10 minutes 60 last hits

how the hell are pros (mid laners) able to do this, while casually harassing, getting runes and ganking some sidelanes? Dont get me wrong....i know how to last hit and farm (my end-of-game-screen shows that i am amongst the top 3 farmers almost every game) and still i have probelms with very early last hitting. i hardly get my bottle within 2:30 minutes; my score at 5 minutes most of the time is somewhere between 15-20 and my 10 minute cs around 40 (+/- 5). When i watch some higher tier games, mid player always seem to be far ahead of my cs (5 minutes ~ 30 and 10 minutes ~60) although they maintain rune control and occasionally gank sidelanes.

therefor i have some general questions considering mid laning:

- Early Harass and hit-trading: when the opponent plays very aggressive i fall back in farm significantly ....even though my opponent also isnt getting much, whats the plan here?: say "f*ck it" and use all your regen within the first 2 minutes to get some last hits or stay save and avoid getting harassed ?

- rune control: i always try to push the creepswave back to the enemy tower by using aoe spells or simply auto attacking right before the rune spawns.... is this advisable?

- ganking: when is the right time to gank for a midlaner? Is there somewhat of a minute mark or is it a rune issue: like illusion or regen rune --> stay lane and farm; haste/invis --> gank sidelane?!

- general last hitting advise in the first 5 minutes: i dunno why, but i overestimate the AA dmg of my hero in the first few minutes of the game. as the game progresses i have less and less problems but thos first 5 minutes i barely get any cs....any help would be appreciated

Early Harass:
This depends on several things you need to consider, if you are a carry that needs a lot of gold, then last hitting/getting gold is over ANYTHING else, harassing is second in the list, while if you are against this type of hero, then harassing/denying becomes more important than actually getting last hits

As to how get your farm without wasting much Hp: its actually pretty simple, one of the best practices is to pretend you are going to attack the enemy hero (Right click him) and then immediately click elsewhere to walk away, this will draw the enemy creeps to you, and as you run away they'll attack your range creep, and there its way easier to last hit them, if your enemy attacks you then your creeps will attack him, and with no more enemy creeps in the way they'll probably do more damage to him than he did to you

-RUNE control: Yup, you sound like a pretty decent player to come up with that yourself, but dont do it all the time, only push hard 20-30 secs before the rune comes out, you'll be in a better position to take the rune, obviously also warding is pretty usefull...and if the competition for the rune is very rough then simply trust on chances, go get it 5-10 secs before it comes out...if the last 2 runes have been bot then I'd try top for example

Also, if you have a bottle then try to USE it, waste some mana, and attack the enemy hero to waste some hp before using your bottle so that you can refill it with the rune and use the mp and hp to its best potential. If you are just refilling your bottle when it's still got 1/2 charges, then that is a waste.

- Ganking: There's no defined best time to gank, it depends on your enemy, your hero, the time of the day (Obviously night is better) The runes, and how agressive are the enemies of the lane you want to push (If they are staying behind the tower then its usually a waste of time to try to gank)

Some good times to gank:
- With runes (Haste, dd, illusion (you send one back mid so that he wont call missing)
- When enemies are pretty aggressive (Pushing a lot)
- If you arent getting a lot of advantage against your enemy mid
- When you have multiple allies with stuns in the lane you want to gank
- When both allied heros are there, and with enough HP and MP to help in the gank

Remember, a failed gank means lost exp, gold, and time from mid, something your enemy probably has and now you dont.

- That is just practice mate, you need to know what hero and with what items you can do what amount of damage, if you are not sure simply autoattack a lil and see how much damage you do




Another good practice mid is not only to deny your creeps, but also damage them when they have less than 50% hp so that you can pull them away from the enemy tower

Dont autoattack unless you want to push the tower (If your enemy hero got the rune before you or he went ganking or died, or went healing, then push to do some damage to the tower.

thanks for the detailed answer. I will try to keep all of that in mind.
I think you just stated my biggest probelm. When i play a hero like Storm Spirit or QoP i feel like i HAVE TO make something happen in the early stages of the game (which most likely even is true) and gank like mad (ganking with EVERY rune and stuff). The problem is - maybe its just my skill level bracket (im just lvl 20) - but ganks only work half of the time: the opponents instantly retreat; my allies dont react and stuff like that.

I think the most important thing you stated is, that i should only gank when im 100% certain that i can get at least 1 kill, because elsewise it really is just an immense exp and gold loss.

I wouldnt go as far as saying 100%, but the higher chances you got, the less likely your time, exp and gold will be wasted.

And yeah you have to do something early in the game, but its usually one of those choices:

- Gank a lot
- Grow
- Dont let your enemy mid grow

Sometimes you can do more than one or even all 3 of them, but dont trust the noobs that say "Oh you are a noob becuz you never gank"

If you never gank you ARE a noob if you never gank when you had good opportunities to do so
However
You are a very good player if you know WHEN to gank, and IF to gank

Sometimes your team gets more benefits from your growing or harassing mid, than from ganking.

Or simply they dont need ganks, they are owning their lanes, and they'll keep doing good as long as your enemy hero doesnt gets out of line.

Your early game cs: friends who are better than me (and I'm sure pros) take it seriously when they miss a creep...like anger. They don't see cs based on how much they got, but on how many they miss. If you're saying F*CK every time you miss one, you're on the right track.

Pros get pooled regen, so that might answer your regen question.

Go read a warding guide so you learn to supprise the enemy.