---
title: 'How to play Offlane | Dota 2 Beginners Guide'
source: 'https://youtube.com/watch?v=3nRblEPkR8E'
video_id: '3nRblEPkR8E'
date: 2026-07-28
duration_sec: 2365
---

# How to play Offlane | Dota 2 Beginners Guide

> Source: [How to play Offlane | Dota 2 Beginners Guide](https://youtube.com/watch?v=3nRblEPkR8E)

## Summary

This guide teaches Dota 2 players how to play the offlane role effectively, focusing on hero selection, laning mechanics, and mid-game strategy. It emphasizes simple, tanky initiators and aura builders that remain useful even when behind, and provides practical tips for managing creep equilibrium and transitioning into the mid-game.

### Key Points

- **Hero Pool Selection** [01:34] — Pick simple heroes with a straightforward game plan that are useful ahead or behind. Recommended starters: Centaur, Axe, Tidehunter, Underlord (tanky initiators/aura builders).
- **Laning Phase Priorities** [08:22] — At 0 min, secure bounty rune safely and body block creeps to bring lane closer to your tower. At 7 min, secure wisdom shrine. Use a safety salve for mistakes.
- **Body Blocking Creeps** [11:15] — Block the back three creeps to let the first one die early, causing the lane to push toward your tower. This is a safe trick that works even with a weak support.
- **Aggressive Creep Block** [16:16] — If your team secures the bounty rune, run to the enemy's safe lane and body block their creep wave to push it under their tower, forcing the lane to push back to you.
- **Late to Lane? Hit Your Own Creeps** [17:00] — If you miss the initial block, instantly attack your own creeps below 50% HP to speed up their death and shift equilibrium in your favor.
- **When Lane is Shoved, Commit to Shove** [20:25] — If the lane is pushing out, shove it completely under the enemy tower and then pull the next wave into the jungle to reset equilibrium.
- **Desperate Creep Aggro** [23:30] — If losing heavily, constantly draw creep aggro to split the wave and create chaos, making it harder for the enemy to zone you completely.
- **First Objective: Enemy Safe Lane Tower** [26:11] — After laning, prioritize taking the enemy's safe lane tower. Once down, occupy their safe lane jungle to steal farm and restrict the carry.
- **Post-Tower Map Control** [30:34] — After taking the tower, you gain access to more farm on the enemy's side while limiting the carry's options. Use this to gank mid or rotate.
- **Teamfight Role** [34:13] — Enable your best damage dealer by initiating and applying auras, or disrupt enemy saves. As a tanky initiator, absorb damage so your carry can deal damage.

### Conclusion

Mastering the offlane requires a simple hero pool, solid laning fundamentals, and a focus on taking the enemy safe lane tower to open up the map. With practice, you can become a reliable offlaner who contributes even when behind.

## Transcript

Hello friends. You wanted to go play
Dota, but what? You have to play off
lane now, but you're not an offlane
player.
What do we do? Don't worry. Whether you
are an experienced Dota player who needs
to brush up on how to play off lane or
you're a new player getting into the
role, we're going to cover all the
basics you need to not feed to be an
acceptable off laner, at least have some
impact every game. Down the line, we'll
do a more advanced guide to become like
a real off laner. But for now, let's
cover the basics. Keep in mind, you
don't have to become an actual offlane
player. theoretically the the best for
the given bracket. We just need to be
better than the other panicked roll Q
offlane players or support players. The
concepts the same. If you're doing a
different role than usual just to earn
the tokens, you just need to be in the
middle of the pack doing your best as
long as we are better than the other
clueless people who aren't bothering to
learn the new role and they're just
tanking the losses. You just need to win
some. 50% would be great, but if you're
like 30 to 40% win rate on an off
offlane role and then you earn your
tokens to go play your main role and I
assume have a positive win rate there,
it'll work out. You can climb. But of
course, the better you become an offlane
so that you can win more games, that'll
make the MMR games easier. And because
the off link got added as a high demand
role, that means in a lot of games, you
versus the enemy off laner. Sometimes
you're going to play versus actual off
laners and they're going to be better
than us. But actually, there's a pretty
good chance you are just playing versus
someone else who also does not play that
role. They're just having to do it
because no one is playing the role.
That's why it's high demand. So, we just
need to be better than them. And we are
going to have our team is going to have
the better off laner. It's us. First,
we'll need to decide on a hero pool. And
you want to hit a couple of things here.
First, pick a simple game plan. You want
to do you don't want have to do anything
complex. As you get further into the
role, you can do all that stuff later.
For now, just something easy so you
don't have to think that hard on it. And
then you want a hero who can be useful
ahead or behind. If you're watching this
video, you're getting into the offlane
role. You're not that good at it. So,
we're actually likely to lose a lot of
our lanes to start. Now, if you win,
fantastic. Then, you know, do whatever
you're doing as a winning hero. But
realistically, as we start off on the
back foot because we're bad at off lane,
we need to still be useful. Certain
heroes are better at that than others.
Some people have to win their lane or
they're useless. I don't want to play
those heroes even though they might be
strong laners. Uh so you could do it if
you really want to, but my advice be
useful whether you are ahead or behind.
