Skills for an Inferno hero.

+1. Both the third and fifth factions have demons that aren't very good. The fifth faction is much more interesting, but still... there's too much hassle with recruitment and the hero selection is not ideal.

I read your test of a level 40 Nimue, I was just searching for how much the special ability gives, and I came across your post. It's informative and insightful, thank you.

Regarding the build - a small nuance about defense. If you take light, definitely take this perk; it will be much easier to break through, and if you focus on dark magic and gates, extra base defense won't hurt. I had a battle with Nimue for Axel on the 3rd month, and the demon only won because of mana and subduing paladins.

I want to test one strategy against aggressive factions, specifically elves, with whom demons have problems, although you can try it with anyone.

The idea is to take logistics and keen mind, light magic with stone skin and storm, attack as standard, luck, and either a defense branch with defense or even with stalwart defense or readiness (a very debatable perk for a demon, but still).
You'll have to sacrifice surprise attack (not a big deal) and either pathfinding or fast gate opening (in my opinion, the first one, needs to be tested).

An important point - artifacts are not taken last for defense.
That is, ideally, the gnome set, which gives stone skin and dodge on expert, if it's not available, then:

- dragon's fiery tongue and dragon ring - together 4 defense (if there is no staff of the underworld), if not, then "on the verge of balance":
- shield and cuirass of the gnome set - together 8 defense and 40 percent resistance;
- maybe sandals of the saint and secret protective cloaks, although there are better options - together 2 defense.
In total, 12-14 defense.

In upgrades like arenas, don't take attack, but defense. Many (including me) automatically take attack and end up with a kind of berserker with stats of 35-5-10-15. But we need to try to make something like a gnome, something like 20-20-10-15, all numbers are approximate.

Battle algorithm.

First, cast stone skin with the hero with keen mind (if there is no set) and open a gate, then stand in stalwart defense and buff the troops. Of course, not all the time, only until the gate opens. Then attack with the whole mass.
The point is that the troops should withstand the blow due to the starting defense and the applied skin, and the devastating strike will compensate for the lack of attack.
If opening a gate is not an option (we only have time to open the gate and then get hit by everyone), immediately attack with troops under skin. It's impossible to say for sure here, as the initiative is different depending on the artifacts, and there is also a 25 percent variance.

You can also try without light, with the mass skin perk in the defense branch, you can try to cast mass slow or immediately bless-devastating strike with keen mind, variations are possible.

It may turn out to be nonsense. Or reinventing the wheel, as the game is quite old. But maybe someone will find the idea interesting. Or maybe someone has tried it, share the results.

P.S. I think taking defense stats for a demon is the optimal option, in any case. Initiative and good damage, along with survivability, should give good results.