What's your most efficient strategy (free quest)

[Pax]

Lately I played Sorceror's legacy with frontier outpost start, 15K; it's minotaurs and rock golems with vampires added. So far the best strategy I've got is this:
1. rushing Blacksmith lvl 3
2. spam Rangers
3. marketplace in the corner of the map
4. lvl 2 palace while researching 2nd lvl Blacksmith tech
5. Dwarven settlement on the exposed corner of the Palace

This is where it gets touch and go. 3 minotaurs hit about that time and it's hard to get the timing right to get the DS up in time. A way around it is to move the Ranger's guild next to it; even if it doesn't sufficiently block the minotaurs, it draws in the Rangers. With some luck they alone can defeat them, or they can buy enough time for the DS to finish.
As soon as this initial attack is repelled,

6. Trading post by the edge of the map, as close as allowed
7. 2nd TP as close as possible, further in the same direction
8. 3 Ballista towers next to it
9. upgrade Marketplace to lvl 3

This sets your economy up and running nicely.
From here on out it's either getting the 3rd TP in the same direction, complete with 3 ballistas, or going Agrela lvl3 - Warrior's guild + Dauros. I usually skip Monks; even if I wanted to use them, their barely audible death sound makes it difficult to keep them alive (reheated). 3 ballistas are the magic number because that's the number that can take down a rock golem (they usually attack alone); you may lose one defending this. If playing against dragons you will need more, as they're ranged and not all towers can strike back.

So 4, then 8 paladins, 4 rangers, 4 healers and some wizards in the mix, when I feel like it. More TPs are possible but 3 are usually plenty; if using heroes with lower survival rate (paladins are tanky AND intelligent - i. e. they run away, sometimes too easily), more may be needed. Later on, more heroes if necessary. Temple of Lunord comes in handy, particularly for wind walk expand.


TL;DR - quick Dwarven settlement, ballista - protected TPs, ressurection, paladins, win. On some maps early protection may be needed, then this. Any better strats?

[Dorgath]

I'ev always done just a Palace and 10K for freestyle; I'll have to try your starting setup and see how it goes.

[Reality]

Palace 10K random expert freestyle

Gnomes>Rogues>4 heroes > Palace lvl 2 > Temple of Krypta>Marketplace

Works for anything but Yetis

It's well known that skeletons can tank dragons, but a lot of people overlook the otherthing that Krypta brings... the wither spell. By paying attention you can survive the critical early waves without going over the limits of the very tight budget.

Also I always place the guild toward the center except for when I get a bottom left start.. It's helpful to get the "defending home" berserk AI on the priestess, beacuse against strong monsters, skeletons ONLY tank, and don't kill themselves, allowing for more monsters to come and eventually overwhelm them.

After 3ish~ waves the game usually stabilizes to the point where you can start clean up with warriors of discord.

Skeletons > Dragons
Skeletons < Melee Enemies
Skeletons > Withered Melee enemies

[Matkatamiba]

Warriors Guild as the furthest point towards bad guys. It's so tanky that your guys should be able to get there in time to repair.

I haven't fully tested Marketplace vs. Trading Post incomes, but I think multiple Marketplaces makes you more money than Trading Posts, especially since they're a smaller multiple build radius. Also, Caravan gold is multiplied by the level of the Marketplace they reach, so I'd upgrade that to 3 (but delay the teleport ring upgrade until you have money).

Gnomes can be good to get a strong base quickly where you won't lose many buildings. Elves really let you boom in economy like crazy. I find that things are either already going really well or really poorly by the time I can actually build Dwarves.

Krypta are pretty bad against Vampires until they get high enough level to control them (and not one-shot themselves). Getting enough Rangers/Rogues can be good against Vampires so that they take a lot more dps than they can heal through.

I usually go Gnomes > Krypta/Fervus, as the light path is just so expensive and slow to get going, (but better in the end).

[Pax]

@ Dorgath This works with the 10K start, but more slowly - most of the remaining 5K is spent on setting up the second TP and ballistas.

@ Guaranic I used to play 3 Marketplace + Elves (double marketplace income); TPs bring in more. The first one (at minimum distance) spawns caravans that bring in around 250 gold, the second around 450 and the third 650-700; but remember that this is multiplied by the level of the Marketplace! (Naturally, you build only one as close to the opposite edge of the map as you can. Later on you can put a Guardhouse next to it to eliminate the risk of taxmen getting killed en route to the palace with a couple of thousand gold in the bag.)
Of course, the further away the TPs, the more difficult they are to protect, hence ballistas. Guardhouses are a poor and much more expensive substitute.
Also, no Elves = no Elven lounges nor Gambling Halls. If only those places weren't tax-exempt...

