Medusa Stores

Medusa Stores
Picture
%	Guards	Content	XP
30 %	20	2000 5	500 (520)
30 %	30	3000 6	750 (780)
30 %	40	4000 8	1000 (1040)
10 %	50	5000 10	1250 (1300)
Visiting scheme
Event
You have found a Medusa Stores. Do you wish to attack the guards? * * * You have found what once was a Medusa Stores, but it has been deserted for some time.

The medusa stores is an adventure map location, and commonly known as one of the creature banks. It is guarded by 20–50 medusas. The more guards there are, the better the reward. The treasure contains 2000–5000 and 5–10 .

The guards are divided into five stacks of 4/6/8/10 Medusas (red hexes). 50% probability of getting a stack of Medusa Queens in the lower left corner (C hexes). All the guard stacks of the same speed attack in alphabetic order: from A to E.  In Horn of the Abyss, the object's level can be preset by a map-maker, and the upgraded stack option may be toggled on or off.

The hero's troops are located in blue hexes 1-7 (a tail hex for two-hexed creatures) according to stack positioning in the army slots 1-7. But if the hero has less than 7 stacks, e.g. 3, they will be placed in hexes 1-3 no matter how they were placed in the army slots.

Though war machines are not present on the battlefield, the infinite shots effect from Ammo Cart is active.

Slain enemies do not respawn (should the hero retreat or be defeated). The damaged stack's losses will not be redistributed among the others. If a stack was destroyed, it changes the guards disposition. Its place on the battlefield will be taken by the next one in the attacking order. (E.g.: If A stack was destroyed, B stack takes its place, C stack takes the freshly vacated place of B and so on).

Guards preview

The table shows how to pre-check the guard strength of an object without attacking it.
Guarding stacks accentuated with bold font should be considered in the first place.

Guards	Stacks	Guards preview	Upgraded stack
30 %:  x20	4 x5	lots (20-49) of Medusas	pack (10-19) of Medusas few (1-4) Medusa Queens
30 %:  x30	6 x5		lots (20-49) of Medusas several (5-9) Medusa Queens
30 %:  x40	8 x5
10 %:  x50	10 x5	horde (50-99) of Medusas	lots (20-49) of Medusas pack (10-19) of Medusa Queens

Default settings for random map generator

• Terrain: any except subterranean and water.
• Value: 1500.
• Density: 100.

User commentary

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Castle Your main disadvantage here is that Pikemen have only 4 speed, so you can't use them as blockers. You can use any other unit that has 6 speed or more, like Gargoyles, Harpies, Griffins etc. Never try to block the Medusas and use your Marksmen, since they will move towards them and attack in melee. This means there are mostly two feasible options with Castle to take the bank, and that is if you built Cavaliers or Angels week 1. Rampart Unicorns and Centaurs are perfect, just be careful with the Elves in case the Medusas get morale. You will need to go for the stack that is closest to your Elves with your tank stacks, and than hope that none of the blocked Medusas will shoot at the Elves. Tower Nagas can pretty much kill everything and your Master Gremlins should kill 1 whole stack too. Gargoyles are perfect blockers. Try to aim to have Haste ready for the Nagas (not required for Naga Queens), or you may be too slow in the end. If u split the Naga Queens in 5 you can use your Master Gremlins to take out any Medusa stack which gets morale or stones the Naga Queen. You can also split the Naga Queens in 2 and 3 (make sure 3 go down to confront Medusa Queens). You want it look like this (make sure to place Gargoyles exactly as such, since you want the Medusas to enter your Naga Queens' range when killing the stacks of 2 Gargoyles): Fortress Stay away from the Medusa Stores, Wyverns are weak, Gnolls are slow, and often you will not have many other options. If the Stores are on swamp terrain and you have Gorgons then you can go for them. Upgrading your Gnolls might also be good - 6 speed and they also hit hard, you can hope to take 1 stack of Medusas out fast. Stronghold Also not recommended to attack them. The Behemoths can get into trouble due to their speed (Cure would be very helpful but there's only a 5% chance of getting it in Stronghold's Mage Guild) and you don't want to lose your Rocs as well. Usually, Stronghold hardly needs the money, and you don't need Sulfur anyway. If you want to try it, you need another good striking force, like Goblins or Wolf Riders. Usually you don't want to split your Behemoths either – if one of them gets stoned, there's a high chance that the Behemoth will die. Inferno Good town to attack it if you have Pit Fiends, and coupled with Efreeti they hit hard and fast. A large stack of Imps helps of course, but you really need at least 4 Efreet and 7 Pit Fiends to try it, or else 40 Medusas might defeat you. You can bring a stack of Hell Hounds as a blocker that lasts a bit longer than a single Imp. Necropolis Vampire Lords make it a breeze. Without them you can do it with Haste and a bunch of Skeletons, but you don't have any fast Necropolis blockers except for the Wights and Wraiths so you might need luck with your Tavern heroes. It is not recommended to take the Liches with you. Dungeon Troglodytes, Harpies as blockers and a strong Minotaur stacks will easily beat 40 Medusas. If you went for Manticores you could get into troubles because they don't deal enough damage. Hasted Troglodytes are very powerful, and might even kill a single stack with only one attack.

See also:

• List of map objects