This is all very intro-level, but it's incredibly important, especially if you don't have much experience with Warcraft 3, which is the evolutionary basis for the modern MOBA genre. You'll also get a very basic introduction to items. Learn what Tangos are. You'll be using them often. This might seem premature, but my first experiences with Dota 2 skipped past the "playing with bots" stage and went straight to "playing with friends who knew how to play Dota 2. I'm impatient. I started playing Dota 2 specifically because it was the only thing anyone I knew was playing with any regularity, and I wanted to play games with my friends.
It was only later that I started playing without them. This is what allowed me to find fun right away, as opposed to struggling against bots in a game I didn't understand. I asked a ton of questions as we played and, because these were people who wanted me to understand the game, no question was seen as stupid. There are a number of resources online, but constant supportive communication early on was key in getting me involved and keeping me from fleeing in terror at the prospect of Dota 2 's complexity.
So, if you've got friends on your Steam list who play Dota 2 , ask if they'd be willing to show you the ropes. Also, get a mic. Voice communication is critical, especially when you're learning.
This should be seen as mandatory. My sister started playing Dota 2 months before I did, primarily learning the game by using online resources and, unlike me, playing against bots. She played matches against the AI hundreds of times to learn the game and, as Dota 2 's bot AI tends to be very aggressive, it's not a bad primer on player behavior in public, unranked games.
The result after hundreds of games is that my sister has a better win-loss record in matches than I do. That's not indicative of skill necessarily — and my team beat her team when we were randomly matched against her and her new Dota 2 friends, thank you very much — but she's put in a ton of practice and has used the in-game guides to learn heroes and the game very well.
The best way to avoid criticism from the community is to not be new, and the best way to not be new is to play against the AI. Each charge replenishes a small amount of health and mana. Also, makes sure you purchase boots. Brown boots are the most basic type of boots, providing your hero a flat move speed boost.
Phase boots give you bonus damage and a short burst of speed which also makes you walk through units as if you were a ghost. Boots of Travel are the costliest, and a late-game purchase for the most part. These give you the highest move speed boost compared to any other boot. They function like TP scrolls, except the TP feature is built-in and you can also teleport on friendly creeps.
Plus, the cooldown on Boots of Travel is much shorter compared to a TP scroll, so you can move around the map faster. Itemization in the mid and late-game comes down to what your hero needs, how the game is going, and a myriad of other factors. If you feel like the enemy has too many escape abilities that make them hard to catch, build something like a Rod of Atos or Orchid Malevolence. Scythe of Vyse is going to turn your opponent into a harmless pig for a few seconds.
If your team lacks initiation, you build a blink dagger which is a short-range teleport that gets disabled if you take player damage. Want to control runes? Get a bottle. And buy observer wards to maintain vision on the map. That way you can see where your enemies are, what they are doing, and plan your movements accordingly.
Once again, I recommend you follow the default skill build guides provided within the game. While leveling up skills, you typically focus on the ones that provide an increase in damage. Skills that help you clear creep waves, nuke down enemy heroes, or farm faster- these are the ones that provide your hero with a power spike.
What increases, is the hex duration. But note that the mana cost also increases significantly. So you typically put only one point into this skill and upgrade your first and 3rd skills instead. On the contrary, Lion who also has a similar ability with the exact same name benefits quite a bit from leveling it up. The skill starts out with a 30s cooldown at level 1, which goes down to just 12s by level 4.
Also, you can actually start with a hex at level 1 on Lion since it lasts for 2. But Shadow Shaman is better off getting either shackles or Ether Shock since his level 1 hex duration is so low. It prevents enemies within the area of effect from casting any spells. Both the duration during daytime as well as the radius of effect stay the same at all levels.
So you get one value point in this ability at level 3 or 4, and max out your first skill and 3rd skill instead. Before leveling up a spell, read its description to see what it does. What do you gain from each level? Some spells gain a lot by going from level 1 to level 2, but the level 3 upgrade is mediocre. Typically, the mana cost for skills goes up with each level and most heroes have very small mana pools early on.
