Two Rook vs...

So I have 4 games in a row today that were against two Rook players. They turtled the map with towers and managed to out creep us and managed to keep up a heavy push. I assume they had the help of Hearts of Life, as they never seemed to run out of mana.


I know that TB with Ice Nova will help against this, but I like to mix up who I am playing and often times I get paired with the same DG. So assuming I am not playing TB, what can I do to beat this slow moving glacier of towers from eventually hitting my base?

1,649 views 5 replies
Reply #1 Top

I'd say force them to defend. They move slowy, so use that to harass them on flags they cannot defend. Just keep in mind they can teleport on summoned towers ;)

I say, early on go for their base towers quickly and rush for cataputlts / Portal flag locking.

Reply #2 Top

Well, if you are QoT then you won't have any issues fighting the two Castling Rooks. QoT has two AOE abilities, both of which are highly effective vs Rook and his towers. Uproot and minions are also very useful.

UB can spit on the Rooks to keep them from using HoL.

Erebus can minion spam the Rook and his towers.

TB needs to use Frost Nova, Ring of Fire, Rain of Ice, and Fire Nova... any two should work.

 

Non-Character Specific:

Universal Gadgets will help keep your structures alive.

Siege Minions will help eliminate towers (Rook or regular)

Upgrading to Catapultasauri/Giants will make short work of any tower.

Reply #3 Top

Your strategy depends on the map.  One of your top priorities is to blunt their push, and that means buying your citadel upgrades early on.  Take advantage of their lumbering move speed and grab flags from under their noses.  On some maps, particularly Crucible, if a Rook can get through your front line of towers early enough the game may be over right then and there, so ensure you have the capacity to blunt that advance.

Remember that Rook can only support two towers when he's under level 4, and this isn't enough to stop you from running up and attacking him.  Because Rook has lots of hit points but little armour, he can't rely on passive hit point regeneration and needs to return to base to heal up.  Don't let Rooks get an early game foothold, and you'll be in a good position to turn things around mid-game.

Above all else, don't allow a Rook team to control flags.  Rook has to lumber out to go and get them, and if you haven't done any dying he's going to be at a significant disadvantage so far from his tower farm.  At very least it'll take him quite a while to get there and back, by which point his original tower farm can be damaged significantly.  Do everything in your power to stop a Rook advance, but be careful not to die.  A good Rook player gets his kills from his enemies being foolish and straying into his tower farm; don't become first blood, because once they start getting gold a Rook push can be very hard to stop.

Reply #4 Top

You must harass the rook, that's all there really is to it. I played a game where a rook player who stacked speed items and was always trying to set up farms but never had success because when  I would start harassing him, he would start running away after a bit. Sugesstion also to get some more armor because then the tower attacks will do less damage to you, also your creeps should you get that upgrade to, since tower strikes are normal attacks.

With the large amount of mana regen items, combined with Rook low mana dependency, it's extremely easy for a tower rook to stay full of mana basically all the time.

Reply #5 Top

Scaled Helm – 550g
+525 Mana
+4 Mana Per Second

and

Vlemish Faceguard – 1750g
+1050 Mana
+11 Mana Per Second
+4 Mana Per Second Aura

Tend to leave me with a near inexhaustable amount of mana for my Rook. From personal experience, the Rook moves very slowly and even with a high amount of health tends to die easily. Stun/Slow the Rook down and have your team focus fire on him. He's the easiest Hero to chase.