Resources in DotA 2

One aspect that is important in Real Time Strategy (RTS) style games (DotA being considered an Action RTS, or ARTS) is resource accumulation and usage. There are some very obvious resources in DotA 2, but there are also some hidden ones, as well as actions directly linked to resources.

In short:

• Obvious Resources
• Gold
• Experience
• More Subtle Resources
• Intelligence / Vision
• Gold - Reliable
• Gold - Unreliable
• Inventory
• Linked Resources
• Time
• Structures

The Obvious Resources

There are two resources that should become apparent very quickly:

1. Gold
2. Experience

These resources are directly linked to your hero and your team, to some extent. There isn't a huge amount going on at the surface level here. You want to accumulate a lot of both of these resources and eventually use your advantage to win the game.

To most new players, it should be pretty clear that you want to be in experience range, denies help you build an early level advantage, etc. Similarly, you want to get last hits, hero kills, tower razes, etc.

Because of how important Experience is, you see heroes like the 6.79 incarnation of Lich making quite an impact on the pro scene. Now that Sacrifice gives you XP for your own creep, you can build an advantage a lot faster. If you Sacrifice far enough back, you also deny your opponent the XP and the change to get the last hit (and therefore Gold).

More Subtle Resources

Some resources are just less obvious because there is no number associated with them, while others are hidden by less apparent mechanics.

Intelligence / Vision

This is an invaluable resource that there is no number or score for. It's something that over time, players pick up on the common sense that the more they can see, the better decisions they can make. Vision is important across all RTS rooted games. For instance, StarCraft players constantly scout and collect information about their opponent.

In DotA, this is important enough that Observer Wards have a cap and restock time, or how the 6.79 tweak to Night Stalker's ult limiting vision propelled him into a top tier pick.

Vision isn't just important for seeing enemy movement, it also allows you to inspect their inventories and make better judgements on what build you should use or gauging what kind of strategy they are aiming for.

Alternative Forms of Intel

From a different angle, you can learn a lot from the Intel you don't have too. For instance, when you only see one hero farming a lane on the other team, the 4 that are missing can give you a big hint that something else is in the works, be it a gank, Roshing, or what have you. Regardless, having good Vision tells you a lot even in this case because you know all the places they are not at.

Good Vision can also lead to good Counter-Intelligence (i.e. Counter-Warding). You'll often see top tier teams like Alliance put up wards even before Rune Spawn so that they can see when the opposing Supports go to Ward and where they Ward. This allows them to knock out their Vision and take advantage of the opposing team's lack of knowledge.

One other important way to collect knowledge is from getting caught out, killed, or failing a gank due to the opponent backing. Often, this tells you that they had Vision of you, like getting ganked at the Secret Shop, or seeing an opponent back as you sneak up on their flank.

Heroes and Intel

A number of top tier picks are valuable because of the Intel they provide. This also becomes an integral part of the balancing process because that extra utility needs to be factored in.

Some major examples:

• Batrider - gives flying vision while using Firefly. This allows you to scout out areas like the Rosh pit, or find heroes juking through the jungle
• Clockwerk - Rocket Flare allows you to scout as it moves, but it also gives you 10 seconds of vision at the impact site.
• Templar Assassin - Psi Traps are good for monitoring high traffic areas like ramps, gank paths, Runes, and Roshan
• Slark - his ultimate's passive will deactivate if they have vision of you. Often, this is a good indicator that an enemy ward is nearby.
• Luna - Lunar Blessing will passively give you better than average vision at night

Reliable Gold

This is a mechanic that many newer players overlook, but it is incredibly important. Reliable Gold is gold that is absolutely safe when you die. That means it is safe and available for Buy Back, or that you can play riskier if more of your money is Reliable.

Reliable Gold is earned basically by achieving "objectives" or playing aggressively. You can earn it from:

• Getting Kills
• Destroying Towers
• Killing Roshan
• Using Hand of Midas

When you die, Reliable Gold is used first when buying back. When you make an item purchase, Unreliable Gold is used first.

The basic idea of this type of currency is that you are rewarded for doing things that progress the game or make it exciting. And by having reliable gold, you're at a lower risk when you attempt a risky play. Because you don't lose Reliable Gold on death, it's an incredibly important resource to have and manage.

Unreliable Gold

Though Unreliable Gold is less useful than Reliable Gold, it's still important. When you make item purchases, it's much better to use up Unreliable Gold and try to leave your Reliable Gold available for buy backs or very important item purchases. This is often why you see players with Hand of Midas building up a large pile of Gold in the bank before making a purchase.

Unreliable Gold is the easiest gold to come by, for the most part. You get it from:

• Creep Kills
• Neutral Creep  & Ancient Kills

As of the 6.79 patch, there is another huge change that impacts Unreliable Gold and that's the new Buy Back mechanic. If you Buy Back, you can only gain Reliable Gold, so that means you have to make your Buy Backs count (i.e. kills, tower pushes, etc.).

This is very important and exploitable. If the other team can bait you into a Buy Back, then you not only lose the gold you spent, but you also lose some of your time while up because you can't even start farming back your loss.

Inventory

You have 6 inventory slots that are incredibly valuable. These can be manipulated by certain heroes or item pick ups. For instance, if a Shadow Blade is picked up, now the enemy supports need to be carrying around additional Sentry Wards, Dust, or purchase a Gem. Likewise, a pickup such as Butterfly may warrant making a Monkey King Bar in response.

