Northern Arena Days 1 and 2

The middle of a tournament is the most fun from analyst point of view when it comes to predictions - there is just enough evidence to point you in the direction of where the tournament is going while maintaining a fog of the unknown. The Northern Arena tournament is no exception to this. The tournament format, commentators, and heroes have made for a fast paced and interesting event. Because this is a major LAN before the next Valve Major which has tier 1 teams, the results are important for teams trying to measure how they're going to line up against each other.

This tournament is sending teams home on the first day. This increases the stakes for teams like NP, Complexity, and EHome who looking to put in much needed LAN time before heading to a high stakes tournament in Boston. Unfortunately, FDL was eliminated yesterday and either Complexity or the loser of the EG/Alliance will go home today (currently it's game 1 and EG is in firm control EG beat Alliance 2-0 and Alliance sent Complexity home.) The format for the Northern Arena condenses the tournament experience down by keeping it from dragging with a no frills double elimination best of 3 in the upper bracket and the always popular best of 1 in the lower bracket. The two heavyweights of the tournament - Wings and EG - on opposite sides of the bracket. My guess is so that they can meet toward the end of the event. Overall, there haven't been any major bumps or glitches and the personal player format is nice so hopefully we will see another event here.

The commentators have been great, especially Purge. He continues to step his up his game when it comes to dissecting the details of the game and he keeps the other commentators on task by blowing through some of the nonsense or keeping them on task. Capitalist has also been filling this role by keeping it professional yet lite. There are still some immature/unprofessional/crude aspects to the DOTA 2 and ESports community as a whole which need to be ground off if ESports are going to compete with the likes of other professional sports. Purge and Capitalist are facilitating this transition.

The most interesting thing to me is the hero picks and the continuation of a decentralized metagame. Warlock is the best support by consensus but every other role has no clear best hero. We see a rotation of mids, carries, and offlaners which increases the importance of the draft and allows teams to keep picking what they like until they decide to pick something else. EG and Wings gaming have benefited the most from it and have just destroyed other teams, ending the game at the draft (the best example of this so far is Wings Gaming vs. NP game 2.) Mainly, teams have also been getting baited into drafting an aggressive lineup and usually lose because of it. This is because the less aggressive team secures their advantage by being greedier, getting an item up on their opponents, and then winning a team fight.

In summary, this tournament is a great way to bridge the gap between the TI and the next major. The format, commentators and current metagame makeup testify to the healthy nature of the sport. I encourage you to watch the games and enjoy high level of skills these players exhibit and the awesome nature of this tournament.

Suriving 3k Item Spotlight: Drum Solo

Drum of Endurance used to be ubiquitous on most right click carry heroes. Generally, agility carries would go Phase Boots, Drum of Endurance, Yasha before branching into other items. It's comparable to Armlet on strength carry heroes currently. The reason for this is that drums had an easy build up, provided cheap stats - notably strength and intelligence - came with an extremely useful aura and provided an activated ability. This ability allowed you to chase, retreat and take objectives better than your opponent. Currently, pro-teams are forgoing this item except on a select few heroes like Batrider. In your games, make sure at least one person on your team gets a drum. The pushing power it provides is enough to justify the purchase.

Surviving 3k: Spectre is the the hero you should be playing

There are many heroes to chose from in Dota 2 but the hero you should be choosing is Spectre. This hero is one of the best hard carries in pubs currently with an astounding 55-59% win-rate in the safe lane (according to Dotabuff.com.) This win-rate should come as no surprise when looking at the hero: high ceiling team fight potential; the ability to globally pickoff heroes; high single target damage for separated heroes;  AOE damage; pure damage; damage mitigation; and the ability to chase a hero into the abyss. The biggest weaknesses of the hero are that your laning stage is very weak, you are dependant on your team to take good fights in the mid game, your flash farm potential is low, and you don't want to build a black king bar (BKB) for any reason. With this profile in mind, let's dive a little further into why you should be playing this hero.

As with many carries, Spectre scales well with items and levels. Unlike many carries, however, you can deal a lot of damage even if you're behind. This damage correlates directly to getting levels and some very cheap fighting items. Urn of Shadows or Ring of Aquilla (RoA) and Phase Boots are my preferred initial items because of the cost efficiency and mana regeneration. This hero needs a mana item in the early game to reliably ensure haunt + spectral dagger for team fights. Both Urn and RoA provide damage and have small trade offs; choosing which items is simply figuring out if another player on your team is going to get Urn (like Pudge) and adjusting your build accordingly. My standard rule is to always get Urn unless someone is getting it.

Your next item decision comes from how well your are farming and how many fights your team is winning. If your farm is high and you're winning team fights, saving for Radiance seals the win for your team. If you enter the mid-game at parity with your opponents or you need to to be able to solo kill heroes on the map, getting Vanguard and Diffusal Blade will help you survive, farm the jungle, and kill supports relatively easily; these advantages are on top of having easy build-ups. If the game is very close or you find yourself being focused, Blademail becomes an especially potent item on this hero, scaling with your opponent's damage output and taking advantage of her ability to mitigate damage. The final item you want to consider is manta style. While this is an expensive item, the build up puts it in mid-game item department. The stats are good and it spawns more illusions, which Spectre takes advantage of, increasing your damage and farming rate. The downside to this item is that sometimes, it just doesn't do a whole lot. 

Late game item decisions are extremely important. I cannot stress how important it is to choose the correct items for late game because you usually only get one or two top tier items (5000+ gold) before the game ends - choose wisely. Butterfly, Heart, Eye of Skadi, and Assault Cuirass (AC) are the main four items you want to go for, with a items like Monkey King Bar getting an honorable mention. Each offer different advantages: Butterfly and Skadi are the fighting items; Heart is a sieging and tanking item; AC helps you push and should be gotten if you don't have another natural AC builder; MKB is necessary against heroes that have or will get evasion (most agility carries.) Usually, I build Butterfly against opposing carries that want to man-fight you like Lifestealer, Sven, and Phantom Assassin. The evasion also makes your illusions hard to deal with - not to mention the agility and attack speed increases your damage by a lot. 

