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Heroes Community > Heroes 5 - Temple of Ashan > Thread: Academy advanced strategies
Thread: Academy advanced strategies This thread is 14 pages long: 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 12 13 14 · «PREV / NEXT»
Moonlith
Moonlith


Bad-mannered
Supreme Hero
If all else fails, use Fiyah!
posted June 05, 2007 05:50 PM
Edited by alcibiades at 18:41, 05 Jun 2007.

Any tips on what to do against late-game Sylvan when playing Academy?

+ Taking into account I'm at 0 ore (no ore pits WHATSOEVER to be found), got colossi dwelling (waiting to be upgraded, 10 ore, DUuhhrr....)

Got Archmages, got Djinn Sultans, got Gremlins and Gargoyles. Mage Guild offered CRAP, but then again, I've never taken low level spells into account much. Hero's got Light, Summoning ( Biiiig mistake, no conjure phoenix or Elementals, but maybe phantom forces would do well), Destructive (another big mistake I think, ended up getting only Chain Lightning as high level destructive), Sorcery, and, something. I need to check.

Chances of building up second Academy castle, but again, OOORRREEE!!!! So far managed to get +2000 gold a day out of it, and lvl 1 mage guild in effect, but no more than that.

Trading recources (get 4 wood a day) for ore is gonna cost too much I think. Don't have a lack on gold though, 50 K +.

Any tips on what to do here in this economical crisis when facing a Sylvan who seems to love the ****load of wood?


Late-game strategies preferred, btw...

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sdfx
sdfx


Famous Hero
posted June 05, 2007 07:28 PM

Mass haste + mass slow is the key. Your mass haste won't be countered by mass slow(cleansing costs 40 mana and his magic resistance hopefully won't trigger on his emeralds ) and you can keep mass slowing his mass hasted army.
That means your army's initiative is on average artificer*1.4 while his army's initative is on average 1.4(his mass haste) * 0.6(your mass slow) = 0.84

So relatively, mass haste + mass slow makes your army 1.4/0.84 = 1.66(6) -> 66% faster than opponent's who has mass haste only.

If you have 40 knowledge for artificer that means your army is 1.4*1.4/0.84 = 2.33(3) -> 133% faster.

If he decides not to counter your mass slow(and for example cast righteous might instead) then your army is relatively 1.4*1.4/0.6 = 3.266(6) -> 226% faster than his.  

So basically he chooses to make his army:
mass righteous might = + ~60% damage to his army
BUT
uncountered mass slow = + (226% - 133%) = 93% initiative to your army

For example:
your titans' initiative = 10 * 1.4 * 1.4 = 19.6
his druid's initiative = 10 * 0.6 = 6
19.6/6 = 3.266(6) -> your titans are 226% faster than his druids.

Not to mention, that under the above circumstances, MotW + resurection and MotW + phantom forces comboses becomes way more powerful because he can't kill you that fast and high level hero phantom spam is always a threat -> phantom's ATB = 0.4+0.02*hero_level.
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TheDeath
TheDeath


Responsible
Undefeatable Hero
with serious business
posted June 05, 2007 07:33 PM

Quote:
Mass haste + mass slow is the key. Your mass haste won't be countered by mass slow(cleansing costs 40 mana...
Erm, I think cleansing costs 10 mana -- mass cleansing costs 20 mana.
And by the way, he doesn't need cleansing for slow, he can cast Haste/Mass Haste which:

- dispels your slow
- adds the new haste effect

yes I know it's not fair, but that's how this game works

Quote:
That means your army's initiative is on average artificer*1.4 while his army's initative is on average 1.4(his mass haste) * 0.6(your mass slow) = 0.84
If slow is cast after haste, it dispels it, so cut out the 1.4.. likewise if haste is cast after, cut out the 0.6 in the formula

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ZombieLord
ZombieLord


Promising
Famous Hero
that wants your brainz...
posted June 05, 2007 07:39 PM

@Moonlith:
Try trading the Gold into Ore first, since you have 50k+ and 0 Ore

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sdfx
sdfx


Famous Hero
posted June 05, 2007 08:10 PM
Edited by sdfx at 20:14, 05 Jun 2007.

Wizards have perks: suppress light and seal of darkness that doubles the mana cost of light and dark spells respectively.

Rangers probably won't learn dark.. that why I listed cleansing and resistance.

