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Parrhesia and Integrity's Guide to Surviving Wesnoth


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Battle for Wesnoth has been around as long as I can remember. I have tapped and prodded it on and off for close to a decade now. It is the effort of many hands over the course of years. People who've been there from closer to the start remember a time before it was the polished, Steam-worthy production it is today.

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when did this become more beautiful than this?

Wesnoth is, itself, a tactical, turn-based RPG. Your minions are somewhat individual, though not to the degree of, say, most Fire Emblem characters. It is also unashamedly reliant on the RNG - most of the time, units on flat ground will hit each other 60% of the time, and it's very rare to see higher than 70% or lower than 30%. It was thrown out into the world as an engine. People of varying ability wrote and designed campaigns for it. There is an extensive and by this stage generally excellent standard of both portrait and sprite art, pretty decent music, and a competitive online scene. It's evolving, but some rules remain the same. Myself and Integrity (each of us having finished... approximately a third of the campaigns before) will teach you how to survive in this cold, unfeeling environment, as we complete all sixteen of the campaigns that are not called Under the Burning Suns.

We will need your help. Specifically, minions - they're renamable, and sometimes to a degree customisable in terms of promotion paths. Anyone who puts themselves up for adoption in the thread will have a guy named after them for each campaign. Feel free to specify if you generally want to be, say, a tough melee guy, or a flashy skirmisher, an archer or a wizard. I'll adapt your preference to the available unit list of the given campaign - each deals with a different race and thus has different options available to them. This will start to be implemented in the second campaign each onwards - we're starting off with the easy baby campaigns, before moving onto the longer epics.

The menu has many options, none of which I'm going to bother you wi-

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w h a t  t h e  f u c k

-th. There is also a tutorial. It does not matter.

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Let Arne (whose artist statement is to my recollection something like 'I want an overweight, past-it, mid-life-crisis type guy) be your guide.

TABLE OF CONTENTS
1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 12 13 14 15 16 17 18 19 20 21 22 23 24 25

page 11

PARRHESIA

Tale of Two Brothers 1 2 3 4

Mid-life crisis mercenary reunites with nerd brother who he hates for it turns out no reason.

The South Guard 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9

Descendant of tertiary character from lore whisked off to civilise Tasmania, discovers true crime inside him all along.

Descent Into Darkness 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8+9 10 11 666

The metamorphosis of an insufferable kid with bad skin into final boss.

Legend of Wesmere 1 2 3a 3b 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 12 13 14 The Incident 16

Sixty-eight elven fighters, and how they met their end. The Curse of Aquagar.

Dead Water 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10

Parrhesia gets a cuttlefish and, for once, has nothing to complain about.

Son of the Black-Eye 1 2 asdf

The perils of Kaizo Wesnoth, the limits of human endurance.

Memoirs of Delfador 1 2 3 4+5 6 7 8 9 10 11 12 13 14 15 16 17+18 19

It turns out that Delfador always thought Konrad was a bitch for only incorporating like four factions.

Sceptre of Fire 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9

Plot twist: Marabharata actually A Comedy Of Errors all along.

INTEGRITY

Orcish Incursion 1 2 3 4 5 6 i might be missing one i thought there were seven

Elf meets orc. Elf meets orc's affinity for fire. Elf kills orc. Player learns value of terrain.

Heir to the Throne 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10x 10 11 12 13 14 15 16 17 18 19 20 21 22 23 24 25

The flagship campaign. They took every idea they had and threw it into one big pot and it's not very good.

Liberty 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9

Breaking bones with sticks and stones. The only campaign to make sense at 1:1 scale.

Edited by Parrhesia
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TALE OF TWO BROTHERS - 1

As usual while I do LPs, the formatting is going to be a little weird while I'm still getting my bearings.

Spoiler

 

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Skeletons and zombies killed cattle and fired fields. "Fear and obey Mordak the Mage!" they cried in fell voices as they did their foul deeds. People vanished from isolated farmsteads. Men and women began to fear the night, and their children even the bright day. But the nearest lord was more than a day's ride distant, and messengers sent to seek his help did not return.

There was a man named Baran who had shown talent as a mage when he was young, gone to the great Academy on the Isle of Alduin, and returned to work his magic in the land where he was born. The people looked to him for help and leadership. He found weapons half-forgotten from the times of their sires and grandsires hanging in many houses, and bade the villagers to take them down and clean and oil them. He set the smiths of Maghre to making spearheads and axe-blades for the rest.

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It begins. And. Look. Okay.

Wesnoth is not a fantastically-written game. It's fine. You can read it and nod along. It's going to be 6/10 excuses to beat people up all the way through. Don't expect more.

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The art, though? In more recent times, it's excellent. And, honestly, the spritework holds up to any scrutiny. This is another example of evolution - generally, the sprites don't look too dissimilar to how they did in, say, 1.6 or whatever (we're in 1.14 now). But what's been added have been small quality changes, animations added or improved, and there's been a more recent drive to include different facings. You'll note that the spearmen and horsemen are facing up - most sprites don't have these facings, unfortunately. But it's a nice touch, and would be deeply unrealistic to roll out across every sprite in the game.

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Okay, I swear this guy used to be called Arne.

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Arvith is also kind of a bitch.

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I can hear all of you with siblings recoiling.

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Okay! And we're off. Kill a bad wizard within three days, the earlier the better.

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Hey, idle animations. Baran's fucked off, you'l note. What's everyone else's deal?

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Full interface. Won't bore you with this most of the time. So Arvith's selected, his stats are on the right.

HP/XP is the same shit in every game. MP is movement.

40% is his evasion. Cavalry aren't that evasive. 40% is about usual.

Arvith is a name. For generics, this can be changed.

Knight is his class, and it is a level 2 class.

He is lawful. I'll get into this later.

He is human. This is beginning to seem like a very NetHack way of explaining someone.

He has two attack types; generally, units have 1-3 different ways of hurting people. Arvith can hit someone for 8 damage four times with a sword for slashing damage, or 28 damage twice with a lance - the catch being that the enemy will hit back twice as hard, due to the charge special. The sword is reliable and safe - it has a lot of attacks, and blade is a generally good weapon type. The lance is for when you have to go big or go home.

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This is another one of our dudes, Tarek Elrich. We'll try and reunite him with his brother Ahmed down the line. You will note he is crap at everything compared to Arvith. You will also note he is loyal, resilient.

Units have traits that give slight but noticeable buffs to their capabilities. Generally, they have two. Arvith doesn't, because he's a bitch (and because protagonists usually don't), but all his homies do. Specifically, his homies being loyal is really fucking good because it means they don't expend upkeep. I won't bore you with the details of how money works, this is getting information-overloady already. Tarek is also resilient - he has +4 HP, +1 for each level. Other common traits include quick (+1 movement, -5% HP), intelligent (-20% XP to level up) and strong (+1 melee damage, +1 HP). Generic humans will be any two of resilient/quick/strong/intelligent, but only plot guys are loyal.

