Some thoughts on this topic: First round picks: 1. Riflemen actually scale better than archers (Unless you also roll hippos), because they don't have projectiles, so they never waste shots, while archer projectiles are slow, so they waste a ton of attacks if you make too many. Additionally, the higher DPH of rifles makes them dramatically better vs Mountain giants. Headhunters scale better than archers late game due to higher DPH and berserker upgrade, but their short range causes them to go into more risky positions. 2. Fiends are "bad" with Ghoul/Grunt/Footie but are arguably the best T1 ranged unit when paired with hunts, because bounces kill any webbed targets and fiends have higher HP, so you can actually front line them to absorb pierce damage from the other T1 ranged so hunts can close in if the enemy is massing T1 ranged in response to your hunts. You are also less reliant on your W unit when you have hunts, because hunts scale better as the game progresses than the other T1 frontline due to being ranged. Just don't make more than you need, because mass fiends is definitely bad. 3. Casters: Shaman > Dryad = Shee > Sorc - Shaman can both win you the front-line fight even if your front line is worse in T1 and has dispel. LS absolutely wrecks footies/ghouls, and they have the best scaling due to bloodlust in T3. 4. W unit is the lowest priority on the tier by far, so don't stress much about it. Overall best first picks: Grunt/Rifle/Shaman and Hunt/Fiend/Shaman. - these are the compositions that can stay competitive the longest when staying T1, and delaying T2 until you need it means more tempo on your opponent. Hunts scale better than grunts, but hunt frontline can allow the opponent to mass W unit. Dryads are only better than shees if you end up needing dispel to counter a summoner hero or necros. 2nd pick (healing/mass dispel casters, t2 flying anti-air, : 1. Overall best is probably Priest/Druid of the claw or Breaker/Statue. Talons are probably 2nd best in 3rd slot after statue. 2. If you have archers in T1, since W unit is the lowest priority of the selection there by far, Hippos are very good, but they are otherwise by far the worst unit in their slot. 3. Breakers are probably the best unit on the tier if you also have hunts, as they give you a solid front line option vs pierce damage. They're also a very viable alternative to other sources of dispel. 3rd pick (siege + utility): 1. IMO, Faerie dragon might actually be the best because of just how hard it counters casters. I've had too many games completely decided by faerie dragons annihilating one player to rate them below Kodo - Kodo Aura is neat and all, but it's less damage than 1 upgrade even in T3, and Kodos are just an okay unit in their own right. 2. Siege unit barely matters. You're looking at the utility units here. Glaives are the worst and demos/wagons are the best, but glaives with kodo or faerie dragon >>>>> wagons/demos + shade or dragon hawks. 4th pick (T3) 1. Priority is obviously destroyers if you have no other mass dispel. 2. MGs are by far the best front line unit, especially with their ability to screw with melee unit AI and split damage with taunt but they do get countered by Abom/Tauren/Knights (Knights being the most effective counter to MGs due to their 15% bonus damage, while being the weakest overall as a front line unit) 2. Tauren and knights are both worse than Aboms unless you rolled walkers, in which case Tauren can be very good. 3. I rate Siege engines about the same as bats/below Destor/Hippo riders in a general sense, since they give the enemy team a reason to build siege, and that can result in your fort dying if the enemy team gets a push going, though a lot of players won't build siege anyway, and fortified armor is very good vs everything else, especially pierce/magic, which armies tend to be heavier on late game. They also don't actually have that much HP, so while thy are a decent front line, their best role is really anti-air if an opponent goes for mass air. Vs normal damage, they're less efficient front line than any of the main frontline units in the selection (though they are better vs pierce/magic damage than Tauren/abom/knight). 4: 3rd slot is frankly the lowest priority. Chims/Wyrms are best Overall draft optimization: 1st pick: Hunt/Grunt >= Footie + Shaman >= Shee/Dryad - W unit is not really selected for, since frontline unit and caster primarily determine T1 tempo. 2nd pick: Dispel (Breaker/Priest/Walker) is first priority, followed by sustain/tempo stabilizing (eg: Statue and Necro can stall waves and are good at causing stacks - Talons can sort of do so with Cyclone when used near fort/tower at T3) and buffs/debuffs (Druids of either type - talons are also fantastic anti-air). 3rd pick: Faerie dragons or Kodos. If you don't get those, probably take dragon hawk over shade - at least it gives solid anti-air. 4th pick: Destro if no earlier mass dispel > Mountain Giant >= Tauren if you have walkers > Tanks if you really need anti-air and are especially vulnerable to pierce damage late game due to starting hunts and not rolling bears/breakers/raiders for alternative front line > anything not Wyverns. Aboms are better than Knights/taurens. Anti-air is low draft priority, since W/basic ranged unit and hero is generally serviceable, but it is definitely something to consider, especially if you rolled fiends or raiders but not hunts.
