Heroes V -- Tribes of the east -- Grim crusade quest

[vampireprince]

I am at the point in the grim crusade quest where I have defeated all but the red player. I have picked up the red key and gone down the stairway. There I confront a 1k stack of Succumbus Mistress. I have a very large army, but I can't find a way to defeat this stack without losing most of my army in the process. I consulted the walkthrough on this point, but the walkthrough doesn't even mention the existence of this stack. Any advice would be appreciated!

[Jonas]

I don't remember exatly how it was on that map. Sometimes you encounter strong enemies when you're close to the end of a map and you're maybe supposed to lose the bigger part of your army at that point. Have you tried to play on after the succubus? 'Couse it could be just an end dialog after that and then it's on to the next map.

[vampireprince]

Hi Jonas, Thanks for you reply.

This is one of the most insane maps I remember playing.

The problem is this isn't the end, I haven't even gotten to the red player's castle yet. I thought I was on my way there, after discovering the stairway, but then I ran into this 1k stack. These are just *guardians*!!!

after defeating them I need to enter the portal further up, which will transport me to the red player's castle. But standing before the portal further up is a red player hero with another army listed as "Challenging" for me. Which means I still have one more challenging army to defeat after the 1k stack, before even getting to the portal.

Now I can think of one way to do this: defeat the stack, and get my army destroyed in the process. Then go back overground and take a week or so to recruit another big army with top creatures from all of my towns, so that I can go defeat the red player.

But I was hoping there might be some easier way to do this, given I'm so close to finishing the scenario. My eyes about popped up out of my head when I saw the 1k stack of guardians (shooters, no less, whose shots do huge multiple damage across my entire army) before I'd even reached my final goal.

Crazy!

[Jonas]

Alright, a tuff task I believe. As I said before I hardly remember the map, so I just ask some questions:

1. What fraction do you play?

2. Do you have any mass-spells (mass-haste, mass-slow etc)?

3. Do you have any troops with good defence?

A good idea is to move some of your creatures with high defence up against the succubus stacks - not nessesarily attack - just move them there. Then the succubus won't be able to retaliate when you attack them with your shooters. They will attack your troops that stand up aginst them, but their melee attack isn't that good.

This is a way to get more time; every retaliation you can avoid from the succubus stacks saves a lot of your troops.

Succubus is one of my favorite hate-objects in the game

[vampireprince]

Thanks for your advice. I used some of your strategy ideas, as well as building up my troops.

It seems the succubus mistresses keep multiplying as the game goes on, because I waited around for awhile caravaning more troops to my hero, and by the time I got back down there, there must have been close to 2000. But by this time my army was so powerful they weren't a problem.

I sent a stack of ghost dragons up there as a sacrifice, and then was able to wipe out the succubus mistresses pretty quickly with the rest of my army.

[RommeL_666]

Thanks for your advice. I used some of your strategy ideas, as well as building up my troops.

It seems the succubus mistresses keep multiplying as the game goes on, because I waited around for awhile caravaning more troops to my hero, and by the time I got back down there, there must have been close to 2000. But by this time my army was so powerful they weren't a problem.

I sent a stack of ghost dragons up there as a sacrifice, and then was able to wipe out the succubus mistresses pretty quickly with the rest of my army.

First I have to say that this is really funny
The reason and ONLY reason beacuse they have so big numbers is that you have waited like FOREVER to come to them and attack them,ofc they will get larger as game goes by,I dont wanna even to think why you waited so long and in the end how you cant deafeat such an easy opponent, Vampire rules against range creatures,put some cursing spell on them if they are such a big problem,I remember this creatures but man,If I am not mistaken you wont even touch red players castle if you are barely can touch succubs...
my advice,restart map,and dont waste FOREVER to get to them

[csarmi]

I think stacks grow by 10% every week.

[Asheera]

Actually it depends on difficulty

Easy -> 5% per week
Normal -> 9%
Hard -> 10%
Heroic -> 11%