KBDS Normal/Hard/Impossible No-loss thread

[MattCaspermeyer]

Depending on what I got, I usually end up doing the Elven stack last since I try to get level 5 from either the first or second stacks.

You know what the worst thing is?

It seems like you get the least amount of experience for the toughest stack! In my game, I got 50 for the Dwarves, I think 63 for the Humans and then only 47 for the Elves!

Those amounts are so small, I know, but still it is just a bit insulting that you get the least experience from the hardest stack!

By the way, I way able to take out the 3 basement stacks and the first Whitehill stack with the Ball of Lightning strategy so it is good.

You won't believe how long some of the basement fights went! I had one go over 200 rounds! I get a little bored once I get past about round 30 and really bored after round 50, but I was in a situation with 2 50+ Cave Spider stacks and I was able to get into a repeatable loop as I whittled them down with the 2 Bats before I could go into Vamp mode.

This is crazy to have to do this so early in the game for no loss.

I think I'm going to shift gears a bit and start checking out Bagyr's situation some more...

/C\/C\

[Snow11]

Hey DGDobrev, thanks for the save. With it I managed to kill all the guards somehow. The elven stack was easy but the human was so freakin impossible.

The books of evil were so useless that in the end I killed the hordes of priests and archers mostly with poison skulls and incredible luck. At 1 point I was with 1 vampire bat with only 1 hp
I also used the 1 book of evil scroll(to slow the melee) and 1 slow scroll. I made the mistake not to take Diversions skill and also ended up with only 34 mana.

I dont see how you can win with books of evil since thay die so fast from the melee and their dmg is not that great. Even if rank 2 book manage to cast 2 lighting spells on the range units, it's still not enough to hurt them.

[DGDobrev]

Yeah, I am seeing that myself. Ever since Matt and Impy started giving ideas what spells are best, I just started scanning saves for them, and this one looked best, so I posted it. I seriously thought it will be much easier than it is with the books.

The human stack indeed looks to be the biggest problem for Daert. I am still trying to fool them somehow, but I am kinda running out of ideas. So far 1 level 2 book and lots of poison skulls look the be the best option for me, but sooner or later one of those ranged stacks destroys my vamp.

I guess I need to try other spell combinations, maybe like demon portal. Phoenix looks to be the best option, but is still very hard to find a save that has it. Maybe I should just fall down to impy's strategy and try to do it with Magic spring only, but I really don't know how those 2 vamps can survive all those ranged attacks at once if I am forced to fly about in bat form.

I certainly haven't given up though. The is a way for Daert to do no-loss, it is absolutely clear now.

[MattCaspermeyer]

Glad that you did it, but here are some tips with the Evil Book strategy:

You may need to do an easy Catacombs spider stack or two to ensure that you get Level 5 Daert for the final stack whichever is tougher between the Elves and Humans to get more Mana (I actually had to do this in the Ball of Lightning strategy, too). It seems more likely than not that I end up a few exp short of level 5 and so I need to do at least one or two of the easy stacks in the Catacombs to push me over. You should be able to start with 36 Mana for the harder fight and with at least Level 1 Concentration you are no more than 4 rounds from your second Evil Book level 2. Level 2 Meditation is better than Level 2 Concentration and both cost 8 Magic Runes. Level 2 Meditation will get you 40 Mana. I was 2 Magic Runes short, however, in my Ball of Lightning playthrough when I got Daert to Level 5.

You also need to have 2 Evil Books @level 2 versus the Swordsmen / Guardsmen so ensure that your book stays away from them until you get that second Book because one level 2 Book is not good enough against both of them. It can handle a single troop, though, so place your Vamps' starting position to split them up (especially the humans) if you have to fight one to recharge your spell.

Both the Priests and Inquisitor's / Sprite's and Faun's damage is Magic (well half the Faun's anyway) and so try to get them to attack the book or if your book needs to reload its spell attack then attack them to recharge it.

In my test, I actually found the Human stack much easier than the Elven stack, but it just depends on how much they attack your Vamps versus your Books and the spells your Book casts. If it is casting Slow, for example, then use it on a fast troop. If it is casting Lightning then use it to cast on a troop for maximum damage, etc.

