Archon - Who can do this?

[Atari8guy]

Hi All,

 

When I was younger I was obsessed with beating Archon over and over and over again. After mastering it I tried to make the game harder by giving myself goals, purposely lose your spell caster, try to win with just pawns left, just archers, just unicorns, whatever, but my favourite was always to rout the computer by winning what I considered the "perfect game". Well it's been 20+ years but I did it again....

Edited February 26, 2013 by 8bitguy1

[+CharlieChaplin]

No,

 

I never did this. Most of the time, when I use the light side, I first kill the Sorceress with my Djinny. When I have the dark side, I always kill the Wizard first. Bye bye to (computer) magic then. Think I never ended the game without losing one single figure - with the light side my knights always lose against the goblins, with the dark side it is the other way around (my goblins always lose against the knights)...

 

-----

 

Regarding revive function, you know of the cheat, where you can revive some figures in Archon that you have not lost ?!? You have to spare one figure though (e.g. a knight), but when using revive you may get another figure (Djinny, Unicorn, etc.). How to do that ?!? Alright here it goes, for testing purposes start a 2-player game where you control both sides - boring, I know, but just for testing. Now with the light side spare one figure, e.g. a knight. On the next move with the light side, move your wizard to a certain row. Again, on the next move use magic and there, use the revive function. Move the cursor down to the lowest place or simply keep it there (there is no figure there!). Press the fire button and garbage appears, move this garbage next to the Wizard (directly left orright to his side) and all of a sudden a white, err light figure appears !! Depending on the row where the Wizard is standing you will get this figure (rows counting from top=0 to bottom=9):

 

- Archon (title or row zero, just so you know)

- 1st row: rien, null, nada, nothing !!

- 2nd row: white Valkyrie

- 3rd row: white Archer

- 4th row: white Golem

- 5th row: white Knight

- 6th row: white Unicorn

- 7th row: white Knight

- 8th row: white Djinny

- 9th row: white Knight

 

So, you may spare a knight and therefore get another djinny or unicorn (even if you have not lost a djinny or unicorn, which means you now have two djinnys or three unicorns on the light side). Can the dark side do this also ?!? Yes, it can. You also spare a figure there (e.g. a goblin) and depending on the row where the Sorceress stands, a new WHITE, err light figure will appear, ouch. Which means only white / light figures will appear (so you may have three djinnys or four unicorns then)... nice cheat, eh ?!?

 

Here is a video showing this cheat:

 

-Andreas Koch.

[+therealbountybob]

Impressive stuff

I loved playing Archon but eventually found the computer too easy too (wish the logic could be updated). Great fun if you have 2 evenly matched (human) players. Might have a try with giving away a few pieces delierately

 

Did anyone play Archon II: The Adept much? I found it way too hard to beat, but I might play it again soon

Then there's Mail order Monsters (please someone make a 130XE version without the constant disk loads)

 

p.s. If you like Archon check out His Dark Majesty (sort of Archon meets Ultima III) a fantastic game.

[Nukey Shay]

Adept sucks for single-player gameplay. The AI chooses Armageddon much too often (even when the your threat is still pretty low).

[+therealbountybob]

Adept sucks for single-player gameplay. The AI chooses Armageddon much too often (even when the your threat is still pretty low).

Would be neat if someone could tweak that, I think that was the main thing that put me off, just when you start getting it together it goes for that and you're toast

[Tempest]

Maybe that was just in the Atari 8-bit version? I don't remember the Armageddon problem in the Apple II version I played as a kid.

[doctorclu]

On 3/1/2013 at 9:04 AM, Tempest said:

Maybe that was just in the Atari 8-bit version? I don't remember the Armageddon problem in the Apple II version I played as a kid.

 

Necrobumping since I have been playing Archon lately, mostly as my way of "doodling" to ease the stress between moving and working.   Been great.  

 

So always wondered, could a person look at how the Apple II version was written, and just adjust the Atari version's AI based on that?   Maybe make the Atari version of Archon 2 better that way.

 

And maybe try out Archon on the various platforms (NES, Commodore, Apple 2 etc) and use how those were coded to tweek the AI for the Atari version.  Matter of fact, you could adjust the sprites to match too.   So you get tired of the Atari version of Archon, you could try "Archon: Commodore", or "Archon: NES".

 

Ok, it might look more like the Atari version, but have the smarts and AI coded like the other platforms.  Could be fun.

 

Also thanks CharlieChaplin above for reminding me of the Archon cheat.  I could easily use two Djinnis!   Or three Unicorns!   Now being the dark side with a unicorn?   That's just crazy!

 

There was one Archon trick was trying to look up tonight that used to happen all the time on the disk version, but not the cartridge version.   There were times when I was advancing on the computer's light side wizard (I remember this happened on the left side about two or three times) that as I had a character advancing toward the wizard and past the middle power point AND as I had a character on the same row above the Wizard, this crazy thing would happen...

 

... the Wizard would exchange one of his characters and one of mine.   Then after that, my piece was taken over by the Wizard!   I want to say he took over my Basilisk.   I fought my own character and naturally lost my own piece when I won.

 

I was told over the years of others that had that happen, and no, a human player could not do that move from the experience of those others.

[doctorclu]

On 2/26/2013 at 4:28 PM, CharlieChaplin said:

No,

 

I never did this. Most of the time, when I use the light side, I first kill the Sorceress with my Djinny. When I have the dark side, I always kill the Wizard first. Bye bye to (computer) magic then. Think I never ended the game without losing one single figure - with the light side my knights always lose against the goblins, with the dark side it is the other way around (my goblins always lose against the knights)...

 

-----

 

Regarding revive function, ..... Can the dark side do this also ?!? Yes, it can. You also spare a figure there (e.g. a goblin) and depending on the row where the Sorceress stands, a new WHITE, err light figure will appear, ouch. Which means only white / light figures will appear (so you may have three djinnys or four unicorns then)... nice cheat, eh ?!?

 

Yep, tried that out as the dark side and sure enough, I made a light character Djinni that promptly attacked my Basilisk. 

 

Hey got another not so much a "cheat" but a "strategy": (against AI)

Trolls are magnets for knights,

and Golems are magnets for Goblins.

 

If you get tired of cleaning up the knights or goblins towards the end of a game, just move, for example, the Golems in the white square next to Goblins.   The Goblins, if you tease them enough by moving to nearby squares will jump off the black square that they are more powerful on, and onto the white square the Golem occupies, where as a dark character they are weaker.  The result is the Golem just stands there till they almost right on top of them, and then one shots them with a boulder!

 

Works in reverse for knights and Trolls.

 

Would love to hear other strategy tips for either Archon 1 or 2.

[+gnusto]

Unfortunately in my youth I ruined this game for myself pretty quickly after having bought it. Basically if you are skilled enough at the combat any fast projectile creature = easy win, even when you are on an opposite colored square. I realized after a short time on light side all I ever needed was the unicorn, and a teleport spell. I would just teleport my unicorn to the back of the dark side and take out all the strong units one in a row. The computer (or my friend, who wasn't as good at combat as I was) would contribute to their own death by trying to summon/teleport things to me when I was on the dark squares.