While this resource isn't something you always want to manipulate, it's something to look out for. If a support is forced to buy extra detection and sacrifice 1+ item slots to carry it around, that could mean something beneficial to them is sitting in their stash or it could set back other item purchases.

Linked Resources

There also exists what I'd consider a "Linked Resource" in that it relates to one or more resource listed above, but also can be counted as a resource on its own.

Time

In a lot of ways, time is an obvious resource. But it's also something you see many players mismanage.

Time filters into a number of other resources:

• Experience - the longer you're out of lane and away from battle, the less experience opportunity you have
• Gold - similarly, the more time you're doing other tasks, the less time you're spending on getting gold
• Intelligence - even if you're spending time gaining Intel, you're also giving enemy the intel that you're missing from lane. On Supports, who often are missing early game to do pulls (at least in pre-6.79) may go unnoticed, but core heroes missing will give the opposing team intel that your team is making a play. This is why it's important for plays like ganks to be done quickly.

Time is also part of the reason why kills are important. Not only are you gaining a power advantage, you're setting a player back quite a bit in terms of time to gain gold and XP.

Structures

Structures relate to a huge amount of resources, whether they be your own or belonging to your opponents.

• Time - with structures like Towers down, your team cannot react or move as fast to certain situations or plays. You are denied a teleport location which slows your team down significantly.
• Gold - your team gets Reliable Gold for taking down a number of structures. This can lead to critical gaps in net worth for your team to exploit. Similarly, losing Towers will put you in a bad situation economically.
• Intelligence -  Towers not only give you vision, but they keep the wave pushed back. The vision you gain from your own creeps can tell you a lot about what's going on over the river.
• Win Condition - the most obvious thing you get out of structures is they move you towards the win condition of the game, taking the opposing Ancient (i.e. Throne/Tree of Life).

 

Final Remarks

DotA is a deep, complex, and often convoluted game. Just managing Gold and XP will help you get better, but there are a lot of other very important resources that often go overlooked.

If you take a look at any traditional RTS, you'll see players constantly poking and prodding at their opponent, just to get some hint of what their plans are. Many DotA players seem to parody this without understanding the full depth of how to gain intelligence on their opponent. Most players get that Warding is important, but may not see it as a vital resource akin to Gold or XP. Intel makes you, the player, more dangerous while Gold & XP aid your hero in game.

Likewise, Time and Structures need to be managed because they are direct feeds into other resources. Most players get that they shouldn't waste time and that you need to take towers while defending your own. However, sometimes Gold and XP can blind you, like running back to lane instead of teleporting there. or going for kills instead of pushing a tower.

The important thing here is to understand all the different resources and how to manage them, not to tunnel vision onto Gold and XP.

The Basics of Micro

NOTE: There is more to come on this post (look for updates on an upcoming weekend)

Micro is a fairly important part of the game. It's not as prominent as in other RTS-style games, and it varies from hero to hero. This guide is intended to help with just the basics of how to set up and control heroes with multiple units, and some examples.

Control Groups

This is the most basic part of micro. You need to have ways to select various combinations of units.
An easy method is:

1. Selects your Hero Alone
2. Selects both Hero + summons/illusions/etc.
3. Selects just the summons/illusions/etc.

As you progress, you might customize it to your liking, or use something more intense. For instance, if you're playing Chen, you might want a creep like Troll (ranged abilities) in a separate control group from those with abilities that are on a radius around the creep (e.g. Ursas, Centaurs).

Basic Micro

Depending on the hero, you'll find you need to do different things.

Nature's Prophet

With Nature's Prophet jungling, you want to make sure your Treants live as long as possible. When they get too low, you want to have the aggro switch to another Treant. That way you maximize its lifespan (i.e. more treants --> more damage --> more gold).

One way to do this is by moving it back temporarily. The more optimal way is by "attack clicking" an allied creep with your Treant. This games the system into thinking it is a low priority target (it just tried to attack an enemy of the AI). I just do this on an individual basis. When I see a Treant get low, I select it, then have it lose aggro. You can monitor this through having them all selected and watching the health bars in the lower left of your HUD.

Phantom Lancer

For a hero like Phantom Lancer, your Illusions don't live that long anyway and don't really cost you anything (i.e. you don't have to use mana to make them, they don't give the enemy money). You can do things like have your Illusions farm/push the lane while you safely farm the jungle.

A lot of the time, I find myself just quickly making temporary control groups to farm multiple neutral camps at once, while having the others just on an attack-move down the lane towards the enemy base.

Tabbing and More

Tabbing is a huge tool for heroes like Chen, Enchantress, Meepo, and Visage. These creeps all have spells they can cast, so you need to quickly cycle through them. If you have them all selected, you can Tab then cast easily.

Shift-Queueing is something else that is helpful. You can hold down shift to queue up commands. This can help you coordinate things like having creeps move along multiple specialized paths (e.g. so they don't take shitty direct routes) or doing things like the infamous Blink Dagger Meepo (i.e. Meepo #1 Blinks in, all others finish channeling Poof as Meepo #1 arrives --> massive nuke damage).

