DoTA 2 One: Not to be confused with DoTA 1 Two

[Octopus Jack]

... I wonder if Centaur mid might be nice against OD. Need to try this. He doesn't need much INT at all, and is naturally tanky as all hell.

Centaur's still on my list to try, not really gotten much chance but he looks really fun.

Speaking of really fun I just finished up a stupid "supercarry" bloodseeker game where I got very, very fed. Not sure how as the enemy team seemed to know how his moves worked but by the end of the game I could slap down their ancient towers through backdoor protection on my own. Needless to say it was quite ridiculous, plus we were down a player so that made it even sweeter. And I got a bloodseeker hat the game before.

[Anteros]

A few thousand, give or take. And that means you have to find people to stack with during that time. Public matchmaking will never give you high-class games.

Yeah...I think you're exaggerating. I'm pretty sure you don't have to log literally thousands of hours of gameplay to work your way up the ladder far enough to find people with a basic understanding of the game. I'm not looking for competitive play here...just people who understand how the game is supposed to work.

[TubaMortim]

Yeah...I think you're exaggerating. I'm pretty sure you don't have to log literally thousands of hours of gameplay to work your way up the ladder far enough to find people with a basic understanding of the game. I'm not looking for competitive play here...just people who understand how the game is supposed to work.

Well, depends on the idea of basic gameplay I guess. I'd expect my support to stack and pull instead of single pulling, ward, deward warded camps, pull through to secondary camps if the pullcamp isn't stacked and know when to stay on lane and harass the enemy instead.

Also, I expect people not to dual lane most of the time, as most of the time it blows, and not waste a solo or safe lane on a support hero. And that they pick heroes according to at least the possible laning, ie. pick what we're lacking and not just another carry / clinkz in general.

I see this as basic gameplay or "how its supposed to work", but everyone probably has their own definition.

Edit:
Also, yes, I was exaggerating to vent my frustration over the MMR.

[GreenSerpent]

Centaur's still on my list to try, not really gotten much chance but he looks really fun.

I usually go Hoof Stomp at lvl 1, then max Double-Edge grabbing a point in Return at 4 and taking his ulti whenever possible.

An early Hood of Defiance makes him stupidly tanky - I also sometimes build Vanguard on him for the even greater tank, and I can disassemble it to build a Heart later. I'm also considering messing about with Radiance.

Important though. There's a delay between casting Hoof Stomp and it taking effect - it needs careful timing.

[Hellwyrm]

Important though. There's a delay between casting Hoof Stomp and it taking effect - it needs careful timing.

Ahhh but once this and animation cancelling are mastered, Centaur raves all day every day.

[GreenSerpent]

... I just had the weirdest bot game I think I've ever had...

I'm playing jungle Lifestealer. We've got a safe lane Sniper, a mid Drow, and a dual hard lane Tusk/Bloodseeker. Bleh, but it's easy bots right? Should be no bother.

After Drow feeding the enemy Necro Bot mid 9 kills I rethought my opinion. Tusk/Blood were dying too, Sniper was doing okay. This was gonna be hard - especially because Drow was feeding the Luna Bot carry.

After Luna had her 15 minute Manta Style and proceeded to wreck our mid barracks, kill 4 of us (not me, due to pushing another lane) and almost take our mid towers (left due to me pushing bottom lane back to tower) I thought "This is gonna be bad...".

At the 45 minute mark things were looking dire. Luna had 30+ kills, 0 deaths, and we were having real trouble. Then salvation came.

Drow DCed. That meant a bot went back to base. It was Luna Bot.

Me and Tusk snapped into action. Unholy Rage, Open Wounds, armlet activate - we basically jumped on Necro Bot and Windrunner Bot and went all out. One Double Kill later (Triple technically, but Tusk finished one off) and I was feeling a little better.

Then Drow reconnected while I was taking the top tower. Luna came charging out of the fog at me, glaives a-spinning. But this time I stood and fought. And to my huge surprise, I won even though she activated her Manta Style.

