MARREND PLAYS HEROES OF MIGHT AND MAGIC 3 COMPLETE!

While the rumors of King Roland were false, the rumors of the Lich-King Gryphonheart have been very much verified. The matter of the king's death have been in question, and it seems the general, Nimbus, has information as to the truth of the matter. Personally speaking, I feel it's a waste of time so long as the Lich-King is a threat, but, the Queen's orders were to escort this general to Highcastle.


Scenario notes/asides
Starting Bonus: <Boots of Speed>, Basic Logistics, 2500 Gold
Win Condition: Have the hero Nimbus reach Highcastle with the Statesmen's Medal (achieved week 1, day 1)

To be quite frank about it, the temptation to UGE Town Portal on Nimbus, and then use it to jump directly to Highcastle, was just too great to ignore. Saves myself a lot of time and effort, even if this makes this the most lackluster post on this site LP.

One more final push against Deyja. This time, Queen Catherine herself, has taken to the field, and it is my humble honor to be allowed to give her commands.

The good news is that the enemy only controls two towns in this region. The bad news is that this is a rather large region. The extra-bad news is that their towns, while not physically on cursed land, were still surrounded by the stuff. However, King Gyphonheart has been laid to rest once again. As for, Lord Haart, who was part of the conspiracy to murder the king in the first place, he shall be dealt with accordingly.


Scenario notes/asides
Starting Bonus: <Helm of Heavenly Enlightenment>, Tome of Earth Magic, Spellbinder's Hat
Win Condition: Capture all enemy towns, and defeat their heroes (achieved week 1, day 7)

I didn't 100% intend to also finish this scenario today, but, here we are. Either way, this scenario ends this campaign, having spent 22 days, granting me a score or 1510 (1st place), and a ranking of Pit Lord.

With the Grail in hand, it might behoove us to give it a proper home. The people of Welnin have volunteered for this honor, and the town's positioning is favorible enough as a base of operations.



Scenario notes/asides
Starting Bonus: Mage Guild 3, 5000 Gold, <3 Dendroid Soldiers>
Win Condition: Have Ryland reach Welnin, and build the Grail Structure there (achieved week 1, day 1)

Yeah, another "get s hero to y town" mission, where the player already owns the town in question. Of course I'm just gonna UGE/use Town Portal, and save myself on so much time and effort!

Following the initial invasion of Eeoful, an elite force had pushed our Erathian forces back. It is now our turn to push those forces back, else the nation of Erathia will ultimately be lost.

As if the forces from Eeoful weren't enough, there was another force that was discovered. These elemental Confluxes...



...seemed neutral to either the affairs of Erathia or Eeoful. How long that will last, none can say. Something to keep an eye on as things develop.


Scenario notes/asides
Starting Bonus: 30 Pikemen, 20 Archers, <8 Griffins>
Win Condition: Capture all enemy towns, and defeat their heroes (achieved week 2, day 2)

Conflux units are both the best and worst units. Best because they are super-fast, and tend to have the initiative. Worst because a vast number of them are immune to spells that are attributed to the Fire Magic skill. Which, of course, includes Armageddon. An Orb of Vulnerability can be used to ignore that, as other factions do, but, other factions also tend to only have one or two units that have immunity, (or a chance thereof), whereas this faction has, like, three or four?

I have certain misgivings of constructing the Armageddon's Blade. Yes, it allows it's wielder to cast Armageddon, but at the cost of being immune to it's effects. It might be backwards to consider such a thing as a "cost", but, the benefits of casting it are readily apparent.

Alas, the powers that be have given me the task of constructing the Armageddon's Blade or die trying. What else can I do but to go through the motions?


Scenario notes/asides
Starting Bonus: Speculum, Equestrian 's Gloves, <Necklace of Swiftness>
Win Condition: Obtain Sword of Hellfire, Breastplate of Brimstone, and Shield of the Damned (achieved week 2, day 7)

Speculum and Necklace of Swiftness are both artifacts I UGE to "adventuring" heroes. Also of note, the game crashed if the artifacts the scenario wanted me to get weren't on Xeron in some way, shape, or form at the end of the scenario. While I had heroes trade to Xeron within the context of the scenario, the last artifact was closer to a different hero, and is apparently what lead to the crash.

Thankfully, Xeron could use Dimension Door, and was able to snag that artifact in one day's movement.

King Roland has misgivings about the alliance with the elemental Confluxes. Yet, it should be of some use against the Kreegan, and their plans to set the world ablaze.

As for the immediate concern, scouts report the existence of six towns in this area, and would be a step in at least slowing them down. King Roland, himself, and General Kendal joined the fray to ensure this mission was a success.


