Skills for the hero!

Diplomacy is your key skill. Sometimes you amass such a large army and annex so many territories that neither magic nor artifacts can help your opponent. Logistics is a good skill; on expert difficulty, you can complete tasks in three days that would normally take four. It's great to have all the expert-level spells. Fire is a wide-ranging berserk spell, and Curse is useful in combat. Water allows you to clone units up to level 7, cast Blessing, and remove spells in combat. Earth allows you to slow down enemies in combat, resurrect units, and create a portal to any of your own cities. Air allows you to accelerate units, and if you're playing with the Dimension Door spell, you can use it up to four times a day. Ballista is useful for taking cities without any problems.