In the previous Age of Wonders games, your specializations were what defined your character. They were the source of most of your abilities and magic, and let you tailor your leader into whatever role you saw fit. Age of Wonders III differs from its earlier iterations in that it has a much greater emphasis on your leader's Class rather than his specialization. While specializations have lost a bit of their clout from this, they still fill an important role of customization and can greatly augment how you play the game. Furthermore, while the Tome of Wonders is an incredible resource, a lot of its text is misleading or not fully explanatory of what each spell is capable of. This guide is meant to go into greater detail for each spell, compare how they match up to one another, and to see what kind of role I feel each best serves. That being said, my recommendations for each element are merely my opinion; almost every combination can be quite playable and have their own advantages.

If you feel I've missed out an important detail, want to add your own experience or advice, or simply want to give your thoughts on the guide, please leave a comment below.

There are three general types of specialization: 

• Elemental Spheres (Fire, Water, Earth, Air, and Wild Magic)
  
• Alignment Spheres (Creation, Destruction, Keeper, Grey Guard, and Shadowborn)
  
• Empire Upgrades (Explorer, Expander, and Partisan)

Each sphere comes with one passive, free benefit, and four spells or upgrades. While they all have different areas of expertise, each type follows the same general trends. The Elemental Spheres all provide damage, summoning, and targeted enchantments, and usually can fit into any playstyle. The Alignment spheres provide some magic, but are generally more focused on tactical and strategic enchantments, and tend to focus your strategy down a specific path. And the Empire Upgrades are almost entirely passive and nonmagical, providing a variety of benefits to your cities and units.

The Adept schools of magic are the most common type of specialization, and almost every leader is going to have at least one of these. While some have late game benefits, most serve to help you explore and fight your early battles.


Tier 1 Empire Upgrade, Free
Air Nodes generate an additional +5 Mana

This Passive upgrade is shared by the six original magic spheres (Fire, Water, Earth, Air, Creation, and Destruction), and corresponds to their respective Mana Nodes. These are fairly basic, and are unique for each element; If you took three different Adept spheres, you would get all three Node bonuses. On their own, they are a nice early game boost that rewards taking nodes of your element, but tends to be quickly dwarfed by your overall mana production. An additional benefit now is that these bonuses are improved each element's Mastery passive upgrade, which is discussed later.

While lacking any buffs or defensive abilities, Fire Adept provides a very solid suite of basic spells. None are game-changing or incredibly strong, but each are useful in many situations.

• Great early game damage spell
  
• Highly flexible summon
  
• Versatile Single-target Debuff

Tier I Tactical Spell (Instant), 80 Research, 10 Mana
Deals 10 Physical and 12 Fire damage to target Enemy or Wall.

Fireball is the damage spell against which all others are measured. It's more expensive than Vengeful Frost and Suffocate but cheaper than Stoning, and remains the most mana efficient of them all, dealing 22 damage for only 10 mana. However, the smaller damage channel is physical and the larger damage channel is fire, meaning enemies with either above average armor or fire resistance can greatly reduce how powerful this spell is. What makes Fireball truly special is that it is one of the only spells in the game that can target terrain objects; you can blast down fences, gates, and even walls given enough time and mana. This extra functionality combined with its high efficiency makes Fireball an excellent damage spell for finishing off weakened targets, even into the late game.


Tier II Tactical Spell (Unit Enchantment), 100 Research, 7 Mana
Target Enemy suffers -2 Physical Strength, Defense, and Resistance, as well as -60% Fire Weakness

Skin of Oil has come a long way from its original incarnation. -2 to all stats is quite annoying even to high-tier units, and 60% fire weakness synergies very well with units who deal fire damage. Combined with its very low mana cost, the end result is a surprisingly useful spell in a large number of situations. That being said, Skin of Oil still has the issue of being a spell with no direct impact; the time you spend casting this could easily be spent on another Fireball instead, and if you don't capitalize on its effects it can easily be dispelled or ignored entirely. It's best used when it will have an immediate impact; cast it on a strong unit just before hitting it with a lot of small damage from multiple sources, a powerful debuff (the lower resistance means things like Charm or Stun are more likely to work), or obviously anything that deals a lot of fire damage.


Tier III Strategic Spell (City Enchantment), 180 Research, 70 Mana + 30 per turn
Target Friendly City and Units within that City's Domain, now like Tropical and Volcanic terrain. Machines, Undead, and Magical creatures are unaffected.

Compared to its Frosty equivalent, Domain of the Sun provides morale bonuses for two types of terrain rather than just one. While this makes it much more generally useful in a vacuum, it does cost +10 mana both to cast and per turn for that benefit, making it a far more expensive investment overall. While this spell can be used with races that normally hate these climates (And since the 1.5 update, now boosts the morale of your garrisoned units, too. No more angry elven guards in an otherwise happy elven city!), you run the risk of running out of mana or having the spell disjuncted, leaving you with a very unhappy city. Instead, consider starting as a race that enjoys Tropical or Volcanic climates (Draconians, Tigrans, Humans, Halflings, and Orcs), as they tend to start in these regions in random maps, ensuring you can get value out of your spell while not hamstringing yourself in the process.


Tier III Strategic Spell (Summon), 180 Research, 70 Mana + 9 per turn
Summons a Hellhound, a Tier II Monster

Of the four summons available in the Adept schools, the Hellhound is the most generally useful. It deals 13 damage per hit, a large chunk of which is fire damage, and has Overwhelm, making it a very capable combat unit against a wide variety of early game enemies. It has average defenses and a weakness to Frost, but is highly resistant to Blight and Fire, the two most common elements. And with 36 movement it can scout effectively as well as keep up with even the fastest army. And at 70 mana they are quite affordable compared to most Tier II summons, making them easy to produce in sizeable quantities. While not the most powerful combat or scout summon in the Adept spheres, its versatility and low cost makes it very useful to classes that lack inherent summoning.


Overall, Fire Adept is a highly versatile sphere, if a bit unexciting. All of its spells have multiple uses, but their overall flexibility means none of them excel in any field; Fire Adept doesn't have any single "killer spell", like Seeker or Degenerate. That being said, all of Fire Adept's spells are useful and can serve you well even into the later stages of the game, making it a solid choice for almost anyone.

Notable Synergies:
• Draconians, Dwarves (Both factions have innate sources of fire damage, including Hatchlings, Flamers, and Forge Priests, which can make Skin of Oil a much juicier prospect early on)
  
• Dreadnoughts (While flame tanks are far less of a threat than they once were, Dreadnoughts still have many sources of fire damage. Combined with Juggernaut mortars, Destabilized Mana Cores, and even Engineer scattershot and flashbangs in a pinch, Skin of Oil can be a death sentence to even the hardiest of units)

A highly specialized sphere of magic, Water Adept provides a lot of niche tools that are quite strong when in their element, but are of little use elsewhere.

• Low-cost Damage spell
  
• Anti-Mechanical and Undead AoE
  
• Favors water maps

Tier I Tactical Spell (Instant), 70 Research, 7 Mana
Deals 15 Frost damage to Target Enemy

One of the cheapest damage spells in the game alongside Suffocate, Vengeful Frost deals an appropriately low amount of damage. Unlike Fireball and Stoning, It's not going to kill many troops by itself. But given that very few units resist frost, and that draconians and tigrans are actively weak to it, it's quite useful for picking off damaged targets, and it's low mana cost means it's easy to cast while still leaving you enough casting points to use something else.


Tier II Tactical Spell (Instant), 120 Research, 20 Mana
Deals 20 Physical Damage and applies Weakness for 5 Turns to Target Enemy Machine or Corporeal Undead, jumping to up to 3 additional targets.

After receiving countless buffs increasing its damage, reducing its cost, and giving it extra features, Rot has finally found its niche. Previously only affecting machines, Rot was highly situational, only really serving to annoy dreadnoughts due to the rarity of machines in any large quantity. Undead, however, are highly common enemies on every map that are generally quite tough to kill, even excluding all of the new undead introduced in Endless Lords. Dealing potentially 80+ damage for 20 mana is incredible, but the additional -60% Blight Weakness to those targets makes this spell invaluable to Goblins and other blight-users, allowing them to harm previously blight-immune enemies. While situationally useful to everyone, if you enjoy playing goblins, this sphere is worth considering for Rot alone.


Tier III Strategic Spell (Terraforming), 220 Research, 40 Mana
Freezes Water terrain in a 1-Hex Radius for 3 turns

Costing almost 4 times as much research as Basic Seafaring, this spell may not be as crucial as it was in the old games when boats were far less convenient than they are now, but it still saves you a lot of time otherwise wasted embarking and disembarking your armies just to cross a small river or lake. It can also be used to trap dangerous aquatic enemies like pirate galleons, enemy invasion forces, and Krakens, letting your ships escape or attack at your leisure. Just remember to get your units off the ice before that timer runs out; units not embarked or who can't swim will die instantly.


Tier III Strategic Spell (Summon), 180 Research, 70 Mana, 9 per turn
Summons a Baby Kraken, an Aquatic Sea Monster

The Baby Kraken is a bit of an odd duck compared to the other adept summons. Strong defenses, good damage against ships, and decent movement speed makes it a good unit for defending your shores against invading units or assaulting Pirate coves. Plus, if you can level it up to Elite (A trickier task than it sounds), it evolves into a fully-fledged Kraken, a Tier IV powerhouse capable of destroying fleets single-tentacledly. With the recent changes to Embarkation, the Baby Kraken can outrun most transport ships (Human and Warlord ships excluded), making it a decent choice for defending your shores. However, once enemies have access to Flying or Floating units, the Kraken loses a lot of its bite, as a full third of its damage is tied into the Terror from the Deep ability, which only affects ships or embarked units, and Galleons are more than capable of taking out a few squid. Overall, unless you're on a very water-centric map, you'll be hard pressed to get much value out of your krakens.


Many different updates have converged to make Water Adept less situational than it once was. Water is more generally common in large quantities on randomly generated maps, transports are slower and more vulnerable while on the high seas, and the influx of Undead means Rot now serves double-duty. While I still highly recommend Water Adept be used either on maps with lots of water or paired with Water Mastery, it now finds a lot more value outside those situations, which I'm more than happy to see.

Notable Synergies:
• Goblins (Pretty much every Goblin unit, both Racial and Class, deals a significant amout of Blight damage, making them very poor against Machines and the Undead. Rot handily deals with both of these issues, and also gives access to Water Mastery, which also has unique benefits to Goblins)
  
• Warlord (While more of a silly gimmick, Global Assault automatically evolves your baby krakens into fully fledged Tier IVs without any of the hassle of trying to level them up yourself. While they still suffer from the weakness of being stuck in the oceans, they will easily give you dominance over the seas.)

A very simple and unflexible adept sphere, Earth Adept provides strong attack and strong defense, and some very useful city enchantments, albeit at cost.

• Powerful but expensive damage spell
  
• Solid defensive enchantments
  
• Favors Subterranean maps

Tier I Tactical Spell (Instant), 80 Research, 15 Mana
Deals 24 Physical Damage to Target Enemy

The most powerful and the most expensive of the adept damage spells. Dealing 24 damage to a single channel is massive, and can kill low armor Tier I units in a single blow. But its high mana cost severely limits how many of these you can throw around, and physical resistant enemies like Phantasmal Warriors will laugh at you if you throw rocks at them.


Tier II Tactical Spell (Unit Enchantment), 120 Research, 8 Mana
Target Friendly Unit gains +5 Defense and +3 Resistance, but loses -16 Movement

Stoneskin is something of a double-edged shield. +5 Def and +3 Res are both massive bonuses, and turn fragile units into decent tanks, and decent tanks into excellent ones. However, -16 movement means that unless enemies are forced to interact with the buffed unit, they can just run away from it and kill it later from a safe distance, while your poor unit crawls around trying to make itself useful. This spell is best used on a unit that won't be moving much or will be on the defense, such as a unit holding a choke point against attacking troops or a spellcasting hero you want to keep alive.


Tier III Strategic Spell (City Enchantment), 180 Research, 60 Mana + 20 per turn
Target Friendly City and Units within its domain now like Subterranean Terrain. Machines, Undead, and creatures of Magical Origin are unaffected.

Cavern layers are weird. On the overworld, every hex has both a Terrain type (Dirt, Grass, Trees) and a Climate (Hot, Cold, Dead, etc). However, underground all climates are replaced with Subterranean. This spell gives you a large morale advantage when working with underground maps. Given that Goblins and Dwarves tend to start underground, while Elves, Humans, Frostlings, and Halflings tend to dislike living underground, this spell can be useful for pretty much any racial city. While this spell is naturally worthless on maps without a cavern layer, it gives you a strong advantage when in the caves.


Tier III Tactical Spell (Battlefield Enchantment), 180 Research, 20 Mana
Heals and Restores all Walls for +20HP every Round

Given how useful city walls are, having them continuously regenerate is a Very Good Thing. The key element of this spell is that it rebuilds destroyed segments. There is only room for one unit in front of your gate, so if that unit spends his turn breaking it down, nobody can walk past him to actually get in while the gate is down. And when his turn comes around again, the gate is back up, daring him to waste more time attacking it while archers whittle away at his backside. It also completely negates the effect of Vengeful Vines, neutering the Druid's ability to break sieges. All told, this spell can win you many sieges single-handedly, depending on your enemy's unit composition. While it greatly slows down both units at your gates and Wall crushing units, If your opponent brings a lot of units that can fly or climb over walls, you're might be better off casting something else.


Three of the Earth Adept spells are 100% useful, and the fourth one is highly valuable on any map with the underground layer. That being said, Earth Adept has no summoned units, and none of its spells are very flexible; Stoneskin trades mobility for defense, Stoning costs a lot and does very little against enemies with high defense or physical resist, and Regenerate Walls is only useful in defensive sieges (You could cast it when sieging someone else, but I don't recommend it :D). If you just want some solid defensive spells and don't mind not always using them, Earth Adept is a great pick.

Notable Synergies:
• Dwarves, Goblins (Both races tend to start underground on maps with a subterranean layer, making Earth Domain a handy tool to have)

Air Adept provides an interesting selection of spells. While many of them aren't useful in a vacuum (ha ha), they provide options that help shore up weak areas of certain classes, or boost specific units and strategies.

• Weak but inexpensive damage spell
  
• Powerful enchantment for Ranged units
  
• Noncombat scout summon

Tier I Tactical Spell (Instant), 80 Research, 7 Mana
Deals 15 Physical Damage to Target Enemy; Undead, Machines, Elementals, and Incorporeal Units are Immune.

