DOTA 2

Also, go watch some Purge videos, he is probably the best dota teacher ATM
PurgeGamers

Cool trick with Brood I've been doing since new patch is stealing the enemies bounty rune at game start.

Pick web (which should always be your first anyway) and run the clock down to about 15 seconds. Stay hidden and away from open lanes like the river, etc. so you don't get spotted and they ping over reinforcements. Start making your way and drop a web as soon as it can cover the rune - go invis and at exactly 2 or 3 seconds left til spawn, attack whatever hero is sitting on enemy rune but do not chase or move away from the spot at all -hardcore spam right click on the spot and snatch the rune. GG.
It's only failed once when some lucky ass Pudge hooked me in the.web out of sheer luck and died to a 3 man gank. Most people get too flustered when you attack them and forget to click the rune faster than you can since you are prepared. Also, if for whatever reason the enemy team decided to drop a Sentry ward or whatever on the spot, it's one less ward they have in the lane at a crucial point in the game. The fact that it also costs them 100G per ward is just another bonus.

Once you are not godawful at base mechanics (last hitting, positioning) spend time learning to read the minimap. Check it a lot, like really a lot. Pay attention where you spot enemy support / gankers and understand the movements they do. You see them top, they vanish and appear again in middle and move to bot. Excpect a gank and prepare or retreat to tower. Most people dont have the patience to wait and ruin your farm. They will leave again and wasted a shitton of time and exp and you hardly lost anything.

It is one of the most important skills (map awareness), but takes a lot of experience to pay enough attention and read their movement properly. Also check inventories for wards on supports and see if they place them or not to properly counterward. Very important with heroes that go for shadowblade or blinks aswell, so you know when you have to be ready for an unexcpected gank. These are tips for more experienced players, but when you see a low mmr game, it is very obvisious that people do not have map awareness yet and it messes them up a lot.

Even as a 4k player Rethan has pointed out mistakes in my gameplay that are *REQUIRED* to remove in order to advance in MMR. But like he has said in this thread, knowing what you're doing wrong and eliminating it from your game are two entirely different entities. It took MONTHS of analysing the exact same type of play that was costing me games, before I was able to successfully remove it from my dota-muscle memory so to speak. Game is hard.

Last hitting in Dota is hard, but remember. Its relative to your current skill. One of the things in my early Dota career that I would religiously keep track of for myself was my last hits at 10 minutes. There isn't a target number that is good or bad, but you do want to know if you're performing at your current average, above it, below it. Also taking into account the lane matchup, and how interfered or lack of help did you have. There are a lot of variables here, but the idea is that you become able to reach your average in a variety of situations as well as increase it through time. From free farm, to highly contested you've just gotta give yourself the right grade for that number. If you have a few hero's you like, be certain you know your performance over time for those specifically. The other very strong reason to do this is because even your losses will likely give you 10 minutes of even play. You can't really compare your 30 minute/game end last hit numbers as simply because the variables are so broad.

I only have three item related tips that you should think about at all at your current level. The first is this. If the enemy team is almost all physical damage, buy at least one item that also gives you armor if you are not an agility based hero. Many good items have an armor component. Mek, Shiva's, Lotus Orb, Medallion of courage + upgrade. AC, Crimson Guard etc. Second, If the enemy team has a great deal of stuns and magical burst, force yourself to buy a BKB at the 30-40 minute mark. These two choices are easy to conclude and give a lot of value. Last, and maybe the most important tip is to buy an upgraded magic wand on ever single hero you play until you have a justifiable argument as to why you shouldn't buy one. +4 stats plus an active that gets you started from early in the game using inventory slot actives. I know it might seem an odd suggestion, but 17 wand charges will win you fights, get you that last bit of mana for a spell you need to finish, and start building your active item use muscle memory that is beyond the skills of your hero. Many items in Dota are very strong, but only if you click them and use them like your 5-6-7-8th abilities. The wand guarantees that you buy a cheap active, that won't retard your long term item progress, is great in early fighting, and can be bought in the first minutes of the game every game. You can place it on your favorite easily accessed inventory hotkey, and it transcends the game or hero that you play. If it saved you once or got you a kill it has paid for its rental fee of 230~gold after you sell it due to lack of slots later in the game.

I do have a 4th item tip that crossed my mind. If the enemy has a Shadowblade(s) or an invisibility hero and you have an inventory slot that is going to waste. BUY DUST. Even if you are a core. When you gank someone with a shadowblade, dust prevents escape. Detection is poorly bought in most low tier games. The worst thing about that, is that by the time people decide to buy detection they have been killed 6 times in the same way by the same hero. If you start here at least, that will set you on the road to understanding sentry use in the future. If you tunnel an invis hero with dust constantly it pays for itself and will make that hero so bad it will do nothing later in the game. Keep in mind, you might be the first person to actually actively counter the invisibility picks of your opponents. You will get to abuse them because they will have to learn how to avoid being killed by dust to stay effective into higher ratings of skill.

Your third point is the knowledge cliff of Dota, you don't need to study shit like school work but when you get ruined by a hero you don't know, do take the time to read his skills. If how that hero does damage doesn't make sense, maybe go to a Purge guide, or ask here. This can only be learned really by doing. Even knowing all the hero skills by memory does not give you the insight on how the best players will use those skills to kill you.

More walls, I can't help it.

Stopped playing a long time ago, due to the rage the game induced. Had a group of 10-12 people I would play with, and none were amazing, and it was before a visible MMR was actually around, so no one knew exactly how good anyone was. Watching a couple of these dudes literally unfriend each other over a disagreement on a game, and the constant screaming/yelling between everyone led me to quit. This shit is a game, and how serious they took it was a turn off.

