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Carry
Carries are heroes who scale well with items and levels, allowing them to become extremely powerful later on. Carries typically have abilities that improve their physical damage output and overall durability or mobility. Carries can range from slow-moving, but devastating brutes with massive damage and resilience, to long-ranged auto-attackers that gun down their foe from afar, to highly mobile and evasive heroes that, once they farm their stats up, can jump on and eliminate just about anyone. Carries, more than any other role, value raw increases in stats, which improve their combat ability even more dramatically than normal, with items like Satanic, with it's powerful, but short-lived 200% lifesteal to serve as an on-demand Heroic Second Wind, Black King Bar to grant temporary immunity to most abilities, and Daedalus to vastly increase their damage output.
Carries are divided into Hard Carries and Semi Carries in competitive jargon. Hard Carries, referred to as position 1, are extremely vulnerable early on, with the potential to become all but unstoppable if fully farmed. A Hard Carry will often sit in safe, or at least relatively secure territory, farming for much of the early and mid game before joining the fray decisively. In comparison, a Semi-carry, also known as position 2, is at least partially self-sufficient early on, and is expected to fend for themselves, and tend to become powerful based on levels alone, although gold can definitely help, but lack the sheer late-game power of a Hard Carry note .
Archetypal Hard Carries include the likes of Phantom Assassin and Sven, while Archetypal Semi Carries include Storm Spirit and Drow Ranger.
- The Hero: Carries are often the center of their team's strategy, especially later into the game, and take center stage in most promotional material.
- The Lancer: By contrast, a Semi Carry usually ends up functioning like this to another Hard Carry on the same time, with the Semi Carry's earlier power spike helping to smooth over the rough patches of a Hard Carry's early game.
- Magikarp Power: Carries, especially Hard Carries tend to be much weaker than the norm early on, in exchange for their potential power in the late-game.
- Money Multiplier: As a corollary to their reliance on farm, many carries have abilities that help them get that farm faster, ranging from killing creeps faster, getting more gold from them, to simply getting from one pack of creeps to the next faster.
Support
Supports are heroes who support their team in various ways with their abilities and buy items which benefit their teammates. There are many different archetypes of support, from those who provide buffs for their allies, those who heal and defend allies, lock down enemies, and so on. Supports generally are item independent and invest their gold in items such as Observer and Sentry Wards and Dust of Appearance to provide vision and counter invisibility. When supports do get items, they typically buy items which benefit their allies, such as a Vladimir's Offering giving their allies lifesteal, a Force Staff to bail them out of trouble, or an Urn of Shadows to heal between fights.
Supports are divided into Hard Supports and Farmed Supports in competitive jargon. Hard Supports, referred to as position 5, are the ultimate self-sacrificing players, the person who will jump in front of a bullet to save their carry, buy every ward, and end the game with an abysmal net worth, all for the team. By contrast, Farmed Supports, referred to as position 4, tend to focus on getting items that enable them to use their abilities to the fullest, such as Blink Dagger, Aghanim's Scepter, or even a farming item to potentially scale to becoming more of a traditional Carry.
Archetypal Hard Supports include Crystal Maiden and Lich, while Farmed Supports include Mirana and Sand King.
- Butt-Monkey: The hard carry may be the team's high-profile target, but the hard support is often the easiest. Without gold to afford items for themselves, supports usually end up as the team Squishy Wizard and have to often wander off alone to plant wards, meaning they'll often run into enemy ganks and quickly die; even in teamfights, their disruptive spells often give the enemy plenty of incentive to Shoot the Mage First, and teams will abandon their support to die if necessary to get the carry safely out of a bad situation. They usually end up having the worst kill/death ratios on their team as a result.
- Character Select Forcing: Teams can sometimes win without a true Hard Carry. Teams usually can't win without at least one support, simply because the team needs at least one hero to sacrifice themselves so there's enough room for greedier heroes to farm, and have wards to detect ganks.
- Crutch Character: Thanks to their item independence, a low-level support is fairly capable by themselves, but scale with items poorly.
- Divergent Character Evolution: Farmed Supports are one of the newest roles in Dota, not really emerging as a cohesive role until 2015. Prior to that, there were few viable support items, and supports would rarely find space on the map to get any gold, so dual supports were still pretty similar. These days, Farmed Supports are more easily able to get gold through talents, Bounty Runes, and increased team kill gold, and there're a lot more items they can prioritize.
- The Heart: Because supports don't need to focus on farming, they are more able to promote team play and mediate disputes. In fact, most professional teams have their captain play the hard support role.
