Keeping up mana in battles

[Shadowdrake]

@loreangelicus: how did you get 900K by Day 5?!

[bucazaurus]

If you go for a no casualties game that amount of money is normal to have in day 5.

[loreangelicus]

Originally Posted by Shadowdrake

@loreangelicus: how did you get 900K by Day 5?!

I have read in other posts that money might be a problem on impossible mode, but even using a paladin, I did not actively increase money-generating skills and never had problems with gold.

Here are the things that contributed to my money:

1) As bucazaurus said, on a no-casualty run, you won't be losing money replenishing troops due to casualties.

2) I went with Marauders early on, but I did drop them after buying the Ancient Amulet and Gladiator Sword.

3) By some sheer luck, I picked up Sacrifice on a battle at the marshes. As such, I don't even need to buy new troops.

4) I killed everything; well almost everything. Before leaving for Ellinia, the following are the only enemies left alive:
* Island of Freedom: all dead except for one enemy near the starting castle used for the no-army-suicide trick
* 4 areas of Darion: all dead except for last two fights of the warrior test
* dwarven lands: all dead except for the two "double" battles which is best done with Dryads from Ellinia, and at the highest leadership and level possible to generate more XP
* Demonis: pretty much intact, except I killed off two enemies to save travel time later on (I had extra time to kill before I headed off to Ellinia; of note, these are the toughest battles that I fought against because I wasn't really in a position level-wise and leadership-wise to take them on)

5) Keeper of Light level 3 (as a supplement to Learning level 3), but that was done more for the added XP in killing the undead and demons.

6) I use suppressable items that run contrary to what complements them. For example, been using King's Hammer in a non-dwarven army; that generates 12,000+ gold every suppression battle (aside from 2,080 XP).

Currently cleared all enemies in Ellinia that could only be reached by boat, half of Magic Valley, the whole of Great Forest, and finishing up on Grey Wasteland; I'm up to 2,200,000+ gold, so money really isn't a problem in this game.

*** update 10-10-2009***
Just attached a screenshot wherein I have 2,465,000 gold, and I'm essentially just a bit past clearing half of Ellinia and Death Lands. That's a big jump from the 976,000 gold I had at the start of Ellinia. Bigger and tougher enemies mean more gold/XP.

Nothing gives you more gold than fighting battles; also, no quest reward could supplement the XP you get from killing enemies. So don't skip battles, it is possible to kill these enemies if you just try; I think my going this far in the game on impossible mode without casualties is proof enough. And that's using a paladin, which most people on these forum consider as the weakest of the 3 classes.

Skipping battles sets you up to be even weaker as the game progresses, forcing you to skip even more battles.

NOTE: Well, I did skip ONE battle; the Emerald Green Dragon in the tutorial missions at the very start. Not such a big gold/XP loss though, especially in light of the 30 Black Dragons stacks I'm fighting late in the game.

[iregev]

Originally Posted by loreangelicus

There is a different approach though; you could still do the no-army-suicide trick to go back to Darion from Islands of Freedom, but you really shouldn't be avoiding battles, especially if aside from a 7 Day game you also want a high score.

Attached is a screenshot of my paladin at Ellinia, Day 5, level 20 (since I killed practically everything in Darion and Islands of Freedom), with Demonesses with High morale that only Anga's Ruby could provide; this is also on Impossible difficulty and a no-casualties run as well.

I'm not yet finished, still clearing out Ellinia, then will proceed to the Death Lands; I might create a detailed FAQ after and post it to show how to do this.

So when in freedom isles first time do explore and pick up all the flags or just rush to lucky James, will u have time to explore demonis and pick up everythig on freedom in one day ?

[loreangelicus]

Originally Posted by iregev

So when in freedom isles first time do explore and pick up all the flags or just rush to lucky James, will u have time to explore demonis and pick up everythig on freedom in one day ?

Day 2 18:55 level 10 to Islands of Freedom 12 hours to spare
Day 3 14:48 level 13 to Darion
Day 4 05:33 level 17 to Islands of Freedom 1.5 hours to spare
Day 4 12:40 level 18 to Darion
Day 4 23:58 level 20 to Ellinia 7 hours to spare

There is tons of time to clear Darion, Islands of Freedom, dwarven lands, and take a scenic tour of Demonis.

I did leave Demonis pretty much intact, except I did these time-saving tasks in my initial visit:

1) complete Issarah's quest
2) kill off the enemy on the platform where you initially find Issarah
3) kill off the enemy on the low ridge that could only be accessed via the "floating elevator" behind the merchant
4) picked up all items and bought from stores that could only be accessed via more "floating elevator" travel

I figured what would slow you down in Demonis is the use of the "floating elevators", and doing Issarah's quest early saves you time later on when you sweep Demonis.

In hindsight, Demonis is just one area (not counting the very small area of the dragons) and I'm sure 24 hours to take it out is overkill, but its always nice to have a lot of time to spare.

To answer your question I spent close to 8 hours (Day 3 07:00 to Day 3 14:4 on the initial visit to Islands of Freedom. I basically killed as much enemies as I could (I even killed off all the pirate ships as well as Bart), except for these:

1) Kraken
2) underground of undead
3) Head of the Family quest (it was better for me item-wise to kill 2 out of the 3 brothers (for more XP), but that would have been tough to do on my initial visit)
4) Cursed Treasure quest
5) Pirate's Crops
6) Lucky James and his whole cave
7) orc embassy
enemy near the initial castle (would be the only enemy left alive in Islands of Freedom as it would be used twice for the no-army-suicide trick)

Admittedly, I got lucky and picked up Sacrifice in a battle in Marshan Swamps. This allowed me to multiply my 2 Royal Thorns into a full stack. That and the initial castle of Scott Thompson was selling a Crown of Blackthorns, hehe...

Note that this is a no-casualties run; you could probably kill them all if casualties are not a problem. But since I knew I was going back anyways, I left most of the "tough" battles for the return trip.

On a side note, pre-Ellinia, you should kill off everything (Rezo's Tower, Castle Karmag, Magic Range, Haunted Castle, etc.) except for your double battles in the dwarven lands. Killing them off later when you have a higher level and more leadership would give you more XP. As such, it might not be advisable to do the no-army suicide trick to travel from Ellinia back to Darion. Just kill as much as you can in Ellinia before Day 6 06:45 so that you have the highest level/leadership possible when you fight your double. Also, if you do the no-army suicide trick, you won't be able to bring back to Darion the secret weapon for killing your double: Dryads.