The Healing Shop

Most build orders involving the Blademaster are the same, with slight variations of the construction of the Voodoo Lounge. It is essential that the shop is completed before the Blademaster goes on his long journey to harass or creep because the Blademaster always needs to have some form of healing. Another option would be to build your Voodoo Lounge outside your base.

Without healing salves to regenerate health, you will find yourself getting crushed by humans who tend to pressure early by attacking burrows or even tower rush. Usually, the Voodoo Lounge is built before the 7th lumber peon (19/20 supply).

Creeping or harassment first?

Both the Archmage and the Mountain King are relatively weak at Level 1 compared to the Blademaster and the Farseer. Without Brilliance aura, the Archmage cannot cast too many Water Elementals due to its high mana cost. The Mountain King's mana capacity is also quite low at low levels. Thus, if it is possible to prevent the human from reaching level 2, you should harass first (e.g. side-spawn on Turtle Rock).

But most of the time, harassing first won't bring about any significant benefits – The modern human player uses too many militia to kill the creeps as compared to old school humans. Therefore, the human would have probably finished creeping his creep camp by the time you arrive there. However, there might be certain situations when you should harass immediately. Examples include spawning beside your opponent's Goblin Laboratory on Twisted Meadows.
So when should you harass then? There are various ways to play this matchup and if you are up against the same opponent in a competition, it would be good to vary your style a little to remain unpredictable. You could either creep until you hit Level 2 and then pressure with a Voodoo Lounge in the middle of the map for quick healing or you could creep until Level 3 for greater backstab damage from Windwalk. The first variation will probably delay the expansion by a little as you would be killing more peasants at the start while the second variation will allow you to kill about 2 to 3 peasants without losing anything. Remember that you can dodge Storm Bolt with Windwalk as long as the Dust of Appearance is not sprinkled on your Blademaster.

Different play for different maps

On maps where the human is less likely to expand due to the difficulty of the creeps at the expansions (Turtle Rock and Twisted Meadows and Gnoll Wood), I believe it is best to harass after your hero reaches level 2 against humans.
Creeping till level 3 will give the human sufficient time to creep up till level 3 and if he tries to expand, he will certainly be able to get away with it with minimal losses. The monstrous level 2 Water Elementals can wreck your burrows and this is exceptionally dangerous if the human decides to tower rush as well.
Attaining a Level 2 hero is important. If you are using the Blademaster, having the Critical Strike ability can help u hunt down retreating footmen. If you are using the Farseer (a good alternative for Turtle Rock and Twisted Meadows), having Chain Lightning may allow you to steal creeps or finish off weak footmen.

Tower rushes can be classified under four main categories:

Firelord tower rush at tier 1

The human will hire his Firelord and head straight for your base. You will have to choose between attacking the peasants, the Firelord or the lavaspawn. I would suggest weakening the spawn at the start. Having the spawn split into two will only make matters worse later on.
Then you might want to send the grunts to attack the peasants while your Blademaster chase after the Firelord (do not chase his Firelord too far out, just injure him sufficiently to scare him).
If the human sends too few militia to your base, you can easily take the peasants down when their Call To Arms duration expires. If he sends too many, he will have not enough lumber to upgrade his towers. This tower rush is not too difficult to defeat but may work well on 2 player maps like Secret Valley.