So take that into consideration before you put a bunch of points into mana hungry skills because you might not even be able to use them. For starters, there are 3 basic types of damage in Dota 2- physical, magical, and pure. It is blocked by armor. Finally, there is pure damage. Pure damage does the exact amount of damage that it says in the spell description, there are no reductions. More on spell immunity later.
Dota 2 also has damage over time spells, which affect you over a period of time dealing ticks of damage at fixed intervals. Armor reduces the amount of physical damage you take from basic attacks; this is extremely useful against agility carries who rely on items to increase their raw damage and attack speed.
A good combination of armor and HP will make your hero very tanky. Magic resistance reduces the spell damage that you take. It is worth noting that Dota 2 has items and spells which amplify physical and magical damage by reducing your armor or magic resistance.
Learn more about how armor works here. Dota 2 is a game of intel, the more information you have on the enemy, the easier it becomes to win. Trees create wedges of no-vision zones, which makes the jungle a dangerous place to venture alone.
Most units have higher vision during the daytime, compared to night vision. Vision is generated in a circular radius around friendly units. Anything that one friendly sees, the rest of the team can see as well. Most heroes have day vision, which is reduced to just in the night.
Day-night cycles are an important part of Dota 2, you always start at with daytime. The first nightfall happens at precisely minutes in, and the next daytime starts at Day and night alternate every 5 minutes, so it is important to keep one eye on the clock at the top of the game. We talked about the fact that most heroes have less vision during the night.
There are exceptions, of course. Nightstalker actually loves nighttime, since the vision game is reversed for him. You have to deal with invisible units like Riki, Bounty Hunter, Clinkz, etc. Weak supports and squishy ranged heroes with limited mobility are their favorite prey. There are two ways to deal with them- sentry wards, and dust of appearance. Place a sentry so you can initiate on him before he gets the jump on you. Dust of appearance has a different effect; it releases a cloud of magical dust in a unit radius that latches onto all invisible units and makes them visible for a short period of time while also slowing them down.
Even if they move out of the original area, they will remain visible until the debuff duration ends. Sentry wards stay for several minutes but only cover a fixed area. Wards are an important part of Dota 2, you place them in key locations to gain vision over enemy movements. There are different warding patterns for when your team is ahead when you are even, and when you are behind the enemy.
When ahead, you place aggressive wards deep within the enemy territory since you plan to invade their area. When even, you place wards around specific parts of the map that you need to control.
Perhaps the most important thing I can teach you in this guide. Dota 2 requires plenty of patience and an open mind. Know that failure is inevitable when you initially start out. But always have a reason behind every decision you make, no matter how big or small the consequence of that decision.
Create a gameplan before you enter the game. Practice a small pool of heroes at the start, and understand the nuances of a specific hero. The most complex decisions often originate from the most basic concepts. The key to being successful in Dota 2 is breaking up everything into objectives.
Take a large problem, and break it down into smaller chunks. Okay, I need to get this tier 1 tower first. How do I get there? I need to level up and buy items. How do I do that? Also, the role of Carry is often taken by heroes capable of causing a lot of damage to enemy structures, the so-called Pushers.
The Carry hero is basically positioned on the Easy Lane, this is the bottom lane when playing on the light side and vice versa, the top one if you play on the dark side. From this lane, the hero has quick access to a large number of camps in the allied forest, as well as the possibility to quickly retreat to the allied tower and avoid getting ganked. Throughout most of the game a Carry hero needs to farm a lot and to collect the necessary artifacts as soon as possible.
To do this, he requires Supporters, who help him on the lane and in the allied forest. The enemy hero standing with the Carry on the lane is called an Offlaner or Offlane hero.
Sometimes an Offlaner is followed by one or two Support heroes in order to keep you from farming. During the Laning phase a Carry must kill as many creeps as possible and do his best to survive in any case, even if his allies are dying and badly need his assistance. A Carry can pick a fight with enemy heroes only if he is sure to win and manage to survive, since his priority is farming. As mentioned above, the Carry is the core unit that inflicts most of damage, especially after 20 minutes of play, when he acquires useful artifacts.
Of course, every game is very situational, and general rules may not work. You may as well ignore weaker Support heroes and try to attack the enemy Carry instead, but it is too risky as Supports usually help the allied Carry with buffs and can disable your abilities.