We managed to win. Final score was 93 to 22, mine was 3/9/4.
(equipment was Hand of Midas, Armlet, Phase Boots, Assault Cuirass, Skull Basher and MKB)

[Dumbledore lives]

Damn, last couple of games I've played have been really good up until one of the members of the other team dcs for unspecified reasons and then everyone leaves. I even had a good Pugna solo suicide lane which was very odd. Only died once and got a kill.

[Lunix Vandal]

And for another extreme of weird bot games (or, "Never ever EVER let someone get this fed," or, "Lunix <3 midgame powerhouses"):

Spoiler

Show

This afternoon I picked Weaver in a Medium bot game. Since neither our Spirit Breaker nor our (last-pick) Sniper wanted mid, I took it. Laning was uneventful outside of SB grabbing a few kills, both at bot and with across-the-map charges to top. After grabbing Boots + Perseverance, I managed two solo kills of my own on Death Prophet, then started roaming.

And pushing. (Treads finished.)
And not dying to a merry 1v3 chase, then picking up a kill on Razor when they decided to back off to defend top. (Linken's finished.)
And more roaming. And more pushing. (Demon Edge acquired.)

Having not really encountered the bots between finishing Linken's and picking up the Demon Edge, I was itching to check my strength relative to theirs. Opportunity presented itself when my team decided to back off from the top-lane high ground, leaving Dire spread around the ruins of the Tier 2 tower. I dove in, figuring that (due to the bots' relative lack of hard disables, especially with Linken's up) I could always Time Lapse + Shukuchi out if things got hairy.

Solo Triple Kill.

"Well that was awesome," I say to myself, "that's enough to finish my MKB. Time for an easy 'rax."
The tower goes down easily enough, but the bots keep running up to me one by one as I chew on the 'rax. Presumably they were in "Roaming to the half-HP Weaver to gank//Defending top" mode, but by running in immediately after spawning ... I got fed. Hard.

It's not until the Ancient falls and the scoreboard pops up that I realize how hard: 1153 XP/min, 748 GP/min. Level 23 with 18.3K net worth, in a game that only lasted 24:30.

GreenSerpent -- Winning a game 93-22 as the 22? Wow. Just ... wow.

TubaMortim -- I expect my support to not autoattack the wave. No such luck in half my games, and the other half I'm the support. (Which, admittedly, I'm still a bit below the examples you gave.)

[Octopus Jack]

Well, depends on the idea of basic gameplay I guess. I'd expect my support to stack and pull instead of single pulling, ward, deward warded camps, pull through to secondary camps if the pullcamp isn't stacked and know when to stay on lane and harass the enemy instead.

My idea for basic gameplay is carries need to know how to farm, when to engage and when not to, supports need to know how to do most of the above aside from pulling through to secondary camps, at my level, especially queueing with three new players, most people don't block camps so dewarding isn't that common but still happens.

I am gradually training some very new players up in the art of Dota. So far teaching them to stack and pull is...difficult and one has absolutely no map awareness whatsoever. Ah well we're getting wins and I generally ball out of control when I queue with them, eventually they'll all be fairly solid players but until then practice makes perfect.

Speaking of balling out of control, last game I had with them I went 11/1/16 Sand King in a game where the end scores were 40 - 6. The entire team just kept getting kills and one of my newbies has picked up Shadow Shaman very quickly and is, more often than not, trapping people in his wards, knowing who to hex, who to shackle and generally makes playing with him a pleasant experience.

[GreenSerpent]

GreenSerpent -- Winning a game 93-22 as the 22? Wow. Just ... wow.

All I can say is, thank god for Rage granting magic immunity. Taking an Aghanim's-upgraded Eclipse to the face hurts.

[Wolf_Haley]

Got the chance to chill and talk with Sunsfan Sunday at Lanhammer a fighting game/rts/mba tournament. Cool dude, while he doesn't really play he's pretty knoweldgeable about fighting games and loves watching em.

[Scurvy Cur]

Well, depends on the idea of basic gameplay I guess. I'd expect my support to stack and pull instead of single pulling, ward, deward warded camps, pull through to secondary camps if the pullcamp isn't stacked and know when to stay on lane and harass the enemy instead.

