Worthless spells

[Tianx]

List out your worst nightmare:

1) Book of Evil: Any use for 1 time spell cast?
2) Fit of Energy: 3 AP max for 20 mana?
3) Pygmy: Why not use Helplessness?

Almost useless spells:
1) Doom: Some usage but probably better using Helplessness
2) Kamikaze: Used to work well in KB:L, feel like it's reduced to nil now.
3) Peacefulness: At least it's cheap but don't really see its use
4) Avenging Angels: Way too mana costly. Pain mirror is better
5) Life Light: Mana costly and limited usage. Need more range and duration to be effective.
6) Magical Axe: Only better than Ghost Blade in terms of mana at level 1
7) Weakness: Lvl 3 is a mass spell but really don't see any use.

[Zechnophobe]

List out your worst nightmare:

1) Book of Evil: Any use for 1 time spell cast?
2) Fit of Energy: 3 AP max for 20 mana?
3) Pygmy: Why not use Helplessness?


I have used Fit of Energy to give solo stacks to attacks per turn, which is nice. I can't recall ever casting Pygmy...



Almost useless spells:
1) Doom: Some usage but probably better using Helplessness
2) Kamikaze: Used to work well in KB:L, feel like it's reduced to nil now.
3) Peacefulness: At least it's cheap but don't really see its use
4) Avenging Angels: Way too mana costly. Pain mirror is better
5) Life Light: Mana costly and limited usage. Need more range and duration to be effective.
6) Magical Axe: Only better than Ghost Blade in terms of mana at level 1
7) Weakness: Lvl 3 is a mass spell but really don't see any use.

Life light is a fine spell, you can time efficiently heal two stacks of level 5 units with it... and sure, damage any undead in the area.

Other bad spells: Precision, Berserker, Call of Nature, pain Mirror (good against Archies, but that's it), Poison Spit... I'm sure there are even more.

[Tianx]

Why not use Speed instead of of Fit of Energy?

[ckdamascus]

Woo boy, can of worms.

FIT OF ENERGY
I don't use it that much, but I believe Fit of Energy gives you another turn to attack. You never cast it in the beginning. You cast it after your stack has already moved. Think of it like a Second Wind from Paladins. Can be handy for super damaging high critical archers.

PYGMY
Pygmy is perhaps one of the best spells for me.

Pygmy reduces the enemy attack power by a significant amount and lowers the HP, which means you can spell nuke for additional damage.

All your spells will now do 66.6% more damage.

I believe it was... DG? Or perhaps Impy... one of them told me their old combo.

Pygmy + Death Star. :)

That said, I would sometimes use a stoneskined unit to smash into a pygmied enemy, knowing that their retaliation would be weakened.

Also, Helplessness does you NO good if your attack is +60 over their defense, so you need to use Pygmy to do an additional 66.6% damage over your 200% damage boost from +60 attack over defense. :)

I would commonly use Pygmy for my Warrior Pure Archer attack team since I would routinely have +60 attack over their defense.

PRECISION
Precision - sometimes this is useful for pure archer teams since it will last longer and lets you hit anyone. If you use a de-buff, you might "overkill" that stack. I agree it isn't that best though.

BERSERKER
Berseker - excellent to use for Demonologists demonic summons.

DOOM
Ok, I agree this is sometimes not as useful especially since I usually have a high critical hit rate. Do not forget though, criticals count as a "bless" spell too!

PEACEFULNESS
Use it with Sacrifice.

LIFELIGHT
Agree with Zechno. You have no idea how awesome this spell is when you roll with the Shrek Team (Ogres, Trolls, and Orc Chieftains).

PAIN MIRROR
Archdemons that Halve you would strongly disagree about the power of Pain Mirror. :) Agreed that some of my armies can cope with the Archdemons enough so it is not necessary, but some of my armies cannot, and Pain Mirror helps tremendously in that regard.

[Tianx]

Why would Life Light be awesome for Shrek team? Care to explain a bit :)

[ckdamascus]

Why would Life Light be awesome for Shrek team? Care to explain a bit :)

Same reason Zechnophobe mentioned. :) You can heal multiple Level 5s with it.

Admittedly it is a bit more situational than "zomg, this is the Way of the Shrek".

My Shrek Team usually has very high physical resistance, so healing them is quite useful.

I also usually roll with Rune Mages as that is the primary method of revival.

It is not too unusual to have all 3 giant stacks to be hurt. Life Light lets me heal all 3 of them in a single round.

