South Guard 5. Choice in the Fog

Feedback for the mainline campaign The South Guard.

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Konrad2
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Re: South Guard 5. Choice in the Fog

Post by Konrad2 »

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

Version 1.14.0, Soldier (Normal)

(2) How difficult did you find the scenario? (1-10)
Elvish Choice:
4, probably because I already know this map.

Outlaw choice:
6, the lack of healers hurts. ._.

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

Both choices:
100% clear.

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

Both Choices:
Double positive check.

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

Elvish Choice:
Kinda...none?

Outlaw Choice: Realizing that I can't beat both enemies at once, because ghouls + no villages in the woods + only one healer make a good defensive position. Add to that that it is a forest and I can hardly advance.

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

Both Choices:
8, Choices are rare and nice.

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

-
TSG-Choice in the Fog replay.gz
Outlaw Choice
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TSG-Choice in the Fog replay.gz
Elvish Choice
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EDIT:
Updating because of the new TSG.
Mind you, it's probably not exactly the same as the TSG online because the replay is from the playtesting phase.
Attachments
TSGr-Choice in the Fog replay.gz
Only the elvish choice, I accidentally overwrote the bandit one. Also no meeting with the outlaws, was testing if that's covered.
(55.75 KiB) Downloaded 580 times
Last edited by Konrad2 on March 1st, 2019, 10:57 pm, edited 1 time in total.
LordWolfDan
Posts: 216
Joined: September 30th, 2018, 7:31 am

Re: South Guard 5. Choice in the Fog

Post by LordWolfDan »

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

- 1.14.5, Beginner

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

- 5

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

- Easy, find out what's going on and make a choice: Remain in alliance with elves or form a new one with outlaws

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

- Very good. With Urza Afalas revealing that Mebrin could be behind this is chilling and the fact that Black Forest is quite unknown makes that place very mysterious and frightening. The parting of Sir Gerrick and Deoran could be a good part as well

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

- Make a choice: Alliance with elves or with outlaws. I made a smart move by choosing elves

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

- 8

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

- Not really sure. Maybe the impostor lich could reveal who's behind it or if Mebrin is really in there?
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Tom_Of_Wesnoth
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Re: South Guard 5. Choice in the Fog

Post by Tom_Of_Wesnoth »

wrote:(1) What difficulty levels and game versions have you played the scenario on?
1.14.7 on Soldier/Normal.
(2) How difficult did you find the scenario? (1-10)
6. This one was actually a bit of a challenge, siding with the Elves. Three enemy factions on the map, with the first two pressing in from either side, and then the last one starting to arrive just as you think you've won.
(3) How clear did you find the scenario objectives?
Clear enough. Go exploring until you find enemies, then kill them.
(4) How clear and interesting did you find the dialog and storyline of the scenario?
Very clear. I enjoyed having to choose between the bandits and elves, and there was a genuine good case to be made for both sides.
(5) What were your major challenges in meeting the objectives of the scenario?
The bandit faction kept feeding their footpads into the undead faction's walking corpses, so the force I sent to deal with that leader ended up severely outnumbered. I think I sent too many units to take out the bandit leader, and not enough to face the undead. In the end, though, I just ran from the walking corpses and went after the lich, who I was able to defeat easily enough, and before the walking corpses caught up.

The amount of poison was pretty challenging, especially as I had only two units with cures, and one was off fighting bandits.
(6) How fun do you think the scenario is? (1-10)
7. There's a good bit of challenge, and the choice to be made adds replayability. The bandits and undead fighting one another adds a bit of unpredictability, and that leads to more fun to be had. I was close to giving it an 8, but dealing with so many poison attacks isn't fun.
(7) What, if any, are changes you would have made to the scenario to make it more fun?
I'd make the walking corpse faction recruit less ghouls, and more corpses - maybe even throw in a ghost or two.
If presented with the opportunity, I would take great pleasure in becoming a world ruler.
Konrad2
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Re: South Guard 5. Choice in the Fog

Post by Konrad2 »

First line is going to be for the elvish choice,
second line if for outlaw choice.

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

1.15.6, Soldier (Normal)

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

6, it's mostly a lot of slowly moving around on the map.
4, because now I have units that deal decent damage vs skeletons.

(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?

I like the choice.

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

Staying focused for the whole scenario.

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

6, poison and low movement for a great part of the map. But I'd rather not change it. (And for this path poison is overall easy to mitigate.)
7, you can deal with the poison because you have a healer, and you get new shiny units that are useful against undead.

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

-

Scenario stats:
First attempt elvish path
Spoiler:
3rd attempt elvish path (I forgot to save a replay for the 2nd attempt)
Spoiler:
Outlaw path
Spoiler:
Attachments
TSG-Choice in the Fog replay 20201108-214705.gz
Outlaw path
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TSG-Choice in the Fog replay 20201108-114906.gz
First attempt, elvish path
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TSG-Choice in the Fog replay 20201108-124053.gz
Third attempt, elvish path
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Sandsculpture
Posts: 21
Joined: February 20th, 2021, 2:55 am

Re: South Guard 5. Choice in the Fog

Post by Sandsculpture »

1) What difficulty levels and game versions have you played the scenario on?

- 1.14.15, Hardest, choose to side with elves

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

- 6

(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?

- Clear

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

- defeat the mainly lv2 undead enemy. The skeletons hit very hard, especially
Spoiler:
- bad terrains

(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?

- No.
Apparos_Vaklas
Posts: 37
Joined: April 24th, 2021, 11:52 am

Re: South Guard 5. Choice in the Fog

Post by Apparos_Vaklas »

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

Version 1.14.16, Soldier (Normal) difficulty

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

4 (Sided with the elves)

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

Pretty clear.

