i_killa_you
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My ultimate orc strategy guide
Orc's Guide To FFA
An Orc’s Guide to All Things Free-For-All-ish
By i_killa_you
Abs:
FS=Farseer
SH=Shadowhunter
TC=Taurenchieftain
Lvl=hero level or player level
AA=antiair or alcoholic anonymous
DR=darkranger
PL=pitlord
PB=pandarenbrewmaster
BM=blademaster
Zerks=berserkers
And so it begins. Let’s see. You like green people. You even played them in solo and maybe even RT. You come to this strange way to play… FFA. And you get your ass kicked. But you like it. FFA got something other ways to play do not. You don’t know what exactly yet.
So you continue to play it. You build them grunts, them headhunters, them demolishers, you rush your closest opponent, you kill him, damn, you even take over his gold mine. Your Farseer is lvl 3 now and your naga is lvl 2. You start teching to good old tauren, and get some more spells for your casters, but all of a sudden you see minimap flashing, you turn to your base and see that there are green things flying around. No, not wyverns. Green goo, more like that. You scroll a little and you see that the sky is… purple?
A bit frustrated you leave the game and go on www.battle.net/war3 and go to the section with all the monsters, and you look for something purple. Then you finally find it’s called Chimaerae and you have never seen it before in solo or RT. “hmmmâ€,-you say. Hum indeed. You have been owned.
And so you continue to play that strange FFA, and in about a month or so, your score is something like 12 wins 56 losses, and you wonder: “what am I doing wrong?†You go on www.battle.net/war3/ladder and check the FFA ladder for top players, you see weird variety of scores like 90-140(“that’s not too badâ€,-you think), 27-9(“hmmmâ€,-you say) and etc. So you do some research and stumble upon this guide. And you read(ing) it.
That’s about enough for the intro. What I mean is, this guide is not for complete newbies. You have to have some experience as orc in FFA to know some of the things I consider common sense. I am going to discuss units, buildings and heroes for the Horde, and their use in decent lvl FFA (12+, ranked Azeroth). I am not going to discuss actual macro strategies: every FFA player has his own style concerning macro, and that’s for you to develop. What I will help with is getting yourself up-to-date with common FFA army counters, combos and counter theories.
1.The Units
This section will consist of 3 subsections for each unit: Best use, secondary use and special circumstances-type-of use. You may not agree with this , but statistically, this is how it is in FFAs. I will also go into details on how many units to build and when.
1.1 Barrack units
Green guy with an axe.
Best use: creeping. Build up to 2 grunts to help your first hero creep. Works best with darkranger(black arrow) and shadowhunter(hex). Use grunts as tanks and don’t worry if they die – their primary goal is to get your hero to lvl 2-3 and free the closest mine for expansion.
Secondary use: rushing. There are times in FFA when you just got to gruntapult that nasty NE who is teching to chims right by you. If you played solo, you know what you have to do. I do not advise this strategy on higher lvl games, however.
Special use: you are getting rushed. The game is most likely to be ruined for you, but at least to give yourself a chance, try getting a few grunts, to fend off the rush.
My strategy: never get more than 2 grunts per game. 200 gold is a bit too much for such weak unit.
Jamaican guy with sticks.
Best use: Heart of your army. For many orc players, headhunters(or berserkers) are the main unit of the army. Supported by casters and heroes, with right Berserk micro these guys work excellent vs air units and for focus fire. Disadvantages: slow walking speed, bad range and vulnerability to heavy AOE/heavy melee. Best way to support your headhunters are healing wards, stasis traps and spirit link from casters (as much as you can afford). On heroes’ side, try getting 1-2 tank heroes, such as the TC or PL or PB. Most orcs who get berserks as their army get 1 or 2 tauren for extra tanking. A good way to enhance berserks is a kodo beast (kodo will add 20% to each of the zerks’ dmg which is a lot if you have many zerks.) You should build about 12 zerks, if they are your main army. That way you can give them whole control group and focus fire with no problems on micro side.
Secondary use: fast creeping. In high lvl games, usually creeps do not last very long, and so you need to get army quick to get your piece of the creepy pie. Grunts being expensive and ineffective vs creeps, try getting 4-5 headhunters to help you creep faster.
