2008-03-20, 03:15:54
I spent all day slaving away at this (roughly 5 hours). I hope that new and experienced traders will find this useful. This guide is meant as a SUPPLEMENT to TKF's trading guide here. I will try to find time later to give this post clearer formatting to make it easier to read.
Manipulating the Dynamics of the Economy
- A guide to trading effectively in Battle Tanks -
Abstract:
Trading is the only way, besides getting player kills,to give your team more gold than the other team. As such having a good trader on a good team guarantees a victory against a similar team which ignores trading.
About Battle Tanks:
Welcome to Battle Tanks! Battletanks is an AoS style map which has been around for a long time. Battle Tanks has been around for about 3 years, and has always been a popular map amongst the Warcraft 3 community. In Battle Tanks, you purchase a tank, weapons and lay siege to your enemy's base while protecting your own. However, considering such a simple game, there is a surprising amount of depth to its gameplay. There are various dynamics which teams can take advantage of to gain the upper hand. In order to understand how these dynamics can be used to your advantage, you must understand the statics of the game.
Statics vs. Dynamics:
What is a static? What is a dynamic? Simply put, a static is a thing which does not change, while a dynamic is a thing which does change. Dynamics in Battle Tanks are things such as your teams layout, or your tanks setup. Statics are things which do not change no matter how many times you play the game, or how hard you try (unless you are a map editor, of course). Examples of statics in battle tanks are things like the number of factories you start with, the amount of money you start with, the weapons available to you, the number of conquerable control points, etc etc... It is very easy to take advantage of statics, and it is quite likely that you already have taken advantage of them. You use weapons with a longer range to defeat enemies with shorter range weapons without getting hurt. You use faster tanks to catch slower tanks. And perhaps the most basic static that people take advantage is to use stronger weapons and tanks to defeat weaker tanks.
Dynamics, on the other hand, are harder to take advantage of. Taking advantage of a dynamic might be something such as predicting the path of your enemy and ambushing him when he goes back to his control point to heal. Building a factory near your enemy's base to make it easier and faster to heal your tank when damaged is another great example of taking advantage of dynamics.
The Economy:
What does this have to do with trading, you ask? It's EVERYTHING. Consider the following hypothetical situation. You have 2 teams, both with 1 player who do nothing but sit in their bases. Who has more money at the start of the match? After 10 minutes? After 100 minutes? The answer is apparent – they both have (roughly) the same amount of money. Because there is no player interaction, the only game mechanics coming into play are the statics. Discovering the sources of income in this scenario exposes the statics of the economy. The statics of the economy (as they apply to this guide) are:
-<wrong>Income generated from killing creeps</wrong>---It turns out that this is not true - if the computer kills a creep, only a portion of this money is returned to the players. Thanks Exodus for correcting me here.
-The slow, but steady trickle of money to all players
What does this mean to you?
<wrong>First of all, because any money that your troops “steal” by killing off enemy creeps is redistributed equally across your team. So if one of your lanes is empty, your team isn't losing any income (in the long run). Second: You don't make your team stronger by getting more creep kills – you simply redistribute more of your teams collective wealth towards yourself.</wrong> - Because the computer only returns a portion of the money it collects from farming creeps, your team DOES get weaker by leaving a lane empty.
Third: What if you had a dynamic source of income to supplement this static income, which your enemy didn't have? The answer: you would have more money to spend on better weapons and better tanks than your enemy.
What are the dynamic sources of income then? The ones that I know of are:
Income from trading
Income from killing creeps created by the “Troop Command” item, and from extra factories
Income from killing enemy buildings
<correction>Income from killing normal creeps</correction> - Moved from static. See note in statics of the economy for more info.
You also have to consider dynamic income “sinks”, or things which cause your team to LOSE money:
Building a tower/factory which is then destroyed
Selling a tank or weapon (you receive only 50% of what you payed when selling an item)
Consumable items
Now that we have discussed the dynamics and statics of the economy, we can discuss how this relates to trading.
Advanced Defensive Techniques:
Trading itself is fairly straight forward. You can check out TKFs guide to understand the basics. However, there are some techniques you can use to protect your self, should you have to evade enemies. First of all, there are 3 skills you have that protect your tank against enemy players:
Shadow Walk – Turns the trader invisible for a certain amount of time, and increases the traders speed by a certain percent.
Magic Barrier – absorbs a certain amount of magical damage – this does not include damage from creeps. Only damage from skills and tank weapons are absorbed.