i can only say i disagree with most you said here if you have a good winrate with it go for it their are more then 1 playstyle which can work out in my recent games i have with my strat & thoughts as pointed out a 80% Winrate atm
@@PicaPinguin Eh, most of what I said wasn't really any different from what's in the video, aside from the mention of fiends/raiders having utility specifically with hunts, rather than saying "never pick" - they do have niche use cases, and you might be stuck with them in some drafts, since you're drafting Q and E units at higher priority. Only thing that's notably different is rating banshees a bit higher, siege engine lower, and Faerie dragons higher because they can outright win a game if the opponent(s) go too many casters (If opponent has basically no casters, you might not go for any faeries, but that's rare.), whereas Kodo is just nice to have for the 5/10% damage aura and is always worth building 1-2 of.
Siege engines also resist aoe spells such as clap which is relevant. They don't spawn corpses, which can be relevant too. Last addition: when you pick the second bracket, make a unit that counters the weaknesses of your first bracket. So e.g. if you got a bad matchup against grunts + dispel, walkers are great. Or usually I don't like raiders, but with hunts they can be decent also due to armor type
I think Ghouls is arguably the second or third best honestly. If youre in position 1 you can get 5 ghouls which is enough to fight off any other combination of tier 1 units, they do get outscaled but theyre very cheap and can be sold for more of the tier 3 or tier 2 units later on. That and frenzy makes them do crazy damage if they plan to ignore ghouls for some reason
hey man, selling a lot of units is very wasteful well how can the enemy ignore your frontline - wont happen if u like them go play em i do agree that they are probaly not the worste but also not great - very wacky cause they depend a lot on enemy unit comp
No, ghouls are really bad because they suffer terribly from AOE hitting a bunch of them at a time. You want your front line to hold the line so your glass cannons can do the damage, but ghouls just melt. A Chain Lightning or Carrion Swarm just annihilates them. Tauren with Pulverize destroy them. They're also harder to buff. It takes less time and mana to BL+Frenzy 5 hunts or grunts than 10 ghouls.
@@kuchikirukia2464 well ghouls ARE the glass cannon units just in melee form. also notice how these are all mid-late game units yes? by then you will probably be transitioning away from ghouls into more durable units. footmen and grunts will probably scale better into late-mid game but ghouls are king of the early game
Hi ! Thank you for this video !! I found it very useful even if i dont agree with everything. Is there a link to the AMAZING unit data sheet you are presenting here (which is really well done btw) ? Or, if you are the creator, would you agree to send it to me ? :) Also, i noticed units are sorted by Hotkey (Q for melee, W for range etc.), so what hotkeys are you using ? (by default, or by grid maybe?) Cause my hotkeys seems random, i always have to check the hotkey of my units every game (i'm on AZERTY). Anyway, keep up the good work !! See you in game Take care
ok that was not so good of a video , hunteress as front line is the weakest coz is the easiest to be countered by tier 1 units , and u dont want to give ur oppenent the oportunity to spam their range pierce unit coz they are the best in late game , ghouls may not be strong but they are so cheep and attack so fast that opens a lot of doors their main weakness thow is hero aoe spells , dryats are the best early but shamans are the best at tier 3 u have to balance what u need coz if ur tier 3 is late dryats will be better for longer , as talking for siege units has literaly no point coz they are offered with an other unit so u should always kodo then fearie dragons the rest is so mid u should not care! then in 2nd wave of units u should prio always statue coz enables stacks , but the only spamable units are necros that can be game winning or easily countered , gargs are super good and spamable one of the best anti air but they can be countered ez but they enable the fastest wins , and spell breakers are spamable too but u need to have front line coz they die super ez to front line units , u should always try to walker or priest for dispells , and roar is good but really ez to be dispelled, talons are fine rest is meh
No hate on the vid, I actually like that you're making content about direct strike but... I hope noobs don't copy this by heart as near every unit has pros and cons. Like Fiends for example are actually heavily underrated as they can function as early game frontline as well as shutting down all air later + really decent pierce. Overall great vid tho!
@PicaPinguin I agree, but you say you don't like banshees but talons are decent because of faery fire. Maybe it's because you consider the alternatives of banshee to be better than the alternatives of talons?
@@somebody-anonymous i said banshee are decent and i dont like talons yes shaman and dryad are better then banshee so u only pick banshee to not pick sorceres and yes everything is better then talons. you dont pick to get talons. if you get them with the good units its fine. But u dont want them especially.
Huntresses need to be buffed, an extra ability needs to be added to shades, hippogryph riders need to be cheaper, bat riders need splash damage increased, demolishers need attack priority fixed and Glaive throwers need to be cheaper/buffed.
I said some high mmr player like hunts a lot i think you should pick for footmen or grunts and see if you get better wins in with them i agree that hunts are very weak vs T1 pierce
i cant dominate lobby because of new players who rush 4 mines or greedy players who rely on others also go 4 mines and dont give a f about tower and winning game just to be possibly stronger in late game what never happens cuz we die after 20 minute mark so their mines didnt payed off for themselfes it pisses me off because there is nothing i can do it about trying play the game sitting on tier 1-2 while try to carry these idiots but always lose, if your teammate or two goes 3-4 mines you always lose unless your oponents do the same
hey man, i feel you its similar to me in a lot of games only thing we can do is stay positive. play our best and w8 fpr the "real" player to go online :D atm their are a lot of new player around and thats why a lot of player are just not yet used to the strategys will get better soon sure when they learn basics
Wrong on a lot of fronts. Banshees are top tier, huntresses get countered like some of the other comments said. If you're new I wouldn't follow this. Gl hf
@@kaineskeptic6484 Possession? well in good lobbys posession is very very hard to get of to an good unit. they will just place inbetween T3 frontline some T1 frontline and then u posses T1 units and lose u need toggle posession in perfect timing or its useless on Top u cant possess MG´s or Siege Tanks + all summon comps are recking posession cause they spam out small units i dont think that AMS is very useful and curse is also not great imo (you get only a chance on miss so RNG)
@@PicaPinguin every unit has a counter, including the top tier. Banshees are 140g if memory serves, pretty cheap considering it takes 1 to 1 unit off the field. Also, as you pointed out, possession can be turned off, so if you are up against an army with bait, wait till it is dead.
@@kaineskeptic6484 i like the discussion wiht you :D i still disagree a bit banshee Curse: 33% chance to miss attack which means its pure RNG if you get value or not. I dont like play around heavy RNG Possession: yes you can toggle it off - the real question is then are your banshees still alive when the small frontliner are dead? or did they get sniped out alrdy from e.g. Chims. So imo it is hard to put them to value. I can agree with you in 1 Point thou. If you get off good possessions its a real game changer!
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Some thoughts on this topic:
First round picks:
1. Riflemen actually scale better than archers (Unless you also roll hippos), because they don't have projectiles, so they never waste shots, while archer projectiles are slow, so they waste a ton of attacks if you make too many. Additionally, the higher DPH of rifles makes them dramatically better vs Mountain giants. Headhunters scale better than archers late game due to higher DPH and berserker upgrade, but their short range causes them to go into more risky positions.
2. Fiends are "bad" with Ghoul/Grunt/Footie but are arguably the best T1 ranged unit when paired with hunts, because bounces kill any webbed targets and fiends have higher HP, so you can actually front line them to absorb pierce damage from the other T1 ranged so hunts can close in if the enemy is massing T1 ranged in response to your hunts. You are also less reliant on your W unit when you have hunts, because hunts scale better as the game progresses than the other T1 frontline due to being ranged. Just don't make more than you need, because mass fiends is definitely bad.
3. Casters: Shaman > Dryad = Shee > Sorc - Shaman can both win you the front-line fight even if your front line is worse in T1 and has dispel. LS absolutely wrecks footies/ghouls, and they have the best scaling due to bloodlust in T3.
4. W unit is the lowest priority on the tier by far, so don't stress much about it.
Overall best first picks: Grunt/Rifle/Shaman and Hunt/Fiend/Shaman. - these are the compositions that can stay competitive the longest when staying T1, and delaying T2 until you need it means more tempo on your opponent. Hunts scale better than grunts, but hunt frontline can allow the opponent to mass W unit.
Dryads are only better than shees if you end up needing dispel to counter a summoner hero or necros.
2nd pick (healing/mass dispel casters, t2 flying anti-air, :
1. Overall best is probably Priest/Druid of the claw or Breaker/Statue. Talons are probably 2nd best in 3rd slot after statue.
2. If you have archers in T1, since W unit is the lowest priority of the selection there by far, Hippos are very good, but they are otherwise by far the worst unit in their slot.
3. Breakers are probably the best unit on the tier if you also have hunts, as they give you a solid front line option vs pierce damage. They're also a very viable alternative to other sources of dispel.
3rd pick (siege + utility):
1. IMO, Faerie dragon might actually be the best because of just how hard it counters casters. I've had too many games completely decided by faerie dragons annihilating one player to rate them below Kodo - Kodo Aura is neat and all, but it's less damage than 1 upgrade even in T3, and Kodos are just an okay unit in their own right.
2. Siege unit barely matters. You're looking at the utility units here. Glaives are the worst and demos/wagons are the best, but glaives with kodo or faerie dragon >>>>> wagons/demos + shade or dragon hawks.
4th pick (T3)
1. Priority is obviously destroyers if you have no other mass dispel.
2. MGs are by far the best front line unit, especially with their ability to screw with melee unit AI and split damage with taunt but they do get countered by Abom/Tauren/Knights (Knights being the most effective counter to MGs due to their 15% bonus damage, while being the weakest overall as a front line unit)
2. Tauren and knights are both worse than Aboms unless you rolled walkers, in which case Tauren can be very good.
3. I rate Siege engines about the same as bats/below Destor/Hippo riders in a general sense, since they give the enemy team a reason to build siege, and that can result in your fort dying if the enemy team gets a push going, though a lot of players won't build siege anyway, and fortified armor is very good vs everything else, especially pierce/magic, which armies tend to be heavier on late game. They also don't actually have that much HP, so while thy are a decent front line, their best role is really anti-air if an opponent goes for mass air. Vs normal damage, they're less efficient front line than any of the main frontline units in the selection (though they are better vs pierce/magic damage than Tauren/abom/knight).
4: 3rd slot is frankly the lowest priority. Chims/Wyrms are best
Overall draft optimization:
1st pick: Hunt/Grunt >= Footie + Shaman >= Shee/Dryad - W unit is not really selected for, since frontline unit and caster primarily determine T1 tempo.
2nd pick: Dispel (Breaker/Priest/Walker) is first priority, followed by sustain/tempo stabilizing (eg: Statue and Necro can stall waves and are good at causing stacks - Talons can sort of do so with Cyclone when used near fort/tower at T3) and buffs/debuffs (Druids of either type - talons are also fantastic anti-air).
3rd pick: Faerie dragons or Kodos. If you don't get those, probably take dragon hawk over shade - at least it gives solid anti-air.
4th pick: Destro if no earlier mass dispel > Mountain Giant >= Tauren if you have walkers > Tanks if you really need anti-air and are especially vulnerable to pierce damage late game due to starting hunts and not rolling bears/breakers/raiders for alternative front line > anything not Wyverns. Aboms are better than Knights/taurens.
Anti-air is low draft priority, since W/basic ranged unit and hero is generally serviceable, but it is definitely something to consider, especially if you rolled fiends or raiders but not hunts.
i can only say i disagree with most you said here
if you have a good winrate with it go for it
their are more then 1 playstyle which can work out
in my recent games i have with my strat & thoughts as pointed out a 80% Winrate atm
@@PicaPinguin Eh, most of what I said wasn't really any different from what's in the video, aside from the mention of fiends/raiders having utility specifically with hunts, rather than saying "never pick" - they do have niche use cases, and you might be stuck with them in some drafts, since you're drafting Q and E units at higher priority.
