Speed run techniques for selected levels
Oct 11, 2016 17:01:35 GMT -5
capthawk and Vae Victus like this
Post by redartrats on Oct 11, 2016 17:01:35 GMT -5
The following are posts that I made about some of the speed run techniques I discovered in my most recent playthrough, and fallen has proposed that I collect all of the information here and delete the original threads. So here goes.
I'll quote each of my original posts below, and perhaps some selected replies from the original threads, and in between may add a few more remarks. Whoever else wants to, can feel free to reply to this thread about other speed-running tips.
Ferarai Lance: Power Relay Grid
Just finished Fererai: Power Relay Grid on difficulty Demanding in 14 turns, with only 4 templars. Actually, could have done it in 11 or maybe even 10, had the last node in the center not blown. Hooray, 20% bonus!
My strategy: hire 2 engineers, route first node west, send 2nd engineer west while 1st engineer heads north. Since the north path has more open territory, I sent the soldier with him, and the captain went west with the 2nd engineer. Then route the west node north, while soldier and 1st engineer secures the 2nd middle node. Then route 2nd west node east and 2nd middle node north, pretty much in 1 move. Here's where I got greedy: once my 1st engineer got to the 3rd middle node I routed power north instead of west, as I would have according to the zigzag pattern I was using with 2 engineers. I wasted about 3-4 moves after the last middle node blew, backtracking to the 3rd middle node to route it west. But I had the 2nd engineer already at the last west node by the time the 1st engineer reached the 3rd west node, so the last turn was pretty fast.
I didn't defend the tact point at all -- in previous playthroughs, I had to spent lots of resources (time, templars, turrets, upgrades, the whole shbang) to defend it. This time round, with only 4 templars on the field, the xeno didn't even bother attacking the tact point -- and even if they did I wouldn't have cared since I was going for the speed run and wasn't turning back.
I don't know if the bad nodes are randomly selected each time, but the last time the zigzag pattern worked very well too (15 turns, with a different captain). My very first time playing this level was a nightmare, though, with nodes blowing everywhere because I keep trying to take the shortest route north, and my troops were all over the map as I didn't know what I was doing.
Update: I just did this level again and managed to reduce it to 8 turns (this is on Replay+, but I think it should still be doable with a new squad since the strategy doesn't really rely on equipment/stats only available in a more experienced squad. Basically, the idea is the same, except that this time, instead of trying to be greedy and routing the 2nd middle node north, I routed it west and had the engineer team on the west route it north. So it was a zigzag pattern: west, north, east, north, west, north, win. This time round, I sent the captain with the 2nd engineer to the west while the first engineer headed north with the soldier. The soldier's OW provided cover for the first engineer, while the captain served as meat shield for the 2nd engineer. Since this is Replay+, the enemies were tougher, and both captain and soldier got wounded to dangerously low HP. Fortunately, since the xeno perceived my squad as more threatening than the tact point, I was able to purchase medtech ordnances to keep everyone alive. The 3rd west node can be reached by detouring around to the west and back through a narrow opening; but then a big wall blocks the 2nd engineer from going farther north after routing the power up the final leg of piping. Luckily, there is some open space where the 1st engineer can move diagonally across from the 3rd middle node to the 4th west node in good time.
Result: victory in 8 turns (goal 24, 20% bonus), 6 confirmed kills (haha, ridiculously low kill count because I was mainly running away from xeno rather than staying to kill them), 4 veteran templars.
Extermination by Fire
This time through Extermination by Fire, an idea occurred to me. The last two times I played this level, I spent lots of time moving my hydra around the map trying to reach all 3 spores, and many of the other squad members were busy playing escort and keeping the xeno hordes at bay. So I thought, what if I hired two hydras instead of just one? Then I can send one north to take out the two northern spores, and one south to the tact point to deal with the last one. Since I wouldn't have time to capture tact points and add more templars, I had to make do with the 5 starting templars.
Since the northern two spores cross open territory and potentially had more possibilities of ambush by xeno, I decided to send the soldier and captain north with one hydra, and the other hydra accompanied the engineer to the south. The southern group was risky because engineers aren't very good at killing large numbers of xeno; but I thought it was worth the risk because the distance is shorter. The soldier definitely had to go north because OW is indispensible for horde control. (In retrospect, I could've swapped out the engineer for another soldier, but I wanted to be able to capture the tact point.) As it turned out, strategic placement of a turret right at the north end of the bridge helped with both horde control from the rush of xeno from the tact point, and also to keep the xeno approaching from the north at bay after the hydra had burned out the spore and the engineer was busy taking over the TP. So the turret played the role of soldier with OW.