If the enemy got up close to my rune mages too, I can end up healing 4 level 5 units in a single round. Very handy since Warriors cannot doublecast.

Shrek team is usually very fast... fast, strong... and furious. ROAR!

[Fatt_Shade]

Worthless spells, hm . . . nice idea but there are so much of them :-)
Ice shards, Poson spit, Shoal of pirana, Earth blades, Stone rain . . . almost all of new spells that used to be Spirits of rage skills. I didnt include Gloths armor, since it`s preety imba against Goblin shamans, or simmilar devastating attacks ( lvl 1 is enough since it can take infinite dmg for 1 turn for 10 only mana)
As for older spells :
Kamikaze, Book of evil, Doom, Avenging angel, Weakness . . . you ppl almost said them all. Ill only say i dont like Plague (usefull only for undead), Necro call, Demon gate - Ilusion is much better, and give you higher leadership worth of units, Hypnotise never use it since Blind/Fear or Ilusion are much better for disabling enemy. I agree it`s good to force enemy to waste their turn, but since it`s leadership related and 90% of enemy have much larger army then mine, i almost never get chanse to use this spell, thus i dont like it :-)
But i cant agree for some of your choices :
Peacefulness - make illusion of some unlimited retaliation unit(Royal griffins, Demon or Black knight with Moro`s item) and put it in middle of enemy army with peacefullness. It will tank tons of dmg while you clear enemy with your main dmg dealers.
Berserk - same as for peacefulness, or for summoned units.
Fit of energy - for some heavy dmg archer/range unit is great but it`s mana cost should be changed for 10/15/20 mana per lvl`s maybe. I use it for Goblins, since they are mostly used with Quick draw they play before Orc/Paladin, so they play their turn, and another with Fit of energy, and then 1 more with Orc commander/Paladin second wind ability`s. If you get lucky unstoppable will happen at least once, so after first turn your goblins have +20 attack thx to Zeroing in. It happened to me but just once goblin attacked 7 times in first round with this tactic.
Precision - i hope `Zechnophobe` was kidding, on 3 lvl it`s mass spell, and gives 30-50% dmg for archers, if you go Trigger and 100% crit chanse this is MUST spell. It gives 75% more dmg when scoring criticall hit : normal dmg 100, 150 with crit. But if you use Precision normal dmg would be 130-150, and that makes 200-225 with crit. If you go all archer team this is spell for you. For only 16 mana (3 lvl) all archer units get great dmg boost.
Pugmy - i like it more then Helplesness. As `ckdamascus` said it have it`s use.On 1 lvl is much better for huge stacks of low lvl enemy units. Helplesness reduce % of defence, and for 1-2 lvl units that almost nothing. Pugmy takes 20% of Hp for 5 mana,which is almost like Soul drain spell lvl 2 witch is 20 mana. Helplesness is great for high defence enemy, but for big stacks of low lvl enemy Pugmy is much better.
Life light - only problem is high mana cost for only healing, if you want to dmg undead there are much better spells. If it resurected units it would be great, but for only healing to much mana. Only usefull when going 5th lvl army :-(

[ckdamascus]

Demon Portal can be very good for certain Mage builds. You usually use it so you hope to get Archdemons. :) I've won a few nifty matches that way. I admit though, I hate the random nature of it and I usually prefer more deterministic spells.

Plague is the only other debuff I would use when Helplessness is not an option (due to +60 attack over defense)... since it works on Black Dragons and other Level 5s (Pygmy does not). So I can lower their HP by -15% AND their attack/defense AND it inflicts a de-buff agains their morale.

Shoals of Pirana is very situational (great on that bridge battle). A lot of those new spells were pretty "worthless".

Ice Orb was marginally useful, but mostly eh.

I agree with Glots Armor, but I also find I am usually better off with using Phantom instead. It isn't always easy to predict who they will use their imba attack on and I usually have trouble when they gang up on a single stack, so glot wouldn't really save me all that much.

I agree with your other sentiments and clarifications.

[Zechnophobe]

Precision effects too few units. And generally ones that aren't any good. Hunters? elves? Bowmen? It makes a few mediocre units slightly less so. But I'd much rather have cast a good spell on a good unit.

Demon Portal has its uses, though it is rare. But it is one of those spells that like, once or twice a game, it is 'the answer'. blocks off a movement route, and then adds units.

Healing Light is a spell That I'll cast, oh, 5 or 6 times a game. But each time is incredibly important. It lets me easily beat Zilgadis without losses, and low physical resist gear. It lets me suddenly keep alive two DIFFERENT stacks of dragons that were going to get hurted lots.

