I just played a game on hard difficulty which i won, but i need some advice on taking nodes inhabited by Sky Drakes, there were at least 4 nodes on Myrror guarded by 4 Sky Drakes + entourage (usually Phantom Beasts), i sent in a full squad of elite hammerhands and could only weep as they were destroyed while doing minimal damage, so any advice on killing the Sky Drakes would be helpful, they move so fast i cant even figure out a strategy for them.

TIA

You want to use flying melee units to bring down the sky drakes so that they can initiate each attack rather than having to wait to be attacked; the latter means that the units will get fried by the sky drakes' lightning breath. These flying units will still take heavy casualties unless they have strong protection going - they'll have a better chance of bringing down the drakes in the process though.

The best option is powerful ranged units that are fast enough to keep the sky drakes out of range (or can kill them before they get close). The "Flight" spell from the sorcery school is the best option here, especially since it can be applied to warships.

A sufficiently powerful, magic-immune hero (such as a well-leveled and well-geared Torin the Chosen) may also be able to deal with the drakes, especially if it has flight, but this is a risky approach since the drakes are still quite powerful one-on-one.

Any other units you bring should be solely for the purpose of taking out the supporting creatures and/or maybe getting off an early buff/heal before the drakes tear them apart.

I believe that Doom Bolt also works against sky drakes, so (if you aren't a powerful chaos mage) a sufficient quantity of sacrificial dark elf warlock armies should be able to eliminate the drakes a few at a time. (The main difficulty with this approach, aside from the expense, is that the node will foil many of their casts.)

Thanks for the reply.

1) Does Web work on Sky Drakes?

2) Would a unit of 9 Elite Halfling Slingers have any chance of killing 1 or more?

3) Would a unit of 9 Elite Griffins be a better option.

I do hate the thought of having to sacrifice alot of elite units but if it's the only way....

1) I don't remember offhand whether Web works on creatures with Magic Immunity. I think it does, but if you're fighting in a node then getting Web off may be a challenge, but if it works then heavy melee units should be able to gang up on it.

2) IIRC sky drakes don't have Missile Immunity, so if you've buffed them well enough, they should be able to deal with at least some of the drakes. Ideally you'd want ones with adamantine weapons too.

3) Probably not, but if you can't get any other strong flying units then enough well-buffed gryphons should eventually whittle the node down.

How you can best deal with sky drakes does partly depend on what races, units, and spells you have access to. Buff spells definitely matter, especially if you can't pull off a flying warship assault.

They're meant to be tough - maybe the toughest fights in the game - so it's pretty hard to reliably take them with normal units.

I've had some success with elite Slingers and flying Paladins. They're expensive and lots of them will die, though.

The only "sure" way I've found to take 6+ Sky Drakes in one fight is with a very upgraded mage hero. She needs ~10 moves and enough ranged power to be able to take one out in 1-2 hits. Or less than that if you have Haste, which you can cast in a blue node without problems. The idea is to "kite" them (run away from them while you whittle them down). You need to be smart about where you run...

But both of those methods are very expensive, so they're not going to be available until pretty late in the game. You've probably already won by that point