Please let me know if something about this guide irritates you. I am thinking of substituting hero and item pics for names too. Let me know about your views on this guide are.
Creeps for DUMMIES: New Perspective
Hi! This guide is intended to show starters the influence that creeps have on the game by providing a new point of view on creeps to beginners through simple explanations. I recommend this guide to the low-skilled players who have been playing for a while too.
By the way, this is my first guide, and hopefully you guys would enjoy it.
Let me start this guide off with an old saying. It goes like this, "Killing heroes does not win you the game, pushing towers and downing the ancient wins you the game".
I am guessing that you are saying "duh!" right now. Obviously, that is what the whole game about, destroying the opposition's Tree/Throne. So, what is going to help you push through all the way to the Ancient?
Of course it's the creeps! If you answered your ally heroes I would not say that your answer is wrong.,it's just that 'creeps' as an answer is more correct. Take away Roshan, neutrals, and heroes, and watch waves after waves of creeps spawn. Guess what? It is a matter of time before one side wins the game. That, my friend, is the power of creeps.
The creeps are an important aspect of the game. One could compare them to the pawns of a chess game. Underestimated and belittled, they play a big role in a game. They can act as your first line of defense or attack, and their untapped potential is left there in the open for you to exploit. One question is that how men are wise enough to notice their influence on the game?
Allow me to cite some examples of what creeps can do:
I chose to start off with creep equilibrium because I believe this concept is closely related to most of the other topics that I am going to discuss in this guide.
What is creep equilibrium? When the lane is in equilibrium, the meeting point of the Radiant's and Dire's creep waves would always be at the same spot. Meaning that it does not shift at all. Let's say at the mid lane, the first creep wave on both sides would meet exactly at the centre of the map. When the lane is in equilibrium, the next creep wave on both side would still continue to meet in the centre of the map. As long as the lane is in equilibrium, the creep waves would always meet at the same place, at the centre of the map.
Basically, the Principle of Moments apply to creep equilibrium too. What you want to achieve is equilibrium. The Principle of Moments states that for an object to be in equilibrium, the sum of clockwise moments about the pivot is equal to the sum of anti-clockwise moments about the same pivot.
The clockwise moments refers to the total creeps on your side that is in action (engaging with enemy creeps) or the total HP of you creeps in action. The anti-clockwise moments refers to the total creeps on the enemies' side that is in action (engaging with your creeps) or the total HP of enemy creeps in action.
The moments is directly proportional to how far you would push or get pushed. The more you push or get pushed, the further the meeting point of creep waves would be from the original position. The next tab shows an example of what I am trying say, hopefully it will clear things up.
A simple math equation:
Your moments(clockwise) - Enemy's moments(anti-clockwise) = Displacement
If displacement is a positive number, then the meeting point of the creep waves shifts towards the enemy fountain. If displacement is negative, it then relocates in the opposite way, towards your fountain.
However, you want the displacement to be at zero when you are in a favourable position (cliff at mid/farming) and maybe tweak it when you want to push forward to end the game or retreat for strategic purposes (ganking etc.).
For example, the moments would be 10 for both sides at the start.
Your moments(clockwise)=10
Enemy's moments(anti-clockwise)=10
Each attack, be it yours or the enemy hero's, would deduct 1 to the opposition's moments (which is 10). You attack 8 times and the enemy hero attacked 4 times. So now the moments wold look like this:
Your moments(clockwise)
=10-4(from enemy hero's attack)
=6
Enemy's moments(anti-clockwise)
=10-8(from you attack)
=2
Substitude those numbers into the previous equation:
Your moments(clockwise) - Enemy's moments(anti-clockwise) = Displacement
You would get this... 6-2 = 4
Displacement = 4
Displacement is a positive integer and so you would push the meeting point of the creep wave nearer to the enemy's fountain.
Another way is to count the number of creeps on each side to calculate the creep equilibrium. The more 'sensitive' creeps are the ranged and siege units. If they are more on your side, you are going to push forward the creep line.
Hers's a problem. Do you remember that displacement is best left at zero if you are in a favourable position? So the question for me to you is how do you keep it at zero if you are farming alone?
If your answer is by lasthitting then you only got it half right! The other half of the answer is by denying your own creeps! 0 displacement is only achievable when the number of attacks you land on the enemy creep is equal to the number of attacks you land on your ally creeps. For every (last)hit landed on a creep, a (last)hit must be landed on a creep on the other team in order to maintain creep equilibrium.
Quite a number out there know how to lasthit pretty well. However, there are a lot of people out there who hates to kill their own man, and by this, I meant that they do not deny at all or even see the importance of it. Are you one of them?
For every (last)hit landed on a creep, a (last)hit must be landed on a creep on the other team in order to maintain creep equilibrium.
The art of lasthitting, so powerful yet elegant, simple yet difficult to grasp is a beautiful part of the game. A good lasthitter denies as many creeps as he farms. A better lasthitter knows when to lasthit enemy creeps and when to deny for he has understood the ideas of lane control.
Last hitting is intimately associated with creeps. It is essential for you to learn how to last hit to control the creeps. You want your actions to control the creeps and not let the creeps dictate your actions. Creeps can aid you in the game but can also be troublesome if not managed well. In order to use them, you must master lasthitting. By lasthitting, you can control creep equilibrium much easier, and through that, you can dominate lanes.
