Warcraft II Magic
Magic is a huge part of Warcraft II; if you don't agree, just ask anyone who's been a victim of one of my magebombs. All of the best strategies, both Orc and Human, deal with magic. Magic breaks stalemates, kills armies, sinks armadas, and turns the tide of entire games. I'm respected as a sort of a magic guru on Kali, in that I love to use magic, so I thought I'd write a few of my thoughts down. Here they are:
OGRE-MAGE MAGIC:
The ogre-mage is the most powerful of orc units. Not only do they have the same strength as a knight, they can make their strength better through Bloodlust, and can lay down land mines as well. Bloodlust is one of the most powerful tools in the game. So use it! (Unless you're playing me:)
Eye of Kilrogg
This spell isn't worthless, but I rarely use it. It's much easier to explore with zeppelins, and the eye doesn't see very far. Since you start with this spell, once you upgrade to ogre-mages, you can't not bother to get it, but I would save my magic for bloodlust.
If your enemy has destroyers, check this out. Cast it directly over an enemy ship, a juggernaught preferrably, and the enemy destroyers will start attacking your eye. But in addition to hitting the eye, they will hit the jugg! You can use this relatively cheap spell to turn enemy units against each other! This isn't TOO practical but I can see situations where you could actually use it.
Note: this strategy also works with fliers and zeppelins.
Bloodlust
Bloodlust is the reason to get ogre-mages. Bloodlusted ogres mow through just about any other unit. Just watch 4 bloodlusted ogres take down a tower. And cast it on all your units: grunts, and especially dragons! Bloodlusted dragons really kick some serious ass. Man this is a scary spell. Defending against it is almost impossible; it makes a force of 5 ogres equal to a massive army. And if you cast it on axethrowers, you can take out gryphons in short order. Always cast this, if you have it, just before attacking....you'll alert the enemy that you're coming, through the noise, but then again, they'll be able to do almost nothing about it. Get bloodlust first and don't stop using it; just watch what happens.
Bloodlust rivals blizzard for being the best spell in the game. Damn it is hard to defend against....if your opponent is using this, you had better do something fast. I learn this every time I play against a good orc player.
You still not convinced how good bloodlust is? Take three ogre-mages and bloodlust them. Then attack a tower. Watch the tower die. And don't blink.
Here are some things you don't see too often:
Runes
Don't sell this spell short; I have lost games because people knew how to use it right. These land mines, though they take up 200 magic, can be used to very effective purposes. It sets down 5 land mines that flash every so often, but are otherwise invisible. And if you run over one you take 50 damage (I think). So, imagine casting this right in your enemy's peasant line. Bang! 5 dead peasants! Or cast it just as you are about to be attacked. In any case, make sure you're not the one to hit them. They maybe aren't worth it but they are good if used correctly.
Here is one thing to do...if you're facing a superior force that's somehow blocked in, be it by a building or trees or water or whatever, do this: cast runes right in front of them, enough to create a wall. Then take an axethrower or catapult or even a death knight, and attack the enemy force from the opposite side of the mines. The enemy will attack your unit and BANG!!! They just got a whole lot weaker. I've had this used on me before and it hurts.
The most practical place to put this is in the enemy peasant line: BANG!!! 5 dead peasants! This is like a poor man's blizzard or d&d.
PALADIN MAGIC:
Paladins don't rule as much as Ogre-mages; their magic is wimpier and they just don't have anything to match bloodlust. Healing is ok but is only limitidly useful; it doesn't really work when cast in the middle of a battle. I go for mages instead, unless I have a good reason not to.
Holy Vision
This is slightly better than Eye of Kilrogg, but not as useful as flying machines. Every so often you might want to cast this on an unused mine, to make sure your enemy isn't hiding anything. But by the time I have this I usually have a lot of fliers and thus don't have much use for it. But if your opponent is hiding a base it might be good to use this as it has a huge area of sight. It's not useful, really for finding where units are, but it spots buildings just fine.
