another sick challenge from impy:-)

[machival]

Yes, that was my idea, a playthrough that does not involve (ab)using the most powerful combos in the game. I think that the game would have been more demanding of a player's strategy and skills if it would not present the opportunity to the player to use them, i.e, it would have been better for those to never exist.. There would have been diversity in play. Every creature should have a % chance of being attractive enough so that a player uses it. Who uses Bears? Undead Spiders? Zombies? Who ever chose Snakes, when he can buy Royal Snakes? Well I read something about using Bears for keeping armies with no-retal alive for rage and mana growth, by using their sleep mode, but I think that was for The legend only. ( i hope i did not give you any ideas :p)

I think that if you insist on having the dragon making some kind of damage, let it be Crushing Blow .. or Ball of lightning. I don't think Ball of Lightning is that good when there are multiple strong stacks, as you need time to kill them all with it.. Sure there is awaken dragon but still, you waste your castings with the hero by it. Doing massive damage with the dragon to all or almost all enemies takes out a lot from the strategy of playing with the units. (with a powerful enough dragon you could beat lethal armies or invincible with 5 stacks of peasants, dragonflies, firefly, hienas, etc.) Besides, Ball of Lightning is not so good in Gremlin fights i think, whereas with a dragon dive you can hit all gremlins and units.

The no horde quantity buy idea is to "care" for your units. I mean, think about devilfish. They are inexpensive, and Horde after a certain mission on Scarlet Wind. One can use them as a "berserk kamikaze" unit in most battles with melees. Just cast bless and stone skin on them and that's all. But to have them limited by number means you can't do that all the time because at some point you run out of them. Anyway it applyes to other units too I just wanted to exemplify.

No battles lost does not mean no reloads. You can reload all you want. Means you must not actually lose a battle and go back to the castle and continue from there. ( In the legend some players abused the fact that the hero was given free new troops when he was put at castle after a loss of a fight (retreat actually), and you could basically make legions of fearies and peasants for free. just attack a random monster and retreat.

Using a scanner would be , in my oppinion, yet another attempt to bypass some of the challanges a game presents. Knowing that everything will be perfect and easier then it should be. Why not just start a game and see how it goes. Even the worst case scenario game should be winnable by a skilled player. Why avoid the challange if challange is what you seek? Regardless, it's up to you eventually to pick the constraints that you consider desireable.

[impy]

You say you wanted to prevent all powerful combos from your challenge, but would allow dragon lightning ball. I wonder if you are aware of super powerful combo in round 1 : gorguana cast double damage spell on strongest enemy stack, pet dragon: lightning ball on this stack, hero : awaken dragon, hero: phantom on gorguanas, phantomed gourguanas cast double damage spell on second strongest enemy stack, pet dragon : lightning ball. This way in round one you eliminate 40-96% of two strongest enemy stacks in enemy army (there are few exceptions). So NO to dragon ball if you want your challenge to be challenging..I hardly use damaging spells apart from ball with pet dragon, usually it is mana recharge. I only rarely cast low level dragon dive to move opponents back one tile,when they come to close and represent a danger.
Not using creatures provided in "horde" amount to buy is not really a problem. That is normally level 1-2 creatures which I never use anyway. So once you get to Verona, you should have plenty to choose from. Since it is not no loss game, you can use anything you want. Example you found 150 druids, use them until their numbers drop, then take other unit on board. Also, due to general mage lower leadership, once you find for example stack of 200 demonologists, you're ok, since you only suffer smaller losses until Reha if playing smartly.

[machival]

Yes, I'm aware of mark of blood ability, but.. No phantom spell, remember? This takes 50% power of this strategy , and anyway gorguana comes a bit late, so you still need to play midgame without it.

Also, boss fights will be even more challanging , ball or no ball..

edit: An alternative way to decrease power of mark of blood is to ban Awaken Dragon also.. hmm.. that should work, I think, no?

[ckdamascus]

Isn't this getting to be a little ridiculous? Haha.

[impy]

Originally Posted by ckdamascus

Isn't this getting to be a little ridiculous? Haha.

You are hitting the spot, and missing the point at the same time

Hitting the spot : yes, challenges have to be kept simple when it comes to rules. Otherwise it comes to bizzare situations when for example "only spells starting with C can be used...". I recommend my old challenge to everyone: impossible warrior no loss, no kiting, no wanderer scrolls, no pet dragon usage.
Nice and clean.

Missing the point : there will always be people who get much greater amusement from doing something than the others, whatever it is. One may not understand them, but has to accept, and/or tolerate them. I for example do not fancy cars, for me it is just means of transport. I do know plenty of gyus though who can spend whole weekend refurbishing their cars, which i do not understand..I know you were not taking a mickey, just adding to debate from work

[Razorflame]

i bet using mass tanks should work xD

giants and cyclopses royal thorns, demonlogist, royal griffins