After itemizing correctly during each stage in the game, the last things left to consider are overall play style and decision making. The latter is personal to the player so I'll cover this in other posts. The former, on the other hand, depends on your itemization, team composition and game pace. In order to be the most effective hero you can be, you need to figure out, with your team, how to synthesize these elements together into a winning game plan. This is not easy. The most important decision you have to make is when to use your ultimate. If the game is about team fighting, then save it for that. Otherwise, use it whenever you have the opportunity for a pickoff. Be wary of playing too aggressive or not aggressive enough.

To wrap it up, get the right items for the right situation, analyze how the game is going, project how the game is going to play out, and then use haunt appropriately. Spectre is one of the best heroes in the pub meta and should be treated as such. Please use this guide to improve your MMR and expanded your hero pool. Thanks for reading and please leave comments below.

A Farewell to 6.86

The most recent patch to leave us will left us as the most successful patch to date. While Invoker was in almost every pub, the pro scene was constantly evolving and it wasn't until the end when the most successful strategies were figured out. With that said, 6.87 will replace 6.86 as the most successful patch. As I write this, the open qualifiers are going on for TI 6 and they are some of the most exciting ever and here are a few reasons why.

1. Supports, the most under-appreciated role in Dota, continue to get buffed. At least in the pro-scene, the number of items a support accumulates over the course of a game has increased because of the low cost for getting wards, courier, and other early game essential items. The is also a boon to pubs but most teams can now truly get away with a single support. Earth Spirit, Bounty Hunter, and Enchantress are able to dominate games from the 4 position, if given the opportunity. Ice Frog's decision to open up this avenue of playing the game continues to keep it fresh.
2. Heroes are no longer getting beat down by the nerf stick. At least for heroes available in captains mode, heroes haven't been getting major changes to their stats, skills, or anything else Ice Frog can think of. This means that the relative power level of all heroes is about equal, with small exceptions. The flair that each region and team bring to the Dota continues to be expressed in new and exciting ways. Keep in mind that buffs and nerfs are mainly targeted at professional play.
3. The new items aren't game breaking, but they continue to increase the diversity of play-style and heroes. While Wind Lace pushes everyone toward drums, Raindrops, Bloodthrorn, Blightstone, Echo Saber, and Hurricane Pike all increase the viability of different heroes, play styles and open the game up for more decisions.
4. There are a lot of general strong heroes (Doom, QoP, Io, Chen, Enchantress, WD, Juggernaut, Vengeful Spirit, ES, Bounty Hunter, Natures Prophet, among others) and a lot of situationally very strong heroes (Slark, Slardar, Axe, Spectre, DK, Wind Ranger, Faceless Void, among others). This means drafting matters a lot and the team that can out draft their opponents has a significant advantage.
5. Finally, The terrain changes continue to try to balance dire and radiant. Again, this is geared toward pro play. I won't go into all the details but the big things to note are that radiant now have a better path behind the dire offlane tier one tower and there's a warding spot in the dire jungle similar to what the radiant have. Both changes give the Radiant some map advantage to offset the Roshan being on the dire side and the fact that radiant was more easily warded.

The Manila Major qualifiers just finished and Epicenter is right around the corner so let us bid farewell to 6.86: 6.86, you paved the way for a new dawn of Dota 2 greatness!

The Road to Manila: From Dota Pit to Starladder

The first big LAN since Dota Pit has taken place and the implications for Manila abound. Some teams rose to the challenge and using this LAN to increase their chances of the coveted direct invite. Unfortunately for others, their poor to mediocre showing means the grind will be a coarse one through the qualifiers. The results from this LAN show that Patch 6.86 continues its reign as one of the most exciting and interesting patches in recent memory. The field of heroes available to pro teams is wide and open as evidence by the meta changing from event to event. But enough talk about the meta, let's discuss what's really important: the teams!

This team is the story of the tournament. They overcame obstacle after obstacle in order to secure themselves a win. Mikasa had to stand-in because of visa issues for Nono. Vici Gaming Rebord (VGR) recently formed from the ashes of Vici Gaming and Vici Gaming Potential. With poor results for the Chinese teams at the Shanghai Major, professional squads from this region tried to quickly build Frankenstein in time for the lock date for the next major and TI. VGR seems to have emerged from the shuffle with a very competitive roster topping regional rival the all-star packed LGD in the loser's bracket finals and then defeating on a resurgent Na'vi in the finals. 

Here's a team that went from being the team to beat 3 years running to obscurity before rumbling their way back to relevance once again. I discussed the CIS teams a little bit (here) during Dota Pit, touching on how the roster shuffles could favor Na'vi, Virtus.Pro or Empire the most. These teams are seasoned and, assuming IceFrog doesn't change the game through a patch too much (likely) and the patch comes out before invites come out (very likely) and Na'vi doesn't implode between those two times (very likely), Na'vi are in a great position to secure an invite to the Manilla Major.

Finally, these is Virtus.Pro. VP are looking for something. They have the experience and the players but are struggling to find consistent success against tier 1 and 1.5 teams. Na'vi beat them in dream league 3-0 and they washed out of the Starladder I-League Invitational, only beating Vega Squadron 2-1. They do take games off of some of the best teams in each tournament and they convincingly beat tier 2 and 3 teams on a regular basis which could mean one of a couple of things: their opponents are quicker to adapt to what they are doing, their drafts are too predictable/not predictable enough or their are very dependent on winning the laning phase to win the game. They aren't playing in ESL One Manila but they will be heading to LAN for Dream league because they beat Team Spirit 2-0. Maybe this team just needs some time to find their grove or maybe they are just doomed to play doomed to play second fiddle to tier 1 teams. Either way, their invite to the next major is will probably not be forth coming. And unless win the Manilla Major, they probably won't be invite to TI either.

As I finish this, another LAN takes place in Manila. Some teams that we didn't get to see at Starladder will be there looking to prove their invite worthiness. Specifically, Ehome, Mineski, Complexity and Empire are in the hunt. For all but complexity, this LAN affords these teams with very fierce regional competition to set themselves apart at an international event. As for Fnatic, Liquid and Secrete, they will all probably get invites because of their consistently strong performances in their region and at other events.

Thanks for reading and let me know who's story your following as we head into the most exciting time in Dota 2!

