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Hello boys,
Not sure it warrants its own topic but I feel the question, albeit simple, could use too many answers to fit into the simple question simple answer thread.
Anyway, I took a break from dota2 in dec. 2017, and now I'm back. Playing offlane as usual, but... it seems much harder than before (3.9k mmr solo queue). I feel zoned a lot, very vulnerable, basically presented with a very unsettling choice :
- play extremely cautiously and get nothing (not good) ;
- juke my way near the creep wave / ninja some last hits if i can, and probably die in the process (not good).
Also, I do feel pressed to pick my offlaner before mid and core, more than before. Not sure why that is, it's probably just me.
My current solution is Underlord. I do win a lot of games with Underlord actually.
![[image loading]](http://tof.cx/images/2018/04/05/c4f819e9650b533a9d43fb596597f1aa.png)
But mostly picking the same hero every game is getting boring, so my questions are : what's up with the offlane recently ? How do you guys play it, in solo queue (ie ~0% chance of dual lane) ? Hero suggestions, besides UL ?
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Centaur and Doom are my go-to offlaners at the moment. In both cases, my goal is to pressure the fuck out of the enemy core and make it so their supports cannot safely leave the lane to roam. Doom is a bit more flexible in this, as you can retreat to get your guaranteed devour creep and change your skill build to play aggro / passive. Centaur is less so, but all you really need is levels to field massive nukes.
But yeah, ultimate goal for me is to force the support(s) to have to deal with me, and not leave them free to roam or jungle. I wouldn't really consider a 0/3/0 offlaner to have "lost" the lane, but I definitely would a level 3 offlaner that now can't lane solo against their level 6 core, while the enemy supports are free to do whatever the hell they want.
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I also play alot of UL and it seems like I am always up against some stupid shit like MK+Shaman+Tusk. In situations like that, I just accept that I won't win the lane and hope to comeback later if my other teammates are having a good game. If my teammates are also having a hard game, it will be very hard to win, since UL without farm is quite useless.
Offlane in general is going to be difficult now, no free lanes anymore. I haven't really tried it, but I think DS may be able to make a comeback. You should be able to get some farm with him at least that would be hard to get for other heroes.
Even if it sucks, just try your hardest to make sure the supports stay in your lane, because if they are allowed to move about freely you may end up in a situation where you lose all your lanes and comming back as UL then is very hard/impossible.
The biggest thing I guess is mostly the change from having a pretty "free" lane offlane, to being very contested, is adapting to how it plays out and that just takes time to get used too.
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Creep cuts (if you can) and disrupt creep equilibrium. It's pretty fine to feed first blood or blow a chunk of regen if it gets the creeps to your tower in the first 1-3 mins. People at that mmr can't control the lane after that anyways so it's smooth sailing once it happens.
It's also lane winning at that lvl do get your range creep killed with the block.
Clock is a nice starter hero imo with cogs and stuff.
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I honestly think that to face off well in a 1v3 you need to accept a few things:
1. You will never be a carry.
2. You will probably never win your lane. That's not your objective.
3. You dying to ensure that supports aren't rotating (or anything that is disruptive to the opponents flow of the game) doesn't make you a feeder.
4. Capitalise on mistakes even when you are behind. Are the supports rotating, but the enemy carry is too strong for you to contest farm? Pull the lane, bring it back to one of your camps and farm it.
5. Don't be afraid to buyback early, it's less punishing than ever. If a wave is crashing into your tower and you're level 4, just buyback and get that XP.
6. Never start the game aiming for a Radiance, Midas or a farm accelerator. If you can bring fighting power to the table (Drums, HoD, the occasional Urn, whatver) you help your team establish tempo and map pressure.
Play with this in mind and offlaning makes more sense.
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I tend to play farmy off lanes and it’s def a harder patch for it. NP, abba, LD. Don’t think of it as greedy, think of it as pushing and making space for your team.
Double waving and creep pulling is very strong you should almost always do it, even if you die you get guaranteed lv 3 and often prevent a 2v1 mid
I tend to go for hotd. The regen and stats help a ton in offlane and often u can outrade their carry. Also leaves the lane open for pushing.
Ur laning items should be designed to win the 1v1 core matchup. With that in mind, wand bottle phase hotd drums all pretty good at this in different situations
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Well, Bulldog offlaning in his 2nd game of the ESL qualifier sums up my experience quite well. He was level 2 at minute 5 or something, 0 last hit, and then he turned off his stream.
Clearly not the winning strat but that's definitely how playing offlane these days makes me feel, most of the time.
Regardless, thanks guys for the positive inputs!
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On April 07 2018 22:51 Jisira wrote:
I honestly think that to face off well in a 1v3 you need to accept a few things:
1. You will never be a carry.
2. You will probably never win your lane. That's not your objective.
Play with this in mind and offlaning makes more sense.
Pangolier
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On April 19 2018 02:25 harodihg wrote:Show nested quote +On April 07 2018 22:51 Jisira wrote:
I honestly think that to face off well in a 1v3 you need to accept a few things:
1. You will never be a carry.
2. You will probably never win your lane. That's not your objective.
Play with this in mind and offlaning makes more sense. Pangolier
If you want to, you can play a lot of heroes offlane. However, if you think that Pangolier blindly goes from level 1 1v3 to getting items then you are sorely mistaken. He is, like a lot of other heroes, hardcountered by others. The main problem with a Pangolier as an offlaner is that he is so quick to eat any space given to him in the lane. 50% of the Pangos I play with / against haven't gotten level 4/5 by 10 minutes because of his weakness to certain heroes. He thrives in a lane with passive farmers who don't build for the laning stage, that's all.