Lasthit is basically applying the last hit, literally, to an enemy creep in red health such that he would die and you would get +45 gold. When you last hit, 99% of the time it is the first time you are hitting that specific creep, and that first time happens to be the last.
So, what constitutes a good lasthitter? The answer has five parts to it.
Let's start with the first on the list, anticipation. You have to anticipate when the creep is going to be in red health before applying the lasthit. When it is in red health, hit A and left click the creep in red HP. The damage from melee 'reaches' the target faster than the damage range. Hence, it is easier to last hit as a melee.
You always got to be TWO steps ahead. Why 2 and not 1? Because if the enemy hero is thinking of being one step ahead so that he can deny the creep, you would be one step ahead of him to last hit that creep. Anticipation is the reason for the timing of your attack. You don't want your attack to be too early or late. Good anticipation can help you to get more creeps as you would land your attack at a more perfect timing.
Next up, it's composure, something that you would need in ganks and teamfights too. It is the ability to think clearly in a tense situation. For example, you see 2 enemy creeps getting to red health, which one do you get first? If you thought of this question for more than 2 seconds, you would not have got any creeps.
Composure is a trait that is closely related to decisions. You need composure to make the right decisions quick and fast. However, composure is only visible in a real game situation. Things that happen suddenly and your ability to manage those problems on the line. The more compose you are, the better the solution.
Concentration is something you need throughout the game. It affects your consistency in getting the creeps. Concentrate on the creeps' health because it makes your anticipation to be more accurate. Your composure and determination also allows you to concentrate properly and not get too nervous.
When you are too nervous, you lose concentration. And when you lose concentration, you start anticipating things either too early or too late. Your concentration on the game determines how well you will do in the game. It can help you to make better decisions in order to lead your team to victory.
Every single click is a decision. Are you making too many unnecessary clicks? Sometimes, decisions have to be made on the spot. There isn't always enough time to weigh your pros and cons. To attack or not to attack? That is the question. Your decision making has a direct impact to creep equilibrium. Which creep to go for? The enemy creep attacked by your creeps or the one attacked by the tower. To last hit the enemy creep or deny?
Those are common questions that you would face while playing DotA. In the case of decision making, experience would be your best teacher. Learn from your mistakes, not dwell on them.
Last but not least, we have determination. It's pretty self-explanatory. How much you want the creep and how far you would go to get it. Determination is how willing you are to stay in the game. If you are determined, concentration would come naturally to you. There is no improvement without determination. It is the engine in a car, it drives you forward to achieve your goals. It can be 100 creeps at 25 min or anything. Are you determined to win the game? Or are you determined to win yourself?
I would like to highlight someone who possess all this five traits. That person is ZSMJ.
During 2009, ZSMJ was at Malaysia attending SMM, and playing in FTD against Ks on their home turf. The flying courier holding his phantom lancer's sacred relic was roared by an enemy beastmaster, and the bird was killed at about 20 mins in the game. Though he lost the sacred relic, he knew that the game is not yet lost until the ancient is destroyed.
7 mins later, he farmed up another sacred relic through maintaining his composure, retaining his concentration and sheer determination. After dragging the match for more than an hour, FTD won the match and would later go on to be crowned as champions of SMM'09. This particular match is also labelled as one of the greatest match played ever in the history of DotA.
So how do you last hit? Well, we have some tips from a fellow guide writer, XSTORM999.
1. Move around, click in a random manner around the creeps and attack a creep when his hp is nearly about to finish.
2. Attack the creep you want to last-hit, and then keep pressing the ‘S’ button until you can launch the last hit.
3. Attack another creep and then quickly switch to the creep you want to last-hit.
4. Auto-attack and Stop trick is not common but certainly effective. You basically auto-attack a creep and use the ‘S’ button to time your attacks so you can last-hit.
One of the key to lasthitting is your ranged creep. Using your creeps to help improve your lasthits. Focus on the health of the creep you are going to attack and the projectile of your ranged creep. When there are melee creeps only, the rate of damage is constant, since damage dealt and attack speed is the same for all melee creeps. Ranged creeps kind of change this.
For example, if the enemy creep is in orange health, you need to aim your attack perfectly right after the 2 ranged creeps attacked that particular enemy creep(just after the projectile reaches it). Sometimes, it may be just right before the projectile reaches the enemy creep. This is because if you delay for a tenth of a second in any of these situations, the melee/ranged creeps would ks you. You also can use the time that the projectile is in the air to estimate the rate of damage dealt by melee creeps.
Moving on, we often hear melee heroes are better at lasthit. Why is that so? Is it really that hard to lasthit with ranged heroes? Let's not include quelling blade or base damage into this equation. I have seen little people mentioning about distance. Yes, distance. When a melee attacks, the damage will be dealt right after the attack animation. This is not so for ranged as the projectile takes time to travel.
The closer you are to the creep, the faster the projectile reaches the target, the easier it is to time the attack, and the chances of a last hit increases. As a ranged hero, you can attack like a melee hero and harass like a ranged.
Remember the optimal solo mid position? In a ranged vs. ranged situation, being at the optimal position is a big advantage. It allows you to move closer to the creeps and forces your enemy to stay further away. This gives you a better chance to both lasthit and deny. If the enemy hero comes too near, you can harass him too to deter him from coming near the dying creeps. This means that you can outfarm and outlevel him.
