Round table

6. Barbarian - Gunnisson or Crag - birds, sometimes orcs or upgraded goblins on 111 and forward. Bears are easily built in the castle on week 1. Often lucky with artifacts on respawn.

Easily bears in the castle? Would be nice if someone made statistics of reports how often this "easily" is?

8. Inferno - Pyre starting, immediately buy a book for her and go far from the castle, preferably to grass. In the middle of week 1, pits and efreets will clear what's left near the castle. Devils are often built on week 1.

But until the middle of week 1, Pyre is idle in half of the setups if she doesn't leak. Good if you gather enough for pits or efreets, really great if you have the gold to buy them. About devils already mentioned above))))). Fresh example - recently decided with Sanal to play Inferno vs Inferno - 50% of setups are unplayable, we re-rolled and gave up.

9. Conflux - even total beginners manage to build phoenixes, so it's almost always banned :)

And here I'll argue)) - I often don't ban Conflux for the opponent because its start is quite difficult and you need to know how to play it to get birds on week 1. Especially when lacking level 2 from the start.

Added after 6 minutes

5. Tower - I like playing Torosar - the tactic protects gremlins from neutral morale.

Tower is a good castle, but I take Aine from the start - chance to learn papa from Solmyr, Demer, etc., and also from the castle too and stable 2000 per week.
Stumbling block - resources for building mages by day 3-6 are not always found. And that means either losing tempo and going somewhere deep into the respawn for the needed pile or farewell nagas.

P.S. We got peckered to "zeh best" - there will be an opportunity to prove I'm wrong)))))