kingcomrade said:
Like I said in the other thread, War3 games are funny to watch. You get a lot of really silly shit going on. The game is a bit broken. Half the units in the game aren't ever used, most players just spam 2. Most of the games I watch nobody even expands, it's hilarious.
Most units are useful, but only for quite specific tactics.
Eg with undead - every unit in the game is useful in some situations, but some are very rare.
First up you'll be choosing between a creature build or a ghoul build. Can't afford the upgrades on both. You'll definitely be getting either banshees, maybe necros, but only upgrading one of them. You'll be getting statues in every game that doesn't turn into a rush, and hence destroyers in most games.
Against humans, when I played, the cookie-cutter strat was 1 of 2 options. Main one was DK 1st take a rod, harass their base if they are shit, harass their creeping if they are good, use a team of ghouls to creep and use cannablism to heal between each creeping, send back badly injured ones to base so you lose none. When humans (we're assuming a mid-level, i.e. shit, opponent) tech to casters you'll have fast-teched to ghoul frenzy, with 3 heroes (economic advantage through harassment), destroyers to mass dispel. Add more ghouls if they go lots of rifelmen, more destroyers for less rifles but more casters. use lots of healing scrolls.
summary: both sides use mostly tier 1 upgraded units, humans also tend to use tier 2 casters, ud use a tier 2 healer and tier 3 anti-magic. Humans win if they get an expansion up or force early confrontation, undead win if they harass correctly and deny the expansion.
Vs orc: Most go creature build w/burrow. Aiming for one of 2 cookie-cutter builds. Necros+pults (as a surprise attack - orcs tech early, but have a weak spot where your at T2 but their wyverns haven't reached critical mass to overwhelm your crypt fiends). Mostly its battles between hit+run DK-sped fiends vs raiders trying to net one fiend each harassment to kill it. If UD reach T3.5 it's a win to the UD - orcs can't handle frost wyrms with adequate support. I don't mean mass wyrms - they'll get pwned, I mean literally 1 or 2 wyrms with caster buffs being used in the same group as your heroes as part of the undead tri-hero nuke. Usually go DK+crypt lord so the Orc meat doesn't overwhelm me, and so the crypt fiends have some time to retreat between harassments. If the fiends take out enough burrows to stop the orcs getting mass wyverns (there's a critical mass where it goes from fiends>wyverns to wyverns>fiends) then orcs are screwed. If the orcs force a fight at tier 2, then UD are screwed. Oddly, minor deviation from cookie-cutter screws even decent-ranked players. I scored a lot of wins with necro-frenzied fiends, where I should have been wiped except the opposition didn't think to deviate even slightly from his straight wyverns+raiders build to get anything to dispell.
But in summary: fiends are used, necros often used, banshees sometimes for possession (they're your only hope if orcs tech to tier3 and you expanded and need to buy time to get wyrms out without getting raped by Tauren), pults often used and a wyrm or 2 is the main aim.
Vs N-elf: cookie-cutter is ghouls to mass aboms+demos, with a few unupgraded banshees for curse, necros for frenzy (or raise dead if they're too moronic to bring wisps). You even use fiends early (but don't both to upgrade them, cause you'll be switching to non-creature build later) if they start building huntresses. Ghouls if they use archers. Very much a scout+react matchup. Another cookie-cutter is to use a LOT of gargoyles at tier 2. Sounds unintuitive considering the anti-air nelfs have, but gargs are fast in retreat, and are insane for base harassment. Your hero harasses their creeping, your ghouls do your creeping and your gargs gp behind the enemy base, come in kill all their wisps and flee out of range. Requires microing 3 different groups at once though. The other thing is that gargs get great damage bonsuses to huntresses (as to pults- they get great bonuses against most elf units).
Summary: much use of aboms, use of either ghouls or fiends early game, much gargs at tier 3, statues as always, not a lot of casters but they're there.
- mirror match - obviously either ghouls to ghoul frenzy+gargs (more ghouls if they have creature builds, more gargs if they have ghouls). Destroyers work ok, but you're unlikely to see casters - statues are a given so you can get a destroyer quickly if you need it. Aboms might appear later, but generally high-cost single units are poor choices due to cripple and possession, and the tri-hero nuke. I'd win most mirror matches by forcing a tier 2 showdown. If they aren't scouting then go Crypt Lord first, if possible decoy the opponent into thinking I'm going a ghoul build, then go a strict fiend build, using CL+bugs+fiends for fast-creeping. Then get DK, stats, and delay ever so slightly to get necros with frenzy. The opposide UD player almost certainly lacks destroyers at that point, and they are expecting a straight fiends+stats attack. The frenzy+judicious use of raise dead would win almost all the time. Trade-off if you go DK first is you'll have the speed boost to make harassment possible against the naturally faster ghouls, using burrow to heal up wounded fiends while it's much harder for the opponent to save wounded ghouls.
summary: almost any tier 1 unit will be commonly used, maybe casters as well.
So, whilst some units get used more than others, every single one of them is awesome in at least one situation, depending on race and opposing strategy.
My pro friend said to me one that (and I have NO idea whether this is bullshit, but it seemed plausible) that the Koreans acknowledge that WC3 is actually strategically more complex than SC, but that comparatively it sucked ass to watch (they watch games televised, remember). In SC the armour values and damage bonuses make sense - if it looks like one unit should have an advantage over another, then it usually will. Whereas in WC3 you get some truly bizarre counters: demos countering huntresses, gargs countering huntresses, the bizarre 'critical mass' swap where mass wyverns counter mass fiends, but less number of fiends counter less number of wyverns, aboms countering bears, archers and huntresses, etc.
