beating undead ai insane

[GhostThruster]

whos done this and how?

edit: legit, non exploitative strategies only. by that i mean by outmicroing and outmacroing, not choosing maps with restrictive treelines or island bases etc.

 

[Kala]

I've always found Insane AI really easy. They don't even know how to do the Coil/Nova/Impale combo.

 

[GhostThruster]

theyre stupid, but the thing is u'll win like the first few engagements, but then with their infinite resources they can recover in half the time. only ways ive managed to beat them was by fast expo with humans or ghouls/gargs/dl, and thats coz a) im better than them in micro by far, and the expansion allows me to be on par with macro b) super easy strat and theyre too dumb to attack their sleeping heroes.

 

[Squiggy]

I can't even beat an NPC on easy alone.
You guys are freaks.

 

[trolman]

Humans ftw. Paladin main hero for obvious reasons. MK cuz he's powerful. Archmage 3rd hero for support. Use an army combo of Knights Priests Seige Engines with barrage, and griffins. Sorceresses are optional.

Necromancers get owned by priests, Wyrms die from tanks.

 

[Aeroblyctos]

Gonna take a while to kill a wyrm with a tank. ^^

Tank does 25 damage per barrage and wyrm has 1350 health. Ha!

 

[trolman]

But the AI never has more than 4 and that the tank has lots of HP, seige armor and a triple missle attack, get those elven flying guys if its such a problem

 

[Aeroblyctos]

No idea to make tanks against air if the enemy doesn't have a lot of air units. I mean tank can hit 9 targets at the same time. Tanks are either meant to destroy bases or kill masses of air units.

 

[trolman]

Fiiine get riflemen then, or better yet - goliaths.

edit: actually tanks arent a bad choice after all

copied from the legit warcraft 3 site

Barrage (Passive)
Fires powerful Dwarven rockets at nearby enemy air units, dealing 25 damage per hit for a range of 50. 9 rockets can be fired at once. 2 second cooldown.

I think they can all get pointed at one unit so thats about 150 damage with armor reduction...

 

[Aeroblyctos]

Fiiine get riflemen then, or better yet - goliaths.

edit: actually tanks arent a bad choice after all

copied from the legit warcraft 3 site

Barrage (Passive)
Fires powerful Dwarven rockets at nearby enemy air units, dealing 25 damage per hit for a range of 50. 9 rockets can be fired at once. 2 second cooldown.

I think they can all get pointed at one unit so thats about 150 damage with armor reduction...

No it doesn't work like that.

 

[GhostThruster]

its one rocket per unit in barrage.

my human build is mk first; he can easily kill the enemy heroes, as the ai is not smart enough to tp or micro weak heroes back to heal. second is paladin for healing my own units; i choose him second because i find a lvl 3 bolt more valuable than a level 3 heal, simply because you rarely need to heal a unit by 600 hp, and bolt deals more damage + stun as a nuke. in t1 ill train like 2 footies, go militia creep my natural and fast expo. then i go to t2, mass some rifles. its around this time the ai will attack your base or your expo, so i set up one or two towers. at t2 i go casters and dragonhawks + rifles. frost wyrms are the ai's biggest threat really, and dragonhawks completely neutralise them.
i never go workshop vs undead; mortar teams and siege engines get raped with a combo of frost wyrms (slow), orb of corruption (negates siege engine's armor largely), and unholy aura (speed allows easy surrounds and catching up to flank siege units). gyrocopters fall like flies vs frost wyrms, better off going rifles or dragonhawks.

 

[trolman]

But thanks are very useful against undead because in their bases, everything is shooting at you ! Also vs wyrms, polymortp or whatever (the sheep spell) works epicly.

 

[Kala]

Fun tactics:

Human: Mass sorceresses and polymorph all enemy units. Then use MK and Paladin to nuke their heroes. And maybe make AM for Brilliance Aura.

Orc: TC + SH + Mass HH and Doc. Use Scroll of Protection and spam healing wards in fight. This will keep all your HH's alive with no problem.

