So... Sceptre of Fire in 0.9.2
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So... Sceptre of Fire in 0.9.2
Hi folks,
This is my first post (long time reader first time writer). I'm having real trouble completing this level with anything I'd consider a success. Various strageties I've tried have failed to be really fruitful always costing too much and occasionally not even getting to the sceptre. The main 2 strategies I've tried are;
* Advancing a main army up only 1 tunnel and holding/delaying the enemy with a small batch of troops in the other tunnel seems like it might work but the main body of my troops gets held up by troops from 3 enemy castles and I don't get anywhere near the sceptre (I end up with serious negative cash too).
* Advancing with a castle's worth of troops up both tunnels has got me to the sceptre but it takes so long and there's so little revenue that I have -200/-300 gold by the end.
I'm playing on medium, I start with 550 gold, I have a whole host of levelled troops too many to list here (elves, dwarves etc). Admittedly I only have 1 shyde, 1 druid and 1 white mage but this doesn't seem to pose much of a problem for winning battles.
Having read a couple of the other guides on the forum I have some questions:
Do people have most success with the 'advance up both tunnels' strategy?
What's a good amount of cash to end with? Should I put up with being seriously in the red or can it be done with a positive balance (if so, how)? Should I not worry? Is the next level so straight forward it literaly throws cash at me?
Many people say you have to keep re-trying until you get a good map (design flaw there I think) but what's the hallmark of a good map? If I keep trying will I find a map repleat with villages or are the total number of villages constrained to a low number? Will I eventually get one where the sceptre is so nearby it doesn't matter?
What's a good/sensible number of troops to recruit? Is 2 castle's worth enough or too little? With the exception of the Shyde and my white mage I only recruit dwarves (recalling those about to level and level 2 ones).
It's driving me slightly mad, Either it's genuinely way, way harder than all the levels that came before it or I'm missing some fundamental strategy that I didn't pick up from the previous level's play. Either way it seems like an awfully harsh leap up the difficulty curve. Not that I'm complaining about wesnoth's difficulty which I really appreciate (unlike most games these days that you waste £40 on and complete within 24 hours). Ooops bit of a long post there.
This is my first post (long time reader first time writer). I'm having real trouble completing this level with anything I'd consider a success. Various strageties I've tried have failed to be really fruitful always costing too much and occasionally not even getting to the sceptre. The main 2 strategies I've tried are;
* Advancing a main army up only 1 tunnel and holding/delaying the enemy with a small batch of troops in the other tunnel seems like it might work but the main body of my troops gets held up by troops from 3 enemy castles and I don't get anywhere near the sceptre (I end up with serious negative cash too).
* Advancing with a castle's worth of troops up both tunnels has got me to the sceptre but it takes so long and there's so little revenue that I have -200/-300 gold by the end.
I'm playing on medium, I start with 550 gold, I have a whole host of levelled troops too many to list here (elves, dwarves etc). Admittedly I only have 1 shyde, 1 druid and 1 white mage but this doesn't seem to pose much of a problem for winning battles.
Having read a couple of the other guides on the forum I have some questions:
Do people have most success with the 'advance up both tunnels' strategy?
What's a good amount of cash to end with? Should I put up with being seriously in the red or can it be done with a positive balance (if so, how)? Should I not worry? Is the next level so straight forward it literaly throws cash at me?
Many people say you have to keep re-trying until you get a good map (design flaw there I think) but what's the hallmark of a good map? If I keep trying will I find a map repleat with villages or are the total number of villages constrained to a low number? Will I eventually get one where the sceptre is so nearby it doesn't matter?
What's a good/sensible number of troops to recruit? Is 2 castle's worth enough or too little? With the exception of the Shyde and my white mage I only recruit dwarves (recalling those about to level and level 2 ones).
It's driving me slightly mad, Either it's genuinely way, way harder than all the levels that came before it or I'm missing some fundamental strategy that I didn't pick up from the previous level's play. Either way it seems like an awfully harsh leap up the difficulty curve. Not that I'm complaining about wesnoth's difficulty which I really appreciate (unlike most games these days that you waste £40 on and complete within 24 hours). Ooops bit of a long post there.
This scenario was the first one where I really learned how to play the game. Admittedly I did this with 0.8, but my experiences may be relevant.
I tried both the strategies you mentioned - holding one arm even if you make good progress along the other fails since you can easily run out of time.
Trying to recruit only a couple of castles-worth of troops fails because you just can't kill the enemy fast enough.
What worked for me eventually was recruiting 25-30 units (using up all the gold I had which I think was about 500 too). Elves aren't much use, so this was my druid, both my white mages, my red mage a couple of blue mages (the fast ones) from my recall list and all my leveled dwarves and as many other dwarves as I could afford.
They key here is you have to kill the trolls quickly - you can't afford to whittle them away since time runs out. This sometimes involves losing the odd unit - which is why a whole bunch of extra dwarves are needed.
Ideally you can clear most of the map and capture enough villages that you can actually make money on this map. My best run through I had over 400 cash at the end despite having 20 units left.
I've not tried since 9.2 came out, but with dwarves being cheaper I suspect it may be easier. I'll let you know when I get there again (running through on medium at the moment).
I tried both the strategies you mentioned - holding one arm even if you make good progress along the other fails since you can easily run out of time.
Trying to recruit only a couple of castles-worth of troops fails because you just can't kill the enemy fast enough.
