Banshees are one of the most controversial units in castle fight. Some think they're way too strong, while others think they're lots of counters for them. I'm going to shed some light and share my experience.
As a disclaimer before i say anything further: I'm talking about private -pr3 -lm games between good people. None of this applies in public games.
The First Banshee
The first banshee is the most important banshee you get and it might be the most important single building in the whole round. To build a banshee, it is imperative that you collect the first coin, which nets you an easy 11 gold. Bansheeing in -nc games isn't viable. It's important to note that the banshee is the single best unit you can build with one coin.
Early game
In fact, I'm going to say this now: In a 4v4 private game, there is NO good unit counter to an early banshee push. (ie. the first banshee you build).
Why is this?
In 4v4 private games, both teams build in one lane and sync their first units into combat based on build time, movement speed, and in what order you want units to arrive to battle. Usually you want your most durable unit(tank) to get to the fight first, because all 4 of your opponent's units will be focusing whatever unit engages them first. This allows for low hp but high damage units to survive and do their job (ie. archers, bloodthristers, druids). The possible tanks include: banshees, defenders, kodo windigo). Usually whichever tank falls first loses the push for its team. This is the scenario for a starting push in castle fight.
Ok, this next part gets a little difficult to understand. The problem here is that no tank can outlast a banshee under normal circumstances. Why? When most teams see an Undead worker picked on the other team, they intelligently assume banshees will be built. Then, they assign one person to make a chaos-damage unit so their push consists of 3 regular-damage-type units + one chaos damage unit. The other push will consist of probably 4 regular-damage-type units. Your team will be doing 25% damage with 3 units and 100% with one unit to the banshee tank. Your opponent will be doing 70% to 175% to your team's tank. Even though banshees probably have much less hp than your tank, your team’s tank will almost definitely fall first. In addition banshees are usually paired with farrie dragons will heals banshees for almost 4x effectiveness in comparison to a regular unit. The point: banshees seldom lose.
So what if your team gets 2 or 3 chaos damage units? Well, the first foreseeable problem is that you’re limiting the types of units you get and many chaos-damage units aren’t especially good early pushers. Also, if your opponent’s team can simply sync so another unit is in the front to tank or better yet, build another undead unit that’s not banshees.
The most popular choices for countering banshees early game and the reasons they don't work include:
Bloodfiend: Unless you get lucky, this unit isn't very durable.
Zombies: These things don’t' have very good stats and again aren't very durable.
Frost dragons: Very hard to sync, because they are so fast and fly. Also, they're not very durable especially vs banshees. On an unrelated note, banshees actually beat these 1v1.
Naga siren: You have to save for an insanely long time and you will have lost the first push by the time you get these plus you'll be behind a lot on income.
Druid: Theoretically this COULD work, but druids extremely flimsy as well and if your team has banshees, you’re probably better off with a fairy dragon.
In my opinion, the best counter to banshees is super early building. If your opponent is making banshees, they will probably wait and sync on the banshee. If you get 2 waves pushing together before their first wave can come out, you will probably win the push. However, your units won’t be the best possible early game units (all under 255 gold or 275 if your unit has an upgrade like defenders). If the other team is extremely quick, they can adapt and counter your strat with quicker buildings.
Mid Game
During the mid game, units with chaos do pretty well, because there are no (or less) complex tanking mechanics going on. Naga sirens especially work wonders versus banshee. Also, tentacles become a viable option, because one group of tents can kill a
banshee.
Late Game
Remember that to win the game, you’re not trying to counter banshees; banshees aren’t the only units your opponent is making.
You must counter the combo of units and specials your opponent’s team is making. When the late game comes around, another strength of banshees is shown: They are highly resistant to spells and can be healed with extreme efficiency by wizards and glades. Late game is all about large presences on the battle field. Many games see 30 units on each side battling it out with reinforcement rates almost equaling death rates. This is the reason why long range siege units are effective late game (They build up because they never get hit by conventional attacks and don’t die). Banshees are a key part of this equation, because aoe spells are not very effective against banshees. These include: frost nova, chain lighting, warlock explosion, tidal wave, starfall. Wizards heal all the damage from these aoe spells very well and in fact, in many games, late game pushes consist of almost entire banshees and wizards.
