Dungeon Keeper 2
Unofficial Strategy Guide and FAQ
by Kasey Chang
released March 29, 2003
0 Introduction
This section is mainly about the FAQ itself and some legalese.
You can read the most often asked FAQs at the end of this
section, or skip right to [1] for the "stuff".
If you like the FAQ, send me $1.00. :-) See 0.3
0.1 A word from the author
This is a FAQ, NOT a manual. You won't learn how to play the game
with this document, and I'm NOT about to add it to ease the life
of software pirates, no matter how old the game is.
Some of you may recognize my name as the editor for the XCOM and
XCOM2: TFTD FAQ's, among others.
If you don't care about all these verbiage (it's mainly for
people who want to redistribute the guide) you can jump right to
the end of this section and read some of the FAQs.
If you like the FAQ, send me $1.00. :-) See 0.3
0.2 Terms of Distribution
This USG should be available at Gamefaqs
(http://www.gamefaqs.com) and other major PC game websites (such
as gamesdomain.com, ign.com, etc.).
If you get this FAQ from anywhere else, beware that it may NOT be
the latest and greatest version.
To webmasters who wish to archive this FAQ on their website,
please read below.
This document is copyrighted by Kuo-Sheng "Kasey" Chang (c) 2001-
2002, all rights reserved excepted as noted above in the
disclaimer section.
This document is available FREE of charge subjected to the
following conditions:
1) This notice and author's name must accompany all copies of
this document: "Dungeon Keeper 2 Unofficial Strategy Guide and
FAQ" is copyrighted (c) 2001-2002 by Kasey K.S. Chang, all rights
reserved except as noted in the disclaimer."
2) This document must NOT be modified in any form or manner
without prior permission of the author with the following
exception: if you wish to convert this document to a different
file format or archive format, with no change to the content,
then no permission is needed.
2a) In case you can't read, that means TXT only. No banners, no
HTML borders, no cutting up into multiple pages to get you more
banner hits, and esp. no adding your site name to the site list.
3) No charge other than "reasonable" compensation should charged
for its distribution. (Free is preferred) Sale of this
information is expressly prohibited. If you see any one selling
this guide, drop me a line.
4) If you used material from this, PLEASE ACKNOWLEDGE the source,
else it is plagiarism.
5) The author hereby grants all games-related web sites the right
to archive and link to this document to share among the game
fandom, provided that all above restrictions are followed.
Sidenote: The above conditions are known as a statutory contract.
If you meet them, then you are entitled to the rights I give you
in 5), i.e. archive and display this document on your website. If
you don't follow them, you did not meet the statutory contract
conditions, thus you have no right to display this document. If
you still do so, then you are infringing upon my copyright. This
section was added for any websites who don't seem to understand
this.
0.3 VOLUNTARY Contribution
Gamers who read this guide are under NO obligation to send me ANY
compensation.
However, a VOLUNTARY contribution of one (1) US Dollar would be
very appreciated.
If you choose to do so, please make your US$1.00 check or $1.00
worth of stamps to "Kuo-Sheng Chang", and send it to "2220 Turk
Blvd. #6, San Francisco, CA 94118 USA".
If you don't live in the US, please send me some local stamps. I
collect stamps too.
0.4 How and when to contact me
PLEASE let me know if there's a confusing or missing remark,
mistakes, and thereof... If you find a question about this game
that is not covered in the USG, e-mail it to me at the address
specified below. I'll try to answer it and include it in the
next update.
The address below is spelled out phonetically so spammers can't
use spambots on it:
Kilo-Sierra-Charlie-Hotel-Alpha-November-Golf-Seven-Seven AT
Yankee-Alpha-Hotel-Oscar-Oscar DOT Charlie-Oscar-Mike
To decipher this, simply read the first letter off each word
except for the numbers and the punctuation. This is "military
phonetics" or "aeronautical phonetics" in case you're wondering.
0.5 The Author
I am just a game player who decided to write my own FAQs when the
ones I find don't cover what I want to see. Lots of people like
what I did, so I kept doing it.
Previously, I've written Unofficial Strategy Guides (USGs) for
XCOM, XCOM2:TFTD, Wing Commander, Wing Commander 2, Wing
Commander 3, Wing Commander 4, Privateer, Spycraft, 688(I)
Hunter/Killer. Mechwarrior 3, MW3 Expansion Pack, Mechwarrior 4,
Mechwarrior 4: Black Knight, Need for Speed: Porsche Unleashed,
The Sting!, Terranova, Fallout Tactics, Starfleet Command Volume
II, and a few more.
Most of them should be on http://www.gamefaqs.com, the biggest
FAQ site around.
To contact me, see 0.4 above.
0.6 Disclaimer / Copyright Information
Dungeon Keeper 2 is produced by Bullfrog
(http://www.bullfrog.co.uk/), is distributed in the US by
Electronic Arts (http://www.ea.com). See the official site at
http://www.dungeonkeeper.com.
There is no warranty for this unofficial strategy guide. After
all, it depends on YOU the player. All I can do is offer some
advice.
This document was produced on Microsoft Word 97, with some
notetaking on a Handspring Visor with the Targus foldable
keyboard. Some editing was done with Editpad
(editpadclassic.com).
0.7 Revision History
17-MAY-01 Initial release
03-SEP-02 Some updated info
29-MAR-03 Updated a bit about capturing the princes in the next
to last mission.
0.8 The Most Frequently Asked Questions
0.8.1 General Questions
Q: Can you send me Dungeon Keeper 2 (or portions thereof)?
A: No.
Q: Can you send me the manual (or portions thereof)?
A: No.
Q: Can you tell me how to play the game?
A: Read the manual.
Q: What are the control keys?
A: Read the manual or the README file.
Q: What's the latest version?
A: See http://www.dungeonkeeper.com. As of release of this guide
it's V1.7.
Q: Where are the cheat codes?
A: See last section, and/or
http://www.geocities.com/theEvilOnesDK2page/
Q: Any expansion packs?
A: None for DK2. There were two expansion packs for DK1.
Q: When's DK3 coming out?
A: No one knows. The official site says it's in development, but
there has been no news for YEARS. It's likely dead. Peter
Molyneaux has moved onto other studios and projects in any case.
0.8.2 Land Questions
Q: How do I destroy a hero gate?
A: There are two types of hero gates. There's a free-standing
one, and a "wall" one. For the free-standing one, claim all the
land touching it (all eight tiles). If the tile's under water,
build bridge there. For the wall one, claim all three tiles in
front of it MAY disable it.
Q: One of those tiles around the gate is solid rock!
A: Then you can't destroy that gate. Put an alarm trap there to
warn you of any incursions.
Q: I dug somewhere I didn't want to. Can I put the rock back?
A: Nope. Put a door or barricade there instead.
Q: Should I build a wooden bridge temporarily over lava and let
it burn, or build a stone bridge?
A: The best way is to build wooden bridge, then sell it before it
completely burns up. If you don't have time to micromanage, then
build stone bridge, and sell it later.
0.8.3 Beast and Hero Questions
Q: How do I attract a specific type of beast through the portal?
A: You can only provide the specific incentives (different beasts
are attracted by different things) and hope the right beasts show
up through the portal. See the specific creature's description.
If your "portal limit" is reached and you want a different type,
drop the creature you don't want into the portal to "fire" it.
Q: I don't have a portal! How do I get more units?
A: You have three possibilities: build a prison and turn your
prisoners into skeletons; build graveyard and turn the dead
bodies into vampires; build torture chamber (with prison) and
convert your prisoners to your cause (be ready with heal spells
and/or chickens). On some levels, you may be able to claim "free"
creatures roaming the landscape by digging into its area, thus
freeing them, or free imprisoned creatures by claiming their
prison. Converted/created creatures do not count against the
portal limit (of course).
Q: My creatures don't like their company!
A: If you converted "hero" creatures, you will need to build
separate facilities for them apart from the regular facilities
for the "evil" creatures. That includes training room as well as
lair and hatchery. In addition to that, some "evil" creatures
don't like each other either. See creature references or your
manual for details.
Q: How do I move one creature's "bed" to another lair?
A: Pick up that creature and drop it into another lair. If
there's room in that lair that creature will resettle once it
gets over the "dazed" period.
Q: What is this about "Elite Creatures"?
A: Version 1.61 introduced elite creatures, a "special" captain-
type creature that has better stats than their regular brethren.
For more information on these, please see
http://www.geocities.com/theEvilOnesDK2page/
Q: How do I "fire" a creature? I have too many "weak" ones!
A: Grab a creature and drop it back into a portal.
0.8.4 Mana/Gold Questions
Q: How do I get more mana?
A: You get mana via claiming tiles (1 per tile per "turn"), claim
mana vaults (100 per vault per "turn"), or via "specials" (hard
to find). You can also recycle excess imps by dumping them into
the dungeon heart. You can also have creatures pray at the
temple. They will gain you mana depending on their type and
experience level. Maximum mana intake per "turn" is 500 from the
land, TOTAL, no matter how many tiles or mana wells you hold.
NOTE: With V1.7 you can get additional 100 mana added to the
maximum per turn per mana vault you claim. This is in addition to
the tiles. Maximum mana you can store is still 200,000.
Q: How do I get more gold?
A: Dig gold seams, dig gem seams (doesn't run out), sell
existing/captured structures (including bridges)
Q: I see some gold in the prison but imps won't pick them up!
A: Imps will not enter a prison to pick up gold. You can pick it
up yourself using the hand and drop them into your treasuries or
around the dungeon heart.
0.8.5 Other Questions
Q: My imps won't pick up the special item!
A: You need a library to store special items. Once you have a
library, your imps will drag the "chest" back. You may need more
libraries if your existing ones are "full".
Q: I need to retrieve something "underwater" and my imps won't go
there!
A: Build a bridge on top of that tile and the item will "float"
to the top of the bridge, allowing your imps to get it.
Q: How do I get more multiplayer maps?
A: Try the official website. Also, there are some fan sites that
have more available.
1 Game Information
Dungeon Keeper 2 is the sequel to Dungeon Keeper, the genre-
breaking title from Bullfrog, published by Electronic Arts.
Dungeon Keeper was revolutionary by turning the typical "dungeon"
game upside down. Instead of being the hero with sidekicks
smashing monsters and amassing gold, you are the dungeon keeper,
controlling creatures to STOP such heroes, and even torture them,
and perhaps convert them to your cause.
Dungeon Keeper 2 advanced the concept by introducing better AI
and smarter individual units, also removed some of the existing
creatures that are not well balanced.
DK2 also introduced full 3D, and supports 3D acceleration through
Direct3D. You can now possess one of your creatures and take a
walk through YOUR dungeon, and admire your handiwork up close and
personal!
1.1 How do I get Dungeon Keeper 2?
DK2 can be purchased as an EA Classic from ea.com. Also check
your local software stores. There's now also a dual-jewelcase
pack that contains both DK and DK2 for one low price.
1.2 What do I need to run Dungeon Keeper 2?
From the official website (http://www.dungeonkeeper.com):
Minimum Spec:
P166MMX
32MB RAM
No need for 3D acceleration (software 3D)
Recommended Spec:
PII-266
32MB RAM
No need for 3D acceleration (software 3D)
For multiplayer, you'll need a TCP/IP networking components
installed for the respective O/S's.
1.3 Are there more maps available?
You can download some multiplayer maps from the official site and
some fan sites.
1.4 Where are the patches?
See the official site: http://www.dungeonkeeper.com. Latest as of
this guide is V1.7.
1.5 What game modes are there?
Single player: campaign, my pet dungeon, skirmish (against AI) on
any multiplayer map.
Multiplayer: select among any multiplayer maps against another
human and/or AI.
1.6 Is there a demo?
Yes, try the official site for a downloadable multiplayer demo.
2 Dungeon Building
Some basic tips on dungeon building
2.1 Terrain Types
Here's a list of the different terrain you'll encounter and some
tips on dealing with them.
2.1.1 Rock
Dig-able. Once it's dug, it can't be put back. Blocks any sort of
travel except digging.
You MAY want to use sight-of-evil to make sure you are actually
digging in the right place.
2.1.2 Hard Rock
Cannot be dug, so forms natural walls. Use these as your natural
"borders".
Sometimes, seeing a "corridor" of rocks in hard rock can lead you
to hidden specials, or open yourself to attack as you "dig
through". Use sight of evil to make sure you don't dig yourself
into a hole you can't get out.
