Warcraft 3

2005-10-22 04:05:12 pm

Never give up!

I'll consider having a look at those replays, but I don't know how useful the strategies will remain on Hard mode. And I'm not ever considering recording the replays themselves - not only is there what Strangeness mentioned, but my video card still has issues with it.

Anyway, I'll probably do more level tests today to get a better idea of how to approach levels. And I'll remember to max out the game speed this time.

Gorash

2005-10-22 04:43:24 pm

${$uid.$user}{' usertext'}

Well if you ever played the game on hard you know that rushing won't do you any good. Starting with mission6 of the humans (The Culling?), the game really is hard. Compared to hard you can make yourself tea on easy and only come back to the pc when you're under attack.

soteos

2005-10-22 10:05:17 pm

Ok, I see, they purposefully lost to reduce the difficulty. Well even so, they'd all still be a great help to look for any tricks.
I'll try to find time eventually to watch the replays myself and find their relevance to hard mode. But it's a little doubtful for now with all the work I have going back to college.

AquaTiger

Edit history:

AquaTiger: 2005-10-24 08:15:13 pm

2005-10-24 08:02:37 pm

Never give up!

I've decided that I myself am not even going to worry about what the replays demonstrate, for the most part. I'll be conducting mostly my own research.

By the way, I went back and tried both the tutorial levels again, as well as testing the first Human campaign level. It turns out I was indeed playing on the fastest speed. Anyway, here's what I got:

Tutorial Level 1 Time: 2:00

Notes:
-I think I got hung up on those gnolls just once.
-I suffered what must have been a 10 second loss because the game decided to explain Chain Lightning just as I reached the Prophet, and wouldn't give me credit for the quest until they finished talking.

Tutorial Level 2 Time: 9:22

Notes:
-I did use two barracks this time, building the first before I started my War Mill and the second after the War Mill. I think I saved time only on the last three grunts. Also, I did wind up training one more than they said I needed, but remember that the gold doesn't need to go anywhere else.
-I think I got hung up on fighting the humans unnecessarily in two spots - when they attack the towers, and those last two knights before the towers guarding Grom.

Human Campaign Level 1 Time: 2:05

Notes:
-I accidentally fought the Bandits until they ran. Glad I didn't pursue.
-I got hung up on those two grunts just outside the city for a bit.
-I thought Arthas was going to die during the fight with the Slave Master. Honestly.

Now, my question for the next level. Should I simply activate the optional quest just to get the extra troops, or should I be training any and all troops I need instead?

Also, until I do actual campaign runs I will be testing these levels individually, so take that into account.

I've decided that I myself am not even going to worry about what the replays demonstrate, for the most part.  I'll be conducting mostly my own research.

By the way, I went back and tried both the tutorial levels again, as well as testing the first Human campaign level.  It turns out I was indeed playing on the fastest speed.  Anyway, here's what I got:

Tutorial Level 1 Time: [b]2:00[/b]

Notes:
-I think I got hung up on those gnolls just once.
-I suffered what must have been a 10 second loss because the game decided to explain Chain Lightning just as I reached the Prophet, and wouldn't give me credit for the quest until they finished talking.

Tutorial Level 2 Time: [b]9:22[/b]

Notes:
-I did use two barracks this time, building the first before I started my War Mill and the second after the War Mill.  I think I saved time only on the last three grunts.  Also, I did wind up training one more than they said I needed, but remember that the gold doesn't need to go anywhere else.
-I think I got hung up on fighting the humans unnecessarily in two spots - when they attack the towers, and those last two knights before the towers guarding Grom.

Human Campaign Level 1 Time: [b]2:05[/b]

Notes:
-I accidentally fought the Bandits until they ran.  Glad I didn't pursue.
-I got hung up on those two grunts just outside the city for a bit.
-I thought Arthas was going to die during the fight with the Slave Master.  Honestly.

Now, my question for the next level.  Should I simply activate the optional quest just to get the extra troops, or should I be training any and all troops I need instead?

Also, until I do actual campaign runs I will be testing these levels individually, so take that into account.

Gorash

Edit history:

Gorash: 2005-10-25 12:16:04 am

2005-10-24 08:39:16 pm

${$uid.$user}{' usertext'}

Tried Human1 too, got 1:48.
Is there any difference between normal and hard in that level?

btw: Arthas does not level up there, nor will he start at level 2 in the next mission, I checked. But it will make absolutely no difference, because no matter how you play mission 2, Arthas will end up being level 3 (not regarding any stupid low level runs).

Speaking of mission 2, I recorded a 3:51, which I thought to be pretty good until I saw that the easy record is 3:42. Strength of enemies doesn't matter here, so it has something to do with the starting assignment of the workers.

