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heroes_player
Known Hero
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posted May 13, 2014 12:23 PM |
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In my humble opinion, town hall must be always 1st priority whenever you play on 200% difficulty  also, starting with a hero who has +350gold speciality is the best choice for this difficulty too. However, on the other difficulties I would concentrate on starting troops first depending on map's neutral creatures and resources.
Just my 50 cents... 
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OhforfSake
Promising
Legendary Hero
Initiate
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posted May 13, 2014 03:35 PM |
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Don't forget it takes 5 days before the investment starts to give a net gain. If the game lasts for 25 days, the difference is 10k gold at the end.
1. week: -2500
2. week: 1000
3. week: 4500
4. week: 8000
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Living time backwards
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revolut1oN
Famous Hero
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posted May 13, 2014 04:10 PM |
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Town Hall never pays off in the first week. Only army makes sense so you can conquer more stuff on the map.
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SkeleTony
Hired Hero
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posted May 13, 2014 05:25 PM |
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jackdaniels said:
I always play with 130% difficulty, which means I get approzimately 15000 in the first day. I believe it's very useful to do Town Hall on the first day because it gives you additional 500 gold a day. If I was not doing it, then I would be out of money by the second week.
However, I'm not very sure if it is wise to start going for the capitol straight after finishing Town Hall. It requires Marketplace, Mage Guild 1 and Blacksmith. So, three days would be wasted. Therefore, I usually start doing the dwellings after Town Hall and if I am lucky and there is enough wood on the map, I may even get a Castle by the seventh day.
On the other hand, that makes me quite passive, because I don't have much gold and I just stay in the town and wait. Most of the times I'm just defending rather than attacking. I am quite sure the style suits for the town, because I'm playing with Fortress.
It IS wise to go for the Capitol immediately...on larger maps at the very least. Every day you do not have the capitol built (but Do have the city hall) you are losing 2,000 gold. Every day you do not have the city hall built you are losing another 1,000 gold. In just 2 weeks you are giving up between 28,000 and 42,000 gold. Trying to get creature generators built early instead will make looting crypts and such easier but this will net you maybe 10,000 gold if you are fortunate before you start suffering from financial problems such as being unable to afford your troops and such in my experience.
And other than looting (which you can and often do get enough creatures to do just from the freebie generators (skeleton, troglodytes, harpies, etc.) you don't really have a need for creatures until after the capitol is built anyway so one should not waste the beginning weeks not building toward the capitol.
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OhforfSake
Promising
Legendary Hero
Initiate
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posted May 13, 2014 05:44 PM |
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I seldom got around to get capitol and yet money was hardly an issue. Getting a couple of level 7 critters at week 2 against the AI is a pretty sure way to achieve an easy win.
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Living time backwards
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scbw1234
Hired Hero
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posted May 17, 2014 03:27 PM |
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Edited by scbw1234 at 19:30, 23 May 2014.
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It really depends on the map,the alignment you choose and your starting condition(whether level 2 creature dwelling is built,whether your starting army of three heroes is good).
A good example would be for playing Rampart,when play Ivor as starting hero,sometimes he would bring 10+ elves with him.If you can hire another hero with several evles,then you would definitely build homestead instead of mage guild or town hall.
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SkeleTony
Hired Hero
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posted May 17, 2014 04:06 PM |
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OhforfSake said:
I seldom got around to get capitol and yet money was hardly an issue. Getting a couple of level 7 critters at week 2 against the AI is a pretty sure way to achieve an easy win.
While I don't often play Rampart, I do knopw that this depends on things like map size, opposition etc. For the average or even above average player (not the guys who love to play maps where you start with no money, no armies and face throngs of black dragons on a smaller map) I don't think they would get away with your tactic on a very large map against conflux (or even several other factions) opponents.
