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How to Play Pitlord and get 4k in 6 mins
| Sent By: One[Destiny] |
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This article is a guide to the first 6 mins of gameplay...where you go from there is up to you. I've believed ever since version 1.8 came out that pitlord is the only way to go. It makes fast money for all its weakness. If you wanted to ditch the pitlord later in the game, you can restart him for as little as no money.
Rival Nations is all about getting off to a good start and most veterans will tell you that getting the second hero is a good marker of progress. The pitlord is the best hero to use for getting a 2nd hero. Below, I outline the strengths of the pitlord as well as what to look out for. With practice you too can own with the pitlord =).
Many heroes can make money fast. Other heroes are good for harassment. What makes the pitlord so efficient is that he can do both. His posse, along with his splash attack, allows him to be targeting many different units at once. A higher rate of attack brings in more money, the reason why blizzard is so deadly. The doom guard attacks air so you're not missing out on the +75 gold they bring in. His coil spell allows for 2800 hitpoints of regeneration (7 casts at 400hp a piece). Howl, though not as strong as the tc's stomp or mk's has a larger area of effect, which makes it a better than either stomps. Fellhounds can burn up to 390 mana if you start their mana regeneration process early (6 casts of -65 mana). Lastly, cripple makes it hard for heroes to move around. When a mage needs to fall back but he is crippled, his only two choices are to die or tp. If he chooses to die, chances are he will have to tp later on, so more than likely he will choose to tp. Tping wastes not only their money but also their time, which is so precious so early in the game.
Knowing these strengths, your arsenal is this. Use howl as your main weapon. It's area of effect is unmatched. Center your pitlord among enemy troops before using it. Since this will not always be safe, you will need a healing salve before heading out to compensate. Boots, if you can get them, will also help enormously. You'll want to be using howl constantly just as the mage casts blizzard constantly but since the pitlord does not have brilliance aura as the mage, pack 1 clarity and 1 mana pot before going out. Actually it's best to pack 2 mana pots but 500 gold to start doesn't allow for it.
The next step of the arsenal is using his minions, but you can't cast that spell until you hit lvl 6. Knowing the physics of troop flow will really help you out here, but that is beyond the scope of this article, as they say =).
Once reached, do all you can to keep them alive which translates to keeping your doom guard alive since he can heal the others if they get hurt. So how do you keep him alive?! Actually you can't do it indefinitely. Sadly, skilled players beat the living crap out of it :*( However, what you can do is keep him away from computer troops. It's enough that air units target him. Don't let riflemen, footmen, and knights focus on him too. Use a healing salve or two to keep him healthy. Fellhounds and the pitlord himself soak up the damage while the doom guard coils. Once he runs out of mana, feel free to set him loose to kill.
With doom guard usage covered, we now look at fellhounds. They dont possess an attack spell. If you can keep them alive, they will keep bringing in gold. Back them away from the towers and large enemy troop concentrations. Coil them if their hp drops below 350. Their mana burn does not bring in money but it does have a purpose. As tempting as it is, you mustn't allow yourself to mana burn everything you run across. Your goal is to make gold. Suppose you run across a blademaster. He is in no position to kill your beefy doom guard, so why waste mana on him. Or suppose you're up against a mage/tc. If you mana burn the tc, he won't be able to shockwave, he wont be leaving either. If you mana burn the mage, you're closer to making him tp, but the tc will go to work on you and your troop flow. Looking at the two options, your best choice is to hit the mage hard and fast. Blast him with mana burns immediately while using cripple. Coil him . Walk up to him and stomp him. Use howl, then cast rain of fire ahead of him. 2 more mana burns. If he hasn't tped yet, coil/howl him again. Just under 2 mins later, you will have enough mana to mana burn the tc and we all know a tauren chieftain without mana is nothing more than a big ugly cow.
By now, 6 minutes have passed and you have 4k. Time to tp to the altar to grab a quick 2nd of your choice, restock on the essentials of war, and head back out.
Before I end this article, some quick notes. Rain of Fire is best used on buildings and not troops. You are not invincible simply because you have read this far. Counters to this strat do exist. Dark Summoning has a cooldown of 2 minutes exactly so pace yourself. Coil itself has a cooldown so don't go all kamikaze with those fellhounds. They WILL die if you fight too aggressively. Use a mana pot only when you are 300 mana below your capacity. Mana is oh so precious. Don't waste any of it. If things take a turn for the worst, maybe you're fight 3v1 and you've also lost troop flow thanks to the other team, you may not make 4k in 6 mins or even 3k in 8 mins. Whatever you do, do not tp back. Accept death. When you revive, you will have a fresh pool of mana to draw from as well as full health. That is worth the 250 gold you give up. Not to mention the 200 gold you save on town portals. The key to making money is a furious attack. If you've run dry on mana, don't play crippled. Go suicide on the dragons and come back strong. You need only tp when you run out of spirits.
