[suggestion] Heroes obsolete, remove them.

Heroes differ from rank and file units in being able to use all manner of looted equipment, which often exceeds what you can find at the shop.  They also can't die, receiving only an injury when defeated.

While it is true that the rank and file troops often do the majority of the damage, heroes are more versatile, they can gain new traits and even change equipping before a fight.

They sure can do all those things and they got some fancy skill trees. But that doesnt change the simple fact that they are utterly pointless in battle.

Aside from Mages and Commanders - the other Hero types have only one purpose: To deal damage in battle. And thats the one thing they are REALLY bad in. Besides: Since they only have 20% of the HP of regular troops they usually fall much quicker.

No. Your Arguments do not convince me. Have you tried building some troops fitting your fighting style and compared them to your heroes?

I remember not so long ago people were complaining that heroes are OTT, overpowered, and that there is no need to build armies since you can steamroll through the whole map with just heroes...

There will be no absolutely "balanced" solution to this issue, IMHO. I LOVE the customization and individuality of heroes, but since this is not an RPG but rather a strategy game I also love having to reinforce them with suitable armies and troops, and having them play a more supportive or surgical role in the process.

Lest we forget, heroes are the only ones who can do quests and they can change equipment and artifacts on the fly. I personally don't mind that a single hero, no matter how legendary, can no longer take down a batallion of troops.

I hope the OP suggestion to remove them completely is a hyperbole just to show that they should be reinforced - in any case, let me say for the record that I DISAGREE.

Perhaps the only thing that I would change is to give them specific "heroic" abilities versus single monsters (dragonslayer, demonslayer etc.) which should then also be improved to have a decimating effect against ordinary troops...

I find it ironic that the expansion entitled "Legendary Heroes" basically removes a necessity to have heroes to win the game

Agree with OP - once i hit middle/late games i tag heroes along just because of old habit, not necessity or usefulness.

NOOOOOOO!!!...    If you remove HEROS ... How will I get to LOOT and STEAL thier spells from them???

This is why I've always been partial to Air/Water/Life. Makes your units so much better, regardless of how strong your sovereign is.

Getting the squad count x weapon damage from a weapon is way too effective. I sometimes aim for squad count over newer weapon tech just because it adds more HP I can heal through.

The heroes now lead troops into battle like the Jedi led clone storm troopers into battle in pre empire days.

Heroes require a different approach to combat. I had a L6 hero, mounted on horse, caught alone by 2 archers, and three x 5figure units of mid game regular troops (shield of yada, etc). The hero had its sword (8 +3) pull earth, heal, throwing knives, and the blood spell that allows a magic attack that does single digit damage. The lone hero prevailed, it danced around the battle field, avoiding melee and slowly whittling down the massively superior force. Pull earth sometimes 'crushed' some enemy unit(s) giving the hero a chance to distance itself from enemy. Took a very, very long time, and the experience points awarded were superciliously low. They have their place. Whats needed, I think, is to beef up their skill affects over the other two major entities of the game: cities, armies. Also, perhaps, some new skills like, (monster-hunter, giving accompanying army +10 attk/def against monsters, or all monsters move away, and higher adm affects. As far as tac goes, I still think that a unit/hero with a sufficiently higher init/movement points should be able to refuse a melee by automatically retreating... especially if it is over matched.

I really think a Hero XP Pacing slider would be a great option.  That way those who want faster leveling and more powerful heroes can crank it up and those who are happy with the current lower powered heroes can turn it down.  I know this can be tweaked in ElementalDefs.xml but maybe just stick the option up front.... at least it would save a lot of debate about it.  There's never going to be a setting that suits everyone.

@Elana - with lvl6 you are at the very beginning of the game. At that place Heros still work. Once you hit mid-game you'll see what i mean.

@EffBie - the Jedi did so, because they're trained leaders and the troops led actually benefit from their presence. Most heroes however, are more or less mascots much like Jar Jar Binks.

I didnt say all heroes were useless. I've got about 5 or 6 commander-Heroes which do a marvellous job, providing +40 accuracy and +3 initiative to  their respective armys. What i was criticising is the fact that Warriors, Defender and Assassins are just worthless.

Defenders and assassins are not worthless they can both be made unkillable fairly easily. Defenders can get a massive amount of health, especially ironeers, and reduce damage from most troops to pretty much nothing. Assassins never get hit, period, make it a wraith and they can solo the map on auto-resolve.

A level 20ish defender with a lightning hammer can actually put out some OK damage, with other good gear they can do like 50 damage per hit, which can outright kill a lot of the crappy troops the AI sends at you (even companies), and militia. Armored targets, with levels and health bonuses, a crushing blow will make a noticeable impact on. It's not great damage obviously, but it can help, and their main job is to be in the middle of the enemy absorbing blows.

