NE vs Orc 1v1

[WES]

Hello,
I've been playing FFA actively for the last year on the bot, and I watch FML games on youtube. I learned how to fight UD, HU, I also think I understand the NE mirror. But I am totaly at a loss when it comes down to fighting orcs 1v1. My main issues are: bats, stomp, bladestorm. Let me explain.
1. bats. This one is obvious. They explode my chims. People say that this is expensive for orcs, but I had 1 game where we had a split map and 20k in the bank each (Sanctuary). So I thought I will roll over him with chims and suffocate him. But after a while he was 2-3k ahead of me, after some more while — 5k ahead, etc. He would use 2-3 bats per chim, and I tried to position them, staff them back and use tranquility as they were exploding. Now, I know that guy and he's leagues better than me, but it seemed so hopeless anyway.
I thought about keeping wands of illusion to clone my chims later in the game and let him waste a lot of bats in vain, but one can't rely on obtaining lots of wands everytime on every map. I aso thought about harassing remote expoes with 1-2 chims, like HUs do, sending 1-2 tanks, would that be effective? Lastly, I probably shouldn't just a-click my chims, but rather kite and bait their bats to Haze/BoF them + some other AOE? (I play a lot of different combos)

2. Bladestorm and 3. Stomp. These two spells seem to counter ground so hard. I figured, that when orcs go headhunters with casters, I'm doing well with roared Giants+archers+talons and AOE heroes (Panda, Tinker, Naga, maybe Warden). But if the BM is lvl 6+, this strategy seems feeble because bladestorm counters archers so hard. When they bladestorm, I transform my talons into crows, but my archers are gone. I can delay b.storm/stomp by using cyclone (I use this spell a lot), but it's not forever.
For the same reason I don't feel I can go bears vs orc ground, as they will get stomped (literally) and b.stormed.
Will real mass chims work vs headhunters with casters?

Lastly, to speak about hero choice. I usually play tinker first, but if my main rival in the game is orc, I feel that dh/dr are very important, sometimes I pick them both. May be, demon/dr/kotg, idk? I also experiment with using beast and pitlord sometimes (summons/howl). I feel that talons are really good vs orc with their manual faerie fire and cyclone.

I also noticed that I can rush orcs with 2 hero archer talon army early on (t2-t3), even without cyclone. Sometimes I managed to take down players, that are clearly better than me and would leave me no chance late game.

But late gate vs an equal orc I lose most of the time. Someone said in another thread, that NE= or even >Orc. How so? Help me, please.

[aarnikratti]

Best army vs orc is mixed army: 1-2 bears, 1-2 chims, 2-3 dryads, 1 MG, 3-4 talons, 2 faeries and 3-5 hippos. Talons are very important, always cyclone TC. Best hero vs orc is Dark Ranger because it can silence the whole orc army including walkers, so there's no way how orc could dispell it.

That's my advice briefly.

[ZsSuperCumulo]

Never, ever, solo an orc in late game. People don't need to be good to play orc. Orc is like an automated race. Unless you are 100% sure you can beat orc in a final 1v1 then just play the three way, because orcs will surely trash you.

@FML|Renaud , any advice for the young fella?

[FML|Renaud]

I hate it; I really do

The orc WILL need more money to kill your chims using bats... but that's assuming the battle is chim vs bats; if you involve heroes, he will slowly be gaining massive amounts of xp, and high level orc heroes are a PAIN to deal with

I've never been good at switching my army type, so the best I can usually do, is make sure I have healing/protection scrolls, and have the teleportation staff to save at least 3 chims each time.

But even then, you will be stuck with weakened chims, which he will easily eat alive with his heroes. And your chims will die much faster than they will be able to kill any of his heroes (assuming he heals and has invul potion)

So don't fight him. TP away (kill some casters if you can), heal at the moon wells, buy more scrolls, and go back at it. (This is actually the most important part, leaving before all of your stuff dies)

That way he will be getting minimal amount of xp, and spending much more money than you are.

[WES]

Thanks for all the replies so far, guys!
Yes, I always try to take down an orc, esp. if I know he's a good player.
The bot is full of orcs, however, sometimes there are 2 or 3 orcs in a 6-way game.
And they are doing pretty well, so I often have to fight them 1v1.
I get it, about killing smth and tping out, I've seen uds do the same thing in solo or 2v2, basicaly they killed a bear or two and tp'ed away. TP is 350, so as long as I kill something that is 350+ gold, it's a good trade.

But as I dodge direct confrontation, I should somehow harass them too, I guess?

A lot comes down to multitasking, I've just lost a game to a rly good player who split harassed my expoes, I think I should learn to do the same.

