Raelag - summoning&light magic - warlock campaign - IMBA

[pikaadel]

Hi everyone! (this is my first post )

I just finished the warlock campaign in heroic. OUFF !
I think I have been playing on that one for 2 months.
Anyway, I first tried to follow the walkthrough, but I was having no luck.
Soulcars from mission 3 were still kicking my ass, I could never get to build a good Raelag. there was always something going wrong (no spellspower, bad skills, ...)
So I decided to try Summoning, and it went smooth !

I basically followed that method for every fight:
-field only minotaurs
-arcane armor on minotaurs
-summon phoenix
-haste on phoenix/mass haste
-phoenix kills everything
-1(or more if needed) resurection on minotaurs before end of combat
I could take any army with a stack of 50-100 minotaurs. I was even skipping raelags turn while conquering towns to save his mana.

Mission 3 was still a pain in the ass, but manageable. I had the bug where demons get stuck in the corner and dont move, dunno if it would have made a difference.
Then mission 4 and 5 were just a piece of cake...

I havent tried that strategy in a normal game. I wonder if it would work.

Thank you for reading me
Cheers, Pikaadel

[cjlee]

You don't always get resurrection with Raelag. So the 'normal' and safe choice for a warlock is to field Deep Hydras and keep them waiting to regenerate.

I think it is normal when playing warlock to skip turns and use their Dark Ritual skill.

Are you suggesting that you made it through the entire campaign on Summoning and Light alone? (If you didn't go the destructive route, that means no implosion, no deep freeze and no meteor shower, right?) That's impressive. Me, I can't play Raelag like a wizard (summoning and light) because he doesn't have enough mana to fight a long battle. I prefer to decide the fight in one or two meteor showers.

[pikaadel]

Well yeah, I didnt use Destruction magic. at least not with Raelag.
I am sure other players have done it with Summoning. I dont know which spells they used tho.

Its true its not easy to get light magic with warlock. But you can always restart mission 1 until you do or get it in a witch hut in mission 2 (thats how I got it). And then, you just visit the dragon utopia or mage vault to get resurrection.
I managed to get it in all my trys.

I think you need too many skill points to be efficient with destructive by the start of mission 3:
expert destrutive+warlocks luck+empowered spells+expert light+some points in sorcery.....
Sure, you can get all those by lvl 18, but its pretty tight. you cant afford a bad pick...otherwise, you have to start all over again.
I had no problem building my warlock the summoning way. All you need is expert summoning+master of conjuration+expert light.
I even had the luxury to take logistics which was pretty nice.

You dont need that much mana for summoning because you are not casting many spells. When I said skipping turns, I meant during fights. I didnt have to cast any spells because my phoenix was doing all the work.

And yes, fielding only deep hydras is a good and common strategy. but against a other hero and his army (especially warlock), their regeneration rates is not sufficient to keep them alive.

[cjlee]

Wow! I'm almost tempted to replay Raelag's campaign again.

it's too natural when playing warlock to go the destructive route; I almost forgot that summoning has its uses also.

My main problem with summoning is that it requires a lot of tactics and micromanagement. For instance, positioning barriers. Luck with the 8 landmines you get to place on each firetrap casting.

Summon Elementals is very unreliable given the terrain, while I don't dare rely on Phoenix. If you recall, you are fighting demons a lot of the time - that Vorpal sword is perfect for killing phoenixes.

And if you get Arcane Armor... restart!

So how did you avoid these problems?

[pikaadel]

Are you crazy?? arcane armor is awesome --> cant beat 50% damage reduction...

I didn't really use the other spells. I used fire wall only if I was defending the town, and there was a brach in the walls.

Fire trap is pretty good when you are fighting neutrals, especially large creatures. But really all you need is Arcane Armor and Summon Phoenix.

Sure, Vorpal Sword is annoying. Luckily, Pit Lords tend to stay in their corner and cast spells. Just keep your phoenix away from them. Kill some with your hero, then finish them with the birdy. By mission 5, mine could kill a stack of 12 pit lords in one attack.

Oh! and yeah, you are right. Summon Elementals is rubbish

[cjlee]

As much as I may sound like a noob, I have never fought a battle where arcane armor could turn the tide. An arcane armor strategy presupposes you have resurrection, which means mage guild level 5 in 2 separate castles since Warlock castle has no high level light magic.

You can do a lot better deploying deep hydras and lower level spells. By the time you get a stack powerful enough to withstand severe damage, such as 100 minotaurs, it's already month 2. Besides, you're not making the best of Raelag's specialty. Do you know how incredible 1 weeks' production of blood furies are with a high level Raelag? Even if the enemy is vastly outnumbering them, blood furies are great for running in circles as you blast away with spells. It's so fun!

[wimfrits]

As cjlee says, furies can get a warlock through most battles against neutrals. And most often at minimal spellpoint cost. Which allows for fast early expansion.

However, against enemy heroes you usually don't want to deploy your furies because they're targeted too much. Regenerating deep hydra's can help you through to an extent, but on heroic often not all by themselves. So I also used a minotaur meat shield to absorb damage. But with a Destructive magic build, which is not an efficient combination. I think arcane armor, summon phoenix and resurrection is much more effective.
(Mind, effective but not efficient. Spellpoint costs are pretty high and arcane armor works best on high defense units)

In TotE things are different, as stalkers can help you through most of the fights where furies cannot.
Overall I think that on heroic setting, Dark magic works best with Dungeon units (Vampiric furies). Followed by either Summoning or Light and ending with Destructive magic. Then again, Dungeon is the only faction that can properly use Destructive magic..

[Mirez]

unless you are offered war machines with sylvan of course