The Ranger - The Vampire Lord

[VAMPSVSZOUNDS]

I suggest you don't play this on 1.3.I went to the underground with 250 MH,130 D Elders,25 Emmy Dragons,60 Ancient treants,about 90 unicorns and about 200-250 sprites and wardancers.I found the grail,had Unicorn bow,Dwarven shield,Blessed Sandals,Armor of the Forgotten Hero,2*Ring of Vitality,Necromancer's Helm,Endless Sack,26 ATK,27 DEF,21 SPP,450 Mana,Luck+elven Luck,Logistics and Ligth +all basic perks,Enlightement with Scholar@Know your Enemy,Attack+all basic perks.Teal fights me with an army of 12000 skel archers,150 raiders,500 specters,25 specter dragons and about 150 vamp lords.I had only 25 MH killed,because I sent unicorns to take the Skellheat.Buuuuuuuuuuuut.......they also have Vlad-13k skel archers,125 Wraiths,175 Archlich,200 vamplords,500 specters and 900 zombies.Now that I don't have fodder anymore,I have no chance.What's going on??????

[VAMPSVSZOUNDS]

Statistics on week 4,month 5:50 emerald dragons,141 ancient treants,159 unicons,334 druid elders,639 master hunters,450 wardancers,554 sprites,attack 30,defense 28,knowledge 31,spellpower 22,morale 1,luck 5;attack,light magic and logistics:basic perks,Luck elven luck+magic resistance,enlightement-scholar+know your enemy,Pendant of Mastery,Blessed Sandals,Unicorn Horn Bow,Ring of Vitality+Ring of Celerity,Dwarven king Shield,Armor of the Forgotten Hero and Necromancer's Helm+all light spells except Word Of Light,level 32.He has 10 attack,11 defense,22 spellpower,16 knowledge,5 morale and luck,10047 skellie archers,1547 specters,530(!!!!!) Archlichs,176 (!!!!!) Specter Dragons,330 Wraiths,560 Vampire Lords and 334 Griffins(joiners).How could they get so strong??(I have 1 Sylvan city empowered with Asha and underground under my control).

Edit:finally finished this mission after 6 months(ran bout 1 month to take all stat boosts@3 trees).I fought him from inside a Necro castle and one thing that really impressed me was:50 emeralds killed 190 Wraiths and 650 MH killed 600 Archlichs! Only in 1 turn!



After that Nicolai,no matter how many times I fought him,he didn't manage to kill me.I had bout 1000 mana,so I summoned 35 Emerald Dragons and 7-weeks of 2 cities,of which one had Tear of Asha,production.With 350 Master Hunters,150+ Ancient Treant and 35 emmie babies,no Nicolai could kill me.
Edited on Fri, Oct 23 2009, 05:39 by VAMPSVSZOUNDS

[tionitis]

it suks i was playing the mission beat nicolai twice i checked how many troops he had 72 spectral dragons next day he had 700+ next day 2000+ and the day after that he had 5000+ they are growing out of the ground!

[xiilus]

I definitely enjoy playing these early campaigns with the ToE mod, but it can trivialize some things. Although I don't often take Dark magic with Sylvan, I managed to get Vampirism fairly early with Findan. It's very good on most elven troops, yet the most evil choice has to be Sprites. My build had battle frenzy and vitality, and for a large portion of the mission i had 2 rings of vitality and a bloody claw necklace, so my Vampire Sprites had exactly double hp and double damage and absolutely refused to die. If it weren't for the fact that the most serious fights were against the undead, I might have been able to run over the entire map with just tier ones.



For some reason Nicolai "The Vampire Lord" had an army of exactly 1 Vampire Lord. There were multiple Necromancer heroes near him with real armies, and I didn't rush him so he had plenty of opportunity to get troops (I had one more stack of Spectrals to face before I could take him on). When I finally approached him he retreated to a town with a large army. But against all sense of self-preservation, he decided to "visit" the town instead of entering the garrison. I've experienced many anti-climaxes in this game before, but watching Nicolai's solitary Vampire Lord troop die to to a storm of arrows before I even took a proper turn was breathtaking.