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

10/10

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

Deciding how many units to recruit at first but being able to recruit from other castle tiles on the way solved that. Also feeding xp to the units I wanted to level up.

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

10

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

When I got sight of the enemy leader he recruited several units which was a nice touch but he also charged at me outside of his castle and I killed him before those extra units even got to move. I would make it so the enemy leader is stationary to have a bit more challenge near the end.
mal_shubertal
Posts: 93
Joined: December 1st, 2018, 6:58 pm

Re: South Guard 5. Choice in the Fog

Post by mal_shubertal »

(1) What difficulty levels and game versions have you played the scenario on?
1.16.2 Soldier/hardest
(2) How difficult did you find the scenario? (1-10)
7. On the harder difficulties, you have to replay this scenario a couple times to get a good outcome, because of the difficult terrain, fog, multiple enemies who interact in different ways, 3 different enemy keeps, etc.
(3) How clear did you find the scenario objectives?
Obviously, not very clear initially, but after you meet the bandit leader it's clear.
(4) How clear and interesting did you find the dialog and storyline of the scenario?
I really like Ethiliel's character development and relationship with Deoran throughout this campaign, as she is so totally in denial about Mebrin and he has to know when to back off and let her find out for herself.
(5) What were your major challenges in meeting the objectives of the scenario?
Just finding my way around! I definitely had to restart a couple times, once I had figured out where all the enemy keeps were. It was also a challenge because you don't encounter all the skeletal undead until pretty late in the scenario, so you might make some bad recruitment decisions by that point. Also, if you don't realize there's an option to join the bandits, you might end up killing a lot of them before meeting the bandit leader.
(6) How fun do you think the scenario is? (1-10)
10. I LOVE this scenario. It has SO much replay value, and such interesting roleplay choices. I think that on the first playthrough as a new player, the obvious choice is to stick with the elves, since you already know ethiliel and the heavily forested landscape and fog encourage you to recruit elves in the first few turns. You have more enemies to fight this way, but you also have ethiliel and her bodyguards and a big mobility advantage in the forest. On later playthroughs, you know about the choice and so you can plan to pick the bandits from the start, meaning you don't waste any gold recruiting elves. The branching paths from this point are very different and make it very worthwhile to play through both ways. The terrain in this scenario also gives you lots of different strategies, like going straight through the forest from the first undead keep to next instead of going north through bandit keep, or crossing the river at the northern end of the map directly to the bandit keep rather than taking the bridge toward the undead keep, etc.
(7) What, if any, are changes you would have made to the scenario to make it more fun?
The whole northern and eastern edges of the map are kind of pointless, no villages and no enemies but just a lot of empty territory. In my first playthrough I wasted a lot of time and units exploring those areas and totally ignored them on later playthroughs. To make those areas more relevant, it might make sense to put more villages there, or more sea serpents or other events to trigger.
Attachments
TSG-Choice in the Fog replay 20220326-164009.gz
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TSG-Choice in the Fog replay 20220326-152431.gz
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JL42
Posts: 66
Joined: December 9th, 2023, 11:19 am

Re: South Guard 5. Choice in the Fog

Post by JL42 »

What difficulty levels and game versions have you played the scenario on?
v. 1.16.10
Soldier / Normal
How difficult did you find the scenario? (1-10)
7
How clear did you find the scenario objectives?
Very clear.
How clear and interesting did you find the dialog and storyline of the scenario?
The dialogue and storyline are very well done.
What were your major challenges in meeting the objectives of the scenario?
The biggest difficulty I had was getting too spread out, as some of my troops split off to fight the walking dead in the southwest, leaving an insufficient force to deal with the situation around the bandit camp. I was ultimately able to win on both fronts, but it took a while. The small keep that is positioned there for more recruitment is perfect. Seems like there's a lot of different options for how to approach this map, which is kind of awesome. The very end of the scenario, having to tackle the lich in his mountain hideout with time running out, was also a significant challenge.
How fun do you think the scenario is? (1-10)
10 – This map is awesome. Perfect three-way battle at the start where you have to cautiously engage and decide how to approach it, and it only gets better from there. I think there have been some changes to the map since the last time I played; seems like it took an already-good thing and made it even better.
What, if any, are changes you would have made to the scenario to make it more fun?
None. I agree with the previous comment that a couple of villages up north would make exploration more rewarding, and it might also help the player to have more gold going into the very challenging next scenario in the elf branch – but I don't know if that would actually be desirable. This map and the next one are both just really great.

About the Overall Campaign:

In general this campaign is really well done. The story and writing quality are notable here; it draws me in right from the start, gives Deoran some background and character, and creates a sense of urgency and mystery about what is going on in the countryside. You can really see the hero developing across the scenarios as new realizations emerge and as the challenges he faces continue to become more significant.

Most of the maps are excellent as well, very thoughtfully designed, and the battles feel engaging and meaningful. The early scenarios are mostly simple and easy but then they become solidly difficult around #5 and #6. Nearly all of them have some kind of interesting happenings or combat complexities. Really just enjoyable to play.

The only thing that brings this down for me is the final two scenarios. (I'm reviewing the elf branch – never played the bandit branch since they are clearly scum and siding with them seems like it would be out of character for Deoran.) In the elf branch, the last two scenarios feel like a total afterthought and waste of time; you could wrap this up with an epilogue after scenario 6 and be better for it. The story aspects continue to be good in those final scenarios, but the actual gameplay is a massive letdown from the previous maps.

For me the campaign is 4 out of 5 stars; the only reason it doesn't get full marks is the boringness of the final two scenarios.
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