Invulnerability (Ultimate) – makes the trader completely invulnerable for a few seconds.
--Use the Mini-map:
When facing an enemy who doesn't try to hunt the trader, these aren't needed very often. However, talented players will make hunting the trader a priority. Because the trader can not use hulls, the trader dies very quickly later in the game. As such, you will find that in the later portion of the game, if you are being hunted, you won't be able to activate your skills in time. As such, it is CRITICAL to watch the mini-map when trading. Battle Tanks defaults to having fog of war turned off, so you can easily see when someone is heading your way on the mini-map. If someone is heading your way, run away.
--Buy a teleporter and/or speed pack:
Buying a teleporter or speed pack (or building a speed pack) grants you the ability to instantly teleport to anywhere within 3600 range. This essentially gives you an extra escape ability, and it is perfect for situations where you need to get away, FAST. However, since it requires 2 mouse clicks to use, you shouldn't try to use this as your first line of defense. It's best to make yourself invulnerable or invisible first before teleporting, giving you ample time to choose where to teleport to.
<amendment>You can double click on the teleporter/speedpack/trader hunter pack and it will tend to teleport you towards where you purchased the item, which is usually safer. So you can do this in a tight situation. --Thanks to Exodus for this info</amendment>
--Troop Command:
Troop Command allows you to periodically create a single wave of troops (the same amount a factory produces), and also increases the damage produced by all nearby allied creeps. If you are ambushed and your escape abilities are on cooldown, you can use troop command to spawn some creeps to shield yourself from the enemy's weapons. I also find it useful for distracting enemy creeps while going behind enemy lines for the more profitable trades.
--Teleport Breaker:
Enemy exploders got you down? Frustrate them with this little known item! This gem will intercept any enemy tank which tries to teleport to a location within something like 1000 range, and teleport them on top of the breaker AND stunning them for a significant duration. An exploder who thinks he's going to get an easy triple kill will be sorely surprised when he ends up on top of one of these. Teleport breakers are consumable items, so you have to buy a new one when the old one wears out.
--Buying towers:
If enemy tanks are camping your trade master, you can buy a laser tower to discourage them from getting too close. Also, if your team loses a control points cannon tower, you can replace it with a much stronger laser tower. I like to assign each laser tower a control group (by selecting the tower and hitting Ctrl + a number) so I can quickly switch to the laser tower when it's under attack by double tapping the number it's assigned on the keyboard. You can then manually control the laser tower and have it attack an enemy tank that is most likely being shielded by creeps. Remember that enemy tanks hurt your towers more than creeps, and you can get kills by controlling your towers!
Advanced Offensive Techniques:
Just because you are trading, doesn't mean you can't be more than a cash dispenser for your team! Even though you can't buy weapons, there are a variety of items you can buy to use offensively:
--Mines:
Mines detonate when an enemy gets too close to them. Even if the enemy survives the mine, they have lost a considerable portion of their health and are much easier to kill. You can buy all 3 mine layers, as they are each on a separate cooldown. This allows you to quickly place a small mine field around key objects such as control points, healers, and whatever paths your enemies tend to use.
--Troop Command:
Troop Command allows you to periodically create a single wave of troops (the same amount a factory produces), and also increases the damage produced by all nearby allied creeps. Troop Command can also be used offensively – when your team mates are pushing a lane, you can use your troops to assist them. If the enemy is running away, I like to run ahead of them and spawn creeps in their way so they can't escape the wrath of your buddies. Also, if you control the troops you spawn, you can sometimes get a solo kill by manually targetting an enemy tank.
--Orbital Cannon:
The orbital cannon is one of the lesser known items in battle tanks, which is a shame. This high-altitude weapon can be used to kill buildings, creeps and even enemy tanks. The Orbital Cannon delivers 6 area effect strikes of up to 800 damage each. Unfortunately, by the time you fulfill the orbital cannons weapons tech requirements (level 10 I think?), most players already have a heavy tank or better, so the orbital cannon can't really be used alone to get kills. However, if you have an opportunistic mind-set, you can snag a kill here and there.
--Factories:
Each factory you build spawns an extra wave of troops owned by you, periodically. These troops head straight towards the enemies base, so if you build them in your base, they will go down the middle lane. If you want them to go down the other lanes, you need to place them near your control points in these other lanes (mind you, they still go straight for the enemy base, so you still have to be careful where you put them). On top of this, you can teleport to a factory like a control point, and provide healing for you and your team mates. Factories are wonderful tools for laying siege to the enemy base. The healing they provide is often the final blow that ends in your enemy's defeat.