I used number 0.84 because I assumend that mass slow ISN'T countered immediately(I mean ATB difference).. and it not just some "cut off" because slow is more powerful than haste.
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TheDeath
TheDeath


Responsible
Undefeatable Hero
with serious business
posted June 05, 2007 08:18 PM

Quote:
Wizards have perks: suppress light and seal of darkness that doubles the mana cost of light and dark spells respectively.
Well sorry you should have mentioned it

Quote:
I used number 0.84 because I assumend that mass slow ISN'T countered immediately(I mean ATB difference).. and it not just some "cut off" because slow is more powerful than haste.
You can only have 1 effect of haste/slow at a time:

you either have slow, when the calculations for initiative are multiplied by 0.6
you either have haste, when the calculations are multiplied by 1.4

You can't have both x * 1.4 * 0.6, it only takes into account the last one, doesn't matter how powerful it is (I assume it's about mastery?)


You can dispel Expert Haste, with Slow (no mastery), and put the new effect. So it's kinda like:

x * 1.4 with Haste
then you cast Slow (25%)
so it becomes:

x * 0.75

as you see the 1.4 factor is completely dispelled because of slow.

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ZombieLord
ZombieLord


Promising
Famous Hero
that wants your brainz...
posted June 05, 2007 08:20 PM
Edited by ZombieLord at 20:21, 05 Jun 2007.

Quote:
You can't have both x * 1.4 * 0.6, it only takes into account the last one, doesn't matter how powerful it is (I assume it's about mastery?)

I think sdfx was referring to 'average' effect, that means a 50% mix of Haste and Slow

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TheDeath
TheDeath


Responsible
Undefeatable Hero
with serious business
posted June 05, 2007 08:26 PM

Slow on one faction while Haste on the other, or something like that?

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sdfx
sdfx


Famous Hero
posted June 05, 2007 08:27 PM

Yeah, I meant that slow isn't countered immediately and it lasts for some time, then haste is cast and it aslo lasts for some time.. and so on. So, on average it's
initiative*0.6 -> ATB grow for some time at 0.6 "speed")
initiative*1.4 -> ATB grow for some time at 1.4 "speed")
and I assumed that heroes' ATB difference is equal 0.25
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TheDeath
TheDeath


Responsible
Undefeatable Hero
with serious business
posted June 05, 2007 08:29 PM

Thanks for clearing that up, sorry for my confusion

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Moonlith
Moonlith


Bad-mannered
Supreme Hero
If all else fails, use Fiyah!
posted June 05, 2007 11:48 PM
Edited by Moonlith at 23:50, 05 Jun 2007.

Well I basicly got my ass kicked.

I ended up finding ore pits after all, so that solved my economical crisis. But it was no use in the end, his forces were too much.

Possible conclusions:

- I suck
- Academy sucks vs late-game sylvan
- He did an overkill on creatures.

So I didn't have mass haste, I probably underestimated that severely since I found myself completely out-intiatived by his nature lovers. What I found more awkward was that Jhora BARELY got to lay in a spell or two. Nor did she come faster than HIS hero did (Even though she had Sorcery and his didn't... wtf?)

On top of that 'twas:

- 20 emeralds
- 63 Treeants (he made a second treeant building in his second town)
- about 50 silver unis
- about 60 Druids
- about 222 Master hunters (he had a second town)
- about 200 Sprites

VS

- 16 Titans
- 22 Rakshashas
- 52 Djinn Sultans
- about 100 Archmages
- about 200 OGs
- about 500 MGs

First blow: Emeralds attacked Djinns, DUUHhrr...

I was fortunate enough to have chosen Light, Destructive and Summoning magic and getting puppetmaster in my Mage guild (and no resurection OR conjure phoenix!!!)

Took me 3 lvl4 mage guilds (different towns) to get a hold on Meteor Shower, and it didn't even work properly (63 treeants!!!).

On top of that, I found most of my spells resisted.

I have a feeling it would have gone better if I had spent the recources on building more dwellings in 2nd and 3th Academy town rather than mage guilds, mage tower and library.

.... And getting Dark Magic...

Which reminds me. Question:

When do you choose the magic types? Before or AFTER you build the mage guild?

I once went for Dark Magic (different map) and ended up getting Blindness and Curse of the Netherworld...

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Miru
Miru


Supreme Hero
A leaf in the river of time
posted June 06, 2007 07:30 AM
Edited by Miru at 18:43, 06 Jun 2007.

*Long post warning*
Well, first I would like to address thread trends:
1) we seem to be pitting against dungeon mainly
2) we seem to assume matriarchs are the ultimate counter
a. inquisitors, lichs, balors, druid, rune mages all can do that
b. the first few rounds can be used doing mark of wizard (more later, but very potent
3) skills (hero's), and army are everything
No tactics and brain, always triumphs over brawn.

Now personally I like using things already broken (rigged) and breaking them more. The most powerful units int the academy lineup are wizards (debatable), and rakshasa (they are better than titans, as I already proved). I like to arrange them like this:

orange = mages, brown = ammo cart, blue = titans, light blue = gremlins, everything else red. The space between the archmage and the titan is intentional.

