TheEasternInvasion

This is a discussion of The Eastern Invasion, the campaign featuring Gweddry General of Wesnoth.

This walkthrough has been updated by Crus4a7E to reflect the changes up to version 1.4.5 on medium and by Maiklas3000 for up to version 1.8.3 on hard. Feel free to add your own updates.

Warning: spoilers ahead!

The Outpost

It is probably best to recruit 5 heavy infantry and 1 mage on this scenario. The heavy infantry can flag the villages surrounding you by turn 3, turn 2 if they're quick, and the mage can flag the northern forest village on turn 2 if quick.

Sending 2 HI(heavy infantry) south, to the revenants, is a good idea because you can usually get both of them a 2nd level kill without having either die. The other ones should stand and fight against the enemies coming at you from the north and east. Use the HI most of time, and use the mage when they are in forest and it can get a killing blow. By the end of the scenario, you should have 2-3 shock troopers and 1 half-advanced mage.

It is sometimes a good idea to recruit another mage on turn 10 or so, since you will probably end the scenario with less than 100 gold anyway, so you save money by buying in advance. (mathematically this does make sense). Also, you can get them about 10 experience along the way.

Alternative Strategy

The above strategy did not work for me despite of several attempts. Whenever I recruited only 5 HI or tried to send 2 HI southwards to capture villages I got slaughtered around turns 10 to 12 by the latest. (Played with V 1.4.5 on medium difficulty) Thus below I describe an alternative strategy which worked rather painlessly for me.

Remark: In V 1.4.5 all of the villages surrounding the player's keep are already flagged at the start. Only in the very south (south of the river) are a couple of unflagged villages.

Recruit one keep full of HI in turn 1 (no mage, as there is little use in it in this scenario and we are short of money). In turn 2, move the HI to build a straight line northeast and east of your castle (the line should be inside the castle walls whereever possible to use its high defence rating but other than that as straight as possible to only allow two enemy units at a time to attack any of your HI). Then wait about 2 to 3 turns until the enemy forces start to attack and you have enough money to recruit about another 3 HI. Use them to reinforce your line.

Then just hold out the enemy attack during night time; only rotate wounded units if possible, but do not counter-attack. At dawn start your counter-attack without worrying to much about keeping the original line intact. Instead try to level 2 or 3 HI to Shock Troopers. The enemy forces quickly cease to be any danger to your forces.

Also around turn 12 the white mage re-arrives and points out a trap door you should use. The trap door is located near your castle and clearly visible unless any unit stands on it. So if you do not see it right away, just move your units around a little.

Position your leader near the trap door so he can reach it in one turn. As it is almost impossible to finish with more than 100 gold (which is the minimum starting gold of the next level), use the remaining turns to level as many units as possible and only move your leader onto the trap door in the very last turn.

Using this strategy I finished with 2 shock troopers and several well-levelled HI. Also your leader and the white mage should have gained a little experience.

Alternative Strategy #2

An alternative strategy to consider is to recruit as late as possible and to start fighting when the sun is up. Somehow you will be able to decide when to engage in the battle, as the enemy will let you stay in your castle without bothering you.

At turn #4, recruit 1 Mage and 5 Heavy Infantrymen (HI). The trick is not to move a single unit and somehow, no one attacks you. I did the test multiple times and I always started the first fight when I decided it was time (i.e. during the day light). A variation of the strategy that does not work is to start recruiting only when the sun is up; somehow the enemy attacks your leader.

Turn #7, this is dawn and now you can start attacking. My goal is to finish any fight with my Mage or the Leader to get them to level 2 and 3 as soon as possible. White Mages always make my life easier during Campaigns. I also recruit 2 HI, 1 Cavalryman to go get some villages, and 1 Mage.

You will end up with 1 HI or your Leader at level 2 and your Mages should be half way to Level 2.

Alternative Strategy... #3

None of the above tactics work when playing under the "challenging" difficulty level(since you are given only 80 coins at the beginning of the scenario).

My advice when playing this on the hardest level is to spend your starting money on two HI units and two cavalry units. Don't buy any mages -- they are too fragile and expensive. Your main goal is to keep away as much enemy forces as possible from your keep (ESPECIALLY during night). Use the cavalry to divert at least a small portion of the undead by making them chase your horsemen. Remember to always "taunt" them -- capture the villages near their keeps and run away from there the next turn. This way you can keep your fortress not owerwhelmed for some time. Spend every coin possible on heavy infantry and don't let skeletons/bats occupy tiles in your keep. If you do let them, this may be fatal to your leader. ;) You may even recruit a spearman or two to "block" a keep tile if this may save your main character.

