Completing Heroes of Might and Magic 3: Crimson Clover

Map Details:
-Name: Crimson Clover
-Size: Medium
-Two Layer Map
-Objective: Destroy all enemies
-Loss Condition: Lose all towns or heroes
-Difficulty: Hard
-Number of Players: Four (Red, Blue, Tan, Orange)

Player Details:
-Red (CPU): Conflux town. Aenain starting hero (Disrupting Ray Specialty). Artefact starting bonus.
-Blue (Me): Castle town. Orrin starting hero (Archery Specialty). Gold starting bonus.
-Tan (CPU): Fortress town. Broghild starting hero (Wyverns Specialty). Gold starting bonus.
-Orange (CPU): Castle town. Tyris starting hero (Cavalier Specialty). Artefact starting bonus.

This was probably the easiest game so far, because of how ludicrously good my spawn was. The two nearest artefacts to me were the Golden Bow (ranged units do maximum damage through obstacles and at any range) and the Bow of Elven Cherrywood (Bonus 5% to the Archery skill). After obtaining these and getting Orrin’s archery skill to expert level, ranged units in his army were getting a 70% bonus to their ranged attacks. As you can guess, my strategy was to spam marksmen and zealots as the Castle faction. For protection, I had an ever-growing stack of Royal Griffins and Halberdiers spread throughout my spare slots. The only other units I mixed into Orrin’s army were some Phoenix once I captured Red’s Conflux.

But I’m getting ahead of myself, this map is fairly easy anyway; The AI in this game never seems to rush towards you until they know where your towns are. Until then they’ll leave you be if they lose sight of a hero. And because you spawn in a corner, it is highly unlikely they’ll ever find your starting town, which gives you a secure place to build up from.

I first defeated Tan who rushed underground to get powerful artefacts – one of which almost proved my downfall when I saw him use it to walk across water to my starting town. He was barely dispatched and, thereafter, suffered for having being so quick to leave himself undefended as Orrin closed in and took his fortress. Orrin had been fighting a long time before now – taking Orange’s starting Castle, but not eliminating him from the game – and slaying a couple of stray scouts Red was pumping out. By the time I had three out of four overworld towns, Red and Orange had fully migrated underground. This made taking Red’s Conflux and acquiring Phoenix incredibly easy! It also made the centre of the map very dangerous for my folks ferrying fresh troops to Orrin.

Unfortunately Red’s Conflux, the only town in this game capable of getting a level 5 mage guild, didn’t give me any overpowered teleporting spells so I was once again walking around. I did find an Inferno later, a town I took from Red which eliminated him from the game, but it hadn’t been developed even a little bit and so there wasn’t much point investing in it as the end was nearing.

Orange had some strong armies, but Orrin’s archery prowess overcame all and he won against everything… Yeah, I should probably knock the difficulty up to expert next time. Although, Barbarian Breakout is still being a pain in my side.#

Find Orin’s stats at the end of the game in the above image. The final score is below:

Allies:
-Red (Me): Stronghold town, Shiva starting hero (Rocs Specialty), gold starting bonus
-Blue (CPU): Conflux town, Thunar starting hero (Earth Elemental Specialty), gold starting bonus
-Tan (CPU): Necropolis town, Vokial starting hero (Vampires Specialty), artifact starting bonus
-Orange (CPU): Rampart town, Clancy starting hero (Unicorns Specialty), resource starting bonus

Team Alignments:
-Team 1: Red and Blue
-Team 2: Tan and Orange

This was a very painless experience and probably the easiest game so far. I had a very good start with lots of good artifacts nearby that turned Shiva into quite the spellcaster, although casting blood lust on her Rocs was all she needed to win. Blue, for a CPU ally, was good too. He didn’t do a lot of fighting, granted, but he scouted 99% of the map for me so I had visibility of everything and also picked up any and all artifacts he came across so the enemy team couldn’t get them.

I got a lot of early levels by sacrificing artifacts I didn’t want at the alter of sacrifice and by taking orange’s starting town very early into the game. He timed out after being unable to capture a new base 7 days later. Tan, naturally as a Necropolis player, had amassed a very big army of skeletons and a worrying amount of vampire lords. But Shiva’s Rocs devastated him and my worries were for nothing.

Shiva’s final stats and the score is below: