Warcraft is an online game. The Frozen Throne and World of WarCraft are two popular versions of it.

Beyond Warcraft a video from YouTube user Beyond1337 (Beyond Leet)
You can see the emphasis on hero killing.

In SouthPark's Make Love Not WarCraft, one player spends all his time playing World of WarCraft and becomes unbeatable, so strong as to be beyond the control of Blizzard Entertainment itself. He breaks the rules and Blizzard ponders how to terminate his account? A player that spends all his time playing WarCraft is said to, "have no life". Blizzard's management asks the question, "How do you kill that which has no life?" You can find it most likely by searching YouTube.com. They keep pulling it, I suppose for legal reasons. But people keep putting it back. It is a must see. Below is a short clip of it from Comedy Central:
                

VOD ShYGuY's one versus one WarCraft III game below from YouTube. The game shows some basic concepts of the game. Both players scout, trying to find the other's base, with ShYGuY rushing his opponent and achieving the quick win. Watch how ShYGuY jumps quickly around the map, trying to make as many effective commands to his units as possible. The mini-map in the lower left of his screen shows where on the map he is working on. I guess we could say he is multi-tasking. Also watch as runs his injured units back to prevent them from taking further damage. His build order has probably been planned out and repeated many times, and he also probably knows this map like the back of his hand.
          

There was a Shaman, who was just and fair. Once he encountered a strong and wise dragon. When he finally slayed it (with 50% of life lost), a dragon's spirit appeared in front of him. Dragon spirit: "Shaman, you are strong, wise and fair. For that, I will grant you three wishes" Shaman: "My first wish is that I have unique full Shaman gear." And the Shaman appears in plus 2000 all skills and resistances, stamina, intellect, strength, agility, spirit... and cool brown-colored gear. Dragon Spirit: "Your wish came true. What do you want now?" Shaman: "I want to switch my class to utterly invincible class!" And the Shaman appears in a class called Uberalles with all available armors and weapons with mana, rage and energy bar. Dragon spirit: "You have one last wish, Shaman" Uberalles: "I want my class to be invincible!" And he became a Shaman again.

What do you call a gnome on a firing range.
Target practice.
What do you call a fat gnome on a firing range.
Target practice for noobs.

A blonde mage human was speeding with her mount on the roads in Elwynn forest when a blonde female paladin cop pulls her over. The mage says: "what is the problem ma'am?" Cop: "You were speeding, it's only allowed to drive at 200% max here, you were going 250%. I'll be needing your driver license." The mage starts searching her purse looking very confused. After a while the cop says: "it's something small with your picture on it." The blonde mage as stupid as she is pulls out her make-up mirror, "here you go ma’am" The cop looks at it and says: "Oh, I'm sorry I didn't knew you were a cop also, proceed."

What do you call a gnome married to a beautiful female Night Elf? Rich!

How do you make a dead gnome float? Take one dead gnome and two scoops of ice cream...

• How many Gnomes does it take to paint your wall? It depends on how hard you throw them.
• So, a Tauren in full Lightforge armor walks into a bar. The barman says "Holy cow."
• Why did the Tauren cross the street? To get to the udder side.

An alliance army is marching across the barrens to raid Orgrimmar when a Shaman comes running up and makes a rude gesture at the General. The General points to two of his soldiers and orders them to kill the Shaman. The Shaman runs away round a mountain and the soldiers follow. After a few minutes the Shaman comes back with no sign of the Alliance soldiers. He insults the General who promptly sends ten officers to kill the Shaman. The Shaman runs round the hill and returns again. The General getting very annoyed orders forty men to kill the shaman. They all chase him round the hill and for ten minutes nothing happens. Then one badly wounded soldier comes back limping and says "Sir, it was a trap! There's two of them!"

