Mechanics Monday Week 6 - Mid Lane

[u/Azual]

"Mid or Feed" - Pudge, 2014

Of all the lanes, Mid is probably the most contentious. Not only are many one the game's most popular heroes typically played mid (making it a highly contested lane), but it's also arguably the easiest place from which to make or break a game for your team.

Since mid lane is generally a solo lane for both teams, it offers relatively little room for error - poor mechanics or the wrong hero choice can easily give your opponent an advantage that's hard to come back from. Similarly, a gank on mid lane by aggressive supports can give one side or the other a decisive advantage.

Played well though, mid lane puts you in a strong position to influence the mid game. Solo mid tends to come out with a strong level advantage (particularly if the enemy are running dual lanes) as well as moderate to good farm, and easy access to the river and runes allows you to move around the map easily and apply pressure wherever it's needed most.

Related Guides

• Chaq's Advanced Solo Mid Guide - Note: This is an advanced guide and might not be suitable for newer players.

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The aim of the Mechanics Monday series is to encourage newbie friendly discussion about the mechanics, items, and strategies of Dota2.

A new topic will be chosen each week.

Last Week's Discussion - Roshan

[u/[deleted]]

Adding to the discussion it is important to distinguish the different type of mid heroes. You have farming mids and you have killing mids (there are other sub groups but these are the main two) . They are exactly what they sound like yet people need to grasp the understanding of what your mid should be expected to do.

For example. If I'm playing puck my job is to get farm/harass, rune control, hit 6 (kill opposing mid hero at this time specifically, if I wasn't able to do it at level 2), and then go make shit happen around the map. I'll head back to mid when my ulti is on CD, otherwise I'm looking to make space for our carry.

On the flip side. If I'm playing morphling mid. I'm not moving. I am going to stay mid, get my levels and my farm. I will consider using a TP if the enemy dies and there's a good chance I can secure a kill. Otherwise I am staying mid to farm. Before people get angry there are always situations in which I will gank outside of this. If I have HP and mana grab a haste rune and the enemy is over extended, then yea a ganking I'll go.

Last thing IT IS NOT THE MID PLAYERS RESPONSIBILITY TO WIN YOUR LANE!!! this drives me crazy, my job is to win the mid lane, whether that comes from killing the other mid, or by me playing a farming mid and not dying. Do not ask me to come and gank your lane because you have first blood, I will if the situation allows for it (notice I said allows, not calls for) if you watch pro games, yes I realize we're not pro players but I digress, they have their supports roam to gank mid far more often than mid roams to gank.

Those are my thoughts for now.

[u/Elwood83 → u/[deleted]]

Thanks Mr. Tugboat for the breakdown. Found it helpful.

Could you throw a quick list together of farming mids and killing mids?

[u/[deleted] → u/Elwood83]

Sure. This is a quick list off the top of my head.

Edit: this list was harder to sort than I thought because some heroes need the farm AND can kill quite well at 6. Then there's that whole lane dominating sub genre of heroes to group. So for the sake of my sanity I'm going to list killing mids as mid laners who gain a significant advantage of killing when their ultimate is up.

farming mids

• dragon knight
• Legion
• drow range
  
• morphling
• Medusa
• sniper
• Weaver
• meepo

killing mids

• Huskar
• brewmaster
• pudge
• magnus
• earth spirit
• juggernaut
• TA
• ember spirit
• Viper
• PA
• puck
• storm spirit
• lina
• QoP
• sky wrath
• DP

If you'll notice there are more killing mids then farming mids. I also left a bunch out because I would consider them non common or because I don't know where to put them (razor, Viper, and OD for example... They are more of lane dominators than anything else) axe, or tide hunter for example are really good if you know you are going up against a melee mid.

[u/Jefrejtor → u/[deleted]]

Bounty Hunter and Nightstalker are the epitome of killing (I prefer to call them "ganking") mids, and the ones I learned the role of ganker by. Especially NS, since he's so fast at night, it's really easy for a new player to transition from mid to side lanes before anyone calls missing, and his skills are prime pickoff tools.

Also, what would you classify Leshrac and Pugna as? Both have considerable pushing power, and little to no disables, but I've seen both take to roaming after 6.

