Heroes of Might and Magic 2 Kaspa's Strategy Guide v.1.0 Armies It's important to get the right mix and arrangement in your armies. Keep slow-moving creatures close to your archers to protect them. Try to have flying units to tie up enemy archers. If the whole army is from the same type of a castle, it'll improve the moral. The thing I like to do is combine two or more average armies into one tough army. You can engage the tougher army in a battle, while the weaker one runs back to the castle stealing resources and grabbing free units on the map or purchasing nomads, rouges..... Another trick is to split a group in your army into multiple groups. For example 20 sprites into two groups of 10 each. That really helps tie up groups of archers. When not firing the archer's hits are much weaker. After the battle you can regroup them into one unit again. For people not aware of this feature, all you have to do is hold shift, press on the unit you want to split, and then click on an empty space. Building Developing castles is difficult, with all the structures you can build in the beginning. First you should be aware of what resources you need, and go after them. The market in only one castle is a rip off. Since there are so many different castles I'll help you one by one: week one Knight Castle day 1 - archery range/day 2 - statue/day 3 - well/day 4 - tavern/day 5 - armory/day 6 - blacksmith/day 7 - jousting arena Sorceress Castle day 1 - archery range/day 2 - mage guild/day 3 - statue/day 4 - stonehenge/day 5 - fenced meadow/day 6 - cottage/day 7 - well Wizard Castle day 1 - pen/day 2 - cliff nest/day 3 - statue/day 4 - foundry/day 5 - mage guild/day 6 - well/day 7 - Ivory tower Barbarian Castle day 1 - stick hut/day 2 - den/day 3 - statue/day 4 - adobe/day 5 - bridge/day 6 - upg.stick hut/day 7 - well Necromecer Castle day 1 - pyramid/day 2 - statue/day 3 - thieves guild/day 4 - graveyard/day 5 - mansion/day 6 - well/day 7 - upg.mansion * Warlock Castle day 1 - crypt/day 2 - statue/day 3 - maze/day 4 - nest/day 5 - swamp/day 6 - well/day 7 - waterfall * - 20 of them upgraded are almost unbeatable. Experience Your hero's experience is very important, you can get it in many ways. Winning battles, artifacts, or treasure chests. Always take the experience points. For example with a high estate skill your hero will earn money like a castle. The other skills can make all the difference in combat. With expert diplomacy you can walk up to just about any group of creatures, and they'll want to join you. Note that leadership is wasted on a necromacer, since the undead have no morale changes. After playing for a while, and getting into the game you'll know who you can and can't attack. Sometimes it's better to run, then fight and loose. When you are about to loose, it's better to retreat then get killed. By retreating your hero will be available for purchase with all his experience and artifacts. When you know your enemy is going to retreat, use a blind or paralyze spell. This skips his turn and you can kill him off. That will get you more experience, his artifacts, and the enemy won't be able to buy him on the next turn. Spells There are many spells in Heroes 2, so develop your spell power and knowledge as much as possible. During a battle some good spells can win the thing for you. Usually drinking from a well, restores all your used up points. Some of the best spells are Chain lightning - strikes for units at once, and might even hit yours if you're standing too close Steel skin - decreases the amount of damage from enemy creatures Summon earth elemental - gives you a and additional unit to help out If you see a hero casting a fantastic spell locate his castle. Try to take it over, and you'll gain access to that spell and others. Artifacts Artifacts play a very important role in the game. They help out in almost every way, some get your stats up, make you walk farther, not use as much spell power, make spells stronger.......of course it's not all good. There are spells of misfortune, transfer those to a throwaway hero, or one that will never enter battle. Someone might even try selling them to you, and since you cant't always see what you're buying save the game before you buy or run over an artifact. Seas A new feature let's you explore the sea, so you might buy a boat and go looking for goodies. The resources gained will probibly pay back for the boat, and give you more. Towns Taking over towns in the beginning of each game is very easy, there are only small armies defending it. Convert the towns into castles as soon as possible. Towns add 250 gold to your income; castle give you a 1000 gold. Another thing is that the castles let you build strong armies, and towns will only supply you with the weakest monsters available. Castle techniques If you're defending a castle you can add additional towers to fire at the enemy each round. There's also the moat which stips the enemy unit for one round (doesn't apply to flying creatures.) Hero types The manual tells you that barbarian and knight heroes are poor in the endgame, but don't believe it. Give them a castle belonging to magic-casting types, and hand them a few spell-enhancing artifacts: they rule in short and medium-lenght games. Those attack and defense bonuses offr more then any fireballs or other spells most enemy mages can throw. Necromancers should be sent after every larger group of minor- league monsters in sight. Liches can destroy huge numbers of peasents very easily. This is an easy way to gain experience, and some of the slain enemies will areis as undead to serve you. Each week check the out the new heroes available. There may be one with well-trained skills. No hero is as might as a barbarian with some spell-enhancing artifacts, or a warlock with several attrack/defense-related artifacts. In other words help out your heroes weaknesses with artifacts. Playing tricks If you are a beginner here are some hints to give you a good start in the game. At the start of each scenario you'll notice a few artifacts around. Grab them to see what their powers are, if they aren't what you like reload the win scenario and start over. The placement will be the same, but the artifacts will be different. I found the endless pouch of gold especially usefull, it helps you boost your gold in the early stages. Your main hero should have the powerful monsters that you can afford, and the all the artifacts that will boost his stats. Take this hero and forge a gouge in their defenses. Find the weader heroes and dereat them as quickly as you can. This will make your enemy spend 2500 gold on new heroes not on more armies. Sometimes, when there's a strong hero coming to your town, buy all the available monsters, and leave the slow ones in the castle. Then take your hero, and run away. The computer will take over the castle, leave, and leave a small army to protect it. What you have to do now is wait untill the sixth or seventh day and recapture it. This gives the computer some time to build additional facilities for you, and gives you the castle one day before new monsters arrive. Don't bother investing in captains. They're pretty weak, and if your castle is captured, you'll end up facing your own soldier as a foe. Always try investing in a new hero when your castle is about to get attacked. Always build a strategy according to the conditions of your scenario. If you're near enough the location of a hidden artifact, send a throwaway hero there to do nothing but dig. If your goal is to conquer a town, scout the area and build a very powerful force to overwhelm it. Also look for desert areas with magic lamps. These contain genies, the best armies you can buy on the road. They give a great advantage if you grab them at the beginning of a game. Cheats - 8675309 view the whole map 911 win the current scenario /nwc access the game's debugger to use change HEROES2W.EXE to HEROES2W.EXE/NWC copyright 1997