• The alliance killed a Shaman and Blizzard shut down the server to investigate.
• What do you call a gnome in a kodos-herd? Roadkill!
• What's the difference between a Gnome and a trampoline? You take your shoes off to jump on a trampoline.
• What's the difference between a run-over critter and a run-over Gnome? There's skid marks before the critter. 
• What do you call 50 Gnomes at the bottom of Loch Modan? A good start.

• Why didn't the Undead cross the road? Cause he didn't have the guts!
• How do you stop a Gnome from drowning? Take your foot off his head.
• How do you make a Gnome drink ? Put it in the liquidizer for 10 minutes....
• Patch 1.9 notes: - Due to a bug Shamans sometimes died in combat, that bug is now fixed.
• How many undead rogues does it take to change a lightbulb? Two. One to remove the broken lamp with his 1337 n1nj4 skillz while the other gets his mother since he is only 14.
• How many Paladins does it take to change a lightbulb? None, shield + hearthstone.
• What's the difference between a Gnome and a basketball? You don't kick a basketball...
• When you are killed by a Druid, it is considered death by natural causes?

Random Team 4 v 4 Strategy

The first and probably most important thing to do is work together. Defend your allies on the end from a harass. It helps to park yourself halfway to their base early in the game. Pay attention to all skirmishes. Make units. Towers are of limited value when four teams can attack one base. The further you are away from your base, the more you need to creep together. Be fair about items dropped by creeps. Creep or attack the enemy, don’t just sit in your base.

Night Elves are the best race for RT 4 v 4. A good build order is this: Three wisps in the mine, one to the Alter, one on wood. Next wisp to moon well. Next wisp to Ancient of War (AOW). Next wisp to mine. All future wisps to wood. Alter wisp goes to mine. Have a total of 6 wisps on wood. Go to two AOWs, at about five minutes into the game. Don’t tower your base. Your allies will have to help deal with a harass. Do not build an Elf Trap, where all your buildings are packed together. Build open so that your allies can portal in and move around.

The Hero to use is the Priestess of the Moon. Her potentially game winning ultimate, Trueshot Aura, and Owl scout, make her the most consistent hero. You should be able to learn Owl Scout if the BladeMaster shows up. Skill points should favor Trueshot, then Owl Scout.

The unit of course is mass archers. These ladies do arguably the most damage when considering food and cost. The are decent anti-air. Their weakness is low hit points. In mass battles, range has the advantage. If there is lag, can you can’t control your troops, they free fire the best, like a tower. Since you aren’t teching, you are always ready to fight, a good consistent strategy.

If you have time to micro, pull the archer taking damage back behind your lines and then re-engage her when they break off their attack. It makes the other team chase instead of hit. I sometimes get to three control groups. That’s a lot of damage output. One thing to do is to make holes in your archer line by moving three or four of them forward so that the melee units can move into the battle. Archers and grunts are the only tier one units then can fight tier three units. The archer’s most important upgrade is increased range. Favor damage upgrades over armor. Good Luck and Have Fun playing Night Elves.

It’s JokeCat's opinion about 2 v 2 Random Team Ladder is that, it is too different from 4 v 4. There ought to be separate ladders for 2 v 2, 3 v 3, and 4 v 4. RT 4 v 4 is the game, you players know it, but the top ranked ladder players hardly play it. For fun, for odd things you never saw before, for seeing noobs do stupid things, you play 4 v 4. What you started playing on Reign of Chaos, when it came out was 4 v 4. You deal with the most random match-ups and that ought to entitle you to your own ladder. You aren’t playing solo or half solo, you are playing Random. It’s an insult to you that 2 v 2 players can be on your ladder, and Battle.net should value its users like you, a little higher.

The second easiest race to play in Random Team is Orc.

You play a tier one meat shield, and provide Bloodlust, relying on your allies to deliver damage, and to cover anti-air. A good build is four peons in the gold mine and one to the alter. The next peon builds a Ziggurat, and the one after that a Barracks. The rest go to wood until you have a total of seven on wood. The alter peon goes into the mine.