So, make weaker heroes your first targets, and then proceed with stronger ones. A Carry should not initiate a teamfight in order not to become a primary target for his enemies. During the Laning phase and further along the game a Carry must prioritize his own survival, which is by far the most important thing for the entire team.
The chance to win a fight without a Support in the fifth position is much higher than without a Carry. Therefore, it is better to save your life and continue the game than die with all your allies and lose it. Agility heroes are largely the most suitable for this role, as they deal a large amount of damage not due to their abilities, but with continuous physical attacks. The name of the position, Midlaner, comes from the central lane, which in the Dota 2 community is called Middle or Mid.
The heroes going to the central lane are mostly self-sufficient and need no help for farming. As a rule, two Midlaners from opposing factions stand against each other on this lane. Heroes on the middle lane must have active attack abilities or at least, manage to deal lots of damage at the very beginning of the game, even without having a large number of artifacts.
Heroes on the central lane gain experience and get a level up faster than the heroes on other lanes, since Midlaners are the only ones who stand in the mid lane. After gaining level 6, this can be used as an advantage to gank enemy heroes on other lanes, as they usually have only level at that time.
Such attacks allow you to break up the farming momentum of enemy Carry or Offlaner heroes. Besides, your hero can gain much gold and experience and let your allies farm safely.
The number of killed creeps is the key farming indicator for Midlaners as each kill gives you gold and experience. To beat your opponent, try to kill more creeps and get a level up as soon as possible. Smart midlaners can become levels higher than their enemies by the 10th minute of the game. However, the best way to do it when the creeps have lesser health and your hero can finish them off with one shot.
The rationale is that destroyed towers and killed heroes give no gold to your enemies. Finishing off allied heroes is allowed when they are dying from long-lasting enemy spells and other damage.
Odds are, your ally is doomed to die soon. Finishing off is very important, especially for midlaner heroes. Once a laning phase is completed, it is worth going to gank the opponents.
You need to realize what abilities your hero has and on which of the lanes you can commit killings. Together with the allies, it is worthwhile to think it through and go bravely on the attack. The role of the midlane hero in the teamfight is important both at the beginning and at the end of the game. While carry does not have the necessary artifacts, and sometimes experience, the biggest impact in the fight is to be done by the hero who came from the left line.
During the first phase of the game, up to minutes, all attention is focused on the midlaner. On whichever line he comes, there will be a backdrop for the initial stage. After a Carry hero manages to buy the necessary artifacts, the midlaner loses some of its position in terms of importance in the fight, but still remains one of the most important players in the team.
Therefore, carry as well as midlaner must survive in fights as their lives are sometimes much more important for a team than winning a fight. Heroes filling the role of midlaner must have active attack abilities and inflict a large amount of damage over a short time. While the first two positions are needed to deal damage and kill at the beginning or at the end of the game, Offlaner is the one who starts the fight or takes control over enemy heroes.
So, what is the role of Offlane hero? Basically, offlaners are the initiators with a high health pool or heroes with very strong ultimate abilities. Standing on the off lane hard lane is rough luck for heroes. He has to fight against enemy supports and carry while trying to farm and survive upon all that. In earlier patches, you could access forest neutral creeps only on the easy lane, and offlaners had no creeps on the line, except those of the other faction.
Therefore, if there are three heroes, a carry and two supports in front of a hero on the hard line, then he simply has to stand and gain experience, or try to draw neutral creeps from his line into the forest and kill them. The only assistance the heroes standing in the off lane can get is the allied support of the fourth position, who sometimes might come and stand with you on the line. Also, he must join the ganks initiated by midlane heroes and try to gather artifacts within the first minutes to gain an advantage for further teamfights.
The role of the offlaner in the fight is sometimes very brief, albeit very important. As we have already said, heroes on this line must have an effective initiation or a strong ultimate ability. One of the important artifacts for heroes in the hard line is the Blink Dagger. It gives a great positional advantage over the enemies. If you are the initiator, that is, the one who starts the fight, for example Axe, Slardar or Sand King, you have to choose the right position before the fight.
In a forest near the line, on a hill behind your enemies or anywhere else where they do not expect to see you. So that at the right time you can enable the Blink Dagger to close in on the enemy location and use the ability to initiate and taunt enemy heroes.
