Lane Control
If you've ever gone to lane and felt outmatched and soon found yourself underleveled or undergeared, you've come to the right place. This guide contains a good deal of information for the laning of phase of the game, a very important phase which often dictates how the game progresses through mid-game (during the ganking phase).
Goals of The Laning Phase
Your goals in laning are not very deep: get money, get experience. Pretty simple ideas, right? That's why I do anything in real life and dota is no different. So lets get right to it.
Experience
In order to gain experience, you must be within a certain range when a creep or hero dies (1000 range). If another allied hero is also in range, you split the experience equally (which is why a solo lane will typically be a higher level than dual lanes). As you gain experience, you will level up and your abilities will get much more powerful.
Since your opponents are often trying to kill you (that is, deprive you of money and experience), it is often smarter to take charge and do that to them BEFORE they get the chance to do it to you, thus allowing you to gain experience and money without restriction.
Money
In order to get money (in addition to the gold accrued every second – a relatively slow source of income) you must get creep kills in lane. When you get the last hit on an enemy creep, you get an additional amount of gold that would otherwise have gone to another teammate (if they get the last hit) or to no one (if your allied creeps get the last hit or the enemy denies the creep).
Both of these ideas goals are very straightforward. Accomplishing these goals, however, with your opponent trying to maximize his money and experience becomes a little bit more difficult. There are a lot of things that must be considered in order to widen the gap between your income/experience gain and your opponent's income/experience gain. First of all, I will address the universal ideas that hold for (pretty much) every hero.
Golden Rule of Laning
- If you manage to stay in your lane longer than your opponent, you will widen the EXP gap between the two of you and likely the money gap will follow suit.
-- This is the central idea to all aspects of laning. If you maximize this gap during laning, you set yourself up for excellent chances of winning further along in the game. If you fall behind your opponent in these areas, prepare for an uphill climb. I will reference this point in most sections.
Regeneration (both hit points and mana)
If you manage to stay in your lane longer than your opponent, you will widen the EXP gap between the two of you and likely the money gap will follow suit. So how do you stay in the lane longer? Regeneration is the answer.
When you head out to lane, in almost all situations you should have some regeneration items, mainly flasks or tangoes for HP and clarities for mana. Mana regeneration is nice but as some of you may notice, you can still survive without mana. This is NOT the case with HP – so bring adequate hp regen.
Flasks or tangoes?
The choice is really up to you and your preference but some situations lean towards tangoes and some towards flasks. If the enemy is more prone to physical harassing (through normal attacks or arrow skills – Clinkz' searing arrows, Viper's poison attack, Drow's frost arrows, etc.) it is often more worthwhile to take tangoes. They will often attack you and try to widdle your HP down (preventing you from gaining EXP) but do not have nukes to take off your HP in larger chunks. Also, since they will be attacking you often and aggressively, you are less likely to be able to recover healing from a flask as any attacks during the duration dispel the remainder of the heal.
If the opposing lane is one with lots of burst damage (consisting of Sand King and Lina, for example) a flask is often a better choice. A burrowstrike followed by LSA and dragon slave with attacks in between takes off a LOT of hp, and healing back HP through tangoes (slowly) will often put you in harms way for another similar combo. A flask solves this problem faster and allows you to remain close and contend for last hits/denies as usual.
Lets say now that you are the ones with a nuke combo. If they have a flask (which heals 400 hp) and you leave them with 200/700 HP after you use your nukes/disables, they will be able to reenter battle quickly. If they do not have a flask but only tangoes (or better NO regen) you can probably manage another attack resulting in their death once your spells are off of cooldown. Choosing a target in lane can often be based off of their regen (or lack thereof).
Tying in the Golden Rule
Another thing worthy of note: sometimes not getting a kill is just as good – if not better – than getting a kill. No, you do not get the experience from their death or gold from killing them. At very early levels, however, this gold and experience is negligible compared with what you can gain from freefarming. If you force someone to have to travel back to base in order to avoid death, you gain a LOT of valuable farming time.
You free farm, they walk back to base; you gain experience and have freefarm. They waste time and lose out on money.