Lasthit has always been associated with carries so what separates a good and a great carry? Things that first come into mind are gameplay and map sense. You think that getting 60 creeps in 10 minutes makes you great? You think that just farming and only farming 30 minutes in the game and getting full items makes you great? You think that 700 creep kills at 60 min makes you great? Think again.
If you do not think that survival is most important, then you are a noob. I know it's a bit harsh but you need to start changing the way you think.
Ask yourself what role do you play? There is a reason why #1 is called a carry and not a farmer. A carry's job is not to farm but to carry. If someone is telling you to concentrate only on farm as a carry, don't listen to their advice. It is important but it is not everything. Lasthitting is a basic skill the you ought to have. The best lasthitter may not be the best carry and the best carry may not be the best lasthitter.
The best juggler may not be the best footballer and the best footballer may not be the best juggler. Ball control is an important aspect of the game but it is not everything. It is merely one part of it. No doubt it is a valuable skill to possess but there are many other factors to be considered too.
Note: This section is to show you not to over rely on lasthit to carry your team. The significance of lasthit stays the same though. The only thing that changes is your view as a carry.
There is a reason why #1 is called a carry and not a farmer.
Basically, denying is lasthitting your own creeps. However, you can only start denying you creeps when their health reaches below 50%. Hence, sometimes it's harder to deny than lasthit especially with the interference of enemy towers.
You don't only want to succeed, you want to see others fail too. If you want to outfarm and outlevel your opponent, lasthitting is NOT enough. If both sides are equally strong, it all boils down to your ability to last hit and deny.
For example, if none of you bother to deny, theoretically, both sides would have the same number of lasthits. Problem is you don't want to have a win-win situation, you want to have a win-lose situation. You want to be the victor and that means you have to start denying.
Although denying is essential, you should put lasthitting as you main priority and denying your second. More often than not, better players have more denies.
1) Management of creep equilibrium
If you've viewed the afk farming video guide by Luminous48, you would know what I mean. Remember the Principle of Moments we've went through previously? The number of lasthits is equal to the number denies when no other factors such as enemy heroes are in play in order to manage creep equilibrium properly. This is essential for keeping yourself in a favourable positon on the map to farm so as to minimise the chances of a successful gank on you.
2) Denying the opponents from getting gold and experience.
This point is actually pretty much self-expalantory but I will still say a bit. Denying in lane is one of the most important yet underrated skill in pubs. To all those newer players out there, denying prevents your enemies from gold and greatly reduce the experienced earned. The numbers can be viewed on the next tab, Statistics. Though you may not outlevel or outfarm the enemy much through denying, it gives you the edge. Sometimes, small things like this results in big differences. Let's say denying is 5% importance in a lane, however, this 5% in exams can mean either an A or B grade.
3) Stronger push
This is just a minor thing that I just want you to take note of. I wll give an example to explain this point. For example, just outside the range of the tier 3 tower, 2 waves of 5 creeps meet each other. You can choose to auto attack and clear the enemy creep waves and leave the remaining 3 of your creeps to push (2 died) or deny your creeps too until it looks like 3v2 or something. Then, when the next creep wave spawns, it will be 8v2 and you finish off the last 2 creeps. The first option requires less time but the creep push would be weaker as it would be 3v5 on the next wave. the second may take longer but creep push is stronger as it is 8v5. Under normal circumstances, going for the second option is a better choice.
Whenever a unit owned by the Radiant or Dire is killed by an allied player, it counts as a deny, and normal experience is not granted to nearby enemy heroes.
The amount of experience enemy heroes get for a denied unit is determined by the following:
Each melee enemy hero in 1000 range of the killed unit gets 36/n experience, and each ranged enemy hero gets 18/n experience, where n is the total number of enemy heroes within 1000 range.
Example: A Radiant player denies a Treant, there are 2 Dire melee heroes and one Dire ranged hero within 1000 range of the killed unit.
Each melee hero gets 12 (36/3) experience.
The ranged hero gets 6 (18/3) experience.
Statistics have shown that (bloodseeker) has one of the highest average deny/game. This is probably due to the fact that he gets a 'hp bonus heal' whenever he kills a creep. (Shadow Fiend) also has got high denies probably due to Necromastery. The concept of meritocracy has motivated people to work harder for more benefits.
(Lich)'s ability Dark Ritual is a strong one. I recommend getting it at the first level for beginners. WHAT?! Why not frost nova at level 1, this n00b guide is n00b.
First of all, it takes about 2 creep wave to get to level 2, then you can level your pr0 frost nova. You aren't using it at level 1, are you? Of course, that's beside if you are going to go for First Blood. It's 125 damage for 125 mana. If you think that 1 damage/mana is really worth it then go for it.
Secondly, Dark Ritual acts as a 100% deny. You can deny a creep at full HP at the start of a game, which would be quite a lot of 'hits'. If you are playing at the longer lanes( top for Radiant and bottom for Dire), you are able to pull back further the creep waves meeting/clashing point. Dark Ritual ensures that enemy heroes only get 75% of experience all the time since (Lich) is able to 'deny' 1 in 4 creeps every 30 seconds.
Of course there are other heroes such as (Enigma) who can pull the creeps back. (Lich) is just one example that I want to point out.
Note: This section is just a special mention.
More often than not, better players have more denies.
When you are pushing, it is always better to station creeps nearer to the enemies’ tower. One would also consider spamming attacks, NOT auto attack, so that ally creeps would outnumber enemy creeps (Captain Obvious strikes again), but still last hitting the creeps at the same time. Only then, creeps would surge forward and reach the enemies’ second line of defense, the tower.
