As a standalone game, stats and protections are a bit different from 2 previous ones. There are two kind of stats:


First, those that are determined by characteristics-
Damage: How much basic damage the unit could deal with each hit;
Health: How much damage it may take, totally;
Initiative: How many turn it may have in one round;
Accuracy: How likely it may hit its target(s);
Evasion: How likely it may avoid being hit;
(*If attacker’s accuracy outnumbers defender’s evasion, the more it outnumbers, the more critical hit may happened; however if attacker’s accuracy is outnumbered by defender’s evasion, it becomes harder to hit the defender. )

Next, those not affected by characteristics, at least not directly-
Movement: How many hexesit could move in a turn;
Interception: How many Interception it may use during the battle;
Range: How far it may hit the target from (*Melee=1)
Target: It may hit one target or multiple targets with a single hit (*Even the unit has “Area strike”, it still needs “Target: Area” to hit multiple enemies.)
Attack Source/Element: The source of its attack.
Protection: Its protection bonus when being hit or affected by certain source.

Besides those basic stats, every unit has their own skills as well, which also affect their performance on battlefields.

As I have mentioned before, there are five stats which are determined by characteristics. So what are characteristics?
Characteristics are unit’s basic attributes. How much characteristics a unit may have is determined by its level (*Total Points = Level + 11, but not all points are for characteristics).

There are five characteristics-
Strength: Mainly affect Damage, secondly Health;
Speed: Mainly affect Initiative, secondly Evasion;
Dexterity: Mainly affect Accuracy, secondly Initiative;
Agility: Mainly affect Evasion, secondly Damage;
Endurance: Mainly affect Health, secondly Accuracy;

In Reincarnation, Every time your unit gains one level, it gains one more point, most of which are characteristic points, and the rest are skills and additional protection (*usually no more than 2 points). Sadly, which attribute or skill it may add to the unit is already determined. Moreover, now every unit, except advancing to a higher rank, could only gain 12 levels, which means that every unit now has its limit.

As a result, even you may break the ceiling of your level, you still don't have any advantage over your peers, since you only have 12 determined points to add...

There are four class of unit in Reincarnation. Although, according to Toolkit, every unit has their own characteristics modifier, it seems that units within the same class share the same modifier setting.

Here are the basic modifier for all four classes:
Note:
1. Units with "Giant" (requiring 2 leadership) have higher damage and health modifier- usually 1.5 of normal units (It's not real bonus from the skill, but simply higher number in default demage and health modifier setting);
2. Units with "Area Strike" and "Double Strike" suffer from certain "damage penalty".
With "Area Strike(3)" or "Double Strike", damage would be cut in half; With "Area Strike(5)", damage is only one fourth;
3. Initiative=8+Spd_modifier+Dex_modifier (10≤Initiative≤100)

So usually-
Fighters have high damage per hit as well as health;
Rogues rely heavily on accuracy and evasion;
Archers are able to acquire high initiative more easily;
Mages may deliver huge amount of total damage to their enemies.


Leaders are, literally, the leader of your squads. Unlike Disciple 1 or 2, in Reincarnation, every unit can be the leader, and every leader can be normal unit in the squad, though such situations may not be achieved without the help of Toolkit...

Leaders have their own modifier:
Note:
1. Fighter/Mage Leader's Dex doesn't contribute to their Initiative!
2. All Mage Leaders have "Area Strike(5)" so the above damage modifier has already counted the general penalty.

Although leaders' modifier is terrible, which makes them extremely weak at the beginning, they gain two points every time they level-up and everyone of them has their own skill trees. As a result, they could be very powerful lately. Not to mention they could have various equipment (In Reincarnation, different equipment no longer has restrict on who may use it)

In game, we have a 4*2 table (4 front slots and 4 back slots) to place our unit.
Normally, the maximum units of the squad is 6, so you have to be clear what kind of team you want to build, and what's the role of each unit. Be aware that, once you walk in one of the path of the building route, there is no turning back. Therefore, choose carefully.

Roles within the Squad

Usually, there are four roles (that's just my "theory" btw XD): Tank, Damager, Supporter, Spoiler.
And, a unit may play multiple roles in the squad.


It refers to those whose priority is to block enemy's path and protect their allies in the back. Well, since it's a TBS game, you don't have any skills to attract enemies to a certain unit. Instead, you need to position your "tank" in some critical spot to prevent enemies from walking freely and even, push them back.

