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| Thread: General Strategy |  This thread is pages long: 1 2 · NEXT» |
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Rage08
Famous Hero
Making it in the real world
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posted September 15, 2005 06:10 AM |
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General Strategy
I wanted to start a fairly general topic to see the different opinions out there...
So my question is how do you fellow Heroes players like to start your games? What kind of things do you like to do in the first week? What heroes do you look for in the tavern? What kind of resources and treasures do you make a habit of getting (if possible)? Basicly what are your usual strategies in beginning a game? And even past the first week if you want...
I don't mind hearing opinions from new players or veterans. I just want to see the variety out there and the common strategies that people of different skill levels may have...
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angelito
Honorable
Undefeatable Hero
proud father of a princess
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posted September 15, 2005 02:47 PM |
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Ok..i will try to give some input about what i am doing in first days / first week on random maps.
1. It helps a lot knowing about the richness of the map / template. You either get this information from the map / template description or u have to get it by your own with scouting.
This is important, coz u have to get a clue if it will be possible to build the level 7 creature dwelling in your town, or if u should focus on level 6 dwelling and castle. The earlier u get that overview, the better.
The richness of the map also decides how many heroes u will buy day 1 / day 2. If the resources lie around in big amounts (like on Jebus template), u will have at least 7 heroes day 1. On poorer templates, u will prolly have only 4 heroes, coz u donīt have that much to fight first week and need the money for your building order.
2. When u look in your tavern, u have to think about the hero choice u will make. Always keep in mind, that your starting hero could level up bad and u will get skills like earth and log with a scout much earlier (by hitting learning stones or doing small fights). So i would suggest to buy heroes which could also be a good main, or heroes who could help ya out on poorer maps, like +350 gold heroes or resource specialists.
3. Try to build a high level dwelling (5, 6, 7) in your town as early as possible. These creatures will help ya to fight vs stronger guards and get more reward such as arties, chests or resources.
4. Always try to get warmachines! Even without the artillery skill, a balista is a great advantage in fights vs. the A.I. It has 250 hp (like a level 7 unit), shoots a lot and, which is the most important fact, itīs good for distraction! If u can lead the enemy stacks (with 1 single fodder) to the balista, your archer group (placed on the very bottom) can shoot without geting attacked, if the enemy stacks have a max. speed of 5 that is.
5. Your goal in first week is to get a strategy about what to do in second week (at least). So try to reveal a hugh area in the first week and make a plan how to position your heroes end week 1 to clear the important stuff in the following days / weeks. Chaining is very important now. Coz u will have good arties, pandoras boxes in one region of your side, and other good stuff in the opposite direction. Thatīs why i suggest to keep some wandering monster stacks alive (undeads or other slow creatures would be the best solution) to be able to make the "poormans townportal" move. With that move, u r able to fight with your main in 2 different places in 1 or 2 days.
6. If u explore your area in the first week, also focus on dwellings. The earlier u flag high level dwellings, the better for you.
7. Check out guards to other areas. When will u be able to kill them? If dragons or titans, expert slow wonīt help that much...etc...
8. Try to get expert air with any of your heroes to cast view air. That way, u can check where your opponent is located and what direction u have to travel later on (except u have a map with some 2way teleporters...)
9. Donīt be afraid of crypts, imp caches, medusa stores early in the game. Those fights are essential on poorer maps to get your money going. 3 full crypts in week 1 will give you 15.000 gold and 3 minor arties. If that doesnīt help in your game, what else could?
I guess this is prolly what i focus on in the first week.
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Better judged by 12 than carried by 6.
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Xarfax111
Bad-mannered
Supreme Hero
The last hero standing
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posted September 15, 2005 03:26 PM |
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...to add some for "fixed maps":
- Always check out the refugee camps as soon as u can. Dont wait until they are "on your way". On maps like BoB2 and HG2 with some ref-camps there will always be 1 Lvl7 or 2Lvl2 to help u to drain the map. Buy every creature! Even if "not useful" theyll help as fodder to keep up your native troups.