This game also has a bestiary. I won't introduce every new unit the moment I can, but I'll at least go through our basic building blocks.

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Spearmen are the basic human infantry. They're cheap, resilient, and surprisingly damaging. They're somewhat versatile in terms of having a shitty javelin they can throw for a ranged attack, but held back somewhat by a reliance on piercing damage, which some units (cough, skeletons) totally negate.

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Bowmen are similar to Spearmen - they're cheap but slow to level, they're pretty tough, they have a mediocre melee attack and a reasonably strong ranged.

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Horsemen are ... fun! They're very expensive, very hit-or-miss. Being cavalry, they're fast, not very evasive and vulnerable to piercing damage - horseman vs. horseman fights are hilarious. Absolutely should not be the mainstays of your army, but an ace up the sleeve.

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Footpads! Arvith can call on some light infantry. Footpads are fucking great. They've very quick, very evasive (60% in open terrain, 70% with any kind of cover!) and are the only guys we have with crushing damage, specifically their clubs and slings. Okay, the damage on these is kind of terrible. They aren't going to break through a line. And, yeah, if an attack lands it's going to paste them - they have negative armour against physical damage, blades especially. Also worth noting: they're chaotic. Again: later.

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Are you bored, I'm bored, let's go. Arvith calls up a couple of footpads with all the money we have and then charges forward. You can only train guys if you have your protagonist in a camp, and guys can't act on the turn they're summoned. As a result, you're limited to summoning as many guys per turn as you have slots in your camp - in this case, though, money was the issue.

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The evil wizard is, wow, surprise, a fucking necromancer. Zombies, ghouls and bats. I'm... not going to give you their bestiary entries yet.

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My turn 2 is just spent roving for villages.

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They advance on their turn and okay fuck yes a random bat has strayed into my range and it's TIME FOR JUSTICE

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BRING THE PAIN HANN wait shit what

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why can this random fucking bat stand up to the ohhh shit right time of day that's a thing

So, it's night, as you've noticed by how it's night. Hann, human soldier (okay, mercenary in this case, but whatever), is lawful. Lawful people hate the night and fight better during the day. Significantly better. Chaotic people - our footpads, and all the undead - do the converse. The day/night cycle is Dawn [neutral] - Morning [day] - Afternoon [day] - Dusk [neutral] - First Watch [night] - Second Watch [night], rinse and repeat.

What are the implications of this? As humans, press the attack during the day. Night is for damage limitation.

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In theory.

Bats are level 0, as you may have noticed. This reflects that they are terrible at everything except scouting. For that matter, zombies are also level 0, and ghouls, well, really they're more tanks. Arvith is fucking powerful compared to these plebs.

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The rest of our lines draw up, cautious. Footpads and horsemen skirt around the fringes picking up houses. Houses mean income.

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uhhh arvith you don't look so good

Green means poisoned, like in every single game ever. Poisoned means 8 points of damage at the start of turn, though it can't be lethal.

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But by dawn, Arvith is basically fine. He's not even green anymore! Villages will either cure poison or heal 8 to whoever's in them at the start of every turn. The bats and other ghoul, for what it's worth, didn't even try attacking him.

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Now it's a neutral phase, this is a much better fight. Arvith hits with his first attack and vapourises the ghoul.

You'll notice that instead of being resilient/quick or whatever, the ghoul is 'undead' (wow what a surprise) and 'fearless'. All undead have set traits. Fearless means you don't do less damage in the (in this case) day, while still doing your usual more in the night. It's a very nice trait to have, but really, I don't rate ghouls as much more than an annoyance.

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We prepare to push in for the day phase next turn.

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Arvith and the line both hold, easy. Now it's day phase. Time for payback.

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Despite some bad luck with hitting - again, 60% is not 100% - we do finish the job in the north. I try and fail to feed the ghoul to Efran, our loyal, intelligent bowman. Then I succeed at feeding it to Alwyn, our loyal, intelligent spearman. Fighting and killing units gets you 1 / 8 XP per level of enemy - or 0 / 4 in the case of level 0s like bats and zombies.

Meanwhile, Arvith flunks boh his 60% shots against the ghoul. Oh well.

RULE 1 of BATTLE FOR WESNOTH: The RNG does not care about the odds.

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Bitch, I'm in position. Anyway, this is the line at the start of turn 6.

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This is the line at the end of turn 6. Yeah, this is extremely a tutorial mission. Weirdly, there's two campaigns that sort of start as a tutorial on top of the actual tutorial, which is why we aren't doing the actual tutorial.

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Dusk's fallen. It's time to finish this. Unfortunately, our odds aren't so crash-hot. The necromancer's sitting pretty in his fortress, normally a place of great mutual protection... except he's a wizard. Magical attacks hit 70% of the time, regardless of terrain.

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Dark Sorcerers are no joke, tier 2 magicians. They aren't undead, and draw from the usual human pool of traits. They're surprisingly tough, and can call upon both a powerful cold attack and a weaker arcane attack for versatility.

In Wesnoth, melee counters melee and ranged counters ranged, and the initiator gets to pick what kind of combat they want to initiate. If I was an idiot, for example, I could have Brent lob a spear at Mordak, who would crater him.

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Best not let him get the chance to use his magic, then. This is where horsemen shine. Who gives a shit damage, doubled, remains who gives a shit damage.

So Mordak goes down. He is afforded the single line of dialogue: 'Argh!'

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Classic Baran, am I right? Also sometimes your generics or loyal units will get lines. It's pretty cool.

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And time to count the spoils! We finished very quickly and with a fairly fat treasury, both of which mean we get more for next mission. This does have an unfortunate tendency to fall into that classic spiral in longer campaigns - either you're thriving and have infinite money constantly, or one pyrrhic win begets another as you barely cling on with the starting gold, mission after mission.

Next time: Tale of Two Brothers 2: Brother 2?

 

 

Edited by Parrhesia
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I don't really like the drama of brining up the random numbers in Wesnoth. Personally I don't really see it as a TRPG at all. I do think that eg. the steam trailer goes out of its way to present it as one for the sake of marketing, but it's wrong to do so. I don't really like user mods or the new "official" RNG-reduction modes since they try to make you play a different game(genre) without understanding what Wesntoh is or really offers. 

As for Wesnoth's built in campaigns. I do feel like a lot of them are geared toward recalling units and are more RPG-ish in that way, although imho I prefer to play most of them with lvl 1 recruits on every level except the (always explicit) final map. Some  of them like Northern Rebirth even seem designed to be that they are balanced around you earning enough bonus gold in the previous mission. 

