How much does the right lane matter?

I'm very new to the game and yes I know I suck, well most of the time. Thing is I can do very well given the right start against the right character/player. Some games I can be the team's MVP the very next game with the same character I'm the worst.

For an example I was solo in the middle lane with Tiny. I was up against sniper and he absolutely ruined me. Or your partner in a lane might be blocking your farming or moving the line up too high leaving you exposed.

All of these things appear to be game changers. What can I do to limit their effects?

Study, learn what heroes counter each other. Most melee heroes can't solo range heroes, especially without a blink ability or a gap closer ability. Watch videos of higher-end play, you'll see that certain roles take certain lanes most the time.

There are 3 lanes-Long lane(safe),mid, short lane (suicide)
The long lane is normally where the carry goes and it is a trilane. This means they wont get as much xp but 2 supports can make sure the carry farms safely.
The mid is the lane that the hero that needs xp the most goes. Tiny and Sniper are both mid laners but sniper destorys tiny since he has the massive range.
The suicide lane is a solo lane. It is normally a hero who has an escape (bounty hunter for example) or does well against more heroes. Another common one would be lone druid.
This is it in a nut shell and but they can always change depending on the situation.

thanks for the replies. I've found out which lanes are which, I've played around 50 games so far.

Let me put it another way how much does it effect a good player if they end up in a lane against their characters worst nightmare? Do they over come it or GTFO of there? Similarly with an ineffective lane partner.

well, you can ask for a lane switch, but low level pubs. (which is where you probably are since you only have 50 games) refuse to change lanes and then flame at you for losing your lane.like what you said that sniper kicked your *** at mid. there, as soon as you saw you were losing you should have swapped lanes. i recommend not picking first because people might counter you and can cost you the lane. for example. you pick lanaya and the enemy picks pudge. unless you are very good with lanaya, he will destroy you because he can burn refraction very fast.

To go off what Ancient Hero hero is saying,. You got three lanes, mid bot and top, the purpose of each lane varies depending on what side you're on and what heroes you have picked.

Lets just say you're playing as Radiant for this breakdown. You're team picks a safe tri-lane with Anti-mate, Crystal Maiden and Lich. That's a super defensive tri-lane with very little killing power, so that lane will most likely go bottom.

Note: If your team picks a super late game carry like Spectre, Anti-mage or Faceless Void, that hero is most likely going to go into the safe lane and farm(Safe lane for Radiant is Bot and safe lane for Dire is top).

The reason people call it a safe lane is because of the position of the tower. If you look at top lane for example, the Dire's top tower is closer to their base compared to the Radiant's top tower. Say if you're top lane and you're soloing, you need to cross the river to get experience and farm, making you very vulnerable to ganks. Same goes for Dire's bot lane, you need to cross the River to get farm and experience.

There are a some carry heroes who will do very well in a aggressive tri-lane, like Naix, Sven and Chaos Knight. The main reason these heroes do so well is because paired with the right heroes, they have a ton of kill potential.

There's not really much to say about mid. Mid is where you send a hero who can use some farm and has kill potential, like Queen of Pain, Bat Rider and Night Stalker. The "suicide lane"(It's called the suicide lane because most of the time its 1v3) is the lane which is furthest away from your base.

I've been in games where I'm playing Luna and someone will pick Faceless Void and come lane with me. You pretty much just gotta share the farm or try to out last hit him. Most people have zero idea how to lane control, if you see the lane getting pushed up too far, pull the next wave and try to bring the lane back closer to your tower.

If you have any other questions at all, feel free to ask :D