Also, I expect people not to dual lane most of the time, as most of the time it blows, and not waste a solo or safe lane on a support hero. And that they pick heroes according to at least the possible laning, ie. pick what we're lacking and not just another carry / clinkz in general.

I see this as basic gameplay or "how its supposed to work", but everyone probably has their own definition.

Edit:
Also, yes, I was exaggerating to vent my frustration over the MMR.

Just throwing this out there in case there are any people who are reading this thread and are considering trying dota out (something I strongly reccomend):

While everything on this list is definitely an important part of playing a really good support, it is also a little more than I would consider part of the "basic" gameplay. Definitely more an intermediate-advanced thing in my book. So newer players shouldn't get too discouraged if they don't even know what half the stuff you listed is.

Support, imo, is one of the most intimidating things for a new player to really dive into. The list of little things that supports need to do with their time is pretty extensive, and it can be overwhelming for a newer player. If I got a support in a pub match that did even one or two of the things on that list, I would consider myself exceedingly fortunate.

My basic list consists of:
- Don't right click the creep wave
- Let the carry take the farm
- Get wards/Place more wards when old ones expire
- Make sure the courier is covered
- Carry a TP scroll at all times (really, everyone should do this, but for supports that can afford to ditch lanes to go protect a teammate, this is especially important)

And tbh, if a support player messes up on some of this now and again, particularly missing some TP defenses, I don't get too upset by it. Nor do I get too upset by supports not trilaning, since sometimes that requires more coordination than a pub match allows.

[TubaMortim]

Just throwing this out there in case there are any people who are reading this thread and are considering trying dota out (something I strongly reccomend):

While everything on this list is definitely an important part of playing a really good support, it is also a little more than I would consider part of the "basic" gameplay. Definitely more an intermediate-advanced thing in my book. So newer players shouldn't get too discouraged if they don't even know what half the stuff you listed is.

Support, imo, is one of the most intimidating things for a new player to really dive into. The list of little things that supports need to do with their time is pretty extensive, and it can be overwhelming for a newer player. If I got a support in a pub match that did even one or two of the things on that list, I would consider myself exceedingly fortunate.

My basic list consists of:
- Don't right click the creep wave
- Let the carry take the farm
- Get wards/Place more wards when old ones expire
- Make sure the courier is covered
- Carry a TP scroll at all times (really, everyone should do this, but for supports that can afford to ditch lanes to go protect a teammate, this is especially important)

And tbh, if a support player messes up on some of this now and again, particularly missing some TP defenses, I don't get too upset by it. Nor do I get too upset by supports not trilaning, since sometimes that requires more coordination than a pub match allows.

Basic is probably a poor word for what I meant. A better explanation might be "things I expect people I stack with / Valve puts in a team with me to take for granted". Maybe not so much for the latter part, at least not after a long history of disappointments in public matchmaking.

[Scurvy Cur]

Basic is probably a poor word for what I meant. A better explanation might be "things I expect people I stack with / Valve puts in a team with me to take for granted". Maybe not so much for the latter part, at least not after a long history of disappointments in public matchmaking.

I can definitely sympathize with that last bit. I try not to play too often with anything less than a 5-stack, since even with a solid set of 4, we always seem to end up with a 5th who does something obviously bad. Though to be fair, my usual five stack seems to confuse the matchmaking system (our typical group will have people that have been playing since Dota 1, people like me who have been playing a year or so, and some people that have only been at it a couple of months).

[TubaMortim]

I can definitely sympathize with that last bit. I try not to play too often with anything less than a 5-stack, since even with a solid set of 4, we always seem to end up with a 5th who does something obviously bad. Though to be fair, my usual five stack seems to confuse the matchmaking system (our typical group will have people that have been playing since Dota 1, people like me who have been playing a year or so, and some people that have only been at it a couple of months).

Yeah, well, I just played the most disappointing game with a party of 3. A dota-friend of mine and someone he knew. Plus two randoms from the matchmaking. Turns out the two strangers played well, but the two I stacked with completely underperformed.