NOTE: I did use this exact same tactic to beat the scenario on challenging, however, it did require some luck and re-loading. Remember -- when things seem dire, leveling up is the best healing. I saved my leader(why do I always forget his name?) by letting him kill a second-level skeleton archer, but that only happened by miracle - he hit all three times on 40% and didn't get killed by counter-attacks although he had only 3 HP left! I must be lucky :P

Euclid

Escape Tunnel

• Objectives: Move Gweddry to the end of the tunnel
• Lose if: Gweddry or Dacyn dies or turns run out
• Turns: 26/24/22 (easy/medium/hard)
• Starting units: Gweddry, Dacyn
• Other
  • Permanent holy amulet in north
  • Treasure of 200 gold in southeast

Don't bother recalling Heavy Infantry, they go too slow in caves. Go for a group of mostly Mages, and a couple of Spearmen. (One keep of units in total should easily be enough.)

The map is quite small. Bypass the fights that you can until you have the bulk of your units in th safety of the dwarf leader's keep area. When you are just moving Gweddry along be opportunistic and get some experience. Move your units to the east until you encounter trolls and reach a crossroads. A couple of dwarves will kindly become your allies and keep off the trolls for a few turns.

There is a holy amulet to the north (unlike in other campaigns this holy amulet is permanent!). Send a quick Spearman there or Gweddry (Giving Gweddry the holy amulet (instead of a Spearman) allows him to level very quickly, which is important, since he can advance to Grand Marshal. This gives benefits in other ways on a number of later scenarios as well, such as the River Crossing, where you can get an easy 1st turn kill against the undead leader and take his castle. Note that the leader is very hard to kill anyway).

As soon as you have got the holy amulet start to move all your units south without bothering about the trolls or the undead which appear after a number of turns from the direction of your keep.

The undead, trolls and dwarves will all fight each other, so after having moved all your units south position one Spearman at the end of the cave leading south (so only one unit a turn can attack him) and position the White Mage right behind him to heal it every turn. These two units should easily keep of the enemies following you until the end of the scenario. Move Gweddry to the northeast accompanied by a Mage and a Spearman (to fight individual trolls coming your way).

Before moving Gweddry to the end of the cave (which ends the level) send the Mage to the east past the funny signpost warning you of the troll hole. In the cave the Mage discovers a chest containing a troll treasure amounting to 200 gold.

An Unexpected Appearance

• Objectives: Defeat either enemy leader
• Lose if: Gweddry or Dacyn dies or turns run out
• Turns: 20/20/20 (easy/medium/hard)
• Starting units: Gweddry, Dacyn
• Other: your next scenario depends on which leader you defeat

What you do in this scenario depends on which way you want to go. Going east is harder, but brings you more reward, such as the chance to go to Mal-Ravanal's Capital, which gives you the opportunity to get extra experience (a lot for whoever survives) and a free Paladin and several Knights.

First kill Mal-Tar to get your keep. To do this, shoot him with Dacyn and attack him with Gweddry's melee. If you don't kill him the first turn, second turn kill him with Dacyn so Gweddry can recruit. You will be fighting a mix of undead and bats, so recruit Heavy Infantry and Mages (if you gave the amulet to a Spearman in the previous scenario, recall him, too). Dacyn might be wounded, so send him to a village. Don't worry, he can fend for himself, since the bats usually arrive one at a time and he can kill one per turn.

The attackers should be no problem so focus on leveling units. If you move quickly you should only need to fight the attackers from one leader. Of course you can have some of your units double back to engage the second set.

Diverging Campaign Path

Elven Alliance

The Orc's warning about the assassin is overrated; Volas can probably take care of it himself, although you might want to leave ONE unit near him to make sure.

Recruit / recall a wide assortment of units, mostly mages, spearmen and cavalry. Send mages and spearmen up to fight the opponent, send cavalry down as scouts. Any heavy infantry should go up to fight also; they will probably arrive late, and be good for reinforcements when the first troops are wounded.

