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| Thread: Witch civ do you like |  This thread is pages long: 1 2 3 4 5 · «PREV / NEXT» |
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Lich_King
Honorable
Supreme Hero
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posted August 29, 2002 03:24 PM |
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DEATH, ORDER, DEATH, CHAOS, DEATH did I mention DEATH ?
I like playing with Necropolis, because I like Death and its secrets. Order is an aligment, that I like too. Chaos? I like it because it has most powerfull creatures. Nature - also good. I don't like Might because I dont know how to win without spells. And I DONT LIKE HAVEN, because I like Death.
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Wub
Responsible
Famous Hero
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posted August 29, 2002 09:59 PM |
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Wub, even if there are situations where Stronghold may be good, this doesnt change the fact that it is the worst town. You must rely on so many aspects to play a good game with them, it just doesnt worth the effort.
Really, I don't disagree with you. Might is one of the least favorite alignments for me too, although this is just my humble opinion which may change when (or if) the multiplayer patch is released. That's why I think that it at least makes sense what Japjer said:
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the stronghold should get some spells to protect themselves, or potions of spells like exorcism, anti-magic. now i know they exist, but only for the heroes (who most of the time will have GM resistance anyway).
with some resistance for the creatures, they will be more powerful and not unbeatable.
I do not agree with this:
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i love to play life in SP, but i think i won't stand a chance with them against anyone but nature (no access to those spells) in MP.
When playing nature, you can always cast anti-magic or simply learn life magic and acquire counter-magic spells that way if you really want to.
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Generals are great for every other town, but the +1 Morale bonus does the Necro hero no good whatsoever, so it's a completely wasted sub-class...
This also encourages taking the offense and defense skill rather than the leadership skill for the death alignment.
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dale
Known Hero
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posted August 30, 2002 10:41 AM |
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the +1 Morale bonus does the Necro hero no good whatsoever, so it's a completely wasted sub-class...
Not completely true, I'm pretty sure that the morale bonus applies to the devils, imps and cerebus that you might have on a death team. They are not dead.
In the opposite direction, if fighting death army vs. death army, save those creatures for last so that your vampires can ramp back up after taking hits from the other side vampires, skeletons or whatever other undead creatures.
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japjer
Adventuring Hero
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posted August 30, 2002 07:13 PM |
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I do not agree with this:
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i love to play life in SP, but i think i won't stand a chance with them against anyone but nature (no access to those spells) in MP.
When playing nature, you can always cast anti-magic or simply learn life magic and acquire counter-magic spells that way if you really want to.
you must admit life has a much better chance winning against nature than against any other alignment (yeah, i know, might, but i don't really count them as anything but objects to cast spells on)
life's power lies in their mass buff spells, and nature is the only one who can't mass dispel them, thus giving life an advantage (in that area!). i don't know if anti-magic also works on enemy targets, but even if it does, you can only cast it on one creature at a time.
nature has a lot of different strong points against life, but in a life vs nature match, wether or not life has nature ward, will mean alot to the outcome.
i think life has the biggest advantage in a multiplayer game with more than 1 opponent. with their resurrection, probably multiple towns (because of a big map) leading to a bigger chance to get the wards, they could get relatively stronger after eliminating the first opponents. they won't have suffered as much casualties.
teh position of the life army also would play a big role. life has the best chance starting next to death and order(hoping for hypnotize not to be there yet), ending with nature and chaos (summoning equals resurrection and DD are relitavely weaker later on)
btw my favorites: life/order/nature,chaos (climbing up in the ranks), death, .................................might
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Wub
Responsible
Famous Hero
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posted August 31, 2002 12:46 AM |
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Interesting post, Japjer! I'll give some reactions.
