Drive Them Back

Information
Name	Drive Them Back
Categories	Story Documentary
Environment	Savannah
Player species	Matabele ant
Player units	Matabele ant worker Matabele ant medic (either) Matabele ant soldier
Surface	Yes
Features	Challenge mode Non-player colonies Circadian rhythm

Without termites to eat, the Matabele will starve. They must be protected.
Well disguised assassins walk unhindered amongst the ants. (challenge)

Objectives

• Remove 120/ 135/ 150/ 150/ 150 driver ants and prevent 30/ 25/ 20/ 20/ 20 driver ants from leaving with dead termites in a single raid.

• Keep at least a termite colony alive.

Rewards

• Base value: 6 territory/ 475 food/ 17 Royal Jelly

• Difficulty bonus: 300%/ 325%/ 350%/ 380%/ 420%

• First-time bonus: + 1500%

• Challenge bonus: + 100%

• Completion bonus: + 200%

• New game plus bonus: + 40% x plus number

Settings

Your Matabele ant colony must repel an advancing swarm of driver ants and protect its food sources.

The mission starts at night.

You have access to 4 termite colonies. Dead colony termites disappear after 2 minutes while other dead enemies disappear after 5 seconds. Dead enemies don't disappear in your nest.

You can attempt the first objective everyday until you succeed. The game only checks the requirements after all driver ants have been removed from the map.

You must choose either anesthetist or fast-responder medics before playing the mission. You start with 11/ 9/ 7/ 6/ 6 soldier brood tiles and 7 food storage tiles.

Non-player colonies

The enemy termite colonies are hostile to each other.

Minor soldiers and major soldiers are kept around the queen and are only deployed to protect the gathering groups or to defend against the driver ants.

The termite colonies retreat inside at noon and gather lignocellulose within their territories for the rest of the day.

Brood tiles with eliminated termites can't incubate for 12 minutes. Nanitic workers aren't spawned for free when enemy colonies don't have any food.

Notable enemies

Enemies are on the same side and are hostile to the ants and the termites. Driver ants and African stink ants are hostile to each other.

Earwigs and termites live in your nest.

Surface enemies don't invade your nest. They occasionally fight among themselves to keep their own number in check.

Wafer trapdoor spiders appear over time on the ways to termite mounds.

Huntsman spiders occasionally appear one at a time and follow your most recently place pheromone marker. They run out of the map after they have eliminated enough enemies or after they have eaten any food.

African tiger beetles and rainbow lizards only appear on the surface during the day.

Rainbow lizards run out of the map when they have below 45% of their health.

Earwigs, large sun spiders, large African giant centipedes, alligator back scorpions and large emperor scorpions only appear on the surface at night. Some enemies can come out of empty termite mounds.

Driver ants

Driver ants conduct raids on termite colonies from midnight until noon every day. Attacking waves appear on the map every 75 seconds and consist of workers, small soldiers and large soldiers. The fourth wave of each raid always retreats midway. Driver ants don't invade your nest.

The targeted mound is chosen in this specific order: green - yellow - blue - pink. Driver ants gather any food on the way and only move to the next mound when there isn't any food in the current mound, not counting the dead queen.

Large driver ant soldiers can inflict 100% more damage on termites and take 50% less damage from them.

African stink ants

Level 1 African stink ants frequently appear underground and move around through the soil. They follow the shortest paths between spawners after you dig into their tunnels. You must eliminate 6/ 7/ 8/ 12/ 16 African stink ants consecutively to close off each tunnel. Your progress is reverted over time if you can't finish it in a single attempt.

Level 1 African stink ants move between the initial spawner and the targeted mound on the surface at night. They disappear just before the driver ants arrive, bring dead termites with them.

African stink ants have 40% chance to summon an extra stink ant only once when they take damage. Summoned ants keep moving along the underground tunnels or linger around on the surface for 60 seconds. They gather any food on the way.

Challenge

Assassin bugs gather on the ways to termite mounds and only disappear briefly at noon. They don't attack other enemies.

Achievements

(to be added)

Trivia

• Huntsman spiders can feed on dead creatures, taking away 1 food each time.

• Tile-lock is disabled for the green colony until the the first raid ends to keep it alive for another day.

Minimaps

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  Surface

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  Underground - player

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  Underground - blue

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  Underground - yellow

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  Underground - green

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  Underground - pink