The “suicide lane” refers to your team’s long lane. For the Radiant this would be the top lane, while for the Dire this is the bottom lane. The reason that the long lane is referred to as the “suicide” lane is because of the fact that it forces you to lane on the enemies’ side of the map, making you very susceptible to ganks. Doing well in the suicide lane is never an easy task, but with a bit of practice and a bit of knowledge you can do very well.

Whether you are with a friend or running it solo, doing well in this lane requires three main things: good spacing, constant vision, and good mana management. Here I’ll guide you on how to do well in the suicide lane and give you a few pointers on how to improve your game.

What types of heroes should go into the suicide lane?

You will generally want to send ranged heroes that have some sort of escape mechanism and the ability to last hit from afar. A few great examples of a good side lane solo would be Puck and Windrunner. Puck is great as a side lane solo because of the fact that he can use his Phase Shift to avoid a lot of abilities and damage. He can also use his Illusory Orb to gain some last hits or as an escape mechanism. Windrunner is great because of her Windrun and Powershot ability. Powershot will let you harass and last hit from afar while her Windrun ability will let you run away really fast while avoiding all physical attacks.

Some melee heroes are also good to put in the suicide lane, although it will always be harder for them in comparison to their ranged counterparts. A few good side lane solos include Broodmother and Clockwork. Broodmother is great because her web keeps her safe, allowing her to pop in and out of invisibility to steal a few creep kills. Her Spawn Spiderlings ability is also great for harassing heroes and getting last hits on creep. Clockwork is also a good suicide laner because of the fact that he can use his rockets to gain some last hits and also scout out the area for any potential ganks.

As you can see, all of these examples have a few things in common. All of them have some sort of ability that allows them to last hit from afar and some sort of ability that will prevent them from dying. You will always need these sorts of abilities when you are in the suicide lane so that you will be able to achieve your goals and progress.

What are my goals in this lane?

Your goal in this lane is to try and control the lane as much as possible. Try your best to pull your creep wave close to your tower so that you will be a lot safer from ganks and a lot more comfortable when farming. You will also need to gain a lot of last hits so that you can keep up with the enemies’ item progression. Having no last hits or levels will essentially make you a dead weight, as you will feed every time you get engaged into combat. Also, do your best to deny as many creeps as possible so that you deny farm and experience to their carry, making you gradually out-level and out-item (replace this word) them.

Most importantly, DO NOT DIE. Dying will cause you to lose any advantage that you’ve been able to gather from all of your hard work. Your death not only hurts your own gold and experience gain, but also drastically increase your opponents as they will allow free farm your creeps without any fear. By the time you get back to your lane, your opponents will be higher level than you and have better items than you, making your job a whole lot tougher than before. Remember to always keep a good amount of space between you, your enemy, and any possible gankers. Try your best to stay alive, even if you have to give up a couple of last hits and experience in the process.

How do I get good spacing?

Ranged heroes:
Try to always stay at the edge of your attack range, which is usually around 600 range for most ranged heroes. If you are trying to harass other heroes, try not to go closer than 300 range of the enemies creep. To put this into perspective, if you’ve walked forward for more than one second to try to harass the enemy hero, then you’ve gone too far.

Melee heroes:
Stay around 300 range away from the creep line and walk in to steal a few last hits/denies. If their support hero is being very aggressive, then you have no choice but to stay back and use your abilities to gain your last hits. In this case, follow the Ranged hero rules.

Both:

Also remember to always keep your hero moving. It will be harder for the enemy to set up stuns and ganks when you are constantly moving, as it will keep them guessing. Heroes with skill shot abilities might actually miss since they will have to predict your movement in order to hit you. If you see enemies coming towards your lane to gank you, then stay about 1200 range away from the enemies’ creep, which is the maximum distance you can be from creep while still gaining experience. In order to measure this distance, simply look at your hero. If you can barely see both your hero and the creep, then you are at about 1200 range.

Puck is approximately 1200 range away from the creep, making it close enough to stay within XP range.

One way to make artificial space between you and your enemy is to keep your harassment high. With your opponent constantly on the back foot, you will have created more space for yourself, giving yourself more wiggle room to work with. This is called artificial space for a reason, however, since they can very easily get rid of it by either regenerating their health or harassing you back. Do not, however, underestimate the power of good harassment. Constant harassment can make the player feel weak, making your lane a lot easier as they hesitate to last hit or retaliate.

How do I keep constant vision of my opponents?

Make sure to always keep a healthy supply of Observer Wards with you. If you are on the Radiant, you will want to keep wards up in the following areas:

This ward will block their pulling camp and give a small amount of vision of their lane.

This ward will give you a lot of vision of their jungle, allowing you to flee from any incoming heroes.

If you are on the Dire side:

This ward will block their pulling camp and give a small amount of vision of their jungle.

This ward will give you vision of the rune while also providing you with tons of vision of their jungle, letting you escape incoming ganks.

Also make sure to get some sentry wards if the enemy kills your wards off so that you can put new wards down. Vision is key to survival, so buying wards and counter-wards is always a viable purchase.

How do I manage my mana?

This will probably be the hardest concept to grasp as a newer player. Knowing when and how to spend your mana will take a lot of practice. My general rule of thumb is to always keep about 1.5x the amount of mana your escape mechanism costs. For example, Windrun costs 100 mana. That means you should always keep around 150 mana on yourself at all times. Whenever you can cast a spell and stay above this threshold, then do it.

There may be a few situations where you may need every bit of mana for your escape mechanism, or there may be situations where you can just use all of your mana to harass and get last hits. In these situations, try to judge for yourself how your mana should be spent and go with it. The only way to learn how to push your hero to their limits is by experimentation. Sometimes you may fail, and sometimes you may succeed. In either case you will grow as a player and be better because of it.

Extra Tips:

-If the enemy still manages to pull their creep, you should go in there and try to steal the last hits. Remember to stay a safe distance away though since you are getting quite deep into their territory.

-If an enemy pull allows your creep to freely hit on the tower, then forgot about stealing last hits and hurt the tower! Permanent tower damage is much more important than stealing a bit of gold away from the carry, since dead towers offer so much more to your team.

That’s it! Now you’re fully equipped and ready to dive into the suicide lane. If you have any further questions, make sure to leave a comment down below and I’ll do my best to answer! Thanks for reading :D