Healing
This is nowhere near as good as bloodlust. For one thing it is defensive, and you can only cast it if someone has been hurt but not killed. This, really, rarely happens too much; your units either die or they don't. It's mostly a hassle to try and keep your units healed...I much prefer bloodlust. It is useful if you're using gryphons and want to attack in waves, healing your birds as they come back, but this spell really isn't all some crack it up to be.
One place where this spell is useful is in sea battles. If you're being invated by six units at a time than you can have 10 or so Paladins, hopefully none getting killed as the attacks come, healing each other back up to full after each wave. This helps as it means you don't have to keep building more units, but you have to use it right.
Basically, I decided the only place this spell is good for is if you're facing small attacks...if you find your units getting hurt but not dying, then get this spell. Mostly, for me, this isn't the case....my units somehow seem to die before I can ever heal them.
Exorcism
This is my new favorite spell. I love it! The second I see an enemy Temple of the Damned, I build a church and go straight for this. I rarely even go for healing; I just don't get my money's worth out of it, unless for some reason I feel compelled to go for gryphons. But Exorcism is easily my favorite spell now; I love seeing a death knight trying to head towards my base, running as fast as it can, maybe even with haste on it. It tries to run past my paladins, thinking it's home free after taking 1 or 2 hits, and then, DONG!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! My Paladins almost always have enough mana to kill a death knight; it takes like 240, and I don't spend paladin mana on anything else. It's the Holy Hand Grenade; it has an area effect! Such a fun spell. Nothing beats rendering Deathknights absolutely useless.
I actually used this spell on skeletons once. Ouch. And you thought it hurt Death Knights to the max. It was so funny.
DEATH KNIGHT MAGIC:
Death Knights are still powerful units, but you have to use them right. Death and Decay is right up there with blizzard...in fact, it is the exact same as blizzard, but can't be combined with invisibility like blizzard can. And it doesn't look as cool. :) I usually go for bloodlust first, but these are definately worth it.
Death Coil
This spell is a nice one...better than fireball, but not as good as polymorph, in my opinion. I rarely use it against land units, execept in a pinch, but instead use against air units, where it puts the enemy in a world of hurt. What is cool about this is if your death knight is hurt, it heals however many hitpoints in the death knight that it took away in the enemy. So if your death knight is weak, cast this on an enemy and you're all healed up.
Want a quick five hit points, and a laugh? Cast it on a critter. This may not be worth it but it's funny.
I apolgize for erroneously including that this spell could miss. Death coil never misses, (though fireball still does, another advantage for death coil). It just looks like it misses. In truth, Death coil never misses, which is a good thing for the orcs.
Haste
This spell is useful, but it is sadly overused....a lot of people believe this increases the speed at which a unit attacks but it doesn't, except for dragons. It merely speeds up the animation at which a unit looks like it is attacking. The unit doesn't actually do any more damage. Still, however, this spell is good. Cast it on a sapper if you're worried it might not make its destination, or cast it on a juggernaught if you need to pursue a transport. This spell is basically only useful on dragons, or if the enemy is running, and is faster than you.
Use this spell on dragons. Man, there is no 1 unit I fear more than a bloodlusted, hasted dragon. This combo may make dragons worth it. Haste actually Does speed up the rate at which dragons attack, not just the animation. So use it on dragons! And watch the armies scatter.
This spell, as far as I can tell, is useless on ogres. It increases the speed of a unit up to the speed of an ogre, and thus doesn't help the speed of an ogre at all. So casting haste on an ogre is just a waste of mana.
Haste does have some cool uses, however, especially where deathknights are concerned. In addition to making them run faster, it speeds their casting of death and decay. Which means you can go from no d&d out there to a full-fledged magebomb-worthy d&d in just a couple of seconds. This makes for some interesting magebomb/dkbomb possibilities.
