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Sorta New But Need TIps

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Forum » New Player Help » Sorta New But Need TIps 11 posts - page 1 of 2
Permalink | Quote | PM | +Rep by Cobbil » December 18, 2012 1:31pm | Report
So I've been playing off and on with friends and have found myself falling behind by leaps and bounds in terms of skill and kill/death ratio. And am looking for some tips and suggestions. I've played about roughly 50-75 games by now.

I generally main three heroes, basically to get a feel for things and be of some used. Those heroes being Drow Ranger, Dragon Knight, and Queen of Pain. Queen seems to be a harder hero to play, but she's overall my best.

On Drow I usually go with Treads, Manta, Helm of the Dominator, and Crystalys. It works well, so long as I'm not over-harassed. I do decent, just not enough to really do what she's meant to as a carry.

Dragon Knight has been my most recent project, and he's been frustrating. I love his concept and his abilities too much to give up. With his items I do go Treads, Amulet of Mordiggan(sp?), Helm of the Dominator (again), and Skull Basher. I do pretty good in the early stages of the game, but end up horrible mid game which drags down my late game.

I feel my problems with Queen is just my stupidity sometimes. I over-predict or end up in sticky situations that I don't think clearly on. Again, she's my best hero, but I'm not amazing with her. I tend to avoid leveling Sonic Wave until I get the Aganihm's Scepter(Sp?) or until 10. It just doesn't cut it damage-wise and I'd just prefer getting a level 4 Scream of Pain. My items for her tend to be said scepter, Arcane Boots, Scythe of Vyce, and Linken's Sphere (if the game goes that long!)

I've also dabbled in Anti-Mage and Bloodseeker. I greatly enjoy what they are capable of but have struggled, specifically Anti-Mage who seems to get the whole enemy team's ire in the first 5 mins of the game.

Well, I'll stop with my horribly misspelled wall of text and just simple ask: Any tips and help?

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Permalink | Quote | PM | +Rep by ShadowStorm » December 18, 2012 1:37pm | Report
Well my advice is to play a few more heroes (even if you just random in a few games) and just improve your general play style (last hitting, Map awareness, ect). Also another way to improve your performance (i found)is to watch Pro games (in-game not on streams) and use the player perspective to view what they do. Also read a few guide (on heroes and general play styles)and that should help a lot.

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Permalink | Quote | PM | +Rep by xCO2 » December 18, 2012 2:57pm | Report
50% of Dota is knowing the capabilities of your enemy. As ShadowStorm said, learn more heroes and you can gauge when to be risky more/less.

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Permalink | Quote | PM | +Rep by ShadowStorm » December 18, 2012 11:54pm | Report
ow and i forgot to mention just reading every heroes spells and stats helps you make split second decisions when gauging when and when not to fight and when heroes ults will be on on off cooldown. and just general hero knowledge is also a bonus but it takes a while to know it all off by heart.

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Permalink | Quote | PM | +Rep by zoglug » December 19, 2012 1:10am | Report
ShadowStorm wrote:

ow and i forgot to mention just reading every heroes spells and stats helps you make split second decisions when gauging when and when not to fight and when heroes ults will be on on off cooldown. and just general hero knowledge is also a bonus but it takes a while to know it all off by heart.


This has been a harsh lesson learnt for me! I found myself dying to bloodseeker all the time wondering why. Ten I read his skills and realised his ulti would do that if I moved! So I definately advocate reading as much as possible into each heroes skills!

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Permalink | Quote | PM | +Rep by xCO2 » December 19, 2012 3:30am | Report
zoglug wrote:



This has been a harsh lesson learnt for me! I found myself dying to bloodseeker all the time wondering why. Ten I read his skills and realised his ulti would do that if I moved! So I definately advocate reading as much as possible into each heroes skills!


Don't forget that by simply clicking on the enemy in-game and hovering over the ability you can read it, that way if you're unsure of values or forgot the mechanics of the spell, you can read it in-game.

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Permalink | Quote | PM | +Rep by Hades4u » December 19, 2012 3:41am | Report
You have to play and learn each hero, that way, you'll know how to deal with the enemy heroes, counters and such.

The more you know, the better you play.
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Permalink | Quote | PM | +Rep by Monty the Warchief » December 20, 2012 8:33am | Report
Play with bots, before you can master the complexities of what your opponents are thinking, you have to first learn the fundimentals. It's also helpful to the learning process simply because the bots don't get angry with you for feeding. Something to remember: Don't let anyone tell you how or what exactly what to do with your hero, not even the game itself. Dota 2 is based 100% around originality, meaning Item Builds, Stat Builds, and Ability Builds. Learn your own heroes playing them, not following a guide on how to play it. Learn the items using them, not reading about them on a website. Learn your abilities by using them in combat, not listening to someone explain them. You've embarked on a great journey my friend. Good luck, and Have fun.

