Post by Galaxy on Jun 29, 2015 17:04:52 GMT 1
Its IMO one of my weakest maps and personally I have encountered many problems with tactics and strategy when shrines are constantly switching owner.
So I read up on several guides and now I know why
so I compiled it into this overview, hope it's usefull read for you too.
Dragon Shire
Spawn times: shrines will begin to spawn shortly after 40 seconds into the game and will give a 30 second warning. Once a the Dragon Knight dies or times out, it will take 2 minutes until the Shrines reactivate.
It takes 8 seconds to capture an enemy Shrine and 4 seconds to capture a neutral Shrine. It takes 3 seconds to channel the Dragon Knight.
The best guide sources for me were IcyVeins (very good read!) and TenTonHammer but I listed all of them for completion, this is just a short summary.
Summary
1. Your main objective on Dragon Shire is not to take control of the Dragon Knight, but rather to prevent the enemy team from taking the Dragon Knight. This supersedes all of your other priorities, at all times.
2. Your secondary objective is to gain an experience lead. First by lane soaking, second by destroying towers.
3. Only fight over the Shrines if you are favoured to win, whether by an experience lead, positioning, or a numbers advantage. There is absolutely no reason to contest the Shrines if the enemy team has the advantage, as they will win and further snowball their advantage.
General tips
#1 Map layout causes 1-1-3 strategy to be normal
As you can see from the map screenshot, it is asymmetrical, meaning it is not the same top to bottom. The top lane does not have a mercenary camp by the shrine, while the bottom lane does. In addition the bottom lane has easier access to two mercenary camps than the top lane does (marked with the red lines). Therefore, it is best to try and overpower the bottom lane, splitting your heroes up to go 1 top, 1 middle, and 3 bottom. This is obviously not always possible based on your teams composition but is a very normal strategy. Also notice the placement of bushes in the bottom lane makes it safer than the top lane, as it is harder for your enemies to flank you.
#2 Early xp is better than rusing early DK
.. Because the DK is really weak early on and you probably won't achieve much by getting him, It's much better to make a successful ambush kill two enemy heroes and then take control of the shrines. Then you can easily push 5v3. Obviously early the death timers are fairly short, so again it's way better to take DK a bit later in the game, even around ten minute mark. Sure if you manage to do it sooner it's great, but DON’T RUSH! In general the game before level ten is the game of soak, you may call it laning phase. Just control one of the shrines and you'll be fine.
#2 You capped DK, don’t rush in! The Dragon Knight does a lot of damage against structures and has a lot of health, but can still be killed fairly quickly when focused down. Your team needs to regroup and find the weakest lane to attack in. Once there, the Dragon Knight should focus on the structures as much as possible and not chase enemy heroes. Use your kick attack on the enemy tanks and healers to remove them from the fight briefly, allowing your team to focus down enemy assassins. Use your flame to apply damage to anything convenient. However, any auto attack that is not against a structure is generally a wasted attack. Your team is there to help protect the Dragon Knight and allow him to take down structures. They should focus down damage dealers and healers as priority targets, and only deal with tanks if that is all that is left.
#3 Lost the DK ? Do not rush in either! If your team loses the battle for the shrines and your enemy gets the Dragon Knight, as above, do not rush in. Group up to engage, and do so to your advantage. The Dragon Knight can be focused down quickly, but if you leave the entire enemy team alive while attacking the DK, they will quickly tear your team apart. This means, looking for their weakest members and focusing them down, to gain an advantage, before directly engaging the Dragon Knight. This may see counter intuitive, since the Dragon Knight can deal so much damage, but if you focus him, you will not be alive for long, and the enemy team will end up dealing far more damage to your structures as you sit waiting for a resurrection timer.
#4 Play this map cautiously... Any time a team gains control of a Dragon Knight they can gain a huge advantage over their opponents. Therefore, it is often better to delay any big engagement until such point as you have a big advantage in it. It is far better to play defensively and to not lose, than to play all out to win. Waiting on a mistake by your opponents on this map and being cautious wins more games than not. There have been many games played where control of both shrines and the gaining control of a Dragon Knight does not happen until well after the 10 minute mark. It is far better to play to make sure you get control, even if it take 8-12 minutes than play to potentially get it quickly only to lose it.