Pain Mirror: Yeah, as mentioned it owns the crud out of Archies. One of the most amusing spells in the game. But outside of that... I generally avoid damage ;P.

Fit of Energy allows a unit to take another turn. Imagine you have a stack of red dragons. It flies over and smacks some things, you use your first cast to stone skin it. Then, later, you Fit it for another turn, and it attacks again. Also, since the first 'end of turn' for a unit causes its abilities to click over, you can occasionally use it to get to abilities you need faster, such as Lullabye.

Pygmy is just a bit too expensive for what it does. Helplessness is a great debuff vs level 5's (plague often even more so). Maybe there are forces where Pygmy makes sense, but I haven't used them. If I want to do more damage generally Oil Mist is a better option. Heck even Doom can be better.

Plague: The only debuff that works on black dragons. I don't use it often, but when I use it, it is incredibly powerful. Seriously. It is kinda like Magic Shackles. I don't cast it often, but in certain fights, it wins the battle easily.

[Tianx]

I am surprised that of all the new spell they added from the original game to AP and CW, they left out one of the best one "Poison Cloud" from KB:L. It was a quite powerful spell maybe too much so they have to remove it :)

[Fatt_Shade]

Precision effects too few units. And generally ones that aren't any good. Hunters? elves? Bowmen? It makes a few mediocre units slightly less so. But I'd much rather have cast a good spell on a good unit.

Demon Portal has its uses, though it is rare. But it is one of those spells that like, once or twice a game, it is 'the answer'. blocks off a movement route, and then adds units.

Pain Mirror: Yeah, as mentioned it owns the crud out of Archies. One of the most amusing spells in the game. But outside of that... I generally avoid damage ;P.

I`ll give you example for precision (for ppl that like archer builds, they already know this but just to remind some1 that doesn`t) : Elf,Hunter,Bowman,Paladin,Lake fairy-3 dmg units that get good bonus from mass Precision, Paladin for second wind and Fairy for hunters mark
Goblin,Catapult,Goblin shaman,Paladin/Orc/Blood shaman-again 3 dmg dealer, Paladin or Orc or Blood shaman for second wind so all your archers get another attack per turn (for goblins even more is possible). Companions Triger/Rakush.
This is to show that for archer army build Precision is great spell. Ofc if you go Shrek team, or some other lineups it`s useless, but for this 2 listed above it`s a MUST.

Demon portal i`ll agree that can only be used as block for enemy units, since is to much random as `ckdamascus` said, and you get unit you spend mana in next turn. I dont need my reinforcement next year, i need it NOW :-)
Illusion is much better since it get more leadership worth per mana spend.

Fit of energy is good for some heavy dmg dealers, but should be rescaled to 10/15/20 mana per lvl to make it useful.

I wonder how come no one mentioned here Exorcism? It`s horrible spell, for so much mana. Enemy have summons-use dispel, enemy have undead-there are other much better spells to deal with them. I`m not sure have i ever used that spell.

[Tianx]

Exorcism has limited use especially at the later stages of the game where there is a lot of demon and undead. If you look at the damage modifier, it actually stacks quite a bit with all the items added but yes, it's a weak spell and should be an AOE/DOT instead of one direct hit.

I think by far, the worst spell is still Book of Evil. Never use it and never invest and crystal in even getting the spell.

[Fatt_Shade]

Here is example why Exorcism is crapy spell - i got 81 int Mage, 2 Gloves of destroyer, Necklase of exorcist and magic light 3 lvl (+20% for some spells) and in the end 20k dmg with Exorcist spell for 30 mana on 1 unit !!! Much better to sped 30 mana on Geyser and make 10-15K dmg on 8 units.
Still i think Life light is among worthless spells. I dont need healing for 10k Hp, i need to ressurect. Only use for this spell is 5th lvl lineup and nothing else :-(

[ckdamascus]

Here is example why Exorcism is crapy spell - i got 81 int Mage, 2 Gloves of destroyer, Necklase of exorcist and magic light 3 lvl (+20% for some spells) and in the end 20k dmg with Exorcist spell for 30 mana on 1 unit !!! Much better to sped 30 mana on Geyser and make 10-15K dmg on 8 units.
Still i thing Life light is among worthless spells. I dont need healing for 10k Hp, i need to ressurect. Only use for this spell is 5th lvl lineup and nothing else :-(

Not to be nit picking, but by definition it isn't a worthless spell if there is a use for it, even if it is situational. :)

e.g. by saying there is a use for it for 5th level lineups implies, it isn't worthless. Especially since it can save me the trouble of casting Phantom for resurrecting a level 5.

