You can't ALWAYS carry, so STOP SAYING YOU CAN

[Nobi]

Sorry for the very blunt title, I just simple want to make a point here. Time and time again I see advice from 4-7k mmr players saying "If your good, you can carry your team to victory no matter what". Which isn't bad adivce, i've see and even perfomed this many times in my DOTA 2 experinece. I have taken this advice to heart and for the past 2 months I've studied countless information from pro players and learning the advanced tatics of laning from videos. Even pushing aside time from family, friends, and school to better myself. But the question here is " Will it always work?, Are there any limitations to how you can carry a team as a single player?" My point is that this advice only works when you have a competent team who is willing to coopertate. Dota 2 is not a textbook game. Anything can happen in this game and pretending like we always know whats going happen is something I consider unhealthy thinking. "Pick void, Medusa, spec, etc and win late". Tried doing this and the enemy team stomped my lane, won mid, and keep control of my jungle while they picked off my team. Heres some examples of this:

http://www.dotabuff.com/matches/1287814159
http://www.dotabuff.com/matches/1275630365

I have many more but I'm keeping it short for clairty and hope you guys trust me when I say I've been trying my hardest.

In both these games the enemy team played very well and communicated well, can't say the same for mines. My teammates were rude and cancerous, they couldn't perform basic support tatics such as pulling, stacking, and not stealing last hits. The result of was me not having space to farm due to the enemy team outplaying ours. By the time I had any farm, they had taken atleast one rax.

This game requires knowledge but more importantly teamwork, espcially in lower MMR(The Trench) The irony of my claim is that I know(and heard) many players who have left the trench, and I'm sure some reading this have aswell. But I honestly don't know how they could have done it when the players primary laungage is Spanish, they feed 29 kills before 15mins do to poor postioning, and they lose mid and refuse to gank because the support didnt give them a ♥♥♥♥♥♥♥ tango.

TL;DR = Everyone says you can carry anything if your good enough. I find myself in impossible carry situiations due to my team being unhelpful. What can I do to leave trench when I'm playing a 1v5? or am I just being stupid and need stfu and git good?

[RockSpoon]

You cannot carry 1 vs 5 versus players even half as good as you, it's insane to even think so.

[Schrödinger's MMR]

the fact is you can carry your team by yourself in lower tranch ,but 3.7k / very high mmr above ? hardly you can do yourself but by this point people will have goods basic skills ..
well , if you sure you have good skills ,try create a smurf lol because it will always be hard to increase matchmaking rating in prime account :D

[Wolf]

Your right in that you can't ALWAYS carry your team, but that's like a 1 in 100 games situation and even then you can learn from it.

My Advice:
When it comes down to it, you have to know how to play the late game. 1 mistake means a lot more late than it does in the early stages and i've personally lost count of how many times i've played against a team that just throws away their lead due to stupid mistakes late

http://www.dotabuff.com/matches/1287203441 this was a game i kinda ♥♥♥♥♥♥ up the early game after getting a 3-0 start, but we stalled long enough for my hero to come back online.

[Nobi]

Originally posted by occultic boom:

And if you find yourself in "impossible" situations to carry, well thing is good players always make it "possible".

I honestly doubt that any player of any mmr can 1v5 a team with little farm. When the situtiation is "Impossible" that means it cannot be won. You can delay, but only the invetiable.

[corbet]

there is no such thing as "impossible" situation to carry in that OP said, also, if they do exist, it always can be avoided to end up in an "impossible" situation.

but to tell OP what he wants to hear, I will agree that statistically speaking you only are 10 percent of the people in the match, 10 people, and you are 1. So statistically speaking you should have a 10 percent impact on the outcome of the match(on average). Then if you were higher than average MMR you would have more than 10 percent impact, which would be above average.

[Nobi]

Originally posted by Wolffire2023:

Your right in that you can't ALWAYS carry your team, but that's like a 1 in 100 games situation and even then you can learn from it. When it comes down to it, you have to know how to play the late game. 1 mistake means a lot more late than it does in the early stages and i've personally lost count of how many times i've played against a team that just throws away their lead due to stupid mistakes late

http://www.dotabuff.com/matches/1287203441 this was a game i kinda ♥♥♥♥♥♥ up the early game after getting a 3-0 start, but we stalled long enough for my hero to come back online.

1 in 100?? Wow I wish i had that. I know I'm coming off as that "guy who blames his team". But I'm not kidding when I say my team isn't helpful. I'm finding it so hard to belive but when I'm proven time and time again that my team is cancer, it only proves my point. However this isn't a constant game after game problem, but it's happening so often to the point where Im leading 5 game loss streaks.

[HEX: LocalLadyboy]

Whenever I play storm with my 2k friends I get some nasty KDA, around 20+.

[Car Low]

(Y)

[Maka-61]

I don't think that's a carry only player's mentality. It is mainly his ignorance and the fact he doesn't trust his teammates that needs to change.
If you queue up with him and he doesn't change, then either allow him to just play carry, or flat out not queue up with him. Having these players in the team can be a double edged sword.

While it's good to have a support that can farm up their items, if they start taking too much of the farm and negates the carries ability to farm, then this will ultimately lead to a bad game especially when the line up is equal.

Also, perhaps by his game play as a support, i figure him as a carry player, he wouldn't know how to rotate appropriately?

