Heroes 3 Cyclops Kings

The old Heroes games developed by New World Computing. Please specify which game you are referring to in your post.
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Heroes 3 Cyclops Kings

Unread postby MeCho » 09 Aug 2013, 04:12

Does anyone else think that upgrading Cyclops to Cyclops kings is useless? the price per cyclop skyrockets from 750 to 1100 while only giving +2 to movement a +2 to attack and +1 to defence i dont even bother to upgrade the building unless im desperete to spend my never ending gold which is almost never the case


What are you opinions on the matter maybe you have similar examples where the unupgraded version is obviously better in terms of cost/effectivness ratio

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Unread postby Pol » 09 Aug 2013, 05:45

They can attack walls twice. So they can crack castles early within one turn. This is not the only reason!
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Unread postby Arret » 09 Aug 2013, 07:43

Better speed is the main reason. Cyclops, Thunderbirds, and Behemoths make it so you don't cripple your movement. Orcs and ogres seem to work better as defensive units.

A second siege attack on Castle walls is just a bonus. The upgrade building is trivial.

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Unread postby MeCho » 09 Aug 2013, 12:29

Ok so they throw at castle walls twice doesnt seem to be a good deal for an extra 350 gold each considering the fact that most of the time i will just want them to kill off defending shooters and force them to come themselves also they have the lowest hp of all level 6 units i also want to draw your attention to the incredibly high Ore and Crystal costs both of which resources are highly consumed by the Stronghold faction while this is the discussion of the Cyclops Kings im beginning to think that imo Stronghold is an underpowered race having only level 3 spells and the Barbiarian being disabled from water magic effectivly removing the mass Cure and Dispell the only thing to back the Stronghold is Rought native terrain cousing some troubles for the invading forces

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Unread postby Pol » 09 Aug 2013, 14:03

Not only that, they have no attack penalty when attacking hand-to-hand. Stronghold is fast offensive faction, which can crush much stronger armies. It's, like always, question of right decisions.

They also excel in sweeping neutral monsters.
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Unread postby MeCho » 09 Aug 2013, 17:51

No hand to hand penalty are you sure? i have checked it up in my testmap Shadow of Death version and neither Orcs or Orc Chieftains nor Cyclops or Cyclops Kings have "no meele penalty" atleast in their describtion below their stats like the ranged units of Dungeon faction do ... maybe im using an outdated version? i simply unrared the game on this computer from my treasure tome .rar ... im using the Heroes 3 Complete ... the shortcut has Restoration of Erathia icon ... maybe i need to install some kind of patch ?

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Unread postby Pol » 09 Aug 2013, 19:24

The best way how to know it is to test it. But alas I think so.

There I don't have how to check it, not having h3c accessible. It's not in the description.
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Unread postby GreatEmerald » 09 Aug 2013, 19:29

According to Age of Heroes, they don't get no melee penalty, so you're probably misremembering, Pol.

Speaking of which, the site also says this:
They aren't kings for nothing, packing two seige shots in one turn and leveling walls to the ground in no time. You'll notice that the lack of flyers is compensated by the cyclops' special abbilities. Kings however are quite pricey - look at that golden skirt armor that you are buying them for 350 gold! Attack, defence and speed improvements are too small to be worth 350 gold, so upgrade only if you are filthy rich and are heading for a long seige. Think about it, 2 kings cost almost as much as 3 normal cyclops!

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Unread postby mr.hackcrag » 10 Aug 2013, 01:52

I don't think the cost of units is as big of a deal as building the structure cost. Anyway, I always get upgrades because using un-upgraded units makes me feel like a sack of crap. :(

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Unread postby Xdarkon » 10 Aug 2013, 13:20

mr.hackcrag wrote:I don't think the cost of units is as big of a deal as building the structure cost. Anyway, I always get upgrades because using un-upgraded units makes me feel like a sack of crap. :(
XD Me too!

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Unread postby Banedon » 10 Aug 2013, 14:51

Don't virtually all Stronghold players do the Thunderbirds -> Ancient Behemoths route? Which would leave Cyclops Kings off the table for a long, long time. In fact, even Cyclops won't be around.
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Unread postby Arret » 10 Aug 2013, 17:03

Yes, but that wasn't the question asked. If you have multiple cities and town portal, you might as well build the cyclops structure.

The issue isn't the upgrade building, it is the 20 ore and 20 crystal requirements for the basic structure. For a primary city there is no reason that you wouldn't just upgrade to ancient behemoths early.