2.1.3 Gold Seam
Same as rock, except they contain gold. Don't dig them until you
need them. Also, sometimes they lead you in certain directions.
2.1.4 Gem Seam
Gem seam can be mined indefinitely. The more imps you have
digging at it (you can dig at it from more than one side if you
can reach it), the more gold you get. Put treasuries nearby for
maximum efficiency.
2.1.5 Water
All your creatures except vampires can wade through water, albeit
at slower speed.
For best movement speed, build wooden bridges over the land.
Build two-wide bridges if you don't want to cause a traffic jam.
Bridges also allow your vampires to travel through.
2.1.6 Lava
Stone bridges can last over lava. Some creatures can walk over
lava, like giants and salamanders. Flying creatures can also fly
over it. So those won't protect your flanks.
2.1.7 Dirt Path
Unclaimed land, claim it to get more mana, but beware attracting
enemy's attention.
2.1.8 Paved Path
The color tells you who's the owner. It takes a bit longer to
UNCLAIM someone else's land than to claim it as your own. Just
let your imps work.
2.1.9 Portal
This is where your creatures come from. Hold hand over it to see
how many creatures have passed through so far and how many can
still fit.
To "fire" a creature, pick it up and drop it into the portal.
2.1.10 Hero Gate
This is where heroes come from. Claim all tiles around it to
disable it. (build bridges if over water or lava).
Some gates cannot be disabled. Build alarm and other traps near
the gate to give you some reaction time.
2.1.11 Mana Vault
Also called mana spring or mana well, these special tiles
generate mana at 100 per second, instead of just 1 per second of
a regular tile. They are very useful in certain situations.
2.2 Rooms
Here are some rooms you can build in your dungeon. The cost given
is per TILE, and some will require more than a few tiles to be
functional. See the manual for basic info.
Most rooms function best at "odd" sizes, like 3xX or 5xX. This is
due to the way the game calculates the wall tiles vs. non-wall
tiles for the room. Rooms only have items every three wall tiles,
or every non-wall tile, or both.
Many of the rooms are best done as "square", like 3x3, 5x5, and
so on.
2.2.1 Dungeon Heart
The symbol of your dungeon, if it's destroyed, you lost. It's
always a 5x5 room. It's also a "treasury" that can store 16K
gold. It's also PRE-BUILT. You never need to build it, just
protect it.
It also gives your creatures a morale bonus if they are fighting
nearby.
You may want to put several traps here in case of emergencies,
and close off the exits with the heaviest doors you have, just in
case.
You can recycle "excess" imps by dropping them into the dungeon
heart. The icon should change to trashcan with the number of imps
you have. Click to drop. You'll get half of the mana cost back.
2.2.2 Lair
Cost: 300 Usable size: 1x1
All creatures (except skeletons) need a place to sleep, and that
would be the lair.
A creature that just stepped off the portal will settle in the
closest lair with room, which is not always the best one. You may
want to put a small lair (say, 2-3 spaces) near the portal. Once
creatures settled there, you can then move the creatures to their
"permanent" lair to "resettle" them.
You will generally want more than one lair. You'll create several
"work centers" (like workshops, guard posts, or staging areas),
and you'll need lair and hatchery at each area.
Remember that "good" creatures (converted heroes) and "evil"
creatures (the ones that came through the portal) would not sleep
in the same lair. Also see your manual on the list of creatures
that don't like each other, and thus need more lairs.
Each creature usually uses one square for its nest.
Lair can be in any shape, and thus are best used to line the "odd
corners" of other rooms.
Lair is best placed near hatchery (for food) and treasury (for
pay day). It should also be near place of work (for fighters, the
training room. for workers, the workshop).
2.2.3 Hatchery
Cost 300 Usable size: 1x1 Recommended size: 3x3 or 5x5
Attracts Bile Demon (3x3 or larger hatchery only) with workshop
Hatchery is your dungeon's food source for all creatures except
undead. While they don't need to be square, the more henhouses
you see the faster you get chickens, which means at least 3x3.
You can pick up individual chickens and feed them to your
prisoners or torture victims. Your creatures will wander in
automatically when they're hungry.
2.2.4 Treasury
Cost 200 Usable size: 1x1
Each tile of treasury stores about 3000 pieces of gold, so you
can increase your storage capacity by quite a bit. Don't
overbuild, as that wastes gold.
When it's pay day, your creatures heads toward the nearest
treasury to get their gold, so you need several treasuries
around, to make sure your creatures don't run too far to fulfill
their needs. Remember to redistribute some of the gold if needed
as creatures who don't get paid lose morale.
2.2.5 Training Room
Cost 500 Usable size: 3x3 Recommended size: 5x5
Training room allows creatures to train up to level 4. You may
want to toss creatures in there personally, as you can't rely on
those creatures wander in by themselves.
Training room has moving targets on the walls for shooting
practice, as well as target dummies in the non-wall tile for
sparring practice. The room must have 3 consecutive walls to get
a wall target, and at least one non-wall tile to get a target
dummy. So 5x5 (9 targets) is much more productive than a 3x3
(only 1 target)
Training creatures takes a lot of gold, so make sure you have
enough.
2.2.6 Library
Cost 600 Usable size: 3x3 Recommended size: 4x4 or larger
Attracts Warlocks (and other researchers, like wizards, maidens,
and so on)
Libraries help make your spells stronger and better. While
warlocks are not bad, converted wizards research even better.
You want libraries larger than 3x3 as the "bookshelves" in the
middle of the room is dependent on the amount of non-wall tiles,
and 3x3 has just ONE bookshelf.
You can sell the libraries after all spells have been researched.
Your imps will drag any specials (those chests) discovered so far
to the nearest library. If you don't have one, your imps will not
collect the special chests.
Maidens and Dark Angels also do spell research, in additional to
warlocks and wizards.
2.2.7 Combat Pit
Cost 750 Usable size: 4x4 Recommended size: 5x5
Attracts Dark Knights
Combat pit allows your creatures to go up to level 6. It is best
to use level 3 or level 4 creatures in the combat pits. Lower
level creatures don't gain much by using combat pits. They drop
unconscious first.
Technically you CAN build a 3x3 combat pit, but then you can only
drop 2 creatures in there. A 4x4 only fits 4 creatures. A lot
more can fit into a 5x5.
Best use is drop your creatures (preferably level 3 or 4) into
the pit and let them fight it out. The losers will be knocked out
(make sure you have imps available to drag them back to their
lairs). The winner will be walking about inside, so be sure to
drag him/her out and drop them so s/he can go get some food or
sleep as needed.
2.2.8 Workshop
Cost 600 Usable size: 3x3 Recommended size: 5x5
Attracts trolls and bile demons (with 3x3 or larger hatchery)
This is where your doors and traps are built.
Consider building a 5x5 workshop with a strip of lairs on one
side and a strip of hatchery on the other side. That way the
workers don't need to go far for food or sleep. Remember to
"relocate" the workers to those lairs!
While only trolls and bile demons are "good" in a workshop, other
creatures can actually help (even though they're not THAT good at
it, and may even hate it). Check the workshop size, then drop in
a few helpers.
2.2.9 Guard Room
Cost 600 Usable size: 1x1
Attracts Dark Elf
Guard room has a "detection radius" that makes it easy to locate
enemy incursions. You can see it clearly on the "radar".
All creatures dropped in guard room start guarding unless the
guardroom is "full" (one creature per tile). That includes imps.
Try dropping them in an empty guard room. They'll just stand
there.
2.2.10 Prison
Cost 750 Usable size: 3x3 Recommended size: 5x3
Creates Skeletons
While 3x3 prison is a tad small, it does work. You don't really
need a 5x5 prison since you should not keep that many prisoners
any way. If you need lots of prisoners, 3x5 or 4x5 are good
sizes. You want them either in the torture chamber or dead as
skeletons. Of course, a bit of time need to pass before the
creature dies and turns into skeleton.
Remember to drop a few imps beside the fallen heroes to drag them
back to the prison. That means you want the fighting to occur on
YOUR land if possible.
You can either feed chickens to the prisoners or use the heal
spell to keep them healthy.
If the prisoner dies, a skeleton will rise, but still inside the
prison. You may need to grab it and drop it outside the prison so
it can go train or something. With V1.7 they seem to wander out
of prison by themselves more often now.
If a prisoner dies, his gold remains inside the prison, and imps
won't pick them up. You'll have to use the hand to pick up
manually and drop them where you wish (directly into a treasury
is fine).
You can LOCK the prison so the imps don't carry the unconscious
creatures back to the prison. Those creatures will then die where
they lie. The body can then be carried to graveyard. .
2.2.11 Torture Chamber
Cost 1500 Usable size: 3x3
Attracts Mistress and Dark Knight (with Combat Pit)
Torture chamber serves two purposes. You may need to extract some
information from a prisoner, or convert the prisoner to your
cause.
If you're only going for information, you don't need to heal
first. Just drop the prisoner straight into the torture chamber
and you'll get the necessary info.
If you are going for conversion, it's best to heal the prisoner
just before you drop them into the torture chamber. You'll
probably have to come back periodically to check on the progress.
And heal the prisoner again.
The number of prisoners you can torture varies depending on the
room. If you have three consecutive wall tiles, you get a "wall
wheel". The "middle" tile in the room gets a center wheel or an
electric chair.
Prisoners that die from torture become a dead body that can be
taken to the graveyard to feed a vampire.
Make sure you drop the prisoner on a tile that contains the
torture device, and the device is NOT occupied (say, by a
Mistress).
A Mistress adding her ministrations to the victim will increase
efficiency of the torture, and make the conversion go faster.
Mistresses like to torture themselves in the torture chamber. If
a Mistress can use the training, drop her in the training room
instead. A high level Mistress can cast lightning like a Fairy,
and is a potent force indeed.
2.2.12 Graveyard
Cost 2000 Usable size: 3x3 Recommended size: larger!
Graveyard makes vampires. from the bodies of the fallen, yours or
theirs. As long as your imps can get to the bodies, they'll be
dragged to the graveyard. When there's enough life force
accumulated, a vampire rises.
The number of headstones tells you how many vampires can fit in
this graveyard. A 3x3 graveyard can only fit one vampire. So you
need something larger.
2.2.13 Casino
Cost 600 usable size: 3x3
Attracts Rogue
Casino serves two purposes: it attracts rogues, and it makes your
other creatures happier as they win money. Of course, it'll cost
you some gold.
You can adjust the "payout" by zooming into the sign and adjust
to either smile or money. You CAN make money off the casino, but
your creatures will not be as happy.
Occasionally, a creature WILL hit the jackpot. The music that
plays can be interesting.
If a creature wins the jackpot, put the creature in a locked room
and slap him until all the gold drops out. The creature will be
unhappy, but no one will witness your act.
2.2.14 Temple
Cost 3000 Usable size: 5x5
Attracts dark angels (2 per 5x5 temple)
If your creatures pray at the temple, your mana will increase.
The amount of mana depends on how "brainy" the creature is, and
what level he's at (1-4, 5-7, 8-10).
Temples are EXTREMELY expensive (the most expensive structure in
DK2). However, Dark angels are very powerful creatures and you'll
want as many on your side as possible.
You can get specific creatures by sacrificing certain creatures
in the temple's "pond" (i.e. drop it into the middle of the
temple. Following is a PARTIAL list.
Temple Sacrifices: (courtesy of gamespot.com)
SACRIFICE EFFECT
2 Salamanders 1 Dark Mistress
2 Rogues 1 Salamander
2 Warlocks 1 Goblin
2 Bile Demons 1 Rogue
2 Black Knights 1 Vampire
1 Salamander + 1 Dark Elf 1 Dark Mistress
2 Skeletons 1 Dark Elf
2 Wizards 1 Bile Demon
1 Skeleton + 1 Troll 1 Bile Demon
2 Dark Elves 1 Troll
2 Vampires 1 Bile Demon
2 Dark Mistresses 1 Skeleton
2 Trolls 1 Warlock
3 Monks Mana Boost
1 Bile Demon + 1 Warlock + 1 Dark Elf Receive Imps
2 Dwarves + 1 Dark Mistress Make Safe
For a complete list, see
http://www.geocities.com/theEvilOnesDK2page/
2.2.15 Wooden Bridge
Cost 200
Used to create speedways over water, it doesn't last very long
over lava.
