Purpose:
Late game carry with a handful of team initiation. Basically farm, farm and use your Siren to either initiate team fights (siren to sleep enemies, your team fights simply walk into position and fight the enemy when song ends) favorable with good team combos that benefit from Sirens setup (Tidehunter, Enigma, Lina, Leshrac, Kunkka). Provides a lot of pushing power/farming late game with illusions and has a disable that goes through BKB making her good against most BKB carries (Anti-Mage, Lycan, Chaos Knight, etc).

Playstyle:
Can be played either aggressively by setting up team fights, catching the enemy team with their pants down and pushing, or defensively by using your ultimate to escape from ganks or unexpected team fights. Needs early game farm to be effective, so she needs a safe lane. Needs to spend early/mid game farming with a splash of ganks and team fights whenever ultimate is off cooldown. Later on can farm/push multiple waves and take teamfights. Is not the best late game carry due to her illusions relative fragility unless the enemy team lacks AoE, however counters certain heroes really well due to illusion mana burn from diffusal. Lacks the mobility of other carries, making her much focused on big team engagements late game.

Items: Arcane Boots, Vanguard, Diffusal/Radiance, Mantastyle/Heart is the way to go. Possibly substitute Arcane for Tranquil + Soul ring.




Yes, that's true. Every illusion effectively extends your Rip Tide AoE around them, so you can use that to easily farm the jungle or even other lanes with illusions. With proper micro and items she can rival an Anti-Mage in terms of creeps per minute late game. However, while Anti-Mage only needs a Battlefury to flash farm, Naga needs slightly more farm/exp to do that quickly, but it's defintely possible to keep up. Keep in mind that if you go Radiance you need absolutely stellar farm because you need Vanguard, Arcane and Radiance by at least 25 minutes, if not sooner.

I'm ready to finish this. Go go Ninjas!

FallenElf and I recorded a guide to jungle Lycan based on a few of my Lycan replays. I then converted the replays into video files spliced them and the audio together and viola! 1st draft of DotaNoobs guide to jungle Lycan after 6.75 is done!

It's still being converted and uploaded, but you'll be able to download the preview at https://dl.dropbox.com/u/18652/lycan_jungle_high_quality.mp4 in a few hours

Ok I hunkered down for a few days (not just a midnight photoshop session, MULTIPLE midnight sessions) with only water and bread in a remote cave and this is what I came up with:



I'ts me, I gotta show the old Denmark some love. Oh and by the way, It's totally made by me and only me, k thx bye.

If you guys want, I can do a coaching session today, where we play a few games together, giving tips in-game, and then I'll review the replays and give some specific advice.

It would, however, be very useful to know what exactly you looking to improve, in terms of role and hero.

We are almost done with the video, but we really a logo and some title graphics for the video. Maybe some us can get together today and finish it?

I'll get right on that if UnoPolak or FallenElf is up for it. We could use some ideas for subjects though. Here are some my thoghts:

Support Player Mentality
Jungling Ursa
Farm, Push or Gank: An introduction to strategy and team composition.
Fun Lane Combos: Sven + Lina

If you want some coaching today, I'll be available. Thought we might focus on a few key areas and we can go through a couple of your replays. Catch me on Steam or teamspeak.

I think the Ouya is pretty interesting, if nothing else it's a pretty decent music/video streamer that should support nearly everything if one has the patience to tinker a bit.
I think it's going to a pretty good casual console, but nothing like Xbox 360 or the PS3. Something like Xbox Live Arcade in a $100 box, which to me, sounds pretty cool.
My only real complaint is that it is based on the Tegra 3 CPU/GPU, which isn't very powerful compared to even phones like the Galaxy S 4 or the Nexus 4.

I felt that the Verge review was extremely unfair since they are were reviewing pre-release software. No one except the Kickstarter backers (who have already bought it) are going to see that software as it is now, because they are currently still improving it. It's like reviewing a beta of game, and complaining about it not being very polished.
I just think it's too early to say anything about the software or the games. When this launches in a couple of months, then you can tell how the experience is.

I seem to remember a skype call from Moe Joe, but I catagorically reject the notion that this ever happened.

To add to Bandit's excellent advice:

Vision
Vision is generally the supports' responsibility (that is, keeping tabs on it and actually placing the wards), but that does not mean they have buy the wards themselves.
If the support is getting Mek, or the #1-3 have gotten up their core items there is no reason why they can't buy 1 set of wards. Look at this way, If your AM has a really early Battlefury (due to good supporting!) and is swimming in gold, 150 gold more or less doesn't make that much of a difference to him, but it will to a Rubick that's desperately trying to get Arcane Boots.

Support Items.
It's very important that the supports carry the sentry wards/Dust for invisbility detection. Again, the #1-3 can buy these items, but often the carry (and maybe the #2) can't actually carry them since that hero often fully slotted and maybe needs space for Aegis.

Getting that sweet, delicious honey-colered metal known as gold.
Often as a support you should try do things that benefit both you and the team.
An early Roshan is an excellent way of getting a lot gold and experience as a support. If you are Enigma/Windrunner/Lina/Vengeful/Veno it's very easy to do an early Roshan (10-15 minutes) with the help of 1-2 other heroes. This will not only benefit an underleveled support greatly, but also give your #1 or #2 extra security and team fighting capability.
Jungle early, jungle consistently. If you are not doing anything, i.e. just "hanging around" you might as well take the small camp. Try to take large camps if you have multiple people there anyway. Make sure you leech experience later on from the carry when that hero takes the stacked Ancient Camps; think of it as "support tax" .