Ironically, banshees plus wizards counter chain lighting from wizards, frost nova from ice queens, and the explosion from warlocks. I would go so far as to say they counter these units even though the units all have chaos damage. (Actually banshees definitely are good vs warlocks because warlocks don’t even attack enough with their regular attack for it to really matter.)
Units with regular chaos also don’t work very well, because they hardly ever attack banshees (same principle with early game where all units focus one unit on the other team). In addition, generally late game is all about aoe spells and specials(which are spells). Units are too busy dying to aoe spells to actually be effective in battle. The only things that are effective versus(notice how I didn’t save counters to) late game banshee are units with chaos splash. These units include azure dragons, red dragons, incubus and infernal. All of these are effective against both regular units and banshees.
A fun analogy
A good analogy from Warcraft melee concerning with countering a strategy: Nothing the orc army has really counters mass druids of the talon.
Theoretically, raiders counter dotts, because they do extra damage to them and take less damage from them.
Theoretically, spirit walkers counter dotts, because they can dispel all of the dotts’ spells and also redistribute the damage from dott focus fire.
Theoretically, the tauren chieftain counters dotts, because it does aoe damage to lots of units
Theoretically, the blademaster counters dotts, because it rips up low hp units.
So many newbies get all 4 of these things and fight a dott army and lose horribly. Why?
They’re too worried about countering dotts and not the whole overall strategy. The elf can position his army so none of your units can hit dotts. It is extremely hard to maneuver around 3 heroes, 2 quillbeasts, and a pocket factory that your opponent gets. Position is often more important than army size or composition. Therefore, raiders will have a hard time actually attacking dotts. In addition, although dotts do reduced damage all the units and heroes I named, the elf heroes will also be throwing out extremely high dps. Although spirit walkers can dispel, they’ll never have enough mana to dispel every single cyclone, because you can never have more walkers than they have dotts. The TC is negated by mana burn and scrolls of healing. The blade is kept constantly in the air. Although you can dispel the cyclone, it is very hard to react immediately, so the blade will always be in the air for a few seconds.
You’ll be surprised to find out that orcs actually do get this combo of units versus mass dotts. The key is timing. You can harass the night elf and attack him during very small windows where the elf is vulnerable. Also, you must avoid fights, many times trading tps. While doing this, you must slowly level up the tauren chieftain so that his shockwave will overwhelm the number of scrolls of healing the elf has. During a fight you must ensnare the dh out of range of the TC and keep the dh away from the TC as much as possible. In addition, you must alternate between focus firing heroes and dotts, because if you mass focus heroes, your opponent will just try to soak the damage will doing constant dps to your army, but if you mass focus units, the elf heroes won’t die and level up extremely fast, overwhelming you. None of this is very intuitive, but this is how it works.
Miscellaneous
On a completely different note, banshees counter the early orb of lighting + scroll of stone combo strategy after a strike, which often forces a team to use 2 strikes one immediately after the other, because they don’t die to orb of lighting.
Conclusion
My point? Banshees are strong at all points of the game.
Friday, June 05, 2009
Thursday, June 04, 2009
Castle Fight Strategies: guide to human
Ok, before i start with the actual guide...i want to make somethings clear. CF is a Team game - especially with human. You cant play alone - u got no good chaos damage for banshee rush, no good anti special stuff, no good unit killing specials. What you do have, is good tanks, anti air units, cheap spammable artillery (both units and specials) good supports and most of all...Unit Spam. So yeah, play as a team.
Another thing - this isnt a Strict guide - u cant join a game and alt tab here to see what to build in what order and what to buy etc. You need to adopt your own strategy. This here is just as a guide to help you around how to counter, make combinations with ur mates, and all around following the game.
with that said, the guide starts now :
First thing to mention is the pros and cons of the race.
