Getting past the bloody spider.

[Xargon]

Originally Posted by FromWisdomToHate

Killed the giant spider on impossible in 4 rounds with viking. Tried to finish the fight with no-loss, but no matter what approach i tried ti seemed 'impossible' so i gave up on it, so guess ill do the very low-loss run

Would you mind posting your strategy for the battle (which seems to work very well)? Looks like many people have problems beating it...

[Monstruel]

Just killed him as Viking on Hard at level 13. Three types of Snakes, Bear Riders and Trolls (3). Only the Trolls engaged the Spider himself, the other four stacks spent the battle fighting the baby spiders.

Frenzy (level 2 for me) was very important here. My Snake stacks got to ~100 attack, after a bit, and the Trolls got up to a whopping 259 attack (from their own property, though, not from Frenzy).

It should be noted that without the snakes (poison resistance) and the regenerating Trolls the fight would be impossible at this level.

[Zechnophobe]

Originally Posted by Karlos

Yeah, the spider is a no-lossers killer
I strongly suspect certain WoTN can't be done no-loss although I'd love for somebody to prove me wrong.

Pretty sure it's doable. I did it with minimal casualties when I wasn't trying to no-loss. You just need to have a high armor stack get stone skinned and hopefully mana spring'd. Have maiden's around for ressurrect, and other units that are good at killing spiders. It doesn't look like the big spider does ranged attacks except as retaliation. It'd take a while, but is probably a fairly good sure bet.

Also, you can get exactly one wanderer scroll before this fight, so that might be an important thing to twink. Get it early, of the right variety, and then duplicate it a few times with the bird.

[namad]

@everyone talking about warrior maidens... darnit darnit... my game I didn't have any! although I think it may even be due to some sort of bug because one of the shops in the game spawned them, but with 1 and only 1 maiden for sale? which made them unusable... thats one thing I don't like about wotn... first four islands don't have a done of random troop variety... difficult boss for which you don't have many choices of troops to bring? not fun! I might give it another try tho with jotun/berzerker/polar bear/bear/royalsnake the only problem is... the first four islands combine to give me ONE CASTLE, with THREE garrison slots... so I don't have enough space to really store my entire old army that easily

also no trolls either... strategies that only work with specfic troops are usually fine for bosses in king's bounty games because usually you can bypass the boss explore a ton... have so many places to recruit from that eventually randomly you'll find what you need... but in wotn half the shops on teh first 4islands have basic vikings troops... I'm really sad I couldn't get warrior maidens in my playthrough ... by the time they become available in my playthrough I'll probably have something better like paladins or something..



actually wait nevermind: here is flat out the one and only flaw with this boss fight! the first time you fight this boss you will probably lose, at least depending on random happenstance, what's the problem? well you can't do go anything else! you realize frenzy would be a great ability to use against the boss? oh well too bad by the time you first encounter the boss there aren't enough enemies left in the game to fight to gain even 1 level, so if you don't already have exactly what you need, it's just not fun! typically in king's bounty you can fight a boss, lose, think about strategy, go acquire a different army, maybe level up once or twice, get what you think you might need, and then try again!!!

for example I went for learning rank 3 early because it can pay off in the long run, I could've had glory rank 3 instead but I didn't realize that the bosses weren't things you could come back for later, crossworlds campaign is 90-95% all about skipping every boss and coming back for it later?!!?!!!!!!!!

[Highborne]

Dunno I beat it with a normal Slingers, Vikings, Soothsayers, Jarls and Scalds.

Lost about 1/5 of my army total; but just went and bought more; not going for a no-loss play through.

However, after beating the Spider and getting to the next islands I have lost maybe 20 troops total due to Rune Mages/Paladins and mostly lost units due to carelessness (didn't res all...or one died and I didn't see it...didn't want to restart battle).

[namad]

I guess I should clarify, I won the battle, I just don't like the design whereby you can't fight the boss until you've done basically everything else first, I'd probably have preferred it if that boss were on island 3 but you couldn't "win" the battle until after island 4 just because that's how the old king's bounty bosses usually went

[Puce Moose]

Holy cow that was a nasty fight! I spent most of the day trying to take that spider down and finally managed it just a few minutes ago.

