Are "hero only armies" a good strategy?

I could be a viable strategy, but remember that XP is split between all heroes that you have in your army (aka they won't level as fast). This doesn't apply to the Henchman that you can make with Altar though. I've never tried playing with strictly all heroes in one army. I have however in the early game, the first champion I get I might put him in the same army with my sovereign for a bit until I can build a few more troops and get them his/her own army.

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I have done it end game before.

First I researched Education over and over until I could research Arcane Magic (mana jump) in one turn. Then I researched the mana jump over and over until I was gaining about 2800 mana per turn.

Then I lined up nine heroes separately in a row so that I didn't have to take the extra step of selecting from a group for them to receive the spell.

I concentrated on raising the mages in level so they could learn spells and max mastery/damage. I concentrated on giving Destiny's gift to the non mage's to boost hit points, attack, and, initiative (with some level boosts thrown in for the few worthwhile skill tree perks that exist).

The final group was rather disappointing. They are about the equivalent of a typical end game army with a typical end game mage.

Conclusion?

Heroes are severely underpowered in this game. The epic items they can wield are much more important than their level.

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Quoting Mick,

reply 2

Heroes are severely underpowered in this game. The epic items they can wield are much more important than their level.

In my current and first game I too feel my heroes aren't very powerful, but I thought this was merely because they aren't very high level yet. Are you saying that even in the late game a high level hero isn't actually that much better then a high level unit that can be built in a city at any time?

If so then what is the point of heroes then?

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Put one hero (plus a henchmen healer if the hero can't heal) per nine man group.

They are great at support and very useful, almost necessary in that role, especially if you want to keep the units leveling instead of periodically replacing them from attrition. The Heros do the buffs, debuffs, crowd control, etc., but are typically not that great at the killing part (unless loaded up with epic gear). The exception is the high end mages that specialize in fire and are maxed in spell mastery/spell damage in the skill trees. Toss in a few fire temples and you have the most powerful unit in the game. Team them up with ice mages to handle the "Lord of the Flame" type army's and there isn't anything you can't mow through.

+1

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I'll admit, I used to be a strong advocate for the hero xp split.

I'll underline used to be as I get mocked from the rest of the community who knew my posts.

As it turns out, with heroes being the power level that they now are, it would do them some good to remove the xp split or reduce the impact of the xp split in order to make some hero combinations a more viable option. I think troops will always be part of the equation, as their relative power level is just that much better. What troops lack however is the special abilities and spells. Heroes are needed there to fill that particular void.

Both have there purpose, but if you have a war of attrition and are winning, you "could" forgo the need of heroes. Enough troops can win you a war.....just look at Russia during WWII.

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There pretty effective.. I've basically only run "hero" armies have yet to run anything else

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pure hero armies only work with gimmick strategies, in my experience. you generally need some troops to support them otherwise.

i don't understand the comment that heroes are crap early game, tbh. in my experience, early game is where they are most useful. their power comes from found items and level ups, so it's independent of your faction's tech progression and economy. heroes can be very powerful long before your trained troops are even semi decent. once your civ catches up and you are able to mass produce units with decent equipment, you don't really need the heroes any more. early game is the "heroic age".

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I've found pure hero (or more often, hero + henchman, which kinda counts) is good for clearing out high-level monsters (ie. Wildland Bosses, Dragons and Waerloga) since they have effective abilities against them and aren't vulnerable to the ubiquitous overpower/despair. However, a direct pure-hero attack against other factions tends to be impractical, except early game. Later on heroes are for leading armies, not replacing them.

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Heroes are also good at taking out units with high defense. Mages have elemental magics and warriros have a high attack. A strong 5 man squad still loses a lot of damage to high defense troops.

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Mages with high initiative can decimate huge numbers of troops.

Generally I try to have two hero armies supported by whatever they need. Generally I only have one mage in LH because when you start fireballing your way across the map there isn't really enough mana to share in the mid game.

If I get a commander I make him/her an Archer commander. You should see what some companies of horse based archers can do to the enemy when trained in a great fortress and supported by a commander.

So, I try to have two armies, but in the early-mid game, I might just have my heroes altogether.

I love the tanks, if you find enough gear to support them defenders can soak a lot of damage whilst you pummel away with archers or spells.

A heavy armor company on horses or wargs can also soak some nice damage, so they can fill in for a guardian if you don't have one. They will level quickly. I generally don't build them until I get company though, because the squads just can't survive multiple hits from dragons and the like.

