Overcoming Meepo-phobia: An In-depth Guide to Microing Geomancers

Introduction

Primary Roles: Carry, Pusher
Secondary Roles: Ganker, Team Fight AoE

Lore: From a Worshiped God to a Commoner

DotA All-Stars
Originally worshipped by the pagan tribes of Germania and the black forests that encompassed it, Meepo is a mischievous spirit of the earth who enjoys burying his enemies alive in mountains of rock spikes, pinning them down into helplessness as he pummels them into submission with his mighty shovel. The most disturbing of the Geomancer's powers, however, is his ability to separate his being into multiple selves, each as powerful as the original and making him potentially four times the trouble for the unlucky who encounter him.


Dota 2
"If you ask me, life is all about who you know and what you can find. When you live up in the Riftshadow Ruins, just finding food can be tough. So you need to cut corners, you need to scrounge, you need to know your strengths. Some of the beasts up there can kill you, so you need a way to trap the weak and duck the strong. On the upside, the ruins have history, and history is worth a lot to some people. There used to be a palace there, where they had all these dark rituals. Bad stuff. If you survived the ceremony, they would shatter a crystal and split your soul into pieces. They made great art though! Sculptures and such. Let me tell you: sometimes you stumble onto some of those old carvings. Take a pack full of those to town and sell them, then get yourself food for a few weeks. If luck is really on your side, you might find a Riftshadow crystal. Get it appraised and start asking around. Someone always knows some crazy fool looking for this kind of thing. If all else fails, sell it to a Magus the next time one's in town. They love that stuff. Still, whatever you do, be careful handling those crystals. You do not want one to go off on you. It really hurts."

Summary

In the right situations, Meepo is a hero that can snowball out of control with ridiculous EXP gain from Divided We Stand, eternal Earthbind snares, and intense AoE nuke damage via Poof. Meepo is a difficult hero to master and is a risky pick due to his limited window of opportunity, but he is also one of the most satisfying heroes in the game, even when you're losing.

Overall, Meepo is daunting to pick up as he requires high amounts of map awareness, plenty of practice, and the ability to make smart decisions based on your limitations.

Pros and Cons

Pros -Fun to play -Strong split push -Not so difficult to pick up= -Can gain exp from multiple lanes at 4, jungle extremely fast at 7, and lane and jungle simultaneously at 11 (More on this later) -Highest EXP gain potential in the game -Potential Global presence -Only hero with a base 35% magic resistance -Painful AoE damage from Poof -Very good base stats (other than base damage) -Geostrike can slow magic immune targets to a crawl -A mid-game powerhouse, decent late-game presence

Cons -A difficult hero to master, requires a lot of practice and experience (not even pro-friendly) -Easy gank target when united -Terrible, terrible base damage (Second worst only to Techies) -Fragile, will melt to AoE disables and high-damage nukes (ei. Epicenter) -GG Earthshaker and Sven (Very easy to counter) -Easy to shut down due to reliance on EXP advantage and map control -Sucks away most of the team's experience in order to be effective. -Cannot contend with true late-game carries like Medusa

Skill Build

1. Poof/ Earthbind
2. Earthbind/Geostrike
3. Geostrike/ Earthbind
4. Divided We Stand
5. Poof
6. Poof
7. Poof
8. Earthbind
9. Geostrike/ Earthbind/Stats
10. Geostrike/ Earthbind/Stats
11. Divided We Stand
12. Geostrike/Stats
13. Earthbind/Stats
14. Earthbind.Stats
15-17. Stats
18. Divided We Stand
19+. Whatever is left

Poof is taken first as it will help last-hitting with Meepo's pathetic base damage and potentially harass enemy melee laners (you can cancel it with hold position/stop). If First Blood is your intention and a straight Poof just isn't reliable, then Earthbind may be more favorable. From then, it is standard to max Poof first as it is your only nuke and a decent escape mechanism at level 4 (maxing Geostrike is arguable in a dual vs solo lane). Earthbind can be maxed out before Geostrike if you have confidence in your ability to land them at a longer range, while early stats will help against a nuke-heavy lineup. Geostrike's slow will go through magic immunity, however, and it can help out with BKB-rushers and Heroes like Lifestealer.

