A TIERLIST! Which WC3 Biomes have the most OVERPOWERED Mercenary Camp units?

[@cedricrobertson2893]

i remember sunken ruins campament had Makruras? where they removed sometime?

[@GrubbyTalks]

Actually you’re right.. you had those Makrura Deep Seers that summoned the shrimps and entangled.. there’s actually so many mercs and neutrals I. Wc3…

[@TheRealMycanthrope]

R.I.P Makruras

[@sergioramirezbelliard493]

If there are many cases of removed hireable creeps he could talk about them. Otherwise talking about a few creeps that could replace the S and/or D tier creeps for balancing

[@DivineBanana]

​@@GrubbyTalksgrubby is so efficient he's learned to shorten "In" to "I."

[@JoceBeggar]

​@@GrubbyTalks do all mercs please

[@user-zs5ub1ic1v]

Mercs are my favourite gameplay feature in this game

[@thelegendknife]

yeah as a kid I always wanted to have ogers and assasins* etc. because they look the coolest

[@MittensOnly]

I agree, I think they should be explored more in the competitive scene; especially on the newer maps

[@ernestomarcos0103]

RIP the mercs that Arthas betrayed.

[@aprinnyonbreak1290]

I like gribblies and monsters. I wish they had a bit more support.

[@HellecticMojo]

@@ernestomarcos0103 THEY TOOK OUR JOBS... and SHIPS! Damn beasts!

[@tagaclaudiu]

A tierlist for neutral creeps to possess with banshees would be sick!

[@Alfie-ni7lx]

You mean banshees?

[@tagaclaudiu]

@@Alfie-ni7lx yes, my bad, haha

[@DavidGlendaleArdenaso]

mammoth, salamander, bandit enforcer, deceiver, unbroken darkweaver

[@MrBratello07]

Oh magad, yes!

[@dennisthorson4159]

It's not ideal, you lose the exp.. but there's troll high priests with inner fire, and dark priest with Sleep.

[@faerie7dragon]

Goblin Shredder should be S+ tier for it's amazing death animation and sound.

[@G1ingy]

It bugged me how weak Ogres are in WC3, the Mauler being equivalent to a grunt when in WC2 and lore the ogres are heavy late game units who can stomp grunts. Beyond that, here's a fun trivia. Pretty much 100% of the creeps in this game are derived from an existing playable unit (Murlocs are reskinned Ghouls for instance, Harpies are Gargoyles), or they're unused assets that Blizzard repurposed as creeps (the Revenants are the first iteration of Death Knights)

[@Kolt461]

Pretty far from 100% i think. (Ogre, Centaurs, Razormanes, Wildkin, Sludge Flingers, Satyrs)

[@ahmadfaiz2467]

Yea, especially that smaller ogre creep. Basically equivalent to footmen and ghouls stat wise.

[@Edin116]

@@Kolt461 I think the sludge units use the same texture as Acolytes. I heard it as a bit of warcraft 3 trivia years ago where someone went through it in the editor. Dryads also have back-boobs.

[@dude123nice6]

@@Edin116 yep, it's the same texture stretched on a different skeleton.

[@АндрейОнищенко-з8х]

same 3d model skeleton ≠ same unit the stats are typically not based on playable race units (probably even in early game development stages)

[@Aakash_Kumar_R]

Kinda surprised you didn't know nerubian warrior spawn spiderliings.. Also you can resurrect the nerubian warrior after they spawn spiderlings to get both them and spiderlings (both spiderlings costs 1 food each I think) I remember in frostmourne mission of human campaign I just bought 6 nerubian warriors, killed them to get 12 spiderlings and resurrected them.. I did this repeatedly to swarm mal'ganis base with like 1000 spiderlings

[@bendystrawz2832]

I knew they spawned spiderlings...I did NOT know they were permanent!

[@rubz1390]

They should have ability tooltip for that or something so that people know.

[@dentrag]

Really sad that basically none of these are seen in melee maps... More maps with different mercenary camps, please!

[@WildHunt3198]

We need the critter tier list Grubby

[@akoslazar9005]

Do a tier list on creeps next time to see which one is the hardest to kill/requires the most effort

[@somebody-anonymous]

Wouldn't centaur archer be great early game to cancel heal salves when the enemy has no cc yet?

[@GrubbyTalks]

That’s great actually. I’d hate for someone to use that against me

[@dakodaco4082]

I would love to see new mercenaries with magic and siege damage.

