First off I should mention that I do NOT use the Insecticide mod. I play the original game version 1.31.

For my starting world I choose 5 Players, Huge, Impossible and Weak Magic (0.5).

I do the Runemancer + Artificer combo all the time now usually choosing, Life/Chaos/Nature and Myrran. Although I have the ability to use a Myrran Race I usually just start with High Men since I will restart any game I don't get Adamantium for my starting city. Hey computer cheats majorly on Impossible so I do not believe that making sure you get a decent start is wrong. I hate building any troops before I get my Alchemist guild built lol.

As you like to get so many Sorcery books along with the combo you should look into the Wind Walking spell. I know it can be dispelled but if your unit is already invisible enemy cannot target with dispel so kind of safe. Wind Walking lets your whole army fly and move at the rate your Hero can with each move costing only 1 point. Therefore if you have a Hero with +4 Move on Armor and/or +3 Movement on Jewlery this can really add up. Not to mention Endure spell.

I really do not build much of an army beyond perhaps 1 8 Paladin group later on for a Leader type Hero. Of course I do try to keep 4-6 units for defense in each town and perhaps another 4 to quickly get to which ever city may need them. Otherwise sending out a single Paladin is usually enough to take out any neutral cities and even raiding enemy towns. With adamantium each Paladin has 11 Atk and 9 Defense right off (Regular exp + Holy Bonus).

The other reason I like High Men is that they have the strongest Magician unit with 6 figures instead of usual 4. Aside from Dark Elves Warlocks they are the best.

The only other races I use are, Barbarians for their Thrown ability(Adamantium increases this ability unlike Breath), Dark Elves for power generation and magical ranged and the Nightblades, Draco's for flying and perhaps Halflings. Sadly I used to use High Elves for their awesome LongBowmen but their limitations soon proved them not so useful.

Interesting. I would think you would get killed early by teching all the way to paladins.

Do you focus on making items for your heroes from the start? Or use Arti / RuMa for the mana gen only? Or just late game items for heroes?

You should give insecticide impossible mode a try. It is a fair step up in difficulty from vanilla. I have lost probably 80%+ of my games, some due to RNG, but still; it's very very challenging, which I find to be extraordinarily fun.

Well as soon as I get the Alch Guild up I make 2-3 Spearmen to help out the Hero or 2 I should have hopefully. This because of the Heroism on the Heroes is enough to hold off any threat for quite a while unless comp manages to start coming at me with 2 8man armies. Anything less my Hero and Spearmen can take care of.

Until I get at least 1 caster to help out with creation speed I just make 50/100 cost arti's to build up the mana pool. This way when my Heroes finally come along I can cast Heroism without waiting for a High casting arti to roll out.

You just sparked a memory in my head. Do casting heroes help your wizard cast spells? I have a vague memory of something like that.

Yes. Heroes with Spell Caster ability when kept in your Fortress town contribute half of their skill to the "Overland" casting of spells.

For example if your Wizard had 15 Casting skill and wanted to cast a Just Cause spell (150) it would normally take 10 turns. But if you had say Zaldron at Commander Level (Level 4, reachable with Heroism, Elite rank for Heroes) He would have 30 Casting skill. He contributes half of that as long as you keep him in your main town so the spell that would have taken 10 turns only takes 5.

You can see why having this help can really help with artifact creation and it is why I always make sure my Casters get Heroism asap. Not to mention that it gives them more ranged attacks and damage for if you fight.

This is why I would want both Zaldron and Serena for home base Heroes and would KEEP them and not just dismiss them when better Heroes come. They have great defensive ability with Counter and Healing with Ranged Attacks and help your casting when not in battle. Malleus with lvl 4 has 40 casting skill so contributes 20 skill to crank out those arti's.

http://masterofmagic.wikia.com/wiki/Caster#Casters_at_the_Fortress

Indeed, that would help a heck of a lot with making artifacts.

Artificer + Runemaster is probably my favorite meta-build as well, and it's nice to see it get some more press. Stuff like alchemist+myrran+warlord and having an army of super-elite, black-channeled war trolls is fun, but I've always been far more fond of using overpowered heroes than normal units, mostly due to how SLOW most units move. When I can have a stack of heroes that move 10-20 spaces per turn on the overland map, going back to even something as crazy-powerful as champion-level adamantium lionheart slingers feels pointless. By the time the slinger stack reaches enemy territory, my heroes could have already conquered all of their territory.

