Dont give up after 5 matches. Most people give up cause they get confused and realise how hard Dota is.

Once you get some understanding, you will get so much fun.

Playing since 2013, still loving it.

That your league friends will flame you for playing DotA. That's what happened to me. I think I face more flame irl by them than I do ingame.

u can get alot on steam market at 3 cents per item

That you are going to invest much more time on it than you want or should.

proper answer: right now it's laning!!! yhou should learn how to w in your lane and get good at laning!

meme sappy answer

You should know that you are getting into objectively the best game. overwatch, csgo, quake champions, all of them honestly fucking pale compared to this game. you have in my opinion after playing numerous other games (t500 in overwatch, mid div tf2 6s, i was shit at csgo, decent run in quake) that icefrog makes this game stellar. this game is made for dota players, which means after you 'get it' it feels extremely tightnit, lucky and entitled. this game is not for casuals or outsiders at all. i think it is the hardest game to get into. so props for enjoying your first few games. i know i didnt.

theres just something so stupildy rewarding about dota that i've never had in any games i've ever played, single player or multiplayer. it just feels so accomplishing to play well, like its more than just a game. winning a veryh ard game sticks with you for a while. way way longer than other games. and imo the pro scene is the best one, maybe out side of fighting game beef which is always fuckin funny to me.

dota lacks in terms of being a moba genre( games are long, hard learning etc) and production value (streamers outside of a few are kind of shitty. tourneys often hvae a lot of issues. skins are kind of bad in my opinion, no silly skins but there are some absolutely retarded sets. )

So the tutorial is decent but some of the scenarios are broken, so if you run into that you just need to skip them.

For a more guide-y type of guide I highly recommend starting with PurgeGamer's Learn Dota Basics and Learn Dota playlists. There's a handful of things that are out of date (mostly things about the map or exact numbers), but it's still by far one of the best starting points for someone new to Dota.

For builds the best current place to look is dota2protracker.com, specifically their hero pages. For example here is the one for Zeus. Just make sure to click the correct roll that you are playing the hero in at the top!

If you have more questions I also highly recommend checking out r/learndota2, it tends to be more helpful than the main subreddit is for beginner questions.

Hey man, welcome to Dota. For starters as others have said, you should play all of the tutorial missions. I see that you have played some of them, and unfortunately you are correct in that they do sometimes bug out, however they do a decent job at explaining some of the finer details and mechanics of the game, including niche mechanics like Manta Dodging. I'm not sure if it covers everything, but it does go in depth for many things.

In terms of which heroes to play, whilst the All Hero Challenge could be a good place to start - I highly recommend that you also pay attention to Valve's complexity filter on the hero screen. More than any other MOBA, Dota has a difficulty variance between it's easiest and hardest heroes - it both has some of the easiest to pickup and play heroes in the entire genre, and also mechanical/strategic monsters that you will feed with your first few matches.

I see you have played Zeus and it's a fine place to start. However if you're looking at other heroes to maybe try out - I recommend Juggernaut and Wraith King for Hard Carries (Juggernaut especially is a good hero to use if you want to practice controlling multiple units in a low pressure environment), and Centaur and Bristleback for Offlaners.

If you're interested in YouTube content - BSJ has a video series on Dota fundamentals. It is mostly 4 years old at this point so there is a bit that's out of date - particularly involving things like items, however the concepts he presents in terms of how to lane and lane equilibrium are still relevant today.

Do tutorial at minimum

Tho some quest are bugged I think (maybe fixed now??) so just disconnect if it seems impossible to complete - or ask here on reddit i guess

 

Everyone's learning process for this game is different

Tho you should probably stick to a small pool of heroes for now

Standard advice is : pick the ones which look cool, make sure they aren't too hard (Google or ask here), equip a hero guide, and go play

Play vs bots a few times if you don't have experience playing RTS games or top down PoV

i would recommend playing something like all hero challenge (play every single time the same hero until you win) it will help you pick some game knowledge quickly plus you will know how every champion feels. Playing basic support like crystal maiden or lich wont help you long term because 1. supports is a very hard role and 2. you wont know what this game is all about.

https://youtube.com/playlist?list=PLZ7yVl4cw_JvEP3H-1HS0dr2hop8UhNO2&si=IIE0IkRo7t8xaMUf

Check this out. BSJ is awesome!

I’d suggest staying away from mid, at least for now, and seeing what role/characters you have fun with, or are successful with.

