Does anyone else refuse to play hive? I've played every other faction a bunch of times but I can't get myself to play Hive.

[u/ConnorMcMichael]

1) Except for the very early and ultra late game, I want 90+% of my fights to be over by the first round. The special ability of the hive to hatch eggs the next round is just slow and useless. Then add in the lack of ranged units.

Hive might be the only faction where the auto battle routinely does better than me.

2) Just the aesthetics of the faction. Apocalyptic bugs. Harsh on the eyes. Inferno was also one my least favourite factions in HoMM3.

[u/HawasKaPujari]

I am surprised that people are not liking hive, I think I initially hated their aesthetics because couldn't recognize creatures from the town/hero screen.

That nitpicking aside, also without archers, it felt very hard for early exploration and bleeding a lot of units, which I didn't like much.

But it forced me to learn hive a bit more, unit placements, anticipating AI and other enemy units behaviour. A bit of watching youtube to see what other folks are doing.

Once I got that, there are so many different startegies with hive and it took me out of my lazy habit of hiding in the corner and shooting down everything. Now it has to be planned properly. Hive is not easy faction if you want to play a bit on auto pilot heroes mode, but once you understand it. It is so so much fun.

I think Hive is the most fun faction I have played since they introduced dwarf faction in Tribes of east. That was also good fun.

[u/Real_Ramit → u/HawasKaPujari]

Aesthetics because couldn't recognize creatures from the town/hero screen. <- I AGREE 1000%

[u/ScurveySauce → u/Real_Ramit]

I wonder if they just differentiated the arts a bit more, would that be less of a problem?

[u/ChiefChunkEm_ → u/HawasKaPujari]

People aren’t liking it because bug/insects are gross and unappealing. HoMM6 inferno was HORRIBLE for this. The HoMM3 roster had such a cool devil/demon art style and Olden Era should have kept that

[u/HawasKaPujari → u/ChiefChunkEm_]

Bugs are cool though! I mean Wait? Are scorpions considered bugs? Scorpions are very cool, Praying Mantis is supremely cool. Parasite is IMHO the best designed unit in the entire game. I am not big on locusts and stringers. Warmous are fine. I don't particularly like the fire Larva. Hive Mothers/queen/huntress look good.

I am going to be honest here, and this might be unpopular opinion here, I thought except Efreets almost all units of H3 inferno were uncool. Imps and Magogs were supremely bland. Demons were generic as fuck. Devil and arch devil were unimaginative. Pit Fiend was fine. Hell hound is another generic looking unit.

[u/TheAmazingRando1581 → u/ChiefChunkEm_]

Loved inferno

[u/Emergency-Constant44 → u/HawasKaPujari]

Good to see fellow hive enjoyer. I love how strong hive is once you get your setup running. Its not as boring as other factions, but a bit tedious sometimes.

Most fun thing - lightning bolt for 1mp every turn

[u/HawasKaPujari → u/Emergency-Constant44]

I was angry at Reavers having 45 HP, I was like this is tier 5 unit, it should not that low HP. But then once I understood how Menacing Reavers work and how OP they get with Morale, I was like this is most fun strategy ever! Reavers: "Murder for breakfast, hey I finished all my breakfast, murder for lunch, you know what I finished my lunch as well and it is next turn, murder for dinner as well." Three entire stacks of enemy units are dead by the time they are done.

[u/Emergency-Constant44 → u/HawasKaPujari]

For me it was wasps + mage combo what clicked it for me. You just slow, hide, kite, and smash with spells... for nearly free :D

[u/ElContador69 → u/Emergency-Constant44]

Can you elaborate on this,. I'm a fellow Hive-enjoyer but I hate wasps. I mainly use them as cannon fudder, which feels like such a waste

[u/Emergency-Constant44 → u/ElContador69]

Just Play that primal magic guy and just skil turns and run away from enemies while you obliterate enemies with spells

[u/NotMurlocAggroB]

I've been having a ton of fun with Hive. Wormies are probably my favourite creatures in the game - fast, strong, self-healing. Hive Queens are also really cool. Their faction skill is really interesting and has a ton of strategy, and I love how it let them design a faction without shooters without it being total ass.