A "Tank" should be able to 1. survive under heavy attack; 2. intercept when necessary; 3. deal a great damage.
Fighter is usually the first choice of "Tank". No matter how good they are in other area, their high Health and damage is too good to ignore.

There are also, some other choices, which do not always works well, yet fun to play with. For example, units like Skylord and Grand Inquisitor are effective against those who do not immune to knockback. They have high evasion and acceptable Health, and they usually have healers on their side, which makes them very annoying "Rogue Tank". But to use this kind of "Tank" with cautions, since Hit Rate ranges from 50% to 95%... So don't put too much faith in their evasion... In fact, the biggest help of their high evasion is not to evade attack, but to prevent them from receiving critical hit.
(*normal hit damage = damage *(100% - defender's protection))
(*critical hit damage = normal hit damage + damage * 50%)
(*critical hit ignore "Defensive stance")

Another example is Vampire/Elder Vampire, who have relatively high Initiative, slashing protection and ability to absorb health. Thanks to "Blood Madness", they could often recover from critical condition and meanwhile deal great damage to enemy's supportive units. They could be a big problem when their opponents have slashing-source "Tank" in the front but don't have damagers with piercing source. Of course if there really are damagers with piercing souce in opponent's team... that would be a different story...


"Damager" refers to those who focus on dealing damage to opponents' units. In theory, most of units can play as damager, but some of them are inevitably more effective than the rest.
Most of "Tank" may also play as "Damager", a rather effective "Damager" actually, as long as such action won't result in the collapse of your formation.

Most of rouges are good damagers. The problem is that they need to find a way to pass the enemy front line, or they may be killed by a simple interception (always remember that the minimum Hit Rate is 50%, no matter how far your evasion is ahead of enemy's accuracy). Good examples for "Rouge Damager" are Infernal Knight. Its "Fury" and "Second Wing" skills provides the fallen knight plenty of opportunities to flank enemy formation. Werewolf is also a good example of "passing enemy front line" thanks to their immune to physical attack.

Most of Archers and Mages may serve as "Ranged Damager", which is quite easy to use, compared to Fighter and Rouge.


"Supporter" is those whose primary job is to boost their companions' performance.
To be a "supporter" always requires certain skills, unless you are a healer.

Healer is a special kind of Mage, who heal teammate instead of hurting enemy. High rank healer may give some useful buff as well, which boosts teammates' general performance. However, since healer don't provide any direct "fire support" (except Inoel...), putting more than one healer in your squad will definitely affect the overall damage your squad could deliver.

Besides healer, Mages with certain skills may also be a good supporter. For instance, White Wizard is able to use his "Discharge" skill to provides surrounding allies additional air damage, while his "Energy Shield" may help his ally to control important spot, or even save ally's life. So White Wizard could be a good "Supporter" as long as he stay close to his allies and make full use of his skills. He is also a good ranged "Damager", who stay away from the front line and use his maximun 4 hexes range plus "Area Strike(5)" to provide damage from extreme long range and sometimes teleport himself to a certain point to make greater damage.


The last one is "Spoiler", who prefer to limit opponents' performance on the battlefield.
There are mainly, 2 kinds of "Spoiler":
1. Those who directly affects enemy's ability or action- such as Theurgist with "Rust" to reduce enemies' physical protection to make them vulnerable against physical attack; Succubus who could transform enemies to imps, which disable their skill use and make them very weak in combat; Shade who paralyze enemies.
2. Those who use indirect approach to force their enemies make hard choice- such as Modeus, whose "Black Projectile" would make anyone receiving buff suffer from continuous poison damage; or Grand Inquisitor, who will damage surrounding enemies every time he receives debuff and dispel target's current buff when landing critical hit.


Although, as I have said, a unit may play multiple roles in the squad, it is better for them to have a main task. For example:
-If you decide to use one of your Holy Avenger as a "Tank", you shall position him more carefully as a barrier for his ally;
-If you want him to do more damage, use "Preparation" as soon as possible to pass enemy front line and hit weak units directly.

Remember that the ability of your Leader could be customized, while your units' are determined. As a result, what your units could do is fixed. Grand Inquisitor, Angle and Holy Avenger may all play as a good "Tank", but Defender of the Faith seems to be a better "Tank".
I suggest that, when building your team, first you shall decide what member you want to have in your team, and which building route you want to choose for them. Then, choose your Leader and decide how to customize him/her to improve your team.