The hero is the Tauren Chieftain. His endurance aura is right up there with Trueshot. As soon as you have two Grunts, start creeping and don’t stop until you hit level 5, rally point your hero. 

Always build a shop and use healing salve on the Grunts. The grunts most important upgrade is level one armor, followed by Berserker Strength, and then more armor. Learning Pillage is a tough call, since once you are attacking the buildings, the game is usually already won.

As long as you keep making grunts, you can take your two hall upgrades to get to tier three and Bloodlust. Build at least one Spirit lodge as soon as possible and of course you devote all to reaching Bloodlust while having sufficient Grunts. Stop only when you get to eleven Grunts. 

A nice little bonus is to Bloodlust the heroes on the way to a battle, along with any high impact tier three units. Auto-cast otherwise.

Your Chieftain is played carefully, in his own control group. He is an aura hero that stands behind the skirmish line and only jumps in to stomp, and then retreats. His skill points favor Endurance Aura, and then stomp.

In the face of heavy air, you can switch to headhunters, and research their first damage upgrade. Remind your allies to equip their heroes with orbs.

You can see that you are teching with units, decent, able to play tier three, units.

The Simpsons - World of WarCraft

More general Random Team 4 versus 4 Strategy

• Do not skip making tier one units. Yes it can be done, it has been done to you by the other team in the past, but you should be ready for a rush.
• You should know when to use your first scroll of town portal? Count the attacking teams. The closer your base is to one being the attacked, the more likely you should use it. Your ally on the opposite site of the map from the base being attacked, is the last to portal in, only when four teams have been identified as attacking. If you get an expansion, get a 2nd scroll of town portal. Always build a shop, so you and your allies can move around the map.
• Talk to your allies early on. Decide what heroes and units you are getting. Discuss who is getting what counter to an unexpected threat?
• Watch the mini map constantly. Changes in it almost always require your action.
• Scout. The Priestess excels because she can scout with her owl.
• When your ally commits to a battle, you commit to it. He may be wrong, but you can't win with all his troops dead anyway. You might as well follow him.
• Share gold on maps that only have two natural expansions. Give resources to a hurting ally if they ask for it.
• Try to make more than one unit. Just melee or just air doesn't seem to work as well as a better mix.
• Start your damage and armor upgrades before tier 2. Less upgraded units frequently are better than more un-upgraded units.
• You should use a gaming pad as your eyes don't have to leave the screen. After 20 games with a game pad, you won't be able to play without one.
• When your allies agree to a rush, rush with everything you have.
• Do not get caught creeping and die. Use your town portal. Good teams will kill you in the middle, and then make their main attack to try to win the game.
• Start a counter after every major battle you win. You can always stop before you reach the enemy's base or run away from a failed counter.
• If you are skipping tier one, inform your allies so they can compensate.
• If you are creeping and your ally needs help, leave the creeps.
• Most of these are just common sense rules. Good Luck and Have Fun.

There was a WarCraft II clan called Wind Clan. Mostly the game was to tower rush computers. WindChimes, Artic~Wind, and DrunkinSailor would usually play together along with a 4th player, perhaps some noob that didn't know how to tower rush. These three players were pretty much retired from ladder games. Though not perfect, they were three of the most interesting players on Battle.net.
 
Things change over time and the Wind Clan seems to have disappeared. The introduction of WarCraft III had something to do with it, and there was other factors that some remember. There was one of our maps that made the transition to WarCraft III, sort of. The Art of Defense. We had some of our best games with that one. We miss you Lynn.