The Basics of Roaming

What Roaming Does

• Frees up XP
• Frees up Gold
• Keeps the other team on their toes / forced into defensive stance
• Gives good rune control
• Potentially leads to kills (when done well)

When to Roam

• Your team has a lot of heroes that need BOTH XP and GPM
• You are no longer useful in the lane
• e.g. your carry feels very secure, so you should go do something more productive
• e.g. your lane failed and as a last ditch effort, you are attempting to force another lane to win hard
• The other team has a very vulnerable lineup (e.g. weak lane comps, heavy carry comps, etc.)

Metrics

• Highly Successful Roaming = lots of kills, which keeps you leveled and gives you money
• Successful Roaming = your team has more space to farm (other team is forced to play defensively), you have good rune control, and then you are given space later on to catch up in farm (think of how Na'Vi supports work - very active early on, then given time to catch up)
• Failed Roaming = you are underleveled / died numerous times / given no time to catch up in farm

Necessities of Roaming

• Good Teamwork - if you roam and your teammates don't communicate well with you, you won't get much out of the roam
• Opportunity - you can't just roam whenever. You have to look at things like how far the lane is pushed, HP/Mana or allies and enemies, etc.
• Regen - going back to base often is a waste, so you need to be able to stay out and out longer. Having someone like Crystal Maiden can help due to her aura, getting a bottle can situationally work, otherwise you'll want some clarities and shit
• Smoke if your friend
• A lineup where you can be out of lane and it's beneficial
• Heroes that can solo / dual lane successfully
• Heroes that need the early levels and farm, whereas you do not
• The space to catch up on farm in the event you did OK or Failed (e.g. some jungle stacks to farm, a lane you can farm while others shift into gank mode, etc.)
• Heroes that can kill as a result of a gank

Examples

Traditional Roamers are heroes like Vengeful Spirit and Earthshaker. Even when they are drastically underleveled, they are incredibly good gankers. VS has one of the best level 1 stuns, ES Fissure is also amazing when used well.

Your lineup also should have 2-3 heroes that need the fast levels, gold, and can get kills from ganks.
Examples would be like: Shadow Fiend, Gyrocopter, Kunkka, Templar Assassin, etc.

• All of them have spells that benefit from fast levels
• All of them need farm
• All of them can net kills from ganks

Bad Examples would be stuff like: Anti-Mage, Spectre, etc.

• Both these heroes offer nothing in ganks except some decent auto attacks, but nothing that can quickly kill or help lock a hero down
• While both benefit from levels, neither has as much to gain from them as someone like Shadow Fiend
• Both would be better off if you helped them secure farm instead

You should also look at your other support. If you leave a Venomancer to babysit Anti-Mage, while you roam to gank for your mid Shadow Fiend and offlane Weaver, you might jeopardize your hard carry's livelihood. A support like Venomancer doesn't offer that much in terms of counter-initiation (if you leave them against, say, Centaur and Rubick), especially when paired with a hero like AM that has relatively minimal early game presence.

Modern Roaming

From what I see in tournament games lately, instead of sacrificing a hero to roam, you more often see two scenarios:

1. You have a jungler that can roam between safe lane and mid lane to set up kills, or at least harass them (e.g. Chen picking up a harpy to harass with Chain Lightning, or a Wildkin to Tornado a lane)
2. Your supports pick up smoke early on and roam to mid, or sometimes even offlane when there is an opportunity or the safe lane carry feels secure enough to solo (even if just for a bit)

Both these methods guarantee a bit more farm. Jungling can especially have a similar effect as roaming because you've freed up more XP.

The Basics of Playing Suicide Lane (Offlane)

 Preface

The "Offlane" can refer to many different scenarios:

• Suicide Lane
• Typically a 1v3 scenario
• Can also encompass the 1 vs. 2 + Jungle scenario, which is much easier to control and heroes like Windrunner are much more viable in the Suicide Lane then
• Solo Hard Lane
• This is a 1v1 matchup where you're far from your tower and more subject to jungle ganks (if they have a jungler), and sometimes roams
• Solo Safe Lane
• This is also a 1v1 matchup, but you have the safety of being near your tower
• Semi-carry and some carry-type heroes become viable solos in this lane (e.g. Gyro, sometimes Luna)

An "Offlane" player is typically ranked #3 in farm priority. In some situations, that player would become the farmer in an offensive trilane.

The key component of defining "offlane" is that it is in a side lane, and the player is NOT a primary carry.

This post will focus primarily on the Suicide Lane Role.

 Overview

There are a several key things to Suicide Lane:

• Tricks
• Positioning
• Vision
• Sizing up your opponent
• Item Choice
• Giving Up

 

Tricks

 

A common "trick" would be using Ion Shell on creeps to get farm. Many heroes have stuff like this that helps.

For instance, if you watch Admiral_Bulldog play LD, you'll notice that he sends the bear to pick up the enemy creep wave between the Tier 1 and Tier 2 towers, then kites them between his own T1 and T2 towers. This allows him to get some safe farm. If that doesn't work out well enough, there's always a jungle to go to.

With Nature's Prophet, you can do basically the same thing.

Heroes like Beastmaster (and sometimes Tinker -- LGD.int has run him offlane before) can utilize Soul Ring and stack ancients (Axes are composite damage --> they damage ancient creeps, similarly you can stack with the Boar). This allows you to make up your farm toward the end of the laning phase when you're strong enough to farm the stack.

Other heroes, like Bounty Hunter, don't even really need to farm. They just need to mooch XP until they hit level 6 and can get plenty of farm with ganks.

