How to play Rebels

Share and discuss strategies for playing the game, and get help and tips from other players.

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F8 Binds...
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Post by F8 Binds... »

nebula955 wrote:Trees....they can counter all but the axemen which are countered well by mages/archers, even then doing heavy retal. Shaman tends to die too easily to ulfs for simply 4 hp healing... way too easily ulfed.
A knalgan player can counter woses quite easily. Not only the fighters come into play. Gryphons are good at weakening woses outside of forest, perhaps even inside forest. 12-2 will likely give you both hits due to the wose's low defense. Though you take a hefty counter, I suggest you don't attack woses, atleast with gryphons, during the day. Fighters are also good at weakening them from hills and mountains. Ulfserkers with full hp do equal damage (or more) to woses, and if weakened, are likely to kill them.
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Post by nebula955 »

all that is true....at night........ Inside forest the gryphon has almost same defense as the wose while suffering this 19-2 in daylight, 16-2 at dusk, and equal damage even at night with far fewer hp. Ulfs do equal damage to wose....at night...with far less hp and probably not more defense, and while in day they suffer this 13-2ish attack that probably kills the ulf. Fighters do do well against trees but also suffer retal and at least 2-3 is needed to kill a wose without causing other units to die later

Tree is necessary for rebels to ATTACK dwarves, especially thunderers and it counters other annoying units also. And if the wose "easily countered" by the mentioned strategy then so is every unit in the game by every faction. e.g. "knalgans can easily counter ghosts by shooting it with 4 thunderers", "drakes can counter spearmen by burning it with 3 burners in daylight"
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Post by F8 Binds... »

nebula955 wrote:all that is true....at night........ Inside forest the gryphon has almost same defense as the wose while suffering this 19-2 in daylight, 16-2 at dusk, and equal damage even at night with far fewer hp. Ulfs do equal damage to wose....at night...with far less hp and probably not more defense, and while in day they suffer this 13-2ish attack that probably kills the ulf. Fighters do do well against trees but also suffer retal and at least 2-3 is needed to kill a wose without causing other units to die later

Tree is necessary for rebels to ATTACK dwarves, especially thunderers and it counters other annoying units also. And if the wose "easily countered" by the mentioned strategy then so is every unit in the game by every faction. e.g. "knalgans can easily counter ghosts by shooting it with 4 thunderers", "drakes can counter spearmen by burning it with 3 burners in daylight"
First of all, don't attack elves in their favored terrain, if you can manage it. Preferably counter the wose when it attacks you from grassland, where it has 20% defense. Second of all, don't attack the wose in it's best ToD if you can avoid it. (Which you can, considering it is slower across hills and mountains and only has 4MP.) If the wose were to attack you during day, the worst terrain you'd likely be standing on is hills, or a grass village. You'd only likely take one hit from the wose. 13 damage is not that significant. a thunderer would do likely 12 damage back, a fighter 14 damage, possibly 21 damage back. Guardsmen don't do as much back, but they do take a whole lot less damage in the first place. Granted, the ulfserker has all around better defense than the wose other than in forest. Not much... but it does. The more important fact is that in two rounds of combat a wose and ulf are likely to do the same amount of damage to one another, granted you are playing smart and attacking at night. You seem to ignore the fact that a ulfserker is a utility unit- it is not meant to attack any full hp melee fighter, but rather weakened units or just plain weak units. Like mages, perhaps archers not entrenched in 60% defense or higher... That 12 hp Spearman... etc. Granted you've weakened the wose, the wose will die. Gryphons are the perfect killing instruments for woses. 24 damage in one attack (not strike) is nothing to be shy about. And after you've killed the wose, you can fill in with units to protect it. Elusivefoots are great for this purpose.

Please do note that all units do have a counter for every faction. Although this may be a little black and white, the fact is that this is the knalgan counter for the wose. Don't nitpick at my wording of it. For me, it isn't that hard. Heck, if you want to try to prove your point further, I suggest you try seeing me on the MP server.

I did forget one unit that is great against the wose- the thief. Backstabbing in group with a gryphon at night is very easy to accomplish. A theif will do 10-3 during it's favored ToD against a wose, even if it is in forest.

Again, I suggest you see me on the MP server. Set up a reasonable time for myself, and I'll do my best to show up.
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Post by Elvish_Pillager »

Gryphon Riders cost more than Woses and are weak to Woses' damage type. While they may be effective, they are costly and somewhat risky - even at night, a Gryphon can die to three Wose hits. I definitely wouldn't recommend them as "the counter" to woses.

Dwarf Fighters cost 4 gold less than Woses instead of 4 more, and they resist Impact at 20% instead of being 20% weak to Impact. They also have more hitpoints than Gryphons and better defense on hills and mountains.
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Post by F8 Binds... »

Basically, gryphons are glass daggers when attacking woses. Quite useful in the longshot, really. Get your gryphon in, get those hits in. Attack with your fighters and theives... finish with an ulf if necessary. No, having more than one gryphon for the sole purpose of attacking woses is quite idiodic. I agree there.
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Post by Tom of wesnoth »

I mostly get elvish scouts to get a distance then send fighters and archers to help them,with my shamen nearby is send injured units to them for healing.For advancements I mix it up a bit I prefer Rangers and Captains,Sorceresses 98% chance.
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Post by eyerouge »

There are no links in the original post that lead to Rebels vs X - is that because it hasn't been written?
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Post by singalen »

JW, I copied your first post to wiki and added a piece of text on myself.
Hope it's not too wrong, as I rarely play against humans.
http://www.wesnoth.org/wiki/How_to_play_Rebels
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Post by JW »

eyerouge wrote:There are no links in the original post that lead to Rebels vs X - is that because it hasn't been written?
Indeed. Anything that isn't currently linked is yet unwritten, and will probably go unwritten until 1.4 is released.
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Post by Jetrel »

One of the tricks with the rebels vs. knalgans is to -really- use the shamans to their full potential. It comes in two forms; first, shamans in forest are surprisingly durable; they have the defense and hitpoints of a thief, but lack the weakness to physical weapons. That, -and- they have retaliatory slowing on ranged (and can slow some of the worse melee attackers). Especially shamans in pairs, or even better - shamans backed up by a druid, can nearly stop a small group of melee dwarves from progressing into forest.

Shamans allow you to do one game-changing thing, which is that you can slow a dangerous melee unit, and then attack said melee unit with your fighters. Normally, attacking a dwarven fighter on grass, with your elven fighter, would be a "fair fight", and thus would be very stupid for you to engage in - the general trick to winning a game like wesnoth is to engage your units in combat only when you can arrange a fight that -isn't- fair. Usually it's terrain, or being outnumbered that does this, but shamans allow you to, for the space of one turn, make a normally fair fight suddenly very unfair in your favor. It allows you to do this where other factions cannot manage this, such as on open ground.

With shamans, you want to slow as many units as you can; but chiefly you'll want to find whichever "dangerous unit" is the most accessible for you to assign units to attack, and so long as you can keep most of the enemy from retaliating (say, if you slow their three hardest melee hitters), slow him, and then break rank with whatever you can attack the thing with. You'll end the turn with a few lightly scratched fighters (missing maybe 4-8 hp each), and your enemy will either have a nearly or completely dead fighter/gryphon. And conveniently, if those fighters ended their combat next to shamans, you will quickly recoup said "scratches". Woses are also very useful for these kinds of tactics - you can slow their victim, and whatever damage they receive will likely be 8hp or below. A corollary to this is that if you ever have the chance, slow an ulf, and immediately eliminate him with a fighter/wose - it's nearly a free kill.

As usual, if at all possible, get a druid, and get a captain. These level-2 abilities really enhance the elves' capability; the captain, for example, generally negates the effect of the dwarves' armor. The druid's a bit mean when applied to units with 60-70% defense (it's like turning all forest tiles into villages). These kinds of level-2 abilities are something the dwarves don't have access to, so use them to your advantage whenever possible. After you get one captain and one druid, you'll generally want to make any other level-ups into heroes and sorceresses, to give you a bit more firepower (and in the case of the former, something that can actually tank decently for the elves).
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Post by singalen »

Jetryl, I'll copy your piece to wiki.
My own piece on wiki is:

added to General:

If you happen to use Elvish Captain as a leader (or to level up a Fighter), take the advantage of his Leadership. He's one of the fastest leaders, so on small maps can get to fighting line in 2 turns. Not that amazing himself, his Leadership gives nearby units +25% bonus. That's an advantage you use day-night cycle for, that's the difference between retreat and attack. When properly positioned, he can boost 3 or even 4 units a turn. Of course, this works best combined with other advantages like time of day or good unit unit matchup. Mages and Woses under his banner tear Undead in halfs.