Montage of Wagamama's Meepo by diesmiling531 Play Video

Skill Overview

The Greater Cost of Divided We Stand

Divided We Stand

Because Divided We Stand is Meepo's trademark ability, knowing one of its major drawbacks is important. Though the fragile clones are a nuisance, they only affect the Meepo player. A common misconception is that the clones will give extra experience from creep and hero kills, but this is not true. Meepo usually gets a larger amount of experience because he is sapping more experience from his team by counting as more than one hero. For example, if two Meepos and two other heroes gain experience from a hero kill, Meepo will get 30 + 12 X (Hero Level) experience while his allies will get 15 + 6 X (Hero Level) individually because of how experience gain is calculated:


This is one of the major reasons why Meepo is so risky as he will constantly drain experience from kills and multiple lanes, which can potential cripple level-dependent Heroes such as Invoker and will continue to do so at the level cap.


An extreme example of Divided We Stand's experience leech. Good for Meepo, but bad for his team.

Earthbind and Poof

Earthbind

Meepo's primary crowd control ability and a tricky skillshot to land at a range. By afflicting one target with Geostrike and others with Earthbind, it is possible to keep several units tied down with snares and slows. Also serving as a pseudo-escape mechanism, the rewards for the mastery of this ability are not to be underestimated.

Personally I use the F key for Earthbind to give some more room for hotkeys and Poofs, though it really comes down to preference.

Poof

The skill that makes Meepo quite scary, it serves as his main escape mechanism and nuke. Though one Poof provides little damage, five can deal up to 1400 spell damage in an AoE, 840 if blink Poofing. It can also be used via the minimap.

Using quick-cast for Poof might help with microing efficiently without the crutches that scripts create.

Tab-Nets and Tab-Poofs

One of the most basic, integral tactics for Meepo, tab-netting and tab-poofing involves pressing TAB to switch between Meepos in order to cast Earthbind and Poof individually back-to-back.

(ei. W+Click+TAB+W+Click+TAB+Repeat to mass Poof)

Some tips for Not-Looking-Like-an-Idiot-With-Earthbind

Despite its fairly large AoE, Earthbind's relatively long cast time and travel time can make it a pain to land, especially early on when the number of nets are limited. It works much like a mix of Meat Hook and Ice Blast in that the farther the target is, the more you have to lead. Below is a visual that shows the general timings of the nets:

With these timings in mind, also note that movement speed represents the number of units travelled per second. So if a Hero with 300 movement speed that is 800 units away was moving in a straight line away from your location, then it will be at 1100 units away from your location after a second has passed.

Put into practice it would look like:

Dark Seer has 300 movement speed. The net will take around ~1.5 seconds so a ~450 unit lead is required.

Dark Seer has 522 movement speed. The net will take around ~1.8 seconds to land so a ~900 unit lead is required.

This really only works when your target is heading into a choke point or is just moving in a predictable fashion. Otherwise, you will want to slow your target with a couple stacks of Geostrike or throw a cascade of Earthbinds in order to catch your target.

Don't be afraid to waste nets mid game. You should have plenty of them to spare by then.

Blink Dagger Poof

If waddling over to the enemy team and tab-poofing is too dangerous, then a Blink Dagger is often bought to give Meepo some mobility. The way Blink Dagger Poof works is the secondary Meepos start channeling their Poof and the primary Meepo blinks to the target right before the first Meepo finishes Poofing to him. Step by step it looks like:


*It is important to note that Poof will transport to the Meepo closest to the target location at the END of the cast time.

You can also do this without Blink Dagger if you can position the primary Meepo without it and/or are sharp at landing Earthbinds

Here is a video demonstration by PxJ22: Play Video /dota-2/hero/meepo-95

Managing Your Private Army Throughout the Game

Hotkeys

Hotkey preferences differ from person to person and if you've been starting to learn with a certain layout, I'd highly recommend sticking to it.

