Gold Wood Ore Crystal Gems Mercury Sulfur
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RUST DRAGON LEVEL

The first thing to remember is that Rust Dragons are obsessed by Master Gremlins. Keep resurrecting the gremlins and this level become considerably easier.

Every mine is guarded by Rust Dragons. If you find a mine without any it means your opponent has got there first or it's a trap (there is a crystal mine in the middle-left like that).

You start in the bottom right corner just north of a crystal mine. Go there and kill the dragons. Tag the mine and claim the Ogre's Club [Attack +5] as your prize. It will save time in the later fights until you get the Sword of Hellfire [Attack +6]. Also grab the hut and "eyeball" the opponent's towns. Note the names of the computer's current heroes, as they will be the toughest ones when you meet them later on and should if possible be taken out by Dracon personally.

Head north tagging the wood and coal mines. Head further north tagging another wood and then the crystal mines in "Crystal Valley". Keep heading north until you find the genies then bear left to the Coliseum. Defense it usually best in this level (unless it get way ahead of Attack) since the club gives you the Attack stat you need.

Keep going left and get the golems and the dragons for the gold mines. When you can't go left anymore, head south claiming all the mines and then fill in the middle bit. To save time have a couple of other heroes wandering around (one on the opposite circuit to yours). Don't waste good troops by having them fight any dragons though.

As soon as you have this corner mapped and the stat enhancers claimed, send Dracon back to town and collect any troops available as well as a few new spells. Then head left and smash one of the genies. Spread out through this area with you main hero going roughly straight across from the lowest set of genies. You should find another town here. Grab it.

Continue searching this area, grabbing the stat enhancers. Almost immediately south of the new town is a spell scroll guarded by a group of archmages. Kill them and grab the scroll. It is dimension door.

Just left of the new town is an small area with a spell scroll and a prison you can't get to normally. Use dimension door to get it and release the prisoner. It is a level 20 hero (mine was Crag Hack) with a sizeable army and a [+5 to all] shield. Grab the shield and the Ancient Behemoth (optional) off him and dimension door back out. Have Crag Hack grab the scroll (another Dimension Door) in order to free him. Note the majority of his troops are non-upgraded. Also since Enchanters don't count as Tower troops (don't know why), adding Ancient Behemoths will give the -1 Morale penalty for 3 troops types (you should have an item to counteract that by now). This may be changed in a future patch.

In the south-west corner is an area you can access from either the black border guard (inside your start area) or by the dimension door. I used the dimension door so as not to waste time/troops fighting the titans beyond the blue border guard in order to get the black tent. Also in this area you can get the Angel Feather Arrow (+15% to Archery skill), which can be traded in the north-east area for the Golden Bow. By doing this level my way, neither will be of significant use. (Although the Golden Bow stops the range penalty, the rust dragons are usually on your side of the board by the time you get to move anyway). Don't forget to pop through the monolith and snag the mine behind the black gate at this point.

North east of the new town is a hill fort so send Crag Hack there as soon as possible to get his troops upgraded.

North of the new town (just above where Crag Hack was) is a Seer's Hut to allow you to change the Diplomat's Ring (from Level 1) into the Collar of Conjuring (carry over item to Level 3). Oddly enough the fact you can carry over the Collar isn't listed on the Scenario Info, but it does happen.

Around the time you start exploring this region, you will see the first signs of your opponent (not counting the areas "eyeballed" from the hut near your start town). If it is a scout, smash it with whoever is at hand capable of doing so. If it is a start hero, get everyone to run towards Dracon. Provided they are closer to the hero than Dracon is, the computer will usually keep approaching until that changes (the computer regularly falls for this).

When you meet one of the top ones, you again face the most annoying computer trick. When things get rough they retreat taking all their artifacts with them and get rehired back at base immediately. Most of the time, you have to surrender to get this (and that costs money), but they can do it for free and so regularly will.

You may also see some movement north of your start area, but they generally won't wander in yet.

Send Dracon north of the new town and you should find a Library of Enlightenment and eventually another town. Grab it, but don't bother defending. Don't bother recharging magic and head north, by the right hand route (unless there is an enemy hero camped on the left road). Pass the garrison, grab the magic spring (double magic points) and swing north west. You will find the first barbarian town. After a usually tough fight, grab the town, the Attack bonus and head east to the next barbarian town. Grab it and then head south to the third one. Only divert to smash any enemy hero you see hanging around.

By capturing the three barbarian towns and defending them, you leave only the four Tower towns between his corners and the south row. Only one of these can be upgraded (just north of your start area) and so if his heroes flee there isn't a lot of troops to rebuild their armies and so can be killed by a big army before they have time to flee.

Now return to the Tower town below the Barbarian corner (either Town Portal or, if you lost the town, walk for a few days). Retake if necessary and head right.

While this is going on, Crag Hack should head back to your main town, grabbing stat enhancers on the way. There he should pick up any titans, naga, genies and mages available to replace his goblins, wolves and now missing behemoths. Then head north.

If the computer breaks into your territory before Crag Hack gets to your main town, Town Portal Dracon there and smash them before Town Portalling back to the Barbarian lands.

Crag Hack should take the town just above your territory and wait there for Dracon to arrive, then the two of them hound the enemy into the last corner (there is a town just outside the barbarian lands eastern gate). While you do this send your scouts tagging any free mines that the computer claimed (either itself or took off you).

Note: there is a crystal mine in the middle left not far from the Hill Fort. It can only be approached up a tree lined, two unit long path. It appears to be undefended, but you will get jump on the first of the two square by 20+ rust dragons. Let Dracon do it.

With that done combine the armies on Dracon and send him around the map tagging remaining mines. Note that although most mines have only a few dragons, the ones surrounding the Barbarian lands have 30+ dragons on them.

Don't forget the mine behind the Blue Guard in the top corner (the monolith leads to the area with the black tent that got "eyeballed" at the same time as the Barbarian towns). If you used dimension door earlier, ignore the titans and the black tent and claim the last mine straightaway.

You will almost certainly be Level 24 when you leave and so in the next level you can't gain anymore experience at all. Seeing the "no more experience" box after a fight work 350,000 experience is real annoying.

That's two down and two to go.


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This walkthrough was written by Lord Xar, a.k.a. Robert Dent.