Despite only qualifying for the Situational tier in our pub tier list, Legion Commander is definitely worth discussing. The pick rate of the hero has been on a steady rise, reaching slightly over 25%, making her the 4th most popular hero in Dota. However, her win rate cannot be called impressive, decreasing rapidly from its highest at 49% in the 2-3k bracket to 45% in the 5k+ bracket. Today, we would like to go over how to utilize the hero better, while addressing some issues players might face.
It has been said time and time again, but it is always worth repeating: the drafting stage is important, not only for the choice of a role, but also the hero you pick for that role. More versatile players will find themselves at an even bigger advantage in this patch, since the pool of viable heroes is unquestionably larger. But when exactly do you draft Legion Commander?
There are a couple of drafting stage ideas that would indicate a good Legion Commander game:
Her ability to dispel stuns is among the most underrated mechanics in Dota. Being able to get rid of strong single-target disables on one of your important heroes, while remaining relatively safe from potential silences, can and will be fight-turning. Sacred Arrow, Fiend's Grip, Shackles and Primal Roar are probably the strongest disables which turn into nothing with the help of Press The Attack
Her outpush potential is incredibly high. Think of Overwhelming Odds as a smaller Echo Slam on a much lower cooldown with a smaller radius. The damage is lower, but when facing a pushing line-up with a lot of controlled/summoned creeps, it is probably even better—low cooldown and decent cast range allow for it to shine earlier and occasionally brighter.
The hero does very little against tanky line-ups, since almost all of her abilities work better on squishy targets. In a single teamfight she also doesn’t offer a lot in terms of damage, until very late into the game, and even this is dependent on her getting a decent early-mid game. As such, she should complement glass cannons on her team and works better against glass cannons in the enemy team. The early game of the hero is generally more utility-based.
There are certain heroes which do not necessarily have great auto-attack damage/attack speed but deal a lot of damage through melee/ranged splash attacks. Heroes like Ember Spirit, Medusa, Gyrocopter are all good match-ups for Legion Commander.
You don’t draft Legion Commander to jungle from level 1. She can’t contribute much to the game from the jungle and she generally can’t and shouldn’t get an early game-breaking item such as Mekansm because of her limited mana pool. Even the introduction of Iron Talon doesn’t solve the issue of having to spread skill points out for Press The Attack or Moment of Courage earlier in the game. Getting Overwhelming Odds maxed by level 7 is almost always a must, since otherwise the hero offers very little in the initial skirmishes.
The fact that the hero should be played as a core should not raise any questions—there are better options for a support hero.
The choice of lane is also quite limited. According to global statistics jungling is by far the worst choice for the hero. The hero is also not exactly the best position one material, since her scaling is unreliable and she isn’t exactly the hardest of carries.
This leaves middle and off lanes and both have their ups and downs. The win rates for mid and off-lanes are 49% and 51% respectively.
By far the most XP-rewarding lane is great for the hero, since she does benefit from getting her levels. While there are few matchups that can be considered to be in favor of the Legion Commander, she can stand her ground against almost any opponent and shouldn’t get harassed out of lane completely.
Mid lane and the XP advantage the midlane provides also benefit the general gameplan for the hero—getting a lot of kills in the early-mid game and snowballing from this advantage. Unlike many previously popular tempo heroes in this role, she doesn’t fall off as hard come late-game.
Moreover, midlane will generally provide more gold for the hero, since last hitting is easier against a single opponent. This would potentially lead to an earlier initiation item and higher chances of snowballing.
The second choice, which is almost three times as popular among the players as the middle lane. Being decently tanky, it is generally hard to completely zone out an offlaning Legion Commander. Moreover, her ability to deal surprisingly high damage with Overwhelming Odds should also leash the enemy supports to their safelane core—even with a level disadvantage, the hero can be extremely strong in 1-on-1 or 1-on-2 situations.
This creates much needed space for your mid laner and it should also provide benefits in early-game skirmishes, since numerical advantage at this point is key. If the enemy supports have to make a trade-off to rotate mid and your supports feel more freedom moving around the map, it can be easy to get a decent early-game advantage from ganks or even simple zoning of the enemy mid. It is especially important if the enemy mid relies on snowballing and/or is a glass cannon.