Book of Evil... I find it very hard to make use of it in any really useful situation.

I agree that exorcism is a bit wasteful. I think I used to do double-cast exorcisms against Archdemons though, but I was quite noob back then. :)

I haven't done the math, but geyser is physical damage, so maybe some demons would resist that a bit better than exorcism? I still agree it is generally not so useful for the mana cost.

[Fatt_Shade]

Worthless isn`t same as useless.
I mean life light can be only used to heal NOT resurrect 5th lvl (using life light to heal any lower lvl is pure waste of mana). Lets say you have 5 5th lvl units (for resurrecting Rune mage is mandatory) , first you need to place them all together and then heal. Then again you need to cast Phantom to resurrect any fallen(more then 1 time probably). So it`s 2 spend turns to gather units around and then presume fight. I rather fight normally, then leave some weak enemy before ressing my troops while picking chests. Any spell have it`s use, but Life light is inconvenient because of small range, and high mana cost to be dmg dealing spell, and it doesnt resurrect :-( If it worked like shamans ability Magic axes to heal any unit on battle field i would use it first, but now it`s to much trouble to gather units around.And since i`m not big fan of 5th lvl builds i`ll stay with Illusion/resurrecting for now.
Exsorcism is higher dmg magic spell, but again it`s single target for 30 mana, Geyser is 8 target physical for 30 mana. I just now checked 80Int, 2 Gloves of destroyer, Dragon cloak - Exorcism 17,5K dmg, Gayser 8,5-16K dmg. If you have only 1 enemy unit Exorcism is OK, but that is rarely case, so i prefere Gayser for 8 tagrets. As you mentioned physical resistance demons have 10% max, so only problem would be Ghostly units. All other undead/demons take 90-100% from Geyser.
And using Exorcism on summons (x2 dmg to summoned) is just silly, Dispel is better.

[ckdamascus]

Worthless isn`t same as useless.
I mean life light can be only used to heal NOT resurrect 5th lvl (using life light to heal any lower lvl is pure waste of mana). Lets say you have 5 5th lvl units (for resurrecting Rune mage is mandatory) , first you need to place them all together and then heal. Then again you need to cast Phantom to resurrect any fallen(more then 1 time probably). So it`s 2 spend turns to gather units around and then presume fight. I rather fight normally, then leave some weak enemy before ressing my troops while picking chests. Any spell have it`s use, but Life light is inconvenient because of small range, and high mana cost to be dmg dealing spell, and it doesnt resurrect :-( If it worked like shamans ability Magic axes to heal any unit on battle field i would use it first, but now it`s to much trouble to gather units around.And since i`m not big fan of 5th lvl builds i`ll stay with Illusion/resurrecting for now.
Exsorcism is higher dmg magic spell, but again it`s single target for 30 mana, Geyser is 8 target physical for 30 mana. I just now checked 80Int, 2 Gloves of destroyer, Dragon cloak - Exorcism 17,5K dmg, Gayser 8,5-16K dmg. If you have only 1 enemy unit Exorcism ia OK, but that is rarely case, so i prefere Gayser for 8 tagrets. As you mentioned physical resistance demons have 10% max, so only problem would be Ghostly units. All other undead/demons take 90-100% from Geyser.
And using Exorcism on summons (x2 dmg to summoned) is just silly, Dispel is better.

Heh, the Shrek build almost always has all of your level 5s near each other though. :) Also, in the battles where you are pressed in your own original line, it still applies. That's why you have high physical resists. I'd rather heal up 3 level 5 stacks rather than have them sit around, too afraid to attack because the retaliation will force me to require up to 3 more resurrections. The way the Shrek team rolls, a life light is very close to 3 resurrections. :)

Just because you aren't a fan of level 5 units doesn't make it a universally "worthless" spell. It is useful, albeit a little situational, for level 5s. It was quite a godsend when I finally got it.

I shouldn't call eviln a worthless spell when I only use non-undead units. :)

I agree that exorcism on summons is worthless. I don't know who suggested that.