Another reason Pangolier is so great is the fact that he can tailor his build towards being a damage threat or carrying the team items.
A hero like Dark Seer has to carry team items.
A hero like Timbersaw (more or less) has to be a damage threat.
Someone playing Pangolier can look at a game and state "we need damage" or "we need teamfight" and itemize accordingly.
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I don't think you understand what makes Pango such a strong offlaner or what he's capable of
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Care to elaborate, harodihg?
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He's one of the more evasive offlaners currently and offers pretty consistent teamfight control, but I too don't consider him a stand-alone exceptional offlaner.
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Pangolier is exceptional in the offlane because he can pull the creep wave without dying very safely. Also if he gets someone to roam he can kill almost anyone with a heartpiercer proc even with a level disadvantage. But, it wouldn't matter if his laning is awful because his teamfight/skirmish strength and wave push lets him create unique pressure on the map.
Dark seer is actually very good at right clicking now with his damage talent. Dom + echo + solar lets you kill anyone on the map. Building teamfight items is outdated and you become sort of useless. Dom is the only teamfight item you need for the vac + stun combo.
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I've only ever felt the "He's annoying in fights/skirmishes".
Honestly the solo offlane I'm most "afraid of" I guess is Timbersaw, because there are a lot of 1v1 matchups that he can win even from a level disadvantage and it takes specific supports and/or a ton of attention to actually kill him. It's also really hard for certain supports to kill him, and it usually takes 3 bodies to do so.
Pango is good with levels but you can still trade regen with him evenly as a support and he doesn't have amazing tools to make sure he still gets exp - basically anything he can do is stuff some other offlaners do, and quite a few better than him.
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On April 23 2018 20:10 Fleetfeet wrote:
I've only ever felt the "He's annoying in fights/skirmishes".
Honestly the solo offlane I'm most "afraid of" I guess is Timbersaw, because there are a lot of 1v1 matchups that he can win even from a level disadvantage and it takes specific supports and/or a ton of attention to actually kill him. It's also really hard for certain supports to kill him, and it usually takes 3 bodies to do so.
Pango is good with levels but you can still trade regen with him evenly as a support and he doesn't have amazing tools to make sure he still gets exp - basically anything he can do is stuff some other offlaners do, and quite a few better than him.
Batrider and pango can cross radiant forest without being intercepted because they abuse the terrain with their abilities. Most of the time you aren't going to get the opportunity to trade regen since he can pull the double wave past his t1 tower with a ranged attack. Timber is very easy to zone with most of the popular heroes right now and if your carry has treads or phase boots they can simply kill him. It's important to note that an underfarmed pango is still useful but an underfarmed timbersaw is food. Something you will notice is that the popular offlaners still offer something (roar, rollout, firestorm, chrono) even without farm.
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I struggle way more with the Pango pos 4 because he's basically a Tusk that trades early utility for damage, with similar evasiveness (jump down cliffs / shard yourself down from a cliff etc).
I don't know if things are different where you are at (region or MMR or whatnot) but seeing Pango pos 3 on the opposing team is generally a good thing simply because he is so weak before his Javelin pickup. One HotD or a root on your team severely impairs the entire hero beyond his Q.
Don't get me wrong, I still lose 47% of my games vs Pangolier. He's not a bad hero. I just don't see why people think he is so strong pos 3 before factoring in opposing composition.
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On April 25 2018 14:00 Spicy_Curry wrote:Show nested quote +On April 23 2018 20:10 Fleetfeet wrote:
I've only ever felt the "He's annoying in fights/skirmishes".
Honestly the solo offlane I'm most "afraid of" I guess is Timbersaw, because there are a lot of 1v1 matchups that he can win even from a level disadvantage and it takes specific supports and/or a ton of attention to actually kill him. It's also really hard for certain supports to kill him, and it usually takes 3 bodies to do so.
Pango is good with levels but you can still trade regen with him evenly as a support and he doesn't have amazing tools to make sure he still gets exp - basically anything he can do is stuff some other offlaners do, and quite a few better than him. Batrider and pango can cross radiant forest without being intercepted because they abuse the terrain with their abilities. Most of the time you aren't going to get the opportunity to trade regen since he can pull the double wave past his t1 tower with a ranged attack. Timber is very easy to zone with most of the popular heroes right now and if your carry has treads or phase boots they can simply kill him. It's important to note that an underfarmed pango is still useful but an underfarmed timbersaw is food. Something you will notice is that the popular offlaners still offer something (roar, rollout, firestorm, chrono) even without farm.
Yeah but you don't even need to hop terrain to wave skip, you just need to be able to TP to your tower. Unless a/the support is in position beforehand they can't really stop you... and that's largely a game of not getting noticed when you try invade in the first place.
The truth is I haven't played against a pango that has impressed me yet. He gets more or less nothing out of lane, then is annoying in teamfights but not much else. I haven't felt unsafe leaving my core alone against him nor had to slow down my own gameplan to adjust to what he's doing. I don't doubt he's a good offlaner, I just don't see him being an exceptional one.
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So, not sure if that's just a coincidence or what's going on but, since the introduction of ranked-roles (yesterday), it seems that people are more willing to 2-1-2.
Well it's clearly too early to tell but... still, I am under the impression that those willing supports have been more concerned by the offlane. Which is nice.
It still mostly ends up with very close calls, and me feeding like a noob, but at least I don't feel forever alone :s
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EPT
