"Nagash was a powerful wizard before sacrificing himself to an 'eternal life' as a lich. He owns much land, though most of it now lies within the desolate borders of Deyja." -- In-game biography
Nagash is a character in the video game Heroes of Might and Magic III: The Restoration of Erathia, and by extension he also appears in the game's two expansion sets, Armageddon's Blade and Shadow of Death. Once a powerful wizard, he succumbed to greed and transformed himself into a lich. Now a force of darkness, Nagash serves among the other undead monstrosities that make up the nation of Deyja. When the planet of Enroth was destroyed in the Reckoning, Nagash was not seen again and likely perished in the planet's destruction.
Nagash is a hireable hero players can purchase in any scenario, but does not serve any major plot-based purpose across the three games. As an undead hero, he starts with Basic Necromancy which allows him to summon Skeletons after battle, with the number based around 10% of enemy monsters killed (his own troops cannot count towards this). He also naturally possesses Basic Intelligence, which increases his maximum spell points by 25%. These two skills alone make him a worthy magic-casting hero, but he also possesses a unique version of Estates between Advanced and Expert skill level which allows him to automatically generate an extra 350 gold pieces for the player to use each day, as opposed to Advanced Estates' 100 gold and Expert Estates' 500; this skill is simply known as "+350 Gold".
Behind the scenes[]
- Nagash is likely to have been named after Nagash, an infamous major villain of Warhammer Fantasy lore, intended to be a reference. Like this Nagash, the originator was a skeletal lord, dark wizard, and lich, and both games originate from the same country. This is not the only occurrence like this to occur in Heroes III, further cementing the likelihood that it was intentional.