I highly recommend learning a hero that’s currently strong, the game is harder to learn on weak meta heros. Sounds obvious, but some people will try to make an uphill battle for themselves. The payoff isn’t worth it as such a new player to play low tiers, you need a hero that accels in certain areas and can win a game. This way you can get a taste of what it takes to take objectives and win.

Don’t let toxic players get to you, many of your teammates will flame you. A lot are wrong, some are right. Makes learning harder imo, try to base decisions off of game sense rather than the chaos in chat. Don’t fully ignore teammates, but listening to every single call your team makes will make it very hard to learn how to make decisions in this game.

Good luck!

A good start is to watch replays right from your game client. If you got any heroes you are already familiar with, you can search for games where he is picked. DotA is a very complex game and 50hrs is not nearly enough time to be average at it

Try playing support until you understand what’s going on. You get to focus on the game from almost a third person perspective.

Play 3 heroes, ogre magi, lion, disruptor.

Ogre: focus only on disables and buffing your team.

Lion: focus only on setting up kills, keeping mana full on your team and empty on the other team.

Disruptor: focus only on setting up kills with glimpse and fence.

Once you got that, you now understand the three spots of positioning, front (ogre), middle (lion), and out of sight (disruptor). You understand how to set up kills in three ways, disable, nuke, and positioning.

Make sure you ward and don’t steal cs. You’ll be archon soon with this

Edit: Side note, dota is like going back to college. Each hero is a brand new field of mastery. You’ll never learn if you are taking three different career paths. Same thing in dota, if you play 15 different heroes you’re learning the game with 1/16 of your energy compared to playing 3 heroes where the game is 1/4 of your energy.

Just play Shadow Shaman.

Learn how to disable, disable, nuke, and take down towers with ult.

At your level you should be able to easily take down towers by placing an ult.

Learn when your ult will turn the tide of a teamfight

Learn when a teamfight is trivial and you can punish opponents mistakes by setting up an extra ult on nearby tower

Shadow Shaman is a really good hero. After Arcane Boots I personally make Blink Dagger to jump enemies, Eul’s Sceptre of Divinity (a bit expensive) to dodge their attention and set up blink escapes, and Force Staff to escape (or force the enemies into me.)

Shadow Shaman has the tools to always play a good game of Dota.

Do you mind sharing anything specifically that gives you trouble? Otherwise:

DOTA is a game of resources (gold & XP): maximizing your team's and minimizing your opponents. The first two phases of the game (Laning & mid) revolve around the farm capacity (i.e. resource generation) of each team: the laning phase has cores primarily farming in the lane while the mid game has farming occurring in lane and in the jungle. The end game unlocks as soon as one team can reasonably win a high ground fight in their opponents base.

Your team's strategy will shift during the game depending on what phase you are in. But I suspect you are familiar with this coming from lol.

If you want to DM me, I can coach you through some matches and clarify a few things to get you going in the right direction.

Also check out the ingame guides for some basics. Play a lot of bot games and find a hero that you like. Then take it into unranked. Mute toxic allies immediately. Have fun!

Find a hero you like, try them all out cuz they are all free.

The only tip I have is Uninstall now, WHILE YOU STILL CAN, see this message as you write it yourself from the future....

Just dont do it

Find a hero you like, try them all out cuz they are all free and play bot matches

Use item guides that are in game (you can choose in hero selection or in Learn tab section)

Ask any questions in r/learndota2

Check out TZAR_POTATO on YouTube cuz he makes videos about League and Dota differences

The other advice already given is great, follow that.

There is also a new player mode available now that's pretty good. It simplifies things and guides you ingame.

play the tutorial for items, heroes, what they do, how they work, last hit trainer, watch BSJ, Jenkins, Datohleong, they have quite a good amount of Dota for Beginners type of vids

Go check out Purgegamers on Youtube. His channel has a really good introductory series called "Learn Dota".