- Make a "chainsaw"..= put all your heroes in line and lets them all fight one after the other..so that an area is completely "drained"...repeat this with the other areas. Dont fear that your main hero wont get enough experience by doin so, youll have enough experience by sacrificing useless arts..after Lvl20 gettin experience isnt really important anyway. NEVER take experience out of chests = there is always something to build (example = second castle) or to buy (example = money for joiners). Make sure your chainsaw will always be suplied by the newest highest creatures from your town...watch your moneymanagment = sometimes its important to built a building at the end of turn, sometimes in the beginning.
- HITPOINTS WIN THE GAME!!Thats the main rule you should always keep in mind. Unless your opponent gets very lucky with something, you will win as long as your troups do have more hitpoints as his. So ALWAYS built Creature buildings over money buildings..the creatures will give u the money. If uve have enough money to go for capitol, youll have enough money to build a high level creature dwelling and buy them...thats the better way. Try to enrich your hitpoints (Castle = griff conv, Inferno = demon farming, Necro = skel hoarding, Fortress = dragfly hives, Dungeon = internal dwelling (flag one outside), Diplomancy, external dwellings asap, refugee camps, pan boxes)
- Dont waste your main heroes movement points! Think about if this +1 wisdom or +1 spell power is really worth the way!? (Typical example is the +2 Arena on Desert War) Only let him do the essential fights, keep the "map goals" in mind (like pan box on day 5 at latest on BoB2 etc.)......
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Russ
Promising
Supreme Hero
blah, blah, blah
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posted September 15, 2005 05:48 PM |
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Edited By: Russ on 15 Sep 2005
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Nice strat, Angelito! I'd like to add some points to it:
0) Always chose gold from the chests and never pick stuff with your main. Only exceptions are maybe when your main is a ballista hero and you want advanced ballistics ASAP.
0.1) Your "main" will always move last. Two reasons for this:
1. if you get a better main from the inn, you will be able to use him instead and send your "old main" scouting instead.
2. you will know where to go with your main once your scouts have explored some land.
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2. When u look in your tavern, u have to think about the hero choice u will make. Always keep in mind, that your starting hero could level up bad and u will get skills like earth and log with a scout much earlier (by hitting learning stones or doing small fights). So i would suggest to buy heroes which could also be a good main, or heroes who could help ya out on poorer maps, like +350 gold heroes or resource specialists.
You forgot to mention ballista heroes - those should always be hired (free ballista!!!)
If none of those are available, always give preferences to magic heroes since they already have a spellbook and decent magic skills. This is useful for many reasons:
1) if you load them with 3-4 level 1 or 2 units, they will be able to take new towns with their magic arrows.
2) they will be able to win small fights with the abovementioned units (i.e. 3 griffins on a magic hero + 25-30 mana + magic arrow can kill "a lot of" weak level 1-s). This will give you a few extra chests, gold piles, or resources.
3) They will be able to visit shrines and to learn new spells. Once you get a scholar hero you will be able to transfer all those extra spells to your main.
4) If it is Vidomina, Solmyr, Deemer, or Ciele, you can give them some army (usually - the army from your non-native hero) and go for the critical battles that your main won't be able to reach. I.e. you are playing Ivor/rampart, and there is an elf dwell guarded by lots of lizards on the other side of the mountain. Say, you hire Vidomina and Aine. You will trade the Death Ripple to Aine and load her with 8 dwarves and 1 centaur. She'll be able to take those lizards out with np.
One of my favorite quotes from Braveheart (as English infantry is fighting the Scots):
King "Archers."
Advisor "I beg your pardon sire, but won't we hit our own troops?"
King (looking at him a bit tired): "Yees, but we'll hit theirs as well."
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"poormans townportal" move. With that move, u r able to fight with your main in 2 different places in 1 or 2 days.
I have no idea why it is called "poormans townportal". It costs 2500 gold to do, so it is more of a "rich but unlucky man's portal"  But anyways, it is definitely worth doing if you have a choice of wasting 2-3 days with your main or spending 2500 gold on the "townportal".
