DOTA 2: Thanks volvo

[Azuark]

I'm pretty sure this is inaccurate as hell

[BlackMoomba]

A Riki after a Huskar/Druid to carry already. Expected outcome. Shit hero.

Riki is a much better hero than Huskarr. Would have done fine too if he didn't try and solo aganist our trilane. I'm suprised at that comment coming from you about Riki, you watch and talk to pros enough to know he's used in pro/high level play as a counter.

[Bweigelt]

Yeah Riki isn't the problem in that lineup. He's become a first ban/first pick sort of hero in the pro scene and he's even stronger at lower levels. The issue is they picked Huskar against a shit load of stuns, and Sylla. Sylla is just not a good hero to play unless your micro is top notch and your team is built around a 20 minute push.

On a totally unrelated note, SD + Leshrac lane might be the greatest thing ever. There is just no way to lane against it, and it's even worse if you add in ES for the trilane.

[Vandole]

gredival will never admit that riki is a good hero now.

[Gredival]

Riki is a much better hero than Huskarr. Would have done fine too if he didn't try and solo aganist our trilane. I'm suprised at that comment coming from you about Riki, you watch and talk to pros enough to know he's used in pro/high level play as a counter.

My opinion is established BECAUSE of all the pro circuit games I watch. Every time a team tries to pick him as the AM counter, they usually fail terribly. Theoretically, sure he brings a lot to the table with smoke. But in actuality his win-rate is terrible. I think he's succeeds in maybe 1 game out of 10 as a counter because he himself can be instantly countered with 200-700 gold.

[Maguspk]

The bars are fairly accurate I think, friend has full bars on QOP and Juggernaut and 4-5.5 on a few others and he's a former pro. Don't think full bars means you're the best though, it's probably just some threshold like, better than 10% of the people who have played this hero based on whatever metrics they are judging with (guessing CS/Time, (K+A/D)/Time, K+A/Team K+A, GPM, XPM, etc.).

My highest are Leshrac and Enigma at 4 bars :s I should start picking harder pubstomp heroes but I usually support, Leshrac is pretty fun if I get mid though, nobody seems to know that Leshrac rapes a lot of heroes.

[Rivero]

The system is a bit weird at times though, I remember I had no stats on Pugna and then I went 20-1-20 in one game and I shot from no bars to 4 and 4/5ths. And I think Pugna isn't even one of my best heroes to be honest, I usually do horribly with him.

[Azuark]

I mean i understand why Ursa maxed and i kinda understand Lycan cause i've stomped a game or 2 with him but BM?! i suck as BM

[Gredival]

Remember that two bars is generally considered average iirc, and it's all relative to measurements to that hero specifically. Like having good GPM relative to Furion is going to require 800+ whereas good GPM for Maiden is probably 400+.

The ratings are affected by small sample sizes, as are any statistic, so playing only a few games and doing well will overshoot you. Going 20-1-20 is extremely good KDR wise, especially for a Pugna, and that was reflected on your rating. There is also confluence because I'm pretty sure GPM is part of the equation too and that obviously gets better from having good KDR.

[Rivero]

800 GPM and 400 GPM respectively seems a bit nuts for those heroes. Unless you're going refresher/aghs/midas on Furion and stealing everything, lol. But yeah, I agree for the most part my top heroes are generally ones that are either completely idiot-proof like Axe, or some that I'm generally good at like Beastmaster/Clockwerk.

[Maguspk]

800 GPM is definetely possible with a top end farming (Midas, etc.) Furion in a short game where you get towers fast and/or lots of kills. I've done 750 GPM Furion, I'm a decent farmer but I'm not delusional there are people much better than me. But yeah, if you only play a few games and do really well it'll skew your bars but over time (more games played with that hero) it should begin to reflect where you truly are.

[Gredival]

800 GPM and 400 GPM respectively seems a bit nuts for those heroes. Unless you're going refresher/aghs/midas on Furion and stealing everything, lol. But yeah, I agree for the most part my top heroes are generally ones that are either completely idiot-proof like Axe, or some that I'm generally good at like Beastmaster/Clockwerk.

I'm saying that maxed performance on Furion would require you to be getting 800 gpm games because he's such an efficient farmer already. Comparatively Maiden is so shitty at farming that 400~ would likely get you high marks.

[Sup3rB4d]

I just got two "Dota 2 gifts" if anybody wants this shit.

[Trocian]

I just got two "Dota 2 gifts" if anybody wants this shit.

PM'd.

[Blackice]

I have a gift to give as well.

[gt_killa]

I have a gift to give as well.