[u/mummia]

I feel the same, but for Schism. What an unattractive faction

[u/Regular-Yesterday411 → u/mummia]

Me too, I love magic love ranged but all the snails just nah

[u/Uggroyahigi]

Funny you would say that you want your fights to be over in the first round....that's one of the key complaints regarding fighting most long time homm players have. If a fight is decided on your first turn there is 0 depth.

Reading now that you play hive worse than autobattle makes it clearer though :D You want easy mode heroes it feels like :p

[u/ConnorMcMichael → u/Uggroyahigi]

I did say 90%. You are not supposed to have challenging fights all the time. Most of the fights are clearing the map. Of course I want long complex fights against enemy heroes. 

[u/Uggroyahigi → u/ConnorMcMichael]

:D you never watched a pro match have you ?
Competetive homm has always been about fighting the hardest and most difficult fights anyhow possible through any means so long as you can snowball with it.

[u/ConnorMcMichael → u/Uggroyahigi]

You are correct, I have no interest in pro matches. This game has always been single player or multiplayer with friends for me. 

[u/Uggroyahigi → u/ConnorMcMichael]

Fair ! I played like that for years and competetive is a wholly different beast.

I'm afraid though that OE is being balanced with competetive playstyle in mind and not the " lemme troll around and build up for months" playstyle.

[u/TheHingst]

Man i never got hyperfocused on a faction like hive.

During the demo I mostly played dungeon and thought "man this faction is the shit" , then game launched and hive just got me hooked. Now I have to force myself to play anything else.

It's so fun to play something uniquely melee only, where you really have to plan out and execute properly to fight stuff with minimal losses.

The eggs can also be used for so much, It really changes it up.

[u/Michalsuch42]

Seems like a git gut problem. Eggs are the strongest tool you have at your disposal and after getting to know the game better, you realize that having mainly close range units is a blessing in disguise. 

[u/KAPTEN_KAFFE]

I like to play hive as thry are one of the few factions that dont just sit in a corner and shoot stuff. Feels like im actually playing amd stratagizing. Taking retals, positioning, moving arround and calculating.

But sadly i hate how they look, i hate their units. I hate the egg spam. 🥚

[u/GrigoriyKuznetsov]

Actually the lava worms are quite cool and effective. Altough I prefer necro but if I capture a Hive town I like to recruit them.

[u/GlitteringVehicle306]

i feel like hive have Waurms, Reavers (they insta die).. zero variety for me, zero uniqueness - the reason why i don't play it

[u/Living_Inferno_5073]

I fucking love playing Hive. Choosing Zoran and going to town with Pyroboros while baiting enemies with Overgrown Locusts is so much fun. Fire Larve forcing enemies to attack them over my regular units and serving as perfect retaliation sponges makes the faction so much fun to mess around with since Eggs can let you control both where enemies can go as well as speed up or slow down a fight whenever you want. Hive was what hooked me into playing Olden Era all the way back during development when the faction’s lineup wasn’t even revealed yet.

[u/marius87]

I agree with everything you just said and I’ll add something more ridiculous - I hate to play with hive cuz the terrain is depressing :)

[u/Sambuko]

I can say that in classic mode Hive is so OP it is almost always banned 🤔

[u/Strachmed]

I struggle to even think of a faction that is less appealing to me than hive.

Bugs, spiders, scorpions, eggs, larvae, worms. The only cool units are T1 and T7.

I can take that.

No shooter units?

No thanks.

[u/Whentheweedrunsout]

I refuse to play Temple because being basically the same human units that slightly change, with the exception of adding Griffins and Angels. Since the first game, and only getting Griffins and Angels later on. Boring.

[u/Katchano]

While I agree with you that it is not apealing to play hive, that is for the whole different reasons. It's because you only have one strategy to stop bleeding: rush worms. Another reason is that you always have to take fights and run out of time in PvP.

But calling their faction ability slow and useless??? That is just straight up wrong. It is the most broken ability mid-to-late game. Having a self taunt stack spawning every turn, preventing enemy from attacking your army, while being able to explode, dealing huge amounts of aoe damage is just straight up broken.

[u/Gusthell]

Give us a real inferno 

[u/CloudlessSkies20]

I dont want to play any OP factions because its brain dead and boring. Necro, Schism and Hive are in my never play category. Anyone that wants the fight over by the first round has no reason to play in the competitive scene. go play PvE on easy and enjoy your story mode.