Is the Ghost Dragon any useful?

[✝ Gamlingwine]

I've found dozens of threads posted through the years on old official and unofficial forums, and everyone seems to agree the GD is virtually the worst tier 7 dwelling. Of about 11 unit reviews I've found on the internet, 8 people classified the Ghost dragon as the worst t7 creature, and the rest as the second worst.
Anyone that knows tricks on how to make it any useful?

[✝ Gamlingwine]

PS: I know towns have their respective cheap (thus weak) and expensive (thus strong) tiers, but overall the GD seems to be just plain ♥♥♥♥♥♥ - besides even weak units have usually a purpose. Certainly unlike tier 1 and 2 units it cannot be massed and thus wouldn't be useful as a fodder.

PPS: I also know being a really fast t7 unit and having the Aging ability it could be used to directly block and render useless enemy ranged creatures... But it would not survive any fight by doing that. And the aging ability triggers so rarely (20%), relatively speaking, that the odds are against you.

[chen creep]

Try to abuse "Aging" ability.

[Disappear]

You shouldn't look at GD separately from it's faction as a whole. Yes, you're so often tempted to just compare the strongest (lvl7)creatures and decide which faction is strongest, but that is wrong. The Necropolis along with Conflux in addons is almost unanimously considered OP'd and/or even cheating - which is equally wrong! I think the game is very well ballanced and you should take into account all the possible aspects of it when considering pros and cons of any given faction. Sure if you put a GD agains any other lvl7 creature on a barren battlefield with no particular hero skills to back him up, he will most likely perform poorly, But if you remember that it is Undead (thus unaffected by low morale and a wide spectrum of lowlevel spells) as are all the creatures in its faction and it is the fastest of them And a flyer. Don't forget the Animate Undead spell which let's you resurrect undead units And_Keep_Them after battle even at lowest Earth magic skill. All things considered, There are plenty of good reasons for why it is what it is. I can't see a situation where you'd chose not to add GD to your undead army unless it's lack of resources. But it certainly adds to th eoverall strenght of Necropolis in a way that maintains the balance.

[✝ Gamlingwine]

Originally posted by Disappear:

You shouldn't look at GD separately from it's faction as a whole. Yes, you're so often tempted to just compare the strongest (lvl7)creatures and decide which faction is strongest, but that is wrong. The Necropolis along with Conflux in addons is almost unanimously considered OP'd and/or even cheating - which is equally wrong! I think the game is very well ballanced and you should take into account all the possible aspects of it when considering pros and cons of any given faction. Sure if you put a GD agains any other lvl7 creature on a barren battlefield with no particular hero skills to back him up, he will most likely perform poorly, But if you remember that it is Undead (thus unaffected by low morale and a wide spectrum of lowlevel spells) as are all the creatures in its faction and it is the fastest of them And a flyer. Don't forget the Animate Undead spell which let's you resurrect undead units And_Keep_Them after battle even at lowest Earth magic skill. All things considered, There are plenty of good reasons for why it is what it is. I can't see a situation where you'd chose not to add GD to your undead army unless it's lack of resources. But it certainly adds to th eoverall strenght of Necropolis in a way that maintains the balance.

Thanks for the complete response, it is true what you say: the dragon is balanced to fit within the other ranks of the Undead army. Since the t4, 5 and 6 creatures have a really high performance and overall can be used in all situations, the GD is supposed to be balanced so not to make all the undead tiers excessively "elitist".

Some say that the reanimate spell is supposedly a lot better used on DK's or Power liches... I can't comment on this yet, I'll see for myself. The point is as I play almost only vs the cpu: will the enemy ranged dwellings target my dragons first, regardless how distant it is to them? If I can avoid it being targeted too much, I guess sending it in at some later turn when other fast units have approached the enemy could help it.

[Crusader_bin]

Quite often, doing that first strike means the difference between winning and loosing. The battle, or even the whole game, even if you loose your T7.
And of course, I agree that Necropolis is the most OP faction. Power Liches, Alps, Necromancy skill... I remember (long time ago I guess) that when a player managed to get a really high ammount of Alps near the end game, all the others were plucking the hairs out of ther heads :P

[✝ Gamlingwine]

Originally posted by Crusader_bin:

Quite often, doing that first strike means the difference between winning and loosing. The battle, or even the whole game, even if you loose your T7.
And of course, I agree that Necropolis is the most OP faction. Power Liches, Alps, Necromancy skill... I remember (long time ago I guess) that when a player managed to get a really high ammount of Alps near the end game, all the others were plucking the hairs out of ther heads :P

Alps? I know this mythological/folkloristic creature from other games, but there's no unit named like that in HOMM3. You could be referring to the Wight, Wraith or whatever that robe-wearing levitating skeleton is called.