For anyone else using the ToE mod, note that the Unicorn Horn bow is not necessarily the best weapon to use. To be sure, master hunters with the bow will do more damage over time than arcane archers (which do not benefit from it as they already have no penalty to range). However, the initiative advantage of the Arcane Archers is generally very useful, and with two towns and a hunter dwelling, arcane archers will tend to destroy stacks just fine. I eventually got the Staff of the Netherworld, after which my entire army could run circles around any enemy, as opposed to the bow which only improves shooters. If I had found the Treeborn Quiver, I might have felt differently, but alas I did not.

[cjlee]

Just played on version 1.60 (completed this a few times before in 2006, 2008, 2010 using earlier patches)



Don't worry folks. On patch 1.60, it is a cakewalk. Thanks to that Dark Energy limitation, necromancers can't raise huge armies now. You'll face a couple thousand skeletons here and there but nothing approaching five figures. You'll be grumbling that you can't level up Findan enough, or that things are too boring.



One thing you should do very early is to take out the zounds (I think 700) of Wights just south of Town C. I don't know why Maltz thinks they're hard to kill, because I made them top priority early in the game and wiped them out in week 3. That was two weeks of production for me, because week 3 was The Plague. My forces weren't even upgraded. They were also not favored enemy. Nope, I never found Unicorn Horn Bow all game. I think it was removed by the programmers after they nerfed the necs using Dark Energy limits.



You know the usual routine: take advantage of Findan's tactics, position treants to cover archers, druids, sprites and war dancers (the original 20 the AI gave me; I hadn't built any upgraded structure). Mass haste, defend, mass divine strength, cast endurance, resurrect, use sprites to distract and do some damage... easy stuff.

[Now, how did Maltz kill 9700 skeleton archers on a level 30 enemy hero, That's Scary.]



Why kill the Wights? Because Sprites are always getting hammered, and you want Sprites to live as long as possible because they're great distraction and also because you want the enemy to target them instead of archers. I had Vitality +2 as a perk, so with 2 more +2 rings that's 16 hit points, making sprites as durable as... zombies!



Thanks to these pretty little floating zombies, my archers were rarely targeted throughout this game!



As for Nicholai, don't attack him! Walk past him as if he's not there! I know he's easy to kill, typically with 1 unit of something or 1 week's worth of neutrals that he picked up somewhere, but that's a trick. If you kill Nicholai, you are so screwed because he will respawn somewhere far, far away from Findan (but always conveniently outside one of your castles). Furthermore, AI will give him a huge free army. This army will never be enough to prove a challenge to Findan, but always be enough to wipe out Dirael or Thalmar (unless you gave them a month's worth of troops at least).



Your Real Mission in this map on 1.60 (without fears of enemy harvesting skeletons), is to level Findan up as much as you can for the final battle with Kha Beleth, which Findan will face with only a tiny army. (In the Final Battle, Zehir is so weak that Findan needs to give him at least half his army). Make sure Findan visits every stat booster. There are a lot of them, and in fulfilling both the Spectral Dragons and the Dwarven Armor quests, you will see them all. (Oh, I did have Silent Stalker which adds to the scouting radius.)



The nec heroes and castles are mere distractions. Kill them whenever you can just to reduce the nec army sizes. Hire all the undead you can to prevent the enemy hiring - you will have tons of money and it is too much of a pain to get more troops when you don't need them anyway. Way to win is: Findan collects the dwarven armor or kills the spectral dragons. Once he has them, he can kill Nicholai. Once Nicholai is dead, you know the tale.



finished as a black dragon. extremely disappointed. Sylvan was way too hard in earlier patches because of unlimited skeleton raising. I remember playing on Normal long ago because Maltz's walkthrough said it was tough, and boy it was tough even on Normal because of legions of skeletons. Once that was nerfed, it was a joke on Heroic.
Edited on Mon, Apr 23 2012, 13:17 by cjlee

[Wheeler Dealer]

Hard 1.6. Pretty easy. It was a bit of a struggle at first but I reached a tipping point about the time Findan reached the western land mass. In my mission there were three Sylvan Ancients and I think just four Obelisks. My grail was near the NW obelisk.



