Chieftain

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Description
The Chieftan is a tough warrior type class with access to skills which empower his/her armies. As such, the Chieftain is mixed between a warrior and a supporter.

Stats and Skills
The attribute changes you get by choosing this class:

The abilities you get by choosing this class:

Overall
The Chieftain is a reasonably successful class with access to skills which both make the hero stronger and improve the units they lead. Although not nearly as powerful as in 1.03 (in which the Chieftain was very overpowered; the Barbarian King skill allowing the player to power up Barbarian Cavalry and Infantry by 5% per point), the replacement in 1.03.24 is the Riding ability which is still very useful since it affects all cavalry for every race. If having high morale, powerful cavalry units and a pretty strong hero is what you're looking for, the Chieftain is sure not to disappoint.

Races
The obvious choice to pair with the Chieftain is with the Barbarians. The Leadership skill comes in handy when the player has a horde of just about any unit, but the best combination is likely to go to the Barbarian spearmen as the player will most certainly see the improvement as they throw spears quickly through multiple opponents. As soon as the Barbarian Chieftain gets access to Riding, the player may want to put 30 points into it. That investment, plus the Training research will make all the Riders and Warlords come out with 70XP, right on the dot for level 6 (level 7 requires 110XP which is impossible to reach by level 50). Then, the player has 5 points to invest in supporting the race with more Leadership or empowering the hero with Mighty Blow/Ferocity.

Despite not having any cavalry, the Minotaurs can make great use of the Chieftain. Their strength levels, already high enough, rise to insane levels and they also boast a double synergy with Ferocity and Mighty Blow, making them even stronger and deadlier! Leadership also helps with Mino assaults, as the already insanely-powerful, burning, drunk, morale-boosted Minos strike even faster.

Finally, a Knight Chieftain can become a nice alternative to the Paladin. While he lacks Healing magic and the Smite Evil skill, he makes up for it by a synergy in Leadership, offering good morale to his side and the Riding skill, which provides extra XP to ALL cavalry, including Knights. Beastslayer might seem useless, but it can at least help counter some (but not all) fliers, as they are classified as Monsters. To conclude, combined with Mighty Blow, Ferocity and balanced investement in Charisma and Strength/Dexterity, the Knight becomes a true powerhouse that can also be even trickier to beat, thanks to his superpowered, morale-boosted Knight Cavalry escorts.

High Elves may also abuse the Riding and Leadership skills, combined with healing in later levels, in order to train very, very powerful Unicorn and Dragon knight armies that can wreak havoc to practically anything, short of large armies (of Empire units, in particular). The Healing sphere also definitely helps, despite having much lower Intelligence than say, a Priest or a Paladin.

Counters

 * Getting rid of a Chieftain is going to be a problem for almost any race. Since the hero is pretty tough and the units he/she leads may get a reasonable attack speed and/or XP boost, the only real way to take the Chieftain down is to exploit the weaknesses inherent in the race he/she is leading.