Pros :
-Good massing units
-Specialized units
-Good supporting abilities
-Really powerful artillery (when used right)
Cons :
-Many tactics can counter them
-Massing units may often cause to lose so careful what units u mass
-Their specialized units can easily be countered, so you need to micro well and sync ur units
-Lousy tower
All in all, u see that human is an easily counterable race. So, until late game comes in and u have 12 warlocks, 24 gryphons, shrine and other units, u are easy to be countered, so if u are, get your friends to help you.
Now, the units :
1.Footman - 100g
250 hp
18 DPS (normal dmg type)
4 armor (heavy)
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It can be easily seen that the unit itself is pretty weak. However, its DPS/Gold ratio is pretty high. This means that if massed, it can pose some threat (but careful - if u are facing avatars of vengeance, dont even THINK about massing these, and that is just an example)
2. Defender - 275g
575 hp
38 DPS (normal)
7 armor (heavy)
has evasion and defend (reflect ranged attacks)
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One of the best tanks around (considering the price) . Most of the time, footman is built just so you can upgrade to defender. And he is pretty worth it.
3. Sniper - 140g
270 hp
22 dps (pierce, 500 range)
0 armor (medium)
Has critical strike
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Another good massing unit. This unit is best massed vs light armored units. However, with the recent 1.13b version, its main purpose is to either sit around like that to see if u can counter both land and air units, or specialize it into anti-ground or anti-air unit
4. Marksman - 300g
450 hp
61 dps (pierce 500 range) to air
28 dps (pierce 500 range) to buildings
1 armor (medium)
Has critical strike vs air (its pretty devastating
)
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Personnally, i hate this unit but...oh well
. It is a pretty good anti air unit, and i've often seen it one hit some air units with critical. I'd not recommend it for massing unless opponents go all air
5. Heavy Gunner - 320 g
53 dps (pierce 550 range)
525 hp
5 armor (medium)
Has splash
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A really good anti-ground unit. When backed up with some tanks, it can be a really good unit. When massed, its even better - it can easily kill an entire wave if u have a strong tanking line.
6. Mortar - 210 g
280 hp
21 dps (siege 1000 range)
0 armor (light)
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One of my favorite artillery units. No, not because of the lousy dps and hp. But because of the easy spammable price - in most games i often find myself having like 10 mortar buildings and not into late game. So when we push, the buildings fall really easy. Needs a strong tanking line tho. And no assasins.
7. Gryphon - 250 g
500 hp
23 dps (magic 450 range)
2 armor (medium)
Has Bash and chain lighting on attack
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Another great unit to mass. Actually, unless your opponents start with ground non-air-attacking units, this unit is only capable of doing something if massed. 6 gryphons often cast chain lighting like crazy and have an easy push. If u have gjallarhorn, its even better.
8. Crusader - 280 g
600 hp
42 dps (hero)
6 armor (heavy)
Has devotion aura, cleaving strikes and inner fire
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Another may-be tank. Tho he is much better as a supporter, especially with inner fire which is more or less a heal.
9. Paladin - 525 g
850 hp
67 dps (heal)
9 armor (heavy)
Has devotion aura, cleaving attacks, bash, inner fire and ressurection
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Even better than crusader (ofc ) . His ressurection makes him an awesome supporter and spamming unit - have a group of 8 paladins and they never die especially with an ice queen around.Paladin may also act as a tank because of his high armor, however even tho his buff buffs good, he likes to cast it to other units, so in some situations, paladin is better than defender in tanking
10. Warlock - 300g
350 hp
17 dps (chaos 160 range)
1 armor (Unarmored)
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Probably the best unit to spam in whole castle fight. 10 warlocks usually give the same results as a rescue strike, which by late game is easily achievable.
Those are all the units. Now, about the specials. The lumber costs remain a mystery but i will figure it out soon
Artillery - 200 g
Shoots at random places in the opponent's base, dealing 400-500 siege dmg.
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
This is probably the best late game special ever. Having multiple of these (and by that i mean 10-15) will easily win the game for you. THIS is the reason why human are becoming really lousy when playing -na. Artillery is their best thing.
