"River압 tale", an Warcraft III, The Frozen Throne battlereport.

As you can guess, the map for today압 game is the Two Rivers, a pure 1x1 map with two main bases separated by two bridges.

This map has a bit of all forest tile압 creeps, ranging from two lvl 1 gnolls near each main that a simple summoned water elemental or pair of wolves could kill alone to a fully equipped ogre lord+ogre magi+2 ogre warriors+2 troll berserkers creep camp of doom!!
(ok, not really but it is the best the map has to offer, no dragons for you garg users ^^), which guards the upper left and mid left gold mines, that could take many lives with them before finally respectively giving either no item or an item on the range of lvl 1 boxed briliance aura and an rune of mana which replenishes mana when activated.

Since no map would be complete without players and a history of hatred, crime and due punishment, the two gladiators which will deal it out in this match are (and before I forget, better remind myself not to watch so much movies here on after):

Sentitec.Skin, codenamed Skin for reading purposes, is a talented lvl 37 Night Elf player whose solo stats are 178-162 with an NE vs Orc win% of 52.1% (his second worst), who likes to mass tier 1 all games in order to pursue an agressive early beating of his opponents that ensures an easy transition from mid to late game and to back it up 210 apm average which grants him a nice unit control, his weakest point is getting lazy after taking control and due to that, usually having mid-game problems after controlling the early game with the tier 1 mass.

Spawns as darkgreen Night Elf on the bottom position.

Last.Phoenix, who will be codenamed Last (he actually is yellow in this game but since the background doesn앖 let the color be seen very well, we might as well darken that eye-hurting yellow to a soft maroon in order to avoid eye diseases appearing ahead of age on the readers) is a lvl 39 orc whose stats are 256-236 with a 49% win rate in the Orc Vs NE matchup, making it his worse one. He likes to tech fast to tier 2 for bestiary units and 2nd hero and keep there as long as possible, in order to take advantage of Orc압 strong base defense in early game (when there is not enough firepower to make the burrows a liability instead of an impenetrable defense) and make up for other race압 advantage in tier 1/3 with a mass of cost-effective tier 2 units. He has overall lesser APM than Skin but he can micro real well too, especially when motivated. His weakest point is usually being on steroids that make him not be the smartest possible player but rather the typical grunt that just micros his way through.

Spawns as "yellow" Orc on the top position.

(take note that in the current AMN, even though Last has a higher level than Skin, he is actually the worst player, stat-wise due to needing almost 30% more wins to achieve it, what basically means he is playing against worser players than Skin and therefore winning less experience from each game but still losing a lot of them)

The reason for these two players to face each other, both determined to win at all costs was an all-out clan war between both player압 clan which ended on defeat for Skin압 one with Last압 coming as the winner even though he didn앖 play in that particular war, the argument was basically checking if the result would have been different had Last played or if it would remain the same and a game was arranged to solve the mistery and that, is that.

THE EARLY GAME (lvl 1 harassment, creeping, early strikes, etc)

Both players true to their nature, Skin starts with an agressive Altar - Moonwell - Ancient of War - Huntress Hall - Moonwell - Ancient of War build with an Warden as first hero to push his opponent into his main while creeping his opponent압 camps, and possibly killing some grunts on the process.

Last starts with a conservative Altar - Burrow - Barracks - Burrow build for some early grunts to creep and harass his enemy should he go the path of archer creeping (good against straight teching orcs due to huntresses being nearly useless at tier 2 and vs some orc units), an Farseer is summoned as well from the altar for more creeping power.

The first strike is done by Skin as he catches Last creeping some easy creeps adjacent to his main, stealing the tome reward and getting some experience from a near-death wolf and some more from detonating a wisp on two recently summoned wolves while hitting the Farseer over and over with shadow strike, forcing his retreat and ultimate death which makes the Warden lvl 2, due to low hp Skin has to town portal out, losing 350 gold in the process that probably made up for the Farseer압 death.

