Impossible warrior LEVEL 61/Day 7/all quests/ZERO casualties run

[loreangelicus]

At last, I have finally completed my high-score attempt. Family, work, and limited playing time has made this into a 4 month project in the making. Below are the main goals (must complete) and secondary goals (not necessary to complete, but would be nice) that I had set for myself:


main goals:
* Impossible difficulty using Warrior class
* LEVEL 61!!!
* Day 7
* all 87 quests
* ZERO casualties

seconday goals:
* all medals at level 3
* all 3 stats 30+ (Attack: 37; Defense: 33; Intellect: 32)
* crystals collected 1,070
* FAILED: 5,979,036 gold (was targeting 6 million gold); this is easy to cheat though as you have the opportunity to sell high-cost scrolls and buy them back for ZERO gold at Darion
* FAILED: pet dragon only level 57 (was targeting level 60)

final score: 1,869


I armed myself with as much info as I can get out of the posts from this forum, and there are definitely great tips to be found here. But I must point out (and give credit to) VITAL tips to be found in the following links:


SHORTEST ROUTE

http://forum.1cpublishing.eu/showthread.php?t=11666&highlight=unicornXP
http://forum.1cpublishing.eu/showthread.php?t=11996


QUEST LIST

http://forum.1cpublishing.eu/showthread.php?t=11137


The posts above have pretty much handed me the path to take in order to achieve a 7 day run and complete all 87 quests. I especially thank unicornXP as it is a very slight variant of his path that I took in completing this game:

Debir --> Scarlet --> Bolo --> Verona --> Rusty Anchor --> Scarlet --> Debir --> Verona --> Montero --> Verona --> Dersu --> Uzala --> Elon --> Nameless --> Reha --> Umakas --> Montero --> Tekron --> Rusty Anchor --> Scarlet --> Debir --> Sheterra --> Dersu --> Elon --> Nameless --> Uzala --> Verona


LEVEL 60

http://forum.1cpublishing.eu/showthread.php?t=12860&highlight=DGDobrev


XP items and skills are vital for a high-level run, and below are the items and skills to go for:

* Learning 3 from the Mind tree - +20% XP
* Shark's Tooth regalia - +5% XP [guaranteed at Scarlet]
* Memoir's of the Marshal - +5% XP [at Montero in my game]
* Hand of Necropolis (you could have 2 in a game) - +10% XP [had 2, both at Verona, in my game]
* a gift bag mod item - +5% XP (I didn't use the gift bag mod though)

UnicornXP hinted in his post that the key to a high level run was the use of Ancient Knowledge scrolls. But when do you use them? Which enemies were worthy of the use of an AK scroll? It was DGDobrev that addressed this question in his post above. His detailed evaluation of expected XP from enemies from different islands was what gave me a key understanding as to how to chain-fight the 5 enemies each AK scroll usage provided.

Given that AK scrolls are vital to reach level 60+, how do you get a good supply of them?

1) Shops sometimes sell wanderer scrolls. And a good idea is to use the KBScanner (http://forum.1cpublishing.eu/showthread.php?t=11780&highlight=KBScanner) to guarantee that you have 3+ AK scrolls sold at shops. Some people people say that this is tantamount to cheating, but my contention to this is that a high-score no-casualties run takes a lot of time and effort, and it is too much to ask from a player to leave it all to chance if the game he is playing would net him level 60+. I myself had a guaranteed 3 AK scrolls sold at shops.

2) Your pet dragon has one ability, chest digging, that could net you wanderer scrolls. You still have to be very lucky to get AK scrolls from chests since the most common contents are gold and common spells, but you could increase your chances by REPLAYING the battle and moving your troops DIFFERENTLY from the previous attempt (which would net you different contents for the chests from the previous battle).

3) Duplicate navigational maps turn into wanderer scrolls instead, and could result in an AK scroll. But take note that this is FIXED; reloading from a save game before picking up the navi map would not result in a different wanderer scroll.