However, in battles where the archdemon has not inflicted Halve damage to you, and if you do not have a lot of heavy damagers, sometimes the double-cast exorcism isn't so bad. Although I've found other alternatives that are generally better, but in those cases, Geyser wouldn't be it (in fact, I probably never cast Geyser in all of my games. ;) )

[Fatt_Shade]

OK how`s this as an idea for healing your Shrek team ?
Instead of BD take Shaman. He`ll almost always be enraged because of Thirst for glory and have Magic axes on disposal, casting totems to suport your mele team, and kill alott of enemy (they wont be able to attack them behind your mele Shrek team. For Mage -25% leadership will mean much to recruit them, and +50 HP will make them great substitute for Sacrifice (Sacrifice them for some of Shrek units, them spend adrenaline to remove +50 hP and revive them with Rune mages/or turn back time).
+ they will have nice morale thx to commander from Ogres.
This way no need for spending runes on Voice of Dragon. I know ppl like BD for -1 inititative to enemy, and burning, and all that . . . but in Shrek movie there isnt Dragon without Donkey - Shaman is Donkey (or closest thing to it :-D
Or kick Rune mages and go 3 mele, BD and Shaman (radical idea, but might be doable).
On side note, how does Shaman (regular and Blood) effect Chieftans 3 ability Spirit strike ? It`s not explained how does it work ?
I`m not big fan of 5th lvl because i have bad luck with them, and availability in almost all my games, last time i wanted to got Shrek and got 0 Chieftans, 9 Ogres and 12 Trolls in all game, not much of Shrek team :-(
When i try to build heavy Dwarf team, there`s no Hamer for -15% leadership for Giants, if i want to go all dragon army, there`s no Hearth of dragon etc. 5th lvl`s are great units, but i just have bad luck with them :-(

Never used Geyser ? What you do when there are 7+ stacks of enemy before you get Black hole/Death star.

[ckdamascus]

OK how`s this as an idea for healing your Shrek team ?
Instead of BD take Shaman. He`ll almost always be enraged because of Thirst for glory and have Magic axes on disposal, casting totems to suport your mele team, and kill alott of enemy (they wont be able to attack them behind your mele Shrek team. For Mage -25% leadership will mean much to recruit them, and +50 HP will make them great substitute for Sacrifice (Sacrifice them for some of Shrek units, them spend adrenaline to remove +50 hP and revive them with Rune mages/or turn back time).
+ they will have nice morale thx to commander from Ogres.
This way no need for spending runes on Voice of Dragon. I know ppl like BD for -1 inititative to enemy, and burning, and all that . . . but in Shrek movie there isnt Dragon without Donkey - Shaman is Donkey (or next closest thing :-D
Or kick Rune mages and go 3 mele, BD and Shaman (radical idea, but might be doable).
On side note, how does Blood shaman effect Chieftans 3 ability Earth blades ? It`s not explained how does it work ?
I`m not big fan of 5th lvl because i have bad luck with them, and availability in almost all my games, last time i wanted to got Shrek and got 0 Chieftans, 9 Ogres and 12 Trolls in all game, not much of Shrek team :-(
When i try to build heavy Dwarf team, there`s no Hamer for -15% leadership for Giants, if i want to go all dragon army, there`s no Hearth of dragon etc. 5th lvl`s are great units, but i just have bad luck with them :-(

Never used Geyser ? What you do when there are 7+ stackes of enemy :-) before you get Black hole/Death star.

Shaman are ok, but not good enough. Sacrifice is horribly inefficient unless I have ghost armor and other astral resistance items. Shaman work best with... black dragons and other level 5s :) Since shaman can afford mass healing to all of them, but sadly not often enough.

However, shaman are too weak in a fight, whereas in the shrek team, most of the giants can hold their own and deal consistent damage since they are relatively hard to kill.

Shrek team does not work well with the Mage class, as counter-attack is vital and you need leadership for raw firepower.

My shrek team does not have voice of the dragon if I remember correctly. Black dragons act more like an interdictor instead of a real damager (even though ultimately they did the most damage by the end game because I got the giants later than the black dragon).

I mean, it already has a fairly easy time going through the game. I do agree, shaman are probably closest to the donkey. :)

To be honest, I could probably dump the orc chieftain, as he is borderline the least useful of the three giants. Although I believe he does give the Ogre morale boosts.

I think orc chieftain's special "hit everything around me" attack is pretty crappy even with blood shaman.

I usually just divide and conquer against large number of stacks of enemies. With the Shrek team in particular and counter attack, I am better off buffing my giants, letting at least one of them get into the fray so they can smash, and counter attack quite a few times. Or I de-buff the strongest enemy and smash him up.

