[Uncommon Offlane Heroes} Monkey King vs the world

Hello guys , back again with another episode of U.O.H, this time about everyone's favorite Monkey King . This hero is also more commonly known as safelane carry or midlane semi-carry ganker type, since the picks on offlane is rather rare, you ought to surpise most match-ups in the enemy safelane with this pick. Monkey king himself is a very strong , independent hero and can win most laning stages, considering similar skills bracket. So there's no need to talk about the strength of this hero, this article however will focus mainly on how exactly to completely winning your lane and impact other lanes as well as how to recover from a bad laning stage. There's also a support Monkey King playstyle but i'll cover it some other time in a different article . What i will be writting today will include some more technique you can use and should be using in the higher mmr brackets. (4500+).

Some recomendations if you want to improve your skills with this hero on the offlane, you can check out zai's MK or iceiceice's one.

First of all, im going to talk about HOW DO YOU LANE?

An offlane monkey king is basically a 2nd carry in your team, just that he doesnt need that much farm to be effective, and can be very annoying for the enemy.

Im going to walk through some of the basics "When to pick MK" just so you could have a better decision head-on

• Pick when enemy have MELEE type hero (especially recommended if they have AM safelane, Alchemist midlane) : this hero is basically an Axe that have 300 range attack and 100% lifesteal, which is a total nightmare for all melee carry heroes early game. So there's no questions ask.
• Dont pick when enemy have Duo Zoning Support ( Rhasta - Lion, Dazlle - Slardar ) or the Ursa-Shaman would be pretty anoying all the same. Also when the enemy have a Sniper or a Viper.

That's the basic pick-and-counter knowledge, now we're going onto the laning skills.

Starting out with the basic 2 tango set, stout shield, venom orb and a salve ( or a ward if u think enemy have duo support , you can block the safelane small camp with this ). Quelling blade? you can get it at the sideshop, so better spend money on regen .

Picking this heroes also mean that you should try to solo this offlane , unless you think there will be better kill potential or if you cant barely even leech the exp, you should go with 1 support until you're lv5. There is usually 2 scenario to cover:

1st : 2-1-2 laning

This should be easy for you, even if you're soloing, by lvl-ing the 3rd skill first, try to hit the enemy at many times as possible since you'd get free lifesteal with this, at level 2 with Q its basically a free regen to full HP ( on a cost of mana ofc ) . Once you max out your stacks , most of the time the enemy wont dare to come near you since you have 100% lifesteal + bonus high damage that can hit 300 range away , use this to your advantage, try to control the creep wave while you have it or calculate the Q so that you can deal massive dmg to the enemy and heal at the same time.

2nd: 3-1-1 laning

Now this is a very popular laning around 7.10 patches, this kind of laning will put heavy pressure on the offlane so players usually prioritize picking heroes with either escapability or healing/quick farming skills. Monkey has all of that. With this kind of lane set-up , you should start out with 1 ward, save early money for quell and skip venom orb. Place this ward at the nearest spot to the lane so that you can see both the creewave and the camp-pull, on later patches where the map is fixes you can simply just place it the yellow zone to block the camp.

If the lane is hard, this is when you'd apply this technique called Enemy Wave Pulling. To do this , you need to be aware of the timer at all time to be most effective. The creepwave will always reach the warding spot at around x:45-x:50, this is when you'd cut the wave and pull it all the way to the middle of your offlane 1st and 2nd tower, just in time to meet up with your own wave. By doing this , the enemy would have to farm inside tower , and you'll manage to get gold and exp easily.

Now that you get pass your laning phase, what should you build and take which actions next to be impactful for the team?

For item build, go for phase boot->drum->echo sabre-> deso(opt) ->EOS and any optional items you'd prefer ( basher , AC, Satanic)

For talent build, i'd personally prefer attack speed, tree dance cast range, boundless crit and +1 area wukong command.

Now, if you have dominated your lane, there are 2 options you should consider.

1. Deep warding enemy jungle to gank their carries: There is no strict ward area for this , just try to ward anywhere near their shrine since it provide most vision, and gank their carries as much as possible while your midlaners pushing waves and towers and your carries farming.

2. Roaming: This is when your midlaner and/or carries have a hard time laning, your skillset would simply overpower the enemy if you're going 2v1 with your midlaner/pos4 support.

Remember to always push after you manage to get a kill, this is a pushing games after all.

That's all to cover for my article today, hope to see you on the next one ,.. Peace!