Other easy tricks:

• Creep Blocking can help a bit
• If you're Radiant Hard Lane, you can eat through the tree of the neutral camp near the river and pull creeps from there to help control the lane

Positioning

 

You need to maintain the right amount of distance from your opponent. Never be too close to their trees and always leave yourself an escape route.

There are some tricks you can learn, like if you have Tangos, there are trees you can eat through around the side shop and sneak out the back (SexyBamboe has some good replays of this).

If I recall correctly, Demon played an offlane KotL and bought a Quelling Blade to burrow into the trees and get some XP/CS that way.

But overall, just watch where you're standing. Make the most use out of Line of Sight.

Vision

 

Get to the lane early and drop wards so that you can see the opponent. It's generally more important to place wards that give vision than wards that block neutral spawns (and in competitive games, the opponent will have Sentries to deward those anyway).

Major areas to have vision of are:

• The pull camp --- this lets you know when there is one less support in lane and you can afford to be a bit more aggressive. Sometimes you can also go and try to mooch XP (or even gold) from the neutrals.
• Behind the Tier 1 Tower --- a lot of the time, you can get this along with vision of the pull camp. Having vision here lets you see when mid is coming to gank or someone else is rotating to gank. If you manage to get a kill, you'll have vision of the player returning to lane
• The Clearing on the Side of the Lane --- supports will hang out here to set up kills or harass you. Having vision here is a huge help so you know when to play up and when to back off.
• (River) --- good for the mid to have vision of the rune, but also to be wary of mid ganks

Again, there are also some tricks to getting more vision. For instance, Broodmother can use her webs to knock down trees and be able to see any incoming gank. But note that it also gives you no spots to juke if they place a Sentry Ward.

Sizing Up

You have to keep constant watch on your opponent's various bars and items. If one of the trilane is low on HP, you can sometimes push up and put more pressure on as they will be less likely to go on you.

Likewise, watch your opponents' mana bars, knowing whether or not they can cast a disable lets you choose when to be aggressive.

Lastly, watch their items. Seeing something like Sentry Wards (as an invis hero) is a dead giveaway that you need to be more cautious.

Item Choice

Your choice of items makes a massive impact on the success of your lane.

• Starting Items 
• Stout Shield - some heroes (e.g Dark Seer, Lone Druid's Spirit Bear) might pick up a stout shield for survivability and/or creep wave pulling
• Tangos/Salve - pretty important to have regen. Usually, you'll want one of each, but heroes like Lone Druid may not need regen as much due to having Spirit Bear
• Ring of Protection - this can be an OK choice on some heroes so you can build a fast Tranquil Boots (RoP is the only item you cannot buy in the Side Shop for Tranquils)
• Observer Wards - usually a support player will pool you a set of wards so that you can gain vision of the River & the Pull Camp (you don't necessarily need to block it - often it will be counter-warded anyway). You really just want to see if TPs are coming, or mid is ganking you.
• Tranquil Boots
• These are a great option on many suicide laners because you have a free healing salve every minute or so
• You have to play carefully as to not get caught so far out that if your boots break, you can't make it back to the tower 
• However, overall, you can play more aggressively than normal because you have a way to regen a significant amount of HP
• Soul Ring
• A number of heroes work well with Soul Ring to have a continual source of mana
• Dark Seer, for instance, can spam Ion Shell near indefinitely
• Beastmaster needs this item to help with his Ancient Stacking & Farming

Giving Up

Sometimes you have to make the call to give up on the lane. Situations where you might do this are:

• You aren't getting the farm/XP you need or feel you should have
• The lane is too dangerous (e.g. a Dark Seer vs. a lane with Bane + stuns is very dangerous if you Surge at the wrong time)

When you make that call, your options become:

• Play Passively - burrow into the trees to mooch XP or just try to soak up XP and forget about last hits (e.g. you might do this with Tidehunter or Bounty Hunter)
• Stack Ancients - some heroes can resort to putting full effort in stacking Ancients and just trying to delay any pushes the other team makes (once your Tier 1 drops, the Ancient camp is less secure)
• Jungle - many popular suicide laners also make decent junglers. You should be prepared to TP (or someone on your team at least) in the event the other team puts pressure on your towers.
• You might consider this option with: Dark Seer, Batrider, Lone Druid, etc.

It's a tough call to make sometimes, but if you're a hero that needs to get some core items (e.g. Batrider NEEDS Blink Dagger), you should focus on ensuring you'll have an impact on the game. The Suicide Lane is a lane your team goes into the match knowing you'll "lose", so it's not necessarily a huge loss. The other team just gains uncontested farm, which can result in supports roaming or making/farming jungle stacks. You need to be prepared for that (and pushes that force someone to return to the offlane).

The Basics of Playing Lane Support

Lane support is a very difficult role for many players because you have to do a lot with a little bit of farm. You main job as lane support is to ensure the carry gets farm and to screw over your lane opponents as hard as you can.

In this post, I'm going to go over a lot of the problems I hear from people that are trying to learn how to be a good support player.

Keep in mind, these are some of the basic things. Warding locations and other stuff will be covered at another point in time.