Ancient Behemoth>Behemoth+Cyclops

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Unread postby Banedon » 10 Aug 2013, 17:07

You would still prioritize Ancient Behemoths over Cyclops Kings. The Ancient Behemoths take up all the Crystals. By the time you get to upgrading the Cyclops Kings, if you ever get there, you'd probably be at the stage where you're rolling in so much resources you can do whatever you want.
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Unread postby Arret » 10 Aug 2013, 21:49

Of course, but remember that they don't really have anything to spend gems, sulfur, and mercury on until they capture another faction's city, so trading resources to get the building is fine when you are geographically isolated. This doesn't happen very often. There are plenty of scenarios where they are fine, but they are usually low priority because of how easy it is to skip them and how poor their hp is for a T6 unit.

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Re: Heroes 3 Cyclops Kings

Unread postby BoardGuest808888 » 15 Aug 2013, 09:40

MeCho wrote:Does anyone else think that upgrading Cyclops to Cyclops kings is useless? the price per cyclop skyrockets from 750 to 1100 while only giving +2 to movement a +2 to attack and +1 to defence i dont even bother to upgrade the building unless im desperete to spend my never ending gold which is almost never the case


What are you opinions on the matter maybe you have similar examples where the unupgraded version is obviously better in terms of cost/effectivness ratio
The +2 speed upgrade is actually far more important than u might guess.

If u examine most other ranged creatures, they move at either speed 5 (mostly low levels like magogs, lizard warriors, marksmen or orcs) or speed 7 (vast majority of the more important ones like examples; elves, archmagi, lich king, zealots).

having a speed of 8 means u can shoot others before they can shoot u.

Actually, only titans and some other extraordinary types like enchanters and sharpshooters can outspeed cyclops kings in shooting duel.

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Re: Heroes 3 Cyclops Kings

Unread postby GreatEmerald » 15 Aug 2013, 19:09

BoardGuest808888 wrote:The +2 speed upgrade is actually far more important than u might guess.

If u examine most other ranged creatures, they move at either speed 5 (mostly low levels like magogs, lizard warriors, marksmen or orcs) or speed 7 (vast majority of the more important ones like examples; elves, archmagi, lich king, zealots).

having a speed of 8 means u can shoot others before they can shoot u.

Actually, only titans and some other extraordinary types like enchanters and sharpshooters can outspeed cyclops kings in shooting duel.
Eh, in combats where you really need that initial attack, you can usually cast haste anyway.

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Unread postby MeCho » 15 Aug 2013, 20:58

isnt the initial attack granted before the battle even begins like the fastest unit during the battle gains the initial turn

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Unread postby Amehmet » 15 Aug 2013, 21:30

It is, but I guess GreatEmerald means initial ranged attack and assumes you have a unit faster than the enemy's ranged units.

You're right that the fastest unit normally gets the first turn -- and unless I'm mistaken, if both the attacking and the defending side have a unit with the same speed, the attacker acts first. However, in a siege, arrow towers and the catapult attack first (in that order), so a defending hero with Artillery or an attacking hero with Ballistics get to cast a spell before any of their troops' turn.

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Unread postby GreatEmerald » 16 Aug 2013, 05:36

Yeap. Thunderbirds are way faster than Cyclops Kings, and even Ancient Behemoths are a bit faster, so you should have some time to cast haste.

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Re: Heroes 3 Cyclops Kings

Unread postby BoardGuest808888 » 20 Aug 2013, 07:01

GreatEmerald wrote: Eh, in combats where you really need that initial attack, you can usually cast haste anyway.
In case (1) u actually have that spell in u'r magic book or using certain hero with similar ability (like Mullich) and (2) u actually want to cast said spell as u'r gambit.

Otherwise, better speed was still better.

For example; in case u want to remove a neutral grand elves stack. Do u really want to cast Haste for such a simple pest removal ? What if u'r Barbarian didn't have all that many spell points to begin with ? Don't u want to conserve u'r spell points for better, bigger things ?

Or perhaps in case the Thunderbirds or Ancient Behemoths weren't really available ? Say, the stack got blinded ?

Or perhaps u got a better spell to cast, like Counterstrike, or Teleport-ing the Ancient Behemoths ?

Unlike other ranged creatures, Cyclops King wasn't really designed to quickly ruin the enemy's tanks. It doesn't have the required supreme damage output like Grand Elf or Lich.

On the other hand, it was designed for the purpose of quickly destroying the other side's ranged capability with its own supreme speed and wall-destroying ability. Since ranged units (save the supremely powerful and costly Titan) tend to have awful HPs, the King just doesn't need crap load of damage on its own to destroy them.


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