Last thing I want to cover, I promise. Pitlord vs Pitlord. It's a race to lvl 6. Don't worry if you're facing a tc/pitlord. Actually, any additional heroes will only serve to slow them down leveling wise. Once you hit lvl 6, mana burn his pitlord. With question, he is the one to mana burn. We've covered how effective howl is and dark summoning as well. If you can prevent him from ever casting his dark summoning due to lack of mana, you've won. What happens if he's reached level 6 first? Run!! Run to the other side of the map. You cannot allow his fellhounds to cripple you. Now what if you both make it to lvl 6? You want to kill his doom guard. Command everyone to attack it. Mana burn the pitlord first, then the doom guard. Cast stomp and howl continuously. Do not cast cripple. If you use up all your mana kill his doom guard, you've also made your doom guard useless. Play conservatively. Rival Nations, like life, is an ffa. Focus on getting strong, rather than weakening others. Happy Hunting.[ back to top ]
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Power BM counter
| Sent By: RiK |
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Recently it seems that lots of people are trying a power blademaster (bm) "strategy". In my opinion this "strategy" is basically as cheap as trying power pali. No matter how u look at it, powering ANY solo hero is pretty lame because once you reach a certain threshold in terms of speed / dmg, no skill is required - you just walk in, kill buildings and walk out.
People who've played against me might comment that I've played power blademaster too sometimes. However, there are certain small points they overlook:
1) I never power more than 90 agil with a max of 150-160 total dmg.
2) I dont use it to kill barraks
Still, I agree that I'm a bit hipocritical. =)
However, the whole purpose of this post is being lost. =) I wanted to talk about a strategy to counter power blademaster. The best combo for killing bm is tc + dl + mk. tc + mk can create a stun trap and sleep fills in for the time stun takes to charge. Additionally, if a blademaster comes at you with mirrors, do a stomp, clap, carrion and then look for bm with highest life and sleep it. The logic is that spells do 75% dmg to heros and 200% dmg to mirrros. So mirrors will always lose more life. I've beaten quite a few blademasters this way. It takes practice, but once you get used to it blademasters are in trouble.
Again though - if the power blademaster has good allies who are supporting him (multi hero-ed partners who stick with the bm), then you are pretty much in trouble. The best you can do is, sleep the bm and then go after his allies OR you can keep ur dl there and continuously sleep the bm while your allies total the barraks on the opposing team. Share control with your allies so that they can use your heros in this case, because you only need the dreadlord to keep the bm in check.
Alternative combinations are tc + dl + dk or tc + dl + fs. You need the TC for stomp to completely halt bm movement and you need sleep to stop the bm completely once you find the real one. The third hero can be substitued with anything more or less. DK is a good choice because of the high DD (direct dmg) spells he has, while fs is good because of farsight / chain.
If you have already gotten 2 heros and suddenly find that a team is powering a blademaster, then the best hero 3rd hero is TC in my opinion. Reason being that if the blademaster ever comes for you, you can stomp to halt him and then retreat if need be. You should also start getting town upgrades ASAP if you see someone powering bm. Each structural upgrade gives +1 armor and +600 HP to barraks. Additionally, the increase in attack and armor of your units slows down the money making for the blademaster.
Lastly, if you realize a bit too late that someone has powered a bm and you have already gotten all the heros you can handle, then the best bet for you is to get upgrades FAST, get catapults and try to take out their barraks. The purpose of the game is to kill the castle, not to kill heros. Always remember that!! =)
Overall, power bm isnt as cheap as a power pali, but it is quite annoying because of bms hero killing abilities with critical. I hope that people will realize this and stop resorting to such "strategies" to win. Doing it for fun once in a while is okay, but claiming it is a "strategy" is something that I dont agree with.[ back to top ]
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How to use catapults
| Sent By: RiK |
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In RN 3.5, catapults have been improved greatly. However, not many people have realized this and thus they are greatly underused.
Here are a few reasons why you should use catapults:
1) They do seige dmg = 150% dmg to buildings
2) They do 80-100 dmg per hit = 120-150 dmg
3) They are cheap (300 gold, 75 lumber)
4) They have spell immunity so they cant be sniped from afar
5) They have more range than any tower (guard / magic)
Hopefully that convinces people that catapults in ver 3.5 are good ! Still, just because you have a good unit doesnt mean you are good at using them. So let me go over a few pointers on how to make the best of your catapults.
The basic idea is to capitalize on the long range and spell immunity of catapults. If you make sure that the army / heros do not get close enough to your catapults to attack them, then your catas can quickly make minemeat out of the barraks / castle. There are a number of ways to accomplish this. My 3 favorite strategies for acheiving this are:
1) Mass summons - AM + KOTG + FS + PoTM (optional)
You can create a wall of mass summons to prevent the opposite army from reaching your catapults. Continuously bliz and chain lightning. But make sure you do NOT bliz your summons. Bliz a bit farther in front to weaken units that are coming out and use chain lightning on the front line of units that are attacking your summons. If you go with a PoTM, starfall helps - but remember to keep an anti-magic shell on her.