--Siege Pack
Siege packs spawn 3 mortar teams, and reduce the armor of nearby enemy structures. Siege packs are good tools for taking down towers to replace with your own towers. Also, they are useful for taking down those nasty laser towers in the enemy base which never seem to die easily. You can use this alongside Troop Command, and also the consumable troop/mortar team items which all have separate cooldowns. Doing this can take down enemy structures FAST.
Other Advanced Techniques:
--Delaying enemy capture of control points:
The trader acts just like a normal tank with regard to capturing control points. That means that if an enemy is trying to capture one of your control points, you can stop the timer. This is true even when you are invisible or invulnerable. Doing this can give your team mates enough time to get there and take down the enemy tanks.
--Sneaking in through the backdoor:
Because of your Shadow walk ability, you can sneak behind enemy lines and use your orbital cannon to damage enemy buildings. Given time, you can destroy towers and even factories, giving your team a serious edge.
--The Immortal Laser Tower:
Not really invincible, but this makes it much harder for enemies to take down your laser towers. Purchase repair robots, and upgrade them to nano bots. Giving these to your laser towers makes them heal pretty fast. Unless the enemy keeps consistent pressure on your laser tower, these can nearly guarantee that your laser tower is always at full health. If the laser tower gets destroyed, the nanobots will drop on the ground and can be picked up again (by only you, I might add).
--The Bait on the Hook:
Traders make nice bait. Because they have the ability to so severely unbalance the game, people tend to be more willing to risk their lives to take them down. You can take advantage of this by teaming up with a friend. Start trading near an enemy with your friend close by. With luck, the enemy will make risky attempts to kill you. With even more luck, your friend will nab quite a few kills by exploiting this risky behavior.
--Hey! Look! Listen! Distraction!
If an enemy likes to chase you, distract them from helping their friends by leading them on a wild goose chase. The longer they spend chasing you, the less time they spend defending their control points. Co-ordinate with your team to take advantage of this.
Trader Hunting:
Contrary to popular belief, there are a lot of counters to Traders. The simplest counter is to simply have a trader of your own to match the enemy trader. However, if everyone on your team has already purchased a tank, this is not a viable solution. Instead, your team should designate someone to be the trader hunter. Copters make the best trader hunters since they fly, and with a bit of gold/skill points, move pretty fast too.
--Traders weaken the team early game:
Remember this – a team with a trader has 3000 less gold to use in combat when they start (under normal mode). Also, the trader can only stay invisible for a few seconds, and are slow too. Hit the trader early, and hit him hard. Kill him a few times and he will give up on trading in the middle and will have to resort to trading behind his front lines. It will take him longer, and he will produce less gold this way too. A trader doesn't start having a noticeable effect until he hits 20 lumber. The longer it takes him to do this, the more precious time you have to take down the side lanes. Once the side lanes are under you control, you can use the control points to harass the trader constantly.
--Harass the trader using control points:
Whenever you see the trader going for a trade point on the sides, teleport to a near-by control point and head straight for him. If he's a low enough level, his invsibility won't last long enough to save him. Early game, the more times you kill the trader, the harder it is for his team to make use of trader gold.
--MINES:
Traders don't have much life. Oftentimes, a single mine is enough to kill them. Place mines around trade points, in the path they take imbetween trade points (watch them to see which spots they go over), or if you are feeling particularly sadistic, mine their trade master if they manage to avoid the mines near the trade points, they lose ALL of their trade items when they go to turn them in. I don't like it when people do this to me because even with radar, it's hard to see those little mines, and I am so used to staring at the mini-map instead of the screen that I don't notice them at all.
--Radar:
What if the enemy trader has gotten a couple levels, and his invisibility lasts longer than you would like? Get a radar item! This will let you see him when he goes invisible. Particularly effective before the trader reaches level 10 where they get pure invincibility and before the trader gets the teleporter.
--Trader Hunter Pack:
What if the enemy trader has gotten a teleporter? Get one of your own and make a trader hunter pack. If the Trader teleports, you can teleport on top of him. Remember that if the trader is loaded with lots of trade items, it's worth it to suicide to kill him.