Special use: none. You either get zerks as your main army or you never get them at all.
My strategy: I never get zerks. They make the army very slow and cumbersome to move around. There is also always a non-zerk solution to anything your opponents might do.
Fire truck
Best use: duh. This unit is very rarely bought in ffas. If your enemy has too many towers, it’s probably the only time you will want this. Otherwise there are always ways to deal with towers without demos.
Secondary use: Another good use for demo is vs mass casters. If you are up against big ground army with caster behind it, get your demo to attack the casters.
Special use: mass siegeable units. And what I mean by siegeable is this:
TANKS. So someone decided to be funny and build 100/100 worth of steam engines, and you see those about to move into your base. If you got a barrack up, it’s about time to get the demo.
My Strategy: I never get demos except for the tanks case, when there isn’t much else you can do.
1.2 Beastiary and Totem units:
Dudes on dogs who need a shave.
Best use: none. Raider must be the most pathetic of the blizzard’s inventions. Anti-air in FFAs from raiders is a myth. Siege dmg for 3 food, even with lousy pillage? I don’t think so. It is sad, because raider is actually a cool-looking unit.
Secondary use: channeling spell breakers. So there is a POTM with a AMP and starfall in your base, thinking she be Goddess. Not anymore. Another good use for ensnare is against human’s most annoying (sorry not most annoying, all human units are equally annoying) unit – dragonhawk. Whether its cloud or shackles, 3-4 raiders will usually do the job.
Special use: Anti-tanks. If you do not have a demo or barrack up, but you have about 5 beastiaries, get a 4-5 raiders to help yourself a bit.
My strategy: I always get raiders against humans, because they use griffons, tanks and dragonhawks so much.
Dude who didn’t get in a band riding on another fat dude.
Best use: Upgraded drums, plus a big army(quantity-wise). Rally the kodo to your ranged hero, that’s all you need to do really.
Secondary use: Devour. This is only time you should mass kodos – say if you opponent is into mass aboms, knights, bears, tauren. Remember that kodos can’t do anything besides devour, so get some army backup, depending on your enemies army.
Special use: None.
My strategy: I never get kodos, because my army, quantity wise is so small. Kodos are most helpful with aura when you have many many smaller units, such as berserk strategy.
Flying things(are they orcs? Are they birds? Are they orcs who put bird mask on?)
Best use: None. I am joking. Wyvern is truly the weakest air unit in game, yet they are the best air orcs have. So, the best use for them, is like headhunters, your main army body. Again, to enhance their performance you will need casters, this time, 3-4 shamans, because wyverns do not have berserk. Wyvern is one of the 2 main strategies for the orc, discussed further in unit combos. 9 of these babies is the most mobile army in game(besides all garg+dk UD).Wyverns are perfect for hero nuking - combined with hex and their high speed while bloodlusted, it is usually as good as UD nuke.
Secondary use: temporary anti-air. If, for example, you went for zerk army and destroyed a chipo NE, he will probably switch to an all chim build with few mgs. This is the time to surprise him with the flying AA wyverns provide.
Special use: none. Either get wyverns or go zerks and do not get wyverns at all.
My strategy: my main army is wyverns at all times, mixed with whatever counter units I need.
Suicide terrorists (I know its not funny, sorry)
Primary(read secondary) use: AA. Works excellent against about every air unit in game except chims, wyrms and griffons. That’s about it really. Remember about splash and try to make sure that it hits the most enemy air around.
Secondary(read primary) use: Tower killers and building killers. You are most likely to get teamed just for using bats to kill someone’s townhall, so be wise. Incredibly efficient, fast and cheap. People hate them, especially NE type of people. Biggest bane of bat harassment – human towers and dragonhawks. Everything else bats can ignore.
Special use: they kill dryads and casters and even tanks quite fast, so if you don’t want bats fly around and do nothing, focus fire on those things.
My strategy: bats are the only way to help wyverns deal with NE’s hyppos and dots and UD’s gargs. Get 10-12 of them to do some serious dmg.