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I gotta say good luck if you really want to play through all the mainline campaigns, since I guess they give you a nice cross section between different developers wanting it to be "more" of a strategy game or "more" of a rpg. That said I think that they're of extremely uneven quality. I can't think of any standout maps for being really boring until Legend of Wesmere and the 12th map of Hamer of Thurgasan.

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9 minutes ago, BrightBow said:

Which difficulty level is this?

I'll be doing the default level for everything. Two Brothers is like the only campaign I can think of that doesn't have three difficulties - it just has two. I'm playing it on tiny baby mode because I want it to be a smooth, well, tutorial.

2 minutes ago, Reality said:

I don't really like the drama of brining up the random numbers in Wesnoth. Personally I don't really see it as a TRPG at all. I do think that eg. the steam trailer goes out of its way to present it as one for the sake of marketing, but it's wrong to do so. I don't really like user mods or the new "official" RNG-reduction modes since they try to make you play a different game(genre) without understanding what Wesntoh is or really offers. 

As for Wesnoth's built in campaigns. I do feel like a lot of them are geared toward recalling units and are more RPG-ish in that way, although imho I prefer to play most of them with lvl 1 recruits on every level except the (always explicit) final map.

How exactly am I meant to talk about Wesnoth without discussing the RNG? The entire point of the game is built around weighing the odds in your favour. Like FE. And like in FE, sometimes shit just happens and you have to adapt to it. It's more forgiving than FE in that if something goes seriously downhill, units are replaceable.

Well, that's your preference and you're entitled to it, but recalling is a feature that you are expected to use. TRPG, TBS with RPG elements... it's splitting hairs by this point. But the elements do exist, whether or not you want to lean into them.

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Spoiler

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Let's get going. An Orcish Incursion is your tutorial elf faction (called Rebels for reasons that aren't relevant except in one campaign - and I don't remember which) campaign, which deals with you as elves vs. them as orcs in all seven maps. It's not difficult. I'm going to be playing pretty fast and loose with it, and show off how stuff tends to play out in Wesnoth when terrain is a huge player. Elves and orcs are interesting in that each gets great movement and huge defense in a terrain type (trees and hills) that the other is resoundingly below average in, so making good use of the battlefield is quite important.

 

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Narration, over a shield and some moss

The arrival of humans and orcs caused turmoil among the nations of the Great Continent. Elves, previously in uneasy balance with dwarves and others, had for centuries fought nothing more than an occasional skirmish. They were to find themselves facing conflicts of a long-forgotten intensity.

Their first encounter with the newcomers went less well than either side might have wished.

But humans, though crude and brash, at least had in them a creative spark which elves could recognize as akin to their own nature. Orcs seemed completely alien.

For some years after Haldric's people landed, orcs remained scarce more than a rumor to trouble the green fastnesses of the elves. That remained so until the day that an elvish noble of ancient line, Erlornas by name, faced an enemy unlike any he had ever met before.

The orcs were first sighted from the north marches of the great forest of Wesmere.

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Wesnoth's lore isn't much to write home about. It's not bad. It's extremely Right-Justified Fantasy World. You've seen it before. Erlornas is the dude in the campaign picture, and your main lord for this campaign.

 

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I hope you like the color green. I think Lomarfel comes back later, but for now he represents the first elven cavalry promotion. He'll be gone as soon as we're done talking.

Quote

Lomarfel: My lord! A party of aliens has made camp to the north and lays waste to the forest. Our scouts believe it's a band of orcs.

Erlornas: Orcs? It seems unlikely. The human king, Haldric, crushed them when they landed on these shores, and since then they've been no more than a bogey mothers use to scare the children.

Lomarfel: So it seemed, my lord. Yet there is a band of them in the north cutting down healthy trees by the dozen, and making great fires from the wood. The trample the greensward into mud and do not even bury their foul dung. I believe I can smell the stench even here.

Erlornas: So the grim tales of them prove true. They must not be allowed to continue; we must banish this blight from our forests. I shall marshal the wardens and drive them off. And the Council needs to hear of this; take the message and return with reinforcements, there might be more of them.

Lomarfel: Yes, my lord!

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It's pretty generic.

 

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Here's an overview of the map with our general plan. I'll be using this template for the beginning of maps - solid lines represent the general movement of troops I'm expecting, diamonded lines front lines I'm forming/anticipating, and dashed lines for smaller maneuvers. We want to meet them at the trees in the center-left so they're in the flat, but really anywhere on this map heavily favors us or, at worst, is even. I may end up sending a scouring detachment northeast as the lines join to counter his cappers, if he sends any out that way. Similarly, I'll probably send a horse west to grab some houses and join the main fight. Most of this campaign will be decided in one to two battles per map - let's see how creative I have to get when we move on. Anyway, it's a bestiary dump.

 

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This is you. Full warning: Battle for Wesnoth has elvish wank set to full. One of the writers for this game at least masturbated exclusively to Arwen for an entire year. Or Elrond, I don't judge. We'll start pretty light, but by the time we get to top tier elf units it's....

You'll see.

Anyway, Erlornas has a good sword attack and a good magic attack. Magic, due reminder, is 70% hit on everything, which is almost always an improvement. Elvish lords are, simply put, incredibly good.

Let's take a look at our basic daves.

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Elvish archers are, predictably, your bread-and-butter. They're resoundingly mediocre in melee and spectacular at range. In addition to the traits Parrhesia mentioned, all elves can roll with Dextrous, which is a +1 to ranged damage. Elvish archers also move through forests like nothing, and enjoy 70% defense on them. And, as we get there, the promotion options are incredible. Downside, they're a bit flimsy. Note that they can generate in two distinctly sexed versions. They're identical, but it's a nice bit of flair!

 

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Elvish fighters are your front-liners. They have a solid 5x4 sword and a much less solid 3x3 bow behind, honestly, inadequate health - and they only make it to 60% defense in forests. They're quite effective melee fighters when promoted, but always suffer from durability problems. Between you and me? These guys exist to stand between your archers and whatever's on the other side.

 

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Far from the decadent excesses of horsemen come elvish scouts. They have a frankly anemic 4x3 sword and 6x2 bow by default, although they can get strong or dextrous to get either of those numbers up to still not enough. They are, however, fast as hell even in forests, and if nothing else can be used as mostly-ranged finishers for when things don't go according to plan. Their promotions are just bigger versions of them that have the same problems. It's.... unlikely that you'll see an elvish outrider in this campaign, but I can probably scrounge a rider at least.