There are beginner guides, ingame tutorials to start with also watch replays of pro players to mimic their playstyle is also a good way to learn the game.

hey newbie, here are some self improvement resources to look up item builds, videos for beginners, vod sources, guids and even link to a new player discord. loads of good stuff. AND ITS ALL FREEEE MUHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAAH

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##Educational Content

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##Skill / Item Build

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##Wiki

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##VODs

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##Entertainment

go watch some YT. You need to do at least the following:

1. pick one hero and stick with it a bit
2. learn the mechanics of the hero and his/her abilities - read and understand (and watch) how it is played correctly (support, carry, etc)
3. try to watch vids that show you what it means to lane, ward, support, etc - there are major concepts in the game that you need to get familiar with - it really is a team game, so don't just wing it
4. ignore all the comments early that tell you how bad you suck, things about your mom, your gf, bf, etc - you will get many trolling/toxic comments - if someone gives you real advice, follow it if they are experienced

don't get discouraged - it takes a lot of time, effort, practice to get good (or at least capable).

don't forget - it's a TEAM game - your goal is to help the team, not die stupidly too much (which will happen) and get good with one or two heroes - you can branch out as you get more of the basic game under your belt.

good luck - what server / region are you in?

do "Learning" in dota. it should teach you all the basics that's not gonna change. after that, probably try some heroes that looks fun or cool.

Just focus 3 heroes to master. Trust me, you will learn more as you play the game.

It's easy. Play only position 4 and always pick Mirana. Skill arrow on lvl1. It may seem like a good idea to use the arrow on your opponents, however this is a common newbie mistake. You should only use arrows to last hit the ranged creeps. This will take the pressure off your lane partner since they won't have to worry about hitting the ranged creeps. Then max out the leap. If the opponents attack your lane partner, use it to jump to safety. You will never die this way. After your lane partner dies, don't forget to tip them. This is standard Mirana position 4. Guaranteed +2k MMR.

Dota is a difficult game for beginner gamers, but if you really want to get into it:

r/learndota2 can give you a lot more info than here

my list of easy support heroes: Vengeful Spirit, Crystal Maiden, Jakiro, Lich, Lion, Shadow Shaman, Warlock, Witch Doctor

at high level there are a lot of things supports need to do, but at beginner levels, staying with your carry for the first 10 minutes and then follow your team around taking objectives is the best thing you can do. the other reddit page i mentioned can teach you all the other stuff supports need to worry about (vision, stacking camps, and so on)

I can afford an account in any skill bracket. So naturally, yes.

Don’t worry you’ll get there lol but it ain’t real advice so don’t listen to him

One day you will, just try to do complete opposite of what he said xD

there are like 200 + items in dota and a lot of them have an active ability, so its almost like getting an extra spell to use. proper itemization can absolutely be game winning but can be daunting for new players and old ones alike. there are in game guides you can choose from in thein the shop menu while playing, that shows the most common items on the particular hero you are using. some guides will also have a short description about why the item is good on the hero and when.( for eg. Torte delini guides. i think its better to start from there and slowly try to understand why some items are absolutely core on some heros, while some are situational based on the game flow, matchup counters etc.

there are many guids, almost for every hero in every role,

starting items: magic stick if they have low cd spells, stats for right click damage

then you upgrade your stats items into bracer or wraith band and magic stick into magic wand,

and buy more regen that pretty much laning phase,

some situations where you need the movement speed you go early boots,

be more specific otherwise all advices will be general

“Play Demo” all the heroes for a start then watch guides and pro games.

Just buy a rapier bro... it's not griefing if you win.

You not doing a speedrun. Play, try things, fail/succeed thats it.

since youre really new to dota 2 and moba genre as a whole, heres some of my tips and resources:

1. finish the tutorial
2. play against bot matches until you get comfortable enough
3. if you play against regular people, let them know youre a new player. sometimes they will help you out. you can chat to allies by pressing "Enter" and allies and enemies by pressing "Shift Enter" together
4. if they are toxic, you can mute them by clicking on the hamburger icon at the top left corner

some videos to help you out:

Dota 2 Beginners Guide - 7 VITAL Tips for LEARNING THE GAME

Dota 2 Beginner's Guide: Roles and Positions Explained | 7.28c

Dota2 2024 beginners guide: Items mechanism

A few things.

Make sure you do the tutorials. There are a bunch and you'll get some fun skins and stuff for doing it anyways.

For sure play some bots but if you've come from something like league it won't help you much. The bots are wildly terrible and assuming you have the skill to press 4 buttons at random you win.

I'd try to get into real matches as soon as reasonable. This game has a voice chat also. Some people are surprisingly helpful.

Another huge thing this game has is recommended builds and skill order. Pick a hero and pick the top rated build and follow it blindly. This will be ok enough for a bit until you really learn what items do.