[Apocalypse]

Can you carry the team when your teammates are mindless feeder? Yes you can, it depends on other factors too. I can well carry a team with 3 feeders, I'm just trying to get better than that now.
http://www.dotabuff.com/matches/1272175485
That match is just one of the many times I did that, I lost count how many times I did that, but mostly I have at least one player in my team other than me, who knows what they are doing.

But can you always do this? No, you cant, you can be targeted specifically and taken out.
Like this match.
http://www.dotabuff.com/matches/1157212213
I take this game as a valuable lesson.



And from the matches you showed me, you have got the idea wrong. If you ever want to win a game with a team of feeders, keep in mind to never die.

[wp deleted Dota2 1/5/25]

Nobimon, you are right. You can't always carry a team game to victory, especially after the latest updates. Dota2 is a team game and it has been updated to keep players and viewers on their toes so that they keep playing and keep watching. During games, tides can turn and any team can quickly lose the advantages they gained through mistakes by a few players or even one player. This is what makes Dota2 such a team game and such an exciting game. This is also what makes Dota2 players flame so much and rage so much because many times,even though players are playing their absolute best, small mistakes made by their team or outplays by the other team can quickly compound things. The game is very mercurial. Also, you cannot expect to win by supporting (pull, stack, harass, ward, deward, upgrade courier, roam, etc) a position 1 hard carry who cannot last hit well in lane, while your mid loses and ask for gank from supports, while the other duo lane feeds. Understand this point and you will realize that it's bad advice to proclaim, "Elo hell doesn't exist. You are stuck in the low brackets because you suck and cannot play a hero that makes a high enough impact in game!" Such comments are toxic and do nothing to help one improve his/her dota2 teamplay skills. Because Dota2 is such a liquid team game and so fast-paced, you cannot expect to win by picking a mid hero (e.g., Puck, Queen of Pain, Templar Assasin, Shadow Fiend, Outworld Devourer), do well at mid, while both your lanes lose and die, then cry for you to gank while you are still level 5. Because, guess what? Which team is going to topple towers faster (and hence faster gold, and hence even more advantage)? A one-hero (level 9) mid hero or a five-heroes (levels 7 to 9) team? So, Nobimon, you are right. You already realize this: it's bad advice for people to claim that, "just pick a strong mid hero or a strong late-game hero (Void, Nature Prophet, Spectre, Medusa) and stomp the game". It just doesn't work this way anymore in the updated Dota2, which is an intense 5vs5 team game. Tip: I see many ranked matches where people anyhow pick based on their impulses. They don't seem to understand that in such an intense game like Dota2, picks matter A LOT. Many players at the low tier (2k) don't even bother counterpicking. And even at the higher tier (4k), people tend to over-counterpick and forget about hero synergies in the team. Last, but not least, not many people realize that laning partners and laning opponents are very important. Even at 4k solo pub games, when I request for a change of lane because of these factors, I get people flaming me. They wrongfully accuse me of wasting time and gold. What these people fail to understand is that by moving a hard carry from an easy lane, where he/she is being countered by the lane opponents, to the hard lane where he/she can farm better because of hero synergies, the heroes gain more farm (and hence more xp/gold) and even a kill or two. Therefore, yes, you are right, Nobimon, those are bad advice; You really cannot always carry your team. And you are right in that people can be very toxic, rude, and cancerous. Remember that in solo queuing, or even pub stacks (where it is not with five of your friends - by friends, i mean people you physically hang out with over meals and play basketball or other sports together, not mere online Steam friends), you are effectively playing with strangers. You don't know them and they don't know you. You don't know if they are playing for fun, or smurfing, or doing experiments, or are as serious as you in winning that particular day or even that particular game. All these make communicating with strangers in game all the more difficult. If you really want to enjoy the game, playing with people you really know by face can help a lot. I played with my cousins and also used to play with my clan mates in local lobbies and LAN parties (where lag is minimal), and you know what? I realized a lot of the things I picked up from playing solo pub games were actually liabilities in serious team games. For example, I realized that playing solo games boxed up my thinking of this team game, called Dota2. I became mechanical and didn't think out of the box or adapt to the changing situations. How many times do you get a team who can smoke and reach Roshan and get an aegis and get everyone level'ed up to level 2 before the horn even sound, and then do a five-heroes-push and kill off the other team's mid and the other support heroes who tp'ed in to help, and then topple the tier 1 tower, all before five minutes, while solo queuing in pub games? And how many times do you get a team who can communicate well enough to do a five-men hunt in the other's team jungle and get three kills before the horn even sound, while solo queuing in pub games? Once you've played such quality, real, enjoyable Dota2 games with people you actually know, I've got a feeling you will never go back to playing solo on the public servers. You are right, Dota2 is not a textbook game. It's not even like chess, where you can study opening moves and strategies and memorize different moves. Dota2 is a liquid team game, that relies intensively on teamwork, good and clear communication, and lots of good teamplay experience.

[Deepbluediver]

OP, you're right- you can't always win every single game 1v5. Sometimes there are games you play great and still lose, and sometimes there are games when you mess up but your team wins anyway.
HOWEVER, over the course of hundreds of matches you get the exact same combination of teammates and enemies as everyone else in your bracket, and if you are actually better than everyone else around you, then you will win a higher percentage of matches than they do, and your MMR will rise.