 

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Finally, shamans are proper shit. For now. We just talked shit about the scout? The shaman has a whopping 3x2 melee attack, expected for a spellcaster, thus one would expect their magical attack to also naturally be 3x2. And not magical, just ranged and affected by accuracy as normal. With lower mobility and health than an archer. The shaman's got two good points, at least - first, that they heal all units around them for 4 HP at the beginning of each turn (this is pathetic.); second, that their ranged attack (should it land) inflicts Slow. Slow is.... incredible. As expected, it doubles movement cost for all tiles, effectively halving mobility. However, it also halves damage caused for the slowed unit. Clearly, Slow is a pretty strong utility piece - and, if you can manage to feed that shaman to promotion, they become so much more. Details as we move forward, of course.

 

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Back to the map, we'll recruit a pretty balanced spread. For many of these maps, you can afford about two waves of daves from your starting point, +/- based on how much obscene gold you have carry over between maps on long campaigns.

 

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The second wave is just three more archers, and Erlornas sallies forth. I play pretty dangerously with my lords. Sometimes it goes badly.

 

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I took this screenshot to show off Wesnoth's planning system, and immediately remembered it fucking sucks.

 

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Anyway, the plan has gone roughly according to the outline at the beginning. All units in Wesnoth above level 0 (bats, zombies, etc.) have a zone of control, which works precisely like every zone of control you've seen in every game with one. In short, you cannot move through two hexes adjacent to an enemy unit, unless you're already adjacent, in which case you can take your entire turn to move to another adjacent hex. Due to our lineup of three melee guys on the treeline, this wolf rider can't make the relative safety of any trees and also attack me. Thus, either he attacks my line and I'm at a significant advantage, or he adopts a defensive posture and allows me the initiative. Win-win.

 

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Disappointing. Unfortunately, it's getting dark. All elven units are neutral (one exception, later, is lawful), and all orcish units are chaotic, so they have a significant advantage in the nighttime. It's the time to strike before dark falls and try to get some damage in.

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One nice thing about fighting orcs is they tend to be intensely specialized - out of their grunt units featured today, two do not have ranged attacks and one has the second most pathetic melee backup attack in the game. Speaking of, let's do a quick enemy bestiary dump.

 

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This lad is a wolf rider - orcish cavalry. 5x3 blade attack is... alright, at best, and their HP is also alright. They're fast, cheap, and hunt in packs. They've got interesting promotions, but more on that later. Way later.

 

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It, of course, takes 12x5 damage to take out 35 health at 60% - which is basically statistically most likely. Now we can fall in on the other two wolf riders and their support...

 

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The guy on the right is an archer. Orcish archers are relatively thick, have a fucking pathetic melee weapon, and have two different ranged attacks. 6x3 is a respectable, not incredible, ranged statline (compare 5x4 with the potential to be 6x4 as the gold standard), but they have the extremely unique ability to flex to fire-type damage. Remember how Parrhesia said skeletons resist piercing? Orcish archers do not give a single fuck - they just switch to these horrible exploding arrows and move on through the ashes. These guys are also extremely cheap. Orcish archers have a fair shout at being one of the single best units in the game, in my opinion from watching Parrhesia use them. I have a vastly different strategy as orcs, which is why I get an orc campaign later.

 

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The other two beefier guys are grunts. Grunts are blocks of hit points, and two big hits. There is no more nuance to them than any other guy punching you in the face. They promote to guys who punch even harder in the face and have even more hit points.

 

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Anyway, we secure a village in the west, a second village in the north, and on the front line kill the archer and slow one of the grunts. Hey, I ended up using both axes of maneuver I pointed out in the plan of attack.

 

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Of course, the archer in the far north was quick, and somebody lost their life. Now it's full dark, giving the orcs +25% damage, but half of them are at or below half health, and I'm not debuffed at all by the dark.

 

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It really doesn't take much maneuvering to turn that into a rout. The bottom guy will also die to the combination of the remaining two units.

 

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Dextrous elvish fighters can actually cause reasonable damage with their bows, but even without it the three chances to hit can make it a very effective chip finisher. Wesnoth is a cosmic calculus of damage. Do more than you take.

 

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Of course, I don't measure the boss's movement and he rushes out of his hidey hole to obliterate an archer. Whoops. Anyway, he's a

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promoted grunt. Fifty-eight hit points, 10x3 sword, literally nothing else. No helmet in the art, despite the sprite having the sickest marauder aesthetic helmet in high fantasy history, which is an honest tragedy.

 

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Stupid wolf. We crush him. The AI in Wesnoth, in situations like this, likes to try to get their boss back to the keep, even if they have to move through zones of control and only get one hex, and then they won't attack. It's a bit sad. We surround the poor guy.

 

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Smash that F key, and don't forget to like and subscribe.

 

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I took several casualties more than I needed, but to be fair I did this chapter roughly 16 minutes after rolling out of bed in the morning and I haven't actually played Wesnoth in months. Whoops.

let's go

 

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2 hours ago, BrightBow said:

Which difficulty level is this?

i know you didn't ask me but i'm also doing the default difficulty level for everything - higher difficulties just give the ai more money and fuck that, the long campaigns already swing hard enough against you that we don't need that shit in our lives

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10 hours ago, Parrhesia said:

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I can hear all of you with siblings recoiling.

Yeah, that wince had to come from somewhere.

10 hours ago, Parrhesia said:

why can this random fucking bat stand up to the ohhh shit right time of day that's a thing

So, it's night, as you've noticed by how it's night. Hann, human soldier (okay, mercenary in this case, but whatever), is lawful. Lawful people hate the night and fight better during the day. Significantly better. Chaotic people - our footpads, and all the undead - do the converse. The day/night cycle is Dawn [neutral] - Morning [day] - Afternoon [day] - Dusk [neutral] - First Watch [night] - Second Watch [night], rinse and repeat.

What are the implications of this? As humans, press the attack during the day. Night is for damage limitation.

Ah yes, this thing. Really does make some units useful despite not being in line with the rest of the faction.

10 hours ago, Parrhesia said:

Meanwhile, Arvith flunks boh his 60% shots against the ghoul. Oh well.

RULE 1 of BATTLE FOR WESNOTH: The RNG does not care about the odds.

The RNG don't give a duck.

That I never fully got over.

8 hours ago, Integrity said:

This is you. Full warning: Battle for Wesnoth has elvish wank set to full. One of the writers for this game at least masturbated exclusively to Arwen for an entire year. Or Elrond, I don't judge. We'll start pretty light, but by the time we get to top tier elf units it's....

You'll see.

This description's great.

8 hours ago, Integrity said:

Note that they can generate in two distinctly sexed versions. They're identical, but it's a nice bit of flair!

I don't remember this being the case when I first played. Note I said I don't remember, I could be remembering wrong.

So yeah, I actually have some history with this game. I always felt a bit awkward playing it, but I did play through quite a bit of the campaigns at the time. It has been years since I played it however, I do think part of its appeal was that I had next to nothing else for a Linux system and this was freely available. I never got to making a good custom map in that time.