Mana Regeneration
Mana regeneration through clarities or another source (CM aura, basilius aura, obsidian aura) is also important for maintaining aggression on your opponents. After all, if you do not have any mana to cast your spells, how dangerous can you be to them? - It is this same logic that makes Nerubian Assassin and Keeper of the Light very frustrating to lane against as they will deprive you of your mana through skills.
Poultry
In all cases dealing with regen, a chicken is EXTREMELY useful. If your lane opponents are particularly aggressive and you run out of your starting regen, have the chicken/crow send you some more. If you aren't in the habit of buying a chicken, either start buying one or get a friend to buy one :D. (or join a game until you find someone named tinfoiltank)
Harassing – weakening your opponent without the immediate intent to kill
How To
Harassing is a pretty important topic in lane control. Some heroes, however, won't be able to harass as effectively as others. Melee heroes have an obvious disadvantage when you consider “creep agro.” Creep agro is the aggression of creeps (to attack your hero) based on your actions or position. The creep has AI designed such that if you issue an attack command on an enemy hero (either by a + left-clicking or right-clicking by itself) the creeps will attack you. The serves as a form of anti-harassment, so to speak, and you can lose a lot of health if you are not careful. There are some ways to get around this.
If you position yourself far from the creeps before attacking the enemy hero, the creeps will have to walk further to get to you and you can retreat before they are able to damage you much. This is ranged heroes often have an easier time in lane. They do not have to be right next to the opponent (and creeps) in order to attack unlike their melee counterparts.
Another more unique form of harassing is using arrow skills, such as those on Drow, Viper or Clinkz. The creeps react to these skills like they do normal spells, that is they do not draw aggression (must be manually cast, however). This is a nice way to get in extra attacks without causing yourself to lose health from creep aggression.
When?
When should you harass? Not all the time. Some times you must play a bit more passively and simply stay for experience. If, however, you are laned with a melee hero that is relatively item dependent, it is often a good idea to harass so that person will be able to contend for last hits. If you don't make this effort, the other team will be able to harass your heroes and force you to lose some last hits and possibly experience.
What about in a solo lane against another solo? Harassing here is a bit safer since they will often lack the power to kill you by themselves (unlike dual stun lanes, for example). In this case, however, you are not contending with a teammate (or trying to support one) for last hits. This means that if there is a last hit available and you elect to harass the opponent, the money from that last hit does not go to your team. Wasted money is no good.
If you are in a solo lane vs two opponents, it is much more dangerous to harass (depending on the opposing lane, of course, as some are much more dangerous than others). Many times in this situation being content with some last hits and gaining EXP is best. Some heroes can “harass” in these more difficult lanes through use of certain spells and also get last hits. Some examples include Death Prophet's Carrion Swarm (timing the cast to hit heroes and get a last hit or two), Zeus's Arc lightning and Leshrac's Lightning storm.
Tying in the Golden Rule
The more you harass, the more the enemy will have to retreat to regen or otherwise play "passively" allowing you to farm more freely.
Here is a screenshot of myself and a friend playing a pretty formidable lane (NA/Lina) against the not-so-strong lane ofES/PL.
The important thing to notice is the enemy's distance from the creep wave. There is almost no chance of them getting any last hits without risking their lives (or using their long range spells). My ally was harassing quite a bit and we still had plenty of mana to kill them should they step close.
Note about aggression
If you have the ability to be aggressive, by all means take it. Seizing the initiative is very important when talking about lane control. An enemy that is afraid of you will be much less likely to engage you and will probably make poor decisions in an effort to return the balance. You WILL (or should) be the target of ganks in this scenario, so make certain you are prepared (with observer wards, mostly, or adequate "mia" calls from your teammates).
Hero Choice
With regards to early game laning, not all heroes were created equal. So what hero should you choose? It's not always an easy question to answer. A lot of this depends on your opponents hero choice (and skill level!) in addition to many other factors. Also, playing heroes you aren't comfortable or familiar with is often pretty difficult, so before choosing a “top laning” hero be sure to know what skill builds and item builds you would go under which circumstances.
Stunners/Combo Nukers
Heroes with stuns work particularly well in laning – after all when a hero is stunned he cannot deal damage (excepting skills like pudge's rot or clockwork's battery for example) and certainly cannot cast anything against you during this time. Also, you are free to get in a number of attacks while they cannot retreat.