Personally I use:

1 - Primary Meepo
2 - Meepo #2, 3, 4, 5
3 - All Meepos

(The following is used for split pushing and farming)
4 - Meepo #2 and #3
5 - Meepo #4 and #5

(The following is mostly for managing Boots of Travel)
F1 - Primary Meepo
F2 - Meepo #2
F3 - Meepo #3
F4 - Meepo #4
F5 - Meepo #5

Level 1-3

Meepo's laning presence is quite mediocre with his lack of a solid, reliable disable and low base damage. He is best either dual laning or soloing the mid or safe lane (Radiant bottom, Dire top).

Despite these shortcomings, he has some decent starting health and has ludicrous starting base armor and magic resistance and can survive solo if played defensively and cautiously. He is best paired with Heroes like Lich and Crystal Maiden who are excellent lane harassers that can get by without farm. It is in this stage that you want to hit 6 uncontested, so avoid dying and ask your lane partner to stack and pull the neutral camp consistently. You can get a Poor Man's Shield if the lane is particularly tough or if you need the extra damage.

If you plan on soloing, remember that Meepo's capability to mid isn't terrible, but he will give free farm to the enemy mid. However, there should not be a single hero that can completely kick a Meepo out of his lane with his high early EHP as long as he plays defensively and gobbles down Tangoes (with the possible exceptions to Huskar and Viper).

Once you hit level 4, you will get your first clone. Your Poof will not be strong enough at this point to jungle efficiently, however it is still recommended that you stack the hard camp with it for when you hit level 5/7. Otherwise, you can clear the small camp quite quickly. You will also gain two Earthbinds and Geostrikes and become a legitimate threat in the lane, provided you find the opportunity to be aggressive.

There is nothing more important than staying alive and gathering as much experience as possible until at least level 4.

Level 4-10

By around levels 4-7, your options start to open up. You can:

Make use of your doubled power and make some kill attempts with your lane partner(s) if your composition allows it.

Stay in lane with the primary Meepo and stack camps with the secondary for later farming (the best to pull a jungle camp for stacks are :53 and :51, the latter for ranged creep camps and/or well stacked camps).

Send the secondary to an empty lane to farm two at once (ei. Mid lane while the mid is ganking).

Jungle with both Meepos by stacking multiple camps at once. Remember the tip about movement speed, instead of trying to use quick hands, just distance your Meepo around 700 units away from a camp and order it to move in and out 2 seconds before the stack time. Assuming you have ~360 movement speed it will take you around 2 seconds to reach it, giving you plenty of time to stack with the other Meepo. You can chain commands with shift and aggro neutrals just by being next to them.

Ideally you want to participate in any ganks that occur with both Meepos at the scene, however if your team lacks the lineup or coordination it's better to farm for guaranteed experience. Keep in mind separating your Meepos will provide a decent escape mechanism in case one or the other is ganked.

Level 11-17

At level 11, you really start to pick up speed. You can use the secondary Meepos to jungle and push out lanes while your primary sticks with the team to help out in teamfights.

If you have your Aghanim's Scepter, you can Roshan by using Smoke of Deceit to sneak in and leaving a clone in the fountain to rotate for heals.

Level 18-25

By the time you hit level 18, you should have an Aghanim's Scepter and/or a fair amount of HP and should start being aggressive with your team, the clock is ticking! By this point I would recommend grouping your secondary Meepos into two pairs, one pair for pushing out lanes, and the other pair for jungling and occasionally pushing. Always save for buyback as you hit higher levels since your death time will get ridiculously long and remember that the longer the game endures, the more your snowball advantage will wear off.



The Meepo prime should be seperated from the clones to help his team out. Think of him as a dropship for your Meepo army.

Two Meepo clones are plenty for farming the jungle. Keep in mind that you can use the minimap to move and Poof them.

You can use the two remaining clones to keep the lanes pushed out and farmed.

Just watch out for ganks.

Item Choices

To Start

If you're going to a sidelane...

/

If you're going mid...

A Ring of Protection will help out against harassment and can be built into a Ring of Basilius for extra damage and mana regen. Remember to turn your Ring of Basilius off while laning to avoid pushing the lane, as well as turning it on when pushing to allow your creeps to tank some extra hits. The Iron Branches are mostly filler for some more health, mana, and damage for last-hitting and should be sold without hesitation to free up inventory slots.

