Going from 1k to 2k MMR | Dota 2 Beginner's Guide

 

Underrated items at this MMR that are good in almost every game:

Urn of Shadows, get it if no one made it. Its insanely good. Maybe the best item for the price at 875 gold. Especially at this mmr when there is a lot of dying going around. Only time you don't want one is when you are getting stomped and insta killed in fights before you can use it.

Mekansm. Get it if no one built it and you have the mana to use it. This item wins team fights. Don't build two. Auras don't stack. If you are a Mekansm building support, announce in the beginning of the game that you will build Mekansm and tell nobody else to build it. Check your team's inventory because some idiot will build a second one anyways. If that happens, I grumble, sell my Mekansm and build something else. I think in a good number of games I win as support, I win just because I built Mekansm and the other team didn't. Notice both urn and Mekansm are healing items. Healing in general is super underrated at this MMR.

Drum of Endurance. If you just don't know what to get, its hard to go wrong with building Drum.

Force Staff / Blink Dagger - people in this mmr seem to avoid these items even on characters that really benefit from it. It does take a little bit of practice to master but its well worth it.

Town Portal Scroll, Animal Courier, Observer Ward - Pretty self explanatory. Never be caught without Town Portal, buy double if you have the gold. People at this MMR are constantly caught without Town Portal. If no one buys courier or upgrade it, do it yourself. Wards are important but lower priority at this MMR especially since there's not going to be much ganking, your teammates aren't going to look at the map much, your enemy location is very predictable,and your mid ignores runes most of the time. You should get it anyways, but its not going to dramatically affect your game (unless if they have a pudge). They do become more important in the 1800 - 2000 mmr range

Things that are overrated at this MMR

Farming

Don't get me wrong, you need to last hit and kill jungle creeps during down time but you don't need to get every last hit and kill every single jungle creep in order to win. The reason is that your best source of farm in this mmr is actually your enemy heroes. In the early game, you will be able to get a lot of kills because they push up to your towers by auto attacking creeps and run around with half hp without any regen. In the mid and late game, you'll get kills by catching enemy heores out of position and using your early game advantage. Don't ever farm creeps when you can farm the enemy heroes. In general, I think gankers are better at this MMR than farming based carries (or so called hard carries) because its much easier to secure kills.

Stacking, pulling as support

Your jungle will be untouched by the carries 80% of the time. Also, if you leave the lane to stack and pull, your lane partner will most likely just die. It's not such a big deal if the lane is pushed out since there's probably not going to be a timely gank from the enemy team.

Trilanes

Supports at this MMR don't know how to run a trilane. You'll just end up with three underleveled , underfarmed heroes. And the solo offlane will probablly end up dying a lot.

Heroes you'll see a lot and need to counter (or you can play them and own people)

Pudge - Observer Ward, and map awareness. You always need to know where he is and play conservatively if he's missing. Or play a hero that can man fight him even when he gets hooked. He's pretty much useless without kills, and falls off hard in the late game.

Riki - You'll completely counter 90% of Rikis by just getting sentries and wards. Riki players at this MMR thinks that "invisibility" == "invincibility". I'm always happy to see a Riki on the enemy team because he's just farm food. He's a poor laner so you should be looking to harass, gank, and kill him before he hits level 6.

Bloodseeker - Make sure you have Town Portal, and harrass his face off before he hits 6 (at this MMR people are not that great at last hitting so he's not going to get a whole lot of free heals from last hitting creeps). He's a great hero for punishing players with bad positioning, and there are plenty of that. He's definitely a great hero to play at this MMR. You can counter him with a strength based carry that can man fight him even after he gets ruptured like Centaur Warrunner with Blade Mail.

The ranged single target DPS holy trinity (Drow Ranger/Viper/Sniper) - you'll probablly see one of these heroes every game. Respect their range and their killing ability. If you don't feed them, they aren't that scary.

Heroes played

I usually supported but sometimes carried with a Bristleback playing him in the offlane. If you play a support here are some simple tricks to raise your mmr (try-hards hate us)!. 1. Give your lane partner regen. Keep him alive and don't let him feed 2. conserve your mana unless you know you can get a kill or you need it to save yourself 3. Harass the enemy every time he's in range of your right click and you are out of creep aggro range.

Lich - the ultimate - Chain Frost lane support to keep your dumb carry alive.  Frost Armor your lane partner and keep him from dying. Deny creeps to pull your lane. Once you hit six, drop your ulti and laugh as your enemies die.

Venomancer - great pusher but actually a much better anti pusher. He's also pretty flexible and can be played as support or an aggressive DPS hero. People underestimate his wards because they are not that good in the early game but get stronger as you level up and put up eight of them under a tower. Doesn’t' need any items to be effective and is great at getting the team back in the game after falling behind in the early game.

Bristleback - A carry that doesn't have any glaring weaknesses. He's good in all stages of the game. He's a strong laner, has a really good mid game, and a pretty good late game. Good pudge counter.

Crystal Maiden - she was the hardest hero to get right, because she is just so squishy and slow. But her early game is insanely good because of her aura and disable. Once you understand good positioning and understand how to play as aggressive as you can without exposing yourself to danger, you will easily win the lane and get easy first blood (and second... third blood).