Having lower income should also be less of a problem, if the coordination with your teammates are at a decent level. With the speed boost of Overwhelming Odds, it is quite easy to catch up to a fleeing enemy and earn extra damage in the early game.
With a couple of extra levels and/or some items such as Iron Talon, transitioning to the jungle is an option. You do not farm the jungle full-time as Legion Commander, though. Instead, it is a good way to earn money in-between duels for the next item, if the lanes are occupied by your teammates (and they can’t jungle well) and/or are too dangerous to farm in. Sometimes, giving some space to supports is also necessary—at this point the jungling efficiency is higher for you, while your supports can benefit from extra Gold/XP in lane. It is also less of a deal if your support dies in the lane, compared to a core Legion Commander—there is going to be a significant level and Net Worth difference between the two.
Item choices are extremely important on any hero, but Legion Commander is among the hardest to make correct choices for. The reason for it is the analysis paralysis caused by the fact that when she needs to aim for late-game, she has to build-up tempo and that requires her to make mid-game item choices. When aiming for tempo-control, on the other hand, you can end up having not enough item slots later on and fail at becoming relevant late-game and/or have reduced gold efficiency due to the fact that you will need to buy/sell items.
Overall, there are only a handful of staple items for the hero and even those are somewhat situational.
This first option is a lot more reliable, while the second one is better in terms of DPS. Most of the time Blink Dagger is going to be a better choice, however in certain cases Shadow Blade into Silver Edge is a better option. Disabling strong passives can be game-changing at any point in the game, while stats synergize extremely well with with the hero.
Excellent choice against glass cannon heroes. Since the hero herself is good at dealing with those, it is generally a safe choice if and only if gotten early. An average 12 min. Blink Dagger into 16-18 min. Blade Mail is a good transition. If it is hard to get this item early, it might be a waste of money, since its efficiency is subjective to the enemy getting survivability items.
This item is almost always self-explanatory. You shouldn’t be forced to get it too early though, since it makes for a huge tempo hit (4k gold for very little DPS). It also gets weaker as game progresses, so make sure you do not waste all the charges early on, especially if the early-mid game doesn’t seem to provide an opening for a convincing victory.
One of the best items for the hero, since it incorporates high DPS and survivability, while also benefiting team. If there are no better carries for the item (other strength cores), you should aim for it relatively early.
A decent choice against right-clicking enemy line-ups, but offers too little DPS per gold spent. It’s better if you are frontlining, initiating, or when facing a strong ranged core. Otherwise, almost 4k gold can be spent better.
One of the more underrated choices. Extremely good if there are no natural Diffusal Blade carriers on the enemy team (and/or purge abilities). Provides amazing DPS and scales really well. Extra points if your team has little magic damage, since it is unlikely the enemy is going for a Pipe. Even better, if the enemy has a lot of core heroes which primarily rely on Armor/Evasion rather than HP for survivability (most agility cores).
I have been saying that the hero will become a staple by the end of 6.85 due to the rising popularity of both Broodmother and Beastmaster, but the statistics prove me wrong. Nonetheless, the hero has a lot to offer and is situationally strong in many lineups--there are games where the Legion Commander can be the best choice by far.
Her low win rate, to a certain degree, comes from the Dota 1 habits of jungling the hero. In most other lanes she is a solid pick and should not be underrated. I would be cautious to call her the next big thing after being proved wrong in 6.85, but this time around she has better chances to become popular.
Nice article.
LC is one of the most wrongly played heroes. Too many players are going to farm or afk jungle, they don't max 1st and 2nd skill and so on. LC is VERY agressive mid lane hero or sometimes offlane... she needs fast lvl and snowball, not an afk jungle in hope that after 8 min farming u will get your damage from ulti.
Well, whatever. Nice article, again.
Second bratans
LC is legit, but not for a jungled definitely
4th !!