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angelito
Honorable
Undefeatable Hero
proud father of a princess
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posted May 17, 2014 06:56 PM |
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SkeleTony said:
It IS wise to go for the Capitol immediately...on larger maps at the very least. Every day you do not have the capitol built (but Do have the city hall) you are losing 2,000 gold. Every day you do not have the city hall built you are losing another 1,000 gold. In just 2 weeks you are giving up between 28,000 and 42,000 gold. Trying to get creature generators built early instead will make looting crypts and such easier but this will net you maybe 10,000 gold if you are fortunate before you start suffering from financial problems such as being unable to afford your troops and such in my experience.
And other than looting (which you can and often do get enough creatures to do just from the freebie generators (skeleton, troglodytes, harpies, etc.) you don't really have a need for creatures until after the capitol is built anyway so one should not waste the beginning weeks not building toward the capitol.
Sorry to say, but it seems there are not many words in your post which tell the truth refering to HOMM3 
I can't imagine ANY kind of map where I would go for capitol before creature buildings. Any I can't imagine any scenario/map you would win against a mediocre online player if YOU go for capitol first.
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Better judged by 12 than carried by 6.
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OhforfSake
Promising
Legendary Hero
Initiate
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posted May 17, 2014 07:03 PM |
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angelito said:
I can't imagine ANY kind of map where I would go for capitol before creature buildings
I suppose you could make a map with no fights, all you've to do is pass a single quest guard, which wants money..
SkeleTony said:
I don't think they would get away with your tactic on a very large map against conflux (or even several other factions) opponents.
If you don't get your creatures first week, your opponent has ~67% more creatures than you, and a much higher stat'ed hero, when you meet at the third week.
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Living time backwards
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SkeleTony
Hired Hero
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posted May 17, 2014 10:39 PM |
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angelito said:
SkeleTony said:
It IS wise to go for the Capitol immediately...on larger maps at the very least. Every day you do not have the capitol built (but Do have the city hall) you are losing 2,000 gold. Every day you do not have the city hall built you are losing another 1,000 gold. In just 2 weeks you are giving up between 28,000 and 42,000 gold. Trying to get creature generators built early instead will make looting crypts and such easier but this will net you maybe 10,000 gold if you are fortunate before you start suffering from financial problems such as being unable to afford your troops and such in my experience.
And other than looting (which you can and often do get enough creatures to do just from the freebie generators (skeleton, troglodytes, harpies, etc.) you don't really have a need for creatures until after the capitol is built anyway so one should not waste the beginning weeks not building toward the capitol.
Sorry to say, but it seems there are not many words in your post which tell the truth refering to HOMM3
I can't imagine ANY kind of map where I would go for capitol before creature buildings. Any I can't imagine any scenario/map you would win against a mediocre online player if YOU go for capitol first.
AGAIN (because apparently I cannot say this enough) I do NOT play online against human opponents (for at least 10 years now) and my comments are ONLY APPLICABLE to people who play as I do and have said several times now; Larger, random maps against the AI. Is the AI a worthy challenge? Probably not if your aim is to make the 'game' as 'challenging' as your 9 to 5 day job. If I were looking to put in that sort of work to enjoy a game then I would most certainly be trying to beat online human opponents (and this goes for every video game ever made).
But I am not. I play games just to entertain myself in between real life crap I have to do and deal with.
AGAIN, if YOU are playing (small maps especially) against human, online opponents then I would not be worried about money and you are probably best off getting as many units as you can as quickly as you can.
Clear?
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SkeleTony
Hired Hero
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posted May 17, 2014 10:44 PM |
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OhforfSake said:
angelito said:
I can't imagine ANY kind of map where I would go for capitol before creature buildings
I suppose you could make a map with no fights, all you've to do is pass a single quest guard, which wants money..
SkeleTony said:
I don't think they would get away with your tactic on a very large map against conflux (or even several other factions) opponents.
If you don't get your creatures first week, your opponent has ~67% more creatures than you, and a much higher stat'ed hero, when you meet at the third week.
