", which failed because some other townsfolk accidentally got killed by me. That way, I found a dialog-half-bug: When an orc kills the lieutnant, Malin is blamed the same way as if he had killed him himself.
For the rest I tried to keep out of the battle and let orcs kill humans and vice versa and run. Maybe fighting to gain xp would be better.
(6) 7
(7) well, the beginning is a bit strange...
(8) see above, failed attempt to change the story.
(9) N/A
User avatar
Maiklas3000
Posts: 532
Joined: June 23rd, 2010, 10:43 am

Re: Scenario Review: DiD 6 - Return to Parthyn

Post by Maiklas3000 »

(1) What difficulty level and version of Wesnoth have you played the scenario on?
Difficult (hard); 1.8.3; 294 starting gold

(2) How difficult did you find the scenario? (1-10)
8 to finish, 9 to finish without taking horrendous losses

(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?
Good.

(5) What were your major challenges in meeting the objectives of the scenario?
The first challenge is to kill Drogan without killing any other villagers. This is easily accomplished by recalling a Revenant or something in the northwest hex of the keep, as Drogan then rushes out with his tiny bow. I've added this to the walkthrough.

The second challenge is to escape, while orcs are rushing at you from your escape route, and some serious firepower is coming at you from the village. I elegantly left the ford open and crossed in the water at far right, which caused the orcs and militia to clash. (I also added this to the walkthrough.) Unfortunately, of the orcs' four remaining offensive units, two diverted to attack me, but with two orcs fighting the militia and the militia also distracted by a few Walking Corpses and Ghouls sent southwest, at least the main goal of delaying the militia succeeded. I took the bank before the militia arrived, but they cut through my lines at dusk like they were nothing. Then it was night, and I thought, "We're undead! We're not to run at night! Attack!!!" Although my attacks were effective enough, the enemy dessimated my lines (and my promoted units) on his next two turns, and then it was every undead for himself, fleeing in both directions in terror at daylight. Fortunately, by then Malin had reached the signpost.

(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?
None.

(8) Was there any event that caused you to lose the game and forced you to reload or restart the scenario?
I had to try it a few times to get the hang of it.

(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?
Clear and well commented. Everybody hates that the sister is immortal, though.
Attachments
DID-Return_to_Parthyn_replay.gz
(87.82 KiB) Downloaded 1751 times
Thrash
Posts: 223
Joined: June 25th, 2010, 1:54 pm

Re: Scenario Review: DiD 6 - Return to Parthyn

Post by Thrash »

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

1.8.3, Hard, 224 starting gold

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

9

(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?

Good.

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

First, there is killing Drogan. I found that unless you put a Shadow in the NW corner of your fort, he doesn't come out which makes him pretty hard to kill quickly, which means you'll probably get overrun by human forces from the SW. (I see that's in the wiki, but I'm trying not to read that unless I get stuck.)

Then you have to get your butt to the NW objective as fast as possible with getting caught from behind, which may not be fatal, but you'll take a lot of painful loses. I found I had to walk a fine line skirting the orcs to the east in the river so that they didn't bog me down too much, but I bothered them enough they didn't go back north and surround me (ideally they get tangled with SW human force enough to slow them).

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

6, had a play a bunch of times to figure out the trick to killing Drogan by luring him out of the fort, which is just no fun. You can kill him if you don't lure him out, but then the human forces run you down badly.

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

Tweak Drogan AI so he always rushes out.

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

Few times trying to kill Drogan some human force got itself killed attacking my units before I could kill Drogan.

Then getting run down by human forces and either losing or losing so many forces that I was crippled (especially if it took more than one turn to kill Drogan).

(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?

Good.
Attachments
DID-Return_to_Parthyn_replay.gz
(41.57 KiB) Downloaded 1002 times
User avatar
johndh
Posts: 591
Joined: June 6th, 2010, 4:03 am
Location: Music City

Re: Scenario Review: DiD 6 - Return to Parthyn

Post by johndh »

If you beat the first scenario without summoning any undead, then there is no betrayal to speak of, but in this scenario Drogan will still refer to Malin's treachery, which didn't happen in this timeline.

Difficulty: Challenging
Wesnoth version 1.8.3
It's spelled "definitely", not "definately". "Defiantly" is a different word entirely.
santosis
Posts: 74
Joined: October 11th, 2010, 12:04 am

Re: Scenario Review: DiD 6 - Return to Parthyn

Post by santosis »

(1) What difficulty levels have you played the scenario on?
Challenging (medium) 1.8.5

(2) How difficult did you find the scenario? (1-10)
8 - This was a tough one, I had to take losses (although managed to save most of my leveled troops).

(3) How clear did you find the scenario objectives?
Clear with a tough twist.

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

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

Keeping my quality troops alive while my hero dashed for the sign. I finished in 12 turns with -88 gold.

(6) How fun do you think the scenario is? (1-10)
8 - pretty fun and challenging.

(7) What, if any, are changes you would have made to the scenario to make it more fun?
None.

(8) Was there any event that caused you to lose the game and forced you to reload or restart the scenario?
Yes, many restarts just to stay alive.
Doopliss
Posts: 23
Joined: February 9th, 2011, 8:29 pm

Re: Scenario Review: DiD 6 - Return to Parthyn

Post by Doopliss »

(1) What difficulty level and version of Wesnoth have you played the scenario on?
Challenging (Normal), 1.8.5

(2) How difficult did you find the scenario? (1-10)
7. Very dicey, but not overwhelming.