[@zephh_sk]

Keep making these please they're super insightful

[@yaroslavstarchenko4358]

Thank you so so much for this video Grub, it is a perfect content to watch after a day of hard work. It is interesting enough for people who know WC3 universe well, but also predictable enough to not have some surprise twists or close-shave comebacks like some of the WC3 or Mechabellum content. Meaning one can just sit there for over an hour, eat chips, scratch balls and think simplest thoughts like "Yea you tell em man, Orge Magi are the real deal".

[@GoukenGassenarl]

20:25 I love how the Harpy voices was slowly distracting to Grubby. "Sick voicelines" lmfao

[@BridgetGGX]

While quite situational, it should be also mentioned that mur'gul mercs have an additional advantage over other units - they can swim in deep water. I don't play melee that much, but I'm guessing that the maps are mostly designed in a way that either the deep water is not accesible at all, or it covers the edge of the map. So not really a groundbreaking feature, but may prove useful in some rare scenarios.

[@Lockieez]

Interesting. I remember Naga Sea Witch could also swim but it was removed early on (might've been in the Frozen Throne Beta).

[@LemonGingerHoney]

When you say doodad, I am reminded of Harstems "I DON'T KNOW WHAT DOODAD IS!!!".

[@levimogford3202]

laughed my ass off because i spent many weeks in the world editor as a kid trying ot make shit maps lmao

[@dima1353]

Blodfiend has a crazy stats for a 2 pop unit ! Such numbers do not happens for 2 pop mellee units. Its dps per pop is better than any native fully upgraded unit. 23-26 1.35 chaos with a cleave! I think that in a battle balanced by population, these dudes will defeat anyone except tauren.

[@tahutahu2446]

1:45 😭📕

[@QueenMar1ka]

This is so strange. I knew Grubby previously, but the tier list completely escaped me until last couple days. I watched them all feverishly although I no longer play wc3. And it's surreal that a new tier list just dropped! Do another one again! Keep going.

[@KovahhavoK]

Thank you for putting this together! I am sure this video took a LOT of your time/effort to make, also a long video itself. This game has a piece of my soul so going through all these units I haven't seen in years is fantastic. Thank you, Grubby & Team! Great video!

[@chrisschmidt2245]

It would be neat if the mercenaries got a look over in some of the maps and maybe adjusted and altered in stats to see if they could be made more viable. If certain items got adjusted in their stats to make them more or less attractive, more or less frequent, or more or less required, then I think it's certainly possible to have a merc camp that has some units on offer with decent cooldowns and costs that are "useful and attractive" enough to see players pick them up.

[@Infernal07]

@1:07:46 this is also how Traxes, the Drow Ranger worked in dota1, she had longer range when casting her Frost Arrow, and would not gain aggro from creeps since casting a spell was not considered attacking an enemy. It shared this attack pattern with other orb modifier heroes, like Clinkz the Bone Fletcher, Viper the Netherdrake and probably others I don't remember about rn.

[@KharnTheBtrayer]

I would love to see a map ban / best maps video for each race! I just started playing again after a decade of not playing and I am always unsure what maps are good for me and bad on each race. Love the videos, your channel has been a huge help getting back into the game!

[@ElvenSpellmaker]

Wtii sometimes does Assassins only on Market Square hahaha.

[@poroknight5937]

Hey Grubby. I have a request for the next tier list video if you planned to make another. You can rank the Warcraft 3 Race Soundtrack or just soundtrack in general, the many reasons i played warcraft 3 it's not for it's gameplay, but for it's amazing Sound design. Hopefully you can do it one day

[@ThatsRickdiculous]

Grubby, these are such fun videos. I'm very happy you do them :)

[@blacklotus561]

A tierlist for all the ways in which you can kill a Demon Hunter

[@kronniichiwa9909]

Or a blademaster

[@Edin116]

Please do a Possession/Charm tierlist. Which are the best units to steal and what combos can you do with them (including creeps with certain abilities). Edit: some people responded last time I asked that just because a unit is S-tier in its own race list doesn't make it the same rating for stealing the unit.

[@SyRose901]

I think the way to assess what unit to steal is to consider how you'd benefit and what the enemy would lose. Stealing a headhunter is not a big deal if the opponent has a dozen more of them, your one headhunter will not contribute much. Stealing a Troll Batrider and then detonating them into their air army is a much bigger reward. What I mean is, the unit you steal gets better if they can provide utility just by itself. If it has nothing aside from auto attacks, not a good unit to steal. Aside from casters with dispel, Druid of the Claw, Witch Doctor, Abomination, Sorceress... those are the ones you want. You can try memeing by stealing a worker unit and getting their whole tech tree. Not very practical when it comes to 1v1s, though.

