Echoes of the Void

UPD

Decided to replay. And that's when things got really tough. It seems that a lot here depends on random chance. Sometimes, Ishkabal appears as early as week 1, regardless of the number of villages saved. Well, Ishkabal/demons/Raven – that's still manageable. They can be defeated with turrets.

But at the end of week 4, a cheerful and energetic Sorgall showed up with 6 Shadow Dragons and, despite having a castle with a built turret and Alaric at level 14, he defeated me. And that's despite the fact that Alaric had well-developed defense, evasion, and reflection. And he had excellent logistics – he was running around the map, leveling up, and was already gathering demons to kill Sir Thomas, and then this happened=(

At the same time, my army consisted of 100+ archers, 60 pikemen, and 300 militia. It was a disappointing outcome.

So, I'll expand the list of suggestions.

1) A refuge for secondary heroes. It's VERY necessary. If you're stuck in a castle, which you often have to do, the AI hunts down secondary heroes and eliminates them. And they are essential – for gathering resources, managing the treasury/training troops, and other important tasks. To prevent players from avoiding playing as Alaric, you could prevent him from entering the refuge.

2) Delay the appearance of the Necromancer. His magic negates all efforts to build up an army. This is what happened to me.

3) Altars with Light magic are also very needed.

4) The Seer. It would be good if, after the dialogue with him, it was possible to postpone receiving the bonus. Often, it is more convenient to visit him with a secondary hero, and then have Alaric come and receive the coveted bonus to spell power. Currently, this is not possible: if you close the dialogue without choosing anything, he gets offended and doesn't give anyone any more bonuses.

5) Necropolises. It would be better to convert them into human cities after capturing them, so that the player is not tempted to convert troops from all castles into undead, which greatly simplifies the game and is not canonical. Again, it's no coincidence that the video mentions breaking up parks on the site of bone pillars. And an army is desperately needed, so let it be a normal, human army. Otherwise, the player is tempted, and then receives a triple dose of trouble from the Shadow Lord – and the whole game is ruined. And there is no information in advance warning about this on the map.

6) Regarding demon cities... maybe they should be dramatically destroyed? The Inquisition would approve of that.

7) Witch huts. Yes, the skills there are useful. But by the time you get to them, you've already acquired the necessary skills. It would be good if the Seer showed them all, so that his visit would be more useful.

8) Judging by the map, the first thing you're supposed to do is defeat the demon. But how can you defeat him if there are garrisons with imps that drain Alaric's mana before he can speed up his troops/cast Darkness?

UPD 2

I finally finished it, in 202 days (I prolonged it because I went to visit Hottabych). Overall, everything is great, except for the possibility of the Necromancer appearing too early...