AGAIN, in a single player match on a large - gigantic random map you are NOT going to run into the AI opponents in the first 3 or 4 weeks and if you try to keep up with the AI by giving your money away and hoping to match him in raising an army...you may be out of luck (or will be out of luck most of the time).
Do none of you read the comments leading up to the ones you take out of context to respond to?!
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OhforfSake
Promising
Legendary Hero
Initiate
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posted May 17, 2014 10:50 PM |
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I gotta admit it kind of confused me when you wrote can't get away with X vs. Conflux on a large map.. but if all you write about is against the AI, you could get away with a lot of stuff.
The AI takes a lot of time to buy units pass level 4, not to mention level 7 units. That's among the reasons why it hardly matters what town you give to the AI. Once you've level 7 units, you can often simply travel to his place and beat him quickly and easily.
Of course that's not always the case, e.g. if you attacked a town which has build its castle with Behemoth's or Hydra's, then odds are it won't work. Also for Dungeon & Rampart, getting those level 7's first week isn't really possibly under normal circumstances. But that doesn't change the AI is incredible easy to win against.
It's kind of funny though, I remember having a very hard time against the AI when I played the game back in late 90's. I always played the Normal diff. (100%), and I thought it was going too easy, so I tried Hard (130%), just to see if I had the skill. I went for my usual tactic, capitol as fast as possible, so I'd have plenty of money... then at some point in the game, my hero (singular) met the AI who'd a lot of different units, like Elementals and stuff (creatures that didn't belong to his faction he'd gotten from dwellings), and I got trashed in that fight and didn't have the guts to play on hard difficulty ever again.
Had I continued I'd eventually have won, but back then I really thought it was hopeless.
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Living time backwards
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SkeleTony
Hired Hero
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posted May 18, 2014 02:57 AM |
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OhforfSake said:
I gotta admit it kind of confused me when you wrote can't get away with X vs. Conflux on a large map.. but if all you write about is against the AI, you could get away with a lot of stuff.
The AI takes a lot of time to buy units pass level 4, not to mention level 7 units. That's among the reasons why it hardly matters what town you give to the AI. Once you've level 7 units, you can often simply travel to his place and beat him quickly and easily.
Except it DOES matter which towns the AI starts with (especially if playing against a team or two of allied AI). While the AI is of course not capable of the reasoning we humans are capable of, Conflux is purely unbalanced and every game I play against the AI when he starts with (or gains early) a Conflux opponent ends up being twice as much trouble for me to beat than other towns are. I am speaking of non-HotA Conflux here (as I know the HotA guys did work to better balance the Conflux) but still, the AI can and will get throngs of Phoenix if given a little time while his greatest challenger may have 1/2 to 1/3rd as many dragons or titans depending on how the map ends up.
I happen to have just played a random map game with HotA in which the AI met me around week 13 with a horde of Phoenix, a swarm of storm elementals and 750+ sprites (and pretty standard numbers of several Rampart stacks as well). I won but it was a pain for a bit.
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OhforfSake
Promising
Legendary Hero
Initiate
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posted May 18, 2014 03:30 AM |
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Playing against a team of 7 AI's on a small map HoMM 3 Complete (vanilla) should not be a problem to win. Then again, my games usually finished fast, no matter the size of the map (in vanilla, not talking about stuff like XXL maps here). I only noticed that the AI typically didn't have anything beyond level 4 units in the first month, unless the map was made to make buildings for them. Doesn't matter what town the AI has due to this. I've never seen Conflux being more of a challenge when the AI used it.
About a horde of phoenixes in week 13, is that a standard random map? If so, which one was it? I believe a horde is 50+, but less than 100 (throng), so 50-99. If it's a specific map that lets the AI have firebirds the first week, like a human player.. let's add the castle building to that, after 13 weeks, the town alone still only produces 2 + 12 * 4 = 50
Let's add a level 7 dwelling to that, then it becomes 4 + 12 * 6 = 76. But neither of those cases are the norm, typically the AI won't have its level 7 within the first 4-5 weeks at least.
