Basics of Combat

"There are routes not to be followed, armies not to be attacked, citadels not to be besieged, territory not to be fought over, orders of civilian governments not to be obeyed.
    Therefore generals who know all possible adaptations to take advantage of the ground know how to use military forces. If generals do no know how to adapt advantageously, even if they know the lay of the land they cannot take advantage of it.
    If they rule armies without knowing the arts of complete adaptivity, even if they know what there is to gain, they cannot get people to work with them." - Sun Tzu

    TAO is more than just units and formation. It is also about how you USE those units. This section will give you a few very basic and general tips to use when playing. More specialised strategies for individual units will come soon.

Moving

    Units have different sorts and ranges of movement. If possible, do not move a unit UNLESS:
- It is in danger of dieing or getting hit from the back next turn.
- It is part of a bunched up section of units and an attacker that has an area attack ie Pyromancer, can reach that formation during the opponents turn.
- It is not in range of anything and has to move to attack.
- To reach the back armour.
    The main reason is because that units who move AND attack have to wait the FULL recovery time. Another tip when moving is to see WHERE you're moving your unit to. If you move your unit in to attack a witch and kill it, you might be killing your own unit. Look out especially for spellcasters and scouts. You want to try and stay away from them as much as possible.

Attacking

    All units have very different attack styles and it is important that you learn and master these attack styles. Below are some general tips for attacking.
- At the start of the game it is always hard to decide what unit to attack. Most players to tend to look at the gaming board and do one of two things:
    > a) Attack the strongest unit the opponent has eg Dragon.
    > b) Attack something they know they can kill, eg witch with a dragon/lightning ward.
- When choosing a target, always look at two things, the turns they have left before moving, amount of hit points left.
- It is ussually more useful to attack units that are can attack you next turn rather than waste turns attacking units that take 3 turns to recover. This strategy applies especially to dealing death blows. It is better to kill units that can move next turn rather than kill units that can't move until 3 turns time. NEVER EVER EVER EVER attack from the front unless ABSOLUTELY neccessary. This applies mainly to knights, assassins and scouts. However can apply to the other units that can block. Attacking from the front is always a waste unless you are in one of two scenarios.
    > a) There is a unit that can kill you next turn or screw you up and you have this one chance to take it out, however, you can only attack from the front.
    > b) You are using an unblockable attack
- Sometimes you can only attack from the side. There are two ways to approach this effectively. These will usually work when the enemy has to wait the next turn before moving again.
    > - a) Move a unit like a knight but DO NOT attack from the side. The reason being that next turn, the unit cannot move but your one can so can reach the back armour and not be scared of the other unit blocking.
    > - b) Attack from the side and risk the blocking. If they do block, their back will be turned another way and you can attack form the back with another unit.

Orientation

     After attacking you will want to face your unit so that its back armour is facing away from the enemy so they cannot reach. It is good to know the different movement ranges of each unit as well as the different ranges each unit has. This will be useful for determining where to face you behind. Another tip is to always face your back to the edge of the arena if you are right next to it. This way your unit can only be attacked from the side and front only.

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