It is pretty rare where all 7+ stacks are truly equally dangerous to everyone in the field.

Last time I used a Mage, I didn't have black hole or death star until after scrounger (stupid quasi speed runs) Probably could have used geyser, but I managed to do without.

I forgot how I beat Scrounger with the Shrek team Warrior class, but I would imagine it was fairly heavy reliance on phantom to revive my giants.

In my slower runs with the Mage, Scrounger was much easier with a buffed up Black Hole.

[Fatt_Shade]

As far as i know sacrifice is only way to restock your army without traveling between islands. I usually wait for 3-4 lvl worth of leadership and pick some easy fight, before finishing spend 5-6 turns sacrificing/resurrecting units.
Why would you want astral resistance ? You need to kill as much as possible to gain enough HP worth for new units.
For shamans i think your mistaken. They can get magic axes almost every turn thx to thirst for glory, and fighting spirit. Lets say you use magic axes to kill some enemy spent 8 adrenaline, then with other orc units kill and every orc get 4-12 more adrenaline (shaman even more because thirst for glory), it`s good chance that shamans will regain magic axes in next turn. Use them to heal any dmg made to your units for 8 adrenaline, and again next turn if some unit is killed by your orc units shamans get 4-12+ more adrenaline get over max and reset magic axes again . . . and so on, almost every turn magic axes available. If it doesnt happen cast some totem to force enemy to waste turn killing it, and save your melee units in enemy lines.
About Mage/Shrek team my bad, i somewhere read about double casting with Shrek team and made mistake here.
For spirit strike i think your wrong, since i just tried it. 27 chieftains inflict 1500-2000 dmg with spirit strike to swordsman, then i added 200 blood shamans in army, and they inflict 7000-8500 dmg. Still think it`s crappy? :-) Every blood shaman give 1 astral dmg to spirit strike ability to chieftains, so around 100+ shamans it get quiet a punch (spirit STRIKE-punch :-D get it ? ).
And ogre`s and chieftains dont give each other morale. but here i must say i would pick chieftains : ogre arent affected with Orc`s ear item (-10% leadership so ogre 1000, chieftains 1080), ogre 680 hp - chieftains 850 and higher resistances, ogre dmg 50-60 - chieftains 65-91 that`s 50% more, drain is imba ability - sneer much weaker, but chieftains have aoe spirit strike. So in my opinion chieftain is better.
But as for me i cant use neither since i still cant find error with onslaught skill and adrenaline distribution to orcs in 1 round of battle. I tried to use Toadstool item to give my orcs 5-7 adrenaline in first round and it`s not working either :-( Try to figure this out : i have shamans, ogre, chieftan, veteran orc, and blood shaman on start of battle no adrenaline for my army. Dismiss ogres and take catapults and on start of battle all my units have 5-10 adrenaline !!! WTF is wrong with that skill ?

[ckdamascus]

As far as i know sacrifice is only way to restock your army without traveling between islands. I usually wait for 3-4 lvl worth of leadership and pick some easy fight, before finishing spend 5-6 turns sacrificing/resurrecting units.
Why would you want astral resistance ? You need to kill as much as possible to gain enough HP worth for new units.
For shamans i think your mistaken. They can get magic axes almost every turn thx to thirst for glory, and fighting spirit. Lets say you use magic axes to kill some enemy spent 8 adrenaline, then with other orc units kill and every orc get 4-12 more adrenaline (shaman even more because thirst for glory), it`s good chance that shamans will regain magic axes in next turn. Use them to heal any dmg made to your units for 8 adrenaline, and again next turn if some unit is killed by your orc units shamans get 4-12+ more adrenaline get over max and reset magic axes again . . . and so on, almost every turn magic axes available. If it doesnt happen cast some totem to force enemy to waste turn killing it, and save your melee units in enemy lines.
About Mage/Shrek team my bad, i somewhere read about double casting with Shrek team and made mistake here.
For spirit strike i think your wrong, since i just tried it. 27 chieftains inflict 1500-2000 dmg with spirit strike to swordsman, then i added 200 blood shamans in army, and they inflict 7000-8500 dmg. Still think it`s crappy? :-) Every blood shaman give 1 astral dmg to spirit strike ability to chieftains, so around 100+ shamans it get quiet a punch (spirit STRIKE-punch :-D get it ? ).
And ogre`s and chieftains dont give each other morale. but here i must say i would pick chieftains : ogre arent affected with Orc`s ear item (-10% leadership so ogre 1000, chieftains 1080), ogre 680 hp - chieftains 850 and higher resistances, ogre dmg 50-60 - chieftains 65-91 that`s 50% more, drain is imba ability - sneer much weaker, but chieftains have aoe spirit strike. So in my opinion chieftain is better.
But as for me i cant use neither since i still cant find error with onslaught skill and adrenaline distribution to orcs in 1 round of battle. I tried to use Toadstool item to give my orcs 5-7 adrenaline in first round and it`s not working either :-( Try to figure this out : i have shamans, ogre, chieftan, veteran orc, and blood shaman on start of battle no adrenaline for my army. Dismiss ogres and take catapults and on start of battle all my units have 5-10 adrenaline !!! WTF is wrong with that skill ?

