You're wrong to think so poorly of the lizards ;) ... With roughly equal proportional growth, in the hands of a decent hero, they can beat both enemy marksmen and even grands (Vistan, well, and Tazar primarily) during weeks 1-2 — an excellent shock stack; with poor templates, it sometimes happens even later...

Earth is for mass Slow. And less frequently for everything else (like mass shield, skin, TP, Resurrection). A good stack of shooters with mass slow and Tactics is a guarantee of pleasant map clearing, and in the finale, it can really make a difference:smile20: ! Air is for mass Haste, but primarily for map control (Fly and DD); sometimes enhanced lightning spells can decide things in the finale... Counter-strike is generally very good for the swamp with hydras too, but in actual practice, it's not used that often... By the way, own same Destructive Ray is more useful than Counter-strike. Water is also not bad, but slightly inferior to Earth and Air.

Artillery for the Swamp is 99% useless due to the low Attack of the main heroes; they aren't Barbarians after all :D . Ballistics for the main hero is extremely doubtful, unless it's the last slot left, the hero is facing the final assault and ballistics are granted then — that might work, although if something like Defense, Attack, Earth, etc. isn't maxed out, I'd probably max those instead of ballistics anyway :) .

Wisdom and other mage bells and whistles for the swamp are usually a big question mark, especially if the Red Orb was found. Such a Castle is better off excluding magic in the finale and relying on the strength of fat meat rather than weak magic. Wisdom can be taken in principle, but everything else (Sorcery, Intelligence, Eagle Eye, Literacy, what else is there?..) would be a move in the wrong direction. Now, Resist — sometimes it's very good to have.