Skills & Attribute Analysis

[fld88]

Thanks for your detailed analysis Falconhurst, I only disagree with a couple of points. I had misunderstood what Reserve was during my first few games that I started but this time around I got it and I think it is one of the most essential skills to get for the enjoyment of the game. There is so much less running back and forth for troops when you have it, especially if you have Sacrifice.

Also as someone who is trying to make it through a Normal game without reloading, maxed Scouting is essential.

If you're a mage specializing in more than one school, alchemy is essential and I would recommend maxing it out as early as possible. I like having lots of options so I'm really burning through my crystals even with alchemy maxed.

[alon]

Originally Posted by Namel

So far I haven't found haste that useful. My aim is to slow enemy getting to me rather than rushing to it. Of course because of that I use lot of ranged units. And when enemy gets close I can see how far they can move next turn so I just leave my melee outside their attack range and hit them next round when I can be first.

Of course if enemies later have enough movement to get to me with one move then haste will be much more useful.

Agreed. Slow is far better than haste.

Think: to slow an enemy troop for 4 turns, causing it to move just 1 single square per turn giving you virtually endless time to kill it off in whatever way you like or to completely and utterly ignore it. Doesn't it sound sweet?

Also there's the trick that you can simply place your units 2 squares away from the slow moving enemy unit, wait for it to move 1 square towards you , than simply attack it without it being able to retaliate at all. Best done with Royal Snakes. (no retaliation + easy to get early game)

Originally Posted by Yaster

Not only it has very high damage it additionally ends opponents move and works with black dragons, great stuff.

Thanks for the tip.
Didn't think about using it vs. Black Dragons.

Originally Posted by Yaster

And about sacrifice - it's awesome for replenish your army. You can take one low level unit (so it could be resurrected) in your army and keep huge replacement of them in reserve. You will have always something to sacrifice so rest of your units would be covered. No more need to run between shops. It is usable on nearly every unit in game except for black dragons. But hey, you can't have everything right?

Sacrifice doesn't work on undead either.

Originally Posted by Kosiciel

Sacrifice is best spell ever, and it is Chaos Magic. If not this single spell, I'd vote for Distortion.

Agreed.

Also, using 2 Reserve slots you can even go beyond your leadership max and let them "run free" in the battlefield, than after game you can keep the extra troops you can't control in your reserve until you need them or the space in the reserve, whichever comes first.

Also, using the "Peacefulness" spell you can increase the troops hit points by a factor of %30 to %50 more - thus you can resurrect a LOT more troops using the same group of Fodder. Best used on Dwarfs which have a huge amount of hit points and are relatively cheap to come by. (Just check the ratio of Leadership per Hit Point and you'll be set to go).

Also, when you don't have any "fodder" troops but you really, REALLY need more troops and you played smart and have the Mana to spare in battle, arm yourself with a full troop of Inquisitors, Sacrifice at Level 1 one of your best troops that has lots of Hit Points, than Resurrect it with the Inquisitors, than on the next turn use the Gift spell (Order) to re-equip the Inquisitors with the resurrect skill - and resurrect, than gift them again and resurrect - until you have all your "first line" troops back - and you don't even need fodder anymore.

Also use Hypnosis if/when you can and than Sacrifice their lives for your own troops. The very best way to kill off enemy troops by far!

I also use Shaman Totems to keep my newly sacrificed units at top health before I resurrect them with the weak Inquisitors - easily saves me that extra troop.

I even resurrect the "Fodder" troop if my Inquisitors got it available, so I will have max troops.

Originally Posted by Zhuangzi

In terms of the three spell classes, I am thinking now that Distortion is the best discipline of them all. It has very useful spells like Haste, Slow, Trap, Phantom and perhaps Pain Mirror too.

I %100 agree and would demand to know where is the "Target" spell in the list of best spells? and what about Hypnosis...

Don't you just hate Archers? now imagine you can tell them to only shoot at the unit who has the best defenses and hit points in your army + a Healing Totem standing right behind him... isn't it worth at least a mention?

And has anyone tried setting up a Target+Magic Fountain Combo going in a +3 archers battle for some great free Mana boosting? I have. It is amazing fun to see the Mana going up for a change!

Besides all that, I just had a battle with "Magic Shackles" at Level 3, and it was my second time against an army of Devils. DAMN! did you know that at Level 3 and for 40 Mana (10 Mana for Levels 1 and 2 ) the ENTIRE enemy's army can't use their annoyingly powerful talents in battle? (Imps - Fireballs, Seductress - "switch" trick etc. ) Not worth mentioning, ha? I also fought once against 2 Fairies with their annoying "sleep" crapiola who had half my army snoring! 2 quick "Magic Shackles" and BYE BYE!

You also didn't mention the "Teleport" spell! shame on you!
If I didn't have the spell at full power, my Inquisitors would have been mints meat after a seductress-she devil switched places with him. Or the trick where you take a group of huge Giants, plant them right in the face of a group of archers and have him Stump his boots really hard on the ground right next to them! Or the trick where you Teleport your Royal Snakes from one end to another in the ever hard Guardian Battle Screen (where you fight Gremlin towers) having them destroy Tower after Tower - with a single Blow!

And you didn't mention the Stone Skin spell that gives %40 resistance to everything and %40 defense for only 7 Mana at Level 3... I just put them on my Giants which originally have 58 Defense and it turns to 78 for 5 turns!!!

Nope.
All these spells are not even worth mentioning.

Originally Posted by Zhuangzi

By contrast I am finding Order to be less important.

