Talk:Welcome Home/@comment-27263122-20180316020956

How odd. I couldn't build Bombard Cannons in this... Played on Hard.

Other than that, easiest map ever. At the start, send your units forward and clear some space. You don't want to block off the location you're currently at because that's where it will spawn elite petards, the trebuchet, and the monk later on.

Since the mobile town center was removed, you can simply start by building a market. You won't be using it for any trade routes at the start as your ally's market won't be available until way later (or you have enough time to spend on destroying those 10k HP fences around it.

Town center goes up first, then start getting wood and building houses. Get villagers as soon as you can, and continue forward slowly with your starter units. Honestly, your enemies can easily be handled with just your General and your team of crossbowmen. Even when they come in waves, simply use your swordsmen as fodder and watch out for the pikes hounding your General. General can heal, so make use of him often.

If you make it into your target 'base', I suggest ignoring that and falling back a bit. Build a second TC right outside it and you can handle whatever comes at you. Somehow, the enemy will go around the half-assed barricades and attack you from below, so your TC there can simply be manned by the crossbowment while your tough General can run circles around the enemy and let the TC take care of them.

Food and wood are a plenty at the start. You can also move south-west and south for more gold caches. If you have extra units, send them north and around the outskirts of the map to find some wandering goats and the enemy purple. Losing even 1 unit to those purple guys is a disgrace as they are easy enemies.

Gidajan will constantly build units, but there seems to be some pop limit available, even if they auto-spawn. Anyway, simply take advantage of what you can and don't worry much. I lagged a lot, so I simply rushed the map, but you can also just build the 35 units quickly and wait out an army of elite petards to come.

I found no stone caches at all... I was probably blind or something, but I basically ended up trading for my stone, which seriously depletes your gold. hence, choose your castle placement wisely. I suggest one a bit further from where the first objective flag was, and another at the southern entry way to the city. That's where the breach is, so you can simply plot a castle in some gap and sit back afterward.

Again, I dunno whether it was me, but I had no access to Bombard Cannons. In the end, Siege Onagers and Rams were the way to go. Although Shotel Warriors are cheap and fast, they are not durable enough for this map, so either spend some on Cavaliers or go the swordsman line. Archers are heavenly here due to the range and quickfire. A bit slow, though, so watch for enemy catapults.

Don't destroy the first castle too soon if you want to spawn more elite petards. I ended up with only the one petard left. Also, destroying that castle essentially unleashes the hoard as a veritable army of Gidajan's troops will rush the breach where the Castle was. I'd suggest hiding a nice army of siege onagers for when you're ready to batter them all to mush.

Furious the Monkey Boy appears, and for some reason one Aksum player changed diplomacies to enemy and converted him... Luckily he doesn't attack proactively, so simply convert him back with your one monk. If you can, try and convert the other monk... I didn't have the patience to do that...

This map is restriction hell. Linear objectives, damn horrible houses in the way, each with 10k HP... sighs... S. Onagers sent to mow down quick paths for my villagers...

Don't stop the wood/food if you're a slow player like me. Ran out of gold so face cause I idiocally sent all Shotel Warriors. it's fine watching a hundred of them spawn and attack in waves. It's not fun watching them get squashed by enemy catapults and sniped by weak-ass towers... Play it safe.