#5 Shrines contested? Jungle merc camps! While holding a shrine, but not both, it is a great time to have a strong jungle hero capture any mercenary camps that are available. The best mercenary camps to capture are the bottom 3 since they are closest to a shrine, so it is easy to come back to help defend. By doing this, you force your opponents to either come back from shrines to defend their towers and forts or to ignore the damage they are suffering. Either option is to your advantage. If they come back to defend, it gives your team a chance to capture both shrines and gain control of the Dragon Knight. If they ignore the mercenaries (and you support the mercenaries) then you can easily destroy towers and keeps and gain an advantage.
#6 One shrine at a time... Once the shrines do activate, your goal is to overpower one quickly and then move to capture the other one, leaving a strong defensive player in position. As long as you have one shrine controlled, you should be looking to initiate any team fight that is to your advantage. If the fight is clearly not to your advantage, just harass, do not directly engage. Once you have both shrines under your control, keep at least one defended, and both if possible, and move to the center to take control of the Dragon Knight. Once again do not enter fights that are not to your advantage, it is better to fall back and wait for an advantage than to engage and lose team members. While you are short handed your opponent will quickly take advantage and capture the shrines.
#7 Do not die when shrines activate! When the shrines announce that they will be activating, make sure you do not die. This may sound obvious, but it is also the best time to initiate a team fight to ensure an advantage so that you can grab the two shrines and secure the Dragon Knights service. Therefore engage cautiously and only when the fights are to your advantage, if they are not, back out and try to lure opponents into situations that are to your advantage.
#8 When some team members died... If you fall behind in the shrine phase and lose a few heroes, then your best strategy is to focus on taking a single shrine and holding it until all of your team mates are alive again. If at any point in time the enemy team has both shrines and there is not time to capture a shrine, then your best option is to simply harass the heroes at the center that are trying to gain control of the Dragon Knight. It is not even required to kill that hero or to engage them directly, in fact it is often best not to. All you need to do is hit them any time they move in to try and channel to gain control. Hitting them stops the channel timer and forces them to start again. Repeat this until your allies are there to help, or they are able to capture a shrine back.
Some explanation about the 1-1-3 meta
The focus lies on pushing structure, avoiding team fights and avoiding the enemy capturing the DK.
With 3 people controlling the bottom area, it’s very easy for 2 players to go up (ogres) or down (bruisers) and get mercenary camps while one hero defends the shrine.
This also means that you should have complete control over bottom shrine and should therefore never allow them to get a dragon knight (DK).
When pushing early game prio towers over fort, when towers cleared, you can the rotate push to mid (switch bot with mid or send healer/dps to mid).
The hero on mid lane never leaves his lane. This lane is really good for heroes that need stacks (Regen Master, Conjuror’s Pursuit, Seasoned Marksman, or Bribe) because the only job is to stay in the lane to soak xp and keep the lane even.
Team composition wise you should look for:
Top: 1 strong survivable wave clearer
This hero should have decent wave clearing and be very safe, able to survive any ganks, the hero in the top lane will generally have the least contact with the team, and it should therefore be a hero that does not bring much to their team during the early game, or has a global ability: Brightwing, Falstad, Chen, Tassadar, are all examples of strong top lane Heroes.
Mid: 1 strong roamer tank/assassin who can prevent DK cap
This hero should generally have good wave clearing, and have more mobility or utility than the hero in the top lane. This is because the hero in the middle lane will constantly be assisting and fighting with their team due to the close proximity of the lanes: Valla, Tychus, Stitches, Jaina, are all examples of strong middle lane Heroes.
Bot: 1 ranged damage, 1 support, 1 ranged damage/assassin/tank
You should place your best pushing Heroes in the bottom lane, along with a healer. Nazeebo, Sylvanas, Sgt. Hammer, Zagara, are all examples of strong bottom lane Heroes.
Example 1-1-3 compositions
Top: Valla
Mid: Tassadar
Bot: Arthas/Tychus/Uther
Tychus, Arthas, and Uther can quickly clear a lane and annihilate any two-person composition from the very beginning of the game. Tassadar, with the long range and duration of storm, can easily prevent someone from taking the Dragon Knight for quite a long time. Valla goes top because she has good wave clear and can stave off even a two-man attack; she’s also a bit more nimble and mobile compared to Tychus, so she fits in top lane better than bottom lane.
Top: Stitches
Mid: Illidan
Bot: Tyrael/Brightwing/Valla
Valla, Brightwing, and Tyreal can push the lane and bully other heroes around pretty well. Stitches could go mid, but because he has arguably better wave clear compared to Illidan with Slam + gas, he works better in top lane. Illidan goes middle lane because there’s really not a better place for him, but being very mobile does help him avoid ganks coming from bottom.
etc.
There are other meta's...
