Specific Properties of Individual Creatures

Of course, almost all "city" soldiers have some peculiarities documented in the Manual. The tips in this section are based on some especially notable properties of these "city" units.

If the opponent uses Blind against your squads, and your Hero does not have Cure or Dispel spells, then a good (albeit more expensive) alternative can be the Teleport spell. A "blinded squad" can be teleported right up to enemy shooters, who will attack your squad in melee combat more weakly and automatically remove the effect of the spell from it. If the enemy Hero moves the blocked same shooter squad to another place on the battlefield instead of attacking so that no one blocks them, then you can use the Teleport spell again on the next turn. Cast it as soon as any of your squads gains the right to move, in order to block the shooter squad before its turn comes. (Source – astralwizard, Rich Browne)

Royal Griffins. If there are enough of them in a squad (since the HP of a single bird leaves much to be desired), it is useful to send it into the thick of battle so that the birds "respond" to everyone attacking their flock. The same property is based on the rapid capture of an enemy city with a weak but multi-squad garrison. The faster Royal Griffins get behind the city walls, the sooner the battle will end. If your Hero storming the city fortifications has the Tactics skill or Haste spell, which allow the birds to immediately "visit" the besieged, then the assault may last only one round.

Cavaliers and Champions. Do not forget that their striking power depends on the length of the "run-up" and try to attack enemy squads at the limit of cavalry attack range.

Archangels. Do not forget to use their one-time ability in battle to restore (or even resurrect) some allied squad. If a Hero has a squad of archangels, the Clone spell, and the Water Magic secondary skill at Expert level, he can restore original archangels (after losing one or several) using a squad of cloned archangels. Given that one Archangel restores 100 hit points, you can use the Clone spell repeatedly so that by the end of the battle not a single "real" archangel is lost. As long as there are enough spell points for all the spells. (Source – astralwizard, Ye olde sorcerer (Florian Trombach))

Master Genies. If the Hero's army has few of them, then in battle against a strong opponent it is better to use their magical abilities three times during the battle to "cast" useful spells on your own army squads than to rely on insignificant combat qualities. At the same time, they can be split into several squads (if there are free slots) to increase the number of useful spells.

Nagas and Naga Queens. While other squads Wait in battle, they can attack any reachable enemy squad without any pain to themselves, reducing its size so that other squads of their army take less damage during attack and "retaliation." And a large amount of HP will allow the "nagas" to withstand a possible attack from their opponent.

Devils and Arch Devils. Here everything is simple: you Wait and attack the enemy twice without any "response" on their part. However, if the battle with the enemy can end in the first round, then "waiting" is unnecessary.

If your Hero, who has a squad of Devils (Arch Devils), is defending a city, having the Teleport spell and Expert Water Magic skill (so that squads can be teleported through walls) allows you to attack the enemy with this squad on every turn without punishment (after Waiting, of course) and at the beginning of the next turn teleport it back behind the walls, Wait, and attack again at the end of the turn. You should only keep in mind that your "horned ones" must be the fastest on the battlefield.

Vampire Lords. Self-sufficient warriors. A single squad with a decent number of these beauties can handle a numerous army of "living" opponents, whose lives Vampire Lords will use to restore themselves.

Ghost Dragons. Use the 20% probability property to "age the opponent" in attacks on strong squads - do not waste them on low-level same small fry.

Harpy Hags. During a siege of your city, place "harpies" right by the wall so that as many enemy squads as possible are reachable for their attacks. It is good if they can reach shooters standing in the back line. Their property - to deal damage to the opponent without "retaliation" and return "home" - will be of significant importance when repelling an attack on a city. Especially if they are not bothered by enemy shooters and flying squads. When besieging an enemy city, it is sometimes useful to prevent garrison squads from coming out. Especially if it consists mostly of heavy infantry. In this case, the most convenient place for your Harpy Hags squad is right in front of the gates, from where they can attack any defender squad and return back, continuing to hinder the sally of the garrison infantry. (Source - astralwizard, author - Tianyun)

Cyclopes and Cyclops Kings. They shoot well at the enemy, but when storming fortresses, if the number of cyclopes in the attacking army is insignificant, it is useful to use their "catapult" ability (throwing their stones at walls and towers), splitting the cyclopes into several squads when there are vacant slots in the army.