Signs of the Impending Apocalypse as witnessed in DotA games:

People who enter a random game, re-pick, and then leave. If people can't at least make a try at a hero they aren't good at, they shouldn't waste nine other peoples time by joining random games. People should not be so selfish and inconsiderate.
People who can't play one ally short, especially at the beginning of a game. The second player to leave the game, when it has just turned to 4 versus 5, will most certainly work at a less than ideal job, perhaps making French fries, their entire life.
People who type the word "lag" when the game lags. It is as if they go through life, naming things they see: "Dog" "Car" "Woman" "Tree" Or maybe they only name things they dislike? "Litter" "Mean Dog" Traffic Jam" Well in any case, this statement of the obvious isn't as common as it used to be.
People who type the word "stay" when someone on the other team leaves, usually giving an advantage to the one doing the typing. I doubt few who would leave have changed their action by seeing that someone has typed "stay"
People who can't wait 30 seconds for the game to start, once the room is full. This situation has improved some what. Not too long ago, most start rooms consisted of imbeciles chanting “go“. This proved to me that said players lacked the ability to even find a variation of the word “go“. Still it is troubling that many don’t seem to have the attention span of a 4 year old.  MORE SIGNS

Offensive Towers

"Towers work great for defense, by why not use them offensively? Early on players discovered that Towers can actually be used as siege weapons, and with much more effectiveness than Catapults. While Catapults have long range and deal more damage, Towers can be repaired and kept alive for much longer. When training Catapults, Barracks are unable to train Footmen, but when using Towers Barracks can continue to build Footmen while building and using Towers at the same time."

"To use this strategy you need a Lumber Mill for Guard Towers. Once you have that, you only need to find the enemy."   -for more from Battle.net click here

From Gamerdad: WarCraft III review for Parents:
by Andrew Bub July 15, 2003

"Warcraft III is violent (it is an RTS) and the storyline is invariably dark and intense. But the cartoon-like graphics make it feel friendly and the storytelling is simple yet sophisticated enough to make it good for younger gamers. The strategy is simple (you only have a handful of units in your army, as well as a hero or two) but deep (you have to level your hero, effectively use spells, and keep your army alive) and it'll make your kids think. Teaching them to plan ahead and use what they have effectively to win."

JokeCat comments: Both WarCraft III and World of WarCraft (WoW) can be played solo or as part of a team. Team games probably rate a little higher than solo games because they reward effective communication and awareness of a more complex situation involving allies.

WarCraft III offers solo ladder where most agree the top players are found. It has arranged team ladder where two, three, or four allies play another team knowing in advance they will be on the same side. And JokeCat's favorite, random team ladder, where two, three or four allies chosen at random play another team also picked at random. Random team 4 v. 4 is the most unpredictable, the most challenging, and the most fun.  

The question might be, is it better that your child play solo or team games? Some of both. At times they will have to do it all, and at times they will have to be part of a team. JokeCat finds it rewarding, to either provide support leading to a win, and to occasionally make the game winning move.

Part of WarCraft is losing to other players. I'd pay attention to how your child handles that? Perhaps the appeal of WarCraft is starting out as someone who is going to lose just about every game, but then finding solutions, corrections, changes in what one does, and then seeing that lead to a higher victory percentage. I'd guess most successful video games involve the requirement that one learn how to play, before one is rewarded with victory.

World of Warcraft review for Parents
by Dr. Matt J. Carlson November 08, 2005 

"Massively multiplayer online games can easily become addictive as there is always something more to do or to see. The temptation to play just a little more may be too much for younger kids who are inclined to be a bit obsessive about their entertainment. In addition, the game is a way for hundreds of people to mix and interact in the impersonal setting of the internet. While there are some nice filters to prevent most obscene language, they aren't going to be perfect. The game itself is quite tame with very little blood and gore, even though killing humanoids or animals play a large part of the game. Female characters tend to show an unrealistic amount of skin when armor-clad, and the night elf women have somewhat suggestive dancing animations, but for the genre the graphics are rather tame. Due to the unknown of playing with internet strangers and the danger of addictive play habits, I'd recommend the game to kids high school or older. If a child is supervised, such as playing along with a parent or older sibling, there shouldn't be too much problem with the game at even younger ages." - More from Gamerdad.com

John Carmack Cells It 
The legendary programmer behind Doom and Quake talks about his new project—making great games for your mobile phone.

