I didn't know that. Always wondered... Makes sense.

Meh, I couldn't be bothered to ask my ally for towers so I just went around them.

The same race is only that you don't have too many of different alignment and races in one group as it makes them even likely to rebel. But if you add to 1 unit that doesn't like you another one of the same race it won't help at all.

Also, I hope you don't want to attack with that 7 stack. You would very likely lose.

Me neither.

No, the seven stack is way too small. When I assault, I'm planning to use everything in the city, everything I can hire from up north, everything I can summon, and everyone that arrives from the south. The trigger will probably be when the city finishes migrating to archons. The 7 stack is guarding the bridge towers so those slow units are closer and keeping Necrosis honest.

I'm not sure if the crowd I have in the city + seven stack is enough against the large number of shooters, and if I'm too premature in my assault, it will end up taking longer while I rebuild (or you two come attack). Were it just me, I'd probably save and just try it.

I've counted units, and I'm going to hit him next turn.

6 necromancers + 4 spiders + tower wouldn't be such an issue if those walls didn't have far greater than the 50% block chance the games displays. I'll probably shred him if I can get most of my army past the walls intact.

Well, that could have gone worse, though only slightly. At least I got a couple of kills before my forces were annihilated. I retreated my heroes, but I'll be very, very surprised if they survive to my next turn, sitting right outside a city that is heavily populated.

I'll finish off Nekron in another 50 turns or so. I can't spend 3-4 rounds just trying to get inside the stupid walls when they are guarded by shooters, and the walls are far too good at blocking my shots. Pegasi it is!

Lessons learned:
-Similar to Heroes 3, walls may have a "moat". It isn't automatic damage, but it will swing on every step through a hex with it and it will swing in between combat rounds. The "moat' extends out two hexes, but not every hex in that range is guarded.
-The city's "Animate Dead" effect will generate up to 5 zombies to join the fight once bodies start hitting the ground. Thankfully, zombies were mostly a minor distraction (though they did eat movement via retaliation).
-Necromancers can animate pretty much anything. Including unicorns. Amusingly, one of the unicorns went to gold medal after being animated; I took some vicious satisfaction in knowing it wouldn't survive the battle even if I didn't end up rekilling it.
-The AI is smart enough to use spiders to web a unit that happens to be standing where the gate door previously was. Ugh. It wouldn't have mattered in the long run, but something to keep in mind.
-Death Strike is a real pain, giving weakness to the damage type it does.
-I really need to pick up the Freedom spell so I can deal with those stupid webs. 2 turns out of combat against a shooting gallery is NOT good.

On the bright side, I'm now paying virtually nothing in maintenance.

New plan: Burn everything in his area if I can't maintain control of it. Need to hold the newly migrated city so I can use a teleportation gate to get units there faster.
Question: Does the computer pay maintenance? Can it be starved? Those necromancers can't be cheap for a single city's income.

Question: Do sites that allow for hires ever generate new hires?

Nothing wrong with learning lessons! Those crazy special abilities like bringing everyone back as zombies don't matter 80% of the time, but that 20% can be a serious bitch. Nekron has a nice mix of units and it's tough to figure out whom to target first. Black Spiders, Necromancers, and Succubi are all really annoying units in their own ways.

Re: Maintenance - Not that it matters. Enemy AI get huge boosts of money.

Re: Hiring - Nothing new. Sometimes it's worth buying 'em just to prevent your human enemy from getting them... Also, this is why your burning up of the Ice Dragon was such a big deal.

Re: Webbing - Units on fire can't be webbed! But yeah, it's strong as hell.

Re: Chokepoints - The gates are seriously tough spots in a tactical battle. You really have to watch out not to get a unit stuck there and slowing your explosion into the inner courtyard. It's often worth it to absorb a hit by an enemy unit to move the potential gap filler another hex into the city.

Black spiders got some targeting priority since they ended up in exposed positions (and are softer targets). Happily, I think one of the succubi suicided on a Charioteer. Necromancers were my favorite target, but I had a hard time getting a decent shot at any of them.

Can't say I didn't expect that result.
But no worries we all ahev been there in the past.

What did you build in your capital?
If you build all Champions Guild, Master's Guild and Sanctuary you will be able to build Tier 4 units, Titans in your case. Not only they are strong as hell they also have wall crushing and are able to get you inside faster.

Do you have enough money?


EDIT: One more thing about conquering towns. You should always bring either some flyer or wall climbing unit if you need enemy to go out, because if you maange to get them over walls, AI will consider the walls breached and will be willing to move outside of gates even when the walls and gates are still intact.

Also, the thing you call moat, it's generated by Enchanted walls building.

I haven't bothered with the Sanctuary yet, since it didn't say it produced any units and I didn't need w/e its bonus was at the time. I've got the other two buildings. I've been considering Titans. They are quite a bit stronger than pegasi, but are they 2-for-1 good? It will take about 4 turns to build a titan (once I have the requisites in place) versus 2 turns per pegasus.

I've been mulling over why Archons, for a race supposedly geared toward killing undead, has so many units with a weakness to the Undead's favorite assault method.

Edit: I've got a little over 300 gold/turn income. Until recently I was generally floating > 1k gold, but I've been rushing some things in the last few turns. I'll be letting it trickle in better once I'm confident my forward city isn't at risk of being taken.

Right now is exactly the situation you want (though you can't take advantage of it). The enemy has three stacks, but one is outside the city. If you attack that stack, the one adjacent to it will help defend, but the third stack will be excluded from the battle.

This is the sort of screw up the AI does all the time. Likewise, if you put some low level shooters in the tower nearest the AI, you should be able to draw out some of his units from the castle. It is rare that the AI just hunkers down and keeps three stacks in the castle for very long. Especially if you divide your forces and have them just out of his range (the AI slows down stacks big time by mixing fast and slow units without thought).

We're heading towards Necro to throw units against his walls and kill off some enemy troops. Will be a few turns, but hopefully it assists our ally. :)

He trotted those guys out to steal a hero and kill a paladin. Torvin believed the lies of a succubus, and I hope he gets what he deserves for it. The AI decided to ignore the hero that was sitting by himself for some reason.

I'm working on getting shooters in place to guard my forward city, and then I'll work on more AI containment.

Well, maybe.
They have all stats higher (most of them considerably) and more than double pegasi health, so they should be more than match to 2 pegasi. Those have charge and can flight, though.
It's really your call.

Only 2. Undead have seevral with Holy Weakness on the other hand, so they are in bigger disadvantage in that regard and I suppose it's for balance as it would make them too strong against them in 1-on-1 combat and I don't think that was the way devs wanted it to be.

I'll be possibly sending some troops to throw against the walls sometime in the future too but I need to capture every single thing left untouched first. :-)


Be careful with hurrying production too much, so you don't end up with village.

It also lies. :-)
In the fight against Serena it kept claiming it will last for 1 more round but it took several before it ended.

Now I know why I should have left Ariane back in the other city, instead of placing her near the frontline to help in case of city assault: she gets +10 casting skill while in the other city.

New question: what determines which city a banished wizard respawns at?