SonOfThe BlackEye

The End Of Peace

• Objectives: Defeat Albert, the human lieutenant
• Lose if: Kapou'e dies or time runs out
• Turns: 34/30/26 (easy/medium/hard)
• Starting units: Kapou'e

It looks tempting to recruit lots of Wolf Riders to match the humans' cavalry mobility, but don't try -- they're not quite a match for cavalry and tend to get cut to pieces in detail. Two Wolf Riders for village stealing is enough, recruit mostly Orcish Grunts and Orcish Archers instead. Keep close order, pot the cavalry with Archers, and bodyguard the Archers with the Grunts. Kapou'e can do a second round of recruiting at one of the neutral keeps closer to the battle.

Hint: Read ahead one scenario.

The Human Army

• Objectives: Resist until your people can leave, then get Kapou'e to the signpost
• Lose if: Kapou'e dies or time runs out
• Turns: 18/18/18 (easy/medium/hard)
• Starting units: Kapou'e

Avoid this scenario; it is very difficult to beat. You'll be given the option at the end of the first scenario.

Towards Mountains of Haag

• Objectives: Move Kapou'e to the signpost and, optionally, kill the dwarf leader
• Lose if: Kapou'e or Grüü dies or time runs out
• Turns: 27/24/20 (easy/medium/hard)
• Starting units: Kapou'e and one other unit

Players have succeeded by either running or fighting.

Option 1, run: Keep Kapou'e and your troops moving and try to brush the dwarves off your flank as you pass, because if they get to mass on you and fight a static battle they will chop you to dogmeat. Recruit at most for two rounds and run for the signpost at least until the trolls show up. Then, if the odds are with you, you can linger a bit and harvest some XP. If you fight the dwarves, try and get them onto non-hill/mountain terrain. Again, your Archers are your best offensive tool, but you need to use Grunts and Wolf Riders keep the dwarves off them.

Option 2, fight: Run 2-3 Wolf Riders around to nab ALL the villages outside the mountain border. They do not need to engage the enemy. Send a large force of Archers with their Grunt bodyguards to the hills west of your keep. If you have a Crossbowman, he will be especially effective. Grunts must often forgo attacks, for fear of getting too weakened to survive the enemy's turn. Bring in some raw recruit Grunts to handle the risky jobs, sparing your high XP Grunts. When the trolls arrive, they should help clear the path to the king. When he steps off his keep, send someone tough to cover the spot, like Kapou'e, who can then recruit reinforcements if you wish. Keep an eye on the clock, especially on the hardest setting. Even if you kill the Dwarven king, you still have to move Kapou'e to the signpost.

The next scenario is a tough one, but it will be much easier if you finish with lots of extra gold here.

The Siege of Barag Gor

• Objectives: Defeat the enemy leaders
• Lose if: Kapou'e, Grüü or any of the Shamans dies or time runs out
• Turns: 30/28/26 (easy/medium/hard)
• Starting units: Kapou'e, Grüü and a scout
• Other: try and get to the Assassin cage near Blue's castle. You get a loyal Assassin and the ability to train MORE Assassins.

Even though you get a nice allied troop surge in Barag Gor at the beginning of turn 2, the key to winning this one is that you shouldn't waste your own troops in a futile effort to hold the city. Instead, run the trapped Shamans out as soon as possible; a gap is likely to open up to the SE around turn 2 or 3. You can provide ZOC blocking with your Troll and Wolf Wider.

For taking care of the enemy leaders, players have had success with various strategies:

Option 1, clockwise: Take your troops south to knock out the elves there, then west, then north. One problem is that it's easy to get pinned in and overwhelmed at the south after taking out its leader. So, consider sending a few Wolves and maybe Troll Whelps counterclockwise to boost income and distract some of the enemy troops.

Option 2, two pronged: Send an assassination squad (heavy on Troll Whelps and/or Wolf Riders, possibly leveled) to take out the southeast leader. Send your leader, your Troll, and escorts north. To maximize your income, the escorts can be a relatively small and cheap squad of level 1's, in which case try using Wolf Rider bait to lure the enemy leader off his keep and also away from your leader, so your leader can sneak in to recruit more there. Then your northern and southern forces can head west to finish off the last two leaders, transferring Wolf Riders to bolster any lagging front.

Pay attention to income. The more income you get, the more Troll Whelps you can recruit. Think twice before recalling any level 2 units, except maybe Pillagers. Later in the game, the villages in the middle will be relatively undefended; swoop in with Wolf Riders.

It's also helpful to have gold coming into the scenario. On nightmare, it would be hard to win with much less than 280 gold.