Gjallarhorn - 225 g
Increases nearby units' attack speed by 66%. Casts it every 6 seconds. Buff lasts for 1 minute.
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Although it is pretty good set on autocast, the best thing to do is cast it manually - turn off autocast and when ur units come around cast it. Thx to gjallarhorn, i often see gryphons killing red dragons in 1v1 situations.
Heroic Shrine (still not sure i got the name right ) 725 g
Gives a 22% chance to spawn 2 units instead of one. Doesnt work on legendary units.
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
There it is, the shrine of all massing. If u ask me, it is a must-have for all human builders. Shrine first, artillery second, safety third. Awesome for turning 10 warlocks into 15 or even 20
Now, we're done with almost all buildings (im not gonna mention towers and treasure boxes yet, but with the recent balance changes, im gonna look up to them). What we have left is strategies. But as i said before, DO NOT STRICTLY FOLLOW THEM. Most of the time, u need to adapt to your opponents. For example, if the elf makes OoL and stops production, u need to do so too. Or else u will get ownd.
1. Defend da DPS
Human have 2 effective tanks - Defenders with their relative low price and good anti-piercing abilities, and Paladins with good armor and healing abilities. Use them ! Try to make a synced wave of tanks, gunners and snipers/marksman.
Something similar to the "imagined strategy of orc" (which is - mass grunts/axemasters which cut off esnared range units while being buffed), this strategy, if managed ok, might be the human strategy. In most games i know, human are about protection and holy stuff. Here, their protection is made by defender, and the holy stuff is in paladin. They can easily be countered by air, which is countered by ur ranged units. Which means, that human units help each other. Syncing them can make this strategy a winner. However, take care. You must rely on your mates to help you out with specials and divine units. Also, this strategy isn't recommended vs splash and other strategies which will damage your ranged units without killing the tanks.
2. AllYourBaseIsDestroyedByArtillery
Simply, counter your opponents, support your friends until u have enough money and lumber to make lots of artillery. A reminder - artillery is more or less useless if u have low numbers and opponents don't have lots of buildings. What artillery is good at is killing buildings which gives u money which gives you ability to make more artillery.
That is pretty simple, nothing else to say.
3.I beleive i can fly!
The only unit of human that can fly - gryphons. Not only do they fly, they can bash and chain lighting ur opponents, and they use no fossil fuel! Give them a ghallarhorn, and a shrine (just a shrine ) and they will hammer their way to the opponent's castle. Take care tho - if opponents use anti air units, it will pay off to make ground units too.
Again, not much to say except that if ur enemies make roflcopters, marksmen, dhawks or other anti air units, abandon strategy! You cannot rely on friends to take out some units. Exceptions are marksmen and possibly copters, which wont fight back vs most units, and your mates can counter them while u are massing your army.
4. Unlimited rescue strikes.
Yes human can do that . What did i say before about warlocks? Have a good mass or them and their nukes will kill the opponents to death. AND , they became smarter, so that once they unleash their nukes, they go back so not everything is lost.
One thing to say - if opponents make assassins, abandon strategy! At least until it is late game and assassins don't do much.
Conclusion : Now you know what human units do and what they can do to opponents. Yes, i know i posted strategies, but u need to adopt them to your game - the warlock strategy should NOT be used if opponents have assassin. Sure it might sound attractive - "hey look at me no0bs , i have rescue strike! Oh noes cheater killed my warlocks! " But yeah, the strategies were a bit emphasized . They arent godlike strategies and u need to collaborate.
Countering
A very important thing, not only for human, but also in all castle fight. In the beginning (pros&cons) u (probably) saw that humans are pretty specialized. The good side of that is that u have some way of countering almost every unit around (except banshee and specials). But the bad side is that if u don't sync ur units, the marksmen will go hunting air without a tank so melee units will kill it, then the air will attack the helpless paladin/defender leaving the warlock with no protection. So to avoid this, you need to sync your units.