For pushing, obviously, the number of creeps on your side must be more than that of your opponents’. (Ring of Basilius), a common item which offers a bonus armour aura, helps to sustain creeps by making them more resistant to physical attacks, and many other hero abilities helps in pushing in early game.
Overarching idea: hero abilities with AOE damage.
Conclusion: AOE damage=Push.
Note: this picture is exaggerated.
However, please note that it is not advisable to push too early in the game; you should just concentrate on farming first (for the gold and experience).
First of all, you need to have a stronger lane presence to push. It can be 2 ranged vs. 2 melees, with you being ranged for example. If you always push the creep waves to their tower, you give them the opportunity to farm.
On the other hand, if you keep it away from their tower, the job of harassing is much easier of they approach too near to the creeps, depriving them of farm if they want to stay alive(especially true if they are melee heroes). To play more aggressively, you can always stay much nearer to the creeps. This also helps to make last hit much easier.
You want control over them by control over the positions of creeps to control the lane and the game. This is even more important for orb walkers such as (Viper) to control the lane properly and not to push too far in order to gain an early lead.
Didn't we cover the part about AOE damage=push just now? So do we use AOE spells to harass opponents? Answer is yes. The most important thing is to dominate the lane. Let me introduce you to a golden rule: " Your mana should never be full in lane". However, make sure that you always have enough mana to kill in a gank or unleash your full combo or escape.
For example, your current mana can be at least 40%(number is adjustable as situations vary) of your total mana. By limiting your mana usage, you limit the number of AOE spells used and you limit the push. At the same time, you can maintain your lane dominance and prepare for future ganks.
"Map control is key to winning a game, so early-mid game aggression and keeping up the pressure to build up a farm and level advantage is most desirable."
-Slesh
Map control is the power to decide how the game is going to be played. The team without map control can only react to what the opposition does and can rarely initiate something to happen without taking a big risk. Map control also determines who gets the neutrals, runes and Roshan. Essentially, you can build up map control by pushing.
The two main factors that decides map control are vision and mobility. By pushing enemy towers, you reduce their vision and mobility. By keeping yours up, you maintain those two factors. The things that provide these two factors are the tower and creeps.
Towers provide mobility as heroes are able to TP to towers and move from one lane to another in a short time period. The more outer towers that are still up, the more the mobility. It works in conjunction with pushing especially if your outer towers are still up and your enemies' are down. You can TP to any pressured tower and push back the lane to keep the creep wave line high up. In addition, your opponents cannot push far out without the risk of a gank.
This is a simple idea. A>B>C and therefore, outer towers being up has a high level of mobility for the team provided that the hero carries a TP scroll.
Creeps, on the other hand, provide moving vision. A high creep wave line is key to map control. They are like your detectors for enemy heroes locations since your enemy must get their income somewhere (the creeps). A pushed up creep wave line also limits the space of the opposition. It allows you to track enemy movements and guess where they are heading more easily since their movements are limited. It also allows your team set up successful ganks and at the same time make farming safer for your team. Moreover, due to the a smaller safety area for the enemy, a ward will be able to cover a larger proportion of this area.
Green solid circles represent Radiant towers.
Red solid circles represent Dire towers.
Green circle outlines represent key areas that Radiant controls.
Blue line represents creep wave line.
The team with more map control can split up and farm different lanes as they may feel relatively safer whereas the team with less map control may be forced to stick together to feel safe or to discourage a direct encounter. Hence, a disparity in map control will lead to a difference in gold and experience for each team.
By limiting your mana usage, you limit the number of AOE spells used and you limit the push. At the same time, you can maintain your lane dominance and prepare for future ganks.
When the solo mid hero or roamer is ganking, the creeps are preferably away from enemies’ tower, better if it is nearer to yours. First of all, the tower is the most powerful unit in early game. You do not want to be in the range of the enemy tower. Secondly, if the distance between the enemy hero and tower is far, it leaves behind a lot of space to exploit. If the enemy is to retreat, it would take a much longer time, allowing for the cooldown of spells just in case he survived, not to mention the extra hits you can land on him. Furthermore, more space would mean more fog, which means that opponent would be caught off guard more often in a gank.
Note: numerous paths from the forests at side lanes also assist gankings from any positions. The hardest thing is to choose when to strike at a perfect timing. Use the terrain to your advantage!
This type of gank is ideal as enemies are in a more vulnerable position and are usually outnumbered. Furthermore, time of enemy reinforcements arriving would increase due to the increased distancing away from the opposing first tower, which means that enemy's TP support will take much longer. Thus, risks and casualties would be minimised on your side.
Please note that these ganks are easier to pull off in pubs as gamers there have little or no sense of controlling the positions of creeps.
This shows yellow getting backstabbed by two enemy heroes. Due to him moving too forward in the lane, he finds himself to be in a very vulnerable position, far away from the tower. In the end, he was flanked and killed. By the way, yellow is (venomancer). He planted wards in the Dire forest but it seems like there is an alternative path for enemies to reach him.
This one shows a mistake by iG.Zhou. He goes too near the creeps to use death pulse, without realising that es was near and fissure is just in range. Fissure coupled with cold feet and ice blast from (AA) was enough to finish him off. By the way, note that it was the night and sight range is smaller for Zhou's (necrolyte) and (venomancer)'s sight was also reduced to 800 (both heroes on Radiant).