On the northern advance, it was pretty straightforward: the soldier used OW to cover the hydra, and the captain dispatched any leftover xeno. I followed the northern canyon pretty closely to avoid the xeno TP on the east of the map, and was able to get the hydra to the 3rd spore on the 5th turn.
Result: Victory in 5 turns (Goal 22 for 20% bonus), 9 confirmed kills (1.8 per turn for 2% bonus; 1 TP purged), 5 veteran templars. Hurrah!
Haha, am I causing the nerfing of many levels by finding creative ways to beat them?
In general, on this current playthrough, I'm finding that speed running is more effective than take and hold, because xeno numbers haven't built up yet. The longer my squad takes to move around, the more xeno I've to deal with, which in turn slows me down even more. It's a vicious cycle. Going faster with less troops seems to work better, because there's less xeno to deal with in general, so not as much firepower is needed, which means less waiting around for SP to pull in more troops. It also lets me split up the squad into focused fast-acting groups of 2-3 operatives, hitting objectives in parallel.
The only catch is that on larger maps heat issues will arise from pushing the templars at top speed all the time.
Also, I find that holding tact points is usually a waste of resources that could be better spent on the tip of the spear, so to speak. It draws the xenos' attention, which in turn requires even more resources to defend the TP. Whereas if the entire squad moves ahead, the xeno are more likely to perceive the squad as a threat and leave the TP alone, meaning it can be just left undefended. In the worst case you could just upgrade the TPs health or add a cannon and it will serve as a good decoy to keep the xeno busy while the squad moves ahead towards the objectives.
Trench Warfare
Here's my latest BF exploit: Trench Warfare finished in 6 turns (goal 16 for 20% bonus), 29 kills (4.8/turn for 6% bonus), 2 secondary objectives (+10 XP). Total: 88 XP + 32 bonus = 120 XP; 88 RP + 22 bonus = 110 RP.
Main idea was to boost the scout with Overdrive and Pressing Need (in retrospect, could have done a bit more than that to reduce the turn count to 5; scout was just 2 squares short of the last command console on the 4th turn). Swapped out the 2nd scout with another soldier, and sent soldier and Nyra up north to hit the 4th command console. Second soldier also got boosted with Pressing Need to follow the scout and provide OW coverage (didn't really catch up to the scout until the 2nd console, though, when the scout needed to detour to hit the console). Captain and hydra followed behind, and hit the building (another secondary objective). Got lots of kills from hydra torching large groups of cultists and Nyra slaying them like flies. Totally ignored the southern bank, as it would have taken too long for limited benefit, though I did shoot down a sniper or two who shot at the scout. No big hindrance.
@redartats
Nice run! It can be done in three turns with all goals if you use Blitz kits, and triple buff your scout with Pressing Need 4, Rallying Charge 4, and his or her own boost at 7.
I have to say that the goal count for this level is probably too high. Even with my Low n' Slow group that uses minimal +mp gear/buffs, I think we finished in 6 turns. The scout had a twitch kit and maybe +3 mp from his self buff. With kills, I think we scored 28% bonus and got two secondaries, not a bad haul. I'm really not sure what you would have to do to take up all 16 turns.
Hive Mind
I just finished the Hive Mind level yesterday on difficulty Demanding with only 22 turns (target 30). (Which is very surprising, because most of the time my turn count is pretty bad!) Basically, my strategy was to hit both the power nodes and the worms, depending on the configuration my squad members end up in.
I had Captain Xander's half of the squad move in to kill the first worm, by a "drive-by shooting" pattern: basically continue moving towards the Hive Mind head while shooting at the worm so that when it dies, most of the squad is within shooting range of the head and can start dealing damage to it. Nyra's half of the squad took out a series of power nodes on the right side, going counterclockwise, while the captain took out another node south of the head, then turned back north (because too many Narvs were spawning from the spawn points farther down). Then both halves met north of the head, and killed another worm on the NW, barely within the range of being able to run back and shoot at the hive mind and deal the final death blow. Captain strategically stayed close enough to be able to melee the Hive Mind to death after the worm went down.