We were tri-laning the dire top lane against a dual lane of clock+jugger. We managed to FB and get another kill later as well. However, both supports were more interested in securing their own farm in the jungle than securing farm for the carry (me, the 1 game in 100 when I play a farming carry) and the lane was practically 1v2 most of the time. Even though I told the Keeper to help me on the lane. Multiple times. Even with some frustrated language.

Basically the first ~10+ minutes were me trying to get lasthits vs two other melee heroes denying what they could and trying to cog/kill me if I took a step too far. And because of the pulling I tanked half the waves under the tower (didn't have a stout shield either, which I should have bought for that situation) and basically missed more than half of the cs.

What really made me lose all interest in the game was that dota-friend of mine, after I managed to finish treads and drums on lane, asking "armlet soon?". Could've started a dungstorm, decided to just mope and half-heartedly play until the game ended.

Doesn't matter how well you pull jungle shenanigans if you lose sight on the priorities on the lane & in the game

Edit: And I used the console to disconnect as they were taking down the final raxes & throne. Now I'm in the low prio pool for 24h.

[Scurvy Cur]

Yeah, well, I just played the most disappointing game with a party of 3. A dota-friend of mine and someone he knew. Plus two randoms from the matchmaking. Turns out the two strangers played well, but the two I stacked with completely underperformed.

We were tri-laning the dire top lane against a dual lane of clock+jugger. We managed to FB and get another kill later as well. However, both supports were more interested in securing their own farm in the jungle than securing farm for the carry (me, the 1 game in 100 when I play a farming carry) and the lane was practically 1v2 most of the time. Even though I told the Keeper to help me on the lane. Multiple times. Even with some frustrated language.

Basically the first ~10+ minutes were me trying to get lasthits vs two other melee heroes denying what they could and trying to cog/kill me if I took a step too far. And because of the pulling I tanked half the waves under the tower (didn't have a stout shield either, which I should have bought for that situation) and basically missed more than half of the cs.

What really made me lose all interest in the game was that dota-friend of mine, after I managed to finish treads and drums on lane, asking "armlet soon?". Could've started a dungstorm, decided to just mope and half-heartedly play until the game ended.

Doesn't matter how well you pull jungle shenanigans if you lose sight on the priorities on the lane & in the game

Yep. Had a similar game not too long ago with a group of friends. I figured we had a pretty good trilane with an Alchemist, KotL, and Jakiro. I was even more convinced we'd be in good shape when our opposition turned out to be a couple of melee heroes in a duo lane. Easy pickings for concoction > ice path > illuminate, with Chakra there to keep the mana flowing. Or so I thought.

It sort of fell apart from the start because KotL and Jakiro had some pretty strange priorities. KotL decided that pulling and stacking mattered more than securing an early lead/first blood/lane dominance, and Jakiro had some frustratingly bad control on his ice path, firing them off into lane willy-nilly, even when I made it clear that I didn't have the mana for a concoction just yet, and then being completely oom when I did have the mana to make something work (I ended up using concoction more to fend off some aggressive 2vme action from the opposition than I did to grab lane kills like we planned). And then Illuminate was never, ever there when it was needed, because KotL was always off doing other things.

Was able to make an interesting game out of it anyhow because Alch farms from behind pretty well, and the other team's PL was bad, but we couldn't come back from that bad trilane, especially once their Tinker figured out KotL was a free kill.

Frustrating, but it happens sometimes.

[TubaMortim]

Yep. Had a similar game not too long ago with a group of friends. I figured we had a pretty good trilane with an Alchemist, KotL, and Jakiro. I was even more convinced we'd be in good shape when our opposition turned out to be a couple of melee heroes in a duo lane. Easy pickings for concoction > ice path > illuminate, with Chakra there to keep the mana flowing. Or so I thought.

It sort of fell apart from the start because KotL and Jakiro had some pretty strange priorities. KotL decided that pulling and stacking mattered more than securing an early lead/first blood/lane dominance, and Jakiro had some frustratingly bad control on his ice path, firing them off into lane willy-nilly, even when I made it clear that I didn't have the mana for a concoction just yet, and then being completely oom when I did have the mana to make something work (I ended up using concoction more to fend off some aggressive 2vme action from the opposition than I did to grab lane kills like we planned). And then Illuminate was never, ever there when it was needed, because KotL was always off doing other things.