(Most of the following content ignore the use of Magic, since every team would be a nightmare to the enemy with the help of magic...)

The Empire has useful Melee units and healers, which makes them very efficient in farming. With the help of magic, the Empire may even take down some powerful Neutral party in early stage.
The biggest question is ,which Building Route to choose for melee units?

Trust me. That's a tough one... To choose Inquisitor path often means that you need a Fighter Leader to be the main "Tank", while the other three options may leave you more freedom in customizing your leader.

Note that Grand Inquisitor and White Wizard have their powerful "combo" ("Disavowal"+"Discharge", one reduce air protection while the other provide additional air damage), which could result in some serious damage in following rounds. They are the best partners among the whole Empire if you put them together.

Angel is a “nasty" and fearsome Damager, because he will hit anyone who dare land critical hit on him with a noisy lightening bolt immediately, and his evasion is too low to not receive critical hit often... Since it's attack source is air, you may want to put Assassin or Elementalist in your party instead of White Wizard in case of facing some units with high air protection.

On the contrary, Paladin is a good Tank, though he may deal with considerable damage as well. With "Preparation", Paladins could easily break enemy defense. Just don't make all of them charge... Leave one or two to protect your ally. Defender.F and H. Avenger are usually difficult to reach due to their large demand of stone, even with *3 resource in Hot Seat. The Defender is better at tanking the strong and the H. Avenger is better at cutting down the weak.

Besides Melee units, there is not much to say. White Wizard, in most of the cases, is the best Supporter/Damager from back; Assassin may deliver good damage but, with only 3 Hexes range, it is hard for him to cover much ground unless put himself in danger; Elementalist is strong at first thanks to Air Elemental, yet rather weak in late stage due to Air Elemental...

Single Healer is usually better than Group Healer (Much Greater heal amount, higher health). The only notable feature of Group Healer is "Dispel Curse" of Prophetess... which is unavailable until your Group Healer reaches her highest rank...

Titan is a good fighter, except for his poor protection stats, low evasion, high price, useless skill, requiring 2 leadership... He is useful to defend your town and Guardian.

The Alliance used to benefit a lot from its wired Building Route in Disciple 2, which gave the Alliance a tough Rank 2 fighter and 4 useful Rank 3 Archer. In that time, the elvan army was powerful and cheap... Now, it's time to pay back...

In Reincarnation, The Alliance suffers from its Building Route... which leaves no useful fighter in late game... Therefore, the biggest problem is, how to fight without a proper fighter unit...?

Your first choice is to develop your fighter leader into a Tank, and make the rest of your squad provide as much damage as possible. In this case, you may have the following options:
1. (Marauder*3+Theugist)/(Marauder*4)+Sundancer/Sylph
However, to acquire such combination is no easy task, since Leader was very weak at the beginning of the game, and it's quite expensive to build such squad.
2. (Stinger*3+Theugist)/(Stinger*4)+Sundancer/Sylph
This one is similar, except cheaper, and more effective against units with high piercing protection, yet more vulnerable.

Although you may give up using Tank and choose Archer or Mage Leader to provide more damage, which leads to a suicide tactic, your squad may soon be wiped out when confronting strong fighters.

Warden and Sentry, by the way, is not as powerful as they were in Disciple 2, but their attack is still deadly against weak target, and with "Magic Amplifier" from Lord of Wood, these archers may damage enemy fighter a lot as well. It's a pity that the lord himself is too vulnerable to provide cover for these Elemental Archer.

In addition to Archer Squad, you may choose to use Griffin/Skylord as your main tank, which results in a less extreme tactic. These beasts are tougher than they look, and they have many interception points. This tactic also leaves you more choice to build your rest squad: you may use Lord of Wood as damager to flank your opponent's weak units; you may use Grove Rider as secondary tank to share damage and rely on healing as well as "Rust" from Theugist; or you may still build an archer squad behind the beast. The major disadvantage is that they require 2 leadership, so to use Griffin/Skylord, you have less members in your squad but even a Skyload could not confront 2 fighters that have similar level... not to mention how expensive a griffin and its nest is at the beginning of the game...

Ok, enough downside. The Alliance is relatively powerful when reaching Rank 3, especially their archers, so elves could be a very dangerous force on small maps.

Healers from the Alliance are great supporters, except they just don't heal much. Sylph could provide initiative boost while Sundancer gives damage increase for multiple allies.
Maiden (Rank 3) is, in fact, more "Healer" than those higher rank. She could provide good area healing for your front line, though not enough in later game...

