Disclaimer: I make no presumption of being good at this game
I've found that my team and I have moved away from running a solo offlaner to a 2-1-2 setup. Obviously every game is different but as a general rule, we haven't been running it since a week after 6.79
It's taken me a while to adjust as I was the solo offlaner in the team. My played heroes is shifting from mostly dark seer, bounty, lone Druid, timber and Mirana which is tough because I'm not really good enough/well versed in the full hero roster to make that change quickly and effectively.
I will say that Mirana paired with someone with a reliable stun seems to be working well for me. Crystal maiden in particular works well I find as her frostbite into arrow into starfall is great for early kills in lane
The MLG tourney really showed what a team can accomplish with next level Mirana play. I guess the drawback is you tend to either do really good...or really bad.
WR got a name nerf post patch and her ultimate was rather significantly buffed (in that you always get the whole duration of max attack speed on the target), but not really. Item changes and the lane equilibrium might have affected things slightly, but she's still the same ginger you know and love.
As for 2-1-2: At least from pub experience, a strong aggressive duo against the solo (guys with point and click stuns or high burst magic damage; even "carries" like Luna or Sven don't do bad here) and a strong defensive/harassing duo against the tri (guys who can peel like Abba, Weaver, clock and guys who can CS or harass from far away like Lich, WR, or Veno) can work really well, since it's a lot easier to entirely shut down their solo than it is for their tri to stop your duo from getting enough levels to be relevant elsewhere or to at least wear down the carries regen and contest neutral EXP.
On the other side of the coin, if your solo off can survive the new lane well and you have a "support" who can duck into the jungle early and effectively, a pseudo-trilane with a jungler and a solo off can get a really solid early gold and EXP advantage, but that's more of a general "exploit pubbies being bad" strategy, like if their team has no lane that could shut down a weaver off even if they bought detection.
The creep equilibrium changes and the fact that you can leech exp off the pulls are both big buffs to offlaners. The trade off is that everyone is running roaming supports now, so you're under pressure to get more out of your lane than before to compensate for them bothering your mid.
I'll gladly take 6.79 hard lanes over 6.78 ones.
Your first point is definitely correct, but I don't agree with the trade off. Roaming supports means that the offlane hero is more likely to stay in the lane and get faster xp than 6.78 which gets you level 6 sooner which in turn allows them to gank sooner not because of the pressure necessarily, but because they hit 6 and the majority of offlaners have ganking ultimates.
Also don't agree with the creative play leading to winning. Speed played really well, but DK made some really subpar decisions especially with their draft compared to their play style in game 3 along with burning crumbling under pressure.
not sure how your disagreement addresses the fact that the offlaner's earlier and easier level 6 is a direct result of the two supports who in 6.78 would be in a safelane tri stepping on the offlaner's throat choosing to roam instead in 6.79 (and usually to the mid).
also expectations scale with the perceived ease of your task. if everyone knows the offlane is easier now, they will expect more out of you there
Disclaimer: I make no presumption of being good at this game
I've found that my team and I have moved away from running a solo offlaner to a 2-1-2 setup. Obviously every game is different but as a general rule, we haven't been running it since a week after 6.79
It's taken me a while to adjust as I was the solo offlaner in the team. My played heroes is shifting from mostly dark seer, bounty, lone Druid, timber and Mirana which is tough because I'm not really good enough/well versed in the full hero roster to make that change quickly and effectively.
I will say that Mirana paired with someone with a reliable stun seems to be working well for me. Crystal maiden in particular works well I find as her frostbite into arrow into starfall is great for early kills in lane
The MLG tourney really showed what a team can accomplish with next level Mirana play. I guess the drawback is you tend to either do really good...or really bad.
Mirana is easy as fuck... just gotta land every single arrow and then you win the game.
gt: Bobby2Socks | steam: Billy Boot-Snatcher
You talk clean and bomb hospitals, so I speak with the foulest mouth possible
Holy hell was last night most definitely not a good time for me to be playing Dota. First game, get a Clinkz DC before creeps spawn. I quip in chat that he'll probably come back with a minute to go on the timer, feed first blood, and then leave again. Guess what happened?
I queue again, but end up in a Slark Spirit Breaker (me) lane against a solo Ursa, gifting Ursa easily the greatest lane phase ever. Adding to the annoyance we had a first pick PL and a last pick....Medusa, who was clearly new and just fed the entire game.