The Sorceror's Legacy is the only expert-level map where I can level to Dwarves before (actually, just about the time) the feces impacts the ventilator, and this does require a pre-built Blacksmith. (Although a guardhouse and rangers can get you through the first three-minotaur wave well enough.) Anything else requires throwing money into the fire early on. I haven't tried the Krypta rush yet. I never use gnomes - those self-spawning peasant huts messing up my base are irritating enough :)

[Dorgath]

Interesting! It's been so long since I've played but I have vague memories of going Rangers, Krolm, Palace 2, Elves, Outpost, destroy Krolm, Agrela for Healers. Once I've beat back the waves and stabilize, probably Dauros for Monks and A Wizard. But Minotaurs, Rock Golems, and Vampires are some of the toughest enemies so not sure if that worked now.

I always turn off tax collecting for Trading Posts. Just wait until the caravan gets to the Marketplace.

Also, no Elves = no Elven lounges nor Gambling Halls.

Can't tell if you are saying that's a good thing or bad thing?

[Matkatamiba]

It's a good thing, as your heroes spend money there that they could spend elsewhere (where you'd actually get some back).

Gnomes are nice because the most difficult part of the game is the first 10-15 days, so accelerating your base progress helps a lot for stabilizing quickly. The main reason I made my mod was so it wasn't just a huge crunch at the beginning with only busywork later.

[Dorgath]

Ah. I view the Lounge and Gambling Halls as "decoy buildings" for monsters to bash on instead of important ones :) (and obviously turn off the Repair Building for them)

[Pax]

I've tested the Krypta rush/ballista at Dragons reach now, it works well at first; that map gives you a bit more time to prepare so the first waves of dragons met the formidable Dwarven outpost. It was difficult to expand past the first TP (which was at the city limits) since the scaly fying buggers went for the expansions first.

My trouble came later, when I wanted to push out. The priestesses are slooow; they also tend to separate from their skeletons, which led to huge amounts of gold being sunk into the Mausoleum. The Reanimate spell is terrible; it revives your heroes where they fell at half HP, i. e. wounded and in harms way, and the 2K cost is the same as reviving heroes of up to lvl 4 (I think) in the Mausoleum; beyond that it grows by 250 gold/level.

My other options were Warriors of Discord (slow, painfully vulnerable despite their HP due to low armor and the fact that they never run, require collosal amounts of babysitting), Cultists (hardly ever use them, I guess they might have worked?) and Solarii/Adepts (adequate but somewhat underwhelming); also Warriors and Rangers (decent, lackluster). I went mass Krypta (4 temples) and it took me 65 days to finish.

After that I tried the same map with Ballista/Agrela lvl 3/2 guilds of Paladins. Finished in 2/3 the time.

Turning off tax collecting at the TPs is good, but I throw in a guardhouse in the mix here and there (mostly for the taxmen), also an outpost at the 3rd TP.

[Dorgath]

I actually do put a Guardhouse next to a TP when I can, but that's only to delay that one lone wandering Minotaur that shows up occasionally and heads straight for the TP. :)

If the TP accumulates enough gold to make a TC trip worth it (like > 5000), I toggle the collection back on. But generally, the amount of income from a caravam coming into a Level 3 Marketplace keep the TCs busy and it's all centrally located in my "kingdom" :)

[Reality]

I decided to give Sorceror's + Vampires a few tries instead of relying on memories

First of all, I find these setttings to be unusually random - Sometimes vampires will attack one at at a time, and sometimes up to 5 will clump up and come together. Sometimes the level throws multiple rock golems at you, sometimes you only see 1 the entire time.

Never used : Fairgrounds, Guardhouse, Dwarves, Elves

Barbarians - 15 days - no real surprise: there are reasons people complain about them

Krypta into Warrior of Discord - 24 days - Honestly fighting the first few vampires solely with priestesses wasn't that bad. No charming involved - With wither skeletons will always beat vampires if you already have about 3 of them out. You do have to set it before they drop the shield, but worst case you can actually wait for their shield to expire and then wither them later. Also you can drop down a couple of your extra rogues or normal warriors (WoD being too expensive early-game) in a pinch. When you stabilize, I find that warriors of discord are best with 2 full guilds, and then manually delete the temple to fervus (if it's on the edge of town) so that they don't drop their useful fighting behaviour to "defend building". They need Wither support if they fight a minotaur at level 1 (fight them unsupported at about level 5~) and against vampires/rock golems at all levels, however they travel to the far map edge on their own, and don't really come back for healing, so they can get multiple lairs out of the way even without the sorceror's abode.

