Water Magic | Information about gameplay Heroes III HD Edition Guide

Last update: 11 May 2016

Magic Arrow

Cost: 5 Level: 1 Duration: - Description: Target, enemy unit receives (Power*10)+10 damage. Advanced level: Target, enemy unit receives (Power*10)+20 damage. Expert level: Target, enemy unit receives (Power*10)+30 damage.

The first offensive spell in the game, which can almost always be found in any first level Mage Guild. It's mainly used during the early rounds, because even those heroes who lack Power can deal significant damage - later on the effectiveness falls off considerably, because it lacks a good Power-damage ratio.

Protection From Water

Cost: 5 Level: 1 Duration: 1 round Description: Protects the selected unit, reducing damage received from Water spells by 30%. Advanced level: Allied unit receives 50% less damage from Water spells. Expert level: All allied units receive 50% less damage from Water spells.

Protection from Water is useful only when you are certain, that the enemy has large amount of Power and is likely to use spells such as Frost Bolt, or Frost Ring - in other cases the spell is completely useless, because of the fact, that it only decreases damage from water-oriented spells and that no unit in the game does any elemental-related damage.

Bless

Cost: 5 Level: 1 Duration: 1 round Description: Target, ally unit deals the maximum amount of damage when it attacks. Advanced level: Target, ally unit deals the maximum amount of damage +1 when it attacks. Expert level: All allied units deal the maximum amount of damage +1 when they attack.

One of the best spells in the game, which can only be cast during combat. After casting it, the unit you targeted (or all of your units, if you have Expert Level in Water Magic) will deal its maximum damage.

If a unit targeted by the spell has a damage range of 2-7, it will, under normal conditions, deal 2, 3, 4, 5, 6 or 7 damage (for each unit in the group) at the moment it attacks the enemy, making its attacks to fluctuate in damage. To get rid of this effect, you can cast bless on it, which will allow it to always deal its maximum damage, which is 7, greatly increasing the overall effectiveness of the unit.

This spell can be immensely powerful when used on creatures with a huge "spread" in their minimum / maximum damage - if a unit has '40' or '50' damage, there's no point to cast Bless on it, as it will literally give nothing to it.

Dispel

Cost: 5 Level: 1 Duration: - Description: Removes positive, as well as negative, status effects from a target, allied unit. Advanced level: Removes positive, as well as negative, status effects from a target, allied, or enemy, unit. Expert level: Removes positive, as well as negative, status effects from all units on the battlefield.

A really good spell, which can turn the tides of any hopeless skirmish, during which your enemy keeps on buffing his own units, while curing yours - if you cast it on the Expert Level, you will, literally, reset all the units, because it takes away all the status effects of every creature. On the basic level it's still an useful spell, because you can take off a negative spell (like Blind, Hypnosis) from your unit, while on the Advanced level you can dispel any effects on an enemy unit, which was heavily buffed by the enemy.

Cure

Cost: 6 Level: 1 Duration: - Description: Removes all negative effects and regenerates (Power*5)+10 health of an allied unit. Advanced level: Removes all negative effects and regenerates (Power*5)+20 health of an allied unit. Expert level: Removes all negative effects and regenerates (Power*5)+30 health of all allied units.

Another extremely useful spell. In contrast to the previously described Dispel, Cure works only on allied units - it's useful when you want to get rid of those pesky negative status effects cast on your units, or you simply want to heal them up a bit, without taking out negative effects off the enemy forces. The healing aspect is a nice addition, but weaker units, with smaller health pools won't be able to benefit from it fully, as it heals to the maximum, but does not resurrect fallen creatures. It means, that a creature needs to have at least 25 health points (with a hero with 1 point of Power) to fully benefit from the healing.

Summon Boat

Cost: 8 Level: 1 Duration: - Description: Summons one of your hero's boats to their current location. If none of those boats are available, then one of your other heroes' boats is summoned. Spell has a 50% chance of working. The spell fails if there are no unoccupied boats available. Advanced level: Same as Basic Effect, except that if no boats are available, a new one is created. The spell has a 75% chance of working. There are a maximum of sixty-four boats allowed on the Adventure Map at one time. The spell fails if all are occupied. Expert level: Same as Advanced Effect, except that the spell has a 100% chance of working (unless all sixty-four boats are occupied).