4) Elenhel gives you a wanderer scroll every 30 battles. The nice thing about this is that you have a 1 in 11 chance of getting an AK scroll, and just like the chests, you could REPLAY the 30th battle differently to possible give you a different wanderer scroll. I found this to actually be the best way of getting a good supply of AK scrolls. So get Elenhel as early as you can, and you can "bypass" his 20 INT requirement by temporarily giving even your low-INT warrior +10 INT using the wanderer scroll Depth of Thought.

Just to give you an idea of the number of AK scrolls to expect, below is a tally of the AK scrolls that I got in each of the 4 ways:

Ancient Knowldege scrolls: (16 total)
- shops (x3)
- chests (x5)
- Elenhel (x5) [could have gotten 6 from him, but already had enough AK scrolls for remaining enemies]
- duplicate navi maps (x3)


And in following DGDobrev's footsteps, below is a list of enemies (and their XP) that I used an AK scroll on:
(NOTE: all battles below are at +50% XP from items & skills and an additional +50% XP from AK)


AK#1

MONTERO:
Hagni - 11,004
Thomas Torkve - 8,498
Crazy Miner - 8,661
Iron Fist - 9,521
Fangol - 15,649


AK#2

MONTERO:
boss Driller - 20,701
Necromancer Mesmer - 7,215

VERONA:
Arnold Heningem - 18,771
Marquis of Krause - 8,902
Demenion - 24,891


AK#3

UZALA:
Koruskan - 10,667
Elenhel (when he rebels) - 15,315
Urh-Urh - 10,043
Rakush - 13,237
Weed - 11,425


AK#4

UZALA:
Captain Krueger - 9,828

ELON:
Great Uchkuk - 20,425
Shenobi - 28,658
Rakatarh - 11,209
Kotor - 11,034


AK#5

ELON:
Shiva - 11,537
boss Zilgadis - 33,121
Uldara - 14,306
Moro Dark - 22,886
Professor Dambior - 13,156


AK#6

REHA:
regular enemy 1 - 8,506
regular enemy 2 - 6,532
Sarkash - 25,433
regular enemy 3 - 6,845
regular enemy 4 - 7,750


AK#7

REHA:
regular enemy 5 - 8,614
regular enemy 6 - 7,428
regular enemy 7 - 7,765
regular enemy 8 - 6,981
Marakash - 22,753


AK#8

REHA:
Chief Harrus - 27,576
regular enemy 9 (guarding the Singing Dagger) - 7,003
Ziraks - 29,718
Harrum - 26,551
boss K'Tahu - 41,401


AK#9

MONTERO:
Gnusmas - 6,778
regular enemy (dragon lair) - 6,475

TEKRON:
Sir Gavendum - 6,900
regular enemy 1 (Abyss) - 6,719
regular enemy 2 (Abyss) - 7,174


AK#10

TEKRON:
Professor Nimnul - 9,112
Hararos - 6,122
Spirits of Sorrow - 8,212
regular enemy 3 (temple of sorrow) - 3,294
regular enemy 4 (Grand Canal) - 4,809


AK#11

TEKRON:
Black Joker - 8,626

SHETERRA:
regular enemy 1 - 6,672
Sargatas - 14,582
Samman - 23,124
regular enemy 2 - 6,375


AK#12

SHETERRA:
Von Cracow - 15,431
regular enemy 3 - 5,088
regular enemy 4 - 6,617
regular enemy 5 (Ultrax) - 5,575
regular enemy 6 (Ultrax) - 6,433


AK#13

SHETERRA:
Master Skinnner - 13,679
Asklepy - 13,481
regular enemy 5 - 5,471

DERSU:
boss Spider - 12,421
boss Frog - 16,561


AK#14

NAMELESS:
White Night - 15,279
Vlad Vegeto - 16,626
Restless Zombie - 17,820
Dark Mistikus - 13,948

ITEM SUPPRESSION:
Demetrius - 2,845


AK#15

ITEM SUPPRESSION:
Flame Necklace 1 - 2,743
Flame Necklace 2 - 4,318
General's Baton - 2,943
Adept's Staff - 4,179

DARION:
boss Baal - 53,821


Other enemies that were worthy of an AK scroll charge, but I took on without an AK scroll on were:

MONTERO:
Xerxes - 6,042
Hungry Beast - 5,448

DERSU:
Hogan - 5,495

NAMELESS:
9 regular enemies


So why wasn't I able to use AK charges against these enemies, wasted some charges on item suppression battles, and used only 15 of the 16 AK scrolls that I collected? The simply answer is that you can't plan for everything, and I made a bad decision... I decided to hold of fighting the item suppression battles that I have collected in my inventory. I started fighting them after I defeated the Frog boss... and luckily(?) picked up 2 additional AK scrolls from chests in those battles. :) The placing of my "guaranteed" AK scrolls from shops and duplicate navi maps were not too good as well, almost all of them showing up AFTER wiping out Elon, Nameless and Reha. I already had enough intuition to skip all the enemy hero battles at Nameless for later (since my planned path took me back to the said island for a second visit), but I should have gone further by initially skipping all the regular enemies at Namelss as well.

So, is level 61 the highest possible level that could be achieved? I would like to think not, and that level 62 is reachable. I have already shown that my choice of enemies to take on with an AK scroll has room for improvement. And if one uses the gift bag mod then another +5% XP item becomes available. You need 1,708,500 XP to reach level 61 (I ended the game with
1,712,523), and level 62 is 1,813,900 XP. I'll leave it for others to do the math on this one, if level 62 is possible.


As for zero casualties, there are just too many good tactics out there. I just found some posts saying that one could solo-unit the game with black knights, another saying that one could solo-unit the game with bone dragons, and another saying he took out Baal with just two stacks of repair droids. Staying in line with my motto as early as KBTL to use a full lineup of troops, I decided to use black knights, bone dragons, repair droids (split into two stacks so that they could repair each other), and guard droids.


Attached below are screenshots of my high score stats.

It has been a blast playing KBAP! I do hope people continue to push the game to its limits and play on. :)

[Razorflame]

well done chap;-)
^^

same like KBTL eh?:D

[loreangelicus]

well done chap;-)
^^

same like KBTL eh?:D

Thanks. :) And just like in KBTL, I sincerely hope someone pushes the game a bit more, finds out something new, and one-ups me. :)

It is the challenge that pushes our planning and tactics to new heights.

[Razorflame]

for that i think we need the old team that pushed the limits to the highscore of kbtl as well

i remember how we discussed alot fo things and eventually made me make an tutorial xD

lol
all i care is for 0 casualties;)

[MaroonMaurader]

Very nicely done.

[Esteral]

Hiya loreangelicus,

Nice job.

Could you maybe explain a bit how you keep de wandering down on each map.
At the moment I am playing a Mage and I am lvl 29 on Elon, and i am already on day 7. I only lost about 3 hours or so because I went to Rusty Anchor twice.
Problem for me seems that I lost to much time on Verona en Montero.

I hardly kite and I try to keep walking down to a minimum but still I seems to lose a lot of time getting new and keep my army on or near max units.
(I got sarifice very late).

Maybe you can give some more info on your tactics.

Thanks

[Razorflame]

@esteral

some tips for u might include(i'm quite sure lorean used this)

step 1. use kbscanner(for the right items and where the good units are)

step 2. start the game finish tutorial(then SAVE)

step 3. scout all map and see what opponents u get and how to handle them

step.4 go back to the saved game and take the path u aim for fastest walking time

step.5 on new continent save again

step6. repeat step 3

step7. repeat step 4

do this all and u can get the shortest time :)

it's not as hard as it looks:)

i have to give him props for using a full stack though since u can cheese easily with a 1 bk stack or bone dragon stack and use eviln;)

but then again that can also be used in combination with the droids:) very thoughtfull thinking

[loreangelicus]

@esteral

some tips for u might include(i'm quite sure lorean used this)

step 1. use kbscanner(for the right items and where the good units are)

step 2. start the game finish tutorial(then SAVE)

step 3. scout all map and see what opponents u get and how to handle them

step.4 go back to the saved game and take the path u aim for fastest walking time

step.5 on new continent save again

step6. repeat step 3

step7. repeat step 4

do this all and u can get the shortest time :)

it's not as hard as it looks:)

i have to give him props for using a full stack though since u can cheese easily with a 1 bk stack or bone dragon stack and use eviln;)

but then again that can also be used in combination with the droids:) very thoughtfull thinking

Correct on all accounts! Armed with the quest list and the definitive path, it was just a matter of pre-scouting a new continent, then reloading from a save game.