If an offlaner hero does not have any strong initiation ability, he can gain momentum by using his ultimate abilities. For example, Enigma owns the Black Hole, an incredibly powerful ability that can reverse the tide of a fight by killing up to three enemy heroes if used properly.
To do so, Enigma takes a good position and waits until the enemies are initiated by his allies and get close together. At this time the damage Enigma deals is the most devastating. It takes time to learn this tactic, but a seasoned offlaner is eventually much more effective than a carry hero with all his artifacts.
Heroes on the hard line must have a large health pool to lane against two or more enemy heroes and survive. Or the hero must have a strong ultimate ability, which can turn the course of the teamfight. There is also a strategy when one more hero, capable of causing the same damage as carry, is positioned on the hard lane. This is one of the two secondary positions in the team. The fourth position player should be good at pressing the keys and feel the game both on lanes and in teamfights like no one else.
In a teamfight as well as on the line, he acts both as an initiator and as a support and as an attacking hero. In a nutshell, he has to be a master of all trades, so to say. Such heroes do not deal as much damage as those on the first and second positions can do. Neither they can initiate as the third position heroes, but anyway the fourth position is very important. There are several options how to act while on the fourth position during the laning stage.
The first one is a roamer, a hero that constantly moves along the lanes and prevents enemy heroes from regular farming by killing them or just dealing some damage and breaking up their health regeneration. At the same time, roamers can farm neutral creeps or stack them to help his allied core heroes gain some gold and experience. The main task of the roamer is timely pulling and attacking the enemies when they do not expect. It is also the case, when your carry needs assistance and both supports of the 4th and 5th positions are on the same line.
This is called the triple lane. It works only if there are two enemy heroes standing in the offlane and your carry needs to farm badly. It is advisable to get all the necessary artifacts during the laning stage and, at the same time, try to leave much farm for your fellow heroes.
During the teamfights, players of the 4th position must do their best to prevent enemies from performing effective attacks, no matter what it takes. The 4th position hero must initiate fights, disable enemy heroes, sunder enemy positions before attacks or defence. There are several targets to attack in the teamfight for the fourth position players. Depending on the situation on the map, this can be any of the core enemy heroes. The best way is to disable a hero who can currently make the most impact in a fight, it can be a carry with good artifacts or a high level midlaner or an offlaner with a good ultimate ability.
In the span of a fight you have to survive and prevent fellow core heroes from getting attacked. When there is a choice — to die or to save the life of a core hero, it is better to sacrifice your own life. The death of a carry means surefire defeat for your team. A lot of different heroes may be the position 4 players. The main criterion here is the abilities defining their play styles.
If this is a support hero, you need some appropriate abilities to assist your allies. Support is the main assisting hero in the game. The fifth position at the Laning stage. Support in the fifth position is usually on the lane with a carry. The support is responsible for harassing the enemy offlaner, while trying to keep him from finishing off the creeps.
If you do not let the enemy stand still on the line, then eventually the allied creeps become more in number than the enemy ones and begin to heavily push the line. This tactic can also help the support gain some gold from neutral creeps and get useful artifacts.
The rationale behind the creep pulling is to attack neutral creeps, thus making the allied creeps rush back to defend you. Another trick with forest creeps is stacking. At each of the camps there is a stack of neutral creeps, which can be withdrawn from the camp by using a normal attack at the th seconds of the current minute.
And the next minute, while they are following you, a new stack of creeps will appear in the camp. As a result, you can gather up to stacks of creeps within one camp. All these stacks can further help a carry or midlaner gain a large amount of gold. For each creeps stack gathered and killed, a support gets additional gold. In situations where an enemy attack occurs on your line, you must do your best to save a carry. Even if this requires sacrificing your own life. You must try to survive in the very first seconds of a teamfight and not die very fast.
Later on, you need to sustain your allies with healing spells and try to disable the enemy, especially the core heroes. They are the most dangerous for you and your fellows, so must be dealt with as soon as possible. When there is a chance to save your teammate by sacrificing your own life, do not hesitate as 5 position support has the least value and your death gives little gold to your enemies.