Particular combinations that work well are those which include two stuns – at least 1 of which being targetable (f/ex storm bolt). When multiple stuns are landed in conjunction with normal attacks, the enemy will lose a lot of health, if not all of it. With that being said, the enemy will be much more apprehensive when approaching creeps to last hit.
* This is what you want the enemy to be scared of - they will be less able to get creep kills and likely be more passive allowing you to last hit more freely - bringing forth yet again the golden rule.
Some ideas to keep in mind possibilities for offensive lanes
Goals of The Laning Phase
Your goals in laning are not very deep: get money, get experience. Pretty simple ideas, right? That's why I do anything in real life and dota is no different. So lets get right to it.
Experience
In order to gain experience, you must be within a certain range when a creep or hero dies (1000 range). If another allied hero is also in range, you split the experience equally (which is why a solo lane will typically be a higher level than dual lanes). As you gain experience, you will level up and your abilities will get much more powerful.
Since your opponents are often trying to kill you (that is, deprive you of money and experience), it is often smarter to take charge and do that to them BEFORE they get the chance to do it to you, thus allowing you to gain experience and money without restriction.
Money
In order to get money (in addition to the gold accrued every second – a relatively slow source of income) you must get creep kills in lane. When you get the last hit on an enemy creep, you get an additional amount of gold that would otherwise have gone to another teammate (if they get the last hit) or to no one (if your allied creeps get the last hit or the enemy denies the creep).
Both of these ideas goals are very straightforward. Accomplishing these goals, however, with your opponent trying to maximize his money and experience becomes a little bit more difficult. There are a lot of things that must be considered in order to widen the gap between your income/experience gain and your opponent's income/experience gain. First of all, I will address the universal ideas that hold for (pretty much) every hero.
Golden Rule of Laning
- If you manage to stay in your lane longer than your opponent, you will widen the EXP gap between the two of you and likely the money gap will follow suit.
-- This is the central idea to all aspects of laning. If you maximize this gap during laning, you set yourself up for excellent chances of winning further along in the game. If you fall behind your opponent in these areas, prepare for an uphill climb. I will reference this point in most sections.
Regeneration (both hit points and mana)
If you manage to stay in your lane longer than your opponent, you will widen the EXP gap between the two of you and likely the money gap will follow suit. So how do you stay in the lane longer? Regeneration is the answer.
When you head out to lane, in almost all situations you should have some regeneration items, mainly flasks or tangoes for HP and clarities for mana. Mana regeneration is nice but as some of you may notice, you can still survive without mana. This is NOT the case with HP – so bring adequate hp regen.
Flasks or tangoes?
The choice is really up to you and your preference but some situations lean towards tangoes and some towards flasks. If the enemy is more prone to physical harassing (through normal attacks or arrow skills – Clinkz' searing arrows, Viper's poison attack, Drow's frost arrows, etc.) it is often more worthwhile to take tangoes. They will often attack you and try to widdle your HP down (preventing you from gaining EXP) but do not have nukes to take off your HP in larger chunks. Also, since they will be attacking you often and aggressively, you are less likely to be able to recover healing from a flask as any attacks during the duration dispel the remainder of the heal.
If the opposing lane is one with lots of burst damage (consisting of Sand King and Lina, for example) a flask is often a better choice. A burrowstrike followed by LSA and dragon slave with attacks in between takes off a LOT of hp, and healing back HP through tangoes (slowly) will often put you in harms way for another similar combo. A flask solves this problem faster and allows you to remain close and contend for last hits/denies as usual.
Lets say now that you are the ones with a nuke combo. If they have a flask (which heals 400 hp) and you leave them with 200/700 HP after you use your nukes/disables, they will be able to reenter battle quickly. If they do not have a flask but only tangoes (or better NO regen) you can probably manage another attack resulting in their death once your spells are off of cooldown. Choosing a target in lane can often be based off of their regen (or lack thereof).
Tying in the Golden Rule
Another thing worthy of note: sometimes not getting a kill is just as good – if not better – than getting a kill. No, you do not get the experience from their death or gold from killing them. At very early levels, however, this gold and experience is negligible compared with what you can gain from freefarming. If you force someone to have to travel back to base in order to avoid death, you gain a LOT of valuable farming time.
You free farm, they walk back to base; you gain experience and have freefarm. They waste time and lose out on money.
