Barbarian magic suppression skills...

Why is "Wrath of the Horde" not relevant? All Orc possibilities should be considered. In my opinion, it perfectly replaces "Anti-Summoning," meaning it serves precisely to reduce shields and destroy phoenixes. Furthermore, it seems you summoned a phoenix when half of your armies had already gone to the afterlife? Then you simply didn't set the task conditions correctly. At the time the phoenixes appeared, there weren't "600 centaurs, 160 chieftains, etc.," but fewer. Therefore, the question is: what did the Orc have left? Who and how many? And also: your friend made a big mistake by taking Chieftains instead of Executioners. Added after 14 minutes

The Shield will have 2000 HP for about 4 weeks, and how much damage will "Wrath of the Horde" deal? And don't forget that killing goblins and centaurs is not a very long process. After that, you can completely ignore "Wrath of the Horde." It only gets worse because the necromancer will definitely have more than one growth per week thanks to the converter. 40 lords per week is more than realistic. It is very likely that you won't reach anyone with your first move because having 2 artifacts from the racial set is quite common. And the effectiveness of vampires doesn't decrease from 1 "Rise Dead," and sometimes it even increases. With a run, you won't collect just one mine, and you'll take damage and have your wrath reduced. Let's say you hit 4 mines, i.e., absorbed 700 damage. For example, a stack of 100 Warmongers will have 1100 * (700/2000) = 385 wrath reduced. They can't recover from this, and they'll be killed immediately. I agree that Darkness is usually more effective, but what if you have a set of spells, and what if you don't? We look for other options and find them.

1) On the 4th week, it is quite possible. Although I still don't see anything terrible in this situation. I will have time to use "Wrath of the Horde" once, and there will be too few necromancers to resist the "furious" orcs. It's not that easy to kill centaurs and goblins if your opponent has moved away from being a noob. 2) Don't forget about the Aura of Speed. It is more likely to be obtained than two artifacts from the set (on the 4th week), so there is a good chance of reaching the vampires or shooting a lot if you are playing as Haghesh. 3) Yes, I will collect them, but I will "mine" the road and try to follow it. 4) Don't forget that "Summoning" also needs a set of spells to be collected; summoning spells start with level 2 of Darkness, from level 1. In conclusion, I will find it much easier to play against a Hero with Summoning magic than against a Hero with Darkness magic. Therefore, I don't level up "Anti-Darkness"; I level up "Anti-Summoning."