Ways of Heroes - a HOMM3SOD Strategy Guide, (C) 1999-2002 Viktor Coyot Urban Version 2.0, supposedly final. Contents of AllInOne HOMM3 FAQ: Chapter I: General Game Guide Chapter II: Combat Guide Chapter III: Troop charts - efficienty comparison and more Chapter IV: Castle guide Chapter V: Rampart Guide Chapter VI: Conflux guide Chapter VII: Tower guide Chapter VIII: Stronghold guide Chapter IX: Fortress guide Chapter X: Inferno guide Chapter XI: Necropolis guide Chapter XII: Dungeon guide =============================================================================== Chapter I: General game guide Contents: I. Exploring your vicinity (and what comes before it) - the basic guidelines on choosing factions and heroes, using and developing them effectively. The main part of this guide. II. Map structures and other info III. Building strategies IV. Defense strategies V. Hero list. I. Exploring your vicinity In most cases it is very wise to purchase at least one more hero to your starting one. Of course, if you have an observation tower in front of your castle and can see from there that all ways out are blocked by some stronger armies and you only have a little space to explore, a second hero won't be needed... yet. 1. Main advantages of twoor-more-heroes exploration: a. In early stage - that 'round the castle' exploration - you will usually profit from having two heroes by having more goodies gathered quicker. Applies to mines, resources, artifacts and even the fact of uncovering the map. [More heroes can be used, if your financial situation seems good and exploration is possible. These guys usually pay back quite soon.] b. Further in the game, when you assemble a task force strong enough to go after your enemy, a second guy in backup can be used for several things: o takes care of resources, mines and full exploration of conquered land (here I often purchase new heroes at conquered castles, because within a few days the money is back in resources from taken mines.) o holds backup armies for your main hero o can build up quite solid experience o can take out some of the wandering armies o can take care of some minor enemy heroes/towns 2. How to select your primary/secondary hero? With the exception of necromancer, there's no need at all to use a hero corresponding with the castle class (and even with the necro castle, you should consider buying another type if there's not any large quantities of skeleton reserves (aka 1stlevel troops) scattered around the map). However, a hero aligned to your starting castle will bring in troops that could be of use! Sometimes (when a ranger comes with two stacks of dwarves or a necro with walking dead) you may ignore this benefit. So, how to make your choice? A. Primary hero/castle: Since both might and magic heroes exist in each castle and every hero is unique, choosing primary castle and primary hero is quite complicated. First, for the castles: + Castle: Balanced troops, rather slow, more emphasis on the top troops. + Rampart: Rather fast troops, good specials, best 1stlevel troop. + Tower: Good specials, strong 7thlevel troop, numerous 1stlevel. + Stronghold: Offensive troops, cheap 7thlevel troop. Good 5thlevel. + Fortress: Defensive troops, nasty specials - dangerous 7thlevel troop. + Dungeon: Rather offensive troops, best 2ndlevel troop. Black dragons ;-) + Inferno: Offensive troops with two non-retaliated attacks and good specials. + Necropolis: Good specials, cover of darkness structure. Second, for the heroes: I prefer might heroes to the magic ones, because in most cases the might ones still get some experience in magic. Might heroes can develop magic schools, and since bigger armies benefit more from misc. spells than from damage spells, with the only exception being Armageddon ;-), might heroes should be better in the long run, when they can get enough spellpower and knowledge to be able to cast Bless, Slow or Haste every now and then. Necromancer may be worth it if large amounts of skeleton producing wandering armies are located nearby - the recruited skeletons make excellent garrison troops. My usual practice is to hire a might hero (unless I have access to some high-level magic and/or magic skills boosting structures and artifacts) and concentrate the experience with him. In many cases I manage to get Wisdom, so I can use some good spells from captured castles. In fact, probability of not getting wisdom for might hero is next to zero. There are only two situations where a strong magic hero is better: Both of them are based on Fire spells. One of them is Armageddon, but that requires the magic hero to also have some spell-resistant unit. The other one is Berzerker at Expert level. With it, up to 5 armies are often forced to fight each other and the only solution will be mass Cure or Dispel. Direct damage spells (maybe except Armageddon) aren't a big threat, because with large armies the damage caused by those can be compensated by supportive spells on your troops - with big enough armies, MassBless beast ChainLightning. (Of course, you need an expert magic school for that...) Getting secondary skills: CheckWay ofparticular class to see which skills suit the best your troops and strategies. There are some general rules to follow. See description of advanced skills below for most of them. Many of the skills are just generally good (Luck, Leadership) while others are case-specific (Mysticism, Wisdom, Logistics, Ballistics) where the conditions cover anything from Map size, number of castles, type of main hero, type of most used troops, amounts of resources available and all other things up to terrain types. Of course, the hero class is very important. I.e. Leadership, Offense and Archery provide much better advantage to Might Heroes, whose troop damage ratings (that profit from their skills) are generally high. On the other hand, for a spell caster skills like Expert Wisdom are a must, because those expand his strong features. B. Secondary hero: [In the following, percentages for level advancement are averaged for heroes with 20 levels! The advancement in first 9 levels is a bit different, generally with more emphasis towards the skills native to that hero. So that barbarians get 55% levels on attack below level 10 and only 30% later... yet I used the averaged number.] a. Defensive purposes: For castle garisson with troops that will do little apart from just standing behind the walls while the towers shoot the enemy, BeastMasters are the best, with 45% of their advancements going into Defense Skill, followed by Rangers, Knights and other might heroes. However, if your castle troops are bound to use offense (i.e. shooters, fast flyers or tough walkers), you might care for a barbarian with 43% of levels gained raising his attack. But, on the other hand, if the castle you're defending has a mage guild with some supportive spells (namely Cure/Dispel), you might try to get a hero with some knowledge to be able to remove negative spells like Blind. b. Offensive purposes: If you need the hero to become another primary hero, you already know the algorithm for choosing primary heroes. c. Miscellaneous (aka secondary) purposes: The true secondary hero should be of some use. A scout/picker should have fast troops. Check the hero recruitment for details - you're looking for Logistics, Pathfinding and/or scouting, especially for those guys that will peddle troops to front lines. Since the heroes now have different secondary skills, there is no recommendation like 'I usually take warlocks'... however, there are several all-round good picks: + Caitlin, Clavius, Octavia, Nagash, Damacon, Jenova, Aine and Lord Haart are moneymakers (all get +350/day, only Haart has Basic Estates with 5% bonus, so he'll need a few levels...) + Thane with Advanced Scholar makes a good spell-transporter, but there are others with basic scholar - a few learning stones or trees of knowledge will be on almost every map. + Voy is the super-sea scout with navigation and 5% bonus. + Deemer has Advanced Scouting - a good pick for early exploration. + Rissan, Calid, Saurug and Sephinroth produce 1 magic resource per day, each different. Remember that 25 days with this hero will pay back with a few marketplaces, if you don't need the resource. Also remember that the two-hero strategy doesn't implicate use of ONLY two heroes, but AT LEAST two heroes. The larger the map, the more heroes may be used. Generally in L or XL maps, at least one secondary guy should have aggressive ambitions, should visit all the skill boosts and pick good secondary skills, because his time will always come. The so-called backup guy should be taking his share of experience. Especially later, when the main hero will need large amounts of experience to advance, it's usually better to let the chests and minor battles to the backup guy, because he'll profit them much more. The only exception should be the case when the main guy desperately NEEDS to upgrade some advanced skills.) The main purposes of the backup guy are carrying reinforcements, killing minor enemies and wandering armies and sometimes possibly softening up enemy resistance, even at the cost of sacrificing himself. If the secondary hero survives, he might often 'inherit' all the main hero's armies - especially if you happen to capture enemy castle with some 7th level troops left inside unpurchased. In that case the main hero buys all the big guys and those often carry more firepower that his entire regular army. In this moment, the backup guy becomes sort of another main hero and at those moments you really appreciate that you've already let him to get some levels.) [Or, if he's still pretty weak, you might consider giving HIM the dragons, who tend to take minimal losses, grab some quick experience by defeating wandering armies etc. - and later switch the armies. This applies in cases where the main hero's army relies very much on his skills and with the weak secondary guy would suffer many losses. A good example would be a knight with archery, luck and leadership, while the secondary guy is a spellcaster...] There might be a bunch of 'tertiary' heroes that can take care of collecting resources, gold and armies from self-refilling sources (usually one hero can do that easily) and for shuttling reinforcements to the front lines. Those guys need no experience, but should (if that doesn't mean BIG delays) visit learning stones and possibly trees of knowledge (if they're for free) to try and get scouting, logistics or estates). Also, buying a hero to scout and claim mines near a captured castle is usually worth the 2500 gold. The fresh information from scouting (even if he dies there) may navigate your main guy towards new enemies. And with some marketplaces, even a few days' worth of those mines production will repay the gold back if needed). 3. Task sharing between the heroes: The main hero should spend his time doing only things that number two cannot do himself. The former are usually battling armies, getting artifacts and treasure chests, while the latter are usually occupying mines, picking up resources and exploring Witch huts. Of course, things like visiting learning stones and other skill increasing facilities are common. One more thing should the second guy do - probe trees of knowledge, because they're more valuable later in the game and you don't want to waste their potential in the beginning, when the needed experience can be achieved from a few chests. 4. Experience and advancement handling: a. In witch huts you can get random Basic skill. [Random in sense that level creator cannot affect which skill will it be, but every time the level is started, the skill is set and remains the same for the single playtime.] So, the backup hero has one important role: If your main guy still has some secondary skill slots free, his friend will check every witch hut and sacrifice his free slots to learn what the hut has to offer. Sometimes you might even buy a new hero, if the backup guy has ambitions to become another primary hero. b. Treasure chests and other sources of experience. As the experience needed to gain a level rises with levels already gained, it is pretty obvious, that if you have a hero with some 40000 exp. and his backup guy has some 3000 from stones only, then when ever you run into a treasure chest, you'd better take it by the second guy... Coz getting another +1 skill for your main guy is usually not as good, as getting some +6 for the same price... Okay, sometimes you take them with the main guy, because you desperately need some advanced skill to be upgraded... [Here I strongly recommend checking every now and then, how much the hero needs to advance to next level. Even with 100000+ experience points, the hero sometimes is just a 'chest-far' from next level.] c. The same thing comes with wandering armies... If the backup guy can take them out, let him do it and leave only hard targets to your main guy. There is one exception... If the main guy has a strong army, it is a good strategy to leave him one empty stack when touring the landscape... (The backup guy will carry the seventh army in case it would be needed for a castle siege or enemy hero attack). Thus, wandering armies can join you. So, if you happen to have a force strong enough to defeat any wandering army, approach those you'd like to join you (or buy, having advanced/expert diplomacy) with the main guy. If they will join you, you can either use them immediately or give them to the backup guy, if they don't fit for the main guy's alignment, combat style or speed. Those armies can be then used by the backup guy as forces to kill other wandering armies and towns for experience, and later maybe to be left as garrisons in captured castles and towns (ogres and similar armies are excellent for this purpose, because their high HPs will either prevent any weaker heroes from attacking your towns or, at least, cause some losses to enemy armies.) d. One more comment on treasure chests - always bear in mind that they're also a good source of GOLD! If you plan to rely on diplomacy or build very expensive structures, it's worth it to take gold with the secondary heroes. In early game, I take all the 1000 gold/500 exp. chests for gold and with the better ones, I go for experience. Later I shift up and take gold even from the 1500/1000 ones. e. Also, if your secondary hero explores a closed area that you don't want to visit with the main guy (maybe there's nothing important except a few chests, or he's in a hurry to somewhere else), you might grab gold or exp. with the secondary guy even at early stages of the game, where the main hero could profit them, but it'd cost too much time. f. All other sources of experience and skills can be used by more heroes (stones, primary skills increasers and tree of knowledge, which has the same price for all heroes (decided at startup, can be nothing, 10 gems or 2000 gold)). In case that a Tree of Knowledge wants no payment, the level advancement is done immediately (which is why it's better to try those with the backup guys first, because using a tree of knowledge before you already have some 50000 exp. is a real waste - in case that the main hero will probably be near this tree later in the game - if you're sure you'll never get there again, grab the level!. g. Harpies at sea and altar of sacrifice are a good thing. No longer will you just carry around unneeded artifacts and troops that have joined you yet you don't want them. Imagine this: Your hero with some massive army is offered i.e. a throng of demons. You accept, give them immediately to the secondary guy who sacrifices them, getting some two, three levels for them... and this can happen pretty often. 5. Artifacts Since the hero now has the backpack and can un-equip artifacts, handling them is much easier. There is one general rule: most of the artifacts COULD be needed later, even if you don't want to use them. Equipping the Spirit of Oppression (that prevents morale bonuses) would be a nonsense when you have positive morale. But you might run into an enemy that has expert leadership, three medals, visited temple and likes to cast Mirth on expert level. Needless to say, in that battle you'll gladly use the morale preventer. Since you can now weild only one weapon etc., your backup heroes will probably get some from the captured artifacts, too. Also, only four misc. artifacts can be equipped, so it's imperative that you transfer all gold and resource providing stuff to some secondary guy. Unwanted artifacts are disposed of at altars of sacrifice, already mentioned above. 6. Movement rules Movement bonuses for fast armies (the slowest troop determines the bonus) are: 0 for Extra Slow (4) 1 for Slow(5) 2 for Swift or Extra Swift (6-7) 3 for Very Swift(8) 4 for Ultra Swift or Super Swift (9-10) 5 for Quick and faster (11+) Therefore, having Arch Devils (17) instead of Devils (11) won't help you, but you'll outrun a knight with Archers by 5 tiles/day. The default value is 15 tiles. [Just came to my mind that this could be a good way to waste your opponent's time - once the enemy wanders onto the edge of your territory, get close enough to him to let him see you. But be sure to have very fast armies, possibly logistics or a movement increasing artifact... and every turn, keep just a few steps ahead of him... And run around the map, wasting the time of the powerful enemy army... 7. Also, use always appropriate heroes! In rough terrain, try to hire somebody with PathFinding, on high seas try hard for Navigation. Get to remember what skills do the nearby witch huts give, let secondary heroes get some experience ASAP to determine the purpose they'll be used for. 8. Secondary skills Advancement - Magic heroes A typical hero will start with two levels of secondary skills, which gives him another 22 opportunities. In these, he'll be offered a total of 44 skills to take. The chart below, however, shows how many times will a hero be offered a particular skill in 112 level advancements. Don't ask me how this number came to existence - only it allows much finer distribution of probabilities than the '44'. A zero indicates that the hero will never be able to learn this skill. I believe that a ten indicates that the hero will reach the expert level quickly... I haven't tested it but it should be that a skill with ten will be offered in every advancement - or was it something like getting the skill to Expert before having all eight slots filled? Skill Cle War Wit Her Nec Dru Bat Wiz Total Air Magic 4 2 2 3 3 2 4 5 25 Archery 3 2 3 4 2 5 4 2 25 Armorer 3 1 4 4 2 3 4 1 22 Artillery 2 1 2 4 3 1 4 1 18 Ballistics 4 6 4 6 5 4 6 4 39 Diplomacy 7 4 2 3 4 4 3 4 31 Eagle Eye 6 8 10 4 7 7 5 8 55 Earth Magic 3 4 4 4 5 4 3 4 31 Estates 3 5 1 1 3 3 1 5 22 Fire Magic 2 3 1 5 2 1 2 2 18 First Aid 10 3 1 5 0 7 4 7 37 Intelligence 6 8 7 6 7 7 5 10 56 Leadership 2 3 1 1 0 2 4 4 17 Learning 4 4 4 4 4 4 4 4 32 Logistics 4 2 3 3 4 5 10 2 33 Luck 5 2 4 2 1 10 2 4 30 Mysticism 4 8 8 10 6 6 4 8 54 Navigation 5 4 6 2 5 2 0 1 25 Necromancy 0 4 4 4 10 0 2 0 24 Offense 4 1 2 4 3 1 7 1 23 Pathfinding 2 2 2 3 6 5 4 2 26 Resistance 2 0 0 3 1 1 4 0 11 Scholar 6 8 7 5 6 8 4 9 53 Scouting 3 2 2 3 2 2 4 2 22 Sorcery 5 10 8 6 7 6 6 8 56 Tactics 2 1 2 4 2 1 5 1 18 Water Magic 4 1 3 2 4 3 1 3 21 Wisdom 7 10 8 7 8 8 6 10 64 Total 112 112 112 112 112 112 112 112 Intersting details: Clerics, Wizards and Druids cannot learn Necromancy. Resistance is even less popular - no chance for Warlocks, Witches and Wizards, tiny chance for Druids and Necros. Battle mages are superb in Logistics - they make both great scouts and main heroes. Their only disadvantage is low affinity towards magic schools. Also take mental note of general frequency of skills - for all magic heroes Leadership and Tactics are very infrequent and so you shouldn't waste the opportunity if you're offered one of these. Necromancer's ban on First Aid seems logical - only stressing the unbelievable fact that Necro castle Blacksmith sells only First Aid Tents... - Might heroes Skill Kni Ove Bea Dem Dkn Ran Bar Alc Total Air Magic 3 1 1 2 2 1 3 4 17 Archery 5 6 7 6 5 8 7 5 49 Armorer 5 6 10 7 5 8 6 6 53 Artillery 5 8 8 5 5 6 8 4 49 Ballistics 8 7 6 6 7 4 8 6 52 Diplomacy 4 3 1 4 2 4 1 3 22 Eagle Eye 2 1 1 2 4 2 2 3 17 Earth Magic 2 3 3 3 4 3 3 3 24 Estates 6 4 1 3 0 2 2 4 22 Fire Magic 1 2 0 4 1 0 2 1 11 First Aid 2 1 6 1 0 3 1 2 16 Intelligence 1 1 1 2 5 2 1 4 17 Leadership 10 8 5 3 0 6 5 3 40 Learning 4 4 4 4 4 4 4 10 38 Logistics 5 8 8 10 5 5 7 6 54 Luck 3 1 2 2 1 6 3 1 19 Mysticism 2 3 2 3 4 3 3 4 24 Navigation 8 4 8 3 8 3 2 3 39 Necromancy 0 1 1 0 10 0 1 4 17 Offense 7 8 5 5 7 5 10 6 53 Pathfinding 4 5 8 4 4 7 8 4 44 Resistance 5 6 5 6 5 10 6 5 48 Scholar 1 1 1 2 2 1 1 3 12 Scouting 4 5 7 5 4 7 8 4 44 Sorcery 1 2 1 3 4 2 1 3 17 Tactics 7 10 6 6 5 5 7 4 50 Water Magic 4 0 2 1 3 2 0 2 14 Wisdom 3 3 2 4 6 3 2 5 28 Total 112 112 112 112 112 112 112 112 It's pretty easy here. All the magic skills are low. If your might hero has a chance to learn Air magic, he should. Mass Haste is almost as good as Tactics (overally, in some aspects it's even better. Magic schools are generally scarce, with Fire being forbidden to Rangers and Beastmasters, while Water magic is a nono for Overlords and Barbarians. Note that Alchemists are extremely good learners - which also means that if you decide to not take Learning in the beginning, you'll be offered it many times later. So you'd better take it soon, because you risk that on some well-earned level above 10 you'll be faced with a combination like Learning and Mysticism... Generally all the 'tens' indicate that you should take that skill sooner or you'll be fed it later. Here the ten for Tactics makes Overlords highly appreciated. (Arlach, Damacon and Gunnar have non-dungeon specials and are therefore good for any class!) Demoniacs with Logistics are pretty good for scouts (namely Pyre and Octavia with non-infernal specials. Every hero has eight slots for advanced skills. Therefore you have to be picky and choose only those you'll profit from. The simple fact that your hero would profit from a skill doesn't mean that you want to take it... There always could be more skills to profit from. A good example may be a knight that gets offered Advanced Leadership and Basic Archery. A newbie will snatch the archery, while the Pro will stop here, think about waiting for wisdom/logistics with the free slot and therefore will take the advanced one. This waiting is generally affordable in cases where the basic offered to you isn't a rare skill for your hero, or in cases where you don't need it any badly right now. And the archery in this example is a good one, since knight has only two shooters of which one is frequently targeted by all enemies. o Ballistics: A must for walker based armies, in every scenario with lots of castles it will save you some losses to your vulnerable shooters... Either by destroying enemy castle installations or just making way for your armies to run in and slay the defending troops sooner. Not needed much for flyers/shooters based armies, such as dragon or titan task forces. Expert ballistics increases chance of hitting arrow towers to 75% (until all walls are destroyed). However, there is one big advantage of ballistics: Since you get manual control of the catapult and the catapult always plays first in the battle rounds, you can cast a spell before the opponent gets his fastest troop to move. Favorite spells are Slow/Haste/Earthquake. o Artillery: Might heroes profit from that skill pretty well. It has proven worthy in many battles, especially in the earlier stages of the game. It's firepower can be immense. o Archery: Increased damage from ranged attacks usually comes in pretty handy, unless you have small stacks or none shooters at all. (I.e. Fortress, Necropolis). o Tactics: This is the BEST skill for me, no doubt about that. Two things should be separated: 1) The fact that your walkers can start their action at 7th row - when your armies are faster than enemy, this is the deadliest skill in the game, because even relatively slow walkers (6-7) can strike in the first turn - so if everything goes well, the enemy doesn't get to play at all! Especially well used with Rampart or Castle troops. 2) Then there is the ability to rearrange your troops upon seeing the enemy 'configuration' - and it's always nice to be able to move all your troops out of range of the enemy fast flyers! I've won many battles ONLY because I had this skill. Only in castle defenses this skill is less useful, as the point 1) doesn't apply - but point 2) still does! o Offense: A very potent skill for all Might heroes, especially those that depend on aggresive approach. o Armorer: Smaller brother of Offense, a bit less useful, but definitely beats Mysticism and Eagle Eye ;-) o First Aid: This could be an important skill for cases where enemy fire is concentrated on high-level units. If you're walking around the map with your 7thlevel creatures only, the First Aid Tent with 100 points of healing can prevent losses - it successfully eliminates castle towers' fire (towers usually score about 100 points of damage.) o Luck: Causing double damage can't be a bad thing, ever ;-), but it's never a thing I'd wait for to come. And, the damage is not exactly doubled, it is increased only by an average raw damage of the stack, without A/D included. o Leadership: Can sometimes save you a lot of trouble and losses. I prefer it to Luck, as it gives you more tactical benefits. (You can let enemy units share the double damage you're granted.) o Learning: An useless skill. For a wasted slot, you only get one level ahead of opposition. o Logistics: A must, except for Small, sometimes Medium and those island realms scenarios. o Pathfinding: A must, whereever large desert, swamp or snowy areas require exploration. Otherwise useless. o Navigation: Don't have to tell you that you won't need that, when you have no seas/rivers to conquer, do I? ;-) o Necromancy: Not of much use, unless you manage to get expert one and find large masses of cannon fodder such as trogs. However, in necromancer's hands it's a powerful weapon. o Resistance: This skill is stronger than it looks. Especially heroes that have it as a special are dangerous opponents, because a spell resisted at the right time can decide whole battle. If you manage to get some artifacts, enemy spellcasters will have a hard day then. On the other hand, results are not guaranteed and therefore I usually pick other skills - those that work always, not by percentage. o Diplomacy: If you get it in early stages, comes quite handy, coz with expert level of this skill, you get quite a fair price for new units. [And you can see how many they are, before fighting them... and hell, there IS a difference between 'lots' and 'lots', 20 and 40 ogre lords definitely aren't a bit the same easy bait. A few times, having adv/expert diplomacy saved my life, because I could avoid fighting a stack of grand-elves, that would have beat crap out of my armies.] There's another VERY important aspect of diplomacy - surrendering is cheaper! At expert level, you have 60% discount, which can be pretty important in saving crucial parts of your army. And another thing that I tested: Every level of diplomacy gives you TWO levels' discount on the requirement to enter Library of Enlightenment! So that if your hero at level 4 has Expert Diplomacy (or at 6 Advanced or at 8 Basic), he'll be let in, getting +2 to all skills! This can be very useful, if the library is near to your castle (and even more, if you can learn Diplomacy in a hut. You might then want your secondary heroes and/or castle defenders to get the Diplomacy, grab some experience and get this +8 bonus... From Gus at NWC we've learned exactly how Diplomacy works. Here's the mail quoted (and slightly reworded): Here's how it works, in a nutshell. Diplomacy makes it more likely that: + Monsters will join you for free. + Monsters will join you for money. + Monsters will run away (avoid fighting). Each monster has a aggression level, set at the start of the game. You can adjust the range of aggression in the editor, but there's always a random factor, unless the monster is "compliant" or "savage." When you encounter a monster group, the monsters first decide whether to fight. The depends on your strength, how friendly they are, your diplomacy skill, and whether you have similar creatures in your army. If they are friendly or ambivalent, they may decide to join you. For normal monsters, 10% of the time they'll join you for free. Every level of diplomacy makes this 10% more likely. Having similar creatures also makes this 10% more likely. Having an army that is mostly similar creatures makes it 20% more likely. Example: Sir Christian has an army composed exclusively of pikemen, and Expert diplomacy. Normal pikemen and halberdier stacks will join him roughly 60% of the time - if they don't fight. Diplomacy also allows you to persuade monster stacks to join for money. You always get the full stack, and the price doesn't change. Each level adds 10%. Of the pikemen stacks that Sir Christian encounters, another 30% will offer to join for money, again if they don't fight. Only 10% of them will flee without offering to join. Sir Christian's a really likable guy. If the creatures are ambivalent, and you turn down the offer to join, they'll fight you. If they're afraid (or impressed by your silver tongue), they'll run away. Diplomacy never makes it more likely they'll fight. If you turn down an offer and get a battle, they would have fought you anyway. This is for normal, "Aggressive" monsters. If they're set to "Complaint" in the editor, they'll join anyone. If they're "Friendly", they're 30% more likely to join. If they're "Hostile", they're 30% less likely to join - you'll need Expert diplomacy, or similar creatures, to have any chance of them joining for free. If they're "Savage", they won't join anyone. [End of quotation.] o Scouting: Useful for exploration, coz you'll be able not only to see resources and mines you're looking for, but sometimes you'll spot your enemy soon enough to turn back or even spot him without him spotting you. o Eagle Eye: Learning spells from your enemies is a good concept, especially if you don't have enough resources to build your own guilds. But I personally prefer other skills and take this only when I either have to or know I'll need it. (Being offered Navigation on land-based scenario, it's really lesser evil to take Eagle Eye.) Of course, there might be situations where you could even RELY on this skill. Imagine a map that is short on magical resources and yet you've been forced a magic hero... o Estates: I never take estates for my main hero, but the secondary guys would be foolish to not take it. If there's a witch hut, all the army and resource couriers should visit first and then get some levels at stones and trees to upgrade. o Intelligence: More than effective replacement of Mysticism. Top spellcasters can then make long journeys and be generous with offensive spells ;-). Also, Might heroes that won't ever be good at knowledge should consider taking this skill - if only to have a decent spellpoint reserve for Haste/Slow/Dispel - which are pretty important. Especially dispel may be needed pretty often against the way too often blinding AI. o Sorcery: A must for offensively thinking spellcasters. the 15% increase of damage is a great thing. o Scholar: This is a great skill for secondary heroes!. You won't have to return home with your main hero to learn spells from newly built guild - the secondary guy will take the knowledge on the road and share it with all others. o Mysticism: Could be useful for long journeys without castles, if you need to use magic. The better knowledge your hero will have, the lesser need of that skill you have. However, with magic schools that reduce spell costs, I rarely use mysticism - sometimes with Might heroes that need to cast Haste/Slow/Dispel often and don't want to waste a slot on a magic school (because their most used spells come from different schools each.) o Wisdom: Unless you build higher level of mage guilds, you won't find much use to it, but take this rather than other, worse skills, coz somebody might build the guild levels for you (either in your or his city). In large scenarios, even magic-hating/fearing knights/barbies should take this one - it will give them access to spells in conquered castles and spells like Berzerker may greatly improve their battle efficiency, not to mention getting i.e. TownGate. However, I would recommend some planning here - to try and get some magic school, too, as wisdom alone will not get you the real power of the spells. [I.e. Town Portal without advanced Earth magic sucks.] o Magic schools: I don't want flamewars about which school is better, so I'll let anyone make their choice... All damage spells have increased base damage (usually it's + 10,20,30 or 10,20,50), elemental summoning has doubled effectivity. Protection from another school is 50% for all friendly units.. I will use the following syntax: Interesting spell (effects), applying for Expert level of that school. + Air magic: + Haste (All +5 speed) - a decisive factor + View Air (Artifacts, heroes, Towns) - great for hunting down enemies + Disrupting Ray (Defense -5) + Precision (All ranged +6 Attack) - that means +30% damage! + Air shield (ranged damage taken is reduced to 50%) + Counterstrike (All +2 retaliations!) - great for armies with specials! + Dimension Door (4 jumps/day) + Fly (100% of normal movement) Important spells: ChainLightning, Hypnotize (to use enemy's small stacks to waste retaliations of his top units.) + Water magic: + Bless (All Damage is Max(damage)+1) + Cure (Cures all friendly) + Dispel (Dispels ALL spells on the battlefield) + Weakness (All enemy -6 A) + Forgetfullness (All enemy ranged attackers don't use range attack) + Teleport (Can teleport anywhere, incl. castle.) + Clone (Works on 7thlevel troops too) + Prayer (All A,D and speed +4) + Water Walk (100% of normal movement) Important spells: Bless, Cure, Frost Ring, Summon Boat, Scuttle Boat + Earth magic: + Slow (All 50% speed) + Stone Skin (All +6 Defense) + View Earth (Entire terrain and mines/resources) + AntiMagic (Immunity to all spells) + Town Portal (Can choose destination) Important spells: Animate Dead, Resurrect, DeathRipple, Meteor Shower, Implosion (aka the only Dragon killer around ;-)) + Fire magic: + Bloodlust (All +6 Attack) + Blind (Doesn't retaliate when blinded and attacked) + Berserk (All in 19hex radius affected!) - total insanity! + Frenzy (Target has A increased for 2xD) + Slayer (+8 A against all 7thlevel troops) Important spells: Armageddon, Fireball, FireWall, Inferno, Sacrifice! Favorite secondary skills are a tough part. For a might hero, I would suggest Tactics, Offense, Leadership, Ballistics. Other slots might be used for Logistics, Wisdom, one magic school and maybe Intelligence, but skills like Diplomacy, Artillery, Archery, First Aid, or Pathfinding are applicable as well. Magic heroes should have Wisdom, at least one but prefferrably more magic schools, possibly Sorcery and Intelligence. They might use Tactics as well, Logistics needn't be mentioned. Of course, you might have a Super-duper spellcaster with Sorcery, Wisdom, Intelligence and four spell schools - and still one slot left. Or you could have a mega-might freak with Offense, Armorer, Archery, Leadership, Artillery, Ballistics and Tactics - and still one slot left. In general, when deciding about a particular skill, you should always bear in mind particular conditions in that particular game. You won't need Estates, if you have a few goldmines/endless bags. You won't need Diplomacy, if you're very short of gold or if there are only a few armies that you would want to join you. You won't need Pathfinding on grassland landmasses. You won't need Logistics in a Small map. You won't need luck with strong armies. You won't need Intelligence if there are enough castles and wells in the map... If there are any skills that are useful 'always', then I would vote for Tactics - it will bring results in the first week - no building required, no special map conditions (size/terrain/armies) needed etc. 9. Spell Casting - adventure spells When an adventure spell is cast, ALL your heroes profit from it. So, if you have some spare guy at home, cast all view spells with him, sitting in his castle. I don't have to mention profits of dimension door, do I? Remember one thing, though. Plan your DD journeys well, considerings wells ;-). It's good to be able to travel half the map in one day, but is even better to end your trip with almost full spellpoints, in case you might need them - i.e. to travel back or use powerful offensive magic to repel an enemy that you've gotten near to. It's always nice to see a computer hero DDing onto a little island and then waiting a week to regain ten points to get back - especially if he has his pack of titans with him and not in his home castle... Also bear in mind that DD is limited to 2/3/4 jumps/day - so make sure that if you can cast it twice, you won't end near somebody you don't want to face in battle! The town portal is even bigger bastard than DD. Suppose you capture an enemy castle with some heavy losses - you warp home, get new armies, run to a well, that often is near your starting castle, and then, warp back to the newly captured castle, all in one turn! [I personally began to dislike DD and Town Portal, finding them very unbalancing to the game.] Dirty Trick: Hit'n'Run: Although the following is nasty and almost cheating, you can do this: Having some very fast units in your castle, an enemy nearby with a huge army and some offensive spells in your guild: Split your very fast units into 7 stacks, if possible. Just have the seven stacks occupied by 1 unit each. Attack the enemy, demolish his stacks with spells, retreat, hire again and repeat. If you'll have a well nearby, you can do this as long as you have the cash. Having 7 stacks of 1 unit often allows you to cast 2 or even 3 spells per battle. (Remember, you must FLEE, don't get killed!). This may be applied even with many starting heroes, but the process is generally more costly. And anyway, it's considered as 'dirty' by many players. Softening up an enemy before attack/defense may have another aspect - if you use strong enough army, you might force the AI to cast spells and thus waste spellpoints. If you sacrifice one or two armies this way, in the following castle siege the AI may not have enough spellpoints to caste annoying Blind on your shooters. This way, you can reduce the enemy's army to quite poor numbers and then, either fortify at your castle, or even slay him with your main army, that was resting in your castle all the time (and maybe providing the very fast units for those repeated attacks). Note that sometimes it would be better to use non-offensive spells, eh, I mean berzerker ;-)) In early exploration, casting View Earth or View Air may have crucial impact on your success. Seeing mines is often helpful, because there are often scattered respective resources near a mine, so it's important to be there sooner than your opponents. 10. Did you know that... - if an army is composed of creatures native to one terrain type, the hero does not suffer from movement penalty on that terrain type (applies to Tower, Stronghold and especially Fortress. When you hire a scout hero of other class, leave his starting troops in the castle for defense and take native troops out). - movement or resource artifacts are needed only at the beginning of turn. You won't lose the movement bonus for changing the boots of speed with Sandals of the Saint... Also, Knowledge increasing artifacts are needed only at the time you're replenishing spellpoints. You can therefore use i.e. the Crown of supreme magi to give all your heroes +40 spellpoints, when they meet near a well. - magic plains enhance all spellcasters, not only the hero. All elementals, Ogre magi and genies will cast Mass versions, where applicable. - skeleton transformer creates Bone Dragons from all dragons and hydras. - all guarded treasury buildings can be scouted by refusing to enter. After a right-click, you are then told what guardians are there, just as if they were a wandering army. You can then safely decide, how big an army will you need. Note that war machines cannot be used in those fights. - try to attack on day 7 or even better at day 1. Computer has Day 1 after you, but his dwellings have it before you :-). This way, you can capture ligthly defended towns and have some considerable forces left for defense without delaying your main force. - if you fear that the town will be recaptured soon, spend money only on those defending armies that are pain to fight against (usually shooters or fast units) or on those armies that will cause the biggest losses to the recapturing army. - if the AI comes near your castle, but does not attack, don't think that it fears you. It knows the above tip as well and often spends a few days flagging nearby mines and dwellings before striking. - avoid whirlpool losses by using a free slot to hold one 1stlevel troop. The whirlpool will consider that the weakest stack and remove it. It is a pain to repeat the splitting, so if you will be a little more generous, two creatures will last for two turns :-) - If you want a fair battle, play on Hard difficulty. At normal, the AI plays very lousy - does not use Wait, does not retreat etc. - in team matches where your ally is a computer, it is often a good idea to block his castle and take some of his resources. Once his starting hero gets outside the castle, buy a hero in there and leave him as visiting - your ally won't be able to recruit other heroes or return with his starting hero for more troops. You can then hire another hero there to collect resources, recruit from dwellings and take some lightly defended towns. II. Map structures and other information This section is a shortened version of Christoper Nahr's HOMM3 Manual Addendum, rewritten and published with author's permission. The originalis recommended for most players as required reading... o Garrison heroes cannot be traded with - you have to click on the castle, move the hero to 'visiting' slot and then manually initiate a trade with another hero. Garrison heroes cannot be anyhow selected from the map. Putting a hero to the garrison has therefore effect similar to 'sleeping' him (the tent icon), but not only you don't get him selected by 'next hero' icon (or 'n' key), the hero isn't even visible in heroes column. o If there are both visiting and garrison hero present and enemy attacks, the visiting hero is fought on free terrain. After the battle another 'click' on the castle is needed to fight the hero inside. o [Therefore is may sometimes be handy to purchase a visiting hero - just to hold the enemy one more step - if his planning was tight, it might happen that he doesn't have the one extra movement point left and you get extra turn - and even on other days than day 7 this might be good - you might upgrade a dwelling, get some beneficial building or increase fortification level...] o If there is a visiting hero (that is visible in the castle entrance) and no hero inside, the garrison armies are merged into the hero's army, what cannot be merged is unused (just as in HOMM2) - and if the defender wins the battle, the armies are still there, if he loses, they're lost without fight. Therefore, be sure to check whether some castle army shouldn't be better transferred to the hero right before the siege - I don't know exact algorithm for choosing armies from the garrison slots to be merged into the hero's army, so if you want to be sure, better do this manually. o Creature Dwellings dwellings offer a fixed number of creatures, replenished once per week, to any visiting hero whose flag will then be planted at the dwelling. The actual number of creatures offered is equivalent to the base production of that creature type in their native town type. Any creature dwelling that flies your flag will also add one creature to the weekly production of all of your towns with a corresponding creature generator. This means that if you have flagged three Cursed Temples on the Adventure Map and two Necropolis towns with a Cursed Temple already built, each of these towns will offer three additional Skeletons per week. To fully exploit a creature dwelling you will have to keep sending heroes there once per week. The bonus creatures added to a town's production will accumulate along with regularly produced creatures until you choose to buy them, but any creatures that were not fetched from a dwelling in any given week will be lost. The Dungeon Town's Portal of Summoning duplicates a random, flagged dwelling's weekly production by offering the same number of creatures again that is also, and additionally, available at the dwelling itself. However, in this case too unhired creatures will be lost. First-level creatures will join a hero for free when invited at their dwelling but come at the usual price when added to a town's production. Creatures purchased directly at a dwelling are always of basic quality whereas creatures added to a town's production are hired at the same quality (basic or upgraded) as the corresponding town structure. Their price changes accordingly. o Cursed Ground. No spellcasting is possible and all positive luck and morale modifiers are removed. o Magic Plains. All adventure and combat spells are cast at expert proficiency. o Idol of Fortune. While giving either a morale or a luck bonus on most days, the o Idol will give both bonuses on the 7th day of the week. o Temple. The morale bonus bestowed on your troops by the Temple is doubled on the 7th day of the week. Note that it is always a good idea to conquer cities on the day just before the weekly creature growth because you will be able to replenish your forces on the very next day. The enhanced powers of Idols and Temples on the 7th day of the week are meant to encourage this strategy. o Spirit of Oppression. This artifact does not negate the morale bonus for wandering creatures on their native terrain, although it does negate this same bonus for creatures in a hero's army. o Hero Specialty. Some hero specialties come as bonuses to creatures, spells, or secondary skills. The descriptions of these specialties state that the bonus would increase "for every level after the nth" which is somewhat misleading. The bonus is not actually increased by a fixed amount of points per level. Its calculation merely involves the current hero level as a factor, as follows: + Creature Speciality. The indicated creatures gain a percentage bonus to their Attack and Defense ratings equivalent to (Hero Level / Creature Level) x 5. Note that since Creature Level appears as denominator, it can take a very long time before you see any effect at all on high level creatures! Therefore it's usually better to pick heroes that are specialized in lower level units. A hero on 20th level would give 50% bonus to skills of archers and 15% bonus to skills of Champions, if he had these two as special units. Practical effects will be pretty close, since the archers will get +3 to their attack of six, while the champions will get +2-3 to their attack of 16. (In other words, the lower percentage due to higher denominator in the formula is balanced by higher base numbers to which the counted percentage is applied.) + Spell Speciality. The effect of the indicated spell is enhanced by a percentage value of (Hero Level / Creature Level) x 3, where "Creature Level" is the level of the creature(s) targetted by the spell. + Skill Speciality. The effect of the indicated secondary skill is enhanced by a percentage value of Hero Level x 5. Note that this percentage value is multiplied with, rather than added to, the skill value: a 10th level hero with a Logistics specialty and Expert Logistics (30% movement bonus) receives an additional movement bonus of 15% (30% + 30% x (5% * 10) = 30% + 15% = 45%. o Army formation selector is used to determine the amount of free space between army stacks. It's functionality is very limited - the resulting formations are different for the two setting only for armies with 2-5 slots occupied - 1, 6 and 7 armies will always take the same position, no matter which setting you use. o Tactics selector can be used to switch off the usage of Tactics before the actual battle - on player side. This means that if your hero has Tactics skill and you don't want to use it most of the time, you switch it off here. Note that your hero will still 'use' his level of Tactics to eliminate enemy hero's Tactics, since Tactics of one hero eliminate the same amount of levels of Tactics of the other hero (i.e. you having Expert and enemy Advanced, then in the battle it looks like you have Basic and enemy has nothing...) o Archery skill applies to fortification fire, too! Therefore it's good to buy heroes with Archery for castle defenses (The castle usually does some 100 points of damage - and the increase comes pretty handy.) o Morale bonuses are individual for every unit in the battle - all units use the modifier that their hero gives them, but they get morale boost from their native terrain. Also, some creatures have specific morale rules. (Undead - no morale. Minotaurs - morale always at least at +1). o Special Abilities: (Briefly and incorrectly mentioned in the manual as "Make a Special Attack.") Some creatures have a special ability, such as the Archangel's ability to resurrect dead allied troops once per combat. When a stack of creatures with a special ability is active, just place the mouse cursor over whichever troop you want to use their ability on. Watch the mouse cursor change to an animated spell-casting icon and click to apply the special ability to the target troop. Using a special ability ends the turn for the performing creatures (but not for the target creatures). All special abilities except for the Mighty Gorgon's death stare and the Dendroid's entangling attack are affected by spell resistancies, immunities, and Cursed Ground in the same way as hero spells are. Alas, there is no indication whatsoever when a special attack fails due to such circumstances; the attack simply will not happen. o Two-hex creatures: Any ranged attack on a two-hex creature is considered hampered if any of the hexes occupied by the creature shows a "broken arrow" cursor. This is true even if the cursor turns into a whole arrow on the other hexagon. Also note that both hexes of the creature can take damage from some spells (notably FireWall - if the creature moves right through the firewall, it'll take double damage - for every hex one hit. Area damage spells such as fireball, however, don't have this effect. o Purchasing creatures: When you click on the castle/Citadel/Fort, you can not only see all stats, but by rightclicking display stats of the units and by left clicking purchase them. III. Building General rules on building are these: You should always start with money a town hall. However, since the town hall, built on day 1, earns you only 1000 gold extra on Day 1 next week, you might consider building creature dwellings and benefit structures instead. When upgrading dwellings, consider these points: o The most important upgrades are those that increase speed of your fastest unit. This applies especially to those cases where the fastest unit of your is rather slow. Getting an upgrade to speeds like 11 means that you'll at least sometimes get first shot in battles. o The second most important upgrades are those that increase speed of your slowest unit(s). They give you extra movement points for each turn. o The alternative second most important upgrades are those that give your units some specials. Why alternative second-most? It's good for a barbarian to move one step faster with his orc chiefs, yet it's comparatively good (yet in different ways) for gremlins to start throwing their balls or for vampires to start drinking blood of their enemies in large scale ;-)). o Upgrades to 7thlevel creatures are sometimes great change (i.e. behemoths) A Town Hall built on day one will result in extra 1000 gold on first day of next week (and then extra 3500 every first day of week). The build schedules shown in other articles build it, but there may be cases where you could build some highlevel dwelling at the cost of not building the Town Hall. So, before you build your first structure, try to guess whether you will be able (gold and resource-wise) to go for some high-end dwelling that quickly, and alter the building schedule accordingly. Always try to build most of dwellings before day one of next week. All miscellaneous buildings like Mage Guild, MarketPlace or Blacksmith can wait. The second week should be usually aimed at building money generators including Capitol, if possible. Ideal case: You start with two towns. One goes for the creatures and Citadel/Castle, the other goes for money in the first week. In the second week, the first town goes for capitol, while the second stays idle. Further on, all the cash that is left after troops are purchased should go to upgrades and also lower level dwellings in the second town. If you really don't know what to do with cash, build other structures. Short notes on all common structures: o Village hall: Default building, earns 500 g/t. o Town hall: First upgrade, earns 1000 g/t. o City hall: Second upgrade, earns 2000 g/t. o Capitol: Last upgrade, earns 4000 g/t, can be built only in one city per player. o Fort: Basic military structure - adds a wall to let shooters in your garrison defend the city. Also allows building of basic creature dwellings. o Citadel: Adds moat and arrow tower, increases base creature production by 50%, rounded DOWN! o Castle: Adds two arrow towers, stronger walls, increases base creature production by 100%. o Mage guilds need no big explanation, only remember that some town types are restricted in levels of mage guilds allowed. o Marketplaces generally come to work well in large numbers. [The more marketplaces you control, the better conversion rates you get. Three marketplaces get you the same rates as trading posts. With eight or more the rate drops to 1:2 in resources.] o Tavern is the place where you can recruit new heroes. Usually it's already there. o Class dependant buildings can be of use. Some help with defense, while others give some benefits to heroes. Check Way of particular castle for details. IV. Defense strategy Get used to computer heroes attacking every now and then your castles. There are three main ways to chose: 1. Take and forget - where you capture a castle and enjoy the gold it provides, learn it's spells, use it's benefits and leave. The enemy soon tries to recapture, but you've not helped him any with building the castle. 2. Take and hold - where you sit in the captured castle and wait for the enemy to come. This isn't any good, since it binds your main force to that castle and also the enemy may attack a bit later, when he feels strong enough to beat you. 3. Take and expand - where you stay near the castle with some decent armies (usually the main army, whose hero runs around to flag mines and get benefits (skill boosts etc.), while you build and upgrade dwellings, raise a castle to get maximum defensive power, buy another hero, run the benefits with him, too, recruit all troops and get ready to hold the castle with its own troops against enemy raids. With two weeks' production you can move your main hero away. This approach is pretty costly, but remember one thing: if you take a castle and let the enemy retake it, all the troops that were left inside unrecruited, will be probably recruited by the enemy and you'll face them later in the battle. And since castle defenses play first in the siege, this will usually mean more losses on your side. Of course, if you have 7thlevel troops only in the recapturing army, the towers won't score a kill and you'll gain experience for the troops you've killed. Always think first - is the castle worth holding at all costs? Are the troops inside strong enough to defend it? Or are they weak enough so you won't waste money on them and kill them later, when the enemy has paid for them? How strong enemy forces will try to take the castle? The AI's not stupid. It has learned much and will try it's best to strike on Day 7! So better be prepared. Defending the castles with newbie heroes has one good and one bad side. The bad side is higher losses, the good side is higher profits in gained levels, if you win. When defending ANY castle, think well about picking targets for defensive shooters. While the enemy may have relatively strong shooter armies, his walkers/flyers are usually a bigger threat - the shooters are out of effective range - they'll score half damage on you and you'll score half damage on them! So it's better to go after the walkers, especially those standing in the moat. Also, try to notice what units are targeted by your castle defenses and how much damage they suffer. For example, if your tower scores 60 damage and targets a stack with one archer left, it would be very wise to finish it, so the next 60 points from the tower will not be wasted on this one archer. Even if you're gonna lose the battle, fight to the end and try to inflict maximum losses, unless you want to surrender to save some precious troops. V. Hero list Hero list with special abilities: (Heroes marked '*' are special and will not appear in regular games, at least I think so.) Death Knights: 1/2/2/1 Charna Necromancy, Tactics Wights or Wraiths Clavius Necromancy, Offense +350 gold per day. Galthran Necromancy, Armorer Skeletons Isra Advanced Necromancy Necromancy skill Moander Necromancy, Learning Liches Tamika Necromancy, Offense Black Knights Straker Necromancy, Resistance Walking Dead Vokial Necromancy, Artillery Vampires *Lord Haart Advanced Necromancy Black Knights get +5A, +5D, +10Dmg Necromancers: 1/0/2/2 Aislinn Necromancy, Wisdom Meteor Shower spell Nagash Necromancy, Intelligence +350 gold per day Nimbus Necromancy, Eagle Eye Eagle Eye skill Sandro Necromancy, Sorcery Sorcery skill Septienna Necromancy, Scholar Death Ripple spell Thant Necromancy, Mysticism Animate Dead spell Vidomina Advanced Necromancy Necromancy skill Xsi Necromancy, Learning Stone Skin spell Barbarians: 4/0/1/1 Crag Hack Advanced Offense Offense skill Gretchin Offense, Pathfinding Goblins Gurnisson Offense, Artillery Ballista (above 4th level) Jabarkas Offense, Archery Orcs Krellion Offense, Resistance Ogres Shiva Offense, Scouting Rocs Tyraxor Offense, Tactics Wolf Riders Yog Offense, Ballistics Cyclopes *Duke W. Boragus Offense, Tactics Ogres *Kilgor Offense, Tactics Behemoths gain +5A, +5D and +10 Dmg Battle Mages: 2/1/1/1 Dessa Wisdom, Logistics Logistics skill Gird Wisdom, Sorcery Sorcery skill Gundula Wisdom, Offense Offense skill Oris Wisdom, Eagle Eye Eagle Eye skill Saurug Wisdom, Resistance +1 Gem per day Terek Wisdom, Tactics Haste spell Vey Wisdom, Leadership Ogres Zubin Wisdom, Artillery Precision spell Rangers: 1/3/1/1 Clancy Resistance, Pathfinding Unicorns Ivor Archery, Offense Wood Jenova Advanced Archery +350 gold per day Kyrre Archery, Logistics Logistics skill Mephala Leadership, Armorer Armorer skill Ryland Leadership, Diplomacy Dendroid Guards Thorgrim Advanced Resistance Resistance skill Ufretin Resistance, Luck Dwarves *Gelu Leadership, Archery Trains Sharpshooters Druids: 0/2/1/2 Aeris Wisdom, Scouting Pegasi Alagar Wisdom, Sorcery Ice Bolt Uland Adv. Wisdom, Ballistics Cure spell Coronius Wisdom, Scholar Slayer spell Elleshar Wisdom, Initelligence Intelligence skill Gem Wisdom, First Aid First Aid skill Malcom Wisdom, Eagle Eye Eagle Eye skill Melodia Wisdom, Luck Fortune spell Alchemists: 1/1/2/2 Fafner Scholar, Resistance Nagas Iona Scholar, Intelligence Genies Neela Scholar, Armorer Armorer skill Piquedram Mysticism, Scouting Gargoyles Josephine Mysticism, Sorcery Golems Rissa Mysticism, Offense +1 Mercury per day Thane Advanced Scholar Genies Torosar Mysticism, Tactics Ballista (above 4th level) Wizards: 0/0/2/3 Aine Wisdom, Scholar +350 gold per day Astral Advanced Wisdom Hypnotize spell Cyra Wisdom, Diplomacy Haste spell Daremyth Wisdom, Intelligence Fortune spell Halon Wisdom, Mysticism Mysticism skill Serena Wisdom, Eagle Eye Eagle Eye skill Solmyr Wisdom, Sorcery Chain Lightning spell Theodorus Wisdom, Ballistics Magi *Dracon Advanced Wisdom Trains Enchanters Beastmasters: 0/4/1/1 Alkin Armorer, Offense Gorgons Broghild Armorer, Scouting Wyverns Bron Armorer, Resistance Basilisks Drakon Armorer, Leadership Gnolls Gerwulf Armorer, Artillery Ballista (above 4th level) Korbac Armorer, Pathfinding Serpent Tazar Advanced Armorer Armorer skill Wystan Armorer, Archery Lizardmen Witches: 0/1/2/2 Andra Wisdom, Intelligence Intelligence skill Merist Wisdom, Learning Stone Skin spell Mirlanda Advanced Wisdom Weakness spell Rosic Wisdom, Mysticism Mysticism skill Styg Wisdom, Sorcery Sorcery skill Tiva Wisdom, Eagle Eye Eagle Eye skill Verdish Wisdom, First Aid First Aid skill Vey Wisdom, Navigation Navigation skill *Adrienne Wisdom, Expert Fire magic Expert Fire magic at start Knights: 2/2/1/1 Edric Leadership, Armorer Griffins Orrin Leadership, Archery Archery skill Sylvia Leadership, Navigation Navigation skill Lord Haart Leadership, Estates Estates skill Valeska Leadership, Archery Archers Christian Leadership, Tactics Ballista (above 4th level) Sorsha Leadership, Offense Swordsmen Tyris Leadership, Tactics Cavaliers *Sir Mullich Advanced Leadership +2 speed to all units *Queen Catherine Leadership, Offense Crusaders *King Roland Leadership, Armorer Crusaders Clerics: 1/0/2/2 Adela Wisdom, Diplomacy Bless spell Cuthbert Wisdom, Estates Weakness spell Caitlin Wisdom, Intelligence +350 gold per day. Adelaide Advanced Wisdom Frost Ring spell Ingham Wisdom, Mysticism Monks or Zealots Loynis Wisdom, Learning Prayer spell Rion Wisdom, First Aid First Aid skill Sanya Wisdom, Eagle Eye Eagle Eye skill Overlords: 2/2/1/1 Ajit Leadership, Resistance Beholders Arlach Offense, Artillery Ballista (above 4th level) Dace Tactics, Offense Minotaurs Damacon Advanced Offense +350 gold per day Gunnar Tactics, Logistics Logistics skill Lorelei Leadership, Scouting Harpies Shakti Offense, Tactics Troglodytes Synca Leadership, Scholar Manticores *Mutare Tactics, Estates Dragons get +5A, +5D Warlocks: 0/0/3/2 Alamar Wisdom, Scholar Resurrection spell Darkstorm Wisdom, Learning Stone Skin spell Deemer Wisdom, Adv. Scouting Meteor Shower spell Geon Wisdom, Eagle Eye Eagle Eye skill Jaegar Wisdom, Mysticism Mysticism skill Jeddite Advanced Wisdom Animate Dead spell Malekith Wisdom, Sorcery Sorcery skill Sephinroth Wisdom, Intelligence +1 Crystal per day Demoniacs: 2/2/1/1 Rashka Scholar, Wisdom Efreet Calh Archery, Scouting Gogs Fiona Advance Scouting Hell Hounds Ignatius Tactics, Resistance Imps Marius Advanced Armorer Demons Nymus Advanced Offense Pit Fiends Pyre Logistics, Artillery Ballista (above 4th level) Octavia Scholar, Offense +350 gold per day. *Xeron Leadership, Tactics Devils get +4A, +2D and +1Speed Heretics: 1/1/2/1 Ash Wisdom, Eagle Eye Bloodlust spell Axsis Wisdom, Mysticism Mysticism skill Ayden Wisdom, Intelligence Intelligence skill Calid Wisdom, Learning +1 Sulfur per day Olema Wisdom, Ballistics Weakness spell Xyron Wisdom, Scholar Inferno spell Xarfax Wisdom, Leadership Fireball spell Zydar Wisdom, Sorcery Sorcery skill Planeswalkers: 3/1/1/1 Pasis Offense, Artillery Psychic el. +3A, +3D Monere Offense, Logistics Psychic el. +3A, +3D Thunar Tactics, Estates Magma el. +2A, +1D, +5Dmg Erdamon Tactics, Estates Magma el. +2A, +1D, +5Dmg Ignissa Offense, Ballistics Fire el. +1A, +1D, +2Dmg Fuir Advanced Offense Fire el. +1A, +1D, +2Dmg Lacus Advanced Tactics Water el. +2A Kalt Tactics, Learning Water el. +2A Elementalists: 0/0/3/3 Luna Wisdom, Fire Magic Fire wall double damage Brissa Wisdom, Air Magic Haste spell Ciele Wisdom, Water Magic Magic arrow does 50% more damage Labetha Wisdom, Earth Magic Stoneskin gives +3 extra defense Inteus Wisdom, Fire Magic Bloodlust spell Aenain Wisdom, Air Magic Disrupting Ray works +2 Gelare Wisdom, Water Magic +350 gold per day Grindan Wisdom, Earth Magic +350 gold per day Chapter II: Combat guide Compendium of combat tips, strategies and information Combat tips could be divided into several categories: 1. Using knowledge of computer intelligence [This is a non-combat section with tips on how to initiate battles ;-)] A few basics can be put there, anyway... Typically, when a strong hero approaches your castle and you want him stalled for one turn in order yo get your main force home for defense, you may buy a few sacrificers... but in order to make the computer hero attack those weaklings, they usually have to be put only one or two squares aside from the computer hero's expected path... if they're any further off his course, he will simply ignore them and go after the castle. 2. Always make sure you KNOW, what army will play next. The rules are these: * First comes speed. If there's a stack that is faster than any other, it plays first. * When both sides have stacks of same speed, in the first round the attacker gets the first move. In castle defenses, however, the defending party has first strike (as the attacker was preparing siege) * If both sides have stacks of same speed, the rounds go zig-zag. Once all stacks of that speed have moved, next lower speed army moves and if both sides have that speed in their ranks, then again moves side, that hadn't had made the last move. * On every side, armies with same speed play in order of appearance on the screen, when the battle begun. So, if you have two armies of the same speed, the ORIGINALLY upper plays always sooner, even if it moves below the other army. * The 'wait' function needs some explaining. A unit that uses 'wait' in it's regular turn will have to play within the battle turn. After ballistas on both sides fire, a sub-turn for waiting creatures begins, following all the rules about speeds and zig-zagging, but the speeds go in reversed order, from slowest to fastest creatures, So that the fastest creatures play last. 3. Always try to use appropriate targets in order to attend your goals. Your goals may be one of the following: * winning the battle at any cost * causing maximum damage (i.e. defending a captured castle) * winning with no losses * not letting enemy flee. There's a different way to each of those goals, but most of them require you to know exactly the order of play, as well as to know approximately the damages that your and enemy stacks can cause. And it's good to be able to actually count the expected damage, because knowing that a particular stack of yours is able to kill an enemy may be important when deciding i.e. which spell to cast or where to move the stack... and in these cases, you simply cannot get the help on the status line... Note that if you turn on 'all statistics' or 'spells only', it will along with displaying the requested information, show a context-sensitive help on damage. That is, if you put your cursor over an enemy you are able to attack, it will show you, how much damage will your unit cause. Order of play is important for one more thing. If i.e. both you and opponent have some shooters of the same speed, you'll have to determine, if yours will play sooner, and if so, you can direct your other attacks to other enemy units (assuming that your shooters will cripple enemy shooter stack enough to cause you no casualities). 4. Combat rules: How the damage is counted? DAM= (1+((A-D)*X))) * A_count * RND_damage In words: Number of attackers times damage caused by a single unit [this one is the only random factor - damage lies somewhere within damage range] times modifier based on Attack skill of Attacker and Defense skill of defender Value of X: X equals 0.05 if A is bigger than D, which means that the damage is increased by 5% for every point between A and D X equals 0.02 if D is bigger than A, so damage is decreased by 2% for every point between D and A. 5. Try to get to know your enemies as well as your units. Memorize most units' HPs and other numbers and be able to estimate, how much damage will your armies deliver, in order to use them most effectively. In the battle, always keep an eye on current state of any unit, especially the number of HPs. If the stack with badly wounded unit can get out of enemy range, try it. If you can finish a badly wounded enemy dragon or another big beast, do it. Two dragons, if which one has miserable 5 HPs left, still do damage of two dragons. If you have two stacks with equal HPs left, always sacrifice the one that you need less. (It's always better to lose a minotaur than a dragon.) 6. Remember counterstrike rules! Any close range attack is retaliated, but every unit retaliates only once every turn (see exception list below). So, if your enemy has a strong stack, you'll want to either attack with a stack strong enough that attacked enemy will be too weak to cause losses of your units, or sacrifice a small, cheap unit to waste enemy retaliation. Any fast unit will do for that trick - or, with use of 'wait', slower units may do so - let the main stack wait and when the enemy gets near, attack with some expendable unit, then in 'waiting' turn with the main stack. 7. Learn the ways computer fights: The AI has a complex targeting algorithm, far better than HOMM2. It goes after the most threatening enemies, where the threat may not be immediate. A good example would be computer shooters targeting a huge troglodyte army at your starting line, while their shooters could attack manticores that will be able in the next turn to score damage. [In general, attacking weaker armies is easier - you score bigger damage due to their lower defense and low-level armies are in fact very powerful, measured by damage/HP rating.] I haven't done any thorough testing, but AI seems to pick targets so that the damage potential of your armies is lowered as much as possible. Knowing what the AI's going to do can help a lot in defeating it. 8. Use special abilities to your full advantage. I'm talking mainly about two-field attacks (dragons), and I'm talking about yours as well as your enemy's. Two-field attacks can be used against enemy, if they happen to stand in the wrong place. Since many armies have specials now, I will deal with them individually. 9. Tricks battling computer heroes Computer controlled heroes follow some patterns in their battle behaviour (as well as non-battle behaviour, see below. Usually, if an enemy hero has some artifacts, he'll try to flee, when the battle turns bad for him, preferrably after smashing a lightning bolt into your stack of shooters. So, try to do your best and plan your crushing attack in a way that will not allow computer to flee. [Usually this means letting him come closer and then smashing all his units in counter attack... here comes very handy good usage of spells, knowledge od abilities, order of playing units and careful planning, using effectively your damage-causing capabilities. Also, using the 'Wait' is crucial here - even at the cost of letting enemy shooters fire first. If enemy walkers all spend their turns, while all your armies were waiting, you now may have two attacks with each army that is faster than at least one enemy army. See more in class dependant strategies] 10. Order and sizes of stacks Unless you have to, never place your shooters next to each other - this way you allow enemy units to block two units at once. Of course, since your units are automatically spread on the battlefield, you actually CAN have them next to each other in the hero army slots, but you'll soon find out where is any particular army placed if n of the seven slots are used. Always try to have your shooters at both ends of screen, with the strong protective walkers in the middle. Generally position your walkers so that they could possibly protect most of other units. Always line up your troops wisely, using knowledge about your enemy and speed of his units, but don't count too much about AI stupidity - the computer now tries to not expose his armies to your units unless he has to - and he manages pretty well to sometimes move units less far out than they could. So, do the same - stay out of range of your enemy, if you're faster than him and therefore he is in your range. 11. Spell Casting - combat spells * Before casting a combat spell, always think carefully what will your casting cause. Remember the following: * Sometimes a non-offensive spell on your unit will give you better results, than an offensive on enemy. Casting Bloodlust on 10 Titans will kick your damage by 15%, which can often bring much more, than an offensive, direct damage spell. (Applies especially for heroes with low Power) * This applies also to non-offensive spells cast on enemy units! Disrupting ray can also decide a hard battle, because strong slow units like hydras or ogres are a pain in the ass in big numbers, but once their defense is set to 1 with no possible cure, any good attack acts as a pain reliever ;-) I personally won MANY battles by casting disrupting rays instead of lightning bolts (but that was back in HOMM2). * Generally, you should be able to estimate what spell will have bigger impact on the enemy. Just count up your damage capabilities and compare this number, multiplied by the Attack modifier, with the damage that would your offensive spells deal to the enemy. * If you can afford it, let the enemy cast first. Usually it's better to be able to remove enemy spells efect. I.e. a curse on 20 titans is worth removing by a bless. However, the AI has become much wiser about when and what to cast - and until you learn his thinking, you'd better watch out for some nasty well-timed blinds. * Remember that your spell casting can often cause a reaction from the AI. This covers all non-offensive spells: Blinding, cursing or slowing an enemy unit can force the AI to cast Haste, Bless, or even AntiMagic to remove your spell. Sometimes this is better, than letting the enemy fry your shooter stack with a 300 worth of lightning bolt, but sometimes an attempt to slow down the most threatening enemy stack results in this stack playing far sooner than it regularly would - and getting to your units, too! * Use Blinds, Hastes and Slows wisely! Always be sure to know, what impact on play order will your spells have. If you know that you'll wipe four of five enemy stacks within the first turn and without computer moving, be sure to cast a Blind on his last stack. Since any stoned/blinded unit will get it's play in the same turn that it was attacked, the only way to use a Blinding combo is to have at least TWO stacks faster than the blinded unit. Once the enemy is blinded, all but one of your faster armies can attack, but the last faster army of yours must be used to cast the blind again and skip go. * Rules for using haste are much simpler, because you'll have to slay the enemy before his regular move comes. (Haste will not only let you play sooner, but extend your range! Always remember that and use it wisely. Especially hasted very fast profit from that!] One of the most profitable uses of Haste is: Play the battle without spells until your massive army (esp. Skeletons or Ogre Lords) get their turn. By that time, many of enemy units have moved. If you cast Haste right now, your strike stack will be able to reach many enemy units AND, in the next turn (if you have spell power greater than 1) they'll be probably among the faster units. Thus, you have two sequential strikes with a very offensively oriented stack. Be careful with Expert Air magic - once you get it, you cannot cast Haste on a single stack and therefore you won't be able to change the order of play like you could in HOMM2. * Slow is usually better, but on the basic level the reduction is only 25%. * Use offensive spells to cause maximum damage. It means: - Don't cast a 300 Lightning bolt on a stack with 50 HPs, unless you really NEED to kill it! Use magic arrow instead, or bolt something else, that will suffer the whole 300 damage! - Always know which enemy stack means bigger danger to your armies. A nice example would be my favorite: One titan has 300 HPs. 76 Master gremlins have 296 HPs. Your unit has D=4, so the titan will score ( 40 - 60 ) * ( 1 + ( 24 - 4 ) * .05 ) = ( 40 - 60 ) * 2 = 80 - 120 damage. The master gremlins will score ( 1 - 2 ) * ( 1 + 0 ) * 76 = 76 - 152 damage. So the gremlins are bigger threat. On the other hand, there are cases, when the numerous stacks of poor creatures, such as centaurs, mean much lesser threat than a stack with the same HP total, consisting of i.e. very fast and quite strong minotaurs etc. [You should take into consideration whom will the possible targets of your magic attack - sometimes the shooters would cause damage, while the walkers would kill - if the minotaur kings cannot get to titans, they might decimate your gremlins, while the centaurs would only damage your titans.] 