In terms of micro/macro/decision making, I'm your average ffa bot player. I just don't know what to do vs orc at all. Recently I had a game where I amassed around 10k and hadd all the production facilities. But felt so numb and stuck, because what should I buy vs a fully buffed orc army of tauren, casters, wyverns and bats?

I like the advise on making a mixed army from aarnikratti, btw, will definitely try as soon as I can.

1 more thing to add, though, is that I can't find FML games on youtube, where I'd watch a good lategame NE v OR 1v1 to learn from.

[SosoHasRedHair]

look bro beating orc is ez.

step one: pick DR PANDA KOTG or PANDA POTM KOTG

now 20k elf vs 20k orc is simply a game of adjusting armies. he has mass hh caster? go pure chims and get 3 fairies + u have dr and panda so the orc has zero chance of winning that fight if u dont a click the tc lvl 10 like a retard wich 80% of the elfs do. to counter pure chims he needs wyv, mass wyv. so u get hippos now wich will force him into bats. Now lets do some math here u both are 50 food typical orc base vs typical elf base. u pump 6 ancient of wind and 4 chim roosts orc pumps 6 beastiaries and 2 spirit lodges. Who has quicker a good army? right u the elf. so just throw masses of units into the orc cuz he cant compete with ur speed of producing new units. bats are quickly produced? yes but u need 6 of them to kill 2chims and u cant pump wyv and bats at the same time + wyv without caster? useless. now heres another thing why throwing army over army into orcs work. ORCS NEED THEIR MANA and their heroes. u lose ur panda? big deal taver him staff him back and staff into the fight and hes as good as new. Orc loses sh? well tavern him and he has 50%hp no mana (super usefull) now elf haters will say but orc can buy mana pot! yes u fags thats 1healwave. and  u dont have time to mana him up anyway cuz as i said u constantly pressure the orc.

[IWANTWC4]

If you both had 20k.   But then he had a 3 or 4k advantage it means you didn't split chims.

It takes 3 bats to kill a chim if you split.  480>330.

And never ever ever never forget scrolls.  Scrolls of heal if times right make a HUGE difference.

[Peregrine]

the best answer here is : scrolls

scroll of protection to reduce damage from bats + scroll of healing to heal them while they're being hit

and if you can snipe even a few of the bats before they hit - then enough chims can survive to win the battle

send the hippos out front to kill the bats, use dotts on the heroes, silence everything, charm a bat and explode it on another bat, bof the bats before they reach the chims. cyclone the heroes again. spread the chims as the bats come for them. use scrolls timeley. staff the chims that you know are about to die, which makes the bat start autoattacking and u can kill it

if you do all those things then maybe you can beat the orc. but like everyone said, in fair 1v1, orc is imba.

[Seksi]

Some simple tips that you can use in your games vs Orc:

1. Snipe the Voodoo Lounge.  Orc can't produce Bats without a shop and most orcs will not build an extra shop.   

2. Use Druid of the Talon solely to cyclone heroes.   If you can regularly cyclone BM / TC orc has a tough time stopping that.   If they dispel they also lose their positive buffs (link and bloodlust). 

3. Rush the Orc.   Orc requires more lumber (same principal  applies to Human) and has a longer tech time to reach Tier 3 armies.  As Elf or Undead, you should often go fast 80 or 100 food against a Orc or Human threat that is nearby. 

4. Target the casters with Chims.   When you engage an Orc, neutralize the heroes with cyclone and focus CHims on his casters.   If you can wipe out the shamans/docs/walkers and TP out that is a significant advantage.  So often you'll see a Elf player use Chims to mass focus on a TC or SH unsuccessfully.  Kill the casters!

5.  Stay away from mixed armies.  In contrast to another suggestion, I would stay away from armies that consist of a few units of each type.  Orc is very dominant when buffed and leveled and a strong orc player will tear through a mixed army.   You'll want to focus on clear objectives in a fight (unless you have a significant hero advantage, then play whatever you'd like).

Pure Chims with 3-4 Dotts and 4-6 Hippos is often the best army type.  You can add a Bear, Dryad, or some Fairie Dragons as you please.  Late game, Elf ground can be effective against Human or Elf, but not so much Orc.   

 

[mrSweets]

I think u need DH +NAGA + POTM its solv u problem 

[ObserveAndLearn]

Some simple tips that you can use in your games vs Orc:

1. Snipe the Voodoo Lounge.  Orc can't produce Bats without a shop and most orcs will not build an extra shop.   

2. Use Druid of the Talon solely to cyclone heroes.   If you can regularly cyclone BM / TC orc has a tough time stopping that.   If they dispel they also lose their positive buffs (link and bloodlust). 