I used instant travel to skip some battles until I was better prepared, like the wights near the first necropolis. Dirael jumped the wights to get the artifact, later Findan came back to kill them to get the experience (over 70,000) to reach Level 31. With the three trees he made Level 34.



Dirael commanded an army of undead but did only a little fighting. I kept thinking I would find a perfect battle for her to win with 200 Vampire Lords, Arcane Armor and Raise Dead but in was never required. Talanar did odd jobs, moving troops, flagging mines and exploring. Having Summon Creature, Instant Travel and Town Portal made him very versatile. I hired Ellaine on day one so for 4 months she chipped in 182 gold pieces a day (that's over 5000) while doing errands and increasing growth when she could.



I had to reload when I hit the first city on the western island. I killed Nicolai and I wasn't done exploring. I eventually had the Phoenixes, killed all the spectral dragons and owned all the cities before I finished off the Vampire Lord on day three of month 5.



I did notice that Talanar started this mission at Level 24 and Dirael at Level 28. I seem to recall observing years ago that if you were given a hero already over the mission cap he would keep that level until he gained some experience at which point he would be adjusted down to the cap for that mission.



It was fun!

[vil2]

On 1.6, I have a graphic problem with this map.

The night has not fallen on Ashan, as it should if I'm correct, so I have a standard light in the world map.

During fights I have a very very very bright screen, and I suppose those two problems are related. i tried to change video settings but it did not solve anything. ANy idea?

[Sunlover]

Hard 1.6. I didn't know what I was in store for, so I "looped back" twice for more army reinforcements (I came back halfway, Dirael or Talanar came halfway and met me). Surprisingly, I caught Nicolai "napping" with a weak army in Abi-Libur -- behind another guy who had a weak army. Vladimir was about 1/3 day behind me with 4202 skeleton archers, 2001 spectres, 684 vampire lords, 186 archliches, 154 wraiths and 89 spectral dragons. AI was telling me that'd be a "hard" battle.



I made my final assault with 684 sprites, 440 master hunters, 201 druid elders, 127 silver unicorns, 134 ancient treants, 35 emerald dragons and the 5 phoenix - but like I said, Nicolai was super low compared to Vladimir.



My skills were pretty much the standard ones except I got blessed (cursed?) with Destruction instead of Dark (and that around level 24 a few missions back). I had some nice artifacts including Armor of the Forgotten Hero, Crystal Ice Shield, Sword of Might, Lion Crown and 2 good rings helping.



I was not in a hurry since I didn't know what I'd be facing on Hard; finished on month 5, week 3, day 4 -- I know, I know. :p Part of me was just looping around Vladimir in the underground, part of me was collecting stat bonuses. I only explored about 1/3 of the major "dark" continent at the end. Time to try on Heroic next time.
Edited on Wed, Jul 30 2014, 18:29 by Sunlover

[Bravehome]

I've seen so many comments that Rez is a must, while I found it more a hindrance/mana sync. A good build I used all Sylvan scenarios on Hard that avoids the need for Resurrection was by following the 3 eLves: Leadership, Luck and Logistics. Along with last option for Findan, Defense, avoided the need to waste mana on Rez and spent it on useful things like Divine Strength, Slow, Weakness and Vulnerability (using Imbue Arrow in large battles). What with Archery, Protection, Soldier's Luck, Elven Luck, Pathfinding and Navigation (very useful in 2 scenarios), can use auto-avoidance to vastly reduce damage (thus reducing the potential need for Rezes anyway), while using Logistics and its Abilities to either catch the enemy or stay a step ahead. I tried the Rez path and it was just too mana intensive, when I wanted to use the mana to slow/weaken my opponent. Happy Hunting!

