Ok so I've been playing Eador Genesis for over 4 hours and I have played many grand strategy games. I was doing very well and I got my hero to level 23 then all the sudden the other nation(AI) decides to go to war with me. No big deal. I had everything in order. jump into battle to defend my capitol thinking this will be a good fight. Well no it was not. 2 arrows later and my hero is dead and my capitol its taken. 2 arrows from this ranger guy and I end up dead, game over. 2 arrows really? From across them battle field? 2 rounds of combat and my hero is toast? ok so all that for nothing and its not like I have a save point to jump back to. going back a round doesn't help. Am I missing something? And is it just me or are vampires in this game totally overpowered?

It wasn't a ranger it was a double shot from a marksman, I suppose :) And yes pure Warrior, pure Ranger and pure Mage are very strong classes.

Marsman is one shot killer, however he is not too good when dealing with the number of enemies. As I recall a 30 level marksman can do only 2 maybe 3 double shots in a row. There are certain spells to reduce Ranged attack or increase ranged defence. Though I preffer burning his ammo, depleting his stamina or just killing him with simple spells depending on his resistance.

Undead are indeed imbalanced, especially the strong ones.

Btw, I can see all things you mentioned above very well in the New Horizons mod. That is reason we nerfed marksman and the reason we are nerfing higher tier undead units :)

Archers can deal out lots of damage very quickly if you don't kill or disable them. Wizards are a good counter, if you can avoid being one-shotted in the first round, since you can hit them with spells like Web or Word of Ice to completely take them out of the battle for quite a few turns and repeat as necessary (late game wizards can be incredibly powerful, but they tend to have a slow start). Archers can also have a tough time against larger armies (either high-level commanders, or guards with numerous fast units), since the Archer's own army isn't that large, and they can at best only take out one unit per turn (and once Archers get surrounded in melee they're pretty much toast).

Basically each type of hero has its own strengths and weaknesses, doing well against certain types of heroes and armies and having a more difficult time against others.

As for vampires, they are indeed quite powerful (as a level 4 unit should be), but while they can last almost indefinitely against level 1 and 2 units (and some level 3 units), many of the other level 4 units will beat them one-on-one since they outclass the vampires in health and damage (beyond what life drain can compensate for). Also, the relatively low HP and defense of vampires make them vulnerable to stronger ranged attacks (Catapults can take them out pretty well, and Archers can usually kill them with a single double-shot). Just like heroes, each unit has its strengths and weaknesses, and a key part of the game is taking advantage of that.

What the class of your hero? Mage, probably? Rangers are specifically made to counter squishy target. "I'm paper and met a scissors. overpowered?"
You should have buffed yourself or debuffed archer.
Phantom form, Blind, Burn ammo, Sleep, Wind shield, word of Ice, fear, or even Fatigue.

Also, you should fill all slots with items. Don't skip all these "+1 hp" hats/belts/cloaks, they are very useful to survive initial damage.

Vampires are pretty good units, if you get them early. But far from "op". They don't have any significant armor and can't get medals, so in late game they are pretty sub par fighters.

Don't worry about it too much, in the beginning all kinds of things seem unbalanced, but later you will learn that other stuff is even better, or they aren't really as good.
In the first few hours I thought Scouts were totally OP, then I thought Warriors are the best, from hours 100 to 1000 I was sure pure Mages rule, and now I learned how awesome Commander/scout and commander/mage are. Now I only use scouts with slinger cannonfodder to pick off Dragons.

Vampires are among the weakest Tier 4 units I think, they have small HP and little defenses.

I did not have my mages killed by enemy scouts for a long time. It usually takes ages for the AI to make a scout that strong and by then my Wiz has either enough initiative items or enough HP items to survive. And if not I place the mage in the far corner (if you lose initiative you can see the enemy placement) , which is most of the time far enough away. I try to go for initiative though, because they tend to go for my healers.

I could much rather see a other classes die to a Scout because the scout could get multiple turns of shooting at him. But a Wiz can neutralize the Scout immediately with so many different spells.

To neutralize Shooters I always prefer to either kill outright asap or to Burn Ammo. Sadly it's hard to get Burn Ammo for me as I do not choose that school as 1 of my 4 choices.

Although you have to be careful not to Burn Ammo on guys that easily gain ammo back, especially if you DO have the first move as it will let units that have meditation gain ammo back right away. Not sure if this is the same for slingers/halflings.

1.Could you describe your Situation a bit more detailed. It sounds a bit curios that you played 4h with great success and then you have to defend your demese suddenly after the AI declared War and it's difficult to give an advice without knowing anything.
Maybe even add screenshots from your Hero and the enemy army

2.As a general tipp...if you use the Revision you could hire a guard and let it defend first to weaken the enemy hero and then finish him off with your hero...if you still can't win...hire a guard to weaken him, man the walls of your Fortress that he has to start a siege instead of just conquer it..then you have won some time..to gather your heros, to weaken him further with Rituals,...


3.Another general statment...4h are nothing for Eador ;)...i played HOMM, HOI, LOTR, AOW,...with great success and get a big slap into my face as i started Eador at Expert...so..don't loose your hope..just learn through trial&error ;)

My mage was lvl 23 and he had full gear. I had just reached tier 4 units. Had a large army, and all of my lands were protected by the best guards I could buy.( never once had a money issue) They had first turn and hit my mage taking at least 60% hp away. Then I moved and used a debuff on the ranger then next turn its was game over for the mage. Seeing I'm new I don't know all the spells I could get so Ill have to try some of the others mentioned.

As for the vamp when I ran into him he rushed and killed my mage hero then took apart the rest of my army. All range attacks only did like 2 hp and close range did nothing seeing he would heal after ever attack. Regardless of stating that the vamp has poor armor and hp doesn't seem to matter when he can just gain all the health back.