A spell, which is useful only on those gigantic maps with immense amounts of water. In a hypothetical situation, a player can land on one side of the island, clear it and get to the other side, summon the same boat to him and board it, without the need to lose time to get back to it. Naturally, if the map lacks any water, the boat cannot be summoned.

Ice Bolt

Cost: 8 Level: 2 Duration: - Description: Target, enemy unit receives (Power*20)+10 damage. Advanced level: Target, enemy unit receives (Power*20)+20 damage. Expert level: Target, enemy unit receives (Power*20)+50 damage.

The Ice Bolt spell is one again a more powerful version of the Magic Missile - increased mana cost translates to higher amount of damage dealt, making this spell useful both in early and in late game. In a certain sense, this spell is an equivalent of the Lightning Bolt from Air Magic - which one the hero will use depends solely on the level of school(s) of magic he has learned. It's worth to use it on enemy shooter units, or to weaken those powerful 7th level creatures - with a proper amount of Power, artifacts and skills, you can kill several of them with a single use.

Visions

Cost: 4 Level: 2 Duration: 1 day Description: Displays number of monsters in a wandering monster troop and whether or not the troop will offer to join the casting hero's army. Range is equal to Power or three, whichever is greater Advanced level: Additionally, it now shows the enemy hero's primary skills, as well as his army. Expert level: Additionally, it now shows the information about an enemy city.

Another very useful spell, which can be cast on the world map. After casting it, you must press and hold the right mouse button over an enemy hero to learn about a set of things - the amount of information depends on the highest level of proficiency in a given school of magic. Additionally, it's an useful spell while dealing with neutral monsters, as it allows you to estimate the chances of the enemy joining your army.

Weakness

Cost: 8 Level: 2 Duration: 1 round Description: The attack attribute of a target, enemy unit is decreased by 3 points. Advanced level: The attack attribute of a target, enemy unit is decreased by 6 points. Expert level: The attack attribute of a all enemy units is decreased by 6 points.

This spell is the opposite of the Bloodlust from the Fire Magic. The ability to decrease the enemy attack attribute comes in handy when you are playing a hero with low defense attribute, while the enemy has high attack - after casting it on every enemy unit, you will be able to level the difference in attack / defense quite a bit.

Remember, that each attack point of an enemy unit surpassing the defense of your unit, which is being attacked, increases the damage dealt to that unit by 5% - in some extreme cases, you can decrease the enemy bonus damage by 30%!

Remove Obstacle

Cost: 8 Level: 2 Duration: - Description: Removes one, non-magic obstacle (trees, stones) from the battlefield. Objects such as cliffs are not removed. Advanced level: The spell now also removes magic obstacles. Expert level: Removes any obstacles from the battlefield, apart from elements of the environment.

An extremely situational spell, as it's not affecting any unit directly, but allows you to remove an obstacle, which, for instance, blocks your unit from attacking your target. It comes in handy in situations, in which the course of the whole battle can depend on a single attack - and as that does not happen frequently, this spell is one of the rarest to be seen on the battlefield.

Frost Ring

Cost: 12 Level: 3 Duration: - Description: Units surrounding the target of the spell receive (Power*10)+15 damage. The unit the spell was cast on remains unharmed. Advanced level: Enemy units receive (Power*10)+30 damage. Expert level: Enemy units receive (Power*10)+60 damage.

A powerful spell, but equally situational - the target of this spell must be surrounded by several units, which the spell can damage, in order for it to be worth casting, as it has poor Power/damage scaling. If the target is surrounded by at least two enemy units, you can freely cast this spell - if, however, that's not the case, and there's a single enemy unit to be harmed by it, cast Lightning Bolt or Ice Bolt instead.

Teleport

Cost: 15 Level: 3 Duration: - Description: Moves the targeted ally unit to the designated spot on the battlefield. The unit can't be moved above moats and walls. Advanced level: You can now teleport the unit above moats. Expert level: You can now teleport the unit above walls.

Yet another situational spells, as the type of units you have under your command decides, if it's worth to cast it. If you have extremely powerful, but slow units, such as (Ancient) Behemoths, or (Chaos) Hydras, moving them in between enemy units may prove fatal to your foe, as you will be able to deliver a sudden, deadly strike. If your units have a lot of mobility, or the teleportation won't give you any edge, it's better to use another spell.