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TALE OF TWO BROTHERS - 2

Spoiler

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The Chase.

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Oh. Great. Elves.

Yeah, so, you'll also notice that this art is... a step down. That's no disrespect to the artist, who more recently painted things like, well, every wizard in the game like last map's necromancer. She's clearly professional-grade now - 2009, maybe not so much. The elves are the oldest art still in the game, and showing its age.

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Arvith's like 'the fuck bro I'm after my bro' and this elf's a dumb moron, so we're going to kill every elf in our way.

I'm down with this.

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Arvith Does Not Give a Fuck.

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haha jesus are you ready for wesnoth elves

I love Wesnoth. I do. I even, by and large, like its elven aesthetic. But whoever wrote these descriptions... eeeesh. Makes Eragon look balanced in its portrayal. At least they're willing to admit riders 'lack combat prowess' - though honestly, they're good enough in a way that scouts... aren't.

Anyway. We don't have our homies back. Where are they from last mission? Well, there's two options for recruitment. Either we can make fresh grist, or...

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For a flat fee of 20 gold, we can bring guys back from previous missions! In the case of our loyal units, this is very much worthwhile. Unfortunately for Helila and Rutharry, our generics last mission, well... they cost 6 more than it'd take to just grab another generic footpad. Horsemen are an interesting and not-quite-unique case - they're ALWAYS cheaper the second time around, costing 23 at base.

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We can conveniently recall every homie we have before sallying out and demolishing this guy.

The official term for a guy with 'loyal' is homie.

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Turn 2 is still more foreplay. Our boys advance cautiously. I hire five more guys - probably overcautious, but we've money to spare.

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Stupidly, the riders advance on us; annoyingly, Arvith hits both his 40s and takes this kill.

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The mop-up is easy, and now it's basically this guy against the world.

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And it turns out he can't even win as this guy against Magrid, so go figure. Recurrent theme of these scouts: they die too easily and I miss getting the XP on the right guys.

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Just as things were going so well, I do a hubris. Magrid's luck suddenly deserts him, and this fighter damages him heavily after a failed charge before finishing it, just barely, with three perfect bowshots. Sure, it was unluckyish - five hits from eight at 60%, while Magrid had to miss his 33% chance to kill - but you can't just accept 'good enough'. I shouldn't play these maps on the tail end of a disastrous day at 11.30pm like an hour after I literally wound up passing out on the bed for a bit, but here we are, this is the baby campaign and I'm a little rusty anyway.

Also this and the last shot were taken as action shots but I guess got fucked somehow.

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WEVENGE

This bowman's one of the new recruits - intelligent/quick, which is pretty much optimal. Especially on a 5-move guy - because 6 move becomes three instead of two over difficult terrain.

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In the west, the elves spend their turn not killing Tarek who was absolutely at their mercy. They had him surrounded, but the leader returns to his base to not summon a guy.

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Old mate then rides back out to uhhhh

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Yeahhhh

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... What?

Leaving aside how stupid this is... bitch, you think they want you?

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Anyway, we still have to catch the kidnappers. Fast-forward a couple turns and Faren, our loyal footpad - the only one I trained this mission, for better or worse - catches up.

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Oh, mother of fuck, I shoulda brought more footpads.

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Meet the dark adept, the prelude to the dark sorcerer we killed last mission! They're fragile as shit, not especially fast or cheap, and are the only combatant in the game to lack a melee attack entirely. They have a strong, accurate cold wave, and a kind of shitty arcane one that is mostly good for hard-countering undead.

Fun fact, the male was modelled on the artist's boyfriend.

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Skeletons are skeletons, and in any game as based around damage resistance as Wesnoth is, they're bad news. They're especially bad news for loyalists, who depend on piercing damage for most of their firepower, and the two big loyalist options for crushing skeletons aren't available to us. We do have footpads, who... I didn't train any of this mission because I assumed the horsemen would be a threat, at all.

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I have Faren bait out their skeletons. 'Fun' fact about the loyal foot homies - the four spearmen are Alwyn, Brent, Cadell and Dannen, the bowman is Efran and the footpad is Faren. I'm not sure why they followed the alphabet but I guess it's as good a theme as any.

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Hann rolls up and immediately beats a monologue out of him.

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Well, that was easy. Also note the Muff's (heh) HP total. So yeah Arvith binds him and takes him with him.

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Ooh, the Incident......

But just as we thought we were out...

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HEY HEY HEY WHO'S THIS TALL GLASS OF WATER

TALL GLASS OF WATER WANTS TO JOIN THE HOMIE CREW

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SHUT UP TAREK ELBITCH YOU'RE FIRED

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WHY IS THIS EVEN AN OPTION

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Important thing - Hann promoted with that final kill! I could and under normal circumstances would turn him into Arvith II aka a knight - but this is a very short campaign. Some unit types have more specialist promotions that don't have a Tier 3 (or, in a couple cases, that do have a Tier 4). In longer campaigns it's generally best not to take these dead ends, but... this campaign ends in literally two maps, so. Lancer is one of them - you can tell by the fact that the XP is purple instead of on the blue spectrum.

Not every class has branching promotions, and some have multiple. Knight itself has two different promotions of its own, while Spearmen turn into either Swordsmen who turn into Royal Guards, Pikemen who turn into Halberdiers or Javelineers who don't pick Javelineers. Bowmen always become Longbowmen who always become Master Bowmen.

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Lancers don't have a third tier, but it's okay, because they aren't gonna live long enough anyway. They don't bother with a sword, or armour - they just get another point of movement and another stab with their lance.

NEXT TIME ON TALE OF TWO BROTHERS 3: THRUTHERS?

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We make friends.

 

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Glad to see at least someone packed their anti-skeleton gear.

Quote

Foolish human, you have killed me but you will not catch the undead in time. I have fulfilled my contract, and will be reanimated soon to become a lord of their armies.

For a dead man he sure is chatty.

And really stupid. Like, I'd imagine in order to reanimate someone, you would need to get the body first. And elves of all people probably don't have much of a reason to become undead. I mean, they can live centuries as is.

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Spoiler

 

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Quote

Soon they arrived at a region where the forest was cut through by many streams, only to find something unexpected.

 

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We've moved a quarter mile.

 

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The dave that talks to you in missions is randomly assigned. I don't know the algorithm.

Quote

Erlornas: There is a keep ahead of us. How comes it that we know nothing of it? I thought our borders were watched more carefully.

André Gomes: I... I know not, my lord. For ages there was no one in these lands that could build such a thing save us. I fear we have fallen prey a false sense of security that has injured the vigilance of our scouts.

Erlornas: When the fighting ends, I'll have some answers. But for now--

 

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Ugly bastard, ain't he.

Quote

Erlornas: --let's focus on the task at hand.

André Gomes: Does that demented creature truly believe he can kill us?

