help me with Impossible mage!

[ihira]

My first playthrough was on Hard Warrior and while up until the Big spider was pretty challenging, as soon as I got Warrior Maidens + Veteran Orcs almost all battles became a 2 turn no loss battle.

So I'm trying Mage on Impossible now but holy *** how do I beat the necromancer in cave (after Ahriman).
Right off the bat he does a ghost blade that crits no matter what.
My leadership is only 554 and can't produce much physical damage.
This is against Ancient Vampires that regenerate, and Ghosts that cut 50% physical dmg.
The worst is when my army is near death he will use necrocall to ressurect a fresh new troop that takes me turns to kill. wtf

My current approach is lvl2 natures call to get 945leadership Griffens to tank (+counter) and then use lvl2 healing until I run out of mana...but yeah he casts necrocall its over.

I have the best equipment available and the spell selection sucks too.
ANy suggestions?

[ihira]

http://cloud-2.steampowered.com/ugc/848075970835301385/6A82AAA5EC1746C4E3F8864874A116997DE33477/

This is what it looks like. Enemy moves first and guaranteed ghost blade crit.
Good news is I can get a 945 leadership Griffens which can dive into SK archers and distract them while retaliating everyone that attacks him.

Other units available are Soothsayers, Axe throwers, Wolves, Slingers but they all suck imo.

[Belgarath]

Try swapping your troops around... Sometimes simply changing the places of a few troops can cause the enemy to cast different spells, or maybe at least not have the Ghost Blade be a crit...

[ihira]

phew did it...
the key was wait do as much damage as possible when Ancient Vampires are in bat form, and I got lucky because enemy hero didn't use necro call.