Towards Harbor of Tirigaz

• Objectives: Defeat the enemy leaders
• Lose if: Kapou'e, Grüü or any of the Shamans dies or time runs out
• Turns: 36/30/24 (easy/medium/hard)
• Starting units: Kapou'e, Grüü, Jetto (the assassin, if you have him) and the Shamans

For recruitment, remember the Archer lines and the Troll lines. Anything else is far less useful. The level 3 Archers and Trolls can take out an undead unit every turn with little damage to themselves. Except for taking down the Liches, level 1 Archers and Troll Whelps can get the job done too; it will be at grave danger to themselves, but you won't shed a tear if a low XP unit dies.

For main strategy, players have used at least two basic approaches with success:

Option 1, southwest first: The northeastern enemy can be blocked with a couple of veteran units at the river fort; do that while you take villages on the near side of the river with your Shamans and take a recruiting round or two of troops south to deal with the southwestern enemy.

Option 2, northeast first: Head northeast and destroy the Lich there as quickly as possible. At the same time a few Archers supported by Kapou'e (who should be at least level 2 by now) should be enough to handle the Ghosts the southwest Lich will send your way (unless you're really unlucky). The southwest Skeletons are slowed down by the swamp, so by the time they reach your forces the Ghosts should be no more, and Archers + Troll Whelps can handle the skeletons. On the Warrior difficulty with some luck and enough Crossbowmen recalled at the start you can can finish this scenario in just 10 turns using this approach.

Spoiler: Ignore the holy water as any unit that reaches it will just drink it.

Black Flag

• Objectives: Defeat the human generals
• Lose if: Kapou'e, Grüü or any of the Shamans dies or time runs out
• Turns: 30/25/20 (easy/medium/hard)
• Starting units: Kapou'e, Grüü, Jetto and the Shamans

If you run Grüü and Kapou'e straight south to the central keep (not stopping to grab villages unless you can end a longest possible move south on one), you'll get to recruit troops in time to meet the first pirates on the beach. This will be good as fighting from the water hinders them. Punch out Harmon's (southern) keep first, then roll north. (If you can, take out the galleons by attacking them directly before they can offload their troops. Goblin Knights or Direwolf Riders are good for this. This way you can effectively take out four units for the price of one.)

The Desert of Death

• Objectives: Reach the oasis and defeat the bandit leader
• Lose if: Kapou'e, Grüü or any of the shamen dies or time runs out
• Turns: 22/20/18 (easy/medium/hard)
• Starting units: Kapou'e, Grüü, Jetto and the shamen

Pick troops with lots of mobility because the desert is hard to move in. Use your shamans' ranged attacks against the giant scorpions. Head southeast towards the near edge of the big lake; the enemy you'll need to defeat is there. His troops aren't very effective but beware of letting isolated units get swarmed.

The Silent Forest

• Objectives: Defeat the elves
• Lose if: Kapou'e, Grüü or any of the shamen dies or time runs out
• Turns: 40/38/36 (easy/medium/hard)
• Starting units: Kapou'e, Grüü, Jetto and the shamen

The only real trouble in this scenario are the woses (aka walking trees). They have a very strong melee attack that poses a danger even to strong level 3 units. Also they can hide in the forst. The actual elves are pretty weak though.

I used the following strategy (Start Gold: 100, Medium Difficulty):

1. Recalls: 2 Orcis Warlords, 1 Direwolf Rider, 2 Slurbows (in addition you have Gruu the Troll, the 3 shamans, the loyal assassin, and your leader who should be level 3)
2. Send one group (2 warlords, Gruu and the assassin) straight south. Kill the couple of elves you encounter. Make them fight you from open grounds, so they do not get 70% defence from the woods. Press on south and kill the south leader. So, far for the easy part.
3. Send a second group with your leader and the 2 slurbows westwards over the river close to the north border. Make sure you always stay at least 2 hexes away from the woods because of the elve defence and to avoid being suprised by woses. When you encounter the elves and woses exploit the woses' slow movement: Retreat just far enough that only the elves can attack you. At night use your slurbows with their strong fire attack to kill the woses one at a time.
4. As soon as group one is done killing the south leader send it westwards to aid group two. Once you have killed all woses go for the west leader.
5. The shamans stay well away from all fighting as otherwise they will just get killed.
6. The direwolf rider is scouting the terroritory and taking villages in the center of the map. Make sure to retreat as soon as you encounter enemy units as it easily gets circled and then killed.
7. With this strategy I finished in turn 26 without hurrying.