With that said, I don't actually want to
lose all my lanes. So pick strong laners
rather than weak laners just to make it
easier on yourself. But if you do lose
the lane, people who can jungle early to
recover are very nice. With this in
mind, there's a certain type of offlaner
that is best to start with in my
opinion, and that is going to be
initiators and or aura builders. They
usually they frequently overlap, not
always. If you pick one or both of
these, you're going to be in a good
spot. If you need a new off laner to
learn, these are my go-to
recommendations. They all are fairly
tanky in the lane. You know, starting at
the beginning, we got Centaur and Axe.
Very high strength, some of the highest
in the game, and then some of the
highest HP regen in the game. So even as
you get harassed, you'll just heal up
naturally. You've got the retaliate
build on centaur and then spin on axe.
So in the lane, the first few levels can
be a little awkward, but once you get
past that, you walk into the creep wave,
you farm it. You walk into the jungle
camps, you farm it. The enemies hit you
and you don't know how to harass, they
take some damage back, right? So it's
it's not that hard to do. And you just
focused on last hitting as you are new
and then eventually hitting your item
timings later. you will then be a fairly
low cooldown playmaker with like blink
hoof stomp or blink call and that is
useful no matter what every single game.
Tide hunter and underlord they're more
aura builders but also very tanky in the
lane. Tide hunter has the anchor smash
to reduce enemy damage when he hits them
with it and then he has kraken shell for
guaranteed damage block whereas
underlord has the atrophy aura which
reduces enemies attack damage so he just
takes less damage when they hit him.
Then in fights, uh, Tide Hunter, you
know, the big AoE ravage, build auras.
Underlord, build auras. Fiends gate in.
That part's a little bit more complex,
but you can also just be with your team.
Uh, fiends gate people into you. And
then just, okay, giant AoE pit, giant
AoE firestorm, press my auras, I'm
contributing. It's very straightforward.
The last three are more honorable
mentions. Uh, I don't like them as much,
but I still think they're fairly
straightforward. Dragonite has high
armor and HP regen in the lane, so it's
hard to bully him out. You can get a
blink so you can initiate for your team.
You push towers with your ultimate. Then
you kind of scale for damage, which is
why I'm like, you know, not as uh not as
good of an offlane pick for keeping
things simple, but uh at least the lane
I think is straightforward. Abdon kind
of similar cuz his main build right now
is to go for radiance, but throughout
the game you're just hard to kill.
Aphotic shield is a great utility uh
spell for your team because it's a
strong dispel and then you can kind of
build some auras, but you also kind of
build for damage. And then that's also
true for Viper where you crush certain
people in the lane and you often build
towards being very tanky but also kind
of doing damage, which is fine. I'm
giving you guys the options. But the
downside of these types of heroes,
especially Abdon and Viper, if you don't
do well in the lane, you can fall off
pretty hard because uh these three
heroes do not have farming mechanics as
easy as these four heroes. Uh Viper has
like a Nether toxin build that kind of
bumps him up there. So, he's a little
safer and I did want to give a ranged
off laner. Uh, so you guys have options.
But he is meant to win the lane. And if
you don't win the lane cuz your like
mechanics are a little iffy, then I feel
like these three can be a little shaky.
For the other positions who need to
learn some off lane, a different
approach you can take is to just play a
hero you already play as a carry, as a
support. And hey, they can work as a mid
laner. So then you just do that. And
you're already comfortable with the
hero. You might be doing a new build.
you're going to be higher level and more
money, especially for like supports than
maybe you're used to, but you kind of
already know like roughly your matchups
and how your abilities work. So, you
make it a little easier for yourself and
now you just have to play in a new lane
and a new role. Uh, but then that's
easier than just like completely brand
new stuff. The downside is there's only
so many heroes that overlap multiple
roles, like truly overlap multiple
roles. So, I tried to put those heroes
closer to the front here. So, for
example, you see like if you happen to
play any of these guys as carries,
they're like actual offlaners. Same down
here. Like you can run these as actual
offlanes.
The further you go, I admit especially
the experienced Dota players, you're
probably like, "Zack, that one seems
kind of griefy." And I, you know, kind
of agree. But if, for example, a carry
player is like stuck in the off lane,
it's like, "Look, I can play D or I can
play Wind Ranger. God, please pick Wind
Ranger off lane over Draw, dude. Don't
no D off lane. Please Win Ranger, right?
That's what that tier of off laners are
like. It's like the real C to D to lower
tier heroes, but they aren't the
absolute garbage worst pick you could go
and you've seen it in your pubs. Like it
does happen. The reason they're a little
griefy is cuz many of them just build
towards damage. So like the Wind
Rangers, the Weavers, Terblade offline,
I know you could do like the pipe, but
then it's like it's into damage, you
know? So like, oh damage, you know? So
it is a little but it works. And if
you're a more experienced Dota player,
you can kind of understand certain
matchups when these heroes would be
better uh and then go towards it. I
think a newer player, you know, you
wouldn't really know why this is kind of
griefy or when it's good. So then I
would wouldn't recommend it as much. Uh
but for the off lane, like I just need
to off lane and I'm just going to play
heroes that are good enough, then these
are some that I think are they're
acceptable. They're not the worst out
there. I know these three are actually
more offlaners than carries. This is for
people who want to try to pick up
semicaries. uh carry players
specifically and then you can play it in
off lane or in the safe lane depending
on the lineup. Especially when you have
like sniper mids, TA mids, things that
are actual carries and you don't need a
second carry. You actually need to bring
a bit more utility upfront value to your
team. Then you can learn one of these
guys and then flex that in between your
roles. I've got a cheat sheet for you to
help you understand what to prioritize
at different times of the game here.
