Nigel

This was a great adventure - or the start of a series of adventures :) The Knights of Riverbourne, I like it. It has a good ring to it, not unlike the Magdalen Knights, who were a group of adventurers doing quests at the Stronghold Knights forum in the olden days. I still can't believe that Glynn should be such a traitor. I hope he rots in that dungeon for a long time. I hope it for his own sake, because when I get my hands on him, he will hope to be back in that dungeon for good.

This may be interesting to modders and map makers alike. Stronghold Nation now has an article on how to lock and unlock Crusader 2 maps :) http://www.stronghold-nation.com/article/244-lockingunlocking-stronghold-crusader-2-maps

With curiosity and relieve the lords come forward to shake the Duke's hand. "How great to see you, Mylord. But now you must tell us the story. We are burnig to know it all. Who was it to capture your caslte? Is Lord Richard really an usurper? Who is this fellow, Glynn and who are his friends? And whom did we help more, your Lordship or your enemies?"

With that the little group moves on and after a few hours of march through the forest, they reach the entrance of a cave. Sir Loring leaned over to Brother Goodman: "Now this is the tricky part. Up to here Sir Lloyd's archers have been covering our backs, hidden away in the forest. But if we go into that cave they cannot follow us without getting noticed. What should we do: - notify Sir Lloyd to come out of hiding and join us in the cave, thereby making our number larger? - notify him to stay in hiding at the cave entrance, where he may still emerge for a surprise attack, but leaves us on our own inside the cave? Good Brother, I would reall appreciate your advice here."

I have just uploaded my file : A Hunting Party To make it easy for everyone I also put a description of the mission here. Hope you will enjoy it :)

Glad to have Brother Goodman's agreement (even in grudgingly), Sir Loring started to organize the move. The set out quitly at night - deciding not to tell Lord Richard about their plans, lest he be indeed a traitor. If Lord Richard turned out to be loyal and Glynn and his friends, the traitors, they would have some explaing to do when they got back. But that was a taks for another day. Now they moved off, a couple of melee men led by Brother Goodman and their prisoner walking between them. "Take us to the Duke and while we walk you can tell us a bit more about your story. But do not try anything funny. Remember, Brother Goodman's sword is right behind you. And you have seen what he can do with it." No one in their group - apart from Goodman and Loring - knew that Sir Lloyd followed them secretly with a group of archers.

Indeed: cudos for not just starting over after you realized your mistake, but biting the bullet and going through with it. That is the way of the warrior - :)

Charles Loring looked at Sir Lloyd. "Indeed, we have allowed a lot of responsibility to pile up on our friend's shoulders. Well, he seems to be a natural leader, not unacustomed to assume command. But even for a seasoned veteran, the stress can get too much. Especially if he is trying to cover up the fact that a wound is taking more of his strength than he likes to admit. Let's pay attention and support him more. Not only in our actions, but also in the decision making. So that it does not all rest upon him alone." With that he walked over to Brother Goodman. "If you agree, good Brother, we will take this fellow between us and make sure he does not try anything funny when he leads us to the Duke's hideout. Sir Lloyd will secretly follow us with his group of archers, some way behind and in hiding. That way he can bail us out if we should run into a trap and cover our retreat if it should be needed. I really don't know if this man here is with us or against us, but if he should prove to be a villain, our plan should still keep us save. Well, as save as someone can be in this country of turmoil, in any case." It had not escaped him, that for some reason the saddle markings of Glynn's horse had caught Goodman's attention. He only hoped Goodman would be able to remember where he had seen the symbol before.

This sounds good; count me in. One question for clarification: Does "Stronghold 3 editor" refer to both, Stronghold 3 and Crusader 2? After all, both games use more or less the same game engine / editor. Or does it explicitly have to be a Stronghold 3 game? By the way, I would not be worried that no one took up the last challange. 52 are a lot of challanges and 1 year is a long time. I think it is quite normal that from time to time there will be a challange that does not find any takers.

Well, on your first 2 questions, it is as you say. You have to do it one by one and there is - at least as far as I know - no shortcut. To dock laddermen and siege towers to walls, you have to make sure that there is enough space in front of the wall; otherwise they won't be able to dock on. I usually take a few macemen forward together with my tower and when the tower gets near I let them run out and destroy any buildings near the wall. Apart from that I think small walls are not accessible by ladders and towers, but I am not sure about that fact. Let me know if you still have trouble with ladders and towers and I will take a close look at it.

Ah, The Strategist will fight his battles on the fields of his own choosing - very wise. * raising hand in salute on rearing horse *

Well, if you own SHC2, you also own SHC:HD and SHC:Extreme - they came as free additions to the SHC2 game. Only if you want to give them a try :) I will probably also pass on this challange. Up to now, I have never modded a game and I feel that I am miles behind in that art - too far behind to produce anything reasonable within 1 week. I don't mean to say that I will pass on every modding challenge - only this one comes too early in the year for me to take it on. But it is never too late to start learning something new. So hopefully I will be able to mod something later in the year.