You also really need to have it be a damaging spell on its first cast, otherwise it gets way harder. A Poison Skull, Ghost Sword, Magic Axe, or Lightning works wonders on a first cast and this has to be cast on either the Elves or the Inquisitors. Position the starting location of your Vamps, change the time in the round when the spell is cast, etc. to get it to change if it is not good. Sequence of events is everything!

Lastly, remember the goal of your Evil Books for both stack types: 1) for Humans, once you get rid of the ranged troops, the fight is over and 2) for the Elves, once you get rid of the melee troops, the fight is over.

As a variant, you may decide to do 2 Points in Meditation and 1 in Concentration / Chaos so that you can do 3 Level 1 books (but in my experience this is not as good and requires 45 total Mana).

Anyway, glad you were able to do it!



/C\/C\

[MattCaspermeyer]

Okay, I went and downloaded DGDobrev's save and I was able to defeat both the Shelter Elven (easier) and Human (harder) stacks using the double Evil Book @level 2 strategy.

I did defeat the 3 easy Spider / Snake stacks in the Catacombs such that when I defeated the Shelter Dwarven stack I was level 5. I put a point into Order to get me up to 36 Mana and was able to cast my first Level 2 Evil Book and then by splitting the Werewolf stacks it was able to work on the Werewolf and Sprite and then on round 5 as it was close to death I cast my second Level 2 Evil Book. The first one had taken the 8 Elves down to 4 and then only lasted another turn or two, but by that time, the damage had been done and the Sprites and Fauns were gone. My Vamps then helped take down the Werewolves with the second Evil Book as it had gotten the Elves down to 1. Starting placement of your Vamps made a difference between 1 dying and not.

As far as the Human stack, they were much tougher, but once again I split the Guardsmen and Swordsmen (moving towards the latter since they did less damage). I did have a fortuitous Lightning Bolt take out 14 Bowmen, 9 Priests, and 3 Inquisitors when my first Evil Book was about 50% health. This allowed my Vamps to switch to Bat mode and slap the second Evil Book right next to the group of shooters. After that I managed to take out the rest of the shooters and then my second Evil Book was able to take the Swordsmen and Guardsmen down to about 50% when it finally died. As I mentioned above, once the melee troops are the only ones left in the Human stack it is just a matter of time before your Vamps can slowly take them down and finish it. I actually probably could have done better as I forgot to cast Poison Skull when I had gotten 7 Mana and had let my Evil Book absorb 76 damage from an Eviln, which I was trying to get the Swordsmen to hit, but at this point it did not matter since there were only melee troops left.

Compared to Ball of Lightning I'll say that it was a bit easier, but all these strategies (except for maybe the Phoenix which is very easy @level 2) are fairly dependent on finding the right sequence of events.

By the way, I did a little experiment and Runes given during levelups are dependent on the area. I used the "levelup" cheat when I was in Portland to level 5 and I had enough for Meditation Level 2, Concentration Level 1, and Chaos Level 2 when I was level 5; however, since I made level 4 in Dragandor and Level 5 in the Shelter the Runes given were then different and I couldn't get Meditation Level 2 so that's when I went with Order Level 1. Note that I could have also gotten Diversion if I wanted instead of Order Level 1, but I never tried that strategy to see if it was better or not.

If you can get Meditation to Level 2 when Daert is Level 5, then all these strategies are a lot easier when you start with 40 Mana instead of 36. To have a chance, though, you should probably take out the 3 easier Spider / Snake stacks in the Catacombs to give yourself a chance of reaching level 5 after defeating the Dwarven stack.

/C\/C\

[Snow11]

I'm glad you made it Matt.

In my game I even got 1 magic rune from a chest in the fight before the black gate but at the end I was still 1 rune away for lvl 2 Meditation.

Anyway, with 36 mana and your strategy I'm sure it can be done with not too many tries.
Even with 34 mana and enough tries I think it's doable with evil books, however this is a huge problem for me since my pc is so slow that it takes literally 5 min every time I try to load the last save.

[DGDobrev]

Awesome, Matt, congrats

I think you can only hit meditation 40 if you get lucky with the rune/level giveaways. I think there are 3 or 4 combinations, and if you luck out with a good one, you can get twice the max amount of magic runes for the mage, but since the game selects a random line of those 3 or 4 combos, there is no way to be certain.