The Mage → The Liberation

[Minizo]

OK, here's something I just found out: you CAN get a level 5 mage guild in your starting mage town post 1.3, all you have to do is let the teal player capture it (I left no defenses and captured Al Safir, effectively swapping academies) and when I got Sihaam back, it had a level 5 mage guild.



Fun times

[obanvar]

Patch 1.5, Normal. I agree with Peredhil. It IS the best option and it IS possible to conquer Al Safir at the end of the first week or during the first 2 days of the second week, with just what you get on the starting town. One Phoenix and one Elementals did the trick for me . Barely made it with a few golems and gargoyles, and some gremlins, but it is possible!. Separate your stack of Gremlins on 3 parts before the battle, it will increase your chances of getting them killed early and get some Elementals, which will add to your summoned Elementals. Then: -First: summon phoenix RIGHT AWAY as soon as possible at the start of battle. -Second: destroy those towers!!! with Earthquake if you have it (if you got Phoenix on the first stage, probably you have Earthquake)., they really do damage to your Djinns and gremlins, and keeping them alive all you can will skyrocket your chances of success on this battle. -Third: cast Righteous Might with your Archmages on your Phoenix, and Divine Strenght too with Zehir, it will give your Phoenix's power a little boost. -Fourth: first kill some Liches with your phoenix, they are devastating, and they have more initiative than the Titan, then kill the Titan, then finish some Vampires (they will come to your Phoenix), then finish off the Liches. -Fifth: by this time, there will be a few liches left, about half the vampires, the Ghost stack will be full, and the Wight and Zombie stacks too. Leave the Wights for the final, they will take time to get to your units. Focus your Phoenix atack on the vampires to finish them now, and your Elementals (all of them) on the Ghosts, to prevent them from reaching your remaining Gremlins, gargoyles and golems. It will be difficult, use Zehir to resurrect some of your remaining alive units, like Archmages and Djinns (Djinns will be surely dead by now, but if you are lucky...), it will gain you some time to use Phoenix. I only used one simple Phoenix during the whole battle . -Sixth: sooner or later, those damn ghosts will kill many of your units, which is bad, but you'll get plenty of Elementals, which turns the tide. Finish the Ghosts NOW for good, and then the Zombies (they are crap). There will be only the Wights left. -Seventh and final: probably this battle will provide you with plenty of Air Elementals (both the summoned ones and the ones you get when you get your units killed), which get no enemy retaliation. (If not, then oh God! you are in trouble... I'd re-start the battle). Use them to surround and block the Wights path, to force them to kill your elementals and allow your true units (gargoyles, gremlins and golems if you have any) to escape beyond the castle walls, while you kill the Wights with Zehir's attack (you won't have much mana by now), and the Phoenix.



Congrats! you get a FULLY developed Academy town, with Sky Ship on it , and plenty of reinforcements (the AI forgot to hire them ). Let's kick some Necro asses now
Edited on Sun, May 30 2010, 14:43 by obanvar

[darkmage]

1.6

Attacked Al-safi pretty early, defended by 10 Titans, 20 Wights, 30 Lichs, 90 Steel Golems, 20 Rakshasa Rajas and 39 Djinn Sultans.



I had 7 spectres.



Only spells I used were Earthquake x2, Summon Phoenix, and raise dead. Easy fight, thanks to the incorporeal ability of the spectres...

[ShadowLiberal]

This map is quite simply hell on heroic, unless you can pull off a week #1 of the two necromancer towns. That's really about the only way to do it.



You simply MUST have expert Summoning Magic, expert Dark Magic will help a lot to against neutral stacks, but not so much against the undead (other than the mass spells).



If you wait around to grow stronger then week #2 the AI WILL invade your town and WILL defeat Zehir.



I tried at first rushing a town week #2 after the AI came to invade my town (having Zehir narrowly escape being killed before getting through the portal). I took the town over with heavy loses, but the AI didn't upgrade the town hall at all, and I was flat broke, so I had to restart the game since the AI overran Zehir a few turns later.

