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Yea, I just remember in team chat you saying something like "Well, I guess all or nothing." Then I saw the most marvelous Barbarian Rampage Heromages ever seen.

Definitely was the reason we won being pinned down by 2 psionists.

seeker missile is 8 countable tiles, so with LoS you have to actually trace around the wall to see if they are in range. But the wall placed right there, blocks said LoS, so you must count around that, and 8 spaces is not enough to do that,

Fighter Mage + bard + barbarian has my favorite memory combo.

2v2

Me + warmage vs Ross + ??

Ross had us pinned hiding because of their psionist, so warmage buffs up the barbarian with bloodlust and attacks his own summon (to keep buff)

Next turn he bards the barbarian, he goes out there and kills 5 units in 1 turn. 2 summons, 2guardians, and 1 Mage. Then his fighter Mage came out and blizzarded the field. Stunning 2 other units.

I still attribute the song "working on the railroad" to the barbarian because of that.

If I could give you mine I would.

Well, from my experience, except in multiplayer games I have never been on the receiving end of this. (and in free for all if you get ganged up on that's part of it. Aka making alliances.)

What I see when it normally works is the person on the receiving end made either a fatal error or was using a weak strategy.

And with healing spells and mages able to sprint and cast spells on same turn giving them any more hp or def. will make them too defensive. Remember as in chess the queen is so powerful, but can easily be killed easily if not used/played correctly. Add in augmentation spells and the fighter Mage, trying to kill a 16 def 10 hp unit is too much.

Never really cared for the paladin

The summoner an be strong, i just dont like the playstyle she normally excels with.

I have to say I win quite a lot without a mage - especially against the computer.

Good luck doing that against me! haha

As anyone who has played with me knows I have settled on a favourite combination

Fighter Mage
Paladin
Bard

And yes I know some people say no to the pairing of the fighter mage and Paladin but I started this group due to the fact that I tend to lead with my mage which results often in an early demise!

The Paladin and the Bard are, in my opinion, the most survivable pairing in the absence of a mage.

I don't have the expansion packs...yet...so can only speak from the point of view of the basic units.

My 4 most popular setups:

Fighter Mage
Psionist
Barbarian/samurai

Wizard
Warrior
Paladin

Sorceres
Rogue
Psionist

Fighter mage
Warrior
Barbarian

May I add  -

Never Give Up, Never Surrender! (Yes a movie quote but it's a good principle!) - I've lost my mage in the first round and gone on to win. This has happened not only in group fights but also one on one sessions against another person. With the element of chance this game is very fluid so fight on until your last life point ebbs away!

Move, FIRE, run - move your mage out of cover, fire off a spell or two, run them back behind cover! You have to be careful as your sprint distance is variable each time but it works a treat if you only have to run a square or two

Eye Spy - the fastest way to check what square you need to be on to target an enemy unit is to click on the Line of Sight icon (looks like an eye) and then click on the ENEMY UNIT in question. This immediately shows you which squares it can see - AND be seen from. Much faster than clicking around at random.

Run and launch - Move your mage (even sprint as well if you want) then summon a creature - which can itself move before it attacks! This means you can hit enemy creatures a really long way away...I might get the exact number wrong here but let me see...move 5 squares, sprint up to 4 is it? Then cast in the square adjacent and then that creature runs 5 and can now attack...so a hitting range of around 14 or so!

Try it out - it's nasty!

In Free for all, definately never give up, the other teams will take each other down to just guardians eventually too. To play the best with only guardians in a FFA, team up with another person whos weak and team up on the big guy. Sure, If I have my hero alive and you don't 99/100 I never lose, its too easy to stay outta reach. But with 4+ units coming at me you just never know.

And actually the summoned units major strength is, they can hit a enemy unit that is not in Line of sight from any other attack.

Anyone who plays me knows my first basic strategy mixes "run fire and cover" with Run and launch. Basically causing chaos in another players backfield with a summon (forcing him to spend time with that and not moving forward in the game) and returning my mage behind a wall with a sprint so he isn't in LoS.

I love it. Many hardcore diablo 2 fans don"t care for it, because of reasons that make no sense.

And other players like WoW players are finding it too hard for other pointless reasons.

But I really enjoy it. Best part is 2 of wizards spells are : "teleport and disentigrate"

It's ok I haven't been on in like a week or 2 as I have been busy saving sanctuary from diablo and the minions of hell.

Character I'm playing is a wizard (surprise right)

Not really, he had a chance to defend himself or not move in a position to not be killed that easily.

But since it is the A.I. cant really say much on that.

I have killed many heros on a 2nd turn (of game) or 3rd turn of game. Hence which I was popular for back when I played alot.

But it is never because of who went first, its all because cards were just right, or (usually in my case, as my hands are never amazing, just average) they hero was stopped in a bad spot to allow something like that to happen.

And I base my answers only on what I observe and "qualifications"

-1200+ games played
-unofficially the heromages champion with a rediculously high rating
-world of Warcraft character theory crafter and statistician
-gaming since age 3 playing galaga

Trust me when I say I know the feeling of killing and having a Mage die in first turn. But this was back when teleport assaults ruled, and all it required was a good hand on first turn to win.

Since that has changed its rare to even see a unit die in a first turn. (if a unit dies in a first turn it takes extreme luck, as every unit has 5-7 hp, and each dice is less than 50% chance to hit, meaning 6 hp 13 def unit would probably need 16+ dice rolled on him to die in one turn at a 50% ratio)

That is a lot of dice in 1 turn. Especially first turn when most guardians can't help in the assault cuz of line of sight and distance between teams.

Now if a unit is killed in first turn, usually it's a map fault (crystal palace, and that fire 4 person map is bad, horrible balanced.)

BUT in free for all map faults are fine as the major part of free for all is politics and making temporary alliances, backstabbing. Etc.

And in games like circle of slaughter, it's suppossed to be chaotic, that's the fun of it. Though 15s turn time skittles is still my favorite, cuz first player gets screwed as he spends half his turn trying to find his units.

Kenjun,

I think you have some valid points. The nature of some maps does (with lots of luck) allow for first turn mage kills, which, as you've pointed out, is incredibly detrimental to strategy moving forward - especially before you have any chance whatsoever to act.

This problem is even more prominent in 8-player FFA, especially on Circle of Slaughter, where your entire team could easily be wiped out before you have the opportunity to do anything.

I'm open to suggestions. Maybe there is a "first round" protection that keeps units safe or shielded in some way until that player has a chance to act.

No, because then itd be the worst thing possible to go first, as you can't pressure the opponent with a summon going in and doing a point of damage, or a seeker missile, or something. Meaning, really all this just makes the 2nd player with all the advantage.

Then in an FFA, will all players have shields for plaeyrs that go before them, making the 8th person in a circle of slaughter invincible?

Honestly, game works fine as is. Otherwise you are trying to fix a d10000 to prevent the 1 from being rolled.

(for those that dont get it, I am basically saying a situation like this is 1 in 10000)