Starting with the lane at 0 minutes, get
the lane to come back. back. I know this
sounds obvious, but as soon as the
bounty is grabbed, we're going to run to
the lane, and we're going to do a
variety of tricks to bring the lane
towards our offlane tower to make laning
safer for us, but it might also open up
some kill options on your opponents. I'm
going to talk through uh some examples
of this later, so we're just going to
brush over it for now. And uh more
details to come. 7 minutes, the wisdom
shrine activates. You have to make sure
your team gets at least one wisdom
shrine. If you lose both, the game is
very hard. If you can secure both,
great. But you're not usually involved
in stealing the enemy wisdom shrine,
unless you have like some global
ability. Most of the time, the off lane
is part of securing the wisdom shrine
that is right by the lane. You don't
strictly need to be the one to get it.
If your four supports headed over and
you can see the enemy heroes in the lane
still, you're fine. Just stay where you
are. But if you think the enemy is
invading, then you need to go get it.
And if the support is busy, you need to
make sure you head over to the wisdom
shrine to get it. Along that topic, when
the support is busy, because they're
going to go get the wisdom shrine, you
can't die. You just have to be patient.
You will lose a little bit in the lane,
but that's okay. That also applies when
the lane is coming towards you. If you
can count to five, you can figure out
which way the wave is going. I recommend
you practice this for yourself. So, come
over to play Dota. Don't actually play
Dota. Create a custom lobby. Come over
to these settings. Make sure we are
filling in the empty slots with bots.
Uh, make it all pick and then whichever
team you're going to be on, we'll do
radiant first. Give yourself passive
bots or new player bots. That'll
simulate your teammates. And on the
enemy side, give them whichever
difficulty you feel comfortable with.
But the higher you can go and manage,
the the more prepared you will be. We're
going to walk out to lane, and I'm just
going to give you a couple tips here
while we wait for the creeps. First, I
really recommend you buy a safety salve
just as a default. The Salve is very
forgiving. When you mess up, inevitably
playing a new role, new hero, the Salve
will heal you back up. You want to do a
little bit of backpack efficiency, go
for it. But the the Salve just as your
starting purchase off the bounty runes
will just cover your ass. And then as
you get more comfortable, then you can
start skipping it if you don't think you
need it. Uh at least until later when
you like end up do needing it. Bounty
runes, don't go crazy, guys. We're bad
at the off lane. Go there safely. So
take a very defensive posture. If your
team is with you for this rune, just do
it. You get one bounty rune, it's no
problem. If your team wants to be here,
that's fine. You can come over as well
and then TP to lane. If you don't want
to go and you just want to like do
something safe, also wouldn't mind. And
if you see enemy heroes and you're by
yourself, just give up on it. And if
they aren't there, then oh my god, get
out of here. I might die. Actually, I
think we're okay. We're pretty fast. So
we're going to come over here. And then
because I just walked a lane, you maybe
take this angle too if you need to. You
could also end up tping like if you went
bottom. I'll just t to show you. We'll
do a, you know, somewhere up front.
We're going to head to our creeps and
we're going to body block the first or
we're going to body block the back
three. This is a very safe trick to do
because you can just TP to your tower.
Like this is always doable if you're
being safe at the bounty runes. Now, I'm
not going to do too much here. I'm going
to turn on the XP range indicator. If
you come over to the settings, it's
under Dotal Labs interface persistent
range indicators. Alt rightclick your
XP. And I'm going to pretend I have a
useless support. So, because I have done
this trick, the first creep walked up
and started fighting the enemy four
creeps first. So, you can see as the
rest of the creeps get here, my creep is
already half dead. So, it's going to
quickly become four versus three. And
because I can count, I know four is more
than three. I could do extra tricks
here. And which doctor might try to
grief me, but I'm not going to right
now. I'm just going to show you that
this block alone is enough. Look, the
enemy is even doing some damage. This
actually going to happen. I'm going to
try to get No, I didn't get him killed.
Uh the enemy will do this kind of stuff
actually surprisingly a lot if you are
crusader and lower. The bots don't
usually go this aggressive. That was a
little weird. But you can see depending
on a little bit of a mistake, it is
shoved in the lane now. And look where
I'm laning. I am set for the rest of the
game actually because it's now up to
these guys to fix the lane. These creeps
that are just spawned at 1 minute,
they're walking into the lane. They're
supposed to meet the wave here. This
wave right here, they're supposed to
meet here. Any amount of delay from
these creeps that affect these creeps
bring the equilibrium from here to here.
Now, you don't need to fully understand
this. All you need to know is that once
you get a wave here, what will
frequently happen is it will keep doing
this. Even as you bring it under tower,
the wave will just keep bouncing back
and forth. This was maybe the most
dangerous.