- The Medic: Supports are usually the ones to grab healing items such as Urn of Shadows and Mekansm.
- The Smart Guy: Being on Ward duty effectively puts you in Intelligence and Counter-Intelligence role.
- Support Party Member: Yes.
Utility
Utility heroes are the ones in between true carries and true supports. Oftentimes, they're something of a catchall; they can be carries run in the offlane that focus on building aura items, supports that have had a good start, or midlaners who build defensive items. However, generally, they fall into two archetypes: tanky heroes with some form of initiation or frail heroes with some form of escape, and are put in the offlane, where their skills allow them to farm against the opponent while also gaining items that support the team as a whole, but are too expensive for support heroes to rush. In competitive jargon, they tend to be referred to as the 3 role.
Archetypal tanky utility heroes are Tidehunter and Dark Seer, while archetypal evasive utility heroes include Pugna and Weaver.
1-2-3-4- 5
Competitive jargon used to refer to positions, roles, and heroes quickly and casually. Positions 1, 2, and 3 are referred to as "cores" as they have a gold and experience priority, while positions 4 and 5 are "Supports".
- The 1 is usually the Hard Carry, and is run in the safe lane or mid.
- The 2 is usually the Semi Carry, or a secondary Hard Carry, and is run in safe lane or mid.
- The 3 is usually the "Offlaner", a utility hero with some useful spells, often an Initiator, and is usually run in the offlane. On occasion, the 3 will be a third carry, or at least have the potential to grow into one if they have a good start.
- The 4 is usually the Farmed Support, and can be found as a roamer, jungler, in the offlane with the 3, or as part of a trilane in safelane. Farmed supports can have some overlap with the 3 role, as utility heroes often fade in and out of popularity as cores or supports, or the way an individual game plays out.
- The 5 is the Hard Support, and is almost always found in the safe lane supporting the 1.
Lanes
Mid Lane
Middle lane is the archetype of the one on one of Dota, and the only lane where the creep equilibrium, towers, and pathways are completely equal. Mid Heroes tend to fit into a few archetypes that take advantage of this; gankers who want to take advantage of the Power Runes to help their side lanes, experience hungry heroes who want the solo experience to get an early advantage, and pressure heroes who shut down their opponent. Historically, this used to be the lane where initiator heroes would farm, but these days it has evolved into more of a Carry role. Mid is typically either the 1 (Hard Carry) or 2 (Semi Carry) role.
Archetypal Mid Heroes include Invoker, Shadow Fiend, and Templar Assassin.
- Healing Potion: The most vital item that the Mid laner needs is the Bottle, which recovers HP and MP and have their charges refreshed when bottling runes. If you're refilling your Bottle charges at the fountain, chances are, you're losing the lane.
- Herd-Hitting Attack: Heroes in the Mid lane need AOE spells or passives with short cooldown to gain as much last hits as possible in a short amount of time to gain advantage over the enemy Mid lane and eventually buy one of their core items before the enemy does.
- Solo Class: Mid-lane heroes fight one-on-one with the enemy mid-laner, unlik the other lanes which are usually the domain of two heroes.
Safe Lane
Safe lane is where Heroes can farm lane creeps more comfortably and eventually go out of control if they have enough gold and experience, with the tower more forward to the creep equilibrium adjacent to the jungle where lane creeps can be pulled into and deny the enemy Off Lane experience and gold, is more difficult to gank from for the enemy and easier for heroes to escape into. The tower being more forward means that less time is used traveling to the lane creeps from the tower via TP scrolls, and if a hero is getting ganked, other allies can teleport into the fight faster. Either the 1 (Hard Carry) or 2 (Semi Carry) and a Support role are usually here.
Archetypal Safe Lane Heroes include Medusa, Phantom Lancer, and Chaos Knight.
- Hero Secret Service: Usually what the safe lane entails: one carry farming up to their heart's content, while one or two supports protect them from enemy ganks and harassment and try to bully the enemy's offlane heroes away.
- Non-Action Guy: Because safe lane carries tend to be of the Magikarp Power variety, and the laning phase means they're very much still in the "Magikarp" stage, they'll usually prioritize staying out of trouble and last-hitting creeps over trying to actually have a go at the enemy (the supports take care of opposing heroes for them).
