Dota 2 is a complicated game with many moving parts that can seem very intimidating to new players. However, some heroes are far easier to get the hang of than others, and starting with one that is easy to understand and use makes learning the rest of the game a much more manageable task.
Dota 2 is one of the most popular video games in the world. It is an online battle arena game developed and published by Valve in 2013, so it has been around a long time. Despite its age, it still boasts an average of over 400 000 players daily.
This popularity has borne one of the biggest and most lucrative esports scenes. The flagship annual tournament, The International, boasts a prize pool of around $25-million, most of which is raised by fans of the game via the purchase of the battle pass. The Australian Dota 2 league is another major event on the calendar. It has helped make the game one of the most popular esports betting in Australia with betting sites such as PlayUp.
This on its own makes the game intimidating for new players because a lot of the people playing have been doing so for a very long time and know the game inside and out, so they can sometimes get frustrated with new players. And in case that wasn’t enough, there are 121 different playable characters to choose from, all with their own skills, spells, and abilities.
It isn’t just a case of picking a hero that sounds cool either because each hero fills one of four roles in the team, i.e. hard carry, midlaner, off-laner, or support, and teams need a balanced mix of heroes from these categories in order to be successful.
There is the fact that there are 208 items with unique and varying effects that any hero can buy with money earned during the game that can have a significant impact on the outcome. Some items work better on some heroes than others. Then there are neutral creep camps to be aware of, earning gold and experience to make your hero stronger, areas to place wards for vision to keep an eye on the enemy, and more.
There is a lot to learn when you start playing Dota 2, and the best way to learn is always by doing. So, with that in mind, these are the five best heroes for new players to pick so they have a little less to worry about, can learn the game a little easier, and, hopefully, still manage to make a positive impact for their team on the way.
Lich
The Lich is a support hero, so he does not have high health and dies pretty easily if you get caught out. However, as a ranged intelligence hero, it is way easier to be involved in fights without putting yourself too much at risk and have several powerful spells to throw into the equation. His support spell, frost shield, can be set on to auto-cast, which will automatically apply to nearby allies on cooldown but try not to become too reliant on this because it is more effective when cast manually.
Lion
Lion is another ranged, intelligence support hero that is actually even more squishy than Lich, but he has two disable spells to Lich’s zero. Disable renders the enemy unable to contribute to a team fight, whether it be a stun or a hex, by preventing them from casting spells and sometimes even from moving at all, which can be used to set up kills for your teammates. Additionally, his ultimate ability is one of the strongest in the game. It does over 1000 damage when fully leveled up, so you can literally delete some enemies with a single click.
Dragon Knight
Dragon Knight is an incredibly versatile hero that can be played in just about any role required of him by your team. Still, we recommend you use him as a support/tank because he has high health, a lot of armor, and one of his skills grants him passive regen so you can get healing without the need of teammates or items. He also has a long stun, and, best of all, his ultimate ability allows him to turn into a dragon. If that’s not enough to convince you to give this character a try, we aren’t sure what will.
Wraith King
Wraith King is similar to Dragon Knight in that he is tanky, has a good stun and tends to initiate fights for his team/ However, his one significant advantage over every other hero in the game, and the main reason why new players should use him when learning the game, is that his ultimate ability will bring you back to life when you die (as long as it isn’t already on cooldown from dying recently). Yes, you heard that right; there is a hero that allows you to have two bites at the apple. You should be aware, though, that because of this ability, Wraith King tends to get targeted first in every team fight, but as you get better, this will just become something else you can use to your advantage.
Axe
The final hero on our list is another big tanky boy, Axe. He is different from the other two because he is most often played as a midlaner or carry rather than a support class. The thing about Ax that makes him so suitable for new players is that you actively want the enemy to be attacking you as much as possible because most of his skills are based on taking damage from the opposite team. You want to be running straight at them like a headless chicken, which is what new players are best at anyway.
Avoid Agi Heroes
Some of you might notice a distinct lack of agility heroes, and that is by design. The power scaling of agility heroes makes them very difficult for new players to be effective with. They have neither the high health of strength heroes nor the magic power of intelligent characters at the start of the game.
Instead, most agi heroes are very weak at the start of the game and need time, experience, and items to become incredibly powerful and impactful later on. It is especially hard for new players to pull off because everyone knows what they are trying to do and targets them. That being said, when you become more familiar with the game, they are just as fun and rewarding as the other characters.