While the Farseer revives, Skin takes the time to creep up a bit, getting even bigger of an lvl advantage over the Seer, who seems to be pretty hotheaded (or maybe it is Last압 steroids) as he gathers the grunts for an quick strike against the Elf main, for revenge on his past death.

They say one picture is worth a thousand words, I guess this is the case:

STRATEGIC REMARK:

Things are looking pretty grim for Last at the moment, with the early loss of the Farseer and now two grunts, the Farseer still being lvl 1 due to lack of creeping while the Warden is lvl 3 already and the units being 2 grunts vs 6 huntresses and archers now pumping as well as tier 2 on the way, the only thing keeping the hope up for Last is that his tech has finally arrived, with an Shadow Hunter and Bestiary ready to try and turn the game, wyverns and wards could definatively turn the tide due to huntresses weakness to them, should Skin pressure too much or get lazy after getting so sucessful early on, the lvl advantage of Skin is pretty brutal, however.

THE MID GAME (or when lvl 3 arises and tier 2 units start pumping out)

Some boring creep and woundlicking time passed through, Last finally atained lvl 2 on the Seer and half that on SHunter while gathering an army of 3 grunts and 2 wyverns, while Skin압 Warden is lvl 4 now and almost at full mana, Last showing his braveness (or maybe just the steroids) decides to strike again at the Elf압 main, meeting the enemy force healing by the moons and with pretty much more units than him, what makes him retreat as soon as he sees them

You can앖 run from an Warden however, and if you must fight, you have better do it on a good place for you, in this case, the bottom bridge was the place for the fight:

As you can see, this fight ended pretty much on a draw, with two huntresses and one grunt killed but a tp spent on Last압 side.

Skin then goes for "teh shopz creepz" (aka 2 rock golems who can stun and do 100 damage with a spell and 3 mud golems who can cast slow but are very weak and die almost instantly in battle) and manages to lose one huntress to a rock fallen from the sky, nearly getting lvl 5 as well a mana stone to join with his potion of greater mana (it압 not like that Warden isn앖 powerful already O_O) and hastly buys a scroll of healing to heal up his units that were damaged in the last fight, meanwhile Last has bought all the healing he needed and he sure is coming back fast for the shop and to fight again before Skin can heal his heavily damaged units.

STRATEGIC REMARK:

Although the hero advantage is cleary on Skin압 side, with a lvl 4, half to lvl 5 Warden (fok lvl 2 / ss lvl 2) and equipped with a scroll of town portal, scroll of the beast and two 300 mana healing items, the unit advantage has switched to Last압 side, due to especially wyverns and to an extent grunts being pretty cheap for the food they use and their effectiveness, what means that with Orc you get the unit advantage really fast but will also spend more on upkeep later on due to all units eating big food, his heros are lvl 2 and 1 without any good creep-items however and he is still pumping out the same combo while Skin has just started to pump out hippos to clear the skies of wyverns, what gives him some advantage still.

Due to cleaver wisp placement (right after the upper-right bridge seeing if anyone would cross it) Skin sees the enemy force coming and quickly retreats into his main base, leading to more boring creeping that makes hero levels slightly more even as Last압 Farseer is lvl 3 (wolves lvl 2/chain lvl 1) and the SHunter reaches lvl 3 (wards lvl 2 /healing wave lvl 1) while Skin압 Warden reaches lvl 5 at last (fok lvl 3) with a recently bought scroll of protection and over 50 food tipping off an most likely big attack soon.

And attack he indeed does:

Last is caught completely offguard as he was going to harass with his wyvern mass and is caught outside while desperatly running for the safety of his main base and calling off the harass, a tight position is achieved with peons getting to battle stations, wards being planted down, wolves running around, foks spreading knives everywhere and the smell of poison fills the air, with the wyverns still in no sight...

But at last, the air riders arrive and start pounding death on Skin압 units from behind or almost, as they have to retreat behind the grunts quickly since the back line is mostly archers, and they lose a bit of time and one of their members during the transition, that Skin uses to pump his units with the scroll of protection and a scroll of healing, both bought earlier in the way for the attack.