Mighty Gorgons. Due to their additional death stare ability with a certain probability to instantly destroy several creatures of the attacked squad, these "bulls" are better used in attacks on the opponent's strongest creatures. The number of destroyed depends on the number of Mighty Gorgons and ranges from 1 to (N:10)+1 (where N is the number of Mighty Gorgons. For example, 31 "bulls" can additionally destroy one to four creatures of the attacked squad). The probability of a death stare appearing depends on the number of Mighty Gorgons and for one bull equals 10% (as stated in the Manual). Increasing the number of Mighty Gorgons in a squad leads to a significant increase in the probability of a death stare. Without providing a general formula for calculating this probability, I will only report the probability values for some Mighty Gorgon squads that were tested in practice and matched theoretical calculations:
10 MG – 0.65; 20 MG – 0.88; 30 MG – 0.95 (Source - Mironov@piter.com)City Construction

The first week, and if funds permit, the subsequent ones, should be entirely devoted to the daily construction of your city's buildings. This is what lays the foundation for your future victory. Every day resources must be allocated for the erection of some structure. Here is the necessary list of what you should have built by the end of the first week: Town Hall, Fort, Citadel, creature buildings levels 1-4, and for the other two days depending on city type and availability of resources: City Hall, Castle, Mage Guild Level 1 etc. (for a city of the Castle type, for example, it is good to build a Griffin Bastion).
At the initial stage of development, you should strive for maximum growth of creatures and postpone "upgrades" of soldier buildings to a later time. Exceptions may be flying creatures (Griffins, Rocs, Serpent Flies etc.). It is useful to perform their "upgrade" as early as possible.
They will add speed to Scout Heroes, and in the armies of other Heroes they can more quickly (Dragon Flies even in the first round) block enemy shooters of neutral squads, who very often stand guard at resource sources that are so necessary for you at the beginning of the game.Playing on Impossible Level

There is no money, and not much is to be expected from the city, which usually brings almost 500 gold at the start of nearly every scenario. Therefore, much in playing at this difficulty level depends on the choice of Starting Hero and the initial accumulation period, which should put you on par with other commanders in the scenario. Here are a few tips that will to some extent help compensate for the complete lack of resources at the beginning of the game.

When choosing a Starting Hero, everyone else should be preferred over the Hero whose specialization is a contribution of 350 gold brought by them to the lean coffers of your kingdom every day. A supplement to this freebie should be the gold that you prefer in the Starting Bonus over other resources. I must note, however, that not all city types have such "rich men." In Fortress and Stronghold type cities they do not exist (but Necropolis and Conflux even have two). I don't think, however, that anyone would want to play on the hardest level as swamp creatures, and those who prefer barbarians can settle on a Hero named Dessa. She runs fast thanks to the Logistics skill and will be able to explore the area more quickly, gathering scattered resources and establishing control over their sources. Experienced players, however, can ignore monetary Heroes even at this difficulty level and use the services of "top specialists."
Such examples include:
Dungeon - Jeddite or Alamar, who initially have Resurrection,
Necropolis - Thant with his Animate Dead,
Tower - Solmyr (Chain Lightning),
Conflux - Ciele (Magic Arrow +50% damage).

On the very first day, you should try to capture the Sawmill and Ore Pit located near the city. If you have only one Hero at your disposal who cannot be in two places at once because these resource sources are not located nearby, then you must capture the resource near which there is a Treasure Chest or gold deposits. The Hero must manage to pick up the chest, taking gold from it, and/or money lying on the ground, so that together with the bonus from the previous tip they can gather 2500 gold and hire a second Hero, who will then take care of the other resource source.

When encountering Treasure Chests, you should always prefer money over "leveling up" the Hero. Your Heroes will have to increase their characteristics in battles with field squads and armies of enemy Heroes. The thing is, when you have enough money not to take it from chests, your main Heroes will already be quite "cool," and "chest" experience can only be useful if a Hero is just a little bit short of moving to the next level.

When forming a Hero's army in the first week, special attention should be paid to the development of "advanced" flyers, who will allow you to quickly "tie up" shooters standing guard at resource sources and other useful objects.

If a passage protected by a field squad of creatures is discovered, it must be destroyed as early as possible. It is quite likely that it is an exit from your territory into the outside world, which contains resources, sources, and cities common to all opponents. If you manage to loot there before others arrive, you will be able to catch up with your rivals in development. Procrastination, in this case, is like death.

If there is an opportunity to send a Hero sailing, it should be done as early as possible. Even if there are no wooden debris on the water, the sailor can land on one's own land that has unclaimed resources, and at the same time show you the paths of other sea expeditions with stronger armies capable of capturing neutral cities and destroying obstructing field squads of creatures.

City development (construction) in the first week is greatly hindered due to a lack of resources. And yet you should try to adhere to the same tips that were indicated earlier. You will always be able to put up a Citadel and level 1-3 creatures. The rest of the construction depends on the promptness of your Heroes exploring the territory in search of resources and the availability of the resources themselves.

Since you have several Heroes in the first week and, most likely, only one army (assembled from those soldiers who arrived with these Heroes) that is capable of "dealing" with field squads, try to use its transfer from one Hero to another during a single turn to speed up the process of destroying all enemies and establishing full control over your territory.