As far as squad setup is concerned, after much experimentation of the Narv levels I discovered that the most effective way to deal with Narvs is to respec my scouts to max out Crippling Fire and my soldiers to max out Overwatch, then deploy at least 2 scouts + 2 soldiers each time. The scouts use Crippling Fire to reduce each enemy unit to MP 1 or 2, and the soldiers use Overwatch to keep the rest of the enemies at bay. Keep the squad moving as much as possible, so that slowed-down enemies will just be left behind, to save my AP for dealing with enemies ahead. (Sometimes if I'm lucky to get a break from the endless stream of enemies, one of the soldiers could use Overwatch to finish off the slowed-down enemies at the rear.) I found it very useful to give my Engineer the Sensorkit Scan talent; this frees up my Scouts to use their AP for Crippling Fire instead, without moving in "blind" because of unscanned areas.
For levels with higher squad cap sometimes I add a Hydra, but I found that soldiers with Overwatch are far more effective at Narv horde control, so I usually have 3-4 soldiers + 2 scouts instead of 2-3 soldiers + 2 scouts + hydra.
Final stats for the Hive Mind level: 22 turns, 42 confirmed kills (1.9 per turn for 2% bonus), 7 templars.
P.S. I also equipped my scouts with bio-poison weapons so that after an enemy unit is slowed down by Crippling Fire it continues to suffer damage while the squad leaves it behind; low HP enemies often die from the poison later without my needing to spend more AP to shoot at them actively.
Just completed this level again with a new captain: managed to do it in 18 turns. I feel like it could be even less, as quite a few turns were spent retreating from flame spiders and radiators or healing up from injuries caused by silly mistakes. It was a pretty rocky start, but it seems like after the initial onslaught things became more manageable. Took out 3 power nodes and 2 worms; for each worm I planned it so that a team of 5 templars were close by enough to strike the head. Emptied all I've got each time, including grenades (I respec'd all the soldiers to carry grenades): every last AP was spent, except when Nyra was too far away after killing a worm on the north. I had my scouts wield bio-poison weapons for extra background damage in between worm kills (not sure if it actually has an effect on the hive mind though!).
I found that an effective strategy after the initial onslaught of narvs is to use Crippling Fire on narv warriors (reduce to MP 1) and then ignore them unless they get in the way. Saves a lot of firepower for the more important targets.
Stratos: Defense Relay
Didn't seem like 13 turns was that much to brag about, but now that I read other reviews of this level, it seems that I may have come up with a funny way of, whatchamacallit, avoiding most of the level? In fact, I think I could've done it in fewer than 13 turns had I resisted the temptation to kick xeno butt on the way, but that was riskier. There's probably also a way to do it with fewer than the 6 templars I deployed, but even more risky, and I don't really feel like replaying the level yet another time.
Basically, the main idea is to note that to get past the security system, all you really have to do is to destroy a single 2nd tier turret on the far left of the level. The extraction point is just north of this turret, separated by a chasm, which requires crossing the fire zone of the turret next to it, but the danger area is quite small and you can easily sneak past it by following the edge of the chasm closely (and avoiding to stop within the fire zone).
First two moves basically consists of boosting the engineer with Pressing Need (+3 MP), and the engineer himself is actually almost maxed out on Capture, so he captures the first TP in a single turn (two strikes: first one purges the xeno, second tunes it to templar frequencies). All 4 starting templars sneak around the bottom edge of the TP to avoid the fire zone of the first turret. Then on turn 3, I deployed a hydra and another scout, and everyone starts making their way NW toward the extraction point through the small bridge. Then head west, making sure to avoid the fire zone of the turrets on the north, while fending off the xeno attacking from the TP on the south. At the last turret on the far west, line up all templars just 1 square south of its fire zone, then in a single turn swarm the turret and destroy it. I found that with Piercing Fire at high enough level, I can bring down the turret's armor low enough that I still have AP to spare after the turret is smashed to bits and gone. After that, line up everyone at the chasm next to the extraction point and sneak them past the fire zone of the turret on the right in single file.
Result: Victory in 13 turns (goal 20 for 15% bonus), 21 kills (1.6 per turn for 2% bonus, 1 TP purged), 6 veteran templars. I actually didn't even hit any of the power nodes (though arguably could have hit at least 2 on the way). So basically all I did was to destroy a single turret and leave the rest of the security system untouched. Methinks Stratos' security systems needs a review for loopholes. Well, too late for that now that the traitor blew up the entire station... 
