Best National Hero?
 

I was playing Ulm Black Forest for the first time, when Burkhard Nachtzehrer appeared. I had never seen him before, and I couldn't believe it.
In just a few turns equipped him with some items and... completely destroyed the biggest armies Arcos had, and Arcos where the 2nd most powerful nation (it was a single player game)... almost all by himself. http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/images/smilies/eek.gif

I don't have much experience, but I thought Ho Hsien-Ku was the best national hero, but Burkhard is incredible.
Is him the best national hero?

Re: Best National Hero?
 

Yeah, I saw that written about Ho Hsien-Ku in a post, as well. I love playing T'ien Chi S&A, and I'm always happy to have Ho Hsien-Ku show up, but I'm a bit skeptical about her being the best national hero. She brings healing ability to a nation which doesn't have that to begin with, but OTOH, I'd guess that T'ien Chi has a better than average chance of getting the Chalice or GoH. T'ien Chi is also probably better than average at being able to get to and afford Faerie Queens.

Re: Best National Hero?
 

yeah burkhard is coooool .

Ambicephalos the Ettin Mandragora is my favourite national hero . 118 base hp , 3 armslots and 2 headslots iirc.
he is an almost as good sc as a nataraja you can give him so much stuff http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/images/smilies/happy.gif

mictlans 3 heros are pretty nice too cause they have strong magic and cover together with mictlans already very flexible mages almost every path http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/images/smilies/happy.gif


finally rylehs heros are nice too i think http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/images/smilies/happy.gif
and of course your mentioned tien chi ones .

most other heros though are expect that their description is stylish nothing more than a free extra national commander/mage with sometimes slightly better stats .

Re: Best National Hero?
 

I'm going to have to go with Etimmu the Wraith Lord (undead Ermor, both themes) and Angerboda the Great Hag (Jotunheim, all 3 themes).

Etimmu is a regular Wraith Lord, except he's mounted (not really an advantage in this case since it costs him a slot), and comes with unholy priest abilities. It's like getting a 40 gem, conj-7 summon for free, and Ermor can easily take luck-3, and get him in the first 10 turns or so.

Angerboda is a powerful Jotun Hag with 44 HP, two built in resists and a whopping 11 magic paths, although (except for S3) they mostly duplicate the already available Jotun paths. The S3 can be awkward in case of magic duel, but if you're not fighting Pythium or Arcosnuffle she's just about indestructible as combat mages go. Unfortunately, Jotunheim also normally takes Misfortune.

Burkhard Nachtzehrer is great, and needs only a blood thorn, shield, and boots of quickness to be a real force for destruction, what with his built in flying and resistances. Unfortunately BF Ulm requires misfortune 1, and usually adds another point or two of misfortune on top of that, so he isn't seen very often.

Ambicephalos is good too, for all the reasons you mentioned, and since Pangaea usually takes Luck, heroes arrive relatively often. On the downside, CW Pan has so many heroes, the chances of the hero you get actually being Ambicephalos is not so great until later in the game.

Re: Best National Hero?
 

Aboleth of R'lyeh is pretty strong, too, with hundred or two hps. He also has high Astral magic and IIRC attack that enslaves, or was it kills?, if target fails mr roll.

He has no item slots apart from (I think) two miscellanous ones, and is aquatic, but still pretty powerful and very thematic. He isn't the most powerful, though, and if you look at that score he isn't the best.

Re: Best National Hero?
 

Yep. And Aboleth just let me take out Bogus and company who were besieging a fortress of mine, without needing equiped SCs or lots of mages to do it. Aboleth, a diseased prophet who was about to die (and did so against Bogus), and some of those mindless cheap R'lyeh troops. Bingo - 1 dead commander, 13 dead troops, and 3 of Bogus's crews are now in my armies. Sweet. http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/images/smilies/wink.gif

Aboleth is very good; so is Ambicephalos, which is about as nice an SC-chassis as you could hope for. I'm not sure what the one person meant about CW having "too many heroes" - 3, same as most nations, as I only know of one that has just 2, Jotunheim. TC's immortals ain't bad either, if only TC could keep positive dominion. http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/images/smilies/wink.gif

Re: Best National Hero?
 