Look at my old thread regarding Sacrifice and Astral Resistance. In the current patch, you absolutely want to have as high Astral Resistance as possible. Sacrifice will still give you the FULL benefits of the restoration, but the Astral resistance will REDUCE the damage you take.

So, I can sacrifice and restore whatever, 800 HP worth of units, while ONLY taking like 100 damage. You can look at my thread for more detailed examples, but I just want to give you a quick idea. You really want to use Sacrifice with astral resistance. :)

Sacrifice then Heal. Very nice deal. :) Much much much better than Sacrifice and Phantom (or the inferior Resurrection).

Healing doesn't matter if the Shaman die. Every other round is still wasteful, so I would need to resurrect. Every round I do not have a counter-attack giant is potentially 30-40K less damage aggregate PER GIANT against the enemy.

*yawns*, 8500 damage is very crappy if you can consider the preconditions. To do this I need to add CRAPPY units (blood shaman and normal shaman or even one of them). Shaman die too easily compared to even the Orc Chieftain, that is more to resurrect. Also, there is a big cooldown, and it hurts the CRAPPY orc chieftain's combat abilities even more, due to loss of passive adrenaline buffs.

Anyway, so why do I say 8500 damage is crappy? Shrek team works well if the leading Giant unit blows an enemy counter attack. I will typically have the giants together for this reason and spirit strike hurts friendly units AND pushes them back. Double bad.

Ogre has Ogre Rage, which gives me double my CURRENT attack not double the base attack.

Trolls gain attack from malevolence, which means any unit, friend or foe that does, he gains attack.

Orc Chieftains gain...verry little compared to those two skills.

So, while my Ogres and Trolls will quickly converge to +60 attack over defense and deal maximum damage of around 16-19K per hit AND they can hit more than once with counter strike AND they do not shift the enemy AND they do not hurt friendlys AND I do not have to sacrifice one of the other GREATER giants for this purpose, you can sort of see why I can easily say, Spirit Strike sucks.

And to top this all off the Orc Chieftain still sucks in combat. He has a very hard time reaching +60 attack over defense compared to the other giants. Yes yes he has the hit-through ability which does not hit friendlies, but considering the alternatives, not so fantastic.

I'd rather not waste a round casting Helplessness to help out a weak giant. I'd rather cast phantom, hell breath, pygmy, plague, stone skin, etc.

Onslaught is currently broken in this patch.

[RYTEDR]

I would just like to add that Exorcism is not quite as useless as suggested.

Just so you know, Exorcism works on ALL summons, not just Phantoms. Thorns from Dryads, Droids from Engineers, demons from Demonologists etc. You can't dispel those, and the damage output can be quite impressive and cripple the enemy's summons. Yes, it's a bit expensive, but you don't have to use level 3 Exorcism to still get impressive damage.

Carry on. *Disappears*

[Fatt_Shade]

Look at my old thread regarding Sacrifice and Astral Resistance. In the current patch, you absolutely want to have as high Astral Resistance as possible. Sacrifice will still give you the FULL benefits of the restoration, but the Astral resistance will REDUCE the damage you take.

Healing doesn't matter if the Shaman die. Every other round is still wasteful, so I would need to resurrect. Every round I do not have a counter-attack giant is potentially 30-40K less damage aggregate PER GIANT against the enemy.

*yawns*, 8500 damage is very crappy if you can consider the preconditions. To do this I need to add CRAPPY units (blood shaman and normal shaman or even one of them). Shaman die too easily compared to even the Orc Chieftain, that is more to resurrect. Also, there is a big cooldown, and it hurts the CRAPPY orc chieftain's combat abilities even more, due to loss of passive adrenaline buffs.