Mana Regeneration
Mana regeneration through clarities or another source (CM aura, basilius aura, obsidian aura) is also important for maintaining aggression on your opponents. After all, if you do not have any mana to cast your spells, how dangerous can you be to them? - It is this same logic that makes Nerubian Assassin and Keeper of the Light very frustrating to lane against as they will deprive you of your mana through skills.
Poultry
In all cases dealing with regen, a chicken is EXTREMELY useful. If your lane opponents are particularly aggressive and you run out of your starting regen, have the chicken/crow send you some more. If you aren't in the habit of buying a chicken, either start buying one or get a friend to buy one :D. (or join a game until you find someone named tinfoiltank)
Harassing – weakening your opponent without the immediate intent to kill
How To
Harassing is a pretty important topic in lane control. Some heroes, however, won't be able to harass as effectively as others. Melee heroes have an obvious disadvantage when you consider “creep agro.” Creep agro is the aggression of creeps (to attack your hero) based on your actions or position. The creep has AI designed such that if you issue an attack command on an enemy hero (either by a + left-clicking or right-clicking by itself) the creeps will attack you. The serves as a form of anti-harassment, so to speak, and you can lose a lot of health if you are not careful. There are some ways to get around this.
If you position yourself far from the creeps before attacking the enemy hero, the creeps will have to walk further to get to you and you can retreat before they are able to damage you much. This is ranged heroes often have an easier time in lane. They do not have to be right next to the opponent (and creeps) in order to attack unlike their melee counterparts.
Another more unique form of harassing is using arrow skills, such as those on Drow, Viper or Clinkz. The creeps react to these skills like they do normal spells, that is they do not draw aggression (must be manually cast, however). This is a nice way to get in extra attacks without causing yourself to lose health from creep aggression.
When?
When should you harass? Not all the time. Some times you must play a bit more passively and simply stay for experience. If, however, you are laned with a melee hero that is relatively item dependent, it is often a good idea to harass so that person will be able to contend for last hits. If you don't make this effort, the other team will be able to harass your heroes and force you to lose some last hits and possibly experience.
What about in a solo lane against another solo? Harassing here is a bit safer since they will often lack the power to kill you by themselves (unlike dual stun lanes, for example). In this case, however, you are not contending with a teammate (or trying to support one) for last hits. This means that if there is a last hit available and you elect to harass the opponent, the money from that last hit does not go to your team. Wasted money is no good.
If you are in a solo lane vs two opponents, it is much more dangerous to harass (depending on the opposing lane, of course, as some are much more dangerous than others). Many times in this situation being content with some last hits and gaining EXP is best. Some heroes can “harass” in these more difficult lanes through use of certain spells and also get last hits. Some examples include Death Prophet's Carrion Swarm (timing the cast to hit heroes and get a last hit or two), Zeus's Arc lightning and Leshrac's Lightning storm.
Tying in the Golden Rule
The more you harass, the more the enemy will have to retreat to regen or otherwise play "passively" allowing you to farm more freely.
Here is a screenshot of myself and a friend playing a pretty formidable lane (NA/Lina) against the not-so-strong lane ofES/PL.
The important thing to notice is the enemy's distance from the creep wave. There is almost no chance of them getting any last hits without risking their lives (or using their long range spells). My ally was harassing quite a bit and we still had plenty of mana to kill them should they step close.
Note about aggression
If you have the ability to be aggressive, by all means take it. Seizing the initiative is very important when talking about lane control. An enemy that is afraid of you will be much less likely to engage you and will probably make poor decisions in an effort to return the balance. You WILL (or should) be the target of ganks in this scenario, so make certain you are prepared (with observer wards, mostly, or adequate "mia" calls from your teammates).
Hero Choice
With regards to early game laning, not all heroes were created equal. So what hero should you choose? It's not always an easy question to answer. A lot of this depends on your opponents hero choice (and skill level!) in addition to many other factors. Also, playing heroes you aren't comfortable or familiar with is often pretty difficult, so before choosing a “top laning” hero be sure to know what skill builds and item builds you would go under which circumstances.
Stunners/Combo Nukers
Heroes with stuns work particularly well in laning – after all when a hero is stunned he cannot deal damage (excepting skills like pudge's rot or clockwork's battery for example) and certainly cannot cast anything against you during this time. Also, you are free to get in a number of attacks while they cannot retreat.