Surviving 3K: Doom and That All Mighty Money

I have been playing a lot of Doom this patch. This hero is naturally greedy and is picked on-and-off in the pro scene because he excels against single and dual core line ups and will always get gold out of the map. This latter reason importantly results in items to help the team, like Puppey's very notable Buckler. In a 3k MMR game, Doom plays a different role: he removes the best player from the game. His ultimate deleting a hero from a fight, allows your team to take a 5v4 against the weakest 4 players on the opposing team (goodbye and good riddance, OD.) But this isn't always the easiest thing to accomplish and begins to break down against 3 and the dreaded 3k MMR 4 core lineup. Let's give Doom one last hurrah! before the next patch.

There are 2 main roles Doom is currently played in: jungle and offlane. He spends the laning stage trying to get ahead and then the mid game staying ahead. He needs his levels and items to be effective but has the tool in the form of Devour. The question then becomes what to get with all this loot? And the answer is easy: Randiance.

Rather than getting an Aghanims, Radiance affords you the magical damage you need to become a true team fight nightmare and increases your solo pickoff potential. The nerf to Scorched Earth hindered Doom's ability to chase people down and kill them quickly but Radiance solves this. Radiance also allows you to farm quickly, provides you with some additional tankiness in the form of evasion, and increases the value you get from the attack speed bonus of power treads. Radiance also takes advantage of Doom ability to naturally acquire currency so a radiance by 20 minutes is normal. Let's dive a little deeper into the build.

I start with two rings of protection, a set of tangos, a ward and salve before heading to the offlane. Depending on the lineup you're facing, you can ward the pull camp or put it in a place to grant you vision. From here, you need to play the game by ear. Generally, it's correct to finish the Basilius so that you can continually devour creeps and pick up boots so you aren't as susceptible to ganks before weighing what item to get next. You can get Vlads to help your team, Vanguard  to front line or Midas to further increase your farm depending on the tempo of the game. Also don't be afraid to get Power Treads for the attack speed; with Scorched Earth, Treads, Radiance and AC your right-clicks become relevant. After itemizing for the midgame, you need to farm your radiance.

Upon acquiring Radiance, I usually get auras for my team and by stacking armor with Vlads, AC, and Shiva's. If you went the Vanguard route, this would be the time to get a crimson guard. If you're against a Zeus, then pipe is the item. These items help  your team fight. The patch favors early aggression to get ahead in the laning and early mid game stages and team fighting. If your team suffered because you went for a greedier build, these items will help make up for that.

The skill build is fairly straight-forward because you don't want to fight early. Maxing Devour lowers the cool-down, allowing you to farm faster. After that I max Scorched Earth then Infernal blade, getting Doom whenever possible. Scorched Earth increases your survivability and AOE damage which is preferable to the single target focused Infernal Blade. If you find yourself fighting a lot in the early game, then only get 1 point in Devour and focus on the other two skills + Doom. As always, go into each game with a plan and then tailor that plan as the game unfolds.

This build is greedy, to say the least however it's merit lies in Doom's ability to get a fast radiance. For some games, getting a fast radiance is good enough. Make sure that the team isn't going to be relying on you to get a tool of initiation and make sure you have the space to farm. The last thing you want to do is burden your team with an under-farmed and item-less Doom. Other than that, have fun burning down your opponents.

Thanks for reading!

Surviving 3k: Spamming Heroes

If your goal is to increase your MMR and aren't spamming between 3-5 heroes, then consider giving it a shot. Here are some reasons why you should consider this approach to gaining MMR:

• Gaining MMR is about consistency and skill so by spamming few heroes, you can increase both of these. 
• Most people can only stay sharp on a finite number of heroes, play styles, and habits and spamming eliminates this variability. 
• Patches create an environment where certain roles, play styles, and heroes are favored to have a higher impact in the game and spamming tries to take advantage of that. 

You don't have to pick "meta" heroes to be successful. That isn't quite the right mindset. Instead, use this approach to breakout of a plateau or build up some confidence in your game. Give it a shot and let me know how it goes. I'll share my results next week and I hope you will do the same.

Surviving 3K MMR: Objective Pressure

Objective pressure is that feeling when the opponent just double raxed you. Your team lost a team fight and your opponents decide the time has come to take out your precious barracks. Having had this experience more times than I care to count, I haven't let that feeling of pressure from being down overcome and consume me. Instead, I always ask myself how can I get back in the game? While this scenario takes place late in the game, a healthy pressure should always exist in the back of your head, keeping you alert and focused on the game. With all this in mind, let's dive a little further into objective pressure.

The main objectives are:

1.   Runes – the most important objective during the laning stage but fall off as the game progresses (unless you’re S4).

2.   Roshan – the mascot of DOTA 2 and his aegis represent one of the most important advantages any team can secure.

3.   Tier 1 and 2 towers – objectives teams try to secure after the laning stage

4.   Tier 3 towers and Barracks – the end game objectives, taking these greatly increases your team’s chance for success

5.   Tier 4 towers and the Throne – the penultimate objectives; taking these means you have won the game.

These 5 categories are the most important to understand for learning objective pressure because Dota is a game of objectives. Consider for a moment the following scenarios and decide for yourself if your team or your opponent improved their position, gained an advantage or it's relatively neutral.

• You trade safelane tier 1 towers with your opponent
• You trade damage on a tier 4 tower for stopping the opponent from killing Roshan
• You trade a tier 4 tower for stopping the opponent from killing Roshan
• You trade your safelane tier 2 tower for Roshan
• You trade a tier 1 in the offlane for a tier 1 in mid
• You stop your opponent from taking your tier 3 tower
• You trade your ranged rax for a buy back on one of your team's core and an opponent team wipe
• You trade your ranged rax for a buy back on two of your team's core and an opponent team wipe
• Trading damage on your tier 1 for a bounty rune as a mid player
• Trading damage on your tier 1 for a haste rune as a mid player

And the list goes on. Weighing these tradeoffs usually takes place in a split second. It's generally when we feel the most pressure that we make these decisions the fastest. This in turn is where we are most prone to err if we haven't thought through what we are going to do in those situations before hand. The best way to illustrate this is when high level players commentate about what when wrong for the losing team. Most of the time they use phrase's like: "if Beast Master doesn't buy back there, it's over" or "because the Sven got rooted at this point in the fight, they missed their window to win the fight." To a pro, these thoughts are second nature. This is because they have internalized conscious decisions made before this on what to do in certain situations. For the 3k player, we need to take these conscious decisions and make them unconscious through thinking how different scenarios in the game will play out and practicing.

