Say you as the OL have at least 30 XP, so you can choose... do you take the obvious choice of the Eldritch, to upgrade the Sorcerers and Skeletons that are found in most dungeon levels, or do you go out on a limb and pick Humans or Beasts?

I go with whatever is cheapest. I feel that upgrading the cheapest monster category sooner will go a long way toward giving me the ability to upgrade my other monster categories later.

In my current campaign (Great Wyrm + Ascension) I upgraded beasts first. It has already paid off as silver-level Naga’s, Hell hounds, Spiders, and Razorwings once taken for granted as easy kills and minimal threats, are now very threatening and demanding of the parties full attention – this places the sorcerers and beast men a little lower on the parties target priority list while maintaining their high damage output.

In my previous campaign (Beastlord + Ascension) I upgraded humanoids first. This was extremely fun because silver-level beast men and ferox HURT anyone and everyone regardless of armor.

In the campaign previous to that (Demon Prince + Eternal Night) I upgraded eldritch first. This was an excellent choice because silver-level skeletons and sorcerers can put the hurt on those soft heroes not equipped to take focus fire to the face.

I enjoy variety and I feel every monster category has its benefits when played correctly.

Beasts protect LTs and are in encounters more so if you have a LT within attacking distance it could be good to help with some bigger beasts.

Of course eldritch have numbers on their side in the dungeons

I am not sure if it matters who gets the first upgrade to silver but I really like beasts at gold more then eldritch at gold level.

And yes I have left off the other useless group on purpose. I see no reason to upgrade them until the campain is at least gold level and even then I am not sure. They do make up a chunk of the leaders in dungoens but that seems unimportant vs the other groups.

Eldritch (because they are so common), then Humanoids (because they can deal out major damage). I've upgraded Beast in our current campaign, a waste of XP....

yes, Eldritch pack the bigger punch when upgraded. Humanoids are usually the worst at protecting lieutenants, and die too fast in dungeons. Beasts lack serious damages and are hard to spawn, so I'd got with Eldritch.

I powered my Humanoids first every stage of the campaign.

Silver/Gold/Diamond Beastmen, Ferrox, Trolls, heck even kobolds are just down right nasty, and are the only things capable of standing up to the heros damage output.

(and the new added Medusas! Holy Shclamoly! do they pack one heck of a punch!)

I've never been too fond of Beasts, too often they do minimal damage, large peices which are hard to spawn and situational abilities IMHO.

Eldritch are nice and I've upgraded them when I get the chance, they have some great ranged damage, but are so bloody squishy.

Eldritch first of all.

Nothing is more dangerous than Immortal Silver mobs, they go a long way into wrecking the players plans. And if you are playing the High sorcerors then it is game over

The only way I would consider upgrading something else would be if the Avatar special is very good on this kind of mob... but that is very very rare occurance, except for ... Eldritch

Choose Eldritch if you aim at a longer campaign where you just dominate the heroes but dont wanna beat em (like a cat playing with a mouse )

Choose beasts if you want a fast copper tamalir raze.

Dreepa said:

It depends, the demonlord lieutenant is a lot stronger with Eldritch upgraded, but it is true that most of the time, beasts are better for lieutenants, and eldritch for dungeons. Humanoids are nice, but they are very rare among lieutenants (even the beastman lord doesn't field any :'( ), and they have to take horrible risks to kill heroes in dungeon.

It depends on the Avatar type, the campaign level and the campaign style.

Beast are generally the most useful in Lt battles and also seem to get their best boost from Silver to Gold.

Eldritch are the most common in dungeons and get a good boost silver to bronze.

Humanoids have the biggest damage output but are generally too slow and rarely get to hit anything so I consider them near-useless. However that largely depends on the hero playstyle, skills and makeup, so is not always the case. When I played as the Beastman Lord Gold Kobold swarms in early silver were hilarious!

I haven't played all the avatars yet but so far the Spider Queen has been most fun for (and against) me. Because she depends less on monsters for putting hurt on heroes it seems she is best able to stay relatively even or even ahead as the heroes power up and become way to good for even the best and most upgraded monsters.

For her, I would choose Beasts to upgrade and save the 5 extra CT for more Treachery...

Corbon said:

Good summary: humanoids lack the ability to survive, and as they need to close in to deal damage, the only ones who benefit from upgrades are the ones you spawn, which is a shame. I don't understand why they chose to make the upgrades so unconsistent:

Blood Apes deal higher damages than skels at copper and gold, but skels hit harder at silver, and it is generally true for most beasts indeed(near irrelevant boost at silver, very good one at gold).

Beasts are probably the best for the spider queen indeed, and her spiders are even remotely useful with pierce