Suffocate is very similar to Vengeful Frost; same mana cost, same damage value. The difference is that Suffocate rolls against enemy Defense rather than Resist, due to being physical. This is a bad thing, as resists tend to be lower across the board, especially as enemies start getting higher level. Also, only being able to hit enemies with lungs greatly limits this spell, especially as undead and elementals are much more common these days. It gets the job done early on, but it's easily one of the weakest damage spells in the entire game.


Tier II Tactical Spell (Unit Enchantment), 140 Research, 10 Mana
Target Friendly Unit's Ranged Attacks deal +1 Damage and ignore Obstacles and Ranged Penalties

If you pick Air Adept on its own, it's probably because of this spell. Ranged units being able to do 100% of their damage at maximum range while ignoring all enemy cover is ridiculous, and almost every ranged unit benefits from it. Not only that, but unlike most enchantments this scales up fully as the game progresses; it works just as well on a Juggernaut or Shrine of Smiting as it does on a Musketeer or Apprentice, meaning you will always want to cast this. And since it only costs 10 mana, you'll usually be able to.


Tier III Strategic Spell (City Enchantment), 180 Research, 60 + 20 mana
Target Friendly City and Units within its domain now like Arctic Terrain. Machines, Undead, and creatures of Magical Origin are unaffected.

While cheaper than Sun Domain, this spell only benefits cities in Arctic Terrain, making it less flexible overall, especially since a much greater number of races dislike and hate Tropical and Volcanic terrain compared to Arctic. Similar to Sun Domain, pairing this spell with a race that tends to start in Arctic terrain (Frostlings, Elves, Dwarves, and Humans) helps ensure that this spell will be useful, as in most cases casting this spell on a city wholly in Arctic terrain will provide +200-400 happiness, which equates to a 15-35% increase in all income. While it will rarely be useful on a large scale without also casting Arctic Empire, it's great to use when you have the opportunity.


Tier II Strategic Spell (Summon), 120 Knowledge, 60 Mana + 12 per turn
Summons a Zephyr Bird, a Flying Animal

With stats comparable or worse than most Tier I Irregulars, the Zephyr bird has trouble winning fights against even the most frail of opponents. While the 1.5 update gave them access to Wing Beat, letting them attack enemies without retaliation, it deals so little damage and their death is almost assured afterwards that it's rarely worth the cost. The real value of the Zephyr bird lies in it's premiere scouting ability. It has Flying (All terrain costs 3 movement, +2 Vision) and a Vision Upgrade (Another +1 Vision), giving it a massive vision radius of 6. While most classes have a built-in aerial scout, none of them move as fast or see as far as the Zephyr Bird. That being said, many of those units serve multiple purposes as both scout and militia while costing almost half as much, which the Zephyr bird simply cannot do. Furthermore, with Warlords getting their own personal Scout unit, the only classes that really lack a dedicated scout are the Archdruid and arguably the Necromancer, meaning the Zephyr Bird's niche is getting smaller and smaller.


Overall, there is a common trend of the Air Adept spells in that many have equivalents spells in the other domains or as base class elements. That being said, they fill in quite well if you lack what they provide, and Seeker enchantment alone may be enough reason for some players to pick this specialization.

Notable Synergies:
• Necromancer, Archdruid, Warlord (Both the Archdruid and the Necromancer lack a truly dedicated scouting unit, meaning they can get some mileage out of the Zephyr Bird. While Warlord scouts are fantastically useful, this spell lets them summon scouts anywhere)
  
• Dreadnaught (With a lot of ranged units, Seeker enchantment can get some serious mileage. And with the recent nerf to Floating units, having access to a Flying scout is occasionally useful.)

Creation is meant to be a very defensive school of magic, and it succeeds at that very handily with a powerful heal and unit enchantment, as well as early game climate controls for a defensive empire.

• Powerful healing spell
  
• Cheap & effective creature enchantment
  
• Single-sphere terrain control

Tier I Tactical Spell (Unit Enchantment), 60 Research, 5 Mana
Target Friendly Unit gains +2 Defense, +2 Resistance, and +300 Morale

While not a very flashy spell, Bless was arguably already quite strong before Golden Realms. Now, it grants a unit a respectable amount of defense and a large chunk of Morale, potentially boosting a unit up two morale stages instantly. Also, because it costs a measly 5 mana, you can spam it on as many units as you want and have little fear of running out of casting points. The only downside is that as the game goes on, you may be less inclined to waste your leader's valuable turn on a minor buff. It's not as direct as a fireball, but can have as big of an effect when used properly.


Tier II Tactical Spell (Instant), 140 Research, 10 mana
Restores 25 Health to Target Friendly Unit. Undead, Machines, and Animated Units can't be healed.
While healing abilities are relatively common, healing spells are incredibly rare, and Holy Cure is quite useful for this distinction. While not as proactive as simply annihilating an enemy, healing a lynchpin unit or a valuable hero is always a worthwhile use of your time. Plus, Holy Cure is incredibly mana-efficient compared either to other healing spells, or even most damage spells, coming out ahead of even fireball in terms of "damage" per mana.


Tier III Strategic Spell (City Enchantment), 180 Research, 60 Mana + 20 per turn
Target Friendly City and Units within its domain now like Temperate Terrain. Machines, Undead, and Magical creatures are unaffected. +25 Alignment.

While every other Climate has someone who actively dislikes it, Temperate is the only one that nobody minds living in. So having a spell to make people like Temperate terrain seems a bit redundant, as the same effect could be achieved by terraforming, which costs no upkeep and every leader has access to. If it weren't for Cleanse the Land, this would be the worst of the four domain spells in Adept. With it, however, it stands out as being a very handy spell, letting you make any city Cheerful with minimal effort.


Tier III Strategic Spell (Instant), 220 Research, 50 Mana; +25 Alignment
Target Hexes in a 3 Hex Radius are converted into Temperate Terrain. Corrupted Springs and Corrupted Farms will be cleansed of corruption.

This spell is what makes Domain of Life useful. While slow, clunky, and somewhat expensive to cast repeatedly, it can be used to turn all of your territory into Temperate terrain, removing morale penalties and providing morale bonuses. It also can be used offensively to ensure your troops aren't fighting at a disadvantage. It may not seem like much, but being in disliked terrain is -150 morale, and hated terrain is a full -300 morale. And given that morale effects cap at +/-600, hated terrain alone is a full quarter of your morale bar. This is especially notable to Halflings, who hate pretty much every terrain type besides Temperate, making this spell incredibly valuable to them both in combat and in their cities. A small benefit added in Eternal Lords is the ability to cleanse Corrupted structures, meaning a Creation Adept can fully reclaim undead territory. While not always crucial to have, it's hard to complain about a free benefit to an already useful spell.

A side effect to both Cleanse and Life Domain is a small positive alignment increase from each casting. Being good gives an overall boost to relations with all players and neutral factions, making diplomacy much easier to do overall. Furthermore, with the advent of Eternal Lords, alignment is much more important than it previously was. Both Keepers and Grey Guard may find these small alignment shifts useful to their grand strategy, as falling outside of their respective alignments can result in empire-wide unhappiness.


Overall, Creation Adept is an Adept sphere superstar, alongside Earth and Fire; healing is fairly hard to come by, and bless is a handy unit enchantment to have. Combined with a two-spell climate combo, every one of its spells can be useful to almost any player or faction on any map.

Notable Synergies:
• Halflings (Bless + Lucky is a small but quite handy combo to have at your disposal, and Cleanse the Land means you can keep your cities happy despite their picky nature)
  
• Elves (As the second most tempermental race in regards to Terrain, elves often have the hardest time finding good places to settle or migrate to, making Cleanse the Land a useful tool to have)

The evil counterpart to Creation, Destruction is a far more passive school of magic that is highly useful for rapidly expanding via conquest.

• Focus on conquest and plundering
  
• Strong damage enchantment
  
• Valuable Empire Upgrades

Tier I Tactical Spell (Unit Enchantment), 80 Research, 6 Mana
Target Friendly Unit gains Humanoid Slayer, and +50% Critical Damage.

While it wasn't terrible before, the very small benefit Killer Instinct provided to most players wasn't worth the time spent to cast it. Now with a bonus to Critical Strike damage (Increasing it from 1.3x damage to 1.8x damage), this spell is potentially far more powerful in the right circumstances. Slayer bonuses are especially nice because they also affect ranged attacks, something most damage bonuses don't do. The only real downside to this spell is it loses some of its effectiveness as the game progresses, as many more summoned units and monsters start showing up in neutral camps or enemy armies. However, as Morale bonuses start to stack up far more in the late game, this spell can become even more useful once your units begin to crit more often; critical hits for 1.8x damage are no joke.


Tier II Strategic Spell (City Enchantment), 140 Research, 40 Mana + 15 per turn; -25 Alignment
Target City you own will be Razed instantly when you lose control over it

Assuming you don't want to plunder every city you come across, this spell is a good compromise. You can steal a valuable enemy city, and then use it to continue earning money and building troops without needing to leave a strong garrison; if they take it back, it just gets destroyed anyway. Additionally, this negates the usual empire-wide happiness penalty for razing a city. While this can be used defensively, it does mean that if you push back an enemy invasion you can't recover your city without rebuilding it. This caveat does not apply to Necromancers, who can rebuild cities instantly with their Raise City spell. Losing a city isn't a big deal to them, making this spell much more amusing in their hands.


Tier III Strategic Spell (City Enchantment), 180 Research, 60 Mana + 20 per turn
Target Friendly City and Units within its domain now like Blighted Terrain. Machines, Undead, and Magical creatures are unaffected; -25 Alignment.

Unlike this spell's Creation counterpart, every race in the game with the exception of the Goblins dislike or outright hate blighted terrain, suffering a massive morale penalty for living or fighting in it. This means that Domain of Corruption, while still requiring Mastery spells to be reliably useful, does let you settle in otherwise unlivable territory. Furthermore, Goblins tend to start in Blighted Territory, meaning this can be a strong early pickup for them in particular.

Like the Creation Sphere, both of these spells lower your alignment slightly when cast. While this effect is useful to Grey Guard and Shadowborn players who actively want to be Evil, keep in mind that being Evil drastically lowers your diplomatic relations with all players and neutral factions, meaning most people you meet will declare war on you on sight once you really get going.


Tier III Empire Upgrade, 200 Research
Allows you to instantly raze a city and gain loot as if it were plundered.

Boosted up from Tier I to Tier III, Hasty Plunder has seen a significant increase in power. Not only does it give as much gold as slowly plundering a city of valuables, but it also burns it to the ground even faster than Razing would, making it a strictly better option than either of it's alternatives. This upgrade is fantastic for raiding enemy cities and vassals, assuming you don't mind the massive -150 alignment hit that razing a city entails.

Overall, Destruction is quite a useful specialization to have for early game aggression. While it does indirectly hurt your diplomatic standing, if you're focusing on fast expansion and aggression this often won't be a problem.

Notable Synergies:
• Warlord, Rogue (Both are very good at early game aggression and siezing cities)
  
• Goblins (Domain of Corruption further rewards you for settling in Blighted terrain, and given that only Goblins can do so without penalty, you should be doing that anyway.)

The new school of magic introduced in Golden Realms, Wild Magic Adept provides a variety of interesting tactical spells, as well as a very strong summon spell.

• AoE and Single-target Debuffs
  
• Unit Teleportation (With limits)
  
• Powerful but Expensive summoned units

Tier I Empire Upgrade, Free
All Heart structures produce an extra +10 mana

While probably one of the weakest empire upgrades in the game, given that it's attached to one of the more powerful Adept spheres it's probably a fair trade. "Heart structures" refers to the very rare and powerful Elemental Hearts that can be found in the wilderness, such as the Heart of Blight or the Heart of the Tropics, which give your entire empire immunity to that climate and give produced units a special bonus relating to the element when within your cities. Even if you can find a Heart and settle a city on top of it, the benefit this passive provides is barely worth mentioning compared to what it already gives you.


Tier I Tactical Spell (Unit Enchantment), 80 Research, 20 Mana
Equipped Units and Machines in a 2 Hex Radius suffer a random penalty to Defense and/or Attack until end of combat

Originally being a significant -2/-2 to all units within its radius, Warp Equipment was felt to be too predictable to be a Wild Magic spell, and ended up getting a nerf; now it randomly lowers physical damage and defense by 1-3, meaning it can be stronger than it once was, but more often will be much worse. It's still a decently powerful effect, but spending 20 mana for a spell and seeing your enemies get -1 damage does feel a bit cheeky. That being said, Warp Equipment cannot be dispelled, and affects all "equipped" units (That is, units with standard classes like Infantry, Cavalry, Archers, etc). This spell won't be very useful past the early game, but it can serve well in early game battles, and can do a surprising amount of damage if you can hit a large number of targets with it.


Tier II Tactical Spell (Unit Enchantment), 120 Research, 20 Mana
Target unit trades places with a random unit of the same tier owned by another player.

While this spell might not sound like much, it has a surprising amount of uses. In an ideal situation, Swap Locations can be used to grab a valuable enemy unit and drop it in the middle of your combat line, letting it get carved to ribbons while putting a strong melee fighter of yours into the midst of enemy archers, killing two enemies with one spell. Naturally things are rarely this tidy, but while it has Wild Magic's natural tendency towards unpredictability, the tricky part of this spell is that you can target either side's units. You can always ensure that one half of the equation is taken care of, whether that is "I want my unit behind enemy lines" or "I want that enemy gone". This gives you a surprising amount of control over what can happen… so long as you know what you're doing when you cast it.


Tier III Strategic Spell (Summon), 220 Research, 120 Mana + 15 per Turn
Summons a random Lesser Elemental to target location.


Compared to most of the adept summoning spells, this one has potentially the most usefulness of them all. All of the lesser elementals are quite strong, sharing many of their elder brothers' strengths (and weaknesses) with the added benefit of all coming with a ranged attack. Furthermore, as each and every Lesser Elemental has Evolution, you can conceivably get Greater Elementals of all six flavors. That being said, the lack of control does hurt a bit, as all elementals are now very weak to specific types of damage, usually to a massive degree, meaning you might keep throwing mana down the drain for very little benefit. And coming in at 120 mana per casting, this spell is very expensive compared to most other summons. For reference, you could summon a Greater Elemental for just 30 mana more. Overall a strong spell, just one that must be taken with a grain of salt.


Tier IV Tactical Spell (Unit Enchantment), 380 Research, 15 Mana
Gives target creature -60% Weakness to all damage types for 3 turns.