When the battle starts, you have your mage use MoW (mark of wizard) on rakshasa, and beat on your opponents mage (as listed early, e.g. matriarch), then use phantom forces on your mages. You get a double in the gap, and double rakshasa, your opponent will be forced to go after one of the two phantom stacks, with no better option. Then teleport your opponents other ranged unit to line up with a previous line. Your mages can take this line of units down like a bowling ball (a sport in USA, possibly elsewhere), and as a bonus your rakshasa are also teleported... right next to their over exposed caster. Teleporting units can be very powerful, as is phantom forces (+MoW, hehehe).


For those of you who like Armageddon style, there is a simple counter -  sacrifice many armys, too big to take out with significant few losses. Either your Armageddons eat your own army (eternal servitude?), or my mediocre armies wear you down. Dungeon mana wears down too, throw stuff at them and when they do run out of mana, they are stuck doing a dark ritual or worse.

Small pointers:
*have mages use firewall to protect them, and put them on the front line. More damage to the mages, but less to golems, or what ever would have been in front of them. Woe to them enemy stepping in the fire wall!
*suppress light and seal of darkness kill warlocks... and anyone else
*going for the racial ultimate leaves you venerable until then, and may not happen
*the power from enlightenment more than triples your every stat when mastered, much spell power.
*the artifact guild can be used to purchase things, but keep in note percent artifacts are betting in the long run. (lightning rod over elemental waistband.
*Academy loves to summon, let summons and phantoms die for you to conserve troops while creeping
*their high mana, and regen allows  you to summon many troops.
a. keep few with you until the last second, surprise!
b. if leaving the castle for a long time, take upgrades or nothing at all, as you can't summon upgrade your troops
c. get your mage guild upgraded while in town, as opposed to creatures - creatures can be summoned, spells can't.

___ Edit, more:

Mini arties are very usefull, as your mines pump out many resources that you do not use late game, as long as you break them down and replace them every level you go back into town.

But much of the strategy seems to be, who gets the last laugh - counter spell insures that who ever goes first can keep your opponent from going, but that is only useful if your heros turns are less valuable than your opponents turns. And academy being manily wizards, your spells are very valuable. Not as potent as dungoen, but you can cast a lot more of them. On the other hand of counterspell is polarized spells - haste/slow, bless/curse things that the later caster get the advantage of. So, it is most efficient to burn the first few turns, not only to keep the interference of their mages out, but to take last word in the polarized spells. And what better way to burn turns that MoW? They all tie together.

Enlightenment - not just the extra XP. At level 21 a typical, unbuffed (no star axis, artifacts), wizard has 8 spell power. With enlightenment that jumps to 18. Obvious - over double. But that bonus applies to every stat, attack, knowledge and defense.

Hero choice - there are a couple of heros likely to choose from:
Jhora: always go first in late game, but as mentioned earlier that isn't necessarily a good thing.
Narxes: oh those mages - at level twenty one, with expert enlightenment their attack jumps from 10 out of his presence to (assuming no buffs) 33 in. With a "Magic Attack" that is lethal to many stacks.
Nathir: Armageddon, already detailed on first page.
Nur: what seems to be a last choice has merits after all.

More about Nur; right off the bat I'll admit she isn't the best hero, but you aren't using her for that. Have her go for expert artificer, and at the first opportunity recruit another hero, preferably native to your opponents terrain (typically your opponents race). This does three things:
1) give you a good main
2) prevent your opponent from using what you choose as a secondary
3) give you Nur as a second
Nur is the best second for one reason: mana regen. More creature summoning from the castle. And the 1k bonus from graduate (enlightenment skill) doesn't look so bad on a second.

Middle power; so far most of the people on the thread people agree that academy if weak in mid game, but this is when rakshasas come in, archmages are upgraded to, and the wizards are getting tier 5 spells!
Maybe I'm missing something, but I disagree that academy is weak mid-game.

And of course I would like to end with a likely stack of 1k mages for you to see me with:
+30 attack
Enemies teleported into a convenient line for me to attack
Fiery wrath, cold steel, archery, haste all on.
Mini arti with Plus init, moral, luck

Anyone not flinching or diabolically laughing upon seeing that has problems.

____________
I wish I were employed by a stupendous paragraph, with capitalized English words and expressions.

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Elvin
Elvin


Admirable
Omnipresent Hero
Endless Revival
posted June 06, 2007 09:36 AM

Quote:

On top of that 'twas:

- 20 emeralds
- 63 Treeants (he made a second treeant building in his second town)
- about 50 silver unis
- about 60 Druids
- about 222 Master hunters (he had a second town)
- about 200 Sprites

VS

- 16 Titans
- 22 Rakshashas
- 52 Djinn Sultans
- about 100 Archmages
- about 200 OGs
- about 500 MGs.