A Stout Shield can be taken from the side shop to counter heavy harassment and should only be bought first if you anticipate that you will get zoned out without it. It can be built into a Poor Man's Shield from the side shop for extra damage if you started with it.

An extra set of Tangoes with a Stout Shield start will help you in the mid lane by giving you the ability to hide behind your high EHP by quaffing Tangoes.

An Orb of Venom's slow will stack directly with your Geostrikes, turning your measly 5-10% slow at level 4 into a formidable 17-22% slow. It should be gotten if you plan on being aggressive for early kill attempts.

Choice of Boots

Boots of Speed

You can get by with just a plain Boots of Speed if you want to start your Aghanim's Scepter immediately. Otherwise...

VS

VS

Power Treads

A "fight now" item, Power Treads will provide Meepo and his clones with increased health, mana, and damage (for taking hits, jungling and clearing empty lanes with Poof, and finishing off towers and neutrals, respectively) with a bit of extra micro (Tread-switching). As an added bonus it will give Meepo clones 200% of the stats with an Aghanim's Scepter. It can be skipped entirely for an quick Aghanim's Scepter and an eventual Boots of Travel.

Should be gotten first if: -The enemy team has burst damage (gives 152 health to Meepo, and his clones) -You are laning quite well and don't need extra regen -You want some early HP for teamfights -The mobility of the other boots isn't needed

Tranquil Boots

Provides a decent amount of armor and a great movement speed boost (though the latter is useless in ganks). It also provides a decent decent amount of health regen between fights. Its most recent rework, however, has made it far less effective for constant farming in the jungle with the lack of reliable health regeneration.

Should be gotten first if: -You need the regen to stay in lane -You plan on ganking another lane -The mobility will help your farm -You want something cheap so you can start on an Aghanim's Scepter ASAP

Boots of Travel

The most expensive boots in the game, it is not recommended to rush Boots of Travel as it will delay your other items (particularly Aghanim's Scepter) by quite a bit. It provides Meepo with extra global pushing power, however, and can be gotten as a mid-late game pickup to help split push. It is only effective as a rushed item if your team is far ahead and you can freefarm to make up for the cost.

Should be gotten first if: -You can afford to rush it and pay it off with safe farming -You want extra mobility to help deal with/join other global powers (such as Tinker and Nature's Prophet) -Your team can coordinate split pushes

Core Items

Aghanim's Scepter

With it's recent buff Aghanim's Scepter has become very powerful on Meepo, providing him and his clones more survivability with shared STR gain and opening up his builds and options with an extra clone to boot. It should be gotten ASAP to increase damage and exp gain and set up for future items.

Once this item is farmed up, the following items become potent pickups:

---

Reaver

A plain Reaver is a favored item for raw health as it is efficient on slots. It should only be upgraded to a Heart of Tarrasque if there is no inventory room and buyback money is not a concern.

Reaver

An Ogre Club is far less efficient on slots than a Reaver, but has much easier build-up. Highly recommended if you've rushed Boots of Travel and need an alternative that comes online faster.

Armlet of Mordiggian

Cheaper than a Reaver by 600 gold (about a minute of ideal farming) and only drains the health of the main Meepo. It gives the same 25 strength and can be considered if frequent armlet toggling is not a problem.

Ethereal Blade

Provides the most raw AGI in the game as well as a dabble of STR, giving the Meepo army the killing power of a woodchipper. It comes with a neat active as well which will disarm harder carries while leveraging damage from Poof. Can also be used on clones to keep them alive late game.

Drum of Endurance

A cost-efficient item, it gives almost the same amount of stats as an Ultimate Orb while giving a passive and active movement speed aura for your clones and the rest of your team.

Eye of Skadi

A very expensive luxury on Meepo. It provides a metric ton of stats for just one item slot, but the hefty price tag attached reserves it for extremely well-farmed Meepos.

Manta Style

Provides mediocre stats for the cost, but with an Aghanim's Scepter, your illusions will gain the 100% stat sharing and deal quite a bit of damage if they can survive.