Anyway.... I'm back, and looking to start learning again. Went through the Tutorial last night and played a few of those bot games, was fun. Gonna be doing a lot more Co-op games, and maybe even hop into some non-bot games as well. My problem always was never picking a few heroes to learn, and so I could never put in the hours necessary to improve. At least that's how it felt is that I was never improving, despite putting in so many hours.

Suggestions for new heroes? To be honest, I really enjoy the ranged Carry heroes. Sniper or Drow are super fun. The issue is I don't have confidence to play a hard carry, and so when I pick them I feel like I'm letting my team down.

if your playing support under 5k just abandon your safelane gank mid once gank enemy safelane once and u will win the game

DO NOT STAY IN YOUR SAFELANE JUST MUTE THE CARRY AND ROAM

very weird patch for support

Crone said:

Stopped playing a long time ago, due to the rage the game induced. Had a group of 10-12 people I would play with, and none were amazing, and it was before a visible MMR was actually around, so no one knew exactly how good anyone was. Watching a couple of these dudes literally unfriend each other over a disagreement on a game, and the constant screaming/yelling between everyone led me to quit. This shit is a game, and how serious they took it was a turn off.

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I remember you playing with us in Heroes of Newerth when it came out, and that's what happened to the FoH group there too. I came back because of 7.00 also. I have about 30 games in, and nothing much has changed in terms of the basics.

Anyway.... I'm back, and looking to start learning again. Went through the Tutorial last night and played a few of those bot games, was fun. Gonna be doing a lot more Co-op games, and maybe even hop into some non-bot games as well. My problem always was never picking a few heroes to learn, and so I could never put in the hours necessary to improve. At least that's how it felt is that I was never improving, despite putting in so many hours.

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I'm actually pretty close to the same skill peak I was at before. I'm gonna have to let Rethan coach me a few more games because I do want to get better, even though I have no desire to play ranked games.

Suggestions for new heroes? To be honest, I really enjoy the ranged Carry heroes. Sniper or Drow are super fun. The issue is I don't have confidence to play a hard carry, and so when I pick them I feel like I'm letting my team down.

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TBH I felt the same way until I came back a few days ago. Carries have to focus on LH, farming for items, and getting in teamfights when they can. Supports have to push, ward, attack, defend, and be all over the place for most of the match. If you're coming back and playing unranked/low MMR I would say don't be afraid to step up and be the carry if nobody else will because it's a different kind of stress, but no better or worse than being support.

Urlithani said:

I remember you playing with us in Heroes of Newerth when it came out, and that's what happened to the FoH group there too. I came back because of 7.00 also. I have about 30 games in, and nothing much has changed in terms of the basics.



I'm actually pretty close to the same skill peak I was at before. I'm gonna have to let Rethan coach me a few more games because I do want to get better, even though I have no desire to play ranked games.



TBH I felt the same way until I came back a few days ago. Carries have to focus on LH, farming for items, and getting in teamfights when they can. Supports have to push, ward, attack, defend, and be all over the place for most of the match. If you're coming back and playing unranked/low MMR I would say don't be afraid to step up and be the carry if nobody else will because it's a different kind of stress, but no better or worse than being support.

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Holy hell, HoN. I loved playing Fairy!! With her huge stun, and then fucking around sometimes and building her for damage! hahahahaha

But forgive me... do you have a different name in game? I don't remember who you are/were. I feel like an asshole now.

It was Urlithani in game. I am pretty quiet in games and just go along for the ride mostly. Maybe it was Kirotan but I'm not sure. We had 17 people at one point though so I don't remember all of them either, just yours and a few others.

Urlithani said:

It was Urlithani in game. I am pretty quiet in games and just go along for the ride mostly. Maybe it was Kirotan but I'm not sure. We had 17 people at one point though so I don't remember all of them either, just yours and a few others.

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HoN was right after, or right at the tail end of my weed fueled younger days, lol... I don't remember really a single thing about who I played those games with. Now that you mention it, I do very vaguely remember there was an FoH chat channel or something in game that we used, wasn't there? haha

ill play dota with anybody, im not much of a rager just pm a steam id if ur on EST time

Just saw the stats that my profile has. Looks like the last game I played of DOTA was August 2013, so quite a while. Looking back at what heroes I was playing, I was such a pleb support. lol!

I watch a bit of twitch DOTA 2 at night now...I added it to my smart TV. Anyway, I like BananaSlamJamma for his coaching sessions and general play. Explains what is going on a lot as he goes...A lot of the casters just mumble to themselves.

Didn't have time for a lot last night, but I queued up for the Coop game outta the Tutorial, and that's for Easy Bots, and after 5 minutes I gave up and just played another Solo bot game as Sniper.

This stage of the game is fun as every single game is a huge improvement over the last as you get better at things.

I think I'll try today to queue for a Normal Bots, or Hard Bots game, and see if that helps the queue times. Profile link below, add me on Steam if you want. I'm PST, and due to working 2nd shift, more often than not on pretty late.

Steam Community :: Crone

You need to watch EternalEnvy then

BrotherWu said:

Someone recommended Purge and I watched a recent video he made playing Maiden. I couldn't understand about half of what he said. It was all quiet mumbling. It was like the whole team was making a point of sounding very very calm.

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If you want to see what not to do, SingSing is back this weekend I think

So ppd's retirement lasted <6-months haha. Other than Boris who I don't remember seeing him play the roster looks very strong. QO and ppd need nothing said, Chessie usually looked like the best player on his teams (Alliance, Complexity) and Jeyo looked good with Rave.