The 2-1-2 is more balanced but less map specific (since it leaves the hard camp at bot open), it focuses on team fights rather then structure pushing.
You are more likely to encounter pushes by the enemy team, counter it by ambushing the least guarded lane (prob top) and taking the camps nearby to force them back and defend.
Team composition wise you are looking for:
Top: 2 strong shrine defenders tank/dp
Typically the tank can defend the shrine while the dps can soak/clears the lane to gain xp lead. Examples of heroes include Valla, Tychus, and Tassadar for the DPS and Uther, Malfurion, or Chen for the tank.
Mid: 1 high-sustain hero for soak xp
This hero should focus on soaking up xp, since there is only 1 person in this lane, the other team can gain an advantage if they're in mid lane and you aren't. Heroes that will be good here are Illidan, Nova, Zeratul, Muradin, Sonya, Raynor, etc.
Bot: 1 support, 1 dps/assassin
More vital heroes are necessary here, since all the minion camps are in that area and it's generally closer to the mid lane where the DK will be pushing if your team captures both shrines. A ranged damage dealer is necessary, which could be Valla, Jaina, Tychus, etc. The other should be a healer to keep the DPS alive, like Lili, Brightwing, Malfurion, etc.
There are prob even different meta's...
For you to come up with..
Tips & Tricks
# Your main objective is to prevent the enemy team from unleashing the Dragon Knight.
# Healers (excluding Brightwing) should never be in the top lane.
# Use early game Dragon Knights to destroy the outer Towers of each lane, before destroying the forts.
# The Dragon Knight should be used to destroy buildings, not to team fight. If you must team fight, use Savage Charge to kick away key enemies, preferably over walls.
# Once you are around level 20, the Dragon Knight can easily kill solo the enemy core.
# With the lanes so close together, always be on the lookout for ganks from other lanes.
# Capture Mercenary Camps whenever possible, but not at the expense of losing experience from lane.
# If your allies are dead and you have just taken control of the Dragon Knight, it is almost always better to simply wait until your allies have respawned.
Sources
So I read up on several guides and now I know why
so I compiled it into this overview, hope it's usefull read for you too.Dragon Shire
Spawn times: shrines will begin to spawn shortly after 40 seconds into the game and will give a 30 second warning. Once a the Dragon Knight dies or times out, it will take 2 minutes until the Shrines reactivate.
It takes 8 seconds to capture an enemy Shrine and 4 seconds to capture a neutral Shrine. It takes 3 seconds to channel the Dragon Knight.
The best guide sources for me were IcyVeins (very good read!) and TenTonHammer but I listed all of them for completion, this is just a short summary.
Summary
1. Your main objective on Dragon Shire is not to take control of the Dragon Knight, but rather to prevent the enemy team from taking the Dragon Knight. This supersedes all of your other priorities, at all times.
2. Your secondary objective is to gain an experience lead. First by lane soaking, second by destroying towers.
3. Only fight over the Shrines if you are favoured to win, whether by an experience lead, positioning, or a numbers advantage. There is absolutely no reason to contest the Shrines if the enemy team has the advantage, as they will win and further snowball their advantage.
General tips
#1 Map layout causes 1-1-3 strategy to be normal
As you can see from the map screenshot, it is asymmetrical, meaning it is not the same top to bottom. The top lane does not have a mercenary camp by the shrine, while the bottom lane does. In addition the bottom lane has easier access to two mercenary camps than the top lane does (marked with the red lines). Therefore, it is best to try and overpower the bottom lane, splitting your heroes up to go 1 top, 1 middle, and 3 bottom. This is obviously not always possible based on your teams composition but is a very normal strategy. Also notice the placement of bushes in the bottom lane makes it safer than the top lane, as it is harder for your enemies to flank you.
#2 Early xp is better than rusing early DK
.. Because the DK is really weak early on and you probably won't achieve much by getting him, It's much better to make a successful ambush kill two enemy heroes and then take control of the shrines. Then you can easily push 5v3. Obviously early the death timers are fairly short, so again it's way better to take DK a bit later in the game, even around ten minute mark. Sure if you manage to do it sooner it's great, but DON’T RUSH! In general the game before level ten is the game of soak, you may call it laning phase. Just control one of the shrines and you'll be fine.