This spell is easily the Jewel in Wild Magic Adept's crown. While not as potent as Wreck, this spell is far more flexible, and comes in an Adept sphere rather than a Mastery. 60% more damage from all sources is incredibly powerful in the right circumstances, and can turn even powerful heroes into pincushions for your Tier I archers. Furthermore, the 60% weakness works on non-damaging abilities, too; your Stuns, Charms, and Debuffs are all far more likely to succeed on a Degenerated target. The added benefit of being able to normalize a unit's elemental immunities, making that fire-immune dragon now susceptible to your fire units (Though still quite resistant to them), is just icing on the cake. A very nice spell, and one that has plenty of uses even for players lacking much elemental damage (Though a wide variety of damage channels makes it even better). While it was nerfed to only have a 3-turn duration, this is overall a very minor drawback. If you find yourself unable to kill your target within that time, you probably wouldn't have been able to do it at all.


While very tactically-focused, Wild Magic Adept feels very fleshed out, and its spells cover a wide variety of circumstances. However, all of its spells are very high-variance, and are much less simple to use than just throwing a fireball or buffing up a unit. That being said, I personally find it a very fun and interesting school, and it provides quite a bit of flexibility in terms of what its spells are capable of.

Notable Synergies:
• Warlord (Degenerate, Swap Locations, and even Warp Equipment give you more ways to make use of your units' exceptional combat abilities. Furthermore, Summon Lesser Elemental + Global Assault upgrades all of your Lesser Elementals into Greater Elementals, which can be terrifying to behold)

The first of a new series of alignment based faction spheres introduced in Eternal Lords, the Keepers are a throwback to the good guys from the original Age of Wonders, which I think is a rather neat touch. They strive to have everyone united peacefully, and have plenty of tricks to deal with anyone who disagrees.

• Good-aligned faction
  
• Heavy emphasis on Morale effects
  
• Buffs allied troops in various ways

Tier I Empire Upgrade, Free
You have an additional +75 relation with Independent Cities


Originally an unlisted side effect of Folk Hero, Mediator is now the initial bonus given to the Peacekeepers. While a small bonus, it ensures that many cities will start off one stage happier with you when you first encounter them; untrusting cities will trust you, and trusting cities will love you. Overall just makes the gears of the Keeper's gameplan move that little bit smoother, as you will become friends with everyone just a little bit faster. It dovetails nicely into Bearer of Light in the Mastery sphere, and also can be stacked with Folk Hero and Courtesan Ambassadors to be everybody's pal from the word Go.

Tier II Tactical Spell (Unit Enchantment), 120 Research, 10 Mana
Target friendly unit gains 100% protection to all types of damage but cannot move or act for 2 turns.

Where most spheres would get a damage spell or unit buff, Keeper Adept gets a very unique get out of jail free card for your troops. If a unit is caught out of position, or is very low on life in a dangerous situation, Safeguard lets you remove it from combat for a few turns. Additionally, you can continue healing or buffing it while it's guarded, meaning when it returns it can be in top fighting shape. This spell has a few other clever uses, as well; moving a low-tier unit into a choke point and then dropping a Safeguard on him essentially seals off that entrance, forcing enemies to go around or wait out the spell while you bombard them with arrows from the other side. That being said, while this spell is very handy, it has no real offensive functions beyond throwing a valuable unit into an otherwise losing battle then Safeguarding them once they get low. Also, while 100% protection is immunity in most cases, it does not account for any weaknesses that unit may have. Safeguarding an Elven unit leaves it only 80% protected from Blight; a Goblin can still walk up and poke them to death through the gap in their shield.

Tier II Strategic Spell (City Enchantment), 140 Research, 60 Mana + 5 per Turn
All units produced or summoned in target friendly city gain Meditate and become Dedicated to Good. Researching this spell will make your Leader and Heroes Dedicated to Good.

Similar to the Elemental Sphere's enchantments related to Terrain types, each of the three new Alignment Factions has a set of spells for making your units Dedicated to their respective alignments, and granting them bonuses for the privilege. Plus, since these spells are all very cheap and difficult to disjunct, it’s quite easy to spread them all over your empire. Dedicated to Good by itself does nothing; it means Good Slayer units will deal more damage to you, it means your troops will get upset and lose morale if you start turning Evil, and means Festivals of Light are more powerful for your troops. The other half of this spell, Meditate, lets all your units get a random buff at the start of every battle: +3 Physical damage, +3 Fire or Holy damage, +3 Defense, or +2 Resistance. While none of these benefits are massively powerful, they do give your troops quite a bit of extra power or resilience against many enemies, the undead in particular, and are quite useful on low-tier units. This spell is much more important if you also take Keeper Mastery, but even on it's own can prove surprisingly useful.

Tier III Strategic Spell (City Enchantment), 240 Research, 80 Mana + 20 per Turn
Target enemy city suffers -500 Morale and is more likely to betray its owner. Additionally, betrayals can happen regardless of overall Race happiness. Independent, Vassal, and Undead cities are unaffected.

One of the nastiest spells in the entire Keeper arsenal, it allows you to effectively trigger a city betrayal event whenever you want. Added in 1.5 with the new Racial Governance mechanics, a betrayal will normally happen if a city is both A) very unhappy or rebellious, and B) is a race that is happier with you than with their owner. Rally entirely removes the second requirement to betrayals, meaning anyone unhappy will be willing to betray their ruler to join your side. Betrayal fights are hilariously stacked in your favor, and so long as you can reasonably fight your opponent are essentially impossible to lose. All the city gates are destroyed from the beginning of the fight, all enemy units have a massive -600 morale penalty from being betrayed, and every turn two random units spawn under your control to help in the fight. These can be any units the city could produce, meaning you could get anything from basic infantry to Manticore Riders. Lastly, a city that betrays its ruler will join you instantly once you win the fight, rather than needing a lengthy absorb time. Overall, this is the Keeper's ultimate answer to siege battles, and greatly boosts your odds in your favor once you finally go on the offensive.

Tier III Tactical Spell (Instant), 220 Research, 15 Mana
Your units do not suffer from morale penalties until the end of combat


Another fantastic Keeper spell, this one is of particular interest to highly morale dependent armies but is still a great tool for anyone to have access to with the possible exception of Necromancers. This removes almost all morale penalties from your units, and prevents new ones from being applied. Fighting in a blighted wasteland? Cursed by the undead? Betrayed by your own city? Are you just literally on fire? Don't care! Furthermore, since this spell is an Instant rather than a Battlefield Enchantment, it can't be disjuncted; only dispelled from specific units. A very handy spell in a large variety of situations, and at 15 mana is quite affordable even if your leader isn't present on the battlefield.

Overall, Keeper Adept is a surprisingly useful sphere of magic. It's provides a lot of different tools that aren't really available anywhere else. And while I would recommend taking Keeper Mastery alongside it, all of it's spells are quite useful on their own merits; there's no reason you couldn't just take it on its own. One minor note; each of the three Factions are mutually exclusive. Taking Keeper Adept locks you out of both the Shadowborn and the Grey Guard, and vice versa.

Notable Synergies:
• Halfling (Halflings are notoriously vulnerable to morale effects; they hate almost every climate and drop like flies without their Luck backing them up. Bolster is an invaluable spell to them)
  
• Rogue (It might seem strange, but a faction of evil shadow mafiosos pairs quite well with the Peacekeepers. Rally the Populace + Incite Revolt will bring any city to its knees, and Courtesan Ambassadors + Mediator means every independant city will be begging to join your side)

While Shadowborn and Peacekeeper are strong, cut and dry playstyles, Grey Guard is by far my favorite in both flavor and mechanics. It emphasizes a true neutral playstyle, demanding you balance both good and evil within your empire, and often times leads to very interesting decisions where you must declare war on one faction in order to broker peace with another, or peacefully absorbing a neutral town only to immediately migrate out it's entire populace. It's a fun but challenging twist on the alignment mechanics, and is also quite strong mechanically, making it well worth the effort.

• Neutral-aligned Faction
  
• Boosts offense and defense of units, Opposes summoning and the undead
  
• No active combat abilities or summons; highly passive

Tier I Empire Upgrade, Free
As long as your leader is Neutral, all your cities gain +50 Population growth (+25 if a Necromancer)

At best, this means all of your cities will upgrade one, maybe two turns sooner than otherwise. While not a very impressive bonus on it's own, it's free in all of your cities and requires little input on your part beyond remaining neutral.


Tier II Strategic Spell (City Enchantment), 140 Research, 60 Mana + 5 per Turn
All units produced and summoned in target city are 100% more likely to deal critical damage and become Dedicated to Neutral. Researching this spell makes your Leader and Heroes Dedicated to Neutral

Unlike Dedicated to Good and Dedicated to Evil, Dedicated to Neutral is only affected by Grey Guard abilities. Dedicated to Neutral units suffer increasingly large morale penalties if your leader becomes too good or too evil, making this spell the most difficult to manage of the three alignment enchantments. However, in my opinion, it is also the most powerful of the three. Having all of your units crit twice as often is crazy powerful, and unlike Life stealing applies to Ranged attacks as well as Melee. Additionally, this does stack with other effects that boost Crits, such as Killer Instinct from Destruction Adept and the Tigran Tier V Military Upgrade. Keep in mind, though; not being neutral makes your units unhappy, which means they won't crit anymore. Grey Guard is a lot stricter about your alignment than the other two Faction Specializations.


Tier III Empire Upgrade, 160 Research
All enemy Fey, Summoned, Undead, and Magical Origin creatures slain in battle provide your leader with +5 Casting Points. Undying and Ghouled units do not trigger this effect.

With all the undead and magical units running around the world map, this upgrade gets a surprising amount of use at all stages of the game. The extra casting points you earn from killing unnatural units work just like world map pickups; they remain on your leader until used, and can push you above your maximum casting limit. Being able to recharge your casting batteries mid-fight is a game changer for a lot of classes, and this upgrade is great fun when you are matched against Druids, Sorcerers, and Necromancers. Ironically, this ability is extremely valuable to casting classes despite being meant to counter them, but every class can make good use of Essence Harvest. It's just good!


Tier III Empire Upgrade, 200 Research
The time it takes to Absorb a city is cut by 50%, rounded up


With Cardinal Culling being nerfed into a Mastery spell, Voluntary Union now fills it's shoes, and honestly is a lot more useful now that it appears earlier in your spellbook. A nice dynamic between the three factions is each has a unique upgrade that boosts their specific way of adding cities to their empire; Keepers love Vassals, Shadowborn love to Migrate, and Guard love to Absorb. I’ll admit it’s not the most exciting passive, but when you play Grey Guard you will very quickly realize how much of a luxury being able to migrate or vassal (Let alone pillage or raze) a city really is. Both options send your alignment flying all over the place, which will then make your units unhappy and turn off all of your wonderful passives and bonus crits. Usually the absorb action takes 4-6 turns; being able to cut that down to 2-3 makes claiming and defending captured cities much less of a burden. It's no Cardinal Culling, but it's not bad either.


Tier IV Strategic Spell (World Enchantment), 400 Research, 100 Mana + 20perTurn
All your units gain +1 Resistance, unless flanked. All your Dedicated to Neutral units gain an additional +2 Defense, unless flanked.

Unique among the Alignment Factions, the Grey Guard gets access to it's World Enchantment in the Adept sphere, rather than the Mastery sphere. Naturally it is also the weakest of the three, but getting access to it early on is quite handy. Essentially it grants all of your Neutral units a Shield, even if they already had one, and gives extra resistance to all your units. It's not really a gamechanging bonus, but all that defense adds up. Especially on already tanky units like Dwarves, this bonus on top of all your other upgrades can make your Axemen and Firstborn a nightmare to kill. Just keep in mind, the bonus only works if you aren't flanked. If you overextend or get hit with crowd control effects, the bonus will vanish, leaving you no better off than a regular unit.


While far less of a must-have with the loss of Cardinal Culling, Grey Guard Adept is still quite useful for an adept sphere. A lot of the synergies are self-contained, including everything benefitting Dedicated to Neutral, and literally all of it's abilities are passive upgrades and enchantments. Unlike Shadowborn and Peacekeeper, Grey Guard Mastery is more of a suggestion than a demand; you could take it, but it's separate and different enough that you don't feel forced to do so. That being said, playing true neutral is tricky even in the best of times. Vassaling and Migrating cities becomes a luxury rather than the norm, you will end up checking your alignment every time independants try to flee from your armies, and you will hate it every time someone sends you a peace treaty. Such is the way of the Grey Guard.

Notable Synergies:
• Tigrans, Orcs (Both of these races are highly aggressive, relying on overwhelming burst damage to make up for their overall low defenses. Scales of Fortune is quite valuable to them - and stacks with the Tigran Military V upgrade! - and Shield of Dispassion helps dull their weaknesses somewhat)
  
• Dwarves (Conversely, Dwarves are highly defensive and prefer to wear down their opponents through attrition. Shield of Dispassion works great with all of your shielded, armored, Defensive Striking units, and Cardinal Culling both weakens your enemies' attacks and makes your axes and heavy crossbows surprisingly dangerous)
  
• Halflings (Halflings are very fragile, deal lots of physical damage, and focus heavily on having High Morale, meaning they can easily take advantage of Grey Guard benefits)
  
• Dreadnought, Warlord, Theocrat (All three of these classes produce large quantities of troops and have many ways to boost their units' morale, which goes along with the Grey Guard methodology. In particular, both Warlord and Dreadnought have powerful troops that deal massive amounts of physical damage, meaning Scales of Fortune and Cardinal Culling, if you also take Grey Guard Mastery, are quite useful to them)

On the opposite end of the spectrum from the peace-loving Keepers, you have the cartoonishly evil Shadowborn, whose only goals are to sow havoc and cause mayhem. Shadowborn Adept provides a decent selection of spells, but they might leave you wanting for more.

• Evil-aligned Faction
  
• Cheaper and stronger melee troops
  
• Emphasis on Life Draining and Debuffs

Tier I Empire Upgrade, Free
Pikemen and Infantry cost 5% less to produce


I think it's a nice touch that a lot of these abilities are named after the classic God-Wizards from the older games. Karissa's Rally isn't a very large cost reduction, but has a lot of important caveats. First, cost reductions make units faster to build as well as cheaper; getting infantry out in one turn rather than two turns is a huge advantage, and this gets you closer to doing just that. Second, cost reduction effects are additive; a Goblin Shadowborn Warlord can produce infantry units at a whopping 35% discount

Tier II Strategic Spell (City Enchantment), 130 Research, 60 Mana + 5 per Turn
All units produced and summoned within target city's borders become Dedicated to Evil and gain Life Stealing. Researching this spell will make your Leader and Heroes Dedicated to Evil.

It's good to be bad. The main benefit to having your soldiers and summons join the dark side is giving all of them Life stealing, which has always been very useful for both keeping units alive in combat as well as reducing how much they need to heal up between fights. A particularly cute thing to note is that even Machines can gain these benefits; having Lifestealing Golems rampaging across the battlefield is truly something special. Additionally, it makes your units Dedicated to Evil, which mostly matters in regards to many spells in Shadowborn Mastery. However, they will get upset if they see you going soft; even just being Neutral gives all your Dedicated to Evil units -200 morale, so make sure to only really invest in this spell once you're a card carrying villain. This is overall a fantastic ability, and one of the big selling points of Shadowborn Adept.

