DOTAFire Blogs

Hi, I'm Sando - I've been playing Dota 2 about a year and a half and mainly play int/support heroes, thou I'm getting quite into randoming :)

This blog is going to be a series of musings on games I've played, thoughts about strategy and hero comments.

First up Timbersaw...now I'm happy to be corrected on this...but I've yet to see anyone play him effectively. Supposedly he's a ganker, but due to his powers he doesn't seem like a great mid, and he never seems to get going enough to really do very much from the sidelanes. Not really a carry or a support...where does he fit into a team? I can think of more effective gankers, team fighters and other non-carries. So, bad pick, or just bad players?
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I joined this site about 3 weeks ago. I did it so, I could write guides and blog, I guess. It was not until attempting to write my first guide that, I realized, I don't know much about the deep game mechanics. I mean you see guides like the, (ANTI-tabs) and is the pinnacle of genius and, Dota understanding. All of the guides explain every possible way to play a hero. I started reading walls of text on heroes and overall stats on strength, agility, and intelligence. I started to have these thoughts about combos between items and heroes. I feel like this website overall has just made me a better, Dota player. Thanks.
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Recently some of us have been discussing ways to increase activity on the site or create a more populated community. I've been brainstorming a few ideas myself and wanted to know what you, the users, think about these ideas and if you'd be willing to participate.

My first idea consists of creating a more abundant amount of responses by adding notifications. Such as if someone rep'd you, commented on your guide, or quoted you. I feel like this will quicken the response time between users and allow them to see who is interacting with them.

Another idea I had to create more communication between users is to change the Off-topic sub-section to something more inviting. Something that has been done on sites like GaiaOnline (iE; the Chatterbox), and create something where users that are close within the Dotafire community can just blab between each other about whatever.

Most likely the most impactful of my ideas; create rewards for the active members of the community. By creating forum com…
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Want to learn Omniknight!
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Here is a list of sets that I personally "built" from from other set items and individual items.

I'm using them together either because most of the other better looking items are too expensive or too hard to get, or the original version of the set does not look at good as it could look.

Items: Aspect Mask of Fulimant Rage - rare mask Strange Grand Claive of the Unshamed - common sword Seven-Sealed the Fur Bracer - common bracer Twelve Tusks the Cape of Boars - common cape

This is a set I recently settled for after trying to mess around with a combination of High Plains bracer and Cuffs + Defender of the Ivory Towers for a more barbaric-looking Juggernaut.

The colors on all the items fit Juggernaut's default color scheme which is orange.
Personally I feel that the Claive of the Unshamed looks nearly as good as a Fireborn Odachi due to it's glow, the extra details with the rings on the blade only makes it more appealing.

I'm not a big fan of putting …
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Well, I guess I won't tag this inaugural entry. I'm very new to the Dota 2 scene, and to ARTS games in general. I'm learning and have every intention of practicing so that I can enjoy the game with friends. Not looking to make any waves, but it feels like a waste to own a game like this and not play it, so I need to start somewhere.

I was surprised to see that Dotafire has blogs, but I guess if I have anything to say about my experience with the game, I know where to put it!
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ALRIGHT GUYS, you got like 100 heroes and you gotta kill one, **** one and marry one. so whats it gonna be?
me? i would kill axe, **** lina and marry queenie.
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Bounty Hunter or Gondar if you prefer is a very versatile hero. He can track you and give his team extra gold and movement speed, he can stealth for a quick get-away, or he can even throw a mini metal windmill at you. All of these together make him very devastating in the grand scheme of things, however, how devastating exactly? This is the question I asked myself when looking into stealth based carries. Granted he's not a hard carry like Anti-mage I feel he has his pro's. A few of his simple and easy to spot pro's are his mobility, gold contribution from his ult, burst damage, and uhm, oh yeah gold from his ult. If you don't get the picture already, what I'm trying to say is that he gives huge gold with that single spell and I'm not sure that any team compilation will be able to stand up against his team if he gets track kills on all 5 of them in a team fight more than once. That amount of gold hurts and it hurts bad. You may think that your one or two levels over him gives you an adv…
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As the beta becomes more expansive and allows for more and more people to play, a flood of new players of Dota 2 or even MOBAs in general are coming in. As you start to play your first few matches, you may find the game very fun, but extremely difficult to learn. You may play a few more games, read a few guides and try a few new things out, but many of you may feel like you aren’t getting any better.

This is the situation that so many people will find themselves in. Even after hundreds of games, players may still feel stuck in the lower matchmaking brackets, not really knowing why they aren’t improving. It turns out that while many of you may be playing the game and practicing your skills, you may be not actually be practicing the right way. You may say “Wait, doesn’t playing the game a lot count as practice? Am I not getting better by playing more?” In the beginning, you will always get better simply by playing matches, but as you try to push yourself into higher skill brac…
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Since the last time I posted, I've probably played another 20 games. I focused a lot on what people had commented on. Figuring out which player on my team needed the farm the most and not stealing gold from them. Or pushing a lane only when our team had the advantage. Playing heroes like Drow Ranger and Riki because it is hilarious to gank. I would say that my individual skills are improving to where I am not a total noob, but still not an average player. Things I still need to improve on is last hitting, playing support, and knowing when to fully commit and trust that my team mates will follow.

Things that I have noticed that a lot of people like myself struggle with is knowing when to engage in a team fight. Myself or a team member will spot a couple of the other team's heroes pushing a lane and ping the map. The whole team gets into position and then 1 or 2 people decide they don't want the chance of dying and run away resulting in the whole team dying. However, it does seem…
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