Align the troops in the forest, so that the enemy will be on grass; this gives you a tactical advantage. Use Dacyn to heal those who need it most - those on the corners, and any mages who are on the front lines.

There is a village at {20,8} that can prove tactically very useful, because the elves usually fight somewhere near it. The elves are defeated most of the time, and the orcs claim this village; it is crucial to kill the orc on this village and take it over with a resilient spearman, or a HI.

Once you have gotten past turn 6, it will be day, and the orcs will be very easy to defeat. When the assassin appears on turn 7, ignore it unless you have a cavalryman still down there. In that case, use it to fight the assassin. Keep pressing up. It is possible to kill the orcish leader by turn 9 for a nice gold bonus.

The Undead Border Patrol

This scenario also depends on which way you want to go. If going NW, it is fairly straightforward. The enemy is relatively weak. Do the same as in Unexpected Appearance - recruit 2 suicide cavalrymen to distract the bats. One will probably get enough XP to be worth recalling.

I would use mostly heavy infantry and spearmen with the holy amulet on this level, because mages will only get a +10% to hit from magical. However, as in most scenarios against undead, white mages are very useful.

Try to get the opponent to fight you from the sand. This gives you something like a 70% CTH. >)

(CTH = Chance To Hit).

Mal-Ravanal's Capital

Only reachable from The Undead Border Patrol scenario, but you might also skip it and go directly to Northern Outpost.

This is a very challenging scenario. I started with only 100 gold, so I recalled one Mage, two Shock Troopers, one Heavy Infantry, and my holy Halberdier. I defended the starting castle for about 10 turns until the Revenants had made their way over to me. Upon killing several of them, I freed some imprisoned Knights and a Paladin. I moved my forces to kill the Death Knight, and then split my forces. I sent one group to attack Mal-Ravanal and the other to kill the Necromancer in the NW corner. By turn 30, my Eastern assault force was in postion to attack Mal-Ravanal. However, when I attacked him, he teleported my troops back to the starting castle, so I wasn't able to defeat him. When I was ready, I killed the NW Necromancer and progressed to The Northern Outpost.

The reason to go here is to acquire a cavalry force of one Paladin and five Knights. To do this kill the 6 Revenants guarding the cages, but note the number of Knights available is reduced by one for each of your troops that die *after you rescue the first one*. You might want to make sure any expendable troops are "expended" before this. Each rescued unit pops in with full moves.

If you just want to rescue the paladin and 5 knights and get out (in 1.6), this is how I finished that by turn 8. The horses were captive in 6 cages, 4 in a northern loop and 2 in a southern loop. First turn, I sent a quick shock trooper, quick heavy, and a white mage (not Dacyn) around the northern loop, looping from bottom to top (start at bottom knight, end at paladin). I looped that way to clear the middle ASAP and escape the oncoming troops. Also first turn, I sent 3 shock troopers around the southern loop, looping from top to bottom. If you encounter resistance, kill it quick or run as required, and instead focus on killing the guards fast, which conveniently don't hit back. On turn 2, I recruited another keep full of recruits and immediately sent everyone else to take out the northwestern leader. Time it so you kill the northwestern leader just as the last horses are rescued. It is by no means easy, but this way I managed to lose only a few HI types while picking up all 6 horses.

[elvish_sovereign] (1.8.2 Normal) An alternate strategy for the above if you have more leveled mages than leveled HI's. It also requires that you gave the Holy Amulet to Gweddry. I sent a single quick Shock Trooper due south (recruited on the southern-most hex on the starting castle), which promptly took out the southern Revenant on turn 3. Forget about the villages, it'll only delay you. I sent Dacyn due north, a quick RM go take out the second from the bottom Revenant, and a quick HI and a WM with Gweddry to take out the middle-couple Revenants. I also recruited two HI's to stop the advance and distract the two Dark Sorcerers' troops. After Gweddry and the WM take out the third from the bottom Revenant, send that Knight south. After taking out the Revenant with the RM, send the RM, Shock Trooper, and the three Knights in the direction of the SW Dark Sorcerer. Meanwhile, Gweddry, the WM, and the HI take out the third from the top Revenant, and then get Gweddry the hell outta there with the WM. have Dacyn free the Paladin first, then have the remaining Knights, HI, and the Paladin take out the remaining Revenant and hold out in the north. As Gweddry is fleeing and th e final Revenants are being felled, break through the SW Dark Sorcerer's lines (which should be easy if you distracted them properly) with the RM and the Shock Trooper, and send the three Knights to knock him into oblivion. I finished on turn 8 with no losses, but had some near-death moments.

