Instructions on how to confront Lycan in Dota 2

Patch 7.07 Dota 2 introduces many changes to Lycan’s stats and healing ability. Along with the revised talent bar, Lycan is getting stronger and stronger, dominating pubs at all levels with a win rate of nearly 56%. This success was also replicated in the professional scene, where Lycan was picked more often with a win rate similar to that in pubs.

So how do we deal with Lycan?

HIT RANGE AND HEALTH LOCKDOWN

Lycan is a very difficult hero to keep (lockdown). The hero’s ultimate can be interrupted, but once successfully transformed, Lycan cannot be slowed, just like Weaver’s Shukuchi. As a result, stuns are always better than slows against Lycan, especially long-range AoE spells. Keeping Lycan is important, but let’s not forget Lycan’s minion army, as they can also handle team supports on their own.

Earthshaker is a good counter to Lycan. ES not only stuns long range AoE, Fissure also uses it to block escape, forcing Lycan to fight instead of running away. The Fissure block can be used to keep the highground in front of Lycan, preventing the hero and his army from closing in on the tower. Echo Slam is the best counter against Lycan, able to ‘take poison to cure poison’ with his followers. However, Earthshaker is not currently a strong support in the game, so you need to consider other options to counter Lycan if possible.

Ice Shards of Tusk works pretty much like Fissue, stopping Lycan instead of locking the leg. Snowball is the move to initiate combat at long range and Walrus Punch is the move to keep Lycan at bay. While Frozen Sigil cannot slow Lycan’s movement speed while transformed, it still slows Lycan’s attack speed and minions.

Ax is also worth mentioning here. Bererker’s Call is a great move against lane pushers like Lycan. In addition, Elder Titan also counters Lycan well, especially Elder Titan’s aura can make Lycan weak against magic damage.

Another hero worth mentioning, although not able to lock legs very well, but Brewmaster’s Ultimate is very strong against Lycan, as this hero has the ability to toss Lycan into the sky for quite a long time and deal 1000 damage with the followers of Lycan. While it can’t instantly kill the wolves at Level 4 or the Necronomicons, Brewmaster’s move does considerable damage and makes cleanup easier. Dispel Magic also only has a 4 second cooldown, so it can be used at least 3 times during combat, enough to kill all of the minions.

CONTINUOUSLY SELECT NOT PUSH

Lycan’s great strength lies in the ability to take turrets without much difficulty. Aside from Necrobook, Lycan doesn’t have many long cooldowns, while Shapeshift isn’t that important for pushing lanes.

To prevent lycan from pushing turrets, heroes need to have a long range nuke, so they don’t get into situations where Lycan can hunt supports. In addition to the heroes mentioned above, there are also other champions worth using such as Winter Wyvern or Legion Commander. Both of these heroes have long range push-ups thanks to their strong utilmates that can kill Lycan.

However, Lycan players can deal with these situations by going up Pipe of Insight, a fairly common item when playing Lycan. This is not to say that any anti-push method is useless, teams need to use multiple combos to be able to counter Lycan.

“PUT ON THE FOREST OF LYCAN”

A joke in the Dota 2 community is to “ward the jungle it” when someone asks for advice on how to handle the enemy hero. This joke comes from ganking Lycan in pubs, as the hero has the ability to jungling and lane farming which is very easy and very annoying to handle. Now, Lycan doesn’t farm as early as before, but those are ways to deal with Lycan, but “it’s easy to say but difficult to do”. Like any other carry, keeping Lycan in the lane and blocking supplies and supports is one way to deal with Lycan, but it’s not an easy job.

A better way is to pick heroes that push faster than Lycan. Despite being able to push lane well, Lycan can’t defend the opponent’s push phase. If you’re breaking tier 3, what Lycan can do is split push. Lycan’s teamfight ability is almost non-existent, but Howl cannot be underestimated at night. And as mentioned, Shapeshift allows Lycan to hunt supports, even in teamfight.

Like any other pusher, Lycan also relies on building a lot. Delaying taking the first turret, taking Roshan, or pushing the highground will give your team more time to build the necessary items. Not being able to eat turrets will have a bad effect on Lycan, since he can’t farm as fast as other carries.

NO REAL DIFFERENT ITEM

Unlike every other carry, there is no easy item to build to keep a support safe. Necronomicons can purge Ghost Scepter or Eul’s Scepter of Divinity, while Force Staff or Glimmer cape cannot escape Necronomicon’s Shapeshift and/or True Sight. In general, Lycan will have a level 3 Necronomicon before a support can build an important defense item, making buying inert defenses useless. Just because Lycan can counter these items doesn’t mean these items aren’t worth upgrading. Eul’s Scepter can of course still work: if used actively to block Lycan while chasing, it will more or less slow down the chase. Similarly, Ghost Scepter can buy a bit more time to force Necronomicon to use purge.

Also, increasing one’s own armor is also very effective against Lycan, that’s why Solar Crest is an item worth getting out of Lycan. Not only does it add armor, it also helps Lycan and his followers increase their chances of missing.

EPILOGUE

With Shapeshift, Lycan is no different from Slark. Lycan can hunt people and its high flexibility makes it very difficult to lock this truth. Support will have a hard time surviving. In addition, the ability to focus on destroying turrets makes it quite difficult to beat Lycan’s items. We have many methods to counter lycan, but Lycan has a high win rate in pub and pro right now says something. The first is that there are no items that can really counter Lycan, making customization very difficult when Lycan is the final pick, especially since the hero counters we mentioned above are dependent on the situation. to pick properly.

Maybe pubs need to change their attitude in matches. If Lycan doesn’t get banned, like in pro, people need to think twice about heroes that are capable of going up against him.

Source: dotabuff