#2 You capped DK, don’t rush in! The Dragon Knight does a lot of damage against structures and has a lot of health, but can still be killed fairly quickly when focused down. Your team needs to regroup and find the weakest lane to attack in. Once there, the Dragon Knight should focus on the structures as much as possible and not chase enemy heroes. Use your kick attack on the enemy tanks and healers to remove them from the fight briefly, allowing your team to focus down enemy assassins. Use your flame to apply damage to anything convenient. However, any auto attack that is not against a structure is generally a wasted attack. Your team is there to help protect the Dragon Knight and allow him to take down structures. They should focus down damage dealers and healers as priority targets, and only deal with tanks if that is all that is left.
#3 Lost the DK ? Do not rush in either! If your team loses the battle for the shrines and your enemy gets the Dragon Knight, as above, do not rush in. Group up to engage, and do so to your advantage. The Dragon Knight can be focused down quickly, but if you leave the entire enemy team alive while attacking the DK, they will quickly tear your team apart. This means, looking for their weakest members and focusing them down, to gain an advantage, before directly engaging the Dragon Knight. This may see counter intuitive, since the Dragon Knight can deal so much damage, but if you focus him, you will not be alive for long, and the enemy team will end up dealing far more damage to your structures as you sit waiting for a resurrection timer.
#4 Play this map cautiously... Any time a team gains control of a Dragon Knight they can gain a huge advantage over their opponents. Therefore, it is often better to delay any big engagement until such point as you have a big advantage in it. It is far better to play defensively and to not lose, than to play all out to win. Waiting on a mistake by your opponents on this map and being cautious wins more games than not. There have been many games played where control of both shrines and the gaining control of a Dragon Knight does not happen until well after the 10 minute mark. It is far better to play to make sure you get control, even if it take 8-12 minutes than play to potentially get it quickly only to lose it.
#5 Shrines contested? Jungle merc camps! While holding a shrine, but not both, it is a great time to have a strong jungle hero capture any mercenary camps that are available. The best mercenary camps to capture are the bottom 3 since they are closest to a shrine, so it is easy to come back to help defend. By doing this, you force your opponents to either come back from shrines to defend their towers and forts or to ignore the damage they are suffering. Either option is to your advantage. If they come back to defend, it gives your team a chance to capture both shrines and gain control of the Dragon Knight. If they ignore the mercenaries (and you support the mercenaries) then you can easily destroy towers and keeps and gain an advantage.
#6 One shrine at a time... Once the shrines do activate, your goal is to overpower one quickly and then move to capture the other one, leaving a strong defensive player in position. As long as you have one shrine controlled, you should be looking to initiate any team fight that is to your advantage. If the fight is clearly not to your advantage, just harass, do not directly engage. Once you have both shrines under your control, keep at least one defended, and both if possible, and move to the center to take control of the Dragon Knight. Once again do not enter fights that are not to your advantage, it is better to fall back and wait for an advantage than to engage and lose team members. While you are short handed your opponent will quickly take advantage and capture the shrines.
#7 Do not die when shrines activate! When the shrines announce that they will be activating, make sure you do not die. This may sound obvious, but it is also the best time to initiate a team fight to ensure an advantage so that you can grab the two shrines and secure the Dragon Knights service. Therefore engage cautiously and only when the fights are to your advantage, if they are not, back out and try to lure opponents into situations that are to your advantage.
#8 When some team members died... If you fall behind in the shrine phase and lose a few heroes, then your best strategy is to focus on taking a single shrine and holding it until all of your team mates are alive again. If at any point in time the enemy team has both shrines and there is not time to capture a shrine, then your best option is to simply harass the heroes at the center that are trying to gain control of the Dragon Knight. It is not even required to kill that hero or to engage them directly, in fact it is often best not to. All you need to do is hit them any time they move in to try and channel to gain control. Hitting them stops the channel timer and forces them to start again. Repeat this until your allies are there to help, or they are able to capture a shrine back.
Some explanation about the 1-1-3 meta
The focus lies on pushing structure, avoiding team fights and avoiding the enemy capturing the DK.
With 3 people controlling the bottom area, it’s very easy for 2 players to go up (ogres) or down (bruisers) and get mercenary camps while one hero defends the shrine.
This also means that you should have complete control over bottom shrine and should therefore never allow them to get a dragon knight (DK).
When pushing early game prio towers over fort, when towers cleared, you can the rotate push to mid (switch bot with mid or send healer/dps to mid).
The hero on mid lane never leaves his lane. This lane is really good for heroes that need stacks (Regen Master, Conjuror’s Pursuit, Seasoned Marksman, or Bribe) because the only job is to stay in the lane to soak xp and keep the lane even.