[Crusader_bin]

Originally posted by Milo äl Lungubard:

Originally posted by Crusader_bin:

Quite often, doing that first strike means the difference between winning and loosing. The battle, or even the whole game, even if you loose your T7.
And of course, I agree that Necropolis is the most OP faction. Power Liches, Alps, Necromancy skill... I remember (long time ago I guess) that when a player managed to get a really high ammount of Alps near the end game, all the others were plucking the hairs out of ther heads :P

Alps? I know this mythological/folkloristic creature from other games, but there's no unit named like that in HOMM3. You could be referring to the Wight, Wraith or whatever that robe-wearing levitating skeleton is called.

Sorry, it was like that in my translation of the game. Didn't even knew that in english version they are actually called Vampire Lords. Heh :)

edit: And the bone dragons were actually called Drakoliches :P

[Adderhead]

Stats-wise, hydra is the worst lvl 7 unit, but it can attack multiple targets without enemy retaliation, so you can make the same argument with GD. Their stats might suck but they have abilities to make up for it (aging ability for GD). And because of that, fortress is my favorite town. It has low stats creatures but they have amazing abilities. Its nice to see something like that in the boring, OP necro too (again, like the GD).

[✝ Gamlingwine]

Originally posted by Crusader_bin:

Originally posted by Milo äl Lungubard:

Alps? I know this mythological/folkloristic creature from other games, but there's no unit named like that in HOMM3. You could be referring to the Wight, Wraith or whatever that robe-wearing levitating skeleton is called.

Sorry, it was like that in my translation of the game. Didn't even knew that in english version they are actually called Vampire Lords. Heh :)

edit: And the bone dragons were actually called Drakoliches :P

lmao, game translations rarely make sense if you put it on a literal level. Since the Alps I knew were from a polish game and you're polish too, I guess it's no coincidence anyway.

Originally posted by Sir Adder:

Stats-wise, hydra is the worst lvl 7 unit, but it can attack multiple targets without enemy retaliation, so you can make the same argument with GD. Their stats might suck but they have abilities to make up for it (aging ability for GD). And because of that, fortress is my favorite town. It has low stats creatures but they have amazing abilities. Its nice to see something like that in the boring, OP necro too (again, like the GD).

I love Fortress too, and the Hydra is awesome, but the crowd-control 3 headed attack seems much less rare and situational than the aging ability. Anyway fortress creatures aren't really low stat beside a couple: Gnolls are slightly above average for example, and Gorgons have really high HP.

[Crusader_bin]

Originally posted by Milo äl Lungubard:

Originally posted by Crusader_bin:

Sorry, it was like that in my translation of the game. Didn't even knew that in english version they are actually called Vampire Lords. Heh :)

edit: And the bone dragons were actually called Drakoliches :P

lmao, game translations rarely make sense if you put it on a literal level. Since the Alps I knew were from a polish game and you're polish too, I guess it's no coincidence anyway.

Originally posted by Sir Adder:

Stats-wise, hydra is the worst lvl 7 unit, but it can attack multiple targets without enemy retaliation, so you can make the same argument with GD. Their stats might suck but they have abilities to make up for it (aging ability for GD). And because of that, fortress is my favorite town. It has low stats creatures but they have amazing abilities. Its nice to see something like that in the boring, OP necro too (again, like the GD).

I love Fortress too, and the Hydra is awesome, but the crowd-control 3 headed attack seems much less rare and situational than the aging ability. Anyway fortress creatures aren't really low stat beside a couple: Gnolls are slightly above average for example, and Gorgons have really high HP.

I like Fortress for the astethic values, but I just hate hydras. Gorgons, I always thought were kind of OP for their tier though, so can't complain. The Tower is probably my favorite anyway, just for the ranged units and magic.
Necros are well OP and their castle music is enough of a reason to play them :P

[✝ Gamlingwine]

Originally posted by Crusader_bin:

Originally posted by Milo äl Lungubard:

lmao, game translations rarely make sense if you put it on a literal level. Since the Alps I knew were from a polish game and you're polish too, I guess it's no coincidence anyway.




I love Fortress too, and the Hydra is awesome, but the crowd-control 3 headed attack seems much less rare and situational than the aging ability. Anyway fortress creatures aren't really low stat beside a couple: Gnolls are slightly above average for example, and Gorgons have really high HP.

I like Fortress for the astethic values, but I just hate hydras. Gorgons, I always thought were kind of OP for their tier though, so can't complain. The Tower is probably my favorite anyway, just for the ranged units and magic.
Necros are well OP and their castle music is enough of a reason to play them :P

I like the Fortress for the looking of its units. Most other towns have creatures so ugly to the point I really can't even look at. Though Necropolis looks good too.