This actually a strong combo right here.
And here is going to be the safest. So,
you just evaluate on the lane where can
you get last hits. And anytime you're
scared, just default to a safer tier.
So, right now, I'm I'm too scared. I'm
just going to be back here. my witch AFK
witch doctor feeding. Who knows, right?
I don't need to die for that deny. Look,
the creeps are coming in. I'm going to
start being pretty safe. I have the
tower behind me and I'm going to go for
last. So, I'm going to miss them cuz I'm
bad, but at least I can try to get some
and I can get the XP. And you can see
because this creep wave is interacting
with the next one. It has delayed them
and they're now meeting this creep wave
that was supposed to meet here, we're
now meeting here. And once again, pushed
up. It's going to push back down. My
creep wave shoves up. Where's the next
creep wave? This time, um, my tower did
a good amount of damage, but it still
delayed a little bit. Once again, three
creeps versus four creeps. I'm gonna
come. Look, they're being weird. I get
to last it, right? Sometimes, okay,
these bots are being wacky, but what
will happen more often in your pub
games, like someone will try to do a
pull and they'll leave. Maybe they
don't. They keep sitting here, then you
just see what I'm doing. I just keep
sitting in this area and pull them back.
Get my last hits. Uh-oh, the carry's
here. I'm scared. Hit your own creeps as
much you can. This is the extra tip. Hit
your own creeps to kill them off faster.
This one gets low, kill it. If you miss
a last hit, you actually shouldn't. You
should prioritize last hits. But if
you're scared, that's okay. Then just go
for N. Look at my feeding support. Let
him die. I don't care. The creep wave is
pushing in. I'm going to drag it here.
By the way, what will frequently happen
is that the melee creep that tanks the
tower first will die and then, okay,
well, in this case, it just went to
another melee creep. It often goes to
the range creep in the back. And so as
you drag the creep wave back, make sure
you kind of turn around in time to
attempt this creep. If you miss it, it's
not the end of the world. If you have a
ranged ability, you can use that to get
it. Um, but it's just a little bonus tip
to help you get CS under the tower.
Ranged creeps are often let the tower
hit it three times and then you hit it
once or you hit it once, the tower hits
twice, then you hit it once if you have
higher damage. For melee creeps, hit it
once if they're full health. Hit it
once, let the tower do all the shots,
and then you hit it again at the end.
That is a very rough guideline cuz it
does depend on your damage, what the
creep's focusing. Don't worry if you
miss last hits for now, guys. Just do
your best. We're all learning off lane.
Again, if you weren't playing off lane
before, let's say your team goes for an
aggressive play. I would generally
follow them. You end up here. So, we are
going to grab the rune and then we are
going to aggressively body block the
enemy's creep wave. If you're not sure
where they are, look at your own side.
It's going to be mirrored. So, they're
by this tower. It's going to be here.
The timing is about 13 to 15 seconds
where you need to be here. So, I'm just
going to stand here. And now I'm going
to head over and I'm just going to start
body blocking because they're supposed
to meet just outside the tower. Just a
little bit of body blocking on my part
means that my creep wave will now go
under the tower and I get scared so I'd
run away. You don't have to do the full
block. Like honestly, just blocking like
from here to here is likely to be
enough. Uh, this can be a little bit
dangerous. You see, I'm like passing
some enemy heroes. As you get better at
the game, you keep an eye on the map,
you see them showing other places, then
you will realize that this is actually
surprisingly safe.
because it went under tower. Look how
hard this pushed out compared to the
other trick we did where I let the one
creep go through and I mentioned if they
hit their own creeps, they could fix it.
There's actually nothing you can do to
fix this. Like once the tower starts
hitting creeps, you're cooked. You have
to they have to come out and body block
our creep wave and most pubs are simply
not going to do that. So right away on
the very first wave, the wave has shoved
in and now I'm laning here. Maybe it's a
little further up than I like. So I'm
just going to keep being safe and I'm
going to wait for it to come in. You
don't have to be this is overly passive,
but let's just say you're really scared
cuz this guy's gone. Then don't lose
your health for one creep. Just wait.
And now here it is. And even if I bring
this under tower, it will just do what
we talked about. It'll push out, push
back in. You come to the lane late.
We're not able to do the body blocking
trick. So the creeps are going to meet
normally. Actually, even if you block
the back three and let the first one go
through, you can still do this trick. So
because the creep wave meets here, we're
going to immediately draw aggro. And if
you can time it with the range creep
attacking like now it works out because
like you pull it back and then these
guys get aggroed by the range creep.
It's a little messy sometimes. Um but
you can attempt that. And then I hit
their creeps. I mean I should get this
lasted I guess because I aggroed my
creeps went under the tower right away.
And then here we are. And then I just
hit my own creeps. Maybe I don't get the
deny. No big deal. But I help kill the
creeps faster. And look at that. The
very first wave already up here again.
And it's going to do what? It's going to
push in. It's going to push back out.
Going to push in. Going to push back
out. I'm just in a good spot
immediately. Why not just block every
creep? There are reasons to do this, but
as a newer off laner, I don't recommend
this because it requires more
participation from you to get the lane
to actually come back. So, I do the body
block. Let's just stop there. And now it
meets. I can count. So, I know that this
is four creeps versus four creeps, which
means this is actually at equilibrium
even though it's a little further here.