Last tip I'd say is keep your champ pool small for a while. Something like 1 tanky laner, 1 dps laner, and 1 support. This will be enough that if your hero or roll is taken you have something familiar to fall on but not be so big that you never learn heros.

Where r u coming from? Purely new moba player or from other games? If ur from leagues then search TZAR POTATO on reddit or youtube, he makes guides for league player.

If ur purely new then starting from the ingame tutorial isnt that bad. After that u can find some heroes ur comfortable with and play some bot games.

I can help u if ur based on Asia. js dm me

Delete Dota, believe me. 9k hrs

I recommend playing against bots for several matches and fully completing the tutorial first.

After that, try Turbo mode - people there are usually less toxic (unless you’re in a smurf pool), games are faster, and you’re constantly fighting, which helps you learn quicker. Turbo will also improve your behavior score. You’ll get familiar with controls, ability usage, and how other heroes work (micro gameplay), while skipping more complex aspects like map movement, objectives, farming patterns, and tempo decisions (macro gameplay).

I wouldn’t recommend starting with core roles, because they’re more responsibility-heavy, and you’ll likely get blamed for every mistake. Arguably, the best role for a complete beginner is Position 4. The hero pool is diverse, and most heroes are relatively easy (Bounty Hunter, Ogre Magi, Nyx Assassin… cough Sniper Pos 4). You’ll also experience a bit of everything: farming, supporting, warding, assisting, and dealing damage. Position 5 (Hard Support) is more challenging because you typically have to make a greater impact with less farm. It's similar to Position 4, but with a much stricter hero pool, fewer resources, and the added responsibility of babysitting your core.

Once you’re confident as Pos 4, you can experiment with other roles and heroes. When you feel comfortable in Turbo, you can transition to All Pick.

In All Pick, stick to support roles at first to learn fundamentals like laning, itemization, and macro gameplay. Once you’re confident, branch out to other roles.

I don’t recommend muting everyone, sometimes, players give useful advice (even in a very rude form). However, always mute toxic flamers who just bully others without reason. It’s better to ask what items to buy(dota players LOVE to gave advices to eveyone) than to get instantly reported for a daedaus second item on CM. This also helps you avoid the classic Dota Player trap - ignorance. "Both 2k, 5k and 10k players make mistakes, but 10k players acknowledge them more often."

Once you feel ready, jump into Ranked Matchmaking and start the usual grind: play, review replays, analyze mistakes, repeat. Watch guides, and most importantly - don’t tilt. There are three types of games: you stomp, you get stomped, and close matches. You can’t win every game solo - Dota is a team game, and sometimes, the enemy team is just better.

Of course, you can ignore everything I’ve said and forge your own path. Good luck on your journey!

inside the game itself there is a “Learn” tab which teaches you a lot of the game mechanics (you even get in game rewards, such as skins, couriers, etc). theres a lot of people who dont know about this tab

Huh? Nobody mentioned r/learndota2 yet? Check it out!

watch streams, see what the top players do, you can also watch in game live games of other players

I will! (sound warning: Undying)

Bleep bloop, I am a robot. OP can reply with "Try hero_name" to update this with new hero

^(Source) ^(|) ^(Suggestions/Issues) ^(|) ^(Maintainer) ^(|) ^(Author)

Find heroes you want to play, whether that's through streams or just looking through the hero pool, or even playing games and getting stomped by what looks like fun heroes. You said in a comment that you wanted to play Marci, Mirana, Rubick and Meepo, so try those out first.

Go to demo mode with that hero, go to the shop and check out the guides section. Specifically, check out Torte De Lini or ImmortalFaith's guides for the hero (IMO Torte is better for new players). They have guides for every hero updated to the latest Dota version. Once you select the guide, it'll tell you how to level your hero and what items to buy. You can spend some time testing out your abilities in demo mode, and read up on what the items do. Like for Mirana, Torte's guide tells you to buy Urn (because your hero gets kills with landing arrows and that fills up the Urn charges) and Euls (so that you can lift them in the air and time arrows to hit them when they land).

Honestly you could follow those guides until you're familiar with more items and heroes. They make sure that you have at least an adequate enough build every single game. Feel free to diversify from what the guides say if you feel like you need something else and you know what it is too :)

As for other tips, don't hesitate to mute someone who's toxic (you can do it on the scoreboard). It's already stressful learning this game, and the added strain of someone flaming you is not worth it.