About countering, there are 3 most important unit types :
Melee ground
Ranged ground
Ranged air (no melee yet)
now, humans pretty much have all they need to counter most of the units here. For melee ground they have gryphons. Ranged in a lot cases is pierce or magic, both reflected by defender. And air is obvious - marksmen.
however, there is a big problem about humans - assassins. They love to target and kill your gunners, mortars and warlocks. The most common solution is paladin, he has mana which means he will attract some of the assassins, and he can revive units.
Special Cases
In most cases, human are equipped with the right unit to counter opponents. But there are cases when things are deceiving. For example Dhawks. Often newbs dont know their capabilities and they "counter" them with gryphon's magic damage. But that is a newb mistake so we put it aside . Decent players have an instinct that makes them counter any air with marksmen. In most cases it is a good idea, but not in this case. Dhawks have heavy armor, which means low dmg from marksmen. So, even if a lucky marksman may kill a Dhawk, it is not good for u cause opponents can use ground units to kill them.
So, what is a good solution?
Well, ive often see this done by newbs who dont know what air and what ground units are . But they effectively countered Dhawks with...Defenders! Yes, defenders. But why? Well, simply - they wont attack them, but they will reflect almost all their attacks, and evade the rest, taking almost no damage. Eventually, the defender is going to kill them.
Other special cases are : Plague bearers (often people counter them with air, and are really surprised to see their units die to plague cloud), Wyverns (counter them with marksman, and u will barely attack. U can only hope to crit on the first attack.) and others
oh, and one more thing. Often you may be tempted into countering ground melee piercing units (such as wandigoo, naga guard, corrupted hound and others) with defender. Well, it isnt a bad choice, but remember - u will not take any damage if u build air units. Be carefull tho, if opponents can build anti-air units, then defender is the way to go
Supporting
I dont remember how many times i said it before but i need to say it again...CF is a TEAM game. And human's specialization enables easy supporting and combining with allies. For instance, ur friend makes a void keeper and opponent's naga counters with naga guard. Your best thing to do is a defender - it will protect the opponent and the void walker will attack air units in case opponents build them.
Then again, the situation is often in reverse - u build the mortars when opponents have a tower, and ur mates will protect your siege. Or u make gryphons and opponents make trolls. If u are going for the gryph strategy, allies will have to help u out until ur army of gryphons can take out copters or even Dhawks.
Out of the 6 different types (not including upgrades) units human can build, 3 are units which ur mates benefit from. Those are Paladin for the heal and ress, Defender for good tanking capabilities and Mortars for taking down towers. And of the 3 specials they have, 2 of them are supportive! Use them!
Another important thing - i know that through the guide, i made mortars look really good units. Not that they aren't, but do not overrate them. Siege dmg is probably the easiest dmg type to counter. AND, mortars don't attack air! So yeah, use them when needed but take care of how you use them!
Credits :
Kiraice for numerous tactics that helped me get better
Gex for the awesome game
ZliElektronicar and monk for their units stats file which helped me out with units stats
oh almost forgot, FlorWarrior for making the file compatible with excell 2003
Update 1 :
-added countering strats
-added supporting
-added credits
Update 2 :
-added colors! (eye cookies ftw!)
-further explained some strategies, and fixed typos
-started hoping for the rep icon
Update 3 :
-added special cases at the countering place
-started preparing for videos/replays
Another thing - this isnt a Strict guide - u cant join a game and alt tab here to see what to build in what order and what to buy etc. You need to adopt your own strategy. This here is just as a guide to help you around how to counter, make combinations with ur mates, and all around following the game.
with that said, the guide starts now :
First thing to mention is the pros and cons of the race.
Pros :
-Good massing units
-Specialized units
-Good supporting abilities
-Really powerful artillery (when used right)
Cons :
-Many tactics can counter them
-Massing units may often cause to lose so careful what units u mass
-Their specialized units can easily be countered, so you need to micro well and sync ur units
-Lousy tower
All in all, u see that human is an easily counterable race. So, until late game comes in and u have 12 warlocks, 24 gryphons, shrine and other units, u are easy to be countered, so if u are, get your friends to help you.