I did get Sacrifice early on because I was digging chests a lot and even replaying battles when I didn't like the contents of the 3 dug up chests. Also, I stuck with a definitive crew: droids, then black knights (via call of death) and finally bone dragons (via call of death or call colossus). You buy as may droids as you can on Bolo, then load up your 2 reserve slots with tons of repair and guard droids (to last till the end of the game) once you hit Montero. Then it's pretty easy to top up your 2 undead stacks using sacrifice on the droids. This meant I didn't need to buy troops after the initial visit to Montero.

You guys should really try the droid-undead lineup. :-) All the enemies would concentrate fire on the droids (when they are within attack range), who are even easier to resurrect than the Eviln-powered undead.

[Razorflame]

i will try sometime maybe;-)

currrently thinking of a impossible game with pally with phantomed ed
^^

makes dragons that much stronger xD

[Esteral]

Thanks for the info Razor and Lore,

Iam playing with the gift pack and also used the scanner to get a nice build, but at the moment I got stopped in my impossible mage campgain.
I am lvl 29 and on Elon. Killed all the normal mob but Shenobi is to strong (lvl 44). I tried to battle him, but his troops do just to much dmg.
I have 10000 leadership and got 5 Red dragons , 42 Pallies, 55 Ancient Vampires, 47 Demonologist, 66 Black knights. Also have Mages and Inquistors in reserve.

He has Trolls, Ogres , Demonologists, Ancent Ents, and a bunch of orcs and stuff. Problem is his lvl 5 troops are too strong at this lvl for me.

I am trying to figure out how I can get my lvl up, but on all previous Islands I killed 98% of all troops. Only Montero Dungeon is mainly untouched and most of the hero's I left alive, because they are to strong (10+ lvls compaired to me). I played a noloss mage game before without the gift pack. The gift pack moved some of the higher lvl boss mobs and I have the impression some easier mobs are made harder in the gift pack but I am not sure if the game got harder with the gift back. Also I am still trying to figure out if I should do better on Montero and kill the hero's there.

Maybe you can tell me what your general lvl was at the mayor islands. Did you also have the flying horse when you left Montero?

I will try with the droids, I tried before but never really liked them.

[Razorflame]

esteral your unit combination is a bit weird to me but anyway
for that battle

i would suggest swapping the black knights for evil beholders if u got any of them

i would swap the red dragon for a emerald green dragon

i would swap the vamps for royal thorns

and maybe but not sure of this swap pallies for royal griffins but i don't think is nescearry


on first turn
aussuming u got onslaught at level 1 and quick draw too

(make a phantom emerald dragon
fly to his units and use that mana boost)

throw a fireball on the ents

and use the evil beholder to mind control the goblins to attack an level 5 units
or try to get him fall into sleep(gobs sleep easily)

second turn cast fear on a low goblin if the sleep fails
and cast another fireball on the ents
and wait your real emerald dragon(he needs to steal mana after the second round)

then turn 3 fly back with the real emerald and phantom it again and move to phantom again to enemy
while meanwhile keep summoning those thorns and hit his level 5 units as hard as u can and try to kill ents first(aussuimg they are burning they die fast)

and keep a low stack of goblins alive for mass resu;)
turn fear on them or something so they won't attack:)

hope this helps

[Esteral]

Thanks for the tips.

But I do have some questions on it.

- How do you keep de royal thorns alive, they cannot be ressed ?
- Evil beholders I used in the passed with a warrrior build but they not so usefull in most fights. I liked the Ancient Vampires better because they heal themselfs and created more rage, which I then can turn into mana.

- I used the reds for the fire on the ents, got also turn back time, but still 43 ants in 2 stacks are a lot.

I will try to get a screenshot of the battle field. (Added a screenshot)

[Razorflame]

demonologist can heal royal thorns
using their life force ability;-)

^^

it's better to use a fireball on the ents
and use emeralds for mana

85 ents are easy ;-)
one of the most easy battles
maybe after bears;)

[Esteral]

I will try and see what happens with Green Dragon's.

