Orc-Human 2v2 Guide: Heroes

Des (Whisper) wrote an interesting guide discussing the Warcraft III Orc-Human 2v2 team. A solid 2v2 Arranged Team player himself, he speaks from his experiences playing the strong race combo.

To understand this guide, you only need to know the basics like build orders and creeping. No Master's degree in Micromanagement is required, though a good sense of humor is necessary. So read on and enjoy.

Part 1 - MAPS
Part 3 - MATCH-UPS


Once considered the strongest 2v2 race combo, the Orc/Human team creates a balanced attack and causes devastating damage to enemy heroes. This guide will explain to you nearly every single standard situation (I am sorry, I cannot account for the dual alchemist burrow rush you are about to face) an Orc/Human team can come up against and how to deal with this situation. I obviously have too much time on my hands because I am writing this. Anyways, time to take you from suck to pro.

Heroes

Human

Archmage
The primary hero for human in most games. Summon Water elemental is a very useful creeping asset and also helps largely when it reaches level 2.

• Blizzard: This is usually used after Water Elementals have become useless. (Opponent has destroyers, or any kind of mass dispel.) This ability is useful for killing huntresses and other units that are grouped together in small clusters.
• Summon Water Elemental: Your primary ability. Use it to creep, deal damage, and support you as a strong secondary unit in any situation. It may lose is effectiveness if your opponent has many forms of dispel.
• Brilliance Aura: A very handy skill. This is largely helpful for the Shadow Hunter or Mountain King, two heroes who rely heavily on spells to be useful in a fight.
• Mass Teleport: If you finish reading this guide, you should win the game before you reach level 6. This is pretty annoying for the enemy if you want to screw around during end game hit-and-running. The cooldown is nearly instant.

Mountain King
A common secondary hero for human. It is a great asset to help combo off certain heroes (Death Knight especially.) Storm bolt is very handy to prevent an opposing hero from teleporting out.

• Storm Bolt: This must be precisely timed with hex. It doesn’t matter who uses the ability first, as long as it’s not used at the same time with hex.
• Thunder Clap: Thunder clap is one of those secondary abilities that are available, but lack a hard core use. It can be used to slow down enemy units or finish off low-hp units if extra damage is needed.
• Bash: You have aura, why get bash? You have enough mana to use both spells. There is really no point in getting bash. All the cool people get Thunder Clap as their second skill nowadays. Only get it if you are using Mountain King as your first hero.
• Avatar: Let’s have some fun.

Paladin
A very common third hero. In higher level games, the Paladin does not come into use often - the game should end shortly after reaching tier 2. Paladin should always buy the Staff of Sanctuary, the best staff in the game. It’s like the elf one, but on steroids because it fully heals the unit over a period of time.

• Holy Light: Heals unit. Save your heroes/units. Always get this ability first.
• Divine Shield: Save your paladin. This guide will not go into how Paladin is used to screw undead players over. Always get this ability second.
• Devotion Aura: I wonder what this ability does.
• Spell that is opposite of Animate Dead: Used so little, I even forgot its name.

BloodMage
I will not go into detail on this hero because the Archmage/Mountain King combo is much more common than Mountain King/Bloodmage. If you are screwing around, feel free to do whatever you want.

Orc

Blademaster
The strongest hero in the game. People think this hero is so incredibly strong that they create threads on the Bnet forums complaining about imbalance.

• Wind Walk: Invisibility with no collision. The Blademaster already has maximum move speed with Level 2 Wind Walk and boots making him a good scout.
• Mirror Image: If you got this, you misclicked horribly and should now proceed in leaving the game.
• Critical Strike: Just why the Blademaster is so imbalanced. Critical Strike should be taken at levels 2, 4, and 5.
• Bladestorm: Might as well get Level 3 Wind Walk unless you want to have some fun.

Shadow Hunter
The most common second hero when playing Orc is the Shadow Hunter. It’s a multi-purpose support hero that can also be used as a first hero. Against Elf/Undead, you can take hex first and harass the undead opponent by hexing and focusing down fiends. Tauren Chieftain with stomp/aura should be taken as the 2nd hero if you are going Shadow Hunter First. At level 2 and 3, you should get serpent wards to deal with the mass huntresses.

• Healing Wave: Healing wave is a very good ability to keep units alive especially your Blademaster. Powerful nukes from undead could lower your Blademaster’s HP very quickly.
• Hex: Your first skill, always. When your Shadow Hunter comes out of the Altar, you want to utilize it to its maximum ability, killing on the chase and preventing units from escaping.
• Serpent Wards: Great for tower rushes and also great for unarmored units such as huntresses. Usually these are ignored because opponents tend to focus down units instead of Serpent wards. These immobile wards can do a crapload of damage if unattended to though.
• Big Bad Voodoo: For fun.

Tauren Chieftain
Almost not viable anymore. Lacks the ability to move around in the battle and is quickly focused down. Stick to going Blademaster/Shadow Hunter.

Far Seer
Not going into any detail about FS in this guide. This is strongly based on the most standard Orc/Human games.

Neutral

Naga Sea Witch
A great 2nd choice if you are looking for an early Tier 2 push on your opponent. Only choose Naga if you believe you can get more out of her than you can out of Mountain King.

• Forked Lightning: Basic 2nd skill nuke.
• Frost Arrows: Frost arrows is Naga’s primary ability. If used well, Naga could be a better choice than the Mountain King. However, Frost Arrows do not scale well into late game because Naga is a very squishy hero and dies quickly to focus fire.