Now, the units :
1.Footman - 100g
250 hp
18 DPS (normal dmg type)
4 armor (heavy)
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
It can be easily seen that the unit itself is pretty weak. However, its DPS/Gold ratio is pretty high. This means that if massed, it can pose some threat (but careful - if u are facing avatars of vengeance, dont even THINK about massing these, and that is just an example)
2. Defender - 275g
575 hp
38 DPS (normal)
7 armor (heavy)
has evasion and defend (reflect ranged attacks)
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
One of the best tanks around (considering the price) . Most of the time, footman is built just so you can upgrade to defender. And he is pretty worth it.
3. Sniper - 140g
270 hp
22 dps (pierce, 500 range)
0 armor (medium)
Has critical strike
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Another good massing unit. This unit is best massed vs light armored units. However, with the recent 1.13b version, its main purpose is to either sit around like that to see if u can counter both land and air units, or specialize it into anti-ground or anti-air unit
4. Marksman - 300g
450 hp
61 dps (pierce 500 range) to air
28 dps (pierce 500 range) to buildings
1 armor (medium)
Has critical strike vs air (its pretty devastating
)--------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Personnally, i hate this unit but...oh well
. It is a pretty good anti air unit, and i've often seen it one hit some air units with critical. I'd not recommend it for massing unless opponents go all air5. Heavy Gunner - 320 g
53 dps (pierce 550 range)
525 hp
5 armor (medium)
Has splash
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
A really good anti-ground unit. When backed up with some tanks, it can be a really good unit. When massed, its even better - it can easily kill an entire wave if u have a strong tanking line.
6. Mortar - 210 g
280 hp
21 dps (siege 1000 range)
0 armor (light)
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
One of my favorite artillery units. No, not because of the lousy dps and hp. But because of the easy spammable price - in most games i often find myself having like 10 mortar buildings and not into late game. So when we push, the buildings fall really easy. Needs a strong tanking line tho. And no assasins.
7. Gryphon - 250 g
500 hp
23 dps (magic 450 range)
2 armor (medium)
Has Bash and chain lighting on attack
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Another great unit to mass. Actually, unless your opponents start with ground non-air-attacking units, this unit is only capable of doing something if massed. 6 gryphons often cast chain lighting like crazy and have an easy push. If u have gjallarhorn, its even better.
8. Crusader - 280 g
600 hp
42 dps (hero)
6 armor (heavy)
Has devotion aura, cleaving strikes and inner fire
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Another may-be tank. Tho he is much better as a supporter, especially with inner fire which is more or less a heal.
9. Paladin - 525 g
850 hp
67 dps (heal)
9 armor (heavy)
Has devotion aura, cleaving attacks, bash, inner fire and ressurection
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Even better than crusader (ofc
) . His ressurection makes him an awesome supporter and spamming unit - have a group of 8 paladins and they never die especially with an ice queen around.Paladin may also act as a tank because of his high armor, however even tho his buff buffs good, he likes to cast it to other units, so in some situations, paladin is better than defender in tanking10. Warlock - 300g
350 hp
17 dps (chaos 160 range)
1 armor (Unarmored)
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Probably the best unit to spam in whole castle fight. 10 warlocks usually give the same results as a rescue strike, which by late game is easily achievable.
Those are all the units. Now, about the specials. The lumber costs remain a mystery but i will figure it out soon
Artillery - 200 g
Shoots at random places in the opponent's base, dealing 400-500 siege dmg.
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
This is probably the best late game special ever. Having multiple of these (and by that i mean 10-15) will easily win the game for you. THIS is the reason why human are becoming really lousy when playing -na. Artillery is their best thing.
Gjallarhorn - 225 g
Increases nearby units' attack speed by 66%. Casts it every 6 seconds. Buff lasts for 1 minute.
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Although it is pretty good set on autocast, the best thing to do is cast it manually - turn off autocast and when ur units come around cast it. Thx to gjallarhorn, i often see gryphons killing red dragons in 1v1 situations.