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you must admit life has a much better chance winning against nature than against any other alignment
Well, personally I always am very careful with such pronunciations. It is extremely hard to prove them because there are so much factors that must be taken into account. And I think that until the multiplayer patch is released we cannot say anything too definitive anyway. But I certainly agree that (mass) cancellation and (mass) dispel are a plus when facing a life army led by a magic hero. But that does not necessarily mean that nature should be less effective against life. By the way, if I follow your way of reasoning, do you think life is more effective against chaos as well? Chaos has no counter magic spells whatsoever (except maybe for haste and misfortune if you like).
By the way, anti-magic can indeed only be cast on friendly targets.
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i think life has the biggest advantage in a multiplayer game with more than 1 opponent. with their resurrection, probably multiple towns (because of a big map) leading to a bigger chance to get the wards, they could get relatively stronger after eliminating the first opponents. they won't have suffered as much casualties.
Again I wouldn't say it so definitive. Wards are just one factor. Maybe they are decisive, maybe not. And besides, other alignments have ways to reduce their casualities too: death can reinforce its army with necromancy or the undead transformer. In my opinion, order can create an army which can clear out most wandering creatures with no losses. And nature may be able to let summoned creatures to the dirty jobs (for example: eating up retaliation). Maybe you disagree with some of these tactics/strategies, but I just want to make clear that resurrection is not the only way to prevent or diminish creature losses.
Finally I'd like to pose a question: when playing on impossible with Life, what do you think is the best way to tackle the big creature stacks very early? I can think of ways to do this with other alignments, but I can't make too fast a start with Life...
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japjer
Adventuring Hero
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posted August 31, 2002 06:11 PM |
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to your question:
some order magic is a must have for a life army, with slow and precision you can come a long way.
before i start commenting on this further, i'd like to ask you how early in the game do you mean, if you mean the very beginning then i think you have an advantage with the archers at your side. in combination with the squires stun attack and decent stats, i think you will come much further than with other alignments, they are the best lvl 1 units on it's own (again, not counting might)
in reply to your counter to resurrection with necromancy:
that's why i think life only has a chance against death early on, when holy word/shout still does reasonable damage and the necromancer probably won't have GM necromancy yet.
i also said that life's advantage against nature is only in that(!) area, as i'm aware of nature's other strong points(summoning, great buff spells).
why i didn't name chaos as a beatable opponent concerning dispel etc., it's because they have access to death, which every chaos player should take against life, be it only for the spells.
i know my arguments are not all proven yet (i haven't played a lot of hot seat either, maybe 8 games), but my opinion is, that life is too dependable on the opponent wheter or not gaining dispel etc.
also, when life gets the dispelnegating artifact, they become much more powerfull.
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Wub
Responsible
Famous Hero
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posted September 01, 2002 03:00 PM |
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to your question:
some order magic is a must have for a life army, with slow and precision you can come a long way.
Ok, that makes sense. Slow is good to give your shooters more time to attack and letting your hero(es) cast spells. And precision is especially good for monks and it helps crossbowmen as well (ballistas are immune for it though). The question is how fast you can gain order magic though and that may well be a bit late I guess.
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before i start commenting on this further, i'd like to ask you how early in the game do you mean, if you mean the very beginning then i think you have an advantage with the archers at your side. in combination with the squires stun attack and decent stats, i think you will come much further than with other alignments, they are the best lvl 1 units on it's own (again, not counting might)
Let's give an example of what I mean. When I play death (on impossible) the key is to get vampires as soon as possible. (In the 'which is the best' thread Dale explained this a bit further). In the very early game, death can try to get that vampire dwelling by using the excellent scout ability of the imps, or by using the poison spell. With the latter I mean engaging a slow stack (squires, peasants, troglodytes etc), casting posion and moving your hero around until the stack dies. This is a VERY boring tactic, but it at least works well. To make a long story short: if I play death I can start very fast. In the medium 1 on 1 map: Gulf of Nayr (a CD-map), I finished in 9 days playing death and now I know the map layout I can do it even in 7 or something I think.
