What are your favorite troops?

[jwallstone]

In the Land of the Dead, you will often find a bunch up in the mountains. Also, in the Magic Valley in Ellinia, the mage hiding behind the magic range will sometimes have some.

I'm just starting to experiment with Demons. I added some demonesses, but for some reason my inquisitors weren't able to resurrect them! Is this supposed to be the case? Is resurrect not supposed to work on them? If this is the case, are they worth getting, with all the morale hits and all?

[DGDobrev]

In the beginning of the game I went for the usual strategy with 2 melee and 3 ranged units (playing as a Paladin) - Royal snakes + bears and inquisitors, archmages and archers behind them.

In the mid-game, I started to get a bit more range-oriented. Both types of elf archers, human Archers, Skeleton Archers and some horsemen to tank (rather poor tank, should have taken ents).

Now in the late game, I keep Knights, Demons and Arch demons as melee units and 4 types of archers. This allows for a lot of flexibility - from 4 ranged + a tank to 3 melee + 2 archers. Lets see how the final battle will go.

EDIT: As for the last battle, close-combat troops are essential. Knights with sweep are a battle-winner, especially if you manage to get them surrounded by dragons. Ogres hit like hell (gift is very useful here), and Demons give extra diversion. In my game I found ONLY 13 Archdemons... Pitiful. I still used skellies though. A full troop of skels with dragon arrows drops a troop of black dragons in 1 hit. They will also draw the attention of other dragons to them for 1-2 rounds, which is rather cool.

I hate that hypnosis spell Haas casts, though.

[MisterBarca]

Originally Posted by DGDobrev

In the beginning of the game I went for the usual strategy with 2 melee and 3 ranged units (playing as a Paladin) - Royal snakes + bears and inquisitors, archmages and archers behind them.

In the mid-game, I started to get a bit more range-oriented. Both types of elf archers, human Archers, Skeleton Archers and some horsemen to tank (rather poor tank, should have taken ents).

Now in the late game, I keep Knights, Demons and Arch demons as melee units and 4 types of archers. This allows for a lot of flexibility - from 4 ranged + a tank to 3 melee + 2 archers. Lets see how the final battle will go.

EDIT: As for the last battle, close-combat troops are essential. Knights with sweep are a battle-winner, especially if you manage to get them surrounded by dragons. Ogres hit like hell (gift is very useful here), and Demons give extra diversion. In my game I found ONLY 13 Archdemons... Pitiful. I still used skellies though. A full troop of skels with dragon arrows drops a troop of black dragons in 1 hit. They will also draw the attention of other dragons to them for 1-2 rounds, which is rather cool.

I hate that hypnosis spell Haas casts, though.

I killed Baal and still cannot recruit Archdemons. Where do I find them?

Also, isn't the game pretty much over once you get Archdemons?

[DGDobrev]

Originally Posted by MisterBarca

I killed Baal and still cannot recruit Archdemons. Where do I find them?

Also, isn't the game pretty much over once you get Archdemons?

I found them only in Baal's castle, after beating him. There were only 13 and that was all. I did a pretty thorough search of Demonis, the castles (I married Xeona, still nothing) and the buildings, as well as the labyrinth and the orcs' lands. That was it.

Maybe we're just unlucky. However, Archdemons aren't that wickedly powerful. You should keep them in reserve and use them only vs. dragons. Haas has high level hypnosis and he can possess pretty much any units that isn't mind immune.

[MisterBarca]

Originally Posted by DGDobrev

I found them only in Baal's castle, after beating him. There were only 13 and that was all. I did a pretty thorough search of Demonis, the castles (I married Xeona, still nothing) and the buildings, as well as the labyrinth and the orcs' lands. That was it.

Maybe we're just unlucky. However, Archdemons aren't that wickedly powerful. You should keep them in reserve and use them only vs. dragons. Haas has high level hypnosis and he can possess pretty much any units that isn't mind immune.

Hmmm, people keep saying that you can recruit them at Baal's castle, but I have not been able to find them. It's funny how you can only recruit 13 of them, however. It must be related to the fact that they have 666 hit points!

Thanks for the information on the Haas. I will definitely keep in mind.

[Ryastar]

Wow, this thread has suddenly become VERY popular. I just gotta put my two cents in.

First, black dragons are ALWAYS to be found in the land of the dead, not too far from Karador's castle, amongst all the ridges an so on. Red dragons are also available in the same area, though not the same building, and green dragons are available in a shop only accessible from the water in the land of a thousand rivers.

As for arch-demons, I don't believe there is any garunteed location for hiring them. You'll have to check everywhere in demonis, and if you have no luck there, there is a small chance that you might find them in Haas' labyrinth. I know that i have seen demon-aligned shops there, and you might get lucky.

Final thing, Haas has a lot of spells he is fond of using, not just hypnosis (in fact, in three completed games, I have never seen him cast it). In my experience, he mostly casts armageddon, sheep and pygmy, the latter two usually on whatever stack you need the most.

[Goat]

One unit I really like that hasn't been mentioned are cyclops. They have high leadership and slow, but with an artifact that gives my slowest unit +1 to speed they are great. I walk them out into the middle of combat and because of their high damage resistance I very, very rarely lose one.

They are hard to find so I have to get more with sacrifice, but that is the only problem with them.

[Elwin]

Originally Posted by Ryastar

and green dragons are available in a shop only accessible from the water in the land of a thousand rivers.

Where exactly ? I sailed around the coast and islands there couln't find it. Found pirate hut, lighthouse and elven underground with many emerald dr but enemies, no any dwelling. Altough i have them (because i sneaked to demonis earlier and had them available after doing quest with stealing dragon egg from ultrax) and can use sacrifice to get more, would be nice to buy some if they are available nearby instead of playing with sacrifice ( already have to do that much with royal snakes due to lack of any places to buy more, and i had no inquisitors untill i beat Emenem, while there was only like 20 of them so not much, also got sacrifice just here in grey wastelands)


And about the topic : I didnt finsh game yet so havent tested all but so far my favourite setup is :
royal snakes - thats obvious
emerald dragons - mana, tank
giant - even better tank than emerald ;p and with emerald positive morale and alle barrel doing nice damage too
cannoneers - alle barrel + telescopic sight
shamans - love distract with totems and dancing axe heal

i am also considering to change cannoneers and gianst to elves + hunters, which are better cannoneers or elves/hunters?

[Vendetta]

Best Units:

King Snakes
Dryads
Orc Shaman
Necromancer
Ancient Ghosts - endless reserves
Seketon Archers

Worst units:
Zombies
Peasants
Plants
Archmage - wtf? Lvl 4?
Hyenas

Dragons: Red Dragon

[Zonc]

Originally Posted by jwallstone

I'm just starting to experiment with Demons. I added some demonesses, but for some reason my inquisitors weren't able to resurrect them! Is this supposed to be the case? Is resurrect not supposed to work on them? If this is the case, are they worth getting, with all the morale hits and all?

Resurrection doesn't work with Demons

Are they worth getting? Demons are great - lots of attack&defence, 3 speed, always retaliate (perfect combo with Reaper's Timeback). Imps - no retaliation and 2 charges of fire ball. Cerberuses - 3 head attack (in HoM&M they also had no retaliation, it's a pity). I didn't like Demonesses though, but fighting against them is annoying (Magic Shackles are essential)