12. Fighting shooters If there are wandering armies of shooters, think before you attack them. You should always bear in mind how much damage your armies can sustain without losses, how much damage the enemy can deal to you. Think well about order of play, spell casting etc. Be prepared to take some losses as your slower flyers will not make it to the other side in one turn. Use wait here - although you might have wasted morale boost, you stayed out of range of the shooters - and they scored only half the damage - then you fly towards them in waiting turn and in the next turn get at them. It also helps to bring along some cheap expendable shooters to take damage instead of the flyers (or vice versa, depends on which army do you value more.) During the play, keep an eye on damage to your armies. (Sometimes it's i.e. wiser to NOT attack with the flyers, coz you save damage from retaliation - use this rule, if you wouldn't kill at least half of the enemy stack.) Also, sometimes it's wiser to NOT attack blocked shooters, if you have an army with the same speed as those shooters, that wants to attack some others... sometimes it's crucial that a particular damaged and blocked stack is alive so that another enemy's army of the same speed will NOT get opportunity to play before your unit of the same speed. Before fighting shooters, divide strong stacks of shooters, too. You don't need 20 zealots to attack 5 archers, it's better to attack 2x5 archers with two stacks of ten zealots. If you have fast flyers, divide them to block the enemy. Griffins and rocs do best here. Gargoyles too, since they're expendable. Blocked shooters will NOT sheepishly stand in one place and fight - once they're forced to hand-to-hand combat, they behave like standard walkers, if they sense that they could kill. Otherwise they might try to outrun your blocking units and get an unblocked shot, but that's very rare. 13. Fighting flyers Unless the flyers are of speed 11+, they won't get an attack in the first turn, so treat them like walkers. The best fit againts dragons and their two-hex attack is a single big stack of hydras, boosted by spells. The AI has learned how to use two-hex attack against multiple units, so if you have to fight dragons, be careful to not have your troops any close to each other. 14. Fighting walkers Here are a few good tricks against walkers: Use 'wait' often - especially if the walkers are out of the full-damage range of your shooters and will come into this range in this turn. Also your walkers/flyers should wait even if they can attack. When fighting walkers with your armies that contain mainly shooters, take mental notes on how much damage you cause to the enemy stacks. Especially if the enemy walkers are of the same speed as some of your units. The trick is: Sometimes it's wiser to let a damaged stack that is closing on your shooters to attack those shooters. If they're of the same speed, this stack will attack them, die in retaliation and those shooters then can go shooting at another stack. 15. Concentrate your firepower As in most strategy games, even here works the approach of taking the enemies out one by one. Here the thing is based on the fact that all enemies except griffins retaliate only after first attack. The only exception is fighting (mostly wandering) shooters, which should be (in most cases) taken out simultaneously to prevent them from shooting at you at all. Enemies led by a hero are a bit more dangerous, because the simultaneous approach can cause losses to walkers and flyers. But sometimes those losses are a fair cost for protection of your shooters. 16. Prevent the enemy from concentrating his firepower. Always try to determine the primary and secondary target of your enemy and IF the secondary target is either less important or more durable, try to let the least possible amount of enemies attack the primary one. And how to prevent enemies from going after their primary target? There are two different situations: * The enemy are walkers/flyers with the primary target still out of their range. In that case you need to move any unit into their range, while keeping the primary target out of their range. The AI rule of attacking whenever possibly will force them to go after the bait unit. * The enemy are walkers/flyers with the primary target in their range. In that case the only remedy is surrounding targeted troop with other units. Best in this task are fast two-hex creatures. Just place the primary target into first or last slot and the two-hex unit right beside it. If the two-hex unit plays before the enemy flyers, move it as close to the primary target as possible, from below/up. Thus, you'll leave only one free hex to attack the primary target from. If another unit of yours still plays before the enemy fliers, you can move it onto that last free hex in front of your shooter. Thus all the enemies will have to go after the secondary target. Also remember that Tactics skill is just for this - you can arrange your troops so that the shooters are completely covered even before the battle starts. But watch out for area-damage spells (and liches/Dragons). 17. War machines * Ballista - can be bought for 2500 gold at War Machine factory and in some towns' Blacksmith. At the end of each battle round, is can inflict ranged damage (2-3)x(hero's Attack +1). With Artillery skill they become player-controlled, they shoot twice and have greater chance to deal double damage. Worth buying for stronger heroes. Ballistas quite often attract AI, especially wandering stacks. Quite often the Ballista is much lesser threat to them than other your units, but the AI will still attack the war machine. So, if your scouts are to be used for mine-clearing only, buy them a ballista - with it's durability it will be more worth than 2500 worth of other units. * Catapult - each hero has one automatically. They're deployed only in castle sieges and have massive HP rating. When defending a castle, if the enemy posesses no/weak flyers, it could be a good strategy to wait with your fast flyers one round and then eliminate the catapult - you can then put a book on the 'space' key and go make yourself a cup of tea - the castle towers will do all the work ;-) * First Aid Tent - can be bought for 750 gold at War Machine factory and in some towns' Blacksmith. Can heal top unit of a stack. With First Aid skill becomes player-controlled and increases it's effectivenes. I rarely pick that skill and I buy the tent only when I have to use some higher-level creatures alone. * Ammo Cart can be bought for 1000 gold at War Machine factory and in some towns' Blacksmith. Provides unlimited ammo for range attackers. Only Medusas really need it. When equipping your heroes with war machines, bear in mind that all of them can be targeted, which will give enemy area-attackers (Magogs and liches) a good opportunity to score three hits in one round. When approaching enemies with these armies, you might want to reposition your troops (and maybe give the machines to some secondary hero) so that the troops that would stand next to those machines will move sooner than the enemy area-shooters. 18. Defending castles If you have one fast flyer (i.e. Dragon Flies or something else that can get to the other side of the battlefield) and the enemy has some shooters, DON'T attack in first turn - rather 'wait'. The shooter will score some damage, but all the nearby walkers will likely proceed towards the castle walls. In the end of turn, your waited flyer will attack the shooters and at start of the next turn, you have two options - either pull the flyer back behind the castle walls (if the shooter has been harmed enough), or attack again (or block only). The decision may depend on the position of those walker armies - if they could reach you, consider the losses. If they CAN'T reach you, stay there, because they'll try anyway - I often lure three walkers away from the castle walls, only to retreat with the flyer in the next turn. The walkers head for the castle again and I repeat the process. Your shooters will usually score more damage to those units that are closing on you. Units in moat are more vulnerable than others, too, and in SOD they even take damage every turn. (But, in SOD they don't get into the moat until the castle walls get breached.) If an enemy walker/flyer gets inside the walls and blocks your shooter, try to 'wait' with the shooter and wipe the blocker out with your walkers. When picking targets, try shooters in the first round, but if any fast/medium flyer is present, let your shooters wait to let it close and then attack, since the flyer can be more dangerous (enemy shooters suffer from both distance and castle walls penalty, thus scoring only 25% of their regular damage.) When using fast walkers like Centaur Captains, remember that if you 'wait' in one turn, you can run outside the walls, attack somebody and in next turn retreat back behind the walls, if they're slower than you. Unlike battles in open terrain, your strategy should be to keep as many enemy troops alive as you can. This applies especially for walkers (flyers and shooters can be killed swiftly, if they pose a threat). If you distribute damage from your shooters and spells among all enemy walkers, the enemy will have four or five small armies that will cause him a lot of trouble - blocking each other's access to collapsed castle walls, and once they get in, causing smaller damage and again blocking each other's way.) A classical example is computer behaviour when all his walkers have assembled in the moat. When his catapult destroys one wall section in front of a slower troop, all the fast ones will run out of the moat and move closer to the opening. The slow troop will play last. If some faster units have waited, the slow troop could move away and the faster unit would later in the 'waited moving' phase occupy it's place and in the next turn break loose into the castle. But since the fast unit didn't wait, it is now standing somewhere behind the moat and will need extra turn to get into the moat again. In SOD, the behaviour will be different, since units will not enter moat before the walls are down... yet once they are down, the troops will amass themselves in close area, again. 19. Did you know that... - Cloned archangels can resurrect even when the original stack has already used it's resurrection. The only bad thing is that you cannot clone a stack that already has a clone present in the battle, but i.e. in castle sieges, the towers will target the clone every turn, so if you i.e. Blind the last enemy stack, you can then resurrect as long as you have enough spell points for the repeated cloning. Another possibility may be to destroy the clones by area spells (frost ring, fireball or inferno), since they cannot be targeted directly. - If you stand on top of a dead enemy unit, it cannot be resurrected. It works even for two-hex creatures blocked on one hex only. So, if you're facing i.e. a nasty Necro with high spellpower and a big army of Vampire Lords, once you happen to kill them, block the body and let the hero waste his Animate Dead on something far less dangerous. - Forcefield is very powerful spell. It can be used against strong wandering armies if you have a shooter faster than they are. Just move the shooter to the top left corner and cast forcefield. (Turn Cursor Shadow on to see exactly where the spell will be). You will have to renew the spell every two turns, which gives time for Bless, too. This trick can be pulled against faster armies, if you have Expert Slow or Expert Haste available. - Second good use for Forcefield is blocking holes in castle walls in sieges. But it can, as well, be used to block the gate to prevent enemies from coming out. - More on blocking gates - when you have superior ranged firepower - or flyers fast enough to hit'n'run the enemy shooters in order to achieve that superiority, you may want to put a durable walker stack into the hex that the gate opens to. The gate cannot be open then, but you must expect the enemy shooters and walkers to focus on this stack... - More on blocking gates, this time blocking them open. The gate won't close if there's a dead body on it, so place an army to a hex adjacent to the front hex of the gate. Choose which of the adjacent hexes will you use, mainly depending on which troop will be the first to try and attack you and how far could it move - I'm not sure about AI, but a human player will surely try to avoid dying on the gate. The AI will probably attack with the first available stack. - Your blinded troops can be Teleported. If you don't have Cure/Dispel or don't want to use Mass Dispel, you can block an enemy shooter with your blinded stack, which either forces the shooter to move away or to attack at half strength, suffer from retaliation and unblind the troop. Pay attention to timing. If the blinded troop is attacked when all the creatures have waited, it will have it's turn immediately, so you can run back, should the need be. - With Ballistics skill, when you pick targets in a siege, you can cast a spell! That's especially nice for Mass Haste/Slow, Earthquake, Berzerker or frying the fastest enemy with a damage spell. - Summoning Elementals may win otherwise unwinnable battles by keeping an enemy killer stack busy. The AI always attacks if it can, so the elementals can be used to lure the enemy away from your shooters. This is handy especially when the enemy cannot be slowed (or when you fear a counter-Haste) or destroyed by direct damage spells. - Elementals can be also used to block holes in castle walls. - When an enemy hero approaches your castle, don't panic. If it's a super hero with a huge army, it will probably be best to abandon the castle, or to use a few units split into seven stacks to waste enemy spellpoints and give the castle turrets time to score at least some damage. But when the enemy is not so strong, take a careful look at his army. The fewer and slower flyers and shooters he has, the bigger your chances for winning are. Don't scare him away by returning a strong hero or using all gold reserves to buy a huge army. Instead, try to build a one-use army, just capable enough of holding the castle. From the composition of enemy army, you should know exactly what will be needed. The shooters can be usually ignored, because they will be shooting and 25%. You'll need to eliminate the flyers first and then hold the walls. As long as you have turrets shooting or some shooters remaining, use your walkers passively. Split your armies to have some retaliation-soakers. The goal is to have one strong walker stack left to deal with what gets inside the walls. Don't put that strong stack close to your shooters, because the enemy will likely try to block the shooters by attacking adjacent armies. If the enemy flyers are eliminated and you still have some weak stacks left, use them first to block broken walls. Your strongest stack should attack only when it will suffer low damage from retaliation. In this way, you'll be able to promote a fresh/scout hero quickly. - Another defense tip against enemy secondary heroes - if you still have some gold left, buy a fresh hero, move his troops into the garisson and give him seven stacks of one low-level unit. Leave him as a visiting hero. The enemy will quite probably waste a few spellpoints dealing with him, plus you get a chance to deal one or two magic arrows or better to his most dangerous units (fast, weaker flyers - see the above tip). If you happen to have a good 4thlevel spell in the castle, look for heroes that start with advanced wisdom. - Delaying the approaching enemy may save you a turn. Sometimes hiring more than one hero with the above mentioned weak seven-slot force and a few lousy spells may not only drain enemy's spellpoints, but it may delay his attack on the castle itself for one turn. That turn can be used to upgrade castle defenses (if you think that this will decide the battle) or building or upgrading a dwelling. Think twice before building a dwelling. An upgrade can sometimes have much better effect than some fresh, weak cannonfodder. - Aging and Poisoning can be cured. Poisoning is less dangerous, but it repeats the effect (knocking off 10% of orinigal health of every unit) on beginning of two more turns. If you don't remove the spell (and First Aid Tent does NOT do that), be sure that the opponent will wait for the second turn. - When sieging a Tower, Mass Dispel removes the defensive Landmines. [It also removes QuickSand and Landmines in general]. The Landmines cause 150 damage no matter how the town is developed. - Arrow towers cause damage dependant on how the town is developed. - If you cannot outmaneuver enemy to get a first strike on a particular unit (typically when you have a one-stack army), use Defend rather than move/wait. Defending increases the D rating of the stack by the creature level. So i.e. Nagas gain +6 defense. If the attacker had lower attack rating than Nagas, the damage will be lower by 12% only, but if his attack rating was above the Nagas' defense, the damage is lowered by 30%. (If A-D was lower than 6, the percentage will be proportionally lowered). - If you're about to battle a fast wandering army (or enemy hero) and have one strong shooter stack that's worth protecting, the following may help: In adventure game settings, choose 'close formation'. Put the shooter in the middle slot, one slow tough walkers adjacent on each side. All you will need is to have one stack faster than the enemy units. The close formation is centered, with the shooter being in the leftmost column, having only three adjacent hexes. Two of them are occupied by the walkers and the third can be taken by the fast unit of yours. - In castle defenses, if you happen to have fast flyer (or a very fast walker) left alive after all enemy flyers and shooters have been eliminated, you may use it to outrun the enemy walkers by repeatedly flying back and forth over the castle walls in the top or bottom row of screen. The castle turrets will then do the most for you. It is especially applicable in larger battles, where you can use hit'n'run or damage spells to quickly destroy enemy catapult. It is especially effective against walkers that need two turns to move through the moat. - How to counter the above? Earthquakes, Teleport (with expert Water only), Berzerker (the enemy flyer will try to attack) or Hypnotize (to move the enemy closer to you or to have it open the gate for you - in case the enemy fragged your catapult quickly and the walls are not breached yet. - Not only for Necros: Wraithbombs. If you happen to get your hands on Wraiths (Necropolis, dwelling+fort, wandering army join), keep them tucked somewhere near the front lines. When an enemy comes to attack you (or when you need to attack him), take a scout hero, give him 7 stacks of wraiths (or six plus one stack of something faster than enemy units, if you happen to have Mass Slow/Haste), let the wraiths suck his spellpoints and if he could kill many of them, surrender, rehire and repeat. If he can kill only one or two in the first round (shooters, spell), let them suck once more. If he has to kill them with spells, let him, it's even better :-). This may be quite effective especially against might heroes that don't have that big knowledge, but it may be worth trying even against magic heroes, whose big spellpoints would be used for repeated resurrections or strong damage spells. - Not only for Wizards: If you happen to acquire master genies, split them into as many stacks as you can (usually 2-4, depending on how many useful armies you'll need. Their beneficial spells will usually be worth more than carrying a slow walker army around instead). Try to protect them, esp. if the source of them was a one-times (refugee camp, join). - Be careful with War Machines. They make a good damage soaker for enemy High Voltage experiments, but on the other hand, they allow flame-strikers to attack adjacent stacks without retaliation and allow liches, magogs and Faerie dragons to hit with area attack. (Yes, Faerie Dragons sometimes want to cast Frost ring, but they cannot target empty hexes!) - against slow units, hit'n'run with fast armies can be used, so that you only suffer from their retaliations. Wait, attack and then retreat far enough so that you can wait in the next round. Using Slow/Haste makes this available even with not so big speed differences. - every unit with a percentage special can be used for splitting attacks. The best example may be Ghost Dragons. If the necromancer leaves walking dead and wights at home, the two free slots can be used by single ghost dragons that will accomplish two things - waste a retaliation of a powerful enemy and increase the chance of halving the HPs of the target stack. You will probably use this approach only a few times, because the dragons are quite valuable. But troops like Basilisks can be used as well, they will only need some magic support (Haste). Chapter III: Troop charts Legend: A: Attack D: Defense HP: Hit Points Damage: Normal damage range of a unit Avg: Average damage of a unit Sp: Speed $$: Cost without resources AdjD: Damage caused against an enemy with Defense rating 10 L: Level of the creature (1 means 1stlevel creature, 41 means 4thlevel upgraded.) C: Castle number: 1 Necropolis 2 Stronghold 3 Rampart 4 Tower 5 Fortress 6 5Castle 7 Dungeon 8 Inferno 9 Conflux Dm/g: AjdDam/$$*100 (Damage cost - i.e. how much damage can 100 gold worth of this army cause to enemies with Defense 10) Gro: Growth rate with castle and growth increase structure present. D/W: Damage dealt by one week worth' of this creature to an opponent with 10D. This is the field that tables are sorted by, so you can see the most damaging units at the bottom of each table. This table compares damage potential of all armies. However, specials, speeds and ranged attacks cannot be reflected in these numbers. The best unit list after each table reflects those characteristics (and my opinions ;-)). Unit A D HP Dmg Avg Sp $$ L C AdjD Dm/g gro D/W Gremlins 3 3 4 1__2 1.5 4 30 1.0 4 1.29 4.30 32 41 Master Gremlins 4 4 4 1__2 1.5 5 40 1.1 4 1.32 3.30 32 42 Imps 2 3 4 1__2 1.5 5 50 1.0 8 1.26 2.52 38 48 Pikemen 4 5 10 1__3 2 4 60 1.0 6 1.76 2.93 28 49 Goblins 4 2 5 1__2 1.5 5 40 1.0 2 1.32 3.30 38 50 Familiars 4 4 4 1__2 1.5 7 60 1.1 8 1.32 2.20 38 50 Hobgoblins 5 3 5 1__2 1.5 7 50 1.1 2 1.35 2.70 38 51 Skeletons 5 4 6 1__3 2 4 60 1.0 1 1.80 3.00 30 54 Skeleton warriors 6 6 6 1__3 2 5 70 1.1 1 1.84 2.63 30 55 Troglodytes 4 3 5 1__3 2 4 50 1.0 7 1.76 3.52 35 62 Pixies 2 2 3 1__2 1.5 7 25 1.0 9 1.26 5.04 50 63 Infernal trogs 5 4 6 1__3 2 5 65 1.1 7 1.80 2.77 35 63 Centaurs 5 3 8 2__3 2.5 6 70 1.0 3 2.25 3.21 28 63 Centaur captains 6 3 10 2__3 2.5 8 90 1.1 3 2.30 2.56 28 64 Halberdiers 6 5 10 2__3 2.5 5 75 1.1 6 2.30 3.07 28 64 Gnolls 3 5 6 2__3 2.5 4 50 1.0 5 2.15 4.30 30 65 Gnoll Marauders 4 6 6 2__3 2.5 5 70 1.1 5 2.20 3.14 30 66 Sprites 2 2 3 1__3 2 9 30 1.1 9 1.68 5.60 50 84 Best creatures: * Halberdiers * Centaur captains * Master Gremlins Sprites are far best in damage/gold rating, plus While the 'cheapest' damage goes to gnolls and gremlins, halberdiers are 5th in that rating and 1st in absolute damage. Centaur captains get the second place for the 1st (with halberdiers) absolute damage and the speed at which they deliver the damage. Note however, that the damage they cause is 3rd most expensive! (low dam/g rating). Master gremlins are the only shooters and so they get the 3rd place, although their rating is average in numbers. Special mention goes to Sprites, who produce by far the cheapest damage and without retaliation. Unit A D HP Dmg Avg Sp $$ L C AdjD Dm/g gro D/W Walking Dead 5 5 15 2__3 2.5 3 100 2.0 1 2.25 