Panther Lord (EoFM campaign)

[Maiklas3000]

I think I'm stuck on Establishing a Claim. I recruit riders, grab villages (including my ally's), recruit vipers to supplement my buggy ally who recruits none, and fight a delaying action in the north with boatmen, canoes, vipers, and tribesmen. I maximize income and then splurge on a castle of level 3's. Meanwhile I try to sneak Siskite, the Panther Spirit, and a couple other units around the south to assassinate the leaders. Siskite is too slow, and the enemy's northern thrust rolls over my level 3's like they aren't there, so I lose before even killing one leader. I replayed the previous scenario and now have 307 starting gold, but the result is the same. My roster has pretty much everything. The buggy enemy recruits no vipers.

[Velensk]

Replayed that scenario just a moment ago. I came in with substantially more gold than you record and I lost a unit which would be restart worthy to me (the praetorian) but this general approach should work.

The secret to holding the line is managing the beastmen/wraths. As the first enemy to take their turn they can only attack you if there are slots open from that. Use this to try to lure them into you slowly (and/or try to get them to cross the river early so that your ally can take care of them). Wraths will generally fill the slot if you leave only strong melee units exposed and shouldn't be too hard to kill with other strong melee units.

This is IMO the second hardest scenario in the campaign, (the last would be the hardest and the one with the tree spirits would be the third hardest). I was a bit surprised when in the last scenario you reported only finishing on the second to last turn, if it was so easy then perhaps you could finish swifter and come in with a bit more gold. Your leader may be quite a bit of a drawback here, which makes me wonder if I should make it so that Daklo can only become a militia (or perhaps I could give him a custom unit type).

[Maiklas3000]

Your replay crashes Wesnoth for me after the initial dialog.

Scenario 9: Establishing a Claim
(1) What difficulty and version? Normal, 1.9.8, 1.0.1
(2) How difficult? (1-10) 9.5
(3) How clear? Clear.
(4) Dialog? I was a bit confused, sorry.
(5) Challenges? Beastmasters plus Vengence make a deadly combo.
(6) How fun? (1-10) 6, don't like the enemy banzai charging out of their fort
(7) Changes? Modify it to use the full recruit list and keep vastly more guards in fort.
(8) Restarts? Several restarts and save-reloads.
(9) WML?
(10) Game summary? This time my ally did an admirable job of sending substantial troops into the middle in line formation. With my help, the middle and south held. In the north, after a delaying action over the river, I fought from the riverbank and was just barely able to hold the line, with a minor enemy beachhead at the east. Then it was just a march on the three leaders. My mistake on previous plays was to try to fight from the river (with boatmen and canoes) rather from the riverbank. Vulnerability of my leader was not an issue. Vulnerability of level 3's/4's and allied leader was the problem.

[Velensk]

It doesn't make any sense for them to stay in the fort. That would make them more vulnerable, not less.

EDIT: your ally doesn't have vipers or serpents in his recruit list (nor do I think it advisable that he should). I will modify the enemies to recruit their poisoners though.

[Maiklas3000]

If it doesn't make sense for them to stay in their fort, then it doesn't make sense for them to have a fort. However, it does make sense for them to stay in their fort, because it is surrounded by swamp and water. (Plus that's where their leaders are.)

[Velensk]

It makes sense that they would have a fort as they have to sleep somewhere and a fort although not a tactical advantage for a larger force, is a comfortable place to rest, good place to store things, and more secure than a village would be.

However, if you're a larger force the water and swamp acts against you as it holds you in making it harder for you to bring your force to bear against the smaller force that can simply surround you and block exit points and bottle neck you in. In this case a siege scenario would favor the people in the jungle rather than the isolated force.

In in game terms, I could get the AI to zone up in the fort but what I cannot do is stop them from dashing into the swamp after easy bait, nor replicate the fact that a siege ought to to favor the player.