Assassins can pretty easily do double that damage, built right they can almost do as much damage as a company. Again while being impossible to kill.

Depending on how the Reap change in .80 works warriors might also become useful, if it becomes 10 health gained per hit they might be able to hold their own in a fight with the right equipment. I haven't tried their overpower skill yet, I'm guessing warriors can destroy pretty much any enemy troop, no matter how well geared or leveled. More damage to trained troops than assassins, but less damage to single targets.

All that is ignoring the tactical spells most of them can cast, regardless of being a mage or not. Also keep in mind we are still playing with mostly FE champions, the better ones have not been updated to LH yet, we'll see next patch how they do. Just look at the spider guy champion new with LH, he comes with a +5 health per level trait, that's huge. I've been hoping to get the ghost champion, I'm guessing she is immune to physical damage, which is basically game changing.

I changed my stance, Commander is OP because of Trainer and no other reason. I suppose giving army accuracy until that point is pretty good for archer lines.

 

Mage is good because of Knowledge + Potential. So good, I never choose anything else, my first 4 upgrades are already chosen, instead of leveling just give me a script to auto-choose.

 

Everything else...  meh. I can design a unit with it.

I never understand these "please remove one of the essential elements of the game" posts.

I love to go Defender with air magic (or that blink ring) so i can just blink to anywhere on the battlefield.

 

Dropping a tough sunnofabitch right into their rear line is magic, no matter how much damage he does.  I need a hero to do this.  I also need a hero to put the when hit, curses the enemy unit amulet to really wreak havoc. 

If I want to go more damage but more risk, dropping a warrior or assassin works well as well. I can stack them with all matter of dodge, damage or other spell buffs as well.  I need a hero to put on most of the good ones. 

 

So yeah, I will keep the heroes please.  Feel free to just dismiss them as they come, that is your choice.

A "give a hero the pink slip" option wouldn't be a bad idea.

If your playstyle is to have your heroes augment the trained units, of course they're gonna seem "useless." 

I have another thread going now about mana blast doing obscene damage, and since ALL my heroes got it when I finished the quest, I had have a nigh-invulnerable Defender who could 1-shot elemental lords. I don't know of a way to build a trained unit that could do the same or even have the same levels of dodge, defense, and HP.

 

I will agree that heroes don't have the same "steamroller" feel as they did in FE, but that might be due to the ridiculously slow XP gains.

Heroes could be immune to Swarm bonus, that would help them considerably. Or there could be a tech upgrade which gives Heroes "bodyguards" so they have more "people in their unit", which would have a % chance to soak the damage instead of the Hero when damaged.

They are good for a couple of things:

Governing your cities (reducing Unrest)

Roleplay element (The reason I enjoy these games is due to the RPG element, otherwise I'd just play chess or mine sweeper)

 

I level up usually 1 hero along with my sov and put the rest in my cities. Not because it's more effective, you really only need your Sov, but mostly because I enjoy hero units more than normal minion units.

 

However heroes are very powerful if you have leveled them up and geared them up, the problem is doing so of course. Early and mid game I find them a bit lacklustre in battle.

 

Personally though what I'd like to see is more powerful Heros, but with a perma-death penalty. So instead of just getting wounded when you defeat them, they actually die. Would balance out their power a bit if they are beefed up.

I think it might be interesting to have heroes die, and then be dead.

But maybe provide some Life spells that resurrect them, or Death spells that zombify them.

They would have to be significantly tougher than at present if they are to have permadeath.  Right now the only hero you'd have is your Sov unless you babysat them, which is no fun to do.  I do try not to let my champs get KO'd, but I don't cry or reload unless they get a really annoying injury like the -25% accuracy one.

 

I have a better idea! Instead of removing heroes, what about fixing them?

Problems are solved, not avoided.

I agree with that suggestion

This, indeed.  Honestly, I rarely set my heroes to level up as Assassin, Defender, or Warrior.  They've made Warrior better, and Defender will be better in the next patch, but really, why would I want a hero that doesn't cast spells or augment my troops?  I know that the basic spell trees can be cast by all heroes, but if they're spec'd out for combat...  Plus, they can't learn new basic spell trees unless they visit Pariden (or you have The Decalon).  

I did have one really good Defender hero once.  He got a mace that did bonus damage based on the number of units in the stack.  He was hitting for over 100 damage non-critical.  Plus, with his armor, he was practically unkillable by physical attacks.  Him and the Storm Dragon just decimated my enemies... mostly the Storm Dragon, but he helped.

I think that heroes just need to be more interesting than any trainable units.  Mages certainly are.  My sovereign is always a mage.

I wonder why so many here actually think i suggested removing the heroes instead, like most did, understand that was just an exxageration to make a point. Then again, if you had read the thread you would have known that.

Unfortunately, sarcasm is often misinterpreted on forums and mailing lists when there is only text and no measuring of body language.