2.25 16 36 Zombies 5 5 20 2__3 2.5 4 125 2.1 1 2.25 1.80 16 36 Harpies 6 5 14 1__4 2.5 6 130 2.0 7 2.30 1.77 16 37 Harpy Hags 6 6 14 1__4 2.5 9 190 2.1 7 2.30 1.21 16 37 Lizardmen 5 6 14 2__3 2.5 4 110 2.0 5 2.25 2.05 18 41 Archers 6 3 10 2__3 2.5 4 100 2.0 6 2.30 2.30 18 41 Marksmen 6 3 10 2__3 2.5 6 150 2.1 6 2.30 1.53 18 41 Gogs 6 4 13 2__4 3 4 123 2.0 8 2.76 2.24 16 44 Magogs 7 4 13 2__4 3 6 175 2.1 8 2.82 1.61 16 45 Stone Gargoyles 6 6 16 2__3 2.5 6 130 2.0 4 2.30 1.77 22 51 Wolf riders 7 5 10 2__4 3 6 100 2.0 2 2.82 2.82 18 51 Obsidian Garg, 7 7 16 2__3 2.5 9 160 2.1 4 2.35 1.47 22 52 Dwarves 6 7 20 2__4 3 3 120 2.0 3 2.76 2.30 20 55 Battle Dwarves 7 7 20 2__4 3 5 150 2.1 3 2.82 1.88 20 56 Lizard Warriors 6 8 15 2__5 3.5 5 140 2.1 5 3.22 2.30 18 58 Air elementals 9 9 25 2__8 5 7 260 2.0 9 4.90 1.88 12 59 Storm elementals 9 9 25 2__8 5 8 275 2.1 9 4.90 1.78 12 59 Wolf raiders 8 5 10 3__4 3.5 8 140 2.1 2 3.36 2.40 18 60 Best creatures: * Wolf raiders * Magogs * Harpy Hags Wolf Raiders make far best absolute damage (and that figure doesn't include their second attack, so they're in fact almost TWICE that good!) Magogs, although they generate a bit expensive damage, took 2nd place in absolute damage. Adding their area attack, they're far ahead other shooters. Harpy Hags seem to be pretty bad (most expensive damage, absolute damage below average) but their special seems to me very worth it, considering also their high speed. Storm elementals, although best in absolute damage, are a bit costly, and what's worse, less numerous. With their vulnerabiliry to Lightning, they can't get top place here. Unit A D HP Dmg Avg Sp $$ L C AdjD Dm/g gro D/W Orcs 8 4 15 2__5 3.5 4 150 3.0 2 3.36 2.24 14 47 Orc chieftans 8 4 20 2__5 3.5 5 165 3.1 2 3.36 2.04 14 47 Stone Golems 7 10 30 4__5 4.5 3 150 3.0 4 4.23 2.82 12 51 Serpent Flies 6 8 20 2__5 3.5 9 220 3.0 5 3.29 1.50 16 53 Wights 7 7 18 3__5 4 5 200 3.0 1 3.76 1.88 14 53 Wraiths 7 7 18 3__5 4 7 230 3.1 1 3.76 1.63 14 53 Iron Golems 9 10 35 4__5 4.5 5 200 3.1 4 4.41 2.21 12 53 Dragon Flies 8 10 20 2__5 3.5 13 240 3.1 5 3.36 1.40 16 54 Elves 9 5 15 3__5 4 6 200 3.0 3 3.92 1.96 14 55 Beholders 9 7 22 3__5 4 5 250 3.0 7 3.92 1.57 14 55 Grand Elves 9 9 15 3__5 4 7 225 3.1 3 3.92 1.74 14 55 Evil Eyes 10 8 22 3__5 4 7 280 3.1 7 4.00 1.43 14 56 Water elementals 8 10 30 3__7 5 5 300 3.0 9 4.80 1.60 12 58 Ice elementals 8 10 30 3__7 5 6 375 3.1 9 4.80 1.28 12 58 Cerberi 10 8 25 2__7 4.5 8 250 3.1 8 4.50 1.80 13 59 Hell Hounds 10 6 25 2__7 4.5 7 200 3.0 8 4.50 2.25 13 59 Griffins 8 8 25 3__6 4.5 6 200 3.0 6 4.32 2.16 17 73 Royal Griffins 9 9 25 3__6 4.5 9 240 3.1 6 4.41 1.84 17 75 Best creatures: * Ice elementals * Royal Griffins * Evil Eyes Not like storm elementals, thier ice friends grow fast enough to rank well in weekly damage rating, thus deserving first place... (yet I'm not sure, with their magic vulnerability) Royal griffins are equal to golems in absolute damage, flying and retaliations make them far more useful in battles. Evil Eyes and Grand Elves offer both a good performance, but in favor of Evil Eyes speaks their 'no melee penalty' special. The golems deserve honorable mention for good damage dealing and their toughness, especially high number of hitpoints. Hell Hounds deal the best absolute damage, but Cerberi are theoretically able to deliver 3x3.5 points of damage. Of course, these cases are rare, but two targets can be hit much more often. Considering non-retaliated attack and high speed rating, they deserve the first place. Unit A D HP Dmg Avg Sp $$ L C AdjD Dm/g gro D/W Fire elementals 10 8 35 4__6 5 6 350 4.0 9 5.00 1.43 10 50 Vampires 10 9 30 5__8 6.5 6 360 4.0 1 6.50 1.81 8 52 Vampire Lords 10 10 40 5__8 6.5 9 500 4.1 1 6.50 1.30 8 52 Energy elementals 12 8 35 4__6 5 8 400 4.1 9 5.50 1.38 10 55 Medusas 9 9 25 6__8 7 5 300 4.0 7 6.86 2.29 8 55 Medusa Queens 10 10 30 6__8 7 6 330 4.1 7 7.00 2.12 8 56 Swordsmen 10 12 35 6__9 7.5 5 300 4.0 6 7.50 2.50 8 60 Demons 10 10 35 7__9 8 5 250 4.0 8 8.00 3.20 8 64 Horned Demons 10 10 40 7__9 8 6 270 4.1 8 8.00 2.96 8 64 Magi 11 8 25 7__9 8 5 350 4.0 4 8.40 2.40 8 67 Basilisks 11 11 35 6_10 8 5 325 4.0 5 8.40 2.58 8 67 Pegasi 9 8 30 5__9 7 8 250 4.0 3 6.86 2.74 10 69 Silver Pegasi 9 10 30 5__9 7 12 275 4.1 3 6.86 2.49 10 69 Arch Magi 12 9 30 7__9 8 7 450 4.1 4 8.80 1.96 8 70 Greater Basilisks 12 12 40 6_10 8 7 400 4.1 5 8.80 2.20 8 70 Crusaders 12 12 35 7_10 8.5 6 400 4.1 6 9.35 2.34 8 75 Ogres 13 7 40 6_12 9 4 300 4.0 2 10.35 3.45 8 83 Ogre magi 13 7 60 6_12 9 5 400 4.1 2 10.35 2.59 8 83 Best creatures: * Crusaders * Ogre Magi * Arch Magi Crusaders with their double blow (not included in the figures here) outperform anything else in this category. While Ogres deliver the same damage for a lower cost, Ogre Magi are faster and their BloodLust special makes them useful even in first turn of battle. Their high HPs are also very important. Arch Magi offer good damage at a bit too high price, but considering their specials, they pay back (no melee penalty, reduced spell costs). Honorable mention goes to Silver Pegasi for their remarkable speed. Surprisingly low performace of Vampire Lords suggests that their numbers will have to be pretty high to make them worth the money. Unit A D HP Dmg Avg Sp $$ L C AdjD Dm/g gro D/W Earth elementals 10 10 40 4__8 6 4 400 5.0 9 6.00 1.50 8 48 Magma elementals 11 11 40 6_10 8 6 500 5.1 9 8.40 1.68 8 67 Monks 12 7 30 10_12 11 5 400 5.0 6 12.10 3.03 6 73 Zealots 12 10 30 10_12 11 7 450 5.1 6 12.10 2.69 6 73 Liches 13 10 30 11_13 12 6 550 5.0 1 13.80 2.51 6 83 Gorgons 10 14 70 12_16 14 5 525 5.0 5 14.00 2.67 6 84 Mighty Gorgons 11 16 70 12_16 14 6 600 5.1 5 14.70 2.45 6 88 Rocs 13 11 60 11_15 13 7 600 5.0 2 14.95 2.49 6 90 Power Liches 13 10 40 11_15 13 7 600 5.1 1 14.95 2.49 6 90 Thunderbirds 13 11 60 11_15 13 11 700 5.1 2 14.95 2.14 6 90 Dendroid Guards 9 12 55 10_14 12 3 350 5.0 3 11.76 3.36 8 94 Dendroid Soldiers 9 12 65 10_14 12 4 425 5.1 3 11.76 2.77 8 94 Genies 12 12 40 13_16 14.5 7 550 5.0 4 15.95 2.90 6 96 Master Genies 12 12 40 13_16 14.5 11 600 5.1 4 15.95 2.66 6 96 Pit Fiends 13 13 45 13_17 15 6 500 5.0 8 17.25 3.45 6 104 Pit Lords 13 13 45 13_17 15 7 700 5.1 8 17.25 2.46 6 104 Minotaurs 14 12 50 12_20 16 6 500 5.0 7 19.20 3.84 6 115 Minotaur Kings 15 15 50 12_20 16 8 575 5.1 7 20.00 3.48 6 120 Best creatures: * Minotaur Kings * Power Liches * Mighty Gorgons Minos are superior in both absolute damage and low price of it. Power Liches get the second place for their area attack special even though their damage ratings are average. MGs have pushed out Dendroids. They're terribly sturdy with best defense and HPs among 5thlevel troops, with quite reliably working and very devastating special - the best 7thlevel killer around ;-) Unit A D HP Dmg Avg Sp $$ L C AdjD Dm/g gro D/W Psychic elementals 15 13 75 10_20 15 7 750 6.0 9 18.75 2.50 4 75 Wyverns 14 14 70 14_18 16 7 800 6.0 5 19.20 2.40 4 77 Manticores 15 13 80 14_20 17 7 850 6.0 7 21.25 2.50 4 85 Scorpicores 16 14 80 14_20 17 11 1050 6.1 7 22.10 2.10 4 88 Cyclopes 15 12 70 16_20 18 6 750 6.0 2 22.50 3.00 4 90 Wyvern Monarchs 14 14 70 18_22 20 11 1100 6.1 5 24.00 2.18 4 96 Cyclops kings 17 13 70 16_20 18 8 1100 6.1 2 24.30 2.21 4 97 Magic elementals 15 13 80 15_25 20 9 800 6.1 9 25.00 2.50 4 100 Unicorns 15 14 90 18_22 20 7 850 6.0 3 25.00 2.94 4 100 Cavaliers 15 15 100 15_25 20 7 1000 6.0 6 25.00 2.50 4 100 War Unicorns 15 14 110 18_22 20 9 950 6.1 3 25.00 2.63 4 100 Nagas 16 13 110 20_20 20 5 1100 6.0 4 26.00 2.36 4 104 Efreet 16 12 90 16_24 20 9 900 6.0 8 26.00 2.89 4 104 Efreet Sultans 16 14 90 16_24 20 13 1100 6.1 8 26.00 2.36 4 104 Black knights 16 16 120 15_30 22.5 7 1200 6.0 1 29.25 2.44 4 117 Champions 16 16 100 20_25 22.5 9 1200 6.1 6 29.25 2.44 4 117 Dread knights 18 18 120 15_30 22.5 9 1500 6.1 1 31.50 2.10 4 126 Naga Queens 16 13 110 30_30 30 7 1600 6.1 4 39.00 2.44 4 156 Best creatures: * Naga Queens * Dread knights * Cyclopes Naga Queens stand above all others in raw damage. Considering average price for that damage and their great special of non-retaliated attack, they deserve the first place. Cyclopes are the only non-upgraded unit that made it for an award - for the cheapest damage while having a good special. Even without their special, dread knights look for the top... Yet they'll never outperform naga gueens... Unit A D HP Dmg Avg Sp $$ L C AdjD Dm/g gro D/W Hydras 16 18 175 25_45 35 5 2200 7.0 5 45.50 2.07 2 91 Chaos Hydras 18 20 250 25_45 35 7 3500 7.1 5 49.00 1.40 2 98 Bone dragons 17 15 150 25_50 37.5 9 1800 7.0 1 50.63 2.81 2 101 Devils 19 21 160 30_40 35 11 2700 7.0 8 50.75 1.88 2 102 Behemoths 17 17 160 30_50 40 6 1500 7.0 2 54.00 3.60 2 108 Ghost dragons 19 17 200 25_50 37.5 14 3000 7.1 1 54.38 1.81 2 109 Ancient Behemoths 19 19 300 30_50 40 9 3000 7.1 2 58.00 1.93 2 116 Green Dragons 18 18 180 40_50 45 10 2400 7.0 3 63.00 2.63 2 126 Archdevils 26 28 200 30_40 35 17 4500 7.1 8 63.00 1.40 2 126 Red Dragons 19 19 180 40_50 45 11 2500 7.0 7 65.25 2.61 2 131 Giants 19 16 150 40_60 50 12 2000 7.0 4 72.50 3.63 2 145 Angels 20 20 200 50_50 50 12 3000 7.0 6 75.00 2.50 2 150 Black Dragons 25 25 300 40_50 45 15 4000 7.1 7 78.75 1.97 2 158 Gold Dragons 27 27 250 40_50 45 16 4000 7.1 3 83.25 2.08 2 167 Firebirds 18 18 150 20_40 30 15 1500 7.0 9 42.00 2.80 4 168 Titans 24 24 300 40_60 50 12 5000 7.1 4 85.00 1.70 2 170 Phoenixes 21 18 200 20_40 30 21 2000 7.1 9 46.50 2.33 7 186 Archangels 30 30 250 50_50 50 18 5000 7.1 6 100.00 2.00 2 200 Best creatures: * Archangels * Titans * Chaos hydras Archangels are no doubt the strongest 7thlevel creature - in direct battle, they're capable of battling Titans (who are a bit tougher) due to the first strike advantage. Their resurrecting special is the one thing that puts them above titans. Titans, delivering second best damage both hand-to-hand and in ranged attack, with their high HP rating cannot take any worse than second place. Chaos hydras are usually able to strike at two or more targets. Even with only two enemies hit, their damage tops all others except Archangel. Those weakly looking phoenixes (just like earth elementals) deserve to be mentioned, since with their growth rate they deal a lot of damage. Castle comparation Legend: All growth benefits are assumed to be present along with the Castle structure. HP6: Total HPs of one week town production without 7thlevel creature. HP7: Total HPs of one week town production with 7thlevel creature. c/HP6: Cost of one week of the above production. c/HP7: Cost of one week of the above production. A106: Last value without 7thlevel creatures. A10: Average damage that the above production will cause to an enemy unit with defense 10. D106: Adjusted hitpoint - how much damage would be needed to kill the above production with any unit that has 10 Attack. D10: Last value without 7thlevel creatures. g/HP6: Cost of one HP of the above production. g/HP7: Cost of one HP of the above production. dm/g6: Damage dealt per 100 gold invested (without 7thlevel creature) (a106 / c/hp6 * 100) dm/g7: Damage dealt per 100 gold invested (with7thlevel creature) (a10 / c/hp7 * 100) Bold: Best value. Italic: Worst value. Town HP6 HP7 c/HP6 c/HP7 A10-6 A10 D10-6 D10 g/hp6 g/hp7 dm/g6 dm/g7 Rampart 2150 2650 18620 26620 438 605 2075 2833 8.66 10.05 2.35 2.27 Stronghold 1770 2370 18530 24530 429 545 1583 2314 10.46 10.35 2.31 2.22 Fortress 1790 2290 19660 26660 432 530 1830 2455 10.98 11.64 2.20 1.99 Necropolis 1792 2192 20920 26920 412 520 1757 2222 11.67 12.28 1.97 1.93 Conflux 1800 2600 20500 28500 423 609 1705 2658 11.39 10.96 2.06 2.14 Dungeon 1602 2202 19525 27525 420 578 1549 2407 12.18 12.50 2.15 2.10 Tower 1820 2420 20800 30800 469 639 1771 2506 11.42 12.72 2.25 2.07 Castle 1745 2245 19580 29580 445 645 1688 2522 11.22 13.17 2.27 2.18 Inferno 1635 2035 19090 28090 425 551 1571 2196 11.67 13.80 2.23 1.96 Commentary: * Chaos Hydras +84 per head (1-8) * Cerberi +59 per head (1-3) * Power Liches +84 per hex (1-7) * Magogs +44 per hex (1-7) * Gold Dragons +128 per hex (1-2) * Black Dragons +128 per hex (1-2) * Marksmen +40 double attack * Grand Elves +55 double attack * Crusaders +75 double attack * Wolf Raiders +60 double attack Other: * All ranged units were assumed as shooting in their effective range - no obstacle penalty, no range penalty, ranged attack. * No percentageous (or non-damaging) specials were considered (such as Poison, Aging, Lightning of Thunderbirds etc.) Strategic resumee: Looking at the costs of dealt damage (the number represents average damage per 100 gold worth of troops), the most bang for your bucks you can get from Rampart, followed by Stronghold and Castle. Fortress, Inferno and Necropolis form the 'weak' group, but Fortress can get out of this group easily by attacking 2+ opponents with Hydras. (Same for necropolis and Liches, although evading hydras is much harder.) * Considering the increases to the A10 value, Fortress becomes very strong, especially when the Hydras are Hasted/Teleported, because it's virtually impossible for enemies to prevent them from multiple attacks. Also note that the special of Mighty Gorgons, when used against high-level units, will increase the total dealt damage VERY significantly... (it can be up to 200 HPs per week). Tower and Castle are the heaviest hitters. Also bear in mind that double attack (from Grand Elves, Marksmen, Crusaders and Wolf Raiders) makes another VERY important change, not reflected in the above table. If those units were assumed scoring double damage, their towns would get into vicinity of 2.70 damage per 100 gold invested, with castle's weekly damage bumped up to 761 - a hundred more than Rampart and then 50 more than other towns! Also the Castle can quite rely on those Crusaders - if they wait, retaliations can be soaked by pikemen, if they don't wait, both angels and cavalry may soak retaliations from some huge stacks that Crusaders will demolish. * Rampart is the toughest castle on defense... And since it's units are also the cheapest (in both damage delivered and damage dealt), it seems to be the best pick for might-oriented players... * Inferno is the weakest town in HPs with Defense ratings considered, followed by Necropolis. If we ignore 7thlevel creatures, Dungeon, Inferno and Stronghold form the weakest group. Of those, however, Dungeon benefits most from useful force combination. * Rampart has also the cheapest troops, with Stronghold taking second place. All others fall at least 15% behind those two, with outstanding Inferno, whose HPs cost 37% more than the Ramparts', while scoring 10% less damage. Without the 7thlevel troops, Rampart gets significantly cheaper, Inferno without those inferior devils gets back into the middle and suddenly Dungeon tops the bunch, being some 7% above the average, while the Rampart is 23% below it. I wonder why they gave Treasury to the town that needs it the least ;-) Fortress, Necropolis and Inferno are the low-end here in attack stats, although Fortress has the (above explained) easiest way up, while the Inferno will probably get stuck forever down there. * Without 7thlevel creatures, the situation doesn't differ much. Shooter comparison Town HitPoints Cost Base damage dm/g g/HP Necropolis 240 3600 90 2.50 15.00 Stronghold 560 6710 144 2.15 11.98 Rampart 210 3150 110 1.75 15.00 Tower 368 4880 113 2.31 13.26 Fortress 270 2520 58 2.30 9.33 Castle 360 5400 155 2.11 15.00 Dungeon 548 6560 112 1.71 11.97 Inferno 208 2800 45 1.61 13.46 Conflux 660 7800 119 1.52 11.82 Explanation: All values are per week, related to shooters only, in their upgraded versions. All shooters are assumed shooting at 10hex range (no penalties). Both Necropolis and Inferno do NOT include 'area' damage of their only shooter. Both Rampart and Castle DO include two shots for Grand Elves and Marksmen. [The reason is simple. While area damage can be avoided on enemy side, two shots can't.] Titans are NOT included, they add 600 HPs, 10000 gold plus those gems and 170 damage. So, the results: The cheapest HPs come from Fortress. Liches, Elves and Castle shooters are the most expensive, while the remaining towns offer similar value. Cheapest damage comes from liches (even without area attacks!!!), followed by Tower and Fortress (but Fortress doesn't count ;-))) Obviously weak Fortress and Inferno are in contrast with obviously strong Castle and Stronghold, but Castle's shooters are very fragile and quite expensive. Based on the total damage, the middle five offers two good picks, Dungeon and Conflux, whose shooters can absorb a lot of damage. Dungeon offers this performance at somewhat lower total price and much better specials. Another meaningless table - town sensitivity to Bless and Curse (Expert Level) Per_* show how big is the change in the total damage compared to the average value. Necropolis is out, of course, but so are several units from other towns (their average damage has been used for both cursed and blessed variant, then.) Town A10 Curse Bless Per_curse Per_bless Necropolis 520 N/A N/A N/A N/A Castle 645 566 804 12% 25% Tower 638 556 801 13% 25% Rampart 604 514 776 15% 28% Dungeon 578 456 780 21% 35% Inferno 551 426 761 23% 38% Fortress 530 401 740 24% 40% Stronghold 544 417 761 23% 40% Conflux 611 420 893 31% 46% The results interesting - it's good to see that Expert Bless is a good way how to help Fortress and Inferno raise their odds in battle. Conflux is the obvious winner with highly sensitive sprites, both shooters and phoenixes - lower sensitivity affects only walkers. Neutral armies: Name Cost A D HP Dmg Sp Special: Gold Golem 500 11 12 50 8-10 5 Resists 85% magical damage Diamond Golem 750 13 12 60 10-14 5 Resists 95% magical damage Azure Dragon 30000+20m 50 50 1000 70-80 19 Cause fear Crystal Dragon 15000+10c 40 40 800 60-75 16 Walker Faerie Dragon 3000 20 20 500 20-30 15 offensive spells, magic mirror Rust Dragon 9000 30 30 750 50 17 % acid - lowers D, adds damage Boar Rider 150 6 5 15 2-3 6 Enchanter 750 17 12 30 14 9 casts misc. mass spell, shooter. Halfling 40 4 2 4 1-3 5 Shooter Mummy 300 7 7 30 3-5 5 Can Curse target Nomad 200 9 8 30 2-6 7 Peasant 10 1 1 1 1 3 Rogue 100 8 3 10 2-4 6 Enhances Thieves' Guild info Sharpshooter 500 12 10 15 8-10 9 No range/castle wall penalty Troll 500 14 7 10 10-15 7 Top unit heals each round. Enchanters and Sharpshooters can be upgraded by Dracon and Gelu respectively from Zealots/Monks/Magi/Arch Magi and from Archers/Marksmen/Wood Elves/Grand Elves. Chapter IV: Castle guide Strengths: Capable fighters Archangels' special Weaknesses: Shooters very weak on defense. Army evaluation: Pikemen 4/5/10/1-3/4/60 Halberdiers 6/5/10/2-3/5/75 Third best 1stlevel unit. Archers 6/3/10/2-3/4/100 Marksmen 6/3/10/2-3/6/150, shoot twice After upgrade, they can be pretty effective, considered their price. Griffins 8/8/25/3-6/6/200, two retaliations Royal Griffins 9/9/25/3-6/9/240, unlimited retaliations Excellent anti-shooter army, one of the toughest 3rdlevels. Swordsmen 10/12/35/6-9/5/300 Crusaders 12/12/35/7-10/6/400, extra attack Those footmen are the real infantry - not only cannonfodder. Monks 12/7/30/10-12/5/400 Zealots 12/10/30/10-12/7/450, no melee penalty Way too costly, but quite needed second shooters. Cavaliers 15/15/100/15-25/7/1000, jousting bonus Champions 16/16/100/20-25/9/1200, jousting bonus If given room for their jousting special, they're 2nd best 6thlevel troop. Angels 20/20/200/50/12/3000 +1g, 150% against devils Archangels 30/30/250/50/18/5000 +3g, 150% against devils, +1 morale, once per battle can resurrect allies These holy guys are strong enough to speak for themselves... Upgrading priorities: * Halberdiers: Low. Although used often, their performance isn't crucial. * Marksmen: Highest, both for speed bost and double shooting. * Royal Griffins: High, for the +3 speed. * Crusaders: High, increase in damage BY 120% * Zealost: Low, unless you won't have champions soon. * Champions: Higher for +18% damage and +2 speed. * Archangels: Top, although very costly. +50% damage, resurrect special and highest speed Castle building in the first week: Day 1: Town Hall 2500g Day 2: Archer's Tower 1000g +5w +5o Day 3: Blacksmith 1000g +5w Day 4: Barracks 2000g + 5o Day 5: Griffin Tower 1000 g + 5o Day 6a: Mage Guild 2000g + 5w +5o Day 7a: Monastery 3000g + 5w + 5o + 2cgms Day 6b: Stables 2000g + 10w Day 7b: Training Grounds 5000g + 20w Guardhouse as 1stlevel dwelling assumed present. If it's not present, we don't go for Monastery/Training Grounds and since we spare one day here, we can head for either Guardhouse or Town Hall. There are, of course, alternatives - we don't need Griffins and Swordsmen to get Cavaliers. Or, if we're lucky, we can even go for Angels - Griffins are not needed, so the a) variant may get shortened and on 7th day, we can build the Portal of Glory. (Also, Town Hall can be left out to build Citadel instead, if we happen to have lots of gold and want to buy three angels instead of two. Resource summary: For a) variant, you'll need 20w, 25o and 12000g, which leaves us (20000 + 7000 - 13500) = 13500g for Day 1 to spend on troops. (And we'll need 17x200=3400 for griffins, 21x150=3150 for marksmen (along with another 1000 for their upgrade on day1), 10x300=3000 for swordsmen or 38x60=2280 for pikemen. That should be our forces in the second week, along with those that came with strating hero(es) - total 10000+). For b) variant, you'll need 40w + 5o and 11000g. So those two variants are costly about the same - one needs wood, while the other one needs ore. It's clear then, what will affect our decision. With the Training grounds, you should be able to recruit most of the cavaliers on the Day 1 along with marksmen and swordsmen. You can try the 'minimal' variant that stops at griffins, but upgrades all the lower dwellings and recruits all. The build schedule would then be at day 5 citadel and later three upgrades (marksmen, royal griffins and crusaders). spent for upgrades. Total costs would be: 13000g 10w 35o 5c - and you could buy all troops at day1 - the only problem is ore, then. Second week strategies: I strongly suggest running for gold at this stage. That requires Blacksmith, Marketplace, MageGuild and CityHall - a total of 15w, 5o and 8500 gold, with Castle and Capitol later (15000g, 10w and 10o). Unless you'll find huge amounts of wood, choose the minimal variant or a) variant, as those have lower wood consumption and therefore you can afford the CityHall in the second week. [The b) variant would need 50 wood in total - which means a sawmill captured on the first day of play or some extra wood.) Troops cost weekly (with castle): Without 7th level: 19580 With 7th level: 29580 With one castle producing 14000/week, two armies will be left at home... Usually it's pikemen and either zealots or griffins, depending on available numbers. Even with capitol at 28000/week, you'll need extra 2000/week to be able to buy out all troops. HPs grown weekly: 1745 (plus 500 in archangels) at 11.22 g/HP (13.17) Benefits: Blacksmith: Produces Ballista war machines Brotherhood of Sword: +2 morale (worth it, if you're likely to get attacked) Lighthouse: Shipyard upgrade, acts like a regular lighthouse under your flag. Stables: Visiting heroes gain movement bonus as at regular stables. Resource silo: adds 1w and 1o per day. In long games worth it. Griffin bastion: Increases growth of griffins by 3. Strategy In your first week, either ore or wood will be crucial, based on which variant you choose in building. However, the wood will be crucial in week two for income increase. A sawmill should be obtained even at some cost in lost troops - you should have some 15 archers and 40-50 pikemen available, which is 600 HPs. Be aggressive with your scouting, because on week two, you'll be building money generator and you should have at least three days' reserve for accumulating gold in case you'll need to buy all troops for castle defense - in many maps the enemy visits early and if you can't see him in time to prepare defenses, you'll end bad. Forces combination: You should be able do to without pikemen in battles - they're ideal troop for castle defenses - when an enemy comes near, buy all the pikemen that have been waiting here - they provide cheap, yet concentrated firepower that will last long, letting your castle towers deal the damage. Zealots might stand on their side, if you won't have them with you, but would only get killed quick, by magic, likely. In the battles, your champions should provide the most offensive - use their jousting bonus and attack at full distance. Use marksmen to damage strong stacks and then champions to finish them. Crusaders should fend off anyone that goes after the archers, while griffins should take care of enemy shooters. Angels, of course, will have the task of binding enemy firepower and absorbing damage. It is good to have archangels splitted into two stacks to use their resurrecting special well. Note that you need three archangels to resurrect one fallen, so with stacks of 4 and 3 of them, you can have them resurrect each other. A good offensive combination is Champions, ArchAngels and Zealots. This will leave your home with griffins, archers and pikemen, with crusaders being optional for both forces. And the secondary force could be plentiful due to all those