Mirth

Cost: 12 Level: 3 Duration: 1 round Description: Increases the morale of an allied unit by 1. Advanced level: Increases the morale of an allied unit by 2. Expert level: Increases the morale of all allied units by 2.

Similar to Fortune from Air Magic, Mirth is a rather weak spell, because it's easy to accumulate the maximum amount (3) of morale for your troops, be it from artifacts, or visiting various places scattered around the world. It's better to use a given round of battle to cast a different spell - an exception to this rule is when your units' morale is below 2 points, and that is when casting Mirth can prove to be effective.

Forgetfulness

Cost: 12 Level: 3 Duration: 1 round Description: Half of creatures in an enemy unit with ranged attack forgets to shoot. Advanced level: All creatures in an enemy unit with ranged attack cannot shoot. Expert level: All creatures in all enemy units with ranged attacks cannot shoot.

The strength of this spell depends on the contents of the enemy army - if the enemy heavily relies on units with ranged attacks, it's worth to use this spell to decrease some of their effectiveness (or to completely shut them down as shooters, depending on the level of Water Magic your hero has) as shooters. If your enemy lacks spells such as Dispel, or Cure, he will be forced to send his shooters into close combat, where those units may (and most likely will) have a penalty to damage, severely lowering their effectiveness.

There's no point in using this spell when your enemy does not have powerful shooters, or your enemy uses units from the Dungeon or Tower cities - most shooters from those cities have "no melee penalty", making this spell not so effective against them.

Prayer

Cost: 16 Level: 4 Duration: 1 round Description: Increases the attack, defense and speed of a single allied unit by 2. Advanced level: Increases the attack, defense and speed of a single allied unit by 4. Expert level: Increases the attack, defense and speed of all allied units by 4.

Prayer is probably the most powerful unit enchanting spell in the game. The possibility (on the Expert Level of Water Magic) of increasing the attack, defense and speed of all your units by 4 gives an immense edge over your enemy - it's also a perfect way of reducing the gap between your units and the enemy ones, in a situation in which you are controlling a hero who is highly magic-oriented, while your enemy is a pure "fighter", with a lot of attack and defense.

Clone

Cost: 24 Level: 4 Duration: current battle Description: Creates the copy of a selected allied unit. The copy does the same damage, but it is dispelled the moment it sustains any damage. You can clone units of 1-5 levels. Advanced level: You can now clone units of 1-6 levels. Expert level: You can now clone units of 1-7 levels.

A powerful spell, which can turn the tides of any battle. A cloned unit retains the damage, as well as abilities of the original creature - a cloned Archangel can use his resurrection, even when the original used it before the cloning happened. There can be more than one clone on the battlefield simultaneously.

The only flaw of this spell is the fact, that the clone is dispelled upon taking any damage - because of that, it's worth to clone shooters, or units, which are highly unlikely to be retaliated at (with "no retaliation" ability).

Water walk

Cost: 12 Level: 4 Duration: 1 day Description: The hero casting the spell may walk across bodies of water. The move must be finished on dry land. The range of the Water Walk spell is 60% of any remaining movement points the hero has at the moment of casting. Advanced level: Increases the range to 80% movement points. Expert level: Increases the range to 100% movement points.

This spell is very similar to Fly, but it is limited to moving through water, without the necessity to use a ship. It's a very effective way of crossing water, because of the fact, that a hero boarding and/or leaving a ship will lose all his movement points and will have to wait a day before he can move - with the help of this spell you won't have to wait for that. There's only one condition - the movement must end on dry land, meaning that you can only go to, for instance, a neighboring island.

Water Elemental

Cost: 25 Level: 5 Duration: whole battle Description: Summons (Power*2) Water Elementals. You can't summon more than one type of elemental during a single battle, but several of the same time can be summoned. Advanced level: Summons (Power*3) Water Elementals. Expert level: Summons (Power*4) Water Elementals.

This spell, coupled with high Power attribute of the hero casting it, allows you to summon quite an amount of elementals to aid you, but there's one single problem - summoning Earch Elementals, from the Earth Magic school, is a lot more efficient, because those units are simply stronger. However, if you lack the ability to summon other elementals, using this spell is by no means any waste.