--Late game, the trader doesn't return to the trade master very often:
Take advantage of this! Get a teleporter, and let the trader think he's safe on his trade routes. Then when he gets too cozy, teleport on top of him, stun him and kill him! The later it is in the game, the longer the trader usually takes imbetween turn ins, so killing him wastes more of his time. In fact, the later it is in the game, the more important the trader is! A single successful turn in can result in his team getting 10k or more gold! Don't let this happen.
--Use tinker towers to act as radar towers:
Tinkers can give their towers a radar module which allows them to see invisible units. Building enough towers around the enemy's trade master can make it impossible for the trader to get a turn in if he's below level 10. You can also build towers around trade points, since traders like to turn invisible while hitting a dangerous trade point. Being able to see invisible around trade points makes it easier for trader hunters to kill traders.
Countering Trader Hunters:
--Mines:
At the very least, get the radar, if not a remote fuse too. All you can do is pay attention. Unfortunately, now you have to pay close attention to both the main screen along with the mini-map to stay alive. Because you can't buy hulls, surviving an encounter with a mine is not an option.
--Radar:
Even if your enemies can see invisible units, your shadow walk ability isn't useless. Radar only allows enemies to see invisible units close to them, so if you can teleport out of range, your invisibility will work. Even if you don't have a teleporter, Shadow walk increases your speed, so you can still use it, combined with your invulnerability to get away. You can also use magic barrier to give you an extra few seconds of life to make it to safety.
--Trader Hunter Pack:
If the enemy can also teleport, you need to only use your teleport when you can also go invisible, to make it hard for the the enemy from knowing where you teleported to. If he doesn't know where you are, he has to guess. If you are unpredictable, it's unlikely he will find you.
--Tinker Towers:
Siege pack and/or Troop Command are useful for taking out tinker towers guarding trade points. If you don't have enough money yet for those, ask for help from your team mates. Your safety is imperative towards your teams success.
--Don't be afraid to turn-in your trades early:
If there are trader hunters about, don't be afraid to turn-in your trades early. There is no penalty for this – you just waste some of your time. But you will waste less time turning in the trade early than from dying because you waited too long.
--Move to a new trade route:
If there's a particular player who is good at killing you, try to avoid him. Move to a new trade route, even if it's less profitable. Some money is more than no money. If he follows you, then try to get your team mates to push one of the lanes really hard. With luck the harassing player will be distracted by the push, and you will get a few minutes to trade in peace.
Manipulating the Dynamics of the Economy
- A guide to trading effectively in Battle Tanks -
Abstract:
Trading is the only way, besides getting player kills,to give your team more gold than the other team. As such having a good trader on a good team guarantees a victory against a similar team which ignores trading.
About Battle Tanks:
Welcome to Battle Tanks! Battletanks is an AoS style map which has been around for a long time. Battle Tanks has been around for about 3 years, and has always been a popular map amongst the Warcraft 3 community. In Battle Tanks, you purchase a tank, weapons and lay siege to your enemy's base while protecting your own. However, considering such a simple game, there is a surprising amount of depth to its gameplay. There are various dynamics which teams can take advantage of to gain the upper hand. In order to understand how these dynamics can be used to your advantage, you must understand the statics of the game.
Statics vs. Dynamics:
What is a static? What is a dynamic? Simply put, a static is a thing which does not change, while a dynamic is a thing which does change. Dynamics in Battle Tanks are things such as your teams layout, or your tanks setup. Statics are things which do not change no matter how many times you play the game, or how hard you try (unless you are a map editor, of course). Examples of statics in battle tanks are things like the number of factories you start with, the amount of money you start with, the weapons available to you, the number of conquerable control points, etc etc... It is very easy to take advantage of statics, and it is quite likely that you already have taken advantage of them. You use weapons with a longer range to defeat enemies with shorter range weapons without getting hurt. You use faster tanks to catch slower tanks. And perhaps the most basic static that people take advantage is to use stronger weapons and tanks to defeat weaker tanks.
Dynamics, on the other hand, are harder to take advantage of. Taking advantage of a dynamic might be something such as predicting the path of your enemy and ambushing him when he goes back to his control point to heal. Building a factory near your enemy's base to make it easier and faster to heal your tank when damaged is another great example of taking advantage of dynamics.
