I've only been playing Heroes 5 for about 2 weeks... I've installed all the latest patches. I read this thread...
The game balance, in my opinion, is good, at least in theory.
However, I have some misunderstandings: maybe I just haven't figured something out yet... Mainly, it's about the spells.

1. In patch 4.1 for the expansion, did they really fix the "Lightning" spell? With a "Sorcery" skill of 3, it dealt 33 damage (and scaled proportionally). Even with the "Chaos Magic" skill, it's much weaker than a simple "Magic Arrow," even though it's a 2nd-level spell, and its only perk is the "Storm Master" skill. Where's the balance here? "Ice Bolt" deals 5 times more damage – it's the same level.
2. "Hornet Swarm" deals decent damage, doesn't proc on half the units, and costs as much as any other 2nd-level attack spell... What's the point? Maybe it's better with a maxed-out "Summoning" skill? I haven't noticed...
3. "Hornet Swarm" and "Raise Dead" were given to me in 4 out of 6 castles on the map, and none of them were Necropolis castles. And "Hornet Swarm" is completely useless – is this some kind of joke? :confused:
4. A catapult with an expert skill for war machines and for the catapult itself fired (twice) in 3 turns in any direction except for the tower I pointed to... Is this the "element of randomness" that the Nival developers talk about? :rolleyes:
5. The "Rune of Energy" for the Dwarves is a blatant cheat.
And so on.

The balance is generally good, but the clunky spells in the Guild of Mages, levels 2 and 3, often ruin the mages' experience:smile35:
And that's already an imbalance...
Sorry for going off-topic.