The red zone shows that it is quite dangerous to be inside there, and the futher away you are from your tower,the more dangerous it is. The yellow arrows indicates the possible paths that enemy gankers may take to capitalise on your positioning mistake.
Green arrow- path of es and cm
Orange arrow- path of syllabear
Purple arrow- Path of nw
(Nerubian weaver) looks funny because CM frostbite him, and the animation is not up yet. Needless to say, Dire got a valuable First Blood.
This picture shows that the victim has to travel a longer path to be safe yet is still in range of attack from a good fissure. I just want to show that if a hero has to travel a long way for safety, then he would be in a vulnerable position. If you push out too far towards the enemy tower, and you are using a hero with poor escape mechanism(poor mobility), and are ganked, sorry to say, but you are going to be dead.
Next picture is related to the previous one:
Copy-pasted: The red zone shows that it is quite dangerous to be inside there, and the futher away you are from your tower,the more dangerous it is. The yellow arrows indicates the possible paths that enemy gankers may take to capitalise on your positioning mistake.
Chances are you are stunned before you even realise it. Not many people notice what's going on behind his hero, literally. Next, you find yourself appearing at the fountain. Again, the further away you are from your tower, the more the different routes enemy heroes can take, meaning more opportunities of a gank, increased flee time also allows the extra hits and spells(after cd) on you. Conclusion: Death.
P.s the river path is not shown in the last photo.
This type of ganks has little to do with creeps but I think that beginners should still know a bit more since we are on the topic of ganks.
Another style of gank is to aggressively yet intelligently tower dive (not recommended for Newbies/Noobs/Cowards). This is usually employed in the late part of early game/mid game where heroes are bulky enough to tank some of the tower hits.
These ganks are harder to pull off and requires skills and a bit of teamwork to even work. Better players would try to hug the tower without the tower attacks disturbing the balance of the creeps, meaning that two opposing creep waves would always meet on that same exact point every time a wave spawns. This point is usually closer to their tower, making ganking much more difficult as teammates are able to tp in quickly to counter-gank and also having to withstand painful tower attacks from ganking them. The increase in risk of ganking helps to deter enemies from ganking.
However, if a gank does occur, losses are common on both sides. The good thing is that it somewhat provides an element of surprise, causing your opponent to panic for a while.
This type of ganks also helps to save time, as one would not need to wait for the next creep wave to distance away from towers to strike. This is especially important if you are a solo mid leaving your lane, which would give the opposition’s solo mid the space and time to farm and push down the tier 1 mid tower.
Tower diving is also the only way to kill a hero who plays passively and hugs the tower 24/7. It is the only possible way to get into attack range of the tower-hugging hero. If you ever manage to kill the hero, you would put a bigger dent into his economy. Tower diving is usually used when you outlevel or outnumber enemy heroes(usually one). This is to reduce the chances if a failed gank. If there are no causalties, the ganked hero would have more farming space temporarily.
In both ganking styles, creeps do play a part in the success. In the first ganking style, it is the idea of a safe zone. Playing in you safe zone makes killing you harder and ganking oppositions easier and you don't want to be in your opponent's safety zone.
The yellow zone is one of the safest if not the safest. That is where you want to be. Note how the natural terrain and tower helps to deter ganks.
For the second ganking style, you can also dive in when you see your creep tanking the tower. This is a smart way to minimise any damage that the tower can inflict onto you when you tower dive. It reduces the risk of dying without compromising the potential rewards of a kill. If the gank is successful, it will transition into a push and a tower may even be gained.
However, there is one important thing to take note of. That is creeps positions DO NOT 100% ensure gank success. Gank is 75% individual skills and 25% teamwork and not on some AI controlled unit. Creeps positions ONLY help to provide an edge.
Watch the part of LGD.dd’s beastmaster (it’s the #9). It shows that towers are powerful early game; DON’T mess with the towers yet unless you have got creeps to tank the tower like in #8. Do you think Kunkka (#8) could have got 3 kills without the creeps tanking for him earlier?
When farming or in solo mid, the most important thing is to control the positions of creeps. First and foremost, let’s start with farming. Farming is one of the main aspects of the game. Basically, the more you farm, the richer you are, and money is power. Everyone reading this guide can farm, but how many here have actually mastered it?
In early stages of the game, creeps are everything. But as the game progresses, other factors come into play. Again, imagine dota as a game of chess. You want to develop your pieces quickly and efficiently early in the game to gain momentum. Just like chess, outcomes are usually determined in mid-game. However, a good start is always beneficial in the present and future. There is a saying in Chinese; “好的开始是成功的一半”. It means that a good beginning is half done.
Why is a good start important? Basically, the reason for having a head start in a certain lane, especially mid lane, is that you would then be able to help other lanes to gain tempo. The solo mid laner usually dictates the tempo of the game and has the power to affect two other lanes.
The Law of the Chain states, “The strength of the team is impacted by the weakest link”. The thing is to help the weakest link to be more threatening and competent in the game. You do not want to be the one bringing your team down, in the end letting them down. You want to be the heart/brain/spine of the team, not the appendix.
And what involves a good start? The answer is simply just you and the creeps. You just have to get all the creeps. Think of all the creeps as heroes, and you want to kill steal all of them just by only attacking, no spells or Dagon. They give you the money and the experience. If you can’t kill the heroes, you kill the creeps. DON’T let any of the creeps off. They are the main source of your and enemy’s income unless you are Chuck Norris who farms on heroes and Roshan. You want to keep your main source of income going and destroying your opponent’s at the same time through simple yet effective last hitting and denying.