The Economy:
What does this have to do with trading, you ask? It's EVERYTHING. Consider the following hypothetical situation. You have 2 teams, both with 1 player who do nothing but sit in their bases. Who has more money at the start of the match? After 10 minutes? After 100 minutes? The answer is apparent – they both have (roughly) the same amount of money. Because there is no player interaction, the only game mechanics coming into play are the statics. Discovering the sources of income in this scenario exposes the statics of the economy. The statics of the economy (as they apply to this guide) are:
-<wrong>Income generated from killing creeps</wrong>---It turns out that this is not true - if the computer kills a creep, only a portion of this money is returned to the players. Thanks Exodus for correcting me here.
-The slow, but steady trickle of money to all players
What does this mean to you?
<wrong>First of all, because any money that your troops “steal” by killing off enemy creeps is redistributed equally across your team. So if one of your lanes is empty, your team isn't losing any income (in the long run). Second: You don't make your team stronger by getting more creep kills – you simply redistribute more of your teams collective wealth towards yourself.</wrong> - Because the computer only returns a portion of the money it collects from farming creeps, your team DOES get weaker by leaving a lane empty.
Third: What if you had a dynamic source of income to supplement this static income, which your enemy didn't have? The answer: you would have more money to spend on better weapons and better tanks than your enemy.
What are the dynamic sources of income then? The ones that I know of are:
Income from trading
Income from killing creeps created by the “Troop Command” item, and from extra factories
Income from killing enemy buildings
<correction>Income from killing normal creeps</correction> - Moved from static. See note in statics of the economy for more info.
You also have to consider dynamic income “sinks”, or things which cause your team to LOSE money:
Building a tower/factory which is then destroyed
Selling a tank or weapon (you receive only 50% of what you payed when selling an item)
Consumable items
Now that we have discussed the dynamics and statics of the economy, we can discuss how this relates to trading.
Advanced Defensive Techniques:
Trading itself is fairly straight forward. You can check out TKFs guide to understand the basics. However, there are some techniques you can use to protect your self, should you have to evade enemies. First of all, there are 3 skills you have that protect your tank against enemy players:
Shadow Walk – Turns the trader invisible for a certain amount of time, and increases the traders speed by a certain percent.
Magic Barrier – absorbs a certain amount of magical damage – this does not include damage from creeps. Only damage from skills and tank weapons are absorbed.
Invulnerability (Ultimate) – makes the trader completely invulnerable for a few seconds.
--Use the Mini-map:
When facing an enemy who doesn't try to hunt the trader, these aren't needed very often. However, talented players will make hunting the trader a priority. Because the trader can not use hulls, the trader dies very quickly later in the game. As such, you will find that in the later portion of the game, if you are being hunted, you won't be able to activate your skills in time. As such, it is CRITICAL to watch the mini-map when trading. Battle Tanks defaults to having fog of war turned off, so you can easily see when someone is heading your way on the mini-map. If someone is heading your way, run away.
--Buy a teleporter and/or speed pack:
Buying a teleporter or speed pack (or building a speed pack) grants you the ability to instantly teleport to anywhere within 3600 range. This essentially gives you an extra escape ability, and it is perfect for situations where you need to get away, FAST. However, since it requires 2 mouse clicks to use, you shouldn't try to use this as your first line of defense. It's best to make yourself invulnerable or invisible first before teleporting, giving you ample time to choose where to teleport to.
<amendment>You can double click on the teleporter/speedpack/trader hunter pack and it will tend to teleport you towards where you purchased the item, which is usually safer. So you can do this in a tight situation. --Thanks to Exodus for this info</amendment>
--Troop Command:
Troop Command allows you to periodically create a single wave of troops (the same amount a factory produces), and also increases the damage produced by all nearby allied creeps. If you are ambushed and your escape abilities are on cooldown, you can use troop command to spawn some creeps to shield yourself from the enemy's weapons. I also find it useful for distracting enemy creeps while going behind enemy lines for the more profitable trades.
--Teleport Breaker:
Enemy exploders got you down? Frustrate them with this little known item! This gem will intercept any enemy tank which tries to teleport to a location within something like 1000 range, and teleport them on top of the breaker AND stunning them for a significant duration. An exploder who thinks he's going to get an easy triple kill will be sorely surprised when he ends up on top of one of these. Teleport breakers are consumable items, so you have to buy a new one when the old one wears out.
