The Battle Net Solo General Guide

[MGCImtR]

The Battle Net Solo General Guide
(By Impact02)
​

The purpose of this guide is to give you directions and tips when playing Battle Net rather than teaching you specific strategies.

The first thing you see when you click Play Game is your race of choice and the map pool. For the current version 1.21b I suggest you thumb down (red thumb icons) the following maps as being unpopular and inappropriate, and leave the rest maps like that:

Thumbed-Down Maps: Tirisfal Glades, Broken Shard, Wetlands, Moonglade, Scorched Basin
Thumbed-Up Maps: Echo Isles, Terenas Stand, Lost Temple, Phantom Grove, Turtle Rock, Twisted Meadows, Gnoll Wood

Section 1 - Player Statistics (/Stats Command)

When you match people, you see all types of levels with different statistics. The system of matching is called AMM in short. Many have complexes from bad stats and sometimes, if you enter a melee game in public ‘Play Custom Game’ you will see how they call other ‘noobs’ when they are ‘noobs’ themselves. Or excuses are made by those with too bad stats: ‘stats don’t matter’.

Now, let’s get into what matters and what not. You may know when managing an account you have to deal with factors such as experience decay and lag / disconnections / errors / crashes / drop-hacks. You may never know when someone’s stats are real losses or any of these factors. In fact, someone may have decided to play for fun and mass lose or abuse losses so as to get much weaker opponents after many losses. But no serious player abuses losses and gets good stats and high levels (see Section 2) like that. There are rare cases where someone’s stats may not correspond to the skill – it may be also an account sold by someone else.

But throughout my 4 year observation, I do know that what we should expect is stats to determine a player, as this is ~80% of the cases and not take into account the rest ~20%. You can determine a player just by his micro, units used and build order (bo) even without seeing his stats. And here is a description of what players are like, because these are mostly the cases:

• You cannot say whether a player is good when being up to level 10-12: he may have 1:0, 2:0, 3:0 and still be a newbie. He may be 7:5 or 10:6 and still be good. That is why good players know what is good, and if they host a game and want a skilled player, they expect you to have like 5:0 and more as well as 7:1, 9:1. A newb player cannot make even 4:0, not to say more. (See Section 2) and if you are a good player who decided to make bad stats, you will have for sure another account with good stats. Thus, you may have a bad account that does not correspond to your skill but you will be asked in public custom games to show a good record account. So when even good players say ‘stats doesn’t matter’ that’s what they mean – it can be lag, decay, loss abuses but they will always have a good account(s) too. All stats mentioned here are taken into account excluding the factors.



Section 2 – Ladder Leveling And The AMM

If we cannot judge a player level 10 (except for the mentioned stats up), then we can sure do with higher levels.
How does the AMM work?

• matches you with opponents with the same stats or similar skill; you may think the same levels. Wrong. Levels alone are nothing, what you should remember is what level for what record matters. Examples of matching:

• a 3:0 matches another 3:0 ; a 7:0 matches another, etc (but not every opponent is exactly your stats!). When you have an outstanding record you start matching higher levels. A 14:7 player, level 11 matches levels 29 – 31.

What levels are good for certain stats? Level 17 at 27-28 wins is awesome, level 20 at 40-41 wins, level 26 at 60 wins or like some - level 29 at 69 wins, lvl 30 at 70-75 wins, lvl 39 at 130 wins, lvl 43 at 150, even lvl 40 at 200 wins is not too bad but not very good either. Anything beyond that is lame and for lower levels - newbish.

The first players you match (continuing our thought) when you’re 14:7 are lvl 29-31 but lvl 29 at 250 wins, lvl 31 at 250 wins, lvl 31 at 400 wins. Come on, I’ve played and owned such many times to see they are worse than someone even 10:4 level 9. For levels 40 at 600 or 900 wins I would say may equal not more than lvl 30 at 150-130 wins. As you can see, people with that bad stats match lower levels or with similar stats.

