This thread are for people who really really struggles in Stick Empires and are unaware of the basic things they need to know in order to win. I was once that person. I always kept losing because I never done something I was suppose to do at the beginning. Buying Miners.

Let's start at the very very beginning of the match.

Like everyone, you start off with 2 miners. Miners are very essential, if you don't have enough, you gain a bad economy, and bad economy = terrible army. If you have too much, it'll hurt you in the middle of the match. You need to have the right amount.

Step 1. Assign your 2 miners to mine gold. It is not recommended to make them pray to the statue first.
Step 2. Buy another miner, and then make him pray to the statue instead.
Step 3: For every 3rd miner you buy, put him on praying duty. For example: Buy 2 miners and make him mine gold. The next miner you buy should be praying.
Step 4: Keep doing this until 8 Miners are assigned on gold, and 4 miners are assigned on praying duty. You don't need 4 miners to pray, but if you want to make a good army, you need as much Mana as possible.
Step 5: That's it! That is all you need to know on how many miners you need throughout the whole match. But wait! I never mentioned about building an army, did I? I will explain that in the next spoiler tag underneath this one.

This is the result:

Oh boy, this is the most crucial part throughout the game. You may make some mistakes and still win, but I want to teach you the most secure way to win!

Every time you start a match, I want you to follow this method: Buy 2 Miners and 1 Swordwrath.

Step 1: In the early beginning of the match, you must buy a Swordwrath. Swordwraths are not only cheap, they deal good damage to your opponent. They also offer good protection for your Miners.
Step 2: You may notice that you're wasting time waiting to buy Miners. This is a good time to buy a Swordwrath.

Keep repeating this until you could afford a Spearton.
*Remember, save money by buying only 1 unit at a time. Do not buy 2 of something at the same time because you could have been spending that gold elsewhere*
Step 3: Observe your opponent through the dark fog. The most simplest way to tell what he is doing is by looking what's above his castle. There's 2 possibilities:
Scenario 1: He has a Castle Archer!

Usually, these people usually likes to defend their castle all the times. Their strategy is to build a stronger army to beat you at the end. Do not let that happen!
Scenario 2: There's no Castle Archer!
These people are more common. They usually buy units such as Swordwraths and Miners first. Just like us!
Step 4: Knowing your opponent is half the battle.
How to counter Scenario 1: Stop your mass production of Swordwraths. They are very vulnerable against Castle Archers. Buy a Spearton.

These guys are the tough guys. They could be able to tank the powerful arrows the Castle Archer shoots at him. I want you to mass produce these instead of Swordwraths.
How to counter Scenario 2: Your opponent is doing the same thing you're doing. He's building an army while building his miners. His goal is to takeover the Central Tower. Central Towers are the key to winning a match. If you takeover one, they produce +20 Gold each couple of seconds. Taking over the tower is essential to economical success. What I want you to do is to keep buying Swordwraths (while buying miners!) to overwhelm his army. If he retreats, you succeeded at taking over the Central Tower! Good job~

Step 5: Maintain your Central Tower. That is all you need to do. Be sure to buy Archidons and some Merics to heal you.

You don't want to counter these guys. They are flying units that your Swordwraths can't attack. But your Archidons could!

The results:

Look at this army! It's gorgeous, isn't it? :o
It got a perfect balance of Swordwraths to fight against Speartons and other melee units, while your Archidons could be able to fight units within a distance and units that could fly. It also got a Meric to heal all the wounded units!

Step 6: (Recommended) You could keep building Swordwraths and Archidons if you like to. However, it's recommended for you to slowly evolve into Speartons and Flying Crossbowmen. Reason is that Swordwraths and Archidons are low in health and are vulnerable to Magikills, which you don't want to ever face. Magikills uses explosions to kill them all, but your Speartons and Flying Crossbowmen have lots of HP to survive.