towers and guardhouses often used in maps. Try to split Archangels into more stacks - they can then use their resurrecting special more effectively. A typical situation is a castle siege, where you leave the enemy one last unit, suffer another round of castle fire on your zealots and then use one archangel stack to resurrect them, while the other will wipe out the last enemy unit, thus not giving the enemy hero a chance to cast an offensive spell. Remember that you'll have only one ressurection per archangel stack - and plan well. If you manage to capture another Castle, try to focus on one or two troops and build massive numbers - marksmen, crusaders or even pikemen. The pikemen that wait in home castle in reserve should be transferred to some castle in front lines to help you hold it. Heroes: Most Knights do well in battles, I'd suggest Valeska for Marksmen, Tyris for Champions and Tactics, Sorsha for Offense and Crusaders. Avoid Haart(Estates) and Sylvia(Navigation) unless needed (as secondary). Among Clerics, useful are Adela (Bless, Diplomacy), Adelaide (Frost Ring), Loynis (Prayer!!! - it will compensate for low A/D), Rion (First Aid). Others aren't good, except for secondary (CuthBert and Caitlin generate gold). Skills important for the troops and strategy: Archery might be useful, if you have some archer towers or other Castle towns, or if you plan to use monks/zealots, but usually the hard work is done by champions, crusaders and griffins. Offense is a must here, since your troops rely on dealing damage hand-to-hand mostly. Armorer could prolong life of your griffins and crusaders, but there are better skills. Ballistics is strongly recommended to get Crusaders and Champions inside, Artillery too, as heroes with high A/D can get a big bang from the Ballista. Unit A D HP Dmg Sp $$ AdjD Dm/g grow weekD Halberdiers 6 5 10 2-3 5 75 2.30 3.07 28 64 Marksmen 6 3 10 2-3 6 150 2.30 1.53 18 41 Royal Griffins 9 9 25 3-6 9 240 4.41 1.84 17 75 Crusaders 12 12 35 7-10 6 400 9.35 2.34 8 75 Zealots 12 10 30 10-12 7 450 12.10 2.69 6 73 Champions 16 16 100 20-25 9 1200 29.25 2.44 4 117 Archangels 30 30 250 50-50 18 5000 100 2 2 200 Chapter V: Rampart guide Strengths: The most durable troops Excellency in castle defenses (dendroid special) Three anti-magic specials Castle special (Treasury) is cumulative and can sometimes achieve great results. Both defender fighters have benefically increased growth rate. Weaknesses: Only one shooter and two flyers (and one of them quite vulnerable), however the shooter is a good one and the flyers are both pretty fast... Army evaluation: Centaurs 5/3/8/2-3/6/70 Centaur captains 6/3/10/2-3/8/90 Those fast warriors carry a good offensive punch. In high numbers they're far more important than you'd expect from a 1stlevel troop. Dwarves 6/7/20/2-4/3/120, 20% magic resistance Battle Dwarves 7/7/20/2-4/5/150, 40% magic resistance Dwarves make a sturdy defensive unit, but after upgrade, they can be used even in offensive. Elves 9/5/15/3-5/6/200 Grand Elves 9/9/15/3-5/7/225, shoot twice In decent numbers, they provide you with much needed ranged firepower, but they need to be protected. Pegasi 9/8/30/5-9/8/250, enemy has spell costs higher by 2 Silver Pegasi 9/10/30/5-9/12/275, enemy has spell costs higher by 2 Quite capable offensive unit with a handy special, esp. against weak scouts. Dendroid Guards 9/12/55/10-14/3/350, binding attack Dendroid Soldiers 9/12/65/10-14/4/425, binding attack An excellent defensive unit with a special that has great tactical value. Unicorns 15/14/90/18-22/7/850, blinding attack, magic aura War Unicorns 15/14/110/18-22/9/950, blinding attack, magic aura Tough and fast fighters. Magic aura gives adjacent units 20% magic resistance (the unicorns don't get the resistance bonus themselves.) Green Dragons 18/18/180/40-50/10/2400+1c, immune to spells 1-3 Gold Dragons 27/27/250/40-50/16/4000+2c, immune to spells 1-4 Dragons are pretty strong and green ones also easier to get. Upgrading priorities: * Centaur Captains: High - increased durability and speed boost are worth it. * Battle Dwarves: Low. Their value lies in magic resistance, but it's not so common for them to be primary target for spellcasting. * Grand Elves: High, for the double shot and speed bonus. * Silver Pegasi: High, for the speed boost that gives them access to enemy side in one turn. * Dendroid Soldiers: Low. They're best used in castle defenses, as they can effectively 'block' holes in walls with their special ability. * War Unicorns: High, for the +2 speed and increased HPs * Gold Dragons: Very High, for the +6 speed, +9 A/D and +70 HPs. Castle building in the first week: Day 1: Town Hall 2500g Day 2: Homestead 1500g + 10w Day 3: Enchanted Spring 2000g + 10c Day 4: Dendroid arches 2500g Day 5: Unicorn Glade 4000g + 5w + 5o + 10g Day 6: reserve Day 7: Citadel 2500g + 5o Centaur stables as 1stlevel dwelling assumed present. If it's not present, we use the reserve slot to shift the schedule. Usually the reserve would be used for Dwarf cottage, but as dwarves aren't a crucial unit in offensive strategies, you might want to go for something else (i.e. a mage guild, if your main hero is a ranger and you want him to get a spell book fast.) Under extremely positive conditions, you might be able to buy Dragon Cliffs. However, you need two levels of mage guild, so you'd have to skip Town Hall and Citadel from the above schedule. And them extremely positive conditions are extra 14 crystal and extra 25 ore. No need to mention that it is worth is, sacrificing some gold chests to get two dragons on the beginning of second week - they'll allow much faster exploration, as they can battle many medium wandering armies without fear. Resource summary: You'll need 15w, 10o and 15000g, which leaves us (20000 + 7000 - 15000) = 12000g for Day 1 to spend on troops. I suggest the reserve day being used for homestead upgrade and day1 of second week be used for centaur stables upgrade - those will consume another 15w (thus making your requirements 10 wood above starting 20) and 2500 gold. With 9500g, you'll easily purchase all the centaurs (35x90) and elves (17x225) and all 12 pegasi, too. That is a decent exploration force. If you don't need the pegasi, save the gold for economic structures! If, for some reason, you don't go for Unicorn Glade, I recommend upgrading Pegasi instead (if you find extra 5 crystal) and getting 1st level of mage guild (for the same gold, wood and ore consumption as unicorn glade). Second week strategies: Since there are no building variants, the second week will be easy - get some wood and raise City Hall, possibly Castle and Capitol or some of the beneficial buildings, while your main hero will look for gold and crystal sources. Troops cost weekly (with castle): Without 7th level: 18620 With 7th level: 26620 With one castle producing 14000/week, you see that you'll have to decide which units to left unpurchased. Dendroids and Dwarves are favorites, of course. Capitol at 28000/week will have minor surplus. HPs grown weekly 2150 (plus 500 in Gold Dragons) at 8.66 g/HP (10.05) [This is the highest HP total/week and lowest g/HP rating among all towns!] Benefits: * Blacksmith: First Aid Tents sold here. * Dendroid saplings: +2 dendroids growth (not bad, just in case) * Mystic Pond: gives 1-4 random resources each week. A good thing for longer games. * Fountain of Fortune: Upgrade to mystic pond, gives +2 Luck when under siege. I never build it. * Miner's Guild: +4 Dwarves growth (just as good as dendriod saplings), required for treasury. * Resource Silo: Provides +1 crystal/day - a must if you don't have the mine! * Treasury: On day 1 of each week increases your gold reserve by 10% - Great! Great! But be careful, the game can't handle total gold hihger than 10,000,000 ;-) Strategy You won't have much to worry for. Of course, wood is always needed for the City Hall and Castle, but you can relax in the first week. A good strategy might also be to upgrade centaurs quickly, hire a few extra heroes that come with centaurs and with some 60-80 centaur captains run into some action - they're durable and offensive enough to handle even strong enemies. With their high speed, they can rely on 'waiting' to get two consecutive shots. But since AB, 3rd+ hero in any week will not come with any good starting army. Forces combination: In general, Dendroids and Dwarves should be kept home as castle defenses, possibly unpurchased. Of course, against particularly well-defended castles you might decide to use them - dendroids can be used to block an enemy that went after your elves or any other unit. They can take a lot of damage and you have a +2 growth benefit option on them. A good strategy could be to use either dwarves or dendroids as sort of expendable fighter unit - and whenever their stack would get crippled, you'd switch for the other one, while the first would sit in the castle and grow silently and slowly back to some reasonable numbers. The offensive force should be Centaur Captains, Silver Pegasi, Grand Elves and War unicorns. All are pretty fast and therefore you should use 'wait' against all walkers/flyers and even against shooters, unless your morale is very high and you count on it. Green dragons are wimps that should be in later game used only in hopeless situations such as castle defenses. Upgrade them ASAP. If for some reason your dwarves and dendroids hit the action out there, try to have first strikes with dendroids - they can absorb much more damage. Also, when all the enemy walkers/flyers attack them, the dwarves can with a little help of Haste start quickly to the other side to demolish shooters and/or war machines. The dendroids will take losses, but the effect should still be positive. Also area spells (Frost ring the best) are good to help them when surrounded. [It might be even reasonable to use fireballs, if their opponents are weaker - especially if the fireball could win the battle - because if you'd spare the dendroids from your own flame, enemy might hit them with his own spell.] Heroes: Rangers are a mixed group. There are nice picks like Kyrre the Logistics expert, Thorgrim with magic resistance and 5% bonus to it, and on the other hand Ryland (Dendroids) and Ufretin (Dwarves) that would make good castle defenders. A secondary pick is Jenova (+350 gold). From druids, I recommend Aeris(Pegasi) and Alagar(Ice Bolt, has Sorcery). Also Elleshar with Intelligence may come handy (esp. for castle defenses). Others seem quite useless to me under common conditions. Skills important for the troops and strategy: Given so fast units, Tactics may be the best pick for you - your centaurs, pegasi and unicorns will be able to pick most of enemy units for targets. With Expert Haste, you will be able to attack slower enemies even with Dendroids and Dwarves. Since you have only one flyer (except dragons) and one shooter, you should get Ballistics to let your Unicorns and Centaurs make some justice, especially when you expect many castle sieges. Unit A D HP Dmg Sp $$ AdjD Dm/g grow weekD Centaur captains 6 3 10 2-3 8 90 2.30 2.56 28 64 Battle Dwarves 7 7 20 2-4 5 150 2.82 1.88 20 56 Grand Elves 9 9 15 3-5 7 225 3.92 1.74 14 55 Silver Pegasi 9 10 30 5-9 12 275 6.86 2.49 10 69 Dendroid Soldiers 9 12 65 10-14 4 425 11.76 2.77 9 106 War Unicorns 15 14 110 18-22 9 950 25 2.63 4 100 Gold Dragons 27 27 250 40-50 16 4000 83.25 2.08 2 167 Chapter VI: Conflux guide Strengths: Excellent HP rating of armies. First strike guaranteed Phoenixes have a nice growth rate! In fact, they're the only ones that grow two units basic production... Therefore, even with their lower A/D ratings, they can be compared to the best 7thlevel units, since you can afford to take two phoenixes against one Archangel/Dragon/Titan... Weaknesses: Those nice durable troops are unfortunately quite costly Magical vulnerabilty of those elemental types can be dangerous if you face AI heroes early in the game. Army evaluation: Pixies 2/2/3/1-2/7/25 Sprites 2/2/3/1-3/9/30, no retaliation An important unit - crucial in early exploration, the only non-retaliated 1stlevel. Air elementals 9/9/25/2-8/7/250 Storm elementals 9/9/25/2-8/8/275, shoots, no melee penalty Vulnerability to lightning makes them less durable, but with their speed and good HPs, they make a good shooter. Water elementals 8/10/30/3-7/5/300 Ice elementals 8/10/30/3-7/6/375, shoots Fire is not as damaging as lightning, so you can expect them to last a bit longer than Storm folks. Fire elementals 10/8/35/4-6/6/350 Energy elementals 12/8/35/4-6/8/400 Average fighter. Earth Elementals 10/10/40/4-8/4/400 Magma Elementals 11/11/40/6-10/6/500 Quite lousy before the upgrade. After it, still the lousiest 5thlevel, but they make good damage soakers. Psychic elementals 15/13/75/10-20/7/750, immune to mind magic, no retaliation, attacks all adjacent enemies Magic elementals 15/13/80/15-25/9/800, immune to magic, no retaliation, attacks all adjacent enemies If used wisely, this unit will score tremendous damage. The bad thing is that it cannot profit from beneficiary spells. Firebirds 18/18/150/20-40/15/1500, immune to fire magic Phoenixes 21/18/200/20-40/21/2000. immune to fire magic, rise from the ashes The fastest unit in the game, they guarantee first strike. They're also with their doubled growth compensating for lesser durability. All four elemental units have some magic immunity and some magic vulnerability. Also, after upgrade, they are able to cast Protection from their element of magic. Upgrading priorities: * Sprites - a good upgrade... they're virtually worthless without it, since they die quickly in retaliatory attacks. * Storm elementals - necessary in early phases for the shooter attack. * Ice Elementals - same as Storm. * Energy elementals - low priority. The upgrade brings little difference, only the +2 speed could force you to upgrade. * Magma elementals - medium priority. They gain more punch and +2 speed, which in their case is more important than it was for energy elementals. * Magic elementals - a good upgrade that brings damage increase along with +2 speed boost. They, as a crucial attack unit, need to be as fast as possible to afford waiting in battles. * Phoenixes - an important upgrade, the only that increases HPs and also gives you first strike in all battles. Castle building in the first week: Day 1: Town Hall 2500g Day 2: Mage Guild 2000g +5w +5o Day 3: Altar of air 1500g +5o Day 4: Altar of Water 1500g + 5o +2c Day 5a: Altar of Fire 2000g + 5o +5w +2m Day 5b: Temple of Clouds 1500g + 2o + 2w +2g Day 6a: Altar of Earth 2000g + 10o Day 6b: Temple of Ice 1500g + 5c Day 7a: Altar of Thought 3000g + 5o +5w +2cgms Day 7b: Citadel 2500g + 5o ·ŽŽŽŽŽŽŽŽŽµŽŽŽŽŽŽŽŽŽŽŽŽŽŽŽŽŽŽµŽŽŽŽŽŽŽŽŽŽŽŽŽŽŽŽŽŽŽŽŽŽŽë There are many variants of the building order - I've picked two extremes. The a) variant aims at quick exploration with minimal losses... it assumes that you upgrade Flower of Life on Day1 Week2 to get non-retaliated flyer (with some extra troops from starting heroes) along with two shooters. The b) variant assumes that you don't hurry anywhere or you need some good walkers (and four psychic elementals are quite a strong force) Both of these variants can be enhanced if there's any of the first three picks already built. In case of b) variant, it can be wise to skip TownHall in favor of Citadel, if you can get some extra gold from the map. Resource summary: For a) variant, you'll need 15w, 35o, some cgms and 14500g, which leaves us (20000 + 7000 - 14500) = 12500g for Day 1 to spend on troops. For b) variant, you'll need 7w + 22o, some cgms and 13000g. And that's about how much will the first three upgraded troops cost on day1. When choosing the right variant of build schedule, take ore requirements into consideration, since the b) variant is lower on them. Troops cost weekly (with castle): Without 7th level: 20500 With 7th level: 28500 Without Capitol, you'll probably want to save 8000 a week by not buying the two walker elementals, but even than you'll be 6500 short of the requirements for all-out sale. Once you get Capitol up, it'll cover all your production, but if you keep avoiding the two lower walkers, you'll quickly catch back and be able to buy out all shooters, sprites, phoenixes and psychic elementals from the earlier weeks. HPs grown weekly: 1800 (plus 800 in phoenixes) at 11.39 g/HP (10.96) - Phoenixes are the only 7thlevel that actually makes your average HP cost lower. This gives you second place among all castles in HP production. Benefits: Blacksmith: Produces Ballista war machines Artifact Merchants: Trade resources for artifacts... Resource silo: adds 1 mercury per day. In long games worth it. Pixie branches: Increases growth of pixies by 10 - important one. Shipyard: Allows ships to be built. Magic university: Heroes can learn (for 2000g) magic schools. Strategy You'll need some ore in the first week, especially if you choose the dwelling-oriented variant. In that case, you should also try to get as much gold as possible in order to be able to complete all moneygenerators in the second week... In the long run, you should focus on getting firebirds ASAP... You don't actually have to recruit them, but get the dwelling soon. Their nice growth rate will be worth it and the 10 mercury, wood and ore should be easy to obtain... Forces combination: With Capitol built, you can afford to recruit anything except magma elementals... (You could leave out any other unit, but magmas are the slowest). They provide an excellent defensive unit, since the only damage spell that really hurts them is meteor shower... (and therefore, the attacker will be only able to attack from distance (and by spells) or at close range with no spell support. So, you'll probably use the two shooters on the run. Note that both those shooters are quite good compared to other 2nd/3rdlevel troops. In fact, the only 3rdlevel with comparable hitpoints are Iron Golems. Of the ground walkers, Magic and Energy elementals form a good pair... the Energy folks are a good damage absorber, while the magics with their all-round attack are the 'main' killer unit. Yet the magic folks suffer from low HPs, so you should use them cautiously. Also keep in mind that you can't help them with ANY kind of magic! In early phases of scouting and exploring, you can divide your troops into two armies... One hero can lead the two shooters (their stacks should be quite numerous, so they could be splitted) with either phoenixes or one walker as a cover force. The other hero can have sprites and walkers to deal with walkers/flyers... This hero should, however, definitely try to develop expert Haste/Slow so as to assure tactical advantage for the sprites... Heroes: All planeswalkers are elementals that provide some stat boosts to their elemental type in battle. Along with A/D boost, Thunar and Erdamon boost Earth/Magma elementals' damage rating by 5 points, suddenly making them a VERY useful unit, while Ignissa and Fiur get less significant +2 for Fire/Energy elementals... Monere, on the other hand, starts with Logistics and Tactics and enhances A/D of magic elementals... he's the best choice, IMHO... at least in larger maps. Planeswalkers generally get good skills at start - Offense and Tactics appear often. Among elementalists, the nicest folks seem to be Labetha with Stoneskin, Brissa with Haste and possibly Inteus with Bloodlust. Gelare and Grindan (+350 gold) are ideal secondary heroes. Also, the Luna's return with doubled Firewall can be a good pick for a primary spellcaster. Note one important thing - all elementalists start with magic school corresponding with their special, so you'll have one less worry. Skills important for the troops and strategy: Either Air or Earth magic for Haste/Slow purposes would be good to any hero, including Planeswalkers. Since the basic elemental types are vulnerable to some kinds of magic, maybe even Resistance could be considered, since it's quite probable that opponents will hardly resist the temptation to fry the storm elementals for double damage... Water magic could be also considered as an important skill. Not only it provides Mass Prayer that makes Haste obsolete, but it provides (with much higher probability) Bless... and with 50 sprites/week, the max+1 damage really counts, not mentioning that the lower elementals have quite wide damage ranges. Other than that, the troops are a mixed bag stuff... yet if you'll accept the archers/walkers force division suggested above, you might want Archery for the shooter-based army. Unit A D HP Dmg Sp $$ AdjD Dm/g grow weekD Sprites 2 2 3 1-3 9 30 1.68 5.40 60 101 Storm elementals 9 9 25 2-8 8 275 4.90 1.78 10 84 Ice elementals 8 10 30 3-7 6 375 5 1.33 14 59 Energy elementals 12 8 35 4-6 8 400 5.50 1.38 12 60 Magma elementals 11 11 40 6-10 6 500 8.40 1.68 12 67 Magic elementals 15 13 75 15-25 9 800 23 3.13 4 100 Phoenixes 21 18 200 20-40 21 2000 46.50 2.33 4 186 Chapter VII: Tower guide Strengths: Titans - the only 7thlevel shooter. Hordes of gremlins at start Best 6thlevel troop. Three shooters and two flyers. Useful special of Master Genies (if used properly, see below) Land mines instead of moat. They're affected by the spellpower of defending hero (which is usually a pretty high number.) Weaknesses: Titans and Nagas are very expensive. Worst heroes (only a few are really good) Army evaluation: Gremlins 3/3/4/1-2/4/30 Master Gremlins 4/4/4/1-2/5/40, shoots The only 1stlevel shooter! But don't be too happy - gremlins are weak both in offense and in defense. However, expert bless gives them 100% increase ;-) Stone Gargoyles 6/6/16/2-3/6/130 Obsidian Gargoyles 7/7/16/2-3/9/160 An average unit, good against shooters. Stone Golems 7/10/30/4-5/3/150, 50% damage from magic Iron Golems 9/10/35/4-5/5/200, 25% damage from magic Ideal troop for castle defense - cheap, tough, magic resistant and with solid damage, this one can block holes in castle walls forever. Magi 11/8/25/7-9/5/350, no melee penalty Arch Magi 12/9/30/7-9/7/450, no melee penalty, reduces spell costs by 2, no walls penalty Strong shooter with good specials. Genies 12/12/40/13-16/7/550, hates Efreet Master Genies 12/12/40/13-16/11/600, hates Efreet, casts random beneficial spell Very potent unit (for sitting in the back line and casting spells), also for cleaning of low-level units. Keep out of reach of enemy grunts. Nagas 16/13/110/20/5/1100, no retaliation Naga Queens 16/13/110/30/7/1600, no retaliation Best 6thlevel troop, but the cost reflects that. Giants 19/16/150/40-60/7/2000 + 1g, immune to mind spells Titans 24/24/300/40-60/11/5000 + 2g, immune to mind spells, shoots, no melee penalty, 150% damage against dragons Very potent but expensive. Luckily, unupgraded variant can be built quickly. Upgrading priorities: * Master Gremlins: High in early game, because their numbers are great. * Obsidian Gargoyles: Low, unless needed against shooters. Good for scout arm, however. * Iron Golems: Very Low, unless you can't build Nagas or unless you've got plenty of them and need them for offensive. * Arch Magi: Higher, speed up and sieging special are worth it. * Master Genies: High, their special, although uncontrollable, works wonders. * Naga Queens: High for +50% damage and +2 speed. * Titans: Top, although very costly. One of the best 7thlevels. Castle building in the first week: Day 1: Town Hall 2500g Day 2: Parapet 1000g + 10o Day 3: Golem Factory 2000g + 5w + 5o Day 4: Mage Guild 2000 g + 5w + 5o Day 5: Mage Tower 2500g + 5w + 5o + 5cgms Day 6a: Golden Pavillion 4000g + 5w +5o + 2cgms Day 6b: Altair of Wishes 3000g + 5w + 5o + 6cg Day 7: Citadel 2500g + 5o Workshop as 1stlevel dwelling assumed present. If it's not present, we must forget about Citadel or one of the alternative day6 buildings, unless we decide to delay TownHall. If we have enough resources, we can sacrifice Townhall and Citadel to build ALL dwellings in the first week, since Cloud Temple costs only 5000g + 10w + 10o + 10g. I'd vote for that in cases where a HillFort is nearby to upgrade the two giants to titans on the very next day - with such unstoppable force you can explore very aggresively, so the costs will come back fast. If gold is abundant, the TownHall can wait in favor of Genies AND Nagas built in the first week. Resource summary: You'll need 20w, 35o and 16500g, which leaves us (20000 + 7000 - 16500) = 10500g for Day 1 to spend on troops. Since most of the troops are much better upgraded, I'd suggest buying out Nagas and Magi and use these two troops for exploration force. (However, an upgraded Workshop will usually throw in a significant amount (100+) master gremlins. I consider Nagas better than Genies for the second week exploration, since they have non-retaliated attack. I also recommend upgrading them. [They're very expensive - but I suggest to compare them with 7thlevel behemoths (unupgraded) to see that they're worth the money.] Second week strategies: After getting City Hall, focus on two or three troops types, upgrade them and try to buy them all in third week. (I suggest Naga Queens, Arch Magi and Master Gremlins.) All other upgrades can wait. Pay extreme attention to securing ALL mines - you'll need a lot of rare resources to get the most out of your troops and heroes. Troops cost weekly (with castle): Without 7th level: 20800 With 7th level: 30800 With one castle producing 14000/week and one of the most expensive army sets, you'll get used to ignoring golems and either genies or gargoyles completely until you secure large gold sources. Tower is the only town that isn't self-sufficient even with Capitol - the Titans add 10000, thus making the weekly budget almost 3000 in deficit. HPs grown weekly 1820 (plus 600 in titans) at 11.42 g/HP (12.72) Benefits: * Artifact Merchants: May be useful, but seldom you'll have 10 grand to spare. * Blacksmith: Ammo Cart (useless); * Library: Extra spell in each level of guild - great! * Lookout Tower: May be useful in cases where you must choose one path in early exploration (i.e. if two ways are guarded by two strong armies and you can't beat both with the same force.). Also good if you have a close Necro neighbour, as it eliminates Cover of Darkness in a too close city. * Resource Silo: +1 gem /day * Sculptor's wings: +4 gargoyle growth (good). * Wall of knowledge: +1 knowledge per hero (good, esp. for defending heroes. Strategy In your first week, ore will be crucial, if you want high dwellings. Wood can wait into second week for City Hall action. Try to use upgraded troops (esp. gremlins). Forces combination: If your starting heroes have brought many gremlins, upgrade them ASAP. For their protection, any slower walker may be used. However, if gremlins are low in count, you might press for upgrade on Nagas and use them with their high damage and speed as the main offensive unit. I often explore with Nagas being the only troop, divided in two or three stacks. Once you get Master Genies, take two to four strong armies (master gremlin hordes, magi, nagas and/or titans) and split the genies into all the remaining free slots. Having i.e. three offensive armies and four master genies to cast a spell on them each turn is a very effective combination, as the genies can cast any beneficial spell, ranging from 'Protection from ...' to Prayer! The genii should engage battle only in absolute need. They can cast three times in a battle. They won't cast duplicate spells, they won't cast spells useless under current battle condition (like Protection from... when enemy hero cannot cast spells.) Their spells are cast at power 6 and Advanced level of the corresponding school. Heroes: Best pick from Alchemists is Torosar (Tactics, Ballista). Fafner likes Nagas, others aren't that useful (Golems, Gargoyles and Genies aren't critical offensive units and having a special wasted at them isn't good). Wizards are better: Astral is hypnotizer with Advanced Wisdom, Cyra has Diplomacy and Haste. Theodorus has Ballistics and promotes Magi, but the all-round favorite pick is Solmyr with ChainLightning! Others are useless, except for Aine (350 gold) as secondary. Skills important for the troops and strategy: With three shooters (and esp. Titans), get Archery! With Libraries, you might consider Sorcery and Magic Schools, because the probability of getting useful spells is much higher. Unit A D HP Dmg Sp $$ AdjD Dm/g grow weekD Master Gremlins 4 4 4 1-2 5 40 1.32 3.30 32 42 Obsidian Garg, 7 7 16 2-3 9 160 2.35 1.47 22 52 Iron Golems 9 10 35 4-5 5 200 4.41 2.21 12 53 Arch Magi 12 9 30 7-9 7 450 8.80 1.96 8 70 Master Genies 12 12 40 13-16 11 600 15.95 2.66 6 96 Naga Queens 16 13 110 30-30 7 1600 39 2.44 4 156 Titans 24 24 300 40-60 12 5000 85 1.70 2 170 Chapter VIII: Stronghold guide Strengths: Cheapest troops Most offensive troops Weaknesses: Lack of potent shooters - cyclops are hard to build due to ore and crystal requirements. Only one flyer Army evaluation: Goblins 4/2/5/1-2/5/40 Hobgoblins 5/3/5/1-2/7/50 Due to their speed, both goblins and hobgoblins are somewhat more useful than you'd expect for a 1stlevel troop. Wolf riders 7/5/10/2-4/6/100 Wolf raiders 8/5/10/3-4/8/140, two strikes A good offensive troop. They're extremely bad on defense, so you need to protect them. Orcs 8/4/15/2-5/4/150 Orc chieftans 8/4/20/2-5/5/165 Another offensive unit - they make good cheap shooters and upgraded are pretty durable. Ogres 13/7/40/6-12/4/300 Ogre magi 13/7/60/6-12/5/400, cast Bloodlust Ogres are great fighters, yet their lower speed assures them defensive tasks, especially protection of orcs. BloodLust is cast at Advanced level (+6 attack) and is affected by Magic Plains/Cursed Ground. Rocs 13/11/60/11-15/7/600 Thunderbirds 13/11/60/11-15/11/700, Lightning attack Both variants are good flying fighters, important in most battles. Cyclopes 15/12/70/16-20/6/750, attacks siege walls (Basic Ballistic level) Cyclops kings 17/13/70/16-20/8/1100, attacks siege walls (Adv. Ballistic level) Powerful special! Behemoths 17/17/160/30-50/6/1500, reduces target defense by 40% Ancient Behemoths 19/19/300/30-50/9/3000 + 1c, reduces target defense by 80% Behemoths make excellent fighters, although they're not as remarkable as other 7thlevel creatures. Upgrading priorities: * Hobgoblins: Low, unless you're going to use them in offensive campaigns. Taking into account affinity of castle tower fire towards them, you probably will take them along only as cannonfodder. * Wolf raiders: High, for the speed boost, double attack and higher damage. May become low if you manage to build Rocs and Behemoths quickly. * Orc chieftans: High, for the increased HPs and higher speed. * Ogre magi: High, for the special and +50% HPs. * Thunderbirds: Top, for the +4 speed and nice cleaning special. * Cyclope Kings: Moderate, for increased special effect and +2 speed. * Ancient Behemoths: High, for the speed boost and almost doubled HPs. Castle building in the first week: Day 1: Town Hall 2500g Day 2: Wolf pen 1000 g + 10w + 5o Day 3: Orc Tower 1000g + 5w + 5o Day 4: Cliff Nest 2500g + 10o Day 5: Behemoth Lair 10000g + 10w + 10o + 10c Day 6: Ogre Fort 2000g + 20w Day 7: Citadel 2500g + 5o Goblin Barracks as 1stlevel dwelling assumed present. If it's not present, we don't go for Ogre Fort. If we can't get enough resources, we should focus on less dwellings and try to upgrade them. A good combination is Hobgoblins, WolfRaiders and Thunderbirds (and these troops are pretty fast, too!) Resource summary: You'll need 25w (45 with ogres), 35o and 21500g, which leaves us (20000 + 7000 - 21500) = 5500g (7500 without ogres) for Day 1 to spend on troops. That isn't any much, but you'll be able to recruit three behemoths and a few rocs, which should provide capable army for exploration. The minimal variant with upgraded cliff nest, wolf pen and goblin barracks, but without orc tower, ogre fort and behemoth lair requires 7000 less gold, so you'll be able to recruit all the built troops and still have some gold left to raise CityHall quickly, if you'll get the required wood. Second week strategies: If you choose the rich variant with all dwellings, you'll have a lot of unpurchased troops in the castle, so hurry for all the gold you can get. The minimal variant will have priorities in getting all the extra wood, ore and a crystal mine first and extra gold later. Troops cost weekly (with castle): Without 7th level: 18530 With 7th level: 24530 With one castle producing 14000/week, you will probably do well without ogres and possibly either goblins or wolfraiders... yet the goblins make good cannonfodder for AI castle turrets. Capitol at 28000/week will spare some 4000 gold a week, thus making the Stronghold the richest town in the game. HPs grown weekly 1770 (plus 600 in ancient behemoths) at 10.46 g/HP (10.35). (Behemoths are the cheapest/HP 7thlevel around!) Benefits: * Blacksmith: Ammo Carts (useless, even dangerous as a target for magogs and liches) * Ballista Yard: Blacksmith upgrade, Ballistas aren't useless ;-) * Freelancer's Guild: a good way to convert forces that joined you to something useful (especially if they're some nuts like Zombies ;-)) * Resource Silo: +1w and +1o per day * Escape Tunnel: if you've got enough money, get the tunnels so that you can save armies if unexpected enemies appear. * Hall of Valhalla: +1 Attack, worth it. * Mess Hall: +8 goblin growth - get it soon or never. Strategy: Since your dwellings are cheap, you can get behemoths in first week. You'll need some extra wood and even more extra ore, however. (and 20 wood for ogres, too). However, the behemoth lair will make a large suction in your cash reserves, so be careful and keep some spare cash for building economy later. Forces combination: The behemoths alone in second week are enough to do most exploring. The thunderbird variant isn't aby bad, too, but since the two supporting troops are very weak, they'll tend to suffer casualties, unless used very carefully. In later phases, go for upgraded behemoths quickly, as they're much more durable and considerably faster. Goblins and Ogres are quite good for castle defense, but since their upgraded versions are faster, you might want to take them on the road with your might hero. In that case, cyclopes might be used as the reserve troop, until their number accumulates into a useful shooter stack. (However, cyclopes in castle sieges are good even in the lowest numbers, as the damage dealt to castle walls isn't dependant on the size of the attacking cyclopes stack - so if you enter the battle with four stacks of two cyclopes, you'll have four extra catapult attacks per turn. One cyclope isn't enough, however, since the castle towers will score 100+ damage and would eliminate him.) Heroes: From the barbarians, Crag Hack is the best with Advanced Offense and 5% per level bonus to it. Gurnisson's ballista is a good thing. Tyraxor with Tactics and WolfRaider speciality seems a good pick, too. All others are fair, maybe except Krellion (Ogres and Resistance.) Battle Mages: Dessa with Logistics is a good one. Gundula is a spellcasting version of Crag Hack (Offense). Terek is my personal favorite (Tactics and Haste special - Those two combined guarantee you a huge first strike. It is, however, very wise to try and acquire some very fast unit (phoenix, archangel, some dragon etc, so that you play first and have time to cast Haste)). Zubin is good for shooters (Precision). Others don't seem good. Skills important for the troops and strategy: Offense is the key to success, because your troops already score good damage, having very high attack rating - and expanding it by 15% is certainly worth one secondary slot. With two shooters and four walkers, Ballistics seems a bit better than Archery, taking the not-so-good availability of cyclopes into account. Unit A D HP Dmg Sp $$ AdjD Dm/g grow weekD Hobgoblins 5 3 5 1-2 7 50 1.35 2.70 38 51 Wolf raiders 8 5 10 3-4 8 140 3.36 2.40 18 60 Orc chieftans 8 4 20 2-5 5 165 3.36 2.04 14 47 Ogre magi 13 7 60 6-12 5 400 10.35 2.59 8 83 Thunderbirds 13 11 60 11-15 11 700 14.95 2.14 6 90 Cyclops kings 17 13 70 16-20 8 1100 24.30 2.21 4 97 Ancient Behemoths 19 19 300 30-50 9 3000 58 1.93 2 116 Chapter IX: Fortress guide Strengths: Four two-hex creatures (although it may be considered a weakness, too ;-)) Best 4thlevel troop Dangerous 7thlevel creature Fast flyers Two-hex moat! (Effectively doubling the time walkers will need to cross.) Weaknesses: Slow armies Poor shooters Army evaluation: Gnolls 3/5/6/2-3/4/50 Gnoll Marauders 4/6/6/2-3/5/70 They offer above average 1stlevel performance, but that doesn't mean you should use them. Lizardmen 5/6/14/2-3/4/110 Lizard Warriors 6/8/15/2-5/5/140 Since the SOD upgrade, they're a bit more durable and also score higher damage. That makes the only fortress shooter more important. Serpent Flies 7/9/20/2-5/9/220. dispel target Dragon Flies 8/10/20/2-5/13/240, dispel target, cast weakness on enemies I like those flies because of their speed rating. They're excellent for taking out shooters and sweep those little stacks that wander somewhere on the battlefield. Also they can take some damage... and they'll love Bless. (And they got quite better in SOD, including the weakness special.) Basilisks 11/11/35/6-10/5/325, petrifying attack Greater Basilisks 12/12/40/6-10/7/400, petrifying attack They fight well, their special ain't any bad and they're two-hex - good for blocking. Gorgons 10/14/70/12-16/5/525 Mighty Gorgons 11/16/70/12-16/6/600, death stare Their special is great. They're extremely durable, again two-hex and in fact cheap. In long games, they make the Fortress superior, since they can wipe out 7thlevel monsters like nothing. Wyverns 14/14/70/14-18/7/800 Wyvern Monarchs 14/14/70/18-22/11/1100, poisoning attack Pretty dangerous, although low on health. A nice special (to watch ;-). They should not be used to battle higher level units - use their speed for hit'n'run against shooters, catapults in castle defenses etc. Also, they can be built pretty soon and serve as a crucial exploration army. Hydras 16/18/175/25-45/5/2200, no retaliation, attack all adjacent Chaos Hydras 18/20/250/25-45/7/3500 +1s, no retaliation, attack all adjacent Fourth two-hex creature in Fortress, quite tough ones. Their special is pretty strong, if used effectively. You gotta try and get Expert Water Magic and Teleport ;-) Upgrading priorities: * Gnoll Marauders: Lowest. They're nothing but cannon fodder, used in exploring and in castle defenses. * Lizard Warriors: Low. They're not strong enough to be important. * Dragon Flies: High, for the speed that takes them to the other side. * Greater Basilisks: Low, as they're used mainly for protection and cleanup works. That is, unless you decide to use them as a main fighting stack, which they can do, as well. * Mighty Gorgons: High, although it doesn't seem so, they're quite offensive weapon, mainly because they can walk out there and stand some damage. * Wyvern Monarchs: High for +20% damage and +4 speed. They will be quite important in eliminating enemy ranged attackers. * Chaos Hydra: High. The HP and speed increase makes them less inferior compared to other 7thlevel units - and therefore gives you more room to exploit their devastating special. Castle building in the first week: Day 1: Town Hall 2500g Day 2: Lizard Den 1000g + 5w Day 3: Serpent Fly Hive 1000g + 5w + 2m + 2s Day 4: Wyvern Nest 3500 g + 15w Day 5a: Basilisk Pit 2000g + 10o + 5w Day 6a: Gorgon Lair 2500g + 10w + 10o + 5m +5s Day 5b: Upg. Wyvern Nest 3000g + 10w + 10m Day 6b: Upg. Serpent Fly Hive 1000g + 2m + 2s Day 7: Citadel 2500g + 5o ·ŽŽŽŽŽŽŽŽŽµŽŽŽŽŽŽŽŽŽŽŽŽŽŽŽŽŽŽŽŽŽŽŽµŽŽŽŽŽŽŽŽŽŽŽŽŽŽŽŽŽŽŽŽŽŽŽŽŽŽŽŽë Gnoll hut as 1stlevel dwelling assumed present. The a) variant may also build Hydra Pond instead of Gorgon Lair, if you're lucky enough to have all the resources. The b) variant is cheaper and is good especially against wandering shooters, as you get two fast flyers. Both troops assure you the biggest movement bonus. (And one Dragon Fly is therefore typical Scout army). Resource summary: For a) variant, you'll need 40w, 25o and 15000g, which leaves us (20000 + 7000 - 14500) = 12500g for Day 1 to spend on troops. Since we have a total of six dwellings, the cash won't buy us all the troops. (And it'll be even worse with the Hydra variant, but you can then purchase two hydras, which is 350 non-retaliated-against HPs - against walkers/flyers it ain't any bad!) For b) variant, you'll need 35w + 5o and 14500g. That will leave you 13000 for troops, then, which will be enough to buy out all wyvern monarchs (5x1100) and all dragon flies (20x240) and still some gold left to start for City Hall (or it can be MageGuild + spellbook!). The trouble with this variant is extra 4 bits of mercury you need. As you can see, in both cases, you'll need lots of wood. If you can't snatch any wood around your castle, the building schedule will change at day 4, where you'll get Gorgon Lair for the last wood, buy the three gorgons and start exploring for wood fast! (And in the meantime, you'll be only able to build benefit buildings that need no wood.) There is also a third variant - going straight after wyverns - building them on day three, and with two of them exploring against some stronger, mainly shooting wandering stacks. In that variant, you may then either go towards dwellings (and I recommend to try and get gorgon lair in first week). You should not worry about economy buildings - the extra exploration gained via wyverns should give you access to more resources and money, so that you can concentrate on dwellings and growth increase (Citadel and Castle). Second week strategies: If your wood stock is good, go after the City Hall. If it's not, it'll have to wait, but plan your gold consumption carefully, so that the CityHall is up and running ASAP. Troops cost weekly (with castle): Without 7th level: 19220 With 7th level: 26220 With one castle producing 14000/week, you'd better decide to leave some units in reserve... It can be basiliks, lizardmen or gnolls... but most probably two of those. Then I would scrap those that don't get any support from external dwellings. Capitol gives 28000/week, two chaos hydras add 7000, so we're getting some 1500g/week surplus. HPs grown weekly 1712 (plus 500 in Chaos Hydras) at 11.22 g/HP (11.85) Benefits: * Blacksmith: First Aid Tents sold here. A good thing. * Blood Obelisk: +2 Attack under siege. Very good. * Cage of Warlords: Gives +1 D to any visiting hero. Pretty Good. * Captain's Quarters: +6 Gnolls/week. Get this early or never. * Glyphs of fear: +2 Defense under siege. Very good. * Resource Silo: +1w and +1o per day. Good if you have only one sawmill and one or more extra villages to build up. Strategy Wood is an absolute priority. You'll need to gather at least 35 bits of wood, if you want six dwellings and City Hall (not mentioning castle and hydras, which need another 10 bits each). Forces combination: Gnolls should stay home unpurchased. Good offensive force for early stages might be Wyvern Monarchs and Dragon Flies. If you'll be taking castles, have lizardmen as cannonfodder with you. Otherwise you might need nothing else. However, Gorgons (and Mighty Gorgons even more) make a good offensive unit. A typical usage would be all three stacks waiting, enemy approaching, their shooters scoring half damage, your gorgons then having one attack at the fastest enemies, your fliers then attack enemy shooters in the waiting part of turn and if shooters are no longer a threat, in second turn both flyers returning back to deal with walkers. When you get hydras upgraded, take them along to provide another unit to handle enemy walkers/flyers. If you're rich, buy out basilisks, too, as they're pretty formidable fighters. (But they make a good unpurchased reserve in castles for defense, or good purchased reserve as a deterrent of potential attackers). Mighty gorgons' special Death stare is very powerful and depends on the size of the gorgon stack. The more MGs you have, the higher losses the death stare will score, on average. Since their special isn't anyhow dependant of the enemy type, a stack of 30+ gorgons is excellent to inflict heavy losses to highlevel enemy units. Gorgons themselves with their high HPs can afford to suffer retaliatory attacks from those enemies... Note that you should try not to waste MGs to attack lower level creatures. Wyvern special causes the affected enemy stack to lose 10% of HP limit every turn and lasts for three turns. The HP limit loss is irreversible within the battle. (So this is somewhat less powerful version of 'Aging' of Bone dragons, yet with permanent effect.) Heroes: Among Beastmasters, avoid Drakon (Gnolls) and Bron (Basilisks, Basic Resistance). Gerwulf has Ballista and knows how too use it. Korbac has Pathfinding, Tazar is Armorer. Others are OK. Bron will, with starting armies, make a good scout, though. Witches: Mirlanda is good with Weakness. Andra has Intelligence, so you can go for SpellPower. (And she's a good castle defender, too.) Rosic and Tiva are useless. Voy is excellent as a sea scout (Navigation). Verdish has First Aid bonus - can be used well with Hydras alone, or with two wyverns as the early exploration hero. Skills important for the troops and strategy: Armorer is a good thing here to extend the higher Defense stats of creatures (and all BeastMasters have it, anyway), as well as higher Defense gaining probabilities of heroes. Offense could be taken in to compensate for lack of Attack in both heroes and creatures' stats. Ballistics is a must with so many walkers, especially gorgons and hydras. If you manage to get Tactics and Expert Haste (or with external guild Expert Prayer), the good speed of dragonflies will often enable you to speed up all units and deliver a powerful first blow (allowing MGs and hydras to pick targets well.) Unit A D HP Dmg Sp $$ AdjD Dm/g grow weekD Gnoll Marauders 4 6 6 2-3 5 70 2.20 3.14 30 66 Lizard Warriors 6 8 15 2-5 5 140 3.22 2.30 18 52 Dragon Flies 8 10 20 2-5 13 240 3.36 1.40 16 54 Greater Basilisks 12 12 40 6-10 7 400 8.80 2.20 8 70 Mighty Gorgons 11 16 70 12-16 6 600 14.70 2.45 6 88 Wyvern Monarchs 14 14 70 18-22 11 1100 24 2.18 4 96 Chaos Hydras 18 20 250 25-45 7 3500 49 1.40 2 98 Chapter X: Inferno guide Strengths: 7thlevel fast flyers with non-retaliated attack, although pretty expensive. Excellent 3rdlevel monster. Castle gate! - In larger maps it's very good! Weaknesses: Four armies are walkers - higher losses in sieges. Measly shooter that is often dangerous for his own buddies. (Never press Auto in battles ;-)) Army evaluation: Imps 2/3/4/1-2/5/50 Familiars 4/4/4/1-2/7/60, drains 20% of enemy's spent mana Maybe they should be called wimps instead, coz they definitely are... However, the familiars are pretty fast and their special sometimes comes handy. And one more good thing - AI loves to kill them... Gogs 6/4/13/2-4/4/123 Magogs 7/4/13/2-4/6/175, area attack The faster magogs are useful with their special (especially against heroes with six or armies and some war machines ;-)), but if the enemy manages to put all stacks adjacent to yours, they are useless ;-) Hell Hounds 10/6/25/2-7/7/200 Cerberi 10/8/25/2-7/8/250, no retaliation, attack enemies adjacent to target One of the best 3rdlevel monsters, Cerberi with their boosted numbers and non-retaliated wide attack are a great offensive weapon. Demons 10/10/35/7-9/5/250 Horned Demons 10/10/40/7-9/6/270 They're tough, they're cheap, they can be raised almost like skeletons. Do you need anything more? Pit Fiends 13/13/45/13-17/6/500 Pit Lords 13/13/45/13-17/7/700, can raise demons from slain allies Although costly, they make good fighters and their special comes handy when your familiars or gogs have been crushed. Since the demons are raised permanently, this special can be expanded to great effects. Efreet 16/12/90/16-24/9/900, immune to Fire Magic Efreet Sultans 16/14/90/16-24/13/1100, immune to Fire Magic, FireShield Very mobile and dangerous flyers. Good for magic combos. AI targets them often. Devils 19/21/160/30-40/11/2700 + 1m, no retaliation, 150% against angels, reduce enemy luck Archdevils 26/28/200/30-40/17/4500 + 2m, no retaliation, 150% against angels, reduce enemy luck Very effective 7thlevel units, although not as tough as we would like them. Will take out angels any day of the week ;-), but will get kicked badly by Archangels. Upgrading priorities: * Familiars: Lowest. Used as cannonfodder. Upgrade if you're gonna have strong spellcasters as opponents. * Magogs: Moderate. In early exploration, the fireballs work wonders against flyers and walkers. * Cerberi: Highest. The best upgrade of Inferno castle. * Horned Demons: Low. I don't use them if I don't have to. * Pit Lords: Same as Demonds. * Efreet Sultans: High. +4 speed along with FireShield make them great anti-shooter army. * Archdevils: High, since upgraded can move almost across the whole battle field (and play last in waiting and first afterwards, allowing two consecutive strikes with no retaliation.) Castle building in the first week: Day 1: Town Hall 2500g Day 2: Hall of Sins 1000g + 5o Day 3: Kennels 1500g + 10w + 5o Day 4: Demon Gate 2000g + 5w + 5o Day 5a: Mage Guild 2000g + 5w +5o Day 6a: Fire Lake 4000g + 10o + 3gms Day 5b: Hell Hole 3000g Day 6b: Cages 1000g Day 7: Citadel 2500g + 5o Crucible as 1stlevel dwelling assumed present. If it's not present, we are forced to take the b) variant, shifted one day and therefore without cages. (or we could skip TownHall). The a) variant is for the gold-richer scenarios, while the b) variant is for those where gold is scarce. The b) variant can be made even cheaper, skipping Hell Hole and instead upgrading Kennels or Hall of Sins, with the other upgrade done on day1 - and the army of magogs and cerberi set for exploring. Resource summary: For a) variant, you'll need 20w, 30o and 15500g, which leaves us (20000 + 7000 - 15500) = 11500g for Day 1 to spend on troops. Efreet will cost 5x900, cerberi upgraded on day1 will take 1500 + 12x250, gogs 20x125 - total 11500. (well, four less gogs and we can get a spellbook ;-)). In this variant, the trouble is the 10 extra ore. The b) variant will take 15w, 15o and 13500g (with hellhole skipped in favor of kennel upgrade 11500g). That leaves 15500g for shopping on day1 - where it would be 1000 + 20x175 for magogs, 15x250 for Cerberi and 7250 gold left for demons/imps or saved for castle expansion. If we get the hellhole and recruit pit fiends for 7x500, we'll still be left something about 2000g. There could be even more-saving variant - build townhall, hall of sins, kennels, cages, upg. kennels, upg. hall of sins, citadel, upg. crucible - and recruit all familiars, cerberi and gogs. That would save most of the resources for raising money generator early in second week and possibly getting either hellhole or firelake by the end of that week. Second week strategies: City Hall should be the first priority, if you can scrap enough wood. (By day 3 of first week you should have chosen one of the minimal variants, if it was clear that wood would be scarce.) Later, you should start getting some mercury. Resource silo is costly, but pays back in longer games. The ideal building schedule would be: day1: upgrade of kennels/hall of sins, followed by marketplace, blacksmith, (mageguild if saving variant was chosen), cityhall, horde dwelling, castle. In the next week, you should wait for the Capitol, spending nothing. Troops cost weekly (with castle): Without 7th level: 19090 With 7th level: 28090 With one castle producing 14000/week, inferno players are quite used to leave demons and imps at home, possibly also either hellhounds or pit fiends, especially if they're not upgraded yet. Capitol at 28000/week will just about support full army production. HPs grown weekly 1635 (plus 400 in archdevils) at 11.68 g/HP (13.80) Benefits: * Birthing Pool: +8 crucible production. Early or never. * Blacksmith: Ammo Carts - never bought any. * Brimstone Clouds: +2 SpellPower when under siege (good one!) * Cages: +3 kennels production - a must have. * Castle Gate: Town Portal among Inferno Cities with Gates. Great, yet costly! * Order of Fire: +1 Spell Power for every visiting hero. Not bad. * Resource Silo: one mercury/day. Get it ASAP. Strategy Unless you get +10 ore, you'll be forced to one of those cheaper variants, but don't worry, they're not that bad. Wood source is quite important, but the extra wood will be needed during second week. Forces combination: Magogs, Cerberi and Efreet Sultans are a good expeditionary force, for longer campaings best accompanied by Pit Lords or Horned Demons to do the protective work. Use Efreet to lure enemies together and then try some area spells from Fire School. (Fireball, Inferno). In case that you get Armageddon somewhere, have a secondary hero close by, so that you can temporarily discard magogs and cerberi, launch the nukes and then continue... Demons and Familiars are good for castle defense - familiars will attract the enemy fire, while Demons will kick some butt. If you'll have good forces of Devils and Efreet, you might give all those Magogs (probably not any much due to castle towers' fire) and Cerberi to some secondary hero to enjoy those few extra movement points from units with speed 11+ for the main guy. However, get used to some losses in castle defenses, then. Take familiars with you to long journeys against spellcasters or generally strong opponents - AI will spend a lot of firepower attacking them and this may prolong lifetime of your main forces by some 5 battles. When using Magogs, watch out for war machines on enemy side. They can be targeted and if six or seven army slots are filled on the enemy's side, aiming at a war machine causes TWO adjacent armies to get hit. You might even want to cast Haste on the Magogs, if it'll help them to play before these two units can move. Using pit lords is simple and effective. I recommend waiting a few weeks to accumulate some decent number of them and then rush out. Try to get any low-level critters you can, recruit at castles, empty all dwellings and in battles with anything moving let the weakies perish and then be raised into demons! This is even better than necromancy, since the demons are far better than bones. You might even sacrifice your imps for this reason. But it works best with diplomacy - you could even have a secondary hero get diplomacy from a hut/university and with a force of pit lords and demons persuade willing stacks to join and sacrifice them in battles with the unwilling ;-). However, it takes some practice to force a particular stack to die... Heroes: Demoniacs: Calh is a gog fan and has Archery. Fiona is a good Scout and also handles hell hounds well. Ignatius is good with imps and has Tactics and Resistance. My favorite if Pyre (Logistics and Ballista specialist.) Octavia yields gold - a good secondary in early game. Nymus boosts Pit Lords and has Offense! If you're in for the demon summoning, take Marius that will make them better. Heretics: Ash has BloodLust (a good candidate for Fire Magic). Ayden has Intelligence - a good long-runner or castle defender. Other good ones: Olema - good for sieges. (Ballistics, Weakness). Xyron, Xarfax and Zydar make good Fire spellcasters (Fireball, Inferno and Sorcery, respectively). Skills important for the troops and strategy: Ballistics could be needed, since you have three tough walkers, of which usually cerberi and pit lords will be used in long campaigns. Since 6th and 7thlevel are flyers, you could also profit from Armorer skill, because these two armies will be under great strain, if they engage in battles behind castle walls. Sorcery and Expert Fire Magic for Heretics is extremely recommended, but either Air or Earth is a must - you'll either need the oponent to slow down, or your troops to hurry to use those potent attacks. Unit A D HP Dmg Sp $$ AdjD Dm/g grow weekD Familiars 4 4 4 1-2 7 60 1.32 2.20 38 50 Magogs 7 4 13 2-4 6 175 2.82 1.61 16 45 Cerberi 10 8 25 2-5 8 250 3.50 1.40 13 46 Horned Demons 10 10 40 7-9 6 270 8 2.96 8 64 Pit Lords 13 13 45 13-17 7 700 17.25 2.46 6 104 Efreet Sultans 16 14 90 16-24 13 1100 26 2.36 4 104 Archdevils 26 28 200 30-40 17 4500 63 1.40 2 126 Chapter XI: Necropolis guide Strengths: Skeleton production Vampire Lords with their regeneration Weaknesses: Ghost Dragons being not any strong in combat. Army evaluation: Skeletons 5/4/6/1-3/4/60 Skeleton warriors 6/6/6/1-3/5/70 Their strength lies in numbers, not their stats. Walking Dead 5/5/15/2-3/3/100 Zombies 5/5/20/2-3/4/125, cause disease (-2 A/D for three rounds) Almost useless, their role lies mostly in castle defending. Wights 7/7/18/3-5/5/200, regenerate Wraiths 7/7/18/3-5/7/230, regenerate, drain 2 spell points per turn Flyers of average speed, their use is in castle sieging and in eliminating4 weak shooters. I rarely use them, though. Vampires 10/9/30/5-8/6/360, no retalitation Vampire Lords 10/10/40/5-8/9/500, no retal., ressurect by damaging enemies In their resurrecting version, they make a good castle sieger. In high numbers, they're very hard to beat down. Note that the regeneration doesn't work if vampires attack non-living enemies (undead, golems, gargoyles...) Liches 13/10/30/11-13/6/550, area damage to living Power Liches 13/10/40/11-15/7/600, area damage to living Offensive stats, good speed and area attack make them a good sieging weapon. Black knights 16/16/120/15-30/7/1200, curse enemies Dread knights 18/18/120/15-30/9/1500, curse enemies, chance for double damage They're more than a match for champions - mainstay of offensive forces. Bone dragons 17/15/150/25-50/9/1800, lower morale Ghost dragons 19/17/200/25-50/14/3000 + 1m, lower morale, aging attack can halve HPs of enemy Although not very strong, their upgraded version is very useful in battles due to speed. Their special is quite dangerous, too. Upgrading priorities: * Skeleton Warriors: Low. Although used often, their performance isn't crucial. * Zombies: Lowest, they are rarely used for offensive purposes * Wraights: Moderate, the speed boost allows then to cross battlefield sooner. * Vampire Lords: Highest, dramatically prolongs their lifetime. * Power Liches: Moderate. It would be high, but they're way too often targeted by castle towers. * Death Knights: Higher for speed boost and destructive special. * Ghost Dragons: High for large battles with strong armies, generally a good upgrade for the speed boost - can reach most enemies as well as flee from them. Castle building in the first week: Day 1: Town Hall 2500g Day 2: Graveyard 1000g + 5o Day 3: Estate 2000g + 5w + 5o Day 4: Mage Guild 2000 g + 5w + 5o Day 5a: Mausoleum 2000g + 10o + 10s Day 6a: Hall of Darkness 6000g + 10w + 10o Day 5b: Necromancy Amplifier 1000g Day 6b: Tomb of Souls 1500g + 5w + 5o Day 7: Citadel 2500g + 5o Cursed Temple as 1stlevel dwelling assumed present. If it's not present, we choose the b) variant without Tomb of Souls. The a) variant requires a lot of money - use it if you have a stable gold source (a mine or a village). The b) variant is aimed at getting Upgraded Estate on day1 week2. Resource summary: For a) variant, you'll need 20w, 40o and 18000g, which leaves us (20000 + 7000 - 18000) = 9000g for Day 1 to spend on troops. This could be 5x1200 for Black Knights and the remaining 3000 could be used for 5 liches (but I would rather save that money for City Hall) For b) variant, you'll need 15w + 25o and 12500g. If you can't get the +5 ore, buy any benefit building instead of Tomb of Souls (Citadel is more important that Wights). And remember to include another 5 wood for upgrade of Estate on day1. Thus, you'll have 12500g for troops - which should easily pay for 10 Vampire Lords (10x500) and all available skeletons, while enough money should remain so that you can build City Hall, Mausoleum and Hall of Darkness within the second week (although you'll need some extra wood and ore by then.) With some luck, castle might be raised on day7, week2, capitol at least 5 days later and into the third week you could go with a pretty strong army. Second week strategies: The b) variant is mentioned above, the a) variant should get a CityHall ASAP and then head for Castle, Capitol and some upgrades. With some luck (and resources) you could be able to build Dragon Vault - so plan carefully - the extra dragon or two could prove more valuable than Castle/Capitol - so check the resources needed for the Vault. The Tomb of Souls doesn't have to be built at all - and the 5w and 5o might be needed elsewhere. Troops cost weekly (with castle): Without 7th level: 20920 With 7th level: 26920 With one castle producing 14000/week, you sure will adopt the policy of ignoring wights, zombies and even skeletons in order to get your only ranged attacker and two massive damage dealers... Capitol at 28000/week will change things around and start growing money. HPs grown weekly 1792 (plus 400 in ghost dragons) at 11.67 g/HP (12.28) Benefits: * Blacksmith: First Aid Tents sold here... Strange, ain't it? * Cover of Darkness: Generates shroud around city every turn - good for concealing your activities, but if I were you, I wouldn't build it before my enemies KNOW about my city - if their scouts uncover a bit of the affected area and next turn it is darkened again, they'll learn of your city's approximate location. Also, I'm not sure how this works against computer. * Necromancy Amplifier: A must - 10% necromancy boost. * Resource Silo: +1w and +1o per turn * Skeleton Transformer: A nice idea of disposing armies that offer to join. Why get less than 100% skeletons? ;-) * Unearthed graves: Increases skeleton growth by 6 - buy soon or never. Strategy In a) variant, ore is crucial. You have four days to determine which variant will you choose. Wood is crucial in second week, no doubt. Don't ever hope to buy all the troops that you'd like to - you'll need a good gold source for a decent number of days to get enough... Forces combination: I suggest Vampire Lords, Dread Knights, Power Liches and skeletons. Later, when you get the Ghost Dragons, you might make a special force of them and skeletons alone, possibly also accompanied with Wraiths that may have been unused till this time due to lack of gold. Wraiths divided into several stacks are a great choice - having one skeleton stack, one or two dragons and four wraith armies, best split to 1,1,1,rest works great. The enemy will either lose loads of mana or spend a lot of effort on killing a single wraith three times. (One wraith will drain as much mana as a hundred.) The wraiths in the above combination are used as a cleaning force, but sometimes you might sacrifice them to save the dragons. In the beginning, you'll be limited by money greatly - and it's better to pick only two from the three strong troops and stick to them. If you can, don't leave the liches home. In earlier phases, their offensive potential is great - definitely better that potential of Vampire Lords (until their number tops 20 at least). Upgrade to skeleton warriors only when you get dragons - skeleton warriors are raised like skeletons, but you have to have all slots occupied and no normal skeletons present - so the ideal setup is two stacks of Dread Knights, two stacks of Power Liches, one stack of Vampire Lords, Dragons and skeleton warriors. Yet you can split the Liches/Knights into more stacks. Later you might split skeletons and have either knights or liches together, depending on individual situations. IMHO 66 skel. warriors are better than 100 skeletons - the +1 speed gives you enough first strikes to compensate the lower numbers. Alternative to that can be amassing skeletons and every now and then using a scout to take some 100s of skellies home and upgrade them. When using Liches, watch out for war machines on enemy side. They can be targeted and if six or less army slots are filled on the enemy's side, aiming at a war machine causes TWO adjacent armies to get hit. Huge stacks of Vampire Lords should be used cautiously, mixing their targets - one round go attack something strong to cause non-retaliated damage. Second round - go replenish yourself at something with low defense rating, typically shooters to block them as a by-product. Critical to your strategy is the rule 'all that moves can be killed'. However, things are not as easy now as were back in HOMM2 - now the wandering armies will go after your skeletons and therefore the skeleton 'gain' may actually be a loss - be careful when messing with wandering armies of 4thlevel and higher creatures. Also, if you rely on skeletons, try hard to get Vial of Life or either one of the rings that increase HPs... Skellies profit from them greatly. Covenant suggests using always one might and one magic hero (preferrably Galthran (skeletons) and Thant (Raise dead)) and let them share the experience from slaying armies. The good thing here is that the might hero can be used against all weaker units, where he profits greatly from his A/D ratings, while the magic hero can tackle stronger wandering armies, compensating losses with Animate Dead. Also, it's a good idea to obtain Scholar skill for some scout so that Animate Dead can be passed from Thant to all your heroes (in case you didn't get it in some guild). With Earth magic, it's worth it to use Shield on skeletons, since they're gonna be targeted by most enemies, esp. AI. Heroes: Death Knights: Try to get Galthran if you want to rely on skeletons, since the +1 speed on them can be a crucial point, not mentioning A/D bonuses. Isra is a good starting pick with advanced necromancy and 5% bonus to it. Tamika (offense, knights) or Vokial (artillery, vampires) are useful. Moander (liches, learning) is not that great, learning is a wasted slot. Yet any of the might folks that sports one of crucial unit does a good job - the +1 speed decides many battles. Clavius (350 gold) is a good secondary. Among Necromancers, good are Aislinn (Meteor Shower), Sandro (Sorcery), Vidomina (adv. necro + 5%) and the all around popular Thant. Others don't seem any good to me. Skills important for the troops and strategy: None are exactly needed, but I recommend Earth Magic for Animate Dead and Death Ripple. Air magic should be useful with Haste, best combined with Tactics. Fire magic is another good choice - for Blinding, BloodLust and area spells. Also Curse is handy to counter Bless ;-). Water magic seems most useless, yet I think that Clone/Prayer/Teleport/Dispel aren't really bad spells and apart from the first one, they're mass versions with Expert. [counting the needed skills, we have Necromancy, Logistics, Earth Magic, Wisdom. The other four places could be used for the following: Tactics, Ballistics, Diplomacy (to get free bones) and Air/Fire/Intelligence.] Unit A D HP Dmg Sp $$ AdjD Dm/g grow weekD Skeleton warriors 6 6 6 1-3 5 70 1.84 2.63 30 55 Zombies 5 5 20 2-3 4 125 2.25 1.80 16 36 Wraiths 7 7 18 3-5 7 230 3.76 1.63 14 53 Vampire Lords 10 10 40 5-8 9 500 6.50 1.30 8 52 Power Liches 13 10 40 11-15 7 600 14.95 2.49 6 90 Dread knights 18 18 120 15-30 9 1500 31.50 2.10 4 126 Ghost dragons 19 17 200 25-50 14 3000 54.38 1.81 2 109 Chapter XII: Dungeon guide Strengths: Excellent 7thlevel troop with complete Magic immunity Two shooters and three flyers Harpy Hags special Weaknesses: Gold troubles in early game. Quite low HPs overall. Army evaluation: Troglodytes 4/3/5/1-3/4/50, immune to Blind Infernal troglodytes 5/4/6/1-3/5/65, immune to Blind Those little ugly things make a good cannonfodder for castle defenses, but I wouldn't take them into battle unless needed. Harpies 6/5/14/1-4/6/130, return after attack Harpy Hags 6/6/14/1-4/9/190, return after attack, no retaliation Probably the best 2ndlevel unit in the game - upgraded version, of course. With their high speed, they can sit out of enemy shooters' range, dive at the shooters, score damage and return back home - an excellent army for capturing castles. Unfortunately, the AI knows that and will target them often. Beholders 9/7/22/3-5/5/250, no melee penalty Evil Eyes 10/8/22/3-5/7/280, no melee penalty A potent shooter, should be the mainstay of your army. Medusas 9/9/25/6-8/5/300, petrifying attack, no melee penalty Medusa Queens 10/10/30/6-8/6/330, petrifying attack, no melee penalty With upgrade, they're excellent castle defender and also with their close combat special they needn't any strong protection. Minotaurs 14/12/50/12-20/6/500, good morale Minotaur Kings 15/15/50/12-20/8/575. good morale These big ugly guys should be used for crippling strong enemies. In most cases of a dungeon attacked, they were the only stack to stay alive after battle (and usually with little losses). Manticores 15/13/80/14-20/7/850 Scorpicores 16/14/80/14-20/11/1050, petrifying attack This strong flyer is excellent for attacking enemy shooters, as it be out of their range before the attack. The upgrade is excellent, the special helps them to survive at the enemy's end of battle field (often the petrified stack blocks further attacks.) Red Dragons 19/19/180/40-50/11/2500+1s, 1-4 spell imunity, two-hex attack Black Dragons 25/25/300/40-50/15/4000+2s, all spells imunity, tow-hex attack, 150% damage to giants and titans I guess nothing needs to be said about the black dragons - they're still the good old dragons they used to be. The reds, however, are considerably weak and should be upgraded ASAP. Upgrading priorities: * Infernal Troglodytes: Lower, in high numbers however, they make excellent castle defenses and upgrade increases HPs by 20% ;-). * Harpy Hags: Highest, for the speed and non-retaliated attack. * Evil Eyes: Moderate, for the +2 speed. * Medusa Queens: Higher, eight shots instead of four, also HPs and speed. * Minotaur kings: Low, unless you want them to be main strike force. * Scorpicores: High for +4 speed. * Black Dragons: Top, +30% damage, effectively doubled durability, +4 speed. Castle building in the first week: Day 1: Town Hall 2500g Day 2: Harpy Loft 1000g Day 3: Pillar of eyes 1000g + 1wogcsm Day 4: Chapel of Stilled Voices 2000 g + 5w + 10o Day 5a: Manticore Lair 5000g + 5w + 5o + 5m + 5s Day 6a: Labyrinth 4000g + 10o + 10g Day 5b: Upg. Harpy Loft 1000g + 2c + 2s Day 6b: Upg. Pillar 1000g + 1wogcsm Day 7: Citadel 2500g + 5o Warren as 1stlevel dwelling assumed present. If it's not present, we don't go for Labyrinth. The a) variant is for gold-rich scenarios, where you start exploring with a strong force in the second week. The b) variant is for those scenarios where you've got no extra sources of gold - no chests, no mills, nothing. It allows you to start exploring with lots of Harpy Hags and pack of Evil Eyes, while you've got some gold left to build City Hall and possibly Manticore Lair and Labyrinth in second week. Resource summary: For a) variant, , you'll need 11w, 30o and 18000g, which leaves us (20000 + 7000 - 18000) = 9000g for Day 1 to spend on troops. That is not much, because we surely want to upgrade harpies on day1 in second week (another 1000 down). 20x170 for harpies is 3400, therefore we have just enough to purchase five manticores as the only fighters. [And there's the ore requirement to fulfill in order to get Labyrinth and Citadel!] In the b) variant, you'll need 7w, 18o and 11000g, which leaves 16000 on day1. From that, you can get all the harpy hags (3400), all the evil eyes (4760) and you can build mage guild and get a spell book. [Assuming an Overlord hero - Lorelei with Harpies special is best here!] You'll still have enough gold left to buy Blacksmith, Marketplace, CityHall and Manticore Lair in second week. (And with some luck, Castle, too, or Labyrinth). Or, if you don't hurry on Manticores, you can recruite the ten Medusas (or wait for day2 and upgrade of Chapel). Second week strategies: There's only one important issue: gold. Before buying all out troops, remember that you'll need a total of 8500 gold to raise City Hall. And believe me, it's foolish to wait five days till you accumulate the 5000 for the CityHall, if it could have been built for these five days (and earn you extra 5000 by this time). Unless you MUST conquer some important locations (ore/sulfur/wood/another village), try to make sure that you'll have that 5000 ready to build CityHall pretty quickly. Troops cost weekly (with castle): Without 7th level: 19525 With 7th level: 27525 With one castle producing 14000/week, it's hard to pick one or two armies that won't be used... but most probably it'll be trogs AND scorpicores, yet you may need the latter against shooters and will have to do without minotaurs. Capitol at 28000/week will solve your worries. HPs grown weekly 1602 (plus 600 in blackdragons) at 12.18 g/HP (12.50) Benefits: * Academy of Battle Scholars: Seems better than just adding a point to a primary skill - because you get a secondary upgrade, too. Worth it. * Artifact Merchants: Dungeon version of Black Market. If you can spare the gold, do it. * Blacksmith: Provides ballista war machines. * Mana Vortex: Doubled spellpoints are fine for starting long journeys, but their best effect is for defending newbies that can do better with Slow/Haste/Dispel against enemy armies. Great benefit, indeed. However, works only once a week, on the first hero that enters the castle - so be careful to not waste it on a scout. * Portal of Summoning: If you manage to flag only highlevel dwellings, this portal is great. * Resource Silo: Sulfur producer * Mushroom Rings: Increases growth of troglodytes. Buy soon to get some defensive reserves. Strategy Since wood consumption isn't any high (7 or 11), you'll need to capture a sawmill somewhere at the end of week1, maybe in week2. (or pick up one or two piles of wood somewhere.) Be careful, if you build Manticore Lair and Labyrinth in first week, to have enough gold at hand. For the sake of City Hall, I would even sacrifice two or three treasure chests for gold instead of experience. [Especially those that offer 1000g/500exp, those should be used for experience only when badly needed!] Forces combination: I usually leave trogs and minotaurs unpurchased home, while HarpyHags, Evil Eyes, Medusa Queens and Scorpicores are the expeditionary forces (at least until dragons are available). Note, however, that Minotaurs are VERY strong battle unit. So, to correct the above statement, I leave the minotaurs unpurchased home until I raise enough funds to purchase them... I prefer to get scorpicores sooner, because minotaurs are far less useful in capturing castles... The medusas are pretty good at castle defenses, too. Heroes: Overlords are pretty good. I suggest Gunnar as a special mover (with Logistics given and 5% bonus per level to it.) Arlach is an Artillery expert (which also means that he has a Ballista at start, so he's pretty good especially for the early exploration.) Damacom (which yeilds gold) makes a good secondary. All others increase A/D of some dungeon unit, so pick a hero according to the armis you're gonna use. Among Warlocks, I recommend Deemer with MeteorShower as the best pick, followed by Darkstorn with StoneSkin and Malekith for Sorcery. Sephinroth (+1 Crystal) is a good secondary. Others seem dull to me. Skills important for the troops and strategy: With two shooters and three flyers, you should go for Offense and maybe Archery. Ballistics and Armorer are good only to decrease the losses that you'll take. Tactics is strongly recommended as it allows you to have first strike with Harpy Hags and Scorpicores. Unit A D HP Dmg Sp $$ AdjD Dm/g grow weekD Infernal trogs 5 4 6 1-3 5 65 1.80 2.77 35 63 Harpy Hags 6 6 14 1-4 9 190 2.30 1.21 16 37 Evil Eyes 10 8 22 3-5 7 280 4 1.43 14 56 Medusa Queens 10 10 30 6-8 6 330 7 2.12 8 56 Minotaur Kings 15 15 50 12-20 8 575 20 3.48 6 120 Scorpicores 16 14 80 14-20 11 1050 22.10 2.10 4 88 Black Dragons 25 25 300 40-50 15 4000 78.75 1.97 2 158