Best & Worst Units?

[Quikpik]

I found in the early game that bears rock. You will normally have a few vendors that sell bears, so you don't have to worry about losing them since there is a plentiful supply. They take a good beating and when enraged can deal a bunch of damage. These work much better as cannon fodder units than swordsman.

The worst unit in the game imo is the arch mage. I just don't get these units, very expensive with a high leadership cost.

[Suporex]

I am lev 11 mage only but I have to say royal snakes are my favourite + I have added archmages guardsman inquisitors and priests to that + have max fireball so archmage "push" is definetly useful

but after reading your coments I have to find myself horsman and orc shamans

[travcm]

Marauders are extremely good for building up boatloads of money. Even weak stacks at the beginning of the game can be looted (twice per battle) for upwards of 800 gold each time.

[Sammual]

Here is my take on the units;

BEST:

Peasants: Until your leadership allows a stack of 300+ their ability to stack Attack bonuses make this your #1 melee damage stack. After your leadership gets high enough for 300+ in a stack it is time to move on.

Bowmen: Higher Damage than Thorn Hunters or Priests. Skills that decrease Leadership cost and give special abilites to make this unit last until you get Dwarven Cannoneers or Evil Beholders (Or even further if you are a Warrior).

Royal Snakes: Attacks cause no retaliation, good specials, low leadership cost for HP.

Swordsmen: The Damage Resistance makes them better then average. Use until something better comes along.

Cannoneers: Fast, Great damage, can melee.

Evil Beholders: High Ranged magic-damage, hypnotize alone makes them one of the three top Ranged units.

Orc Shamans: Hands down the best unit. Totems, Totems, Totems, Ranged, Melee. After you get sacrifice and Rez maxed I think you can break the game running around with 5 stacks of these guys.

A. Bears: Loads of HP and good damage make these guys your best early to mid game tanks.

Cyclops: These guys are tanks. They take almost NO ranged damage.

Giants: AoE Tanks.


Worst:

Thorn Hunters: Low HP.

Robbers: Neg morale.

Priests: Fast and Bless special is nice but low damage makes them almost useless.

Goblin Axe-Throwers: Low HP, they don't live long enough to show any potental.

Arch-Mage: HIGH Leadership cost makes them worthless unless you are a Mage that has maxed out the Arch-Mage skill and if you have done that then why haven't you replaced you Arch-Mages with Orc Shamans?

Polar Bears: WTF? A much higher Leadership cost then A. Bears and bearly higher stats.

Sammual

P.S. Does anyone have an excel spreadsheet of the units and thier stats?

[knoxchris]

Are Shaman only available via the Islands? Or are there more later in the game?

[bman654]

And how do you get more than one stack of orc shamans? Or any other unit? Everytime I buy a unit it goes into the same stack with the rest of my units.

[Sammual]

When you have an empty spot hold shift and click on the Orc Shamans and then click the empty spot.
If you ever loose a whole stack just do that with any spell casting creature, put 1 creature in the spot and use them to buff your troops or lay down totems or loot corpses or.....

Sammual

[kennec]

i realy like the elves archers. they are lvl 4 but do good ranged damage. prefect for mage.

i still use orc shamans alot in elven lands.

when do we get blackdragons ? my plan is to have an armgageddon nuker with black drakes only hehe

ai seem to attack them alot though so i have them between my giants and lvl 5 trees.

a unit i think look very cool are the demon/unded lvl 4-5 knights with black armour with gold on. when facing stacks of 150+ of these suckers i am back to kiting from lineage low lvl times 10 years ago lol. they can simply take so much punichment.

[KuPPeRz]

A all melee army is a lot easier to use than what some people would think as well.

Right now I have Horsemen, sea dogs, swordsmen, peasants, and polar bears with archers and pirates as my reserves. When you use the "tactics" ability and can push those units out further, you use the peasant for more than just a tank, which is why most people think of them as a "useless" unit. To be honest, starting three hexes out and two rounds later, you got a counter-attacking 1 hit marathon with a pitchfork that some people really don't take advantage of, strongest unit with the highest count that is a tank as well??!! Jeez.... . Using "Haste" on peasants can be good too. Sometimes you want them to get somewhere quicker when they only move up two hexes at a time, but for the most part I find my peasant killing everything too damn quick for me to use "haste" on him more than 1 time.

In addition to having bonuses to these melee classes, I think it's only important to have 1 long range attack throughout the game for many reasons.

You want your characters to take damage, you want them to attack. Once that rage accumulates there are various spells to cast to eliminate single units slowly or all at once so theres no reason to have more than 1 long range taking massive hits, they just get weak, take damage, and then theres more than 1 unit to build back up. I know everyone has noticed "dragons, griffins, and bears, oh my" go straight for your long ranged units.

Using tactics to push your melee units out onto the grid further before the battle starts is one hell of an advantage, alongside with ice thorns. I use those two together going into a battle with the enemy being "Strong" or "match", I don't even lose 1/2 my units. It's all about ganging up on the one guy.

Have the long-range guy finish off the low count units on the opposing side, using defense when necessary and also attacking flying units. Nothing more to that.

[ureal]

Originally Posted by KuPPeRz

A all melee army is a lot easier to use than what some people would think as well

In addition to having bonuses to these melee classes, I think it's only important to have 1 long range attack throughout the game for many reasons.

I know everyone has noticed "dragons, griffins, and bears, go straight for your long ranged units.

Using tactics to push your melee units out onto the grid further before the battle starts is one hell of an advantage, alongside with ice thorns. I use those two together going into a battle with the enemy being "Strong" or "match", I don't even lose 1/2 my units. It's all about ganging up on the one guy.

That may be one way to do it but later when you face large stacks in the hundreds you will find your self taking huge loses. The main problem with melee units is retaliation so with a stack of 300+, even if you manage to kill 100 your unit will still take a huge hit, I find it better to use 2-3 range units. Firstly to take out archer and long range attackers, secondly to wilt down large stacks so that my units take less damage and I find it better to leave a stack with 10-20 units around instead of wasting turns and focus on the larger stacks.

In all my normal fights (I am in the islands) I have never lost more then 5 units fighting strong or match fights, only time I came close to losing 1/2 my units was against an upgrade fight where the gremlins spammed lightning and fireballs.

Currently in the island my group consists of evil beholder (mind control), dwarf alchemist (can melee up to 3 units, poison bomb), griffins (speed, retaliation), royal snake (no retaliation, lunge), inquisitors (resurrection and rage builder).