Have you found yourself in a situation in which you only needed $30 to buy an item? Congrats! You are a victim of lax attitude. You may have missed getting 1 or 2 creeps in a wave and you do not care. Putting it at an exaggerated way, this one creep may haunt you for the rest of your game. If you have ever found yourself needing $135 (3 creeps) for a tp scroll after buying another item, then you need to take much more notice of minor details. The details may be minor, but when there you are committing too many minor mistakes, then you are one BIG mistake. You do know that people say no one is perfect? Yeah, that is true. Often, the best is determined by who has the fewest mistakes. A 1st and 2nd place may even be separated by a hundredth of a second. So... are you the first or second? Maybe we have to ask the creeps.
By the way, I heard that Chinese rice farmers slap themselves for each creep they did not get while practicing, be it ally or enemy creeps (Nah, I was just joking).
Okay, now for the solo mid part. For those new to solo mid or dota, this is a brief introduction on the role of solo mid. You are the highest level in the team (applicable to 2-1-2 only), and you are the one that has access to both lanes and runes, you have to learn to fight to survive. In the mid lane, it is just you and the opponent. It is a test of skills and battle of wits.
In the later part of the game(probably after 10mins), pushing is made both easy and difficult in mid lane. Simple being it is faster to push to the towers as it is the shortest lane and difficult being that enemies may ambush you on either sides of the lane.
Survival is extremely crucial in the mid lane. If you die, the mid tower is often left unprotected and vulnerable, forcing teammates from other lanes to come and support you, leading to those lanes being outnumbered by enemy heroes. However, if the enemy hero dies, you can choose to push or spread your influence to other lanes. However, just make sure those trips to other lanes are worthwhile.
In a nutshell, I would say that to be a solo mid, you need courage. But to be a good solo mid, you need to be intelligent.
Red box indicates optimal postion for Radiant creeps and green box represents optimal position for Dire's creeps. The white box is where you want to force the enemy hero to be. Anything behind the white box is fine too as this means he would not be getting farm or challenging you for last hits if your creeps are in the best position.
This is what you want your enemy to see only. You can see your enemy but your enemy has no vision of you. If the opposition is scared easily, his play would definitely be affected negatively. He would be more prone to mistakes. Not to forget the 25% miss when targeting an unit on higher ground.
You do not want any enemy creeps to cross over the yellow line and you want the enemy hero to play in the red box just to get farm as you would then be able to win a battle of harassment.
As stated earlier, one of the benefits of solo mid is being able to access the runes. Getting a rune isn't just about running quickly to the rune spawn at every even numbered time(2/4/6 minutes etc.). There is a technique in bottling those runes. Many unexperienced solo mids may not take note of the minor details of runing that can make a difference.
The thing you want to do before getting a rune is pushing the creeps. Use the creeps to your advantage! At the xx:30 mark or about there, you can use aoe spells to push the creeps forward(remember to try get the enemy heroes too). What if you are playing heroes like (lion)? You can choose to attack the creeps more often. Slowly but surely, it will result in your creeps pushing forward. When you push, your creeps would be at the enemy's tower. Then only, you can get the rune.
Evaluation time! Why is it so or why I say so? When the creeps are at the enemy tower, the enemy hero is forced to stay there. If he tries to compete with you for runes, he would lose out at the gold and experience in lane, which means that you will outlevel and outfarm him. This is also why you want to push before getting the rune. Moving on, you now have a 'free' rune. Furthermore, lasthits would be harder to achieve at the tower.
Using the same concept, you can apply it to ganking too.You can force the enemy solo mid to not gank. If he can't even push/clear the creep wave, and go gank, their tower would be very vulnerable and easier to take down.
Let's use (Shadow Fiend) as an example. (Shadow Fiend) can push lanes very fast, forcing the enemy to clear the wave at their tower. This allows (Shadow Fiend) to tp to another lane to gank. A successful gank would mean 2 enemy heroes dead and now you are free to take down their tower. Furthermore, you can damage the tier 2 tower if time permits.
This guide mentioned everything you need to know about farming. It's worth to spend 7.5 min on the video.
The other way of farming is through pushing. Pushing is farming and farming is pushing. Heroes such as (furion) and (tinker) are great pushers and farmers at the same time since they can be all over the place.
Somewhat off topic: (furion)'s ulti should be used at correct timing in early game and not mindlessly using it once CD finishes as it encourages the imbalance of creep equilibrium.
Farming is not just lasthitting. You definitely cannot exclude map awareness from farming.
The Law of the Chain states, “The strength of the team is impacted by the weakest link”.
Creep pulling is drawing the aggro of the neutrals to draw the aggro of your creeps onto the neutrals, then you watch them engage each other. Creep pulling is a very effective and important tactic. It is a skill that lower level players do not practice and higher level players utilise.
Things needed in creep pulling are aggro and timing. You don't have to be a world class player to pull. Even a new Dota player who has 1 week experience with this game can pull. However, pubbers pulling is even rarer than running into a wild Chansey in the Safari Zone(in the older versions of Pokemon).
Creep pulling, in my opinion, is one of the strongest move you can make in the laning stages of the game as a newbie or 'noob'.
There are two types of pulling. They are single pulling and stack pulling.