Tier II Strategic Spell (City Enchantment), 140 Research, 10 Mana + 5 per Turn
No player can advance their diplomatic state with target independant city or dwelling. It will not offerany quests, and all active quests are cancelled and instantly fail.

Seed of Distrust is a fairly situational enchantment. In theory, it can be used to deny cities from do-gooder pacifists by making them incredibly paranoid of all players. It also costs barely any mana to cast or maintain, meaning it's very easy to spread around to cities you haven't gotten around to invading yet. That being said, In a large number of cases you need to act fast to really get use out of this spell. Dedicated Peacekeepers can become friends with a city very quickly, so if you intend to use this you need to beat them to the punch. Against everyone else, it's more of a nuisance; it stops friendly interactions, but not simply kicking down the doors and conquering the city.

Tier III Tactical Spell (Instant), 200 Research, 8 Mana
Calls down Black Lightning, which deals 5 Shock / 5 Spirit damage and has a chance to inflict Spirit Breaking

Emperor Palpatine would be proud. As a damage spell, Black Lightning leaves a lot to be desired; it does less damage than the other Adept damage spells, and being split across multiple channels is both a blessing and a curse in terms of overall damage inflicted. The real value of this spell is Spirit Breaking, a massive -600 morale penalty and -2 Resistance for 3 turns that works on a surprising amount of enemy units; and since the debuff has a massive 16 Res save, it is very likely going to stick to even the most resolute of targets. Even undead can have their Spirit broken, making this one of the rare ways to demoralize the undead. Overall it's a nice spell to have for picking off weak targets or softening up a stronger enemy before hitting them with crowd control effects like Charm or Stun, but I doubt you'll be blown away by it..


Tier III Tactical Spell (Battlefield Enchantment), 220 Research, 20 Mana
Whenever an (Enemy) unit dies, the unit that killed it is healed for 15


Adding to the Shadowborn's love of life stealing, Gift of Nekron curses all of your foes into living health pickups for your troops. And despite the vague spell description, it only affects your enemies. A decent battlefield spell, combined with all your Life stealing troops this greatly increases the survival rate of your troops on the battlefield. That being said, it's not quite as simple to use as something like Healing Showers; you need to figure out who you want to get healed, and ensure they land the killing blow on an enemy unit.

Overall, Shadowborn Adept is a solid sphere for agressive early game strategies, specifically for marching over your neighbors with a swarm of cheap life stealing infantry. Keep in mind, life steal only works on melee strikes; if you plan on leveraging the most out of this sphere, pick a race or class with solid infantry and pikes that you plan to use a lot of. That being said, personally I feel this sphere is quite lacking on it's own. If you pick Shadowborn Adept, I highly recommend also taking Shadowborn Mastery.

Notable Synergies:
• Tigran (Prowlers were such a good Tier I infantry that they got bumped up to Tier II. With the first Tigran Military Governance upgrade and Shadowborn, you can produce Prowlers with Lifestealing for a mere 52 gold, and large teams of buffed Prowlers are incredibly dangerous)
  
• Warlord, Theocrat, Dreadnought (Of the production centric classes, Warlords are by far the most melee-focused and have very few options for healing their troops in the field. Giving all of their powerful units Life Stealing is pure gravy, in addition to cheaper Berserkers and Gift of Nekron. Theocrats and Dreadnoughts are also good choices as Crusaders and Golems can both take advantage of Life stealing to increase their durability)

The Master Spheres are far more powerful than their Adept counterparts, providing end-game abilities and summons, many of which being just as if not more powerful than their class counterparts. Naturally, this power comes at a price; many of these spells will take dozens of turns to research, meaning gaining access to all of them is a lengthy endeavor. In addition, because you have to pick their Adept Sphere to unlock a Master Sphere, they technically cost two of your three picks. This makes them more expensive, as well as exclusive - you can only have one.

Tier 1 Empire Upgrade, Free
Air Nodes generate an additional +5 Research; Earth nodes generate -5 Mana Less.

Tier I Strategic Spell (Instant), Free, 60 Mana
Transforms a standard Mana Node into an Air Node, which provides an additional +5 Mana and +5 Research.

A recent change to the game added new passive upgrades to every single sphere in the game. All of the Elemental Mastery spheres (Again, with the exception of Wild Magic and the Alignment Factions) gained their own version of the two spells listed above. While the Affinity bonus is very nice to have, on its own it would be rather useless for the same reason the adept passives were once quite lackluster; it's hard to ensure that you have a node of your element under your control during the point where the extra mana and research would be the most useful. Similarly, it's highly unlikely that the penalty will cost you any significant amount of mana in most of your games; it's more there as a throwback to the classic games, where the Elemental Spheres directly opposed one another and learning to use one hurt your ability to use it's rival. The transform spell, however, makes this much easier to accomplish. While elemental nodes still spawn in the world, around players starting locations you instead find unaligned mana nodes, which you can immediately convert for an extra boost to your mana and research. It's not much, but every little bit helps early on.

Fire Mastery is a fairly straightforward school, largely focusing on the extreme power of Hellfire by giving you units and enchantments that help you take advantage of it.

• Powerful battlefield AoE damage
  
• Fire Immunity enchantment
  
• Aggressive Combat Summon

Tier IV Tactical Spell (Unit Enchantment), 350 Research, 7 Mana
Target Friendly Unit gains 100% Fire Resistance and +2 Fire Damage

While the +2 Fire damage can add up over multiple attacks (And works on ranged attacks, too!), the real value of this spell is in making a unit fire immune. Given how many units deal fire as a substantial portion of their damage, Fire Halo is a good choice for tackling dangerous enemies like Flame Tanks, Fire Elementals, or large groups of Draconians. This also pairs very well with Hellfire if you want to make sure a high value unit survives the blast in one piece. Not the most flexible or powerful buff in the world, but at only 7 mana it's easy to cast whenever you feel the urge.


Tier IV Strategic Spell (World Enchantment), 350 Research, 80 Mana + 40 per Turn
Tropical Terrain spreads out from the caster's Empire

The obvious use for Tropical Empire is to pair it with Sun Domain, giving all of your cities high morale for all those wonderful production bonuses and festivals. However, the conversion doesn't stop at your domain borders; it will continue to spread from your territory so long as the spell is active, meaning any other players who settle near you will suffer penalties for doing so (Unless they themselves like tropical). You can even use this aggressively, as it spreads from any domain you control, meaning building a fortress or city near your opponents will rapidly turn all their territory into sand. Just keep in mind that unless your race naturally enjoys tropical weather, all of your units will suffer morale penalties if they venture away from your Sun Domain spells; It's best used with races like Draconians or Tigrans, who naturally can take the heat.


Tier VI Strategic Spell (Summon), 700 Research, 150 Mana + 18 per Turn
Summons a Fire Elemental, a Tier III Floating Magical Elemental

The Fire Elemental is a melee powerhouse designed to charge in and crack some skulls. He is the least beefy of the elementals, having the lowest health and defense with only Fire and Blight immunity to back it up. But the rewards are phenomenal; very high damage and both Scorching Heat and Immolation will ruin the day of anyone he hits, tanking their morale, defense, and attack values. Meanwhile, Fire Aura and Explosive Death will make attacking him in melee a painful endeavor. Lastly, Sprint lets the elemental slip past the enemy frontline to kill a valuable target, or retreat safely from a bad position. This combination of skills makes them great shock troopers, though in my experience they tend to not live very long. If you can manage to keep them alive, they become even stronger at Elite where they learn Charge and Killing Momentum, letting them mulch through low to mid-tier units with ease. Still, keep in mind that the vast majority of its damage is fire-aligned; fire immune units can completely ignore you. Additionally, 100% Frost weakness is absolutely devastating, and although Frost damage is still somewhat rare, it's more common than it once was. Beware of Shadow Stalkers, Frost Elementals, Frostlings, anything with Frost Aura, and the Undead in general, as while you kill them extremely quickly, the reverse is also true.


Tier VII Tactical Spell (Instant), 2500 Research, 50 Mana
Deals 30 Damage to all Walls and 50 Fire Damage to all Units on the Battlefield.

This spell is the real reason you pick Fire Mastery. Given that only a few classes have access to battlefield-destroying magic, Hellfire serves quite a few people well by letting you eradicate entire armies of Tier I and II units in one fell swoop. While this damage does hit friend and foe alike, the caster has a better opportunity to respond to it by tactically casting Fire Halo or Skin of Oil beforehand to decide who lives and dies, or by strategically bringing Fire Immune units like Dwarven Firstborn and Forge-Priests, Draconians, Fire Elementals, and Hellhounds to the fight, giving them a strong force remaining once the smoke clears. Furthermore, while this spell won't destroy stone or wooden walls on its own, it will greatly soften them for any siege weaponry (or more Hellfires) that you might have lying around. A new feature of Hellfire in v1.5 is it now has collateral damage in city fights, horribly injuring the city and making them very upset. Given that you are hopefully winning a city fight that you are casting Hellfire in, this does have the side effect of making it much less productive once you've conquered it and angering everyone else of that race, so try not to scorch anyone you care about.


Unlike its Adept brother, Fire Mastery is not very flexible. It wants you to cast Hellfires to blow things to smithereens, and gives you some extra toys to work alongside that strategy. It is, however, a very nice strategy. If you want to play with fire, and don't mind getting burned now and then, Fire Mastery is a great choice.

Notable Synergies:
• Draconians (Inherent fire resistance and Dragon Ancestry make Draconians ideal for pairing with Hellfire)
  
• Dwarves (While not generally as fire resistant as Draconians, the Firstborn are completely fire immune, and Forge Priests are not only immune to fire, but can bless your other units to keep them safe as well)

While not as grandiose or devastating as the Fire or Earth spheres, Water Mastery provides a very tactical selection of spells that are cheaper to cast and more flexible than most other Mastery Spheres.

• Good AoE damage and healing options
  
• Situational Terrain control
  
• Defensive combat summon

Tier IV Strategic Spell (Instant), 350 Research, 60 Mana
Target Hex and a 2 Hex radius around it are converted to Wetlands, and Volcanic Terrain becomes Temperate.

While cleansing Volcanic terrain is situationally useful, the main effect of this spell is converting everything in its radius into wetlands. As wetlands cost 6 movement rather than the usual 4, this ends up slowing down movement through it somewhat. The real benefit of this spell is for Goblin players, who gain massive benefits for fighting in wetland terrain (Namely improved regeneration, boosted morale, and increased movement speed). It also has some marginal use in getting rid of Volcanic terrain, which most races (Except Draconians, Tigrans, and Dwarves) hate. If you're playing goblins this is quite a useful little spell, but for everyone else is of little use besides annoying your opponents.


Tier IV Tactical Spell (Instant), 400 Research, 15 Mana
Summons Healing Rain over Target Hex and a 2 Hex radius around it, healing all living units for +20HP and removing Fire Buffs and Debuffs.

Costing only 5 more mana than Holy Cure, Healing Showers is capable of healing entire stacks at once, significantly increasing your troops' lifespan. A nice side bonus is the removal of Fire magic, clearing Fire Halos and Guardian Flames off of your opponents and extinguishing any of your troops that are Immolated, Scorched, or Oiled. Keep in mind though, this spell doesn't distinguish friend from foe and has a deceptively large radius; you can heal your opponents' units just as easily as your own.


Tier V Tactical Spell (Instant), 750 Research, 20 Mana
Target Hex and a 2 Hex radius around it take 20 Physical and 5 Frost Damage from falling hailstones

While it can't destroy walls like it used to in the older games, Great Hail has a surprisingly large radius for a combat spell, letting it deal a shocking amount of damage to clustered groups of enemies. Furthermore, it only costs 20 mana, making it very spammable in large battles. While it may not be as visually impressive as Earthquake or Hellfire, it can have just as large an impact on the battlefield, and it is much easier to use without hurting your own troops.


Tier VI Strategic Spell (Summon), 700 Research, 150 Mana + 18 per Turn
Summons a Frost Elemental, a Tier III Floating Magical Elemental

Out of all the elementals, Frost are one of the weirder ones with a very eclectic selection of traits. They have amazingly high defenses, with Defender, Projectile Resistance, and Defensive Strike at Bronze. Furthermore, they have a ludicrous number of status effects they can dish out, including Inflict Freeze, Inflict Chilling, Inflict Frostbite, and Frost Aura, meaning anyone that engages them in melee is likely to have a very bad day. However, their Frost immunity is offset by weaknesses to Fire and Physical, making them incredibly brittle tanks against most strong melee opponents. The end result is the ultimate gambler's unit; if they get into melee, something is dying, and most likely nobody is getting off easy regardless of who wins. That being said, their high defenses means they are great units for "aggressive parking", IE: moving next to a nasty opponent and camping in guard mode. The enemy is then forced to either provoke an Opportunity Attack, or attack into their wall of stats and most likely lose. If you can keep them alive they will rack up a ludicrous kill count, and once they hit Elite their weaknesses start to evaporate. Personally I am a big fan of these guys, and everyone should give them a spin at least once. Just be careful; fighting Draconians usually means whoever hits first wins, and both Necromancers and Frostlings are quite good at dealing with their shenanigans.


With three highly useful spells and one situational tool, Water Mastery is similar to Fire Adept; it doesn't have any one school-defining spell, but all of its spells are very good to have in your arsenal. The real question is if you feel its spells are worth two of your three specialist picks.

Notable Synergies:
• Goblins (Drench the Land feels like a spell designed specifically for Goblins, as few others will get much use from it)
  
• Frostlings (While you are doubling down on your weaknesses, you are also taking advantage of your strengths; Frost Elementals and Great Hail hit that much harder with your Chilling supports greatly lowering their defense and frost resistance.)
  
• Warlord (Tireless is incredibly potent on Frost elementals, which Warlords leaders and heroes can provide via Relentless Army)

Very much like it's Adept variant, Earth Mastery is a very strong selection of spells that are all powerful, if not very flexible.

• Battlefield AoE damage
  
• Crippling unit debuff
  
• Slow but Tanky Summon

Tier IV Tactical Spell (Unit Enchantment), 350 Research, 10 Mana
Target Enemy Unit has its movement radius halved until end of combat, and cannot use Attacks of Opportunity or Retaliate.

Slow is a very nasty debuff. Not only do you cripple a unit's movement speed, but because action points are tied to your movement, you severely limit how many attacks it can make each turn if it wants to move at all. Because of this, a slowed target can very easily be picked apart by almost any unit at range and can do very little to stop it. As if that wasn't bad enough, it also prevents the target from threatening or retaliating against any of your units; casting slow on a tough melee enemy before rushing it with your units is incredibly effective. Slow gives you the ability to remove most threats from the battlefield; and since it only costs 10 mana, it is very easy to cast multiple times per fight.