Both players start again to micro it out, wyverns away from hippos, grunts on archers, archers on one grunt at a time, spells going out and ultimately both players are forced to stop the agression due to units being pretty much out of hp.

The Warden will have nothing of this so called "peace" however and charges, alone into the fray wanting to fok the weak orc units like she had done before netting 2 grunts in one shot.

It fails, miserably, however, as the wyvern DPS along with burrows and hero shots are too much and even with a potion and tp on inventory the lvl 5 warden dies alone in the meadow, giving Last압 battered forces time to regroup and go on the offensive before the evil jailer rises again to continue her ninja orc abusing skillz.

STRATEGIC REMARK:

 The death of the Warden gave an oportunity for Last to recover and take the offensive into his hands, instead of a probable TP from the Warden after a little more punching in Last압 main and then healing with the game most likely ending with the Warden getting the lvl 6 of GG, this turned the game into a desesperate race to lvl 6 for survival as Last now controls 55 food worth of orc units while Skin only controls 45, even though he has better upgrades (1-1 archers since beggining almost) and an expo coming up as well, if the expo gets scouted it is most likely that it will be destroyed due to Last압 momentary advantage and air force.
No new units are being produced with both players keeping up with grunt/wyvern and huntress/archer/hippo/talon.

Now it is time for the orc battlecry to be heard on the field and cry they do as they hastly head for Skin압 main, intent on killing some more units while they lack a hero or even the altar and end the game.

Ok, that압 what I thought, but it seems the closeness of both heros to lvl 4 is too tempting for Last as he heads to creep the big ogre camp of his opponent in order to achieve the maximum advantage possible before the attack...in case you are wondering why I included the mini-map for this picture notice the conga line heading for Last압 position, or just look at the rightmost picture.
I guess TFT should have a rear mirror as Last is jacked hard from behind even without a hero, Skin kills pretty much the entire orc expedition with 3 grunts and 3 wyverns down at the cost of two hippos and one huntress.

If he had a hero that would have granted him lvl 6 and the win most likely, but since he doesn앖 he is ultimately forced behind by the dual lvl 4 heros who take no mercy of the feeling units killing another huntress and an archer with the help of two chains from the seer, with a third one not really harming anyone.

The attack rages on on Skin압 main with an defending Ancient going down and the return of the Warden ultimately dictating Last압 retreat and change of tatics from frontal assualt to exp harass with the remains of his air force.

After a pretty long (and boring aswell) period of expo harass by wyvern and chasing off work by hippos and archers, Last decides it is the right time to strike again in full force (in order to disguise his building expansion on the top left corner mine), bats are there to quickly kill the hippos and this time upgrades were researched giving his air 2-0 in upgrades (attack/armor) and Kab00m the goblin sapper is employed in the orc army to give his life for the horde as his brethren did in the previous wars.

Unfortunatly the jailer hates goblins and, aparently, can smell them at a mile away too and even through the path to his glorious death isn앖 more than a 10 second walk from his previous home, Kab00m dies without a b00m, RIP brave goblin :(

Angered by the foul smell that invaded the Elf sacred shrine the Warden is once again lusting for battle, but not enough to foolishly die in vain again and would rather wait paciently for her prey to come near enough for the kill...but the orc smell is too much and an attack on the orc position ensues, this time both having exacly the same food, similar upgrading (2-0 ranged orc, 1-1 archer/hunt NE) and similar exp gained, the outcomer will be determined by micro alone:

However the Warden manages to attain lvl 6 and with the help of many items (thx god 4 expo) is finally able to make the orcs turn around and flee.

Taking a quick note at the casualties, Skin food count dropped from 67 food to 38 food while Last went from 68 to 34 food, with the orc heros being both lvl 5 with wolves/wards maxed and chain/healing wave at lvl 2 while the Warden is now lvl 6 almost 7, with both players having an expo running, it seems to be Skin 압 time for attacking, he still doesn앖 know about his enemy expansion, however.