Basically, it is the 5 position support who is responsible for providing vision to all his allies on the map, therefore reducing vision for the enemies. There are two kinds of wards in Dota It is advisable to place Observer wards where enemies do not expect this. There are several points on the map, where the ward gives the most enhanced vision. These are the great spots, but the enemies expect you to place your wards right there.
Therefore, it is better to find locations with less vision, which are not so obvious to your enemies. Heroes of the fifth position are largely supports. Therefore, the main criterion in choosing the right support is a range of useful abilities.
For your convenience, each Dota 2 match is divided into stages. This is not an official division from the developers though, just the numbers and titles that have appeared in this game over time. Understanding the game stages helps you figure out what artifacts your enemy might have at that particular moment, whether you lag behind with farming and when you can take down enemy towers and Roshan.
There are several game modes in Dota 2. In any game mode, the team should choose the core heroes not later than at the very end of the draft, so that the opponent could not do the same. This game mode has the same rules as All Pick. However, in order to shorten the match time, several differences exist:.
Matchmaking is the process through which the system groups players into opposing teams for public games. With the exception of bot games, matchmaking is mostly determined by matchmaking ratings MMR. Picking one of the 12 daily heroes grants the player an Enchanted Mango at the beginning of the game. Some heroes that were recently created or tweaked are unavailable in Captains Mode; they will be added eventually.
Before picking the heroes in any of the modes, one should think over various combinations to choose. And what has to be done if one of the heroes is banned or the enemy has already chosen him. The Dota 2 map consists of three lanes: top, middle and bottom. The regular arrangement is as follows:.
Of course there are different situations, sometimes one of the heroes can be permanently in the forest, sometimes the 4th position can be on the line along with the carry and the 5th position, creating a triple lane and the like.
But we consider the most frequent of all options. At the beginning of the game, all the heroes farm and try to get as much gold as possible to buy the necessary artifacts. The Carry should always stay on his own line and only in some situations, when you can surely make more than 1 kill, he moves to another line. In such cases, some other hero must occupy the line. In fact, this is the rule of thumb to replace missing heroes when they are out of the line in order not to lose gold and experience.
The Midlaner should go out on ganks only after reaching level 6 and getting an ultimate ability. This gives the greatest advantage over the enemy, who at this time will have level if there are two enemy heroes standing on the lane.
The Early Game phase ends within minutes, depending on the selected heroes. After the laning stage comes the mid game. There are continuous 5 vs. It is important to realize that if you have an advantage over an opponent, and managed to destroy more buildings, you should not slow down.
Supports should place more aggressive wards, for example in an enemy forest and necessarily on the outlets to the river from the enemy side. One must try to control most of the map in order to lock the enemies at their base and engage them in a fight. When your opponent is prevailing, try to find some space for farming and wait until the situation changes.
Let your core heroes farm the forest and the lanes till they have the artifacts they need for a fight. Also, avoid head-on battles while your enemy is stronger. No matter what your chances to win are, do not forget to collect Bounty Runes. Runes give a huge advantage as the amount of money they give increases over time. Collecting most of the runes provides you with much more gold, even if your enemy managed to make some kills before and to farm on the line that is better that you. The control over Roshan becomes very important during the mid game stage.
Killing him over and over again gives many rewards to your team. The first kill grants your core hero an extra life, thus allowing to act more aggressively on the map while attacking the enemy.
With the second death of Roshan , the team receives the Cheese, a special item which restores all health and mana, which is also very useful in a long fight.
The third and other kills give you two enhancements, and the Refresher Shard, an indispensable item for heroes with strong ultimate abilities and long cooldowns. All these kill rewards grant many bonuses, especially when winning a fight may decide a match. While in the mid game you should pay attention to collecting more gold to buy back your hero once he is killed.
Losing a fight means nothing if you have enough gold for buyback. Do so when there is still a chance to get up with your enemy and kill him, or you are sure you can save an allied building from destruction.
However, overusing the buyback option when no urgent actions are needed is nothing more than a waste of gold.
Even professional Dota 2 players may sometimes use buybacks for no reason. If the game is not over during the Mid Game stage, it goes into to the Late stage. As a rule, the main heroes have already had all the necessary items up to this time.