Giants are also a great unit to use too. They are the most tankiest units of all others. They could be able to survive anything! BE sure to have some of these guys on your team. You may have already faced them before.


EXTRA: Be sure to buy Rage as soon as possible (Beginning of the match!). They are essential for your Swordwraths, because Rage increases their speed and their attack rate! Slash slash slash in less than 1 second!

Ghost Tower Spawn Level 1 & Ghost Tower Spawn Level 2
Ghosts are special units that are spawned after you have controlled the Central Tower.


Central Towers are located at the center of the map.


So command your attack units (Swordwraths, etc.) to the center of the map.
Be wary though, your opponent is also fighting for the Central Tower. Casualties may occur.


Have a unit stay on that tower for a period of time to control it. When the red bar is leaning towards one side, the Central Tower is being controlled by that side.


Once you have taken over the Central Tower, it will make a "thump" sound. The red bar is gone and a red aura under the Central Tower signifies you have successfully captured the tower.


In order to spawn a Ghost, you must research "Ghost Tower Spawn 1" as seen on the picture above.
It's located at the farthest building of your Castle.
It costs 600 Gold and 200 Mana, so buy it when it's right!


If you want to upgrade it to Ghost Tower Spawn Level 2, then you must have 2,000 Gold and 1,000 Mana. It's very expensive, but the rewards are priceless if you kept maintaing the Central Tower.

I'm sorry for you readers who wants to read more stuff about what I write. :( Although I know how to beat Chaos myself, I can't explain it that well. So I'll put in these tags. These are other forumers who developed ways on how to counter Chaos. I learned how to counter Chaos by reading these threads. So please read them! :)

http://forums.stickpage.com/showthread.php?56610-This-is-How-to-beat-a-Chaos-Player
This is a thread made by Horrible Death (IGN: Usman). His tactic to beat Chaos is to be aggressive and rush. Now, I won't recommend doing this. It's reckless, dangerous to you, and terrible. But there are chances that you could still win. Chaos is weaker against rushers and chargers, who charges at the beginning of the match. So keep that in mind.

http://forums.stickpage.com/showthread.php?56323-Best-Way-to-Defeat-Chaos
Be sure to read the conversation. There are some key ideas to beat Chaos as each forumer explains here (including me!). At the end of the thread however, it turns into a stupid argument that I don't know what's going on.

What the poo is a Magikill? How is this slow guy useful?!

http://forums.stickpage.com/showthread.php?55848-Magikill-Tips
I know, I'm still relying on other people to build my guide. So bascially, this person is a wizard with Magikills. If you know how to use Magikills right, you could be able to wipe out the battlefield and destroy your opponent's army! :rolleyes:

So obviously, we all encountered the cooldown system. You know, when we have to wait 10-40 seconds just to make a unit, right?

There are some things that you may be unaware of (because I was unaware of this when I was a beginner).

Whenever you buy 2 units of the same colored category (The Red Boxes), one unit is not being produced while the other one is. Why? Because it balances the game. So keep in mind, do not buy 2 units of the same-colored category at the same time.


This is the right way. As you can see, I bought 2 units from 2 different colored boxes. I bought an Archidon from the blue box, and then a Shadowwrath from the red box. That way, I could be able to produce 2 units at the same time, instead of producing 1 Shadowwrath and waiting for the other Swordwrath to come out.


THE ULTIMATE WAY!!! hahaha :p

Alright, before we get into the details of massing, let's explain what massing is first. Massing is just a fancy term to show that a person is making multiple units of the same thing. For example, making tons of Speartons is considered Spearton Massing. There's not that much diversity in a massed army.