Heroic Shrine (still not sure i got the name right
) 725 gGives a 22% chance to spawn 2 units instead of one. Doesnt work on legendary units.
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
There it is, the shrine of all massing. If u ask me, it is a must-have for all human builders. Shrine first, artillery second, safety third. Awesome for turning 10 warlocks into 15 or even 20
Now, we're done with almost all buildings (im not gonna mention towers and treasure boxes yet, but with the recent balance changes, im gonna look up to them). What we have left is strategies. But as i said before, DO NOT STRICTLY FOLLOW THEM. Most of the time, u need to adapt to your opponents. For example, if the elf makes OoL and stops production, u need to do so too. Or else u will get ownd.
1. Defend da DPS
Human have 2 effective tanks - Defenders with their relative low price and good anti-piercing abilities, and Paladins with good armor and healing abilities. Use them ! Try to make a synced wave of tanks, gunners and snipers/marksman.
Something similar to the "imagined strategy of orc" (which is - mass grunts/axemasters which cut off esnared range units while being buffed), this strategy, if managed ok, might be the human strategy. In most games i know, human are about protection and holy stuff. Here, their protection is made by defender, and the holy stuff is in paladin. They can easily be countered by air, which is countered by ur ranged units. Which means, that human units help each other. Syncing them can make this strategy a winner. However, take care. You must rely on your mates to help you out with specials and divine units. Also, this strategy isn't recommended vs splash and other strategies which will damage your ranged units without killing the tanks.
2. AllYourBaseIsDestroyedByArtillery
Simply, counter your opponents, support your friends until u have enough money and lumber to make lots of artillery. A reminder - artillery is more or less useless if u have low numbers and opponents don't have lots of buildings. What artillery is good at is killing buildings which gives u money which gives you ability to make more artillery.
That is pretty simple, nothing else to say
.3.I beleive i can fly!
The only unit of human that can fly - gryphons. Not only do they fly, they can bash and chain lighting ur opponents, and they use no fossil fuel! Give them a ghallarhorn, and a shrine (just a shrine
) and they will hammer their way to the opponent's castle. Take care tho - if opponents use anti air units, it will pay off to make ground units too.Again, not much to say except that if ur enemies make roflcopters, marksmen, dhawks or other anti air units, abandon strategy! You cannot rely on friends to take out some units. Exceptions are marksmen and possibly copters, which wont fight back vs most units, and your mates can counter them while u are massing your army.
4. Unlimited rescue strikes.
Yes human can do that
. What did i say before about warlocks? Have a good mass or them and their nukes will kill the opponents to death. AND , they became smarter, so that once they unleash their nukes, they go back so not everything is lost.One thing to say - if opponents make assassins, abandon strategy! At least until it is late game and assassins don't do much.
Conclusion : Now you know what human units do and what they can do to opponents. Yes, i know i posted strategies, but u need to adopt them to your game - the warlock strategy should NOT be used if opponents have assassin. Sure it might sound attractive - "hey look at me no0bs , i have rescue strike! Oh noes cheater killed my warlocks! " But yeah, the strategies were a bit emphasized
. They arent godlike strategies and u need to collaborate.Countering
A very important thing, not only for human, but also in all castle fight. In the beginning (pros&cons) u (probably) saw that humans are pretty specialized. The good side of that is that u have some way of countering almost every unit around (except banshee and specials). But the bad side is that if u don't sync ur units, the marksmen will go hunting air without a tank so melee units will kill it, then the air will attack the helpless paladin/defender leaving the warlock with no protection. So to avoid this, you need to sync your units.
About countering, there are 3 most important unit types :
Melee ground
Ranged ground
Ranged air (no melee yet)
now, humans pretty much have all they need to counter most of the units here. For melee ground they have gryphons. Ranged in a lot cases is pierce or magic, both reflected by defender. And air is obvious - marksmen.
however, there is a big problem about humans - assassins. They love to target and kill your gunners, mortars and warlocks. The most common solution is paladin, he has mana which means he will attract some of the assassins, and he can revive units.