It is also the only way for a vampire to cross over water.
You may want a bridge that's more than one tile wide if you plan
to use it for a LOT of creatures.
As long as the bridge still exists, you can still sell it, even
if it's charred.
2.2.16 Stone Bridge
Cost 500
Same as wooden bridge, except it won't burn over lava.
Nasty trick to pull on heroes. Build a long bridge over lava to
your land. When the heroes get on. Sell one part of it so they
can't get off. Then the "entrance" piece so they have no where to
go. Now sell the entire bridge and watch them fall into the lava
and get cooked. Only works with heroes since they don't claim the
land. Enemy keepers would have the imps convert your bridge
first, making it impossible to sell.
2.3 Dungeon Building Tips
Think of your dungeon as several "regions". There would be a work
region (workshop, lair, hatchery, small treasury), a training
region (lair, hatchery, training room, small treasury), a
treatment region (prison, torture chamber, graveyard, small lair,
small hatchery, small treasury), a research region (libraries,
treasury, lair, hatchery), and so on. Each region should be
designed for minimize travel time among the needs.
Use the "odd shapes" caused by the hard rocks as treasuries or
small lairs when you don't have perfect rectangles or squares.
Don't open the "door" to a room right in the "middle" of the
wall. Most rooms with "wall" tile structures require three
consecutive wall tiles, and if you put a door right in the middle
of a 5x5 room, you just ruined the chance of getting at least one
structure on that wall. Instead, put the door slightly "offset",
and open into the CORNER of the room.
Use sight of evil to make sure you don't breach into the open
before you want to. Doors and traps should always cover the
entrance(s) to your dungeon before you breach.
You may want to build a "forward staging area" with lair and
hatchery as "home away from home" when you're ready to attack.
Maybe even add a training room there if possible. Use a door to
keep the creatures locked inside until you're ready to unleash
them.
You need door, any door, on your most important rooms. While they
cost money, the increase security is worth it, as it slows down
any attackers. You need the best doors around your dungeon heart,
at the very least. Add traps as security.
To slow down enemy attack, give them something to destroy. Build
single tile lairs right in front of the attacker. You'll lose the
lair and waste the gold, but you'll gain a little time.
Build "rat-runs", i.e. single-tile wide corridors filled with
traps to slow down the enemy.
3 Your creatures
Creatures cannot pass over lava unless specifically stated to be
able to fly or can walk over lava.
For information about Elite creatures, please see
http://www.geocities.com/theEvilOnesDK2page/
3.1 Imp
Imps are pretty dumb. They tend to do the first job they consider
important, which is not always the one YOU consider important!
Also, they will mostly perform duties only on YOUR territory
(except claim more territory, that is). Drop them close to the
job you want them to do and they'll usually get to it. If that's
not it, just grab them and drop them again.
Imps can bash down doors, but they usually take much longer than
"true" fighters do.
Consider assigning more than one to the same job. Some jobs can
have up to three imps working on it at the same time.
The cost of imps goes up the more imps you have. Usually, you
don't need more than 10. If you have plenty of mana you can go up
to 15. You shouldn't need more than that.
Sometimes, you just WANT to let the imps run loose. Several
levels involve letting the imps claim territory so you can send
in your forces close to the enemy.
You can recycle the excess imps if you need a bit more mana.
3.2 Goblin
Goblins are pretty wimpy as fighters, though in a group and high
enough levels, they can swarm their enemies. However, Mistresses
are far more useful, esp. at higher levels.
When you got enough facilities to attract better creatures, send
the goblins packing (drop them back into the portals).
Goblins recover quickly from "drop shock" and should be in your
initial attack wave. Follow them up with heavy hitters.
Equivalent to hero dwarf (except dwarf also digs like imps)
Hates dwarfs.
Attracted by lair (at least 5 tiles)
3.3 Warlock
Warlocks are distance attackers, usually with fireball spell.
Have blockers and other fighters do direct combat. Warlocks can
fend for themselves in melee with their staff, but not that well.
Warlocks are your primary spell researchers unless you've
captured some wizards. Dark angels and Maidens also do research
though, but those come a lot later.
Equivalent to hero wizard
Hate wizards and vampires.
Attracted by Library.
Prefers lairs and hatcheries near libraries.
3.4 Firefly
Firefly tends to explore all over the map by itself, so just let
it look around. Or possess it and fly it around.
Needless to say, firefly can fly over any terrain.
They tend to be shot down in enemy territory, and impossible to
retrieve. Still, they're so weak you can always attract another
one if need be. Training these up is not that useful. Keep one or
two as scout.
3.5 Troll
A bit faster than bile demon in combat, but also weaker, you
don't really need a lot of trolls unless you can't get bile
demons.
Attracted by Workshop
Prefers lairs and hatcheries near workshops.
3.6 Dark Elf
Dark Elves have the sniper ability that allows them to shoot
crossbow bolts over impressive long distances. They are weak at
melee combat. Keep them at a distance.
Attracted by Hatchery, Lair, and especially Guardroom
Equivalent to hero Elven Archer
Hates Elven Archer, Dwarf
3.7 Skeleton
Skeletons are generated from prisoners that die in your prison.
They require no food nor sleep (thus no need for hatchery and
lair). They also tend to charge without heed to danger (sort of
like Mistress) and thus are rather hard to train up to high-level
as they tend to die "young".
Being undead, they are immune to fear traps, which is very
important in certain uses.
Do not send Skeletons to train in the combat pit. If they "die",
they shatter and are lost forever.
3.8 Mistress
Mistress is like Skeleton, except they move faster and has
ability to learn new spells like lightning. At higher levels,
they are quite useful as their lightning knocks down enemies to
be pounced on by other fighters.
Mistresses tend NOT to train. They prefer to torture themselves
in the torture chamber. Be sure to drop them in the training room
for more training. After that, use combat pit.
Mistress is one of the fastest recovering from "drop shock" (the
dazed period following being dropped from the hand), and should
be your initial attackers.
Attracted by Hatchery, Lair, and especially Torture Chamber.
Hates Fairies.
3.9 Salamander
Salamander is a mixed distance and melee fighter. Their fireball
and spit work at all ranges. They are not that strong, but they
do like to train themselves, so they're usually the first ones to
reach level 4. In a group, they can be quite effective.
They can walk over lava.
Attracted by Hatchery, Lair, and especially Training Room.
Prefers lair/hatchery close to lava.
3.10 Rogue
Rogue prefers side attacks. They can be used to steal money from
enemies. However, it's NOT easy. I personally don't see much use
for them.
Rogues can be detected by guard rooms, even while "invisible".
Attracted by Casino
Equivalent to hero Thief
3.11 Bile Demon
Bile Demon is a MUCH slower but tougher version of troll, with
some spell capabilities. However, they are usually too busy
building things to gain levels until you're not building items
any more.
Definitely create "bile demon heaven", which is basically a 7x5
room with lair, hatchery, and workshop all rolled into one big
room.
Attracted by Hatchery (5x5 min), Lair (9 min), Workshop (3x5 min)
Hates Skeletons, Giants
Prefers Hatchery and Lair close to workshop.
3.12 Vampire
Vampires are generated only from graveyards (one of the most
expensive structures in the game), and require a lot of
casualties (both yours and theirs).
Vampire cannot pass over water. If you want them to move around,
build them bridges.
Vampire, when "killed" by creatures other than monks, resurrects
itself in its "home" graveyard, but loses one level of
experience. If it no longer has a graveyard or it is level 1,
then it's "gone".
Vampires receive double damage from monk's attacks, and cannot
resurrect if killed by a monk.
It should be obvious that you should not let vampires train in
the combat pit, since training won't really gain it anything.
Also, don't drop it into training with any monks.
Attracted by Hatchery, Lair, Treasury, and especially Graveyard.
Hates monks.
3.13 Black Knight
Black Knights are your toughest fighters second only to Dark
Angels. Keep them well and they will serve you well.
It takes a long time to train them up. Keep them trained in
training room, then drop them into combat pit paired with other
creatures for more practice. Remember to have imps standing by.
Attracted by Treasury, Hatchery, Lair, Torture Chamber, and
especially Combat Pit
3.14 Dark Angel
Dark Angels are extremely tough in combat, and their ability to
fly is a great bonus. At high levels, they cast spell that raises
3 skeletons to fight on your side (i.e. Skeleton Army) and that
is an impressive sight. Of course, level 1 skeletons don't last
long in combat.
Attracted by Temple (5x5 only).
Note: each temple only attracts two dark angels. To recruit more,
build more 5x5 temples.
Hates Monks, Fairies
Prefers lair and hatchery close to temple.
3.15 Horned Reaper (i.e. Horny)
Technically you can't recruit Horny, as he's the one that want to
go outside. But he's available for summon if you retrieve all
four pieces of the Horny Talisman, and have more than 100000
units of mana.
Horny is absolutely unstoppable by even level 10 heroes and
creatures. One swipe from his scythe will take down just about
any creature except level 9's and 10's. He also has a "fireball"
stun charge that knocks down an enemy.
The problem is, of course, Horny takes too much mana. See the
"Keeper Spells" section for more info.
NOTE: V1.6 makes Horny easier to summon.
3.16 Maiden
Part spider, part human, maiden is a new creature added in V1.6
and later. They are quite multipurpose as they can do research,
fight long distance with their "freeze", or even do a bit of hand-
to-hand combat. They are relatively weak hand-to-hand though.
Have no information on their likes or dislikes.
4 Your opponents
In general, if the captured enemy units are as good or better
than your own, it may be worth the time to convert them. You can
probably leave the level 1 weaklings to die. Level 3's and 4's at
the beginning are worth converting.
4.1 Dwarf
Dwarves are the hero's version of imps, as they dig, but they
also fight (albeit weakly).
They are the fastest hero unit around, but otherwise not that
useful. Let them rot to skeletons.
4.2 Elven Archer
The counterpart of Dark Elf, these are the sharpshooters of hero
force.
If you grab a couple high-level ones and you didn't bother with
guard rooms, you can convert these as your guards, but otherwise
you should train your dark elves instead and let these rot to
skeletons.
4.3 Wizard
The counterpart of Warlock, these are the magic users of the hero
force.
They are much better at research than warlocks. If you have a
library and have more research to do, capture and convert these
to help out.
4.4 Monk
Monks have one purpose in life: to kill vampires. Not do they
cause extra damage on vampires (twice of normal), they also kill
a vampire permanently (no resurrect at graveyard).
While a bit slow, monks can pray to heal, which makes them VERY
hard to kill. They also heal those around them.
Definitely try to convert some, as they go great with your strike
groups, keep them fighting longer.
4.5 Fairy
Fairies fly a lot, so if you have an open flank in your dungeon,
a fairy will likely find it.
Their lightning attack is also quite dangerous as it knocks your
unit down to be pounded by other enemy units. Definitely attack
fairies with multiple units.
Fairies are rather weak and can't take much torture. They don't
do much damage, but they're fast.
4.6 Thief
Thief is the hero equivalent of Rogue, and operates nearly the
same way. They want your gold.
On the other hand, if they are high-level enough, they can just
as easy bash your units to submission.
They are probably better off turned into skeletons, as they are
rather weak in combat.
4.7 Guard
Slow but tough, they don't do much damage actually, and can be
converted with a bit of effort.
Convert these if you can't get "better" recruits, like Giants and
Knights.
4.8 Knight
Knights are pretty tough customers, but a thunderbolt should
knock them down, then your creatures can pound them.
Convert any captured knights, and thank the heroes for sending
you fine recruits.
4.9 Giant
Giants are slow, but they can walk over lava. They are pretty
tough in fighting, and a group of them is nearly unstoppable.
Definitely try to convert some to your cause.
4.10 Royal Guard
Royal Guards appear later in the campaign as personal escorts of
the "Lord of the Land". They differ from regular guards in that
they wear purple. They are TOUGH, and they do quite a bit of
damage.
If you get a chance to convert one of these, definitely do so.
5 Strategies and Tactics
The manual has a LOT of tips, and you should read those first.
A lot of combat involves proper keeper spell casting. Read the
next section.
5.1 Holding Portals
In general, when playing against AI, the need is to hold as many
portals as you can, while disabling hero gates ASAP. The more
portals you hold, the more creatures you can recruit and train.
The less hero gates there are, the less attacked you'll be.