LC is midder, not offlaner, not jungler
LC only works if the enemy doesn't pick 5 stunlock heroes and your allies have good right-click or burst damage. Most idiots in 3-3.5k will not help u duel even if u tell them you're about to gank somebody and ping where the hit will take place.
You will often find yourself needing a Shadow Blade instead of a Blink dagger in that bracket as SB will allow u to hunt for for a short while during ur invis active. The extra attack speed and damage will help u win a duel. With Blink u need good vision, in 3-3.5k supports often don't ward or bait to provide it.
Many of top pub LC players still do it jungle. Open top 10 one-by-one and try to find d+ games in there.
little tip: silver edge disable abaddon ulti from passivly activating, wich allwos you to solo kill hi mif you hit him and duel right after
U forgot to write that the hero works incredibly well against AM and ES as she catches and kills them while split-pushing, and there is now way they will buy linkin until their 2 serious items (bf manta and bot bf). Catching spectre and slark is not so bright but effective aswell
Magnetic field of Arc warden can easily save heroes form LC duel.
she should remain this way, so i can keep raping kids with lc
Jungle LC is how you show to everyone that you prefer to lose a game as an useless core, rather than pick a support and win the game . Icefrog should reverse the scaling of Moment of Courage, by making the total lifesteal per attack the same at all lvls(85%), but scaling up the chance(10%/15%/20%/25%), in such a way that this skill becomes completely useless at the early lvls . With that, at least, people will stop jungling with this hero at once .
Well I myself jungle with LC and do quite fine if u rush blink and get press the attack u get early duel damage and I win all my games with LC doing that so I'm not gonna say hat this is wrong but I feel like just to many don't play Mid LC and that is why the stats say that
LC is not a jungle, i never jungle with her, i only and only play either mid or offlane, because she suprisinlgy tanky. And dont forget how great -rather broken - press the attack is vs a one shot diabling line up. I prefer blink to shadow blade, i dont mean its bad i just prefer the blink because it woirks well with my armlet into blink or blink into armlet build. Blademail is an optional build because i rather want to be damaged -rememebr legion passive ability grantes and extra proc strike equal to amount of damage she take in. MOst players i against tend to stun or disable me when blademail is activated and it has such a short time which seems useless on me, On the plus side that blademail 2050 gold would be spend on better items that can transend into the later stages of the game.... (i jus really hate blademail on legion)
Hopefully legion jungle era will end and people would realise her potentail if she's on lane, i mean you'll never see a magnus in a jungle so what makes him different form legion? Oh yah his durabily is disregardable.
my fellow 2k MMR teammates, please read this article
EvilArthas is love, EvilArthas is life. <3
http://www.dotabuff.com/players/315704609 LC <3
almost every popular jungling hero has their worst win rate, lane presence wise, in the jungle.
Jungler picker is half retard , son ...
Interesting post.
Ah, Legion Commander, also known as Tresdin(horse-riding male commander) in Dota 1.
One of my favorite hero.
http://www.dotabuff.com/players/132702976/matches?hero=legion-commander
You forgot, HH is one of the best ways LC deals with linken's
2k friends, "jungle pa more".
PLEASE STOP JUNGLING, IT'S NOT FREAKING RIGHT!
With Blink you can be there at the exact moment it happens, you can save teammates, interrupt channeled spells and just hide in the trees and wait for prey, Initiate through detection and under towers, how is it even a choice..
Stay in lane, with a support with a stun or a slow u can wreck easy. Only Ursa and Axe can trade with you.
So far I have yet to lose a game with a jungle LC where she calls it before our first pick, the biggest problem in the 3-3.5k area is most wait until first 2 picks are chosen then announce they are jungling and screw over lanes completley
Где посты на русском языке?
