Path of War, Chapter 5, Mission 1

PATH OF WAR:  LOST KING CAMPAIGN
Chapter 5
Return to the Monastery: Mission 1

by Stratego

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Mission Briefing:
“William has always been too trusting and this time it has been his undoing. Choosing Edwin as an ally was an ill-judged move on William’s part and here I am, to pick up the pieces.”

Objectives for Victory:

  • Kill Olaf

Losing Conditions:

  • Your Lord Dies

Starting units:70 spearmen, 12 archers, 10 warrior monks, 4 catapults, lord
Map size:small
Starting Date:January 1066
Game Version:1.2

WALK-THROUGH:

The two-parted chapter 5 consists of two missions that I would characterize both as a siege and of a defence mission. Let’s start with part 1, the siege mission:

Right from scratch, you are immediately under attack by four fire ballistas. Quickly press the pause-key (P) and check the situation. Maybe the map looks familiar to you. That’s right, it’s the same scene you were facing in chapter 2 apart from a few changes: You’ll find a ruined monastery up on the north-western plateau and Olaf’s fortifications erected on former wooded areas. Now have a look on this picture below.

While still pausing the game, you can give several orders (one of the great in-game advantages of Stronghold 2). Move your warrior monks and about a dozen of spearmen to attack both ballista outposts. Additionally, send two of your catapults to the left and right edges of the forest. Withdraw your Lord and the rest of your troops behind the yellow broken line where they will be out of range by hostile fire. Now unpause the game again and watch your men carrying out your orders.

You must destroy these fire ballistae at all costs, even if all of your attacking forces should lose their lives. You’ll notice your fighting monks being stronger than spearmen, thus some of them will have the chance to survive this military operation, hardly injured. Then dispatch of these positions and run back to the safety zone where your main forces are already waiting for Olaf’s counter attacks. The Viking leader will send out several waves of berserkers being fixated on your Lord. Now set your catapults to target the area the berserkers will run through, as shown on this next picture (red crosshair).

Your mounted Lord should ride alternately to the left and to the right. Those “silly” berserkers will follow your Lord’s changing positions rushing headlong into disaster. Your cooperating catapults and archers will kill them all very easily.

After that, lead all your troops forward along the river up to the border of the estates. From there, move your archers carefully closer to the enemy’s palisades eliminating all axe throwers on the first wall. Your archers will target them automatically if you see the red crossed swords above the enemies’ heads.

To destroy the fire ballistae inside the palisades you can apply the following trick:
I used one or two spearmen tearing down two small wall segments, not completely, but down to half height. Now my archers were able to aim at different targets even at those fire ballistae at the back. In fact, the ballistae themselves will try to shoot your archers down, but they won’t hit them if your archers stay at the walls as close as possible.

After cleaning the first wall you can break a hole through the first palisades repeating these tactics at the second wall; one important hint here:

Don’t destroy too many walls in part 1. Postpone this intention to the continuing mission, because it will bring back valuable wood for different starting buildings in mission 2.

This final picture shows that moment shortly before your archers reach the third wall sector, however, Olaf, the coward, will flee before you can reach him…

…victory!

Stratego

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