Team composition wise you should look for:
Top: 1 strong survivable wave clearer
This hero should have decent wave clearing and be very safe, able to survive any ganks, the hero in the top lane will generally have the least contact with the team, and it should therefore be a hero that does not bring much to their team during the early game, or has a global ability: Brightwing, Falstad, Chen, Tassadar, are all examples of strong top lane Heroes.
Mid: 1 strong roamer tank/assassin who can prevent DK cap
This hero should generally have good wave clearing, and have more mobility or utility than the hero in the top lane. This is because the hero in the middle lane will constantly be assisting and fighting with their team due to the close proximity of the lanes: Valla, Tychus, Stitches, Jaina, are all examples of strong middle lane Heroes.
Bot: 1 ranged damage, 1 support, 1 ranged damage/assassin/tank
You should place your best pushing Heroes in the bottom lane, along with a healer. Nazeebo, Sylvanas, Sgt. Hammer, Zagara, are all examples of strong bottom lane Heroes.
Example 1-1-3 compositions
Top: Valla
Mid: Tassadar
Bot: Arthas/Tychus/Uther
Tychus, Arthas, and Uther can quickly clear a lane and annihilate any two-person composition from the very beginning of the game. Tassadar, with the long range and duration of storm, can easily prevent someone from taking the Dragon Knight for quite a long time. Valla goes top because she has good wave clear and can stave off even a two-man attack; she’s also a bit more nimble and mobile compared to Tychus, so she fits in top lane better than bottom lane.
Top: Stitches
Mid: Illidan
Bot: Tyrael/Brightwing/Valla
Valla, Brightwing, and Tyreal can push the lane and bully other heroes around pretty well. Stitches could go mid, but because he has arguably better wave clear compared to Illidan with Slam + gas, he works better in top lane. Illidan goes middle lane because there’s really not a better place for him, but being very mobile does help him avoid ganks coming from bottom.
etc.
There are other meta's...
The 2-1-2 is more balanced but less map specific (since it leaves the hard camp at bot open), it focuses on team fights rather then structure pushing.
You are more likely to encounter pushes by the enemy team, counter it by ambushing the least guarded lane (prob top) and taking the camps nearby to force them back and defend.
Team composition wise you are looking for:
Top: 2 strong shrine defenders tank/dp
Typically the tank can defend the shrine while the dps can soak/clears the lane to gain xp lead. Examples of heroes include Valla, Tychus, and Tassadar for the DPS and Uther, Malfurion, or Chen for the tank.
Mid: 1 high-sustain hero for soak xp
This hero should focus on soaking up xp, since there is only 1 person in this lane, the other team can gain an advantage if they're in mid lane and you aren't. Heroes that will be good here are Illidan, Nova, Zeratul, Muradin, Sonya, Raynor, etc.
Bot: 1 support, 1 dps/assassin
More vital heroes are necessary here, since all the minion camps are in that area and it's generally closer to the mid lane where the DK will be pushing if your team captures both shrines. A ranged damage dealer is necessary, which could be Valla, Jaina, Tychus, etc. The other should be a healer to keep the DPS alive, like Lili, Brightwing, Malfurion, etc.
There are prob even different meta's...
For you to come up with..
Tips & Tricks
# Your main objective is to prevent the enemy team from unleashing the Dragon Knight.
# Healers (excluding Brightwing) should never be in the top lane.
# Use early game Dragon Knights to destroy the outer Towers of each lane, before destroying the forts.
# The Dragon Knight should be used to destroy buildings, not to team fight. If you must team fight, use Savage Charge to kick away key enemies, preferably over walls.
# Once you are around level 20, the Dragon Knight can easily kill solo the enemy core.
# With the lanes so close together, always be on the lookout for ganks from other lanes.
# Capture Mercenary Camps whenever possible, but not at the expense of losing experience from lane.
# If your allies are dead and you have just taken control of the Dragon Knight, it is almost always better to simply wait until your allies have respawned.
Sources
- www.icy-veins.com/heroes/dragon-shire-map-strategy-guide
- www.weskimo.com/dragon-shire.html
- www.teamliquid.net/forum/heroes/474323-heroes-quick-guide-to-dragon-shire
- www.tentonhammer.com/guides/heroes-storm/how-win-heroes-storm-%E2%80%93-dragon-shire-map
- www.tentonhammer.com/guide/heroes-storm/dragon-shire-map-guide
- www.gameskinny.com/3duyu/danielles-hots-dragon-shire-map-guide
- 2p.com/34387923_1/Dragon-Shire---Map-Guide-by-Jamniczek.htm