Scenario notes/asides
Starting Bonus: <5 Zealots>, Torso of Legion, Upgraded Monastery
Win Condition: Capture all enemy towns and defeat their heroes (achieved week 2, day 6)

Nothing here about where Roland has been, or when he got back in contact with Catherine. I dunno, I just find this mildly interesting that the rescue of Roland wasn't more pronounced, and just kinda swept under the rug. Like, in the back of my head, I know he's rescued in MM7/MM8 due to player intervention (I'm tending more toward MM7 here), and MM7's creature graphics take many cues from this game. So, maybe 3DO considered it a spoiler for MM7/MM8? I'm pretty sure both those games came out after this one. Though, maybe, there was some kind of player-outcry of "Lame!", and putting his rescue into MM7/MM8 was 3DO reacting to that outcry?

Or, maybe they just didn't want to include a scenario to free Roland, as the campaign is long enough. For comparison purposes, there's at least one more scenario here, and even if that one is the last one for this campaign, it would still have twice the number of maps as a Restoration of Erathia campaign.

The matter of finding the wielder of the Armageddon's Blade brought both King Roland and Queen Catherine to the field. Nothing was held back. The Kreegans did not stand a chance.


Scenario notes/asides
Starting Bonus: <5 Firebirds>, Town Portal, Sword of Judgement
Win Condition: Defeat Xeron (achieved week 1, day 4)

Town Portal as a "bonus" doesn't really work, because all the initial heroes are all transferred from previous maps, and thus already have it.

Also, this is somehow not the last map in this scenario. I took a good look at the campaign map, and there seems to be maybe two more maps to this before it's all said and done. This campaign shares a name with the associated expansion's title, so, that might account for how long it is. However, if the other campaigns in Armageddon's Blade are even remotely this long, I just don't know if I'd have it in me to finish this LP.

Or, I cheat even harder, or something.

Two lords have been making quite the ruckus in Lord Ordwald's lands. That they have been unchecked as long as they have shows Ordwald has lost his touch.

The first order of business is to smash those unsightly upstarts. To claim the lands as my own, and to use those them as a base of operations in rebellion against Ordwald.


Scenario notes/asides
Starting Bonus: Pillar of Eyes, <Quiet Eye of the Dragon>, 12 Harpy Hags
Win Condition: Capture all enemy towns, and defeat their heroes (achieved week 2, day 4)

I don't know how much of an effect this had to this map, but, before, I set a new adventuring hero movement to 4500. This is about triple the amount of a typical starting hero's movement allotment. With this scenario, I set it to 6000 instead. This is maybe a little less than triple the movement of a hero that has been UGEd, after factoring in Boots of Speed and Master Logistics.

The race for the Vial of Dragon's Blood was is on. While Ordwald may have had several days worth of advantage, reports indicate that he's been slow and conservative in moving forward.

There may have been some sense in being so slow and deliberate. Tight passages and an underground river certainly slowed down progress, to say nothing of the sequence of fights sequestered behind guard posts that would only let armies pass if they did the keepers a favor.

All told, it took a little over a month to get things done. It included pounding Ordwald's forces into the ground so that it was more an inevitability that I find the Vial first, but, there was a sense, at times, that things could have gone a lot smoother.


Scenario notes/asides
Starting Bonus: Endless Purse of Gold, Labyrinth, <1 Red Dragon>
Win Condition: Acquire the Vial of Dragon Blood (achieved month 2, week 1, day 5)

So, this scenario does something I was not entirely prepared for. The game took the slot that's normally reserved for Coronius (ID 24), and replaced it with Ordwald, and customized the hero's background. The text that was replaced is part of the save file, and it moved all the other data after it forward by 200 bytes.

What this ultimately did was put things out of whack in regards to UGE in regards to heroes in general. While I managed to get around this, for the most part, it was still highly annoying.

Though, I think what gets me the most about it is that the player is highly unlikely to be able to hire Ordwald in order to read the custom history. Assuming a player would even bother looking in the first place. Like, once he's defeated, he goes into the hero pool, and can show up at random at Taverns. I'd like to note that there are 136 heroes in total, not counting special heroes, like Catherine, Roland, and Gelu from last campaign. However, since he uses a standard hero's ID, this makes his base-line chances of showing up 1 in 136 (this is less than 1% chance). With one player having a full compliment of 8 adventuring heroes and a full compliment of 48 towns with garrison heroes, this becomes 1 in 80 (this is a little over 1%).

The Festival of Life presents an opportunity for me to rise to become a king. The first task is to prove myself a capable warrior. Slaying Razor Claw, an Ancient Behemoth, should suffice for this.


Scenario notes/asides
Starting Bonus: 5 Cyclops, <1 Behemoth>, 4 Rocs
Win Condition: Defeat an Ancient Behemoth (achieved week 2, day 4)