Heroes of Might & Magic: Olden Era – 11 Tips Before Starting

The safest way to start Heroes of Might & Magic: Olden Era is to build around one main hero, take low-risk fights for experience, and turn your first city decisions into steady army growth instead of flashy tech. Current public mechanics already point to a few stable truths: heroes start at level 1, battle EXP matters a lot, hero classes scale differently, and early tempo comes more from economy and movement than from trying to win every fight on day one.

Because Olden Era is still subject to balance changes, any “best hero” list should be treated as provisional. For Strategy Guides, the most reliable lane right now is Early Game Economy: efficient leveling, careful resource spending, and role-based hero use. Those principles should survive faction tuning much better than a temporary tier list.

11 tips to know before starting

1. Treat “best hero” rankings as temporary, not as rules

Public previews already suggest that some heroes will look stronger than others early, but Olden Era’s final balance is not locked. That matters because a hero that dominates in one build can drop hard after a patch or after one change to starting army size, spell access, or growth rates. A better habit is to ask what problem your hero solves on the current map: movement, income, safer fights, better spells, or faster recruitment. That line of thinking ages much better than copying a static tier list.

2. Read the full hero card before you pick

One of the easiest mistakes is assuming heroes inside the same faction start on equal footing. Current public information says hero cards differ by specialization, starting stats, faction class, and initial army. That means two heroes from the same town can create completely different openings. A stronger starting stack can clear nearby guards faster, while a resource or movement bonus can outscale that combat edge over the first week. Spend a minute reading the card before the match begins instead of locking in on faction name alone.

3. Give every hero a job from turn one

Olden Era’s class-biased stat growth means you should not force every hero into the same role. A mage-style class such as a Warlock is expected to lean more into spell power and intelligence, while other classes will naturally support frontline combat better. In practice, that means your main army leader, scout, courier, and economy helper should not all be evaluated the same way. If a hero has weak direct combat scaling but great map utility, let that hero collect resources, flag pickups, and chain reinforcements instead of pretending they are your duelist.

4. Funnel early EXP into one carry hero

Hero leveling is already confirmed to be a major power curve, so the opening priority is simple: one hero should get most of the meaningful early fights. Splitting your best units across two stacks usually gives you two mediocre armies and slower level gain on both. A single overleveled main hero clears neutrals more safely, reaches better skills faster, and turns weekly recruits into more efficient wins. Secondary heroes still matter, but in the first stretch they should mostly support the carry, not compete with them for your best battles.

5. Take clean fights for experience and skip messy ones

Since battle EXP comes from defeated creatures, weak neutral stacks are not worthless if you can beat them efficiently. This is a big early-game lesson: a low-risk fight that costs no important units can be better than a “bigger” fight that bleeds away your army and ruins your next two turns. In HoMM-style games, tempo is everything. If a fight gives EXP but leaves you too damaged to keep moving, it often was not worth it. Look for safe clears near your starting zone and only stretch into dangerous guards when the reward actually changes your position.

6. In city-building terms, gold usually matters more than fancy tech

Most new players lose the opening in the town screen, not on the battlefield. Your first city is there to generate income and convert that income into a larger weekly army. That usually means prioritizing gold flow and the unit buildings that let you recruit on schedule. If a building is expensive, looks impressive, and does not help you field more strength soon, it is often a trap in the first week. Unspent gold is also hidden lost tempo. If you finish key turns floating cash while your army stays small, your economy is not actually working for you.

7. Secondary heroes are for scouting, pickups, and army chaining

A second hero is still excellent early, just not as a mirror-image warlord. Use secondary heroes to collect loose resources, reveal the map, flag easy points, and transfer fresh units forward so your main hero does not waste movement returning home. This is where unit-management starts to matter: your strongest stack should be where the important fight is, and your support heroes should keep feeding that stack. If you instead split your creature pool evenly because it “feels safer,” you usually make both heroes too weak to solve real fights cleanly.

8. Spend wood, ore, and rare resources only when they create tempo

Gold is the most obvious bottleneck, but side resources decide whether your opening keeps flowing or jams up. Early upgrades, town branches, and specialty buildings can drain materials you soon need for core recruitment or economy. The practical rule is to spend scarce resources only when the payoff is immediate: stronger weekly army, better map access, or a building that fixes your income. A marketplace can smooth awkward shortages, but using it too often to chase nice-to-have upgrades usually means paying extra for decisions you did not need to make yet.

9. Check artifacts constantly instead of letting them sit unused

Artifact management is one of those quiet habits that separates clean openings from sloppy ones. Small bonuses to movement, initiative, survivability, or economy can swing multiple turns once they start stacking. Get into the habit of checking equipment after every meaningful fight, chest, or pickup. Do not just leave items parked in inventory because the bonus looks minor. Also think about who should wear them. A pure combat item belongs on your main hero, but a movement or economy bonus may be stronger on a scout or pickup hero if it improves map reach.

10. Learn the stat names before you misbuild a caster

Olden Era uses four core stats: attack, defence, spell power, and intelligence. If you are coming from older Heroes habits, the important adjustment is that intelligence is the mana-pool stat, while spell power affects spell impact. That means a caster does not only scale through raw damage; sustainability matters too. A hero with strong spell power but shallow mana may win one fight hard and then run dry. A hero with better intelligence can stay active across more encounters. When choosing skills, fights, and gear, think about whether you need burst, endurance, or both.

11. Match your hero choice to the mode and map

“Best starter hero” advice changes a lot depending on whether you are playing a classic map, a single-hero setup, or a combat-heavy mode. In classic play, movement, recruitment, resource generation, and efficient clearing often beat slightly better combat numbers because they snowball your whole position. In a mode that narrows the game around direct fights, battle specialists naturally rise in value. This is why map-level bonuses deserve so much respect in previews: over the first few days, a hero who solves your biggest bottleneck is usually stronger than one with flashier endgame scaling.

A simple first-week template that fits most openings

If you do not want to overthink your first few days, this is the clean baseline that matches the current public understanding of Olden Era’s early game:

• Open by reading your chosen hero’s specialization, starting army, and stat profile so you know whether they want to clear, cast, scout, or support.
• Take only the nearby fights that look efficient and low-casualty, then feed those wins into one main hero instead of dividing your best units.
• Use your town to stabilize income and recruitable strength first; delay expensive side projects that do not improve army size or map tempo quickly.
• Hire or keep a secondary hero for pickups, scouting, and reinforcement delivery rather than building a second equal army too early.
• Before ending each turn cycle, check artifacts, review resource shortages, and make sure next turn’s movement is pointed toward a meaningful clear or pickup.

If future updates move hero rankings around, this opening logic should still hold: build one strong core hero, protect your early game economy, spend rare resources for tempo, and never let artifacts or support heroes sit idle.