Shan Taum the Smug

• Objectives: Surive for 20 turns or, optionally, defeat Shan Taum
• Lose if: Kapou'e, Grüü or any of the shamen dies
• Turns: 20/20/20 (easy/medium/hard)
• Starting units: Kapou'e, Grüü, Jetto and the shamen

I went for killing the enemy leader with the following strategy (about 300+ start gold, medium difficulty):

1. Recall: All of the troll warriors or other trolls you have. They come in really handy hear because they can take quite a load of melee damage (as afflicted by the ogres, for example) and then regenerate. Also recall some orc slurbows and orcish warloards plus two riders to go around the map corners.
2. Spend the rest of your money recruiting troll whelps.
3. Position your entire army in a long north-south line at the hills at the map center, west of the river. Make sure your troll warriors and other level 3s form the initial front line.
4. Send one rider around the north grabbing villages and the other around the south. Retreat the south rider when is in danger of being attacked by more than one unit.
5. The enemy assault comes quick and heavy, but does not last very long. Rotate your level 3s, so they do not get killed. If you have too many wounded, fill the holes in your line with troll whelps. (N.B.: A troll whelp backed by your leader can do quite some damage due to his leadership ability.)
6. Around turn 8 or 9 the enemy runs out of reinforcements. Once most of the ogres are dead, just overrun the remains of his troops and go straight for the leader. Use the troops that are not fighting to grab the rest of the villages to slow down your enemies recruiting even further.
7. By arond turn 13 you will have easily killed the enemy leader.

A downside of this strategy is that despite of the early finish bonus you burn most of your money. To avoid this reducing the number of troll whelps recruited should do the trick.

Saving Inarix

• Objectives: Destroy the bridge and, optionally, bring Inarix and the saurians to safety before blowing the bridge
• Lose if: Kapou'e or Grüü dies or time runs out
• Turns: 16/16/16 (easy/medium/hard)
• Starting units: Kapou'e, Grüü, Jetto and Plonk

With 290 starting gold on medium difficulty the following works fine:

1. Recall one keep of high-level trolls
2. Rush southwards and occupy the central keep. Form two diagonal defense lines: one extending from the keep to the north-west (for the drawves) and one extending to the north-east (for the elves).
3. Recruit one to three keeps of throll whelps. With your leader in the middle of the keep giving them all leadership they are quite strong fighters and cheap to recruit.
4. Keep rotating your lines so the trolls can regenerate to limit your losses.
5. At the end of turn 4 Inarix appears in the south east with a group of saurians. They will only be attacked by a few units, so form a formation with the healers in the middle and run them up in the center of the map, killing the attackers as you go. Use the swamps and water if possible for the high defense or even try to lure your attackers into it. Focus on moving them northwards and do not waste time though!
6. At the end of turn 7 the elves and dwarves are getting low on units. Beware though: they now receive 400 gold each and start heavily recruiting again. If you are really quick and concentrate on diminishing the elven attackers in turns 1 to 6, you can overun the elves and kill their leader. That will make the rest of the scenario very easy going as you will only be attacked by the dwarves.
7. If you do not manage to kill the elven leader, do not worry however. Just run Inarix and his group up to the north. As soon as they reach your defense line, start moving all units up north back across the bridge. Use the troll whelps as buffer to keep away the attackers as you do so.
8. Once all valuable units are past the center of the bridge, blow it up by moving a unit onto the little barrel in the water just east of it. Be aware though, that the troll whelps cannot reach the barrel. You should sacrifice a saurian skirmisher instead for blowing up the bridge.

Some more hints:

• The elves recruit level 1 units only, so this sceneario is a good leveling-up opportunity for your units.
• It will make the next level a lot easier if you can level one of the Augurs to a Soothsayer (+8 heal). Make this a priority.

Clash of Armies

• Objectives: Defend Prestim for 4 days
• Lose if: Kapou'e or Grüü dies a watch tower is destroyed
• Turns: 24/24/24 (easy/medium/hard)
• Starting units: Kapou'e, Grüü, Jetto, Plonk, Inarix and some units

You'll only have +4 healing from your saurians (unless you have already leveled an Augur), so this is a test of how efficiently you can cycle units from the fortifications back to villages without losing them. Your left flank is more exposed than your right as there will be gryphons and the occasional merman (they become rare after the first surge). Hold the river bastion or bridge if possible; if they get to the shore hey'll be able to widen the front and make better use of their numbers. Orcish Slurbows will be really useful. Grüü will be effective against the Gryphons, so try and keep him in the hills. Lure the mermen onto land and then strike at them with leveled up trolls and Inarix.

