Hello!

I have bought here on GOG HOMM3, HOOM4 and HEROES CHRONICLES ... but I'm new to these games.
I started playing HOMM3 and I LOVE it.

But, as a beginner, I have a question ... I know it seems a little stupid so forgive me:

- You start with 1 Hero and you begin to explore the map with him for several turns; in the meantime you build specialized buildings in your starting city and this is my problem:

If you hire a new Hero in the tavern, he can start (for example) with stronger units and an higher level of spells thanks to the new buildings in your city, but your initial Hero, the one who started the game, doesn't have these new powerful units and, more important, it doesn't have a spellbook or he have it but it still contains level 1 spells.
So, your initial Hero have to come back in the city in order to upgrade his party and to visit the Mage tower in order to have better units and higher spells levels.
Maybe your Hero is so far from the city that he needs several turns to come back ...

My question is:

- where is my mistake?
- my hero needs to return to the city in order to upgrade his units and speels or there is another way?
(I was thinking to AGE OF WONDERS where your Wizard, for example, has the new reseached spells available everywhere as soon as they are reaserched).

Thanks in advance!

Roberto

In terms of powerful units, a lot of people simply hire a hero in town and "ferry" the upgraded units out to heroes that are away from town. Occasionally in some games, you will also get the chance to upgrade the units in the field through creature dwellings or other similar buildings (these are rare though).

One thing that I try to do is to keep several heroes hired at one time so that I can always have one or two heroes heading back to base to replenish.

Thanks for the tip!
Of course this doesn't solve the spell problem ... right?
Or I can exchange also the spellbook between the parties?

There is a skill "Scholar", which allows to trade spells between heroes. The higher Scholar skill, the stronger spells your heroes can teach (or learn? I forgot if the hero with that skills can teach someone else or he is able to learn from someone else - I don't use that skill.) Of course, Wisdom level requirements apply.
And no, the spellbook cannot be traded.

For spells, its a 2 step process:
-firstly you build your mage guild in your castle, and get random spells in it
- then you must go with this hero to to that castle in order to learn all those spells only from this guild (you need skill: wisdom lvl 1 - for 3rd lvl spells / wisdom lvl2 - for 4th lvl spells and so on)

You can also have skill 'learning magic' or smth - and when 2 heroes exchange armies on the field then one can teach the other one spells - but thats rather useless skill and its better to get more offensive one.

Yeah, the problem you describe with spell research is actually part of your strategy if you play with a caster for your superhero (the one you let do most of the fighting so he/she gets most of the experience).

You have to keep a caster closer to home a little longer if you're going to go that way. Spell research up to at least second level spells and maybe third has to be your priority over creature dwellings before you start to get far from home.

The spells generated are random - you might get something useless.

These are reasons I don't like to play caster heroes. I think it's better and more fun to get a huge army as fast as possible.

If you must play a caster, you can get high-level spells later in the game by taking over castles from the enemy. The AI usually builds up its spell towers to its own detriment, and you can use your hopefully larger army to take its castles from it and get your spells that way.

THANKS TO ALL!

Roberto

I didn't see these mentioned

There is also the skill Eagle Eye. You can learn new spells by seeing them being used in combat with it (so it's wizard technique stealing).

You can find scrolls and artifacts that give you access to spells when equipped, too.

There are also those small buildings that teach you spells (1 each), can't remember their names, something like spell shrines.

About strengthening your army, trekking back to your base is the easiest way (unless you have the Town Portal spell). If you're playing a necromancer and you're good at using skeletons with minimal losses, you can get quite an army of 'em even without returning (just mass skeletons probably won't bring you the ultimate victory, though). In HoMM 4, some skill combinations (I've forgotten which) make your hero summon troops to his army every day (out of thin air for free, but it gets annoying if you don't want leprechauns in your army).

Casters do well to not get too far away before they can get their second level mage tower going, because the Blind spell can turn a battle around, and it's second level. After that, there's nothing vital until the chance (and it's there, but not a huge one) to get town portal. Town Portal is one of the best spells in the game, because it can get you to the nearest castle instantly, if you haven't used up your move points that day. And with earth mastery, you can go to multiple castles a day, fighting multiple fights and trading troops about with your other troops. It's a game-changer ... but it generally doesn't come around for a while, and maybe not at all or for a long time. Second level is fine for a long time even for casters.

Remember too that you need resources for many other things, and not expanding enough is a key fault in most games, this one included. To do that, you need troops. If you want most of them to survive their battles so you can: 1) keep going instead of running back to your castle for new troops all the time, 2) not having to wait around for the week to change so you can get new troops and leave, and 3) not be crippled financially by the need to replace troops constantly, you need to build your creature buildings as a caster too. Especially ranged creatures.

To do that, you have to get used to your choices with each race/faction. On some, like dungeon, you have two range shooters and your troops are generally expensive. That's a great example of a side that does well by stocking up on its shooters above all else. For dungeon, you may not want to give up much in the way of resources until you get your troop production settled. By comparison, with undead you can get by very well without your sole shooter, the liche, if you rely on ramping up to elder vampires, or even death knights.

To sum it all up, get enough troops and the kind of troops you need to win battles and explore quickly. Don't get all your creature dwellings before you try to get BLIND, but for most factions, get your ranged. In the long run, it saves you time and money to get ranged troops because you don't have to replace as many troops.

Re the skill SCHOLAR, it's an excellent skill. Learn it and you can teach all your heroes spells without their having to travel to the same castles etc. your main hero had to. Get them all earth mastery (also great for mass-casting of another key game-winning spell, SLOW), and wisdom, and they can all teleport all over the map, saving you from losing castles, taking advantage of weak heroes, and generally making terrible trouble for the enemy. You don't need it on more than one hero, but it is always worth building up at least one hero's wisdom and earth mastery skills so he can teach everyone TOWN PORTAL.