Assailed by heroes

[Soyweiser]

Summoning trolls, or low level vine men, also have a lot of hp. Another bonus, I'm not sure if it matters, but vinemen have low protection and defense. So if the AI works as I assume it works, it will try to target these units to maximize the potential HP damage it does. (This is vs the attack rear dude of course).

The construction summons (which I assume are out of your reach) are even better potential HP decoys.

[brxbrx]

How much fire can you cook up? That should hurt them (trolls). Also, you can use a lot of single target spells since there won't be any army to distract your casters. Hopefully a horde of barbarians or a group of ronin won't decide to join them.

[Soyweiser]

Brxbrx, has a good point. They lack a lot of resistances. So you best want to look there. Also, as they usually do not come with an army, you could try shooting them, with magical bows.

[Valerius]

I've also had good success against them using air mages with bodyguards along the lines shatner describes. Air shield to protect against the archer, lightning bolt to kill the knight and Bogus (even if you don't have many mages the lightning bolts will increase his fatigue which improves your melee troops' chances). Once you get past those two the others aren't hard to kill.

It's a hassle having to devote resources to dealing with them so early on but maybe you'll get some decent magic items out of it.

[brxbrx]

The knight will rush you, though.

[thejeff]

Originally Posted by shatner

Be careful because I think the griffon knight has flying and is scripted to attack rear (can someone else confirm that?) so be sure to spread out your lightning spammers and maybe even put them ahead of your archers. Something like

<-- Back --- Front -->
Longbows-----SpreadOutMagisters-----BlockingInfantry

The griffin knight definitely has flying and I believe he is scripted to attack commanders (or possibly mages?)

Spreading out your infantry & archers as suggested won't help. Instead bury your mages in archers, so there aren't any open spaces next to them. He can't attack what he can't get to.

A few indy commanders as bait might help too.

[Immaculate]

he's not scripted to attack commanders. Thats only the archer (as far as i know)

[brxbrx]

Originally Posted by Immaculate

he's not scripted to attack commanders. Thats only the archer (as far as i know)

Yeah, but I'm pretty sure he's scripted to attack rear, and besides, he'll close the distance to your commanders no problem.

[Fantomen]

Originally Posted by Immaculate

he's not scripted to attack commanders. Thats only the archer (as far as i know)

It is the dark knight as well. If you charm him/them you can see the orders in the army setup screen. Iirc the knight is "attack commanders" and the archer is "fire mages". Their order can also be copied over to other commanders, but that is generally considered cheating if used in multiplayer games.

So use a tough commander/mage with boduguards and protection against arrows.

Bogus has high encumbrance and relies on the drainlife effect of his sword to reinvigorate, so you can use undead or other lifeless units against him to fatigue him out.

They're not wearing mr items, use paralyze and the like.

[brxbrx]

I never knew orders were preserved with mind control spells. Is that also the case when they get demoted to regular units and must be GoRed?