Disciples 2:Gold is on Good Old Games (gog.com) for something like $10. It's DRM free, completely. I picked it up on sale a few weeks ago for $5 and have enjoyed it very much. Only one unit (one of the "heroes") will go from map to map (in the story mode) but each unit built will, and needs to be, leveled up per map.

There alot to it. Unit pairing, time management, do you hire a new hero or buy potions etc etc. On top of that, it's a beautifully drawn isometric 2-d world, 3-d battle units.

But of course, it's has the same pointless dribble they call a story which dominates the fantasy genre. But then again, if you were playing a video game for the story i would direct you to penumbra, syberia, or tell you to read a book.

Othello

Distract the enemy with the spy. Sneak your green beret to plant the decoy. Use the trapper to deploy a bear trap. Sneak back and let the drama unfold just in time for your sapper to blow up the fortification. Commandos 1 and 2 were great!

Don't think anyone mentioned Silent Storm or its sequel Silent Storm : Sentinels. It is the best squad based game I have ever played with fully destructible environs with RPG elements. Your squad can lvl up and you can pick from six different classes when making your character. Anything from medic to sniper. All act differently and all have their specializations. 

I highly recommend this game. Currently though if you have more than 4 gigs of RAM the game won't start and will give you an error message stating Unsupported Videocard. You can get around it by doing this.

Currently the best way to get around this error if you are running Vista or Windows 7 is do the following:

1. Click the start button and type "msconfig" in the run/search box.
2. Click on the "boot" tab.
3. Select the default boot setting (selected by default).
4. Click the "advanced options" button.
5. Check "maximum memory" and enter something below 4096. (3096 for example).
6. Click "ok" and click "ok" again.
7. Reboot your computer.

Please be aware this does affect your entire OS. When you are not playing Silent Storm go back and uncheck the "maximum memory" setting.

You will actually need to lower the ram below 3096 as at that setting it didn't work for me. You won't find much documentation for this game because when they were releasing it they had problems shipping it here to the U.S.

If anyone ever decides to do a proper X-com remake they would be silly not to use the Silent Storm engine. Best part about this game is you can hear enemies and civilians moving about. If you hear someone walking on the floor above you shoot the floor out under there feet than climb up through the floor to the next lvl.

Hey guys, thanks for all of the helpful responses so far! I'm going to check out each game tonight when I'm done with work.

Armored princess is a sequel to "Kings Bounty: The legend" and they're both great games.

Very addicting. And both are pretty long so it can keep you busy for a while. I would recommend playing "The legends" first if you want to play armored princess.

The game actually starts off pretty bad. And there isn't much to do.

But then once you get into the main story you would probably play until the end. Very simple classical style rpg story, it's just so great. It's only a single player game, and not much of a re playability. But the first play through will be quite satisfying.

By the way, Battle for wesnoth, like mentioned on the first reply. Is a free, open source game. Andthis game is GOOOD!!! I recommend it. Its only about 200mb, and its FREE!! When you're bored, Answer = wesnoth.

I find it a bit odd that they specifically make mention of new races being put into Armored Princess if the player can't actually play as that race. Usually that sort of product description is limited to strategy games where you can play as different races...

I think you misunderstand. In this game you play as a human, but you can recruit all races on your quests. What you can buy and where is randomized every game, but all the races are there for you to try.

Sorry I didn't get back to you. If you were turned off by those aspects of Heroes, then you will be turned off by Armoured Princess and Kings Bounty. Your hero is on the sidelines, and your troops are walking number stacks in both series. You do indeed get only the one hero (The princess) but there is a... I hate to say it, but a "WoW-like" talent tree that lets you customize her along three paths (broadly, a magic path, a combat/troop path, and a middle-ground "utility" path). The other aspect of customization is, as mentioned, found in the type of units you recruit. Each are fairly unique and there are a number of viable ways to combine them. I find though, that the stronger ones are QUITE rare, so you will rarely have a full unit of Archmages, for instance.

The game is really designed around attrition, which further compounds the feeling that you are never fielding as many men as you could. You lose some each battle, so you find yourself returning to older areas of the campaign looking for stragglers to recruit. Add to that the fact that each shop or fort you can recruit from has a limited stock of units ..... well, you get the idea.

Regardless, I like the game. This aspect keeps it from getting 10 stars in my book, but it is a quality title and well polished.

I don't remember who it was but in September on the chat I asked him what would be a good fantasy game while waiting for the Elemental Beta.

He pointed me to King's Bounty - The Legend. I bought it minutes later and it was a lot of fun!

I liked the different musics in the different zones, the multi-quests and the original combat system.

I'll probably buy Armoured Princess soon. I was just waiting for good reviews to see whether there were still bugs or if the game is already polished.

the only problem with these games was the balance.

The battles on the field was really hard, while the bosses were too easy.

Most of the time you have to run around avoiding battles because of how strong everything around you is.

You are using the unofficial patch/mod 1.13? It doesn't reinvent JA 2, but it goes a long way to fix bugs, add content, and I believe it also reintroduces some quests and such that were in the code, but were never actually implemented. Add to that the ability to create 6 IMP characters instead of 1, and you get a much more fulfilling play. Google "The Bear's Pit JA Community" and have a look. These guys are keeping the game alive.

A Russian developer was working on JA3.  Strategy First pulled the name from the developer (quality?).  The game was finally released as Hired Guns.  You can find it cheap and if you are a die hard JA fan you may enjoy it.  It has everything JA and JA2 had minus the charm.  The characters are flat.  This was the true genius of Sir Tech and I miss them.  I'll never forget clicking on Fox and hearing "That'll cost you dinner and a movie".  Or clicking on the old guy and hearing "They're plastic; WWII".  Good Times.