Thanks for the feedback, Chris. And no worries about beeing critical. I can take a reasonably amount of criticism before I start to cry. And I know that I am not a great landscape artist. So "nice" is a really good compliment for me. I am glad you noticed the bear - or did he notice you first :D I really enjoyed making this map and yes, it was intended to be short and of easy difficulty level. Like the first map in a campaign - perhaps going through English history from William the Conqurer to Richard Lionheart (if I can only find the time). Tokamaps, your map is really impressive. You really deserved to win this one. Fail, I also liked the look of your map (have yet to try it out). Pitty it was the wrong game, but perhaps you can re-submit it for another week. :)

LOL, well, Fail Session, I guess it happens. :D Perhaps Lord Chris will be generous and still accept the Crusader 2 map as an exception (perhaps you loose a few points for missing one of the targets). I myself wound not mind. I would be nice to have 3 entries in this first contest.

Congratulations, Lord Fail - you have the honour of making the first contribution to the 52 Weeks of Stronghold contest. Here comes my entry. I am placing the mission briefing here: Week 1 od 52_Nigel_Saxon Fort.zip

Just to let you know that I have not forgotten about this little adventure. Let's look at our calendars and see if we can find an evening that suits us all. We can use the PM to organize it. Would be cool if we could still get a 4 player game going.

Those are really nice battle reports, Frankel. Keep them coming. Oh and regarding multiplayer: I know the feeling. That's why I seldom play MP games against unknown players these days. Here at Stronghold Nation we have developed a set of rules which makes MP games with more realistic castles and reduces spamming. Also the people here are more interested in having fun with the game than gaining a qick victory. We are occasionally organizing MP events and if you are interested you can come along and check them out. You may find them more to your liking than the "vanilla" MP games.

Tokamaps, you will be getting some competition in this first challange ;) I have a nice scenario in my head. Only now I have to manage to turn it into a somewhat presentable map by Saturday evening.

Meanwhile, Sir Loring listened with growing discomfort to what the young page had to tell him. "This is astounding", he thought to himself. "That Glynn should be a traitor? I trusted the man - but merely on the grounds that I liked him. But then, I also trusted Lord Richard. Now it seems the only ones I can trust are my bow and arrows - and our group of travelers who are loyal to the Duke and un-exposed to the corruption of his court. Indeed I have a lot to learn about the ways of this world" Quietly he gave the signs to bring his archers in position close to Brother Goodman's melee troops - just in case. Then he walked over to where his friend held the remaining one of Glynn's companions at sword point. He just overheared the words of his confession. In a low voice, without the other man beeing able to hear, he said "Brother Goodman, let us hear him out. And if he is willing to lead us, let us follow him - but in such a way that we keep a door open for our escape, in case he should indeed turn to treason. I am sure Sir Lloyd will be most willing and more than capable to cover our retreat route."

Hear ye, The Strategist is back ! I look forward to be crossing swords with you again, Fail Session. Or building castles, or kicking the Wolf's backside, or whatever the 52 weeks will bring us. Tomorrow we will learn of the first challange. :D

Whow, this story is taking quite a twist. Glad to see Glynn, our man in the straw hat, re-appearing. But also, that Sir Richard should be a traitor... that is quite something. I wonder what we are going to do now. Either way, I will be off to the holidays now - returning in early January. If you want to continue the quest, please do. I am sure there will still be lots to do for me when I get back. At this opportunity, I want to whish you all a Merry Christmas and a Happy New Year. :D

No worries. I think we all are just looking forward to the holidays now and we will have a better idea of our schedules once the new year starts. Enjoy the Christmas time - we will continue this game when we get back in the New Year :D

The gods of the internet were not in our favour and we did not manage to get the game working (antivirus software interfereing with Steam/Crusader, which took us the most part of the evening to resolve). So we are now going to reschedule for January.

This event is starting tomorrow (17th ) at 19:00 h London time 20:00 h Paris/Rome/Berlin time 21:00 h Athens time I am really interested to see how it will go. So far I have only been able do some limited testing using AI Lords - it will be the first time with human players and it could go any way. We could beat the Wolf easily, or it could be a long and hard fight, or he could beat us back to the ship and leave us in tatters. I am excited :D P.S. Sorry EaglePrince, I only notice your comment now. It is a pitty you cannot join, but I am sure there will be other opportunities.

Charles Loring stood in awe. As son of a noble family, he had of course been tortured with translations of Cesar's Bellum Gallicum and other Latin texts. He had read about the Testudo formation, the fameous "turtle", but had never believed it could be made to work. After school, he and his brother had tried it out with a group of peasant boys as soldiers. But the village bully had just laughed at them and had smashed through their formation with brute force and a big stick. Bruises and bleeding noses has been the trophies of that day. Now he watched in amazement how Brother Goodman organized his men and repelled charge upon charge of the Wolverine Guards. Their bodies kept piling up with every wave until finally their commander gave the order to retreat. When the field was theirs, Sir Loring divided his men into two groups. "Half of you spread out and cover our backs. Goodman's men are far to exhausted to do anything after their great ordeal, so it is upon you to make sure we get alerted if thei should come back for a second attack. You other guys, search the filed for men who are wounded but still alive. Anyone who is still able to talk is to be brought before Lord Richard for qustioning. I know it is not a pleasant busineess to separate the living from the dead after such a battle, but it has to be done."