What are the early laning expectations for a support?

Support is all about controlling the game.

In Lane

Create an XP Gap

Why

• Most of the time, the early levels of spells (e.g. you're 2, they're 1) can give you enough of an edge to get a kill
• When you gain enough of a level advantage, you can either (a) go do other things that are more important because your carry is now set, (b) the opponent will zone themself because they are worried about getting killed

How

• Zone - a lot of people use the term "harass", but that doesn't really do anything. You want to force the opponent far enough back so that they don't get XP when possible. There are exceptions, like in a 2v2 or 3v3 lane where being out of position will lead to giving up first blood.
• Deny - deny creeps by hitting them or doing pulls (stacked or pull throughs).
• Getting Kills - getting kills > harass. Harass means they will drop back and regen. Kills mean you get gold & XP, and they lose it (by dieing and being out of lane).

Secure Farm

Why

• Gold wins wars

How

• Pulls - help to control the lane, allowing your carry to farm safely, giving you openings to zone/set up kills. Pulls are also a support's source of money.
• Pressure - by applying pressure, you can secure farm by denying the opponent's farm
• Rotation - sometimes you need to rotate to give your carry farming space. If you draw attention away from them, they can farm in peace.

Early to Mid Game Movement/Rotations

Buff a Strength or Fix a Weakness

Why

• Around mid game, it's often smart to surround the hero doing best on your team with support so they can carry (especially if they appear to be doing better than your opponent's carry)
• In early game, it's often smart to help a failing lane to restore equilibrium so that your mid/offlane or whoever can have an impact

How

• Protect the hero doing well by making sure you TP when they're in trouble or making space for them to farm
• If a lane is doing poorly, you can rotate (or smoke gank) to restore the control.

Warding

Why

• You want to maintain vision of areas that you will be focusing on (either defensively or offensively) so that you can see enemy movement and react accordingly / take advantage

How

• Get wards up early so that you can see where they ward and knock out their vision
• Ward areas you're pushing so you can see incoming ganks
• Ward areas of focus (e.g. enemy jungle) to set up ganks and maintain map control
• Ward areas to secure your position (e.g. your jungle, rosh pit)

Utilize Your Presence

Why

• You don't want to waste too much time in transit (leads to underleveled)
• If you aren't getting anything accomplished, you don't want to keep doing the same thing
• Being MIA also makes the enemy play differently

How

• If your carry has established control in lane, then go put pressure elsewhere. If you stick in lane, they will eventually react to you meaning that your offlane is 1v1 with someone that outlevels them and now your carry is also under pressure
• Use things like TPs and Smokes to move around undetected and quickly. Your time, especially in the first 15-20 minutes, is incredibly valuable as a support.
• Being MIA could mean that you're farming the jungle, or ganking. It's a very important part of being a support. The less vision they have of you (and your team) the more control you have.
• Side Note: this is also one of the reasons keeping the lanes pushed in mid-late game is beneficial -- you get vision of their side.

This should give you some things to think about and work on. Don't try to get everything down all at once. Focus on getting good at one thing at a time. Like, maybe in one game try to use zoning to create a level gap (get a support with a good attack animation and decent range like Shadow Demon). Then in the next, try to rotate to a troubled lane after establishing control in your own. And so on...

Like everything in dota, there is the very basic level of pulling, and then things get more advanced

The small camp next to the T1 top and bottom are both close enough to the lane that by attacking a creep at around x:14 or x:44 (that means when the game timer is at the 14 or 44 second mark of any minute) it will meet with your next creep wave and pull their aggro into the jungle.

Now, losing a wave of creeps has some pretty major implications in the lane

First, the enemy creep wave will push all the way to your tower. Second, the enemy heroes will lose out on the XP from your creeps. And third, your carry will get solo XP while you are in the jungle, and you will get XP+last hits from the neutrals that die.

That said, there are also potential issues. Most importantly if your carry doesn't realize you were pulling in a 2v2 lane, he WILL get killed if the enemy has a stun. The next enemy creepwave will show up, your next creepwave won't, and he is left alone against 2 enemies with a full wave of creeps wailing on him. Next, and almost as important is that improper pulling can actually push the wave and make it unsafe for your carry to farm. If the creeps in the camp aren't strong enough to kill the wave, you end up in a situation where your ranged creep lives, the enemy creepwave died to your tower, and suddenly your next creepwave has 2 ranged creeps. That will pretty much always push the lane, and can put your carry in a really unsafe position. Lastly, if you don't have vision of the enemy heroes, they can just come into the jungle and kill you while you are alone. If you aren't smart about your positioning, or it is nighttime and they sneak up on you, you won't make it back to your tower before they land their stuns on you, and you will die.

So how to avoid bad pulling

Tell your carry before you pull. Pretty straight forward, but you'd be amazed how many people don't do it.

Stack the camp before you pull. By this, I mean draw the creep aggro at x:52-x:54 and pull them into the lane. When the :00 mark comes along, there won't be any creeps in the camp spawn box and a new set of creeps will spawn. One thing to note is that for the healing troll camp, you need to actually walk into aggro range to stack them, instead of attacking them. Otherwise the healing troll will stand still healing instead of following you.

Lastly, a lane ward against a scary lane is a worthwhile investment. Place one ward watching the rune/gank paths and where the river, lane, and jungle meet. Your goal is to have vision of the enemy leaving the lane to try and contest your pull.