Tier V Strategic Spell (Summon), 700 Research, 150 Mana + 18 per Turn
Summons an Earth Elemental, a Tier III Floating Magical Elemental

Earth Elementals are, and have always been, rediculously good at their job; some things never change. Let's get the bad news out of the way; earth elementals are sloooow. 28 move and floating means they barely keep pace with basic infantry. Plus, their 60% vulnerability to Blight and Shock means Goblins and Sorcerers eat them alive. However, against literally everything else Earth Elementals are very capable units. 20 damage per hit is significant, and between Defender, Regrowth, Crippling wounds, complete immunity to both Fire and Frost, and 40% Physical Protection, Earth Elementals are very tough to kill and difficult to escape from once engaged. Your enemies are almost forced to dedicate entire stacks to wiping them out, otherwise they will simply regenerate any damage they take. And they only get better with medals; Petrifying touch at bronze gives them a fantastic crowd control ability, and Tireless at gold means they can crush hordes of low-tier units under their rocky fists. Overall, they are arguably the strongest of the elementals, if not one of the strongest summons in the game.

Also, they still float around for some reason. Hey, I'm not gonna argue with them.


Tier V Strategic Spell (Instant), 800 Research, 100 Mana
Kills 20% of Target Enemy City's Population and destroys 1 random City Upgrade

Assuming you don't have the forces to conquer a well-defended city, this is a potential alternative. Killing 20% of the population does little to a town or village, but will rapidly cripple the output of a large city or metropolis, shrinking its size and giving it a large penalty to all income and production until it recovers. More importantly, destroying random city upgrades can cripple unit production, drastically lower morale, or remove its walls entirely, making an invasion a much simpler prospect. The downside is it's a slow and very expensive way of dealing with a city; every turn you spend casting a quake is another summoned unit or tactical spell you could have cast instead. Also, City Quake deals no damage to the city's garrisoned troops, who will still be at full health once you do feel like engaging them. Shockingly, City Quake does not lower the target city's happiness or your approval rating with that city's race. I guess nobody minds horrible natural disasters decimating entire cities? Overall, a decent but rather inelegant spell.

Tier VII Tactical Spell (Instant), 2500 Research, 50 Mana
A devastating earthquake deals 60 Damage to all Walls and 40 Damage to all Units on the Battlefield. Flying units and Floating units are immune.

Much like Hellfire, Earthquake is a powerful tool for dealing with hordes of low tier enemies. While it deals less damage to units, all of that damage is physical, which is overall a good thing. Physical resistance tends to be much rarer than Elemental resistances, and high defense matters much less against a single strong attack than it does against many smaller ones. Furthermore, 60 damage will heavily damage stone walls and instantly destroy wooden ones, making this an incredible siege breaker. The downside is all flying and floating units are immune, which is a much larger group of enemies than you might think, including many of the most dangerous Tier III and IV units. That being said, this also includes your own heroes if you can give them floating or flying mounts, as well as Earth Elementals, their mysterious ability to hover making them a perfect complement to Earthquake. When combined with an airborne force, Earthquake changes from a powerful if situational tool to a highly destructive siege weapon. Just keep in mind, Earthquake got the exact same treatment that Hellfire did; casting it in a city fight will decimate it's population and make everybody very upset. Given that you are probably casting it on a city you plan to take over, you're going to have to deal with the consequences of that. But personally, that's a drawback I can get behind.


Just like Earth Adept, the sheer value present in Earth Mastery makes it a no-brainer pick if you simply want a valuable selection of spells. You may not want to use all of them all the time, but all of them are powerful in their own right and very usable in almost any style of play.

Notable Synergies:
• Elves, Draconians, Tigrans (All three races have flying racial Tier III units, letting them avoid Earthquakes; Draconians get special mention for also having flying pikemen. While Halflings also fill this role, their innate physical weakness means anything that doesn't fly is going to get pasted.)
  
• Sorcerer (Sorcerer and Master of Earth are a perfect fit for one another. Sorcerers have the casting points to really put these powerful spells to use, and all that physical damage fills a gap in the sorcerer's highly elemental lineup. Did I mention that every one of your class units can fly? Even Apprentices float now, if you can rank them up. Earth Wizard Supremacy!)
  
• Theocrat, Rogue (Both classes have Tier III and IV units that fly or float, making their late game armies pair quite well with Earthquake as an offensive tool. This combined with the Theocrat and Rogue's lack of AoE damage and summoning spells makes Earth Mastery quite a useful tool in their respective arsenals)
  
• Archdruid (The Wild Hunt gives all units Floating, which while quite an expensive combination of spells means your entire army is immune to Earthquake, letting you cast it at will)

Air Mastery, while having very useful spells, heavily rewards the use of specific units and strategies, making it not quite as flexible as the other elemental masteries.

• Powerful unit buff
  
• Anti-ranged battlefield enchantment
  
• Mobile Skirmisher Summon

Tier IV Strategic Spell (World Enchantment), 350 Research, 80 Mana + 40 per Turn
Arctic Terrain gradually spreads from the caster's Empire

Arctic Empire is identical to Tropical Empire, both in terms of functionality and usability - Use it to ensure all your arctic-loving cities are happy, and to disadvantage any enemies close to your empire. Naturally, this spell is of particular interest to the Frostlings, who enjoy living in Arctic climates, and gain movement speed and concealment while moving through snow and ice. That being said, those benefits are probably not worth taking an entire mastery sphere for just one spell, especially since Frostlings are almost guaranteed to start in an Arctic biome on most random maps. I would advise you look at the other three spells first and decide if they're of use to your Frostling leader before taking Air Mastery.


Tier IV Tactical Spell (Unit Enchantment), 400 Reserach, 10 Mana
Target Friendly Unit has its movement radius doubled until end of combat and is immune to Attacks of Opportunity

The equal and opposite spell to Slow, Haste is just as useful for melee units as Seeker is for ranged units. Haste reduces the number of movement points spent per hex down to 3, meaning a 28-movement unit goes from travelling 4 hexes per turn to 9, more than doubling their movement range. Hasted units can move further without expending their action points, meaning they can make more attacks once they get to their destination. Also, while Hasted you are immune to enemy attacks of opportunity, making flank attacks incredibly trivial. While Slow is arguably a more powerful effect, Haste is quite easy to take advantage of regardless of battlefield situations. And even if it gets dispelled, you can just cast it again; 10 mana is incredibly cheap for a spell this useful.


Tier V Strategic Spell (Summon), 700 Research, 150 Mana + 18 per Turn
Summons an Air Elemental, a Tier III Floating Magical Elemental

Similar to Frost Elementals, Air Elementals need a bit of finesse to get the most out of them. Air elementals are fast, moving as quick as cavalry and having both Phase and Floating to let them zip around the battlefield unimpeded. However, despite 40% Physical Protection and Immunity to Blight and Shock, Air elementals have little in the way of defense and resistance. Inflict Shocking and Inflict Stun are strong in tandem, but the low chance to trigger makes them unreliable at best, meaning you have to use good positioning and support to prevent your elementals from being overwhelmed. If you can get them to Gold they also gain Static Shield, making them much tougher combatants, but with 60% Fire and Frost weakness they can die extremely quickly against Frostlings and Draconians. Overall, Air Elementals are strong combatants, but not quite as easy to use as Earth Elementals; they are best served dueling single melee opponents, or using their high mobility to harass vulnerable heroes and archers away from the front lines.


Tier V Tactical Spell (Battlefield Enchantment), 800 Research, 20 Mana
All ranged attacks (Including yours) suffer a -8 Strength penalty

Much like Earthquake and Hellfire, Wind Ward is a spell you have to plan around to truly make useful. Unlike Earthquake and Hellfire, this spell won't win you battles on its own. And as useful as ranged units are, not every enemy army uses a lot of them, making this spell a lot more situational. With that out of the way, -8 strength to all ranged damage channels is ruinous; archers and support units might as well just give up and go home, and even muskets get turned into crossbows with a reload time. If you plan on playing a melee-centric army, or your opponent is stacking hordes of archers behind their walls, Wind Ward is a very potent spell, if a bit more subtle than its destructive counterparts.


Air Mastery is an interesting collection of spells. It heavily favors melee combat, letting you get in close faster while shrugging off ranged fire. This means the school is somewhat situational, but also means those situated to take advantage of it can reap great rewards. Overall a similar school to Water Mastery; not very flashy, but still quite strong on its own merits.

Notable Synergies:
• Orcs, Dwarves (Both races lack high-quality ranged units and produce very good melee fighters, synergizing quite well with both Haste and Wind Ward. Tigrans also fall into this realm, but their hatred of Arctic climates makes Arctic Empire significantly worse for them.)
  
• Frostlings (Given that every Frostling unit gains significant benefits for being in Arctic climates, Air Mastery is a very useful spell to them.)
  
• Warlord, Theocrat (Both the Warlord and the Theocrat emphasize melee units and have little to no summoning inherently, making Wind Ward, Haste, and the Air Elemental very useful tools in their arsenal)
  
• Necromancer (The only truly ranged unit in the Necromancer's arsenal is the Reanimator, meaning Wind Ward and Haste are handy to have. Necromancers already have a good number of summons and Air Elementals cannot be made undead, but they still give a bit of flexibility to what kinds of damage you can bring to a fight.)

Creation Mastery is a largely reactive selection of defensive combat spells. While all of them are useful, they heavily reward the use of specific units and fighting specific enemies; often times you may not want or be able to cast them.

• Creation spells make you more Good when cast
  
• Opposes summoning and unnatural units
  
• Can bring units back from death

Tier IV Strategic Spell (World Enchantment), 350 Research, 80 Mana + 40 per Turn, +25 Alignment
Temperate Terrain gradually spreads out from your Empire.

Given that every race likes Temperate terrain, this is the least offensive of the four Climate Empire spells, leaving it's only use in bolstering your own cities. Furthermore, given the presence of Cleanse the Land, this spell seems a bit redundant outside of being easier to use. Not to say that the spell isn't useful; it just won't be the first thing you want to research in most of your games, unless you are surrounded by nothing but endless fields of blight around your cities.


Tier IV Tactical Spell (Battlefield Enchantment), 350 Research, 10 Mana.
Whenever a Friendly unit is killed, its killer is cursed, reducing its Defense and Resistance by -2 and lowering its morale by -300; +50 Alignment.

It seems a bit ironic to condemn killing when you're slaying just as many of your opponents, but maybe that's just me. The mana cost for this spell is almost nonexistent, and while the debuff this spell provides isn't massive, it's still quite noticeable. This spell is much more useful than it once was; it no longer only benefits Devout units, and it no longer curses your units too. However, this spell still has two significant drawbacks. First, in order to gain any benefit from this spell, you have to be losing units; while it's near impossible to play this game and not lose any of your troops, I wouldn't recommend going out of your way to make it happen either. That being said, throwing a sacrificial scout at an enemy's dragon will both waste it's turn killing your much cheaper unit, and then curse it for its trouble; it's not a bad strategy when you have this spell active. Second, the Cursed effect doesn't stack; if one unit is murdering -everybody-, it only gets penalized once. Even with all the changes to this spell, it still seems rather tame for all the demands it makes of you. Still, its costs are low enough that it's worth casting if you have it.


Tier V Tactical Spell (Battlefield Enchantment), 700 Research, 20 Mana.
All units except Undead, Summoned, or Magical units gain +4 Fire and +4 Spirit damage against Undead, Summoned, or Magical units; +25 Alignment.

Bane of the Unnatural has been massively buffed, both in its effect and in its number of potential targets. Undead and magical creatures are everywhere in almost every map, and Necromancers, Sorcerers, and Archdruids are all crippled by this spell. Plus, compared to most battlefield-wide damage boosts like Holy War or Bloodbath, the damage boost also affects your ranged units (Blessed Arrows, eat your heart out), and at only 20 mana it's quite easy to find room to cast this spell. That being said, this spell does negatively affect your own summoned and undead units as well, so if you plan to use it you have to make sure to leave your magical friends at home or risk getting them accidentally Purged. And while it's probably obvious, this is still a situational spell; it's likely little more than a waste of space in your spellbook if a warlord or dreadnought is at your doorstep. Overall, I'm glad to see that this spell has gotten more useful; Creation Mastery needed some love.


Tier VI Tactical Spell (Instant), 1600 Research, 20 Mana
Resurrects Target Friendly Unit, returning it to life with 50% HP. Undead and Machines cannot be resurrected.

This spell is the real reason you take Creation Mastery. It's not the cheapest spell, but 20 mana is very affordable for what it provides you. The ability to bring back a high-level Hero unit or valuable high-tier unit after a particularly nasty fight is irreplaceable. Another feature is that the unit returns to life with an action point - and all of its abilities off cooldown (except ones usable once per combat). This means you can be much more reckless with your units, sending someone in to wipe out an important enemy and letting them die, then just bringing it back to life. That said, Necromancers and Grey Guard Masters are the bane of this spell, as both have a tendency to go around eating up all those wonderful corpses you wanted to resurrect. Seeing a Cadaver or Reanimator crawling over to that Champion Manticore Rider you just lost will leave you furious. Also, make sure you bring everyone you need back before the fight ends; once you've left the battlefield, anyone dead is staying that way. And as useful as it would be, your Leader can't resurrect himself.


With a suite of buffs under its hood, Creation Mastery is still somewhat questionable as a Mastery sphere. Resurrect is unparalleled, but all three of its other spells are highly questionable in their usage. If you don't like summoning units, have trouble with the undead, and don't mind throwing units away for a tactical advantage (You do have Resurrect; death isn't exactly the end of the world), then you can get a lot of use out of this specialization. However, given that summoning is a very powerful tool even for non-summoning classes, giving it up in return for a damage boost is something I have trouble recommending.

Notable Synergies:
• Warlord, Theocrat (Both of these classes have very strong produced armies and lack the ability to summon combat units, making them the premiere choices for Creation Mastery.)
  
• Dreadnought, Rogue (While both classes can use Creation Mastery effectively, they aren't as good as the first two. The former has little need of Temperate Empire (Suppress Nature is just Better) and Resurrect doesn't work on Mechanical units, and the latter builds Shadow Stalkers, who are punished by Bane of the Unnatural)

Destruction Mastery is a complete turnaround from Destruction Adept, going from an Aggressive Military focus to an Aggressive Spellcaster focus, with Storm Magic and Disintegrate making your nukes much more deadly.