STRATEGIC REMARK:

While Last micro has been pretty nice since the last remark and managed to kill most of his enemy units in the last attack forcing a TP and making the Warden waste two pots of healing and one pot of mana as well as the moon juice to be able to win, he is now in a unit disadvantage and his expansion has only recently been completed, with one single peon mining and no towers to help defend.

He has researched ensnare and is pumping raiders now to compliment what압 left of the grunt/wyvern army, however and that may give him the edge over the enemy압 hippos since bats are effective but you lose one for similar cost of an hippo, not being cost-effective in the end, both his lvl 5 heros are probably stronger than the single Warden as well, due to the recent kills and they could probably kill Skin압 army alone if there wasn앖 a lvl 6 Warden to contend with.

Skin is doing pretty well in terms of swimming in money in this moment, with his expansion but he has just fended off a big attack and all his units are still hurting as well as his economy due to dispelling wisps used in the battle, he is still in a good shape to win the game however, with his expansion well protected by two Ancient Protectors that nullify any attempt at harassment from air based forces.

THE LATE GAME (or when you get the ultimates and the main gold mine is down)

Skin압 assualt is pushed back by yet another chain and a dangerously low hp Warden decides it is best to take advantage of nighttime to heal her wounds and her comrades압 as well as get some extra gold and push the advantage over to the Elf side (Skin still doesn앖 know about Last압 expansion in the top).

It isn앖 long until the Elfs are back however, and fully healed again with 54 control vs a 52 control orc, without finding an expansion in the usual place (mine near river), a search in the upper spot is sent, still without towers...

Skin압 fun is over when Last appears from behind however, and both players dance the "micro rap" back and forth to get the advantage.

The well positioned Elves take the advantage however and 2 grunts + 1 wyvern go down while only 2 huntresses bite the dust, good micro from Last save the day however, using his heros to tank a bit while dropping chains and focusing the Elf units one by one and although the peons quickly bite the dust after the Farseer has to TP out, it is soon back into action and due to not wanting to lose any more units without killing anything in return, Skin calls it a day and TPs back home.

STRATEGIC REMARK:

Attacking another player is best done when you know that he either is:

1- Far from home

2- To cover an expansion attempt

3- When you rise an upkeep on W3 you put yourself at an economic disadvantage to try and attain an militay advantage .That basically means the most effective way to play the economic game at W3 is to wait until you are going to attack, and just before you do, queue units on all of your buildings as you are going to, soon, drop again to the lower, most profitable upkeep, after battle casualties.

Both players employed these rules quite well, although the first one wasn앖 really put into practice, mostly due to lack of constant scouting from both players.

The attack Skin just made was pretty even (goldwise) between units lost and items lost on both sides. Due to the time Last압 expansion was stopped, he might be at an economic disadvantage for now. Last압 quick reaction, sending the peons who had been cutting wood on his main base to replace the peons killed, cut the damage to half of what it could have been, though.

With both players making a little pause to reach 50+ control again, this time both attack at the same time, meeting just after the upper bridge, however none wants to risk an direct confrontation and both retreat to heal and mass a little bit more.

The first strike comes again with an attack by Last, this time aimed at Skin압 expansion coming from the side (where no wisps stand guard, making it a surprise attack) and on a critical maneuver the tree of life is taken down while TPing out, effectively crashing Skin압 economy as both mains have run out already.

Knowing it is now or never, Skin attacks with everything he possesses and both players meet at the bridge, at a pretty disadvantageous position for Skin as he is caught crossing.

Quite incredibly (in a big way due to the total spenditure of the Warden압 435 mana pool on lvl 3 spells and vengeance spirits) the Elf comes out as the clear winner reducing his opponent압 food count to 22 while mantaining 43 food and leveling his Warden from lvl 7 to lvl 9 (!).

Due to repeated chains during battle, all of Skin압 units are heavily damaged however and both Orc heros work alone to take as much down as possible with hit and run attacks while the peons at Last압 expansion go down, again.

The archers and talons go down fast as well and soon Skin is forced to retreat or lose more units than he can muster with Last heros in hot pursuit, the tables are once again inverted as the 43 food is brought down to 21 food . Both have an expansion again, however, as the tree of ages in Skin압 main walked all the way to the protected expo to start mining there.