[@SyRose901]

Spellbreakers would be a pretty good target to steal, but iirc, you cannot charm/possess a Spellbreaker, and all magic immune units.

[@aprinnyonbreak1290]

I know it's not the focus of the question, but it occurred to me that I don't think I know what happens to the droppable items when a creep is possessed or charmed. Do they just drop when the possession happens, or are the items inside the unit and drop when it dies, or are the items just lost?

[@Edin116]

@@aprinnyonbreak1290 they're dropped.

[@aprinnyonbreak1290]

@@Edin116 I seeee Thanksies! I figured they were, but thanks for confirmation!

[@BonkHazard]

Voidwalker's frost arrow range reminds me of Ability Draft in Dota 2, where if you give a melee hero an ability like frost arrows and you manually cast it instead of autoing, you'll attack from a range of the hero who the ability belongs to. It's likely the same principle.

[@XMayhemMondayX]

The Wind Witch section had me dying 🤣

[@ghiffaribara2949]

Another tier list video.... Just the way i love it, thanks for this Grubby

[@BengaIaas]

Nerubian Seer looks almost like an extra Hero tbf

[@RTs.Enjoyer]

Make a tier list for creeps of each tileset then?

[@XtReMz98]

Mercenary camp tierlist like I asked a couple weeks ago! Heck yeah! Thanks Grubby :)

[@MG-po6jc]

One nerubian died for this tierlist. It will not be forgotten!

[@henrymapleton]

Merc boys! I've seen the giant wolf or ogre magi in any games ; _ ;

[@smbsmw1111]

26:32 FORTY supply? That is very significant, I agree

[@GrubbyTalks]

Hahaha oops

[@Alfwin]

I recognize that at the higher/pro levels, the different merc camps have some not insignificant balance issues. But as a low-level, fairly casual player, I'd much rather have _variety_ than _balance._ Though, quite frankly, what I'd like most of all is more variety in map tilesets, not necessarily merc camps. So much Lordaeron and Village; I want to see some Outland maps or something!

[@DavidGlendaleArdenaso]

I remember Ashenvale selling Thunder Lizards

[@smbsmw1111]

31:40 I feel Revenant can be worth it for caster human build just for the mindgames of guessing which blizzard actuallu deals damage

[@mikhailgromov5223]

Now I can't wait for creeps tier list! Maybe that'll take like 4 hours... But anyway, creeps diversity is what could bring so much joy to casual 2v2s and FFAs. I remember my friend and I once booted a 1v1 on some map where creeps had, I think, chain lightning. Or something like that, some insane damage output. That was quite a suprise and lots of fun!

[@TS6815]

if wc3 had seasons I think merc camp would be a great avenue through which to throw wrenches at the meta. Offhand, some ideas that might be fun if balanced - hireable workers out of merc camp, maybe even with higher gold mine speed (works with racial mines like ne/ud) - random pools per map or tileset - higher stock counts - more high level mercs with long initial stock times - epic /pseudo heroes akin to doom guard or the kitted out captains(?) from campaign at high cost, long initial stock time

[@TS6815]

I think assigning all the mercs to the racial tech trees would be a good idea too, so they could benefit from the upgrades on whichever class is closest to them

[@PeteOfDarkness]

I think it is also worth to look at units in context of other mercenaries available in the camp. For example if you have several melee fighters single archer option may be much more useful. Same with high-tier vs low tier.Also, Trolls should have their own tier, they usually don't disappoint.

[@dima1353]

I'm pretty sure that when I played about 19 years ago, in one of the camps there was a giant lizard worth 5 or 6 population

[@Zoltri]

One thing I wonder about with the Nerubian Warrior, and I dont know if this would make it any better, but do the Spiderlings he spawns have any Food cost? It seems like having free units on the map just to scout and not actually engage could be useful to know where your opponent is without investing any real resources into that if you feel the Nerubian warrior minus the deathrattle is worth the cost otherwise. P.S I'm actually awful at RTS AND W3, so I have no idea. :) Just thinking out loud.

[@BurningPuddingPrincess]

Cool tierlist. It would be cool if there was more variety in merc pools for melee maps.

[@PerennialSash]

Excellent video. I'll keep an eye out for mercenaries more often!