• Destruction Spells make you more Evil
  
• Emphasis on Instant damage spells
  
• Powerful single-target spells

Tier IV Strategic Spell (World Enchantment), 350 Research, 80 Mana + 40 per Turn, -25 Alignment
Blight Terrain gradually spreads from your Empire

Just as Temperate Empire is the most defensive, Blight Empire is the most offensive of the Climate Empire spells. Everybody except Goblins hate or dislike blighted land, so spreading this around the map will cripple the morale of just about everybody. If you plan on using this, keep in mind that even with Blight Domain keeping your cities and units happy, your armies will still hate blighted terrain outside of your domain, unless you are using Goblins. Necromancers in particular pair very well with this spell, with their Undead units being both nigh immune to morale effects and uncaring about where they live or fight. Though keep in mind that the few living units you do have (Including your heroes, before you get the Archlich upgrade) may be less than pleased with your choice in decoration.


Tier IV Tactical Spell (Unit Enchantment), 350 Research, 10 Mana
Target Enemy Boat, Machine, or Undead Unit suffers -100% Physical and Blight Weakness until end of combat

Previously a strong but forgettable debuff, Wreck has been made absolutely bonkers in an effort to let it see more use. 100% Physical weakness is a death sentence to just about any unit in the game, and will turn even powerful Juggernauts and Archon Titans into scrap in moments. Furthermore, 100% Blight weakness means the previously poison-immune undead and machines are now incredibly susceptible to even simple Blight Darters, Curses, and Poisons. Another cute bit of synergy is that -100% physical weakness makes Physical spells and abilities 100% more likely to succeed, meaning that thrown nets and petrification are much more effective, and if all else fails Wreck + Disintegrate is a guaranteed kill, full stop. While still not as versatile as spells like Haste or Slow, the large numbers of undead running around make this spell much more useful overall, and is particularly useful to the Goblins, whose focus on Blight damage has always left them at a disadvantage against unliving foes. Wreck is a force to be (w)reckoned with against its intended targets.


Tier VI Tactical Spell (Instant), 1200 Research, 20 Mana
Attempts to Destroy target enemy unit (Instant death, 15 Physical vs. Defense). If it Resists, it takes 25 Damage instead

Disintegrate was originally a very bland spell; A high damage single target nuke with a chance to deal even more damage, albeit rarely. It has been drastically reworked into a very monstrous spell, with the simple effect of killing a target instantly if they fail their save. It's potency is 15 (Meaning it has a 50% chance to work against a unit with 15 defense, +/-5% for every point difference), making it shockingly deadly to even higher tier units. To add insult to injury, Disintegrated units cannot use Undying, be Resurrected, or Resurged, meaning they're gone forever (Or at least for a while, in the case of heroes and leaders). Lastly, even if they do survive, it still hits them for 25 damage; not quite as good as turning them to ash, but still quite decent with Storm Magic factored in. Overall, an amazingly powerful spell for 20 mana, and vaporizing your enemy's leader in a single shot at the start of a battle is wonderfully cathartic.


Tier V Empire Upgrade, 1200 Research
Instant Spells deal 50% more Damage

A very interesting empire upgrade, Storm Magic has been massively buffed, rising to a Tier 6 empire upgrade that gives all of your instant spells a hefty boost to their damage. For classes such as the Warlord and Rogue who really lack Instant damage spells, it's not very useful. But Sorcerers, Archdruids, Theocrats, and even Dreadnoughts can find a lot of value in it. It even effects Strategic Spells, making Wrath of God, Thunderstorm, and Sunburst that much more powerful. And if nothing else, it works on Disintegrate.


Much like its Adept cousin, Destruction Mastery still has a hefty emphasis on aggressive play. With two strong combat spells, one situational strategic spell, and a very unique empire upgrade, Destruction Mastery is surprisingly quite useful. It's not as simple to use as most of the Elemental Masteries, and it's not useful to everyone, but it's good fun in the right hands.

Notable Synergies:
• Goblins (With their emphasis on Blighted terrain and their weakness to Mechanical enemies, Goblins are the poster children for Blight Masters. Other potential candidates include Orcs, Tigrans, and Frostlings, who all merely dislike Blight rather than outright hating it.)
  
• Sorcerer, Archdruid (Sorcerers have the most instant damage spells in the game, making them the most capable to take advantage of the bonus provided by Storm Magic, with Archdruids not far behind. Furthermore, their summoned units ignore Blighted terrain penalties, making them quite capable of ruling a bleak hellscape)
  
• Necromancer (Given that Necromancers are naturally immune to most morale effects and lack many direct ways of eliminating their foes, they can get quite a lot of use out of both Blight Empire and Disintegrate.)
  
• Theocrat (While it may seem strange to recommend, given that theocrats only have two instant spells, when Storm Magic is combined with Armageddon they deal positively ludicrous amounts of damage with their spells. Wrath of God deals 40 damage to entire stacks of units on the strategic map, and Smite can potentially deal a massive 80 damage.)
  
• Dreadnought (While they don't have very many instant spells, Destabilized Mana Core is affected by Storm Magic, making an already powerful spell even more devastating. Who doesn't want to deal 90 damage to everything?)

Continuing on from the Adept sphere, Wild Magic Mastery provides even more powerful spells that are even more chaotic, all providing powerful effects while being completely unpredictable.

• Situationally strong strategic debuff
  
• Strong but Random tactical enchantments
  
• Pandemonium is potentially very powerful, but unpredictable

Tier I Empire Upgrade, Free
All Heart structures produce an extra +10 Casting Points

Now we're getting somewhere. Hearts are still very rare, and very highly fought over in most games, but this bonus is actually quite useful. Assuming you can find and hold onto a heart, the extra points are nice to have.


Tier IV Tactical Spell (Unit Enchantment), 400 Research, 25 Mana
Give 2 (Mostly) Positive mutations to all friendly living units until end of combat

This is potentially one of the weirdest battlefield enchantments ever made. Every living unit you control gets 2 of the following mutations at random:

Positive:
• Regrowth, Eyes Everywhere (Total Awareness)
  
• Electrical Skin, Spiked Hide (Damages Melee attackers)
  
• Swollen Muscles (+4 Melee damage)
  
• Iron Skin (+3 Defense)
  
• Spit Poison, Weakening Breath

Positive with Drawbacks:
• Bloated with Gas (Explodes on death)
  
• Leaden Bones (+2 Defense, -8 Movement)
  
• Drenched With Sweat (Fire Protection, but Frost and Shock Weakness)
  
• Something's Inside (On death, summons a random unit under your control until end of combat)

Negative:
• Hormonal Imbalance (Unit loses -400 Morale.)

As you can see, the effects range from trivial to incredibly strong. Apart from Hormonal Imbalance, pretty much all of them are more positive than negative. The biggest two standouts in my opinion are Regrowth, which massively boosts the life expectancy of any unit, and Something's Inside, which can summon things like Blight Elementals, Blight-tusk Boars, and Vampire Spider Queens - all strong stuff, though it'll cost you a unit to use. The only real limiting factor is the sheer randomness of the spell. Getting Swollen Muscles and Spiked Hide on a support unit while your leader gets Drenched with Sweat and a Hormonal Imbalance is always frustrating. Overall, this spell is very strong on armies of any tier, and is always worthwhile to cast.

Tier IV Strategic Spell (City Enchantment), 400 Research, 100 Mana
Randomly changes the terrain in target city's domain into Blight, Volcanic, Arctic, and Tropical terrain, and destroys all Roads and Bridges within the domain.

This spell turns roughly 25% of target city's territory into each of the four non-temperate climate types. That doesn't sound so bad, and in a lot of cases it isn't. The trick is that certain races are far more susceptible than others. Dwarves and Draconians, for example, don't care too much about terrain effects, and would only be lightly annoyed by having their domain Warped. However, Elves and especially Halflings can be absolutely destroyed by this spell, as morale penalties sap their cities of production, income, and research. Plus, with very few ways to actually mend the damage (Cleanse the Land, the Climate Empire spells, and the Ice Queen's sacrificial ability are some of the only ways to change climate in hexes), many factions will just have to grin and bear it. Destroying roads and bridges is a small but useful side effect that can slow enemies down quite a bit, especially in the case of slow moving classes like the Dreadnought. This spell can hurt you as much as your enemies, but many classes (Rogues, Necromancers, and Peacekeepers in particular) can use it's morale penalties to help their other spells work better.


Tier VI Tactical Spell (Unit Enchantment), 1100 Research, 25 Mana
Destroys target friendly unit, and summons a random new unit of Equal or Greater Tier. The new unit will die at the end of battle, and the Destroyed unit cannot resurge.

The poster child for Wild Magic's MO and a very powerful spell, this can summon literally any unit in the game for the low low price of 25 mana and some Ritual Sacrifice (It's probably a good thing your troops didn't read their contracts before signing them). You could polymorph a Hatchling and turn it into a Golden Dragon! Or you could transmute a Dwarven Firstborn and get a Human Settler? You don't know what you're going to get, and the only way to bias the odds in favor of something amazing is to sacrifice a more valuable unit. The best way to use this spell is to target low-health units that are going to die anyway; that way, you deny your enemy a kill while ensuring maximum value from your unit's sacrifice. A particularly good target are your Heroes; if they're going to die anyway, you might as well reroll them into Frost Giants and Juggernauts, as even low level Heroes are considered High tier units, thus almost guaranteeing a good result.


Tier VI Tactical Spell (Battlefield Enchantment), 1200 Research, 30 Mana
All units get displaced up to 4 hexes from their original position, and all Enemies get a random 100% Weakness

While it might not be as simple to use as Hellfire, Pandemonium is certainly worthy of standing alongside it in terms of potential strength. The downside, naturally, is it is impossible to know what will happen when you cast this spell. You could grab all their units and fling them from the walls to your waiting blades, and give them all physical weakness. Or you could just shuffle them around on the ramparts with very little effect. Most likely, units will end up literally everywhere and you'll have to figure out how best to sort them out. The real advantage you get from Pandemonium is that you're the first one to act after the results are in; you can take advantage of any openings the spell gives you while trying to move your exposed troops to safety. This spell is, however, most useful to players with a wide variety of damage types at their disposal. While the teleportation effect is handy in a siege, if you have a lot of elementals, support units, or summons available to deal many types of damage, you can easily tear apart a previously powerful foe after giving him a random selection of weaknesses. And while it's realtively low mana cost means it's much cheaper than it's equivalent spells like Hellfire and Earthquake, the actual strength of this spell varys greatly with each casting; the sheer random nature of it means it can give you the game on a silver platter, toss it out the window entirely, or do nothing.


Similar to its Adept brother, Wild Magic Mastery is very focused on Tactical Combat and aggression, and gives you a wide variety of ways to accomplish that. All of the spells feel very distinct, and are all useful in their own ways. However, this sphere is far more random than the Adept sphere, and can fluctuate wildly in power between games. That being said, the effects are all potentially quite powerful, and incredibly cheap to use on the whole, meaning that even in the worst case scenario where everything goes wrong, you should still have some mana left over to try something else.

Notable Synergies:
• Creation Adept (Warp Domain is a useful tool for crippling enemy cities, but if you end up taking those cities for yourself you'll want to Cleanse the Lands, migrate in a more hardy race, or just plunder it and move on)

Following the lead of its Adept Sphere, Keeper Mastery focuses heavily on buffing up your own troops by providing many support spells and a support summon to help you hold the line.

• Enhances your Dedicated to Good units
  
• Powerful single-target unit buffs
  
• Tier IV Support summon

Tier I Empire Upgrade, Free
All delay between Diplomatic actions with Independent Cities is reduced by 1 turn

It may not sound like much, but this is a very useful passive upgrade. Vassaling independent cities is very lucrative for its cost, and since it raises your alignment and makes everyone happy it only gets better as time goes on. The only downside is how LONG everything takes. 4 turns for a peace treaty, then 4 turns for a vassalage agreement, then another 4 turns before they might consider joining your empire. Bearer of Light makes everything much smoother and quicker, and combined with Mediator it ensures that Peacekeepers are the ultimate diplomats.

Tier IV Tactical Spell (Unit Enchantment), 400 Research, 15 Mana
Target friendly unit gains 2 Physical/3 Spirit Melee Damage and Inspiring Aura (All friendly adjacent units gain +300 morale)

The stats aren't bad, but Aura of Inspiration isn't a very inspired spell. That being said, the damage quickly stacks up if you can keep the unit alive and fighting, and he does gain the benefit of his own inspiring aura meaning more crits as well. This spell is best used in a defensive situation, where you have many units clustered together in a defensive formation; makes sense, given that Keepers generally prefer to be fighting a defensive war on their way to a Unity victory. It's not a bad spell, but for its cost I'd usually rather cast something else.

Tier IV Strategic Spell (World Enchantment), 400 Research, 100 Mana + 30perTurn
All friendly Dedicated to Good units gain +2 Spirit Melee damage and +2 Defense


Sitting between Shield of Dispassion and Entwined by Shadows, Keeper's Creed boosts both the Defense and Offense of your Good aligned units. Spirit damage is quite useful in a lot of situations and giving all of your troops an extra damage channel makes flank attacks that much more deadly, and a free layer of armor on all your troops will reap dividends quite quickly. A very solid spell, while this isn't a spell I would choose Keeper mastery -for-, it is one you will want to bring online as soon as possible.

Tier IV Tactical Spell (Unit Enchantment), 400 Research, 15 Mana
Target Friendly unit gains Shield of Light (Melee attackers receive 5 Spirit damage and can become Dazed). All enemy units except Undead gain 20% Spirit Weakness, while Dedicated to Good and Devout opponents are immune entirely.

Essentially a divine version of Frost Aura and Static Shield, with the added benefit of making everyone a little bit weaker to divine attacks. While Daze isn't as strong as other crowd control effects, completely preventing your enemies from attacking is still quite potent, and with 20% spirit weakness is much more likely to trigger. Plus, the Shield has some small synergy with the other Peacekeeper spells, which all deal Spirit damage. The undead are resistant to the weakening effect, but they're undead; they will generally be weak to Spirit anyway. Theocrats and enemy Keepers naturally don't care about this spell, but they're probably immune to spirit anyway, so it's not a big loss. Overall quite a handy little spell, but it only really becomes powerful if you build around it.

Tier VI Strategic Spell (Summon), 1600 Research, 280 Mana + 36 per Turn
Summons an Arch Angel, a Tier IV Flying Magical Support


Each of the three Alignment Faction has their own Angel to call upon as their ultimate unit. The Archangel is the ultimate support unit, basically serving as a Super Exalted. She innately has Meditate, Healing, and Inspiring Aura, letting her buff all of your other units simply by existing. Her 20 damage polearm gives her decent damage and first strike, backed up by Holy Champion, Blinding Aura, Inflict Daze at Bronze, and a 16/12 defensive statline. And while she's not as good in a fight as most units of her tier (Unless she's fighting Evil Flying Undead), she also has Resurgence and complete immunity to Spirit and the Ghoul Curse, though she does suffer from a 40% weakness to Blight. As strong as she can be in some situations, she does work best in a supportive role; she needs a legion of troops at her back before she really starts to shine. One minor note; because the Archangel is classified as a Support unit, she does benefit from support related upgrades. Theocrats can make her Devout, Archdruids give her Longstrider, and Sorcerers can give her Phase, Projectile Resist, and Inflict Stun.

