Suffering Early Game Need Advice

[gRnt]

Hi all as the title states I am finding early game play to be quite taxing, as a result I often end up just doing my best to stay alive end game and don't have much of an impact on the outcome.

Just a quick rundown, I played DotA for a little bit but never really grasped the game too well, I understand how HoN works but I have never really got into any RTS style games before but I just love HoN. I typically play sdem matches at the moment to give me an opportunity to learn some new toons, and not get stuck against r-tards that pick their favourite imba toon and go get 15 kills with the thing.

My problem is though I really struggle last hit / denying. I will often miss BOTH the last hit and deny on my creeps while trying to lane, I also find that I keep auto attacking even when I don't want to and it's frustrating making sure I don't. Is there any way to improve last hitting other than just to continuously do it? Ranged are obviously easier than melee but I still struggle with both.

Is this what is majorly effecting my cash flow? I find that at around lvl 6 I have my marchers or steam boots, and that is about it, I then have to spend the next 4-5 levels getting my first recipe which is typically the hardest point in the game for me as it is when the ganking starts. I generally try and lane bot, as our creeps stay close to the tower and I can tower hug to try and avoid too much ganking. I'm not a feeder anymore but I still seem to be behind the 8 ball for items, which means that by the time mid game rolls around I am sitting at the fountain every 2 minutes after saving my arse from a gank and never get to farm for gold or XP and end up being the lowest level toon in the game.

Can anyone help or do I just need to learn how to last hit more?

[kharaa]

For lasthitting and denying actually it's easier in my opinion to do it with a melee hitter, the animation from start to finish is much quicker.

What you do try to avoid being harassed(or harass your self, depending on your hero.) and rush in and get the last hit on a mob. don't autoattack the mobs.

alot of people bind their hold button to the spacebar(normally H) this prevents you from moving or auto attacking. I use that to get the last hit/deny on creeps.

As for your cash flow, yes not getting the last hit is what is affecting your bank. you should be aiming to get atleast 2-4 last hits per wave. and you should deny all creeps safely possible without putting yourself in danger, generally the best way to achive this, is to harass the other team to make them back off, then have your free time with the wave.

sometimes they go hand in hand, using pyromancer's wave when the entire wave is low, and their enemies are in range, is a nice way to push them back, plus do some damage.

but don't sit there and auto attack a mob, that gives the enemy too much chance to hit you.

You just sit back, see a opening, take it.

one of the fastest ways i've noticed to regain health early game, at the foutain is to use your bottle charges(they refill instantly, and you gain the health regen inside the fountain aswell.)

[gRnt]

Thanks I think I just need more practice I had 2 last hits and 1 deny by level 6 just then, mind you I have never played Jeriziah and I was getting harrassed like crazy!

[kharaa]

Jereziah is a pretty decent tank, a friend of mine plays him constantly, he can nearly oneshot an entire wave, at rank4 of his heal.

[Zuurax]

Definitely not a great player myself but I can share my experiences with you.

As far as last-hitting and denying is concerned, if you aren't already, pick up some stat items (along with regen of course) to buff your early damage, it increases your margin for error. Practice is also a big part of it, different heroes have different attack animations and range so maybe playing SD games is what's throwing you off a bit even though I can't disagree with your logic for playing them in the first place.

As mentioned, hitting 'hold' or 'stop' is useful for preventing yourself from auto-attacking although I do find that with some heroes, Valk in particular, I really have to spam like an idiot to stop myself. To be honest I can't really tell the difference between the two, anyone care to comment? Another way is to keep moving but there seems to be two schools of thought on this. I personally prefer moving as it keeps me on my toes and makes me less predicatable but do find that if last-hitting/denying is the only consideration, the hold spam works better.

The better players will no doubt consider this lame but if I'm not under any pressure, I find that even if you're playing a ranged hero, it helps to stand closer to the creep you're trying to last-hit/deny so the projectile doesn't take as long to land. I think this is a reason why it can sometimes feel like it's easier to last hit with a melee hero. No doubt when you (and I) get better this will not be a factor.

The problem you have with cash may not just be about last-hitting though although naturally if you're not having any luck getting last hits it doesn't matter how long you spend farming you won't get much cash. It is also a factor of the hero you choose and whether you use their abilities. There are many heroes that farm really well using their abilities and you can be crap at last-hitting and still make a reasonable amount of money with them eg Soulstealer.