Supports usually do not get such items, unless the game lasts too long and even secondary heroes can acquire the best artifacts as well. In most cases, when in the late game, teams are by and large equal in their gold amounts and game performance. There are quite a few buildings left, mostly on the base, and going far into the forest or along the lanes alone may be too dangerous. Most fights have a 5 vs. Therefore, players should move close to each other or be able to quickly teleport to their allies.
The essence of the late game stage boils down to the fact that someone must force the enemy faction to make a mistake. You need to estimate the whereabouts of your enemy and where he might attack from.
To do so, just keep an eye on the lanes and your wards on the map. During this stage, buyback is even more important than in the mid game. Also, core heroes should reconsider their items to see if they live up to new tasks.
Once useful, these items might be not so efficient in the late stage. For example, it holds true for the Desolator , or the Mask of Madness. Such items can be replaced by others, which are more effective in the late stages.
Such items will be very useful against enemy core heroes with maximum artifacts. After destroying the enemy barracks, your lane starts spawning super creeps , which are far stronger than regular creeps.
In the case when all the barracks on the enemy base are ruined mega creeps appear across every lane, which are even superior to super creeps. There are two types of barracks in Dota 2: Melee and Ranged. Melee barracks have more health and higher HP Regeneration stats. Destroying enemy barracks is crucial to win a match, as it allows super and mega creeps spawn and fight for your cause. It is better to focus on destroying Melee barracks first as melee creeps spawn faster and in larger amounts than ranged creeps.
However, handling Melee barracks takes much time and effort, so you must be sure you have enough assets to do it in a single run. Otherwise, a barracks recovers its health in a blink of an eye due to a high HP Regen rate.
Once tier 3 towers are destroyed, you can advance to attack two tier 4 towers guarding the enemy Ancient , which is a principal building in each of the factions. When the game lasts more than 80 minutes, the ultra late stage begins. It is when all the heroes have most of accessible items and the minimum number of buildings remain on the bases of both teams. From now on, regular and super creeps boost their power every 7 minutes and 30 seconds by getting extra health and damage-dealing points.
So even if you have mega creeps on your side, your team may be defeated since mega creeps have no boosts as such.
In terms of overall strategy, the ultra late stage is much the same as the late one. Heroes, creeps, Ancients, Roshan and the Fountain are able to cause some kind of damage. In Dota 2, any damage dealt has its own type. According to the in-game encyclopedia there are the following types of damage:.
You can boost or cut down damage by using armor or various attack modifiers. There are also some items and spells that can entirely or partially neutralize the damage effects.
Ranked matches are played only by equal players. Perhaps this becomes possible thanks to the rating system, which Valve implemented in Dota 2 in Ratings allow to assess the individual skill of each player and pick the appropriate team and rivals. Newcomers are not eligible to take part in ranked matches. They have to go through several unranked game stages before competing with other players in ranked matches. Each rank has its own 5-star ranking. Players have to reach a 5-star status in each of these ranks in a row to finally receive a Divine rank.
Alongside the commonplace game mechanics mention above, there are plenty of gameplay elements in Dota 2 which are not so obvious to first-timers and casual players.
Here are some gaming tips and tricks to help you succeed in this challenging online game:. However, in some cases, temporary activation can prevent the enemy from finishing off allied creeps to get some gold. This feature is especially useful for mid heroes in a typical 1v1 situation. More or less experienced players know what it usually takes to kill creeps.
Getting their armor increased may be an unexpected twist for an enemy hero. In the meantime, you can deny these creeps or let allied towers or creeps finish them off instead. In this case, your enemy gains only experience and no gold at all. Keeping an eye on the minimap to see what your allies are doing is more than an essential tactic that can save your own life. Getting Bounty runes every 5 minutes should be your rule of thumb.
A team that lets many bounty runes slip by loses a lot of gold. Death in the game is not always a bad thing. The only way is to play Ranked Classic, which is easier to find available games. Turbo mode or not, you still have to play the hours in real life. So far, there are only two known factors that contribute to your MMR. They are wins and losses. Naturally, if you win your games, you gain MMR.
Losing games will reduce the number instead. How it works precisely is still a mystery today. Players with similar MMR can play against and with each other in ranked matches. However, Valve has never disclosed how calculating MMR works.
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