[@bartoszbryczkowski569]

I love these tier list videos

[@TimmyInTarky]

The spoder looks actually better value - for 200 gold you get 800+ HP effectively

[@jangerloff3521]

Leaving that tome really triggered me. Well done Grubby

[@ApaProductions]

The grunt is not 50% cheaper than the ogre, it's 1/3 (or abour 33%) cheaper. The ogre however is 50% more expensive than the grunt.

[@kevingause9526]

Sky hired the tier d rogue in stars war 11

[@boshman11]

You actually DID IT. You madlad! I love this

[@mycatismolly]

The tier list I didn't know I needed!

[@BruCipHiF]

1:04:37 Hey Grubby... Normal attack type does full damage to hero armor, not reduced

[@BanoClan]

I love the ogres always been my favourite wish they were part of orc like im the campaigns

[@Shepardicus]

*hands shaking from tierlist withdrawal* yo grubby, you got any more of those tierlists?

[@BanoClan]

Ogre mauler always been my fav wish it got little buff or lower gold cost

[@AresKusa]

Ogre Magi bloodlust Mortar Teams. So overpowered.

[@SwabcraftCreates]

Shredder I loved when I played. 4 supply instead of 5-9 on wood. The only major drawback is vs raiders or siege tanks where it can't repair towers and the main buildings. Pretty much no drawback on undead, and a lot less micro hassle to phase out ghouls without needed to pull them every so often. Surprised I don't see more 50 pop strategies with shredder.

[@smbsmw1111]

It's mostly issue of a 5 minute initial cooldown, you cannot not harvest wood in that period, thus, as Grubby said, you mostly buy it when expanding

[@urimsaqipi5049]

I just tested, command aura does stack with war drums, so you can in theory get up to 30% extra damage as orc on every unit with kobold and kodo beast

[@pho3nix-]

I'd love to see more plays with mercs, definitely underutilized in the game sadly

[@mh-fh2vy]

Please make only merc camp units with beastmaster and firelord

[@zinithin-8208]

1:04:35 normal does full dmg vs heroes.

[@tabula_rosa]

a dumb suggestion & then a serious suggestion 1) what the mercs who have a (downgraded?) version of a single hero's ability makes me think of is if there were a SC2 Versus Mod-type mode for WC3 melee that makes all races have no heroes, & instead their altar can transform itself & permanently replace the altar for your race with one of the mercenary camps. so you're either selecting a merc camp based on what neutral units fill out your army composition, or you're selecting a merc camp based on which unit on that merc camp functions as a lite hero that you can mass up over the course of a match if u keep them alive. (of course there arent enough units that work like lite heroes; this idea would require a bunch of the more useless & a lot of the more repetitive (there are a lot of slow mercs, which isnt a problem with the 1 merc camp per tileset rule WC3 has now but if u did the "select a merc camp" system that would become a problem) to be buffed with a hero or hero-ish ability) which makes me wonder, 2) grubby how would you feel about a change to ladder that adds an extra building to each race that allows them to select a merc camp on top of the race they already are playing without changing anything else, but the building the expensive & once the building is done building transforming it into the merc camp you selected takes a long time & you can see which camp was selected while it transforms, long enough for the enemy to have a chance to scout out what you're doing. so it isn't a thing you can just do in every match, it has to be a conscious choice both of these ideas have a small problem, which is that if the game just lets you pick which out of all of the merc camps you want that is IMO a little bit too much freedom & what would probably wind up happening is everyone would pick the same merc camp regardless of what race they play & introduce a samey-ness that WC3 currently doesn't suffer from. the first idea to get around this is to have it be randomized. I hate this idea; it would result in people starting the match, finding out what the merc camp roll was & then quit out of the match if it isn't their preferred (which is probably why bliz made it be set by tileset to begin with). my second (much more preferred idea) would be to have each type of neutral merc camp on the map remove from the menu of merc camps you can select 3 options (including itself). like each of the 3 lorderon tileset merc camps removes all 3 lorderon merc camps from the selection, so if ur on a map with no lorderon merc camps you can hire lorderon mercs (mud golem with slow) in your base, but if ur on a lorderon tileset map with a neutral lorderon merc camp you HAVE to contest the map in order to get a mud golem. additionally only 1 player should get to have the merc camp they selected (no more pure mirror matches). IMO it'd be fun if instead of getting locked when you select the tileset u want, it gets locked in when the merc camp finishes its (long) transformation, the merc camp transforms 10% slower if it's not at full health & 50% slower if it's below half health, and the first player to finish the transformation to a specific tileset makes all the others of the same tileset in-progress cancel, and having more than 1 tileset being transformed to gives the players vision of the in-progress merc camps. and of course IMO the ruleset set for which camps forbid what should be set by default in the gamefiles but map makers should be able to override the list with their own in case they have a fun idea that might mix up the meta

[@ottomann4846]

I think a flying neutral creep just to kill zepellins is crazy as well, I think you underrate it - I'd argue S

[@Grimbago]

Great video! I would listen to your thoughts on what types of mercs are missing. What should you add to the game?

