Day 1, The Dark Elves
We're immediately spell casting as much as possible!

Turn sent to the Elves (Unicorn).

Day 2 Greenies.

What can I say? Researching, casting, killing. Hoping to be able to deal with an air elemental tomorrow, but that might be too much to ask.

Day 2, The Dark Elves
We keep up our magic!

Turn sent to the Elves (Unicorn).

Day 3.

We can't attack the air elemental. Perhaps researching chain lightning will do it? Tomorrow will see.

Being therefore at something of a loss, we realise there should be some work to do. And hunt out a monster lair under a cloud of ashes. In we go and retrieve the minor but handy items, and get some xp too.

Day 3, The Dark Elves
The mana is flowing in, and is immediately put to good use. The gold is a bit more difficult to collect, but we're working on that too.

Turn sent to the Elves (Unicorn).

Elven Day 4

Yup. Chain lightning. That did it.

Day 4, The Dark Elves
We picked up a couple of reasonably useful items today. Our research for powerful spells continues, while our pet froggie climed a tower to get a good view over the Elves' island. They're busy rebuilding a shipyard!

Turn sent to the Elves (Unicorn).

Elves Day 5

We did two things today, both wrong. I think we selected the wrong spell to research next and we cast the one we had in the wrong place.

Anyway, we see dark elphibians all over the place, which seems to be the quickest way we can also get a presence off our island. The shipyard will have to provide the means for our heros.

Day 5, The Dark Elves
More items, and valuable experience, was picked up today. We've got our heroes on display to put terror into the souls of the green Elves.

Turn sent to the Elves (Unicorn).

Elves Day 6

We see the 3 dark elf heros. We also see their xp is identical to ours, except for their main hero, who has a massive lead of one.

We expect to lose our frog, although he did pinch some mana crystals. We also expect the dark elf frog to stand ABSOLUTELY no chance against two serpents. Unless he can escape before they move or the heros intervene, but I think they will be next.

Day 6, The Dark Elves
Dark Frog eats Green Frog. Good! The Serpents are swimming around, waiting for a much more tasty green ship to eat.

Turn sent to the Elves (Unicorn).

Elves Day 7.

Ah well, on the backfoot again, already. But we do pinch the empty human 2 hex. And we understand the dark frog was a lot more powerful than the light frog (oh, for stone skin), but we still don't know whether the serpents miraculously left it alone or were just short of a meal.

Day 7, The Dark Elves
The human city is back in our hands, and we've sent one of our frogs to harass the Elves in their own back yard. The green frogs are clearly visible, and appear to be looking for fights they can't handle. We'll see.

Turn sent to the Elves (Unicorn).

Elves Day 8

We fight a few fights we can handle, only the earth node boars give us more trouble than the elves, and we lose a couple of frogs. We see the dark elf heros split up a bit, and wonder whether we will tempt them back together again.

Day 8, The Dark Elves
We taste the sweet taste of victory!
Or are we over confident?

The Elven transport ship is sunk, their capital is in our hands, and so is their shipyard and builders guild. It appears the Elven heroes are stranded on an island without possibility of creating any form of sea or air transport.

Turn sent to the Elves (Unicorn).

Elves Day 9

We had no further use of the transport ship, as we had freeze water available. There was a chance we may have cast it last turn, but we wanted a frog. That may have been a mistake, as the Dark Elf level 6 hero now has a storm priest. However, now seems to be the time and armed with another frog our three heros rush across the ice and do battle.

Which is over rather quickly.

More later.

Wow, reading that report sure scared me! I need to study the spell book, since I had completely forgotten that you had the ability to cast Freeze Water!

Day 9, The Dark Elves
The green ones are dead. Celebrations all over the world!

Turn not sent to the Elves (Unicorn).

Thanks for the game, Unicorn! Water Walking was a huge bonus!

Greetings! Since this is a beta map, I'm pandering for input. Any suggestions?

Yes, it was quite interesting. I've just gone into the last turn again, to check on the stats of that hero - I was a bit surprised at how badly the battle went. Out of interest, I didn't summon a frog, and I didn't therefore enchant it. I cast the freezing and tried the battle again. One set of ice shards took the storm priest out, and two more did the hero in. No losses, not even hits, for my lot.
Oh well....

I think that's indicative of the map, it being so small and problematical, smallish differences in tactics make a huge difference. Plus the luck of starting spells (which I was quite happy with) and arguable differences in "what's the best sphere choice". But I do think stone skin is a big loss.

I just don't know how you managed to both research several important spells and cast them liberally, Particularly water walking. Don't tell me you found it again....??

Well done!

lol, no, I researched it in the traditional, honest way!

I too was extremely lucky with starting spells. I got Death Ray, Dark Gift and Summon Frog which I cast as frequently as possible in the beginning, to be able to swim around and grab piles of gold and mana. There are two mana piles north of my city, so I hade plenty of mana to use for casting initially.

The first turn I grabbed the Death Node, which gave me a good starting research base, and I had Healing Water researched immediately. Then Water Walking was available, and researched two turns later. That "gave me" the water node, and practically unlimited mana income. The frogs I've been casting had collected lots of gold and mana, and grabbed mines, wind mills and the center tower, so I knew I had the resources on my side and could see what the Elves were up to.

My swimming heroes had a great advantage in gathering XP, since they could go where ever they wanted, while yours were restricted to your island, or where a boat (destined to be serpent food) could take you. As noted, I never thought about the freeze water spell you could use...

Here's the view of the world immediately after the death of the Elves: magicrules.jpg (377 KB)

Suggestions for TT? First, I definitely enjoyed this map! It was very different from "standard" maps. I like it!

I'll have to say that water walking is the way to dominate the map. Sure, stone skin is nice, but to be able to go where ever I want is better. That combination is maybe too good?

Luck in starting spells is a key factor, but there's nothing to do about that. And the element of luck/bad luck is fun in AoW.

Yes, water walking and stone skin has got to be a winner.

I just didn't get my frogs out quick enough, I guess. Plus I mispositioned one and the damn serpent ate it.

That's a great jpg! But that's not a "natural" view of the turn, is it? How did you get that?

That's what it looks like at screen resolution 1600x1200. No tricks.

Jeez..... I wish.....

Keep wishing for a couple of years, and it may just come true. That worked for me.

Yes, I'm realizing the water player has a very strong advantage on the map. I'm trying to figure out how to fix it.

I would have thought water to ice was more useful, but water walking I see is quite helpful too. I must be confused; I thought water to ice was a water spell...must be air. In that case, it is the humans and azracs who are in trouble. They need to use free movement ships to gain any advantage, but is it enough?

Freeze water is an air spell, which is available quicker than windwalking. But water or wind walking is better than having to cast the freezing.

I can absolutely confirm the azracs are disadvantaged - well, I am in the game I am playing with Sprout. Gold being tight, it's a big chunk out of it to build a builder, shipyard, then a transport. This at least gets you off, then the serpents get the transport. Even a ds would get splatted. Maybe you could cast fm on one and whip it away from the serpents, but fmds are frowned upon in many quarters.

You could have a tower giving water walking to all, but then that defeats the object of having the geography as it is. So I'm still thinking the only way of doing it is to have the same spheres available to all.

I don't suppose you can add to your spheres like you can in the campaign? That would be neat. You could have three to start with, then get given 4 on, say, Day 3 so you know what you are facing then choose water if you are astute enough and need to.

My thoughts so far, TT. Keep up the good work!