By N'Gai Croal - Newsweek - Updated: 1:21 a.m. CT May 14, 2006 
With games like Wolfenstein 3D, Doom and Quake, computer programmer John Carmack is widely considered as one of the fathers of the popular—and sometimes controversial—first-person-shooter genre of videogames. Even with all his success, the 35-year-old remains at heart a tinkerer, shown by his longtime interest in rockets, and, more recently, games for mobile phones, including Doom RPG [role-playing game], a translation of the PC classic. NEWSWEEK's N'Gai Croal caught up with Carmack a few days before the start of the annual Electronic Entertainment Expo (E3)—the world's biggest videogame conference—to discuss his upcoming mobile phone game, Orcs & Elves. More at: MSNBC

A short story on World of WarCraft from the New Zealand television show Campbell Live. From YouTube user: ubnerlewt. It provides a good overview of what the game is, with good quality on-screen images, and touches on some potential problems and social issues.

Frozen Throne Review

The Frozen Throne also features numerous gameplay balance adjustments and interface tweaks, though almost all of these are now available in a downloadable patch for anyone who owns the original game. Many units and buildings have lower costs than before, making the early part of a Warcraft III match go by even faster as you quickly muster a respectable force. New early-game defensive structures are available to discourage hero rushing, a popular tactic in the original Warcraft III. The upkeep system has been adjusted to let you marshal larger armies without incurring a penalty to your income, and the unit limit has also been increased slightly. The system used to determine how different weapon types affect different armor types has been overhauled to better balance ranged, melee, flying, and spellcasting units. More from GameSpot.com

What is the worth of words?
Will it matter if people can’t read in the future?

By Michael Rogers Columnist Updated: 11:45 a.m. CT Sept 14, 2006

“Literacy experts and educators say they are stunned by the results of a recent adult literacy assessment, which shows that the reading proficiency of college graduates has declined in the past decade, with no obvious explanation.

“’It's appalling -- it's really astounding,’ said Michael Gorman, president of the American Library Association and a librarian at California State University at Fresno. ‘Only 31 percent of college graduates can read a complex book and extrapolate from it. That's not saying much for the remainder.’” --The Washington Post, December 25, 2005

December 25, 2025 — Educational doomsayers are again up in arms at a new adult literacy study showing that less than 5 percent of college graduates can read a complex book and extrapolate from it.

The obsessive measurement of long-form literacy is once more being used to flail an education trend that is in fact going in just the right direction. Today’s young people are not able to read and understand long stretches of text simply because in most cases they won’t ever need to do so.

It’s time to acknowledge that in a truly multimedia environment of 2025, most Americans don’t need to understand more than a hundred or so words at a time, and certainly will never read anything approaching the length of an old-fashioned book. We need a frank reassessment of where long-form literacy itself lies in the spectrum of skills that a modern nation requires of its workers. - More from: MSNBC

JokeCat comments: Does it matter that many players on Battle.net communicate using their abbreviated language? Ur instead of You're, 4 instead of for, i instead of I, sum1 for someone? One really sees some atrocious typing that while it may have originated from text messaging, to use it while a normal keyboard is available, seems strange. JokeCat doesn't understand it, but he is old and perhaps that's why he doesn't get it?

                    
DotA Allstars Endless Story from user: GamesPeru
        
The goal of Defense of the Ancients (DotA) game is to destroy the enemies base. Heroes fight each other and waves of creeps that advance from their own base to the enemies. Heroes advance levels as they gain experience by killing the opposing forces. As the heroes become stronger the creeps and static defenses become relatively weaker, the game becomes a heroes versus heroes game. The 'Ancients' referred to in the title are some of the Night Elf buildings found in the Sentinel team's base. These ancients are living trees with special abilities. Perhaps it can be said that the Night Elves reason for being is to protect the forest where they live, the Defense of the Ancients.

