Haven creature choices

[Banedon]

Buying 1 Squire means that I have to give up another unit in my hero's army. I prefer to field the whole Haven army, so as to take advantage of Haven's versatility.

You have to get out of this mindset. It's very conceivable that fielding an entire army can actually be weaker than fielding a partial force. This is apparent in Heroes IV especially when split Genie stacks all casting Song of Peace can be far, far more useful than extra Halflings or Dwarves. I think yuritch makes a very good point. If 1 Squire can do for you what 100 can, there's little point spending the extra gold to purchase those 99 Squires.

@Topic:

1. Peasants. Haven does not need Conscripts or Enforcers to win early-game fights; at that point it's just a matter of barricading the Crossbowmen / Marksmen and shooting it out. And since you do not need them (not even when you are rolling in cash; that's when you train your Peasants into Archers) you do not have to upgrade them.

2. Crossbowmen. Marksmen are much superior at close ranges, but close ranges do not happen often enough.

3. Squires for the reason yuritch gave, though I will say that there's no need to get Vindicators at all. The same role can be achieved with Peasants or even split Inquisitors / Zealots.

4. Imperial Griffins. Battle Dive is a fine ability; if you Battle Dive your opponent's casters / shooters he either moves them (= no shots, which can be a very good trade [think stopping Master Hunters from firing], especially when Imperial Griffins have such high intiative) or let them take the pain. Either way Battle Dive beats Rush Dive no problem. Battle Griffins have much superior HP, but Imperial Griffins much superior initiative, giving them the upper hand.

5. Both. I probably need to patch my version of Heroes V since my Zealots don't have purge (no idea what that is, too) but judging from the list of abilities given you quite obviously want both. Get them, split them (that's why you don't need to upgrade Peasants, or Squires for that matter) and then mass the buffs on your allied units. Since you can switch units from one form to another easily, there's little excuse not to have both casters in your army.

6. Champions; Champion Charge is just very deadly. Though of course if you know your opponent is going to throw curses around, you'll want Paladins.

7. The Seraphs I see don't have Divine Vengeance or Righteous Might; they have Life Drain. Weird. I don't know just how strong Seraphs are, though they are relatively fragile and need to be blessed by Divine Strength (Inquisitors). Divine Vengeance is strong, but then so is Resurrection. I can't tell for certain, I need to use the Seraph more to judge.

[aaelgr]

Sorry, I realise now that what I wrote and meant aren't quite the same thing. What I was trying to get across was that I like to have all of the units available to field, not that I always put all of them in the fight. There's nothing worse than realising that what you really need is the stack that you've left defending your capitol.
I still don't see why having 1 Squire is better. Once it's been killed they can't Shield Allies anymore, and with more of them you can use them to protect your shooters from melee attacks.
Seraphs and Zealots only have the skills you've said were missing in TotE. Zealots can't cast Blindness anymore, and Seraphs don't have Life Drain. If you're playing TotE and they still have the skills from HOF then something's wrong...
Purge can supposedly remove a buff from the target stack, but even with Soldier's Luck I can't remember seeing it happen.

[Humakt]

7. The Seraphs I see don't have Divine Vengeance or Righteous Might; they have Life Drain. Weird. I don't know just how strong Seraphs are, though they are relatively fragile and need to be blessed by Divine Strength (Inquisitors). Divine Vengeance is strong, but then so is Resurrection. I can't tell for certain, I need to use the Seraph more to judge.

They had Life Drain in HoF. Maybe you're playing non-ToE scenario with your ToE?

[Metathron]

Wait, so Precise Shot is not an activated ability like Scatter Shot? Okay, fine. But in one battle there were two enemy stacks (both cerberi) in the vicinity of my Marksmen, one was was 2 tiles away, while the other was 5. And the estimated range of killed creatures for both gave the same number.

The Marksmen need a serious boost, because they cannot hold their own against Crossbowmen, not by a long shot. For example, these two units' attack ratings should be switched, so M should have 6 and C 5; Furthermore, the C's damage range should be decreased to, say, 2 - 6; and lastly, M should get Scatter Shot, in addition to Precise Shot.

[Banedon]

Sorry, I realise now that what I wrote and meant aren't quite the same thing. What I was trying to get across was that I like to have all of the units available to field, not that I always put all of them in the fight. There's nothing worse than realising that what you really need is the stack that you've left defending your capitol.
I still don't see why having 1 Squire is better. Once it's been killed they can't Shield Allies anymore, and with more of them you can use them to protect your shooters from melee attacks.
Seraphs and Zealots only have the skills you've said were missing in TotE. Zealots can't cast Blindness anymore, and Seraphs don't have Life Drain. If you're playing TotE and they still have the skills from HOF then something's wrong...
Purge can supposedly remove a buff from the target stack, but even with Soldier's Luck I can't remember seeing it happen.