Single pulling is creep pulling of only one camp of neutral creeps. As for stack pulling, it is the stacking of neutral creeps, then pull. Hence, stack pulling is the creep pulling of two or more camps of neutral creeps.
Creep Stacking is the art of drawing neutral creeps away from their camps just before they would "respawn". Every time neutrals would respawn, the game checks the area in which they spawn for any units. If a unit is found, no neutrals will spawn. By pulling the neutrals away from their spawn point at the right time, the game will "respawn" the neutrals, as there are no units in the area, allowing a player to double his gold income from a single camp. It is advised to stack a creep camp before pulling it.
How to stack?
Stacking creeps is all about timing. Most camps can be stacked by getting the neutral camp's aggro (by walking close to them while they are awake, or attacking them) around the 51-53 second mark. Once the creeps are following the hero, you should move your hero as far away from the camp as possible (bringing the creeps with you. Following a straight path will ensure that the creeps do not lose sight of you and turn around. If done correctly, the creeps should be away from the camp when the timer hits :00 (a new minute) and new creeps would have spawned.
Note: Neutral creeps only follow you for about 7 seconds, after that they head back to their camp.
The above method can be done multiple times, but timing might start to differ (as you have different creeps running at different speeds). A camp can be stacked indefinitely, as long as you get all the creeps out of the camp by the time the creeps would respawn.
Side note: The area in which the game checks for units differs for each camp. It is not necessarily exactly in the area the creeps are, but sometimes a little further.
Heroes that are most suitable for pulling are supports such as (crystal maiden) and (shadow priest). Let's say in a dual lane, if the support pulls, the other laner, usually a carry, would be able to absorb all the experience by himself. Levels are more important to a carry than to a support. Of course in early game a support's level is crucial but in the long run, a carry determines how the game ends.
Moreover, before pulling, you have to move back to the neutral camp, which means that some experience points and gold would be lost while you are travelling from the creeps to the neutrals. You do not want to lose this 2 valuable things as a carry. On the other hand, a support can afford to lose it as a support is usually skill dependent rather than item dependent.
Neutrals offer quite decent experience points too, allowing supports to keep up with the tempo of the game. Asking a carry to pull is purely minimising the effectiveness of creep pulling. Not that is not effective but it is less effective.
Note: junglers can help to pull too.
As you can see, you want to pull when the creep wave line gets too forward. (slardar) is in a bad position and (bounty hunter) is allowed a lot of space to farm at the tower safely in a dominated lane by the Dire. By creep pulling now, one of the drawbacks, leaving tower vulnerable, is prevented.
Maximises experience earned in the lane. Creeps make up a lane and neutrals half a lane. This means that your lane would be earning 1.5 times as much experience that your opponent is earning.
The number is not exactly 1.5 times or neutrals are exactly half a lane. The idea is that enemies are getting only the experience of 4 creeps and your lane is getting the same thing plus the experience from neutrals. In short, your lane is getting more experience than the enemies in the same lane.
Retreating the creeps wave meeting point is the main selling point of creep pulling. Whenever the creep equilibrium is messed up and you find yourself pushing too far forward, creep pulling helps to pull the creep wave line back. Which means that in the next wave, you would be farming nearer to your tower. Not only that, you would also be forcing your opponents to play in a disadvantageous position in order to get some lasthits.
(syllabear) is using spirit bear to tank the creeps while (crystal maiden) is pulling. (nerubian weaver) is going over to ks some neutrals and creeps.
Copy-pasted: The red zone shows that it is quite dangerous to be inside there, and the further away you are from your tower,the more dangerous it is. The yellow arrows indicates the possible paths that enemy gankers may take to capitalise on your positioning mistake.
Note how far (nerubian weaver) is from the last creep, the width of a screen. Pressure from (crystal maiden) also threatens (nerubian weaver) to retreat as he does not want to be caught in a bad position.
Just a side note, have you noticed how creep pulling has led to the creep wave meeting point to be located at your end of the red zone?
When your creeps engage the neutrals, you can start denying them at half life and not only when they reach red health. If done correctly, there should be only 1 creep remaining, 2 at most. Denying your creeps at half HP helps to minimise the experience points earned by your opponent and also help to lessen the pushing aftereffect of creep pulling.
Creep pulling is a great way for you to outlevel your opponents considering that they would miss out on 2 creeps experience every 1 minute. Let's say there are 4 creeps/spawn. Total number of creeps spawned in a minute is 8. After denying 2, the opposition is left with experience of 6 creeps, which is only 75% of what you are getting.
If you plan on a push attempt, it is better to perform a single pull, preferable when the current creep wave has a catapult or the creep wave after has a catapult. A siege unit is spawned at every 7th wave. A catapult can deal devastating damage to a tower and wear it down and it is more difficult to deal with two waves and a siege creep then simple two waves alone which makes the push even more efficient.
If you pull, and auto attack the neutrals, you are going to have 3 surviving creeps(2 at full HP and 1 at half HP). And when this wave of creeps coincide with the next wave of your creeps, it's going to be a 4v7 creeps battle. As mentioned earlier, the creep equilibrium is going to be affected. Since you have more creeps, basic arithmetic tells you that you are going to push forward the creep line.
For additional information, in an unintentional push due to poor creep pulling, you are going to find yourself in a bad position vulnerable to ganks. In order to curb the problem, what you can do is to start denying the creeps at half HP if you are doing a single pull or you can just perform a stack pull to prevent any kind of pushing.