Erlornas: Appearances can be deceiving. Tell the men to be cautious.

 

Map start!

 

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This is another pretty straightforward map. There are hills for them to exploit, so our goal is primarily to lock them out of their good terrain and try to mire them in the river. There's probably going to be a wide cap run off east, which we'll match with a fighter or two, and we'll get a secondary front line up on the western river to prevent them getting on any dry land. Terrain is king. Forests might be 60-70% for us, but even on hills we're sitting at 50%, while in the water they'll be sitting at 20-30%. It's a superb trade.

 

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Our recall list is looking chunky. The shaman is halfway, one archer is two chips off, and we've got a smattering of dudes hanging around halfway. I recall them all and deploy according to the plan. Two-wave recruitment, again.

 

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They're moving as expected, but I might have overestimated our mobility. Plan B it is, then.

 

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We form up on our side of the island to maximize distance and get everyone in forests or houses. Assassins are nasty. Hey, speaking of.

 

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The boss is a Slayer, which is a promoted Assassin, which he's throwing at us. Assassins are very annoying. Their concrete durability is paper, but that's compensated for by having 60% defense on flat terrain, and that only scales up with favorable ground.  They have a pretty pathetic melee attack, but they have an alright ranged attack with two interesting properties. First: poison. Poison does 8 damage per turn until cured, either by a unit with cure or by resting on a house for a turn. Note that shamen do not have cure, but have heal instead, and the two counteract each other but leave the poison in effect. It's annoying. The second property is Marksman. Marksman is a very interesting weapon trait - on the attack, the unit is guaranteed to have at least 60% accuracy when on the attack. It can go higher, but no matter how defensive you get the attack is guaranteed 60% hit. That means assassins have a bad tendency to just fly in and poison a guy, without doing much damage, and force a retreat while being hard to kill in return. Fuck assassins, by the way.

 

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Anyway, the assassin yeets himself into an archer, and of course chooses the archer who's 2xp from promotion. That gives him 1 experience for chipping. That means any attack will give him 1 more and promote him, fully healing him and clearing poison.

Christ, what a dumbass.

 

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Anyway, we're a bit more flanked than I anticipated, and the push to the river isn't complete, but with a bit of good luck we can still form a half-line at the river at least and tangle up the outriders. Plus, we're about to toss an archer into anyone and get the campaign's first promotion.

 

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He didn't kill, it doesn't matter. Ding.

 

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Rangers are the chunky promotion. They get a respectable 7x4 bow, but also a rather decent 7x3 blade and a fine 42 health. They're meant to be your hybrid dudes, working in both ranges but mostly at ranged. They have a special ability that makes them invisible in forests, which the AI will 100% walk into and get fucked. I really like Rangers.

 

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Marksfolk lean into the bow side. Instead of 7x3/7x4, they get 6x2/9x4. Not only do they get big shoots, but they also get marksman on the bow as discussed for Assassins a few short minutes ago. Particularly when promoted, these guys are damage dealing powerhouses in their element.

By the way, go back and read the descriptions for Marksfolk and Rangers again. Elvish wank is starting to kick in hard. We're not even halfway there.

 

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Anyway, he takes Ranger because I like it more. We manage to clear the assassins and establish a proper line with only one flat ground spot for the enemy to occupy. This isn't quite ideal, but it's damn close.

 

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And the enemy bites. Water is horrible to fight in. This will be a slaughter.

 

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20% defense means 80% hit, and our new ranger makes the most of it. Ouch. This guy was full health a moment ago.

 

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Night's fallen, which gives the enemy a damage boost, but terrain is enough to see them absolutely thrown out and a beachhead established on their side of the river. The map is over but for formalities.

 

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okay well i didn't expect that fighter to nearly fucking die jesus

There's also a heavier flank coming in on the right that may need dealt with.

 

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Wesnoth RNG: compare the health of the central grunt before and after being attacked by two archers and a lord. He's on 50% defense. Bastard. I can't complain too much - I've gotten pretty lucky so far.

 

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Fortunately that lets me secure a kill for the shaman on the poor wolf rider in the water. Shamen promote on a distinctly branched path.

 

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The druid path is the healer path. They get a stronger ensnare, a meaninglessly stronger staff, and an actually magical attack. The major attraction is that heal+4 is upgraded to heal+8+cure, which is a massive step up.

 

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Sorceresses are the offensive promotion, losing the heal entirely, but gaining a 7x4 (cut off lmao sorry) magical attack in addition to a gently buffed ensnare and a still crap staff. Note that the final blurb is not at all incorrect - the magical attack being arcane-type is actually really important for some matchups, for instance that it scythes through undead like they don't exist.

 

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Anyway, Picks goes Druid and we shove through the rest of them. Ouch. The guy on the left f-

 

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Let it be known I was screaming the whole time.

 

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This is what I meant about Scout mobility. Dude switches over from the left to secure the kill and save my brave man's life.

 

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Once again, locking them out of terrain. Assassins have 60% on flat, but that's better than 70%.

 

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Anyway, fuck assassins. I'd wanted to lure this guy out onto flat ground and not deal with 70% defense, but here we are. Unfortunately-

 

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well just fuck me up, okay

 

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That's Wesnoth!

 

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TALE OF THREE BROTHERS

Spoiler

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Time for the third mission, the, uh... imaginatively named Guarded Castle.

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I

uh

wuh?

Okay, IIRC not taking the legendary fucking knight gets you like a stealth mission because you know the password or some shit. But fuck that. Ike tells me to pick Jarlom.

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Ike's a dumb bitch.

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Tale of Two Brothers, I'm learning, actually kind of sucks and I'm someway regretting starting with it. Good news is, there's nowhere to go but up!

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The Thug line is the chaotic human infantry. They're as straightforward as they come; bricks of HP who hit you with clubs, repeatedly. You thought the orc grunt line was unsubtle? Well, Thugs hit you four times with a club, Bandits hit you four times with a club and Highwaymen... hit you four times, with a club.

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Assassins are a tier 3 unit, and they're sons of bitches. And daughters, given they're one of the classes that can spawn as whatever gender. Their knives poison, they can backstab for double damage if they have a direct flank on their enemy, they're evasive like footpads and if they take a hit they will fucking die. Also, they're skirmishers; they ignore zone of control. Threats when not, uhm, isolated in a field.

Memories from art threads past: a guy kept posting that the female assassin was too fat and looked 'pregent'.

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Fortunately, we've got some aces up our own sleeves... note how Brena now has two tiny sons.

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fuck. yes.

Heavy Infantry do exactly what you expect - they refuse to take damage, they annihilate anyone they can land a blow on, they're slow as shit. They're a better and more pure execution of the Armour Knight than any FE besides maybe 14 has managed, don't hate. Also noteworthy: fearless is in their trait pool, unique to humans (but not to them - ghouls are also fearless, and trolls can be).