Nelf: Mass Druid of the Talons. Cyclone everything in sight and then turn into crow and kill all air units ^^

 

[Vunjo]

I don't really see a problem beating any AI, actually in the old days I've gone for solo against 3 normal or solo against 2 insane AIs, oh well. And the tactic is kinda simple, rush most expensive units.
I usually play Undead/Orc, where I either go for Frost Wyrm + Necromancer or Wind Rider + Shamans. Basically, full DPS build.

 

[Aeroblyctos]

The easiest way to defeat computers is doing mass air. Cimeras with hippos, frost wyrms with cargoile, gryphons with haws and wyverns with bats. Just remember to get an expand, train early units and creep fast as possible in order to counter a rush.

 

[GhostThruster]

these early tech builds are really susceptible to attacks on small maps like echo isles. i generally prefer getting a mix of t1 and t2 units.

 

[Aeroblyctos]

these early tech builds are really susceptible to attacks on small maps like echo isles. i generally prefer getting a mix of t1 and t2 units.

That's more like 'professional game' style.

 

[Vunjo]

That's more like 'professional game' style.

Well, that build just requires a bit of micro, while mass end game/air units is just brain afk attack move

 

[trolman]

Maybe a cheap tactic of Goblin kamikazies droped by zeppelin on his main base? xP

 

[Aeroblyctos]

Well, that build just requires a bit of micro, while mass end game/air units is just brain afk attack move

Ha! Well I don't expect these guys to micro a lot anyway.

 

[Footman16]

You need at least 4 sorceress to polymorph the abominations and dragon hawks for the frost wyrms. A few knights for killing the polymorphed enemies and gryphons to Finish off the wyrms as for the heroes I don't know maybe blizzard, storm bolt holy light combo would probably be best. If they have necromancers and banshees with curse and skeletons then get a few priests adept training and get dispelling. Riflemen will also kill the spellcasters quickly.

 

[trolman]

Basicly, Human is the master race.

 

[Footman16]

Basically, yes. lol That and I'm a real fan of Garithos joking of course.

 

[trolman]

Garithos should have had his own skills and he shoud have become his own class ( like Muridan>MK, Arthas>Pala, Jaina>Arch) instead for some reason, even tough the blood elves left for outland and abandoned the alliance, they put Bloodmage as 4th hero -.-

 

[Footman16]

I know, the High Elves never even left the alliance they are still a big part, there are more of them than there are Darkspear trolls.

Orcs are also a good counter to Undead because they can take a lot of damage and deal dps with that bloodlust.

 

[Dr Super Good]

I think they suffer from the flank weakness that SC2: WoL AI used to suffer from. If you raid their home bases with just 1-2 units and their towers cannot handle they retreat even if they were about to attack you.

 

[GhostThruster]

@dsg: no exploits

 

[Dr Super Good]

It is not really an exploit to abuse their own stupidity. An exploit would be placing them on an island map (when WC3 clearly does not support it), building un-killable towers using a hack or rushing ranged units into their lumber before they have access to air.

Fact remains you cannot beat Insane AI using simple A move and micro in open combat. They gather resources faster than you so will always have a larger army. Like all cheating AI, the only real way to beat them is to abuse their own stupidity.

 

[Lordkoon]

I don't really see a problem beating any AI, actually in the old days I've gone for solo against 3 normal or solo against 2 insane AIs, oh well. And the tactic is kinda simple, rush most expensive units.
I usually play Undead/Orc, where I either go for Frost Wyrm + Necromancer or Wind Rider + Shamans. Basically, full DPS build.

And when did you wake up exactly? That's something I used to do when I began playing the game and believe me it never works. So you'v beaten 2 insanes in a team by 'rushing' frost wyrms... people these days.

I beat insane undead by use of sorceres's polymorph on abominations and frost wyrms and roughly 5-7 priests with inner fire toggled and switching it to heal after the fast buff. People tend to try using dragon hawks but you might notice the moment you cast the aeral net disable the AI will focus them and burn them down very fast.