The same applies in multiplayer. The first one to hold more than
one portal will probably win, unless he spent too many creatures
to win that portal, leaving himself vulnerable.
If you have good creatures, and plenty of gold, you may want to
leave a hero gate up to provide some "practice" for your lower-
level creatures, as well as a source of "recruits".
5.2 Recruiting
Consider the sources of recruits: portal, prison, and torture
chamber.
Creatures arriving through the portal need training, lair, and
food. There's a limit to how many creatures can you recruit
through a portal.
Skeletons created from prison need training, and you need
prisoners to make skeletons. Skeletons also start from level 1,
no matter how high level the creature previously was. They are
also quite weak and you can't "recover" them (have imps drag them
back for some R&R). If they "die" they are lost forever. To keep
them learning you must use heal spells (read: mana).
Converting a hero to your cause via a torture chamber needs quite
a bit of time and equipment, but the result is a unit with its
high experience level intact. It'll need lair and food, and maybe
a bit more training, but otherwise it's faster and cheaper than
training up a creature from level 1.
Can you wait until you convert the heroes, thus keeping their
experience, or should you create some level 1 skeletons instead?
The general rule of thumb is you want to convert the high level
creatures if they are higher than your creatures' current
experience levels, or when you're close to the portal limit. The
lower level prisoners can die as skeletons or tortured for
information.
5.3 Training and more training
Creatures arrive as level 1 rookies. They are virtually useless
in a fight against higher level creatures unless present in
overwhelming numbers. You have to "buff" them up with training,
and more training, until level 4, then use combat pit. If they
survive the fight they will advance in levels. Just make sure
your imps can retrieve them.
5.4 Fight on YOUR land
Can't emphasize this enough. Fight on YOUR land! If you do that,
your creatures can retreat to rest and recuperate, and fight
again. Even if they're knocked unconscious, your imps can get to
them and take them back to their lair. If you fight on enemy
land, your imps can't get to them, and they'll DIE, thus wasting
all that gold and time you spent training them.
Fighting on your land also means any attackers will be left where
they are. If you have prison, they'll be imprisoned. Else, when
they die, they'll be taken to graveyard (if you have one). You'll
get new recruits any way (via prison, torture chamber, or
graveyard).
Fighting on your land also makes it easy to add reinforcements
when you need to, as you can only drop forces on YOUR land.
If you can't fight on YOUR land, at least fight near it, so your
imps can go into the melee and claim more land as a result.
5.5 Recon and Information
You may want to consider torturing the low-level heroes for
information on the enemy installations. Level 1 skeletons aren't
that useful. The dead body can then still be used in a graveyard.
When you torture, you gain info on the gold seams, hero gates,
and other significant info.
Make sure your dungeon is sufficiently disguised or protected
before sending out your scouts. You need that information on
where to attack, where can enemies attack from, and arrange your
defenses to achieve local superiority.
Consider possessing one of your scouts and do the recon yourself.
5.6 Micromanagement
Micromanagement, or attention to detail, is the best way to
ensure victory.
Slapping creatures is needed to improve their work efficiency,
but just once in a while. Else they'll start sulking.
Constantly keep the different moods of the creatures in mind, and
listen to the complaints. Fix them ASAP. Click on the complaint,
then go there and see if that creature is almost to what it
needs. If not, pick it up and deliver it to where it needs to go
(usually food or money).
Preempt the complaints by designing well-laid-out dungeons.
You may want to transfer some gold from your main treasury to the
outlying "local" treasuries to minimize the amount of time your
creatures travel to collect their pay.
Help the slower creatures move by picking them up and dropping
them near their destination.
5.7 Shift the Flag
It is possible to pick up the call-to-arms flag and drop it
elsewhere. This will save you quite a bit of mana as you do NOT
need to re-cast the spell over and over.
NOTE: The walkthru was written WITHOUT knowing this. Some places
I would say to cast "call to arms" again and again. You could
just move the flag instead.
5.8 Improve Working Efficiency
Normal working efficiency is about 80%. You can improve that by
1) slapping (just once!) and 2) dropping the creature in their
workplace.
You'll just have to physically drag/drop creatures all over the
place, if you want things to get done in a hurry.
5.9 Some Building Tricks
One good way for quick building is draw the spot, but only INSIDE
the rocks, so your imps can't get to it. They are smart enough to
ignore that dig request, and thus will concentrate on your OTHER
jobs. When you're ready to have them start here, connect that big
block to a dig-able tile so the imps can get to it, and you can
control how things get done, while having rooms "pre-planned", so
to speak.
6 Keeper Spells
As a keeper, you can use some of that hard-earned mana to assist
your creatures in various ways.
6.1 Create Imp
You'll always have 4 imps. If one of those get killed, a new one
will be automatically created. As your dungeon expands, you need
more and more imps.
You can only create imp on YOUR territory.
Create imp costs in mana goes up for every imp you have. You
usually don't need more than 10, though on some scenarios where
you have a LOT of rooms or a lot of digging to do you may need
15. In "My Pet Dungeon" with very little threat, you can go up to
20.
Version 1.7, with the increase mana intake limit, may allow you
to sustain more imps.
Cast create imp in the middle of melee battle in your territory
can help retrieve some of your unconscious.
You may be able to pull an existing imp from their job instead of
creating a new one. Consider this before you start wasting mana.
6.2 Thunderbolt
Thunderbolt is not exactly "cheap" to cast, at 6000 per use. Nor
do it do that much damage, even when upgraded. Its main use is to
knock one enemy temporarily out of the fight.
It is best used right in the middle of melee. Cast it upon the
hero in the midst of your creatures. Once the hero goes down
stunned, he'll get several body blows while down, which should
quickly take him out of the fight.
Mistress and Fairies with high-level skills can shoot a similar
energy bolt that knocks down enemies.
6.3 Possession
Possession is useful when you need a very specific target
destroyed, or need to recon a specific location.
Recon with possession is useful. Possess a creature to take it
for a ride through the tunnels and such. The map is a bit hard to
read, so you'll have to be pretty good to visualize where are
you.
Best used on flying creatures or creatures that can walk over
lava (Salamander preferred) unless there aren't any lava. Recon
with dark elf or elvan archer is a tertiary choice as they are
fast (relatively) and can snipe at enemy units.
Attack with possession is a bit harder to accomplish. Basically
you have to assemble a group and lead them to attack with the
possessed group command, and even then it's not that "accurate".
I personally practically NEVER use the possession command, but
that's just me.
6.4 Heal
Heal is important as it keeps your creatures fit to fight.
As a rule, heal the highest level creature that needs it. High-
level creatures do much more damage and are much more resistant
to damage.
Watch for creatures running away from fights, even when call-to-
arms is active. Those would probably have low health and need to
be healed.
Mistresses and Skeletons simply charge the enemy. They never
"retreat" to recuperate, so you'll have to heal them during the
fight.
One way is to observe the "corridor" where your creatures must
pass to reach the call to arms. If their life is low, heal them
there.
6.5 Sight of Evil
Sight of Evil is useful as a recon tool to allow you see behind
walls, such as when you need to breach (or NOT to). This gives
you a good idea on what to expect beyond the door or wall.
Always use SoE when digging into truly unknown territory, like a
row of "soft rock" between "hard rock", which would suggest an
existing tunnel, for example.
6.6 Call to Arms
"Call to arms" will summon all your creatures to a big attack.
Once you've cast the flag, you can pick it up and drop it
elsewhere, thus no need to waste the mana to cast the spell
again.
It has several problems you need to keep in mind.
Problem 1: It does not care about the optimum combat order.
In DK combat, it's best to let the melee fighters take the front,
followed by blockers, blitzers, and behind them, the support
fighters (shooters).
This all goes out the window when you talk about call-to-arms.
Whoever arrives first is first. And generally, that means support
guys like dark elf, which would be guarding nearby, followed by
weak flying creatures like firefly, then the weaklings like
goblins. The big and slow bruisers like knights and trolls arrive
near the end.
You can mitigate this by picking up the fighters and dropping
them on your nearest tile first, and let them walk to the flag,
and then drop the other creatures, but it's still not a good
system. They just keep circling the flag after they're done with
combat.
Problem 2: It costs quite a bit of mana
At 10,000 mana per use, it's not exactly cheap to cast that just
to "point" your creatures in the right direction. If you want a
group attack and are short on mana, you may want to consider
using possession and lead a group personally instead.
6.7 Tremor
This is best used to "soften up" enemy defenses before your
attack forces arrive. It also removes any reinforcements the
walls have.
The best part about this spell is you can cast it anywhere, not
just your territory.
I have found no good uses for it as I tend to save mana for
Horny. It may help you breach enemy dungeons faster. It may also
serve as a distraction as you set off a tremor on one side of the
enemy while you attack through the other side.
6.8 Turncoat
As suggested in the manual, pick the toughest fighter in the
enemy attack group and turn him against them.
I have found no good uses for it unless you're out of defenders
and traps. It may delay the enemy attack for a few moments,
enough for you to mount an defense.
6.9 Summon Horny
You don't want to summon Horny unless you have nearly a full tank
of mana, since just the act of summoning him costs 100,000 mana.
After a few seconds (about 15?) Horny will suck down 2000 mana
PER SECOND, in addition to any other expenditure you already
have. Since your maximum mana intake per second is 500 (V1.3),
you'll run out soon. You can delay that by minimizing your mana
expenditure (i.e. don't cast keeper spells while Horny's in
action, and minimize the number of traps you have).
Version 1.7 seems to allow each mana vault to add to your 500 max
mana intake. So if you have max amount of tiles and two mana
vaults, your intake is 700. This can seriously increase your
"Horny loiter time", so go after those mana vaults once you get
all four pieces of the talisman!
Horny is a joy to watch. He goes through creatures less than
level 10 like scythe through wheat. It'll take him a bit longer
to take out a level 10 creature, but he's unstoppable. No traps
or such will stand in his way.
On the other hand, you can't really "direct" Horny. He simply
attacks the "closest" enemy, even if that's just a level 1 dwarf
or a lousy trap. And if the enemy retreats, he'll chase!
To maximize Horny's effectiveness, you'll need to "clear" the
area for him with your other creatures first, even if you need to
sacrifice all of them. Also, try to claim as many tiles close to
your "objective" (i.e. your Horny target) as you can. Then summon
Horny as close to the target as possible. That way, Horny won't
be distracted by lesser challenges.
6.10 Create Gold
When you are short on gold but plenty of mana, create gold can
help you until you discover new sources of income.
You should also use Create Gold when you're about to reach
200,000 mana, as any additional mana income will simply be
"wasted".
It is best to cast directly into the treasury rather than relying
on your imps to pick it up.
6.11 Inferno
Inferno is a serious attack spell that can do a LOT of damage to
a group. However, it requires a tightly packed group for optimum
effectiveness.
Cast this spell on the raiding party BEFORE your creatures arrive
for defense.
6.12 Chicken
Usually, you want to cast this on the most power enemy, but
turncoat usually works better and does more damage overall.
If you cast this over your land, you may be able to pick up the
chicken and drop it somewhere where it can do some good, like
prison or torture chamber.
7 Traps, doors, and other objects
There are your "static" defenses for your dungeon... All the
nasty surprises lying in wait for those poor "heroes"...
7.1 Traps
Traps do some damage to the hostile units, but may not disable
the hostile units by themselves. Usually you need several of them
in conjunction.
7.1.1 Sentry Trap
Also known as sentry guns, they cause very little damage. Use
other traps and barricades to keep the enemy away while guns
shoot them.
A little "island" in the middle of lava is a great place to put
such guns, as only distance shooters, flyers, and lava walkers
can get to them.
7.1.2 Fear Trap
Fear traps keep attackers away, so you should put those near
dungeon entrances. May not be a bad idea to keep them protected
with spike traps and such.
7.1.3 Alarm Trap
Doesn't do any damage, it just alerts you to enemy presence. Why
not use a guard room instead?
7.1.4 Gas Trap
Causes just a little damage. It can be useful early on. Use spike
traps later.
7.1.5 Guard Post
Essentially a "local" version of Alarm trap, this just cause your
creatures near the trap to attack the enemy.
7.1.6 Spike Trap
This actually causes a decent amount of damage. This is good for
protecting certain rooms.
7.1.7 Trigger Trap
The "normal" use for a trigger trap is to trigger a boulder trap
just beyond visual range, and there really isn't a better use for
it. None of the other traps are as devastating.