There are players who are like level 18 and stats are like 80:40, there are similar stats like 40:17. Ok, very good players get 30-40 wins more, you cannot mass win and match newbies for 40 games, the more you win, the stronger the opponents. This is an obvious decay, same goes for lvl 18 at 350:290 stats. This may be a decay happening often. But do learn:

Good players may have decay/some disconnections/ drop-hacked and you may see someone lvl 18 80:40, but will make the high levels in no time. From that example he is likely to make lvl 30 at 150-160 wins only because of the decay and if too good be lvl 40 again at 150 if not 200 wins. While a newbie will keep on massing games, massing and losing and the experience will go back and forth for the same level and would do 200 games for 3 levels.

So do not say stats don’t matter, we said when they do not. And if you see someone even lvl 20 with stats 40:30 or 40:35 or lvl 30 with stats 70:68 don’t think he’s a newbie! It is not as good as lvl 20 40:10, lvl 30 70:35 but let me remind you how opponents go:

• you match noobs and own them, then the lvl 31 mass-ers come, then lvl 31 at 150 wins, then lvl 30 at 70 wins, together with it players like 43:20 or other much-more-wins stats. They make these levels at lower stats and lose from good opponents, not from newbs.

Also remember this feature of AMM: some days it matches you on the same map almost every time, or versus the same race, but it never stops matching you with the race from which you lose mostly.

Section 3 – Some Tips For The Thumbed-Up Maps

Echo Isles (EI):

• Any Race: The green-dot creeps under the mine with ogre magi and 2 trolls may drop a tome of experience. (No special tips for orc and undead)
• Human: you can militia creep the Mercenary Camp for a Troll Berserker and Troll Priest.
• Night Elf: you should always build your Ancient of War (AoW) in front of and not too close to the green-dot creeps above your base.

Terenas Stand (TS):
• Human: you can militia-creep the Mercenary Camp for a Troll Berserker and Troll Priest; creep the Observatory with militia and if the mage casts lightning shield put that unit between the 3 priests that are near the Observatory; you can expand to the closest mine or the further that has weaker creeps
• Night Elf: you should always build your Ancient of War in front of and not too close to the creeps guarding the Observatory.

Lost Temple (RoC) (LT):
• Human: you can fast expand but not if he is close to you;
• Orc: you can creep the fountain with a Blade Master and only 2 to 4 grunts for faster hero leveling. When you engage this creep, use the grunts against the Medium armored Gnoll Assassins and Wardens to down them early. The Level 1 Gnolls shouls be no trouble. Killing the Overseers last will be more simpler, they also carry the items at this creep.

Lost Temple (FT) (LT):
• Any Race: When engaging middle creep, kill off any Nerubians with a mana supply (Webspinners and Seer) first. These creeps have Raise Dead which will make your job a lot harder. Use well at night to heal during or after battle. If enemy recovering there with a small army, wake up the creeps and force him to run or TP. You may even have a chance to kill units or a hero.

Expoing early is a must, remember to take Berserker out with melee first.

Phantom Grove (PG):
• Any Race: good for expanding and creeping, watch out for your opponent

Turtle Rock (TR):
• Night Elf: build the Ancient of War near the turtles in front of your base; buy Boots
• Human: to gain almost a level off the bat, get 2-3 footman and your hero. Turn 3 or 4 of your peasents into militia and head to the Ogre/Troll yellow camp near your base. Engage these creeps and defeat them all. Be sure to micro militia. AM should use Water Elementals to take the blunt of the damage from the Ogres and Trolls. If you have Blizzard instead, aim it so you don't harm your forces. Mk can stun targets. Paladin can heal your foots or militia that have taken damage. Blood Mage must aim Flame Strike so you don't harm your men. If you have banish, incapacitate ogres first, as they are the higher damagers.

