All right, so I'm playing the third scenario of 'good' campaign, hopping happily around the landscape on easy difficulty, being only slightly irritated by the wyvern riders anxiously capturing all the towns I happen to have unprotected. How comes I have unprotected towns you ask? Well, I needed my whole army to take 2 cities from Orks, since they were quite protected. I have managed to win the fight, and sent part of my army to fend off the damn wyverns. And what happens next? Out of the mist, a bunch of Orc cavalry arrives and kicks my ass. Apparently, no troop in my army really compares to them, and since I have no money (army upkeep I suppose), I quite simply cannot afford more man to defend my unprotected cities harrased by the wyverns.

And so I load. I prepare for the attack more carefully and ... Well what do you know, a group of 8 riders kicked ass of an army double it's size that had veteran troops within!

Yes, this game is quite awesome, but there's always something that just pisses me off and I stop playing it. I suck at turn-based games, yet enjoy them a lot, and I sort of expect 'easy' difficulty to be 'easy' as long as I don't make REALLY dumb moves. But I just have no clue whatsoever how does one defeats the evil riders of doom, especially when he has no money to upgrade cities.

Anyway, aside from ranting, I want to ask if the second and third part of the series are as good and, especially, easier. Because while I really do love turn-based strategy games, I just don't have time/nerve to repeat scenarios and keep losing

What was the name of that scenario? I can go back and look at my saves to see how I progressed through it. How much of the map do you control?

It sounds like you were ambushed right after capturing a major orcish city? If that's the case, you might have tripped an attack trigger - the AI seems to draw lines in the sand at certain points on the map, and crossing those lines or attacking cities in that territory will piss it off.

Is your gold income still in the negative? If not, it might be wise to back off for a bit and build up your defenses and resources before moving further into orc territory. Alternately, maybe you just need to expand in another direction. If your income is low and you need your entire army to capture an enemy city, you are probably not meant to attack it just yet, especially if the AI is retaliating with entire stacks of heavy cavalry.

As far as upgrading your cities, though, try to keep that to a minimum. 250g is a lot of cash early in the mission, and you only really need enough upgraded cities to keep your army stocked with the right units. Always, always fortify your cities, though.

As you've probably noticed, the power curve is steep in this game. Higher-tier units are often a match for groups of weaker ones.

The Orcish heavy cavalry with 4 in damage, is the most fearsome level 2 cavalry in the game. The orcish swordmen (also with 4 in damage) are the most fearsome level one units in the game. That is not to say that they are necessarily the best level 1 and level 2 units around.
Some other very useful units are the elf and darkelf archers.

This game has many things to learn but I think you will really appreciate all the details as you learn them. I recommend you to play some scenarios before you continue with the campaign. Try some of the extra large ones like after the fall. You will get more opportunities to strike back when you suffer losses on a larger map. Just try not to lose your hero, he\she is a very valuable asset.
If you play a custom game you can customize your hero before the game starts with skills that they can't learn through a level up. You can give a dwarf hero venomous spit or choose some really valuable skills like death strike, holy strike, regeneration or life draining.

When you level up there are many possible strategies to make a fearsome hero, but defense is always very important if your hero attacks the enemy with melee weapons. Resistance is less so.
When a unit attacks another unit the attack point of the attacking unit is compared to the defense point of the defending unit. Each point of attack over defense gives a + 10 percent chance to hit while each point of defense over attack gives a - 10 percent to hit for the attacking unit.
There is always at least a 10 percent chance for the attack to succeed and at least a 10 percent chance for it to fail.
The damage value that a unit has is their maximum damage. So unless there are other modifiers at work a 3 in damage means that the unit does 1 - 3 in damage and a 8 in damage means that the units does 1 - 8.

If your hero fights weapons in hand against the foe you should always choose charge at some point, unless you have an artifact that gives you that. Charge is roughly the same as + 2 to damage and it costs just 5 points, while + 2 to damage costs 20 points!

This is because more damage just raises the maximum damage while a charge raises both maximum and minimum damage with 2, for the first of the two strikes that unit will do each time it attacks an enemy.

I thought I should add that a hero should always try to have a ranged attack. For example it's very handy against flying units.

heh, thanks for all the advice :-) I guess I'll just play scenarios for a bit and see how that goes... Oh, how does archery work, anyway? Does it just take your stats and use them at range?

And what's better: Magic-wielding hero, or a warrior?