And I did the air quotes cuz actually
it's going to push slightly this way
because my creeps are going to meet here
first. It's getting advanced. Don't
worry about that. So, this is like fake
equilibrium where for one wave it's a
little better than here. And if I did a
better block, you know, maybe it's like
here, whatever. From then on, it's going
to be moving this way and then sit here
again unless I do more work. And if I
can, then it's okay. And that's part of
the reason you would do this, cuz you
feel you can play the lane. But if we
are taking the safest default route and
my support, who knows what they're
doing? Oh, I swear they're going to be
smurfs on the enemy team and I'm I I'm
just going to get destroyed. then I
can't actively participate here and I
need to be running in the trees while
the other tricks I did the body block
here instant creep aggrager to get to go
into the tower blocking one creep
forward. All of those work themselves
out without me needing to do anything
else here. Once this happens, which can
happen like even if you were trying to
do the other stuff, sometimes it doesn't
pan out. What we're going to do is
instantly hit our own creeps as soon as
they drop below 50%.
And now look at that count. Four creeps
versus three creeps. Even if I don't do
much here, I'm not going to use too many
other tricks right now. I'm just going
to hit my own creeps as much as
possible. And if the enemies don't do
the same thing, look what's happening.
They should, you can see the creeps were
below 50, but they aren't hitting it.
And until you get to immortal, people
are not going to consistently hit their
own creeps even as they see you do it.
So from here, you just have better
equilibrium, right? We're still kind of
here for now. I'm still having to work
for it, you see? And that's why this
isn't as great. You see how close I am
to the enemy heroes frequently, but
we're getting there. I am pulling it
back over time. And again, you can do
more tricks. I'm just trying to show you
the basics right here why you have to be
involved in this. Okay. And now here I
am. It takes about 30 seconds to a
minute longer. And it could take a lot
longer depending what the enemy does.
The other tricks were pretty instant
that very quickly the lane came back out
to me and I was good to go. But let's
just mess things up. I start attacking
too much. I get involved in a fight, my
four support is terrible, and we start
shoving the lane. It might take a little
bit to do,
but at this point here, you can see we
have two range creeps and four creeps.
The lane is shoving. So, at this point,
just commit cuz it's actually really
hard to fix it with any of the tricks we
talked about. So, we're just going to
shove the lane. Don't use spells that
early. That was actually bad. Bad
example. You should use the spells to
secure the creeps, not to lower them. So
lower the creeps with auto attacks and
then use spells and then come do your
own pull. Shove the lane in. Look, they
have to deal with this. They can't stop
me. I was like, this the support's
supposed to do this. It doesn't matter,
guys. Someone's got to do it and we're
going to be self-sufficient. So once the
lane starts shoving in cuz the support
tried to grief you, just commit. Do your
own pull. Zach, it's blocked and the
support hasn't. So then buy your own
sentry and then shove it in and then do
your own pull. It's just how it's got to
be. if uh your rank is like a little
lower and people are doing this kind of
thing to you. Now, you'll notice because
I was doing the pull, this creep wave
walked into the tower, that's where you
mess up. You do not want to allow that
to happen. So, I did a pull. I can come
over, grab this creep wave, and if I'm
feeling strong, I just bring it over
here. This will get my creeps killed off
cuz they're finding the neutral camp.
And then these all die. Now, here you
may enter a weird spot where now their
camps fight the neutral camp. And this
is where things are a little bizarre. U
it can be okay. It's just, as you see,
very chaotic. Um, but it will still lead
to your equilibrium overall because now
we have these creeps. Then we can even
reconnect them into here. And then I
have the ability to count. And so now I
know the enemy has more creeps than I
do. I hit my own creeps a little bit.
And then here we are. You only do this
if you feel strong enough to fight over
this camp. This time we're going to
pretend we're a weak lane. So I did the
pull. The wave is coming in. And the
enemy carries going to be coming up. Oh,
I'm scared. So, I've run away. Now, the
downside of this is that I'm going to
give the enemy the creep camp. So, he's
going to get more gold. But, if I was
losing the lane the whole time, he's
getting a lot of money. I need to get
something. So, then we are giving him
short-term value for long-term
equilibrium for us. So, I bring the
creeps around like this. And then I
start laning. Now, for him, he was
killing my creeps. And so, you actually
see there's not a lot alive. They could
have done a better job. Let's say the
carry just focused on killing the
creeps. They then bring it in and now
they're kind of matching what we're
doing. Um, but a lot of carries will
also just bring it under the tower and
then their creeps will die. So depending
what they do, it may still work out in
their favor and we have to try again.