I queued for a third, but decided no...it's not worth it.
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3cl1ps3I will build a labyrinth to house the cheeseRegistered Userregular
Holy hell was last night most definitely not a good time for me to be playing Dota. First game, get a Clinkz DC before creeps spawn. I quip in chat that he'll probably come back with a minute to go on the timer, feed first blood, and then leave again. Guess what happened?
I queue again, but end up in a Slark Spirit Breaker (me) lane against a solo Ursa, gifting Ursa easily the greatest lane phase ever. Adding to the annoyance we had a first pick PL and a last pick....Medusa, who was clearly new and just fed the entire game.
I queued for a third, but decided no...it's not worth it.
I am not sure how a solo Ursa beat those two heroes o_O
That's what we thought. We immedately comboed him in the lane thinking it would be easy first blood. He just laughed, fury swiped slark down to take first blood, and then almost killed me. We eventually got the levels to kill him with, but by then it was far too late. Basically it was 2 melees who couldn't stop his farm and have no burst damage to kill him with early. Granted I never play SB so that was a factor, and our Slark was also pretty bad.
Wait, how did you die *at level 1.* It's not like he has any CC or max aspd at that point. Like, he'd have to have started boots and you'd have both had to have been communicating incredibly poorly for you to not win the trade with a dude with no spells and then actually die instead of just walking off.
Also, you'd probably want to combo at level 2, when slark actually does 19 HP removal per attack and your charge actually has CC and damage attached to it... both of your heroes have near useless level 1 skills because of how heavily they rely on their autoattack steroid to followup or function.
Fury swipes dude. Fury swipes. The reason Ursa is a pub stomper is because people insist on manfighting him. I realized immediately it was a bad idea and bugged out, Slark...did not. I mean yeah, we fucked up. But going up against 2 melee iniatiors with no stun (beyond the initial charge stun) Yeah dude, if i'm Ursa I'm loving that shit.
"All men dream, but not equally. Those who dream by night in the dusty recesses of their minds wake in the day to find that it was vanity; but the dreamers of the day are dangerous men, for they may act their dream with open eyes to make it possible." - T.E. Lawrence
I understand he does damage, but so do towers. Both of them have the same effective mobility to hit you while walking away. Also, again: Level 2 is where it's at for duo lanes to combo somebody, in most cases.
Broodmother man..what a weird hero. I don't think I've ever played her in probably over 1000 games, I just never found her interesting. But I got stuck with her in SD and man...I fucking wrecked faces. I have the distinct feeling you can only really do well with her when the other team is terrible.
...Sort of. The recent changes to Brood have made her annoying as hell, but didn't really address her fundamental weakness of being mostly useless.
that was my feeling too. merlini shocked me by mentioning that he thinks she might need a nerf. makes no sense to me; noone is picking her up because she's still useless. how could she be too strong?
imo buff spiderlings magic resistance and increase their gold/exp bounty.
...Sort of. The recent changes to Brood have made her annoying as hell, but didn't really address her fundamental weakness of being mostly useless.
that was my feeling too. merlini shocked me by mentioning that he thinks she might need a nerf. makes no sense to me; noone is picking her up because she's still useless. how could she be too strong?
imo buff spiderlings magic resistance and increase their gold/exp bounty.
The most important reason no one is drafting her is because she isn't in CM at the moment.
Played a game as support venomancer and decided to ignore gale till late game and max out sting/wards. I pretty much spent all game defending towers. with 3/4 wards up with 450 hp they could not get a push going at any point. Now if only I could have had a viper in lane with me....
Brood is one of those characters that probably is really dependent on your micro skill. If you are good with her spiders she is an excellent split pusher. I have played her once since the patch with bots. And I had 0 idea what I was doing but I can see how she would be good with the changes. Problem is there are heroes that split push way better than she does with out the handicap of needing a web to not move slower than balls.
I literally just sat in the lane and leeched XP. Once I got enough of a push going with spiders I'd peel off and farm their jungle for awhile. Then head back to lane. I bought my own sentry wards so I could see where the enemy team put theirs. They never once ganked me, and I never died. By the time team fights started I was a huge mid game problem.
