How to Play Lina (Best Items and Playstyle)

IN Dota 2there are heroes that deal massive damage with their spells. And then there are those who hit like a truck in the late game with the right items. Lina gives you the best of both worlds. With plenty of nukes in her arsenal and a passive that gives her bonus attack speed every time she casts a spell, Lina the Fiery Mage is one of the strongest late heroes in the current Dota 2 the list.

But this does not mean that the choice of the hero is an automatic win for the team. The hero is extremely squishy, ​​much like the Windranger, and relies heavily on securing an early lead. If you're planning to add this hero to your toolbelt, here's a complete guide showing her best items, playstyle, and spell order to help you get started.

Dota 2 Lina Hero Overview

Lina is a caster whose primary stat is intelligence. She has two active abilities, a passive and an ultimate that unlocks when she reaches level 6. Her attack range is quite high, but her base attack speed, attack animation, and agility gain are all relatively low. In addition to a low health pool of only 560 at the start, the hero also has a fairly low starting armor, making her early laning phase easy to punish.

Here is a quick summary of Lina's abilities within Dota 2:

In addition to these abilities, Lina has an Aghanim's Shard and Aghanim's Scepter Upgrade.

• Aghanim's Scepter: Gives Lina an additional Flame Cloak ability that grants unhindered search, increases her spell damage, and grants bonus magic resistance. It also maxes out her Fiery Soul Stacks when activated.
• Aghanim's Shard: Upgrades Fiery Soul. Lina's other abilities deal 20 extra damage for each passive stack.

The Dota 2 The Crownfall update added two aspects and an innate ability to Lina's toolbox. Her innate ability, Combustion, allows Lina to deal additional damage to enemies when she deals 175 damage to an enemy hero. Her two aspects are as follows:

• Thermal Runaway: Casting Laguna Blade gives Lina additional stacks of Fire Soul that can exceed the maximum amount.
• Slow burn: Lina's abilities gain an additional damage-over-time effect.

Dota 2 Lina Building Guide

Lina is usually played in the mid lane as the position 2 of the team, but in some matchups she can also play as the position 1 Hard Carry. For this guide, we'll stick with her position 2 build since it's the one that performs best in the current meta.

While the hero can deal an impressive amount of physical damage with the right items, it's better to play her as a mage and focus on her spells. Since you don't need as many items to start doing damage, you can play at a faster pace on the map. There's nothing more satisfying than blasting an enemy hero with your spells as soon as you find them with Lina, and that's exactly what you'll be doing with this build.

Here's a full rundown of how the build works:

Ability Order & Talent Build

When playing as the mage Lina, you want to go with your first Facet, Thermal Runaway. This will give you extra Fiery Souls stacks from your ultimate, which, combined with your Aghanim's Shard upgrade, will greatly increase your magic damage. For the early laning phase, you want to go with Dragon Slave first to quickly secure range and farm.

The following image gives you a complete idea of ​​her spell order and talent build:

By maxing out your dragon slave first, you can quickly clear creep waves and farm the stacked neutral jungle camps. Even though you're playing as a spellcaster, you'll want to max your Fire Soul next, as it also gives you bonus speed. Put a value point into Light Strike Array at level 4 and pick up your ultimate as soon as it's available.

For her talents, you'll want to go with the side that increases her magic damage or lowers her cooldown. At level 25, go with the talent on the right side to get a damage blocking shield when you cast your ultimate.

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As a position 2, Lina can come online quite quickly due to her ability to quickly farm camps with her spells. Remember, everyone Dota 2 games are unique and require you to adjust your item selection depending on the matchup and situation. With that said, here are the most important items you'll want to pick up on the hero throughout the game.

With Lina, you want to start with a set of Tango, three Ironwood Branches, and a Faerie Fire for the laning phase. This gives you enough stats and attack damage to secure the early farm as you work towards your bottle. Ask for an observer ward or buy one yourself to get a vision of enemy Midlaners and Runes.

Use an Ironwood Branch from your inventory when consuming a Tango to gain bonus regen during the laning phase.

Since you play in the mid lane, Bottle should be your first priority in the early game. This gives you enough regen to consistently use your spells to harass your lane opponent and secure creeps. Make sure you secure the early water runes to refill the bottle.

The bounty rune at minute 3 can also be used to refill the bottle's two charges.

After that, go to the Null Talisman and Boots. If you have two Ironwood branches in your inventory, buy the Magic Stick and recipe to supplement your Magic Wand.

Lina likes to play actively on the map, and Boots of Travel is the best option for this. If the lane is going well, it's okay to rush this item so you can easily TP to the side lanes and join fights. After that it's usually best to go for an item that gives you some mana regen. Aether Lens and Kaya are two good options for this. Ideally, you want to choose an item between the two.

Choose Aether Lens if you want to build into Ethereal Blade later, or Kaya if you'd rather go with Yasha and Kaya.

If you're nearing the 15 minute mark and have saved up 1400 gold, pick Aghanim's Shard next. Aghanim's Scepter is the last core item you need for the hero.

Once you have your core items covered, the opportunity for your build opens up a lot. If the enemy has a lot of silences or disables, Eul's Scepter of Divinity is a great choice for Lina. You can also upgrade it to Wind Walker in the late game. Black King Bar is another excellent defensive item that can help you play around your opponent's disabilities. Linken's Sphere can work wonders when playing against a Legion Commander or Winter Wyvern with a point-target lock.

As far as offensive options go, Blink Dagger is often pretty good on Lina. This allows her to close the gap quickly or even escape to safety if things go south. Octarine Core is good for reducing ability cooldowns, while Scythe of Vyse can be a solid late game pick against heavy carries. In some matchups Dagon 5 can be a decent item as it gives you an extra nuke and spell lifesteal.

How to play Lina in Dota 2

Lina is a pretty squishy hero, and the trick to playing her is knowing when to be aggressive and when to play it safe. Her early game mostly revolves around farming lane and jungle crawls and rotating to gank when her ultimate, Laguna Blade, comes off cooldown. You don't want to rotate into bad fights because a death can seriously affect your tempo.

You will want to come out of the laning phase with your early game items complete along with an extra item. It could be your Boots of Travels or Aether Lens/Kaya. With these items in your inventory, you can start working on the map. Keep an eye on your minimap to see if a fight breaks out. You can quickly go with your Boots of Travels and secure a kill, and get a nice boost to your bank.

During team fights, you want to go after the squishy heroes. Since you're using the Thermal Runaway Facet, you'll want to start the fight with the Laguna Blade. After that, stun with your Light Strike Array and follow up with Dragon Slave. Throw in some right-click autoattacks in between, and the enemy hero should go down pretty quickly. While fighting, try to play around map view. Ask your supporters to secure vision with Observer and Sentry Wards. Lina is extremely easy to focus down, and your opponents will likely try to take you out of the fight once the battle begins. Stay close to the backline and use your Flame Cloak from Aghanim's Scepter to position yourself properly during teamfights.

Mana management is crucial for Lina, especially in the early game. Ferry out Clarities and Mango as needed. You don't want to stay on the map without mana for too long. Since all of your abilities have fairly low cooldowns, you always want to be ready for battle. If you're playing against a physical damage like Alchemist, don't hesitate to use your Ethereal Blade defensively. Since you're immune to physical attacks throughout, you'll be able to use the bonus speed from the Fiery Soul stacks to get away quickly.

That's pretty much all there is to know about playing Lina in Dota 2. Her spells take a while to get used to. However, with a little practice and some game knowledge, you should be able to play Lina like a pro and see yourself climbing up the ranks in no time.