But if they mess up at all, we're back
in this situation where because I kept
the creep wave alive by running it in
circles, I'm laning here. You've seen
this. I won't repeat it too much, but
now we are happy again and they have to
go do a pull. And you have seen many
times where people try to do a small
pull and it it temporarily brings the
lane up and then it ends up under the
tower and then shoves back out. So once
you identify that, you know, ah, this is
where I have to be patient. I don't take
crazy risks cuz I know in 30 seconds the
lane's going to be right back here once
again. I'm going to be happy to last it
and do my best and so I don't have to do
anything insane. If you're strong
enough, sure, go for it. But you don't
have to. The last thing you can try is
to just constantly draw creep aggro. I
don't. This is the last thing you should
try because there is a much more refined
way to do this. It goes beyond the scope
of this guide. I have a creep aggro
guide kind of covers a bit of it. There
could actually be even more detail
beyond that. So, it's too much to talk
about in this one video, but essentially
if you draw no creep aggro and the enemy
is stronger than you, they can do all
the tricks I have told you as well. And
so they can keep the lane here forever
if it just is a standard lane. I'm too
scared to go in. I'm too scared to do
anything. So just start drawing aggro
nonstop even though you may not
understand what's happening. So first
the creeps walked back to me and you
saw, oh, it came closer to me than the
enemies. So then it was easier to get
elastited. You know, kind of like that.
You could try for denies like this if
you want, but one of two things is going
to happen is either the creeps are going
to split up like this, which makes
things easier on you, right? Rather than
all the creeps here and we're constantly
losing cuz the enemy is stronger than us
and I can't even approach this area. Now
it's split like this and it's up to the
enemy to be like, how do I how do I
manage both? Do I get this one and this
one? Like where do I stand? Right? We're
creating chaos as the off lane. And if
we're losing non-stop, then we want the
chaos. We want the wave to get split up.
We want builds to uh develop. So you see
now my creep wave is pushing because I
drew so much creep aggro. And I'm going
to keep doing it, right? Rather than
lane here, I'm laning a little further
back. Rather than lane here, I'm coming
back even a little further. You can do
more advanced stuff. I just don't want
to talk about it right now. Like I said,
trying to keep it simple. We may miss
some creeps during this, but we will
skill check the enemy. I keep two creep
waves like this. I was losing every
single creep trying to lane up here. But
now I've actually secured two creeps for
myself. And if I was XP range of the
others, then I at least got that. And
now my lane is shoving in. Did the enemy
keep the creeps out of the tower? Did
they know to do that or did they let
something like this happen where they
died? Okay, time to resume. Like start
drawing creep a like non-stop crazy.
Hope like that creep goes under tower.
Hope the enemies are like drawing creep
aggro and messing things up as well. I'm
just going to make things chaotic. You
again, you can do this in a much more
refined manner, but for a beginner who
is lost, just keep doing this. Watch the
creep aggro video so you know how to
creep aggro and then just keep a
clicking the enemy and stepping back and
things like this are going to happen
where it builds up large creep waves one
way or the other just cuz like things
are getting so weird and you will be
able to find some CS rather than the
lane being static and you lose
everything. One of your first big
objectives as the laning stage starts to
end is to take the enemy safe lane
tower. This is just a very safe first
play to go towards. It's not going to be
like a oneanddone type thing. Most
likely you're probably just going to
have to like keep pushing for it. You
might have to get a couple fights. But
anytime you're feeling lost and you see
that tower is up, okay, let me head down
there. Let me try to take that tower.
And once you do take that tower, try to
occupy the enemy safe lane jungle until
you hit some kind of power spike. This
will depend on the hero you play, but
it's usually something like a blink
dagger or an aura item. And then it is
easier to join fights around the map.
That doesn't mean literally never leave
until you have those items, but if
you're feeling unsure, this is a good
default move. And when you have your
abilities available, you could probably
head over somewhere else, make the play,
and then, oh, what do I do? Oh, let me
head back to the enemy safe lane jungle.
Now, if you're really not sure what your
power spikes are because you're a new
player, around 20 minutes, it's a little
on the later side, but if you're new,
then it's going to actually happen
around this time naturally, you're going
to see people start moving together and
just go. You may not understand why, but
like, oh, my team's all there. I guess
I'll head over it. It's not always the
right thing to do, but for now, it's
it's going to be a safe uh a safe move.
This is going to be part of an effective
farming video in the near future. So,
I'm only going to do the quick version
here to help you understand why we're
doing certain stuff as the off lane.
First of all, a lane creep wave at the
start is about 160 gold, 240 XP. Over
time, these ramp up, but don't worry
about that for now. So, we both have
creep wave spawning. So, there's 320
gold and 480 XP every minute cuz there's
two creep waves a minute. And we fight
over this at the start of the game
because we're too weak to do anything
else. Now, you might use the pole camps
or you eventually get strong enough to
start farming these camps and then you
can add in an extra 160 gold and 250 XP
that we fight over. This is usually
about the first 5 minutes because then
you have enough levels and enough items
that you can start opening up more of
the jungle and you can farm it without
just dying and wasting your time. So,
those jungles can be like anywhere on
the map where you go is very game
dependent. But for example, say you're
having an off lane, having a rough time,
then you might fall back to these camps
or to this camp. And yeah, you can see
like, okay, if I just completely abandon
the lane, I'm getting none of this, but
I'm getting about half of it over here,
which is better than losing everything
in the lane and feeding. So, if you're
having a really bad time, try to fall
back to one of these. Uh, some of the
off laners I recommended can do the
ancients relatively early. They often
need an item to do it, but it is at
least doable um relatively early. You
will notice though that if we add up
these values, if I'm the off lane and I
keep falling back here, sure, maybe I'm
getting all the creep wave money and
then farming 500 gold. But if I leave
the carry alone, they're getting the
creep wave and then there's 360 gold
here and then 400 over here. So the
longer they're left in this area,
they're actually going to out farm me as
the off laner. Now you might be saying,
Zach, I mean, is some of this not there?