EDIT: It also would not fit the story overly much. You reported being a little confused so I'll try to explain. Ignoring the religious and political part of things, they essentially agreed to slaughter each other to prove which was stronger (thus better suited to lead against the imperialists). It is not exactly the sort of thing that lends itself to sitting in your fortress waiting to let yourself be surrounded even if you could weather a siege and even if an open field (jungle) battle would not be generally advantageous to the larger force.

[Maiklas3000]

Scenario 10: New Era
(1) What difficulty and version? Normal, 1.9.8, 1.0.1. Starting gold 524.
(2) How difficult? (1-10) 7
(3) How clear? Clear.
(4) Dialog? I was unsure who would fight whom. Turns out red and purple are allied (team "joint clans")
(5) Challenges? Surviving the purple assault wave.
(6) How fun? (1-10) 8, interesting
(7) Changes? None.
(8) Restarts? One restart, no reloads.
(9) WML? Uncommented.
(10) Game summary? After losing by blitzing the closest enemies and getting overrun by my furthest enemies, on my second attempt I decided to hang back, recruit lightly, and let my enemies weaken each other, then I recalled one castle of level 3's. This led to a relatively easy victory.

Scenario 11: Raid
(1) What difficulty and version? Normal, 1.9.8, 1.0.1. Starting gold 349.
(2) How difficult? (1-10) 8
(3) How clear? Clear.
(4) Dialog? Something about the narrative style bothers me. The leader seems childish. Maybe he is being played for a sucker, and then it might be okay.
(5) Challenges? Surviving the level 3 Hill Clan assault wave
(6) How fun? (1-10) 8
(7) Changes? This scenario suffers from the tomato surprise of the Hill Clan. Once you know about it, you take your time killing the Imperial leader. It's not a surprise that another force will appear, given the empty castle and high turn limit, but it was an unpleasant game-ending surprise to find out how strong and swift that force was.
(8) Restarts? One restart, one reload to cancel my strategy of sitting on the empty keep (you were too smart for that)
(9) WML? Uncommented.
(10) Game summary? After losing by getting overrun in the Imperial castle by the Hill Clan, I restarted and this time I held the Imperial leader hostage for gold (i.e., some turns of income) before recalling a second batch of troops. I decided to use the same line against the Hill Clan that I used against the Imperialists, i.e. closer to my initial keep, using water to the south and a short line in the east, from the water to the board edge. The extra distance spread the Hill Clan's assault wave out, so it was much easier to deal with. I leveled a bunch of units, but that also means I start the next (and last) scenario with minimum gold.

[Velensk]

I'll take a look at the dialogue. Again though, I find your suggestion for a change strange when I compare it to when I played (I think I have a replay of that scenario somewhere in this thead). I didn't take my time to kill the imperialist leader (and I wouldn't have even if I hadn't been pretending not to know). I killed him quite quickly and held off the highlanders at the fort with the same forces I started with. If you do it quick enough, the straggling imperialist forces that were sent off to collect villages will slow the highlanders down for you giving you more time to get into position. I imagine I finished with fewer level ups but more bonus gold. The last scenario is going to be tough on minimum gold.

[Maiklas3000]

On my plays, the Imperialists never engaged the Hill Clan. Even on my first play, I had pretty much wiped out the Imperialists. I had dispatched task forces to the south and northeast to take care of the village grabbers, so they were not around to slow down the Hill Clan.

[Velensk]

Obviously things don't happen the same way every game. It's possible that I either finished off the imperialist leader swifter or that the way the scouts spread out to grab villages was more advantageous but it probably dosn't matter overly much.

In any case, I'd like to thank you for the help you've been. I might talk back to just about every suggestion you give and endlessly cite my own experiance but it really is nice to see a second approach taken and I do appreciate it.