7.1.8 Boulder Trap
Probably the most impressive trap you see, it can cause a LOT of
damage as it rolls over enemy after enemy. Follow the advice in
the manual and make rat runs (long single-tile wide corridors).
7.1.9 Freeze Trap
Useful for delaying enemies, or holding the enemy for other
attacks. Such as boulder, sentry gun, or even some of your
creatures.
7.1.10 Lightning Trap
Best used near water, behind a lot of barricades and such. Think
of it as a more powerful version of sentry trap. Of course, it
costs a lot more. (Three times more to be exact.)
7.1.11 Fireburst Trap
Best left in the CENTER of the room. and maybe assisted by a
trigger trap so you can cook a LARGE number of enemies at the
same time, not just the scout. Protect it with other traps.
7.2 Doors and Objects
A note on when to lock doors. You want to lock doors when you
don't want creatures to go out. Remember that you can pick up and
drop creatures with your hand to move them, so their own movement
is not the only way things get done. Imps have no need for food
or rest, so you can just leave them OUTSIDE the locked doors, if
there are claimed tiles outside the doors. You can drop an attack
force outside locked doors, but remember to drag them back before
they complain too hard ("Your creatures cannot get to a
________".)
7.2.1 Wooden Door
The wimpiest door, this is mainly for looks and the ability to
lock your creatures in. Don't expect it to keep enemies out.
7.2.2 Braced Door
Slightly tougher than Wooden door, they are about average on
durability.
7.2.3 Steel Door
The toughest door you can get, use it to guard areas you don't
want enemies to see. You MAY want to back that up with a magic
door just in case.
7.2.4 Magic Door
About the toughness of braced door, it also shoots a fireball at
any enemies approaching. However, it can only be damaged by
magic, so it's pretty tough. Double this with a steel door for
extra protection.
7.2.5 Secret Door
Secret doors cannot be seen. Unless it's already open. In which
case they are VERY easy to destroy (like wooden door).
Should almost always be locked, as an "open" secret door is not a
secret!
You can spot a secret door by the fact that your imps won't turn
that section of the wall to your color. If you drop a imp right
at that tile, the imp will start hacking (attacking).
7.2.6 Barricade
Use these to close off certain entrances. Remember projectiles
can still go through, and flying creatures can fly over.
7.3 Trap Tricks
Page 74 of the manual discusses a lot of serious trap
combinations. Here's a couple more to keep you entertained.
Ice Bowling: combine freeze trap with boulder trap. The boulder
will shatter frozen victims.
Water and Electricity: Lightning trap and water mixes great. Put
lightning trap to defend yourself from waterborne incursions. Put
barricade(s) and spike trap(s) to "protect" the lightning trap.
Use trigger traps to set off multiple traps at once. A
possibility is a single trap triggering TWO separate boulder
traps, thus squishing all in between.
Trap doormat: put a trap right before a door. They can't get to
the door without triggering the trap.
Double the doors: put a magic door in front of a steel door will
REALLY slow down the enemies.
7.4 The Specials
If you find those gold boxes, they are likely one of the
following:
7.4.1 Increase level
Increase experience level of all of your creatures
7.4.2 Create Imps
Create some imps for no mana cost
7.4.3 Increase Mana
Adds 50000 mana, great for keeping Horny on the job for a while
longer.
7.4.4 Increase Gold
Obvious.
7.4.5 Make Happy
Improves your creatures' mood.
7.4.6 Make Safe
Make all your walls reinforced.
This is best used right after you take over another keeper's
dungeon, when you've just gotten the rooms but the walls aren't
done yet.
7.4.7 Make Unsafe (MP only?)
Removes the reinforcement from the walls. Great for starting the
attack. The "local" version of "tremor" spell?
7.4.8 Make Unhappy (MP only?)
Obvious.
7.4.9 Hidden Land
Allows you to access one of the four hidden levels. See [9.1]
8 Single Player Campaign Walkthru
There are 20 single player levels in the campaign. Two of them
have two alternate scenarios, one of them have three.
There are also five "secret" levels. How to access them will be
explained in [9.1]
Please note that this walkthru is done with the original (version
1.3). Version 1.7 added several changes including increased mana
intake with mana vaults (easier to use Horny), Elite creatures,
and Maiden (new unit type). The changes made the game somewhat
easier, but most of those do not affect the campaign.
8.1 Warcry (1)
Land: Smilesville
Primary Objective: Locate / destroy Lord Antonius
Secondary Objective: Build 5x3 lair and 3x3 hatchery
This is your first tutorial mission, so it's easy. Just follow
the instructions and you can't really go wrong.
Start by digging gold, as you'll need lots of it to build a big
lair and big hatchery. Keep digging at the gold seams you see.
And the imps will dig them out and carry them to your dungeon
heart.
See the portal? Good. Dig a tunnel to it. Preferably through the
side, NOT the middle, though it doesn't really matter. Once your
imps dig through, one of them will claim the portal, and a goblin
should walk in.
With the gold you gathered earlier, build a 5x3 lair by first
clearing the room, wait for the imps to claim the tiles, then
select lair on all the tiles. More goblins should be walking in.
Use the same procedure, build a 3x3 hatchery to create some food
for your creatures.
Two dwarves (heroes in white) should breach your dungeon about
now. Your goblins should make short work of them.
You should also notice your imps quickly claiming that entire
tunnel the dwarves came from as your territory. Let them (though
keep in mind this is NOT always a good idea). Soon the imps will
come to the end of the tunnel, and a few tiles away is Lord
Antonius himself.
When no more goblins seem to be coming in, it's time to take on
Lord Antonius. Order the imps to dig through. Pick up the goblins
(quickest way is click on creatures tab, then keep clicking on
the goblins "count" until the number reaches 0), then drop them
"near" (2-3 tiles away) Lord Antonius. Notice the dropped
creatures are temporarily stunned, so it's not a good idea to
drop creatures directly into combat. You can also only drop
creatures over your territory (though you can pick them up
anywhere, as long as they're still conscious.) The goblins
should swarm Lord Antonius. If you have enough, Lord Antonius
should go under, and Horny comes by to claim the portal gem.
8.2 Enchantments (2)
Land: Sing song
Primary Objective: Destroy Lord Darius
Secondary Objective: Build library and training room
The tutorial continues, and things are still easy. You'll need
gold, and more gold. So start digging!
Clear sections of land for your lair and hatchery. You want some
goblins soon.
Start building libraries. While libraries don't need to be
square, they work best as square as each of the walls can hold
bookcases. Soon, a warlock or two should join your cause. You can
get by with just one library, but two would be better. The
warlock will then start researching your spell upgrades. Just
keep digging for gold and wait for the research to finish.
Once libraries are built, it's time to build a training room.
You'd need at least 4x4 (5x5 is better) and a lot of gold as your
"training budget". Drop your goblins in there to "remind them" to
train.
As you keep digging north for more gold, Lord Darius' heroes
should breach near your north side, though your goblins should
easily make mincemeat of them.
Let the imps claim the land beyond, and you'll find the hero with
a few dwarves as escort. Let the imps claim as much land as
possible, all around Lord Darius' lair. Keep training up the
goblins and warlocks after the research is done.
When ready, breach Lord Darius' lair, and start dropping
creatures as close to Lord Darius as possible. When Lord Darius
falls over, Horny will show up to claim the portal gen.
8.3 Greed (3)
Land: Ramshackle
Primary Objective: Kill Lord Avaricious
Secondary Objective: Build a treasury to store gold; build a
workshop to build wooden doors and sentry guns
This is another easy level. You can just follow the voice for the
most part. However, keep in mind that the first thing a dungeon
needs is ALWAYS lair, then hatchery. Everything else can wait.
Once you have the lair and hatchery up, dig through to the
portal, claim the land around it, and the creatures should start
coming in.
This is probably the first time you see a firefly. They are good
scouts, but a bit weak in direct combat. Remember to pluck them
out of danger before they go unconscious, or they'll just die in
enemy territory.
You may need to build a treasury to hold more gold.
Avaricious won't attack you, unless you start digging at the gold
around him. So to take him out, you'll need to build workshop,
then a few sentry cannons to soften the lord up as he tries to
chase your imps away. Then drop the rest of the creatures near
him and swarm him.
So start on your workshop. Usually you want a 5x5. Only when
you're REALLY short on room would you build smaller workshops
(4x4 or even 3x3). Just follow the instructions.
The few minor heroes may attack, but your creatures can handle
them, even without the sentry cannons.
Add more sentry cannons, then start mining the gold. Avaricious
comes out. the cannons will wound him, allowing your creatures to
take him out. Remember to help out with the thunderbolt spell.
Soon Horny will come to claim the prize.
8.4 Snipers (4)
Land: Shady Grove
Primary goal: Kill Lord Ludwig
Secondary goals: Find and claim guard rooms; lead a band of
warriors into Ludwig's castle and take him out.
While this is still a tutorial, it is no longer a walkover for
you. Lord Ludwig is a wimp. He won't leave his castle no matter
what. That means you'll have to go in and get him.
Start building the dungeon with the normal necessities: lair,
hatchery, training room, library, workshop, and maybe treasury.
There is plenty of gold so don't be stingy.
As you build, you'll discover some guardrooms left from earlier.
When you claim them, dark elves will appear from the portal. They
are great long-distance shooters.
Ludwig's forces will come after you, so be ready with your forces
to defend yourself. The dwarves and such are easy. You may need
to help out with thunderbolt when you see the knights attacking.
Those guard rooms are really handy.
Continue building north, and you should see two hero gates.
Further north is Ludwig's castle. Listen to the voice and use the
possession spell to possess a dark elf, and use the sniper arrow
to take out the guard. It may take you a couple attempts, but
it's easy enough.
The rest is simple enough: build up a powerful force, train them
well. Claim all the land you can. Then break down the gate and
kill Ludwig.
8.5 Fear (5)
Land: Elm Shadow
Primary goal: Kill Lord Constantine
Secondary goals: Find and claim prison; create skeletons to help
you.
Ah, fear. It is a powerful motivator. But I digress.
Fear traps protect the hero's castle. While the fear trap does
not damage your creatures, it really keeps them away. However,
there are some creatures that do not fear: skeletons. To create
skeletons, allow prisoners to die inside. Simple enough.
Start by building lair and hatchery, then library. Gold is a bit
sparse on this map, so don't overbuild. Remember, the undead
don't need food or sleep (except vampire).
Keep digging the gold to the south, and you'll open up new land
bridges, and the prison. Claim it, as you'll need to use it
later.
When the heroes invade, send your forces in and take prisoners.
Let them "rot" in the prison, and they'll become skeletons.
There are two ways to win this. You can go after Constantine, or
you can trigger Constantine to come after you.
If you go attack, build up a good force of skeletons and your
other creatures. Send skeletons in to take out the fear traps,
then full-scale attack on the castle with all forces.
If you want to play bait, possess one skeleton and use it to go
past the fear trap, and try to go after the lord alone. Remember
to "get out" before skeleton dissolves. The good lord Constantine
will lead his heroes and come after you. When the heroes come,
send in all your forces, then start firing off thunderbolts. You
should be able to take down the good Lord Constantine himself
easily.
Next one you get a choice. Should you choose 6a (frontal
assault), or 6b (ambush)?
8.6 Besieged (6a)
Land: Sweetwater
Primary objective: Storm the gates and kill Lord Ironhelm
Secondary objectives: Capture and convert his minions; find
backdoor into castle
You have a good dungeon in place, but no portal. So you have to
rely on conversion to increase your ranks. Also, there's almost
no room for expansion, so you must only attack when you are sure
you are ready.
Your guardroom must be defended as enemy heroes will tend to
attack that, and those are your best chances to grab prisoners.
Use the workshop to add a few traps and such to help out.
Use the skeletons to take out any fear traps you see. Retrieve
them and drop them back into training, as you need them at a high
level and you can't afford to lose them. yet. Build a few wooden
bridges to allow your imp to go over and claim more land.
Your guard post should be quite lively as you obtain more
prisoners. Let the low-level heroes become skeletons while you
try to convert the higher-level heroes in the torture chamber.
Remember to release the skeletons for more training.
As your imps explore and you continue to grab more prisoners and
skeletons, you should discover somewhere to the castle's right
the "backdoor", which is a wooden bridge. You should almost be
ready for the assault.