Oh... I almost forget Archon... Compared with the other mage-Theugist, the Archon has few advantages (although Archon has higher damage and initiative, it's still not enough to make some remarkable damage, plus her accuracy is terrible...). She and Sentry should be ideal partners. "Teleport Enemy"+"Frostbite"(reduce 1 movement of target when dealing critical hit) should be the perfect combo for Hit&Run, however Sentry's Accuracy can't guarantee regular critical hit against many units, making the tactic extremely risky, or even invalid against rouge and high rank fighter.

Hi and welcome to the hell. Here you will find no Healer!!! Amazing, isn't it?
... Or amazingly painful, actually.

Most of Legion's High Rank units are very powerful, especially after Rank 3, but in order to reach that far, it requires tons of experience and resource, which is not easy since Legion's farming is a real pain in the @ss...

For example, Legion's Rank 4 Melee unit, Infernal Knight, is an efficient killer against enemy hiding behind the front line. But before that, Possessed and Berserker are nothing but paper cup in the eyes of your enemy... Anti-Paladin is good at dealing damage, too, but not surviving... So, it would take a lot effort to keep them alive, otherwise you will spend lots of resource or potions to restore them (btw, Legion's Resurrection magic is a level-5 magic...just like hell...)

In order to control health loss in farming, the Legion has to take a devil with them, which has "Devouring" to recover health after each kill. Thus, Legion's farming always involves a lot of micro-control. And beware that, before it reaches Rank 3 (Moloch), it is still weak as a giant unit, not to mention that the rest of the squad are not tough either, so don't let your guard down...

You may increase your effectiveness in farming further, by putting a cultist in your team. When he reaches Rank 2 he may become a Sorcerer, whose "Dark Ritual" could add 3 Endurance to the demon, although you may no longer have the access to Succubus, one of the best "Spoiler" in game.

Alternatively, you may choose Witch instead of Sorcerer. This enables you to transform enemy to imps for 2 turns, which has little threat. Please note that Devil/Demon is poor at fighting imps for its poor initiative and accuracy, so you'd better take Possessed or Berserker with you to help handling them. Also, Witch lack Sorcerer' ability to deal area damage, so such party is inefficient against hordes.

If you choose Sorcerer instead of Witch, there is one more choice question for you: Incubus or Modeus (Pyrami...Oops! Sorry... Doppelganger is a rather entertaining option, but difficult to handle as well). Usually, Incubus would be a better option, a high damage controller, and most importantly, much cheaper than Modeus; while the Rank 4 Pandemoneus (who will advance to Modeus provided you have enough resource to invest) doesn't have much additional value besides "Dark Ritual", which he already has in Rank 2 (without Modeus' "Black Projectile", Pandemoneus' demage is far from enough to put up real threat)

Anyway, Legion's party will usually end up like:
1. big demon+mage*3
2. big demon+melee+mage*2
Fiend, in the second case, could be an alternative for melee. It can deal good damage and doesn't need to raise from Lv1, although you need its building first...

In any case, it is hard to get a Rank 4 Beast/Demon Lord, and almost impossible to have one of the Big Three... Luckily, Beast and Demon Lord are already strong enough to do their job. With the support from your powerful mages, and sometimes with Infernal Knight/Fiend breaking enemy formation, Beask/Demon could match any fighters in direct combat.

Gargoyle is a joke. It's the TYPICAL EXAMPLE of "trying so hard to be something that you are not". It has 2 useful skill though, since Rank 2 (Marble Gargoyle). "Magic Deflect" provide surrounding allies with additional magic protection. "Land Guardian" turns the Gargoyle into a fortress and keeps enemies away from your units by knocking them back. If it could invest more in Dexterity or Speed, it could be a good guardian for your weak units....

At last, there is also a rather extreme tactic:
3. Infernal Knight*2+Succubus*3 or Infernal Knight*3+Succubus*2
The idea is to use succubus to transform your enemy into imps and use Infernal knight to kill them. It's very efficient against many teams. But such party is too difficult to build since it's hard to farm without a devil. Plus, it's efficient in one battle, but not sustainable because you will need time and resource to recover.

The Undead is an extreme faction. Everyone here seems to be the killer against a certain kind, yet being hunted by other specific unit...

Similar with the Legion, servants of Mortis don't have healer neither... but what do they care? They are already dead... well, of course you may use Elder Vampire as suicide healer if you want, but...

