Test games played

[Nelphine]

Nah elite halfling swordsmen are better than klackon halberdiers. They're actually comparable with things like war trolls once you put a few more buffs on them. 

Do the 5 common buffs and 1 mithril halfling swordsmen can take out full stacks of units by itself.

Yes poison works against them. That is why we did the poison change. But that also works on slingers and klackon halberdiers - so it's still worse to buff those.

By the way, the quintuple buffed halfling swordsmen can destroy most nodes, as long as they can catch them, and there's no poison. Earth elementals, some giants, unicorns that can be cornered, etc. Obviously fliers are problems.

Ranged isn't that bad - 12-14 armor at +2 to defend makes even water elementals do very little and sprites do nothing g if you can use spells to kill them.

[Nelphine]

Casting skill game:

Trying to figure out how to kill 3 behemoths in a nature node. Lack of offensive buffs really hurts here. (8 adamantium orihilacron veteran troll magicians managed to kill one, as did 9 adamantium steam cannons.)

Last unbroken tower is 3 archangels and 6 unicorns. Also causing problems (I really wish I knew why the ai chose to use prayer or not though. I can't imagine a time an archangel should not cast prayer first.)

[Seravy]

Poison doesn't work much on slingers - Nagas don't survive to engage them, and Ghouls don't do enough in the single turn they can survive. Klackon Halberdiers I guess would be able the same against poison as Halfling Swordsmen except for the higher health pool (6*3 vs 8*2...wait that isn't that much higher actually).

Fliers...I can research Chaos Channels and now it should work with buffs, so I can try doing that, albeit I can't help thinking swordsmen should be obsolete now that I have access to other races. Klackons aside (whose large natural armor should be great for buff stacking) I also have a Gnoll city so Gnoll halberdiers or jackals are also possibilities for the future.

...wait 14 armor? on a swordsmen? Heroism is two, they have 3 base, holy armor is another two for a total of 7. Where is the other 7 from? Bless? That does not work against Sprites though, nor Water Elementals (Nature/Sorcery aren't Chaos/Death). Even if I get Chaos Channel armor it's only 10. And I rather not, flight is more important for a melee unit...

[Nelphine]

Sorry, 11-13 - 4 from large shield. Rest from either warlord or mithril or adamantium. You won't always get those obviously.

But yes halfling swordsmen with buffs are WAY up there as powerful units. Jackal riders are better, halberdiers with extra health and some other bonus, like beastmen, are better. Paladins are better until megabuffing.

However, you are right. Halfling swordsmen are really best early game when just heroism and magic weapons is enough to destroy the enemy. Nagas and ghouls are basically custom built and as strong as they are to bear buffed swordsmen

[Seravy]

Yeah I guess I should have built a few before slingers, but I was too busy building spearmen to block the path of enemy settlers to even think of that lol
Buffing them that early is problematic though - for the price of one, I could have 4 hell hounds which reduces unrest by 2...or could cast two heavenly lights. Or if looking at it that way it takes like 10-12 turns to buff one with the starting skill and mana.
A greater problem is if I pick the spells for the slinger strategy, I won't have holy armor and endurance before researching them (or at all) - although this game I did drop holy weapon (which probably was a mistake but wanted Just Cause to get my economy (and heroes) going), I still had to pick Heavenly Light, Healing and Heroism.
I suppose now with Magic Markets, Heavenly Light is not critical to have anymore, albeit the garrison bonus is still a huge deal. Heroism is obviously a must have, so is healing.
...and then there is Bless - Halfling resistance is not that amazing even though it's not bad, so you likely need that against any Chaos or Death wizard. (and you still lose your unit to confusion but at least you can dispel that with runemaster easier)

So yea, buffed swordsmen must be nice but I don't see that happening with only 4 common spell picks from Life. Maybe if I was playing 6+4 books instead of 5+5.

[Nelphine]

I forgo healing and just cause - any life ai will have them and I'll trade to get them. Yes rarely this causes problems, but I've found its the more reliable path with life spells.

[Seravy]

Healing is extremely difficult to trade for in my experience - they generally want a strong uncommon for it. Just Cause isn't much easier but I can live without it longer so I usually skip that one. Albeit this might have been only true for the old trade priority system.
Problem is Healing is necessary in the earlier turns, especially against the wizards who don't have life. So a trading opportunity might happen too late. Note that I do want to use heroes if a chance shows up to do so.

[Nelphine]

Best way to use heroes is: clear 20 lairs/nodes/towers or more before looking at heroes. Then give your heroes the ridiculously good items you've got. Then win.

But honestly, healing isn't necessary early game. Just max defense on something and attack weak targets (like everything that an ai has that isn't it's fortress.) Now you've all but wiped out an AI. 

Ok that's super simplistic. I totally agree healing is strong and in many cases is seemingly required. But I'll get more use out of healing than any ai will get out of any uncommon life spell, so I'm ok with that trade.

[teelaurila]

I cleared a 3 Behemoth node in my previous game with 9 minotaurs, but it was close. Likely you need to cast _something_ to help them out. Behemots like their elemental armor, so magicians don't seem to be a solid pick - or it might even work to take 2 and see if that baits them to waste their casting on the armors.

[Nelphine]

I solved it by finally getting very rare summons - 8 land linked endurance focus magic invisible sky drakes with an angel (and I'm researching archangels - 5000 research per turn goes quick) make short work of, well, everything. And natures cures to heal them every round.

So now that i've officially got the units to win I think I'll go to 1415 and see my skill and power production. I should have Uranus blessing everywhere by then. Actually I'll just go to the turn I get Uranus blessing everywhere.