Im making an undead strategy guide as well, its almost complete----65% done
Orc's Guide To FFA
An Orc’s Guide to All Things Free-For-All-ish
By i_killa_you
Abs:
FS=Farseer
SH=Shadowhunter
TC=Taurenchieftain
Lvl=hero level or player level
AA=antiair or alcoholic anonymous
DR=darkranger
PL=pitlord
PB=pandarenbrewmaster
BM=blademaster
Zerks=berserkers
And so it begins. Let’s see. You like green people. You even played them in solo and maybe even RT. You come to this strange way to play… FFA. And you get your ass kicked. But you like it. FFA got something other ways to play do not. You don’t know what exactly yet.
So you continue to play it. You build them grunts, them headhunters, them demolishers, you rush your closest opponent, you kill him, damn, you even take over his gold mine. Your Farseer is lvl 3 now and your naga is lvl 2. You start teching to good old tauren, and get some more spells for your casters, but all of a sudden you see minimap flashing, you turn to your base and see that there are green things flying around. No, not wyverns. Green goo, more like that. You scroll a little and you see that the sky is… purple?
A bit frustrated you leave the game and go on www.battle.net/war3 and go to the section with all the monsters, and you look for something purple. Then you finally find it’s called Chimaerae and you have never seen it before in solo or RT. “hmmmâ€,-you say. Hum indeed. You have been owned.
And so you continue to play that strange FFA, and in about a month or so, your score is something like 12 wins 56 losses, and you wonder: “what am I doing wrong?†You go on www.battle.net/war3/ladder and check the FFA ladder for top players, you see weird variety of scores like 90-140(“that’s not too badâ€,-you think), 27-9(“hmmmâ€,-you say) and etc. So you do some research and stumble upon this guide. And you read(ing) it.
That’s about enough for the intro. What I mean is, this guide is not for complete newbies. You have to have some experience as orc in FFA to know some of the things I consider common sense. I am going to discuss units, buildings and heroes for the Horde, and their use in decent lvl FFA (12+, ranked Azeroth). I am not going to discuss actual macro strategies: every FFA player has his own style concerning macro, and that’s for you to develop. What I will help with is getting yourself up-to-date with common FFA army counters, combos and counter theories.
1.The Units
This section will consist of 3 subsections for each unit: Best use, secondary use and special circumstances-type-of use. You may not agree with this , but statistically, this is how it is in FFAs. I will also go into details on how many units to build and when.
1.1 Barrack units
Green guy with an axe.
Best use: creeping. Build up to 2 grunts to help your first hero creep. Works best with darkranger(black arrow) and shadowhunter(hex). Use grunts as tanks and don’t worry if they die – their primary goal is to get your hero to lvl 2-3 and free the closest mine for expansion.
Secondary use: rushing. There are times in FFA when you just got to gruntapult that nasty NE who is teching to chims right by you. If you played solo, you know what you have to do. I do not advise this strategy on higher lvl games, however.
Special use: you are getting rushed. The game is most likely to be ruined for you, but at least to give yourself a chance, try getting a few grunts, to fend off the rush.
My strategy: never get more than 2 grunts per game. 200 gold is a bit too much for such weak unit.
Jamaican guy with sticks.
Best use: Heart of your army. For many orc players, headhunters(or berserkers) are the main unit of the army. Supported by casters and heroes, with right Berserk micro these guys work excellent vs air units and for focus fire. Disadvantages: slow walking speed, bad range and vulnerability to heavy AOE/heavy melee. Best way to support your headhunters are healing wards, stasis traps and spirit link from casters (as much as you can afford). On heroes’ side, try getting 1-2 tank heroes, such as the TC or PL or PB. Most orcs who get berserks as their army get 1 or 2 tauren for extra tanking. A good way to enhance berserks is a kodo beast (kodo will add 20% to each of the zerks’ dmg which is a lot if you have many zerks.) You should build about 12 zerks, if they are your main army. That way you can give them whole control group and focus fire with no problems on micro side.
Secondary use: fast creeping. In high lvl games, usually creeps do not last very long, and so you need to get army quick to get your piece of the creepy pie. Grunts being expensive and ineffective vs creeps, try getting 4-5 headhunters to help you creep faster.