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They mount a very annoying suicide charge on our left. Thanks to ZoC and the forest we're actually penned in a bit here.

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Temporarily. That said, he almost kills Efran on his turn. What can you do?

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We range north a bit until we stumble upon the titular Castle and its Guards.

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Some dead air passes... this is not a great map. And Brent lures the orcs out, almost but crucially not quite dying in the process!

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Brena removes the warrior - normally I'd be more judicious about XP, but it's literally a map and a half from ending - and Cadell finishes the job. Alwyn and Arvith talk about why there are orcs so far south.

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bwuh

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All fine here. How are you?

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This is probably the peak of 2 Bros writing

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c568b5cc5e413ecaae5ae8674a4d34cc.jpgAnyway, yes. This continues not to be the password. Whatever shall we do?

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oh

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ok then

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The situation in the south mostly resolves itself. Brent might die, but whatever. Again, normally I'd take greater care in safeguarding my loyal units, but... In the north, the remaining orc has a fucking forcefield around him, but it's okay.

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Brent takes his expected dirt nap. You'll notice the spearmen around him are pretty wounded, because I had them just slam into the thugs with their spears instead of cautiously hurling javelins. That's the thing with Wesnoth - some of your guys really are just disposable grist.

You'll also note that homies have a ring under their, uhm, orb. True generics don't.

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Revenge is swift. Oh, and is it just me or does Efran look a bit... taller?

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Longbowmen! The tier 2 bowmen, who continue to be marked out by resilience and halfway-competent melee damage compared to the highly-specialised elven or orcish archers. I love their art. It's so "What's that sound... ?" right before the fucking Giger hellbeast leaps out of the brush and kills them.

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Mop up, move forward.

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While Alwyn dies in the background, Faren goes roving out ahead and finds Baran! And also the boss, Rotharik, the guy writing the journal in the opening. Also, the dialogue continues to be great.

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The accursed dark sorcerer Rotharik is a fucking idiot who swallows the obvious bait.

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He's beaten into a retreat, in the daylight, surrounded by horse- ooh!

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Counting With Dannen, the hit new television series which was unfortunately cancelled after just four episodes, due to the Incident. Still, it's a handy boost to our coffers, comically stilted dialogue or not.

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And we can still turn this into a learning moment. Normally, shooting at a necromancer is not the best idea. But Ilyn here has just one XP until he levels up, he'll get two after concluding the fight with a level 2 enemy, and levelling up heals you to full. So this is risk-free, since the necromancer can't kill him in a single round.

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So much foreshadowing, so little time to resolve it all...

They make us busy-work Arvith over to the cell for some reason.

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Reminder that Baran was only captured botching the world's least necessary ambush on a piss-easy frontal assault.

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What a lovely and wholesome story written in five minutes on the back of a napkin in a fucking Waffle House.

NEXT UP

BRFOURTHERs

 

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19 hours ago, Integrity said:

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Anyway, the assassin yeets himself into an archer, and of course chooses the archer who's 2xp from promotion. That gives him 1 experience for chipping. That means any attack will give him 1 more and promote him, fully healing him and clearing poison.

Christ, what a dumbass.

Genius.

Situational, but man it is genius.

19 hours ago, Parrhesia said:

I

uh

wuh?

Okay, IIRC not taking the legendary fucking knight gets you like a stealth mission because you know the password or some shit. But fuck that. Ike tells me to pick Jarlom.

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Ike's a dumb bitch.

Or the best jerk.

19 hours ago, Parrhesia said:

fuck. yes.

Heavy Infantry do exactly what you expect - they refuse to take damage, they annihilate anyone they can land a blow on, they're slow as shit. They're a better and more pure execution of the Armour Knight than any FE besides maybe 14 has managed, don't hate. Also noteworthy: fearless is in their trait pool, unique to humans (but not to them - ghouls are also fearless, and trolls can be).

I don't think I disagree, mostly. Armours being any way good in FE is based on them having something else. Their movement issues certainly don't help. How much slower are the heavy infantry then other units in Wesnoth (because it's been years since I played?)

19 hours ago, Parrhesia said:

What a lovely and wholesome story written in five minutes on the back of a napkin in a fucking Waffle House.

I have missed these kinds of lines from you Parrhesia.

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2 hours ago, Dayni said:

I don't think I disagree, mostly. Armours being any way good in FE is based on them having something else. Their movement issues certainly don't help. How much slower are the heavy infantry then other units in Wesnoth (because it's been years since I played?)

Well, these guys got 4 movement. Most Loyalist infantry got 5. So not too much I'd say. And they can still spawn with the Quick trait.

I like how Wesnoth handles this concept. They don't get attacked more often then other units and damage reduction is percentage based. So even against high level opponents they will always take less damage then other units on their level.

Armors in Fire Emblem are just so... dumb. I mean, they generally actually have crappy durability because a few points of defense is a poor substitute for getting double attacked by everything. And as the enemy's attack power grows, the threshold in which they can take more hits then their peers keeps getting thinner and thinner. And all their stats other then Defense generally kinda suck.
Add in the fact that it's hard to train them because they won't reach any enemies, can't hit any enemies due to crappy accuracy, can't kill any enemies due to lack of double attack... well, I'm left to wonder how you are possibly supposed to maintain their defense lead without spoon feeding them tons of kills.

Edited by BrightBow
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10 hours ago, Dayni said:

Or the best jerk.

I don't think I disagree, mostly. Armours being any way good in FE is based on them having something else. Their movement issues certainly don't help. How much slower are the heavy infantry then other units in Wesnoth (because it's been years since I played?)

I have missed these kinds of lines from you Parrhesia.

It's true. I assume none of the passwords are right - though I could be wrong. I won't be exploring route switches, in any case - with possibly one exception if I can wrangle Ike into it.

Heavy Infantry: 4
Standard infantry: 5-6
Light infantry: 6-7
Cavalry: 8-10; in one case 11

ilu2

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1 hour ago, Parrhesia said:

It's true. I assume none of the passwords are right - though I could be wrong. I won't be exploring route switches, in any case - with possibly one exception if I can wrangle Ike into it.

There is a right password actually. Played the campaign yesterday and took the liberty of trying this out. Answering correctly just means that the guys asking you will disappear, so you don't have to fight them.

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TALE OF FOUR BROTHERS

Spoiler

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Well, that was your incident. They were mercenary bros or whatever, Baran fucked it.

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We go full circle.

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Uhh guys do you

do you not see

that village

o'er east

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Our objective is to basically see what's up, and hook up with Reeve Hoban, the village shirriff. Sending the horseman southeast was a mistake - this is the last mission, and we've already used all the cash we've got, starting with 300.

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We stumble into one of his daves not too much further north.