Tier 1 tower rush with Archmage at night

I enjoy using this tower rush the most. It guarantees you a free win vs orcs up till level 40+ on USWest. Many humans also choose to use this tactic if the orc spawns beside their expansion spot on Lost Temple, making it difficult to expand safely.
The human will creep to level 2 or even level 3 (on TM if he gets xp tome) and send about 7-8 militia to your base along with his footmen. He might research Defend as well to protect his footmen from Orc Burrows and Watch Towers.
Weaken his Archmage with your Blademaster and kill him if you have a boots of speed and he doesn't. Grunts should be attacking peasants – they deal extra damage to peasants (normal damage on medium armour). You can bring about 5 peons to fight as well. Peons have a slow movement speed.
Thus they should not target units but rather towers as towers are stationary compared to units. Footmen can easily run out of the peons' range and chasing after them with your peons is unwise.
Against a good player, you will rarely be able to stop the towers from being built. Therefore, you will need a Warmill. You should be able to get a Watch Tower up in your own base and this will enable you to prevent the advancement of the human's Guard Towers deeper into your base. Start building demolishers and rally them appropriately (I often lose demolishers unnecessarily when they take the wrong path and get shot down by a couple of Guard Towers).
If you have spare lumber, upgrade Spike Barricades as well as they will hurt the footmen attacking your buildings. Good human players will try to take down your Voodoo Lounge first to prevent you from healing. Then they will try to destroy your barracks to prevent you from building demolishers.
The human might try to send his footmen and Water Elementals into your base to destroy your demolishers so make sure you are able to repair your demolishers on time. You should try to keep your barracks up for as long as possible. Repair them with your peons until they are at red hp, then swap them for healthy ones mining gold.
If you manage to obtain 3 demolishers, you should be able to destroy the Guard Towers. You might want to use the Attack Ground command (G-key) to target the peasants repairing the towers.
Suitable choices for the 2nd hero include: Pitlord, Panda, Shadow Hunter. The Pitlord is good for casting Rain of Fire on towers clumped together. It is also good at killing the workers repairing them. The Panda is good if it is difficult to stand still to cast a channeling spell.
You can just cast your Breath of Fire and run back. The Shadow Hunter is good if there is an Arcane Tower, he is ranged and he does not have to go close to the Arcane Tower – They will burn up all the mana from a Pitlord casting Rain of Fire by the time he is done with the spell. If you think that you have no chance of fighting all the towers, you can always attack the human base instead.
If the human has no towers in his own base and does not seal up his base, you can easily enter and kill all the peasants. Try to hide some peons and build structures around the map. Your main goal should be to force the human to fight you outside the range of his towers. You should be able to crush him with your two heroes compared to his lone Archmage.

Archmage + Firelord tier 2 ivory tower rush with several footmen

Players such as Tod and Yellow like this rush quite a lot. The Spirit Lodge should be built before the Beastiary as Spirit Walkers are better suited to fighting footmen (with thier magic damage and Spirit Link). Do not play with 2 Sprit Lodges – It allows you to defeat any tier 2 tower rushes with ease but it is a horrible strat that will lose to Spellbreakers or Riflemen in late game fights. Peons should be used in fights as well.
If possible, use Hex to kill the enemy's Archmage and Firelord. Without the support of heroes and summons, the rest of your opponent's forces will crumble quickly. If the situation is not in your favour (heroes have Healing Potions or Invulnerability Potions), then you might want to pick the Serpent Ward skill instead and use the wards to attack the towers.
Archmage + Beastmaster / Mountain King tier 2 ivory tower rush with footmen and casters
Human players usually pick the Beastmaster against the Farseer and the Mountain King against the Blademaster. Spirit Link your units together and destroy Scout Towers that are almost upgraded into Guard Towers. Try to ensnare the sorceresses and kill them as they can cast slow which is an irritating spell.
Building your own Watch Tower to pre-empt a tower rush
If you have difficulties fighting tower rushes, I would recommend Grubby or Lyn's conservative style of building a Watch Tower in advance if you have problems countering such tower rushes. The difference between both players is that Grubby builds the warmill at tier 1 (on Twisted Meadows), allowing for an early construction of a Watch Tower while Lyn builds it later on such that it is completed at tier 2.
Having the extra Watch Tower can help prevent the advancement of Guard Towers into your base too as they have a range of 800 compared to the Guard Tower's range of 700. You should also go for a conservative style if you had lost 2 or more grunts before you hit tier 2. Remember to build your buildings further out, especially your barracks and burrows.
This will give you more space to build things deep inside your base – If your Barracks or Voodoo Lounge is destroyed. Leave a space between your barracks and your Great Hall. You might want to read Grubby's article on building placement. Your demolishers will also be less likely to get trapped between your buildings and get destroyed.

Most humans will either tower rush you or go for an expansion. This is because orc is stronger late game ,and the human will need some form of advantage over you. Get your Blademaster up to Level 3. After that you should head towards the human's base and kill the peasants building the Arcane Sanctums (if they are placed outside).

Intercepting the human before he starts building those towers

If you are confident of your army strength, you can fight the human before he reaches your base. The human will be unable to plant his Ivory Towers at your base and this may prevent you from dying to a tower rush.
On the other hand, this is the period of time where the militia duration is a long way from expiry, thus he will have a boost to his damage output. So only fight if you think you can win. You should also start scouting for expansion spots. If you happen to find one, build your own expansion unless you are fully confident of being able to destroy your opponent's expansion.

Follow your opponent's hero and try to steal some items. Your second hero should be levelling as quickly as possible to level 3.