Special use: none. You either get zerks as your main army or you never get them at all.
My strategy: I never get zerks. They make the army very slow and cumbersome to move around. There is also always a non-zerk solution to anything your opponents might do.
Fire truck
Best use: duh. This unit is very rarely bought in ffas. If your enemy has too many towers, it’s probably the only time you will want this. Otherwise there are always ways to deal with towers without demos.
Secondary use: Another good use for demo is vs mass casters. If you are up against big ground army with caster behind it, get your demo to attack the casters.
Special use: mass siegeable units. And what I mean by siegeable is this:
TANKS. So someone decided to be funny and build 100/100 worth of steam engines, and you see those about to move into your base. If you got a barrack up, it’s about time to get the demo.
My Strategy: I never get demos except for the tanks case, when there isn’t much else you can do.
1.2 Beastiary and Totem units:
Dudes on dogs who need a shave.
Best use: none. Raider must be the most pathetic of the blizzard’s inventions. Anti-air in FFAs from raiders is a myth. Siege dmg for 3 food, even with lousy pillage? I don’t think so. It is sad, because raider is actually a cool-looking unit.
Secondary use: channeling spell breakers. So there is a POTM with a AMP and starfall in your base, thinking she be Goddess. Not anymore. Another good use for ensnare is against human’s most annoying (sorry not most annoying, all human units are equally annoying) unit – dragonhawk. Whether its cloud or shackles, 3-4 raiders will usually do the job.
Special use: Anti-tanks. If you do not have a demo or barrack up, but you have about 5 beastiaries, get a 4-5 raiders to help yourself a bit.
My strategy: I always get raiders against humans, because they use griffons, tanks and dragonhawks so much.
Dude who didn’t get in a band riding on another fat dude.
Best use: Upgraded drums, plus a big army(quantity-wise). Rally the kodo to your ranged hero, that’s all you need to do really.
Secondary use: Devour. This is only time you should mass kodos – say if you opponent is into mass aboms, knights, bears, tauren. Remember that kodos can’t do anything besides devour, so get some army backup, depending on your enemies army.
Special use: None.
My strategy: I never get kodos, because my army, quantity wise is so small. Kodos are most helpful with aura when you have many many smaller units, such as berserk strategy.
Flying things(are they orcs? Are they birds? Are they orcs who put bird mask on?)
Best use: None. I am joking. Wyvern is truly the weakest air unit in game, yet they are the best air orcs have. So, the best use for them, is like headhunters, your main army body. Again, to enhance their performance you will need casters, this time, 3-4 shamans, because wyverns do not have berserk. Wyvern is one of the 2 main strategies for the orc, discussed further in unit combos. 9 of these babies is the most mobile army in game(besides all garg+dk UD).Wyverns are perfect for hero nuking - combined with hex and their high speed while bloodlusted, it is usually as good as UD nuke.
Secondary use: temporary anti-air. If, for example, you went for zerk army and destroyed a chipo NE, he will probably switch to an all chim build with few mgs. This is the time to surprise him with the flying AA wyverns provide.
Special use: none. Either get wyverns or go zerks and do not get wyverns at all.
My strategy: my main army is wyverns at all times, mixed with whatever counter units I need.
Suicide terrorists (I know its not funny, sorry)
Primary(read secondary) use: AA. Works excellent against about every air unit in game except chims, wyrms and griffons. That’s about it really. Remember about splash and try to make sure that it hits the most enemy air around.
Secondary(read primary) use: Tower killers and building killers. You are most likely to get teamed just for using bats to kill someone’s townhall, so be wise. Incredibly efficient, fast and cheap. People hate them, especially NE type of people. Biggest bane of bat harassment – human towers and dragonhawks. Everything else bats can ignore.
Special use: they kill dryads and casters and even tanks quite fast, so if you don’t want bats fly around and do nothing, focus fire on those things.
My strategy: bats are the only way to help wyverns deal with NE’s hyppos and dots and UD’s gargs. Get 10-12 of them to do some serious dmg.
Im making an undead strategy guide as well, its almost complete----65% done