There's always need for a trick. Shamans do three good things:

* +4 healing is never bad (though they rarely level up to give you +8 );
* slow enemy units, which halves their movement and damage for a turn. The more powerful or quick your enemy is, the more useful the ability becomes;
* they have 70% defense in Forests, so, when in bad need, can stop non-magical enemies with own ZoC.

Rebels vs Undead:

Your lot of Piercing damage is useless against their units dealing most damage - Skeletons. So no point in fighting Skeletons with Elves. Your weapon are Woses and Mages. Opponent has no hard counter, but their "weak" units still do good: Skeletons for your Mages, Dark Adepts and Ghouls for Woses. Remember that Ghoul's poison stops Wose from regenerating for a turn. That's 8 damage in addition to its 3.

As always, you need a couple of Scouts to capture villages. Don't get with them into fight: if one lures two opponent's units from your main force, it's fine.

Shaman is always good for her healing and slowing, and does Impact damage.

Keep your Woses high on HP. Wose is slow - 4 base movement - so it takes ages to deliver him to fighting lines, more then delivering a Mage. Count as if you get a Wose 2 turns later. Still, it's your main strike force again most of Undead.

Another Undead's option is Walking Corpses. They do good damage for the money, have no upkeep and sometimes can 'recruit' your people. There's no clear counter except Archers, but archers are weak in this matchup. Just watch for your unit hit points and retreat timely.

So start with 2 Woses, 1-2 Scouts, Mage, Shaman and someone of your choice: Mage, Fighter or Merman.
Last edited by singalen on December 21st, 2007, 11:25 am, edited 1 time in total.
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Post by bert1 »

Jetryl wrote: Especially shamans in pairs, or even better - shamans backed up by a druid, can nearly stop a small group of melee dwarves from progressing into forest.
Which MP map were you thinking of in which this situation is likely to occur?
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Post by Doc Paterson »

bert1 wrote:
Jetryl wrote: Especially shamans in pairs, or even better - shamans backed up by a druid, can nearly stop a small group of melee dwarves from progressing into forest.
Which MP map were you thinking of in which this situation is likely to occur?
I'd guess he's talking about campaigns, or AOH or something; probably not default MP.

In default, you don't have clumps of forest that would accomodate a "team" of multiple shamans and a druid. You practically never see 3+ shamans on a given front (considering that many 1v1s require management of eastern, western and to lesser extents central fronts). If this was the case, you'd either be talking about a 30+ turn game, or a situation in which the shamans would have inadequate support (there wouldn't be enough gold for shield units without crippling your other fronts) and would be quickly killed or bypassed entirely.
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Post by singalen »

Doc Paterson wrote:In default, you don't have clumps of forest that would accomodate a "team" of multiple shamans and a druid. You practically never see 3+ shamans on a given front
I'm thinking about initial setup like: Scout + 3 Shamans + 2xFighter + Archer = 18 + 45 + 28 + 17 = 108, that's more then standard 100.
One can drop last Scout if he's a fan of 3 Druids. Though I wouldn't do it: we'll lose economy to Klanagans' quick Griffons. OK, opponent can be not recruiting Griffons, but why?
Though 2 shamans still seem reasonable.

On Blitz map there's only 2 flanks and you can afford not to defend one of them, just to let enemy in and attack back with leader and a unit recruited after 3-5 turns.
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Post by Doc Paterson »

singalen wrote:
Doc Paterson wrote:In default, you don't have clumps of forest that would accomodate a "team" of multiple shamans and a druid. You practically never see 3+ shamans on a given front
I'm thinking about initial setup like: Scout + 3 Shamans + 2xFighter + Archer = 18 + 45 + 28 + 17 = 108, that's more then standard 100.
One can drop last Scout if he's a fan of 3 Druids. Though I wouldn't do it: we'll lose economy to Klanagans' quick Griffons. OK, opponent can be not recruiting Griffons, but why?
Though 2 shamans still seem reasonable.

On Blitz map there's only 2 flanks and you can afford not to defend one of them, just to let enemy in and attack back with leader and a unit recruited after 3-5 turns.
Sounds like a great way to lose, very, very quickly.
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