The Northern Outpost

This scenario is reachable both from The Undead Border Patrol and the Elven Alliance scenarios.

Here, there are two enemies that you must defeat: the undead and the outlaws. You will create a separate task force for each.

The undead are fairly straightforward to defeat, and in any case Owaec usually does a good part of the work. To finish off the undead, it's useful to have a white mage, since Dacyn has gone AWOL for this scenario. If you don't have a white mage, you can try recruiting a few mages or else go back one or more scenarios and promote a mage to white mage. In addition to the mages or white mage, recall whomever picked up the holy amulet in one of the previous scenarios and have them accompany Gweddry to the southeast. If Gweddry is the one with the holy amulet and you have a white mage, then you can supplement them with a mage. You should also send a horseman or quick spearman to pick up the new holy amulet in the southwest.

By contrast to the undead, the outlaws require a novel strategy. Recruit/recall fast units, e.g., calvary and horsemen. You may supplement them by recalling quick spearmen and quick shock troopers. The challenge is that criminals will sometimes appear randomly around the villages you flag. Therefore, before flagging a village, position as many healthy units as you can immediately around it. Note that you will get a chance to kill any newly appeared outlaws before they get a move. Outlaws will not appear in the villages that Owaec flags, so don't worry about him uncovering enemies for you. Send your outlaw hunting posse up the eastern side of the map flagging one village a turn and fighting the bandits. One of the villages has the assassin that is the outlaw leader, and there are a lot of villages, so speed is of the essence.

Once your undead task force has finished the undead, form them into a second outlaw hunting posse, transferring units as needed from the first posse.

When you come across the village where the bandit leader hides, divert any available units to the battle, as the bandits have a bite.

Note: A Cavalry force (such as the one acquired in Mal-Ravanal's Capital) makes short work of the bandits. Lower level units have trouble against the bandits, especially at night.

Also note, that from this scenario on you can recruit horsemen. You might want to level up a paladin or two, for fast mobile undead removal services (and quick leader assasination).

/* governor */ Just a note: I had the misfortune of taking a group of men to a village where 5or6 enemies appeared. After taking heavy damage, I retreated my char (low on hitpoints) out of the village. When I recaptured the village the same group of enemies reappeared. Since AI enemies seem to prefer recapturing villages this can allow you to obtain easy experience for weak units a few times.

Two Paths

This is a fairly tough level (played in V 1.4.5 on medium difficulty) which took several attempts to get through. In V 1.4.5 you have 16 turns (unlike 12 as in earlier versions) and can choose between going north to attack the orc leader or going north-east to attack the undead leader.

One option is going north on the very east side of the map trying to fight your enemies from solid ground and mountains while they stand on sand ground with weak defense. As your troops move very slowly on this terrain, you will likely take some heavy losses however, as your enemies keep surrounding you. Also this will presumably take too many turns to reach the orc leader in time.

Thus the preferred choice is to recall a couple of shock troopers and white mages and move them on the path to the north-west in a tight formation towards the undead leader. Once you survived the first enemy onslaught without loosing units, the rest of this scenario becomes rather easy as the remaining enemies come one by one. Make sure to keep on moving fast to the north-west to reach the undead leader before turns run out.

On hard (and version 1.8.3), what will probably work better is an all-out suicidal calvary charge to assassinate the undead leader as quickly as possible.

Diverging Campaign Path

Undead Crossing

Spoiler ahead... this scenario has a surprise that will be explained below.

Recall a couple of quick swordsmen (or about-to-level quick spearmen), two white mages, a red mage or multiple regular mages, and any units with holy amulets. Shock troopers are too slow. Send these units as quickly as possible northwest through the swamp towards the eastern crossing. Meanwhile, recruit/recall calvary. The calvary should run as fast as possible along the southern board edge (so as to not attract undue attention from bats and swimming undead) and then up the western crossing. You can divert a couple of calvary and Owaec to snatch up villages and then those units can join the eastern assault.