---

Town Portal Scroll

A very valuable item to keep on Meepo at all times (the only Heroes that have an excuse not to carry one are ones with a spammable, true global teleport *cough* Nature's Prophet*cough*). This is especially true by Level 11 when you don't even have to send all your Meepos to the fountain if you use one and can use it to stay at full health between team fights and pushes.

Utilities

Blink Dagger

A great gap closer for Meepo. It isn't required, especially if you can consistently land Earthbind, but it does help against relentless crowd control and evasive targets.

Mekansm

Not an absolute core anymore with the Aghanim's buff, however it is still a decent pickup if rushed as it will greatly enhance your team's capability to fight and push.

Scythe of Vyse

A 3.5 second doom, disarm, and slow. The INT is shamefully wasted, but it is highly effective against BKB carries (before they can cast BKB), annoying casters, and...well everyone really.

Buyback

With Meepo's skyrocketing levels, his death times can get ridiculously high. Buybacks are pretty much a necessity by the time you hit your early 20s.

Medallion of Courage

Medallion leverages physical damage with armor reduction rivaling that of a Desolator, but is really only useful if your team has enough physical damage to make use of it.

Smoke of Deceit

Observer Ward

Smoke of Deceit is great for sneaking into Roshan, while both are valuable for map control via ganks and awareness. If nobody is buying Observer Wards, it is better to avoid ganks by squeezing out some hard cash over dying during a split-push or Roshan attempt.

Bloodstone Meepocolypse

An item that only gives more mana and health to the holder? Why would anyone in their right mind get Bloodstone on Meepo? Well, the answer is simple: it's bugged as hell for Meepo clones.

When a clone dies, the Bloodstone does not lose charges and will continue to reduce Meepo's absurd death times. With around 20 charges and a Boots of Travel, Meepo can perpetually push with his clones while the primary simply sits in base with an active Armlet of Mordiggian. Add in an Ethereal Blade and the enemy base will be reduced to woodchips with the slightest opportunities.

REJECTED

Desolator

The damage will become a complete waste. The armor reduction isn't worth it as most of Meepo's midgame damage comes from Poof anyway. If your team has decent physical damage output or you want to kill Roshan faster, grab a Medallion of Courage instead.

Butterfly

Meepo will not benefit from 75% of the stats. Ethereal Blade is much better against hard carries.

Cheese

Only the primary Meepo can use the heal. Best given to someone else that can make better use of it.

Divine Rapier

The best part of buying one? It'll drop at the primary Meepo's location on death so you can keep it at the fountain in case of an emergency. The worst part? You just spent 6200 gold on a shiny trophy.

Friends and Foes

As mentioned before, Meepo is one of the easiest heroes to counter due to his niche role, to the point where he can be completely countered accidentally in All Pick.

Friends of Our Handsome Rat

Babysitters

Good lane support will keep Meepo's poor defenseless behind intact while boosting his experience with pulls.

Special mention goes to Lich who can boost the EXP gain of Meepo and himself for a quick level 4 as well as set up kills.

Tough Guys

Initiators like Magnus can help set up painful chain- Poof and provide more control over large-scale fights.

Special mention goes to Elder Titan, who can set up chain- Poofs with Echo Stomp while making sure they feel the full pain of both Poof and Earth Splitter with his Natural Order aura and Warlock who can potentially amplify the damage of Poof by 100% on clumped targets.

Global Powers

Meepo can compliment other heroes with global mobility and spells, especially if he gets Boots of Travel

Special mention goes to Ancient Apparition who can amplify spell damage and whose Chilling Touch has amazing synergy with Meepo's clones, as well as Zeus who can maphack every 90 seconds.

Special Mentions

Treant Protector can help you lane, set up Poof with his eternal Overgrowth, and heal all your clones with Leech Seed. He is also a potent pusher.

Night Stalker gives free reign at nighttime and provides great map control. Meepo has 1800 night vision and will not mind the Darkness.

