I hate Archmages, I feel they offer nothing. I dont think you get 'bang for your buck' so to speak.

You might be able to get some Royal Snakes in the cave in Arlania (Snakes Underground). See witch Helga, I reckon she'll sort you out. It's the first right passed the Magic Range.

Archmages are only useful for their shield skill. It's downright great. Shielded green dragons and giants usually mean no losses battle as long as you have the proper spells.

archmages are very good in the beginning their no range penalty is excellent for hitting the archers in beginning(and their shield is good for a tank)

and for a better unit input

i would suggest

Priest>inqi ASAP
horseman or griffins>royal snakes
don't keep 2 melee units in the beginning

with some proper unit control u can fed off most beginning units with 4 ranged and 1 tank

for a steamrolling beginning
i would suggest this input

INQI(must have)
horseman/royal snake(any of those whichever is avaible)
alchemist(great unit (killing thorns and poisiong the other)
archmages (see above)
and the level 4 unit u get at arlnia after dragon fang quest(unless it's a undead commander)

i mostly get shamans there and they are just GREAT to say the least their abilities are just POWER :)

when u get lucky u might get demons and well they don't need any further introduction ^^

One or two shamans isnt all that great and else you need sacrifice which is unlikely to be in starter area.

i've always gotten sacrifice when i got shamans there:)

and 1-2 shamans are great their totems block enemies for a while
and u can concentrate on others
and the decreasement in initiave from the totem of very good:)

use the shaman to the best of your ability!

I have only ever gotten Ents, Demons and Dark Knights there. And never sacrifice. I did get sacrifice twice at the swamp lady the king's brother wants t marry.

wel there is a luck factor in what u get there:)
but the best thing is they are all level 4 units :>
and sacrifice to raise them up

and i think shamans are best their abilities rock so hard:>

That late in the game I'm not sure, but Archmage small teleport skill is excellent and has many application. One quite cool I like use a lot is set a trap where an enemy unit will go, enemy unit fall in trap. Next turn, Archmage use its teleport to move back the enemy unit, again trap at same place and again the unit felt in the trap. Quite cool to win time against a very strong enemy stack.

Another very nice application of the Archmage teleport is to win this movement point allowing hit an enemy unit at an important time.

Or with an enemy unit slowdown this skill make you win a turn.

EDIT: I also never get sacrifice there and also only at one of witch in swamp.

true archmage has USEFUL abilities:)

Well, when you're facing powerful enemies and you're playing with a tank, things change. You will want that tank to survive long anough for your other units to deal with the rest of the enemy army. In that case, shield is paramount. Your tank will last twice as long with it, and with target, all other enemy units will attack it (as long as they are not lvl 5).

So far this tactic works wonders for me. I do lose units, but selectively (only the ones I can replenish in the same area), and because I'm not so keen on making 80 round battles to ress my entire army. Having emerald dragons as a tanks, 2 types of fairies, archmages and inquisitors drops down pretty much any enemy now on impossible, even if they are strong/very strong. I also have dryads and hunters in reserve. No ancient ents though... not a single one to recruit in my game so far.

I am tempted to try a multi-thorn strategy, drop the dragons and the archmagi and use thorns from the dryads and the royal thorns to act as a meat shield... It will be interesting. Now at day 6 in the death valley... things start getting rough.