To a degree, but should I get started on Peacefulness, Fit of Energy and Phoenix, and even the "lame" Healing spell?

Originally Posted by Zhuangzi

Chaos is poor early (except for level 1 fireball which owns everything at the beginning of the game as a Mage). However, Chaos becomes very important in the endgame.

In your opinion as a Chaos-only mage.

Can you say that you beat a Hero Level 26 when you were Level 17 and had half your army at the end? I sure can. (I will start as a warrior on Impossible after this easy run though)

Originally Posted by Zhuangzi

Therefore I would put the order of priority for upgrading, when playing as a Mage, as this:

1. Distortion

2. Chaos (hard to get to in the early game)

3. Order

Thoughts on the above? Am I selling Order short?

Sacrifice is so important that it moves Chaos before Order but Distortion takes the cake - hands down.

[Kosiciel]

Chaos magic offers one great damaging spell. Armageddon. With Glot's Armor and hight Int it works wonders. I do almost 9k dmg with one hit of this baby. Black Dragons die easily. It's not fire damage, which is a bit confusing looking at its description. First round, Armageddon, rage fills up, Glot's Armor on my only stack of units, then Armageddon again. Next round, ressurection/some damaging spells. Could be repeated in few (2-3) turns. I wonder how to use Time Back with Armageddon.
One thing with Stone Skin - it takes one initiative point, and AFAIK it only gives physical resistance. There is a nice Order spell, God's Armor, on level 3 gives 51% resistance to all.

[wolfing]

Just a few notes:
- On Necromancy skill, it does work, but you need to lose more than 5 or 6 of a unit for it to work.
- Tactics, I find the level 1 version very convenient to play my troops where I want them. If the enemy has area damage spells, then spread my units around, if they don't, then place the 'tanks' in front and the ranged units behind.
- I don't know about you, but my fire rain spell was my bread&butter for pretty much my whole game. Cast this twice in the beginning of the fight (as a mage) and the battle is all but won. This stopped working near the end, with the fire-resistant demons and fire immune dragons.
- Reserve (1) is a must have. You can either use it as an alternate unit to use for different situations, or to have infinite backup for one of your units.

Trying to play my second game as a warrior without chaos magic (i.e. no Sacrifice), think it'll be tough?

[Tamaki]

Originally Posted by Falconhurst

At level 20 you will get a much bigger leadership increase than level 2, whereas other attribute increases offered will stay at +1 at low and high levels alike. Therefore I recommend adding attributes at low levels (Attack and Defense particularly), and picking up more leadership at higher levels. This makes the early game somewhat harder, but the late game easier. Some players like leadership the most; higher leadership at the beginning does make the game easier to start but does not increase the abilities of your troops in any way. As late game leadership can reach 20,000+, I think the attack/defense skills offer more long-term value.

Mana +7: You can get good increases in mana and its regeneration with concentration and wisdom, so you shouldn’t need too much of this.

Rage +5: nice, but not as universally useful as attack/defense.

First of all: Thanks all to all your contributions, thanks also topicstarter. i don't agree with quite some things, but most are said already.

What isn't said though is something I find VERY usefull and just noticed like 2 hours ago:

Never take the rage nor the mana upgrade! This is my first playthrough so I didn't know and I took the mana twice and the rage once, but now I regret it. Why? Rats-on-a-stick!

Yessir and yes ladies! In the mines of Lucky James you can buy rats on a stick from the dwarven slaves. As many as you like (I already ate 5...).

Why?

Easy!

It gives +2 mana and +2 rage PERMANENT for 50 leadership.

So choosing between 7 mana or 200 leadership is already no choice since you get for 200 leadership +8 mana and +8 rage. If only I knew sooner

Well you do now

Greets!

[milo]

sorry to bust your bubble but there are a limited number of rats available, I believe it is five or six

[Gatts]

I would love if necromancy would work differently on undead - like I would normally expect - x% of dead enemy # in conjuction with y% of dead enemy HP (or leadership) is transformed after battle into one pre-set undead stack (based on necromancy level) - on basic you could choose from skells/zombies, on level 2 would be ghosts and vamps added on level 3 dark knights and necromancers ... + special artifact you could also select bone dragon. + the ammount of max Leadership of gained units will raise with your level

It would work like : with the same skill but on level 5 you would be able to raise one vampire and 0,6 of necromancer... but on 30 level 5 vampires or 3 necromancers...

for the "regaining" of lost units - I would use other skill, (if there is spell called ressurection, than the skill name would be tricky to find) but still I would like to have it the other way around :
instead of % - I would like to have Leadership of replenishable lost units.
If it would be 2000 Leadership - you would be able to regain after each battle either 80 archers or one green dragon (where one should be able to choose if he would like to go for specific unit, strongest/weakest, or random)

[Gatts]

Originally Posted by milo

sorry to bust your bubble but there are a limited number of rats available, I believe it is five or six

I remember of getting five (5) rats - could be six but I am not fully sure

[Gatts]

Originally Posted by wolfing

Trying to play my second game as a warrior without chaos magic (i.e. no Sacrifice), think it'll be tough?

I tried to play the same scenario (warrior w/o chaos magic) - realized it is not very much possible (really) but I still wish you more luck than I had

[Tamaki]

Originally Posted by milo

sorry to bust your bubble but there are a limited number of rats available, I believe it is five or six

Haha, whoops!
Well, it's actually better else it would be too easy to choose and too easy to abuse.

Anyway thanks for the heads up, I will now start my game up again and eat the last one then (Yuck!)