One tip that I picked up from watching some videos is that the better players are very efficient with their time and always seem to have a plan so they don't spend more time than necessary out of lanes and maximise their farming time. In contrast in the low skill pub games I'm generally in, you have a lot of people pinging all over the place and they will curse and swear if you don't go where they ping (especially if they die and they often do) so you might feel like you're running everywhere and not getting anything done. Try to plan ahead a little, maybe jungle a little on the way to a lane if you know you have time or if you find you need to head back to the fountain to regen cos you're low on health, use your spells to farm some creeps quickly before you do since you'll be regaining it anyway. Just some ideas, they obviously will not apply all the time.

[EeyoreXD]

In the laning phase, if you're going top(for Hellbourne) or bottom(for Legion), you should try creep pulling. It's a technique used by players to lure the neutral creeps out of their forest so your own creeps would be distracted and kill the neutral creeps instead. This is a great way to have your creeps as close to the tower as possible.

Also, in the laning phase, you should always remember to stay as close to your tower as possible. That way, you're much safer from ganks and the enemies will have a harder time to deny their creeps.

[LightRain]

This is a bit of a riskier technique, but worth practicing. When you right click on the enemy hero, and you're within range of the enemy creeps, the enemy creeps will switch from attacking your creeps to attacking you. So you can tell your hero to attack the enemy hero, then immediately move away, pulling the enemy creeps closer to your tower. Although your creeps do more relative damage while the enemy creeps aren't hitting them, doing this whenever it's safe is very effective for pulling the enemy creeps away from their tower and controlling the lane.
The risk is that if for whatever reason you let the creeps catch you (they will get bored and attack your creeps again after moving a short distance) you're taking damage you don't need to so you're effectively harassing yourself. Try it with ranged heroes first and get a feel for when you can safely pull aggro to keep the lane where you want it.
Zuurax: stop vs. hold: stop cancels your current action, then your hero returns to whatever his AI tells him to do, in this case auto-attack. Hold puts your character in a permanent stopped state. Stop can be useful when you want to slightly delay your attack for a last hit, but if you're still having trouble not auto-attacking, use hold.

[gRnt]

Thanks guys, guess I also need to pick an appropriate hero to counter the other team, go lucky last night and went 13-2 with Blood Hunter and got my first Hat-Trick (w00tface) however the next sdem I was lucky enough to pick him up again and couldn't even get a kill. Might work on that too cheers.

[bobbyflay]

Keep in mind, if you're suffering w/ last hitting, you should probably take 10 mins in practice mode, last hitting in a lane without items, or w/ 2 circlets or something. Dont ever get hit, dont ever put yourself in a bad position, and see if you can last hit well. Imo, do it with thunderbringer, bloodhunter, hammerstorm, and defiler. Those 4 will give you a good spread of last hit examples. Try to get every last hit a wave. Also, keep in mind your positioning. You wont be able to stay next to the creeps that easily in a real game, so just mind that.

[[ABK]_Archangel_]

Getting harassed lots and struggling with last-hits and denying are symptoms of poor lane control; I suggest you read this: Nome's Basic Laning Guide

[Reonhato]

first step is stop playing EM games, 2nd step is make sure you have the stat items and regen at the start to stay in lane longer.

the reason your falling behind in lvls is nothing to do with last hitting and denies. its probably mostly due to the fact that you have to leave your lane often early and then find yourself struggling mid game and find yourself being killed first in teamfights, missing a lot of xp.

while first hitting and denies are important its not the end of the world if you suck at it. one way to make up for it is to chose a hero who can jungle early game. this will help boost your gold.

the most important thing is to do your absolute best to not be forced to retreat from your lane. if this means buying a monkey to make sure you dont run out of runes of blight then by all means buy a monkey

[[LN]Connatic]

alot of people bind their hold button to the spacebar(normally H) this prevents you from moving or auto attacking. I use that to get the last hit/deny on creeps.

Wow, didn't even know there was such a button. That should improve my game greatly alone. I always hated fighting the auto-attack.

[RadialAngel]

well this might sound a little crazy but try getting a babysitter :] i do it all the time. i harass the enemy heroes and take care of the denies while the other guy in my lane gets most of the creep and hero kills. haha. you can add me in game if ever you need a fairly decent babysitter. haha.

[bentoft]

If you have problems getting gold, then select item independent heroes. This is usually int heroes with nukes. Theese heroes rule the game at lvl 5-14 (before the other players has farmed a lot of items).

[[G4ME]OlaOlaSasaya]

Start with heroes who have better attack animation and projectiles, namely Arachna, Demented Shaman, Andromeda.
Or heroes with higher base damage like Succubus, Pebbles, Voodoo Jester.