Unholy Armor
I never seem to find myself using this spell, and wouldn't really bother researching it. It doesn't last all that long and isn't that good. Use it to sneak a death knight up to an enemy peasant line, but once past there I don't see a use for this spell.
Don't cast this on your regular units prior to going into battle. The reason behind this is that this spell takes off half of your existing hitpoints when you use it. You can't be hurt in any way, even by exorcism, (although polymorph still works), once you have cast it but it has a short life and is like taking your guys down to half of their life for nothing.
Likewise, if you see a bunch of unholy armored guys heading into your base, run like hell. Remember that it will wear off very soon, and that the units will be only half as strong. Then, once it is gone, launch your attack.
I never research this spell. It just costs too much (2500 gold) to be cost effective.
Whirlwind
Man, don't get this spell. Don't be that guy. This is a lame spell. You have like no control over it, and it doesn't kick half the ass of death and decay. Get it for a laugh, once you've already won. This spell blows. I have no uses for it.
Raise Dead
This spell makes skeletons; not really that great of a unit but better than some I guess. If you have your death knights close enough to your own dead guys to cast this, however, you had best be death & decaying your ass off. Skeletons are wimpy. So I almost never use this spell.
If you're killing enemy peasants, though, why not raise them from the dead to join your ranks? Free cannon fodder, I suppose, has its advantages, though I could probably come up with a better use for the mana.
There is one place where you can use this, however. If the map is out of gold and you have plenty of lumber, and you're planning one desperate attack, get this spell, kill off all your peons and turn them into skeletons. Skeletons are better than peons, and plus it clears up valuable farm space. But once past that extreme, I don't see a use for this spell.
Death & Decay
By far and away, this is the best Death Knight spell. Get this spell first. Use this whenever you can; it doesn't hurt the death knight that casts it so use it as the death knight equivalent to a magebomb -- running right into the middle of a crowd of enemies and casting it as close to you as possible. This tactict rules; it wipes out rows and rows of baddies. Cast this on enemy peasants, and enemy ships. This spell rules.
Since Death & Decay is exactly the same as Blizzard, see my Blizzard subheading for more details on strategies for Death & Decay.
Mage Magic:
Mages are the units I like more than any other....if they are used correctly they can single-handedly win a war. There are so many strategies for mages that I could not hope to write them all down...suffice to say that they just rule. Here are some of those strategies.
Fireball
Not worth it! I laugh at anyone who uses this spell against me. Even though you start with it, I would never cast it. It costs 100 of your valuable mana, and is about the equivalent to 1 attack from a gryphon. It does a tny bit of area effect damage (it damages three squares in a row, I think, and maybe a little bit side to side), but this ends up hurting your own units almost as much as the enemy, in close quarters. This spell: not worth it.
have used this spell, on occasion, when I was faced with 1 knight attacking my 1 mage, and I hadn't researched slow or polymorph. It was useful then, and is better for assassination than is blizzard, but all in all blizzard is a much better spell.
Flame Shield
This spell serves more as annoyance to enemies than anything. It does damage quickly but isn't hard to avoid...there are a number of cool uses for it, however.
I would not use this spell as part of a standard attack, i.e. casting it on a couple of your units and sending them into battle as part of a regular attack. It will end up hurting you more than the other guy. And if you send your guys in 1 at a time with flame shield on, as I have seen people do, you'll end up hurting the enemy less than you would if you just attack regularly. Otherwise using this spell isn't worth it.
Some of the possible applications for this spell include, however, casting it on a critter as it passes through an enemy peasant line...it can actually do a lot of damage that way, and it is just funny to see a critter killing enemy units (I wonder if doing this would count for your kills....)
Also, remember that this spell damages flying units! If you want to get rid of a pesky flying machine but don't have any archers, cast flame shield on a knight, footman, or even a peasant and chase it around. This doesn't help all that much but it sure as hell is funny.
