I remember taking ages to complete this one on normal, this is one tough map!

Good luck to anyone trying it on very hard

I actually played this map not long ago its a tough one!

Sparrow this ones a great pick after your recent dud decission (talking about my map)

Thanks for picking this one, i'll be giving it a go on very hard and post my results when i get some free time

That reminds me ive still got to pass BRS map - AGH!!!!!!!!!!!!!

Arthus

An excellent choice, Sparrow...
...in deed one of my favourite maps!

Quote:

Me too! We won't even talk about how many tries it took me.

kester? orange in here????
nope i refuse to beleive it!

Arthus

Quote:

Hey, I check it out... just cause I'm not going to attempt any of these on Very Hard...

Phew! Made it on Very Hard ... at last!

This is a great economic map, full of little puzzles and pathways and full of danger from the wolves, bears and bandits. In saying that though, once you know what you're doing it's a fairly straightforward game and your biggest enemy is time.

Without doubt the hardest goal to achieve is the iron collection, which can't be done until you get some to stone to reconnect the stairs pathway. And it's difficult to retrieve stone from your quarry until at least the majority of the wolves are under control. In this sense the map is set up very well. However, and I know this is tantamount to blasphemy for a map that has received an almost perfect 4.9 score, I find it a little unbalanced in that compared to the iron, the other eco-goals are easy to achieve. I'd turned off stone and wood collection long before the map was due to finish and my granaries were bursting with food which allowed for easy tax collection.

I triumphed by being extremely aggressive, downright reckless even, in eliminating the wolves and buying myself enough time to gather the 40 iron. When stone allowed I also built new pathways and stairs to make the iron workers journey as short a path as possible. Each journey from mine to stockpile and back again was still taking approx 20 months!
I'd cleared the wolves by 1678 and placed my first iron on the stockpile in 1680, the fortieth touched down in October 1699, a full two months before the deadline!

This is still a great map to play - at any level - and thoroughly deserves the recognition it has received. My compliments to the author ...

[This message has been edited by brave sir robyn (edited 03-22-2006 @ 11:11 AM).]

Wow, that's fantastic, brave sir robyn

Congrats!

Excellent, Brave Sir Robyn! Very nice work, and good comments as usual. I've put your name up for this one.

I remember having a lot of problems with resting hunters on this one. Maybe I didn't have the huts out far enough. I notice you've got a rather healthy stock of meat in that screen shot. Maybe you were using some good things to ease the burden? Although that would have impacted your iron production. I scoured the map very carefully to maximize wheat production, so bread should have been pulling its proportional weight, although bandits did play havoc with outlying farms. I had to watch food stocks constantly.

Thanks Kester, Sparrow!

This was definitely one of the most challenging of your Challenge maps so far. Arthus' 'Unexpected Return' and, dare I say it, my own 'Star & Crescent' were the only other maps that really gave me a white knuckle ride to the finish line.

Castaways - Full Picture 1695

I never really had any problems with food, as you can see in this screenshot, taken with about five years to go, I had 13 hunter posts out the front. Once I'd cleared the deer stocks from the 'home' island I relocated all hunters to the mainland. I was using around 10-15 hunters on and off, some got smashed by bandits and I think I lost one or two to fires but in general the hunters were working constantly. I didn't connect the path to the northern deer island until all the wolves were cleared, maximizing the deer available to me.
It's also possible to access the deer herds, (and an extra two wheat farm sites), in the southern valley before you get stone - but a little more on that later.
I also kept my population very low which obviously helped with the food consumption.

Good Things? No, never ... It takes a very special circumstance for me to resort to using them in a game. In this map I only placed the required Good Things with about six months to go. As you can see I enclosed them in an inaccessible wooden wall and even then I was terrified of the consequences on my iron workers!

I found sites for six wheat farms across the map. There's the one site at your home island, three in the southern valley, one next to the lake in the north and the sixth is acessible if you destroy the sunken 'gold' mine just south-east of the stone deposit.

Now, one thing that I discovered while playing this map for your challenge and had not spotted in previous plays was a small patch of 'diggable pebbles'. And I only spotted this by chance - I had a spearman selected when the cursor moved over this area and a spade icon appeared!
See the screenshot below ...