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Permalink | Quote | PM | +Rep by Sefi » December 20, 2012 11:50am | Report
Starting with Drow Ranger is good because she's easy, but trying to start with DK is like buying your first bicycle ever and then taking it to the steepest hill you can find. He's a hard carry to play.

The heroes you've mentioned are all carries, (QoP being a semi-carry in technicality) which means that right away you need to perfect one of the hardest aspects of DOTA2: last hitting the creeps.
Consider that every minute of the game, two waves of lane creeps spawn: one at 00 and one at 30. A good carry is expected to be able to last hit at mimimum 80% of the enemy's wave, or for example: if 5 creeps spawn in a wave, you should be getting the last hit on 4 of them. Every single wave. Anticipating enemy denies and ganks and other factors I say you're doing pretty well if you can secure at least 3 last hits every wave, but if you're missing last hits over and over, you are not farming well, and thus you will not carry well.

For me, DK has an unbearable last hit animation, making last hitting very difficult. One of the best ways to rectify this is to start a practice lobby with only yourself, pick your hero of choice, and leaving the hero at level 1 with no skills upgraded and NO ITEMS EQUIPPED, go into lane and try to last hit every creep you can. If you can master last hitting with a hero without any stat buffs or abilities helping out, then you'll find farming in a real game becomes a lot easier.

In the mean time, starting with a Quelling Blade can help.

In Dragon Knight's case, you are pretty much expected to AFK farm until late game starts. If the game is 25 minutes in and you're participating in team fights or kills that aren't 100% winnable, you're wrong.

The only reason you get a HotD on DK is to take control of a strong neutral creep that won't be easily killed off, (centaur khan, for example) position him in front of your team's ancient stack, and between 52 and 54 seconds, micro the creep to walk in the ancient camp and lure the ancients out of the camp to result in a new spawn of ancients. After level 11, DK's Dragon Form gives him a damage splash, making it very easy for you to solo up to even four stacks (12 total) of ancients. Averaging out each ancient to be worth about 100 gold, killing twelve of them gives you 1200 gold. And that's after four minutes of stacking and thirty seconds of killing.

If you don't use this method to stack ancients or you always forget to micro your creep, then you may as well not get HotD.

If you really want to get in the game faster and your early game farm is very excellent, consider getting a Hand of Midas. On a 100 second cooldown, the item gives you 190 gold and 1.5x the experience of the creep you used it on. If you use it every cooldown it pays for itself in about six minutes and then gives you super powered farm the rest of the game.

IMO there is no reason to get Skull Basher on DK. His attack speed is not fast enough to truly benefit from it and his stun should suffice. Not to mention he is a teamfight oriented hero, and Skull Basher is for single-target fighting.

One of the most important items you can get on DK is Black King Bar. If you find yourself dying a lot and having a bad mid game, this is probably why. You're getting stunned/cc'd or just taking too much damage. A hard carry like DK NEEDS a BKB. It prevents the enemy from CC'ing/Stunning you, making them unable to stop you and focus you, and it gives you some much needed bulkiness and damage to boot. And the longer you stay alive, the easier the enemies die.
Consider building BKB immediately after HotD and instead of a Skull Basher.

Heart of Tarrasque is an amazing item for DK. You'll notice your survivability and damage go up exponentially with it, and if you have a Heart, activating Armlet will pretty much let you use Armlet for free; your health will regen so fast that the degen won't even matter.

If you're really dedicated to getting better with a hero and you have some free time on your hands, a good way to familiarize yourself with how to play the hero is to watch professional games. DK isn't exactly a frequent pick for a carry, but he is picked up now and then and can get absolutely terrifying to watch in a pro game. He'll be boring to watch for the first thirty minutes, but then you'll see why it's worth amassing all the farm and survivability.
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Permalink | Quote | PM | +Rep by Nubtrain » December 28, 2012 8:09am | Report
I'd just read over what every hero does or at least the more popular ones and then you can learn what the other heroes do in-game if you're lazy :)

If you want to getting better at playing DOTA, one of the first steps is to learn what each hero does, at least at a basic level

Bloodseeker is heavily countered by Observer Wards and Town Portal Scrolls

All the heroes you've mentioned are actually a bit harder to play if you're really new

Drow Ranger has a really hard time last hitting until level 6 since her attack animation is pretty damn bad

Dragon Knight, you need to know how to take advantage of your beefiness, spells and dragon form

Queen of Pain is the hardest out of the three and requires you to know when to gank and farm. She also has a good amount of skill/item builds to fit the playstyle you want to play

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