1. Harassment is a lot harder than I thought. Creeps constantly aggro on me.

Normal Attacking:

• Keep in mind that you get aggro when you're attack moving on an enemy hero
• If you regular move you will not get aggro
• Get close before **attack moving** to **minimize** the time when you draw aggro
• Attack Move on an allied creep (even if they are full health) to lose aggro

Alternatives:

• Consider attacking from a different direction
• Come from behind your opponent (this can also help set up kills)
• Use fog of war and tree cover to your advantage

2. How often should I soak experience with a carry in the lane?

This is really dependent on the situation.

• 3v1 - your job as lane support is to zone. Your 2nd support will be stacking & pulling. This will result in the opponent being underleveled no matter what because they cannot contest the pull.
• 2v1 - sometimes you can stack & pull, other times you cannot. It's always a bit risky. Zoning your opponent out is usually going to be a good option because sometimes you'll be in XP range, sometimes you won't, but your opponent will be underleveled in any case.
• 2v2 - stacking & pulling is usually going to be a bad option unless your teammate is a good solo hero like Lone Druid. It will probably be better to stay in lane to harass and deny because in 2v2, your opponents can contest the pull.
• 2v3 - not much you can do in this lane. Best bet is to roam or change lanes. If they know how to trilane and you don't have a hero like KotL, Lone Druid, etc. you'll get beat badly.
• 3v3 - you want to pull the first wave, but then go to the lane after that. Harass and Deny (on defensive side), or deny and try to get kills (on offensive side).

3. When stacking/pulling, what is the goal?

• The goal is always lane control
• Stack & Pull - use this to move the lane closer to the tower and deny a wave of XP from your opponent
• Single Pull - use this to make a super wave that will help push the tower (or to move the initial wave closer to the tower in 3v3)
• Siege Creeps come every 3 minutes (good to know for the single pull)
• Don't pull if 
• (a) creeps are close to the tower
• (b) your opponent will take the pull
• When you stack you want to kill your entire wave
• Get your gold as a support from killing pull camp creeps (some supports are also good at stacking other camps and wiping those - e.g. KotL)

4. If I'm the safe lane support, how often should I roam to get kills?

• Roam when your carry is established (general rule of thumb - I'm sure there are exceptions)
• Goal of a Defensive Trilane is to get your carry farmed, prioritize that
• You might consider roaming if there is opportunity and a high chance of success
• Also consider roaming to smoke gank the courier bringing bottle to mid (i.e. <2 min or so)
• Smoke is your best friend

Miscellaneous Tips

• Grab a TP by at most 5 minutes
• Some teams divide support items like: (#4) gets Sentries + Smoke, (#5) gets Observers + Courier
• Upgrade the courier quickly to reduce chances of it getting sniped by opposing supports
• Make sure you get some farm (supports like KotL, Shadow Demon, etc. are good at stacking camps and killing them to catch up on gold + XP)
• Establish a strategy. In 4-protecting-1, you'll leave your carry to move with the rest of the team for pushing. In dual roaming, you'll have 3 good solos while the two supports roam to get kills.
• Defensive Trilanes want to get secure farm for the carry
• Offensive Trilanes want to get kills and deny the opposing carry farm
• NEVER do something for the sake of doing it. If there is no opportunity to roam, DO NOT ROAM. If there is no reason to pull or low chance of success, DO NOT PULL.
• Pick the appropriate support. If you want to be aggressive early, get someone like Crystal Maiden. KotL is good at zoning and destroying Trilanes. Nyx is good at Roaming. Shadow Demon scales well.

Tip: Play Aggressive Early Game

One of the biggest problems I see in newer players is not knowing how and when to play aggressive. Actually, it seems that most players don't know how to respond to aggression. It's a fundamental part of the game and improving.

The thing is that it's scary for most new players. There are a lot of things to take into account, like:

• You do not have a large mana pool. What if you need those spells later?
• What if you feed?

You're not going to just blindly throw spells down. You want to use them intelligently. Aggression applied at the right time leads to lane control. If you can get an opponent to use all their regen and get them to low HP again after that, they are pretty much helpless (this is also basically how you deal with Bloodseeker mid).

I'm going to walk through a few common places where people should exercise more aggression early on.

The Opposing Mid Got a Bottle First (With No Other Items)

Getting a bottle first is like begging to be abused. There are many issues with getting bottle first:

• Minor Stats: they don't matter a whole lot, but anything that helps you get last hits is good. You'll be able to take about one more auto attack and maybe cast an additional spell.
• Bottle regen can be cancelled, Tango regen cannot
• If you fail to get the first rune, you're sitting there with a 600g item that does nothing for you
• If you need to regen HP, you ideally should need to regen Mana

Contextual Example: Tiny (You) vs. Pudge

To put this in context, let's say you're Tiny and you're against a Pudge that bought Bottle first.

Pudge will generally have Rot at level 1. He gets bottle because Meat Hook takes a huge amount of mana (he can only cast it once before needing to regen).

If you get a few auto attacks in on him, then he's going to need to use a bottle charge (because at level 2, your combo could potentially kill him). The problem with this for him is that he gets 50% efficiency from the bottle. It heals him, but his mana is already full.

At level 2, let's say he's at full mana, but has low HP. Now he has to decide: do I want full efficiency from Bottle, or do I just want the heal? If he chooses to throw a hook and actually hits you with it, then you're next to him while he's at low HP. You combo him, and he dies. If he just sips the bottle, then he misses out on casting a spell.