Twisted Meadows(TM):
• Human: be careful with your opponent, if you use enough militia you can creep the Observatory next to you for fast leveling and possible items: Scourge Bone Chimes, Tome of Experience, Devotion Aura item
• Night Elf: build the Ancient of War in front of your base but not too close to the Gnolls;
buy Boots
• Orc: You can level faster by taking out the 2 Gnoll Creeps (The Brute/Poacher and the Overseer/Warden) with just a FS and 1-2 Grunts.

Gnoll Wood (GW):
Any race: either expand or creep the fountain fast for good items, as well as watch out for your opponent; buy Boots.

All maps: buy scrolls

Section 4 – Few Counter Strategies

This guide is not supposed to give you detailed information about strategies. The best is to watch replays frequently from:

WCReplays
Replayers

Human
• vs Orc goes with casters, riflemen vs wind riders
• vs Night Elf goes with casters and mortars
• vs Undead makes expands, towers, tanks/flying machines and knights/gryphon riders
• vs Human uses either 1 or 2 sanctums and tier 3

Orc
• vs Orc, Undead, Night Elf, Human goes with spirit walkers, wolf riders, sometimes wind riders vs Undead, Far Seer + Tauren Chieftain or Blade Master + Shadow Hunter

Night Elf
• vs Orc uses druid of the talon, Demon Hunter, Beast Master or Naga; or instead - bears and dryads
• vs Undead goes with dryads, bears, Demon Hunter / Warden and always Panda second, orb of venom.
• vs Night Elf on LT sometimes is 2 AoWs with mass huntresses and glavie throwers, also Warden / Demon Hunter / Priestess Of The Moon; in other maps: dryads, bears, Beast Master / Demon Hunter and Naga
• vs Human is Demon Hunter / Warden / Dark Ranger + Naga or Panda second, bears and dryads

Undead
• vs Orc best is not fiends but ghouls with frenzy, abominations and always destroyers, Death Knight with Lich second and sometimes Crypt Lord is added as third
• vs Undead goes with first Lich, mass ghouls, harasses and second Death Knight; later are accompanied by destroyers, gargoyles or some fiends
• vs Human uses Death Knight, Lich and Panda third or second, ghouls, destroyers, abominations and sometimes fiends
• vs Night Elf the strategy is 2 Crypts with mass ghouls to own fast, and as soon as tier 2 is reached - mass gargoyles to harass wisps and later in tier 3 - the ghoul frenzy upgrade is added, abominations and destroyers.


Section 5 – Final Words

I will end this guide with the behavior of pro/good players: pro players would never call you ‘noob’ even if you have such stats. Pros are more mannered; noobs with no skill cannot play and insult the others. You may see good players whining but they act more professional, unless you insult first. A Custom Games rule: no one bothers playing or training someone because he asks ‘train me plz’. And Custom Game is not the place where you should create a game ‘lvl 40+’ when your best lvl is 25 and to expect a good player to play with you. Learn the game, make levels, then you can do it. That’s really funny when someone that will be owned for 7 minutes makes such games.

With this I put an end to creating any Warcraft III Guides anymore. Replays are best to watch what to do. I hope also to have made it clear once and for all in what way player statistics matters and in what way not. I will only say – 90% or even 95% of the cases where we stick to – ‘stats don’t matter, let him play’, those that we see with 2:5 do peon rushes, waste the time for hosting or quit in the first minute. I will sum it up – you may have a bad account but if you’re good, you will show an advanced one with levels and stats. When you claim to be good, you should show an active account, that is how being invited in a good clan goes. Like others, if I just want to watch for fun low skilled I do it, but creating a game with title ‘skilled only’ and someone stats 2:5 to claim to be good and to keep on wanting to play by selecting team instead of observers… that doesn’t go with me, or a no-stats player who says he is pro. Pros don’t enter such games and never say it like that. I can tell you by someone’s comments or words if he’s noob or good. Well that’s it, enjoy reading.

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Impactor®