Castaways - Diggable Pebbles

There's a tutorial at SHK about Diggable Pebbles, if anyone hasn't come across them before.

As I mentioned, this means if you dig out these pebbles you can gain access to the deer herd and two wheat farm sites without needing to acquire any stone to make a stairway into the ravine.
I'm not sure how many players would have noticed this but it greatly helped my food supplies by accessing this area as soon as possible. I placed a wooden wall section to keep the new deer near to my home island and preventing them from wandering further out into the landcsape and attracting the attention of the wolves.

Anyway, I hope some of this helps any other players who are trying this map. Good luck!

[This message has been edited by brave sir robyn (edited 03-22-2006 @ 11:16 AM).]

Congrats Brave Sir Robyn!

I remember having played this tricky map full of puzzles "on hard"a long time ago , and I finally made it after several attempts. However I don't intend giving me another chance on "very hard"... I can still see beads of perspiration running down my face... ;-)

What a map. I have had several attempts and as of yet have failed miserably. I can't believe how many of the little "puzzles" I didn't discover the first few times.

Finally have a good stategy to rid myself of the wolves. Then in the last attempt, and doing quite well, a wolf attack started and within a few seconds 10 wolves were on the king! Ouch!

I had a HUGE problem with my hunters just resting. Do they need to be situated farther out from the granery???? I hope someone can answer that for me.

Onward and forward once again.

Yes, Duke of The Glen, I had the same problem with hunters when I first played this, but I had a lot of wheat going, too. I played it again since my last post and had a lot better luck with the hunters by starting them near the granary, then moving them out to where fresh game was as the closer herds were consumed. Even hunters located over the bridge eventually started resting, so I moved them even further out, some way out. This seemed to keep them busy this time, much more like what Brave Sir Robyn indicated he experienced, so that appears to be the answer.

And dealing efficiently with the wolves is definitely the key in this mission.

Hi Sparrow,

This one went rather smoothly.

Playing level - 15,000
1 month early - 100
351 stone extra - 3,510
39 iron extra - 780
562 bread extra - 2,810
1709 gold extra - 1,709
score = 23,909

I started out with 2 woodcutters & 3 hunters, using all the wood. Then I deleted the stockpile to get rid of the usless stock. I had my spearmen take out the rabbits and my archer start on the wolves below. As wood became available I added 1 more woodcutter, barracks and armory. I recruited the rest of my archers and finished off the wolves below. Then I sent the spearman down to fill in the moat and deal with the rabbits below. I added a wooden gate on the north side of where the wooden bridge would go and another at the top of the southeast entrance.

Once the gatehouse was in place I completed the bridge. I put 10 archers on top of each gatehouse (where they would stay for the entire mission). With the last 11 archers, I proceeded out of the gatehouse as far as I could, attracting as many wolves as possible. Then I let the wolves chase them back to the gatehouse and pick them off. I repeated this until the archers had a clear path to the quarry in the north. I built a stockade around the quarry and moved the archers to that point. Then I repeated luring the wolves to this location until I eradicated them. I then built another stockade around the condemned bride in the east and deleted moved the archers at the quarry to this location. I built a quarry, 3 ox tethers and 5 woodcutters near the condemned bridge. Next I moved the stockpile to this location.

When the stone started coming in, I built a staircase next to the condemned bridge, repaired the stairs across the river and built a staircase at the quarry near the wooden bridge. I destoyed the existing quarry & oxen. Then built 2 quarry's and 8 ox tethers at the other quarry. I built 4 wheat farms, then eradicated the bears and the rest of the rabbits. Then I placed 3 iron mines and 12 hunters posts in the area. I deleted the hunters posts near the keep. Then I moved the granery near the stockpile. This was a bit tricky as I had no food for a short time and no market. I had a surplus of gold, so when my popularity got near 50 I bribed the peasants for awhile. I placed a mill and 4 bakery's.

I never use religon or good things unless required. So I waited until the final month's to add the good things and get the win. I had the necessary goods about 12 years early, but played it through to see how much surplus I could get.

Regards,
Lord Blok

This may seem like a simple questions - but how do you make a WOODEN bridge? I made a stone one from stuff I destroyed, but making a wooden bridge is something I can't see in the building options.

Havn't completed the map yet - but I probably play much less than the rest of you do.

