[Agema]

Both HOMM and AOW were interesting in the sense the races were poorly balanced and this was rarely dealt with.

Going back to HOMM2, the nations with the lower HP creatures, particular at higher tiers, nearly always ended up significantly weaker. Whilst you could generally recruit more, it didn't make up for the fact their attrition rate was much higher. The game really revolved around fights between the huge creatures, Titans and Black Dragons. This was improved in later HOMMs... but not that much.

In AOW, there were clearly feeble nations like the hobbits and goblins, who were inferior to the likes of the dwarves and elves, and at the top of the tree probably the orcs, who had that stupid Warlord at L3 who could outmatch many L4s of other nations and be produced far faster. Again, this trend was continued in later games. The Shadow race in AOW:SM seemed to me far better than most of the others.