In these pictures, you'll see the types of massing most people do. I'll put the common types of massing at the top, and the less common types of massing at the bottom.
Common Types of Massing:

The Spearton Mass:

Ah, the Spearton mass. Did you ever face a Spearton before? They are a pain to kill. Now let's multiply that by 18x. That, my friend, is the Spearton mass. If you ever faced an opponent who does this, most likely he'll do either 2 things:
1. The Spearton Rush
This is a tactic where your opponent would ignore and rush past your army. He will strike for your statue, not your miners. This is an inevitable and cheap tactic, but it works well. However, it's simple to counter. If you prepared a Miner Wall, hire 3 Castle Archers, and research Statue Resilence, then most likely your opponent's Spearton rush would fail. Also, use your miners to attack his Speartons too (if he is attacking your statue). Miners do great damage in a mob.
or
2. Attacking normally
Your opponent would just use his Speartons to attack like every player. He would try to kill your army, and it mostly works. However, there are cons about this too. If you want to beat a Spearton mass, you must buy the strongest units available. Getting Giants, Magikills, and Flying Crossbowmen can really change the tide of battle. Giants are powerful in damage, stun, and high in health. Magikills could be able to use his spells to explode all of the Speartons. Flying Crossbowmen are safe from Speartons, because Speartons can't reach them. Wait... if Giants are high in health, damage, and can stun, why can't you mass Giants instead?


Giant Massers:

HOLY CRAP! What is that huge thing?! There's so many of them!!! I believe we all faced this type of mass before. This mass is consisted of 4-8 Giants, a Magikill, and a couple of Merics. The idea of Giant massing sounds impossible to defeat. But on the contrary, Giant massers are usually defeated a bunch of times. It's the choice of your army, the timing, and how you use them. I am going to list a bunch of cons for you about the weakness of Giant massing.
Cons:
1. They are weak against Magikills. A Magikill could be able to cast an AOE (Area of Effect) spell called "Electric Wall", which is highly effective against Giants.
2. They are weak against Swordwrath massers.
3. They only hit 1 at a time. They don't do AOE, so they could only kill 1 unit at a time.
4. It takes forever to make an army of Giants.
5. Nobody will really like you

Those are crucial errors when people build Giants.

So how do you counter them? There are many ways:
1. Spearton Massing / Spearton Rush (They are slow in speed and can't catch your Speartons. Might as well rush to their statue.)
2. Swordwrath Massing / Swordwrath Rush
3. Having 2 Magikills in your army. They kill Giants fast.
4. Shadowwrath Massing (Although sometimes not recommended if you don't know how to use them)
5. Stay in your base and rely on your Castle Archers (Depends on the situation)
6. Threaten his economy at the beginning. This is the best way to defeat them. If you mess up his miners all the time, then most likely he won't have time to be able to buy a Giant. This is the professional way to defeat Giant massers.

So whenever you see a Giant masser and lost against one many times, don't feel bad. Many others lost too. But don't forget, they have tons of weaknesses too!


The Flying Crossbowmen Mass of Doom:

This type of mass is very common. If you don't have any archers as backup, then you are doomed. They are like flies. Pests! Usually, people who does this type of mass would usually upgrade their crossbowmen with "Blazing Bolts". Blazing Bolts deal tons of damage and breaks through a person's armor. You could imagine how powerful that is. But do not worry, there are many solutions to counter the Flying Crossbowmen mass.

Cons of Flying Crossbowmen:
- Low health for a unit
- Very weak against stuns
- Huge opening to rush towards the statue
- Costs a good amount of mana and gold to make

So, you could imagine what I'm trying to hint at here:
- Having 1 or 2 Giants can beat an army of Flying Crossbowmen (But be sure to have some units back up the giants)
- Spearton Rush
- Harass your opponent's economy

Uncommon/Rare Types of Massing:
Now, we will get inside the deep abyss of Stick Empires. As you play more and more matches, you'll see these types of massers. Do not underestimate these types of massers. If they are skilled at what they are doing, most likely they can be able to overwhelm you and your army. Or that they just love the units.


The Shadowwrath Mass:

Ninjas. They always go and mess up your life and then run away afterwards. I have witnessed it all. But on topic, Shadowwrath massers do exist. You may never seen one, but I have.