3. Rush the Orc.   Orc requires more lumber (same principal  applies to Human) and has a longer tech time to reach Tier 3 armies.  As Elf or Undead, you should often go fast 80 or 100 food against a Orc or Human threat that is nearby. 

4. Target the casters with Chims.   When you engage an Orc, neutralize the heroes with cyclone and focus CHims on his casters.   If you can wipe out the shamans/docs/walkers and TP out that is a significant advantage.  So often you'll see a Elf player use Chims to mass focus on a TC or SH unsuccessfully.  Kill the casters!

5.  Stay away from mixed armies.  In contrast to another suggestion, I would stay away from armies that consist of a few units of each type.  Orc is very dominant when buffed and leveled and a strong orc player will tear through a mixed army.   You'll want to focus on clear objectives in a fight (unless you have a significant hero advantage, then play whatever you'd like).

Pure Chims with 3-4 Dotts and 4-6 Hippos is often the best army type.  You can add a Bear, Dryad, or some Fairie Dragons as you please.  Late game, Elf ground can be effective against Human or Elf, but not so much Orc.   

Everything what Seksi said + the following :

1. If you scout and see your natural opponent being an orc I would first max out on armor upgrades. Scroll of protection + a healscroll on every hero is essential. Staffing a few red chims too after the detonation of bats.

2. Always cast scroll of protection and send hippos first to force the orc to detonate the bats in the hippos and not in the chims. Dr/Panda/Potm is the best combination here, silence destroys orcs, potm for the extra dmg on the chims and the ability to clear sentry wards and keep track of the orc army since positioning is so important.

3. If you're not 100 and not ready to fight with armor scrolls on - DONT. Just try to snipe town halls and tp. I will occasionally make a 2nd bear that i send to expos to harrass peons if i see no towers/burrows.

4. Pot of invul on all heroes. This is so underrated in ffa but wins fights.

[WES]

lots of good advice here, thanks a lot!
Yes, I generally upgrade armour 1st, always, because I heard different people/guides say so, although I'm a bit copy-cat-ing here, as I don't really understand why, but w/e.

Sniping a voodoo shop, yes, I always do that, the problem is that competent orcs always have more than just 1! And speaking of production buildings, I played a lot with one guy, he always has at least 5 beastiaries, oftentimes more and in different bases.

And after I lose, I often stay at least to peek at my opponents' bases, sometimes those orc bases are amazing. It depends on the player, though.

So, my primary unit is going to be chim, then. I don't use them often tbh, I usually build 4-8 chim roosts just in case, but generally I play through the Ancient of War and Winds units (archers, talons, hipporider are my favourite, a bear for roar). But lately I started using chims more. And will use them more, too.

TC/SH! That's a revelation. I used to do exactly so, focus TC or SH, hoping to finally kill them, but they never died. I will work on it, thanks for pointing it out! But it's so tempting.

If there is anything else, that seems obvious, but important (like not focusing tc/sh), feel free to point it out. I may still not know about it. I know that one shouldn't focus fire dh also...

[Peregrine]

yes, like seksi said, dont focus the heroes unless you can 100% kill it. silence them, cyclone them, and kill the army

[Dovekie]

Some pretty good advice here, though I do want to point a few things out:

The match up, even very late game, is not good for the Orc. I'm not saying it is usually in the Night Elves favor, I am just stating that it is not good for the Orc, because it is very expensive. They will lose casters/kodo and they will lose gold to invul potions, scrolls, and bats.

I have a quite a different take on this matchup than other people, and I think my way is extremely effective. I would even go so far as to say it is the Orc, even very late game, that is disadvantaged. Obviously if they have a spirit linked level 9 blade master with 3 crowns, and an SH with 4 periapts, with a high level TC, it gets pretty stupid, but it is still, imo, even enough, or even still elf favored in such a situation. But to the point, I think the people in here, while their other advice is great, their claiming of Orc being overpowered late-game in this match up are wrong, and they must have struggle with micro. It is not the case that Orc dominates this.


-Firstly, I think the best tip in here is seksi's "rush them" tip. This solves almost all the problems before they even happen (except for bm suicide harass if you miss some buildings). You should absolutely get your tech up before the Orc, and if you aren't, than that's a macro problem on your end, and can be solved by a little practice. Just hit them with 80-100 food, (1-2 upgraded) chims and scrolls. It is really that simple. Towers + Spirit Linked Orbed BM + Wyvern can kinda push you back if they scouted it, but I mean Orc is just so weak at this point. This is like 75 - 25 in Elf favor.