If u have many duel won and ur damage is hurt enough or can kill supp hero with solo+some hits just buy aghanim scepter in late game this item will make u can freely use duel in late game to make ur damage more sick and better initiation
how is jungling not good (IN PUBS) where you can get a 8min iron talon+blink? you will never have that in lane and jungling pretty much guarantees it esp. with the new camp near ancients which means you can rotate around the map more if enemy wants to contest you. The problem with the hero and why it will never be good in current stage in pro games is basically 0-chance duel heroes. Im talking about omni, WW, oracle, Bane, dazzle etc. If you are facing 1 of those you have to duel him all the time which limits tactics, because they know who you are gonna duel every time. If they pick 2 your hero is useless (for example they have omni and ww, if you duel omni WW embraces him if you duel WW omni uses GA = thats called being outpicked). So its good in pubs until enemy starts picking counters, than youre screwed
definitely amazing at midlane against the right matchups
Lc mix is so good esp against qop and invo. Only play her mid, it's so good
8 minute talon+blink means absolute jack shit if your team has already been completely destroyed by the enemy team thanks to your extremely weakened lanes and extremely poor solo support player. You will come out with the blink, no levels in overwhelming odds and lose the duel immediately because your allies CANNOT back you up, while the enemies will have benefited from tons of extra space from your team's shit lanes.
That's when the 2k jungle legion goes: gg report noob team
Oh god this article is completely wrong. Each and every word is the opposite of what this hero should be played.
The idea suggested is the heroes that jungle from level 1 are heroes to buy mechanism. So, we are not talking about pro tournament games. This is completely wrong. A jungle enigma with a mechanism at minute 10 is way more useless than a jungle lc with blink dagger at 10 in less than 6k mmr.
Jungle lc is obviously the best among the other lanes. You are not a good safe lane hard carry, you will be completely useless on hard lane since you cant contest the lane and possibly wont get much farm. But you go jungle at level 1 with an iron talon and boom, you have power treads and a blink at minute 11. you buy a smoke and you gank every 50 seconds.
Your can do little in messy team fights yet, but the team with a very much farmed jungle legion should be trying to pick off and smoke gank not go direct team fights.
I have never disagreed on an article this bad before.
Идите нахуй,ЛК в лесу с фаст блинком/шб норм вещь,чем стоять и терпеть на оффлейне с 0 фармом
@Angemon
In less than 6k mmr your team will be destroyed while you afk 10-11 min in the jungle. End of story. Maybe works if the enemy full retard but you should avoid it or you have a really high chance to earn a wonderful -25 mmr in less than 25-30 min.
WTf this Article Complete bull shit. YOu Said Legion is not good against Ember i always pick Legion when there is a EMber in the team. and First Ability i dnt pick it until 16. Go jungle 10 Min Shadow blade and Gank on mid 4 Moment of Courage , 4 Press on Attack with shadow blade 30 attack speed and damage you can gank mid and take tower which will give you around 700 to 900 gold and you can take mid. always make Shadow blade to pressure their Support for Extra centrs so that support septer is slow. Dnt Go jungle if u dnt have a Good offlaner like bristle back or else. Legion counters every one Every last carry . make Silver edge and counters troll, jugg, slark, lifestealer, and Medusa as it disables her 3rd . Make Septer if its late game and bkb. and sell slver edge and make blink to "Surprise Mother F***ers". blink bkb ult and kill main carry. in 5 vs 1. and thn your team come . if enough mana make refresher . blink bkb ult kill one core or whatever you find. refresher, bkb, ult. kill another. GG. Misunderstoo and Misplaued my ass. Always make defensive items like asult , Shadow blade, blademail, Heart , only one damage item deadlus :p (Imagine if you have not seen some one killed by one hit of legion). ofcourse MKB is situational . You dnt know any thing about Beauty of Legion.
I think, different player-different play style and build.
Where's the guys who always said to respect Enchanted Mango on comment in every article?
#Han Yolo why you stay in jungle if your team is losing lanes . pick 1 first and go to lane. and help team.
#Every one who hate junglers. Why dnt you pick BB, Axe, tide, Dark Ser, Invoker or any other good offlaner and solo offlane. This way 4 of your Team Members are on High levels thn enemy 1 offlaner , 2 jungler, 3 mid, 4 safe lane.
One thing that every LC player should keep in mind, no matter the laning or matchup is that the hero needs spot-on estimating skills.
