IMMORTAL: Gates of Pyre – Orzum Guide

How to Play Orzum

By Ytlander.

Prerequisite Knowledge:

Play around with the Q’rath faction, familiarize yourself with the names of the buildings and units.

Orzum’s Strengths:

  • High health units
  • Strong defense
  • Passive pyre income from Citadels

Orzum’s Weaknesses:

  • Only one pyre ability that works in combat
  • Can sometimes get stuck in a defensive position

Opening Build Order:

  • Acropolis (expansion)
  • Ether Extractor
  • Legion Hall
  • Reliquary
  • 2x Zentari
  • Mining upgrade on expansion
  • Soul Foundry
  • 2x Zentari
  • Legion Hall
  • Here is a good first time to produce until population capped
  • Ether Extractor
  • Ether Surge
  • Angelarium (Get 1 Scepter when the Angelarium is done)
  • Legion Hall
  • Keeper of the Hardened Flame (start upgrading armor and attack as soon as this is done)
  • Monastery of Izur
  • Acropolis (third base)
  • House of the Fading Saints
  • Add Legion Halls and Soul Foundries for more production and population capacity
  • In the late game, get get a few more Angelariums for Shar’u and/or Throne production

Notes on the Opening

I haven’t added what units to build when except for the first 4 Zentari. The rule of thumb is to always fill population and continue with the build order after that. As you get more familiar with the game you will start to learn when you can wait with unit production in favour of faster tech or more economy.

With this opening you get all the basic parts of the tech tree. The only thing your are lacking are higher tech structures. The style I like to play is quite active. The first two Zentari want to go out and take your closest pyre camp that spawns a pyre miner. They can do it but will get pretty hurt so you want to spend your first 25 pyre on upgrading your forward tower core into a citadel for healing.

The rest of the early game is continuing to take pyre as much as you can around the map. The opening build order is quite greedy so you will need to keep an eye on your opponent, if you see them getting lots of production structures early you could wait with the expansion mining upgrade and get 2 Legion Halls before Reliquary and Soul Foundry.

The greed does let you lean into the strengths of Orzum. Zentari are very strong on hallowed ground (the blue area around your buildings). In Immortal production structures can usually train more than one unit at once which makes reacting to incoming attacks easier than in other RTS games and the defenders advantage is very strong.

This is why we want to be greedy in the early game. We never cancel the natural, even if the opponent goes for a one base play. If we are really scared we can turn of worker production at the natural, skip ether and just build legion halls and Zentari and we should be able to defend any one base attack (we have to be a bit careful about a rush for air units, after holding of an initial attack, make sure to get some Zephyr).

You can use the same opening when playing Ajari but some adjustments need to be made to army composition. I won’t go into detail about playing Ajari in this guide.

Army Composition

The bulk of your army consists of Zentari and Zephyr with Dervish and Magi support. After getting an Angelarium you want to add in Scepters. They are a good addition to your main army, they are surprisingly tanky for an air unit and they can pick of key units with their charged shot. You can also split a couple of the off to do some harassment of enemy worker lines. After the opening build order is done, you have access to the Hallower. You will want to get about 6 of them.

They are quite strong but they tend to overkill their targets if you got too many and they cannot fight well without support. For the late game you will want to add in Shar’u or Thrones. I prefer Shar’u as they are a bit more mobile and Awestrike helps controlling the battlefield. There is a also an added benefit for going for Shar’u since the Eye of Aros contains an upgrade for the Zentari that makes them even tankier!

Playstyle

I usually try to control the map as much as possible. Get as much Pyre and Citadels as you can. I usually don’t spend pyre on Rook of Ira that much, but can be placed at your third and natural if you want to play more defensive. I like to save that Pyre for Pillar of the Heavens. Pillar is best used when attacking an enemy base so that if they retreat (which they should, since the Pillar itself deals a lot of damage when landing) they will loose ground and you will have a superior position. You also get an attack speed boost when standing close to the Pillar after it has landed.

After the opening I like to try and roam the map, keep a scout on both my opponents possible foruth base locations and if I can I try to limit them to only having three bases. I usually go for a lot of units at this stage and stick to the tech level that the opening build order gives me. After getting into a position where I feel confident to take a fourth base I tech into Shar’u.

If you can, you want to roam around your opponents potential fourth base locations, use the range of the Hallowers to take pot shots at the opponents army. If they engage you and you feel you can fight, siege your Magi and try to make sure that the Zentari are in front. When the Zentari are about to die off, you need to retreat as the rest of your army relies on them tanking for you.

That’s all! I really appreciate it if you’ve made it this far. See you in the game!

Volodymyr Azimoff
About Volodymyr Azimoff 8013 Articles
I love games and I live games. Video games are my passion, my hobby and my job. My experience with games started back in 1994 with the Metal Mutant game on ZX Spectrum computer. And since then, I’ve been playing on anything from consoles, to mobile devices. My first official job in the game industry started back in 2005, and I'm still doing what I love to do.

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