First, store the front gate of the castle, and defeat the
defenders in the first room. Do NOT bash down the second set of
doors yet, as we're going to set a little trap. Hopefully you'll
have no casualties yet. Let the imps convert the first room. Drop
all creatures back into your dungeon. Heal them up and be ready
for the final battle.
Put most of your forces on the front gates (in the room you
captured), while put some skeletons and such on the backdoor. If
you have enough forces, you should be able to kill Ironhelm
easily. Consider though grabbing your creatures just out of
battle and drop them away so Ironhelm will chase them, and then
you can drop thunderbolts on him.
When you take out Ironhelm, you win.
8.7 Rout (6b)
Land: Sweetwater
Primary objective: Intercept and kill Lord Ironhelm before he can
flee to his hero gate
Secondary objectives: Capture wandering heroes; torture captives
to learn the location of hero gate
Rout, to be honest, is a bit more fun than Besieged. There's no
portal either, but there's some room for expansion, and expand
you must.
Right at start, the wizard was tortured and you learn the good
Lord's location. You'll need to capture and torture a few more
heroes to learn the hero gate Ironhelm will head for. You can
torture more after that. They'll reveal information like gold
seams and such.
The objective then is simple: get your creatures to the hero gate
first and prevent Ironhelm from reaching the gate.
You'll need to dig west first. You'll break out onto lots of
bridges and eventually come to two sentry cannons. Send in the
fighters and take them out, so your imps can claim more
territory.
Then it's a matter of claiming one room at a time and get some
prisoners, both for information and some skeletons. You'll need
skeletons as you'll run into a few fear traps, esp. around the
hero gate.
You'll expand west, then north, then east, and finally north
again to the hero gate. Get there first, and try to set up a few
traps in the room containing the gate. When Ironhelm comes, drop
in all your creatures into the hero gate room, add some
thunderbolts, and Ironhelm will go down.
8.8 Caverns (7)
Land: Emberglow
Primary objective: Kill Lord Sigmund and his giants
Secondary goal: Traverse the caverns; break into and claim the
old dungeon
As the game starts, a giant will go at your dungeon heart. A pair
of goblins will have just entered through the portal, and they
should take care of the giant. It'll be close though.
As you begin digging to build up your treasury and place a lair,
you'll discover the previous dungeon keeper's remaining dungeon
(including a busted dungeon heart). Definitely claim all those
rooms so you don't have to waste money building the facilities.
The torture chamber will be very useful later.
You'll need a large prison (to hold the captured giants), large
training room (the giants initially are rather wimpy), and
library (you need better spells). Convert any giants captured.
Remember to heal or feed chicken...
As you explore north, you'll find more giants, and more rooms to
claim. Your converted giants should be able to take care of any
enemies, and you'll get valuable prisoners as a result. You
should be able to build up an army of giants. Remember though, to
provide them with separate facilities (lair and hatchery), as
they don't like to share with the "evil" creatures, even though
they serve the same master.
You'll finally come to Sigmund's castle, and if you use sight of
evil properly, you'll see his force is pretty big, but your
forces should have better training and almost equal in numbers.
So send them in, and start bashing. He'll go down, and you'll
win.
8.9 Aftermath (8)
Land: Snapdragon
Primary Objectives: Claim Keeper Dante's room, and kill Lord
Titus
Secondary Objectives: Find and claim all rooms; defeat guardian
wizards
Be warned. This mission is harder than it seems initially. The
enemy is well entrenched, and they just dispatched another
keeper..
You start with several low-level but steady creatures, and you
should see lair and hatchery nearby. Try to claim the hatchery
first, and then the lair, which is guarded by two guards.
You should see the portal to the east, but guardian wizards guard
it, and you can't take them on. Yet.
Instead, go west, and claim Dante's rooms for yourself, one at a
time. You'll be going roughly clockwise. If you need more
workers, create some more imps.
When your creatures have enough combat experience (say, level 2
or 3) and fully healed, then claim the portal. While the wizards
cause a lot of damage, they are also rather fragile. With level 3
creatures you can take them down.
Remember to keep the mistresses training, not torturing each
other in the torture chamber. That is simply NOT productive (for
you, that is).
When you find a hero gate, disable it by claiming all the land
around it. If the land's over water or lava, build bridge there.
By the time you get to Lord Titus, you should have an army of
high-level creatures, and the few guards Lord Titus has should be
no match for you at all.
8.10 Ambush (9)
Land: Silverstream
Primary Objective: Ambush Lord Voss
Secondary Objective: Capture hero's outposts along the way
The mission is simple enough to explain, but hard enough to do.
There are THREE hero outposts along the way, and you need to
claim at least one, preferably two or them, to delay Lord Voss,
and kill him. The catch: you have only 20 minutes before Lord
Voss starts his marathon run.
The most outposts you leave alone, the more guys Lord Voss can
bring along (and the harder time you'll have). So you need to
attack AT LEAST TWO of them.
Start building your dungeon immediately. You need a workshop (at
least 3x3) ASAP with nearby lair and hatchery (strip-sized are
fine). Build strip-sized lair and hatchery to save space. Try to
squeeze in a training room somewhere.
As time is limited, the morale of your creatures is not an issue.
Drive them hard, for time is short. Your initial task is to claim
the small outpost to the east. Send your creatures in and take
out all the guards. Quickly build replacement doors for the ones
you whacked. If you have extra gold, add some traps near the
doors.
Heal all the creatures and do the same to the next guard post
down. This guardpost is bigger and tougher, so make sure your
creatures can be "recovered". If the unconscious creature is
underwater, build bridge there and drop imp to drag the creature
back. Build doors for the ones you busted quickly. Once that's
done, send the creatures back for more training.
When the time's up, lock all the doors, and drop your creatures
in the guardroom closest to Lord Voss's advance. When his
companion heroes bust down the door, your creatures should swarm
him. Feel free to add some thunderbolts, and Lord Voss will go
down in no time.
8.11 Smashing (10)
Land: Woodsong
Primary Objective: Defeat Keeper Asmodeus.
Secondary Objective: Smash through Lord Ronin's forces; find
Asmodeus defense weakness
You thought that last one was messy, huh? Wait until you try this
one. Lord Ronin has Asmodeus surrounded, but you want Asmodeus.
So you have to defeat both to win. This is NOT fun at all. Did I
mention that you have a time limit? Guess not. Well, you do: 40
minutes.
Start by quickly building the basics (lair and hatchery), then
quickly add training room, library, and workshop. Then it's time
to do a little recon. There are a LOT of Lord Ronin's elves
between you, but Asmodeus is well defended against frontal
assaults. Why did you think the secondary objective is there?
The trick to attacking Asmodeus is you should go in from the
west, but you still need to take care of Lord Ronin's forces. Go
west, then north, and you should be able to attack the elves from
two directions.
Once you've cleaned out Ronin's forces, claim all the tiles
around to get more mana, and look for the weak spot on the west
side of Asmodeus' dungeon. Heal all creatures, train them up to
max.
Then it's time to take out Asmodeus. Breach from the west, send
in all your units, maybe even summon Horny if you have the mana,
and you should defeat him with no problems.
8.12 Carnage (11 a, b, or c)
Carnage is named aptly for a good reason: there will be a LOT of
losing keepers. You'll be up against four other keepers, all of
them want to be the sole owner of this map.
There are three variations to the start. You can
a) Start from well-defended position ("a suitable challenge")
b) Start with lots of room for expansion ("A little more
interesting")
c) Start with no portal, but many high-level creatures
("Considerable challenge")
If you choose option a, the choice is simple: build up a force
and blitz the enemy keeper when you think you've built up
sufficient forces. You can't wait too long since the other
players will be consolidating each other. In general, the first
keeper with more than one portal will win.
If you choose option b, you'll need training rooms and quickly.
You'll also need to invest in traps and such to defend your
dungeon while your minions are away on your errands.
If you choose option c, you must go after the enemy keepers right
away, as you do need to claim portals and other rooms. Once you
got a portal, and keep your initial minions healthy, you have the
advantage and should be able to blitz the rest of the opponents.
8.13 Scavenge (12)
Land: Goldenglade
Primary Objective: Destroy Lord Bramble's forces, destroy keeper
Malachi
Secondary Objective: create your legion of undead
This map is won through the use of undead, and lots of them. So
as you can guess, you don't really need much of lair or hatchery
(you'll need SOME though), nor workshop, nor casino. You will
need a library as some of your spells can use an upgrade. You
will of course need a prison (to generate the skeletons) and
exercise room (to "buff up" the skeletons).
While you can build a graveyard, don't. There's one to be claimed
to the east. Instead, dig up the rooms for the things discussed
above and build the basics first.
Some wimpy heroes will attack. Take them out and let them rot in
jail. That'll be your skeleton army. Remember to take them out to
be trained. You need a good-sized skeleton army, say 12 of them.
By this time you should have claimed the graveyard. Turn imprison
off, and the heroes will die where they fall. Your imps then drag
them off to the graveyard. And you'll get vampires. Remember to
train them as they're rather lazy, and level 1 vampires vanish
when "killed".
Keep training them as your imps slowly work north, until they run
into Lord Bramble's forces. Take them and turn them into more
vampires and skeletons. Use your skeletons to take out the sentry
guns after the imps get you close enough. You'll need about 10
well-trained vampires.
Soon you'll see Malachi's dungeon to the far north (blue). Make
sure your forces are ready (all healed, all at least level 4),
then build the bridge to his part and start the attack. With a
big enough horde of undead, you should win with no problems.
8.14 Conversion (13)
Land: Cherish
Primary Objective: Destroy Keeper Malleus' vampire horde
Secondary Objective: convert the monks of St. Cuthbert to your
cause. and use them on the vampires of Malleus.
It's a pity. We liked the undead so much in the previous mission,
we had to go against them this time. However, when monk kills
vampires, they stay dead. Monks also heal others, which means
it's very hard to kill them. With a group of 10 of them, they can
take care of themselves.
You will need a LARGE prison and a LARGE torture chamber to
convert the various monks to your cause. You will also need a
workshop to construct the traps that will defend your dungeon
against the vampire hordes while your minions go after Malleus'
dungeon heart.
Try to convert EVERY hero you come across, esp. the monks (of
course!). Every fighter counts, even the guards. You can really
use the giants too.
Remember to put the good guys separate from your other minions to
keep them happy.
Don't breach St. Cuthbert's until you are ready with your traps.
Freeze trap is very useful as a frozen vampire is very fragile.
Don't forget boulder traps, spike traps, and more.
When you're ready, breach St. Cuthbert's and take out the few
defending monks. Malleus will then release his vampire horde, and
it is a horde. dozens and dozens of them. However, the monks
should take care of them. Keep healing you creatures (esp. the
monks). Then it's time to cast "call to arms" in the enemy
dungeon heart. Your traps should hold off the vampires for a
while, and when his dungeon heart beats no longer, you win!
8.15 Reap (14)
Land: Peachtree
Primary Objective: Kill Lord Tiberius, summon Horny
Secondary Objective: Claim all mana vaults
This is probably the first "difficult" mission. Both gold and
usable room on this level are EXTREMELY limited.
You need a training room (I build it to west of dungeon heart),
and reserve the room to south as a prison. Build lairs and
hatcheries only in strips and in door entrances and so on.
Mine ALL the gold nearby, even those across the lava near the
portal. Build a stone bridge to reach them, sell the bridge after
they're mined out. Do NOT build east of the dungeon heart. You
can see that "corridor" between the hard rocks. If you dig NEAR
there, a dwarf will breach there and 4-6 level 4 thieves will
overwhelm you.
With the training room and lair and hatchery available, you
should be able to attract a decent sized force of goblins,
fireflies, and salamanders. The gold you have should be
sufficient to train them to level three or so.
When all creatures reach level three, breach to the northwest,
and the initial enemy force will attack. Fortunately they are all
level one, so even if you do NOT have good units you should be
able to prevail. Heal all units (chicken or heal spell).
It's time to claim your first two mana vaults. Cast call to arms
inside the room. Kill all the guards and you're done. Once you
clear the room, cancel the call to arms, and look for nearby
gold.
The lava river beyond the northern wall have several gold seams.
You'll need to build stone bridges to reach them. Remember to
sell them after you get the gold. There's also an island there
with FOUR specials, though you'll need to build a library to
"store" them.
As your imps explore east, you'll run into three sentry cannons
to the north. Build a bridge and send in everyone to take it out.