The whole idea about last hit/deny is either your attack/projectile reach the target sooner than your opponent at the right time, (you have to understand when exactly the target creep is last-hittable) or your damage is larger than your opponent so you can launch the attack before he can.

It's better to start with practice mode if you don't know when the creep is last-hittable. If practice mode, your goal is to get 80% of the creep kills and denies of all the waves. By doing this you get a better understanding how many creeps are attacking your target creep, then you have a rough idea of when it's gonna die. So you can place your attack accordingly.

When your target creep is getting focus fired (especially by multiple ranged creeps and catas), it will die sooner than you think, so be aware of that and do it earlier. When you get used to it, you will feel like you are following a stream and your attack will be smoothly integrated.

Once you done with practice mode and face real people, it will be a guessing game instead. You have 4 options: only do last hitting like what you did in practice mode; use your skill and disable/nuke your opponent; attack your opponent when he's trying to last hit; randomly attack creeps. Whatever your choice is, don't be predicable and try to guess what your opponent will do. Each option has it's own counter:

If your opponent only do last hitting, you can attack him before he last hit a creep, this will distract his action and change the position of creeps, making his last hit way more difficult.

If your opponent attacks you a lot, you can disable him when a lot of your creeps running to attack your opponent.

If your opponent use his skill a lot, you better stay away from him and try to get help from your lane mate. In this case last hit is not easy but you can still try to deny and attack your own creep after its hp drops below half. So you get the creeps towards your tower and then can last hit them safer.

Attack target creep randomly is a more advanced tactic, you should only do this if you feel you are at disadvantage regarding the heroes and skills you and your opponent have. Put more randomness in and make him harder to predict when the creep will die. Sometimes your goal is just to stop your opponent getting his last hits and denies, it doesn't matter if none of you get the last hit.

After all it's a matter of experience. You need to practice a lot and play with tons of people with different style a lot. Whenever you feel you're getting owned in lane by someone, pay attention to his behavior, you can learn a lot from your opponent when you are on the way to a decent player.

[Avathacis]

I'd recommend Keeper of the Forest. If you need to learn last hitting he's perfect! He has decent base damage with good main stat growth and a buff that adds up to 60 damage. He also has an escape mechanism and since his main stat is strength he has naturally high hp.

[[E]Tripwyr]

My strongest recommendation would be to stop playing EM games. The subject has been beaten to death, but in short: playing EM will teach you habits which will hurt you in normal games. Additionally, many of the heroes used regularly in standard mode are near useless in EM, and vice-versa.

[[GMY]Stiler]

In my experience with the game instead of using H to hold and not auto attack I simply click on the ground near a creep back and fourth to cancel the auto attacking, as I find the hold key and then attacking has a little delay that can mess up my hits.

As far as timing goes, it comes with the hero. Just pratice a hero and learn how quickly they hit and roughly the dmg it'll take off the lifebar of a creep and wait til it's low enough.

For some heroes it's easier then others because of the attack animations, both ranged and non ranged. Valkyrie can last hit fast but someone likle Pollywog can take more time to learn.

[Shroomz1]

If you are having trouble laning, it will all come together in time. While learning i think it is best to start with a high base damage rang hero like hell bringer. here are some basicly tips. (*) means exceptions.

1. stay max range from the creeps as much as possible (*)
2. Learn to time your last hits, don't auto attack. This improves over time.
3. If your wave is pushing into their territory it is best to deny EARLY, this will allow the wave to push back to you. Which in return will help you stay closer to the tower, have more lane control, be able to avoid ganks, as well as if you push ur lane down it only makes it harder for you to farm there.
4. Pull neutrals. every :15 or :45 second on the minute you can pull neutrals. This will allow you to stay out of the lane, gain more xp along with your partner also getting solo exp, and allow you to get the cs off the neuts. In almost all higher level games this is done. you simply agro the creeps at :15 or :45 second mark and run to your creep have that is incoming.


* only come in closer range to harass heroes or if you are playing very aggressive.
I hoped this helped you.

[[trNs]Darkstrand]

Practice last hitting in, well.. Practice mode. Go ahead and pick something simple (or difficult) like a heavy melee hitter and a Logger's Hatchet till you figure out how to time everything, just don't go crazy and max level yourself and buy big items off the bat lol

Laning beyond last hitting requires trial and error, and won't come easy. You will have to get the **** kicked out of you, and you'll just have to learn from your mistakes.