But how can I accomplish something like that with life? Life doesn't have such a stunning unit as the vampire so it will have a lot more problems clearing creature stacks. I guess I should take monks, but even then I need more creatures to deal with level 1 stacks. And dealing with level 2 stacks will still be too hard for a while. And how should Life save themselves until they get monks? I agree that crossbowmen and squires make a good combo, but depending on the map, you start with an army that is never bigger than a hero, 30 crossbowmen and 42 squires (if you are lucky!). Yet you must fight against stacks of +/- 110 squires. You may be able to kill one such stack but then you will find yourself with no creatures left and only a small treasure which will not help your economy that much. And in the first days your hero has no order magic either. Moreover, Life has no good scouting unit. Death has the imp, allowing to snatch resources away from wandering creatures real fast. Your hero can travel with 28 movement/day as well. Life will have to use squires for exploration, which move with only 19 squares per day. Therefore I think that death really starts faster than Life. Probably I am overlooking something and that's why I asked you how to start with Life quickly.
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also, when life gets the dispelnegating artifact, they become much more powerfull.
Interesting, I hadn't thought of that. But I agree that the ring of permanency is especially good for life (and nature).
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japjer
Adventuring Hero
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posted September 01, 2002 03:41 PM |
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i have to agree
you're right, life has no start like death has, but they can come around. with the squires i usually bring one hero (preferably with some combat) to take the retaliation and heal him with my priest. that way you'll have the crossbowmen and ballistae (i know they're slow, but pikemen suffer too many losses with resurrection not at at least expert yet) to shoot them. also some spells like wards and bless are good for the first 2 turns when they haven't reached eachother yet.
i do think they have a better start than order. with halfling's close to useless early on, the golems and dwarfs suffer heavy losses (mages are too weak for me, but can be good with their poison), also the order mage isn't that powerful yet, with a max damage of 100 with ice bolt. well maybe there even in the beginning...
i think a small adjustment should be made for the vampire dwelling, like building a uhmm something expensive. don't the venom spawns have that?
one other thing about the vamps early in the game. when fighting a larger stack, it could be a problem winning when the neutral army would attack your vamps with all their might. a death army without vamps isn't much, whereas you can take any creature from the life army and still have a reasonable army.
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Shadow_Elf
Wandering Thief
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posted September 01, 2002 03:48 PM |
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chaos
chaos rulz i mean nothing beats a thief w/ grandmaster stealth and grandmaster scouting with 12 nightmares and 30 medusas
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Dont mess with the best cuz u aint got no contest.
Forget the rulz they were made to be broken
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Shadow_Elf
Wandering Thief
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posted September 01, 2002 03:55 PM |
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thats is in midgame be4 theyve got level 4
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Dont mess with the best cuz u aint got no contest.
Forget the rulz they were made to be broken
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Wub
Responsible
Famous Hero
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posted September 01, 2002 04:17 PM |
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Edited By: Wub on 1 Sep 2002
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Thanx for your reply
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with the squires i usually bring one hero (preferably with some combat) to take the retaliation and heal him with my priest. that way you'll have the crossbowmen and ballistae (i know they're slow, but pikemen suffer too many losses with resurrection not at at least expert yet) to shoot them. also some spells like wards and bless are good for the first 2 turns when they haven't reached eachother yet.
Hmm, I can always try that tactic although the prerequisites may be a bit high to pull it off real early. But it's interesting.
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i do think they have a better start than order. with halfling's close to useless early on, the golems and dwarfs suffer heavy losses (mages are too weak for me, but can be good with their poison), also the order mage isn't that powerful yet, with a max damage of 100 with ice bolt. well maybe there even in the beginning...
My experience differs a bit from yours. I always go for magi anyway and I find them real good. And once you get genies, I am able to deal with bigger armies than playing death. A level 2 hero with something like 50 halflings 16 magi and 4 genies can beat 40 minotaurs without losses. You can even tackle stacks of hydras and behemoths. Or slow shooter stacks. Even ivory towers, although the latter two battles are dangerous. The idea against grunts with this army is to cast slow every opposing stack while poisoning them with your magi. Poison is extremely powerful: 4 stacks poisoned by 16 magi will lose something like 150 hitpoints every round. And while the creature stacks are moving slowly towards your army, 50 halflings with precision and mirth cast upon them will do real good damage. Also, your hero can cast magic fist if necessary. And when the creature stacks finally reach your army, you can cast song of peace on every stack, while letting them suffer extra from raise skeleton or magic fist. I really like order!