If you didn't rush them out, here is my advice.

Heros: It doesn't matter too much.  Kotg is the best, and everything else is a bonus. DR, is powerful, but with my style it doesn't make too much of a difference. I like Kotg/Panda with either DH / Alch / Tinker as the 1st hero/carry.

Items: Don't get fancy. This is many peoples problem. You don't want boots, you don't want too many auras, you don't want big mana items (other than on Panda), you don't want claws. Just get Orbs, Staffs, Periapts (Circlets can work on melee heroes), and Consumables (scroll/tp/invul potion/AMS). Don't forget the triple Orb.

Army: This, apart from 3 Orbs, is where I differ the most. I don't believe you need any hippogryphs at all (unless you are really getting your ass handed to you). The army I would suggest is pure dott + chim.  Go like 6-10 dott, then the rest chim. Obviously you can make a bear/faerie/MJ if you really want, but that's just preference. It's the 3 extra chims here that really, really push it over the edge. Also, no one is good at cyclone. Get good at cyclone. 



Basically the plan here is to literally just slowly walk across the map toward their base with lots of scrolls in your army. Tranquility and proper staff usage is king @ staying afloat economically, but IMO you can win without ECO advantage.

General tips to make this work, especially micro:

1. You must play aggressive. They can outrun and out maneuver you on the field with almost double your movespeed. Their base? It is static, and doesn't move anywhere, and cost them a billion lumber to make that they will unlikely ever be able to reproduce.

2. Cyclone. Cyclone all 3 heroes all the time. All the time. Just keep them all cycloned always always always always.  One of the biggest benefits of my strategy is that their heroes will never be spirit linked (cyclone dispels it), and because you have 3-4 more chims then you normally have, and because you will have 3 orbs, and because you will have entangle, and because you will have faerie fire, their heroes will die in any 2 second focus fire. But you don't even need to focus fire them because they are cycloned.

3. Let your chims kill their ground, and your heroes kill their Wyverns. AMS potion on Panda is important—wyverns fare extremely poorly against Elf heroes without blade/tc support, and Haze/Fire massively wrecks them. This is another reason to enjoy using the Alch, and to a lesser extent the DH, because they completely decimate air in conjunction with Panda w/out need of Hippogryph intervention (at least against Orc/Hu).

4. That's it. LOTS OF CHIMS, LOTS OF CYCLONE.


Also, it is hilarious when a "good" Orc trys to outsmart you by going heavy on the Wyvern instead of bats, because they think they can kite your chims. It just does not work when your heroes are constantly cycloned. The Chims are behind the Elf heroes, and once haze goes off on your Wyvern, it is just all bad news.

The only thing I really left out is "how to deal with invul potion on TC/Blade". Just do your best to minimize losses. AMS immediately on your Panda, and cyclone the non-invul heroes. You can even go crow form to dodge a stomp, assuming they don't have any bats left. But this might be the time to scroll.

Anyways, GL.

[WES]

Nice post, mr Dovekie, thank you. Yes, I use cycllone a lot. I'm a kinda sloppy player with ~100 apm, or less. All I do in battles is spam cyclone, try to cast hero spells by cooldown and move my wounded heros back a bit, or staff them out.

Push with chims and cyclone. OK I will as soon as I meet another orc 1v1.

Speaking of items, ye, I'm super greedy here, I buy every aura I can get my hands on, even the worse ones. My philosophy is that my units are going to be totally imba with every aura, this is especially important in mirror. But then my hero has 600hp. I will work on it.
No boots? I usually get a pair for every hero. Will try to play w/o the boots, but it feels wierd! As for the orbs... I used to get them on every hero. But then I thought to myself, is it worth it. Look. The keeper is going to cast his Tranquiity for 30sec (was it?), so he's not shooting half the time. I usually stack him with 4 hp items, a staff, and sometimes an AMS. Panda, I thought it's better to give him the orb past lvl 7, where he can crit (however if my main rival is hu, I usually skip haze and skill brawler to fight tank/copters, I find haze less usefull vs hu, what do you guys think about it?). The DH should definitely get the orb...
I do realize that the orb of venom adds a lot of damage, but then my usual heros (my most usual combo is tinker/panda/keeper), none of them are about damage, save for panda maybe?

As for DR, I usually skill silence and lifedrain (if I get her 3rd) or retrain to lifedrain at lvl5, if I pick her 1st. I cast silence and drain life, the cast silence again, etc. She's much more lively this way, I find, again, what do you guys think about it? But my main point here, she's not shooting again, so the orb on her, is it worth it?