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DAYS SINCE BARAN LAST KILLED EVERYONE BY OVEREXTENDING: 1627 0

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So, yeah, neat thing is that there's no concept of 'home' keeps in Wesnoth. If it's a keep, and you're a commander, you can spit daves out from it.

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Hoban's defences are... uninspiring.

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We've got problems of our own to deal with, but our core of homies and a handful of promoted meat can easily handle these chumps. Oh, and here's Baran... care to introduce yourself, Baran?

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Thank you, Baran.

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The Wesnoth Mage Flavour Guy is a lot better than the Wesnoth Elf Flavour Guy. We'll get into Mages as a whole when we get there - for now it's enough to know that Red Magi set people the fuck on fire. They're also neutral, as are their promotions. They're marginally resistant to fire, which is a nice touch, and have the standard human slight resilience against arcane damage, but really they aren't notably fragile.

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We clean up over here.

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But the issue with orcs is there's always more to come. Oh, and, uh, Vobreddoc - loyalists have absurd fake-Welsh names by default, though plot units are wildly inconsistent from this - promoted into the tier 2. Can you spot the other new unit here?

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The Wartortle of ironclads. You've seen Brena, you've seen the tier 1s, this is what comes in between.

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Hann gets a... line, I guess.

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And we get, uh, a revelation, I guess? Yeah, it's the guy Baran almost killed.

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A guy dies in the north, but things are pretty secure, especially in the day. On green's turn, they clean house.

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Oh my goooood who's that pokemon??

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hahaha goblins are fucking hilarious

You will notice that their traits list is... abnormal. It is, in fact, unique. Instead of two positive traits, they get a negative, either getting weak (-1 melee damage, -1 HP), slow (-1 move, +5% HP) or slow (+20% XP threshold).

Anyway, may as well just hold the li-

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oh

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yes

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Y E S

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okay so hann's swarmed and torn to pieces by the entire army, but still! It's, well. It's what he would've wanted.

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We continue to swarm over the hills - unfortunately, our heavy infantry basically have to head around the north. Hilariously, the goblin winds up murdering one of the flowers of Wesnoth chivalry.

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But Hann's charge (f) did panic the warlord into leaving his keep. Downside: he's now on a village. Upside: he can't recruit new guys, and the ones he does have are getting shredded.

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96c9196ba0f857022cd6acaf2fcaeed1.pngWarlords aren't leaders - there actually is a command line of orcs, but they're only ever plot characters or bosses - but tier 3 grunts. Hey, they even picked up a bow somewhere along the line! Also orcs never seem to know where they stand with archery - I like the idea of a given warlord being able to peer-pressure his comrades into accepting archery into their hearts. Which is fitting because the orcish archer is the strongest unit in the game, more on this later...

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Well, this warlord would rather run into a forest.

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Cadell finishes off one of the trolls and oh God here's the spearman promotion line. There are two blatantly correct options here. We'll be picking wrong, as a joke, and tackle the other two at a later date. They all share in common that they're beefy infantry units who add a net 40% to their physical resistances.

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Javelineers aren't even a bad unit, in isolation. They're generalists. The issue is they aren't good generalists. Consider the elven ranger. The javelineer has first strike on the spear and a chunky 40% pierce resistance. The ranger has an 8x4 bow, a melee option that is a sword and thus offers a more versatile damage type, hides in forests, has an extra movement point and strolls effortlessly through forest, has better evasion generally, and has a Tier 3. And both the swordsman and pikeman are very strong melee units, and the human bowmen are already decent enough in melee!

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But it's time for the real tier 2s to stand up and be counted. Down goes the warlord - even at night, where he could dismember any one of these units in melee, there's only so much he can do surrounded by archers.

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Time for an epilogue!

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Remember the name.

For the time being, though, that's our first campaign done and dusted! Okay, so it was... rough. But at the end of the day, we had to get the basic rules discussion out of the way - better it be, well, here, than for a good campaign.

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Next up: A Good Campaign.

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31 minutes ago, Parrhesia said:

beep beep there's a hotkey for 'post'???

I learned that the hard way.

30 minutes ago, Parrhesia said:

So, yeah, neat thing is that there's no concept of 'home' keeps in Wesnoth. If it's a keep, and you're a commander, you can spit daves out from it.

So, you want us to give names to attack to Dave then?

Funnily, I heard someone tell a story where everyone on a construction site was named Dave. Even the people not named Dave.

57 minutes ago, Parrhesia said:

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okay so hann's swarmed and torn to pieces by the entire army, but still! It's, well. It's what he would've wanted.

I mean, if you count being swarmed by goblin horde as a way to go.

58 minutes ago, Parrhesia said:

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Javelineers aren't even a bad unit, in isolation. They're generalists. The issue is they aren't good generalists. Consider the elven ranger. The javelineer has first strike on the spear and a chunky 40% pierce resistance. The ranger has an 8x4 bow, a melee option that is a sword and thus offers a more versatile damage type, hides in forests, has an extra movement point and strolls effortlessly through forest, has better evasion generally, and has a Tier 3. And both the swordsman and pikeman are very strong melee units, and the human bowmen are already decent enough in melee!

I kinda want to theorise on a rebalance.

Spoiler

Obivously, the Javelin. I'd say change it to 10x3 or 11x3 and that's all that really needs. Spear is a bit of a specialisation from what I can see, though maybe increase it's damage if at all possible.

As for movement, I'll admit I'm not sure what to do to buff them.

Also, maybe it should promote to a third tier (name it Halberdier if that isn't in Wesnoth already, maybe)?

Also, is Heir to the Throne being skipped? Asking as I do remember that being a long one.

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8 hours ago, Dayni said:

I kinda want to theorise on a rebalance.

big problem is that this makes the jav literally promoted archer-tier ranged attack, while retaining an 8x3 spear. if they promoted from there they'd be obscenely good - javs are honestly a great generalist unit in short campaigns / single games where the lack of a third tier doesn't hurt them, and they're reasonably good in both phases. situational, but fine. i like them.

the buff i'd theorize is an increase in damage to 8x3 on the javelin - total damage only goes up from 22 to 24, but they gain a lot more consistency to pair with the 40% pierce resist and 48 base health for ranged dueling.

EDIT: that said, i do think parrhesia does greatly understate the noble javelineer's durability. rangers are 6 hp lower and, critically, have literally no resistances to compare to that golden 40% pierce (and to a lesser extent, 20% arcane versus -10%). they do compensate to a degree by the huge forest evasion bonus, but elves gonna elf. i don't think javelineers are far from being balanced.

 

 

8 hours ago, Dayni said:

Also, is Heir to the Throne being skipped? Asking as I do remember that being a long one.

i'm doing HttT next, after incursion. you're welcome.

Edited by Integrity
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