AquaTiger

2005-10-25 12:13:40 am

Never give up!

Quote:

Tried Human1 too, got 1:48.
Is there any difference between normal and hard in that level?

Amazing what seemingly minor things can do to a run's time, isn't it? By the way, I noticed you pulled one Footman back for a moment during the one mandatory fight of the level. I might just not be paying attention to the details, but it's a bit unclear to me why that's done.

I'll comment on your stuff for mission 2 (and possibly fill in the blanks of the time discrepancy) once I go and do it myself.

Gorash

Edit history:

Gorash: 2005-10-25 01:43:39 am

2005-10-25 12:23:06 am

${$uid.$user}{' usertext'}

Because two people beat him, and that's too much for the healing light to handle, so I rearranged them so that I could heal them when I need, and noone dies (yet). It's even better when one of the grunts hits Arthas, because he has enough HP, but I only got that once (Arthas is just slow...), and in that one the thiefs blocked me in the middle of the map.

I uploaded the nr2 video also, just edited the link into it.

EDIT: Got 3:46, with the same strat slightly altered for faster gold.
EDIT2: 3:46 again... darn...

AquaTiger

Edit history:

AquaTiger: 2005-10-25 02:57:18 am

2005-10-25 02:42:05 am

Never give up!

Unfortunately, my best time for Mission 2 so far is 4:39, and for Mission 3, it's a whopping 5:16 - which definitely tells me I'm not using the right strategy properly enough. (I can't record it right now because my video card has issues, and I still refuse to touch Fraps or Camtasia.)

At the current rate, I may almost have to concede this to you, Gorash. I am not going that far yet, though, as I still plan on aiding with strategy to whatever degree I can (it probably won't add up to much though).

Edit: When I say concede, I mean the individual level stuff - I am most certainly going to do the full campaign runs myself.

Edit 2: My Mission 4 time was 1:55 - I was surprised how easy it was to slip by the enemy here.

Gorash

Edit history:

Gorash: 2005-10-25 03:21:26 am

2005-10-25 02:49:56 am

${$uid.$user}{' usertext'}

I'm actually pretty bad at strategy games. I reached lv10 in BNet in patch 1.04 or so, but that's it.

I'll see how mission 3 does for me...
EDIT:
Mission 3: 4:20, still improvable.
Mission 4: 1:25, thanks for the hint, both just testing, not recorded.

Phauxe

Edit history:

Phauxe: 2005-10-25 04:54:27 am

2005-10-25 04:51:26 am

Prolouge mission 1: 1:55

I could probably lower down to 1:50 if I could time text better.

It's best just to leave the grunts back at base, and run directly from point a to point b, seeing as how most dialouge seems to be activated by the grunts.

I'll give it another shot real quick.

EDIT: 1:49, and I don't think it'll get much quicker.

gracjanski

2005-10-28 12:19:13 am

polak

will there be more vids? It is better to see a vid than replays, becaue, on the video you can see the fastness of the player.

AquaTiger

Edit history:

AquaTiger: 2005-10-28 12:50:05 am

2005-10-28 12:31:58 am

Never give up!

Well, the thing preventing me from doing the vids is the fact that I can't get my video card to recognize the TV. And I still refuse to use Fraps while I have the option of combination video/capture cards.

That, and I have other games I need to work on - plus every time I do a run, it goes and gets beaten.

....actually, I might be able to get that last one to work in my favor. I'm going to skip running Human mission 5 (that's a timed survival mission, so there's no point) and get to work on beating Mission 6 (the 'kill 100 villagers' one) fast in the near future. It's the first mission that truly gave me headaches on Hard.

One theory I had on how to do that mission is to make two strike teams for the mission - one to contain Mal'Ganis and the other to go blast villagers. (The former would contain Arthas and a few other soldiers, the latter a couple of mortar teams.) In a real speedrun, though, the training time generally makes that option unfeasible, although I still plan on getting a few mortar teams to speed up the destruction.

The real problem with this mission is that if ANY of Mal'Ganis's troops get near a villager, they get credit for the capture no matter whether you destroyed the building holding them or not. Thus, Mal'Ganis engages in a lot of what I like to call 'kill-stealing'. Not only that, but he comes with avalanches of troops after his first revival.

Well, the thing preventing me from doing the vids is the fact that I can't get my video card to recognize the TV.  And I still refuse to use Fraps while I have the option of combination video/capture cards.

That, and I have other games I need to work on - plus every time I do a run, it goes and gets beaten.

....actually, I might be able to get that last one to work in my favor.  I'm going to skip running Human mission 5 (that's a timed survival mission, so there's no point) and get to work on beating Mission 6 (the 'kill 100 villagers' one) fast in the near future.  It's the first mission that truly gave me headaches on Hard.