As would be expected, Peacekeeper Mastery lends itself quite well towards the Unity beacon victory. Both of the combat spells are quite effective in defensive situations, and synergize quite well with the global enchantment to all of your troops as well as the Archangel herself. And given how useful the passive upgrade is to peaceful expanders, this is overall a very strong specialization for players who love to turtle up in their beautiful empire. And while many of its spells can be replicated elsewhere, it does provide a few unique tricks to those that want them.

Notable Synergies:
• Humans, Tigrans (While admittedly a minor bonus, both Humans and Tigrans have support units (Human archers also get access to Blessed Arrows) that deal spirit damage, working quite nicely with Shield of Light)
  
• Theocrat, Rogue, Warlord (Shield of Light acting as a mini-Armageddon in tactical combat is very useful to a class whose methods of damaging, converting, and debuffing units all use the Spirit channel. Rogues and Warlords also get special mention, as Berserk, Charm, Seduce, Taunt, and Fear all are Spirit effects, meaning Shield of Light makes them all more likely to succeed)

Compared to its Adept sphere, Grey Guard Mastery is a relatively big shift in perspective. While all of Grey Guard’s unit buffs and debuffs are found in the Adept sphere, the Master Sphere focuses solely on battlemagic and the Chthonic Guardian.

• Greatly opposes Summoners and Necromancers in particular
  
• Battlefield-wide Combat spells
  
• Tier IV Pikeman Summon

Tier I Empire Upgrade, Free
As long as your leader is Neutral, all of your cities gain an additional +5 Gold


Given that War Effort is one of the biggest economical bonuses in the game, and warlords need to research it before they can get any value out of it, half of a War Effort for free is a pretty solid benefit. Plus, given that all leaders begin Neutral in alignment, Grey Guards can immediately start making use of this extra cash at the point in the game where you need gold the most. Combined with Flourishing Balance, all of your cities are markedly more productive so long as you can stay neutral.


Tier IV Combat Spell (Instant), 280 Research, 25 Mana
If there are corpses on the battlefield, they will be destroyed and all of your units will be healed for +10HP and gain +100 morale.

I admit, I was a lot more excited for this spell before I really got to use it. 10HP isn’t that much, and unlike Blessing of Health your units need to be injured to gain any benefit. Similarly, +100 Morale is very unlikely to give your units any benefit, and for some reason it only lasts for one round of combat; once you end turn, the bonus is gone, making it more of a feel-good feature than anything actually valuable. Lastly, the spell can only be cast if there are corpses present on the battlefield; it's a somewhat annoying prerequisite, and more than once I’ve been stopped by it. The real benefit of this spell is in that last feature, however. Destroying corpses will make most necromancers furious, and completely prevents Undying units from returning (It used to deny Resurgence as well, but that was quickly removed :V) So unless your entire army is down on health, or you want to nip some necromancy in the bud, you probably have better things to be casting.
One minor thing to keep in mind, however; Healing Essence does not care what units you have, all of them get healed. Being able to heal up your siege weapons, golems, and undead pals is a cute little trick.


Tier V Tactical Spell (Instant), 600 Research, 20 Mana
Target Enemy Unit and every Unit like it suffers -40% Physical Weakness and -5 Physical Melee Damage until the end of combat

While it has fallen far from it's original incarnation, Cardinal Culling is still the jewel in the Grey Guard's crown and easily one of their strongest tools. Compared to Purging Burst and Healing Essence which are very situational tools, Cardinal Culling is almost always useful and sometimes will ensure your victory singlehandedly. First, 40% Physical Weakness is a crushing debuff; basic archers can turn most opponents into swiss cheese, and even irregulars will be dealing massive damage in melee. And while it may not sound like much, -5 Melee damage very quickly pays for itself against enemy forces in any extended engagement. Both of these combined mean this debuff is incredibly powerful even on a single target, but the fact remains that it will spread to any other unit of the same classification, allowing you to cripple enemy armies with a single casting, especially if they are massing large numbers of any one particular unit. And while your enemy can dispel the effect, the sheer number of enemy units effected combined with the quite affordable mana cost of this spell means it often won't be economical for them to do so. Overall, a fantastic spell and the signature move of the Guard.


Tier V Tactical Spell (Instant), 400 Research, 25 Mana
All Fey, Summoned, Undead, and Magical Creatures must resist (10 Spirit) or be dealt 10 Fire and 10 Spirit damage, otherwise they are dealt 5 Fire and 5 Spirit damage.

Did I mention how much the Guard hate unnatural creatures? This is the instant damage version of Bane of the Unnatural, and given that many of the above creatures are inherently vulnerable to fire and spirit damage this hits a bit harder than you might think. However, this spell isn’t very difficult to resist even with spirit weakness factored in, meaning it will often take two or three castings before this spell will really start to deal significant damage. That might sound very expensive (and it is), but keep in mind that Grey Guards also have Essence Harvest; every time this spell kills something, it refunds you 5CP, meaning against large undead or summoned armies this spell can very easily pay for itself. Much like Bane of the Unnatural, this is a highly situational spell, but is quite strong when in its element. And also like Bane of the Unnatural, it is very capable of burning your own summons as easily as enemy ones, so do keep that in mind if you want to use this spell in any significant capacity.


Tier VI Strategic Spell (Summon), 1600 Research, 280 Mana + 36 per Turn
Summons a Chthonic Guardian, a Flying Magical Pikeman


I think out of all the Angelic units, the Guardian is easily my favorite. She looks very cool, has very strong stats, and fills a unique role among Tier IV units. As one of the game’s beta testers put it: “She’s like the entire city state of Sparta condensed into a single unit”, and is very comparable to a Flying Super Phalanx. While 15/11 isn’t the best in terms of natural defenses, she has first strike and polearm, as well as Pike Square, Shield, Defender, and Defensive Strike, in addition to both Good and Evil slayer. If you can get her to gold, she gets Total Awareness and Instant Wrath, making her an absolute nightmare to kill without losses. And the best part is Rallying Cry, a one per battle 4-hex radius AoE that gives friendly units Inspired (+300 morale) for 5 turns and Vigilant (Unit will always defend after acting) for 1 turn. Inspired is a very strong morale booster for all your crit-boosted units, but Vigilant is basically Defensive Strike on crack for all of your troops, every fight. All of these combine to make her a very tanky unit capable of killing endless waves of low-tier units. That being said, she doesn’t hit as hard as most units of her caliber. They’re called Guardians for a reason; keep them in defense mode and use them to pin down difficult foes while your other forces move up to finish off anything she has trouble with. Just keep in mind; your Guardians are Magical units, making them susceptible to your own Purging Bursts. It’s not likely to hurt them that badly, but it does get annoying after a while.


Overall, Grey Guard Mastery is a departure from its Adept sphere. Its role is very similar to Creation Mastery; while they have very different methods, both oppose similar things in similar ways. And while it does have several synergies with Dedicated to Neutral (Faster absorbs, Gold income rewards, and the Guardian), it’s not required to make that strategy worthwhile. If you plan to take Grey Guard adept, this sphere is definitely worth consideration. But if you already have many ways to deal with the undead, you plan to summon units of your own, or you just want something more flexible, you may want to stick with Adept.

Notable Synergies:
• Warlord, Dreadnaught, Theocrat (All three of these classes have several things in common; they produce large armies and enjoy having lots of gold to spread around their empire, while disdaining summoning spells. Warlords and Dreadnaughts in particular lack many healing abilities, making Healing Essence much more valuable to their large armies)

Shadowborn Mastery and Adept, more than any other pair of spheres, truly feel like two halves of one whole. All of the spells in this Mastery sphere affect the Adept spells in some way that makes them better, meaning it highly recommended if you liked what you saw in the Adept sphere.

• Greatly buffs units Dedicated to Evil
  
• Rewards military dominance
  
• Tier IV Infantry summon

Tier I Empire Upgrade, Free
Cavalry and Archer units cost -5% less to produce


The second half of the Shadowborn passives extends your cost reduction to the more specialized produced units. Given that archers and cavalry tend to be the most expensive units for most races, this upgrade is more useful for long term conquest strategies rather than early game unit rushes. While the reduction is quite small, every hammer you can shave off brings it closer to being produced one turn quicker; and given that cost reductions are additive, they stack up very quickly.


Tier IV Empire Upgrade, 350 Research
Your newly Migrated cities get +20 Production, +20 Gold, and +100 Population or Undead Population for 5 turns

With the addition of Racial Governance and Race Happiness bonuses in Eternal Lords, unless you are going for a peace-loving hippy play style you are greatly advantaged by focusing your efforts on making your main race happy with you. This is doubly true for Evil players, who don't care for your silly unity beacons and would much rather unite the world by crushing everyone who disagrees. Combined with how slow Absorbing cities is, this means you will want to migrate pretty much every city you don't pillage and plunder to your own Master Race in order to cash in on all those wonderful Racial bonuses. Mab's Boon is like getting all of those bonuses and then having your Evil Advisor walk over, give you a sack of cash, and compliment you for the good work. It's not a very big effect, but the extra growth helps offset the loss in population for migration, and the extra gold and hammers is just gravy.


Tier IV Strategic Spell (World Enchantment), 400 Research, 100 Mana + 30perTurn
All friendly Dedicated to Evil units gain +1 Resistance, +20% Spirit Protection, and +2 Shock damage

Of the three new army enchantments, this one is probably the strongest of them all. Shock damage (and resistance to it) is very rare, making all of your units just that much more damaging especially when making flank attacks. Similarly, Resistance bonuses are much harder to come across than Defense, and is much more useful to you given than most of your melee units have lifestealing to offset damage they take anyway. Spirit protection is also quite useful; it helps offset many evil units' weaknesses, and also directly opposes those poncy Keepers. Especially for evil players who want highly aggressive armies this is very useful, and if you're playing a Shadowborn master you should get this spell active as soon as you can.


Tier VI Tactical Spell (Mass Unit Enchantment), 750 Research, 35 mana
Gives two random Dark Powers to every friendly Dedicated to Evil unit until the end of combat. Elemental, Incorporeal, and Machine units are unaffected.

Ahaha, this spell is fantastic. If you loved Spontaneous Mutation from Wild Magic Mastery, you really owe it to yourself to give this one a try. It costs more than Mutation does, but every effect of this spell is positive, and 90% of what you can get from this spell is amazing. Here's a list:

• Blood Boon (+2 Physical Melee; probably the only weak benefit in this list)
  
• Fire Aura, Frost Aura, Fearsome
  
• Slip Away, Shadow Step
  
• Greater Webbing Touch
  
• Weakening Breath
  
• Assassin's Strike
  
• Tireless, Defender
  
• Life Drain, Energy Drain
  
• Doom Gaze, Call Lightning
  
• Dominate, Raise Corpse
  
• Regrowth
  
• Haste

Getting any one of these on all of your units would be amazing; getting two feels fantastic, especially when stacked on top of all the other benefits your Shadowborn troops are receiving. The spell is smart enough to not grant duplicate abilities, meaning you're always going to get two new things to use. And the cherry on top is that this isn't a battlefield enchantment, but a unit enchantment; it has to be dispelled off of each of your units, making it much more sticky (Though beware clever Theocrat players; they've always wanted to find a use for Purging Burst). This is a fantastic combat spell, and makes even armies of low tier units a force to be reckoned with.

Note: An undocumented feature is that this spell also stacks with itself; if you cast it a second time, all of your units will have 4 dark powers. Generally this is too expensive to be really worth the mana, but it is quite fun. However, when I mentioned it to one of the developers he started facepalming, so I imagine it's not intended and will be fixed at some point. Whoops! :V


Tier VI Strategic Spell (Summon), 1600 Research, 280 Mana + 36 per Turn
Summons a Fallen Angel, a Tier IV Flying Magical Infantry


The Fallen Angel is the most deadly of the three Angels. It is immune to Blight, vulnerable to Spirit, and has relatively poor defenses, but a 4 channel melee attack combined with Life Drain, Unholy Champion, and Guard Breaker make it a very dangerous unit if it can catch a unit from behind. Total Awareness combined with its Polearm means it doesn't even need to defend; it can't get flanked anyway, and will probably mess up whoever attacked before their strike even lands. Most importantly it has Petrifying Scream, a massive area attack that can paralyze entire stacks at once, and Undying; if the Fallen Angel should fall, she will rise two turns later. Unlike Resurrection Undying units return with full movement, which usually means her first act upon returning is exacting bloody vengeance upon her killer. Still, high resistance units are very capable of tanking both her many damage types and her petrifying scream; she really does need to attack from behind to deal good damage. Much like the Archangel, she needs a legion of more disposable troops so she can do her job while they keep enemies from overwhelming her. Also note; because the Fallen Angel is an Infantry unit, she can be made devout by Theocrats, learn backstab from Rogues, and gain martial arts from Warlords, all of which make her more deadly.


Shadowborn Mastery is a very solid set of abilities for conquest-oriented players. That being said, a weakness that all of the alignment factions share is that they heavily rely on how strong your standing forces are. None of the Shadowborn spells (With the exception of the Fallen Angel, who is herself even more expensive than a Dread Reaper both to research and summon) can be used on their own; if you want battle magic that simply kills enemies, the elemental masteries are right over there. Shadowborn is meant to take your war machine and make it even leaner and meaner, and it does a very good job of it.

Notable Synergies:
• Warlord (It goes without saying that production classes that enjoy maintaining a large standing army will get a lot of use out of Shadowborn as a whole. Warlords, with their massive gold income and very strong manufactured forces, are the best suited for assuming that role. Dreadnoughts and Theocrats can have good cases made for them as well, but Warlords are probably the finest example)
  
• Necromancer (The slow nature of Ghouling cities and the Necromancer’s complete lack of Racial Happiness means Migration is a very good option for Necromancers. Additionally, the large majority of natural undead tend to be Dedicated to Evil inherently, making Shadowborn a good choice for Necromancer players.)

Comprising the nonmagical side of the Specializations, the Empire upgrades are largely passive, quite inexpensive to research, and have no mastery upgrades. Their largely passive nature means they tend to favor much wider empire strategies, rewarding players that build large numbers of cities and units.

Expander is a great bonus to players who love to settle many, many little cities. Not only do all of your cities grow faster, but your settlers and outposts are much quicker at getting your cities up and running. Furthermore, with Migration becoming a much more important tool in Eternal Lords, Expander is much more valuable than it once was.