Only thing that's notably different is rating banshees a bit higher, siege engine lower, and Faerie dragons higher because they can outright win a game if the opponent(s) go too many casters (If opponent has basically no casters, you might not go for any faeries, but that's rare.), whereas Kodo is just nice to have for the 5/10% damage aura and is always worth building 1-2 of.
@@Matt-ln7lb sry if i misudnerstood you and nice that we kinda agree in most points ^^
Interesting thank you
Siege engines also resist aoe spells such as clap which is relevant. They don't spawn corpses, which can be relevant too.
Last addition: when you pick the second bracket, make a unit that counters the weaknesses of your first bracket. So e.g. if you got a bad matchup against grunts + dispel, walkers are great. Or usually I don't like raiders, but with hunts they can be decent also due to armor type
I think Ghouls is arguably the second or third best honestly. If youre in position 1 you can get 5 ghouls which is enough to fight off any other combination of tier 1 units, they do get outscaled but theyre very cheap and can be sold for more of the tier 3 or tier 2 units later on. That and frenzy makes them do crazy damage if they plan to ignore ghouls for some reason
oh and Banshee ghoul is a top tier combo to deal with enemy hero casters or dps casters in general
hey man,
selling a lot of units is very wasteful
well how can the enemy ignore your frontline - wont happen
if u like them go play em
i do agree that they are probaly not the worste but also not great - very wacky cause they depend a lot on enemy unit comp
No, ghouls are really bad because they suffer terribly from AOE hitting a bunch of them at a time. You want your front line to hold the line so your glass cannons can do the damage, but ghouls just melt. A Chain Lightning or Carrion Swarm just annihilates them. Tauren with Pulverize destroy them. They're also harder to buff. It takes less time and mana to BL+Frenzy 5 hunts or grunts than 10 ghouls.
@@kuchikirukia2464 well ghouls ARE the glass cannon units just in melee form. also notice how these are all mid-late game units yes? by then you will probably be transitioning away from ghouls into more durable units. footmen and grunts will probably scale better into late-mid game but ghouls are king of the early game
@@PicaPinguin fair enough, i wouldnt use them as sturdy frontline but more of a dps
Hi ! Thank you for this video !! I found it very useful even if i dont agree with everything.
Is there a link to the AMAZING unit data sheet you are presenting here (which is really well done btw) ? Or, if you are the creator, would you agree to send it to me ? :)
Also, i noticed units are sorted by Hotkey (Q for melee, W for range etc.), so what hotkeys are you using ? (by default, or by grid maybe?)
Cause my hotkeys seems random, i always have to check the hotkey of my units every game (i'm on AZERTY).
Anyway, keep up the good work !! See you in game
Take care
hey man, youre welcome
@@PicaPinguin Thank you !! I'll see that. No i play on w3c, but i didn't activate grid option.
@@bakedbeans2213 enjoy the sheet & have a nice weekend soon.
grid option is quiet useful to position units imo
ok that was not so good of a video , hunteress as front line is the weakest coz is the easiest to be countered by tier 1 units , and u dont want to give ur oppenent the oportunity to spam their range pierce unit coz they are the best in late game , ghouls may not be strong but they are so cheep and attack so fast that opens a lot of doors their main weakness thow is hero aoe spells , dryats are the best early but shamans are the best at tier 3 u have to balance what u need coz if ur tier 3 is late dryats will be better for longer , as talking for siege units has literaly no point coz they are offered with an other unit so u should always kodo then fearie dragons the rest is so mid u should not care! then in 2nd wave of units u should prio always statue coz enables stacks , but the only spamable units are necros that can be game winning or easily countered , gargs are super good and spamable one of the best anti air but they can be countered ez but they enable the fastest wins , and spell breakers are spamable too but u need to have front line coz they die super ez to front line units , u should always try to walker or priest for dispells , and roar is good but really ez to be dispelled, talons are fine rest is meh
No hate on the vid, I actually like that you're making content about direct strike but... I hope noobs don't copy this by heart as near every unit has pros and cons. Like Fiends for example are actually heavily underrated as they can function as early game frontline as well as shutting down all air later + really decent pierce. Overall great vid tho!
hey man, i do appreciate your honest feedback
thanks for the video, new to direct strike
hope it is giving you a decent start :D
Why would you consider faery fire to be better than curse?