I should probably first go back to Verona/ Montero and kill most of the mobs there then continue on. At lvl 29 I am not sure I can pull this off.

[Razorflame]

seems doable though

only have to worry about the trolls and ogres;-)

the rest can be feared
or blinded:)

and ents die on with fireballs:)

hence i said use a evil beholder to mind control the goblins
so u don't have to cast fear on him yet:)

[Esteral]

Razor,

I only have 4 Evil beholders in Bolo.
Also I don't have blind !!!!!. Will find 1 on Nameless and 1 on Reha!!!
Same for Sacifices. But I digged 1 up luckly in Verona.

Also my plan was to go more of an undead build on this campgain. Thats why I have the vampires and death knights. Both I find to be strong troops.

[Razorflame]

well if u use that

get one stack of BK and vamps
and use eviln;)

[Esteral]

Well I tried with Green dragon's and Fire Ball / Fire Rain.

The fight seems a little easier but still not possible yet. I dont have Chaos magic 3 yet and Destruction is on 1.
I have impression that with 2 or 3 more lvl's and Chaos magic 3 and Destruction 1 or 2. It should be possible. currently I just don't do enough dmg to the ents the first 2 - 3 rounds. The ents kill one of my stacks still in de first 2 rounds.

I will probably restart this whole game and take a different approach with everything learned so far.

[Razorflame]

don't give up that easily ;-)
use the combo i suggested:)

sumons is the win for that fight
to stall em long enough before they get to your real units:)

and else just use a single stack of undead and use eviln;)

it's not as hard as it looks:)

i beated like 40 ancients ents
with 20 demonologist 13 royal thorns, 12 royal griffins, 15 inqi's and 12 evil beholders;-)

but then again
i had descutrction on 2 and chaos on 2 :)

and they were divided into 5 stacks which makes it all the more easy
but then again every summon in spawned got creamed in the first turn:P
luckily the burn effect took out 3-4 ancients ents every time ^^

[loreangelicus]

Thanks for the info Razor and Lore,

Iam playing with the gift pack and also used the scanner to get a nice build, but at the moment I got stopped in my impossible mage campgain.
I am lvl 29 and on Elon. Killed all the normal mob but Shenobi is to strong (lvl 44). I tried to battle him, but his troops do just to much dmg.
I have 10000 leadership and got 5 Red dragons , 42 Pallies, 55 Ancient Vampires, 47 Demonologist, 66 Black knights. Also have Mages and Inquistors in reserve.

He has Trolls, Ogres , Demonologists, Ancent Ents, and a bunch of orcs and stuff. Problem is his lvl 5 troops are too strong at this lvl for me.

I am trying to figure out how I can get my lvl up, but on all previous Islands I killed 98% of all troops. Only Montero Dungeon is mainly untouched and most of the hero's I left alive, because they are to strong (10+ lvls compaired to me). I played a noloss mage game before without the gift pack. The gift pack moved some of the higher lvl boss mobs and I have the impression some easier mobs are made harder in the gift pack but I am not sure if the game got harder with the gift back. Also I am still trying to figure out if I should do better on Montero and kill the hero's there.

Maybe you can tell me what your general lvl was at the mayor islands. Did you also have the flying horse when you left Montero?

I will try with the droids, I tried before but never really liked them.

It is an interesting mix of troops that you have, but I like the fact that they actually blend well morale-wise. Undead go well with paladins/inquisitors and neutrals (and red dragons and demonologists are some of the best neutrals in the game).

Understand that you should skip enemies only if you are saving them for an AK usage later on. That's because skipping enemies creates a snowball effect of making you weaker/lower level, which makes you skip more enemies later on. In my path, I was level 43 when I fought Shenobi (see screenshot).

Also note that I played warrior. I wish I could give you guaranteed tips, like how [mana accelerator-phantom bone dragons] will keep your enemies tied up forever (see screenshot), but I heard from others that the lower leadership of a mage has mixed results using this tactic.

