Here is a quick walkthrough of every tutorial challenge in Heroes of Might and Magic Olden Era, showing how I complete each objective step by step while keeping the key achievement requirements in mind.
Challenges Guide: Tutorial Challenge Walkthrough
These tutorial challenges are now tied to an achievement, so I go through each one in order and explain how I completed them while keeping in mind that there is more than one valid way to finish each mission.
Terrain Penalties
For this challenge, I focus on two important details. Creature type affects movement speed, and artifacts like Boots of Speed also change how far a hero can move. Because of that, I need to use skeletons from the castle.
I give Leon, the hero in the castle, some skeletons first. Then I relocate the grunts back to the castle. After that, I send Leon to grab the Boots of Speed and move him back as close to John as possible.
With John, I take the boots, swap the grunts for skeletons, and then I can reach the final marker. John needs to have the Boots of Speed and only skeletons in his army.
Weekly Creature Growth
This is the easiest challenge for me. Since I cannot build in the castle, I simply buy as many angels as possible and pass a turn.
After the turn passes, the castle gains +5 angels. I buy them, then buy a few more from outside until I have no gems left. I need around 10–12 angels to win, although it may be possible with fewer.
Marketplace Trade
First, I take all the wood from the map and build three markets in the cities.
There are two ways to complete this part.
If I do not notice the upgrade icon near the hero portrait, I can buy 10 gems, 10 crystals, and 7 mercury. Then I trade 9 crystals for 3 mercury. I do not need to hold all resources at 10 at the same time. I only need each resource to reach 10 separately.
If I notice the upgrade option, I click the portrait at the bottom and upgrade a skill so that my hero becomes a market as well. This counts as one marketplace, and then I have exactly enough money to get all three resources to 10 at once.
Global Map Spells
Compared to the demo version, this challenge is much trickier.
First, I go to the nearby tower and obtain the perk that allows me to learn any spell in the Observatory. The Observatory is not a building on the map. It is the button on the right panel that looks like a big eye.
I click it, then click the area spells button. It looks like an earth icon in the right corner of the Observatory menu. Here, I only need to learn and unlock Dimension Door and Shadowflight for free.
Then I return to the map. I use the book icon and cast Shadowflight. I go through the mountain and fight the kittens. The secret here is that when I kill one kitty, its death triggers a berserk ability, so my girls kill all of them in rage in one turn.
After that, I continue to the desert. When I have no more movement points, I use Dimension Door on the marker. That completes the challenge.
Multiple Heroes
My main hero here is Aeos at level 15. I upgrade her by clicking her portrait at the bottom of the screen. There are many skills to choose from.
Then I move the other heroes in a way that lets me transfer all units and artifacts to the main hero. For example, I move Clarissa to the farthest left point. I give all artifacts and units to Vesper, then move Vesper to the center road.
Next, I move Aeos a little until the first crossroad and give her all artifacts and units from Avis. Then I give her everything from Vesper as well.
After that, I go fight the queens. I use a lot of magic, because the available spells are quite good here.
Counterattack
For the northern encounter, I prefer fighting the upgraded Hive Queens.
The key is that I need to remove their retaliation and also block them from reaching my cavalry.
My first trick is to do nothing on turn one. I skip with all units. This makes the queens move, and then I get two turns in a row.
I attack the central queen with my chevalier. This gives me more space between the queens. Since cavalry deals more damage when it moves more hexes before striking, I can kill that queen completely.
Next, I block the queen with a line of birds. It does not matter whether I block from the top or bottom. I remove retaliation with one bird, then I should be able to kill the second queen.
The tricky part is blocking the third queen from my cavalry. If I manage to form a line of griffons against her, she attacks one of them. Since I already removed retaliation carefully, I can kill her with the horseman. I just need to make sure the horseman moves enough hexes before striking.
Counterattack: Eastern Encounter with Two Hive Queen Stacks
The basic idea is the same. I wait, counterattack the Hive Queens, and then deal with the two-unit stack.
First, I skip the first turn with the hourglass so the queens make their moves.
Then I kill one stack with one Hive Queen. It does not really matter which one, because I will retreat to the start anyway. I prefer the middle one because it gives me more space to maneuver later.