Tanks are bad against frost wyrms because of their 2 second cooldown on the barrage and focus they recieve from siege units, the high costs and limit they take. Also their disability to stay healthy without a few peaseants runing behind them to repair like lunatics. They are good against the mid-tier flyers like gargoyles, dragonhawks, batriders etc.

My strategy against AI is to take advantage of it's weak spots :
1. The AI tends to waste town portal when a single unit attacks his main base/expansion. Easily at starting stages you send a single unit against an expansion and force the AI to use town portal there(and he will!) then go inside his main base quickly and wreack as much havock as you can. If the AI already got flyers - e.g. we are talking about undead so gargoyles - they tend to run infront of the main army when retreating to defend their base. Just expect them to arrive first and get them as they do.
In best case scenario they won't even reach Frost wyrm phase. That strategy works on some of the maps where expansions are a bit go-around from the main base. The time period ofcorse shortens graduately.

p.s. Blood Mage's banish with 2 sec. cd is a must when dealing with t3 units. Also good mix is the holy light and storm bolt on a banished target but thats highly unlikely to happen, I mean reaching 3 lvl 6 heroes. Games should end faster than that.

 

[GhostThruster]

@dsg: u can beat them without abusing their stupidity. i have done it a few times, its especially easy going ghouls/gargs against them.

 

[Dr Super Good]

The AI has a fixed build order so will always keep low tier units in its army. This is a fail with the WC3 AI that was corrected in SC2.

What this means is you can rush the most expensive units and win. All you need to do is defend and avoid losses while massing expensive units. Even if the AI food caps its army, it will still lose to your smaller army as it will continue to make cannon fodder troops like footmen, ghouls, archers and grunts despite you having armies of knights, abominations, druids of the claw? and taurens.

An effective human army composition I found was knights, riflemen and priests (with maybe the odd sorceress for slow/polymorph). The knights are large and good at walling off your range troops from the enemy melee. The riflemen do nice damage for their cost so are used to give range and anti-air support. The priests are a must have for the inner fire and healing. Finally throw in a powerful hero like Paladin for devotion aura, healing and resurrection (resurrecting 6 units turns a battle). There is little the AI can do against that composition.

It is important to hit the enemy expansions during construction. They like to send lone workers to build expansions without any escort so you just need to run in, hit the outpost a few times (as buildings die easily when under construction) and then run away before their army arrives.

Massing air units also works surprisingly well. The AI has stupid build strategies that cannot cope with full air mobility. So for example, gargoyles (which trash air units) and frost wyrms makes a lethal combination. The AI will not go all in with anti-air so you can lead their skeleton crew of air away from their main army where ground range units cannot provide support and kill them. You can also harass their base this way by retreating over unpathable terrain so they cannot follow.

There are only three things that make Insane WC3 AI difficult at times.
1. They have a huge resource bonus (either 50% or 100% more income) allowing them to out produce you at all times.
2. They are omnipotent. They will always know when your army is in your base and when not which results in them always attacking your expo even if they do not scout and there are dozens of expos you could have made.
3. When faced with multiple, they seem to target players randomly. Although not as bad as old SC2 AI which focused fire, in 6v6 or other insane comp stomp matches you can occasionally find all 6 AI attacking the same team member at the same time which usually does not end well for them, even when others rush and fend off the attack.

 

[GhostThruster]

t3 heavy melees (knights, tauren, aboms, bears) are out of the question. frost wyrms rape them with ease. i find sorcs, breakers, rifles to be a good combo. breakers tank and neutralise hero mana, whilst rifles focus and sorcs cripple their army.

 

[Aeroblyctos]

Breakers aren't that strong melee and their armor type sucks against other melee.

 

[Dr Super Good]

frost wyrms rape them with ease

All 2-3 of them they make... This is not Age of Empires where the AI loved to mass produce counters for everything you have in production. If you go all in with air you will not suddenly see them making only Gargoyles for example.

The idea is you need to out muscle them. This is much easier than you would expect since they still keep on throwing in low tier units last I remember. Having 3 heroes helps tremendously as they are generally stronger than units.