Contextual Example: Queen of Pain (You) vs. Viper

Here's another example where Bottle is terrible first and you should be aggressive. If you're both sitting at level 2. You play aggressively against Viper and he gets very low. He retreats up the ramp so he can regen, but before that, you manage to hit him with Shadow Strike.

Now he has to wait ~15 seconds to use Bottle because of the DoT. That's plenty of time for you to finish him off, pop a Salve, use your own Bottle, etc.

You Bought Clarities (and Regen)

If you bought something at the start, you should use it. Especially clarities. They allow you to use more spells than you normally would be able to.

Try to attempt level 1 kills. If it fails, who cares? You have mana regen.

A lot of players don't realize how potent your spells are at level 1. They don't need to do a lot of damage at level 1 because your opponent doesn't have much HP, they won't have boots, and they won't have stats from items or levels (you get some minor stats each level).

The basic message here is that if you bought something, make sure you use it.

Your Team Has More Heroes in a Lane

If you're running a 2v1 or a 3v1, then there is no reason not to be aggressive.

Passive play here leads to:

• The solo outleveling you (you're splitting XP with others in lane, they are not)
• The solo getting gold
• The solo getting kills and being useful later on

Here are a few examples:

Contextual Example: Crystal Maiden (You) + Anti-Mage vs. Windrunner

In this example, Windrunner is solo in the hard lane. You're babysitting Anti-Mage.

Get on the other side of the creeps and chase Windrunner out of XP range. If she's smart, then her first spell was Windrun. Meanwhile, you might have Frostbite or Nova, which both do damage. You can exchange blows with her, use spells for harass, or whatever.

If you get hurt or need mana, use a Tango or use a Clarity. Meanwhile, your Anti-Mage is getting free farm and Windrunner is not getting any levels. Pretty soon you and Anti-Mage will be higher level than Windrunner and can get easy kills on her. Just be careful to not draw creep aggro at first (chase Windrunner a bit before attacking her, or use the trees to your advantage)

Some players will tell you to go pull. But you're a 2v1 lane. If you go to pull, the result is:

• Anti-Mage is solo versus a ranged hero that can harass him out of lane
• Windrunner can easily contest the creep pull
• Windrunner is in XP range, so she'll level faster than you and Anti-Mage (or at least at the same pace)

Contextual Example: Venomancer (You) + Sven vs. Drow

Let's say you're in the hard lane while Drow is solo in her safe lane.

Drow is a hero that will stomp if she outlevels you significantly. Once she gets a few levels of aura + her ult, she's doing a ton of damage.

So many players are passive against her and just try to farm and deny. Why not just kill her? What is she going to do at level 1? Frost arrow you? She cannot do anything. She's very slow and has low HP.

Just have Sven stun her, then Venomancer can easily land a Gale. A few auto attacks and she's dead. Now the both of you are level 2, she has no money and has to walk back to lane. After that it's smooth sailing.

Why would you wait? It's like a time bomb.

Worst case scenario is that she hugs the tower. However, at level 1, you should be able to kill her pretty quickly the second she oversteps. You can also do something like push the lane into the tower, then go and block your creep wave. At a certain point you can also dive her.

Your Opponent Skilled a Passive Ability

I see a lot of newer players who lose to Necrolytes that skill their aura at level 1, Silencers that get Curse of the Silent at level 1, and so on.

Skilling your abilities this way is like putting a target on your head.

If you are against them, you have two options:

1. Do nothing - you'll take a lot of damage over time and find them controlling the lane
2. Kill them - they have nothing else to offer. Necrolyte doesn't have his heal/damage at level 1 if he got aura. Likewise, Silencer doesn't have his silence/disarm

There is virtually nothing they can do to stop you. If Silencer casts Curse, then stun him and have your ally go on him at the same time. Boom. He's dead. He has low HP, low movement speed, and low armor. He might have an ally that can stun or something, but now Silencer has to use all his regen to get back into lane or risk getting killed.

Likewise, Necrolyte can't do shit. If you kill him, you've removed the annoyance of his aura for a while as he walks back to lane (unless he has money to TP). You get bonus gold and XP (plus a morale boost).

The Exception

Not every passive merits going for a quick kill. Say a Luna skills her passive first. If her lane partner is also ranged, now they are able to output a significant amount of damage through auto attacks (and besides, Luna's other options are shit like a weak nuke/mini-stun, and glaives which aren't useful in lane).

Your Opponent is Weak Early Game

Some heroes are naturally dead weight early game. Take Anti-Mage for instance. He will either grab Blink or Mana Burn early on. neither of which is very useful compared to a Stun, Slow, or Nuke.

When you see a dual lane with a combo like Lich + Anti-Mage, just kill the Lich early on (lvl 1-3). Anti-Mage can't do anything to stop you. Kill the support and the carry is helpless. And if you control the lane the carry is in, then it's less likely he'll become scary early on (e.g. 30-40 minutes, where Anti-Mage usually peaks in usefulness).

Your Spells Scale Poorly

No matter what point you're at in the game, you can contribute something. But, not every hero has damage that scales the same.

Two examples I can quickly think of are Crystal Maiden and Timbersaw.