Dazzle can babysit somewhat well early game and can make use of Meepo clones to leverage his situational Shadow Wave nuke. He can also buff the clones' armor to brace for late game and save single clones against burst damage.

Shadow Shaman a great pusher that loves to complement Meepo's AoE damage. Also...PORK! CHICKEN! Seven seconds of hex!

The Masters of Pest Control

Harassers and Tri-Lanes

Heroes that can boot Meepo out of his lane will severely cripple him by delaying his ultimate. Meepo is also terrible against tri-lanes as he cannot be left alone for exp.

Special mention to Lich for his ability to consistently deny large amounts of exp from Meepo.

Counters: A strong babysitter, if you don't have one play more defensively and cautiously than you normally would. Ask for a lane switch when set against a tri-lane.

Tougher Guys

Heroes that can disable all Meepos at once can completely shut him down in teamfights. Harder carries can potentially turtle and outmatch him.

Special mention goes to Sven who can outcarry Meepo and cleave his ridiculous damage as well as Silencer who can make your clones waddling targets and seperate your army with his Global Silence.

Counters: Have a powerful intiator/counter-intiator. Seperate yourself from the rest of your team, keep your Meepos split until someone else initiates, ideally until the ultimate has been burned out already. Grab a Scythe of Vyse or Ethereal Blade against carries.

Nukers

Heroes that can burst down one Meepo in a short span of time will make easy prey of him early on, while those that can deal great amounts of AoE damage can put all of his Meepos low on health, forcing them all to retreat.

Special mention to Nyx Assassin who can go invisible.

Counters: Raw health from Power Treads and Aghs-boosted Reavers will help.

Special Mentions

Warlock's Upheaval can be interrupted by Earthbind, but he does have a massive AoE stun up his sleeve from Chaotic Offering that deals constant AoE damage and can amplify said AoE damage with Fatal Bonds.

Bloodseeker will gain the effects of Thirst for every individual Meepo. Combined with some AoE damage, he becames a scary, hard-hitting monster that can only be stopped with well-aimed Earthbinds.

Though it's a relatively short stun, there is no way to dodge Tidehunter's Ravage unless you plan on fighting with a single clone until the spell is burned (bad idea). Still annoying after popping his ultimate with his AoE Anchor Smash damage reduction and ability to shed Earthbind and Geostrike with Kracken Shell.

Drow Ranger is hell to lane against and has an AoE Silence. Later on, she is hard countered by a Blink Dagger since she will struggle if a single Hero is close enough to disrupt Marksmanship, more so with five of the buggers.

Slark is a mixed bag. On one hand, he is very slippery with his ability to shed off Earthbind and escape with Shadow Dance, but will be obliterated by Poof if he makes the mistake of using Pounce offensively on a Meepo...

#@%#%ING EARTHSHAKER

This hero was handtailored to counter Meepo before he was even created. A safe, reliable, long range AoE stun+nuke combined with a 4+ second close range AoE stun and a nuke that deals more damage the more targets are around...GG.

Counters: Your best bet is to grab a Blink Dagger and stock up on raw health. Use your Blink Dagger to fight well away from your team to avoid leveraging his Echo Slam damage. If his AoE stuns are just too much, grab a Scythe of Vyse and hope you will be able to catch him before he lands his abilities.

Conclusion

Meepo is a hero that can only be mastered with a lot of time and patience, but I hope this guide has been helpful and/or sparked some interest in playing him.

If you would like to view some competitive games of Meepo, N0tail from Fnatic is the only a player so far to have had decent competitive games as him like the game below:

A Competetive Meepo game Fnatic EU vs Baguette in the Defense 3 Play Video
You can search for other matches and live-stream games from his perspective.
Play Video

Changelog

6/28/13 Day 1
7/2/13 Grammar
7/4/13 More grammar, added more examples of allies and counters
7/10/13 Added an example of Divided We Stand's weakness in a long match, moved heading below the picture.
7/16/13 Added lore from WCIII and DotA 2
8/29/13 Bloodstone build addition
9/01/13 Added Ogre Club to item build choices
9/29/13 Added Mekansm to item build choices
10/17/13 Minor changes in anticipation for 6.79 (Hell yes)