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

(4) How clear and interesting did you find the dialog and storyline of the scenario?
The assumption that they were "his" orcs felt a bit random, and this assumption continues once you start fighting the orcs (and you would probably have to try not to exchange blows with one). As others said, the baroness assumes the orcs are alive even if they're not when the mission ends. I really like the reveal on how our hero was expelled (though I don`t remember if it was in this stage or the next). His vindictiveness getting him into trouble just like it has throughout the campaign.

(5) What were your major challenges in meeting the objectives of the scenario?
Keeping my troops alive in retreat.

(6) How fun do you think the scenario is? (1-10)
8. I'm a sucker for quick, focused missions.

(7) What, if any, are changes you would have made to the scenario to make it more fun?
Not really, besides messing with the dialogues.

(8) Was there any event that caused you to lose the game and forced you to reload or restart the scenario?
My general got sniped once.
User avatar
GagarinGambit
Posts: 51
Joined: February 2nd, 2011, 12:36 pm

Re: Scenario Review: DiD 6 - Return to Parthyn

Post by GagarinGambit »

(1) What difficulty level and version of Wesnoth have you played the scenario on?
Hard 1.8.4

(2) How difficult did you find the scenario? (1-10)
7, challenging to difficult. I think that's the standard for most scenarios so far: you have to think of a solid strategy and play to the best of your ability, but if you do so you have no major problems (although, depending on your luck, you may take significant loses).

(3) How clear did you find the scenario objectives?
Clear; however, after the objective change you may find yourself unprepared.

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

(5) What were your major challenges in meeting the objectives of the scenario?
Well... killing Dela... see below. I also had to struggle to keep my experienced units alive (and even reload once or twice due to bad luck).

(6) How fun do you think the scenario is? (1-10)
5. It would be 8, had I knew that Dela is invulnerable. After the objective change, I thought of two strategies: run for it, killing the orcs standing on your way; or make a stand in your keep, let the Parthyn troops and the orcs fight each other, and then defeat everyone (that is, play a long game and milk every experience point). I chose the latter and it can work with good play. Well, at least in theory. I did managed to clear the initial waves and press towards Dela's keep. It's tedious and difficult (since she can recruit two fresh troops every turn) but possible, and I got next to the forts near her keep, although at this point most of my troops were badly injured. And when I was ready to assassinate her (and my injured troops were hard pressed to get to this point without many loses) guess what... I find out she can't be hit! It was really frustrating. Had I knew that, I'd move towards the signpost after clearing the initial wave. At this point there was no way to do it without losing most of my troops, so I had to load an earlier auto save. Unfortunately I didn't thought of saving a replay before replaying, I wish I could attach one to illustrate that, had not Dela being invulnerable, it's possible to defeat both leaders.

(7) What, if any, are changes you would have made to the scenario to make it more fun?
Obviously, give a warning that Dela can't be killed. For example, Malin could say that no one is to hurt his sister, in spite of her attitude towards him. Or make her killable (this could be an easter egg of sorts, perhaps giving you an advantage later or leading to a different scenario at some point).
Edit: Example dialogue
Spoiler:
(8) Was there any event that caused you to lose the game and forced you to reload or restart the scenario?
Yes, see above.
Linux. Space technology.
podbelski
Posts: 151
Joined: June 7th, 2011, 8:35 pm

Re: Scenario Review: DiD 6 - Return to Parthyn

Post by podbelski »

(1) What difficulty level and version of Wesnoth have you played the scenario on?
1.9.6, Hard, 248gp, no reloads

(2) How difficult did you find the scenario? (1-10)
looks really tough to beat everyone the hard way w/o losing a lot of your core units, can rate it at least "8". On the first attempt, I reaped orcs by myself and then went to the river with sister's army on my back. It looked ok at first, but by the time I reached the other bank, and with a little help from the orc leader my forces were really raped :(

I restarted, recruited mostly noob units, stepped aside to let the orcs chase Dela's forces, and quickly crossed the river. I left a detachment behind to slow down the enemies, and even managed to give good xp to a couple of them :) lost an experienced ghost b/c I expected I reach the signpost earlier by 1 turn, but decided not to replay/reload anyway

So, for taking this sneaky line, I'd give "5" difficulty rating at best.
finished on turn 14, killed 12, lost 8

(5) What were your major challenges in meeting the objectives of the scenario?
making a decision to recruit noob force and avoid fights vs orcs, thus not putting my core units at risk

(6) How fun do you think the scenario is? (1-10)
can easily give it an "8" score

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

(8) Was there any event that caused you to lose the game and forced you to reload or restart the scenario?
I find the 1st task a bit of annoying, cause there is a clear way to accomplish it - milk the Drogan to run to your camp, and kill him in a single attempt. Due to bad luck, it didn't work for me a couple of times, and I found it's a pain in the ass to continue, while I can simply restart and smash him with just an EV luck.
Attachments
DiD-Return_to_Parthyn_replay.gz
(38.44 KiB) Downloaded 833 times
Post Reply