She's interesting because you're forcing whatever lane you're in to spend a shit load of money on wards on the off chance they can kill you. And it's easy to stay safe now since you can go hide in the trees to leach xp.
Brood is also a hugely roster-dependent hero, particularly for the team you're up against.
If they have wave-clearing spells, you're not only good to get screwed, but you're going to feed them lots of money/exp.
I've been counter-picking DK against broodmother lately and it's been glorious (especially once you get splash in your ult). Buy HH and dust and it's hilarious how effective you are against her. Alternately, I can see DP, Lina, Disrupter (kinda), Jakiro, etc all being really good counters.
Could you guys recommend good channels on YouTube to watch that offer good commentary and analysis on individual heroes, that aren't Purge or Dotacinema?
Merlini does stuff every now and then. He's kind of in the purge vain of having a chill persona and doing streams where he talks about decision making, heroes, strategy, and so on.
Brood's basic gimmick, which might actually be *really* strong in competitive play, is that you need to dedicate an abundance of resources to stop her. With a BKB/Orchid, perhaps her own sentry wards, and her kit, just finding her in lane without her killing you requires really specific or multiple heroes, and even then you may not actually finish her off. It's sort of like the pressure NP can throw down, except that broodmother probably has much better manfight.
However, the spiderlings are still a huge risk-reward even with that style, and broodmother does suffer a lot from simply ignoring her and steamrolling another lane if you can manage it.
...Sort of. The recent changes to Brood have made her annoying as hell, but didn't really address her fundamental weakness of being mostly useless.
that was my feeling too. merlini shocked me by mentioning that he thinks she might need a nerf. makes no sense to me; noone is picking her up because she's still useless. how could she be too strong?
imo buff spiderlings magic resistance and increase their gold/exp bounty.
The most important reason no one is drafting her is because she isn't in CM at the moment.
Merlini does stuff every now and then. He's kind of in the purge vain of having a chill persona and doing streams where he talks about decision making, heroes, strategy, and so on.
Yeah I like Merlini as well. His streams and post-game commentary are usually pretty good, and his mailbag is occasionally useful (the 800gpm one is great). He's a dota1 legend, current commentator and still regularly plays with pros, definitely someone worth listening to.
15-3 as Axe at the +/- 20 minute mark and all my carries decide do go full retarded and wander off where we have no vision and die or die to roshan (twice) as Slardar because you just stay there and get stunned to death. Finish the game 24-13 as the rest of the game was a downhill slide vs a team of carries. God people are stupid. Getting 3 dunks in a teamfight is hilarious though.
Actually the Sven game Purge put up is fun to watch because he is playing with Godz. He gets so excited when he is play just like when he is casting. But I think I will second Merlini he is pretty decent.
Man, PyrionFlax is doing commentary on the dreamhack dreamleague tourney, and it's so damn awesome.
Otherwise, the pro meta right now seems to be buying lots of midas and sandbagging. And frankly..it sucks. Pretty sure this midas paradise isn't going to last come the next Ice patch.
Were you watching last night when Pyrion and Tobi were drinking tea during the Liquid/Navi match?
It was like this ten minute window of Commonwealth weirdness, and they just went completely off topic for ages. Hilarious.
Also, it seems that Alliance have stopped their dumbass picks and have started drafting a half decent lineup. And they're winning again. Man, last few weeks they've been making some super weird picks.
Does anyone who is British not find Pyrion Flax the most irritating person they've every listened to? Every time he's on TeamChat in a game I watch I have to mute it.
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The MLG tourney really showed what a team can accomplish with next level Mirana play. I guess the drawback is you tend to either do really good...or really bad.
As for 2-1-2: At least from pub experience, a strong aggressive duo against the solo (guys with point and click stuns or high burst magic damage; even "carries" like Luna or Sven don't do bad here) and a strong defensive/harassing duo against the tri (guys who can peel like Abba, Weaver, clock and guys who can CS or harass from far away like Lich, WR, or Veno) can work really well, since it's a lot easier to entirely shut down their solo than it is for their tri to stop your duo from getting enough levels to be relevant elsewhere or to at least wear down the carries regen and contest neutral EXP.