Let's get back to our situations listed above. I'm sure a lot of you prefaced your answers with "it really depend" or something like that. This important phrase gives us insight into what we need to do when we feel under pressure. There is no pressure more palpable than trying to securing Roshan in the late game. Both teams jockey for superior ward position, trying to find pick-offs, and map control before confront the beast. This imposes a feeling of pressure that encourages you to act. Thus, you must properly identify which factors your actions will depend on. These factors range from your perceived lead to what point in the game it is to how many smokes you have left. This is where the importance of iteration and education (like this blog and others) come in. Playing games provide reference experience and education allows you to compare your reference experience to that of the educator. 

In the end, that feeling of pressure when related to objectives boils down to a feeling about making the best decisions by correctly identifying what factors your decision should be based on. We could go into the weeds of asymmetric information and the fog of war, but that doesn't help you in your next queue. Remembering that the feeling of pressure should be motivating you to make the best decision you know how to will.

Is it time for internal servers?

Would it be outside the realm of possibility to have a each of lan event be able to have it's own internal server? For those of us old enough to remember a time when a bunch of guys would get together with their computers (or consoles) in a single house and connect them all via a switch, this idea isn't new. Watching Dota Pit and seeing the issues around the ISP for the event, it stands to reason that events could benefit from this idea - have all the computers on an internal network. I know there would be many questions as to how to implement this but it would allow tournaments to go smoother. Until esports reach the level of execution of more traditional professional sports, it still has some hurdles to overcome.

Dota Pit - The Aftermath

What an exciting and great event Dota Pit was. Aside from some of the internet service provider (ISP) issues with packet loss, the even was smooth, the hosting was great and the commentators kept the games interesting and informative. Here are a few of my highlights from the event:

• MVP.Phoenix put up a dominant performance against the best team in the world, Evil Geniuses (EG). Their play style kept EG off balance and showed the power of fighting all the time. MVP looked more polished than they did at the major and really showed their understanding of how far they can push their heroes in fights.
• Navi came out swinging, taking down the Shang Hai major champions, team Secret, 2-1 in some exciting games. Even on day 2 against EG, all of Navi came out to play, despite falling flat game 1 against EG. They ended up losing 2-1 to EG but they exceeded all expectations. Their two new players, General and Ditya Ra, played really well (just peep game the double lasso which sealed game 3). Maybe the Navi magic is back…
• One of the questions I had was for VP - how were they going to do? Unfortunately, that hinged on the former Navi Carry, XBOCT under performing in their loss to Complexity; it looked like nerves got to him in game 1. I’m sure VP will be happy to have Silent back (sorry, XBOX.)
• Complexity's stock continues to rise. Their ability to continually advance further and further into tournaments will help them get better and better, assuming they continue to learn from their mistakes and increase their hero pool. Their biggest problem, as pointed out by Swindlezz, is that they are less flexible in their draft than stronger teams. 
• OG is having a rough patch and there’s not a clear way around it. Moon, Notail, and the rest of the squad have the skills but can’t seem to find a draft or play style they are comfortable with in the current patch.
• The meta still revolves around Lone Druid, Lion, Earth Spirit, Nature's Prophet, Invoker, and Outworld Devourer.
• These heroes are complemented by others: Dark Seer, Void, Chen, Death Prophet, Beast Master Enchantress, and Spectre.
• Sven has fallen out of favor as the go-to carry but it is still the most stable carry as evidence by the announcers mentioning it often for pick 4 or 5 for teams that need a carry. Teams have instead turned to Spectre and Juggernaut as the two carries of choice. 

This will be one of the most boring times in Dota (second to post TI). The next Valve major will be the next major tournament to take place. As teams shuffle around and get their roster settled, they will prepare for the most important part of the season, The International. Thanks for reading and let me know what you thought some of the highlights from the event were.

Dota Pit: The Road to Manila Begins

Dota Pit looms in the aftermath of the Shang Hai major. From here on out, teams are trying to secure a coveted invite to the Manila major and, ultimately, TI. For a few teams, even a single win at Dota Pit would boost their profile and put them in contention for skipping the grueling and competitive qualifiers. Secret, EG, and OG will likely get a direct invite regardless of how they perform at Dota Pit because of their previous major and TI victories. Instead, let's look at the teams who really stand to benefit from doing well at this tournament.

Virtus.Pro is in a wierd position. They are the best team in the CIS region as evidence by their received direct invites to TI and both previous majors. At these tournaments, however, they have failed to find a top 4 finish. They played very well at the Summit, almost taking it down but losing 3-2 to EG in the finals. With that said, VP struggles against the top tier western teams having lost to OG, Liquid, and Secret in their previous tournaments. I think that Silent will pay dividends to the team in the 1 position because his play is less risky thank Illidan. Hopefully with his help, VP gets over the hump of not cracking top 4 at a large Valve event come June. Right now, however, XBOCT will be carrying for the team this weekend. It could be a disaster or a nice change of pace. Regardless, a first place finish Dota Pit would be surprising but not outside the realm of possibility (even The Score's Bernard Malijan has them winning). I place them on the same level as MVP and Complexity, ahead of Navi and Empire but behind Secret, OG, and EG. Remember that invites get spread among regions and the best teams overall so getting knocked out in the first round wouldn't on its own jeopardize their chances of an invite. It would take Empire surging into a series of wins to threaten their chances.  

One of two NA teams in the tournament, Complexity has the most evenly matced opponent in the first round. It's tough to say at this point whether Complexity have earned a direct invite to Manila or TI. Their performances at TI with the old team and Shang Hai with their new roster were above expectations but still showed the team, led confidently by their captain, has some growing to do if they want to rival their NA big brothers, EG. They have also filled the void left by China's waning performance. A win at Dota Pit would be a huge step in securing a golden ticket to Manila and beyond. In front of them is the toughest road to the finals; VP are just as good but more experienced, OG are major champions, and MVP are coming off a strong performance at Shang Hai with a patch that favors their play style. In the finals, assuming no huge upsets, team Secret and EG are the best two teams in the world and their performance has been the most consistent since TI. This would make a win all the more resounding.