Particular combinations that work well are those which include two stuns – at least 1 of which being targetable (f/ex storm bolt). When multiple stuns are landed in conjunction with normal attacks, the enemy will lose a lot of health, if not all of it. With that being said, the enemy will be much more apprehensive when approaching creeps to last hit.
* This is what you want the enemy to be scared of - they will be less able to get creep kills and likely be more passive allowing you to last hit more freely - bringing forth yet again the golden rule.
Some ideas to keep in mind possibilities for offensive lanes
- At least one hero should have a targetable stun or slow. This serves two important purposes: 1) damages the enemy hero; and 2) inhibits movement. Unlike strictly AoE spells, these do not miss and allow for nice combos with other spells.
- At least 1 ranged hero. Two melee hero lanes does not allow for much last hitting (or any offensive tactics while the spells are on cooldown or you have insufficient mana) and are generally forced to be passive due to the harassing edge the enemy will have.
- Cooperative teammates. This is perhaps the most important one of all. If you and your lanemate are not on the same page regarding aggression, there is no way you can expect to dominate a lane. If he is passive, how well are you going to fare when you jump into the fray as he calmly last hits creeps? Probably not very well. "Why didn't you go on that guy?" Communicate beforehand to avoid any problems.
Healers
Heroes that have a healing spell can do well in lane since they will have to purchase less on HP regen and can spend their money in other ways. Such examples include Warlock (Shadow Word), Dazzle (Healing Wave), Omniknight (purification), Bane Elemental (Brain Sap), Necrolyte (Death Pulse), Enchantress (Nature's Attendants), Bloodseeker (Blood Bath) and to a lesser degree Lord of Avernus (Death Coil heals a teammate, but damages you). Many of these heroes have an easier time in lane since they can replenish health in more ways than other heroes. Many of these heals are also instant so they can be used for quickly gaining the upperhand in a fight.
Babysitters
These are the heroes that are item independent that can support a teammate in lane. Some of the healers as mentioned above make good lane partners as they can aid their teammate when necessary. There are also some offensive babysitters that make an easier time for their teammate not because of defensive or healing capabilities but rather due to the threat of killing the opponents.
Last Hitting/Denying
Base damage and attack animation are the two biggest concerns here. If you have higher base damage than the opponent, you will be able to kill the creep at a slightly earlier time than your opponent. You can increase your base damage by purchasing stat items (which you should probably be doing anyways) of your hero's class. These are often the best choice for starting items as they help your last hitting and can be built into useful items later. No, boots do NOT boost your starting damage!
Attack animation
Again in this category not all heroes are created equal. Have you tried laning as Crystal Maiden against a competent Sniper? Getting last hits and denies is pretty difficult. This is due to the attack animations of the characters and each hero has a unique one. This is something that you simply must play with and get used to as some people have an easier time than others with certain heroes. Generally, faster projectiles (Sniper and Troll Warlord for examples) are easier to last hit with than slower ones (Crystal Maiden, Lina).
To solo or not to solo - that is the question
Advantages - The Golden Rule strikes again
- No competition for gold amongst lane partners (not a problem with disciplined babysitters but those people probably won't be reading this!)
If you have a lane to yourself, you do not have to compete with an ally for last hits. This is mostly a good thing as every creep can only be killed once yielding one bounty. It is for this same reason that putting two item dependent heroes in the same lane is a bad idea, as they compete for farm. - Jump in experience
If you are laning by yourself, you do not share the experience with another hero leaving you with all of the experience to advance in levels. This can be useful for a carry hero or a ganker. With a ganker, it is a strong advantage to have high level nukes so that your ganks in other lanes are successful (for example, a level 8/9 Tinker does 561 or so damage with laser/rocket to one hero and 241 to another - if the lane you are ganking is level 5/6 the 561 is probably a LARGE chunk of their HP)
* Do not take these 2 reasons and immediately call a solo lane. It is important you have a hero suited for the lane to be able to take advantage of these perks. Imagine you call solo with slardar and run to lane faced against Bane/Potm. Good luck living for long and good luck with last hitting.