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i think a small adjustment should be made for the vampire dwelling, like building a uhmm something expensive. don't the venom spawns have that?
I agree that building vampires is too easy. What about a citadel as a prerequisite? By the way, for venom spawns you need nothing more than a level 2 building, a fort and a level 1 mage guild. But I prefer vampires anyway.
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one other thing about the vamps early in the game. when fighting a larger stack, it could be a problem winning when the neutral army would attack your vamps with all their might. a death army without vamps isn't much, whereas you can take any creature from the life army and still have a reasonable army.
Agreed, if I must fight a stack from which I cannot drain life early on, I am happy to rather sacrifice all my first level units than 1 vampire. Vampires are the key unit.
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japjer
Adventuring Hero
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posted September 01, 2002 04:26 PM |
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[quote
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i do think they have a better start than order. with halfling's close to useless early on, the golems and dwarfs suffer heavy losses (mages are too weak for me, but can be good with their poison), also the order mage isn't that powerful yet, with a max damage of 100 with ice bolt. well maybe there even in the beginning...
My experience differs a bit from yours. I always go for magi anyway and I find them real good. And once you get genies, I am able to deal with bigger armies than playing death. A level 2 hero with something like 50 halflings 16 magi and 4 genies can beat 40 minotaurs without losses. You can even tackle stacks of hydras and behemoths. Or slow shooter stacks. Even ivory towers, although the latter two battles are dangerous. The idea against grunts with this army is to cast slow every opposing stack while poisoning them with your magi. Poison is extremely powerful: 4 stacks poisoned by 16 magi will lose something like 150 hitpoints every round. And while the creature stacks are moving slowly towards your army, 50 halflings with precision and mirth cast upon them will do real good damage. Also, your hero can cast magic fist if necessary. And when the creature stacks finally reach your army, you can cast song of peace on every stack, while letting them suffer extra from raise skeleton or magic fist. I really like order!
you're right, i tried defending life in an area where they would always lose compared to other alignments, it's just, i really like life and think they could use a boost (at least for a better start). maybe making monks available sooner?
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Wub
Responsible
Famous Hero
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posted September 01, 2002 04:52 PM |
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it's just, i really like life and think they could use a boost (at least for a better start). maybe making monks available sooner?
Let's say that Life does have a slow start at impossible. After all, we may be overlooking something. Couldn't it be so that they are better at lower difficulty levels, where creature stacks are smaller and therefore would be less of an issue? Since you start with more resources you could build a level 4 dwelling at the end of week 1 (I guess?). Maybe Life can win terrain on other civs there (just an assumption)?
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japjer
Adventuring Hero
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posted September 01, 2002 10:23 PM |
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Let's say that Life does have a slow start at impossible. After all, we may be overlooking something. Couldn't it be so that they are better at lower difficulty levels, where creature stacks are smaller and therefore would be less of an issue? Since you start with more resources you could build a level 4 dwelling at the end of week 1 (I guess?). Maybe Life can win terrain on other civs there (just an assumption)?
i don't think so, it will be more of an advantage to nature, where the weak summoning spells let's them have minor casualties.
for life, it won't make much of a difference, their power in the first weeks lies in the creatures.
i prefer playing advanced anyway, the AI has a bigger chance of getting an army because they won't die from the neutrals.
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Wub
Responsible
Famous Hero
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posted September 02, 2002 10:58 PM |
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Couldn't it be so that they are better at lower difficulty levels, where creature stacks are smaller and therefore would be less of an issue?
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i don't think so, it will be more of an advantage to nature, where the weak summoning spells let's them have minor casualties.
