Warcraft III For Beginners - Night Elf Guide

Want to learn the basics of Warcraft III Undead strategy?

Wisps

Wisps are your basic construction unit, very similar the Grunts, Peons, and Acolytes. For the Night Elves, wisps perform the tasks of collecting gold, wood, and building structures.

Gold

Up to five Wisps can collect from a goldmine at any given time. If you want to remove a Wisp from the mine, you select the mine, then click an individual Wisps from the unit pane at the bottom center of the interface. In order for a Wisp to collect gold from the mine, the mine must be “Entangled”. In order to entangle a mine, you must root your Tree of Life nearby. You can entangle additional goldmines by moving your Wisps to one on the map, and using it to seed an additional Tree of Life. In addition to an additional mine this creates a sub-base that you can use in the same manner as your main base.

Wood

Wisps are able to gather wood, five at a time, by circling an individual tree. Doing this, they extract wood without actually damaging the tree itself, which means it is impossible to ever run out of trees, or create gaps in your defense by over-harvesting. You will likely want around six wisps actively harvesting wood in order to keep up your stores.

Construction

One wisp may construct a single building at a time. This means that construction can be a bit on the slow side. Additionally, if you are constructing a living building, such as an Ancient of War, or Ancient of Lore, etc. the wisp will be consumed. Keep that in mind and produce additional wisps as necessary.

Repair

Wisps can be set to auto-repair nearby units and structures. For this reason, it is a good idea to have extra wisps placed throughout your base in case of an attack. To enable auto-repair, select your wisps (double-click to select All) and right click the Renew ability.

Offense

If your base, or other area where you have multiple wisps, falls under heavy attack you may decide that it is high time for a desperate move. You can maneuver your wisps into position near enemy forces and detonate them. This, of course, kills your wisps but can inflict enough damage to your opponent to buy much-needed time and turn the tide of the battle.

Tips for Using Moonwells

For the Night Elf forces, Moonwells fulfill the same role as Farms, Ziggurats, and Orc Hovels do for their respective factions. You have to build Moonwells as your army expands in order to meet food requirements. Moonwells have an additional beneficial feature as well. After you summon a Moonwell, you can select it and right-click “Replenish Mana and Life” (Hotkey: R). To select all of your Moonwells, double click one of them. This will cause the Moonwell to quickly restore the health and mana stores of all units that come near them. It is a great way to refresh your units after any battle, or to give them an edge when defending your base from attack. Keep in mind, your Moonwells have limited mana stores themselves, and one can’t, for example, regenerate an entire army all by its lonesome.

Offensive/Defensive Building and Up-Rooting

All of the Ancients that serve as structures for the Night Elf forces can attack from their rooted position, or up-root and move around the map (very slowly). When up-rooted, they gain an armor bonus. Strategic positioning of Ancients within your base can offer a very tight defensive position. If you place your Moonwells in back (a prime target for attackers to reduce or stop your unit production, and because they heal), and place Ancients in front of them, then any units moving in to attack your Moonwells will be attacked by your rooted Ancients. Additionally, Archers may stand near or behind Ancients to receive defense from melee attackers, and also receive healing from the Moonwells.

Uprooting adds a measure of utility to the Night Elf armies. As mentioned before, any Ancient may uproot and move around the map. One example strategy works versus Orc or Human opponents. If you can get your Ancient all the way across the map, you can root it near your opponent’s goldmine, entangle it, and completely stop their resource gathering from that mine. Additionally, this will allow you to place your other structures on top of your opponent. While risky, this maneuver can sometimes take your opponent by surprise and grant you the victory.