The lone South East Asian team of the tournament, MVP, put up a very surprising and good showing at Shanghai. Their group stage performance and main event run really took teams by surprise. Even with their 0-2 loss to EG, this team has put up consistent results and a win at Dota Pit puts team on track for an invite to the next major, something it didn't secure for either Frankfurt or Shang Hai. The current patch favors their style of play; the aggressive and high tempo games MVP favor put teams on edge and disrupt the normal timings of things. If they can continue to find success with this "all-in" mentality, they can act as a foil to the traditional farm-and-fight style of play man teams like and punch their ticket to Manila and even TI. To make it there, they have to punch through OG, battle the winner of VP/Complexity and then do better than their 0-2 loss to EG in lower bracket of Shang Hai against whoever comes out of the lower four teams. 

Poor Navi haven't had much success recently. According to Liquidpedia, they haven't placed in a tournament since The International 2015. They are looking for that magic they had at TI 1, having picked up Ditya Ra and General, it seems they are trying to turn a new page in the Navi legacy. It's possible they pull an Alliance in the next couple years, but the focus right now is Dota Pit and TI after that. Even with the roster changes, three players have been with the team for a while; Dendi and Artstyle are legends and SoNNeikO showed streaks brilliance during the international (with the Winter Wyvern, especially). Making it out of the first round with a win against Secret would send a wake up call to the all the sleeping Navi fans and perhaps they could ride that wave of excitement to an unlikely tournament victory (no lower bracket here unfortunately.) For Navi, the path to a Manila invite starts with a first round win at Dota Pit and then stringing together better and better tournament performances. 

The last team that could use a tournament win is Empire. If VP is the best CIS team, then Empire is number 2. For some reason, unlike MVP, Empire hasn't been able to capitalize on the current patch and meta. Empire used to be a team which effectively used aggressive line-ups with the ability to push down towers and take teams down. Recently, however, they haven't found the same success and have found minor second place finishes. Just like Navi, a first round win against EG would put them on the fast track for a Manila invite. While I don't think it's impossible for this to happen (Vega improbably beat EG at ESL One), it will require a clever and well thought out approach. I think a more reasonable goal is taking a game off EG with a strong showing and putting up a good fight in a best of three. In this way, Empire can begin a snowball toward Manila and TI. 

All teams new and old have their eyes on the Prize of a TI invite. Dota Pit is the first chance in the wake of the Shang Hai major for some teams to start their Manila and TI run. VP, MVP, and Complexity have their eyes on a tournament win, thus proving they really are teams to be reckoned with. Navi and Empire are looking for first round wins against stronger opponents in order to gain traction toward TI. As many professional players will tell you, every tournament is practice for TI, where the Aegis awaits them, and Dota Pit is no different. 

Surviving 3K MMR: Applying Pressure

Hello everyone and welcome to the first in a 5 part series on pressure. In DOTA 2, there are three main types of pressure and you feel them in each and every game you play. Let me stress this point: pressure is that feeling you get when your heart is pounding because you have lost map control and the enemy team is under the cover of smoke, advancing on you. Understanding the three types of pressure is fundamental in learning how to channel the feeling of duress you get when under pressure into properly allocating the resources you provide to your team. The three types of pressure are: objective, lane, and time. In physics, pressure is defined force over an area like pounds (force) per square inch (area). In DOTA 2, pressure is also force over an area however this force is the the drive for resources and the area is the map. By understanding and properly reacting to pressure, you can make better decisions and increase your win percentage.

Objective pressure is the largest and most important type of pressure in the game for a couple of reasons: the other two types of pressure directly contribute to it, objectives can be taken from minute 0, and your team gains resources either directly through taking objectives or indirectly through information through things that grant vision (like wards). In fact, the Throne is the penultimate objective and taking it means victory. Below the Throne sit other objectives to focus on and talk about: runes, Roshan, and building. Roshan and buildings provide an immediate gold boost as well as the Aegis of the Immortal for the former and map control for the latter. Runes aren't always as tangible; sometimes they swing the game and sometimes they are just bounty runes... Regardless of which runes they are, they are important objectives in the early part of games.

Lane pressure is the second type of pressure discussed in this series. Lane pressure is, in some ways, a subset of Objective pressure, however it gets its own spotlight because it's more localized, time sensitive, and has a large impact on how the game unfolds. To help distinguish lane pressure from objective pressure, think of objective pressure as the result of accumulating resources - i.e. get gold, then get item, take objective - and think of lane pressure as the act of accumulating resources. By accumulating resources in lane (and in the jungle by extension), you pressure your opponent. Think of lane pressure like an Anti Mage clearing waves of creeps and then clearing the jungle then back to clearing waves of creeps - an enemy team feels pressured to stop him.

Finally, there is time pressure which derives its existence from the idea that line ups or individual heroes want to hit certain timings. Missing those timing makes the game a lot harder for the team which missed it. The converse reverse is also true; make your timings and the game gets easier (hopefully resulting in a win!) Radiance represents this idea brilliantly. A Spectre feels pressured to get her Radiance as soon as possible and the enemy team feels pressured to delay it as long as possible. If her Radiance is acquired on time or early (about 20 minutes), her team is in a good position to win. The longer she's delayed, however, the more pressure her team is under because so many resources have been lost or tied up in getting it.

Understanding what you feel when you're playing is important and we have all had that feeling of pressure at one point or another. When you can identify and translate what you feel into coherent terms, you become a force to be reckoned. Most people get stuck in the feeling phase (thus the constant flame) but reading this blog and channeling how feel into the proper response and decision is the key to grabbing a victory in 3K MMR.

The Snowball Effect

Much like a snowball rolling down hill gets bigger and continues to accumulate snow, so to do heroes who accumulate resources tend to continue to accumulate resources. Certain heroes are more prone to snowball than others, but all heroes can snowball to some degree. Some heroes are reliant snowballing to get ahead in resources and then try to maintain that lead until they win the game.

Shanghai Major: Understanding Metagame Forces

The discussing a metagame can be a very contentious subject and yet it's a term that is always tossed about at each and every event because, for some reason, one always shakes out in some form or another. The Shanghai Major is no exception to this idea. I'm sure I'll need to write an indepth tournament metagame primer at some point, but today isn't that day because we have excellent DOTA going on in China. Instead I'll offer up metagame forces (MGF) as a small substitute.