You'll also have to defend yourself against periodic excursions
by the hero attack force from the other hero gate guarding the
last two mana vaults to the east, and they have several level 3
heroes. You can't dawdle too much because you'll run out of gold,
and you need SOME gold to build the bridges to dig more gold.
Your prison should be able to convert most you capture into
skeletons by now. Don't forget to "release" the skeletons to let
them train up a bit, if you have any gold.
When everyone is healed and you got all the gold and the
specials, it's time to claim the second set of mana wells. Cast
call to arms at the gate, (NOT the one to the north across lava!
The one to the EAST on the ground!) Start dropping in your
creatures, fighters first, long-range attackers second. When the
door's breached, send in the imps to start digging to disable the
hero gate. It'll take a while as the walls are reinforced, and
you'll get some casualties, but you should have enough mana to
create enough imps to drag your wounded back to their lairs.
If you have any gold, consider create some lairs and hatchery in
the first mana well room you conquered and relocate some
creatures there. As the digging will take a while, get ready for
another hero attack force coming through the gate.
Once you got the second room, you should have PLENTY of mana at
your disposal, but you're probably out of gold. There's some gold
in the corner of the second room, and if you keep digging through
the "path" in the solid rock, you'll run into some gold to the
south also, but you'll need to build bridge to reach it. Sell all
the bridges when you're done, and it's time to summon Horny for
the final victory...
Build the stone bridge to allow you to cross the lava to the
remaining gate, guarded by two cannons. Then cast call-to-arms
right at the gate. Start dropping in your attack force. Once the
gate is breached, move the flag inside. The narrow corridor will
make fighting difficult, but send in your imps any way right
after your creatures, so they can take over as much territory as
they can. Don't create any new imps as you need to save the mana
for Horny's appearance.
The corridor will soon be littered with unconscious bodies and
some blood as the imps can't reach the bodies... but it should be
cleared soon. If there's any creatures left, leave them there,
and cast Horny as far inside the enemy gate as possible. It
should go after the enemy hero if you got most of the enemies
nearby taken cared of. Once Horny turned the enemy hero into
sashimi, you win!
Now another choice: do you storm (brute force), or do you crusade
(strategize)?
8.16 Storm (15a)
Land: Fluttershine
Primary Objective: Storm Fairy Fortress, and slay Lord Volstag
Secondary Objective: Build combat pit for further training
This mission is VERY straight-forward. Build up a good dungeon,
attract a good set of minions (esp. black knights), train them to
the hilt, then unleash them on the fairy fortress and take out
Lord Volstag. What else is there to say?
8.17 Crusade (15b)
Land: Fluttershine
Primary Objective: Kill Lord Volstag
Secondary Objective: Rescue imprisoned black knights, storm
castle
This mission requires slightly more strategy, as you arrive a bit
late for the party. The black knights went in and had fallen.
You start in southwest, and to the east is a large prison with
three black knights, with more small prisons to the north. Go
after the small prisons first, then with the black knights freed,
go after the big one. If you have a torture chamber, you can even
convert those guards.
Train them up, and attack. What else is there?
8.18 Creep (16)
Land: Stonekeep
Primary Objective: Kill Lord Pureheart
Secondary Objective: Stealthily build up your dungeon within
Pureheart's castle, and use the secret doors properly.
You're inside Pureheart's castle, and you don't have a portal.
Things look a little grim, but not that bad, actually. The idea
is to be very sneaky.
Claim the two small workshops to the north first, then spend a
little money and build two barricades right up against those
doors. This is to prevent YOUR creatures going up and bang them
rather than the other way around.
Now build secret door around the dungeon heart, and remember to
lock them when heroes approach. A secret door that's open is no
secret at all! Don't forget traps.
Start digging east carefully, and you'll see a prison. Claim it,
then "close" the room with a secret door ASAP, then LOCK IT. You
don't want your imps to wander out and attract undue attention.
Use sight of evil to carefully pick your target for expansion.
You should be able to claim several more prisons and grab a few
other creatures. If you're short on gold, sell the prisons. Go
after only one room at a time. Try to squeeze in a torture
chamber and leave one of the prisons when you can, as you need to
try to keep a few prisoners to convert.
You should see that these small rooms surround a big central
"court", which is presumably where Pureheart is. A big band of
heroes forms a "patrol" that passes by every so often. There are
some other facilities to the east and west.
Remember, one room at a time, and remember to "close" the
corridor with secret doors to prevent the heroes from coming
after you! You should build up a small army and your mana. After
the patrol passed, send in your imps to claim the land around the
castle, as you'll need to get Horny as close to Pureheart as you
can. You'll also need lots of mana, of course.
You can use Horny to help you take out the patrol. It'll just
delay the final victory a bit. Unlock the secret doors and use
prison and torture chamber to convert all these high-level
heroes. Now the corridor is clear use it to build the new
facilities for your new recruits.
When your mana is full (200,000), send in the creatures and break
down the door, which should be enough to attract the attention of
the defenders. Send in Horny, and it'll be a great battle. Don't
be surprised if Pureheart don't go down, as Horny tends to chase
the first hero he comes across, and that usually is not
Pureheart. It doesn't matter if you lose all your other
creatures, as no one is likely to attack you if you do things
carefully. Just build up your mana again, let your imps claim
more land, and send in Horny again, and Pureheart will be yours.
Or Horny's.
8.19 Angelic (17)
Land: Moonshine
Primary Objective: Use the dark angels to crush the two rival
keepers
Secondary Objective: Kill 20 heroes to gain dark gods' favor, and
capture the temple
You're up against TWO rival keepers, and you need to score 20
kills before the enemy keepers take the dark temple. And they say
there's no time pressure.
On the other hand, there is plenty of gold for digging on this
map. So things are not THAT tough. Just be warned: the heroes
guarding the temple are level 6's and level 8's. You'll need a
powerful force to subdue them.
Immediately start digging for large lair and large hatchery (both
5x5) to the east and west, then keep making 5x5 rooms (or a
little smaller) eastward and westward until you opened both
portals.
Start adding training room, library, workshop, etc. You'll build
the traps to take care of business while you're gone. Build only
to east or west until you're nearly ready to claim the temple.
Train all your creatures to at least level three, and that'll
take a while. Dig a zigzag tunnel going north, but a long winding
way. You can see the gold so use that as your guide. Fill the
corridor with traps and perhaps a hidden door or two. Combine
freeze trap, trigger trap, and boulder trap. They are deadly in
the long corridors. Don't breach until you're ready. Use sight of
evil to make sure you don't breach in the wrong place.
The imps should go out and start claiming tiles. To the north you
should see two sentry cannons flanking two magic doors. Take out
the cannons (send in your fighters) and start digging the gold to
the far left and far right, just north of the portals. You'll
need about 15 imps.
Now you see the temple. There should be guard stations at each
corner, with 3 guards (elvan archer, guard, and wizard, all high
level). Take one out (I chose southeast one), and drop in the
salamanders to take care of those lightning traps. Repeat for the
guardroom to the northeast. Call in Horny for fast kills.
Remember to heal your creatures in battle. You are going for
speed here, not mana preservation.
Once that's done it's time to break down the doors and claim the
temple. Inside are more sentry cannons and a few gas traps, so be
careful. Cast call to arms inside the intermediate room, then
move the flag into the temple proper. A few guards will challenge
you, but they can't stop your forces.
If the temple is already claimed, you better restart the level.
So you finally revel in the glory of the dark temple. and you get
10 dark angels for free! Create lair and hatchery for them ASAP,
as they whine extremely hard. You may want to sell one of those
guardrooms to make room for them.
With those dark angels, victory is virtually assured. You'll need
to defeat both dungeon keepers, so go after the one that's giving
you trouble, usually the blue guy (to left). Use Call to Arms to
send your army after the enemy dungeon heart, while your own is
protected by traps. So what if they have a big force? Your level
10 dark angels will turn them into mincemeat.
Claim one guy's dungeon by going directly after his dungeon
heart. His creatures are hopeless against yours. Drop in a lot of
imps to claim his territory for your. I mean Horny's glory.
The green guy to the northeast has a graveyard with vampires, but
they're hopeless against your overwhelming forces esp. if you
have taken over all of the blue guy's rooms. Feel free to use the
time to find the remaining specials on the map before you take
out that last pathetic dungeon heart.
8.20 Brotherhood (18)
Land: Cherry Blossom
Primary Objective: Defeat Nemesis
Secondary Objective: Defeat Nemesis' two sons Faust and Fabius
and use their resources
Well, well, you're up against THREE keepers. Isn't that fun? And
they all hate you. They are established, and you're not. Better
catch up quickly.
You CAN defeat Nemesis without defeating his two sons, but it's
much easier if you do take out at least ONE of his sons first.
Start with the basics like lair, hatchery, training room, and so
on. You may need to build combat pit as you need some dark
knights. Build library quickly as you need the upgraded spell
quickly. You'll capture a mana vault. Use the extra mana you get
to generate some gold, as you'll run short until you reach a gem
seam.
Quickly reach one portal, then build toward the other, big rooms
all the way. You don't need to fill up every room immediately.
It's useless building a 25-space lair right at the beginning when
you only have 5 creatures. You do need a big hatchery though.
You have two choices. You can build west, where you'll find some
gem seams if you build all the way west, then north. Or you can
go after the son to the northeast first. Use "create gold" spell
to keep your creatures paid and trained.
As you expand east, you'll see a hero gate that cannot be
destroyed, but it can be blocked. Use the torture chamber and
prison to capture all the attackers and convert them to your
cause. Remember to build separate facilities for them!
When you completely run out of both mana and gold, it's time to
attack. Sell some existing structures (the combat pit would be
good) and build bridge from the eastern "gap" to that keeper's
southern boundary (probably a lair). Dig through THREE tiles
wide, send 9 imps to dig (3 imps per digging tile), and cast call
to arms. Once you dug through, start dropping the fighters and
blitzers on the bridge, followed by blockers and shooters. You
should have enough good creatures to overwhelm him completely and
destroy his dungeon heart.
Quickly send in the rest of the imps (all of them) to take over
all his rooms, and dedicate at least three imps to dig the gem
seam, as you'll need lots of gold for the big payday. Feel free
to expand some of the rooms a little (sell an extra guard room
and treasury to expand the exercise rooms, for example). Relocate
some of your creatures to this new base, esp. dark elves and dark
knights.
The yellow keeper (the other son) will probably try to cast call
to arms near your exposed guard room, but you should be able to
defeat his piece-meal attack easily. Keep all your creatures busy
training for the upcoming big battle.
The blue keeper, Nemesis, will be launching a big offensive any
moment. You should spend the time making YOUR dungeon secure and
your creatures trained. With the gem seam, you should never run
out of gold, so keep it up! Assign as many imps to dig the gem
seams as it takes.
When Nemesis does attack, cast call to arms at your guard room,
and start dropping your forces nearby. His attack would be
somewhat spread out, so you should be able to beat it, but your
creatures will chase his retreating creatures. Drag them back.
Heal all the wounded, then build a bridge to his barricades and
sentry cannons. It's time to counter-attack.
Cast call-to-arms on that little "island", and watch your
creatures take out the barricades and the sentry cannons. He may
try to drop more creatures into battle, but with three portals
AND converted heroes at your disposal you've got numerical as
well as qualitative advantage. If one of your creatures goes
unconscious "underwater", build bridge there and drop imp there
to pick it up and move it back to your lair(s). Same with enemy
creatures and bodies. With this much gold, you should be able to
build graveyard, temple, etc. with no problem.
Once you're cleaned out the outside defenses, you can pause here
to catch your breath and heal your creatures, and build up an
even BIGGER force, or you can continue the attack.
If you want to get it over with, order your imps to dig through
the room at least three tiles wide (use at least 9 imps, 3 per
tile), and be ready with call to arms again. Once you break
through, Nemesis will start dropping ALL his creatures and it'll
be a BIG fight. However, you still have the advantage and you
should be able to defeat him right then and there. Then just go
after his dungeon heart and he's toast.
If you choose not to go after Nemesis directly, you can expand
westward from your existing dungeon to get to the gem seams
mentioned earlier, then attack north and take out his other son,
gain a fourth portal, before you mount the final attack on
Nemesis himself.
Any way you go, his defeat is sweet. And there are only two more
missions to go, not counting the bonus levels.