[cjlee]

Am playing on heroic 1.60



this map isn't particularly hard either once the initial difficulties are overcome. For the battle at Al Safir, it is unwise to block enemy titans. (I used artifacts to increase the HP, defense and Speed of my gargoyles and flew them in thinking they could create a distraction). They will call lightning down on your troops, and it is unmitigated by the distance or castle walls. You will take far less damage letting enemy titans shoot.



Also, the 700 wights guarding the eastern side of the south island might be easier than originally thought. Despite their scary numbers, the battlefield is actually very cluttered and there is only 1 easily blocked choke point so I was able to kill all wights with loss of only 2 gargoyles. The key spell here is Phantom Image and of course you must have ammo cart. Cast Phantom Image on titans and gremlins, after which keep casting it on the gargoyles to block the wights.



Don't be mistaken and think the 200+ paladins on the Western side are easier. They are not. Paladins move much, much faster than Wights and their battlefield has no obstacles. Although I sound like a genius losing 2 gargs to the 700 eastern wights, I actually lost over 70 units, 38 of them expensive Rakshasha Rajas, to the western paladins because there was no way to block them.



I think Maltz had more difficulty in his heroic game because he didn't take Al Safir early enough. I had it by week 7 which helped - Al Safir will let you hire 500 master gremlins which will turn the game.
Edited on Tue, Apr 24 2012, 17:46 by cjlee

[OEA]

i just started this map and decided to do what some of the posters here suggested and went straight for al safir (i am playing 1.5 on hard).

this is definately the way to go! when i reached the city on d1wk2 there were only 20wr, 40vl, 60pz, 30al, 50s (this is starting army) and 1 lone titan!

needless to say my pheonix laid waste to the lot of them while my puny army mostly just defended (the exception being my archmages which cast righteous might on the pheonix).

an interesting note, i think the ai was reluctant to take out a stack as i only lost one complete stack (i had split my gremlins into 3).

i was lucky in that my 2nd week was the week of might and magic (can you say 12 sps to cast a pheonix? i know you can).

in all i cast pheonix x2 (was easier and cheaper to cast a 2nd rather then raise dead on it multiple times), earthquake x2, summon elemental (got fire elems which shot twice finished vls and sps).

in first city all i built was mage upgrade, then tavern (recruited havez) and then city hall.

i had done a quick run thru up to the gate at al safir to see how long it would take (got there day 6 in runthru after having to portal about 15 times to get right one) during this run thru the enemy had shown up by the first city on day 6 of first week. so i decided not to build anything but those 3 buildings (the city hall pays for itself in 3 days) hoping that the enemy would take it over and build mage guild lvl 5. but after taking al safir i think the ai has stopped trying to get to it! one enemy had been playing portal shuffle trying to reach it on day 7 but after i took al safir i end turned thru the week to see if and when it would be taken it; but the ai stopped even trying the portals. so maybe i should have built the first city up more.

anyway that is where i am now in map, d1wk2 enjoying my fully built city with nice flying ship above it, planning what to do with my brand new 3 titans... be afraid necros! be very afraid! your days are numbered...
Edited on Tue, Jul 03 2012, 01:08 by OEA

[OEA]

another thing i just noticed now that i have al safir i can build the mage guild to level five in the first city.

wrong about one thing week later did reach first town where necro hero got smashed on castle walls.

i should also say another thing on 1.5 the ai will ignore summons (and gated) and head straight for your real creatures so some of the tricks in this walkthru are not viable anymore.
Edited on Wed, Jul 04 2012, 19:41 by OEA

[Wheeler Dealer]

1.6 hard. I played this about 4 years ago, so I was able to get by without the walkthrough. Then I had to back up a couple of weeks and redo the end game!