These forces, much like market forces, drive hero picks at each event. These forces are: current patch, previous strategies, and wins. Initially, captains and coaches spend copious time theorycrafting how games are going to go, taking the current patch and teams at the event (previous strategies) into consideration. As the theories are put to the test, the third force driving the meta takes over: wins. This is the point we find ourselves at for the Shanghai Major.

Alliance, MVP.Phoenix, OG, and EG all won their group and they all did it handedly. Alliance and MVP didn't drop a game and EG and OG only lost once. MVP Phoenix has an insane 8.6 KDA and mostly sub-30 minute game times. This is a testament to their aggressive play style and drafting heroes that can constantly fight. They abused Nature's Prophet's ability to apply map pressure and teleport into any part of the map (drafting it 3 of 4 games only because it was banned for a game) and used fighting carries that aren't cool-down dependant like PL, Slark, and Ember.

Alliance is back and everyone know that this is their patch to lose. Admiral Bulldog is such a force that team Spirit and Fnatic both respect banned both Lone Druid and Nature's Prophet. These two heroes typify the Alliance play style: exert tons of map pressure to maximally leverage opponents mistakes and minimize their own. They chose global heroes in 3 out of 4 games and a pushing line up in the 4th to secure their 4-0 record.

OG is the previous major winner, using their unwieldy picks to keep teams off balance. They grabbed Doom(!) twice against LGD, using it to great effect (although Cr!t gave away way too many dooms in game two, which probably cost them the win).  In their five games they grabbed the Bat Ridder 5 times, relying on it to create space for their generally fighting cores. Beware the fish and Moon's ability to play some of the most disruptive heroes in the game currently.

EG also showed diversity in their drafting and creating in all but one game a solid team from start to finish. They prioritized the Lion and Nature's Prophet but gave Arteezy and Fear different heroes all but once and Sumail a different hero every game. Game 1 against Complexity was a bit of an outdraft by Swindle however the following 4 games looked polished and demonstrated the team's commitment to the strategy of their captain, PPD.

There are a few lessons we can tease out from these team's wins:

1. NP is the real deal in this patch because his flexibility lines up with all of the (winning) strategies being used (all in rush, deathball, and AOE team fight)
2. Lion is the best support. Finger provides the right amount of burst damage because when it's paired with another spell, like Lasso, is the best disable because it's permanent.
3. Fighting and farming carries are still battling it out for who's the top dog, but the fighting carries seem to be winning because of Miracle's performances on the Slark and team's inability to effectively deal with the PL.
4. The offlane position is where games are being won and lost. Nature's Prophet, Lone Druid, and Tidehunter are almost winning teams games single handedly because if the support(s) has (have) to protect their position 1 hero, they fall very far behind. Lion has had so much success because he can run around the map and make plays happen.
5. AOE team fight beats death ball which beats all in rush which beats AOE team fight... etc. 
6. Greed is the name of the game. The team that can get away with the greediest lineup win because they just out economy their opponent...
7. Unless the opponent just starts fighting from minute 1 and the game digresses into a feeding frenzy.
8. If you safe lane tri-lane or 4 protect 1, like Virtus.Pro tried to do against EG with their Sven, you're going to lose because the other team will just of farm you like EG did that very game. 
9. Passive supports are out of style for the reasons listed above and as evidence by the success of Lion and, to a lesser extent, Venge. 
10. Enchantress is great right now, despite being risky. She comes online before all the other greedy junglers, allowing teams to put the pressure on right away. 
11. Look for more Shadow Shaman and Crystal Maiden pick-ups as teams look to solidify strategies and try to pull out picks which an opponent may not be expecting. 

There are a few liberties we need to take into consideration. First is that the sample size is small which means that the metagame is still volatile. It will be interesting to see what happens when Alliance bumps into MVP. While OG and EG have some history, their styles are more similar than Alliance and MVP. Hopefully this will mean more fireworks and fun games for us the viewers. Regardless of how the bracket pans out, everyone is going to keep their eyes on who's winning and either jump on the band wagon or try to adapt their strategy to it. 

Surviving 3k MMR in DOTA 2: An Introduction to Carrying

Everyone wants to play the 1 position hero: the carry. They are fun, flashy and can win the game for their team in many circumstance. To play this position better, we need  There is spectrum for carries: from farming to fighting. All carries fall somewhere on this spectrum. In my anti-carry series, I use the term anti-carry because, technically, all carries are fighting carries at some point in the game, usually after they get their key items. Consequently, I make the distinction that anti-carries want to hunt down enemy carries and prevent them from farming by killing them rather than try accelerate their farming potential by getting items like battlefurry. Farming carries want to find a place on the map that has free gold and take it. It needs to be a place where it's relatively safe so that the currency acquired with minimal risk of losing it. This is partially why farming carries are picked over fighting carries; the risk of losing gold is less so getting ahead is easier and the enemy has to react to you. Let's explore these ideas further.

On the spectrum of fighting and farming carries, Slardar best represents what makes a fighting carry. His skills are oriented toward chasing and locking down heroes, he has high mobility but takes extra damage so this isn't the best for farming the jungle - especially in the early and into the mid game, his spells don't let him spam out a wave of creeps, and he has some mana issues. All these thing culminate into a hero that isn't suited for afk-style farming because it isn't as efficient as just finding a hero and killing them. 

The other end of the spectrum contains the Antimage. He farms a battlefurry and then uses blink to move from neutral camp to neutral camp to lane creeps and back very quickly. The Antimage relies on using battlefurry to get ahead of the enemy carry in items and then fight them. You don't have to play AM this way, but it is overwhelmingly prefered because of its efficiency. Once the AM gets two or three core items after a battlefurry, he can start to partake in fights.

Recently, pro-players have been changing how they build heroes to keep their opponents off balance or help secure an advantage for their team early. aggresif played Phantom Lancer getting boots of travel (BoT) early during The Internation 2015 in order to farm more efficiently by getting to the gold on the map faster and giving him the option to fight with his team at minimal opportunity cost+. BoT also saves you 75 gold per TP and has a lower cooldown than a TP so you can move around the map more efficiently. Players have also been itemizing traditionally farming heroes into fighting heroes by getting aquilla, drums, magic wand, sange, et al. This way, they can show up with their team and help dish out some damage before going into a more farm heavy build with items like yasha and helm of the dominator. 