Some late game tweaking

Add a warmill if you haven't done so for damage and armour upgrades. Training a kodo would also boost your army's damage with Command Aura. Some humans may retrain their Archmage's spells from Water Elemental to Blizzard. If that happens, remember to cast ensnare as quickly as possible.
Disenchant all summons and slow debuffs on yourself when the battle starts. Then begin casting Spirit Link on your Blademaster and a few other units. Picking a nice open area for a battle will certainly give your melee units a boost.

Tip: Fighting in an open area will be an advantage to the Orc player. Ensnare the casters first, and then start attacking them.

Try to flank the human's priests and sorceresses and ensnare them. Then start attacking them. They are much more fragile compared to Spell Breakers. Alternatively if your opponent's heroes are in a bad position (the Mountain King or Archmage runs too far in front), start throwing your nets on him every 1.5 seconds and focus on him. Check his inventory for items such as Invulnerability Potions, Health Potions and Town Portals. You could always hex his heroes before he is able to use the items. The exact timing to cast your hex should come with experience (probably at orange hp).
Towards the later portions of the game, you would have finished most of your buildings and upgrades. Thus, lumber is no longer as important as before and you can use your peons to fight in battles with you. Spirit Link your peons together with your other units. Alternatively, you might have build some demolishers and you can use your peons to repair them.

There are a few ways to play this. You can aim for a more aggressive style and try to finish the human off without an expansion if you start off well by killing many peasants or delaying the expansion. If not, you should opt for an expansion and play defensively.
It is absolutely necessary to exert map control and out-level the human as human tier 3 aerial units are the best in the game and orc has a natural weakness against heavy air units (those that deal magic damage). A good way to control the map is to train a single Witch Doctor before you get your two Spirit Walkers.
The Sentry Ward is a handy spell to have in your arsenal so do make full use of it. It also requires very little mana – 50 mana only. Since Humans tend to use the MK gryphon strat on smaller maps which are easier to expand and defend, it will be easy for you to contain your opponent in these small maps. Place your sentry wards at important parts of the map where your opponent has to pass through to creep or to invade you.

Do not be afraid to take the human on if he has nothing besides 2 heroes and 4 or less Gryphons – Spirit Link and Healing Wave should do the trick in helping to keep your units alive while you ensnare his units and pound on them.

The Wyvern Style

A major part of the mass wyvern strat is to exploit the lack of anti-air capabilities for the human at the start. Humans only have Water Elementals (not a problem if his first hero is the Mountain King), Troll Berserkers from the Mercenary camp, Riflemen (most people will not train them) and Guard Towers.
If you do realise that your opponent has a loophole in his defences at either one of his bases, build 2 Beastiaries instead of a single Beastiary and a Spirit Lodge and start pumping out those Wind Riders.
Scout towers have Light Armour and take 200% damage from Piercing damage. Thus it is very easy to destroy Scout Towers before they are fully upgraded. With the new patch 1.22 out, this would be even easier.
I think that the Panda is a suitable complement to the Blademaster for a fast push strat as he is a Tavern Hero (can be hired instantly) and his Breath of Fire is able to kill buildings and workers. If your opponent is using the Archmage, then target the Water Elementals – you won't want them attacking your Wind Riders as their Piercing attacks really hurt.

The Tower Rush Style

While the Wyvern style is used against players with a lack of towers, the Tower rush style should be used on a player who builds too many towers. Build a Warmill and continue creeping with your two heroes.
Then start training Raiders (you'll need to be able to trap your opponent's units near your towers to get kills) and Demolishers (to be able to damage your opponent's buildings with long range attacks).
The Shadow Hunter should pick Serpent Ward and Hex/Healing Wave as his skills. A human with too many towers would have a lumber deficit and he will be incapable of producing his own mortars so quickly. Thus if you are able to tower your opponnent quickly enough, you can probably win the battle before he manages to counter you.

The Raider Style

The raider style can be used if the opponent has a sufficient number of towers in both his bases, but does not have the right placing. With his Town Halls in vulnerable positions, you might be able to tear them down quickly.
Ensnare all his repairing peasants and Spirit Link all your units so that they have a greater longevity. The destruction of an expansion will slow down your opponent's gold and lumber supply by a lot and the destruction of the main Keep/Castle will almost guarantee you a victory. Lyn used a fast tech strategy on Sky and almost won. He managed to destroy the expansion once but lost the game due to his needless sacrifical of raiders to the Guard Towers.
I wouldn't recommend Lyn's fast tech strategy to be used on ladder though, because you will get towered by an Archmage or Firelord if your opponent is aware of your fast tech. Only use it if you are sure that your opponent will summon a Mountain King.