[Kewltist]

Blah.. I just lookd into wml after beating second scenario the proper way (kill zem all!) and saw that I killed 2 stone spirits that would join me..
With 40% carryover I guess it's not worth taking the gold? (had 464 starting in 3rd with it)

First scenario was balanced, I lost all of my first wave and leveled some of my second wave of guys, just hd to use vipers in key locations

Second was really easy (as it was meant to be?) I leveled a lot of units and lost none (spirits and bandits were busy with demselves)
also.. a sprite bug? Dark skinned thief leveled into white rogue! White people are superior in this campaign omagosh =O

[Velensk]

Blah.. I just lookd into wml after beating second scenario the proper way (kill zem all!) and saw that I killed 2 stone spirits that would join me..
With 40% carryover I guess it's not worth taking the gold? (had 464 starting in 3rd with it)

It's your choice either way. You live with the consequences both the good and the bad. You in no way need the stone spirits.

First scenario was balanced, I lost all of my first wave and leveled some of my second wave of guys, just hd to use vipers in key locations

Second was really easy (as it was meant to be?) I leveled a lot of units and lost none (spirits and bandits were busy with demselves)
also.. a sprite bug? Dark skinned thief leveled into white rogue! White people are superior in this campaign omagosh =O

I do appear to have forgotten to change the advances to key for the dark variants. I will fix this, however please try avoid irritating me with sensationalist nonsense if you plan to keep giving me feedback.

[Maiklas3000]

I failed my first attempt at Breaking the Spear, went back a scenario to get more gold (now 816), and failed again.

I formed a line from the swamp to the river. Below is a screenshot at the point I realized my line was doomed, though surprisingly it lasted several more turns, finally breaking on turn 22.



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I have a few ideas. One idea is to use an assassination squad of Guerrillas and/or Panthers, but it's a loooong way to go with limited camouflage opportunities. Or, since I lost due to not being able to replace losses, I could try sitting on as small an area as possible around the keep and maintain a mostly level 1 force that I can replenish. Or maybe my original strategy was okay and I just need to focus more on leveling intelligent units.

I have 3 healers, 1 level 3 leadership unit, 2 level 4/5 rock spirits, and more level 2-4 Wrath than I can reasonably recall.

Any thoughts?

[Velensk]

I'll do a quick explanation of how it played out for me, then I'll make observations on your screenshot.

I started out with I think 700-750ish gold recruited a few cats, serpents, and boatmen/River Dragon but not enough lvls worth to exceed my upkeep reduction. I spread out wildly to kill termites and grab villages, adding more lvl 1s as I grab villages. Around turn 6-7 I got out my leaders and healers and a few level 2 warrior types but still trying to keep income as high as possible. I focused on destroying the avalanche and termites early. I had a very small contingent in the jungle/swamp in the west including a serpent, a priest, and a cat, whose job was to actively lure enemies away from the main front. I picked up some piercing units in anticipation of the white cavalry arriving near the ford (a mix of whispers, stalkers, and elite bowmen) and some priests to deal with the first wave of tanks. Shortly after I began just recruiting heavily focusing on meatshields and priests. I managed to outlast my enemy slowly falling back into the woods at day and holding/slaying at night (focusing on high damage enemies first) [Start your line as close to the enemy as possible, fall back as slowly as you can while keeping yourself protected, your enemies are much easier for your non mage units to kill when standing in woods not ground termites have cleared]. I pressed forward to kill the two close leaders at around turn 24ish but couldn't advance further until the enemy wave subsided.

One thing that I don't think I remembered to state outright is that the enemy will stop recruiting after turn 36. If you can simply last that long the enemy leader will charge forward.

Looking at your screen, things I'd like to note:
-You seem to have a large number of vipers on the field. Vipers are not what you really want here as they do not kill the enemy quickly and cannot be relied on to survive. Serpents are good as line holders and guerillas but against high level enemies poison simply does not take them down fast enough for them to be killers. Now granted, line holders and guerillas are good in this scenario, and a serpent in the west combined with a cat and a priest can be the bane of plenty of armadillos but vipers are not quite up to the task. Maybe grab a couple of them to feed kills to but in general I'd think money would be better spent on tribemen, hurlers, or priests.
-I do not see any guard/milita units, guerillas are nice for holding the line and poking at your enemy but they are not as able killers and they cannot reach level 3.
-If you have as many higher level priests as you say then you should have more of them on the field, they are in many ways your most powerful attrition unit, they hurt the enemy, heal themselves, and reduce the enemies breaking power all at once. Use tactics to protect them from gaurgantaur/shock troops or other heavy melee threats much like those you would have used to protect them from beastskulls in the 'establishing a claim" scenario.
-I had Reh'Doc in the western jungle. He is probably your most powerful piece and you want him where the greatest threat is/where his mobility is useable to best effect.

