'Favourite' suprises in scenarios

[Dugi]

Just a listing of favourite surprise elements (so called 'tomato' surprises, no idea why) in campaigns that nicely ruined my plans to defeat the foes and forced me to reload several turns back. Add yours whenever you remember some. Based on this thread.

Heir to the Throne:
Do you want to get rid of the annoying princess to ford the perilous river peacefully? Let her have endless bodyguards, you will love it.
Can you see that there are two tunnels ahead? Do you feel like scouting? Let us reward your scouting by having to fight Lionel and the trolls at once.

Descent into Darkness:
Oh, you worked hard on advancing ghosts and bats? Let us give you skeletons and force you to use them as main attacking force.
Decided to pick up the book with a bat or ghost? That won't work bro...

Under the Burning Suns (the champion):
Oh, you advanced Garak and used this useful loyal autorecalled unit as your main offensive force? Let us transform him into a monster you will have to face without your main crusher unit and kill him afterwards.
Trying to get injured Nym to safety near that lake far away from orcs? You will surely appreciate the naga ambush.
Trolls or dwarves? What to make meaningless, Invasion from the Unknown or Sojournings of Grog?
Recalled as many units as you could because you didn't know what was ahead? Let us make them drown in a flood.
Don't like that bottleneck? Let us add a Dark Assassin there, you will love him.
Trying to get an injured unit to safety around that rune? Ghoul ambush.
Breaking the enemy front to the south, and approaching the helpless leader? Let him send a messenger to the north and force you to chase him.
Using Zhul as your main healer? Yechnagoth petrifies her when you have to fight a pack of necromancers.

Invasion from the Unknown:
A nice snowy land, yeah? Would be a shame if a pack of quick shaxthal drones attacked you from all directions from distance under the shroud.
Shadow Master almost dead, your units half dead? Let him use his skirmisher ability to attack an unimportant unit and get fully healed from retaliation.

A Rough Life (old version):
Worked on advancing Jackques to a cool, ninja-like Assassin? You will surely like his progression by downgrading to Poacher.

[fabi]

Mine is in DW, first scenario.

Learning the special game mechanics for this scenario too late caused the need for a restart.
Although it happens early on (turn 2, usually) it annoyed me.

[Crow_T]

I think it's the first scenario of NR where you can unleash a hoard of trolls by exploring an bit of the map, armed only with peasants. That's definitely a save-reloader.
I feel as though tomatoes should be really worth it, like a unique item gets dropped or a skill learned- having tomatoes that simply decimate forces is kind of annoying. For instance in NR one of the trolls could be using a legendary shield as a piece of armor (with dialogue saying so). That would make it worth unleashing the tomato.

[Astoria]

I think it's the first scenario of NR where you can unleash a hoard of trolls by exploring an bit of the map, armed only with peasants. That's definitely a save-reloader.

Although I'm usually okay with these 'surprises' (I usually see them coming from a mile away) this one is just plain mean, and in my opinion doesn't add anything to the scenario either. At least the side isn't hidden so you can at least 'guess' there's going to be something.

[Adamant14]

I think it's the first scenario of NR where you can unleash a hoard of trolls by exploring an bit of the map, armed only with peasants. That's definitely a save-reloader.

You can trigger those Trolls (the peasant will surly die) and then stay out of the Trolls reach. Then those Trolls will kill some Orks for you, and the Orks will kill some /maybe all Trolls.
And that is good for you, right?

[fabi]

I think it's the first scenario of NR where you can unleash a hoard of trolls by exploring an bit of the map, armed only with peasants. That's definitely a save-reloader.

You can trigger those Trolls (the peasant will surly die) and then stay out of the Trolls reach. Then those Trolls will kill some Orks for you, and the Orks will kill some /maybe all Trolls.
And that is good for you, right?

Yes, still the encounter can be called a tamato surprise,
since you should be prepared for the Trolls.

If you have too many units around there and they get between Trolls and Orcs, everything is lost.

[Crow_T]

I hate to call out a UMC, but in a certain campaign:

Spoiler:

You recruit/recall for 2 turns, burning all of your money, then on turn 3 a dwarf comes along and now you can recruit dwarves, with the zero gold you now have. Reload! This is a case where I'd hack the scenario file a bit. Kind of a harmless tomato, but a lot of thought can go into recruiting/recalling, you hate to do it twice.

[doofus-01]

I hate to call out a UMC, but in a certain campaign:

Spoiler:

You recruit/recall for 2 turns, burning all of your money, then on turn 3 a dwarf comes along and now you can recruit dwarves, with the zero gold you now have. Reload! This is a case where I'd hack the scenario file a bit. Kind of a harmless tomato, but a lot of thought can go into recruiting/recalling, you hate to do it twice.

