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Sylvan: Avenger

Sylvan's racial ability focuses on dealing added damage to a specific "favoured" unit. As the player improves his/her mastery of the Avenger secondary skill, he/she is able to choose more favoured enemies, starting at 1 with Basic Avenger, up to the highest number, being 4, granted by Ultimate Avenger.

The bonus provides a 40% chance to all the troops in the Ranger's army to inflict a critical hit to favoured enemies, i.e. to deal double damage. To be more accurate, the critical hit is a +100% damage bonus, cumulative with the Luck bonus if any exists (a Luck roll gives +100% damage [+125% with Elven Luck]), so a Luck roll with the Avenger bonus gives +200% damage (+225% with Elven Luck).

The catch is, however, that the player must defeat two populations of this creature before he/she is able to select them as a favoured enemy. That is to say, two times the creature's base weekly growth. For example, 2 Black Dragons must be defeated, as that is 2x their base growth. Additionally, if you defeat 4 Pit Lords, both Pit Lords and Pit Fiends become available to add to your "Favoured Enemy" list. If you haven't fulfilled this requirement, you're unable to choose that desired creature as your favoured enemy.

Additionally, the Avenger's Guild must be built before you can select or change your favoured enemy/ies in that Sylvan town. The structure is quite cheap and can be built early in the game, as is the Avenger's Brotherhood, which provides a good 10% cumulative bonus to the chance to inflict a critical hit.

Avenger Boosters

	Avenger's Guild Effect: Allows to select favored enemies in this town. Requires: Town Level 9, Hunters Cabins. Cost: 1000, 5
	Avenger's Brotherhood Effect: +10% chance to inflict critical hit (cumulative). Requires: Town Level 9, Avenger's Guild. Cost: 2000
	Deadeye Shot Effect: Improves the effectiveness of the hero normal attack by raising his/her level by 3 for the damage calculation. If the target is present in the Ranger's favorite enemy list, the damage is doubled and it always kills at least one creature.
	Rain of Arrows Effect: The Ranger hero attacks all creatures on his/her favoured enemy list, and his/her level is raised by 3 for the damage calculation.
	Know Your Enemy Effect: +10% more chance Sylvan creatures will deal double damage against a favoured enemy Requires: Arcane Intuition

The Avenger skill

	Basic Avenger Allows Ranger to choose 1 favored enemy from the Avenger's Guild in any Sylvan town. All Ranger's troops will receive a 40% chance to inflict a critical hit upon that creature, giving double damage to it. Before choosing a creature as a favored enemy, the Ranger must kill two whole populations of those creatures.
	Advanced Avenger Allows Ranger to choose 2 favored enemy from the Avenger's Guild in any Sylvan town. All Ranger's troops will receive a 40% chance to inflict a critical hit upon that creature, giving double damage to it. Before choosing a creature as a favored enemy, the Ranger must kill two whole populations of those creatures.
	Expert Avenger Allows Ranger to choose 3 favored enemy from the Avenger's Guild in any Sylvan town. All Ranger's troops will receive a 40% chance to inflict a critical hit upon that creature, giving double damage to it. Before choosing a creature as a favored enemy, the Ranger must kill two whole populations of those creatures.
	Ultimate Avenger Allows Ranger to choose 1 favored enemy from the Avenger's Guild in any Sylvan town. All Ranger's troops will receive a 40% chance to inflict a critical hit upon that creature, giving double damage to it. Before choosing a creature as a favored enemy, the Ranger must kill two whole populations of those creatures.

Associated abilities

	Deadeye Shot Grants Ranger an ability to attack any enemy creatures on battlefield. The inflicted damage is + 3 of his or her level. If that creature is present in Ranger's favorite enemy list then the critical strike is fulfilled, the damage is doubled and it always kills at least one creature.
	Imbue Arrow Allows Ranger to enhance his or her arrows with attacking or cursing spells. All Ranger's attacks (Multishot or Deadeye Shot) will now not only inflict damage upon enemy creatures but also will immediately cast an imbued spell, draining Ranger's mana. Imbue Arrow lasts till the end of the fight or until all Ranger's mana is drained.
	Rain of Arrows Grants Ranger an ability to attack all enemy creatures which are present in his favorite enemy list. The Ranger deals + 3 of his or her level damage.
	Nature's Luck Units in hero army always have luck rolled on attacks.

Strategies

Avenger is a skill which is difficult to build up, and much the same effect can be achieved through the development of the Luck secondary skill, the benefit being that luck is rolled irrespective of the defending creature in question. For a powerful, high-level might hero, Rain of Arrows may be appropriate, but it is unlikely so many favoured enemies would be in one battle. Deadeye Shot is a simpler and quite devastating skill against high level creatures. While the effects may not be too overwhelming, much experience may be wasted in developing the Avenger skill when there is only a small chance your investment will be returned.

Nature's Luck

Nature's Luck continues Sylvan's tendency to focus much of their damage output onto luck rolls and Avenger bonuses. While it may seem easy enough to achieve, the major pitfall is missing out on the Archery ability. In best case scenarios, Rangers will already have a Luck statistic of +5, reducing the overall difference (seeing as Luck will be rolled on 50% of attacks rather than 0% anyway) to a 50% increase rather than 100%. Nonetheless, coupled with Avenger and Sylvan's offensive units, Nature's Luck is a potent ability - though it may come too late in the game to make optimal use of it.

You can discuss Heroes V racial skills with the Heroes Community.

Thanks to ThE_HyDrA for creating and looking after the Heroes 5 section of Age of Heroes!

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