Positioning
Remember that the later the game goes on, the more it revolves around the most farmed heroes (typically the carry and the #2/#3). This means that you should take your cues from these players and adapt to what they are doing. It's usually not a good idea to chase after 2 low-HP heroes, if it leaves your carry without disables against the remaining 3. This does not mean you should hang back and play passive though. What it means is that it doesn't matter that you get a sweet 5-man blackhole, if your Carry and mid player isn't there to deal the damage. It is usually much, much better to consistently deal damage/disable than it is to land a big ultimate once in a blue moon.
Try to trade intelligently. Usually the more underfarmed/underleveled you are, the better it is to get a kill and then die than it is to simply walk away. Remember that Kill/assist gold is reliable gold, so you don't lose it even if you die.
Always deal damage when you can. Often I see people that spend all the time team fights positioning themselves and using their spells that they forget to simply right click the enemy heroes. Right-click damage from supports is a major part of the damage dealt early/mid game and it makes a huge difference in teamfights even though it might not seem to be the case.

Here's the Danish song:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=k59E7T0H-Us

It sounds... suprisingly Irish. Known and Shane I better not find out you've infiltrated the Danish camp.

Epic post, proxymate!
The Eurovision contest is not so much a music competition as it is a delicious blend of culture, cringe and chaos topped with heavy dose of glam, glee, glitches and gloating.
I encourage everyone to watch it, X-factor ain't going nothing on this show!

Welcome my dear readers, to the first segment of this most excellent series: Gambit's View. In these posts I will pontificate, prognosticate, equivicate and otherwise explicate my thoughts on the teams going to the grandest Dota 2 tournament of them all, The International.

It goes without saying that I am, at least among the more plebian dotanoobs, considered to be no Dota scholar, but I hope you will bear with me and correct me, should the need arise.

So, without further verbosity, pomposity or thesaural abuse, I give to you:
Alliance - The Swedish Jewel of the Western scene.

Strengths and Weaknesses
S4 is one of the best mids in the game, and can dominate the game if put up against a weaker hero mid.
AdmiralBulldog is extremely competent at a few heroes (NP, bounty and Lone Druid), but doesn't have the range that other #3's have
Loda has, in my opinion, not been as efficient or stable as other carry players, but has adapted well to a more aggressive style of carry lately.

Strategy-wise Alliance seem to favor having the option to split push, with a strong emphasis on a secure late game, often picking 2 carries to achieve exactly that.

What to expect:
Nature's Prophet in most games if he's not banned .
Late game/Pushing hybrids with a strong early game that can take towers, relatively weaker mid game and strong lategame with dual carries.
This plays into their strengths as they have good aggressive supports (Akke and EGM) and carry players who favor heroes that need a large amount of gold to be effective.

Watch out for:
AdmiralBulldog's courier sniping, daring Roshan attempts and Loda attempting to throw yet again (see Zenith at last year's International)

So what do you think? Does Alliance have what it takes? Is Sweden, in fact, the best esports country in the world?

LGD.int - Strangers in a strange land

Overview

They all live together and train in China, being the only western team to do so.
They are a fairly new team, but have already shown that they can beat the best teams, including LGD.cn in important tournaments.
Their individual performances and especially their team play are looking very strong in this very varied team with players all over the western world.

#1 Pajkatt (Sweden) - Solid performance, aggressive style, intelligent plays. Often (for a carry) goes in a solo lane.
#2 God (Russia) - Very good 1v1, playmaker, controls the map, often has a huge impact on the game.
#3 Brax (USA) - Very good micro/mechanical skills. Prefers technical heroes like Clockwerk, Often offlanes.
#4 Misery (Denmark) - Jungling heroes and aggressive supports seem his forte.
#5 1437 (Canada) - Can pull out amazing plays, but has not been very consistent in the past. Often plays the hard support with very little farm.

Strengths and Weaknesses
Pajkatt is one the most flexible carries in the world in terms on laning, having both the inclination and the experience to play safe lane, mid or off lane as the game requires.
God is, on a good day, unbeatable mid, but can sometimes falter when pressured heavily.
LGD.int's biggest liability lies, in my opinion, in their support players, Misery and 1437.
Both players can play amazingly well, but are not as stable as other, more experienced, support players. With all of their training, however, this might not be an issue when the International comes.

LGD.int's strength seems to be the meticulous execution of a pre-planned strategy. It remains to be seen, however, how they will deal with teams that have less predictable picks and strategies than the chinese powerhouses.

What to expect
Very specific strategies that rely on timing. For example, a 15-minute all-in push or a 25 minute slow-siege with illusions, bear or necrobooks. Regardless of the tactic, it will be well thought out, but highly reliant on crisp execution from every player.
LGD.int are possibly in the best position to understand both Eastern and Western dota of all the teams at the International, the question is whether they will have enough experience as a team against the Western playstyle, which they may not have had much practice playing against lately.

So what do you think: Is LGD.int the most handsome team in Dota?
Will the chinese training pay off, and will they play more chinese or western style dota?

I can confirm that this indeed is how Admiral Snuffles talks whenever the subject of "theayter" comes up.

Yes that meat looks very delicious indeed. Moe Joe's meat is always delicious, if you know what I mean...





(Yes, I'll go hide in the corner now)

maybe I shall reveal some of culinary secrets as well

Hey guys, I'm off to Prague (in the Czech Republic).
I'll be back in 10 days time, after visiting many a Czech beer, castle and sculpture.
Enjoy yourselves; I will

P.S. Special requests (alcoholic or otherwise for consumption or reception at Moe Joe Lan 2013) will of course be duely considered.