There are 2 types of Shadowwrath Massers:
1. They just love ninjas (Like me! :))
or
2. They know what they are doing (Crap!)

If you met a Shadowwrath masser who knows what he is doing, then most likely he'll give you a hard time. He'll mess up your economy by assassinating all your Miners, your defense, and especially your Merics and Magikills. Once he assassinated them, he'll most likely succeed in escaping. We can't let that happen!

The Cons of Shadowwrath Massers:
- Any regular army can beat a Shadowwrath army
- Shadowwraths have low HP to survive a big battle
- Shadowwraths takes up a lot of unit space (4 population per unit)
- Expensive to build in time, gold, and mana

But do not underestimate Shadowwraths after all the cons I listed up there. The Shadowwrath masser's strategy is simple. He aims to give you a hard time to build your army. He knows he can't beat whatever army you build. So he plans to prevent you from building that army to defeat him. Once he onslaughted your miners and vulnerable units, he will escape, and then come back again.

How to counter a Shadowwrath Mass:
- Flying Crossbowmen could not be attacked by Shadowwraths
- Shadowwraths are vulnerable to Flying Crossbowmen's "Blazing Bolts"
- Giants stuns Shadowwraths and prevents them from escaping
- Overwhelm a Shadowwrath army is key (Spearton mass, Swordwrath mass, they all work)

To prevent a Shadowwrath from killing your miners:

Miner Walls! They are essential to countering hit-and-run Shadowwraths. If there's something blocking the Shadowwrath, then he couldn't be able to pass it.

Despite walls are very useful, range units can be able to destroy your protection in a safe distance such as...


Archidon Massers:

Hahahaha! Such as Archidon massing! Whenever you see a person with this army style, you would think of it as a joke. I do too. But it's how they use their army which makes them deadly. Again, there are 2 types of Archidon massers: 1) One who just likes Archidons and 2) One who knows what they are doing.

The cons of Archidon massing:
- Each Archidon has low Health
- They are support units that are meant to stay behind the battlefield, not in front
- They are slow escapers
- Little damage to tank units

But no no no! Don't underestimate them again! They are not cool stylish ninjas, but they are surely not wimps. Like the Shadowwrath massers, they will aim to ruin your miners and defense. Again, they are going to prevent you from making your army.

Other than Shadowwraths using assasination to kill your miners, the Archidons will kill your miners in a safe and long distance. Walls are useless if you put them too far, such as near the 2nd row of gold. You must build a wall that is a safe distance from the Archidons and within the Castle Archer's range.

Archidon massing is much more complex than Shadowwrath massers. You need to learn the skill 'Microing' in order to effectively use a Archidon mass. Microing is basically a strategy where you make your Archidon run away while firing arrows. This will be able to make the Archidon fire as many arrows until he loses ground. Now let's multiply that by 30x.

The best time an Archidon masser will strike is when he captures the Central Tower and summons a ghost (Spearton or Giant). He will move his Archidons behind the ghost tank , and fire at your units in a safe distance while your army is trying to kill the ghost. Once the ghost is killed, the Archidons will retreat until another ghost is spawned. It may seem very annoying and unbeatable, but there are very simple ways to counter an Archidon mass from attacking your base.

How to counter Archidon Massers:
1. You must have a Magikill. Magikills can be able to poison Archidons in a safe and long distance too. Poison is highly effective towards Archidons, as they die from the poison in less than 5 seconds. Using other spells such as Explosion and Electric Wall are also great ways to kill all the Archidons in a flash.
2. Instead of trying to kill the Spearton/Giant ghost, have some of your tanky units (Speartons) rush towards the Archidons. Archidons can't kill tanky units that effectively, even if there are more than 20 Archidons. This will signal the Archidons to retreat, and by that time the Spearton/Giant ghost would have been killed. This will save you from being shot by thousands of arrows.
3. As I mentioned all the time, getting tanky units is a MUST. Speartons. Giants. Flying Crossbowmen with Blazing Bolts. They all work.

