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SnowFire
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New York City, NY
Jan 1970
time: 00:21
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It always interests me how HOMM3 turned upside down many of the strengths and weakness of HOMM2's castles (the Knight & Sorceress castles most notably). Anyway, first a rating by power:
1. Knight (Castle)- No question about it. For whatever reason, they decided to make Knights rule. You have everything in this town you could possibly want- strong early units, some flying support and good ranged help, and a level 7 unit that doesn't require rare resources to build (and a somewhat reasonable amount of rare resources to build the structure- it's easier to get 10 of everything than to get 30 of 1 thing, and then keep on paying it to build your creatures). Basically, the Knight castle can do it all with a mix of everything. Not a single one of their units is bad, and many are notably good. And oh yes, the best Level 7 doesn't hurt either. Their only weakness is the capping of the mage guild at level 4, which still isn't that bad (lvl. 4 spells might be more important to get than level 5 spells anyway).
2. Wizard- A bit more focused than the Knight, the Tower still sports an amazing array of death in its ranged destruction. Sure, golems aren't much to write home about and gargoyles die a bit easily, the Tower is still quite good, along with some of the nastier heroes for hire. And the Nagas are among the best choppers around. Only problem with the Tower is that it can get exorbitantly expensive in both gems & gold.
3. Rampart & Necromancer- Good baselines. They both can be a bit slow, and Ghost Dragons & Pegasi are a bit underpowered, but on the whole, good castles with a theme (although I'm still annoyed that they took the super-mobile all-offense Sorceress strike force and replaced it with the "Might of Trees" zillions of HP but really slow Rampart).
5. Dungeon- Like the Tower-, kind of. It's overcosted in that you're constantly scrounging for gold & sulfur, but Medusas & Scorpicores really aren't worth as much as they want. Still, not a total failure.
6. Beastmaster & Barbarian- It's fun to have a very physical hero, but the level 3 mage guild limit is noticed a bit more here. Also, the fact that they have the only non-flying level 7 units is also noticed... a certain strike.
8. Inferno- Just plain sucks. Sucks sucks sucks. There are only two units worth a darn here: Efreet, which are tough, strong, fast, & have that inherent fire shield (quite nice); and Devils, which are decent, but they're a level 7 unit- come on, all level 7 units are good. Every other unit here will get smashed by the equivalent unit in the Castle, and doesn't cost enough less or breed fast enough to make up the difference (Horned demons are a good example, they cost 50 less or something and suck a lot more than crusdaers, and you get 10 per week instead of 9 or some other trivial difference). I'll add that it also always amuses me how Cerberuses have LESS attack power than Hellhounds...
Didn't play around enough with the Conflux in AB to really rank it.
That all said, I play based on flavor, and I was annoyed how the flavor of the Knight & Sorceresses castles was changed, as noted above. I liked the massive wave of human ground troops in HOMM2! Why the need to make them so flexible now? It also annoys me that Crusaders/Paladins aren't top level units anymore, I liked there being at least 1 top level unit that was a human. Crusaders ruled too! So in terms of flavor, I most enjoy playing the Barbarian, Necromancer, & Tower castles, because I feel that their buildings & units fit them the most. In that order.
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ColdWizard
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i preferred castles
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SnowFire
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New York City, NY
Jan 1970
time: 00:21
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Raseblin: Yup. Those and Centaur Captains are the best units that the Rampart has to offer... often times, because I so wanted to play a fast moving attack force, I'd make an army of just those troops (and Dragons, if I had 'em).
MPT: And nah, I think the balance in HOMM2 is wonderful, myself. I agree that the Knight castle has probelms do to its massive lack of flexibility (it's a huge horde of ground troops backed by Rangers), but don't forget that Knight heroes almost always get massive ballistics, which helps soften the pain. And I like that style, darn it. I will say that if the Heroes 2 castles were a bit unbalanced, it would be because the Warlock castle is a wee bit too good (considering they have the Dungeon, strong early units, & the best level 6).
I always wanted to make a Heroes III map featuring an Enrothian warlock travelling to Erathria and suddenly finding his Centaurs, Gargoyles, Griffins, Minotaurs, & Hydra massively bickering with each other for no appearnt reason (going from +1 Morale, all troops of same castle to -3, 5 different castle types). And then customizing the castles you conquer so that you're continually stuck with morale problem type units.
Last edited by SnowFire on 13-08-2002 at 07:24
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Andemagne
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Rovaniemi, Lappland, Finland
Dec 1999
time: 07:21
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well, its Castle for me all the way. I don't play the game anymore with out playing with Castle. its propably over 2 years since I last played some other town.
Dungeon, Tower and Conflux come in second (dunno in what order).
and Inferno and Fortress are the worst.
and why all this?
Castle's Archangel is fastest unit in the game (well Conflux's Phonix is faster, but after you kill them of, Conflux army is dead/finished), so you get to cast the first spell, with mass haste, 6 of your stacks get to attack before the enemy(ok, maybe 1 in the middle) and that's a BIG advantage. tower and dungeon have good forces but if they don't out number Castle's forces, they don't stand a chance, and experience has taught me this. and Castle has Knights => castle player has better moral and gets more free/new turns, a BIG advantage.
and Castle is also strong in the early game also, which is nice.
(this is what I think, if you disagree, that's ok.)
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thinkingamer
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1. Conflux and Castle
2. Necropolis and Dungeon
3. Tower, rampart, Fortress and Stronghold
4. Infierno (+1 if your main hero has expert earth magic w/ resurrection and shield)
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SnowFire
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New York City, NY
Jan 1970
time: 00:21
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Well, as the one person who voted for the Stronghold: 'cause it's neat! The music is great, and you really do get to feel like you're carting a Barbarian army around. Quite flavorful.
That said, powerwise, the Stronghold is pretty pathetic. Your troops are nothing special throughout the ranks (I'm not even that huge a fan of Cyclopes). Makes it nice & challenging though, if nothing else.
I still think that it's better than the Inferno, though. While lots of Stronghold units might be classed "below average," it's not like virtually every unit is classed as "sucks," which is true with the Inferno (with those 2 exceptions). I'd rather have an all-in-all slightly cut-rate army, than a pathetic army with 2 quality stacks.
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12-08-2002 04:24
No actually I like the ghost dragons. And my endless horde of skeletons to conquer the world! *evil cackle*
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