[jwallstone]

Ryastar,

I think you've made a math error here. The Sprites definitely do not do 22666 damage with the two items. They do 11333 damage, half of what you calculated. They essentially do nearly the same damage with the two items. However, there are two things that stack the odds more in favor of Lake Fairies. First, LF's have a higher critical hit change, 15% versus 10% base chance. The % also depends on rage, and changes differently for the two units. With full rage, I was getting around 15% for Sprites versus around 25% or so for Lake Fairies. (if I remember correctly, I'll check when I get a chance). This alone translates to more average damage for the LF's.

Second, most unit's have some sort of resistance. Since having the two items gives you three types of damage (Magic, Poison, Fire), unless the enemy has equal resistance to all three types, the larger numbers of Lake Fairies means you're dealing more of the type of damage that bypasses the strongest resistances of the unit. So in practice, this leads to more damage output from the Lake Fairies too.

I've played with both unit types in the same battle, and just hovering over enemies has (in the battles where I tried this) shown that Lake Fairies do better damage. The extra initiative and speed help too. The extra health is great for Sprites, but these are not units I want to be soaking up damage at all anyway. I use them more like hit and run or fast strike troops. I only bring them in harm's way if I can kill off nearby stacks, bring in a tank that will absorb the damage, or use Timeback. In general, I think the health of this troop is not that important to its use, as opposed to say, Demons. The Dispel ability of sprites may be great, but I've never used it, as good old killing seems to be a better use.

Granted, to put all this in perspective, it's kind of like deciding between two troops that are almost identical in usefulness and power. It's up the user to decide on the minor differences between the two. I prefer the Lake Fairies actually for the higher initiative, speed, and not having to worry about fire damage as much, and not so much for minor differences in damage output, which for both are just enormous, which I think we can agree on.