Was able to make an interesting game out of it anyhow because Alch farms from behind pretty well, and the other team's PL was bad, but we couldn't come back from that bad trilane, especially once their Tinker figured out KotL was a free kill.

Frustrating, but it happens sometimes.

I might just have to wait for my usual cm-buddies to come back from their holidays, although we'll probably have to grab a liability or two since we don't have a core team of 5. On the other hand, lowpool might be the perfect place to practice pubstomping with Spacecow and Timbersaw.

[Octopus Jack]

Just had a really, really intense 72 minute long 72 kills to 71 game. Blood was flowing on both sides, full of pudge hooks, force staff plays and a ragequit on our team.

I had a great early game, laning against a Pudge who swiftly left the lane to get easy kills on the side when he realised that having no mana or last hits wasn't fun. The enemy team took the lead during their midgame with Pudge+Bloodseeker getting a lot of kills and our Gondar+CM bot doing stupid dives that resulted in Dragon Knight and Juggernaut getting a fair bit of gold. Then we started teamfighting which resulted in a lot of 3 for 3s or 4 for 4s. Our Bounty Hunter seemed to dislike using his ult, especially against targets with shadow blades so what should have been a steady gold advantage in our favour turned into a not so even mash up.

Eventually we got our act together, Bounty Hunter bought a Gem for the Shadow Blade users then swiftly died and dropped it then finally ragequit. We won/stalemated a couple 5v4 teamfights then eventually good a good one and pushed through their ravaged base to win with Pudge on their team attempted to base race us and nearly taking out our last ancient tower.

Phew. I think I need a cigarette after that, one of the best things was all 4 of us on my team were a premade and using voip so we could actually communicate. Sadly a couple were very new so a lot of the time the talking was 'Don't move, just stay still, not go back and forth, you've been ulted by bloodseeker, don't move.'
Ah well we won in the end.

[DoctorWhooves]

The best hero to use to beat OD mid is Razor.

[Trixie]

GreenSerpent -- Winning a game 93-22 as the 22? Wow. Just ... wow.

Well, without Luna, that was more like 55-22. Still hard, but within limits of doable, especially if you know how to farm. I know from experience Bounty Hunter with 12 kills can have less xp and gold than that ass Faceless Void who jungle farmed whole game and never came to help in team fights making it 4 vs 5

Spoiler

Show

Speaking of games, had similar experience. Sniper, Stalker, Lich, Drow and Luna (me, but I picked carry first). Sniper parks himself at mid after Night Stalker took it - NS expressed doubt if Sniper is best hero to go there, I supported him, but he eventually relented and moved to the top with Drow.

What proceeded was 9-0 on Sniper.

Against easy bots.

In five minutes.

Drow fared little better, making Viper and Dragon Knight level 14 when our best was level 10, and what was supposed to be easy, relaxing game to let my friend try out Lich turns into push right to the barracks (we lost all towers by 18 minute mark). Thankfully, Sniper ragequits, and game, while still very hard stalls for 10 minutes as we successfully fend off all bot attacks on the barracks. Drow, frustrated with lack of progress, quits too, and at that moment we start pushing bots back quickly despite 2:1 kill disadvantage up to that moment, and finish game 10 minutes later with a win

I must say, bots not only know how to last hit, but when they decide to teamfight you face all 5 with good coordination, loyalty and teamwork, something that never can be relied upon with other pub humans. I lost track how often it was 5 vs 3 (the only players paying attention) and despite heavy damage to all bots, we pretty much always lost (just one more human and it would be TPK on bot team...).