Overall, 5 sorc books is probably the 'strongest' setup due to magic immunity + flight + guardian wind making you immune to anything but melee damage, but I rarely use it. Instead, I almost always find myself drawn to starting with at least 3 nature books for pathfinding and 2 chaos books for the flaming enchantment. From there, I'll either carry it to 4 nature books as a prereq for archmage for super-efficient casting skill improvement, or put the last two points into node mastery and alchemy. Node mastery just makes life so much nicer; 100% chance to web sky drakes really puts a different spin on things, and it can probably beat archmage for casting skill improvement in the long term once you get some of those double-strength nodes going. Alchemy feels a little redundant at times when you've got runemaster+artificer doubling your mana input with each cast, but some games it's nice to legitimately never care about resource management at all. Early game you can literally summon money, keeping the tax rate low-ish to keep dissent down, and by the point in the later game when your casting skill is high and you want tons of mana for meaningful spells, your cities' economy can back you up.

Long story short: when i don't have nature books, I really really miss web and pathfinding (and to a lesser extent, waterwalking). Since I need 3 schools, 2 points in chaos means flaming weapons for +9 attack instead of +6. Last 2 mandatory picks flip flop between life for heroism (and healing/endurance) and sorcery for phantom warriors.

Oh, and any runemaster/artificer variant NEVER needs to put a single point of power into mana generation (except for possibly turn 1 to afford your first spell, if you didn't use Alchemy). Pure spell skill from turn 1 on, with research to taste.

Hey Doc glad to see you.

I hate to point this out but Web will NOT work vs Sky Drakes. Remember Sky Drakes have MAGIC IMMUNITY. I believe you may mean GREAT DRAKES the chaos version found in chaos nodes.

http://masterofmagic.wikia.com/wiki/Sky_Drake
http://masterofmagic.wikia.com/wiki/Great_Drake

Sadly since I only play on Impossible I really hate to start on Arcanus thus I don't get those extra books as Myrran Costs 3. I also go with 2 Chaos as since Heroes will be main army they Rock with an xtra 3 atk.

Also Nature Books give you the chance to get Change Terrain spell to make towns better, Web, Path Finding, Regeneration and Cracks Call along with a few others.

I can never seem to choose Sorc over Life Books for a few reasons. Torrin, Roland and Elana are 3 very powerful strong reasons right off. Healing, Heroism, Crusade, Guardian Spirit, Just Cause, Lion Heart are quite a few more.

Derp, yeah. Great drakes get webbed like chumps but Sky drakes (and non-corporeal fliers) are still protected. Fortunately, 90% of the fantastic monsters out there still can be grounded (and potentially stunlocked) by web. And yeah, life is pretty strong, it just gets boring after a while (imo).

I recently found and downloaded a save game editor. I may just use it to switch my Life Books to Death in a good start I have saved. You know one of those towns you get that have 1 or 2 Wild Game along with 2 Gold mines plus Adamantium right off. Sadly the Editor does not seem able to actually change terrain though. That was the major thing I wanted it todo as well lol.

If anyone wants the link to the editor PM me as I don't think I am supposed to post it. If I am allowed just lmk and I will.

EMAGIC
I can provide a link if you want me to ;)

This is my new favorite build.

2 Life (Healing spell), 2 Chaos (Flame Blade enchantment), 3 Sorcery (Counter Magic and Word of Recall spells, Flight and Guardian Wind enchantments). Runemaster, Artificer and Warlord.

High elves, for inherent mana, Longbowmen, and eventual Pegasi and Magicians.

At start, put all spell points into mana and craft something cheap. Break over anvil, transfer all spell points into research and skill. Continue to craft items for their mana while waiting for the first hero. Once spell research is self-sustaining, throw all spell points into skill instead. (By midgame, I can already cast Just Cause or a decent Disjunction in a single round! Or during combat, a full-strength Counter Magic plus whatever other spells I wish.)

Build a second city ASAP. Use hero(es) to conquer neighboring neutral cities. Use Summoning Circle/Word of Recall to stock them with crack troops from my starting city; Warlord means they'll already hold their own surprisingly well in the early and middle game.

Summon or search for a full complement of heroes. Craft useful items for them, in between crafting for mana; this build means that interim items are never wasted. Send them forth to acquire spells and spell books on Myrror; when an enemy wizard finally gets too big for his britches, banish him and dismantle his empire.

Ideally, bring your spellcasters home and cast the Spell of Mastery just as the one wizard still alive is cowering in his tiny little hamlet in a tundra-covered part of Arcanus. Mwahaha! Profit.

ooo, that summoning circle / word of recall idea is amazing!

"Roads? Where we're going, we don't need roads!" —Back to the Future

Not really sure why you waste all that mana spell casting time on relocating the Summoning Circle and casting Word each time. Unless your towns are so far apart, and this would be at least like half way around the world or on another plane then it's quite wasteful of mana and time better spent making artifacts.

I always send my settlers out with at least 1 and usually 2-4 units from my main town. And they are usually Adamantium troops as I start on Myrror.