Replays for a noob?

[Death's Avatar]

I'm no Mazz man (haven't played since version 2 or so), but I thought a well-practiced and cohesive group of players could beat it without this "key." Has that changed?

The Key was to prevent people from plaing it before they beat the regular. It is a required step or all your units will suddenly explode. its not like more life or anything like that, just prevents you from instant explosion.

As for where to find the key...Im not sure, it is probably on the contest website...if anyone knows where that is...

But really, the regular one on legendary is enough to keep most people more than occupied.

-DA

[Khadrelt]

I'm no Mazz man (haven't played since version 2 or so), but I thought a well-practiced and cohesive group of players could beat it without this "key." Has that changed?

Mazz VI doesn't need a key. It's the 'secret' level that requires the key - and if the key isn't performed correctly, the map script kills all your units. It's actually kinda funny to watch.

I can't remember the key, though.

[Archer]

It's something like taunt Mazz, taunt the second Squire on the left. Hopefully a version will get released without the key requirement at some point, though since it hasn't happened already the chances are probably slim.

Edit: it can't be taunt Mazz, he distributes the units when taunted. Hm. Taunt some dude, then the second Squire on the left.

Edit^2: Electromancer! Electromancer, then second Squire on left.

~J

[Newbage]

I see, thanks replies guys you've been very helpful. And yea that trebuchet thing looks tight, I'm definitely gonna check it out.

As for the pressure of the real map vs just practicing, just practice with the pressures of the real map! How much pressure can there be, it's just a game! You can practice until dead, then restart and practice some more. That's practice.

When I said pressure I didn't mean the kind of pressure you feel when you're taking an exam in college or something. I just meant that for a solo noob, it's extremely difficult to survive long enough to learn anything. And when i said "familiarize myself with the units", I didn't mean practice in the traditional sense (like one would practice hockey or piano). I just mean a sort of sandbox style free roamwith tons of items and orbs everywhere so you could try out the diff attacks, know what they do (I know there are nice descriptions in the manual but you never really know what to expect until you actually use a spell a few times and see how they work and the extent of their effects on other objects), get some of the hotkey combos in to your muscle memory (sort of how in counterstrike you'd learn to reflexively press o2 for armor followed by b41 for an AK at the start of a round as a T), and figure what the items do and look like (I have a huge problem with not being able to see/ID items in this game... they're so small and blend right into the background when gibs and debris starts piling up -- plus i don't even know what their sprites are so I haven't a clue and what to look for). So basically, for a noob like me, just playing the map alone even on timid seems to be a horribly in efficient way to progress through the learning curve. It wouldn't be so bad if one had a few partners to practice with but that'd require some organized practice games (which might make the game seem more like work) rather than having them familiarize themselves with the units solo before actually putting those skills to use in a game where things are trying to kill us lol.

[vinylrake]

...I just meant that for a solo noob, it's extremely difficult to survive long enough to learn anything. And when i said "familiarize myself with the units", I didn't mean practice in the traditional sense (like one would practice hockey or piano). I just mean a sort of sandbox style free rome with tons of items and orbs everywhere so you could try out the diff attacks, know what they do (I know there are nice descriptions in the manual but you never really know what to expect until you actually use a spell a few times and see how they work and the extent of their effects on other objects....

That sounds awfully logical. Seriously, even for some of us long time players a solo map with as many non-standard Myth elements (units, spells, artifacts, enemies) as the Mazz series have can be kind of daunting. My basic strategy is to slow the game down to 1/16th speed so I at least have time to see which of my many mistakes was the turning point that caused me to die. Of course it's often a whole series of gaffes and blunders, but when I play at normal speed I usually can't even see what series of events caused me to die. When I play at normal speed I just see things like all my units exploding in a rain of lava or something. When I play at 1/16th I realize "oh, when THAT unit picks up THAT item and T-Attacks in the middle of his own troops THAT causes the Lava Storm of Instant Death". Of course I forget it all by the next time I play (30 seconds later) but for at least a moment, however brief, I was illuminated.

ps. One could argue that you should play at normal speed and just review your film in slow-mo to see what you can learn, but that just takes too long because you have to play it AND then watch it again. If you just play it in slo-mo it's a much more efficient use of your time.