Stratos: Elevator Complex
Just did Stratos: Elevator Complex in 4 turns. Including 2 secondary objectives (the meditech stash and the elevator power fuses).
Basic strategy is to respec my scouts to max out Stealth and Null Field, with first scout on Overdrive 3 for the MP+3 bonus and the second scout on Overdrive 2 for the MP+2 bonus (because scout #1, going to deck 3, has more ground to cover, whereas scout #2, going to deck 2, can reach the control panel in a shorter distance). The first scout uses the 1st turn to get to deck 3 and begin covering some distance, the 2nd scout goes to deck 2 on turn 2. On deck 1, captain and a soldier take the two fuse nodes on the right, and the engineer and another soldier heads for the control panel.
Scout #1 is able to reach just 1 square away from the turret's fire zone on second turn, and at MP 11 has just enough speed to sneak past the turret completely. Turned on Null Field to sneak past the xeno at the TP next to the control panel.
Scout #2 met no resistance at all, since there's a clear path to the control panel (once you know where to look for it) and by turn 3 xeno forces haven't gathered sufficiently to block the way yet. In any case, he also went with Null Field just in case of an unexpected spawn nearby.
On deck 1, the engineer had barely enough speed to hit the meditech stash, while the soldier behind her hit the switch on turn 4.
Result: Victory in 4 turns (goal 24 for 20% bonus), 4 confirmed kills (1 per turn for 0% bonus, hahaha), 6 veteran templars.
Note: in an older post, contributor had found a 5-move win on first try. So I wasn't the first one.
I'll quote each of my original posts below, and perhaps some selected replies from the original threads, and in between may add a few more remarks. Whoever else wants to, can feel free to reply to this thread about other speed-running tips.
Ferarai Lance: Power Relay Grid
My strategy: hire 2 engineers, route first node west, send 2nd engineer west while 1st engineer heads north. Since the north path has more open territory, I sent the soldier with him, and the captain went west with the 2nd engineer. Then route the west node north, while soldier and 1st engineer secures the 2nd middle node. Then route 2nd west node east and 2nd middle node north, pretty much in 1 move. Here's where I got greedy: once my 1st engineer got to the 3rd middle node I routed power north instead of west, as I would have according to the zigzag pattern I was using with 2 engineers. I wasted about 3-4 moves after the last middle node blew, backtracking to the 3rd middle node to route it west. But I had the 2nd engineer already at the last west node by the time the 1st engineer reached the 3rd west node, so the last turn was pretty fast.
I didn't defend the tact point at all -- in previous playthroughs, I had to spent lots of resources (time, templars, turrets, upgrades, the whole shbang) to defend it. This time round, with only 4 templars on the field, the xeno didn't even bother attacking the tact point -- and even if they did I wouldn't have cared since I was going for the speed run and wasn't turning back.
I don't know if the bad nodes are randomly selected each time, but the last time the zigzag pattern worked very well too (15 turns, with a different captain). My very first time playing this level was a nightmare, though, with nodes blowing everywhere because I keep trying to take the shortest route north, and my troops were all over the map as I didn't know what I was doing.
Update: I just did this level again and managed to reduce it to 8 turns (this is on Replay+, but I think it should still be doable with a new squad since the strategy doesn't really rely on equipment/stats only available in a more experienced squad. Basically, the idea is the same, except that this time, instead of trying to be greedy and routing the 2nd middle node north, I routed it west and had the engineer team on the west route it north. So it was a zigzag pattern: west, north, east, north, west, north, win. This time round, I sent the captain with the 2nd engineer to the west while the first engineer headed north with the soldier. The soldier's OW provided cover for the first engineer, while the captain served as meat shield for the 2nd engineer.
Since this is Replay+, the enemies were tougher, and both captain and soldier got wounded to dangerously low HP. Fortunately, since the xeno perceived my squad as more threatening than the tact point, I was able to purchase medtech ordnances to keep everyone alive. The 3rd west node can be reached by detouring around to the west and back through a narrow opening; but then a big wall blocks the 2nd engineer from going farther north after routing the power up the final leg of piping. Luckily, there is some open space where the 1st engineer can move diagonally across from the 3rd middle node to the 4th west node in good time.Result: victory in 8 turns (goal 24, 20% bonus), 6 confirmed kills (haha, ridiculously low kill count because I was mainly running away from xeno rather than staying to kill them), 4 veteran templars.