Now for the surprise... Once you have fought off the bats and skeletons, you will find this was not your biggest challenge, as the undead leader summons two or three cuttlefish, which appear in the water between the two crossings. These always appear on the same turn number. Be very careful where to position your troops as the cuttlefish have a very nasty melee attack. You have at least three options for the crossing. Option 1 is to just try to get a couple of your calvary across each of the two crossings, while the rest of your units run like hell away from the water and swamp. Option 2 is to send across more units while tossing a spearman into the water as bait. Option 3 is to fight the cuttlefish, which is extremely hazardous. For a fight, maneuver your units to encourage the cuttlefish to separate, then use good melee troops backed by Gweddry (for leadership) and a white mage to kill them one at a time. Good luck. Make sure you leave your units enough time to cross the river and kill the undead leader before turns run out.

The Crossing

I had only 100 gold, so recruited some units and went straight north from turn one on. The fighting in the water was quite hard, with some orcs coming down from the north. The un-dead only appeared when I was in the middle of the river, so no encounter with them, and the ogre's helped get rid of the orcs on the north side. (Allefant)

If you have Holy Gweddry, you can (sometimes) get a 1st turn kill on the 1st undead leader, scarf up all the villages, and return to kill the 2nd undead forces before their leader can recruit anything. If you don't, the second undead leader will recruit lots of level two units. The orcs will start out across the river, but usually most of them turn back to fight the ogre reinforcements. Waiting till their first wave hits your shore and wiping them out in the water will probably leave you just enough time to cross the river and find there are only 2 or 3 enemy units left besides the leaders.

Make sure to cover your rear flank with some expendable troops (such as Heavy Infantry) as the undead can move more quickly through the water than your units.

Another strategy is to go straight into the water after killing the first undead leader using the deep water in the middle of the path to seperate the orc forces. You go to the right with Gweddry and Owaec and some support troops while letting the ogres kill many of the orcs in your way. Knights and a Paladin can hold off the orcs enough to get across while the undead behind you are not an issue.

Note: Owaec can move only one hex a turn in the water.

Important: If the ogre leader is alive at the end of the scenario, he agrees to help you, which results in the following bonuses: he joins you as a loyal unit, you get two free Ogres, you gain the ability to recruit Young Ogres, and you skip "Training the Ogres" scenario and go directly to "Xenophobia". (shadowblack)

Training the Ogres

• This scenario was missing in 1.6.

This can be a confusing scenario to understand. Basically, your three units just have to survive. However, if you want to be able to recruit young ogres later, you need a couple of the ogres to not reach the rocky borders where they will "escape", whereby they seem to disappear into thin air. You have a couple of options for accomplishing this. Option 1 is to run. To keep ogres in the area, you wind up running in a circle, probably with Gweddry. However, running in a circle, Gweddry cannot outrun ogres and he will not survive repeated attacks from multiple ogres. Therefore, you need some of the ogres to "escape", which you can arrange by having Gweddry run close to the rocky border. Option 2 is to fight and kill some of the ogres, but this is hazardous. Or you could try a combination of these options.

Being able to recruit young ogres allows you to promote them to ogres, which do middling damage, but unfortunately can't advance beyond level 2. Ogres are especially mobile on mountains (such as in the later scenario Lake Vrug) and in caves (in the scenario Captured). Being of neutral alignment, ogres can be helpful at night (especially in the scenario Weldyn Under Attack). Perhaps less obvious is that even young ogres are quite useful. Given their low, low price of 15 gold, they make good spam, attracting attention from the enemy and soaking up a lot of damage before they die.

Xenophobia

This is a fun and silly level as all parties in the scenario (i.e. elves, orcs, drawves, and yourself) decide to fight each other instead of forming aliances. The scenario is not very difficult, so you can use this time to gain some experience for your units, pick up another permanent holy amulet (in the north, roughly in the middle between the dwarf and the orc keep), and train ogres (see below).

You have two obvious options: attack the elves first or the dwarves first. Don't worry, they will be distracted by the orcs. After you kill the first leader, proceed to the orcs and then finish off the remaining leader.

Attacking the elves first has the advantage that they have the richest lands, i.e., the most villages, so it means more gold for you by the end of the scenario. It has the side effect that you're more likely to face a live orc leader relative to if you had attacked the dwarves first, as the elves are pretty good at killing him.

Attacking the dwarves first has the advantage that it's probably easier, since the orc leader is more likely to die at the hands of the elves, plus the mountains make good ogre training grounds. It has the disadvantage that you have to spend time getting out of the dwarven mountains and then you will ultimately fight a lot of elves, though most of them will have come out of their forests by then.