If there's a group of enemy ogres sitting around, waiting to cast bloodlust on each other, or whatever, cast flame shield on the middle one (that is, if you're unsure of your magebombing skill) and it will damage all the ogres around it. If you're enemy is on the ball, it won't hurt him much, but the other 8 ogres won't run away on their own. This can do some damage, and is a good desperation/annoyance tactict if you either don't have the mana or the ability to magebomb.
One final application for this spell is to cast it on a transport as it is about to land; it will harm all the units aboard the ship as they get out and thus make the attack less successful.
Slow
This spell is useful, especially as a way of counteracting bloodlust. Man it is so frustrating to have this used against you, as you move around at the speed of a determined sloth. This spell is almost never used by any but the best players, but it should be. I don't use it enough. But this spell really does rule.
Although a bloodlusted, slowed ogre is still more powerful than a knight (at the same levels), here is what you use it for. When the bad guy is casting bloodlust on his ogres you cast slow right on them. I'm not sure about the durations of the spell but I think slow lasts longer than bloodlust. So instead of fighting, I say run. Wait for bloodlust to wear off (and now that the enemy is slowed, you can run with any unit), and as bloodlust is about to wear off you launch your attack. This is one of the few ways to directly counter a bloodlusted offensive.
Use this in combination with magebombs; cast it on 4 or so ogres in a group, and send a mage in to cast blizzard on them. If the baddies are slowed they might not even be able to kill your mage. A reusable mage bomb!
Cast this on incoming sappers, if they are going for your towers. Usually if you have 2 guard towers set up, and 1 demo squad is going for them, if it is slowed your towers can take it out. This is a minor thing but can mean the difference between winning and losing a close game.
Use this spell on enemy juggernaughts! This is a guaranteed 1 on 1 sea win.
When you're on the attack, especially if there's not much of a magebombing target around, cast slow on all the enemy ogres that you can and then launch your attack. Slow is a great spell.
Even though this spell is most often underused, it does have an addictive effect that I have noticed. Keep in mind that this is mostly a defensive spell, and is most useful for countering bloodlust. I have had morons cast slow on my peasants between my gold mine and town hall....this is just dumb. Blizzard is still a better spell, and don't use this when a blizzard would be more effective.
Polymorph
It's mostly the fear of this spell that makes it useful. It has up-sides and down-sides, the main downside being that it costs 200 mana. But if you have mages already, and aren't building archers, it is very useful to fend off gryphon assaults. But rarely do I have many mages with 200 mana.
If you're surprised by a gryphon attack, and have this spell, use it to cover your barracks until you get enough archers to hold their own. But otherwise, if you're afraid of a gryphon assault, just get about 6 archers and place them in a loose group. And if that's not enough, the six should hold up until you get more.
Still, the best defense against fliers is recon. Don't let them build up big groups of gryphons, or if they do just keep building archers, and get a few mages.
The only reason I would get this for air defense over archers is because of the mage's duality. If the gryphon assault was a false alarm, you still have a bunch of mages that you can use to cast blizzard.
This spell is useful against small attacks, but only practical if your mages are undefended. If you find 1 ogre attacking 1 mage then polymorph it, but I see little application for this. Use it mostly for air defense.
Invisibility
There are two uses for this spell that I can see, and yet it places the humans on top, in my opinion. USE IT!!!!! This is the only spell in the game for which there truly is no defense against. Contrary to popular opinion, death knights CAN NOT see invisible units (the computer can see them, but that's different. Humans can't).
What you do is this: cast it on a mage, and walk your ass right up to the enemy peasant line. Then cast blizzard. This will kill all the peasants mining at that mine. And it catches the bad guy completely by surprise. I am still one of the few people I know that regularly does this, and is a reason I win a lot of close games. If your enemy isn't mining gold, they can't build units. And you win.
Here is invisibility's other usage: on sea levels, if you're getting beaten on the sea, here is one thing to do. Cast this spell on a transport and fill it up with your favorite units (mages in my case), and sneak past a superior navy to unload them. This serves some purpose but I rarely find myself using this strategy much. It's been a while since I've played anyone good on sea, so there hasn't been much need. But this is mostly a mess-with-your-enemy's head sort of strategy.
