Question:
I wanted your opinions on 2-hall rushing on Garden of War Battle Net Edition (GoW BNE). What's a good order for it? How would it stand up against a 2 hall power? 1 hall power? 1 hall rush?
-Submitted by ][-][OLLYWOO][)

Answer: Two-hall rushing on GowBNE is deadly. All the spots are easily walled, and there is no messing around with your gold mines in order to get an efficient gold flow. This means that you can have 2 bases set up very quickly, that are both bringing in resources early...perfect for 2 hall rushing.

In order to be as effecient as you can be, you have to remember a few things.
a) You want to send multiple peons to the expansion mine, not just your first one.
b) After you are walled in, you don't want any peons stuck on the outside.
This is actually a little tricky from some spots. Dualing from 12 to 2 is very hard and you do usually end up with 1 peon walled to the outside of your base. Make sure you use that outside peon to build hidden farms, so that you can dedicate all the peons inside to gathering resources. You don't need to wallin everything right away, but you have to be fast enough so a repair rush won't kill you.

The Build-Order(s)
Your typical 2 hall rush goes like this:
Town Hall, farm, expansion Hall..all done by peon 1. Peon 2 has to build a farm at home or you will run low on food. Peon 3 should be sent over to the expansion to start walling it in with either a barracks or a black smith. Peon 4 builds the other building that peon 3 didn't at your first city. The rest of your peons are sent over to the expansion until it is walled in. Now start putting all your peon on gold.
Some things to note: You do not have to keep sending peons to wall your expansion if they are all going to be stuck outside when they are completed. 2 is a good example once again. You don't want to have your smith, and 2 farms building all at once, or 3 peons will be trapped outside. Instead, simply leave a 1 farm space until the first 2 buildings are complete. Get 2 of the peons inside your base, and use the 3rd to wallin. This way you are only left with 1 outside peon. Also be careful that you don't overbuild farms. Some spots require a large wallin (like a 6 and 8 dual), and as such, you must use all of your buildings to wall it. If you were not using your first few farms as a wallin, you might find that getting your wallin put up, will put you WAY over in food. This is very inefficient. Whether you build the barracks or blacksmith first, I leave up to you. The smith will allow for more non-stop peons early on, but you won't get a scout grunt out very fast. If you do go barracks first, you will probably have to give building priority to a grunt, instead of a peon, in order to get that first scout grunt out and about. If you can get away without repairing any buildings the better off you will be. Just build all the buildings you need (1 barracks, 1 smith, and enough farms to keep ahead), and put every peon you can onto gold.

Once in awhile, you will run into someone who 2-halls, 2-barracks rushes. I do not recommend this. By the time this starts to outrush a 1 hall rusher, or a 2 hall, 1 rax rusher, you will be way behind in lumber. A 2 hall rusher can simply stick up a mill, and 2 guard towers once he feels that he is getting outrushed. The rusher with 2 barracks will not have enough wood for a mill, and will even be behind on farms. Going 2-halls, 2-barracks like this will make you lose the upgrade race by alot. I beat several players who used this against me in the normal ladder season #1.

Against a 2 hall power
From the moment you hit a 2 hall powerers wallin, you can pretty much tell what he is up to. When you do find the enemy, immediately scout the adjacent position (if he's at 11, check 9...you know the drill). Once you see him setup for a power, you only need 3 grunts total. You might even have 3 grunts by the time you find him, so cancel any others that are building. What you do now, is hit his wallin as soon as you can with these 3 grunts. If you do it fast enough, you can trick the enemy into thinking, that you are doing a 1 hall rush. Three grunts is also just the right amount so enemy can't ignore it. He will have to put up a tower, or pop some archers or a catapult as defense. This will put you ahead by a little bit. Dedicate your resources to peons, and upgrade to stronghold when you have 26+. If you are quick with your units, you can use this slight advantage to end the game quickly with more ogres, and some fast death knights. To be fair, a 2 hall rush vs a 2 hall power, means that you have to be good to win the game. Both of you are going to be huge, and it's going to show you who can really play the game.

Why don't I try to take out one of his cities with my 2 hall rush? - If you ever try to execute a 2 cat rush, you know that you have to be very efficient for it to stop a 2 haller. Having 2 halls immediately, and than having to build a 2nd barracks, and a mill, and than a cat or 2, will cause you to be ages behind. You will be sending your catapults towards him while he's sending his first 9 lusted down. Sappers are also too slow. You have so many peons when you go Stronghold that you get to go fort instantly. Trying to sap into a 2 hall with your 2 hall is suicidal. He will have twice as many ogres as you, and will now be ahead.

Against a 1 hall power
This is the ideal situation. Again, scout around until you find the enemy. You can usually tell it's a 1 hall power because they get a 1 cat defense very quickly. Build a few more grunts, and scare him a bit by hitting him with 3 level 2 grunts. From here you just build peons and upgrade. You will out resource the enemy so bad that it won't even be a game. The only chance they have, is to send their first 8 ogres and catapult at you as soon as they can, but as long as you have 2 barracks complete before your mound (which you should have on this map), than you will have an easy win. I recommend staying away from a pure 1-hall on this map.

Against a 1 hall rush
This gets a little tough. In general, the enemies first scout grunt will find you at about the same time that your grunt finishes. A good player will scout both spots, and quickly realize what's up. What you do now is build some grunts, and simply use them to buy time. The longer you can go without having to put defense up, the more resources you will have coming in when it comes time. If the enemy did not do a heavy repair rush, you should be able to repel the first assault (people will usually send 3-4 grunts, you should have the same amount when they get there and be in a defensive setup). Get your mill going as soon as you can even if it means not building a peon for a few seconds. What you don't want to do, is get outrushed badly early on. Having no mill, means you have to go with 2 cannon towers before you can afford it. Very expensive. If you can get your mill done, you can try to sneak away with 2 guard towers instead. Or a guard tower and a catapult. The cheaper you can get away with, the better. Just make sure that you do defend both bases. The longer you keep both of them alive, the better your odds are of winning the game. Sometimes you can use their grunts to pop an axer or a catapult behind your wallin. It's dangerous, but I actually use it quite often. I sometimes start my catapult before their grunts get there. Lead them on by not repairing the barracks for a little, in order to make them think that if they keep attacking it, they will get in. Use this trick to keep the enemy grunts on your barracks, and ultimately pop your catapult inside.

Example of a good 2-hall rush wallin

Here is a wallin I used in a real game from 4 on GowBNE. The farm just above my town hall was the first farm that I built. It is placed there for peon warfare, defensive purposes. That peon than went out and built a Hall at 5. The second peon built the left-most farm in this picture. Peon 3 went to my expansion and started a smith. Next peon built the barracks, and the peon after that was sent to the expansion again to help wallin with a farm. Eventually, I built the middle farm in this wallin, and sent that peon over to wallin the last spot at 5. By doing this I never got too far ahead on food, and didn't need too many buildings, or take too long to wallin. Notice that this wallin can be repaired by just as many peons, compared to how many enemy grunts could attack it. Having your barracks high enough to pop only 1 grunt outside at a time, allows you to easily pop defensive units inside, by blocking with a grunt, or even a farm if you have an outside peon somewhere. The lumber mill was built as soon as I could afford it, and close to many trees, for maximum efficiency.

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