[Archer]

Either I'm missing something, you really are advocating playing regularly and then watching the film, or you aren't really slowing down to 1/16 time…

~J

[vinylrake]

Either I'm missing something, you really are advocating playing regularly and then watching the film, or you aren't really slowing down to 1/16 time…

~J

You confused me.

I was just saying that playing the game at 1/16th speed is more efficient use of one's time than playing the game at normal speed and additionally watching the film of the game at 1/16th speed.

[Frumius]

To slow down or speed up the game while you're playing a solo level (not any multiplayer), press F1 or F2. I think those are the keys. When viewing films, the speed is adjustable in this way as well.

[Archer]

Well, yes, but last I checked (about 25 seconds ago) the minimum speed in-game was 1/4. You've got an extra factor of 1/4 there that you're either mistaken about or that I want very much to know where you obtained.

~J

[vinylrake]

Well, yes, but last I checked (about 25 seconds ago) the minimum speed in-game was 1/4. You've got an extra factor of 1/4 there that you're either mistaken about or that I want very much to know where you obtained.

~J

Perhaps I am attributing the slowest film playback speed to the slowest ingame speed?

Not sure really, as I am just making this stuff up as I go. Actually I don't even play Myth.

[Archer]

Yeah, that's probably what's happening. Other than "stopped", 1/16 is the slowest film speed. Mid-game, you can only go down to 1/4 (or Stopped if you don't mind the save/load/restart window being in your face).

~J

[ducky]

...yeah.

first, just in case no one's posted this, the secret level was part of the Mazz VI contest. Every Mazz map had a contest for who could beat the map first, except Mazz VI had sort of a double contest, where it was who could beat all 5 difficulty settings, and THEN who could beat all 5 difficulty settings on the secret level. So I guess it was sort of a ten-tuple contest. So anyway, you can read about the contest, and the trick to getting started on the secret level right here.


speaking of which, the teams that won these contests were generally led by players who had already beaten at least the last three mazzes on legendary (not to mention accomplished mythers in their own right). and each of the last few mazzes added a few more new elements than the last one. heck, I had beaten every Mazz since Mazz 1, and even I remember playing mazz 6 for the first time and being like wtf is that floating eyeball shooting laser beams? wait what just happened to my dwarves? the hell did those tornadoes come from, and what does this special do? W T F?!?!? dragons!?! so yeah, from the perspective of a total myth noob, i imagine you really have quite a daunting task in front of you.

my only recommendation would be that you get the myth down first, and then the mazz. once you've got the controls down, you can work on recognizing the billion and one different specials there are in mazz.

there's probably no better place to start than the myth singleplayer campaign (for the myth TFL campaign, DL the Fallen Levels plugin, that I think frum linked earlier).

it's really a well put-together solo game, so all of it's pretty good (I prefer tfl, but apples and oranges, you know), but the Mazz-like solo levels would be Shadow of the Mountain from TFL, Across the Gjol TFL, The Great Library from SB (SB=myth2), aaand maybe the Wall from SB. there might be others but it's been a long time, I don't really remember.


finally, as for the film pack, i started looking into films and i got really into it, so I've been going through my film archive since January 2007, and I'm putting together the best of the best. I'm up to mid-april, so I should be done soon. It'll be good, I promise!

[Archer]

You must have been drinking heavily the night you beat Mazz V, then, if you didn't remember the Beholders

~J

[Frumius]

finally, as for the film pack, i started looking into films and i got really into it, so I've been going through my film archive since January 2007, and I'm putting together the best of the best. I'm up to mid-april, so I should be done soon. It'll be good, I promise!

It'll have a wightblast in it... right?
I mean, not everything that's good is deadly-serious MWC stuff... right?

[Organ Donor]

finally, as for the film pack, i started looking into films and i got really into it, so I've been going through my film archive since January 2007, and I'm putting together the best of the best. I'm up to mid-april, so I should be done soon. It'll be good, I promise!

It'll have a wightblast in it... right?
I mean, not everything that's good is deadly-serious MWC stuff... right?

Should the anti wightblast film be in it also?