The assault across the river is weak and you should easily contain it. There are only 3 hexes where the enemy can attack you from so you can bottle their massive force up quite easily. If a weak (level 1) unit gets in one of these hexes, don't kill it. They will clog the way. Would you rather have an Archer attack you or a Red Mage? Use this area to sneak kills for your lower level units (especially to get a Soothsayer) but in general just have Orcish Warlords, Slurbows and Troll Warriors hold the bridgehead.

The stiffer challenge comes from the mermen and Gryphons. Keep a Slurbow on the bridge to intercept any Gryphons. As for the mermen, those castle hexes on the water are just trying to sucker you in. If you go there you will be fighting the mermen when they are in water. Bad idea. Go a little inland. You'll be closer to the villages and the mermen will be on land and easier to hit. Again, do most of the damage with your strong units and sneak kills with lower level ones. This is the best place for Kapou'e to take advantage of his leadership.

Here is a short strategy which works on minimum starting gold (200) and medium difficulty:

1. Recall all troll warriors you have, plus some orcish warlords, slurbows, and one saurian healer.
2. Position 4 troll warriors together with Inarix and maybe one of the loyal assassins at the very east, one hex away from the beach. This group fends of the initial mermen onslaught and some gryphons. After the first couple of waves have been beaten, this becomes a very relaxing task well-suited for leveling Inarix.
3. On the bridgehead put the healer in the middle hex and circle your leader, the orcish warlords, slurbows and remaining trolls.
4. After about turn 8 or 9 the gryphons are done with except for an occassional single gryphon recruit. Once you have the money recall the other saurian healers and use the outer hexes of the bridgehead to level them to soothsayers.

Giving Some Back

• Objectives: Defeat the enemy leaders
• Lose if: Kapou'e or Grüü dies or time runs out
• Turns: 28/24/20 (easy/medium/hard)
• Starting units: Kapou'e, Grüü, Jetto and Inarix

This is a somewhat easy scenario, if you keep your critical and loyal troops out of harm's way. Early on, your orcish allies do much of the job for you. With a keep full of veteran recruits you should easily able to finish off in half the turns, though you can instead use mostly level 1's and win at a slower pace. For the slower strategy, recruit or recall a couple of quick Wolf Riders and send then along the western edge and into the treasure trove of enemy villages.

Once the north enemy is defeated, the southern enemy receives another 400 gold and recruits a second wave. If you are very quick, you might be able to kill the south leader first, so this does not happen. If you are less quick, you might catch the second wave in water. If you are slow, you may fight them on open ground and fortess hexes, where they may prove a challenge.

Hints:

• Watch out for the shock troopers, they can cause severe damage even to your trolls.
• You can use this scenario to level some troops e.g. archers and saurians.

A Dwarvish Stand

• Objectives: Defeat the enemy leaders
• Lose if: Kapou'e or Grüü dies or time runs out
• Turns: 35/30/27 (easy/medium/hard)
• Starting units: Kapou'e, Grüü, Jetto and Inarix

This is a relatively easy scenario.

Recruit Wolf Riders and other types with lots of mobility, because just mushing through the snow to get to the enemy units is work. You know all those Troll Whelps you've been spamming? Now is the time to recall your half-leveled Whelps who are quick and preferably fearless, but steer them away from snow and ice. Quick assassins and archers are also helpful. Let your allies get in front of you and screen your troops. Let them fight the entrenched units and rush out onto poor defensive ground. Your Saurians will be almost useless here due to low mobility. It may be worthwhile to have a Soothsayer or two.

Simple alternative strategy for this easy scenario (min starting gold 300, medium difficulty):

1. Recall only one keep of: 1 direwolf rider, 5 troll warriors (preferrably with the quick ability).
2. Send one troll warrior together with the assassin and the rider around the south supporting your ally and taking some villages.
3. Send all other troll warriors toghether with your leader through the hills to the north and then west.
4. First fight off the Gryphons which is rather easy here.
5. Then position your main force at the edge of the hills south-west of the ice river in the north and lure the dwarves into the river. (Fighting them in the hills is quite a pain.)
6. Once the main wave of dwarves is dealt with, press on towards the dwarven leader and kill him.
7. By this time the humans should be running low on units as well. Move some spare units in to kill their leader.
8. Inarix is quite useless here and stays in one of the villages near the keep. ;-)
9. You should be finished around turn 15 already and get a fair amount of money out of it.