I managed to do it on my fourth attempt.

Level 16 soothsayer on hard. I went in there with 3 jotuns, 3 trolls, 30 polar bears, 15 jarls, and 19 soothsayers. Everyone died except my three trolls. I think the fight lasted about 40 turns.

On my third attempt, I entered a rather comical loop; on about turn 60 everyone died except for my stack of trolls. The spider kept casting web on my troll, bypassing his turn - again and again. This went on until about turn 120, when I finally got a turn. I waited, and about every 10 turns the spider wouldn't use web and I would get a single turn. This kept going until about turn 190, when both spider groups adjacent to my troll got criticals and put an end to my trolls.

[Xargon]

Originally Posted by Puce Moose

Holy cow that was a nasty fight! I spent most of the day trying to take that spider down and finally managed it just a few minutes ago.

I managed to do it on my fourth attempt.

Level 16 soothsayer on hard. I went in there with 3 jotuns, 3 trolls, 30 polar bears, 15 jarls, and 19 soothsayers. Everyone died except my three trolls. I think the fight lasted about 40 turns.

On my third attempt, I entered a rather comical loop; on about turn 60 everyone died except for my stack of trolls. The spider kept casting web on my troll, bypassing his turn - again and again. This went on until about turn 120, when I finally got a turn. I waited, and about every 10 turns the spider wouldn't use web and I would get a single turn. This kept going until about turn 190, when both spider groups adjacent to my troll got criticals and put an end to my trolls.

I'd question Jotuns (never tried them, stats don't look that impressive) and soothsayers (they seemed not much use in this fight). I used a standard army of Jarls (only 11, that's all that were sold), Axe Throwers, Warrior Maidens, Berserkers and Trolls (Soothsayer, hard, lvl18 ). Came out with losses of 1 jarl, 1 warrior maiden, 5 axe throwers and 28 berserkers on turn 11. The berserkers really do a lot of damage against the spider (stone skin and use their rage ability), trolls always hit the spider as well, the rest takes care of the little spiders (well, maybe the jarls hit the big spider once or twice).

[themaster]

I came up with a loss-less solution for the giant spider.. (at first I thought it WAS impossible) (am playing impossible)

Here's how you do it..

- Get rune magic level 3 (you need the spell gift)
- Next get the scroll "song of the wind" I believe you get it as a reward for fulfilling a quest for a map
- Then use it until you get "Royal Griffins" (as in travel to a map cast it and reload a new map if you don't get "royal griffins") I would also recommend only loading this with MAX leadership as in it's time for the fight.. the more royal griffins you have.. the more units you create.. I had 23 of e'm creating 53 heavenly guard

- I would also recommend level 3's in magic on transmute and concentration (I say recommend but transmute is probably a must have for no loss )

I would also recommend you pick up the griffen banner at fastland.. (I believe it's always there?) because if you equip you get about 5 more griffins then normal leadership..

Anyway, all you do in battle is kill spiders and continually reload "royal griffins" at 20 spell points a shot.. I had 5700 leadership (mostly with equipment) and was level 18 protect your units w/ griffins/heavenly guard or use the "maidens" to consistently restore any lost core troops

(I think this is obvious.. but do NOT attack the spider with your core troops only heavenly guard because he counter attacks half the time killing your units.. only do this for no loss anyway )

Also it's helpful to have the spell "phantom" and use it on maidens which will allow you to restore every troop including maidens!

Actually, wish I took a screenshot.. (had like 8-10 heavenly guards) could show you too.. anyway.. I won no loss with giant spider.. but before I figured that out.. I did think it was impossible.. my battle went to like round 18 or something and I'm a mage.. but I'm sure there are faster/better ways?

[aghiuta]

sorry to burst your bubble but the wanderer scroll you get is random and the griffin banner same random in shop.
For me the setup was berserkers, ancient snakes and jarls, plus whatever you can find for spiderlings.