2) Total seige - Farseer + TC + AM/PoTM (optional)
As XP mentioning in his artile, the FS + TC combo is one of the best for seiging buildings. The TC can tank in front because of his resurrect, and can halt units with stomp while the FS casts earthquake. The TC's wave also does quite a bit of dmg - 200 per wave. Just start quaking, and use the TC to stomp & wave the units / building. Add to this catapults, and you will have 1 dead barraks on your hand unless your enemy is very good. Having an AM helps because you can bliz the barraks and use water elementals to hasten the barraks destruction. Or, you can add a PoTM to give your catapults trueshot aura (+28 dmg to each), scout for increased range at night, and starfall to prevent units from attacking your catapults.
3) Sleepy heros - DL + TC + PoTM (optional)
Again you use the TC for preventing units from getting to your catapults. If enemy heros show up, you ue the DL to sleep them. The DL's inferno also helps out a lot with it's 50 chaos dmg per hit. This combo is a lot more difficult to micro manage than the previous 2, but is the start for one of the strongest combos (TC + DL + MK + DK + BM).
Finally, ALWAYS get sentry / farsight for night time to increase your sight range. If you put a sentry in front, your catapults will have the same range at night as they do during the day, making it all the more easier for you to take out buildings at night. The enemy team will suffer from reduced sight, while you wont. That is a VERY big advantage.
Hopefully this article will inspire more people to use catapults and add variety to their RN games rather than relying on just 1-2 standard strategies. =)[ back to top ]
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Death Knight first
| Sent By: Smoothdaddy |
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Recently, I've been trying a new strategy to counter the powerful AM,MK,TC etc..
If you are playing against a team that has 2 or even 3 AM's first this works very well. A team like that if left alone for long will have 3 or 4 hero's each by the 20 - 25 minute mark and it is GG at that point.
So here is my suggestion.
Your team
Player 1 - AM
Player 2 - AM or BM
Player 3- DK
Now you can have all the benifits of the money machine that is the AM without all of the grief that the AM can receive early.
At the beginning you should take your DK and get a sobi mask and 2 manna pots . The manna pots are critical. Stick next to the AM and lvl the DK up to lvl 6 as soon as possible. Your skills should go like this
Lvl 1 - Unholy Aura
Lvl 2 - Frost Nova
Lvl 3 - Unholy Aura
Lvl 4 - Deatch coil
Lvl 5 - Unholy Aura
Lvl 6 - Death coil
As soon as your lvl 6 you should be able to start sniping hero's. Watch your map closely and whenever you see an enemy hero at half life or less run in as fast a you can and coil, nova them. Run in front of them to mess up their pathing and if you are out of manna use your manna pot. 2 coils and 2 nova's should pretty much take care of the hero and you have a nice bounty to show for it. The key is you have to hit the other teams while each player still has just 1 hero or 1 lvl10 hero and a low lvl 2nd hero. if you are chasing down a TC or an MK make sure you have an anti magic potion to protect you from stuns.
Once you have made a couple of hero kills and with money from your allies you should have enough money to get your 2nd hero. I think the best choice here is either the MK,TC or DL.
These heros in combination with your DK should make it very easy to kill the other hero's quickly.
Now what this strat accomplishes are twofold. First you are constantly harrasing the other teams hero's hopefully their AM which is trying to make crazy money. So you severly slow their progress because they are either dying or TP'ing back to their base to heal up and spending money on TP's and healing potions. Second while you are out harrassing the other teams your teams AM is lvling without any resistance and should be on his 3rd or 4th hero by the time the other team starts getting their 2nd if you do it properly. With this much of a head start you just need to pool up your money buy some golems head to their barracks and basically make it GG for you.
Plus this is a lot more fun than the 8 - 12 minutes of blizzarding for money.[ back to top ]
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Anti-Blood Mage combo
| Sent By: RNzipf |
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(Works against almost any combo that uses supporting ranged or spellcasters)
The blood mage is a BIG, BIG, problem in TFT. He can cast flamestrike without needing to channel it, he can suck up more mana at greater range than the demon hunter, and he can banish his opponents at only 25 mana cost.
LOTS of people go Blood Mage + other heroes. This kind of combination is often very painful since they use other heroes to meat shield and the Blood Mage to deliver the damage. A fully melee-based army like TC DL MK Crypt Lord is often too slow to get near the mage and takes a lot of damage from being stuck among troops when flamestrike is cast.
The best way to counter the blood mage-combo is a combination that has at least these three heroes: Shadow Hunter, Dark Ranger, and Warden.
ALWAYS cast silence as top priority. Hex as the next. Followed by blinking the warden into the middle of the opposition to cast FoK and shadow strike the most dangerous spellcaster (usually blood mage; if there is a Dark Ranger then kill her first instead). Having tried it numerous times against good opponents with different combinations, I find that the only weakness this strategy has is that you must not let the enemy out-silence you or remove the power of your warden through a counter-hex or sleep.
This combination WILL work against a fully meelee army, providing you silence the TC DL MK CL combi fast enough. As long as the meelee guys cannot stun you, you can hold them at a distance with skeletons, shoot them with your agility-based Dark Ranger and Shadow Hunter, and use your warden to create chaos by blinking in and out. ALWAYS Hex the dread lord if there is one.[ back to top ]
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