In either case, you have a lot of ground to cover, so try to do without any non-quick shock troopers. Calvary, white mages, red mages and spearman track units (preferably quick) are all good.

Strongly consider recruiting three or four young ogres as well. Use the young ogres on the mountains in the north (and west) to hunt down any stray dwarves (and elves) whilst levelling up to ogres.

(Future spoiler: This is your last chance to level non-leader units you will play two scenarios ahead in Captured. For instance, you may want to prepare a dragoon, a white mage, and a couple of adult ogres for that scenario.)

Lake Vrug

This is a very confusing hide and seek scenario that could take you several pointless restarts until you have finally discover the enemy leaders. To spare you the frustration, here is a spoiler...

Spoiler: there are three enemy keeps, all north of the river. One is to the very northeast (go to the right into the mounts directly after crossing the bridge), one is between the path leading west and the river bank just before the path turns northwards, and one is in the very north at the end of the path. The orc leader resides in the first keep, the gryphon leader in the second, and the third is empty.

Gryphons are vulnerable to the impact damage of heavy infantry and shock troopers, so recall two or three, preferably quick ones. Also recall another white mage to supplement Dacyn and recall as many ogres as possible, supplemented by young ogres. (Most of the enemy keeps are surrounded by high mountains which some of your troops cannot pass, but which the ogres handle quite easily.) You might also want to recruit a horseman to scout ahead.

Apart from finding the keeps, the main challenge in this scenario is surviving the first onslaught of gryphons, which starts around turn 4 with quite a number of gryphons appearing from the northwest. On hard, the onslaught will be especially difficult to handle. When you see the first gryphon swoop out of the fog, the thing to do is run! Generally where there is one gryphon, there are more gryphons. So, fall back and form a defensive line that will eventually become a circle. Keep in mind that you can grab good terrain, i.e., the mountains, as gryphons are only too happy to attack you wherever you are, and your ogres and young ogres will hold up well there. Once you have wounded units, position your heavy units like shock troopers and ogres very tighly around them, as the gryphons really have quite a large moving range and thus mercilessly slay unprotected injured units.

Just when you thought you had the gryphons wrapped up, here come the trolls across the bridge. They may be only a minor nuisance on medium or easy, but on hard it's a strain facing a large number of trolls with troops bloodied by the swarm of gryphons. Trolls are really no match for your shock troopers, however, who happily troll-crack away.

Unfortunately, the shock troopers won't do you much good in the end phase. When taking the enemy keeps, use the ogres, who can move well on the high mountains, unlike most of your other units.

Captured

Gweddry starts out on autopilot, running up a tunnel to find some of his companions. Do not send this group back the way he came, or you will have to face some extremely mean trolls in the narrow tunnel. Instead, follow the tunnel to the north and west. You will face a few bats as you proceed. At the end of that tunnel, you will enter a throne room where you will find an enemy leader and his troops. Don't panic; the leader doesn't recruit and the troops are pretty sedate. Beware that a troll can ambush you out of the shroud, though.

Meanwhile, when any of your units first enters the throne room, the resulting ruckus results in a group of your captured troops talking of escape. Already wounded, they appear in a cavern called the "Torture Room" to the east. These troops will face a number of assassins as they leave the Torture Room moving west. Try to get through the prison "door" of the torture room quickly; otherwise, the enemy units have an easy time keeping your entire army locked away using just a single unit blocking the door. To get through the entrance quickly, you need to have your troops back away, allowing the guard to come in so that you can get multiple attacks on him to kill him. Any ogres you have will come in handy to rush out and prevent others assassins from blocking the entrance.

Victory occurs when Gweddry moves through the exit in the southwest corner. There is quite a comfortable early finish bonus, so you might want to move him there quickly, because - believe me when I say - you're going to need every gold piece for the next scenario. You should also quickly flag the numerous villages in a cavern called "The City", a cavern southwest of the Torture Room, where you will be confronted by a troll and other enemy units. If you have a silver mage, remember that the silver mage can teleport back and forth between the Throne Room and The City, as needed. With these things in mind, it should be possible to finish with over 500 gold on medium or 300 gold on hard.

There is a holy necklace on this level in the City, at coordinates x=22, y=38. Preferably grab it with a horseman or something similar. He will come in very hand in later scenarios (if he survives the next scenario, that is.)