I don't really believe it either. I'm just trying to think of maps where Life would have the advantage. Maybe at extremely resource-poor maps (on impossible), where you must depend on your squire-crossbowmen army for a fairly long time. They are a good combo and since Life lacks a killer level 3 unit (in my opinion at least)...
I'm playing a scenario with Life now and the lack of that killer unit and fast scouts are a real setback, at least for me.
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i prefer playing advanced anyway, the AI has a bigger chance of getting an army because they won't die from the neutrals.
I can understand that, but hey, I've got my honor.. 
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Lich_King
Honorable
Supreme Hero
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posted September 06, 2002 10:46 PM |
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Death rulez has anyone have any good tactics for death??????
Which creatures should I choose from all levels??+
Vampires are great!!!!
I think that death magic is the most powerfull. The bet spells are : "Poison", "Mass Curse", "Plague", "Vampiric touch", "Death call" and of course "Hand of death".
In my opinion from 2nd lvl. you should take Ghosts (because their "Aging" abillity. Movement by half, -25% Defence, Attack). Cerberus also good, but not as ghosts. Both lvl. 3 units are powerfull: Vampires flyes, drains life and they have no retelation abillity, that makes them perfect killers in huge numbers. (You must have GM Necromancy to raise more vampires from your enemy.). Venom Spawns are the stronges shooting lvl.3 creatures. And if you have a lot of Spawn thier "Poison" will do more damage... For the lvl.4 I can say, that Bone Dragons are the best choice: they are second stronest creature in hmm4. They have Flying, Panic (No retelation), Skeletal (+100 % against shots) specialtys.
And if you want unbeatable creature cast "Vampiric touch" on Bone Dragons. If you want a hero killer - Choose Devils. He can teleport to any location on the map ! In adition he has life ward (less damage from life spells and units) and "Summon Ice Demon" spell ( every devil can summon 1 Ice demon.). I think all Death units are great, when you now how to use them.
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Tristan
Promising
Known Hero
illegally insane
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posted September 07, 2002 01:01 AM |
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Well, I played several 1 vs 1 maps against the computer (I have nobody near to play hotseat with) and every time but one I have used death (random town), and EVERY time I have been able to get nature magic! This can be a really killer combo with gm necro. The ability to raise vampires from living stacks and summon imps for targets (the AI almost always picks them over the vamps) can help you win with no losses. Also only having 2 stacks (vampires and Hero) in your army keeps the enemy close.
I know against a human player I would not be so lucky, but I have always been able to beat my opponent with just this army, so ghosts or cerebri don't really matter. I usually pick the dogs because I think they fight better (against AI, who likes to mass attack 1 unit at least) but if I don't think I will get nature magic, I will take ghosts along with my necromancer. The dogs are slower, but ghosts are the same speed as the vamps.
Actually, my selection for level 4 varies a bit as well (If I even get around to building one, most med multi maps against AI I don't bother no matter what alignment ) in some cases I will go with the devils, but most times I like the bone dragons. The extra map speed of devils doesn't matter to me, as I am going to have my vamps with me, so the dragons won't slow me down any.
For level 3 with death, I can see no occasion I would pick venom spawn over vamps, They are just too slow and too weak for my liking. They might be better at defending a siege (quite likely in fact, I know I hate attacking a castle guarded by them) but I don't plan on being on the defensive.
As for overall strategy? Get vampires FAST, work on your necromancer and GM necromancy, try to find nature magic, then harvest all those poor living critters!
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If you learn so much by losing, why am I so dumb?
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Thunder
Responsible
Famous Hero
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posted September 07, 2002 05:41 PM |
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I disagree, Devils make ideal hero killers due to their fast movement in the battlefield even if you have to sacrifice them for doing so. Summon Ice Demon is a nice bonus. They are not immune to Hypnotize like Bone Dragons but at least you have a change to kill opposite mage before getting your hero teleported.
