An Introduction and Overview of Hero's

An Introduction to Hero's

Heroes are just like regular units in many respects, but there are a few features that set them apart:

• Heroes are not recruited in a building
• Heroes are not paid for with resources, but with either "Coins of War" or "Coins of Wisdom " which can be obtained by completing Island Quests.
• Each hero has one special skill that can be found in his or her description, each skill will impact the game in a particular way.
• By investing "Coins of War" or "Coins of Wisdom", heroes can reach new levels (up to level 20), this will improve their base values and special skills
• Heroes are not lost if you restart on a world.
• Heroes don‘t die. Following a defeat they are merely wounded and regain their strength over time. (18hrs divided by the speed of the world)
• Heroes are not tied to the population of cities.
• Heroes can be assigned to towns, but there can be no more than one hero in one city at the same time.
• Heroes cannot be used to support other cities or players. They can be used only for your own attacks or in your own towns. They will also not stay when conquering a town.
• After an attack commenced, the hero will immediately return to his home town without travel time.
• Only 1 Hero can be assigned to a city at any time (credit to Hassan al-Sabbah for this)
• Heroes that affect attack strength must be sent along on the attack to gain the benefit (credit to Hassan al-Sabbah for this)
• Heroes can not be trained/upgraded while in transit (either between cities or on an attack (credit to Hassan al-Sabbah for this)
• DO NOT spend gold to open new slots, you can easily open all 11 slots by reaching culture level 11 (credit to k-arch2 for this)

(I'm assuming that you followed the tutorial and have already assigned Andromeda to your city)

1. Start off by doing quests to gain  Coins of Wisdom
2. Once you have 12, upgrade Andromeda (you are given her when you start) - This will increase the amount of resources you get which will be a big help.
3. Now, take a look at the complete list of hero's and read all of their starting abilities. (found by clicking on the face of the hero currently assigned to your city) Once you've decided which ability would be best for you right now, start saving up to purchase it.  

Personally, I intend on going for Chiron. (base ability is -22% of the cost and recruitment time for hoplites - fully upgraded ability is -60% of the cost and recruitment time for hoplites = hoplites in that city become 2x cheaper and 2x faster build time than slingers!)

After your first one, its really up to you, which one you get next. But make sure you're positive you want it as it takes a lot to get one.

Below is a list of the hero's, their pictures, stats, and my opinions on them and what 5 I intend on getting first based off their abilities.

Hero's of War

Atalanta - Great asset to have in making attacks go a lot faster without having to have a speed spell from a quest. We will definitely see many of these paired up with CS attacks to make them go faster and to hide the CS amongst other attacks by "altering" the TT. Well worth the coins to buy and upgrade her. Definitely on my "To get" list. (#4 on it)

Heracles - From the start, we can see this hero will be popular. Many of the noobs will jump at the chance to use his ability. Sure, "stealing" favor (without really stealing it) is cool, but the minimum of 50 bp's is a draw back for sure. It might act as an incentive to be more aggressive and "farm for bp's", but the benefit isn't great enough to warrant the better, more experienced players to acquire this hero. So in my opinion, a complete waste of time, coins, and effort to acquire Heracles.

Leonidas - Turtle soup anyone? Among those that are more defensive minded, he will be their favorite hero and the nemisis of all the aggressive players in the world. While its uncertain by the wording whether or not his bonus applies to ships in the harbor as well, it leans toward the probability that it does. Sadly enough, turtles just became even more powerful. Added with the def. bonus of a lvl 25 wall + Tower, cities with a maxed out Leonidas in them become fortresses that will defy whole armies. Unless I'm surround by over-whelming enemies and on the defensive, I probably wouldn't get Leonidas. Not because he isn't useful, but I could used those coins on someone else as long as I don't need him.

Urephon - While his ability toward myth units is very powerful and useful if you have one or more, it isn't of much use if you don't have one, or you have a pegasus nuke. Sadly, he isn't fast like a pegasus. So, if your relying on your pegasus's speed to save you, pairing Urephon up with them is impossible. This is so sad, but its the way it is. After doing some more research, he is also a tad bit slower than manties and harpies. Thus, these units must conform to his speed when traveling with him. Perhaps this is a good thing for those defending sieges, as it would take the super speed out of harpies, thus giving more time to get LDU into a besieged city. Because of his slower speed, and my love for pegasus, I probably won't buy him unless I got some spare coin laying around, or I'm sending my pegasus to a city to stay for an extended period of time.

Zuretha - One of my favorite hero's as it'll make a great addition to a massive LS nuke. Same speed as LS so it won't slow down the travel time any, but will slow a BR nuke down, but this isn't to important as as soon as a hero supports a town, it will turn around and return home. So, it order to use it with a BR nuke, you must re-assign Zuretha (takes 3 hours) to the city in which your BR's will be showing up. This will take some calculations to make sure Zuretha shows up at the right time so that her bonus can be useful and that the BR's get to use it (i.e. the BR's show up before and a LS nuke takes them out before Zuretha is assigned to the city and gives them the defensive bonus.) She is definitely on my "to get" list. (#3 on it)

Hero's of Wisdom

Andromeda - The first hero that you'll get. Her ability is a very nice one. At max, she's like a constant "happiness" spell that is cast on your city. I would suggest that as soon as you max the resource buildings in one of you cities that you assign her there and then leave her there. It takes 3 hours to re-assign, so that would be 3 hours of lost resources. Since she is given you at the beginning, you don't really have a choice, so she'll always be there for you to use.

Chiron - My absolute favorite hero. With his ability, hoplite nukes become so easy to rebuild, and 2x cheaper than a slinger nuke. You'll definitely be seeing more hoplite nukes being built by me as they are much more affordable now. I absolutely recommend getting this one! At the top of my "to get" list. (#1 on it)

Ferkyon - Similar to an Accelerated Recruitment quest spell, Ferkyon increases the recruitment speed of all land units. Will be great when paired with Population Growth (spell) and will help get slinger and horsemen nukes rebuilt in no time. Will be of more use once you have 8 or more cities and have specialized nukes. Ranked #5 on my "to get" list.

Helen - As Greek history goes, Helen causes nothing but problems. Same is true here. Unless you spend lots of gold to get the Phoenician Merchant to visit your cities frequently, her ability is pretty useless. Personally, I won't ever buy her, not even if I have spare coins laying around.

Orpheus - By far, the most popular hero of all once people found out his ability. At level 1, he has a 33% of doubling a culture point that is gained by city festival, olypmic games, victory prepossession, or theater play. At level 20, he has a 90% chance of doubling a earned culture point. After asking around, I've found out that he only has to be assigned to the city at the time the event finishes. As such, you could possibly move him between towns, doubling or tripling his bonus. From all accounts, an absolutely wonderful hero to have. Ranked #2 on my "to get" list.

Terylea - Though at first glance, she doesn't look to impressive, look again. At level 1 alone she increases silver production by 44%. At lvl 20 it is 120%. I'll definitely be acquiring her down the road some time and putting her in a + silver city. On a speed 2 world, and max mines, that comes to 1874 silver per HOUR. You could increase that further by casting Happiness on the city she is assigned to. Though I was only going to 5, she is ranked #6 on my "to get" list.

Conclusion

I hope that this introduction and overview of the hero's helped clear up some questions and gave you some direction in your search for guidance as in what ones to go after first. Overall, I'me very pleased with the addition of Hero's. There are a few useless ones compared to the others, but they came up with some great abilities. Abilities that will make grepolis a lot more unique in the type of strategies displayed and used.