If you underestimate her power, you will lose the most important role the hero is good for, and can say good-bye to a potential snowballing. Even worse if you overestimate her, you won't only feed the enemies, but will get double punishment as you give them extra damage. And if you are hesitant, you will lose the element of surprise, should an opportunity arise for it.
40th !!!
Legion Commander, one of my best heroes tho but I am afraid that I play her wrong because I only use BM in very extreme rare cases and also, Blink dagger is more preferable and getting deso and bkb to moonshard is best for me.
Safelane,offlane and especially middle lane is the fastest way to farm as LC.
I definately agree her offlane potential is high, being able to stand between the enemy range creep and their heroes and come out on top with harass because of your passive combined with stout shield is awesome, but I do feel she is pretty dependent on assistance from your midlaner. its a pleasure if you have an active midvoker.
Ahhh the jungle lc fucktards showing themselves here...
Gg zero brain no teamwork players
Keep feeding duel dmg
My friend and I often play an LC combo and we never take her in jungle. We usually safelane her, get her an early blink and immediately start roaming, looking for kills. Won many games with this tactic
Notice that while LC can be done in the jungle, it's not necessarily the best lane for her; if you look at the GPM and XPM of each potential laning scenario, she benefits the most in the mid-lane. If your reason to jungle is to "get an early blink/shadow blade/etc.", then unfortunately you are doing it completely wrong. You will actually get a blink or other core item FASTER as a mid-laner than in the jungle. This is because you have a constant stream of creeps, bounty runes, and you can keep it all for yourself without having to wander around and look for camps or wait for camps to respawn in early stages of the game.
Also, while you do open yourself up to pick up runes that allow your farm to be better, you can regen and stay in lane longer (providing necessary early levels), then you can gank either lane easily. It makes perfect sense for LC to be in the mid-lane. Pick up an early level in Press The Attack if you need a bit of regen against a ranged opponent, then max your Q, and profit.
LC is a good jungler in certain lineups, but her best (statistically proven) lane is the mid-lane. Finally, she has a higher win-rate when played in the mid-lane!
Don't think legion commander can become competitively popular in 6.86. Legion commander is a weird hero because while she supposedly want to function as a damage dealing core, her ultimate always put her in harm's way, which means she can't function as a pos 1. Press the attack is merely a 'good to have' skill but you should never see that as the main point to pick her, because there are way better saving supports out there who function similarly to a press the attack (abaddon, oracle, dazzle, winter wyvern, venge, io). And speaking of supports, the same set of saving supports also prevents her from wrecking people with duel, especially now that there's aether lens to increase cast range of those life saving skills.
She was theory-crafted to be a decent counter to swarm-based heroes like broodmother, but we've all seen competitive games of brood vs legion situations, where the brood simply avoid adding spiderlings and add her passive instead, and turn to completely wreck legion in her lane. Her ability as an anti-push is limited because the current push meta either does it early (mainly chen) so her overwhelming odds deal no damage because she's a underleveled offlane, or push with less but significantly higher damage units (syllabear and venge-oriented lineup).
Other than the standard blink / sblade + blademail, the only interesting consideration that's yet to be seen in competitive is legion aghanim, which in that case I suppose her role is to burst a squishy support, but once again all the stuns and saves out there prevents her from doing her role properly.
She probably needs some buffs depending on which direction valve wants her to be played as. For example if valve wants her to be an offlane with tempo-control they can buff her armour abit and make her immune to cc while dueling (now duel only prevents her from being disarmed). If valve wants her to be a stronger anti-push then buff overwhelming odds. If valve wants her to be a better late game / more viable jungle then buff her moment of courage etc.
TLDR: Legion's skill set tries to do several things but there are always other heroes who do them better, and duel gets countered by alot of things.
CHeck my winrate with legion xD
I have never agreed more with an article.
Lesson learned from the comments in this threads:
Some random dude advocates jungle lc -> I go to check profile -> "Normal skill". K gg, please give us more of your 2k wisdoms.
LC does not counter medusa. She can kill gyro, but not medusa. Gyro suffers from heroes that deal a lot of dmg to one target, since his dmg on single target is not that high. But medusa is so tanky that she does not give a shit about strong 1v1'rs. She will outlast them