--Buying towers:
If enemy tanks are camping your trade master, you can buy a laser tower to discourage them from getting too close. Also, if your team loses a control points cannon tower, you can replace it with a much stronger laser tower. I like to assign each laser tower a control group (by selecting the tower and hitting Ctrl + a number) so I can quickly switch to the laser tower when it's under attack by double tapping the number it's assigned on the keyboard. You can then manually control the laser tower and have it attack an enemy tank that is most likely being shielded by creeps. Remember that enemy tanks hurt your towers more than creeps, and you can get kills by controlling your towers!
Advanced Offensive Techniques:
Just because you are trading, doesn't mean you can't be more than a cash dispenser for your team! Even though you can't buy weapons, there are a variety of items you can buy to use offensively:
--Mines:
Mines detonate when an enemy gets too close to them. Even if the enemy survives the mine, they have lost a considerable portion of their health and are much easier to kill. You can buy all 3 mine layers, as they are each on a separate cooldown. This allows you to quickly place a small mine field around key objects such as control points, healers, and whatever paths your enemies tend to use.
--Troop Command:
Troop Command allows you to periodically create a single wave of troops (the same amount a factory produces), and also increases the damage produced by all nearby allied creeps. Troop Command can also be used offensively – when your team mates are pushing a lane, you can use your troops to assist them. If the enemy is running away, I like to run ahead of them and spawn creeps in their way so they can't escape the wrath of your buddies. Also, if you control the troops you spawn, you can sometimes get a solo kill by manually targetting an enemy tank.
--Orbital Cannon:
The orbital cannon is one of the lesser known items in battle tanks, which is a shame. This high-altitude weapon can be used to kill buildings, creeps and even enemy tanks. The Orbital Cannon delivers 6 area effect strikes of up to 800 damage each. Unfortunately, by the time you fulfill the orbital cannons weapons tech requirements (level 10 I think?), most players already have a heavy tank or better, so the orbital cannon can't really be used alone to get kills. However, if you have an opportunistic mind-set, you can snag a kill here and there.
--Factories:
Each factory you build spawns an extra wave of troops owned by you, periodically. These troops head straight towards the enemies base, so if you build them in your base, they will go down the middle lane. If you want them to go down the other lanes, you need to place them near your control points in these other lanes (mind you, they still go straight for the enemy base, so you still have to be careful where you put them). On top of this, you can teleport to a factory like a control point, and provide healing for you and your team mates. Factories are wonderful tools for laying siege to the enemy base. The healing they provide is often the final blow that ends in your enemy's defeat.
--Siege Pack
Siege packs spawn 3 mortar teams, and reduce the armor of nearby enemy structures. Siege packs are good tools for taking down towers to replace with your own towers. Also, they are useful for taking down those nasty laser towers in the enemy base which never seem to die easily. You can use this alongside Troop Command, and also the consumable troop/mortar team items which all have separate cooldowns. Doing this can take down enemy structures FAST.
Other Advanced Techniques:
--Delaying enemy capture of control points:
The trader acts just like a normal tank with regard to capturing control points. That means that if an enemy is trying to capture one of your control points, you can stop the timer. This is true even when you are invisible or invulnerable. Doing this can give your team mates enough time to get there and take down the enemy tanks.
--Sneaking in through the backdoor:
Because of your Shadow walk ability, you can sneak behind enemy lines and use your orbital cannon to damage enemy buildings. Given time, you can destroy towers and even factories, giving your team a serious edge.
--The Immortal Laser Tower:
Not really invincible, but this makes it much harder for enemies to take down your laser towers. Purchase repair robots, and upgrade them to nano bots. Giving these to your laser towers makes them heal pretty fast. Unless the enemy keeps consistent pressure on your laser tower, these can nearly guarantee that your laser tower is always at full health. If the laser tower gets destroyed, the nanobots will drop on the ground and can be picked up again (by only you, I might add).
--The Bait on the Hook:
Traders make nice bait. Because they have the ability to so severely unbalance the game, people tend to be more willing to risk their lives to take them down. You can take advantage of this by teaming up with a friend. Start trading near an enemy with your friend close by. With luck, the enemy will make risky attempts to kill you. With even more luck, your friend will nab quite a few kills by exploiting this risky behavior.
--Hey! Look! Listen! Distraction!
If an enemy likes to chase you, distract them from helping their friends by leading them on a wild goose chase. The longer they spend chasing you, the less time they spend defending their control points. Co-ordinate with your team to take advantage of this.
Trader Hunting:
Contrary to popular belief, there are a lot of counters to Traders. The simplest counter is to simply have a trader of your own to match the enemy trader. However, if everyone on your team has already purchased a tank, this is not a viable solution. Instead, your team should designate someone to be the trader hunter. Copters make the best trader hunters since they fly, and with a bit of gold/skill points, move pretty fast too.