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8. Try to get expert air with any of your heroes to cast view air. That way, u can check where your opponent is located and what direction u have to travel later on (except u have a map with some 2way teleporters...)
And earth magic + view earth on your main Most people (including me until 2 days ago) consider those spells useless, but they are the game-winners!
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9. Donīt be afraid of crypts, imp caches, medusa stores early in the game. Those fights are essential on poorer maps to get your money going. 3 full crypts in week 1 will give you 15.000 gold and 3 minor arties. If that doesnīt help in your game, what else could?
Imp caches can pWn j00 a$$ lyk a m0f0! They can be taken early, but usually are too worthless for the risk involved. Imps are relatively fast and most likely you will take some losses, especially when that 30 or 60 imp stack near your archers decides to morale. And it is not worth it for the extra 1000 or 1500 gold + 1-2 mercury. Dusa stores aren't usually worth it either on week 1.
However, dwarf treasuries (the ones that say "guarded by a horde of dwarves and are NOT on grass) and Naga banks "guarded by a pack of nagas" are worth it even with the losses, but plan your fights BEFORE you attack them. It is a very good idea to practise taking a few 15-naga banks and 75-dwarf treasuries before you try doing this in an online game. And DO NOT attack if you aren't 100% sure you will beat them with only minor losses. For example, it is best to leave nagas alone on week 1 until you have mass slow, unless, of course, you have a very good army with a lot of dispensable fodder.
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Vegetarian: Old Indian word for Bad Hunter.
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Rage08
Famous Hero
Making it in the real world
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posted September 15, 2005 07:22 PM |
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It's interesting how much Heroes is like chess... my pop always told me the key to winning a game is to be very offensive... because trying to protect yourself and staying on the defense will never help you to advance and gain an edge over your opponent.
In both games... one will find just how many people have never been taught this important strategy. It's like great potential skill being applied in the perfectly wrong way.
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Santis
Hired Hero
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posted September 15, 2005 09:50 PM |
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I allways start with a hero with magical skills and in the same round i try to get a hero in the tavern,who has soldiers of the same type,which my starting hero has.So i can bring the armies of both heroes together.When I have the possibility,I also try to get a third hero of the same type,which my first has.The number of my heroes depends on the number of my cities.My starting strategy is:find the nearest mines and resource-locations and conquer them.Wood and stone are the most important resources for a good start.....be continued
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Rage08
Famous Hero
Making it in the real world
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posted September 15, 2005 09:57 PM |
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Well it's good to hear your opinions too...
And also make sure you read the others posts, because they have some good information in there eh?
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Russ
Promising
Supreme Hero
blah, blah, blah
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posted September 15, 2005 10:06 PM |
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Quote:
Well it's good to hear your opinions too...
And also make sure you read the others posts, because they have some good information in there eh?
Yep, and as soon as you hear someone say "use magic hero as a main", stop reading.
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Vegetarian: Old Indian word for Bad Hunter.
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Rage08
Famous Hero
Making it in the real world
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posted September 15, 2005 10:26 PM |
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Yes well, there are definately better ways to play than others, but when you have a variety of poeple's strategies it's fun to atleast see what's out there. I mean personally if it isn't a very serious game (like against the AI) I'll use a magic hero for main no problem.
I just hate it when a game must make certain people blinded in their own little world that they don't accept other ideas. In this situation, Santis would definately learn some important things by reading what the others posted, because these are strategies proven to be effective.
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Tc_Fear
Famous Hero
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posted September 17, 2005 10:26 AM |
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rush- is the most dangeruos and can be the most effective strategy if u r 'wisely fast', since this strat is very risky
lets say random template 'jebus'
its point to outrun your oponent
to clear your territory faster, and move on to middle area wich is rich on goodies
and on many many other fixed and random maps rush can be used
main things:
save your main hero movement, fight battles, take only what is nessesery(exp ect..)
add a fastest creature to him before each turn end
and so on...
i like to out run my oponent
thats why log, path and boots, gloves - are the best skills and arts to me
and using magic heroes is not wise...except if the map is very poor or incase u own blacks or golds and armagedon
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'the only thing necessery for the triumph of evel is for good men to do nothing'
Edmund Burke
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Rage08
Famous Hero
Making it in the real world
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posted September 18, 2005 01:01 AM |
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Interesting... it seems as though there is some form of rushing in nearly all games where you build up armies. It definately has its moments...