• Empire-wide city upgrades
  
• Improves Builders and Settlers
  
• Much faster Migration and Expansion

Tier I Empire Upgrade, Free
Farms and Springs of Life (As well as their undead counterparts) generate an additional +50 Population growth.

A new passive added in Eternal Lords, this is a decent but minor boost to the two major growth structures you can find on the map. The bonus is nice to have if you can make use of it early on, but you won’t always have a Farm near your starting city, so it's unreliable at best. And while Farms are somewhat common on most maps, Springs of Life tend to be much rarer, meaning this bonus is unlikely to give you a significant advantage. However, given that it stacks with the other benefits provided in Expander, it can add up in the right circumstances.


Tier I Empire Upgrade, 90 Research
Your Empire's Population increases 15% faster

Just like it says on the tin, this upgrade just makes all of your cities grow that much faster. Given that the biggest restriction on how many cities you can have is how long it takes them to start paying for themselves, having all of your cities grow faster is just plain good. This bonus is good for everybody, but it is of particular value to the Undead, who tend to have very slow population in general.


Tier II Empire Upgrade, 120 Research
Laborer Units (Builders and Settlers) gain +8 Movement and Mountaineering

While mountaineering drastically increases the speed at which you can cross mountainous terrain, the real value here is the +8 movement. This boosts their movement from 28 (Slow infantry) to 36 (Fast cavalry), letting them fly around the map both for building forts faster and paving roads for your armies. Dreadnoughts in particular may find this upgrade helpful, as your units are slow enough that having faster builders to lay down roads for your armies can help significantly.


Tier III Empire Upgrade, 180 Research
Outposts gain an additional 20 Production and their Population growth is Doubled

This upgrade is a bit of a weird one. It only affects outposts; that is, the lowest form of a city, and disappears once it becomes a village. That being said, this upgrade drastically reduces two of the biggest hurdles of founding a new city, which is getting it to pay for itself (Settlers aren't cheap) and expanding its domain to grab all those wonderful economy buildings. The extra hammers get your Builders’ Hall and Granary out twice as fast as usual, and the doubled population growth shaves 5+ turns off the growth time, both of which combine to let you get a city up and running incredibly fast.


Tier IV Empire Upgrade, 400 Research
The City options Migrate and Purge are Instantaneous

One of the big problems with Migration is distance. Let's say you have an Elven city and want Dwarves instead. The time it takes to migrate increases drastically based on how far away your nearest Dwarven city is. At worst, you could be looking at 10+ turns of migration on a large map if your only Dwarven town is some backwater outpost on the other side of the map. Being able to migrate any city to any of your races instantly is a huge boon, and means you can be far more flexible in what you produce and where you produce it. Furthermore, with Racial Governance and Race Happiness to keep track of, Migrating a city is often the best option now simply because it makes the units you care about happier, as well as letting you generate Race XP faster so you can unlock your race’s unique upgrades. Do keep in mind, however; migration is still an Evil act. If you're trying to be a goodly leader, this is still a powerful skill, but one that must be used sparingly.


While much less useful in shorter games and smaller maps, on larger maps where games can go on much longer than normal, Expander is a valuable tool to have in your arsenal. But even with all of the expander bonuses, without gold mines, foundries, or morale structures, an outpost in a bad location will cost you a lot of time and effort to get up and running before it can repay the cost of the settler and whatever garrison you use to protect your investment.

Notable Synergies
• Goblins (Inherently faster population growth and cheaper settlers means Goblins want to expand rapidly)
  
• Halflings (The ease at which Halflings cities can be made Happy means they get tons of free population growths, which stack with Expander)
  
• Dreadnought, Warlord, Theocrat (Mana Fuel cells + Expansionism can make Outposts more productive than even the largest cities, and both Dreadnoughts and Warlords have many spells and upgrades that make their cities more productive, while Theocrats have many spells that increase their overall empire Income, Growth, and Happiness)
  
• Shadowborn (Given that rapid expansion and migration tends towards the Evil side of the alignment spectrum, Shadowborn and Expander are a natural pair. Additionally, Swift Migration works beautifully with Mab’s boon)

Rather than boosting your empire, Explorer focuses solely on Irregular units, turning them all into very capable scouts, as well as much more effective combat units.

• Cities, Boats, and Irregulars gain bonus vision
  
• Irregulars gain superior movement both in and out of combat
  
• Map hacks

Tier I Empire Upgrade, Free
Your cities and boats have an additional +1 Vision Range

While not a huge bonus, the new Explorer passive is actually quite handy at times. Cities being able to see 2 hexes outside their domain may not be very useful for scouting, but does ensure that invaders are much more likely to be spotted before they can attack. Similarly, naval units tend to be slow and vulnerable enough that every extra bit of vision helps keep them safe. A cute thing to notice is that this vision bonus stacks with all other similar benefits, so an irregular with Scout Training gets both bonuses while Embarked.


Tier I Empire Upgrade, 60 Research
All Irregular Units receive +1 Vision Range

While +1 Vision may not sound like much, keep in mind that radial bonuses like vision range get incrementally better as they get larger; going from Vision 3 to 4 nearly doubles the number of hexes a unit can see, and will make it that much more likely that your scouts will spot extra treasure or potential threats. Plus, given how cheap and versatile irregulars tend to be, it’s easy for even an outpost to build them in one turn and you'll always have a few kicking around that you can send off on scouting missions.


Tier II Empire Upgrade, 120 Research
Irregular Units receive Mountaineering, Forestry, and Wetlands Walking

Combined with Scout Training, this makes Irregulars capable of crossing all sorts of rough terrain without slowing down. And with the recent nerfs to floating movement speed over mountains, this upgrade essentially makes your Irregular units all have floating (With the obvious exception of water hexes). Overall a solid boost to the mobility of your irregulars, making them even more capable scouts.


Tier III Empire Upgrade, 220 Research
Irregular Units receive +8 Movement

Even despite its now-ancient nerf from +12 movement, this Explorer upgrade is still easily the most powerful of the lot. Having irregulars with 40 movement means they can fly across the map, both in the strategic map and on the battlefield. Movement speed is a very rare and powerful stat to have on any unit, and is obviously useful if you are using any strategy that relies on irregular units. Unfortunately for the Tigrans, as far as I’m aware their Sphinx is the only Flying irregular left in the game, meaning they are somewhat singled out with this skill’s downside. At least they still get all the other Explorer benefits!


Tier IV Empire Upgrade, 500 Research
The entire World is explored and stays that way. Explored hexes are still covered in the Fog of War.

Explorer was somewhat unique before Eternal Lords as the only Specialization to only have 3 skills attached to it compared to the usual 4 or 5. This meant that it was simultaneously less powerful than the others by having fewer skills, but also more powerful by virtue of not taking up as many slots in players’ spellbooks, letting them get access to their higher level skills faster. Therefore Master Cartographer was added as a capstone ability to Explorer, and I have to admit I really like it as a skill. Essentially it works the same as turning off Exploration in game creation, letting you see all of the map’s terrain without needing to have visited it first. It’s very flavorful to your role as an Explorer, and means that your scouts can focus on keeping tabs on your opponents rather than scouring far corners of the map for missed goodies.


While Irregulars are still an oddity for most classes, between empire upgrades and racial balancing many of them have gotten much more useful. These upgrades give them a lot of ancillary value, helping them serve as reconnaissance, support stacks of cavalry and flyers, and act as skirmishers in combat. Rogues in particular rely on their irregulars more than most, with Scoundrels serving as both saboteurs and flank attackers, and Assassins become hilariously mobile when upgraded to 40 movement.

Notable Synergies
• Tigrans (Tigrans are the only race to innately have two Irregulars, the Cheetah and the Sphinx. Both are very strong units in their roles, and provide a lot of flexibility to Tigran forces. Additionally, while Tigran Sphinxes don’t get the benefits of Trail Running, they do get the bonus vision range and terrain movement effects)
  
• Humans (Shockingly, I've found myself using Civic Guardsmen a lot more than previously. With Throw Net from their first Military Upgrade, and innate Volunteer making them essentially free to maintain, they are incredibly cost effective units for early dungeon fodder and garrisoning backwater cities. With Trail Running, they can even keep up with your powerful Human Cavalry and Knights, giving you a very mobile strikeforce.)
  
• Rogue (With multiple class irregulars that are each quite powerful in their own ways, as well as several empire upgrades that benefit them specifically, Rogues have always been a natural pair with Explorer, and it is still a very potent combination.)
  
• Warlord (While the Scout is already a very powerful observation unit, Explorer still provides them with considerable benefit. More importantly, Raise Militia means Warlords have a lot of irregulars running around, and Monster Hunters are strong and very mobile units that gain a lot from Explorer’s upgrades)

A very flavorful specialization, Partisan focuses on intelligence and map control, letting you negotiate with and spy on enemies, while making your own troops harder to pin down.

• Strong early game and multiplayer ability in Folk Hero
  
• Rewards stealth and harassment tactics
  
• Combines strong Empire Upgrades with some minor spellcasting

Tier I Empire Upgrade, Free
Units at Inns are 25% cheaper, and Independent Cities are 10% cheaper to purchase

While significantly nerfed from its original incarnation, Folk Hero is still a very useful ability in certain game types. Units at Inns are generally quite expensive, so 25% reduced prices adds up to quite a bit if you use them often. Meanwhile, Cities are 10% cheaper to invest in at all stages of diplomacy, which can add up over time. Sadly the unlisted +200 relations bonus with all factions has been eliminated, which makes this passive much less of a no-brainer. Still, it is quite useful in multiplayer scenarios and maps with a general lack of resources to take advantage of, as it greatly improves and accelerates your options.


Tier II Empire Upgrade, 120 Research
Retreating from combat does incur morale penalties; Additionally, Infantry and Irregular units do not lose movement after retreating

On paper, Guerrilla Training sounds wonderfully useful: offensively, you can strike at key targets in enemy armies before falling back, weakening their forces before the final push. Or you could use it defensively, retreating from nasty enemy spells like Chaos Rift and immediately attacking again, essentially giving you a free disjunction. However, the spell has far too many caveats for it to really be effective, in my opinion. First of all, retreating is often easier said than done; in many fights you'll need to sally forth into the middle of the map to actually engage any targets, at which point disengaging becomes a far trickier affair. And while the AI is willing to charge forward into your waiting arms, most players won't be so foolish. And remember, retreating is only available to attackers; if your opponent strikes first, you must fight to the death. Furthermore, Guerrilla only affects your Infantry and irregulars, meaning unless your army is composed mostly of those units, it has far less of an impact. Lastly, much of what this ability does can be replicated with careful unit management; if you have even a single unused unit waiting after a retreat, he can lead a second charge himself, dragging the rest of your army along with him. The only unique benefit of this spell is negating the -100 morale for a retreat, which honestly isn't very impactful.


Tier II Strategic Spell (City Enchantment), 120 Research, 60 Mana + 20 per Turn
All units in target Friendly City's domain are Invisible

Honestly, I'm not sure how I feel about this spell. The effect is unquestionably useful; urban concealment alone is a handy effect for keeping enemy raiders on their toes, and applying it to the entire city domain means enemies fear going anywhere near your turf without a lot of backup. However, being adjacent to an invisible or concealed unit reveals it, even without True Sight. This means that an enemy player planning to attack your city can float a sacrificial scout over to peek into your cities and get a headcount on what you've got before deciding whether or not to actually attack. And while that in itself is useful, it does mean a lot of the trickery of this spell can be easily avoided by a patient opponent. Meanwhile, against AI opponents this spell is almost worthless. Yes, the AI can’t attack your cloaked armies unless you move into their vision, but it still generally knows where they are, and will either avoid them or try to take the city depending on whether it thinks it can win or not. Overall, I'd say this spell has it's uses, but use it only in domains you are planning to actively defend or strike from; if you use it just to cloak some the garrison itself, it loses a lot of its punch.


Tier III Tactical Spell (Instant), 240 Research, 30 Mana
All enemy units must resist a Strength 11 Spirit check or suffer -500 Morale

As far as tactical spells go, War Anthem is low impact, but surprisingly useful. 30 Mana isn't cheap, but isn’t likely to leave you with no casting points left either. An 11 Res save means most units will have 50% odds to be hit by it (Albeit being spirit-aligned and mind-affecting means Warlords, Theocrats, Necromancers, Tigrans, and anything with Strong Will can ignore it completely). And -500 morale is a pretty strong effect, especially when paired with other morale-sapping effects. Generally it will drop a unit -2 morale stages, which usually amounts to -15% Crit or +20% Fumble, depending on their current morale. While that in itself isn't a huge effect, applying it to half the entire enemy army is. Overall, this is a nice spell for dealing with large, low-tier enemy armies, especially in siege situations with lots of attacks being rolled. And remember that Halflings are incredibly Morale-reliant; if you're getting frustrated by them being far too Lucky, this is a spell to keep in mind.


Tier IV Empire Upgrade, 400 Research
All units gain Wetland, Mountain, and Forest Concealment when alone

This ability is probably the biggest reason to pick Partisan (Fittingly enough, given the name.) It gives ALL of your units the Partisan ability, which gives them concealment in Wetlands, Mountains, and Dense Vegetation. The only catch is they have to be alone in the stack; if two or more units band together, the bonus is lost until they split up again. While this may seem rather useless, it has a lot of potential applications. The simplest is scouting; your scout units are completely invisible so long as you move them carefully, meaning you can keep tabs on your opponents without them being the wiser for it. And because it applies to all units, it works equally well for a class-specific flying scout or a generic irregular you have lying around. Also, it works quite well for masking the strength and positioning of your armies; you can keep your powerful units fanned out around a main stack of weaker units, ready to ambush anyone looking for an easy kill.


Partisan has a lot of potential, but many of its abilities feel like they need an overhaul. While most of its abilities are nonaggressive, passive, or lackluster, it provides a lot of interesting options to its users. It’s one saving grace is that it is much stronger when used in online multiplayer; buying units from Inns and quickly purchasing vassals is much more important in online games, and human players are more likely to fall for stealth tactics. Against the AI, this specialization is still usable, and even provides some neat tricks, but I feel like most players would be better served using Peacekeeper or Explorer instead.

Notable Synergies:
• Rogue (Folk Hero + Courtesan Ambassadors makes neutral cities far easier to recruit. However, Rogues have concealment built into many of their units, meaning many other Partisan abilities are somewhat redundant)
  
• Explorer (Explorer and Partisan combine to give oodles of abilities to your irregulars, albeit at the cost of two of your specialization slots.)
  
• Peacekeeper (You're already vassaling most cities you meet; Folk Hero lets you do that at a discount.)