I didn't get Summon Phoenix in the first mission. Didn't get Expert Summoning magic! Even so, this mission was not too tough. I did had to back up once to protect my starting city. I was poking along exploring, flagging, building and got too far from my city. Starting about week two I had an enemy hero harassing me every week but it wasn't a great hero and he only had about one week's worth of necro troops each time. Once I had taken the two necro cities I didn't see another enemy hero until I invaded the southern island.



I got things out of order and took Lorekeep before Al Safir. Then when I took Al Safir the mission was over! What's worse, I sent a secondary hero with an undead army in to soften things up and she won! I didn't get the spells from Al Safir and I didn't get to develop my mage's guild in my original city.



I went back and took Newpost but not Lorekeep, (got Puppet Master and I had Sandro's Cloak!!!). Then the AI sent his entire Army from Lorekeep out after me, I guess thinking to retake Newpost. Since I had already won this battle with my enemy behind castle walls I didn't give him a chance to turn around and scramble back.



My Zehir had Expert Dark and Summoning magic, along with Expert Sorcery, Enlightenment and Basic Logistics. I got Frenzy on the first mission, Puppet Master from Newpost, Firewall and Arcane Armor from El Safir and finally got Summon Phoenix when I was allowed to finish the Mage's Guild in my original city. Of course, by that time I didn't need it for this map!



One tactic I used throughout was to start with 2 single gargoyles in front of my mages. That way I could create some elementals without have to wait for them to die in combat!

[vil2]

For me capturing the north town during the first week is absolutely impossible.

Don't know if this is version-related but enemy troops just NEVER attack my elementals or my phoenix. Instead he focuses on my lowly troops and wipe them.

I'm sure I could definitely kill'em all if they'd focus summoned troops, but it takes too much turns for those troops to destroy the enemy so I always loose the battle.

I'll try to follow the walkthrough then. Too bad, because capzturing Al Safir was such an interesting strategy.





Edit : so what worked is that I rushed the first necropolis (waiting in my starting zone and trying to get resources was suicidal) during week 1. Then I immediately rushed at the second one. Tough fight, but plenty of mana wells on the way so be sure to fight with full mana and summon elementals/phoenix during the fight. I managed to kill the hero with just 1 gremlin and 2 golems left ! Focus his ranged, and attack his melees with your phoenix and elementals, that way he will focus them and loose some troops. Defend with your regular creatures.



I went back to my academy, bought some troops, and attacked the other academy with 5 Titans and the corresponding army. Enemy had 13 titans plus his undead/academy army...

Tough fight, he was far better than me, but my phoenix and, especially, my fire walls did the job. The AI did not move from the fire patches and he lost his Liches and Archimages this way, while my Phoenix distracted the melee troops.

Again, touh fight, I barely won, after two tries. Rest of the mission was easy.
Edited on Tue, Mar 25 2014, 20:38 by vil2

[cjlee]

Playing this on Heroes Mod5.5, the AI worked differently.

On my first try using the Mod5.5 Quantomas AI, I remembered being constantly short of resources (for artificer) when I played the Heroes V vanilla version years ago. So I decided to try building up my forces first.

I leisurely cleared my home area and all the mines.

Then I realized something that I had not paid attention to earlier - but Zehir cannot use Artificer in H5.5! He has been remade as an Elementalist, with focus on spell power.

And then the AI attacked with a super-ginormous army and I had to restart.

So I went back to the old Maltz advice - attack early and fast. I rushed out of my town after clearing the ore, gem and wood mines. I took the first AI town on Day 8, and the second one before the end of the week. Once that was done, the AI seemed to grow passive and I finished the map easily and quietly without any challenge. (Al Safir was manned entirely by necro troops and all the creature generators packed with unhired troops.)

Zehir as an elementalist makes for a great rush hero. He doesn't need much troops to fight. This is not the nerdy Zehir of the past who had tons of knowledge and not much fighting ability so you really must make full use of the artificer to survive.