One theory I had on how to do that mission is to make two strike teams for the mission - one to contain Mal'Ganis and the other to go blast villagers.  (The former would contain Arthas and a few other soldiers, the latter a couple of mortar teams.)  In a real speedrun, though, the training time generally makes that option unfeasible, although I still plan on getting a few mortar teams to speed up the destruction.

The real problem with this mission is that if ANY of Mal'Ganis's troops get near a villager, they get credit for the capture no matter whether you destroyed the building holding them or not.  Thus, Mal'Ganis engages in a lot of what I like to call 'kill-stealing'.  Not only that, but he comes with avalanches of troops after his first revival.

Gorash

2005-10-28 02:48:40 am

${$uid.$user}{' usertext'}

Mission 6 is really an excercise in how many groups you can control. In that mission I'd have dropped out of recording anyway, I never beat it, and IIRC on hard it's not only Mal'Ganis and his insane killing speed that gives you trouble. The UD base in the lower left also sends you real attack forces with abominations and stuff, very annoying.

Best thing will be to make one main force for defense, and maybe 2 separate groups for killing zombies. Maybe one mortar, one priest and 6 foot soldiers each?
If you are a really cool player you could try to draw Mal'Ganis attention with a few fast units and then carry him behind you. I never tried if that would work, but if it does you have a lot more freedom in this mission.

Phauxe

2005-10-30 07:56:32 am

Quote:

I'm going to skip running Human mission 5 (that's a timed survival mission, so there's no point)...

Correct me if I'm wrong, but if you intentionally level Arthas to have his invincibility up to level 2 by that level, you can rase the undead bases and win early... Just bring in some mortar teams after he takes care of the level 10, maybe the rifle men and footies that you're supplied with for a shield, and you can easily take down the bases.

As for human #6, If you constantly pump footies and rifle men, and attack while you tech, you can eventually get knights, and engage in the buildings closer to Mal'Ganis.

Until then, I'd stick to the boroughs closer to the bottom, as Mal'Ganis tends to avoid it until later in on the level. (But if you clear it out first and foremost, then there's nothing for him to take there ;))

Of course, I could be wrong Tongue

Gorash_away

2005-10-30 12:09:03 pm

I tested that when I rushed the first missions.
I arrived in mission 5 with Arthas at level 3. After you kill the first batch of monsters Arthas gains immediately 3 (!) level and jumps to level 6. I don't know how that works, but it seems the leveling system is more than just capped for single player.

And the level10 freak is "only" level6. Your problem in that mission is more the sheer mass of enemies that rush into your base combined with the fact that the second mine is pretty open to attacks.

Also, the timed Terran03 of Starcraft is also included, so this one should get a demo video too.

AquaTiger

2005-10-30 02:11:37 pm

Never give up!

Wow. I didn't know Mission 5 was so important.

I'll have to test Phauxe's theory, though. Anyway, I meant skip it in the PRELIM phase - keep in mind that I didn't know Phauxe's suggestion until now. Of course it would get a demo when it came time to do the real thing - I don't think the others would be accepted unless it was an entirely complete set.

DAMURDOC

2005-10-30 05:30:32 pm

The BaldurManiac

I played warcraft3 for years and was somewhat popular on the warcraft scene. But i never try the campain, il give it a try one day or another i think.

Gorash

Edit history:

Gorash: 2005-10-31 12:26:00 am

2005-10-30 06:35:37 pm

${$uid.$user}{' usertext'}

I'd be glad.
I'll keep on it as long as it remains possible for my skills, but even then I might miss something obvious.

New times:
- mission 2 stays at 3:46. I don't know how they managed to shave off those 4 seconds, no matter how I set these peasants up, I'm short either 30 gold or 10 lumber to get the footmen in a row.
- mission 3: 2.55
This mission seems to be an excercise of path finding + luck. There are 5 spots to get your heros stuck, and you need to get each of them right to get a good time. Maybe someone who watched the easy replays can tell me how they get 26 seconds faster to that warehouse...

Blackdragon

2006-01-09 01:05:20 pm

I have played wc2, wc3, wc3:tft many years, when i get my computer fixed i'll give a try.

YautjaElder

2006-01-09 01:39:31 pm

Speed is the key.

Quote:

I have played wc2, wc3, wc3:tft many years, when i get my computer fixed i'll give a try.

You should know that DAMURDOC already did a run of the Human Campaign.

DAMURDOC

2006-01-10 09:45:58 pm

The BaldurManiac

Quote:

You should know that DAMURDOC already did a run of the Human Campaign.

Yes, I will do the rest of the campains...

I just happen to be very busy these days