[Razorflame]

well a warrior is alot easier than the mage:)
^^

but that is just my opinion :P

low leadership sucks
and i KBTL u could have firerain doing over 6k damage haven't got that in kbap yet:P

[Esteral]

After playing a normal paladin game , I played a impossible Mage game.
Did it in 71 days and had 1 loss !!!! Main problem with the mage was the lack of int items and Elenhel rebeled on me at the wrong time. So I played the game more as a control mage than a dmg dealing mage. After reading a lot on this forum I played a Hard Warrior game. Finished in 15 days, and I experiemented with different troops, to see what would happen.

This time I want to try impossible Mage with undead and Dmg dealing.
This build has vampire blade, 2 hand of necropolis , Black helmet.
And some of the other items. Again i don't have any rings with int. (grrrrr).
But i do have the Ancient Amulet and Gladitor Sword early.

To battle the barbarians someone on this forum suggested to use Ancient Vampires. I was lucky to find some early on and playing with them I really liked them. With stoneskin / mage shield they are hard to kill plus they heal themselfs back to full stack. Incase they get hit to hard then eviln will help.
But the best I like is that they are nice rage builders and in case a stack is to powerfull , I can slow or fear them. With the help of the vampire blade they almost always go first and can move 2 places futher.

Red dragons I also like a lot, and I am so used to them that I have not though of replacing them. Maybe I should try some bone dragon's.

In the early part of the game I used the Archmage a lot and needed the paladin to keep him alive. But 1 thing I never thought about was to use phantomed Green dragons to get more mana.
More things to experiment with.

[Razorflame]

it's all easy :)

[Bag In Vena]

Warrior, impossible, 7 days, 87 quests, zero casualties, score 1850

[loreangelicus]

Nice one BIV. :)

You should post your results on this link as well:

http://forum.1cpublishing.eu/showthread.php?t=7728&page=13

After doing that, maybe you could join us at KBCW, forum link below:

http://forum.1cpublishing.eu/forumdisplay.php?f=181

See you there!

[RomanowRomanow]

I use royal griffins, druids, royal thorns, driads and demonologs. With phantom in first round I make 8 stacks of troops [items involve more griffins due to regalia and 30% physical res] Try it if u get stuck somewhere. U can clog whole battlefield with your units this way and slowly break through. U need upgraded summoning skill for more summons and also 50% dmg from destruction

[ludak021]

Nice one BIV. :)

You should post your results on this link as well:

http://forum.1cpublishing.eu/showthread.php?t=7728&page=13

After doing that, maybe you could join us at KBCW, forum link below:

http://forum.1cpublishing.eu/forumdisplay.php?f=181

See you there!

I beat Xaero on nightmare anytime of day. Can I join?

[ShuiMienLung]

I use royal griffins, druids, royal thorns, driads and demonologs. With phantom in first round I make 8 stacks of troops

Okay, now that's a cool line-up I hadn't thought of. :)

I'm curious how you get "8 stacks", though?
+5 - Your 5 actual armies summon their own;
+1 - you cast Phantom;
+1 - the Phantom summons;
...?

As a mage with Higher Magic, does (one of the levels of) Phantom cost little enough to be able to cast it again? But if so, then you would be summoning 9 stacks (those 7 + another [smaller] Phantom + what it summons).

Unless you are counting the dragon egg? (Which isn't an actual unit--yet--but more of an inactive item on the board.)

[Svidler]

Hey,
As for the route, I don't see any Verona trip between your first and 2nd (last)
nameless visit? Do you not need to talk to that zombies brother? (and return for reward to complete?) As a sidenote, I always end up on 86 quests.
Wondered everytime what the heck the 87th is. After I discovered Shenobis burial I thought that would be all :/ Does anyone have a decent guess
what is usually missed out?

[razos]

AK#1

MONTERO:
Hagni - 11,004
Thomas Torkve - 8,498
Crazy Miner - 8,661
Iron Fist - 9,521
Fangol - 15,649


AK#2

MONTERO:
boss Driller - 20,701
Necromancer Mesmer - 7,215

VERONA:
Arnold Heningem - 18,771
Marquis of Krause - 8,902
Demenion - 24,891


How did you beat Arnold Heningem so early ? He is guarded by 15+ red dragons and loads of other troops ( both magic and physical) .
How many droids you had by then to survive it ? You killed Driller so early using single troll stack?