PM'd

[Gredival]

If you want a really troll duo, Pugna/Tiny. Decrepify -> Stun / Toss / Nether Blast. Even Shallow Grave won't save you,

[supercoco]

got a beta key today - Which heroe should i start playing with?

[Rivero]

Off the top of my head

Easy STR heroes - Spirit Breaker/Sven/Leoric/Lycan/Huskar/Axe/Naix/Balanar/Tidehunter
Easy AGI heroes - Anti-Mage/Sniper/Juggernaut/Traxex/Ursa/Gondar/Bloodseeker/Faceless Void/Viper
Easy INT heroes - Death Prophet

As you can see, INT is usually the most difficult style of hero. Most of those heroes I listed are pretty much characters you can go farm for 20-30 minutes and just wreck the game completely, they also tend to revolve around one or two skills and they don't require aiming/timing/etc.

[Gredival]

Read this: http://www.welcometodota2.com/2012/0...noobs-aka.html

Off the top of my head

Easy STR heroes - Spirit Breaker/Sven/Leoric/Lycan/Huskar/Axe/Naix/Balanar/Tidehunter
Easy AGI heroes - Anti-Mage/Sniper/Juggernaut/Traxex/Ursa/Gondar/Bloodseeker/Faceless Void/Viper
Easy INT heroes - Death Prophet

As you can see, INT is usually the most difficult style of hero. Most of those heroes I listed are pretty much characters you can go farm for 20-30 minutes and just wreck the game completely, they also tend to revolve around one or two skills and they don't require aiming/timing/etc.

I disagree with the majority of these recommendations. He is basically recommending you start with farmer style carry heroes, which I think is a terrible idea. I agree that Intelligence heroes are the most difficult heroes to master, but I also think they have the lowest barrier of entry and they minimize the impact of your mistakes for the team.

Carries are defined by their ability to scale. Your job as a carry is to get kills and farm so that you have items to fuel whatever skill you have that scales well. If you play too aggressive, you lose all your gold and feed the other team. If you play too passive, you won't get all the kills you need and you will be weak and unable to do your job. It's not just about knowing your hero, it's about knowing all the heroes so you know what will happen in response to your actions. If you dive that tower, do they have a snare or a slow or a stun? How long can your hero take tower damage, is it enough to kill? Have you developed a good innate understanding of armor to know how much damage you actually have to do to kill them accounting for reduction? You can practice last hitting all you want with AI, but against players they will adapt with items and skills to harass you. What do you do when they rotate an Obsidian down there whose sole job is to Imprison you constantly so you physically can't last hit? Or a heavy harass orb walker like Huskar or Viper?

You need to have enough experience to be able to make the right play, and quite frankly I'll bet money that you need a lot more time invested before you are at that stage. You have to have good instincts. I've played DotA (WC3 DotA to HoN, then to Dota 2) for over ten years and my instincts and awareness are far from perfect. I actually generally don't play hard carries for this reason. The carry is NOT the most important role on a team nor is it the hardest; but it is the easiest to screw up. A team only needs one carry (although many teams end up with more because bad people will pick without regards to good strategy, or people won't trust their teammates); you don't want the carry to be a clueless player because it's like having a -1 on your team.

Conversely nukers and supports don't have abilities that scale, but that means they will always be able to make a set amount of impact. It's just that the efficacy wanes the longer the game goes on. The best supports are the ones whose abilities stay effective at the end even if they don't do lots of damage (Tidehunter's Ravage, Venomancer Poison Ring/Nova, Enigma's Black Hole, Rhasta/Lion Hex, Invoker EMP, Silencer Global Silence, Omniknight Repel/Guardian Angel). That frees up farm for the carry without hurting the team fight potential.

Out of those, I would recommend playing Lich, Venomancer, Vengeful Spirit, Warlock. I really think it's easier to start playing with range heroes, but after a few games it's probably okay to play Tidehunter and Skeleton King because they come built in with lots of survivability and have relatively few skills you have to manage in a fight. Sven is also low management, but he's relatively squishy compared to Tidehunter and Skeleton.

Also, don't play invis heroes (Clinkz, Rikimaru, Bounty Hunter; more otw). The invisibility is very useful for newbie players for escaping and compensating for mistakes, but the invisibility becomes a crutch that fosters bad habits. Dying and getting yelled at by your team when you make mistakes is important so that you realize you shouldn't be doing whatever the hell you were doing when you died. When I started with my friends we played retarded heroes and I very strongly believe that it stunted our growth. Years later my friends still play poorly because they kept their bad habits and their best heroes are still those invis heroes which get countered so hardly at high skill games. I only got better than them is while they went off and fucked around in LoL, I tried to play super seriously in HoN and part of that was learning never to pick invis and learning how easy it was to counter invis.