Let's keep this part simple and easy.
1)Leaves tower vulnerable
Currently, there is an enemy creep wave at your tower, and another one is arriving. You chose to creep pull at this time. That means that no creeps would help to absorb damage for your tower. This results in 2 of the enemy creep waves to push your tower down without much resistance.
If your ally hero in the same lane decides to tank the enemy creeps by himself, he would then be taking in a lot of unnecessary damage. So it makes him even more vulnerable. On the good side, the tower is still intact in this situation.
To avoid such situations, do not pull when the enemy creep line is too forward. You can use the river/side shops as a benchmark here. Pull only when the creeps are near there or something.
2)May leave hero in lane to be vulnerable
The lane hero may have to tank the enemy creeps' damage for the tower if the pulling retreats the creep wave line too far back. This causes either the tower or the hero in lane to take unnecessary damage which could have been prevented if creep pulling was more properly planned.
Furthermore, a hero with lower hp may create an opportunity for the opposition. Enemy heroes may choose to dive in and kill the injured hero. If the ally hero is too far from immediate aid, even if the hero does not die from a preemptive strike from the enemies, he/she will be in red health. In the end, the hero will not be able to do much in lane until he/she is back in green health, probably using a healing salve.
Using the game clock to pull, not your instincts or estimation. The 2 spoilers below includes the general time to pull and direction to pull.
Creep aggro is a double-edged sword. If you know it, then good for you. If you don't, then good luck for you. After reading this chapter, you would gain more knowledge but not wisdom if you don't practice it in a match.
Basically, this guide pretty much sums up what creep aggro is. You may call me lazy for not doing it myself but hey, it's a video guide. That means no more long walls of text, for now. Hurray!
Regardless of the fact that you watched it or not, I will summarise the important points from the video.
1) Creeps have 500 aggro range. You will draw creep aggro by either targeting an enemy hero or ally hero.
2) Click on enemy hero to draw creep aggro which in turn draws creeps closer to you, allowing safer farming. As mentioned in the previous point, you can also press 'A' and target your ally hero which would also draw enemy creep aggro. A useful basic technique if you are a melee hero deprived of farm or in an aggressive lane.
3) Keeping the distance from enemy creeps while harassing.
4) Drawing the creep aggro off you teammate who is harassing enemy hero. This can be done so by either targeting your teammate or the enemy hero.
Running into creeps while ganking or rather backstabbing enemy heroes. This leads to the creeps chasing you and provide some vision on you for a period of time. This means gank failed. More of creeps vision than of creep aggro, but I left it here since the creep aggro attracts attention of enemy heroes.
This problem occurs more frequently in low level play. Only way to prevent drawing aggro from those creeps that you bump into besides using dust is avoiding them. In order to avoid those creeps, you've got to estimate where they are. Using the time? No, it's by using your creeps. Look at your minimap, now locate the position of your creeps. From there, estimate the position of enemy creeps. Lastly, evaluate whether is it safe to go and sneak from the back.
You can trigger creep aggro to reduce damage on tower.
Control creep equilibrium.
Draw enemy creeps, not attacking your creeps. Your creeps attack them.
Draw enemy creeps away from tower aggro.
Furion using treants to draw creep aggro
More to be added.
Creeps as Natural Barrier/Buffer Zone (Under construction)
Creep Blocking. Quit Blocking?
People always say runes>creep blocking. Is it true? Stay tune and find out!
More to be added.
Pausing here for a while. Font coloring not working properly. Doing it manually is hardwork.
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(bloodseeker) has one of the highest average deny/game. This is probably due to the fact that he gets a 'hp bonus heal' whenever he kills a creep. 
(Shadow Fiend) also has got high denies probably due to Necromastery. The concept of meritocracy has motivated people to work harder for more benefits.
(Lich)'s ability Dark Ritual is a strong one. I recommend getting it at the first level for beginners. WHAT?! Why not frost nova at level 1, this n00b guide is n00b.
(Enigma) who can pull the creeps back. 
(Ring of Basilius), a common item which offers a bonus armour aura, helps to sustain creeps by making them more resistant to physical attacks, and many other hero abilities helps in pushing in early game.
(Viper) to control the lane properly and not to push too far in order to gain an early lead.
(venomancer). He planted wards in the Dire forest but it seems like there is an alternative path for enemies to reach him.
(AA) was enough to finish him off. By the way, note that it was the night and sight range is smaller for Zhou's 
(necrolyte) and 
(Nerubian weaver) looks funny because CM frostbite him, and the animation is not up yet. Needless to say, Dire got a valuable First Blood.
(lion)? You can choose to attack the creeps more often. Slowly but surely, it will result in your creeps pushing forward. When you push, your creeps would be at the enemy's tower. Then only, you can get the rune.
(furion) and 
(tinker) are great pushers and farmers at the same time since they can be all over the place. 
(crystal maiden) and 
(shadow priest). Let's say in a dual lane, if the support pulls, the other laner, usually a carry, would be able to absorb all the experience by himself. Levels are more important to a carry than to a support. Of course in early game a support's level is crucial but in the long run, a carry determines how the game ends.
(slardar) is in a bad position and 
(bounty hunter) is allowed a lot of space to farm at the tower safely in a dominated lane by the Dire. By creep pulling now, one of the drawbacks, leaving tower vulnerable, is prevented.
(syllabear) is using spirit bear to tank the creeps while 
Misc guide 