As another note: I did this scenario with a somewhat different set of units, I had a couple praetorian and a level 4 leader with standard to help me weather the worst of day, and the river dragon made a huge difference at the ford. I am not certain that this would make it possible for me and impossible for you because you lack them (I had actually managed to lose both the rock spirits by this point and they ought to be able to play that role pretty well) but it might. I do not want this scenario to be impossible if one did not grab the lost battalion and I certain considered making it easier in testing (it is a very fatiguing scenario to play, and I had to repeat it many times, but each time I felt I was just * close to being able to hold it off).

[humanressource]

Scenario 12: Breaking the Spear
(1) What difficulty and version? Normal, 1.9.8, 1.0.1.
(2) How difficult? (1-10) 9 (10 if orange leader brings up Avalanches early)
(3) How clear? very clear
(4) Dialog? Short and to the point. Maybe some muttering from the Sorcerer when fulfilling the orders would add some more atmosphere.
(5) Challenges? Luring the overwhelming enemy force in unvaforable positions. Asassinating the sorcerer before enemy vanguard comes in range of his keep was a very dramatic operation on every try (worked out 3/4 trys)
(6) How fun? (1-10) 8, epic but exhausting
(7) Changes? Brown leader got poisoned early in the game and stayed in his keep, slowly loosing all his HP. Not that it made him a quick kill that way, but i'm wondering if it is intended.
(8) Restarts? 4 restarts after 15-20 turns
(9) WML? Termites are nasty. Nice and unpleasant feature! Red leader stops recruiting after turn 36, white leader leaves after that.
(10) Game summary? 790 starting gold. Put together a quick strikeforce (2 Guerillas, 1 Serpent, 1 Militia) as initial recruits, filled up free slots with lvl1 units (hurler + cats) and loyals (stone spirits and river dragon). Dispatched the strike force and Reh'Doc to get rid of the Sorcerer while chasing termites all around the northern map. Gradually increased level of recalled troops (4 Priests, Serpents, Militia Wasps and Stalkers. Lost Batallion and 3 healers at the end. 45 units on the field.). Small force held the eastern ford (2 Priests, Wasp, some hurlers and high XP tribesmen); cats, Serpent and some hurlers in the western jungle for distraction and termite hunt. Lost Batallion and main force goes down the path and meets the orange units at the hillsite.
Quick Strikeforce with Reh'Doc avoids enemy contact (especially those boats...) and moves in position to kill Sorcerer at second night, after luring him from his keep. Eastern ford is held easily with little losses. Western Jungle is clear of termites by the time the Sorcerer is dead and the units start luring enemys into the swamps. Main force kills as many units at second night as it can get, falling back into the woods at day, making sure that each time some hostiles can follow them. rinse and repeat every day/night cycle. Red units are treated as in "Establishing a Claim". Poisoning and slowing breaks their advance pretty quick (Wasps, Serpents and Priests essential here). After turn 23 their advance was brought to a halt and the mop up begun. Lost both stone spirits at some point and the River Dragon after poisoning the brown leader.
Victory at turn 42 with 34 units left. We are satisfied.

Most interesting part is really the sorcerer. I really dont know how it would play out without killing him first, but it was fun every time sneaking over, slowing him down and tearing him to peaces. Imagine Reh'Doc unleashing the wrath of the jungle on him.
Getting Reh'Doc out alive again is not really a problem but if the red tanks reach there quick, the serpent or guerillas may have to be sacrificed.

Enjoyed this campaign very much, but please look into the River Dragon. Every time that boat gets hit, it takes some time until the fight goes on. Maybe the animation sequence is too long?