Note: Most of the orcs are level two and three units.

Evacuation

This scenario is a little frusting. Not so much because of its difficulty (it is hard but managable with enough high-level recalls and lots of money), but because you will take some heavy losses of high-level troops.

Note: You should have over 400 gold and a large number of level 2 and 3 units to recall to start this scenario.

There are two options in this scenario: you can either defeat all enemy leaders or blow up the bridge in the south. In the former case, you will have to accept quite some casualties in fighting the enemy; In the latter case, all your units which are not on the south side of the river by the time you blow up the bridge (including not recalled units, meanly!) are killed by the explosion. In both cases you have to watch out for the very tight time limit of 12 turns.

I went for option 2 (killing all leaders). First recruit two to tree keeps full of your typical experienced troops like iron maulers, white mages, and so on. Ogres are also helpful, if you have some left, as they are strong and you will have no use for them in later scnearios. After that recall a keep full of young ogres as cannon fodder.

Start to move you units south and attack the central enemy right away (i.e. do not wait until you have recruited all units). The last recalls before the young ogres split and send half of them to the north-east and the other half to the south-west (otherwise you might not make it to all three leaders in time). Finally, send some young ogres to the north-east and south-west to distract the enemies there for two or three turns.

With all three groops of your units try to focus on attacking the enemy leaders as soon as possible so you do not run out of time. Apart from that, watch out for the level 2 trolls, particularly, as they can (and frequently will...) instantly kill almost any of your units. Best fight them with two white mages or a white mage accompanied by some other unit.

With a bit of luck and probably some nasty casualties you will have killed all three leaders around turns 10 to 12.

[Garion] In 1.0, I recruited a lot of Cavalry for fodder, spacing them 1 hex apart to establish a ZOC corridor from my castle to the bridge. They got chewed up very quickly, but they bought me enough time to get out. Use a few Shock Troopers to guard your rear against the Blue enemy; they're too slow to escape anyway. Remember to recall your slowest units closest to the bridge, to minimize the time they spend in transit. I was able to evacuate 2 Holy Cavaliers, 2 Paladins, a Great Mage, the three heroes, a quick Iron Mauler, 2 White Mages, and a Mage of Light.

[Vladevil] In 1.2.6 what worked best for me was recruiting only fodder for 2 turns, then running away with all the main characters. I let Owaec and the mage first and Gweddry last since he can take some hits. All in all I was finished on the 6th turn without losing any valuable troops.

The Drowned Plains

The Skeletal Dragon will be found in or near the castle (located on an island in the south-east). In getting there, there is a chance the undead (three units mostly level two and an occasional level three) will spring out of the ground near the unit you just moved. Therefore less units are better. Advanced mages, paladins, and other fast-moving units with arcane weapons work well here. To withstand the initial dragon attack you will need very strong units (with more than 50 HP). In order to discover the dragon despite the fog units with a large moving range (and thus large visible area) like horseman are helpful.

The dragon wanders around near the castle but only attacks units which he can kill instantly. If only strong units come near him, he tries to flee. Because of the fog the major challenge of this scenario is finding him and then getting him surrounded so he cannot just move away again. Once you have him trapped like this, slaying him should be easy using your stronger units (preferrably impact weapons because the dragon has a low resistance there).

Approaching Weldyn

This scenario is fairly easy, but also fun to play. The essence to success is being very fast.

Recall 6 to 8 fast-moving units with arcane attacks. This should be any fast unit who has picked up a holy amulet in earlier scenarios like horsemen or spearmen plus some level 2 or level 3 mages. Completely forget about heavy infantry or other slow-moving troops of similar kind. Move all your units to the eastern enemy and try to kill him by turn 3 or 4 by the latest. This should be easy, as he is still very weak.

Then rush over to the western enemy. It will be night by now so not a good time for attacking. If you have a very strong and fast unit (like a dragoon) try to position it on the enemies keep. This trick stops the enemy leader from recruiting more troops despite having plenty of money left. Once your other troops arrive and daylight breaks you should have an easy time finishing of this enemy leader and those of his troops which you ally has not yet killed.

Then attack the third leader in the south-west in the same manner. If you hurry, you should be able to finish by turn 9 and gain a good early finish bonus.

The Council

Only plot in this. You see the inside of the castle.