Anyway, so why do I say 8500 damage is crappy? Shrek team works well if the leading Giant unit blows an enemy counter attack. I will typically have the giants together for this reason and spirit strike hurts friendly units AND pushes them back. Double bad.

Sacrifice/Astral resistance combo didnt know thx for info. It`s even easier to restock my army now :-)

For Shamans i didnt say every other but almost EVERY round with only 8 adrenaline cost, and their gain +1 adrenaline for every orc unit attack + from kills. They reset their abilities (fighting spirit) almost every round. And with full adrenaline they make 25-31 magic range dmg/heal your army, only few other 4th lvl can do anything similar (necromancer normal attack alchemist poison bomb). I never use shamans to fight, they stay behind and spam totems and magic axes, rarely they actually attack some1 with melee attack.

I mentioned spirit strike in general not connected to shrek build. 27 chieftains 8500 dmg to 2 units, 2000 physical and 6500 astral (bonus from 200 blood shamans). In same round 28 ogres did 2600 physical dmg to 1 unit. I just say spirit strike can be nice aoe dmg ability, and it`s 35-45 physical +1 astral dmg/blood shaman in army so no enemy have resistance to it. It`s aoe, but who said you need to do it near your own units ? And it cost 20 adrenaline, so you`ll lose 1 lvl of adreanline, but if you kill some1 with it it`s back up on 3 lvl so no combat stats lost. I did this with all orc army just to compare 5th lvl units.
I agree blood shamans fit more with orc range units, but their bonus to chieftains is nice to know.
In pure shrek team chieftains are weaker then other, but in comparing orc 5th lvl`s i like them more.

So exorcism use is to kill undead/demons, and demonolog can summon demon, so does that mean this spell make x3 dmg to them (they are both summoned and demon) :-D Actually i never use it since every time i get that spell i already have some better available.

[Zechnophobe]

I think Fatt, you really just need to have tried out these combat styles before decrying the spell. Level 5 armies are very strong, and often great for smooth no-loss runs. When you have 800 hit point units, a level 1 Healing Light is much MUCH less cumbersome in many situations than sacrifice, Turnback Time, etc tricks.

It's a lot like Magic Shackles. You just... need it sometimes.

[Fatt_Shade]

I agree that 5th lvl are great to play, and life light is handy with them it`s just that i never played Shrek team (tried 4 times, and every time one of my giant firend missing in all game, and using trophies to upgrade orc veterans is to expensive :-( Just never had luck with shrek units.
As for dragons they are available in 100% games but not much fun to play repedetly
(1 playthrough with them was enough), and there life light wasnt much help killed my bone and not working for black`s.
It`s not that i dont know about using life light it`s just i never had opportunity for it :-(
Only my thought for such mana/heal ratio on 3lvl it should resurrect or at least remove poison/burn. But bince almost no1 use more then 1lvl life light thats why i said it`s worthless. For pure dmg spell there are many better choices, and for heal 1lvl is more then enough, who ever need heal for 3k+ Hp no unit have so much. So there`s no need to upgrade it=worthless. Spell that is possible to use for only 7 units in all game (rune mage, red dragon, green dragon, ogre, chieftain, troll, giant) and not effective above first lvl is not something i`d pick as good spell.

[ckdamascus]

I agree that 5th lvl are great to play, and life light is handy with them it`s just that i never played Shrek team (tried 4 times, and every time one of my giant firend missing in all game, and using trophies to upgrade orc veterans is to expensive :-( Just never had luck with shrek units.
As for dragons they are available in 100% games but not much fun to play repedetly
(1 playthrough with them was enough), and there life light wasnt much help killed my bone and not working for black`s.
It`s not that i dont know about using life light it`s just i never had opportunity for it :-(
Only my thought for such mana/heal ratio on 3lvl it should resurrect or at least remove poison/burn. But bince almost no1 use more then 1lvl life light thats why i said it`s worthless. For pure dmg spell there are many better choices, and for heal 1lvl is more then enough, who ever need heal for 3k+ Hp no unit have so much. So there`s no need to upgrade it=worthless. Spell that is possible to use for only 7 units in all game (rune mage, red dragon, green dragon, ogre, chieftain, troll, giant) and not effective above first lvl is not something i`d pick as good spell.

In the latest patch, trophies no longer are based on your leadership/enemy leadership or whatever befangled formula they had. (darn, it was so fun netting nearly a thousand trophies in a single battle).

They are based on your current experience level. If you use the trophy badge throughout the early game, you should have plenty by the time you need them.