This dose not turn me off to the game at all. The game is a brilliant concept. Wish there were more like it. Thank you all for your good information. Many people in forums are just plain rude when it comes to "teaching noobs". To these game mechanics I am new but have played RPG's and strategy games my whole life. So I feel that I'm not totally handy caped starting the game. I just have to learn the tricks of this game.

To kill vampire as mage you would need at least couple of T2 units and Web spell.
Best units -
Thug (level 10+ with medals and crushing blow) can deal around 30-40 damage per hit.
and
Guardsman - make a box like:
mage monk guard
guard guard

Guard have first strike, halves armor on hit, have really high counterattack, and really good armor - he would deal more damage to vampire than he could get from vampirism. Just heal wounded unit with monk.

If you don't have access to T2 units, use swordsmen. See attach for example. This swordsman have 12 armor and parry would give 8 more on first hit in round - he would get 5-6 damage from vampire. level 0 healer can give it back.
http://i39.tinypic.com/2q3p5ww.jpg

For your battle against the enemy hero
What Subclass has your Mage, wich skills does he have?
Did you have the ini or the enemy?
(If you can see the enemy army during the deploymentphase the enemy has the Ini)
What spells are at your spellbook and at the libary?
What Units are at your Army, wich can you hire?

If you has the Ini you have 2 Turns to take him out of the battle, this can be done by simply killing him with a combination of attackspells, attacks of fast units and ranged Units or you use debuffs/CC's to render him useless..it's easy done by spells, most of them where allready suggested by Gremilon.
If he has the Ini...turn on the Hexgrid, and place your Mage at a position he can't be attacked the first round...then you will have even 3 or more Turns to disable him.

Killing him can be done with
I.Fast attackers like Pegasi, Manticores...buff them with Haste(Elemental I) to speed them up, or give them additionals actions with Astral Energy(Sorcery I)

II.Good Ranged Units maybe buffed for stronger attacks or given additionals actions with Astral Energy

III. Strong attack spells

IV. any combination of I-III ;)


Disbaling him can be done with
Burn Ammo(Chaosschool I) destroys 6 Ammo+(more with higher spellpower compared to the targets resistance),
cast 2 times should leave him without ammo left

Or Vulnerabilty(Chaos I) reduces the resistance by 3, might be necessary to lower the enemys Ress and then
Web(Sorcery I) traps the target for 2-3 Turns if he has 3 or less resistance
Blind(Chaos II) reduces attack to zero
Sleep(Sorcery II)..well puts him to sleep
Word of Ice(Elemental) Freezes the Target

Or defend yourself with
Magic Armor(Wizardry I) +3 deff
Airshild(Elemental I) +4 ranged deff
Stoneskin(Elemental II) +5 deff
Phantomform(sorcery II) +10 deff)

buy time with
Restoration heals 12+ hp

Asside from this..there several Units that can cc
Spiders have Web as a ranged attack that is not stopped by ress
Medusas, Basilisks have petrification as a ranged attack
Harpys, Thiefs,...have steal ammo

For the Vampirefight

I.How could he kill you hero so fast...if you turn the Hexgrid on its easy to place him at a position he can't be attacked
the 1. Turn...and it would be wise anyway to turtle your Mage in against fast attackers like Pegasi, Harpys, Vampires,...

II.Vamps have a relatively low Ress compared to armor, as your Mainhero is a Mage you can either kill him with attackspells(Exorcism from Healing II has a basedamge of 15 against Undead&demons), rendering him useless via Cc's or debuffs or buffing your Units with Fire Blade so that they deal magic damage.

My subclass was necromancer. (love that class) I had mostly close combat troops and mages backing me up. Thugs and executioners. I had some debuff spells and used them. They had the ini so I had no idea how they were going to set up. I try my best to protect my mages with my men. I didn't have any monsters on my side. All my faction was evil by the way.

As for the Vamp. He ran in killed one of my men then flew past all my guards and directly attacked my mage on turn 3. I focused everything on him and yet it did nothing. Even had my thug past lvl 10 with medals and he didn't do anything to the vamp except die and give him more life.

Use Web spell - you get it with astral energy (probably best T1 spell), web from mage would disable counterattack from vampire with guarantee.

When I talk about thugs, I mean something like this: http://i39.tinypic.com/2wlr51h.jpg
Crushing blow, astral energy, crushing blow = exorcism.

Personally, I think that necromancer one of the worst classes in the game.
He have weak magic(all other classes have bonuses to duration/spell power/thaumaturgy), and pure mage have stronger undead units and can subdue vampire earlier.

To me this statement is odd. Why would the necromancer not have the strongest undead units. It really is had to find a game that has a good necromancer. Why have a class in a game that sucks? Why have a class that is defined as weak? To me that's seems pointless to have a class in a game where people say not to play it. I only hope that they patch the game to fix this problem.

Well, previous iteration of this class had only bonuses to crystal costs, he was called Druid, and got buffed to his current state.
Problem with this class - his specialization gives him only bonus to level of raised undead, but this bonus equal to bonuses from 4 and 5 levels of Necromancy skill. Then there are level 4 and level 5 skills of "Summoning", which can get only pure mage, then there is bonus to undead health regeneration from level 4 and 5 skills of Necromancy, again, for pure mage, pure mage can have more spell slots and have double cast on top of this.

Necromancy is pretty strong in this game, but balance between classes isn't very good.
Oddballs: nobody takes commander/warrior multiclass, all scout multiclasses combined have lower pick rate than pure scout(he have t4 magic, AND t4 unit, AND doubleshot), and necromancer.

We had some discussions about balance, some were implemented, now we are waiting for new build, where heroes would be able to have more than 3 passives per class.