Controlling Health loss is harder for the Undead. The most effective way is to use ghost to paralyze enemy. Regardless of her terrible accuracy and shot range, she is still a must for the Hordes, otherwise every fight would be extremely painful since her allies are slow-and-looking-for-being-critical-hit mages, slower-and-looking-for-more-critical-hit fighters and some so-called Wyverns...

I recommend Mage Lord for anyone use the Undead since you will need a lot of low level spells to help with your farming, unless you want a thug wiping out your whole squad... and trust me, I saw that before...

It is interesting that archer class of the Undead: Ghost, Specter, and Shade, all have their own value.
Ghost benefits from accuracy, initiative and range bonus, from her level-up (lots of Dex point);
Specter has "Area Strike(3)" to paralyze mutiple targets, and also receives bonus for initiative;
Shade has "Area Strike(5)", which makes her a terrifying "Spoiler", although she never add Spd or Dex when level-up;
Due to their unique stats, we may even take two of them within your team to continuously paralyze your enemies despite their low demage.

Besides archers, the Undead has powerful mages, too. In most of the case, Reaper and Wight are better options than Vampire and Lich. Sometimes, with the help of Ghost and certain luck, you may have a Wraith in early stage. Its immunity to physical damage makes it almost a cheat in the game. To be more specific, when facing the Horde, if the Empire, the Alliance or the Legion don't choose a certain path to counter physical-immune unit, then they have already lost the battle.
(The Legion has the least problem to deal with physical-immune unit, since Succubus and Incubus is common to choose)
(Eleven Elemental Archers is able to deal with Wraith and Werewolf with the help of their allies, but they cannot match with Reaper and Wight; While the Empire may choose Angel, or Grand Inquisitor+White Wizard to fight physical-immune unit, but they may all find trouble dealing with Dark Lords. As a result, the Alliance and the Empire usually rely on spells to fight these annoying undead...)

Here are some examples to use Reaper/Wright
1. Reaper/Wright*2+Dark Lord*2+Specter/Shade
Dark Lords may be the most useful fighter in game- they are Rank 3 but their ability are almost Rank 4 (after gaining another 3 level... he is even one level higher than his neighbor- Rank 4 Skeleton Champion...). The problem is they are good at tanking magic attack but bad at dealing with traditional fighter. Fortunately, with Reaper/Wright's high damage, they may have the confidence to confront other fighters.
While
2. Reaper/Wright*3+Specter+Shade
While Reaper and Wright would never be a good tank since they can't intercept, but 3 of them could definitely block the way of their enemies.
*3. Reaper/Wright*3+Dracolich/Dreadwyrm/Deathdragon
This one is rather entertaining... Just want to find the way to use those poor creatures after all... They can deal much damage, I can give them that, as long as they actually hit the target...
The use of Reaper and Wright is quite the same. Usually, Reaper may provide more damage and powerful dubuff ("Death's Touch", which keeps reducing enemy endurance); Wright, on the other hand, is more reliable in some particular case. For example, Reaper can't attack Eternal Guardian without heavy loss due to its counter-debuff skill, but Wright has no such concern since it doesn't have such passive debuff.

Except using Reaper and Wright, the Hordes also has some more simple tactics, such as:
4. Skeleton Champion/Phantom *2+Lich/Archlich *2+Specter/Shade
Although Phantom and Archlich are powerful, you may not have the resource to get them all, despite that the Undead has a spell to earn Stones...
Phantom has the ability to teleport himself to wherever he likes, and he can paralyze target by landing critical hit as well as increase damage everytime receiving debuff, so I normally choose to have Phantom first (plus Skeleton Champion is not very useful btw...). The notable features of Archlich are high accuracy, considerable damage and Cleansing Discharge, which dispel enemy buff when dealing critical hit, so if you prefer to do some anti-buff and deal damage simultaniously, you may choose Archlich.
5. Dark Lord/Phantom*2+Vampire/Elder Vampire*2+Specter/Shade
Trust me, Vampires would never be friends with Skeleton Champions, who are too slow and always block vampires' way... Vampire has higher damage due to his smaller attack area, while Elder Vampire has the ability to transfer health to allies.
*6. Phantom*5
Once there was a training camp...
Teleporting troops arriving in 5... 4... 3... 2... 1...

Werewolf is a good melee damager. You may use it to replace any of melee unit above if you like. Just be aware that it is weak against any magic or debuff with magic source.