Faery Fire is not that good cause u dont want talons on T2
T1 Banshee is decent which makes Curse a lot better then Faery Fire
@PicaPinguin I agree, but you say you don't like banshees but talons are decent because of faery fire. Maybe it's because you consider the alternatives of banshee to be better than the alternatives of talons?
@@somebody-anonymous i said banshee are decent and i dont like talons
yes shaman and dryad are better then banshee so u only pick banshee to not pick sorceres
and yes everything is better then talons. you dont pick to get talons. if you get them with the good units its fine. But u dont want them especially.
Great video, to the point, thanks!
thx man, enjoy Direct Strike
Huntresses need to be buffed, an extra ability needs to be added to shades, hippogryph riders need to be cheaper, bat riders need splash damage increased, demolishers need attack priority fixed and Glaive throwers need to be cheaper/buffed.
you can post suggestions on discord
Thank you for the video!
youre welcome, glad you enjoyed it
I notice that the cooler they look the better picks they are haha
must be a sign :D
Cool video❤
thx man, very appreciated
Why is Huntress the best t1? Every time I go huntress they just build t1 pierce behind t1 frontline and i never come back.
Happens to me too
I said some high mmr player like hunts a lot
i think you should pick for footmen or grunts
and see if you get better wins in with them
i agree that hunts are very weak vs T1 pierce
Once you start getting T3 front line units, hunts can be moved back behind them and they still reach the enemy front line as an attacker.
@@kaineskeptic6484 if u lose early game hard cause pierced reckt your hunts the game is over - doesnt matter where u place em then 10 minutes later
@@PicaPinguin If you're losing the early game despite hunts and your own pierce then you likely werent going to win the late game anyway.
❤
i cant dominate lobby because of new players who rush 4 mines or greedy players who rely on others also go 4 mines and dont give a f about tower and winning game just to be possibly stronger in late game what never happens cuz we die after 20 minute mark so their mines didnt payed off for themselfes it pisses me off because there is nothing i can do it about trying play the game sitting on tier 1-2 while try to carry these idiots but always lose, if your teammate or two goes 3-4 mines you always lose unless your oponents do the same
hey man, i feel you
its similar to me in a lot of games
only thing we can do is stay positive. play our best and w8 fpr the "real" player to go online :D
atm their are a lot of new player around and thats why a lot of player are just not yet used to the strategys
will get better soon sure when they learn basics
@kinderbueno223 what you can do is still team up with friends and play together with them on 1 team
Wrong on a lot of fronts. Banshees are top tier, huntresses get countered like some of the other comments said. If you're new I wouldn't follow this. Gl hf
hey man,
i love to learn: So why are Banshee that good?
well their is a counter to every unit in the game. But that doesnt mean u pick nothing.
@@PicaPinguin Possession my man, basically you turn their front line into your front line. Plus AMS & Curse.
@@kaineskeptic6484 Possession?
well in good lobbys posession is very very hard to get of to an good unit.
they will just place inbetween T3 frontline some T1 frontline and then u posses T1 units and lose
u need toggle posession in perfect timing or its useless
on Top u cant possess MG´s or Siege Tanks + all summon comps are recking posession cause they spam out small units
i dont think that AMS is very useful and curse is also not great imo (you get only a chance on miss so RNG)
@@PicaPinguin every unit has a counter, including the top tier.
Banshees are 140g if memory serves, pretty cheap considering it takes 1 to 1 unit off the field.
Also, as you pointed out, possession can be turned off, so if you are up against an army with bait, wait till it is dead.
@@kaineskeptic6484 i like the discussion wiht you :D
i still disagree a bit
banshee Curse: 33% chance to miss attack which means its pure RNG if you get value or not. I dont like play around heavy RNG
Possession: yes you can toggle it off - the real question is then are your banshees still alive when the small frontliner are dead? or did they get sniped out alrdy from e.g. Chims.
So imo it is hard to put them to value.
I can agree with you in 1 Point thou. If you get off good possessions its a real game changer!