I think I have both HoF and TotE installed, but at different places. Pretty stupid of me ... in any case if Zealots could cast Blindness they would be hugely powerful and valuable, and all the more reason to grab them.

Anyway:

I don't mean not deploying all the units you have, I mean not bringing a unit along with you. If you have all Haven units with you then if you don't deploy your Squires (say) you'll have one less stack available. That one stack can be crucial - it might for example keep your opponent's Spectral Dragons from your Crossbowmen for one extra turn, allowing them to fire. So you certainly do want to bring only units that you will use with you into fights. You shouldn't, however, find that you've left a very important stack back in your capitol. If the stack is very important, you should bring it along with you (eg. Master Hunters always follow Sylvan armies, never staying back). There aren't any units so specialized that they're useless most of the time but not so the rest of the time.

Looking only at one's armies, having one Squire is certainly not better than having 100. But those extra 99 Squires cost gold, as well as the dwelling costing resources. If, instead of those 99 Squires you could've trained / hired 10 more Paladins, you'll certainly want the Paladins, not the Squires. It's the resources that matter here. The single Squire (or two Squires with Last Stand) will certainly be easily killed, but they won't be targetted. In a big fight, the units that go down first are the heavy damage dealers - in the case of Haven, this is the Crossbowmen, Seraphs / Archangels and Paladins / Champions. The Squires, unless they get caught in crossfire (eg. Fireball, Archmages' piercing attack) are going to stay alive for a long time - or, if they draw fire and die quickly, they've taken up your opponents' move. Losing those two Squires for one round of your opponents' Master Hunter shots is obviously a great trade.

As for protecting your shooters from melee attacks, this shouldn't happen too often since the Crossbowmen should be well barricaded (Peasants, split Inquisitors / Zealots), but if it does you still have the Imperial Griffins. The Paladins / Champions and Archangels / Seraphs have fast speeds as well, and can come back to help if they really need it. Squires don't exactly deal heavy melee damage, too.

[Dark_PC Gamer]

Do you guys think peasants should fight with you or defend the castle?

[Metathron]

I almost always leave them back at the castle. However, being they are weak creatures, my main purpose in doing so is for them to produce gold, and fight only if the town is under siege.

[blizzardboy]

1. Conscripts. Shield Bash will prevent the counterattack that will kill lots of the low hp conscripts.
Unless you're using the deadly Ellaine, in which case Brutes are good for assault to wipe out more stuff (if even necessary), and they can take hits well enough to be counterattacked without cringing.

2. Crossbowmen. No range penalty rocks.

3. Squires. Shield Other is an invaluable ability. Crossbowmen have low initiative so you're enemies range is almost certainly going to go before your crossbowmen do. You want to protect them as much as possible. Plus squires are better for walling in your crossbowmen while you are killing random monsters.

4. Imperial Griffons. Battle dive is an awesome ability to target enemy ranged, or at least keep them moving around instead of staying in place and shooting.

5. Completely impartial on this one since I usually make both zealots and inquisitors in my army and forgo using either cavaliers or angels. If in the rare event that it's a very late game and I can sufficiently afford making everything (and don't have room for both), then it completely depends on what spells my hero can cast in relation to what zealots and inquisitors cast. (I'll pick whichever spell caster will fill in for my hero)

6. Champions. They're meant to charge, so the more damage the merrier.

7. This is a tough one. I prefer Archangels. Seraph's divine vengeance can be very brutal, but angels are fast moving flyer units and are usually one of the first units to get targeted by the enemy. It can be difficult to keep enough alive by the time you can pull off a deadly divine vengeance. With the Archangels resurrection ability, however, you can res the crossbowmen that you lost on the 2nd turn.

[Lord Lakely]

Hmm...
All depends on the opponent of course, but considering him as ramdom, I pick

1) Brute
2) Crossbowman
3) Vindicator
4) Imperial Griffin
5) Inquisitor
6) Paladin
7) Seraph

I love the Inquisitor-Seraph paring, these two works excellent together

[konfeta]

Wait, so Precise Shot is not an activated ability like Scatter Shot? Okay, fine. But in one battle there were two enemy stacks (both cerberi) in the vicinity of my Marksmen, one was was 2 tiles away, while the other was 5. And the estimated range of killed creatures for both gave the same number. confused

Precise Shot ignores defense, not boosts damage. It's the reason Haven can clear high level melee units so easily - you block off Marksmen with 1 unit peasant stacks, Divine Strength/Haste 'em, and the mighty 30 defense of your enemies get dropped to 0 when they get in range.


As for the Imperial vs. Battle Griffins, take another thing into account - high morale makes Imperials deadly because it can trigger after they fly up... Meaning they will come down much, much faster.