For 200 mana, putting invisibility on anything but a mage or a transport (or an ally's death knight) is not worth it.
It is worth it, sometimes, to cast it on a paladin and sneak behind enemy lines to use exorcism, I guess, if your enemies are building death knights.
Also, if you have an incoming demolition squad, this will blow it up. Use this if you don't have polymorph.
In a free-for-all, if you're boxed in and almost dead, you can cast this on a peasant to sneak away and start your own colony. I have actually used this before.
Invisibility is the anti-recon spell. No matter how good enemy recon is, this can help you get through it. If the bad guy sees your magebomb coming, use invisibility. If you can't get close enough to the enemy dk's to dong them, use invisibility. If the enemy keeps taking out your transports, use invisibility. If nothing else it keeps the defenses honest.
Blizzard
Ah, I have saved the best for last. Blizzard. That cool, refreshing reminder of Michigan Weather. This spell is the reason to get mages (also, death and decay for death knights ... same spell). 1 casting of this spell can cripple your entire enemy operation. Magebombs are the way to go.
Learn the A HREF="http://users.mdn.net/gregshaf/magebomb.htm">magebomb. This may be the most effective way in the game to take out enemy troops.
As I have already mentioned, cast this on enemy peasant lines, and watch them die. This works even if your mana is only 50 or so, though having 175 would be better if you have a lot of peasants to take out. Once past there, it doesn't matter that much. In any case, this is so important to the humans that I put it in the keys to winning page as well. This works SO well. And when you put it in combination with invisibility, oh man. There is NO defense against it, and the enemy loses all their peasants. This is why I think mages are better.
The only thing that can stop an invisible mage is a wall-in. And mages tear down wall-ins. So there really is no defense against this.
With either blizzard or D&D (D&D=Death & Decay), you can still do the peasant-attack thing without invisibility. On levels like Maze and Garden you can use blizzard from across a line of trees, and still hit peasants. This is almost as good as invisibility, but it can be defensed against. This is still what I try to do.
If neither of the two options are available for taking out peasants, nothing says you can't walk right up the middle of their town and find their peasants (well, enemy units might disagree, but what do they know?). If you're playing someone weak enough for this to work on then you might as well be attacking normally, but don't be afraid to show a little balls. Don't be afraid of losing your mage (but get them away clean if possible, of course), because, if you take out an additional 7 or 8 peons because you stuck around (this happens all the time), then you've paid for your mage.
Blizzard should be researched first. Build a mage first, but the first spell you want is Blizzard. (You build the mage first so he has some mana built up by the time you get blizzard).
If you hear the bloodlust sound outside your town, send a magebomb QUICK. Ogres are vunerable when casting bloodlust on each other. If you don't hit them right then (and a magebomb is by far the best way to do so, as you don't have to take damage in order to give it), then you're going to be sorry. And if nothing else it will keep the enemy busy while you gather up your shit and run like hell.
On rivers, the best magebombs are possible: cast blizzard over the rivers and onto an enemy force. The enemies will charge, but won't be able to get to your mage. So they sit there, looking quite confused, as their hitpoint bars make exponentially increasing jumps towards 0. And when they die, whole other ones come to replace them. I've used this, on Rivers, to survive far longer than I otherwise should have.
Blizzard/D&D is the best way to knock out towers, and the best way to take out a wall-in. Just because of its range, and the fact that they aren't defenseless against land units like ballistas. It's a wall-in's worst nightmare to see blizzard striking their buildings. It almost isn't fair. (This, btw, is why I almost never wall-in).
If you find yourself landlocked, get mages and blizzard as quickly as possible. You should see how this spell decimates even the most mighty of armadas. As long as you have oil saved you can rebuild your fleet from nothing, if you have blizzard. This spell rules.
