Which is better, attacking or defending?

I'll repeat: Creature artifacts, +1% initiative for each unit of knowledge.
For example, if a hero has 30 knowledge, and you give a creature an artifact with initiative and something else, it will add a constant 30% initiative. Add to that skillful acceleration, and it will be quite good.
In general, this is the only reason why I like the Academy (and also the Titan animation).

Acceleration, Dragon artifact set (without the ring and sword) + 2 rings of initiative (+30%), + necromantic staff, and if you want to experiment, you can also add slowing – a GREAT combination)). On huge maps, you can increase knowledge to 60+ (my max is 83).

I even found it in my saved games:
I took the screenshot in two different loads of the same game. In the first, I had the artifact set with the Lion Cloak, Amulet, and Hat; in the second, I removed it and put on the Dragon Wing, which gives initiative to Djinns, but I forgot to retake the other screenshots; I was too lazy to restart, but it's not a big deal :), the morale is just different, and the luck is different, but it didn't affect the parameters of the Titans and Rakshasa. Just to let you know, this was the biggest map, month 11 or 12, hero difficulty.
http://img546.imageshack.us/img546/7845/heror.jpg