All in all, I played bots of all levels, from easy to unfair, and IMHO the factor most deciding if game is going to be difficult is single bad human versus enemy carry. Not only having fed bot makes him much more difficult opponent, the bad guy usually cannot be relied upon in fights, making it 4 bots + 1 fed one vs 4 players

[Litewarior]

The problem with bots in just about all games is that they are very predictable. Once you figure out how to bait them into certain actions and reactions, it's very easy to get fed off of them, especially with a hero like sniper. Bots tend to stay in lane longer than is smart, and especially against easy bots, you can walk right up to them and they won't attack you until it's too late.

Bots have some advantages over real players (cheating, perfect chain stunning, rune control, last hitting, etc.), but their predictability makes them highly inferior to any human being.

[Trixie]

Bots have some advantages over real players (cheating, perfect chain stunning, rune control, last hitting, etc.), but their predictability makes them highly inferior to any human being.

I'd say the above makes them highly superior to most DotA players

Seriously, being unpredictable means nothing when you have bad aim, bad build, bad teamwork and communication, things bots tend to do flawlessly.

[GreenSerpent]

I'd say the above makes them highly superior to most DotA players

Seriously, being unpredictable means nothing when you have bad aim, bad build, bad teamwork and communication, things bots tend to do flawlessly.

Their main weakness (on easy at least) is their habit of grouping up into a 5-bot gank pack. Makes them easy to avoid/kill if you've got a team of very strong teamfight abilities (WD, Faceless Void, Tidehunter all together... ow)

[Trixie]

Their main weakness (on easy at least) is their habit of grouping up into a 5-bot gank pack. Makes them easy to avoid/kill if you've got a team of very strong teamfight abilities (WD, Faceless Void, Tidehunter all together... ow)

Well, if you have 5 players with appropriate abilities, sure. When you have 3-4 due to humans not paying attention, with stream or pinpoint damage, taking on perfectly supported death ball flawlessly focusing you if you try any DoT skill can be frustrating

[Anteros]

With the bots though you can generally just buy a BKB and stomp them 1 vs 5 if you have to. They really are very predictable.

[Dumbledore lives]

Just had a fantastic Kotl game. I went safe lane with Specter against a Necrolyte and Brewmaster, and the early game looked really bad. I did all the stacking and pulling and stuff and Specter got some free farm, but then Huskar ganked us and it went downhill from there for awhile. We slowly lost map control until we huddled in our base afraid from Huskar who it seemed we couldn't kill. Luckily we had a batrider, and two or three teamfights later our Specter was farmed and we had pushed from losing our tier 3 mid into theirs. After that we had one more teamfight, a roshan, and it was over. 50 minute game were it looked like it would be a half an hour one. Also somehow Specter had less last hits than me, the Batrider, and the Sven, and still had more Gpm. Anyway Kotl is best counterpusher and mana giver, and all around a great old man with a stick.

[Fan]

Just had a fantastic Kotl game. I went safe lane with Specter against a Necrolyte and Brewmaster, and the early game looked really bad. I did all the stacking and pulling and stuff and Specter got some free farm, but then Huskar ganked us and it went downhill from there for awhile. We slowly lost map control until we huddled in our base afraid from Huskar who it seemed we couldn't kill. Luckily we had a batrider, and two or three teamfights later our Specter was farmed and we had pushed from losing our tier 3 mid into theirs. After that we had one more teamfight, a roshan, and it was over. 50 minute game were it looked like it would be a half an hour one. Also somehow Specter had less last hits than me, the Batrider, and the Sven, and still had more Gpm. Anyway Kotl is best counterpusher and mana giver, and all around a great old man with a stick.

Yeah Gandalf is pretty cool.

[GreenSerpent]

Yeah Gandalf is pretty cool.

And also has voice responses for meeting every female hero in the game.

[TubaMortim]

And also has voice responses for meeting every female hero in the game.

And also:

http://dota2.gamepedia.com/Gandalf

[Dumbledore lives]

So the next patch update was spoiled, and I like the look of it. It buffs most of the heroes I play, and does small nerfs to some heroes who were seeing a little too much competitive play. Only problem I see is Treant Protector is now useless at night, I mean the regen got better but it will only help your lane partner/ tower, that's bad. Nighstalker now hard counters him. In general though I'm most excited for the Pugna change, since he is one of my favorites.