STRATEGIC REMARK:

Both heros have, gradually started to sell the permanent items they had got from creeping, with no creep items standing due to the long game압 money necessity.

Selling an costly item that doesn앖 give you a really big instant benefit such as the ones that improve stats is a good strategy when you really need those extra 200 gold to set up an expansion or to buy an TP/more units.

The game is now reduced to an hero arena, with nearly no units on the field, and no money to field them anyway, it may not be a good idea to pump out more Elf units such as archers and talons or huntresses as they would simply be killed without effort by the powerful Orc heros, which can be killed by the lvl 9 Warden alone however, what makes it one of the most strategic parts of the game, Skin압 hero killing power versus Last압 unit killing power.

The conclusions that can be taken from the previous thinking, for both players, are that Skin would benefit more from filling the Warden with items and hunting Last압 heros than hiring units and some more wyverns or demolishers would be the wisest choice for Last.

To win some time for recovering from the last battle losses, the Warden is sent on a solo mission to erradicate the peons who might still be working at Last압 (still) living expansion. It isn앖 long until she is chased out by the Orc heros and some units, though, making Last go again on the offensive, this time at the Elf main which is pretty much defenceless and only after the Warden returns commences another small battle with Last doing a neat, but useless due to invulnerability pot, surround with 3 grunts on the Warden and ultimately the frail Elf units being massacrated by both the Orc army and the massive serpent wards on the ground, with Skin having to duke it out with only the Warden left in his own main, not taking long until he has to fall back completely and the buildings in there fall one by one.

With only the well protected expansion left as the last hideout of the fleeing Warden, a demolisher is finally produced and after some fights, towers being put besides the expansion and units being picked off by the Warden, it finally falls.

However it is not over yet as the Warden managed to escape (using her renowned ninja skillz of short range teleportation known as blink) and another expansion is being set at the mid left mine, Last probably thinks there the only thing remaining are the buildings in the main base and goes there to finish them off, resulting in one old Troll압 death by poisoning over time even when he is teleported home for treatment.

(gotta hate when that happens :P) And the Warden, now lvl 10 seems unstoppable as she heads for the Orc main lusting for revenge over everything the orcs did to her sisters, however one Warden, even lvl 10 cannot defeat an entire orc army, especially one with raiders and she soon has to run, being chased and picked off by rabid lvl 3 wolves and ultimately giving away the positon of the last expansion left which Last immediatly attacks and demolishes, some more peons are killed by fok and blink but no real damage is incurred due to 2 towers finally defending the expansion, without source of income, no wisps and only a handfull of buildings left in his main, GGs are exchanged and the crime is finally avenged on a Last happy ending.

STRATEGIC POINTS OF THE GAME:

This was one the best games I ever watched, without being "gosu" stuff but rather friends playing with friends, both players had pretty much flawless micro and excelent timing and the only thing I can tell that really changed the course of the game was the lvl 5 Warden압 death with a pot of hp and TP scroll, in my opinion Skin would have won the game by achieving lvl 6 and getting ultimate if that hadn앖 happened, Last did quite a number of big mistakes in the beggining, especially his attack on the Elf main after losing the Farseer which made the Warden even more powerful with lvl 3 and took 2 grunts that could easily have turned the tides later in the game, it was a pretty well played game other than that.

As the scores show, the orc heros which gradually expoed up until their combined power surpassed the one of the Warden by far were the ultimate cause for the final result, Skin did a great job in controlling his opponent and keeping his money low at all times, however solo Warden first strategies suffer from a late game downfall in effectiveness because lvl 6 and somewhat 7 are the peak of the strategy, if you don앖 manage to kill your opponent in that time you will usually end losing to a set of heros with simply got more skills and can cast them more often than you, a Keeper 2nd or POTM could really have helped with herokilling/improving the army, which was really needed when Last압 heros got lvl 4 and then 5.

The replay can be found here

Hope you enjoyed my first attempt at BRing as much as I did and, I앏l see you on the next one!

This has been a WoAh production