Rushing can often be helped with some external dwellings to increase weekly population and also increase army size in general. So if I was going to think about it I would definately take that into consideration.
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GabyStan
Known Hero
Seeking Wisdom
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posted September 27, 2005 08:54 PM |
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Quote:
The richness of the map also decides how many heroes u will buy day 1 / day 2. If the resources lie around in big amounts (like on Jebus template), u will have at least 7 heroes day 1. On poorer templates, u will prolly have only 4 heroes, coz u donīt have that much to fight first week and need the money for your building order.
Yes Angelito, but there's sort of a "vicious circle" (hope this works in English as well) regarding richness/number of heroes bought: you have to explore to see how rich the map is, but for that you have to hire many heroes, so you may find yourself having lots of heroes who discover... nothing. That's why I like fixed maps, coz there you know what to expect and the faster/better man almost always wins. I found myself on most randoms going for Lvl7 and having not enough resources in the end, so found myself without Lvl6 either. Random maps' knowledge gets better with experience, so I'll just play them more (eventually learning the hard way).
Funny enough, I became a fast player (as fast as it gets - playing against AI, mind you) in Heroes 2, but there I had complete knowledge of the maps (used tons of Save/Load) so I can get perfect results. So, in my view, knowing/deducing early on (days 3-4) what sort of map you play makes about 30% of the match won. Of course, if you are a decent player, that is.
How I play is like this: go for most creatures week1 (external dwellings included), than week2 as much money and completing the creature dwells. I always choose might hero as main, out of which the best are those who have specialty for all troops (so much better Offence or Defence than Monster specialty - and still I choose Tyris all the time - but always hoping for a better one from tavern). Never take gold from chests but make sure log and movement stuff are always grabbed on.
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Edit (just to make sure my stupid mistake at the end of this post won't be quoted again - only Xarfax is allowed to do that):
"ALWAYS take gold from chests..."
And one more thing: any rule has its exceptions, depending on the situation, so my statement was a bit outta place anyways.
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Your worst enemy is... yourself.
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Xarfax111
Bad-mannered
Supreme Hero
The last hero standing
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posted September 27, 2005 11:59 PM |
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Never take gold from chests ...
..oh geez..  ..where is Sir Steven when u need him...seems like some peeps never learn.
Btw ..u can look into the random template to know if u r might be able to build up Lvl7 week one..its very simple.
Xarfax1
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GabyStan
Known Hero
Seeking Wisdom
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posted September 28, 2005 08:39 AM |
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Quote:
Quote:
Never take gold from chests ...
..oh geez.. ..where is Sir Steven when u need him...seems like some peeps never learn.
Btw ..u can look into the random template to know if u r might be able to build up Lvl7 week one..its very simple.
Xarfax1
Oh, God, I beg you all pardon: I was going to say "ONLY take gold from chests". Gosh, am I a foo or what?
Ok Xarfax, if there's a template I can do that (dunno how yet), but what if the map is 100% random, not a template? And I mean not only if there're something already built in Castle, but if there're enough resources as well to afford Lvl7 Dwelling.
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Your worst enemy is... yourself.
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rychenroller
Promising
Supreme Hero
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posted September 28, 2005 10:35 AM |
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Theres no such thing as a "random random" in h3, they are all template based.
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Myctteakyshd
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angelito
Honorable
Undefeatable Hero
proud father of a princess
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posted September 28, 2005 10:45 AM |
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Quote:
... Yes Angelito, but there's sort of a "vicious circle" (hope this works in English as well) regarding richness/number of heroes bought: you have to explore to see how rich the map is, but for that you have to hire many heroes, so you may find yourself having lots of heroes who discover... nothing....