Wizards - 29 days - Magic mirror makes wizards seem impossible, but anytime you fight within your town, you can simply use invisibility to prevent them from setting it up, and then wizards have the fastest kills of all heroes. It's better not to let them leave until they have fireblast+fireball and prefferably the level 3 magic bazaar stuff, because they have a harder time with vampires out in the wild without the invisibility support, but can manage if they One Hit kill them before they put the shield up (or in case of the shapeshift potion, simply tank through the duration of the magic mirror)

3x Rogues Guilds + early magic Bazzar - 27 days - Kind of something that I thought was just for multiplayer, but actually it worked kind of ridiculously well on the defensive side. The first 3 minotaurs are simple for rogues, as long when they don't get to pathfind to the front door of the guild. If you have the "top right start" then you can resort to throwing down the foundations of an inn (due to its cheapness) in front of the rogue's guild, which usually succesful stalls the minotaurs, but it's not usually neccesary. When fire-balm powered rogues "defend home" especially if you've put the first two rogues guild next to each other on the edge of the palace facing the map-center, you get the absolute most cost effective defense ignoring barbarians , especially against the 5x vampire group, but they do stop the rock golem as well. I think that mass Rogues do want to go with some kind of "tech" option - such as building the temple to krypta but not recruiting from it just to get wither, or getting one of the berserk sources so you can get the rogues to mass up properly (change of heart from level 1 sorcer's abode or lighting bolt from wizards guild lv2). As expected, however, whenever a rogue fights alone he is next to useless, and trying to get them to fight without the forced berserk from "defend home" caused massive issues which made clearing out enemy lairs an issue... However by building inns toward the center and with sorceror's abode gate drops, they chipped away at all the lairs - usually worked best when the lair-guards followed a few of the flee in terror rogue's away and left 2-3 still at the reward flag unbothered.

Paladins - 31 days - Paladins have the easiest non-barbarian time against rock golems of all heroes since they can do it with no player babysitting at all. However I had my paladins run into problems with vampires constantly, and if you get a 5x group early, they can all die, even at high levels 7+.. They seem pretty dependent on either having a spell to support them or to mix them with other heroes / guardtower / ballista for killing the vampires... That said I remembered to spam healers out after watching 5 paladins die, as harm undead will stop a 5x group with pretty much none of the healers dying... but I was not impressed with being 5000 gold down... I suppose I could have been more aggresive with the temple heal spell but I really don't like needing multiple casts to get through a fight... wither's long duration makes it feel less involved than helping paladin's beat vampires, and with wizards their huge DPS (even lvl 1 spam wizards without fireball/fireblast) means that they will usually kill the vampire in 1 invisibility. That said, once I had the mixd group nothing really bad happened... I think I might try out if the agrela level 2 bless spell brings in a better result though. Healer spam is also defense only because they won't really use harm undead outside of your town, are useless against things it doesn't affect, minotaurs/rock golems and won't do anything when you finally get to attacking the lairs.

I know I'm pretty rusty, and I think normally I would have started over with the paladins too get them a better speed after the bad start, but that's what I came up with.

Barbarians are most effiecent... rage of krolm and 6 per guild is too easy to keep up with just a 2 market economy even without elves or trading posts.

Krypta (WoDs don't come in till day 6-8 on average) is what I gave by far the most experience with, so maybe they had unfair benefit, but I still peronslaly think they are the most effiecent heroes in expert freestyle that are still fair.

I think that I'll go try this again and combine early magic bazaar Rogues and krypta, which should fix the weaknesses of both and be a better use of krypta's extra gold than the WoDs are.

[Matkatamiba]

Yep, barbarians are just busted. It's how I got through the serpents quest and legendary heroes. I tried to nerf them in my mod a little, but they're still plenty good.

[Pax]

Just tried barbarians for the first time, no mausoleum either, just spam.

God they're broken.

[Dorgath]

Go Barbs! :D

In seriousness, I believe they were "gentlemanly banned" from MP because the "Barbarian Rush" was just OP, and I think that was even before NE.