Like the mid laner might get this. Yeah,
but like the mid laner might get some of
this that I'm stealing from them, too.
So, however it's split, the enemy has a
lot more money available to them here
than we do here. And I don't want them
to have that money before the safe lane
tower falls. The split is something like
this where the off lane can play the
lane and then feel comfortable falling
back to their own jungle and then maybe
fight over this stuff and then the safe
lane does the same, right? They push the
lane and then they feel comfortable
fighting over this potentially and then
the rest is where they feel a little bit
safer. So, a very common safe lane
farming pattern is to push the lane and
then go this way and then you
re-evaluate. Oh, the off lane has shoved
the lane back. Okay, I I'm like right by
my tower. I push it back again. And then
maybe I like I come down here if I can
farm ancients early enough. And then I
look again. Oh, the off laner shoved it
back. Okay, I just come back to the lane
once again. What if the off laner isn't
pushing the lane and they're just
holding it here? Well, okay, maybe I'm
over here. Let me just head over here.
Are they pushing it back? Sure, I'll
come back to the lane like right away.
Oh, they're still not doing it. Well,
let me just keep going. Have they pushed
it back? Okay. Oh, they haven't. Okay,
maybe over here. and then push back
here. I could do this number of arrows
any which way. You can increase the
efficiency by like timing it with things
respawning, stacking a little bit
advanced for this. The point is the safe
lane has a million options here of how
they path and come back to the lane and
get more gold as you saw from the
previous slide compared to us as the off
lane. When we take the enemy safe lane
tower, we open up more options for
ourselves as the off lane while
restricting the safe lane because this
is now the new split where they feel
safe up to their tower. They push the
lane out and then h I don't feel so good
because the off laner is playing it here
and I can't see in that jungle. So, is
he waiting to kill me or is he gone? I
don't know. So, let me just play it
safe. They shove the lane and they only
have access to these jungle camps now,
which is a lot less as the off lane.
What can we do? Well, we're playing this
area. Anywhere along this lane, we can
kill the enemy creeps and shove it back
in. Let's say we're just doing it like
right here, right? And then we Okay, I
don't actually want to push the tower,
so let me just come back in here. Or
maybe I come back bottom. Right now, I
can farm this stuff. Oh, from this mid
lane, they think or from the safe lane
jungle, they think I'm farming. I'm
actually moving to the mid lane to gank
that guy and then take his tower. Oh,
I'm actually feeling scared. So, I'm
actually already falling back to my own
half of the map. Oh, maybe I want to go
surprise the enemy safe lane or set the
enemy off lane. I'm going to twing gate.
And at any point, you could also just
teleport out, right? You don't have to
walk any of these paths. You could be
farming, see a fight happen, and then
just immediately teleport over. So, you
can see that as the off lane, when we're
defaulting to this area, one, we have
way more access to farm than we did
before when the split was over here, and
we have restricted the enemy's carri's
farm. And then two, we can make a bunch
of plays. Whichever we end up picking, I
don't know. That depends on the game.
But I'm in a good position to move to
any of those. Compare that to being over
here or back here. There's not as many.
Like you're farming here. That's usually
cuz you're losing. Like where do I go
from here? I got to walk all the way
here to the mid lane. And this isn't
even a good angle. Like he's going to
see me coming. Like this surprises him
from the back. This is just the front
just like the end our own mid laner.
That's not surprising at all. I want to
go to the safe lane. I got to go all the
way over here. And there's not a whole
lot of farm in this area. So, I can't
even like farm along the way to get
money. When you're back here by default,
you also aren't stealing any gold away
from the enemy. So, maybe you get
farmed. And then you get to the game and
you're like, "Hey, he's got the same
amount of items as me." Yeah, cuz you
didn't take any of his money. You got to
come here and take the money. That's the
off lane. We steal their money. From the
Midame onwards, it becomes difficult to
say exactly what you should be doing
because every hero is unique. Every game
is unique. If you're an experienced Dota
player, this part's a little easier
because it's like, oh, I used to play
support and I know Roshan into towers is
good, but now I'm in off lane. Is that
still true? Yeah, it's still true, guys.
So, for experienced players, this
shouldn't be as hard of a transition at
this point. For newer players, there's a
late game flowchart video. I would
recommend checking that out for a little
bit more detail here. But the long story
short is that you want to try to create
situations where you have the numbers
advantage. Dota is a fiveon-ive game,
but if you can take a fiveon two fight,
that's a lot easier, especially if
you're losing. This is the way you come
back is that you find like three of us,
kill that one guy, and now we have the
numbers advantage cuz now five of us can
fight those four heroes. So, you just
try to do this. If you don't have your
abilities or your items on uh available
to you, try to farm the enemies half the
map. Whoever is the most survivable
heroes or the most sacrificable heroes,
they are the ones who take this risk.