Orb effects do not stack
A table from the Defense of the Ancients game explaining how different purchased items with special effects interact.


Specific Hero orb effects Table

"We're sitting here in Ventrilo playing some DotA. We push on and we're owning, with the opponents we're toying. We're sitting here in Ventrilo playing some DotA. Running around creeping, the opponents we're sleeping." - The DotA song - Basshunter:

In the World of WarCraft game there are jokes for each race. The characters will tell jokes in game when you use the slash command “/silly”. The character will then deliver a joke, spoken with the proper voice accent of their race that often relates to some attribute of that their race. 

The ten races of WoW are: Blood Elves, Draenei, Dwarves, Gnomes, Human, Night Elves, Orcs, Tauren, Trolls, and Undead. This compares to the four races of WarCraft III: Human, Orc, Night Elf, and Undead. And this compares again to the two races of the original WarCraft and WarCraft II: Human and Orc.

WarCraft races establish base attributes. Generally Orcs are melee with high hit points, while Night elves are ranged with low hit points. It's the difference between a warrior with a sword and one with a bow.

World of WarCraft top Blunder.
One member successfully kills entire team via his stupidity:

Halo trash-talking video. Though not specifically about WarCraft, this video pretty accurately translates to DotA games. I am not aware of any team chat being available for The Frozen Throne, so the trash-talking is done via keyboards. 

Old Persons Guide to DotA

One way of looking at the game is the killers versus the farmers. A farmer tries to get money to get better items than his opponents and avoids most hero battles, to come back later with something like a Monkey King Bar. The hero killer is looking for money and experience from killing the farmers. Farming is easier, and doesn't require so much eye-hand co-ordination. But it can pay off, when you have avoided getting killed too much, and accumulated good items. While farming, watch the mini-map, and run towards all nearby hero battles, and access the odds of winning before you get there. You still help your allies, putting them first when they may be in trouble.

It's generally easier to farm with ranged agility heroes like Razor or the Troll. At mid levels, they are going to do good damage and attack fast. Generally, you want things like a Buriza and a Monkey King Bar, as they all ready attack fast, so increasing agility heroes damage is more effective than increasing their speed. Naix is the hero that farms creeps the most, disappearing at early levels. He is too easy to nuke early, so even the most talented player will farm neutral creeps with him. Farming items for ranged include Maelstrom for ranged, and Battle Fury for melee. It helps to have life steal, as you don't want to be running back to the well frequently when you are farming neutral creeps.

DotA is a team game. The mini-map is so important. You should turn off the terrain feature, so that it is black except for creeps and heroes, and then the enemy heroes stand out better. You need to look at it about every 2 seconds, and support your allies. Try this: when an attack has broken down and you and an ally are running for you lives, compare your HPs. If yours is significantly greater, try to block for them. Or disable the pursuer, if you can. Similar to this is: Following your ally when he chases deep into enemy territory. You aren't trying to stun his quarry, or kill it, but are there to protect him once he turns and runs. The other team will be watching the mini map and converging on your ally. I think it's important to follow your allies.

You need to use a gaming pad. I use just a few programmed buttons. "A" for attack, and "1" for my control group, that contains my hero, and sometimes summoned units. (Control groups are formed by holding "control", and hitting a single number.) You can add control groups for things like your summons, or leavers. I have a total of 3 control groups. The control pad will, by hitting "1" twice, instantly find your hero. Another button I use is F1 which also brings up your hero. I am so used to setting control groups in Ladder, where you control 12 troops at a time, that F1 is handy as a reflex act, a button that pulls only my hero, when I am trying to save him. There is one more programmed button I use, the DEL key, that show health for all troops on your screen. After 20 games of Ladder or DotA with a gaming pad, you wont be able to play without one. It's natural, even easier than typing, and required for old people looking for an edge. The younger plays can program macros on the fly, or even have them pre-loaded onto their game pad. With that, they can cast spells using the gaming pad. They also can play without a game pad, using their left hand to cover the entire keyboard.