** Think about your team and not only who benefits most as a hero but also as a player. Sometimes the less powerful hero might benefit more from the solo lane due to the actual player. Remember that you can not all solo (or can you?).
Disadvantages
- You become only target of enemy (for spells and harassing)
Yeah, you might have been the target of attacks before but now you have no one at your side to back you up. The enemy has a much clearer target and due to being safer during the attack, will probably be more aggressive. - You carry a bigger load for your team.
This can be seen as a good and a bad thing, but I will put it under bad. If you fail in your solo lane, the gold and experience advantage that you SHOULD have had is squandered. That gold and experience will not come back and is simply lost.
Example: you have called solo and proceed to middle. You aren't last hitting well and find yourself against some tough dual lane. Your team's other lanes are doing alright but are sharing the experience of dual lanes (and thus the money). You die multiple times. That farm/exp is lost. Your team's levels are 6/6/7/7/7 (you are one of the 7s) creating a total of 33. The other team has been doing well in all lanes (including the solo) and are levels 7/7/8/8/10 for a total of 40. This is a level gap of 7 across the whole team and lets you know where you stand with the golden rule. (Note: this example depends on heroes and a lot of other things as to whether or not the farm/exp means a lot; it is just meant as a general case) - You will (likely) have a more difficult time harassing and killing the opponents
This ties into the first point but deserves its own as this is focused on offense and depriving the enemy. Going back to the golden rule, you are trying to create a gap between yourself and the opponent money/exp-wise. If you are unable to force them to retreat or kill them, their exp will not suffer.
Blocking/Creep Line Dynamic
The creep line is the location where the creeps are fighting. This doesn't matter at all, right? Wrong. If you here reading this guide, you probably have some interest in improving your lane control and this is one of those topics that you need to know.
Notice here the location of the creep line (far left of the screen).
My buddy and I have done pretty well in lane and the opponents are quite far away (even missing EXP). If the creep line were any closer to their tower, they would have protection from the tower and we would not be able to maintain our aggressive post on "their" side of the wave.
Blocking the incoming creep wave (by dancing in front of the creeps to impede their progress) can move the location of the creep line back towards your tower. Conversely, aoe spells that damage all creeps are likely to move the creep line forward towards their tower. Ideally, you want your tower nearby for protection but not so close as to take your last hits! (This will also push the lane out).
The creep line's location has a big part in the success of ganks in that lane and many other things. Note in the screenshot above even though our opponents are far from the wave, my teammate and I are much more vulnerable to ganks since we are so far from our tower but very close to theirs.
Pulling
"Pulling" is when you tick off a neutral camp and get it to follow you to your creeps who then fight with you to kill the neutral camp. This is covered in more detail here but basically allows you to deprive the enemy of some experience (since your creeps are not near them) and also gives you a chance at farm that you otherwise would not have had.
Importance of Ganks
Ganking is one of the best means of hurting the enemy team and it is very important to organize ganks to kill the enemy carry. At this stage of the game (lanes have maybe broken down a bit, some towers have fallen, etc.) you need to find the enemy carry and kill him. The golden rule still applies but now there are other considerations - namely the farm/exp for a team's carry has a lot more value than the farm/exp of a support hero. If you must sacrifice some farm for your team's support heroes while limiting the enemy carry, this is a fine outcome. At the same time, your carry is of great importance (and target of enemy ganks).
Importance of TP Scrolls
Teleport scrolls are extremely important in saving teammates and towers (namely ganks/counterganks and teamfights at towers) since they allow you to be there almost instantly.
- Ganks: teleport into an opposing lane (preferably when the enemy cannot see you TPing in) and gank the enemy team with a certain hero advantage.
- Counterganks: come quickly to help your teammates when the enemy starts to get close to your tower. You will often be able to use the enemy's aggression against them and get a kill for your team instead.
- Teamfights at towers: if you have something to contribute to a teamfight, you had better be there for your team if it will make a difference in the outcome of the fight.
Knowing your opponents and their tendencies and abilities
This develops over time and is not as useful if you are not playing against the same people all the time, but it helps to know how aggressive your opponent is. Are they content to sit back and farm or will they consistently tower dive if there is even a chance of killing you? These sort of traits about the opponent dictate how you should lane. Try to piece together everything you know about your opponent (the hero AND the player) so that you are prepared for whatever they decide to do.
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