Rather than stay safe defensively on
your own half of the map, you take the
risk to push the enemy's side of the
map, steal their farm, and offlane is
one of the roles that would try to do
this. Then when you either have the
numbers advantage because someone has
come back to react to that, or because
your items and spells are ready, so I'm
feeling pretty strong, go fight. You do
the fight, push the objectives a little
bit. Okay, back to farming. And you just
kind of like repeat this cycle and keep
looking for opportunities where you can
kill the enemies. And now that they're
dead, you can push their uh buildings
down. Once you get to these fights,
enable your best damage dealer. This is
often the carry, but sometimes it could
be someone else. It's up to you to like
figure that out in the game. But we are
playing initiators and aura builders. At
least that's what I recommended. So, we
want to combo with the damage dealer.
And when I initiate, I want to make sure
my damage dealer can hit the target I am
stunning or my carry is attacking. When
they try to get my carry, okay, I go
help them. I apply the auras. I try to
keep them safe so that they can live and
keep doing damage. Alternatively, you
can target enemy saves and their damage
dealers, especially if you are an
offlander who has a little bit more
damage yourself. So rather than helping
your carry, okay, the enemy has a save
hero like Dazzle. Anyone we try to kill,
Dazzle's going to save them, which means
my carry can't actually do damage. So I
will go run at Dazzle. And even though
I'm not meant to be a damage dealer, I'm
an off lane with some items. Dazzle is a
support. I can probably kill Dazzle or
at least scare him out of the fight. So,
you go distract Dazzle so he can't save
whoever your carry is hitting. Uh, now,
if you're going to line these two things
together, fantastic. It won't always
happen, but typically, do I help my
carry or do I stop the enemy save or do
I absorb all the damage from the enemy
carry cuz we're a tanky initiator who's
built auras, right? We are hard to kill.
So, the carry keeps focusing us and that
means our carry is free to kill the
other people. Some random tips to close
out this video. you're going to face a
lot of pressure to be active from your
teammates. Like, oh, you got to go like
do things, you got to make space and all
that. And it's true. You you need to to
some degree. Of all the core roles, the
off lane and the mid are the ones who
need to be making the most plays. And
because I recommended you guys play
initiators and aura builders, part of
the reason I recommend that is because
frequently people do not draft any of
that. So, you'll be the only playmaker
on your team. So truly, you will have to
find time to be active, but you still
got to set your boundaries of your power
spikes. And you may not know these power
spikes right now because you're learning
the heroes and you're learning the role,
but eventually you will start to feel
it. And you will realize everyone is
telling me to join fights, but I know I
need the blink dagger. Otherwise, I am
just walking in and wasting my time and
I never get anybody. We're we're
feeding. We're we're wasting time. It's
no good. I need two more minutes to
finish this blink dagger and then I can
do stuff. And as you learn more, you
will realize, oh, I don't need the blink
dagger. I can go sooner. Oh, I did need
the blink and another item on top of
that. Right? That's learning the heroes
and the roles. But especially for the
support players coming in to play off
lane, you need to feel comfortable with
this because it's like ingrained the
guilt of like I'm not allowed to farm
and like I got to go do things as a
support. No, it is truly part of playing
core to AFK farm. I know there's a bad
connotation around that, but genuinely
it is part of the game. There's an eb
and flow to the action and it's going to
be hard to know as you start, but I just
want to advise you that it is there.
Like you are supposed to have that
downtime that is part of the role. For
the newer players and the support
players, just try to stay calm about the
last hitting and mechanics overall. I
know it can be a lot to take in at once
when you didn't have to do this before,
but you will just get the hang of it. I
know there's not like better advice for
it, but as you practice it, as you just
play games and do it more, it's not that
big of a deal. It's just part of the
game, but being really nervous about it
is only going to make you play worse.
So, I know it's easier said than done,
but try not to get too freaked about it.
It's just a video game. It's okay.
You're going to feed. That's part of
learning it. Uh, and everyone is going
to go through this right now. If I had
to generalize, my theory craft is that
in the short term coming up here, a lot
of support players are going to drop in
MMR and a lot of core players are going
to increase to some degree because
support players never had to play core
if they didn't want to, right? So, we
were only 100% playing support and yes,
there was four and five yet to play, but
a lot of people could do both to some
degree. So we have been like in our own
space and then core players their MMR
was the core roles and then having to
play support sometimes. So they were
losing more than usual. Now it switched
where supports are going to have to
start playing off lane and we're not
good at it. So we're going to drop a
little bit until we get used to it. And
core players have to play support a
little less often. Maybe they're still
bad at off lane. So I don't know.
Offlane players are truly the ones who
should be going up right now. But core
across the board, I think it's easier to
go between different core roles than
core to support and support to core. So
the core players MMR likely to increase
in the short term. Don't let this freak
you out. It is just it's just going to
take some time, but eventually the
system will balance again and you'll be
wherever you need to be. Thank you for
watching. I will try to make some hero
guide soon for different off laners, but
I too must go through this process. It's
one thing to conceptually know all the
stuff, but now we have to actually do
it. So, I will also be going through the
learning curve with all of you. You can
catch me on stream if you want to see me
struggling in real time. But once I get
the hang of it, I will make some guides
if you guys want to check that out as
well. I'll see you in one of those.