A strategy game is currently free on Steam and we can only recommend it to you. A real insider tip for Warcraft 3 custom map fans is waiting for you here!
If you were to ask me what the best thing about Warcraft 3 and its add-on The Frozen Throne was back then, I would tell you: The story campaign around the Lich King, of course! But close behind are the custom games, fan-made mods and game modes.
The mod with the most fans was by far DotA, but Legion TD already follows in second place in the (Ranking) ranking. Many people are probably not aware that the then extremely popular mod has had an official successor from the same developers for some time now.
You can play this one for free on Steam right now – and if you do, I’m sure that one or two of you will definitely put a lot of time into this absurdly deep strategy game afterwards.
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What to expect in Legion TD 2
In Legion TD 2, two teams of two or four players (or really great AI bots) compete against each other to protect their king from onrushing waves of enemies. The TD in the name of course stands for Tower Defence – even though you don’t build any towers here.
Instead, you have a small area where you can place units, the so-called legionaries. These then fight fully automatically against the attacking enemies. Currently there are exactly 132 of them available, but you can only use a small number per game.
Your goal is to successfully finish off all enemies and for your attacking troops to be able to overcome the enemy’s defence by sending additional troops yourself.
Why I put 300 hours into this game
The gameplay sounds simple at first, but it’s incredibly deep. You have to master three aspects of the game and keep them in mind at all times
The Defence
If you want to be successful, you have to stop the enemy waves with as little investment as possible. The right combination of legionnaires and their placement on your battlefield plays an essential role in this.
If you build your main army on the left side of your battlefield and only a small group of tanks on the right side, this is called Splitting
The attackers split up and your main army only has to deal with half of the units.
Your tank side will die sooner or later, but the remaining enemies run to your main army afterwards and can’t do any damage in that time, while your ranged fighters can keep on hitting. This way you can deal damage without taking any yourself.
The Economy
In case you are now wondering why you have to resort to such tricks to get the last bit of effectiveness out of your defence: In the game, you not only have to build legionaries, but also miners.
These automatically mine mythium, a resource that you can use to upgrade your king or send additional units yourself to join the next wave of attacks. However, mythium is not only essential to crack the enemy’s defences.
For every mythium you spend, your income increases, which is distributed after each wave – and the cheaper your defence can hold off all enemies, the more money is left over for miners. Whoever has the best economy at the end usually wins the game.
However, you shouldn’t be too stingy either, because if enemies break through your defences, not only will you lose the gold from defeating them, your opponents will get some of it instead.
I think you’ll realise by now at the latest that there’s an enormous amount of tactical depth waiting for you here – but the third point is still missing.
The team play
Occasionally there is a time-limited 1-on-1 mode, but the ranking matches are basically played in 2-on-2 mode. Although each player ploughs his own battlefield and has to deal with a player from the other team in 1-on-1, team play is still enormously important.
Because: Mistakes can also be made when sending units! If you send units worth all your mythium every round, they will often not be a problem for your enemies. You earn a lot of income this way, but at the same time you give the enemy valuable kill gold.
It is therefore advisable to save your mythium, coordinate with your partner and analyse the enemy formation to find the perfect moment for a major attack. For if both players attack, the chances are higher to get through to the enemy king, attack it and ultimately win the game.
If you’re thinking: Yeah, that could be fun for me!
– at (Steam) Legion TD 2 is currently playable for free until July 24, 2023 and also reduced by 35 percent to 13 Euros, if you can get as excited about the gameplay as I did.
The learning curve is steep at first and it’s difficult to find the right balance between economy and defence. But once you’ve got the system down, you’re in for a fantastic secret strategy game that is still being updated five years after its Early Access release and has a stable player base.