Crystal Maiden

• She has powerful slows and semi-stuns that are great all game
• Her spell damage quickly tapers off and is not very effective
• Instead of getting lots of levels of her passive spell (mana aura), get 0-1 level of it and go for your damage spells
• Get lots of kills early while you have the great combination of:
• Good Damage
• Powerful Slow
• Powerful Stun
• (Hint: Not many heroes offer all that early game)
• Also, look at Crystal Maiden: she's slow, has low HP, and can't really auto attack well
• YOU DO NOT WANT TO BE DEFENDING AS HER
• She is an aggressive hero. If she is forced to run or take damage, SHE WILL DIE

Timbersaw

• His spells don't scale that well past mid game (yes, his ult is PURE damage, but it's still going to fall off in DPS)
• He thrives in the lane when heroes have low mobility and HP (easier to land has spells and kill with them)
• Also, there are a lot of trees in the lane that he can latch onto
• You NEED to get early kills so that you get the money to get items that give you the regen that lets you do marginally better late game via spamming

The Basics of Trilaning

Trilanes are a tactic used in organized matches to work towards specific goals like optimizing farm, XP, or denying the other team some advantage.

While there are many variations on Trilanes, there are three basic forms:

• Defensive Trilane - 3 heroes in the safelane with the goal of getting their carry free farm
• Jungle Trilane - 2 heroes in the safe lane, 1 in the jungle with the goal of getting the carry farm while also maximizing XP advantage
• Offensive Trilane - 3 heroes in the hard lane, with the goal of screwing over the opponent's carry (typically you'll see a Trilane vs. Trilane)

I'm going to use the following notation to visually show the configuration of your lanes:

SAFE LANE --- MID LANE --- HARD LANE --- [JUNGLE]

Defensive Trilane

General Overview

• Configuration: 3 --- 1 --- 1 --- [0]
• Goals:
• Get your carry farmed
• Deny opponent farm and XP
• Second Support gets some farm from pulls (and Lane Support to some extent)
• Typical Composition:
• Hard Carry (#1)
• Lane Support (#5)
• Second Support (#4)
• Example Lineups:
• Luna (Hard Carry), Jakiro (Lane Support), Sand King (Second Support)
• Chaos Knight (Hard Carry), Wisp (Lane Support), Rubick (Second Support)
• Items
• Second Support - Sentry Wards, Smoke of Deceit (for ganking / courier sniping)
• Hard/Lane Support - Observer Wards (given to off-lane), Courier
• Potential Issues
• An aggressive trilane has the potential to dominate a defensive trilane
• Fast pushing against your offlane cane force the supports to rotate or they get 1-2 tower (potentially even a Barracks)

Specific Roles

• Carry: 
• Farm - get gold and XP
• Deny - deny creeps from opponent (but prioritize farming)
• Lane Support:
• Zone - position yourself between the creep wave and the opponent (if able to), or at least make them nervous to get too close to the creep wave. Ideally, you want to push them out of XP range.
• Harass - get some hits in on the opponent. If you have mana regen (Clarity Potions, KotL, Arcane Boots), be sure to use that to your advantage.
• Deny- deny creeps when the carry has to choose between farming and denying (otherwise the carry can do it). You can also hit creeps down that are < 50% HP to help with lane control.
• (Farm) - ONLY take creep kills that your Carry/Second Support cannot get to in time or are in dangerous areas (assuming you're ranged)
• (Gank) - Once the carry is established (i.e. have decent farm, cannot be contested in lane), rotate to other lanes, gank, etc.
• Second Support:
• Stack - stack creep camps, particularly the pull camp (pulling a stacked camp will kill a full creep wave, effectively denying a full wave of XP to your opponent)
• Pull - bring neutral creeps into the creep wave to exercise lane control. This is also where you'll get your farm.
• Gank - in a 3v1 situation, you'll be over by the pull mostly. When you're not (or the lane is too close to the tower), gank the lane and try to get a kill or send the opponent home. Also, once the carry has been established, move on to other lanes.

Optimal Results

• The carry is 3+ levels higher than the opponent in lane
• Carry has free farm
• Second Support (and Lane Support to a small extent) has farm from pulling and killing neutral creeps
• Opponent has minimal farm, is extremely underleveled, and/or has died multiple times
• Carry is well established and support is able to help win other lanes (or shift into 4 protecting 1 tactic)

 

Jungle Trilane

General Overview

• Configuration: 2 --- 1 --- 1 --- [1]
• Goals:
• Get your carry farmed
• Maximize Second Support's (Jungle Support) Farm and XP
• Typical Composition:
• Hard Carry (#1)
• Lane Support (#5)
• Jungle Support (#4)
• Example Lineups:
• Phantom Lancer (#1), KotL (#5), Nature's Prophet (#4)
• Gyrocopter (#1), Jakiro (#5), Enigma (#4)
• Items
• Jungle Support - Varies based on hero, playstyle, and lineups
• Hard/Lane Support - Observer Wards (given to off-lane), Courier
• Potential Issues
• Less lane control unless your Jungle Support is stacking and pulling (or your Lane Support is)
• Your lane is weaker and good suicide laners can take advantage of that (e.g. Darkseer is very hard to deal with in 2v1) 

Specific Roles

• Carry
• Farm - get last hits, maximize GPM and XP
• Deny - deny creeps when you can, but prioritize farm
  