--Traders weaken the team early game:
Remember this – a team with a trader has 3000 less gold to use in combat when they start (under normal mode). Also, the trader can only stay invisible for a few seconds, and are slow too. Hit the trader early, and hit him hard. Kill him a few times and he will give up on trading in the middle and will have to resort to trading behind his front lines. It will take him longer, and he will produce less gold this way too. A trader doesn't start having a noticeable effect until he hits 20 lumber. The longer it takes him to do this, the more precious time you have to take down the side lanes. Once the side lanes are under you control, you can use the control points to harass the trader constantly.
--Harass the trader using control points:
Whenever you see the trader going for a trade point on the sides, teleport to a near-by control point and head straight for him. If he's a low enough level, his invsibility won't last long enough to save him. Early game, the more times you kill the trader, the harder it is for his team to make use of trader gold.
--MINES:
Traders don't have much life. Oftentimes, a single mine is enough to kill them. Place mines around trade points, in the path they take imbetween trade points (watch them to see which spots they go over), or if you are feeling particularly sadistic, mine their trade master if they manage to avoid the mines near the trade points, they lose ALL of their trade items when they go to turn them in. I don't like it when people do this to me because even with radar, it's hard to see those little mines, and I am so used to staring at the mini-map instead of the screen that I don't notice them at all.
--Radar:
What if the enemy trader has gotten a couple levels, and his invisibility lasts longer than you would like? Get a radar item! This will let you see him when he goes invisible. Particularly effective before the trader reaches level 10 where they get pure invincibility and before the trader gets the teleporter.
--Trader Hunter Pack:
What if the enemy trader has gotten a teleporter? Get one of your own and make a trader hunter pack. If the Trader teleports, you can teleport on top of him. Remember that if the trader is loaded with lots of trade items, it's worth it to suicide to kill him.
--Late game, the trader doesn't return to the trade master very often:
Take advantage of this! Get a teleporter, and let the trader think he's safe on his trade routes. Then when he gets too cozy, teleport on top of him, stun him and kill him! The later it is in the game, the longer the trader usually takes imbetween turn ins, so killing him wastes more of his time. In fact, the later it is in the game, the more important the trader is! A single successful turn in can result in his team getting 10k or more gold! Don't let this happen.
--Use tinker towers to act as radar towers:
Tinkers can give their towers a radar module which allows them to see invisible units. Building enough towers around the enemy's trade master can make it impossible for the trader to get a turn in if he's below level 10. You can also build towers around trade points, since traders like to turn invisible while hitting a dangerous trade point. Being able to see invisible around trade points makes it easier for trader hunters to kill traders.
Countering Trader Hunters:
--Mines:
At the very least, get the radar, if not a remote fuse too. All you can do is pay attention. Unfortunately, now you have to pay close attention to both the main screen along with the mini-map to stay alive. Because you can't buy hulls, surviving an encounter with a mine is not an option.
--Radar:
Even if your enemies can see invisible units, your shadow walk ability isn't useless. Radar only allows enemies to see invisible units close to them, so if you can teleport out of range, your invisibility will work. Even if you don't have a teleporter, Shadow walk increases your speed, so you can still use it, combined with your invulnerability to get away. You can also use magic barrier to give you an extra few seconds of life to make it to safety.
--Trader Hunter Pack:
If the enemy can also teleport, you need to only use your teleport when you can also go invisible, to make it hard for the the enemy from knowing where you teleported to. If he doesn't know where you are, he has to guess. If you are unpredictable, it's unlikely he will find you.
--Tinker Towers:
Siege pack and/or Troop Command are useful for taking out tinker towers guarding trade points. If you don't have enough money yet for those, ask for help from your team mates. Your safety is imperative towards your teams success.
--Don't be afraid to turn-in your trades early:
If there are trader hunters about, don't be afraid to turn-in your trades early. There is no penalty for this – you just waste some of your time. But you will waste less time turning in the trade early than from dying because you waited too long.
--Move to a new trade route:
If there's a particular player who is good at killing you, try to avoid him. Move to a new trade route, even if it's less profitable. Some money is more than no money. If he follows you, then try to get your team mates to push one of the lanes really hard. With luck the harassing player will be distracted by the push, and you will get a few minutes to trade in peace.
hock: 