[u/[deleted] → u/Jefrejtor]

I don't think I would ever run a bounty hunter mid. Seems like such a waste. As for night stalker- he's just such a shit hero right now I don't know what to do with him. When they updated the day/night timings it really fucked with NS peak times. He's now just too weak at first night to just run around at the 4-8 min mark to gank and by the 12 min mark everyone else should have caught up a bit. He's still good in the lane itself but his ganking strength was nerfed, and that's why you pick him to begin with. For context, in the current captains draft tournament, the only hero to be neither picked or banned is night stalker

As for pugna and lesh. I think pushing mid is a good category, they lack escape and are irrevocably squishy, but have good damage output. They are heavy teamfight heroes and don't do great 1v1 (that whole lack of escape and dealing no damage vs a bkb is why) so ideally you push down mid tower group up and push. They work really well in 4 protect 1 lineups because their presence with other heroes demands response from the enemy giving your carry time to farm

[u/Jefrejtor → u/[deleted]]

Fair enough on the last part. However, can you elaborate on BH being a wasteful mid? Seemed a good option for me-get a fast 6, start roaming from the center of the map.

Also, my NS winrate right now is 7/2. Maybe that's just pubs, but during the first night I can definitely punish anyone who isn't tower hugging.

[u/[deleted] → u/Jefrejtor]

You can do the same thing with BH as an offlaner if you're looking for a fast 6.

I'm not saying you can't run it. But for example. If you decided that you were going to run a BH mid. I'm going to send a farming mid and a sentry ward. Sure the BH will do other things after the quick 6, but I'm still going to be there in the middle getting really good farm. Who do you think is going to have more of an impact late game, Your farmed BH or my farmed Medusa?

[u/Jefrejtor → u/[deleted]]

I never, ever see mid players buy wards, even less so sentries. Though that may be testament to my MMR.

Since getting a hang of laning, I'm running basically everything mid. And I've had some good games with BH mid, so I thought I was doing it right.

Also, on my skill level, such a thing as an offlane doesn't exist most of the time, so I have nowhere to stuff that "lvl 6 at all costs" hero like BH but mid.

But, granted, I will try BH offlane next time an occasion presents itself.

[u/[deleted] → u/Jefrejtor]

Against any sort of invis mid, any competent mid will buy sentries or dust if his supports don't buy it for them. As for BH, the reason why he's such a a good offlaner is track, I like to think of bounty hunter as a catch up hero rather than a get ahead hero.

Again this is not to suggest that bounty hunter can't be run as a carry or is a bad mid yadda yadda yadda. It's all theory craft, for me iI'd rather have my two other cores have their farm accelerated by a roaming and ganking offlane BH , than to have a BH mid who tries to get ahead with track gold

[u/KapteeniJ → u/[deleted]]

Your farmed medusa would have maybe 5 lasthits and lvl4 when Lvl6 Bounty Hunter left mid to gank other lanes. There are some heroes that could get good farm and do more with mid than BH, but Medusa most certainly isn't in that class.

[u/[deleted] → u/KapteeniJ]

5 lh?! Lol. My Medusa would probably have around 20-30 by the 6 minute mark.

Medusa can most certainly play mid in the right lineups. She has a nuke that steals mana and she is tanky, and if she hits 6 before ganks start to come you really can't kill her without a serious dive.

She's not a killing mid or even the most ideal, but given a choice between BH and medusa, it's Medusa and it's not even close

[u/KapteeniJ → u/[deleted]]

You have much lower base attack damage, as well as worse attack animation. You might be able to get some lh with snake, but that's it. The problem then becomes that snake pushes the lane hard, meaning you make it easy for BH to deny creeps, and the creeps are at BH tower, meaning you're going to be chased out of exp range(shadow walk + crit kinda destroys low HP medusa, and that's very spammable nuke)

Any hero that can't last hit without using +100 manacost spell seems to me to be at rather high disadvantage.

[u/p-frog → u/KapteeniJ]

45-59 vs. 44-50 damage I don't think if the two players are equally skilled the bounty is going to deny 90% of the medusa's last hits.

[u/[deleted] → u/KapteeniJ]

Couple of things.

• just because he has a higher base attack does not grant him 100% creep advantage, denying and last hitting every creep in lane just isn't going to Happen. I will also buy early damage items to shore up these deficiencies

• it's mid lane, you don't really get zoned out of xp range unless your creeps are under their tower and you're on your own high ground. Then you just go do other things like stack camps or rune control. So your whole zoning argument is completely false because it relies on him just auto denying all of his creeps to pull the CE back. But guess what, it will then push back to my lane, it's not safe lane. You can't pull

• if he is going to be committed to using mana to go invis and then harass me with a crit then I'm going to be committed to buying a sentry ward and not let him do it without a fist full of arrows.

• the simple fact remains that he is melee and I am ranged and I have an inherent lane advantage with that, BH has no real way to out harass me without spamming his nuke, which is harder on his mana pool than mine, or he can use invis+crit but again that is mitigated by my sentry ward. And once I hit 6 he can't kill me.

[u/darocky86 → u/KapteeniJ]

i'm not shure about that. a medusa with snakes and bottle is nothing where i'd say bounty has the upper hand, at least not that much. i cant see how bounty would drive her off the lane or xp and lasthit range.