The Batrider Style

Getting an expansion of your own: There is no way you can hire 3 heroes, buy an Orb, and train sufficient batriders to win the fight if you do not have enough resources to. That is why completing your expansion is critical in winning.
Some orcs may prefer to tech to tier 3 first and expand with the Tiny Great Hall after. I've seen this being executed on Lost Temple by Fly and Zacard in the past. However, I think that increasing your income should take precedence. As mentioned previously, use the sentry wards to keep a look out for the MK and his footmen on suicide missions to delay you.

It would be a sin not to get the Orb of Lightning for the Blademaster. He is a killing machine. His high agility ensures that he does a hell lot of Critical Strikes and Purges with the Lightning Orb.
This will immobilise the Gryphons, preventing the human from using the Staff of Sanctuary on them. Pick the Level 3 Critical Strike at Level 5 – Many newer players are unaware of this.
Level 2 Windwalk is more than enough to gain map control with its 40 second duration and the 30 extra backstab damage from a Level 3 Windwalk will easily be offset by the more damaging Level 3 Critical Strike.
Which 3rd hero should I pick? In BWWI, we see Grubby using the Alchemist and Lyn using the Panda. Let's compare both of these heroes first. The Alchemist is clearly better at low levels while the Panda is better at high levels.

The Panda has a stronger ultimate, and his spells increase in strength proportionately. On the other hand, the Alchemist's Acid Bomb (-3 armour, -4 armour, -5 armour) and Chemical Rage (50% movement speed buff at all levels) has diminishing returns with every increase in level. The Alchemist has an air attack and Chemical Rage can further enhance his anti-air abilities.
My take on this is to pick the Alchemist if there are no creeps left and to pick the Panda if you can level him to level 2.5 or even level 3 before the major battle.

What if I don't pick a 3rd hero? I guess that would be fine, but in general, the only reason why you should not pick a third hero is if you want your other heroes to have higher levels. This is why you frequently see nightelves playing with two heroes only – they are hoping to get level 6 on their DH/Warden/Panda for their ultimates.

On the other hand, you see undead playing with three heroes pretty often – DK's animate dead is total crap and Lich's Death and Decay is only useful against a level 3 Mansory Castle (since it deals damage by %).

In this matchup, Bladestorm is useless against air units and having Mirror Image or a level 3 Windwalk doesn't contribute to your game in any significant manner. The Shadow Hunter's Big Bad Voodoo is also useless.
Serpent Wards deal piercing to air units. Should I use them to kill Gryphons? NO! Wards can be easily destroyed by anything and the Shadow Hunter's other two spells will be much more useful.

Optimising the use of Troll Batriders

Batriders should be used in large numbers. This is because of the 140 splash damage from Unstable Concortion. Before battles, batriders should always be flying behind the rest of the army.
This is to prevent your opponent from having a look at your batriders. If they have Dragonhawks, they will be able to target the bats with Aerial Shackle even before your bats fly close enough. You should activate a Scroll of Speed so that most of your bats are able to hit their targets before they are killed or shackled.
The remaining Gryphons should be ensnared and targetted by the rest of your army. You will want to use batriders in pairs or even in sets of 3 so keep any new bats nearby without revealing them to your opponent.

Tip: Keep your batriders behind your army. Remember to use your Scroll of Speed before sending your batriders to suicide.

If you use one bat at a time, your opponent might be able to holy light the Gryphon or staff it home. If your batriders are rallied to your heroes, they might be bolted by the Mountain King and killed by the Gryphons.

Maintain your advantage

Do not get complacent even if you have won the major battle. Humans are often able to rebuild their army rapidly and you should be on your toes for another attack. Train more bats, do not train grunts at all. Getting one or two raiders might help you to kill heroes.
You can even start training wyverns if you are sure that your opponent is only training Gryphons. This is because Wyverns can defeat Gryphon Riders due to its superior damage type (piercing vs magic) and the ability of orc hero spells such as Healing Wave, Drunken Haze and Acid Bomb to help in air-to-air combat.

Tip: Train wyverns if you are sure that your opponent is only training Gryphon Riders

Hope you have enjoyed this week's edition of the How to Play series.