Archery have its own attack strength. It ain't much in the beginning but after a couple levels in Markmanship it gets quite good.

I prefer to have my leader as the big magic caster for overland, summoning and other non combat spells. The others get by with 10 or 20 points. Warrior is better because combat magic isn't all that powerful. You run out of mana fast and then your weak combat magic hero is as good as dead.

I think it depends upon what role you want the hero to play. I've had games where all I did was artifact-up the hero and give him or her tons of combat abilities-- they were pretty much juggernauts. With spellcasting you have to be creative with your spell use and make sure they have some mana left over if they're likely to be caught in battles.

The evil campaign I'm playing right now has me doing magic, but I'm also bringing along every artifact I can, as well as researching boosting spells that I use at the start of each scenario to make sure she doesn't get stomped if she gets ambushed. The spells are really helpful, but at times I feel like there's just not enough mana in the campaign path I'm on to rely too much on spells.

Something to keep in mind with this game is that the higher level units will walk all over the lower level units. Money spent cranking out armies of level 1 units is usually better spent upgrading one or two towns to quickly get access to the level 2 or 3 units. A group of ballistas with a bit of melee support will make short work out of the kind of army you were having trouble with (while as you found a group of level 1 units will quickly get trounced). The general strategy you'll want to employ is to first try to quickly expand (often using disposable scouts), capturing friendly cities and mines, to get your economy rolling. From there upgrade one or two higher level towns to get access to the stronger armies, and from there take the fight to the enemy (try to aim for the leader as quickly as possible to bring things to an end, especially if you're against multiple opponents). Trying to turtle will just get you overwhelmed eventually as your economy won't be strong enough to keep up. Also, research the Town Gate spell as soon as possible, as this will allow you to quickly move your main army to deal with any large incursions (and thus you won't need particularly large defense forces to hold your cities); it can be worthwhile to have your hero keep the spell on tap, so to speak, as although you won't be able to cast any other spells you'll be able to move your army instantly as soon as you spot the enemy (rather than having to wait a turn or two for your hero to cast the spell).

Also, giants kick some serious ass, although you won't have access to them until the next scenario.

How to kick ass as halflings:
1: Pony riders.
They are a major resource. They can be cranked out at a rate of 1/turn in a size 2 city.
They have 32 movement points, which is low for cavalry, but a lot higher than infantry.

They have low upkeep, decent stats, and can be cranked out like nobody's business.
Build stacks of these, and charge! Lose a stack? Two rounds later, you should have a new one back up.


2: 7 Ballistae, 1 Catapult.
This will curbstomp just about everything the enemy will have to send at you.Use this stack to hold any defensive positions, like bridges, mountain passes, and so on. Or use them in sieges, to cut through the walls, and shoot down any sallying troops. Then send in the cavalry.

3: Use eagle scouts.
And use them like the three foot tall reincarnation of evil you are. Run around with them, and raze EVERY hostile structure that you cannot take and hold.

Example: To the north of the united cities, there's a major river. North of that river there are bunches of goodies. If you get 4 Eagle scouts, you can grab a large town, bunches of farms, and terrorize whatever might live there.

4: Learn the basic tactics. Not strategies, but tactics. Build a shield wall of melee troopers, and keep ranged attackers behind them. Use the long range of a ballista to force the hostiles to close and engage on your terms. Use cavalry to hunt down ballistae and archers. (This is where pony riders shine: They're dirt cheap, so you losing 2 to take down 1 ballista is a good deal to you.

5: Experiment with the high-end units a bit to find out which ones you like.

6: A stack with 2 level 4 units will have people running away in fear. And halfling ones have sick levels of defense and resistance, meaning they're virtually indestructible. They can just sit there and take abuse, and never ever die. Use this fact to your advantage.

7: The human air galley is the most overpowered unit ever. You can make them yourself without having a lvl 4 human city though:
Learn to give a unit flying, and build a galleon. Congratulations, you now have a flying unit, that can slaughter lower level stuff at will. (I can't remember if it flew or floated though. If it flies, it CANNOT be harmed by melee units, so you can slaughter the orcs like nobody's business. Cavalry? Pfft. *shoots ballista* What cavalry?

The flying magic was fixed in the patch so it something between flying and floating. Those units can be attacked by ground troops now.

IOW, we get the patched game?
If it's after the air-patch, the units float.
If it's before, they fly.

Dragon boat + flying is just unfair.

Been playing the game again and it's all coming back to me.