Weldyn Under Attack

This is an interesting scenario where once again choosing the right strategy is the key to success. Also watch out for the time, as you have only 18 turns to finish.

You find your keep in the center of an island. Three allied leaders also have their keeps on the island around yours. There are three enemy leaders: a weak one in the very north, and two equally strong ones in the south-east and south-west, respectively. It stays nighttime (first and second watch) during the entire scenario which is somewhat uncomfortable, but not a big problem.

Start by recalling all high-level units with arcane attacks (6-8 units max). Then recruit two keeps full of mages. Send your troops straight north and finish of the enemy leader. He is quite weak and even moves onto your island so this should be painlessly accomplished by turn 3.

Then split your troops: one half moves onto the western shore (along the very border of the map), the other half onto the eastern shore (same). To get across the river use the bridges in the north-west and the north-east, respectively. Let some of the mages stay behind and capture the villages on the island so you do not loose money. The may also assist you allies so they do not fall so quickly and keep the enemy busy.

The rest of the scenario is straight-forward: move both your troops southwards straight towards the enemy keeps and kill the leaders. As they have sent most of their troops onto the island where they are busy happily slaying away your allies, this should be no challenge for your troops. Watch out for the nightgaunts, though, which tend to ambush you or rush for weak units without you seeing them coming.

If all goes right you should have killed the remaining two enemy leaders around turns 14 or 15.

Hint: If you have one or two silver mages available (e.g. the engineer unit you joined you in the Escape scneario, if he has levelled by now) this is quite useful in this scenario. The map is rather large so have some fast-moving units like horseman run through enemy territory and capture individual villages. Then use the teleport ability of your silver mage to perform hit-and-run (or rather: hit-and-teleport) attacks to weaken your enemy before attacking with your main force. Make sure you do not get him killed, though, by holding out too long after attacking.

After killing all enemy leaders, an enemy messenger appears telling you that you have only fought some delegates of the ancient lich Mal-Ravenal. It challenges you to have a duel with Mal-Ravenal instead of letting the armies meet for a final battle. If you accept the challenge, you get to scenario "The Duel". Otherwise you get to "Weldyn Besieged".

Diverging Campaign Path

The Duel

This is a somewhat strange scenario: you and Mal-Ravanal get to recall/recruit exactly six units each and then have to fight each other. Mal-Ravenal will recruit mostly level 3 units so this looks difficult. In fact, it is quite managable, however.

Recall mostly mages of light and other high-level arcance troops. Set them up in a line of 4 units backed up by 2 units at the edge of one of the forsts near your keep. (Your leader should stand in the back up line so he does not accidentaly get killed.)

Then wait for his troops to reach you, but make sure you are the first to attack. By the time you meet it will be close to nightfall. Do not hesitate to attack, however, as Mal-Ravanal plays unfair and recruits another 3 units on every first watch.

In your first attack you should be able to kill two enemy units. Try to have at least 5 of your units survive the first round of enemy attacks. Then kill the remaining enemy units near you and move over to Mal-Ravenal straight away who hides by himself on the very border of the map in the mountains. Again, do not wait for daylight, as you can reach him before his reinforcements get to you, so you should have an easy time killing him with your remaining units.

Spoiler: After killing Mal-Ravanal the campaign ends with a final scene of Gweddry and his companions being honoured by the king.

Weldyn Besieged

On versions prior to 1.5.6 the siege is laughably easy to break; just recall a keep full of your best troops and rush Mal-Ravanal in the south.

As of 1.5.6 this battle should prove a more substantial challenge. Now the liches' names aren't revealed until they are attacked, and Mal-Ravanal is more likely to be revealed later in the scenario. Sending fast scouts to attack all the liches is not advisable since each lich receives a boost of gold for another round of recruitment after its name is revealed.

A workable strategy is to recall a group of cavalry with holy amulets and paladins to circle behind the undead horde and terminate the liches. You can draw the liches out of their keeps by positioning a sacrificial horseman within their attack radius. Once the lich is out in the open, your arcane damage cavalry should have no trouble finishing the lich off in a single turn.

Meanwhile you'll need the rest of your troops to hold the central keep against the undead onslaught. If you can spare the funds, a few sacrificial troops can delay the incoming enemies on one side, giving you the opportunity to focus your firepower on the undead approaching from the other side(s). If things turn grim, retreat to the castle and make your final stand.