Back Home

• Objectives: Defeat the enemy leaders
• Lose if: Kapou'e or Grüü dies or time runs out
• Turns: 40/35/30 (easy/medium/hard)
• Starting units: Kapou'e, Jetto and Inarix

The only diffcult part in this scenario is the very start. The following strategy works for any difficulty level with minimum gold:

1. Recall two quick Orcish Warlords on the tiles closest to your enemy's keep. Then recall lots of (preferably quick) Warlords and Slurbows, two Soothsayers (preferably quick), and at least two Riders. Optionally, adding lots of leveled Riders will enable a very early finish. Note that you cannot recall any of your trolls, because they have gone with Grüü and show up again later.
2. Position the Warlords on the two towers facing your enemies keep and back them up with you other troops. If you are really quick and manage to get these two units to the tower, you're almost done. Also occupy one or two villages which extend in a straight line with the towers to the southeast. Do not let any of your units be attacked while standing on the snow! Now just let your enemy wear itself out on your well-shielded troops while rotating and healing them.
3. In parallel, send the riders along the very south of the map, grabbing some villages. A second mission they may have is to assist the southwestern ally, if he gets into trouble. Optionally, you also can send a quick rider to grab northwestern villages and assist the trolls (not that they need any help.)
4. At the beginning of turn 4 your first orcish allies arrives to the southeast; at the beginning of turn 5 the second one arrives to the northeast.
5. About the time your closest human is beaten, the elvish enemy starts to reach you from the North. Occupy the keep of your human enemy and kill the Elves using the same strategy as before (you on castle hexes, them in the snow.)
6. At the beginning of turn 7, Grüü arrives to the north-west. You control Grüü as well. Recall three Troll Warriors (quick, fearless is best) and recruit three Troll Whelps. With this, help your northern ally a little to beat your enemies there. Stay in the hills, preferably, for good defense.
7. Once the elvish wave is defeated, move your main force north and kill the two leaders in the middle, either in sequence or in parallel.

Additional tips:

• The best setting for your allies (right click) may be "defensive" with no objective. This will help the southeastern leader stay out of trouble.
• Pay attention to gold, as you'll need extra for the next scenario.

Civil War

• Objectives: Defeat the enemy leaders and move Kapou'e to the signpost
• Lose if: Kapou'e or Grüü dies or time runs out
• Turns: 40/35/30 (easy/medium/hard)
• Starting units: Kapou'e, Grüü, Jetto and Inarix

It's difficult to get this one finished in time unless you divide your forces and get maximum use from the roads. Send two groups at the northwestern and southeastern keeps, then converge on the southwestern one.

The Coward

• Objectives: Defeat the enemy leaders
• Lose if: Kapou'e or Grüü dies or time runs out
• Turns: 34/32/28 (easy/medium/hard)
• Starting units: Kapou'e, Grüü, Jetto and Inarix

Lots of scenery -- and lots of villages -- in this one. Build two or three wolf riders just to run around grabbing villages, it will pay off. The AI will tend to move his units north to grab the coastal villages; encourage this by sending a handful of veterans in that direction to draw more troops north even as you run your main body down the road towards the city gate. [Make sure you take out the two leaders close to your starting position on the first turn or you will be fighting a losing battle with fourteen units right on top of your four units and no place to recruit from.]

Human Attack

• Objectives: Survive for 30 turns or defeat Earl Lanbec'h
• Lose if: Kapou'e or Grüü dies
• Turns: 30/30/30 (easy/medium/hard)
• Starting units: Kapou'e, Grüü, Jetto and Inarix

Let your ally-generals soak up the casualties; use them to screen your flanks and your movements. A static defense on the city wall will work, or you can recruit a large army early on and punch down the middle; that has the advantage that you may be able to take out Earl Lanbec'h before a lot of his reinforcements arrive (they show up at the south-center edge of the board every morning).

Feel free to spend a lot of money. The early finish bonus is massive.

Northern Alliance

• Objectives: Kill Shan Taum and Earl Lanbec'h
• Lose if: Kapou'e, Grüü or Howgarth III dies or time runs out
• Turns: no limit
• Starting units: Kapou'e, Grüü, Jetto and Inarix

Shan Taum is far weaker than Lanbec'h. The benefit of taking him out quickly is that your ally will then concentrate his forces on Lanbec'h; if both enemies are present, Howgarth's forces oscillate a little in between the two.

You should start this level with a lot of gold. Keep recruiting every turn until you run out. With the Great Horde low upkeep this will take a while. Keep doing it. Since you'll largely be level 1 units against their level 2 and 3 units, Orcish Assassins level the playing field nicely with poisoning. The Assassins also have high defense and tend to draw enemy attacks.

Hold the wall until you reach a certain (im)balance and then push south. Lanbec'h gets reinforcements in the afternoon but they are nothing like as formidable as the previous scenario. All you have to do is kill Lanbec'h, not all the enemy units. So, if you get a chance, pick him off.

If you are willing to put up with the tedium of recruiting tons of units, your victory should be inevitable.