I just saw a situation with a buddy (we played on hot seat with "peeking"-))): the start of the game, 1st week, absolutely no money or resources, he had 1 hero with 30 gremlins and 4 gargoyles. On the 3rd day, having scraped together some cash, my buddy bought another hero, upgraded the gremlins, and merged the "armies"... total - about 60 upgraded gremlins and 8 gargoyles...
he attacked neutrals - upgraded zombies - a stack of 7 with 7 undead each....
Everything would be fine, but 5 stacks of undead managed to reach the gremlins, as their damage is very low even on a direct shot.. there was no cloud on 200% hard... and what if those weren't zombies, but wolf riders?? they would have torn them to shreds! My buddy won the battle, of course, but the losses were disproportionate to further movement..
and clearing. Given strong neutrals, which are set randomly, crowds of level 2-3 creatures near the Castle are not uncommon ..
There it is! I trust your experience.. especially since I've read your other forum topics carefully-)