[cjlee]

I played this three times. On Hard, Heroic, and Impossible.

On Hard I found the hardest.
On Impossible (Heroes Mod 5.5), partly thanks to experience, I managed to get through easily but it was not ‘easy’ in the sense of the enemy fielding smaller armies.

Mod 5.5 turned Findan into a purely Might hero, so he had practically no spells to cast. (His spellpower was still really high thanks to all those stat boosters.) I would say that we shouldn’t consider the Sandro’s Cloak and think about casting Dark magic on necro enemies. Most people are not going to play Ranger like that, and without the Cloak, you really have nothing. In any case mod 5.5 nerfed Frenzy.

If anyone is reading my experience on the latest version (Mod 5.5 and TOTEv1.6) you should know that the necromancers have been nerfed using Dark Energy limits. But don’t expect small enemy armies. When they start with 6 towns and many high level necromancers, that’s a lot of Dark Energy points. And now they can raise higher level creatures, so I was seeing Legions of Ghosts and Swarms of liches. The enemy had two super strong armies.

But now here’s the funny thing. Nicolai did his crazy TP-thing early in the game. He teleported to defend the underground SW castle when Dirael was approaching it with her secondary army. She wasn’t that strong because she had been mainly getting by using summons. Nicolai had 803 Zombies but the rest of his army was weak. After a tough battle I killed Nicolai.


Now this means that Nicolai will respawn, of course. But making him respawn early in the game meant that the AI no longer prioritized Nicolai. Two other heroes developed really huge armies and kept building them up via necromancy and hires. Nicolai was now left with a miserable secondary army, which when I fought him again in month 3, was comprised of miscellaneous hires here and there and a motley few undeads from creature generators.

And what is the objective of this mission?

To kill Nicolai!

I realized I could not hope to win by force against the enemy. They had picked up the Unicorn Horn Bow early in the game, which meant that one of their heroes was now carting around 400 superpowered liches. I’m not good enough to win against such odds on Impossible. But I had Talanar and his super range of vision, which means that I could easily scout the entire Necromancer Island on the SW. And I’m a Ranger, so I have logistics and the enemy doesn’t. I went after all the spectral dragons in a hit and run commando raid, avoiding the main enemy armies. Then I took out Nicolai by charging through a portal and running past a really powerful enemy hero. Once Nicolai was down, Mission Accomplished!

[Wheeler Dealer]

Hard 1.6 Found my old post from 2014. Most of it was the same but this time it was harder. I think the difference was that Valdamir had the main army. I couldn't beat him when I first reached the westen land. I had split my sylvan troops between Findan and Dirael and given Talanar all the undead troops I could muster. It worked well for a while but I eventually had to consolidate my Sylvan troops. and had only 2 large armies. The real showdown came when Vladamir attacked Findan in the open and couldn't beat the consolodated Sylvan army or even inflict serious casualties.

I took probably another month maxing out Findan at Level 34. his attributes were 34-21-20-26-1-5. In addition to Avenger he was expert in Luck, Logistics, Light, Attack and War Machines with a full slate of abilities.

Finished Month 6, Week 1, day 2. Findan's army had 56 Emerald dragons, 701 Master Hunters in a total of nearly 2200 troops.

[Wheeler Dealer]

The Vampire Lord, Heroic

Here we go again. Mostly the same on Heroic. I hired Raven, a L31 Necromancer. in week 7.

I defeated Nicolai after eliminating all the Spectral Dragons, but he came back anyway. It may have been because another hero eliminated one of the stacks of dragons.

Talanar and Direal both arrived at L28 +500K xp. I took the Town Hall. There are 3 Sylvanna's Ancients. Findan reached L33, Raven L32, Dirael L31 and Talamar L29.

I finished on 4,2,4.

[ivica]

I conquered all the cities! killed Nikolai at least 10 times but he appears again! what's the problem?