Lord Blok, glad to see you got through this one. That was an inventive approach to move the stockpile near the cliff opposite the iron.

However, I'm so sorry to say this, but I had mentioned in the main write-up for this one that the rule would be no short cutting the path to the iron. Since iron is the critical objective in this map, shortcuts bypass some of the puzzles, speed the accumulation of iron, and make it less of a challenge, and therefore not really extreme. In fairness to the others and in all good conscience I don't think I should be giving you a mark for this one yet.

It looks like you're doing quite well with the wolves so I hope you might consider another try. You may be pretty much set for a final run at full extreme.

budlong, I hate to discuss too much about this mission myself here, so others can enjoy it completely fresh if they so choose. If you can wait just a couple of days I'll have my solution write-up where I will discuss the wooden bridge issue.

Sparrow,
I had not read the main write up for this map. Seeing as I was behind, I just downloaded the map, read the story file and planned a strategy. I will be sure to read the write up on future maps for unique exceptions like this.

I have no problem replaying the map. It was a very enjoyable map. I already have an alternate strategy in mind and am looking forward to the challenge. I'll give it a go in the next few days and report back with a win.

Regards,
Lord Blok

I should try this map again too (on hard or very hard this time) - maybe this weekend

For anybody that was waiting for the solution, it's now up. So sorry for the delay. It seemed to take an eternity to get written up and pieced together.

You can count me in, Sparrow.

The first time I played, I missed the vitory from... one iron and the popularity.

I erased the house already built and started collecing wood with five woodcutters so I would have enough to build a gate and a wall across the path, where I had already placed the granary.
I collected enough wood so I could do so before the food ran out, and then built a few hunters who would prevent me to run out while I was hiring the archers.

Once I had the archers, I built some woodcutters near where the wolves where, which got them to move and to get closer to the walls, where I could eliminate them without damages. I had to send a few of them to get rid of a few wolves remaining as well as from the bears that could be reached.
I then started collecting stone to build stairs to access the iron location.

As for me, I did not manage to make my way by digging the moat, I did not dig the moat at all, and waited until I had built the stairs to start collecting stone.

As this process takes a bit longer, I placed the stockpile facing the stone location, while the hunters and bakers where inside the walls, to prevent the bandits to destroy it. Besides, I had five wheat farms.

As when the wolves appear on the map, they do it on the little island surrounded by the moat, I did not have to face any wolves invasion once I had gotten rid of the ones on the map.

A fine map.

Unfortunately, Duc de Noisiel, I've got to repeat what I told Lord Blok in a previous post below. While I'm glad to see you got through this one, I'm sorry to say that I had mentioned in the main write-up for this map that there would be a rule of no short cutting the path to the iron. Since iron is the critical objective in this map, shortcuts bypass some of the puzzles, speed the accumulation of iron, and make it less of a challenge, and therefore not really extreme.

In fairness to the others and in all good conscience I don't think I should be giving you a mark for this one yet either. I hope you might consider another try. You've been doing so well, I feel certain you can succeed.

Quoted from Sparrow:

Grumbling... I did not read it.

Quoted from Sparrow:

Grumbling... It should be done probably by tonight...

Quoted from Sparrow:

You can count me in Sparrow.

This time, I had a different strategy.

I started by placing the granary on the opposite side to where the keep is, and was surprisingly astonished to see that the hunters would store the meat although there is no path that leads it.

This time I did not manage to kill all the wolves.
I created a enclosed wooden path that would lead to where the trees are north of the river so I could get wood without being bothered by the wolves.
I started collecting stone as soon as I had enough wood to manage to build a wall around the stone location and the path that would lead to it.
I collected the wood to the bottom of the river in front of the castle digging the moat, and once I had collected it and replaced it with a wheat farm with a stone stair access to it (Once I had stone), I closed the little island where the wolves always appear with two walls.

I left the stockpile in its original position this time, and starting collecting iron the soonest possible once I had stone to manage to make a few stairs to accelerate the delivery, including a little bridge near the ruins.

As all I was doing was in between walls, I did not get bothered by the wolves, neither by the bandits that had to deal with the wolves...

Surprisingly, I made a better score on that one.

Just a reminder Sparrow, I also have finished this one...