Special Cases
In most cases, human are equipped with the right unit to counter opponents. But there are cases when things are deceiving. For example Dhawks. Often newbs dont know their capabilities and they "counter" them with gryphon's magic damage. But that is a newb mistake so we put it aside
. Decent players have an instinct that makes them counter any air with marksmen. In most cases it is a good idea, but not in this case. Dhawks have heavy armor, which means low dmg from marksmen. So, even if a lucky marksman may kill a Dhawk, it is not good for u cause opponents can use ground units to kill them.So, what is a good solution?
Well, ive often see this done by newbs who dont know what air and what ground units are
. But they effectively countered Dhawks with...Defenders! Yes, defenders. But why? Well, simply - they wont attack them, but they will reflect almost all their attacks, and evade the rest, taking almost no damage. Eventually, the defender is going to kill them.Other special cases are : Plague bearers (often people counter them with air, and are really surprised to see their units die to plague cloud), Wyverns (counter them with marksman, and u will barely attack. U can only hope to crit on the first attack.) and others
oh, and one more thing. Often you may be tempted into countering ground melee piercing units (such as wandigoo, naga guard, corrupted hound and others) with defender. Well, it isnt a bad choice, but remember - u will not take any damage if u build air units. Be carefull tho, if opponents can build anti-air units, then defender is the way to go
Supporting
I dont remember how many times i said it before but i need to say it again...CF is a TEAM game. And human's specialization enables easy supporting and combining with allies. For instance, ur friend makes a void keeper and opponent's naga counters with naga guard. Your best thing to do is a defender - it will protect the opponent and the void walker will attack air units in case opponents build them.
Then again, the situation is often in reverse - u build the mortars when opponents have a tower, and ur mates will protect your siege. Or u make gryphons and opponents make trolls. If u are going for the gryph strategy, allies will have to help u out until ur army of gryphons can take out copters or even Dhawks.
Out of the 6 different types (not including upgrades) units human can build, 3 are units which ur mates benefit from. Those are Paladin for the heal and ress, Defender for good tanking capabilities and Mortars for taking down towers. And of the 3 specials they have, 2 of them are supportive! Use them!
Another important thing - i know that through the guide, i made mortars look really good units. Not that they aren't, but do not overrate them. Siege dmg is probably the easiest dmg type to counter. AND, mortars don't attack air! So yeah, use them when needed but take care of how you use them!
Credits :
Kiraice for numerous tactics that helped me get better
Gex for the awesome game
ZliElektronicar and monk for their units stats file which helped me out with units stats
oh almost forgot, FlorWarrior for making the file compatible with excell 2003
Update 1 :
-added countering strats
-added supporting
-added credits
Update 2 :
-added colors! (eye cookies ftw!)
-further explained some strategies, and fixed typos
-started hoping for the rep icon
Update 3 :
-added special cases at the countering place
-started preparing for videos/replays
Tuesday, June 02, 2009
MONKEY ISLAND® IS BACK THIS SUMMER!
The long awaited game Monkey Island has been announced to be released this summer, exactly on 7th of July. Ahoy there !
Read more at Telltale site
SAN FRANCISCO, Calif – June 1, 2009 – LucasArts today announced that the original hilarious pirate adventure is back, with two new projects underway based on the classic Monkey Island franchise. First, Telltale will premiere the Tales of Monkey Island™ game series, delivering a completely new epic storyline and swashbuckling flair that will unfold across five monthly episodes on PC and WiiWare™ beginning with the season premiere episode on July 7. The Monkey Island celebration continues later in the summer when LucasArts publishes The Secret of Monkey Island™: Special Edition, a completely re-imagined version of the first game in the series that adds updated high definition graphics, a re-mastered musical score, and full voiceover to the classic adventure game originally launched in 1990. The Secret of Monkey Island: Special Edition will be made available on Xbox LIVE® Arcade for the Xbox 360® video game and entertainment system from Microsoft, and PC.
Read more at Telltale site
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