I was fortunate enough to have chosen Light, Destructive and Summoning magic and getting puppetmaster in my Mage guild (and no resurection OR conjure phoenix!!!)

Took me 3 lvl4 mage guilds (different towns) to get a hold on Meteor Shower, and it didn't even work properly (63 treeants!!!).

.... And getting Dark Magic...

Which reminds me. Question:

When do you choose the magic types? Before or AFTER you build the mage guild?

From what I can see he already had a larger army than you. Much larger and had a might hero, no wonder you lost. Three lvl 4 guilds seems a misuse of resources, you needed tanky creatures to preserve you while you cast. However he also probably had favoured enemies, sylvan can have one hit kills in lategame with some luck.

With such numbers destructive should have been pretty useless as even with motw it can't kill these 20 dragons fast enough and they would be immune to implosion on top of that. Only if you had good power artifacts and elemental boosters in the map or artifact merchants.

I have not played many big maps with academy but what I have understood is that you need light for resurrection and buffs, summoning for motw + arcane armour, phoenix, phantoms mostly and if you can get good spells dark. If only for mass slow. I usually build mage guild 2 in week 1 and it is easy to build mage guild 3 in week 2, even more if you wish. However if you do you will probably have to skip rakshasas for another time, either due to sulfur, gems or ore.

Anyways to pick dark better check what's in the guild up to guild 2-3 first, until then you can get sorcery, summoning, maybe enlightenment etc. Also build library fast.
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Map also hosted on Moddb

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Moonlith
Moonlith


Bad-mannered
Supreme Hero
If all else fails, use Fiyah!
posted June 06, 2007 12:34 PM

Humm, I have a feeling I overestimated a wizard's destructive abilities and underestimated his own army.

Plus I probably underestimated motw + phantom forces.

But what annoyed me most was that my units AND my hero barely got a turn during the battle, the ATB bar was flooded with his troops. And my hero didn't even get more turns than HIS dispite him having sorcery.

Dark Magic and puppetmaster would have worked wonders against that army...

To think his Treeants were trapped in the corner. All it would have taken was 1 puppetmastered Emerald Dragon stack, attack the treeants with it, and it would have trapped BOTH of them.

Thanks for the tips though.


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feluniozbunio
feluniozbunio


Promising
Supreme Hero
posted June 06, 2007 01:56 PM
Edited by feluniozbunio at 13:58, 06 Jun 2007.

He had much more army and academy's destructive isnt too good against sylvan(lots of resistance and fire resistance perk easy obtainable), Those are main reasons why u lost.

In not too good academy player but i think puppet master + motwed acrane armor or phoenix if its early game is the key, i wouldnt bother to slow as he can easily counter if, i wouldnt use confusion either i guess. But like i say i might be wrong

I think light magic + arcane armor could also do the trick. but you wold need lots of good mini artifacts.

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radar
radar


Responsible
Legendary Hero
Castle/Haven player
posted June 06, 2007 07:47 PM
Edited by radar at 19:49, 06 Jun 2007.

miru, those tables on AoH are old and non-actual... but rakshasa is still better than titan though if we not consider shooting

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feluniozbunio
feluniozbunio


Promising
Supreme Hero
posted June 06, 2007 08:20 PM

Quote:
Enlightenment - not just the extra XP. At level 21 a typical, unbuffed (no star axis, artifacts), wizard has 8 spell power. With enlightenment that jumps to 18. Obvious - over double. But that bonus applies to every stat, attack, knowledge and defense.


huh?

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Doomforge
Doomforge


Admirable
Undefeatable Hero
Retired Hero
posted June 06, 2007 08:55 PM

expert enlightment gives 10 extra points at level 21 to the main stats. While the chance of them all going to spell power is possible, it's extremely unlikely. I'd say 3-5 points more at max, the rest goes to knowledge.

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Elvin
Elvin


Admirable
Omnipresent Hero
Endless Revival
posted June 06, 2007 09:13 PM

It is still possible that some will go to att/def. Once I got it with sylvan and gained +2 attack
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Map also hosted on Moddb

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miru
miru


Supreme Hero
A leaf in the river of time
posted June 07, 2007 12:16 AM

Taken from the H5 manual, 45% chance a level point goes to knowledge, 30% spell power, 15% attack, 10% defense,
So a typical wizard will have 8 spellpower by level 21.
However somethings buff that, like a star axis give +1 spell power, and some artifacts give +x spell power... I wasn't counting those, hence "unbuffed"

Any other questions?
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I wish I were employed by a stupendous paragraph, with capitalized English words and expressions.

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