Fallenchar

[quote who="Austinvn" reply="27" id="3380420"] Defenders.. they have this odd assortment of group support abilities, but none of them are all that good (the 'buff ally until their next action' clause really cripples several of the abilities; the ally you're buffing will often have an action right after your defender, it should be until the defender's next action).[/quote] Yes, this always seems like a glitch to me. I hope they fix this.

Hahaha, wow. I didn't know some Americans felt that way. Interesting. I am neither British nor Russian, but I am pretty sure the UK and USSR did feel like they won the war too. Your example isn't perfect, as the war in Europe was already over when the bomb was used.

That's a crappy start situation, no doubt. If the mob is really unbeatable and blocks expansion completely, all you can do is try to sneak past with your stack and level up a commander so you can build roads. With a road, your pioneers can move past the mob.

Wolves are fairly weak. A great wolf army, is pretty scary. Weak -> strong

Wait, are you saying that you can critically hit with a spell? I never knew that! I wonder why that has never happened in anyof my games... Anyway, I will never play an assassin, as I do not like randomness in TBS games. But that's just me, I can see why people like them.

Enough about exploits, back on topic... That quest is the worst quest (with the worst results, I mean. I like the fact that quests are somewhat unpredictable) in the game. It's not an error on your part, OP. This game can be harsh sometimes.

[quote who="greggbert" reply="14" id="3380644"] Having epics running around sure can destroy your expansion plans, especially when they park it next to one of your newest cities and all you can field is a stack of weak STRONGS. Lost 2 stacks and 1 city to a rampaging epic last game. In the case of the city, it was a 12 turn standoff before the epic 9 stack decided my city should die.[/quote] Survival rule nr.2: Do not disturb Epic lairs if you cannot defeat the mobs!

My Sov is always a mage, 1st champ a commander. After that, choices depend on gear/spirit to steal, special abilities, etc.

Mana is scarce. Saving up mana in LH is my main focus in life... Seriously, I do not see how any faction besides Pariden can amass it.

I don't think an artificial limit is needed. Spells are limited by cooldowns and mana cost. If the devs can prevent the AI from spending resources they do not have, we'd be halfway there.

Some more general notes: This is a long game. Your power level and the lvl of your heroes is still pretty low. Cities always have some standard defenders, your army might not be strong enough to overcome those. Heroes and city militia never die permanently. Horses accumulate very slowly. If you hover over your resource totals at the top of the screen, you can see your resource gain per turn.

Aren't Haunter armies Deadly already? Seems about right. There's something funny going on with those Ignys:they are fairly weak by any standard, yet their threat rating is strong and it takes many levels before you can summon them.

Press and hold down the middle button or wheel of your mouse and move it.

In my latest game, the AI used a lot of tactical and strategic spells, especially very annoying ones like Pull of the Earth (tac) and Tornado (strat). So I do not share (that part of) your experience at all. The only gripe I have with AI armies is that they tend to favor armor over everything else. Units with 50+ armor and initiative 10 will die very easily to spells and elemental damage, usually without ever getting to act. This could use some improvement, imo. Maybe setting a minimu

To be honest, I haven't experimented that much with it.

Yes, Ceresa Steal Spirited Consume Spirit. It seemed appropriate :D You can steal any one spell or spell school with Steal Spirit.

[quote who="merlinme" reply="6" id="3378886"] Blimey, 25 shards and 2,500 mana as you move into the endgame! Your victory is still impressive (one of these days I'll give Insane a go), but certainly magic centric strategies become a lot easier if you can get that much mana. And pretty much all my strategy revolves around getting a powerful mage with a stack of doom and killing everything. It's good to know that the AI has got so much better at using strategic spells,

Altar did cast a lot of strategic spells, slowing me down: http://screencast.com/t/sLyh1cyl But with units like this, how can you ever expect to win? http://screencast.com/t/IG7aSNaK Relias has only two cities left. My armies of heroes have him surrounded. http://screencast.com/t/bRLFKPnLJDc He surrender

[quote who="parrottmath" reply="12" id="3376703"] Fear is not working as intended. Fighting against Abeix my units were under the fear effect, yet the afraid didn't remove before I was able to act. If fear was working as intended, my units turn should be skipped as they are with dazed, but in fact they are not. I would have to show screens to prove it to you, but it is not working appropriately. The resist to the spell should only occur the first round, which I do see some of my uni

Call me an idiot, but I cannot find this update on Steam. I play almost every day and it's still 1.1 for me, with no 'update news' on Steam about 1.2

Kingdoms can have the +2 city growth spell. It's Life, so Empires don't have it. That's probably the reason for the different experiences regarding growth.

Imo, it would be best if they removed this feature altogether. It doesn't add anything to the game, except an easy exploit. The AI, even the tiniest faction, asks exorbitant amounts to go to war for you, and if you cannot win a war by yourself, you shouldn't be able to afford this option anyway.

Pro-tip: never simply declare war on someone. Let one of the other factions pay you to go to war [e digicons]}:)[/e] No 'declare war' button necessary.

Forests/rivers: yes, you have to start adjacent to them. Upgrading units: idk, I never build units...

I finally found the time to finish this game. Capitar isn't as strong as Carrodus had hoped. The only army of mine that gets defeated is Craul's 'homeguard'. Poor guy can't get a break. As usual in my games, he never surrenders, so I take all his cities, razing most of them. Altar finally declares war on me. No more trading, that's too bad. This fight might be a lot harder, since Altar has expanded enormously and has three access points into my