Off Lane
Off lane is where it is more difficult farm, but needs to harass enemy Heroes and deny creeps in the Safe lane in order to prevent them from having an early advantage. Unlike the safe lane, the tower is much farther from the creep equilibrium and has more travel time to the creeps, is harder from to escape without TP scrolls or any of their escape skills, and almost no way to deny lane creeps with their side of the jungle due to how the map is designed. Either Initiators or 4 (Farmed Supports) are here.
Archetypal Off Lane Heroes include Magnus, Dark Seer, and Phoenix.
- Iron Butt Monkey: Off lane heroes have it rough - given the difficulty in controlling the lane, they'll often be unable to score too many last hits and be constantly harassed by enemy supports, and the best they can usually do is try to deny as many creeps as possible. However, they usually rely on the lane's experience more than the gold, so they often make it into mid-game perfectly fine (as long as they don't get stomped too badly).
- Solo Class: While not always the case, the offlaner can sometimes hold their lane solo if both supports are sent to the safe lane.
Jungle
Jungle refers to heroes who sit in the jungle and farm neutrals from the start of the game, which can be safe, good farm, but also puts the team's other lanes at a disadvantage. Jungle heroes tend to fall into either a farmed support role or function as semi-carries.
Archetypal Jungle heroes include Chen and Enchantress as supports and Enigma and Legion Commander as semi-carries.
- Nerf: One of the hardest in Dota history. Jungle used to be a notoriously Simple, yet Awesome role and a Skill Gate Character in pubs, as well as still being a way to counteract a heroes having a bad start. Valve started with creeps spawning every other minute, but after that was very unpopular, shifted to just making creeps give much less gold as well as removing two items that nearly every jungler depended on, Iron Talon and Poor Man's Shield. These days, Jungle roles are considered borderline unplayable at every level of play.
- Simple, yet Awesome: Prior to being nerfed, Jungle used to be absurdly fast for some heroes, leading to things like hitting level 5 by 3 minutes into the game, or having a Blink Dagger at 7 minutes. While it required some skill, it wasn't nearly as difficult as some of the harder Heroes or strategies.
- Skill Gate Characters: A Jungler is perhaps the lane most prone to ganks, especially since most Junglers are greedy and don't want to buy wards to detect those ganks. But in uncoordinated lower levels of play, an uncontested Jungler could farm freely and emerge from jungle after farming and feel unstoppable, which was one of the reasons it was nerfed into unplayability.
Roam / Gank
Roamers are heroes who start the game by wandering around the map, trying to help their teammates secure a lane advantage, grabbing runes, and farming a few camps along the way. Because they're often not getting much gold, this is usually a support role, often the 4 (Farmed Support), who will duck into the jungle to farm or farm a lane later in the game to catch back up. Roamers often have a mobility skill or invisibility to assist them in moving between lanes.
A Ganker is slightly different from a Roamer, in that they'll start in a lane (usually Offlane) and then start ganking the enemy around the map once they have some significant early game levels or items. Gankers can be supports, but can also be utility cores as well, and so they hover around the 3 to 4 role in competitive jargon.
Archetypal Roamers include Earth Spirit and Bounty Hunter, while archetypal Gankers include Spirit Breaker and Nightstalker.
- Difficult, but Awesome: Probably the hardest "lane" to start in, because without proper management of time and farm, it's really easy to fall behind in experience. But a good roamer can set up first blood, snipe a courier, and grab bounty runes for the team, setting them up for a great early game.
Official Roles
Nuker / Burst
Nuke heroes excel at eliminating enemies quickly with overwhelming firepower. Nuke heroes are usually reliant on magical damage and split between those who destroy enemies in a matter of seconds and those who inflict punishing damage over time in a huge area. “Burst” is a more general term that includes nukers as well as heroes who inflict massive amounts of physical damage instead of magical damage.
Archetypal Nuker heroes include Lina and Invoker, while Archetypal physical Burst heroes include Ursa and Juggernaut.
- Surprisingly Sudden Death: Along with an Initiator, all it takes is one good disable and high damage spells to take out an enemy hero out of position, if they're not durable enough, and they need to invoke this if they don't want the enemy to react fast enough to either escape or turn the tides against them.
Durable
Units who are tanky to take an onslaught of attacks and still survive team fights. Their job is to survive and use their presence to pressure the enemy into focusing onto them, and if built well enough, becoming legitimate threats if they're not focused down.
Archetypal Durable heroes include Abaddon and Medusa.
Disabler
- Boring, but Practical: Let's not mince words here: Disables are crucial, they can turn teamfights into massacres. But most Disables are part of Support's skillset, and people in general don't want to be stuck with Ward duty.
