[Humakty]

It seemed to me Marignon has gorgeous priests(h3, recuitable everywhere), who should do the job early on (Ermor doesn't produce that much chaff initialy). In fact I think you should jump on him with armies full of those priests and crush him during the first two years, before he has reached a critical mass of undeads (and killed all population in his territory). The only problem is that when you recruit a priest you don't recruit a mage, so you'll be behind in research.