As the carry player, you need to identify how much time you can spend farming vs. fighting. This is the most difficult aspect of playing a carry but is quintessential to playing a carry well. If you spend too much time farming creeps instead of heroes, you risk your not having an overall advantage. If a few 3- or 4-man engagements end poorly for your team, they might not be able to contribute much to future fights. Similarly, if you spend too much time fighting the enemy team their carry could get ahead of you and out carry you or, worse, your team could lose fights and fall super far behind. This begs the question, when should you farm creeps vs. heroes? Here are some general tips I follow in my games:

1. you want to play carry enough to know item timings to judge how far behind or ahead you are; a 15 minute battlefurry on PA indicates you're farming well but each minute after that means you are falling behind
2. understand how much of the map is available for you to use without fearing a gank; more map control = you're further ahead
3. how many towers do you have compared with your opponents?
4. what's the kill score?
5. who won the last fight and why?
6. how many core items does the opposing carry have?
7. how many items do the other cores on your team have?
8. have people been asking for you to come join fights?

These are just 8 quick and dirty things to think about when you decide whether to farm or fight. There are many other situational things you need to think about when deciding, like when is my hero supposed to be strong, but those things need their own post.  Let me know in the comments below how you determine when to fight or farm. We are all looking for ways to improve and by sharing what we've learned, we can improve together.

The anti-carry series: Ursa Warrior

The Ursa Warrior has one of the highest win percentages of all heroes at a stunning 55% for the safe lane, according to www.dotabuff.com and even a ~52% win rate for the jungle and offlane. This is no coincidence given the heroes skill set and item choices. Ursa's strength as a hero stems from his high burst damage from enrage, overpower and furryswipes; his tankiness from enrage; and his ability to solo Roshan with a mask of death. These three things allow Ursa to help his team secure an advantage and, more often than not, a victory.
Unfortunately, Ursa isn't picked in the pro scene very much. Even though Vega did play him with success against IG (Match 1843364264) at ESL One recently, he suffers from some weaknesses in a linear approach to itemization and he is easily kited. In the professional scene, Ursa needs a mobility item (shadow blade or blink), usually bkb, lifesteal, and a hard disable (usually Abyssal Blade). That's 5 item slots taken up if you include carrying a TP and 6 with an Aegis. This means getting that getting your top tier item (5k gold and above) won't come until your hard disable and to get another top tier item you have to give up your TP, the Aegis, or get Boots of Travel. In order to make him more viable for professional games without wrecking pubs, Enrage should have some sort of a charge time where there is a window for a second after casting enrage when he will continue to remove applied debuffs. This offers players the chance to make skilled plays by timing when to use enrage and when opponents use disables.
The pub scene is quite different from the professional scene, however, because games are much more like a death match than a coordinate team game. Ursa thrives in this environment because his cooldowns are short and he deals a lot of damage as early as level 7. This makes for a hero geared to play aggressively. Going into the mid game, blink dagger, basher, and desolator make up the key items to keep this hero relevant. As long as the Ursa has continued to accumulate items, he stays relevant but his role may change depending on the itemization. Many tier 3 items (butterfly, abyssal blade, assault cuirass, scythe of vyse, etc.) are viable on ursa but they need to shore up his weaknesses. For example, if you're dealing enough damage to burst someone down but are having trouble staying on that target, then more lock down or movement speed should be the item choice.
Ursa's role will depend what lane he's in and how much farm he has. I have tried many early builds, to include midas, medallion, blink rush, shadow blade, drums, and many more, and, believe or not like Ripley, it's dependent on what your opponents are doing but still fairly linear. To leverage the abilities of Ursa most effectively, you need, as mentioned before, mobility and a disable. Some games you can get away with not getting a bkb, however,the Ursa will be building it more often than not.
Here are some of the rules of thumb for items I've used to pretty great success on the hero:

1. Vlads is good but not necessary because a mask of death more than allows you to take down Roshan. If the Ursa is having mana problems, you're against a heavy physical damage lineup, or you are looking to end the game in the mid-game, this will be a good choice.
2. Buy a desolator if you're snowballing hard. It helps you push, significantly increases your damage and helps you chew through high armor targets.
3. Phase/Treads choice in boots is close. I prefer Treads because of the added attack speed and being able to tread switch to stretch your health and mana pool.
4. Blink is better than shadow blade in most circumstances. The problem is shadow blade (sb)  is that you have to prime your abilities, activate sb, find someone, hit them, ground pound, and hit them some more. Sb can make for some awkward initiations where as blink is much cleaner.
5. The Ursa might be the hero to get a Silver Edge for the team.
6. Try to time your enrage and bkb to get the maximum amount of damage mitigation.
7. When you're getting kited, get an abyssal blade and kill whoever is kiting you. If there's 3 or 4 heroes kiting you on the enemy team, the Mjolnir buff ensures you still do damage during the fight. Mjolnir is a decent item on Ursa because it gives him attack speed when overpower isn't up. The lightning procs also help against high armor targets.
8. Butterfly is key against heroes that want to try to attack you to death. Troll, Alchemist, Lycan, and others will get up in your grill and try to right-click you down but butterfly allows you to mitigate their damage.
9. Assault Cuirass is a great item if team fights are even, you are dying to a PA, or the enemy team has one.
10. Eye of Skadi is super good and should be gotten after blink and bkb if you need a hybrid item that gives you HP, armor, damage, and slow. 
11. Sange and Yasha (SnY) is situationally good. Most of the time you won't want another mid-game fighting item but sometimes you can get it instead of bkb. It synergizes well with drums and phase boots if you want to be able to run fast.

I can't stress how important itemization is, especially for the Ursa. His skill build is pretty linear so it's the items and play style that allow this hero to shine. Let me know what you think about Ursa and what items you like to get in the comment section below.

The Anticarry Series: Legion Commander

Welcome back to the Anticarry Series. Today is another look at heroes which try to put a damper on traditional farming carries. The last installment talked about Slardar, a hard hitting strength hero who loves to ruin carries which are highly mobile through a near-instant stun, ability to chase, and keep vision on your target at all times. Legion Commander fills a similar role, but with 2 notable twists: her lockdown goes through BKB and she can pressure in lane extremely effectively. Legion Commander is one of those heroes that just excels in the 1v1 match up which is why you sometimes see her mid. Let's look at how some of the top legion commander players itemize.