After killing that stack, I wait twice with the other griffons using the shield icon. My main goal is to move the cavalry to the farthest left position.
Then I wait as usual with all units. The Hive Queens get very close, but that is fine. I kill the last one-unit stack with cavalry. I make sure to attack from behind so I can move more hexes and deal more damage. Then I fly away with the griffons to the right.
Because I waited, I now have two turns to move the cavalry and griffons away.
At this point, only one two-unit Hive Queen stack remains.
Now I need much more movement. I need two consecutive cavalry strikes with 9 hexes of movement each to deal maximum damage. I also need two griffons for the final strike to remove retaliation, so I have to move around a lot.
Usually, with two back-to-back turns, I move all my units to the right side. Another option is to split three griffons to the left, three to the right, and move the cavalry to the top right.
Then I need to use the waiting trick again. Since my cavalry has higher Initiative, I cannot simply attack with griffons and then finish the queen with cavalry. I need to sacrifice some griffons.
When the queen is near the right side, I move the cavalry farthest left. If the cavalry is in the top-right position and I have enough hexes, I simply wait with it. Then I use the griffons to surround the queen.
After that, I wait or attack with all of them twice. The queen attacks the nearest griffon because she cannot move. This gives me a setup where I have two turns with my cavalry if I waited with it.
If needed, I move the cavalry 9 hexes away from the queen, attack with griffons, lose one griffon, and then finally get two turns with the cavalry 9 hexes away. I hit the queen hard, leaving only one queen on the battlefield.
After the second-turn hit, I move all troops away to the left, or only move the cavalry. Then I wait and get two turns again.
The final trick is getting the cavalry as far away from the queen as possible. I only need one more strike to win. I sacrifice one of the three remaining griffons to remove retaliation, then strike as hard as possible with the cavalry by moving as many hexes as I can and hitting the queen from behind.
That should be enough to kill the final one-unit Hive Queen stack.
Flee and Surrender
I pass a turn, hit the leeches once with my angels, and then surrender with five angels.
In the city, I buy my hero back, move the angels to the city, and take one griffon and one soldier. Then I go to fight again and flee as quickly as possible.
After that, I rebuy the hero in the city. He has an ability that gives him six angels after fleeing. Because of this, I could technically flee the first time instead of surrendering, but in a real game I may not have such a lucky ability.
That is why I need to clearly understand the difference between surrendering and fleeing. With surrender, I keep my army. With flee, I only keep the hero.
In this example, I can flee and rebuy the hero with six new angels without paying gold for the army after leaving the battlefield.
Then I buy all troops in the city. Now I have 11 or 12 angels, and destroying the leeches becomes easy. I focus the leeches and skeleton archers.
Spell Levels
In this challenge, I have unlimited movement points. I collect all the loot on the map and visit the Mighty Owl.
I need the wings artifact to collect the Seven Eyes artifact. After I loot everything and visit the owl, I go to the city and build the second level of the Mage Guild.
Now I need stardust to upgrade spells or the Seven Eyes artifact, but I do not have enough. There are two ways to solve this.
Upgrading Spells
I disassemble the flying wings artifact by clicking the small cross-like button when selecting the artifact on the hero paper doll screen.
This gives me 50 dust, which is enough to upgrade two spells in the Mage Guild. I highly recommend upgrading Fireball and Lightning Bolt to level 4.
I also make sure to choose the -1 cooldown option for all spells when upgrading my character after leveling up. The level-up icon is at the bottom of the screen near the portrait.
Upgrading the Artifact
Another option is to disassemble all three artifacts: the scroll, wings, and Caduceus. This gives me 100 dust, which is enough to upgrade the Seven Eyes artifact to level 2.
With this method, I get Fireball and Lightning Bolt at level 4 without directly upgrading the spells in the Mage Guild.
Both methods are acceptable and lead to the same result.
The Fight
After preparing, I start the fight. During the Tactics Phase, I place my poor griffon two hexes from the upper border and one hex from the left border.
Then I begin the battle and pass a turn with the hourglass. When the enemies group into a nice stack of four, I get two turns in a row.
I cast Fireball twice on the group, and the four queens are gone.
After that, I kite the remaining enemies and use Lightning Bolt. If they group into three again, I use Fireball. With this approach, I should be able to kill all of them.