Why fireball is unreliable? It's one of most reliable spells in the game it can kill both magic immune and not immune units. I think it can be a good addition to a standing still gunner, actually better range than repeater too.
Fireball is unreliable in terms of targetting. If a bunch of orc warriors clump up with a sniper among them, there's no way to target the sniper with it. Also, it just deals a pitiful amount of damage. Sure it adds up, but that's after the enemy also dished out their damage which can cost you some units or your health. I prefer instant 200 AOE damage than a single target low damage over time. SINGLE TARGET. Worst part of fireblast coz single target spells is not really a viable investment in a game like H&C2. And there's an 8 second stun which separates the 2. In between repeater shooting and casting Ice Shards, i have both damage sources covered. Having only Ice Shards as the main active spell, i also get the benefit of using skill points for passive skills which are ALWAYS ACTIVE rather than have these skill points sit there ding nothing until i cast it. Take note i started from a Level 1 human character (now lv18), so having multiple spells is pretty bad as they wont be cast as often. Also, i had Fireball (it's actually called fireblast, but i think fireball is easier and more straightforward ) as my main spell until i got to level 7 for my 6th skill point in which i got to try Ice Shards. Upon testing, i immediately re-spec'd to remove skill points on fireball and im never looking back.
It depends on the situation and gamestyle. If your plan is to get closer to units and deal AOE with Ice Shards then you might not want fireballs. But they don't cancel each other out IMO. About damage, yes, it is over time but it deals 375 in total to a single unit. It's situational. If wraiths are dispersed then fireballs are more efficient, for example. Also, it might save stamina as you don't need to get close to a far away wraith/goblin med, etc. Seems to be more useful for a non magic attack mage than a staff based mage, though.
375 total damage is pretty good, but accumulated 375 damage over time versus AOE 200 damage... You only need 2 targets to make the mana investment on par, if not better (400 total damage). In H&C2, it is easy to hit 5 targets at once, and it isnt common to hit over 10 enemies, which translates to 2000 damage in one spell cast. So yeah, despite how good Fire Blast is for single targets, it still isnt enough to build around with. At least not in H&C2. I dont think single target damage-only spell has a place in H&C2 to be even at least viable. I cant see casting Fireblast after fireblast a viable strategy at all, else, you'll only be killing one enemy at a time. A fireblast strategy mage will easily be run down in waves 31-35.
A few things that make me chuckle: 1) getting stuck on small rocks. Just step over it!! 2) none of the stand alone building have doors. Poor peasants have to use the windows to get in and out 3) I finally found a floating tree that Elsa always mentions. Straight back in one of the snow levels. A few possible bugs: 1) I got a 35% discount War Bannerman rune. Can you even buy those guys? 2) goblin rocket men one shot me just about every time. Need more than around 250 HP to survive. Easy to avoid if there are a few of them, but some defend missions can have 20+ at a time along with other threats.
Yep good old gunmage! I enjoy having two magic slinging staves equipped, though... pretty fun throwing magic misses everywhere So fat, I'm finding staves underehelming, but maybe need to upgrade the bonuses more for the mage? Be great to have Foursaken chime in on that...
Recently i've been trying a dual wield elf. It's pretty fun to zip around the battlefield, but i'm not used yet to the low HP. My main hero is a level 30 paladin, so that might explain. This thread has given me some ideas for some builds to try out, just didn't have the time yet to try them out. Especially now with exams and all. It's crazy how some of you have such high level characters. On a side note, i recently found these two elf armors and i really like their design EDIT: Can't seem to upload two pictures from my Ipod. I also found this glitch where the cape of my paladin froze and didn't move along with the walkg animation. It was pretty strange and funny to watch my guy's head bob up and down. It fixed itself after a battle though.
Yay, at least someone pays some attention. Have you looked at rocks that are on edges of the map yet? Some of them are halved and you can see inside them... I also pointed out that there are no doors on little white houses and it really bugs me as well. What about the versus mode?
Ah ok. I read most of this thread, but it moved so fast at one point it was hard to keep up. I've seen the tree's aswell. Never bothered me though, so i never posted about it.
Maybe, in versus mode... But it's still easy to hide behind your units. It must at least have some form of CC to be viable IMO.
I'm going to start working on my human now that I maxed my elf. I have no experience with guns. Can you post some of your gun stats so I can get an idea of what to look for? Any other gun advice is welcome.
Ranged staffs are actually pretty good. I like them more than guns and bows, mostly due to the fact that they're dual-wieldable. In fact, it's a straight upgrade versus repeaters (they get identical stats), without the reheating aspect. There's also more bonuses for it. You can have 100% uptime on vengeance aura and holy shield still, and still have mana left for as many sword strikes as you want. Arcane magic is incredibly strong with footman spam. On that note, I still want to see an upgrade to guns in general. It's clearly the weakest weapon archetype in the game. Requires two hands, overheats on repeaters and fires insanely slow on the others. The least amount of buffs, only 1 active ability for it. In a medieval-themed game, is it really appropriate that guns are the WORST? I mean I guess magic is pretty good, but COME ON! CLUBS? Dual-wielding would help immensely, but all in all, it's still rather bad.
Some good points here. What mostly bothers me is that it appaears that armor actually reduces the chance for ranged staff attacks to hit, even though it's clearly stated that they're magic.
Submitting update today FYI: Because of many recent balance changes, all updating players get one free skill reset per hero Mercenaries now become available after 1 loss You can now use mercenaries with a much smaller penalty (only -1 crystals). Make sure to use them if you ever get stuck on a wave! Generally increased the strength of mercenaries offered Reduced the up front mana cost of some active skills Reduced enemy strength a bit in most campaign missions to better balance enemies against previous hero tweaks Reduced difficulty of waves 31-35, especially wave 32 Tweaked difficulty ramp up to be less in Endless and Coop Fixed a bug with cape models Removed the buffs on enemy lands after you beat the game Fixed a bug with Elven Arrows Fixed a bug with some enemies having instant cooldowns Fixed a bug with torch bearer, orc hyena riders Fixed a bug with forged equipments with certain perks
What im using: On my Human Gunmage: +21 damage, 0 stamina use, 1000 range On my Dwarven Gunner: +68 damage, +20 AP, 0 stamina use, 1500 range
I actually really like the difficulty of waves 31-35. I've completed it with each of the classes, even with a Lv29 Engineer-only Dwarf with a rifle. It's disappointing how users praise games like Flappy Bird, Super Hex and other twitch-type games for their difficulty, but when it comes to highly strategic and in-depth title like H&C2, everyone loses their minds.