Extermination by Fire
Since the northern two spores cross open territory and potentially had more possibilities of ambush by xeno, I decided to send the soldier and captain north with one hydra, and the other hydra accompanied the engineer to the south. The southern group was risky because engineers aren't very good at killing large numbers of xeno; but I thought it was worth the risk because the distance is shorter. The soldier definitely had to go north because OW is indispensible for horde control. (In retrospect, I could've swapped out the engineer for another soldier, but I wanted to be able to capture the tact point.) As it turned out, strategic placement of a turret right at the north end of the bridge helped with both horde control from the rush of xeno from the tact point, and also to keep the xeno approaching from the north at bay after the hydra had burned out the spore and the engineer was busy taking over the TP. So the turret played the role of soldier with OW.
On the northern advance, it was pretty straightforward: the soldier used OW to cover the hydra, and the captain dispatched any leftover xeno. I followed the northern canyon pretty closely to avoid the xeno TP on the east of the map, and was able to get the hydra to the 3rd spore on the 5th turn.
Result: Victory in 5 turns (Goal 22 for 20% bonus), 9 confirmed kills (1.8 per turn for 2% bonus; 1 TP purged), 5 veteran templars. Hurrah!
In general, on this current playthrough, I'm finding that speed running is more effective than take and hold, because xeno numbers haven't built up yet. The longer my squad takes to move around, the more xeno I've to deal with, which in turn slows me down even more. It's a vicious cycle. Going faster with less troops seems to work better, because there's less xeno to deal with in general, so not as much firepower is needed, which means less waiting around for SP to pull in more troops. It also lets me split up the squad into focused fast-acting groups of 2-3 operatives, hitting objectives in parallel.
The only catch is that on larger maps heat issues will arise from pushing the templars at top speed all the time.
Trench Warfare
Main idea was to boost the scout with Overdrive and Pressing Need (in retrospect, could have done a bit more than that to reduce the turn count to 5; scout was just 2 squares short of the last command console on the 4th turn). Swapped out the 2nd scout with another soldier, and sent soldier and Nyra up north to hit the 4th command console. Second soldier also got boosted with Pressing Need to follow the scout and provide OW coverage (didn't really catch up to the scout until the 2nd console, though, when the scout needed to detour to hit the console). Captain and hydra followed behind, and hit the building (another secondary objective). Got lots of kills from hydra torching large groups of cultists and Nyra slaying them like flies. Totally ignored the southern bank, as it would have taken too long for limited benefit, though I did shoot down a sniper or two who shot at the scout. No big hindrance.
Nice run! It can be done in three turns with all goals if you use Blitz kits, and triple buff your scout with Pressing Need 4, Rallying Charge 4, and his or her own boost at 7.
Hive Mind
I had Captain Xander's half of the squad move in to kill the first worm, by a "drive-by shooting" pattern: basically continue moving towards the Hive Mind head while shooting at the worm so that when it dies, most of the squad is within shooting range of the head and can start dealing damage to it. Nyra's half of the squad took out a series of power nodes on the right side, going counterclockwise, while the captain took out another node south of the head, then turned back north (because too many Narvs were spawning from the spawn points farther down). Then both halves met north of the head, and killed another worm on the NW, barely within the range of being able to run back and shoot at the hive mind and deal the final death blow. Captain strategically stayed close enough to be able to melee the Hive Mind to death after the worm went down.
As far as squad setup is concerned, after much experimentation of the Narv levels I discovered that the most effective way to deal with Narvs is to respec my scouts to max out Crippling Fire and my soldiers to max out Overwatch, then deploy at least 2 scouts + 2 soldiers each time. The scouts use Crippling Fire to reduce each enemy unit to MP 1 or 2, and the soldiers use Overwatch to keep the rest of the enemies at bay. Keep the squad moving as much as possible, so that slowed-down enemies will just be left behind, to save my AP for dealing with enemies ahead. (Sometimes if I'm lucky to get a break from the endless stream of enemies, one of the soldiers could use Overwatch to finish off the slowed-down enemies at the rear.) I found it very useful to give my Engineer the Sensorkit Scan talent; this frees up my Scouts to use their AP for Crippling Fire instead, without moving in "blind" because of unscanned areas.
