WarCraft III

[Lochdale]

Hello all. Perhaps I am a little old (29) to be playing this game but one of my more tech minded friends suggested that I pick it up while my wife was away for two weeks. I did and I am addicted to it! Wonderful game. Here is the problem. Whenever I play a multi-player game against my friends they hammer me. Their heros are level 8-9 whilst mine don't get above 5. They have more troops and better units. Basically, I suck. Any advice, suggestions so that I can at least save some face. Thanks.

(Sorry if it appears to be a silly thread).

[Bryan Ekers]

Cheat.

Cheat hard, cheat fast, cheat strong.

Cheat their brains out.

Cheat until they scream for mercy.

[Doomtrain]

I sucked at WC3, but here's what I picked up: A hero should be your first priority. Get one out. Send him out hunting creeps and killing stuff right away. Keep building troops and send them out to him, so he has a little coterie.

As to the rest: Focus on your race's core strengths or their uber-est units. I'm guessing you do what I did, which is try and get buildings up. No! Build troops, build troops, build troops. Then work on upgrades. Hop on websites and read the various strategies.

I did all of the above and still sucked, but hey...

[Chronos]

The discrepancy in hero levels is a clear indication that you need to hunt more creeps. Learn the maps, and find out where the creeps are and what they're guarding (there's always creeps guarding the spare gold mines, and usually at neutral buildings, too). But I can't help you on units; I still can't find the right compromise between huge army and upkeep cost, myself. What I try to do is play heavy defense (preferably on an island) with 40 food worth of units until I drain my gold mines, so I don't have to pay upkeep. It usually works well enough against the computer, but I doubt that would hold up too well against human opponents.

[Blibbleblabble]

I gave up playing online for the reason that I couldn't win a single game! I do enjoy the single player campaign though, and am looking forward to getting the Frozen Throne add-on. Has anyone played it yet?

Anyway, sorry this post doesn't help you at all.

[Lochdale]

It has been very helpful as at least I know that I am not the only one! I haven't played the frozen throne yet but I do intend on getting it. I do whack creeps but my hero doesn't appear to level. Perhaps I need to solo the creeps?

[Doomtrain]

Seriously, you need to play some random map versus the computer with the Fog of War off and learn the maps. Also, you can watch how the computer does things and maybe learn from that. But keep in mind, most Warcraft players have been playing since the original and knew everything inside and out the day WC3 launched.

[iamthewalrus(:3=]

I was on the Frozen Throne Beta, and it's an awesome game. The most important part of it, with respect to people needing to get better, is that creeps are now marked on the map, so you don't have to know the maps.

That said, here are some basic strategies:
If your opponents are way leveled up by the time you meet, don't wait that long. You should be attacking their base early and often. Make sure that the fight is on their ground. Harass and run away. That way they have to try to keep you off their economy units, and yours can continue to build freely.

Keep units alive. If a unit is close to death, pull it back out of range. Send it back to base, or to a healing spot.

Learn a basic build order. I can't tell you what a good one is, because I've been playing Frozen Throne so much, and the costs are different. But you should be using all of your resources as much as possible. If you ever have extra gold sitting around, or are waiting for a building to finish before you can make more guys, then you had an inefficient build order. You can get basic build orders from websites.

[Doomtrain]

Oh yea, swarm the workers. Make some cheap units, send em into their base, and harass those gathering up gold. This works really well with Night Elves. That way they either have to build more workers or build defenses (or both!), which eats up time and resources.

[Chronos]

Note, of course, that "harass those gathering up gold" doesn't work against the Night Elves. You can kill the ones gathering lumber, if you can find where the heck they're hidden (often I'll abandom my original base, and my original lumberers survive for another hour afterwards).