Not really...always keep in mind, the map isnīt made by human "hands", but by the comp. So when u send out 3 or 4 heroes on day 1, which scout a nice area around your castle, you get a good overview about the richness of the area / map. If u canīt see much resources laying around, then the rest of your area will look the same. Itīs not like u will have a very rich quarter in your area, and 3 quarters will be poor.
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Better judged by 12 than carried by 6.
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GabyStan
Known Hero
Seeking Wisdom
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posted September 28, 2005 11:25 AM |
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Quote:
Quote:
... Yes Angelito, but there's sort of a "vicious circle" (hope this works in English as well) regarding richness/number of heroes bought: you have to explore to see how rich the map is, but for that you have to hire many heroes, so you may find yourself having lots of heroes who discover... nothing....
Not really...always keep in mind, the map isnīt made by human "hands", but by the comp. So when u send out 3 or 4 heroes on day 1, which scout a nice area around your castle, you get a good overview about the richness of the area / map. If u canīt see much resources laying around, then the rest of your area will look the same. Itīs not like u will have a very rich quarter in your area, and 3 quarters will be poor.
Ok then, thanks guys, I'll keep your informations in mind and act accordingly.
About the randomization of maps, I'd like to know if there's always the chance to have some buildings in such a proximity to something (mountains, forests etc.) so you can't enter them because of lack of space.
I guess what you rychenroller are saying is that when making a random map from scratch you choose the numbers for how the map will be like: monsters, terrain, towns and so on. But still I'am not sure the resources/buildings will always be evenly distributed for all players.
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Your worst enemy is... yourself.
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angelito
Honorable
Undefeatable Hero
proud father of a princess
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posted September 28, 2005 01:57 PM |
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You should look around in the library and search for threads about "RMG" and "Templates". Many explanations are given there.
Itīs really hard to make a random map (template)completely balanced. The main reason for this is the "value" which is given for each object on the map. You can set a range of values in an aream which is the same for both players, but will show completely different results.
Example: a gold pile has the same value as a den of thieves or a waterwheel. So one side could get about 20 piles of gold in his area, while the other gets 2 waterwheels, 2 gold piles and 10 den of thieves (!!). The comp just picks "about" the same amount of treasury and puts it in the area.
Another example: a level 3 dwelling has about the same value as a griffin conservatory or a medusa store. You can see how unbalanced that could be....
Nagabank and utopia and level 7 dwells have similar value ranges....and so on...
If we would be able to reset the values of each object and give them new ones, randoms would be much more balanced.....but then u could play fixed maps aswell....lol
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Better judged by 12 than carried by 6.
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Russ
Promising
Supreme Hero
blah, blah, blah
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posted September 28, 2005 05:38 PM |
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Edited By: Russ on 28 Sep 2005
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Theres no such thing as a "random random" in h3, they are all template based.
Yep, so, even if you don't load rmg.txt file, if you look in the map info, you will see something like "template was 3Ga6D", which is one of the built-in templates contained in one of the .lod files. If you want you can single it out and generate a map with it to see what it looks like and how rich it is.
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Example: a gold pile has the same value as a den of thieves or a waterwheel.
funny snow is: gold piles on random maps is pretty much the only thing that can be balanced. A value range of 600-600 will almost always create the gold piles But even then one player can have 100 gold piles in a huge area and his opponent can have 10 goldpiles in an extremely small area, half of which is blocked by some monster blocking the passage.
Anything else is nearly impossible to balance since at higher values the random generator will often put combinations instead of one single item. Say, you want to put a tope on each side. You set a value of 11000-11000 and think "ahha, this snow is gonna be balanced! everyone gets a tope!" and then you see 3 resources + scroll + jail on one side and 2 full topes on the other.
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Conan
Responsible
Supreme Hero
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posted September 28, 2005 06:38 PM |
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[modhat]Russ,
I've given you a warning in the Other Side about foul language. After a warning, I must apply a penalty.
I'm sorry it had to come to this.[/modhat]
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Your life as it has been is over. From this time forward, you will service.... us. - Star Trek TNG
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