Artillery
Artillery (HotA) 
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Basic Artillery (HotA) : gives control of the ballista, defense towers and the cannon to the hero. The ballista has 50% chance to inflict 2x damage. The cannon inflicts additional damage to fortifications.
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Advanced Artillery (HotA) : gives control of the ballista, defense towers and the cannon to the hero. The ballista has 2 shots with a 75% chance to inflict 2x damage. The cannon inflicts 2x damage and additional damage to fortifications.
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Expert Artillery (HotA) : gives control of the ballista, defense towers and the cannon to the hero. The ballista inflicts double damage and shoots twice. The cannon inflicts triple damage and maximum damage to fortifications.
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Basic Artillery: gives control of the ballista to the hero, allowing one shot with a 50% chance to inflict double damage. | |
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Advanced Artillery: gives control of the ballista to the hero, allowing two shots with a 75% chance to inflict double damage. | |
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Expert Artillery: gives control of the ballista to the hero, allowing two shots which inflict double damage. | |
Artillery is a secondary skill that gives the hero manual control over war machine Ballista (or Cannon) during combat and control over the arrow towers when defending a town during siege. Artillery provides control over the arrow towers also in the original game, even though it's not mentioned in the in-game description of the skill. It's interesting that Ballista is controlled by Artillery secondary skill rather than Ballistics, which is responsible for Catapult.
Effects on ballista:
Basic Artillery provides a 50% chance that ballista inflicts double damage. For Advanced Artillery this is a 75% chance and for Expert Artillery a 100% chance. Advanced and Expert Artillery also enable the ballista to shoot twice in a row, instead of once.
Effects on cannon :
With Basic Artillery or Advanced Artillery the cannon does randomly 1 or 2 points of damage to fortifications. With Expert Artillery the cannon always does 2 points of damage to fortifications. With Advanced Artillery the cannon does double damage and with Expert Artillery triple damage to enemies. As opposed to ballistas, cannons always shoot once.
Heroes with Artillery as a starting skill:
Arlach the Overlord – Basic Artillery
Christian the Knight – Basic Artillery
Gerwulf the Beastmaster – Basic Artillery
Gurnisson the Barbarian – Basic Artillery
Ignissa the Planeswalker – Basic Artillery-
Pasis the Planeswalker – Basic Artillery 
Pyre the Demoniac – Basic Artillery
Vokial the Death Knight – Basic Artillery
Zubin the Battle Mage – Basic Artillery-
Ranloo the Death Knight - Basic Artillery 
Jeremy the Captain - Basic Artillery
Heroes with Ballista as specialty:
- Arlach the Overlord
- Christian the Knight
- Gerwulf the Beastmaster
- Gurnisson the Barbarian
- Pyre the Demoniac
Torosar the Alchemist *Does not start with the skill Artillery.- Ranloo the Death Knight
- Jeremy the Captain *Cannon instead of Ballista.
Chance to get
Out of total 112 for Shadow of Death, and of (112 + Interference chance) for Horn of the Abyss .
Banned skills change the probability.
| Town | Class | Chance to learn |
|---|---|---|
 Castle |
Knight | 5 |
| Castle |
Cleric | 2 |
 Rampart |
Ranger | 6 |
| Rampart |
Druid | 1 (lowest) |
 Tower |
Alchemist | 4 |
| Tower |
Wizard | 1 (lowest) |
 Inferno |
Demoniac | 5 |
| Inferno |
Heretic | 4 |
 Necropolis |
Death Knight | 5 |
| Necropolis |
Necromancer | 3 |
 Dungeon |
Overlord | 8 (highest) |
| Dungeon |
Warlock | 1 (lowest) |
 Stronghold |
Barbarian | 8 (highest) |
| Stronghold |
Battle Mage | 4 |
 Fortress |
Beastmaster | 8 (highest) |
| Fortress |
Witch | 1 (lowest) |
 Conflux |
Planeswalker | 8 (highest) |
| Conflux |
Elementalist | 1 (lowest) |
 Cove |
Captain | 5 |
| Cove |
Navigator | 1 (lowest) |
 Factory |
Mercenary | {{{21}}} |
| Factory |
Artificer | {{{22}}} |
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User commentary
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Artillery is useful if you have access to Ballista, and even better choice would be selecting a hero with this speciality as your "number one", especially on small maps. If the Blacksmith of your home town doesn't produce Ballistas, but you have an opportunity to get it (by capturing a town with Ballista, on the map, or building a Ballista Yard in a Stronghold), Artillery is a good choice. Moreover, it allows you to fully control the town's defense (as sometimes arrow towers kill enemy's least valuable troops, i.e. neither ranged nor flying). High price of a Ballista is "the other side of the medal". A secondary hero may learn Artillery so as to shoot wandering creatures and weak enemy troops, avoiding melee attack and thus decreasing losses. Always learn Artillery if you rely much on Blind spell, as otherwise Ballista may shoot blinded creatures, making them able to fight. |