Duo bot?... DUO MID!

[quote=Epiin]I would like to ask a fundimental question: from my first days playing DoTA; why has it always been solo mid? The answer to that is simple enough in theory: you want your most powerful player in the middle so they can influence a larger portion of the map more quickly. I would like to take a hard look at the old paradigm; let's start with a pros/cons list. [b]SOLO MID/DUO BOT[/b] PROS: -highest level/fed player has a larger sphere of influence. -the other team has thier solo in mid (you want to stay at the same level) -it's tradition CONS: -middle tower is the most important (gives you the largest "safe zone" in the game) and the death of your mid can quickly turn into losing mid tower. -middle lane is the easiest to gank (harder and more expensive to ward) because it is easy to turn a 1v1 into a 1v3. The 3x1-2 (3solos-duo bot) can quite easily be countered by a 1x5(everyone is solo because of a "roamer"). Against a roamer setup middle will be RELENTLESSLY ganked and is almost garunteed to be underleveled. Also it is simply harder to gank the sides because there are less entry points so it is easy to ward, so why not tuck your 2 solos into a safe(r) place on the sides. lets look at a typical 3x1-2 vs 1x5 10ish minute mark. Your solo mid is already underleveled and underfarmed because he is getting zoned by the potential 3 people in mid, he cant keep up wards because any roamer worth his/her salt is killing all of them. He has to choose between wasting money on wards (that get eaten) to stay alive and get exp or save the money and get zoned/killed from overextending. At this point your duo bottom is already the same level as your mid and your mid is only 1 level above thier roamer. Your mid gets ganked nonstop and you have to constantly help it or you WILL lose the tower. You may be thinking "but this, but that" [u]no matter what[/u] a conventional carry mid in a 3x1-2 will ALWAYS lose levels/farm to a roamer team. The threat on his/her life is far too great to ever get close enough and get a 50% CS (killing 50% of each wave). Now I am making it sound as if Roaming is gods gift to league, that isn't true. Roaming is a strat that effectively counters the current lane setup, [b]but[/b] [u]Roaming itself has a counter and that is shifting your duo bot to [b]duo mid[/b][/u] How does this counter 1x5 you ask? Well the answer is complicated as it is made up of lots of tiny factors. 1) it is harder to gank/zone/blow summoners 2 lvl 6's than it is to do 1 lvl 8 2) it is harder to gank/zone/blow summoners the side lanes 3) during early lane phase top/bot only needs 1 ward each; in the river bush 4) during early lane phase mid needs a minimum of 2 wards; north/south river bushes 5) gives control of the middle lane back to your team and makes the roamer less effective 6) easier to protect your 2 wards with 2 people if you see the roamer beating on it. 7) losing top/bot outer tower isn't as bad as losing mid. 8) same distance to dragon 9) [b]better gank on dragon[/b] bush setup lets your get closer without being seen. 10) easier to help top since you have an extra body in mid; shifting one player up is less dangerous than shifting two players up (1 from mid to top + 1 from bot to mid) 11) increases your team's sphere of influence even further as two in mid has more map dominance than one in mid. Everything I know about strategy tells me to concentrate my forces (or make it look concentrated) at the most critical points of defense/offense. During lane phase the two most critical locations on the map are middle tower and dragon. That is why I think a 3x1-2mid is far superior to a 3x1-2bot.[/quote]

[quote=DEWO]Mid is used as a solo (unless a jungler bla bla bla) becouse it is the easiest way to get ganks going that is for one. Other thing is that it is hard to kill som1 there since the tower to tower range is way shorter which makes it nearly impossible to kill som1 there. 2 ppl on mid vs 1 (that you will usualy see there) will make you push minions very fast to the enemy team and sit doing nothing. You wont towerdive with an enemy champion at it, and he can towerhug anyway, and get the xp going on his belhaf anyway since you will be pushing creeps very fast.[/quote]

[quote=cavemaneca]If you're only getting the last hits, even with both players, then the lane doesn't push any faster than a single player getting all of the same last hits. You can also use both characters to simply zone out mid, get only 50% CS, and even though this is less gold and XP, it's a lot more than the ZERO gold and XP the other person is getting. As well, it's EASIER to initiate a gank on top or bottom, since you can leave one person in mid while doing it. OR, you could initiate on both top and bottom at the same time if necessary. As for it being harder to kill someone in mid, that depends on who the champ is, who the enemy champs are, and where mid gets hit. In mid, it can easily go from 1v1 to 1v3, and you WILL NOT have time to get back to your tower, especially with stuns/exhaust. Mainly I want to point out, that I don't think that 1/2/1+1 (top/mid/bot+Jungler) or any variation where there are 2 champs in mid is always the BEST way of laning, but I still think in the correct situation it could be a better strategy than the standard way of doing it. Like ALL strategies, there is never the BEST/AWESOME/KILLER way of doing something, it all depends on what the enemy is doing. So, with that in mind... here's a couple questions that it would be better to work on. What situation, if any, would it be better to have 2 champs mid? What do you do if the enemy team uses a 2 mid strategy? If you are using a 2 mid strategy, what are the weak points you need to be watching? In other words, if a team chooses a 2 mid strategy, what is the counter, and if countered, what's the best response to the counter?[/quote]

[quote=Bernarnar]Don't you get more exp in mid, or is that a myth?[/quote]

[quote=Grogolog]sounds like a very nice strategy to use if and only if the enemy decides to have a roamer as well as a jungler[/quote]

[quote=JunSupport]I've seen a triple mid, duo-solo once. The solos laned like pros and one even got first blood, but one the midders was a feeder. So it didn't go quite as well as it could have. Our mid was pretty gimped, but the feeder helped us balance it out. Early game would have been pretty rough if it weren't for the feeding. :P[/quote]

[quote=DEWO][quote=Bernarnar] Don't you get more exp in mid, or is that a myth? [/quote] More, no. Faster, yes. But not much. Why you get faster, becouse it takes less time for creeps to get to you while in mid. Anyway... it is not even something you should bother with :P[/quote]

[quote=Trojan995]No. Mid is solo because it's the HARDEST to gank. Any non overextending champion is only a flash's distance away from the tower at any given time - you have to either Alistar headbutt the enemy back, or you have to towerdive like mad/catch an overextender to get a good gank mid. Most of the high elo players that get ganked mid so often are because they're so aggressive (regi) or they push with the intent of taking the tower too often (HSGG's heimerdinger). Also, DEWO made a good point - minions get there faster, thus faster EXP gain. This is imperative for a mid carry who needs as much of a late-game advantage as possible. They can farm almost relentlessly (especially if they can farm like corki) and escape easily (especially if they can escape like crki).[/quote]

[quote=B-Wong]Mid hardest to gank. 2 bot for dragon control.[/quote]