But all that really doesn't matter a lot. Because there are other major weaknesses of the AI, more particularly what hero it uses as its main and how well it casts spells. I used to find more often than not the AI would have most of its army on a hero with stats along the lines of 4 4 7 8, or similar, while my hero had something along the lines of 20 12 7 6, or similar. Plus since the AI would be horrible at casting spells, it could have a superior army and still lose badly. I recall I played a map where all I did was finding the grail in an inferno town and just let time pass, only getting familiars.. the AI attacked me after many months with quite an army.. I don't remember the numbers, but it had build its level 7 units.. and it lost. Sure its own level 7 unit could 2 hit my familiars, but through usage of spells and having lots and lots of mana, I could still win it. Of course it helped the AI attacked me with inferior heroes as well. I kept on doing this, just sitting in my town until the game started crashing too often.
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Living time backwards
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DivineClio
Adventuring Hero
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posted May 18, 2014 04:59 AM |
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@ohforfsake
True.I played a custom map total unbalacing and giving tons of relic to AI.He send only few scout and one with poor stat and modest army.After the defeat(2 month 3-4 week) he just sit on tower with lv 7 hero with less 10 dragon.I was lv 18 with 19-20 archdemon.160% difficult.
So sad to see it.
Agaist AI after you take 50+ grand elves(rampart fagboy)cast wiew air and go kill the AI.
When i played the first time against a good player i saw him with 10 angel at end first month..and i was like WTF!
@scbw1234
Is a bad choise IMO.I think is better start always with mage tower,because you can start roam for shrine.
My truble right now is after took the pegasi&elves if is better go for unicorn or take castle before week 2.
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angelito
Honorable
Undefeatable Hero
proud father of a princess
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posted May 18, 2014 10:00 AM |
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@SkeleTony
Do you really think a tactic vs a human player has to differ from a tactic vs AI?
Playing against a human player ONLY differs when you meet him on the battlefield. All other aspects of the game (cleaning your area, fighting neutral stacks, economy, etc...) is completely the same.
And this doesn't refer to a specific map size. This counts for S maps without under, and for XL+under aswell.
On S maps, town hall is completely not interesting, because you will meet your opponent mostly before week 2 starts
On bigger maps, town hall or city hall is even more usless, because you get your money from utopias and banks.
So again, there is no map which I can think of which needs the money way to win it.
Maybe you just send me one of your maps where you won using the money way, and I try to beat it without even buildung townhall. Then we can compare 
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Better judged by 12 than carried by 6.
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markmasters
Famous Hero
Dragon of justice
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posted May 20, 2014 11:08 PM |
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On normal difficulty i go straight for creatures. On hardest difficulty i get a town hall as first building, depending on the treasures in the area around me i go for more income / more creatures
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scbw1234
Hired Hero
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posted May 23, 2014 07:46 PM |
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Edited by scbw1234 at 20:06, 23 May 2014.
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DivineClio said:
@ohforfsake
True.I played a custom map total unbalacing and giving tons of relic to AI.He send only few scout and one with poor stat and modest army.After the defeat(2 month 3-4 week) he just sit on tower with lv 7 hero with less 10 dragon.I was lv 18 with 19-20 archdemon.160% difficult.
So sad to see it.
Agaist AI after you take 50+ grand elves(rampart fagboy)cast wiew air and go kill the AI.
When i played the first time against a good player i saw him with 10 angel at end first month..and i was like WTF!
@scbw1234
Is a bad choise IMO.I think is better start always with mage tower,because you can start roam for shrine.
My truble right now is after took the pegasi&elves if is better go for unicorn or take castle before week 2.
Mage guild is always a good universal startup.
What i'm saying is that sometimes i start as Ivor as my starting hero to see if he brings enough elves.If the combine elves of homstead and the other hero in tavern(and of course Ivor's) is greater then 16 or even beyond 20 then you should immediately be able to conquer more resources then you would normally do.