• Jungle Support
• Farm - you are jungle to maximize XP and GPM across all lanes
• Gank - you generally will have to gank the lane because good suicide lanes can exercise too much control and have too much farm or mess up your carry's farm. You need to keep them on their toes.
• (Stack + Pull) - some junglers will stack and pull. It's good to do this when you can, but won't always be necessary.
• Important Note: If you are AFK farming, you're probably doing this role incorrectly (there can be exceptions, but generally you'll NEED to gank). Also, you're still a "support" hero.
• Lane Support
• Zone - force the opponent away from the creep wave so they get no XP
• Harass - get damage on your opponent whenever your can (preferably without drawing creep aggro or putting yourself in a bad situation)
• Deny - deny creeps your carry will not (e.g. they are last hitting at the moment), start denying when creeps are < 50% HP to exercise lane control (not always necessary if you have a pull)
• (Stack + Pull) - stack and pull when possible (e.g. you know your carry will be ok alone)
• (Gank) - help gank other lanes when your carry is established and will be OK solo (having TPs is beneficial here so that you can return to the lane quickly if needed)

Optimal Results

• Carry has level advantage
• Jungle Support has level and farm advantage over opposing second support
• Jungle Support has aided in multiple kills
• Carry has free farm
• Lane Support has level advantage over opposing lane support
• Opposing off-laner has minimal farm and is underleveled

 

Offensive Trilane

General Overview

• Configuration: 1 --- 1 --- 3 --- [0]
• Goals:
• Get kills
• Deny opposing carry farm
• Typical Composition:
• Carry/Semi-Carry/Trilane Farmer (#1)
• Aggressive Support (#5)
• Second Support (#4)
• Example Lineups:
• Sven (#1), Jakiro (#5), Undying (#4)
• Chaos Knight (#1), Leshrac (#5), KotL (#4)
• Items
• Second Support - Varies (e.g. split Wards & Courier, get Smoke, etc.)
• Aggressive Support - Varies / Observer Wards (given to off-lane), Courier
• Potential Issues
• Opposing Trilane is not against your Trilane - now you'll have to move, attempt to farm the off-lane, push a tower quickly, etc.
• They have a powerful Defensive Trilane (e.g. KotL makes it hard to be aggressive)

Specific Roles

• Carry/Semi-Carry/Farmer 
• Farm - take last hits when you can
• Attempt Kills -  initiate fights or be prepared to follow up
• Second Support
• Set Up Kills - try to set up stuns, or abilities that will enable the carry to get kills
• Harass - put damage on opponents so kills are easier
• Deny - deny creeps so opponents do not level or farm well
• Aggressive Support
• Set Up Kills - try to set up stuns, or abilities that will enable the carry to get kills
• Harass - put damage on opponents so kills are easier
• Deny - deny creeps so opponents do not level or farm well

Optimal Results

• Opposing Trilane cannot stack & pull
• Opposing carry is killed multiple times
• Opposing carry has no farm
• Your carry has plenty of kills (reliable gold)
• Enemy trilane is forced to move or lose the lane

 

Miscellaneous Notes

• Terminology
• Stack = getting neutral creep aggro at the right time so that while they are following you, the camp respawns and now you have multiple sets of creeps in that camp
• Pull = aggroing neutral creeps so they follow you into your own creep wave (which will then follow the neutral creeps)
• Suicide Lane = a solo hero in the hard lane that goes against a Trilane
• Only stack & pull when it is appropriate
• Done to gain Lane Control (move creep collision closer to your tower, push the enemy tower, etc)
• Also done to deny XP to opponent
• Can be risky in 3v3 or 3v2 because your lane is weaker while you pull, they can attempt a tower push, or can contest your pull (stealing the farm you were attempting to deny)
• Stack + Pull is good for moving the lane close to your tower, denying XP & Gold
• Single Pull is good for making a big wave of creeps in order to push (note: siege creeps come every 3 minutes)
• Using a Single Pull to get a tower can be disadvantageous if your carry is farming well and you do not want to draw attention to that fact (if a tower is under attack, you might have supports TP to defend and put pressure on your carry)
• There are several other pulls that can be useful at times:
• Dire Double Pull - on Dire side you can pull the small camp into the lane, you can also pull the big camp near the river into the normal pull camp
• Radiant Double Pull - You can pull the medium camp into the pull camp by chopping down a tree
• Radiant Hard Lane Pull - You can pull the camp near the river into your creep wave (done with some suicide laners like Lone Druid, Darkseer)
• Radiant Mid Lane Pull - Your support can come and pull the small camp (need to chop down a tree) to stall the lane / kill off a creep or two (to be honest, I can't remember if this was patched or not)
• A good Suicide Laner can mooch XP or farm safely, even against a Trilane (e.g. Windrunner, Broodmother, Bounty Hunter, Beast Master, etc.)
• A Trilane done properly will absolutely destroy a Dual Lane
• Generally, once a carry is established (has good farm, can solo the lane) then the supports go to gank other lanes in order to win more lanes
• Sometimes, ganking begins when your own suicide lane hits a specific level (e.g. when Bounty Hunter hits level 6 and gets Track)
• A Jungle Trilane can be effective for maximizing XP across all your heroes, but can be risky because 2v1 is not as dominant as a 3v1
• You might see other non-trilane lineups such as Dual Mid and Dual Roaming Supports
• Certain Heroes are innately good at Trilane vs. Trilane. Some examples are:
• KotL (Illuminate)
• Visage (Soul Assumption)
• Undying (Decay + Tombstone)