For levels with higher squad cap sometimes I add a Hydra, but I found that soldiers with Overwatch are far more effective at Narv horde control, so I usually have 3-4 soldiers + 2 scouts instead of 2-3 soldiers + 2 scouts + hydra.
Final stats for the Hive Mind level: 22 turns, 42 confirmed kills (1.9 per turn for 2% bonus), 7 templars.
P.S. I also equipped my scouts with bio-poison weapons so that after an enemy unit is slowed down by Crippling Fire it continues to suffer damage while the squad leaves it behind; low HP enemies often die from the poison later without my needing to spend more AP to shoot at them actively.
I found that an effective strategy after the initial onslaught of narvs is to use Crippling Fire on narv warriors (reduce to MP 1) and then ignore them unless they get in the way. Saves a lot of firepower for the more important targets.
Stratos: Defense Relay
In fact, I think I could've done it in fewer than 13 turns had I resisted the temptation to kick xeno butt on the way, but that was riskier. There's probably also a way to do it with fewer than the 6 templars I deployed, but even more risky, and I don't really feel like replaying the level yet another time. Basically, the main idea is to note that to get past the security system, all you really have to do is to destroy a single 2nd tier turret on the far left of the level. The extraction point is just north of this turret, separated by a chasm, which requires crossing the fire zone of the turret next to it, but the danger area is quite small and you can easily sneak past it by following the edge of the chasm closely (and avoiding to stop within the fire zone).
First two moves basically consists of boosting the engineer with Pressing Need (+3 MP), and the engineer himself is actually almost maxed out on Capture, so he captures the first TP in a single turn (two strikes: first one purges the xeno, second tunes it to templar frequencies). All 4 starting templars sneak around the bottom edge of the TP to avoid the fire zone of the first turret. Then on turn 3, I deployed a hydra and another scout, and everyone starts making their way NW toward the extraction point through the small bridge. Then head west, making sure to avoid the fire zone of the turrets on the north, while fending off the xeno attacking from the TP on the south. At the last turret on the far west, line up all templars just 1 square south of its fire zone, then in a single turn swarm the turret and destroy it. I found that with Piercing Fire at high enough level, I can bring down the turret's armor low enough that I still have AP to spare after the turret is smashed to bits and gone. After that, line up everyone at the chasm next to the extraction point and sneak them past the fire zone of the turret on the right in single file.
Result: Victory in 13 turns (goal 20 for 15% bonus), 21 kills (1.6 per turn for 2% bonus, 1 TP purged), 6 veteran templars. I actually didn't even hit any of the power nodes (though arguably could have hit at least 2 on the way). So basically all I did was to destroy a single turret and leave the rest of the security system untouched. Methinks Stratos' security systems needs a review for loopholes.
Well, too late for that now that the traitor blew up the entire station... 
Stratos: Elevator Complex
Including 2 secondary objectives (the meditech stash and the elevator power fuses).Basic strategy is to respec my scouts to max out Stealth and Null Field, with first scout on Overdrive 3 for the MP+3 bonus and the second scout on Overdrive 2 for the MP+2 bonus (because scout #1, going to deck 3, has more ground to cover, whereas scout #2, going to deck 2, can reach the control panel in a shorter distance). The first scout uses the 1st turn to get to deck 3 and begin covering some distance, the 2nd scout goes to deck 2 on turn 2. On deck 1, captain and a soldier take the two fuse nodes on the right, and the engineer and another soldier heads for the control panel.
Scout #1 is able to reach just 1 square away from the turret's fire zone on second turn, and at MP 11 has just enough speed to sneak past the turret completely. Turned on Null Field to sneak past the xeno at the TP next to the control panel.
Scout #2 met no resistance at all, since there's a clear path to the control panel (once you know where to look for it) and by turn 3 xeno forces haven't gathered sufficiently to block the way yet. In any case, he also went with Null Field just in case of an unexpected spawn nearby.
On deck 1, the engineer had barely enough speed to hit the meditech stash, while the soldier behind her hit the switch on turn 4.
Result: Victory in 4 turns (goal 24 for 20% bonus), 4 confirmed kills (1 per turn for 0% bonus, hahaha), 6 veteran templars.
Note: in an older post, contributor had found a 5-move win on first try. So I wasn't the first one.