8.21 Interception (19)
Land: Butterscotch
Primary Objective: Capture and convert the three princes
Secondary Objective: Prevent any prince from escaping, and
prevent any prince from dying before they are converted.
You find yourself with an established dungeon. because this one
requires a LOT of subterfuge, and a LOT of patience.
Go ahead and setup your dungeon, start with lair, hatchery, and
training room. You can dig to the west for a combat pit, so don't
build one. Build everything else, as you'll need a LOT of them.
You don't really need a temple though, as you can finish this
without a single dark angel.
You should have PLENTY of gold, as you can dig every single piece
of gold within sight. They won't attract too much attention.
You should also find quite a few specials in little islands in
the lava. Build a small bridge to each and claim them all. They
are "gain level" specials, and VERY useful for the big push at
the end.
To the northeast is another portal, though you'll need to dig
quite a bit of gold that surrounds your dungeon to get to it,
then quite a few bridges. That shouldn't be a problem though.
To the north you should see a couple giants guarding a special.
Use your creatures to take them out. That special is "reveal
map", a very useful special.
Once your creatures are completely trained up, consider the way
the three princes are moving. They just go back and forth, back
and forth, on their route, UNTIL one of them has been wounded,
even just slightly. Then ALL THREE run for their respective
gates. You can't destroy the gate, but you CAN put traps and
barricades and doors to prevent the prince from reaching the
gate, thus delaying them, giving your creatures a chance to hit
them, and defeat them.
Concentrate on ONE gate at a time. After the prince and his
escorts are out of sight, build a bridge, send in your imps to
convert the tiles. Be careful NOT to let the imps wander to the
princes and "lead" his party back to your dungeon. They will
generally ignore your bridge unless you give them cause to!
You'll use up a LOT of imps as the heroes use them for target
practice, but you'll get those tiles converted. The prince
wouldn't care if he's walking on your land.
When the prince is away, send in your forces to attack the guards
around each gate or door. Retrieve them BEFORE the prince comes
back. You need to block ALL three gates without even ONCE hitting
a prince. You want to claim ALL the land for yourself, so you can
drop imps and reinforcements anywhere. Use a group of good
fighters as your "strike force" to bust doors and the guards,
then grab them and put them back into your dungeon. Then drop
your imps and let them claim tiles.
To lock up a gate, put a steel door on the entrance, then put one
or more freeze trap right before and after the door on the way to
the gate.
NOTE: Several DK2 players reminded me that you can pick off
prince's escorts by sending a unit up the rear of the formation
and tease the rearguard away from the main group, then take it
out. Repeat until you feel you are ready.
Once you got all three gates "locked up" and reduced the prince's
escorts to a suitable level, save the game, just in case you fail
in your next attempt.
Use all the "gain experience" specials now. Then send in your
strike forces and take out one prince at a time, and make sure
you have enough imps standing by to drag them away. Now you know
why you need a big prison. Use the "radar" to keep track of the
imps dragging progress. Go after the next one. As soon as the
prince arrives at the prison, cast heal on him! Princes are
REALLY weak, and will die QUICKLY if you don't use heal. The
traps and doors should slow them down for your creatures to knock
them down.
Once you get all three healed, toss them all into the torture
chamber, then it's standard interrogation. Heal or feed chicken
when they reach "half way" dead. Repeat.
Convert all three and you win!
8.22 Regicide (20)
Land: Heartland
Primary Objective: Kill King Reginald and gain the gateway to the
aboveworld!
Secondary Objective: Cut off the hero's attack routes
You have quite a few rooms dug for you, and one portal in place,
but beware. You'll be under attack VERY quickly, and you'll be
attacked by no less than FOUR directions. That's right, FOUR
directions: east, southwest, northwest, and north.
By now you should know how to build up your lair, hatchery,
training room, and workshop. You'll also need libraries and
later, combat pit, guard room, and more. Use traps to help you
defend from the multiple incursions, as you want to take out one
hero gate at a time. You probably don't need a casino on this
one. You should get plenty of bodies for a graveyard though (4-6
space graveyard should be enough).
The hero gate to the north is easiest to take out, and you'll
need to take it out ASAP. You can also claim a mana vault there.
The initial heroes are just level 1, but as game progress they'll
be tougher, and gold is finite on this level, even though the
amount is quite large.
Once your imps have dug through, they can start claiming tiles
until they run into the "hero outposts". Each of the "hero
outpost" has a guard room, a hero gate, and a small treasury.
They will keep sending progressively tougher attack forces, so
take them out as soon as you can, and dig out the tiles around
the hero gate to disable it. You MAY want to keep one gate active
as a source of new recruits (i.e. capture and torture), but
that's up to you. Keep the high level prisoners and convert them,
turn the low-level into skeletons or torture them for
information.
There are two more portals on this map. One is to the east of
your dungeon heart (just follow the corridor and the gold), while
the other is to the north-northwest.
The single special is to the WEST of your dungeon heart. Keep
digging west and you'll see a corridor. Next to the special is a
mana vault. It's probably a heal-all, which can be useful in the
assault.
Consider torturing some of the low-level heroes for information
instead of turning them into skeletons.
Once you've cleared all the "hero outposts", it's time to think
about the attack. There are two ways into King Reginald's domain.
You can go in the FRONT door, which is actually covered by a moat
with lightning traps (ouchy) and a LOT of cannons, and an outside
wall with plenty of sentry cannons and guard rooms and lightning
traps.
There is also a "back door", which requires you to conquer the
northwest "hero outpost", then dig north from there, and follow
that corridor north, then east. You'll see PLENTY of traps
(lightning trap and/or sentry cannon). You'll even see an
occasional boulder trap. Best way to do this is send in your imps
until they get beaten back by the traps. Then cast call to arms
at the trap, and drop a couple low-level creature as your attack
force. Once all you dropped are attacking, cancel the call to
arms. Those that are already attacking will finish the job, and
you won't have severe casualties even if a boulder hit your
forces.
Once you're reached the second enemy guard room, you're almost
there. To the south of the guardroom is a door and inside this
room, which I'll call the "gateway room", is King Reginald, with
several level 10 heroes assisting, plus hero gates and quite a
few sentry cannons. This is where the "gateway" to the aboveworld
lies. Use sight of evil here and you'll see that you can actually
"dig through" just north of the guard room.
Once you're sure all the creatures have received enough training,
have the imps dig through, cast call to arms, and drop in your
attack force, blitzers and fighters first, support and blockers
second. Summon Horny now to help clean out the room. Once all the
creatures are around the middle of the room, CANCEL call to arms
as you want them to spread out and clear the room of the sentry
cannons and so on. Also drop in the imps and try to convert a few
tiles in the melee. You may want to use the "heal all" special in
the melee if you got it. You'll get a lot of casualties, but you
should be able to clear the room. You may need to cast call to
arms somewhere else in the room to clear it completely. King
Reginald should go down in the melee as he's no match for Horny.
Once the room's clear, you'll see the "corridor" to the
aboveworld. If Horny's still there, send him packing (slap him).
You need to save the mana to summon Horny again. Two stone
knights guard the exit. Both are level 10 Lords. They're so
tough, your creatures can't hurt them. Those are King Reginald's
guardians. But that's not the tough part.
The real test comes when your imps venture inside. Or a few
minutes after you slay King Reginald. A group of TEN level 10
heroes will come through that corridor. As you have suffered
heavy casualties in cleaning out the room, you won't be able to
hold them. You may be able to defeat them by using up all your
mana, but that means you won't be able to attack, and there will
be INFINITE waves of those heroes every X minutes. Even if you
defeat one wave, you can't convert the prisoners fast enough to
help you defend against the next wave, and the damage those
heroes do will mean they'll wear you down and you WILL lose if
you go defensive.
Instead, start selling your structures and start building lairs
right in FRONT of the attacking heroes. You need to delay them to
give you time to build up your mana to summon Horny again to do
direct battle with the guardian stone knights. Building lairs in
the raider's path will slow them down as some of them will attack
the lairs. Drop imps into the gateway room and claim as many
tiles as you can as you want to summon Horny as close to the
stone knights as possible. Do NOT summon Horny to do battle with
the raiders as that would be a waste of mana. Just delay them
while you go straight after the stone knights with Horny.
When your mana reach 180000 or 190000 (you may not have enough
time for the full 200000 as you want to summon Horny BEFORE the
raiding heroes reach your dungeon heart), summon Horny right at
the gate. Then watch him take out the stone knights. You can try
delaying the attacking heroes by casting call to arms, but I'd
suggest you save the mana for Horny instead.
Once Horny defeats the two Stone Knights, you win even if you're
under attack.
9 Other Single Player modes
9.1 Secret Levels
There are five secret levels in DK2. Four of them you can reveal
from the campaign. The fifth one only appears when it's full
moon. And I'm not kidding.
To get the secret levels, you have to dig the rocks and locate
the special chest. Once you have that in your possession you get
access to the secret level when you win.
9.2 My Pet Dungeon
My Pet Dungeon is basically a practice scenario that just
requires you to build up your dungeon. While you can trigger
invasion of heroes and such, it's not necessary to win the
scenario.
MPD is a great way to practice your dungeon building, as there
will NOT be an attack unless you order one. You can use it to
evaluate your defenses and such.
The different scenarios are quite easy as almost all of them can
be won without killing a single hero, esp. on the levels with gem
seams. Only levels without gem seams will be you hard-pressed for
points.
10 Multiplayer
Multiplayer is a lot of fun as you put all the evil ways you
learned in the campaign and My Pet Dungeon to use. Against other
real live human keepers!
A game usually have five phases: build-up, recon, defense,
offense, endgame. Let's discuss each phase, what needs to happen,
and
10.1 The Build-Up and Expansion
Right at the beginning, you need to claim the portals near you,
and as much gold as you can get. Build lair and hatchery first,
then the training room and the rest of the rooms when you can.
Train your creatures up for your initial defense. Fit a workshop
and start building doors and such around the dungeon heart with a
few more traps for defense.
10.2 Prepare defense
While the build-up continues, you need to start planning your
defense. You should start putting traps and such where you expect
the enemy to be. By this time, your creatures should be pretty
well trained, so try to fit a combat pit for further training.
10.3 Recon
Once your perimeter have been "secured", it's time to recon. If
you have plenty of mana, you can use sight-of-evil and be safe
and not warn other keepers. Or you can possess a unit and have it
move around.
10.4 Initial offense
Assemble a strike force with your swift creatures and start
probing your enemy's defenses. You'll want to send in the imps to
claim land up to his dungeon, and then send in the attack. The
objective is to "thin" down his creatures. Keep the fight on YOUR
land, drag back any one that wandered off.
10.5 Go for the heart
Once you've taken down his creatures (either killed them or
imprisoned them), it's time to go for his dungeon heart. Send in
the imps, add some tremor spell to weaken his walls, and charge
straight for the heart.
11 Misc. Information
11.1 Cheat Codes
(Courtesy of http://www.gamespot.com)
While playing, press Ctrl+Alt+C, then enter any of the following:
CODE EFFECT
do not fear the reaper Skip level
feel the power All creatures' skills go
to 10
fit the best Get all rooms, traps
i believe its magic Get all magic
now the rain has gone All map
show me the money Get more money
this is my church Get all rooms
haha thisaway haha thataway Get 100,000 mana
NOTE: For the 100,000
mana cheat, you'll need
to have upgraded to v1.51
or later
Level select
Start the game with the "dk2.exe -level [level name]" command
line, using one of the following level names:
level1
level2
level3
level4
level5
level6a
level6b
level7
level8
level9
level10
level11a
level11b
level11c
level12
level13
level14
level15a
level15b
level16
level17
level18
level19
level20
secret1
secret2
secret3
secret4
secret5
Secret Level:
Set your computer's calendar to any day with a full moon - you
should see a bonus stage appear in Dungeon Keeper 2 as an
encircled flag.
Modify Cheat
Go into the data file, then open up the creature file and you can
change information about creatures and spells around. Ex: You can
change the imp spell to where imps cost nothing.
Show Me The Way
If you do the CTRL+ALT+C thing then type "what are you looking
at", the map will vanish like the "now the rain has gone" code.
But if you CTRL+ALT+C and then type in "now the rain has gone",
the map will come back and the entire map will be visible (i.e.,
everything you couldn't see before you can see now). Not only
that, but you get a little arrow that points you towards the hero
gate.