Have you told this to the author of this UMC-which-shall-not-be-named?

[Sapient]

Funny post, dugi. Especially this one:

Decided to pick up the book with a bat or ghost? That won't work bro...

[Adamant14]

I think it's the first scenario of NR where you can unleash a hoard of trolls by exploring an bit of the map, armed only with peasants. That's definitely a save-reloader.

You can trigger those Trolls (the peasant will surly die) and then stay out of the Trolls reach. Then those Trolls will kill some Orks for you, and the Orks will kill some /maybe all Trolls.
And that is good for you, right?

Yes, still the encounter can be called a tomato surprise,
since you should be prepared for the Trolls.

If you have too many units around there and they get between Trolls and Orcs, everything is lost.

Yes, that's right.
The player should know about the Trolls.
The campaign maintainer should change that.
That would be a advantage for the scenario/campaign.

[Elvish_Hunter]

A Rough Life:
Worked on advancing Jackques to a cool, ninja-like Assassin? You will surely like his progression by downgrading to Poacher.

Downgrading to a Poacher? That's new to me. Last time I checked, if he's an Assassin he'll be transformed as a Sand Ranger (like a regular Ranger, but with better movement on sand - still a level 3 unit). If you got him reverted to a Poacher, then it's a bug.

[Dugi]

I've been playing that 3 years ago, it might have changed from then.

[pyrophorus]

I think it's the first scenario of NR where you can unleash a hoard of trolls by exploring an bit of the map, armed only with peasants. That's definitely a save-reloader.

You can trigger those Trolls (the peasant will surly die) and then stay out of the Trolls reach. Then those Trolls will kill some Orks for you, and the Orks will kill some /maybe all Trolls.
And that is good for you, right?

In my attempt, trolls started to steal all my villages and didn't attack anyone, except some peasants at time
In httT Elensefar, when entering the black guy cave in the north: he is quite alone and it should be easy to kill him (and you need to be quick because the turn count). Then he begins to recruit wildy... Good grief...

[Lord-Knightmare]

I think it's the first scenario of NR where you can unleash a hoard of trolls by exploring an bit of the map, armed only with peasants. That's definitely a save-reloader.

You can trigger those Trolls (the peasant will surly die) and then stay out of the Trolls reach. Then those Trolls will kill some Orks for you, and the Orks will kill some /maybe all Trolls.
And that is good for you, right?

Yes, still the encounter can be called a tomato surprise,
since you should be prepared for the Trolls.

If you have too many units around there and they get between Trolls and Orcs, everything is lost.

Yes, that's right.
The player should know about the Trolls.
The campaign maintainer should change that.
That would be a advantage for the scenario/campaign.

A player can actually use this surprise as an advantage. Having expendable units, the player can create a sort of trail of peasants for the trolls to smash and lure the trolls into fighting the orcs. I did that once .

[revansurik]

Under the Burning Suns (the champion):
Oh, you advanced Garak and used this useful loyal autorecalled unit as your main offensive force? Let us transform him into a monster you will have to face without your main crusher unit and kill him afterwards.
Trying to get injured Nym to safety near that lake far away from orcs? You will surely appreciate the naga ambush.
Trolls or dwarves? What to make meaningless, Invasion from the Unknown or Sojournings of Grog?
Recalled as many units as you could because you didn't know what was ahead? Let us make them drown in a flood.
Don't like that bottleneck? Let us add a Dark Assassin there, you will love him.
Trying to get an injured unit to safety around that rune? Ghoul ambush.
Breaking the enemy front to the south, and approaching the helpless leader? Let him send a messenger to the north and force you to chase him.
Using Zhul as your main healer? Yechnagoth petrifies her when you have to fight a pack of necromancers.

Well, to be fair IftU and SoG both came after UtBS, so I don't think it's the campaign's fault... And the player is told from the start that the tunnels were going to be flooded and that he should hurry.
However, I totally agree with 1 - Garak turning into a monster; the first time I played that campaign, he was theproud Marshal of the upstart desert fighters, but then... 2 - The 2 Dark Assassin ambushes: coincidentally, both times he showed up Kaleh was quite weakened 3 - The first time I played UtBS, Zhul was my only healer, because it was such a pain to level up those weak shamans, so it was a real pain to have her petrified AND having to move her all the way from that island to the main fight.

Invasion from the Unknown:
A nice snowy land, yeah? Would be a shame if a pack of quick shaxthal drones attacked you from all directions from distance under the shroud.

Goddammit, right? What is worse, they all swarmed over the hero units, and, regardless of how well I protected them, they either got killed in a turn, or got so weakened that I had to wait many turns for them to be healed (and, of course, I wasn't going to advance any further, in fear that more shaxthal swarms came).