+1

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I finished a game with "hero only" armies, but I recommend to use a mix of troops/monsters plus 1-3 heroes. I ended up with level 11-13 heroes and a sword that requires level 20 (among other things), so I am moving to more xp efficient tactics

(It is nice, if you can lay your hands on some of the stronger heroes, like the panther, btw.)

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Ascian is god, specially with his maul ability.

But yeah, I always end my game with a super army made up of my sov, 6-7 heroes, chances are I got another sov to surrender so I have him/her in too (So far only Kavarox or whatever the Kraxis one is surrenders to me) and as the cherry on top, a dragon. (Wish they were counted as champions).

Last time I even had two dragons in my army, an ashwake and a storm one. They went first, each used fire breath, battle over.

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I usually end up with a mix in the later stages in the game, to form more stacks of doom.

In the early game however, All-hero or almost all-hero stacks can be great for blitzing. Especially if you can keep the stack move up (mounts, etc.). If you are trying to knock off an AI player early, and if the goodie hut gods were kind to you, such stacks are great at taking out cities.

In the later game, when defenses are stronger, and unit sizes are bigger, this isn't as effective. but while unit sizes are still in the group (3) range...

100 Fame is pretty easy to manage in the early game, so this means a Sov and 3 heroes, plus an extra unit (probably the Brothers Sparus or Panca Archers), and maybe one more unit if you've researched Drills (the recent change to Mounted Warfare makes Drills a prereq now, so odds are good you'll have researched it). Sure, the heroes in these stacks don't gain experience as fast, but since you may be blitzing the opposing cities of a neighbor at that point, experience is coming in quickly enough. After you've cleared out some of the nearby lairs, of course!

Plus, make sure one hero has first aid at least, to increase the stack healing rate. This means less trips home in order heal are required, until you take the next city and hence can just stay put for a round or two while you heal and hold the city, until the reinforcements are built/arrrive. Doesn't work as well with the raze strategy of course, which also has it's place in blitzing.

Early game cities are much easier to take out than later game cities, when things like war colleges, etc. come into play. Plus, early game cities are smaller, and hence have less City defenders to contend with.

Plus, if the hero stack suffers a defeat, you get them back five turns later (once the Sov is back in action), a little worse for wear of course. Spearmen/Clubber/etc. units just die!

Having one summoner in the mix works great with this strategy, as Elementals are disposable and easily replaced, whereas new units take time to build... Air Elementals are awesome for this!

So, I find myself stacking heroes together for a bit in the early game, but once I can start producing units in decent numbers, that's when I start splitting them up, and using them in fire support roles and such.

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High level mages can win you battles single-handed, but you only really want one, because you probably haven't got enough mana for more. I generally don't find it very useful to have more than two, or at the most, three heroes in an army, because of the experience split, and because a trained unit is generally better for absorbing damage. Heroes can be quite fragile, if possible I don't like to leave them where they can get hit.

The one case I can think of where an all hero army could be good is if you can buy mounts but you don't have access to wargs or horses for your trained troops. In that case mounted heroes will move a lot faster if not accompanied by trained troops. Assuming they're powerful enough and you have enough mana then high level mage could probably take out most armies if they have e.g. a defender with decent armour to protect them. I'd always prefer to have mounted trained troops to accompany my heroes if they're available, though. It means you don't have to burn mana unnecessarily for minor battles, and it reduces the fragility of your army if you run into an army that you can't eliminate before they get close to your mage.

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I would agree. All mounted armies also move a little faster.

Designed horse archers on wargs with trinkets and traits are expensive to train, but do alot of damage alot faster.

Cavalary with decent weapons on horses can 1 shot alot of enemies.

Still need heroes for healing and support, plus warrior heroes with uber weapons are just plain fun.

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I finished one of my games using only one hero without army (other forces including 4 dragons did no action). She was extremely effective as you can see from the screenshot http://img-fotki.yandex.ru/get/9226/9252400.3/0_d32a1_5d1eaf55_XXL.jpg

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I very rarely can field a hero that's more effective than a unit of Knights or Paladins. Only if I find a particularly awesome weapon drop (in which case, the hero is often incredibly ridiculous)

So I tend to run a single hero+army all the time now, with the XP split. If the XP split weren't as severe, I would consider fielding two heroes in a group. These days, what that really means is idling heroes, which I bet is not the intent.

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