Defense

Changes to town defense

Blizzard has buffed up the stationary defenses of nearly all the races. All towers now hit a little bit harder, except for the Undead Spirit Towers (which are based off of their Ziggurat farm units anyway, so they have plenty of base buildings to make towers). Buildings also no longer have a buffer zone around them, meaning that it is possible to build structures in such a way to block movement entirely. If you choose, you can now wall-in your town using your buildings. I find this to not be an effective tactic, as I prefer to have mobility around my town with my army. Bunching up your buildings is begging for an area effect damage spell (Blizzard, Earthquake, Death and Decay, etc.), and if you cast a town portal spell to bring your army into a crowded town you could find your troops trapped and ineffective.

Human militia trying desperately to defend

Ghouls and a necro wreak havoc on a human expansion

Human defense

Humans, as before get two types of towers – Guard Towers and Cannon Towers. Guard towers shoot arrows at air and ground attackers while the Cannon Towers shoot a more powerful cannon ball (with splash damage) at ground targets only. Blizzard has also given the human Town Halls a “Call to Arms” button. This rallies all nearby Peasants to run to the Hall, and change into armor, which turns them into Militia. The Militia units run faster, have some armor, and hit a lot harder and faster than a regular Peasant. Though they certainly couldn’t hold off an attack by themselves, they can prove to be the difference maker if your army and the attacking army are evenly matched. The Militia won’t last forever though…after a short timer runs out (you can see the bar by clicking on any Militia), they automatically switch back to becoming Peasants – this prevents anyone from trying a “Militia rush” on small maps. You can also force Militia back to work by pressing the “Return to Work” button on the Hall. The Peasants will remember the tasks they were doing and go right back to them automatically.

No more pig farms

The most interesting change in this area has to do with the Orcs. They no longer build Pig Farms to support a larger army. Instead their food/farm points come from building Burrows, which double as a defensive structure. Similar to Bunkers in StarCraft, a Burrow can be filled with up to four Peons (but only Peons) who then shoot powerful arrows out of the Burrow at any attacking troops. The rate of fire of the Burrow increases depending on how many Peons are occupying it. At four peons, the rate of fire is considerable. I’ve held off two-team attacks by myself in team games using my own army and two Burrows firing as backup, with other Peons repairing the Burrows as they take damage. If you want to attack a smart Orc player you have to come with siege units (Catapults, Ballistas, Meat Wagons, etc), if not an utterly overpowering army. Additionally, Orcs get a new Watch Tower building that functions similarly to the Human Guard Tower, attacking air and ground with arrows. Not many people bother with the Watch Tower though. Finally, the spiked barricades upgrade to Orc Buildings (damaging any melee units that attack them) have been increased in effectiveness.

You'll see the lagger screen sometimes

Bye bye hall

Undead and Night Elf

Not a whole lot of changes were made to the Undead static defense, except that their Necropolis (town hall) acts as a Spirit Tower does, firing at attacking enemy troops. The Night Elf “tower” unit, the Ancient Protector, now attacks air as well as ground attackers, which is a welcome change. Blizzard has also removed the default attack of the uprooted Tree of Life (town hall). The reason for that is because many of the top players would simply build a second Tree of Life near a gold mine right in the beginning of a game, and use it to kill the creeps guarding the mine. Using this trick, Night Elves could expand much faster than any other race, making them nearly unbeatable in one on one matches. That exploit has been fixed, and Blizzard promises in a later patch to allow uprooted NE buildings to attack after an upgrade is researched.