All heroes are different. Unless you are winning easily, go with what you have. With agility, go for damage and perhaps survivability if you are getting nuked. With strength, I usually try for attack speed, or armor, especially if I am expected to tank for my allies. With intelligence, you might go for damage, survivability, Eye of Skadi, boots of travel, or maybe Scythe of Vyse.

As the game progresses, things become more important. Revive times are longer, the enemies ability to do damage increases, and they can drop your key buildings quickly. You need stay alive and fight together. A good late game item is a simple scroll of town portal, giving you the ability to protect your base while trying to destroy theirs.

If there is one thing to know about DotA it is to, fight together.

DotA Hosts:

DotA games require a host to create a game with the DotA map and then start the game when the waiting room is full. Some hosts have some extra software that allows them to eject players, after the game has started, as they see fit. While they have a right to do this, I feel they should disclose this before starting the game. To disclose for instance that, if they are losing the game, they will even things up. That if someone on the Scourge is owning them, they may decide to boot them. I think they should disclose that this is really their little kingdom of a game, and they will do as they wish, not unlike some 4 year old. You can find a program that boots players by Googling: “ShadowFrench Hack.”, though I am against the use of such programs.  MORE DotA Hosts

Notable WarCraft Insults:

Four years of college and that’s the best reply you can come up with? That was a good use of your parent’s money.

You are a loser in life. (In reply to someone doing a verbal victory dance in the end zone.)

You’re All Hat, No Cattle.

When this game is over, you will still be a bagboy, and I will still be telling you I prefer paper and not plastic

Send JokeCat your Notable Insults. Insults that probably wont make the cut would be those indicating a dysfunctional opinion of women, gays, or blacks, by the sender.

WarCraft Hacks

It’s my opinion that WarCraft hacks exist, but I have never downloaded one. I have found two sources of them: ShadowFrench and ZeroGamers. While neither are endorsed, ZeroGamers is Less Than Zero and you should not get one from them if you decide you need one. (Pictured here is ZeroGamer's VIP Access Toilet Seat Cover. I guess these guys skipped marketing class.) ShadowFrench should be your source because he doesn’t want your money. ZeroGamers will charge you for the ones they probably stole from ShadowFrench. What a way to make money? I think that any hack you use will eventually be caught by Battle.net, and your Ladder record will then be toasted, 86ed, history. If you are an idiot, believe ZeroGamers boasts about how good their software is. You really want to let your ladder record be dependent on the word of some 17 year old teenager.  MORE WarCraft Hacks

What to do about lag?

Lag can cause you to be unable to command your forces when you most need to. The simple answer is to buy a better computer with more MegaBytes. But some other things you can do are, turn off all non-required programs before logging onto Battle.net. I'd leave security type programs on, but shut everything you don't need off. You can also take some work load off your computer by adjusting the WarCraft Video settings downward. You will lose some detail, but it should help with lag. To do this, get one step from logging onto to Battle.net, Click on Options, then Video. Adjust the following settings: Model Detail, Animation Quality, Texture Quality, Particle, Lights, and Spell Detail. Try setting them all on Medium if some of them are set higher. If they are all ready at Medium, set them all to Low. Each downward step in quality, is in theory making it easier on your computer.

Another thing you can do is bring up the Run box usually found on your Start Menu. Type in "msconfig". Click on the "Startup" tab. You will see at least some of the programs your computer starts every time it boots. You generally don't need to boot programs like Adobe or Quicktime, they boot when you need them, so un-check ones like those, with the goal of having less programs running the background, and improving the performance of your computer. You generally do need your security programs, and many I don't even understand, so leave those alone. When changing things here in the System Configuration Utility, be cautious, even writing down your changes. If you see a program that you don't recognize, Google it's complete name, and you can usually find out what it does?