The presence of a Hill Fort, which allows you to "upgrade" creatures without spending on constructing corresponding buildings in cities, also provides considerable savings when performing the "upgrade" itself: first-level creatures perform such an operation for free, second - for 25% of the usual cost, third - for 50% of the usual cost, fourth - for 75% of the usual cost. And only starting from the fifth is full cost required (Source – astralwizard, Quebec Dragon).

Choosing a Starting Hero when playing in a separate scenario

The choice of Hero depends largely on the scenario and difficulty level. If the chosen scenario already offers you certain cities, then the choice of Hero is limited only to their representatives. Otherwise, the choice is determined only by the difficulty level, at low levels of which (when there are enough resources for everything) you can be more selective about this point, according to your preferences. The Impossible level has some peculiarities.
Without claiming the final truth, I will still venture to suggest a few candidates for the role of starting Hero in scenarios with low difficulty levels.
Castle - Orrin (Archery), Dungeon - Jeddite/Alamar (Resurrection), Fortress - Tazar (Armorer), Inferno - Xarfax (Fireball), Necropolis - Thant (Animate Dead), Rampart - Alagar (Ice Bolt), Stronghold - Dessa (Logistics)/Crag Hack (Offense), Tower - Solmyr (Chain Lightning), Conflux – Ciele (Magic Arrow +50% damage).
Sometimes, in the list of starting Heroes for a Castle city, Sir Mullich appears (the soldiers of his army receive an additional two units of movement speed), who becomes the best candidate among Heroes of this city type.

Separate scenario with an ally

This type of scenario, besides the fact that the ally does not bother you with their intrusions and cannot use the "fruits" of objects marked by your flag, turned out to be surprisingly rich in nuances, most of which are reflected in this section.

It is very useful (especially for Impossible difficulty) on the first day to hire a Hero for yourself in the tavern of an allied city and send him on a quest for money, resources, and other freebies through friendly lands. As some compensation, you can give the ally part of this hero's army (leaving only the "fastest" squad so that he can grab as much as possible)This hero, of course, will not reach your territory quickly to fight alongside your other Heroes, but the benefit from his acquisitions will more than make up for those 2500 gold that you allocate from your treasury's meager purse. And if he manages to set sail faster than the allied Heroes (to clear the sea of "trash" as well), then one could not dream of anything more.

Since almost everything marked by your ally becomes unavailable to you, keep a close eye on the movements of enemy Heroes. As soon as they establish control over any allied object, it immediately becomes available to you. Try to reach it faster than your ally's Heroes and establish your own control over that object. If you are playing for a high score, try to capture a former city of your ally before his Heroes—who are capable of reclaiming a city captured by the enemy—arrive there. Even if (by this point) you do not need this city, it will be very useful for achieving a higher result.

Allied Heroes leave information about various objects when visiting them. Knowing what is contained in a Witch Hut, various Shrine of Magic, or Tree of Knowledge allows you to choose which ones to visit and which not to. And if there is a Den of Thieves on the ally's territory, you can have full information every day on the current state of affairs for all your opponents (there is no time to visit such an object on your own territory).

The advantage of the first move allows your Hero at the beginning of each week to "check in" at storage objects such as Windmill, Water Wheel, Mystical Garden...

In an allied city, you can buy a Spell Book and stock up on spells from the Mage Guild. However, you are not allowed to build structures or buy soldiers in such a city.

Allied cities allow you to "upgrade" creatures located in your Heroes' armies.
(Source - Hermann Salzmann)

If an ally visits an Obelisk, your Hero no longer needs to—your Puzzle Map will automatically open the territory taking such a visit into account. Keep in mind, however, that the ally will receive similar information from your same visits to new "obelisks." And if he digs up the Grail and places a unique structure in his city, it is unlikely you will get this city—the ally will try not to give it to the enemies.

Regardless of which one of you establishes control over the Shipyard, the shipyard becomes general for both. Only in this case can you not buy a ship "from afar"; you must visit it with a Hero.

If there is a Hut of the Mage on your territory (which opens the territory in a certain vicinity of all Eye of the Magi linked to it), do not rush to visit it. Your ally will do this for you, and you will receive additional information about unfamiliar terrain for free.

If a Hero has acquired the Town Portal spell at Advanced level, both their own and all allied cities will be available to them.

From the editor.

If those who have read these materials have their own tips (not present in this article) on various aspects of strategy and tactics in "Heroes 3...", they can share them with other gamers by sending their tips to: vladimirvis@fcenter.ru.
All sent tips will be analyzed and posted on the site as additional materials to this article, noting their "authorship." Those who wish to communicate directly with Vsk can use the address _VSK@mail.ru