On the other side of the coin, if your solo off can survive the new lane well and you have a "support" who can duck into the jungle early and effectively, a pseudo-trilane with a jungler and a solo off can get a really solid early gold and EXP advantage, but that's more of a general "exploit pubbies being bad" strategy, like if their team has no lane that could shut down a weaver off even if they bought detection.
not sure how your disagreement addresses the fact that the offlaner's earlier and easier level 6 is a direct result of the two supports who in 6.78 would be in a safelane tri stepping on the offlaner's throat choosing to roam instead in 6.79 (and usually to the mid).
also expectations scale with the perceived ease of your task. if everyone knows the offlane is easier now, they will expect more out of you there
Mirana is easy as fuck... just gotta land every single arrow and then you win the game.
You talk clean and bomb hospitals, so I speak with the foulest mouth possible
I queue again, but end up in a Slark Spirit Breaker (me) lane against a solo Ursa, gifting Ursa easily the greatest lane phase ever. Adding to the annoyance we had a first pick PL and a last pick....Medusa, who was clearly new and just fed the entire game.
I queued for a third, but decided no...it's not worth it.
I am not sure how a solo Ursa beat those two heroes o_O
You talk clean and bomb hospitals, so I speak with the foulest mouth possible
new team lineups are crazy. DK has a pretty bonkers roster atm.
That's what we thought. We immedately comboed him in the lane thinking it would be easy first blood. He just laughed, fury swiped slark down to take first blood, and then almost killed me. We eventually got the levels to kill him with, but by then it was far too late. Basically it was 2 melees who couldn't stop his farm and have no burst damage to kill him with early. Granted I never play SB so that was a factor, and our Slark was also pretty bad.
Also, you'd probably want to combo at level 2, when slark actually does 19 HP removal per attack and your charge actually has CC and damage attached to it... both of your heroes have near useless level 1 skills because of how heavily they rely on their autoattack steroid to followup or function.
GT: Tanky the Tank
Black: 1377 6749 7425
that was my feeling too. merlini shocked me by mentioning that he thinks she might need a nerf. makes no sense to me; noone is picking her up because she's still useless. how could she be too strong?
imo buff spiderlings magic resistance and increase their gold/exp bounty.
they're the travelling wilburys of dota.
You talk clean and bomb hospitals, so I speak with the foulest mouth possible
The most important reason no one is drafting her is because she isn't in CM at the moment.
She's interesting because you're forcing whatever lane you're in to spend a shit load of money on wards on the off chance they can kill you. And it's easy to stay safe now since you can go hide in the trees to leach xp.
If they have wave-clearing spells, you're not only good to get screwed, but you're going to feed them lots of money/exp.
I've been counter-picking DK against broodmother lately and it's been glorious (especially once you get splash in your ult). Buy HH and dust and it's hilarious how effective you are against her. Alternately, I can see DP, Lina, Disrupter (kinda), Jakiro, etc all being really good counters.
Our first game is now available for free on Google Play: Frontier: Isle of the Seven Gods
Steam: adamjnet
However, the spiderlings are still a huge risk-reward even with that style, and broodmother does suffer a lot from simply ignoring her and steamrolling another lane if you can manage it.
derp
In my defense I haven't played or watched as much since TI3. That's why I didnt know brood wasnt in CM... yeah... lets go with that
Yeah I like Merlini as well. His streams and post-game commentary are usually pretty good, and his mailbag is occasionally useful (the 800gpm one is great). He's a dota1 legend, current commentator and still regularly plays with pros, definitely someone worth listening to.
also wrt getting better at dota I think everyone should watch this:
dendi talks dota
Anyone want to beta read a paranormal mystery novella? Here's your chance.
stream
That is one ugly set
Why do people never push the advantage?
...and then a couple gems for my Kuroky Rubick staff. Tracking spells stolen and wards placed.
You talk clean and bomb hospitals, so I speak with the foulest mouth possible
Also, that set is ugly as fuck. Just low quality textures.
Otherwise, the pro meta right now seems to be buying lots of midas and sandbagging. And frankly..it sucks. Pretty sure this midas paradise isn't going to last come the next Ice patch.
It was like this ten minute window of Commonwealth weirdness, and they just went completely off topic for ages. Hilarious.
Also, it seems that Alliance have stopped their dumbass picks and have started drafting a half decent lineup. And they're winning again. Man, last few weeks they've been making some super weird picks.
Steam: adamjnet
Mirana and Clinkz for example.
You talk clean and bomb hospitals, so I speak with the foulest mouth possible