These are snippets from the top 10 legion commander players' most common items, according to dotabuff.com. If we assume that the order is descending from left to right, it becomes very obvious that blink dagger, power treads, black king bar, and blade mail are the most agreed upon items. Assault cuirass, magic wand and desolator all follow at 4, 3 and 3. What can we glean from these top rated players? 

1. blink dagger is the initiation tool of choice. Shadow blade has it's place, however, this hero benefits from the attack speed gained from press the attack and items more than any other
2. power treads give you strength and attack speed, which means you're more tanky and better leveraging the bonus damage you get from duel
3. blademail is a way to do more damage during duel and dissuades other heroes from attacking you during duel. It's also good against heroes that deal a lot of damage but don't want to get bkb, like Lion or Lina
4. minus armor further allows you to deal more damage during duel (noticing a trend?) and helps you translate duel damage more easily into objectives
5. you need at least 1 way to help you survive during duel, especially in the mid game when you don't have enough duel damage and/or attack speed to kill a hero quickly. This is mainly done through bkb but AC helps a lot against physical damage dealers.

With these items in mind, the premise of the hero becomes clear: use an instant initiation tool (dagger) so that you can press the attack, blademail and bkb before going in; increase your attack speed (treads and AC) to leverage your duel damage; get items that both make you more tanky and increase your damage (AC and blademail); and ensure you can do as much damage as possible during duel (BKB).

While items are by definition situational, with the LC, you need to stick with the basics and then decide what to get to round out your remaining item slots. After blink, treads, and blademail, the item you chose to slot with can fluxuate. Getting a desolator really helps translate your damage into pushing power, if that's what your team needs. BKB will be picked up more often than not. AC is that hybrid item that also provides some utility. If you find yourself up against heroes that have itemized for the mid game, Armlet might be just the thing; its downside is mitigated by your skill set and it provides armor, strength, and a lot of damage for relatively little cost.

When you find yourself needing a hero that has infinite snowball potential, great single-target lockdown, or you're against the Brood, look no further than Legion Commander. Make sure to itemize correctly and don't jungle from minute zero to ensure you have a great game.

Next time's anti-carry series will feature: Ursa

Surviving 3k MMR: sometimes you just need to win the game

I am a big fan of games; Star Craft, Monopoly, Diablo, Scrabble, Candy Crush, Dominion, Settlers of Catan, Carcassonne, Magic: the Gathering, and many others have been my jam at one point or another over the years. One way that I always try to think when I play is: how do I win the game from this point? This is a very simple but important question to ask yourself because often times there is a path to victory, you just need to find it. This gets harder in some ways and easier in others as you get better and better at a game and DOTA 2 is no exception.

I played a game recently as Huskar and even though we were over 20,000 gold behind, we still pulled out a victory. How is this possible? We just went down mid and won the game. Was it really that easy? Yes. Our opponents made some critical mistakes at the very end. This allowed us win. (You can find out more info about the match here.)

In this game, I initially thought our path to victory would be through the Sand King, Shadow Demon and me creating space for the Tiny and Lycan to farm up. With these two heroes, we had the possibility to take objectives whenever we eliminated a hero from the battlefield. This is one of the fundamentals of winning at dota: translate kills into objective (towers, Roshan, warding and barracks.) 

Sadly, our game plan didn't pan out. We were only able to convert kills into objectives once. Our opponents, however, did this to us many times and by the end, we only had a ranged barracks. What would you do in this situation? We chose to head down mid and pull out a victory. We didn't go for barracks or kills because the Antimage was destroying our base while we barreled down mid. In my mind, the only way we were going to win, given the way the game had gone so far, was to throne them and hope they made mistakes. As I'm sure many of you can attest to, in the 3k MMR bracket, mistakes are common place. So even though our opponents played stellar DOTA until that point, they made mistakes when it counted most, giving us a victory. 

Sometimes you just need to figure out how to go win the game. Share your story about find a path to victory in the comments below. Thanks for reading.

Surviving 3k MMR: Don't play a worse something else

In DOTA 2, the easiest way to gain MMR is to pick the best hero for the situation. Things like opponent team composition, your team composition, and your hero pool eliminate a lot of potential heroes trying to lure you into the trap of playing a "worse something else." In the game, there are roles and picking the best hero for the role you want to play or the role you get stuck with (sorry, position 5) will dramatically increase your teams chances of winning. I have a few pocket pick offlaners and mids so that I can play that position competently. Even though I don't know all the intricacies of each matchup, I have confidence in my ability to play my hero correctly.

Picking a "worse something else" is especially obvious in captain's mode. Commentators almost always point out what they will think is the best pick for the current situation and they are right much of the time because they can properly identify each teams composition, strengths and weaknesses of the current line up and, based on the current meta, sum up what hero would be the best. This idea of picking the best carry or mid hero is what drives a meta.

So the next time you find yourself in the enviable position of picking last for your team, just remember don't pick a "worse something else." Let me know in the comments if this tip was ever helpful for you or if it gave you that "aha!" moment.

Surviving 3k MMR: Actively Thinking About the Game

I recently wrote a post about three things to do to survive (you can find it here). I would like to expand on the second point from that post, which is: not actively thinking about what's going on in the game. Too often players tunnel vision into what's going on right in front of them, lose focus and zone out. This results in three things:

1. Zombie mode farm fest
2. missing opportunities to gain an advantage
3. missing opportunities to push an advantage

There are simple exercises you can perform during the game to snap you out of this mindset and help you become a better player. The first thing to try is checking what items the enemy players have. This will give you valuable information and help you make sure you itemize correctly. Second, check the items on your teammates, especially your supports. You can tell how well a game is going by the number of items on the supports. Third, think about where your going to be in 30 seconds, 1 minute and five minutes from now. Make some assumptions about how the game is going to go and then try to predict how the game's going to unfold after that. Finally, check the minimap and count the number of enemy heroes on the map. If there's only one enemy hero showing, try to think about where the other heroes could be; they could be wrapping around on you for a gank, doing Roshan or farming your jungle.

Hope this quick tip helps as you continue to survive 3k MMR.