Might is not weak by any means. I found it odd that people find Chaos strong and Might weak, as Might seem to be able to crush Chaos with ease in hotseat. Direct damage spells aren't that dangerous. Against most of the time Might does have nearly equal chances against other alignments as well. Order isn't that hard so long as it doesn't get Hypnotize and spell combos. And are, of course, able to cast them in the battle field. Nature might be able to outproduce Chaos in Extra-Large maps, believe me it is quite possible with Summoning skill to do so, but they aren't that huge of threat either. What comes to Life, they have no wards against Might which is a good thing but they also have access to spell combos and Hypnotize just like Order. Death is propably the hardest opponent due to Necromancy, although you can hire Necromancer from Academy and Asylum as well.
As for testing town and hero setups, you might want to try Duel Arena that gives an easy and quick way to do so. It can be downloaded from H3trio or from MapHaven.
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Wub
Responsible
Famous Hero
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posted September 17, 2002 03:26 PM |
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Might is not weak by any means.
I know which arguments can be used to say that Might is not weak since I completely read the mighty strategies thread:
http://heroescommunity.com/viewthread.php3?TID=4923
But still, Might is everything but my favourite alignment. Why? I just don't see enough factors to compensate for the lack of magic. Let me explain.
The typical feature for the might town that should make up for the lack of any magic, is the increased creature growth and the ability to recruit those extra creaturs due to their low cost prize. However, in order to get that extra growth, a very expensive breeding pens is required. It costs 15000 gold, 10 wood and 30 ore; more or less the cost of a level 4 creature building. It is obvious that this structure cannot be built early in the game, so the question is: what does Might have to not fall behind on other alignments in the early game?
Well, the cheaper creatures are a plus that counts from the early game on. But on the other hand: the money that is saved by recruiting cheaper creatures must be partly spent to a very expensive prerequisite for a level 2 building. Building either a caravan or a citadel for a level 2 building will slow you down. So, the Might alignment has no magic and makes up for that by being able to build a breeding pens VERY late and recruiting cheaper creatures so they can build a caravan or citadel, in my opinion.
Are there any other good things in the Might town? Of course, the cyclops. I agree that this is the key unit in any Might army. But, many other alignments have such a key unit too. For example, Death has the vampire and Order the genie.
Some people say that one of the strong points of Might is there level 1 units. I won't be so sure about that either. Berserkers have excellent stats, but you can only control them to a certain extent. They are by no means bad units, but I wouldn't claim they are superior. Centaurs almost look like a level 2 unit, but not quite. Their low growth prevents them from being overpowered as well. And in addition, the scouting abilities of both units are not fabulous either. Centaurs may have reasonably good adventure map movement, but they are too valuable to waste. That's why you cannot 'steal' resources from wandering stacks with them. You could do that with berserkers, but they aren't that fast.
Conclusion is that I don't really see how Might makes up for a lack of magic...and can even excel against other alignments. I would like to hear from other players what they think. And I also like to know if you should first build a breeding pens or a level 4 creature building. Feedback is appreciated!
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daikon
Adventuring Hero
with great magic powers
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posted September 23, 2002 05:42 PM |
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I shouldnīt know how to put it in better words, Wub.
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Against most of the time Might does have nearly equal chances against other alignments as well. Order isn't that hard so long as it doesn't get Hypnotize and spell combos. And are, of course, able to cast them in the battle field.
What do you mean with spell combos? If you are talking about the Hypnotize+Sacrifice, witch is a little dificculty to get, I say we need not to have such powerfull spells to crush a Might army with Order. The might army, not the heroes of course, is more succetible to magic than ANY other town. Your creatures are completelly defenceless to spells because you donīt have any couter magic as dispel, exorcism, magic mirror and so on. You canīt counter your enemies buffs either, so any mass buff spell will offbalance the battle against you. A simple forgetfullness can disrupt the might key unit, the ciclops. The hero may be hard to target with spells, but the illusions shoud deal with them well as might has no counter for them either.
I canīt see a way to use effectively a might army without relying on other aspects (as somehow getting a magic hero) than mights own strenghts. Thatīs what I think.
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