Demon farming analysis

[u/SignificantDiver6132]

Inferno is generally seen as one of the weakest towns, but it does have one ace up their sleeve: Pit Lords' ability to summon demons from the corpses of fallen allies. This effectively allows them to upgrade most lvl 1-3 weaklings into Demons.

However, the conversion isn't much of an upgrade in most cases. This is because the conversion doesn't actually increase hitpoints and actually loses them if the amount doesn't exactly match the amount of Pit Lords doing the summoning or if the dead stack consists of mobs that have more HP than Demons themselves.

The best case scenario is turning a low damage, high HP mob into Demons. For example, 1.75 Dwarves turn their combined 3.5-7 base damage into 7-9 base damage of a single Demon, plus a couple points of extra Attack.

The worst case scenario is turning a high damage, low HP mob like Sprites. 12 sprites do a combined 12-36 or 24 average damage, which is about the triple what a single Demon does. You're also losing great speed, fly and no retaliation in the process.

Hit points are somewhat better protected due to Demon's base defense of 10, but in many cases this is only a few points of defence difference. Hit point artifacts and First Aid specialty heroes do help a bit on the hit point conversion rate.

Pooling creatures from several different cities and external dwellings into one superstack is pretty much the only remaining tangible benefit. And since the new Hota Patch, letting Marius boost a larger share of their entire army to new heights.

[u/TheTitan99]

I've had the most success with Inferno on maps where you get lots of different types of neutral units to join your army.

As you say, converting units into Demons isn't always a great deal... When those units would otherwise be in an army to begin with. It is a fantastic deal if those units would be irrelevant.

You mention how sprites pound for pound deal more damage than the Demons. But, a hero can only have 7 stacks in their army. It isn't a matter of Sprite VS Demon, it's a matter of Demons or even more Demons, because those sprites won't be in the main army. 

Best case scenario for Demon Farming is maps where after each battle you get a new stack of units to sacrifice and convert. Diplomacy theoretically is a great idea for this, but it's so pricey that it tends to not really be viable. Creature banks and Pandora's Boxes can be fantastic, especially the boxes. Oh, a bunch of boars came out of the box, sure, I'm totally adding boars to my army!

I do wish demon farming was on the whole better. You have to put so much work into it more minimal results. I do think it can be powerful, but so much can go wrong. Meanwhile necromancy is just, like, +10000 skeletons after any fight.