[@winsonsonho]

Please rank all units together in one tier list? Maybe just S, A, B units into S, S-, A, A-, B, B-?? Pretty please! 🙏❤

[@BruCipHiF]

Here campaigning for the tierlist tierlist!

[@Mørmëgíl-b1h]

Now I want to see games on each tile set with only heroes and mercs!

[@ИосифЛуна]

Why nobody complained about the wolf? Who is the better version of centaur with same HP, speed and more damage due to crits? Do I miss something? He only cost 20 gold more....

[@mattachtemeier5296]

Do dragon roost !

[@alfredomaggi7219]

You should make the mercs fight against each other as biodomes teams as a final check that the tier list is accurate.

[@deviancepurplehaze6045]

How about Heroes' name tier list?

[@mizark3]

Let's see if I can put my skills and knowledge together. In bronze league heroes you say the biggest mistake is to go for upgrades. Here you say Mercs are better than normal units, but worse once they get their upgrades. Clearly, I need to only buy Mercs, and I will be a top pro in no time! What's that you ask, my W3Champions MMR? I'm pretty sure its 86, since that's out of 100, I'm almost the best I can be!

[@topeee]

where are the crabs, and the turtle

[@StrobeFireStudios]

I just love the way you say Biome

[@billdewall6152]

This is an awesome idea for a tierlist.

[@ryanlee5336]

Shouldnt the levels of the units (how much exp they'll give to opponent) also be a factor?

[@ryanlee5336]

assassin is level 4 but spider is lvl 3!

[@TheTodesrolle]

i think you should also value their lvl and how much exp they give in this tierlist. also the projectile speed.

[@Colnup]

Wouldn't the flame arrows also have bonus range?

[@MintBlancmanche-mk8pi]

I wish goblin shredder had idle unit icon, like peasants. sometimes fucker finish part of the forest and does not go for the next part and just sits there waiting.

[@apocratos0174]

Now You better be doing a tier list of the other mercs you left out.... we dont deserve to be waiting for your opinion about other less common merc camps...and we wont be taking this type of abuse lightly, young man!!!

[@KleberDKurosaki]

I often avoid the kobold camp on Amazonia because of the triple bash

[@livingalife8879]

I remember as a kid doing testing with all the different mercs just because they were rare and cool

[@fluffydestroyer8336]

20:38 I didn't know there were mutalisks in wc3!

[@muratkaradag3703]

Grubbs, what do you think: Should Blizzard create new units, new animations, new voice-acting-lines, a new landscape and maybe introduce some new heroes (Tavern)? Im curious about your opinion! Thanks in advance

[@artuspasserin663]

It would be mega cool if the mercenaries weren't dependent on the map. but the player could choose them like in zero space. At least someone could try to create a map where it could be done.

[@ira233]

Would like to see a tierlist of broken lvl 6 or higher lvl creeps

[@elverdaderoechomikeoscar]

almost every mercenary has 0.5 hp regen except some cases like bloodfiend but cold arrow from (NW+mercenaries) is not different than cold attack from Undead?

[@terryboi33]

The best video I've seen this year

[@stanvanr7149]

I wish there was more variety in merc camps used in competitive maps

[@lordgoogler6380]

I wonder if there is any early creeping abuse you could do with the centaur.

[@Sorenzo]

He kills the Nerubian and somebody in chat goes "You betrayed the mercenaries who fought for you!" and I started laughing 😂Good one Chat!

[@vcepelin]

The Satyr Shadowdancer was part of the original Dota :)

[@boopmcdoop7841]

Finally! Hell yeah

[@serioussilliness2064]

Take 2 Frost Revenants with Obsidian Statues and Necromancer Skeleton armies.

[@TheTodesrolle]

directly at the start the book wasnt taken by the dk

[@Kakerate2]

1:06:55 Not true! Effects that apply generic frost slow are all the same, but abilities like Frost Arrows do not use that effect. 1:17:00 i believe this nerf was only for the war drum item, command aura is a diff buff that should stack.

[@POWerrrrlGrind]

This Voidwalker with Frostarrow abuse works the same as Jakiro. Jakiro has different autocast range modifier aka auto range and click cast range