Now countering Archidon Massers isn't that hard, is it? However, there is a last type of massing I will show you. It's the most dangerous, cheapest, and strongest mass ever...


Swordwrath Massers (*Giggles*)

I'M KIDDING I'M KIDDING! HAHAHAHA! Personally, I view this type of massing as a big joke. Mainly because there are so many cons and so many ways to counter this!

Cons:
- Low HP
- Takes lots of time to build the whole army (Since there are so many Swordwraths to make)
- Slower than every other melee unit
- Can't hit flying units
- Magikills will kill them all in less than 3 seconds

But however, they are still viewed as dangerous. 60 Swordwraths is deadly. It's like a huge ocean of swords bashing your Spearton's face, head, body, and every single other body part. With Rage, they can be able to double their attack speed and wipe out EVERY SINGLE land unit that it faces (Except before a Magikill destroys them all). Speartons are dead. Giants are doomed. Everything on land and can't fly is fried chicken.

But maybe your opponent doesn't want to aim for your army. No way... HE'S RUSHING FOR YOUR TOWER! If you don't know what you are doing, this is very hard to stop. It's much more effective than a Spearton rush. Despite they are low in health, how can you stop 60+ people with swords from destroying your statue?!

How to counter a Swordwrath Mass:
- To counter Swordwrath rushers, you need the best defense ever. 2 Miners Walls, Statue Resilence, and 3 Castle Archers. You must have your miners to attack too! But that still won't stop the dreaded Swordwrath rush. That is why I want you to scout/spy on their army before they attack. If there's a huge army of Swordwraths, I want you to put your whole army in defense. Put your flying units in the middle to keep control of the Central Tower.
- Flying Crossbowmen Mass with Flaming Bolts (Flaming Bolts do great damage against Swordwraths)
- 1 or more Magikills

That is the last type of massing there is. I hope you guys can be able to observe your opponent and find ways to counter their masses! :D

Throughout the time, I will add more replays that you could observe. I want you to take these tactics from me and make it into your own! ;)

Oh, and some tips. If you always lag when you are viewing replays from people, there are some factors:
-Do not surf on another website or go to another tag
-Do not press the pause button for too long.
-Do not open up the pause menu for too long.
-You may feel laggy throughout the middle of the match. Maybe it's because you're in 2x mode. If so, turn off 2x mode and you'll feel everything is normal.

1. The Basic Army: (Duration: 7:38)
www.stickempires.com/play?replay=replay991214&version=1.60
This replay is for part of the Spoiler Tag "Building Your Dreammmmm Army". All my analysis on it will be on "Building Your Dreammmmm Army".


2. The Shadowwraths: (Duration: 9:59)
www.stickempires.com/play?replay=replay994427&version=1.60
Although this video is mostly just me using my Swordwraths and Archidons, there are some parts where I use Shadowwraths. As you see in this replay, I used my Shadowwraths to: Destroy Walls (So my Ghost can enter), Kill off their healing supply (Their Merics), and ESPECIALLY, killing off his Magikill (a major threat to my Swordwraths and Archidons). I won't recommend using pure Shadowwraths though. Just use it as a support unit, because they die easily.

1. Rage Therapy
If you got owned really badly and unfair (Giant Massing, Reckless tactics, losing), don't rage like I do! Raging will set you back even more and just makes you pissed at everything in general. Ignore all the mean people, and don't be so sensitive about losing. If you lose, then you probably need to learn some more. Everytime I lose, I observe what I did wrong through my replays. I then fix my problem afterwards and I win the next match!

2. Be nice to everybody!
Remember guys, we are all a community here. Remember the Golden Rule? Treat others the way you wanted to be treated! So please don't spew your anger towards others, because you'll make others feel bad. This game makes everybody pissed off a lot, so please don't make it even more worse for everybody!