But the catch is,Ivor it self is not a good hero compare to the others.It really doesn't matter if he builts up or not(for the shrines).and after the first week you would built more then you normally do,and still have enough resourse to train all the unit in the beginning of the second week.Then choose the "Real" hero that you plan to build-up,transfer everything to him and have HIM buy a book right after hired.And then have Ivor as a secondary hero to support(since he already had few levels it would be more easier to develop than your other secondary heroes).
Sometimes if i'm lucky,i had Kyrre or Elleshar appeared in tavern at the very first day in the beginning of the game,i would immediately transfer Ivor's unit to them instead with a huge load of Elves,only in this case i would choose mage guild day 1.
But either case of the two,this tactics IMO is really effective.
Thats just my habit of game play after years of Rampart play. Discussion welcomed
For the Unicorn&Castle i would prefer Castle,I do believe Pegasus+Evles are more versatile for neutral farming then Unicorns.But if you are playing against a player on S or M map,more Unicorn is always a good thing.
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Ebonheart
Famous Hero
Rush the rush
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posted June 01, 2014 10:59 AM |
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Problem with the mage guild is that it drains 1 day of building.
If you play as tower for example it is crucial that you build it day 1 since it is a requirement for the Mage Tower and also to provide your wizards with spells.
But besides the tower the other towns don't really gain much from building it since they lose creatures on it (not counting in the Conflux) and playing as Castle I prefer to only build it if I notice I can reach angels week 1.
At the end of the day it tends to be better to skip building your Mage Guild unless it is a must as in the examples above. It is simply far more profitable to buy your spellbook from a recently captured town. Oh and what do you know, we just got an additonal 500g per day, no need for the Town Hall!
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markmasters
Famous Hero
Dragon of justice
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posted June 02, 2014 11:33 PM |
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OhforfSake said:
Playing against a team of 7 AI's on a small map HoMM 3 Complete (vanilla) should not be a problem to win. Then again, my games usually finished fast, no matter the size of the map (in vanilla, not talking about stuff like XXL maps here). I only noticed that the AI typically didn't have anything beyond level 4 units in the first month, unless the map was made to make buildings for them. Doesn't matter what town the AI has due to this. I've never seen Conflux being more of a challenge when the AI used it.
About a horde of phoenixes in week 13, is that a standard random map? If so, which one was it? I believe a horde is 50+, but less than 100 (throng), so 50-99. If it's a specific map that lets the AI have firebirds the first week, like a human player.. let's add the castle building to that, after 13 weeks, the town alone still only produces 2 + 12 * 4 = 50
Let's add a level 7 dwelling to that, then it becomes 4 + 12 * 6 = 76. But neither of those cases are the norm, typically the AI won't have its level 7 within the first 4-5 weeks at least.
But all that really doesn't matter a lot. Because there are other major weaknesses of the AI, more particularly what hero it uses as its main and how well it casts spells. I used to find more often than not the AI would have most of its army on a hero with stats along the lines of 4 4 7 8, or similar, while my hero had something along the lines of 20 12 7 6, or similar. Plus since the AI would be horrible at casting spells, it could have a superior army and still lose badly. I recall I played a map where all I did was finding the grail in an inferno town and just let time pass, only getting familiars.. the AI attacked me after many months with quite an army.. I don't remember the numbers, but it had build its level 7 units.. and it lost. Sure its own level 7 unit could 2 hit my familiars, but through usage of spells and having lots and lots of mana, I could still win it. Of course it helped the AI attacked me with inferior heroes as well. I kept on doing this, just sitting in my town until the game started crashing too often.
The only exception is On 200% difficulty, when you give the AI stronghold, he often has behe's on week 1/2. Which still is easy to beat of course but sine you have a slow start (with a bit of bad luck if the area around you provides few gold you have bo building the first 2 days). If the AI is very close to you, you might actualy have a bad time :-).
At least thats my experience, i've had this situation where the AI would attack me in week 1 with a portal which was next to our castles, i had nothing yet to defend myself.
Quickest lose ever!
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