- Cycle of Hurting: A scant few heroes have two hard Disables*. Using these two back-to-back allows them to cc their target for a very unhealthy 6 seconds, enough time to kill even their farmed Carry, barring gross level/item gap. Alternatively, they can Disable two out of 5 of their enemies, turning the teamfight into a 5 vs 3.
Escape
Pusher
Pushers must do one thing very well: Push Lanes. They usually have AOE spells, cleave, or controlable minions to eliminate lane creeps very fast and destroy towers to both gain advantage and deny the enemy a TP warp point, and eventually enemy barracks to create Super lane creeps on that lane, creating further pressure.
Archetypal Pusher heroes include Phantom Lancer, Tinker, and Broodmother.
- Demolitions Expert: Their job description. These heroes are infamous for taking down towers and forts by themselves.
- Herd-Hitting Attack: Many Pushers possess easily spammable area-of-effect abilities, such as Leshrac and Sven, to quickly cleave through enemy creeps and minimize damage to their own so their creeps can heap more damage on enemy towers.
- The Minion Master: Almost all Pusher heroes have minions to aid in sieges, from only 1 (Lone Druid) to the myriad (Broodmother).
Initiator
Dynamic Entry, the heroes. Initiators start a team fight by pulling enemies out of position or hitting them with a huge AOE disable. They often double as Solo heroes, and are classically run in the offlane; as such, Initiator heroes often function on getting utility items or items that increase their chances of getting a good jump. But there are plenty of Initiator heroes who are carries or supports as well.
Archetypal Initiator Heroes include Tidehunter, Magnus, and Puck.
- Begin with a Finisher: The entire point of the class. Initiators tend to possess at least one large area-of-effect disable, often a huge and flashy ultimate, that can throw the enemy into disarray, and it's their job to start a fight with that ability.
- Difficult, but Awesome: Considered one of the hardest roles in the game as the right initiation is often the deciding factor of an entire game, and a bad initiation can be a deciding factor for the enemy as well.
- Too Awesome to Use: The biggest initiation skill can really grant an advantage during teamfights, coupled with long cooldown. Biggest of them is Enigma's Black Hole.
Unofficial Roles
Save
Saving heroes, also referred to as 'defensive' by some, are heroes who have skills that allow them to help allies, such as heals, shields, mobility skills, and so on. Most save heroes are supports, though some are other roles. Additionally, many heroes augment their skills with items that can be used to save allies, like Force Staff and Glimmer Cape.
Archetypal Save heroes include Dazzle, Oracle, and Omniknight.
- White Mage: Save heroes often prioritize the well-being of their carry, and often have abilities capable of throwing down clutch heals, dispels, or other defensive benefits. Their items of choice often also revolve around protecting allies.
Solo
Solo heroes are heroes who can handle things by themselves, which frees up supports to help other heroes around the map. Solos are generally either highly durable (Tidehunter), highly mobile (Puck), or both (Timbersaw). Solo heroes are often played in the offlane, but can be run in the safe lane or mid, depending on the team lineup. As the laning stage breaks down into the mid game, Solo becomes less of a significant role as teams move as units and heroes get more powerful, but the laning stage can decide the entire tempo of a match, and solo heroes can be critical to scoring a draft advantage.
Archetypal Solo heroes include Tidehunter, Nature's Prophet, and Timbersaw.
Vision
Being able to see your opponent can dictate the entire pace of the game, and some heroes have skills which give them vision on the map. This usually comes in the form of summoned units or unobstructed flying vision in an area around a hero or skill. While vision is a rare role, it is significant enough to sway draft decisions towards or against a hero.
Archetypal Vision heroes include Beastmaster, Venomancer, and Treant Protector.
- Cash Gate: Some heroes have their primary vision skills as their Aghanim's upgrade, namely Nightstalker, Keeper of the Light, and Treant Protector.
- Defog of War: By definition, these heroes can provide map vision in some way to spot enemies ahead of time.
Global
Dota is often a game limited by movement around the map, which is the reason every hero builds Boots of Speed. A very few heroes are able to move around the map far more quickly than a hero with ordinary escape, which allows them to be flexible hybrid pushers and teamfighters at the same time. This comes at the cost of exposing themselves to ganks and requiring more self aware play, but can turn the tides of a match.
Archetypal Mobility heroes include Ember Spirit, Tinker, and Nature's Prophet
- Difficult, but Awesome: Global heroes require much better reading of the map, as well as noticing when enemy heroes go missing. But they offer a toolkit that very few heroes have access to.
