Story Campaign maps

[misolaneous]

Is there any way to view the entirety of the Campaign maps from the game's story mode? Just want to see what is hidden in every nook and cranny :P

[Draco]

The files are technically in the "Campaign" folder, but unlike the custom scenario files, I can't open them using the AoW editor (which was my idea a minute ago on how to solve your question). Maybe here someone knows how to?

[dtt.scanner]

I did this at one point, even going so far as to "dig out" the underground so that it was all exposed. I can't recall any things that are actually "hidden" that are not accessible some other way. Just enjoy exploring. There was only one map that I recall (the Dwarven city excavation) that you really had to make your own paths and uncover the "hidden" areas. I think that was actually one of my favorite maps.

[OkeyDokey]

AoW was once released in a game bundle called the Medieval Masters compilation. The included editor accidentally shipped with the Developer menu enabled. From this accidental release, the community created tools to e.g. edit army sets, or in this case view campaign missions. There's DevEdit, and much more user friendly but bigger download: the Community Content Pack. Not sure how to integrate them into a steam installation though, I never did that. If you have the Community Content Pack installed, you would just have to click on "AoWEd Dev.exe" (this is kinda a batch file which moves around some files and renames them).

I had looked at the campaign missions throughout the years. Some observations I made:

• There's a guaranteed first strike item in the Subterrain Path maps (both for Goblin and Halfling). In the first half of campaign, most good items are disabled, so you can't find them there. There's a guaranteed hero in The Northern Trade Route maps. In the United Cities map, the number of player heroes is set to 0, so you can't get a hero there.
  
• In the last campain missions of Dwarves, Orcs and Lizardmen, you will fight CPU Kings. This is the first real challenge on medium difficulty. Note that the previous map is actually the first time where you can encounter a CPU Lord (and not even that in case of Lizardmen). And you won't encounter CPU Kings in the first 3 missions of Elves, Highmen, Dark Elves and Undeads, so this is an odd difficulty spike. (CPU Knights have no gold bonus, CPU Lords have x2 gold, CPU Kings have x2.5 gold plus 125 external gold, CPU Emperors have x3 gold plus 250 external gold)
  
• The first Dwarf map Earthquake/Deepmir is very maze-like. The easiest way to beat it is starting with an Halfling Eagle Rider and flying through the gaps between the red dragons to find the fabled Dwarven city from the win condition. There's no quick underground path to said city otherwise. You can accelerate your progress by digging to underground rivers and building shipyards. The fabled city has an upgrade level of 4. If you play this map on hard difficulty, the Orc player will conquer it quickly, migrate it to Orc and then pump out red dragons.
  
• The third Dwarfen map Hall of the Heroes is maze-like as well. The matter is even made worse because the devs messed up one teleporter location. The teleporter in the top-left of the first underground level is supposed to teleport to the teleporter in the bottom-right of the second underground level. But instead it teleports to an adjacent earth tile. So, the teleporter doesn't work unless you have dug through said earth tile.
  
• In the first Highmen map Gabriel's last Stand you have an external gold income of 30 gold. Sometimes, the opponents have some external gold income as well.
  
• The first time you can take tier 4 units to next map is after beating the second Elves, Highmen, Dark Elves and Undeads maps. However, the corresponding Elf map The Wizard College has no size 4 city and it's unlikely that you build a tier 4 unit in the corresponding Highmen map Unicorn Valley because the only enemy leader is sitting in the only size 4 city. The corresponding Undead map Isle of Burbatak has no Orc cities, so you won't get Red Dragons ... which is also true for the next 2 Undead maps (ok there's a small chance for one Orc city in the fourth map). While you can get Red Dragons in the corresponding Dark Elf map Noble Treachery, it's unlikely you will (you have no negative relations with the population of all size 4 cities) ... and the following map doesn't feature Orcs again.

[Codyksp]

The Community Content Pack is old and heavily outdated. An updated version of DevEd can be downloaded separately and just needs to be placed inside of the Age of Wonders folder.

https://aow.heavengames.com/downloads/showfile.php?fileid=1222