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| Author |
File Description |
| PuzzleMan |
Posted on 03/17/00 @ 12:00 AM
| File Details |
|---|
| Version: |
Age of Kings 1.0 |
| Style: |
Fixed Force |
A good, brief history of Masada in the history section.
A little humor in the dialog. The main map simulates the area near the Dead Sea quite well.
This is a quickie. A one minute trigger generated intro. A few simple quest type preparations and then a small force assault on the stronghold of Masada. Takes a little over a half hour.
It is not very difficult but will probably require a couple attempts to break through and still have sufficient strength to take out the last objective. |
| Author | Comments & Reviews ( All | Comments Only | Reviews Only ) |
|---|
| laz123 |
Posted on 03/20/07 @ 08:52 AM |
| rakovsky |
Posted on 10/05/20 @ 12:02 AM
Lot's wife is in the woods near the Northwest edge of the map. You have a clearing that runs from your Blue tents up to the upper left edge of the diamond shaped map. You should send a scout along the northern and western edges of that clearing to see Lot's wife in the trees. She is a red unit. |
| rakovsky |
Posted on 10/05/20 @ 01:33 AM
Wow, I actually beat this Scenario after submitting my initial review by using a strategy very different than what the instructions suggested. I don't know whether the Designer intended for me to use this alternate, successful strategy or not.
Following the normal method of breaking through the main gates after using the triggers to make upgrades, the Playability would be considered poor because my forces weren't strong enough to break through the gates and ALSO fight the defenders successfully, even on the Easiest Difficulty. During my failed attempts to break through the main gates and attack the enemy base, I got the Elephant reinforcements, Ram, and Blacksmith upgrades. Since the instructions seem to suggest going through the main enemy gates with your rams, perhaps the designer did not playtest his mission.
Still, the Designer's name is Puzzleman, so I thought that perhaps he did secretly intend for me to clear a path through the woods on the east side of the main enemy fort, which protected my rams from getting slaughtered by the enemy towers. But in that case, he made it pretty tedious- it took me a very long time to cut through maybe 7 tree squares with my lone villager, with some long distance hauling before I cleared enough space to put in a new log camp northeast of the spring. For instance, I was 2 hours into scenario gameplay time before I finally cleared the path through.
Balance: 4
Using the most obvious method of breaking through the main gates with my rams and the 3 elepants, the balance would be very poor. The instructions read as if you are supposed to upgrade your units using the triggers like getting Lot's wife and having her build a blacksmith, and then to tear through the enemy gates. Once you make an initial frontal attack, the messages you get in chat form suggest that you should still have siege engines that survived the attack, and then your soldiers should fight inside. But that did not work for me. I was able to break through twice, one time on Easiest, but my troops got massacred inside the enemy base. First the rams were destroyed breaking through the gates, and then my cavalry was killed inside the base.
Maybe the enemy is able to continue churning out troops like catapults once it realizes that it's under attack. I am not sure if this constant unit production by the enemy was intended, because the Designer included a "Stand Still" AI file, and there is a trigger that you can find in the Editor that apparently sets the enemy's siege production to 0 at time "30", which could mean 30 seconds in. But anyway, the Designer did intend for you to fight enemy units, because it talks about attack Hadrada and protecting your rams, as if the Designer expects that you will be attacked by enemy units.
On the other hand, using the alternate method that I found of clearing a path northeastward of the ram's spring to the southeast of the gates, I found that the balance was seriously in my favor due to me having about 17 rams to attack with that hadn't been hurt by enemy towers.
Creativity: 5
This was very creative, with a neat BMP map and storyline, along with the idea of finding Lot's wife. In case the tree clearing method was intended as a way to enter the base, then this alternative strategy was very creative.
Map Design: 5
The Map Design looked pretty nice with cliffs and a lake, but he did not design a good way for you to break into the fort. The gates are too strong, even having bombard towers, and you are stuck with only one chokepoint to break through. In the South east there is a good way for you to get through by using your villager to chop trees, but it takes so long that I don't know if the Designer intended this. Still, due to this neat semi-secret way in, the design was pretty good.
Story/Instructions: 4
The Story had a good history section, and the hint section was good enough for me to figure out how to unlock the triggers like finding Lot's wife. However, the instructions were not clear on which "cathedral" you are supposed to destroy. The answer is that you do not need to destroy the central temple/mosque, but rather the French-style cathedral in the right corner area of the map.
In case the designer intended you to chop a path through the woods in the southeast, he should have put that in the Hints section.
Additional Comments:
First, I found the spring to the SE of the main gate that supposedly helped my Rams. Next, I found Lot's wife near the NW edge of the map. Belisarius told her to get the elephants from the Moabite trader, but when I sent her to the Moabite forts' walls, nothing happened. I went to the hints at this point and they say to use the villager woman to harvest gold. When I mined some gold, the Moabite player gave me alot of resources. To get the elephants after you mine gold, you need to click on the Moabite villager.
On HARD, my rams were able to break the walls before getting killed, but aferwards my foot and horse soldiers got killed once they attacked inside. I tried again after getting the elephants and did about the same. It's hard to have the rams attack different individual wall sections simultaneously, like trying to get them to snake past the gates and towers on the right side of the multiple gates, even though I took out the front line of towers. The same kind of defeats happened on the Moderate and Standard and Easiest Difficulties also. Namely, my rams got killed at the gates and then my soldiers got killed inside.
Finally, I was able to beat it on Easiest because I considered using my sole villager to dig a path through the trees on the SE side of the enemy gate near the mountain peaks and spring... I only have 1 villager, so I knew that it would take a long time, and I am not sure if the Designer intended this alternate method.
About two hours into the scenario I finally cleared a way through the woods north of the eastern spring. I also built a harbor there and made an upgraded galleon to defend the worker from archers and cavalry when she got near to breaking through, which worked well- the galleon took out an enemy cavalry and an enemy archer who were scouting near my logging camp just north of the spring. |
 
HGDL v0.8.2 |
| Rating |
|---|
| 4.2 | | Breakdown |
|---|
| Playability | 3.0 | | Balance | 4.0 | | Creativity | 5.0 | | Map Design | 5.0 | | Story/Instructions | 4.0 |
| Statistics |
| Downloads: | 1,215 |
| Favorites: [] | 0 |
| Size: | 59.22 KB |
| Added: | 03/17/00 |
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