What worked for me eventually was recruiting 25-30 units (using up all the gold I had which I think was about 500 too). Elves aren't much use, so this was my druid, both my white mages, my red mage a couple of blue mages (the fast ones) from my recall list and all my leveled dwarves and as many other dwarves as I could afford.
They key here is you have to kill the trolls quickly - you can't afford to whittle them away since time runs out. This sometimes involves losing the odd unit - which is why a whole bunch of extra dwarves are needed.
Ideally you can clear most of the map and capture enough villages that you can actually make money on this map. My best run through I had over 400 cash at the end despite having 20 units left.
I've not tried since 9.2 came out, but with dwarves being cheaper I suspect it may be easier. I'll let you know when I get there again (running through on medium at the moment).
Ok I've just given this another go
I notice that the next level starts me with 100gold even though I finished with -300. Is 100 gold enough for 'a choice must be made'?
Fair enough I've just tried this buy about 25 dwarvish fighters/thunderersjs138 wrote:What worked for me eventually was recruiting 25-30 units (using up all the gold I had which I think was about 500 too).
I really don't understand this. I just completed it with 18 turns left but I was still 300 in the red. There just aren't enough villages and even if I took all the remaining villages there wouldn't be enough time left for that much gold to acrue.Ideally you can clear most of the map and capture enough villages that you can actually make money on this map. My best run through I had over 400 cash at the end despite having 20 units left.
I notice that the next level starts me with 100gold even though I finished with -300. Is 100 gold enough for 'a choice must be made'?
Well... just shows how much the map matters - I started the Sceptre with 1200 gold (which I thought wasn't too shabby, playing medium). I finished it (on turn 40, maximising income, and killing every enemy) with -170 or so. Part of the problem was that it took so damn long to get anywhere - and I'll say that not having loyal on some of my dwarves didn't help. Those L3 units eat up the gold...
This was one of the maps where I had about three villages for the majority of the first 20 turns. As I recall the one where I finished with +400 I had 11 villages before I made contact which is probably at the other extreme.
I believe 100 should be enough for 'A choice must be made' - certainly at the easy level. I certainly did it with 100 the first time through (on 0.8.0, before I got the hang of the sceptre tho I came unstuck later on for lack of gold.) So the recruit as much as you can as quick as you can and expect to start with 100 next scenario isn't the worst strategy.
I think I'll got back and see if I can get a more favourable map, tho my note to the campaign developer would still be just to make the darn thing smaller.
This was one of the maps where I had about three villages for the majority of the first 20 turns. As I recall the one where I finished with +400 I had 11 villages before I made contact which is probably at the other extreme.
I believe 100 should be enough for 'A choice must be made' - certainly at the easy level. I certainly did it with 100 the first time through (on 0.8.0, before I got the hang of the sceptre tho I came unstuck later on for lack of gold.) So the recruit as much as you can as quick as you can and expect to start with 100 next scenario isn't the worst strategy.
I think I'll got back and see if I can get a more favourable map, tho my note to the campaign developer would still be just to make the darn thing smaller.
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Matthias[Wlkp]
- Posts: 26
- Joined: June 10th, 2005, 7:25 pm
- Location: Poznan, Poland
I did this level 2 times - second one was succesful, however I didn't have time so far to play the next level, and I started to play multiplayer 
. My key to succes was.... kind of cheating... First time I split my army into 2 groups, the were somehow advancing, one of them found the scepter... but neither Konrad nor Li'sar were in that army, so I run out of time... If I had split these two between the armies, I would be succesful first time (easy lvl). I didn't even bothered to recruit dwarves... On my second try I noticed, that maps are random, so... I loaded one of very early savegames and sent my entire army the right way...
If You're not frustrated so far with the difficulty level, good advice is to recruit dwarves - they are very fast on this map - so have bigger chances to find the scepter. Do not hire units, which can move only 1 hex/turn - waste of gold. Do not place both Konrad and Li'sar in one army!
. My key to succes was.... kind of cheating... First time I split my army into 2 groups, the were somehow advancing, one of them found the scepter... but neither Konrad nor Li'sar were in that army, so I run out of time... If I had split these two between the armies, I would be succesful first time (easy lvl). I didn't even bothered to recruit dwarves... On my second try I noticed, that maps are random, so... I loaded one of very early savegames and sent my entire army the right way... If You're not frustrated so far with the difficulty level, good advice is to recruit dwarves - they are very fast on this map - so have bigger chances to find the scepter. Do not hire units, which can move only 1 hex/turn - waste of gold. Do not place both Konrad and Li'sar in one army!
Well my second try from the start was more successful - I got a more favourable map, and finished on turn 23 (but with a barely positive income - partly my fault since I got Li'sar trapped near the Sceptre and had to jump on it or face her death).
This time I only recruited about 25-30 levels worth of units. Still since I started with 1400 gold and finished with 600, it's still expensive. I could have had more (since my income was positive by turn 23) if I'd not left Li'sar out on a limb, but the second party with Konrad in it was also in a spot of trouble and running out of throwaway dwarves. Those skirmishers make line breaks so much more problematic...
This time I only recruited about 25-30 levels worth of units. Still since I started with 1400 gold and finished with 600, it's still expensive. I could have had more (since my income was positive by turn 23) if I'd not left Li'sar out on a limb, but the second party with Konrad in it was also in a spot of trouble and running out of throwaway dwarves. Those skirmishers make line breaks so much more problematic...