All the Pangaea nations have four heroes (Harpy Queen, White Minotaur, Black Bull, and Sheap Head). CW adds Panicratos the Apostatic Warrior, and Ambicephalos, without taking any of the others away, as far as I know. So, has a total of six.

Re: Best National Hero?
 

Sheap Head? Never ever seen that one. And I've never seen the White Minotaur with CW. I'd forgotten about Panicratos though - only seen him once. (In about 10 or so CW games, and 3 or 4 New Era.)

Re: Best National Hero?
 

Well, Ram's Head. But I have a certain affinity for him http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/images/smilies/happy.gif

Re: Best National Hero?
 

speaking of aribeth, how do you use his enslave mind attack, is it attack or fire?

odd_enuf

Re: Best National Hero?
 

Pretty sure it had to be fire - I scripted Auluudh the Aboleth with a few buffs and then fire, and wound up with Bogus and 2 pals. http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/images/smilies/wink.gif Wonder if it should be reported as a bug that "Enslave Mind" displays "Damage: Death" when you look at him? (Also, Enslave Mind has ammo, which usually implies 'Fire'; I'm really not sure the supposed mechanics / effect of Soul Leech, whether it's just damage, or like life drain, or.... Never had him before, except in a quick test game, given that "Try_Something_New" is my first time with R'lyeh in MP)

Re: Best National Hero?
 

In terms of being a combat monster, Ambicephalos is certainly rather extreme. He keeps his many sleep vine attacks even if you fill up his three hand slots, IIRC, and two heads + three hands + foot + misc + zero-enc + high hp base allows for numerous interesting options, and he even has recuperation.

If you're more into mages, Orokestes (Arco) and Bart the Patriarch (Pythium) could both be rather nasty given that both nations have a decent shot at a communion machine. Angerboda is much more robust, however.

Re: Best National Hero?
 

Here's a question: Is there a list somewhere showing the heroes for each nation?

I'd love to know the stats for the three heroes that Ulm gets...

Re: Best National Hero?
 

the units.xls, the most recent Version, has them; though it may be missing a couple from recently added themes.

Re: Best National Hero?
 

problem is he is undead, ambicephalos so mr equip is a must.

Re: Best National Hero?
 

A lot of people think MR equipment is a must for _any_ SC or good mage. Ambicephalos being undead doesn't change that - he has a base MR of 17 (usually brought down to 16 by magic scale), meaning that Banish isn't going to have much of a chance of working on him, while Dust to Dust and Wither Bones aren't affected by MR anyway.

Re: Best National Hero?
 

The Unit_ID.xls available from Arryn's site has all national hero stats in it.

There are a few who are obviously better than the average hero. Some of the most powerful are Burkhard Nachtzehrer the Blood Marshal (BF Ulm), Mictlipoctli the King of Legends (Mictlan), Ekishnugal the First King (C'tis Desert Tombs), Angerboda the Great Hag (Jotun) and Etimmu the Wraith Lord (Ermor AE & SG). The Pythian Theurg hero, Bartholomew is also a very good one, and all of R'lyeh's heroes are powerful. Ambicephalos makes for a good SC chassis and Menopathos the White Minotaur is a good thug.

Regular and IF Ulm have by far the worst heroes overall, because they have little going for them. With the right equipment they are thugs, but that's all (one has recuperation, though). No mages.

For those who are curious, the BF Ulm heroes are Burkhard, Ulrich Patrifagus the Ghoul Baron and a mage whose unit type is Member of the Third Tier. The mage is passably good with F2S2B2 and has a stealth bonus of 40. The Ghoul Baron is practically worthless. All he has going for him is Unholy Priest lv 2 and he can possibly cast Arouse Hunger every turn for free (not sure about that, though), but he's slow as hell and dies if a mage so much as gives him a hostile glance. Not a spectacular fighter either.

Edi

Re: Best National Hero?
 

He's great. He can make huge numbers of ghouls so that your castles are impenetrable.

Re: Best National Hero?
 

Oops, forgot that. Yes, you're right. I was looking at things more from the combat/magic point of view.

Edi