Hey, what is up guys? It’s Librarian Husky. So, what is good about Lena in this patch, and why is Carry Lena something that I think might be the best strategy of the patch, or at least one of the best? Well, there are a few main things to consider.

Key Talents That Make Lena Strong

The first thing I want to cover is her Talents. Her Talents are crazy. At level 10, you get 25 damage on a hero that already has absurd attack speed. Then at level 15, you have maybe the best level 15 talent in the game, and that might sound like an exaggeration, but let me explain it to you. It’s five Fiery Soul magic resist per stack. So if you have seven stacks, you’re getting 35% magic resist. Now, it doesn’t stack additively, so it doesn’t put you to, like, 64%. It actually brings you closer to around 59% or 58%, but that’s still insane.

Ultimate Synergy with Talents

If you ulti with your Fiery Soul, you get 12 stacks for 5 seconds, giving you technically 60% resistance from your E. And I’m not kidding, that is straight up how it works. The other Talents, like the Fiery Soul per stack at level 20, are unbelievably good as well.

The Level 25 Talent: A Game-Changer

This level 25 talent is unbelievable as well. Lena has four broken Talents. The 150% crit on target effects by spells works through BKB. If you don’t know what it is, if you hit someone with a Q, W, or an R for 3 seconds, you get a 150% crit. That’s pretty good, right? Just for some perspective, Daedalus is obviously much higher at 225%, and Daedalus crits hit like a truck. But this is a 150% crit on every attack, all of them. Unbelievable. And it even goes through BKB.

Lenina Car: One of the Best Strategies

I definitely think Lenina Car is one of the best strategies in the game. Let’s go through how to execute it, as it’s mechanically a little difficult, but if you can master it, you’ll have a lot of success.

Laning Stage Tips

In the laning stage, you’re either going to take Q or W at level one. Against melee heroes, I recommend W to stun them when they go up for last hits and hit them. Against ranged heroes, I would take Q. The only argument for Q, regardless of the matchup, is that it’s better at hitting more units, so it gives you more stacks of E at level two. But in general, if you want to keep it simple, Q against ranged and W against melee.

Starting Items and Strategy

In terms of starting items, it’s generally either W and three branches against lanes that cast a lot of spells, or you can go Blades of Attack and three branches because this hero’s base damage is not the best—not terrible, but not the best. With the high attack speed from E, you get a lot of value out of the Blades of Attack. This Blades of Attack is going to turn into Falcon Blade, and the branches will generally turn into Wand.

Maximizing Early Laning Pressure

For the early laning phase, I really recommend keeping your stacks up and putting a lot of pressure on the enemy. The main advantage of Lenina in the laning stage is that she has 670 attack range, which allows her to dominate most matchups.

Range Advantage of Lena Compared to Other Heroes

Lena’s attack range is much higher than the average ranged hero. For instance, Razor has 475 attack range, Windranger has 600, and Visage has 600, so you almost always have a range advantage outside of a few specific matchups. As a result, you can hit enemies without them being able to hit you.

Maximizing Range Advantage Without Pulling Creep Aggro

The main way you want to utilize this range advantage is by avoiding pulling creep aggro. To do this, issue the attack command before you’re in range of the creeps. Ideally, you should position yourself, issue the attack command, and then move towards the creeps. Since you’ve already issued the attack command, you won’t pull aggro for about three seconds when you approach the creeps. This tactic is particularly broken on ranged heroes like Lena, Razor, and even Windranger.

Leveling Strategy for Early Game

At level three, you should aim for one point in Q and two points in E. The E ability scales really well, providing eight more attack speed per stack, which is significant. For example, in this scenario, he only gets three stacks, so he isn’t hitting nearly as hard as he could be.

Lena’s High Attack Speed and Damage Potential

You can see how Lena does a lot of damage to Spirit Breaker here. With her generally very high attack speed, once you build up some stacks, she can push heroes like Razor out of the lane as well. It’s important to understand how this ability works: it gives you a stack per creep hit and per hero hit. So, make sure you’re hitting as many things as possible when trying to build stacks.

Refreshing Stacks and Maximizing Damage

When you hit anything, it refreshes the previous stacks and adds on what you’ve hit. For instance, if you nuke, you could have five stacks with the nuke’s duration. While in this scenario, there’s nothing to use the stacks on, it’s a crucial concept to keep in mind. However, Lena’s main weakness is her inability to survive ganks—she is very squishy, so you must consider this during gameplay.

Surviving Ganks and Item Recommendations

The main thing I would suggest is if it’s a good W lane, absolutely buy a W and Raindrops. You also need a lot of mana on this hero, so both of those items really help. In this situation, even though he goes on the Spirit Breaker and gets him low, he ends up dying to a Razor plus Monkey King gank, and there’s not much he can do about it. Typically, you want to fight back, and in this case, he almost gets Razor really low. When you get ganked on Lena, try to man up and deal as much damage as you can before going down.

Dealing with Ganks and Recovery Strategy

You’re not going to be able to run away most of the time; it’s just not feasible. Just man up. Despite getting ganked again and being 0-3 at this point, Lena still manages to carry the game and be top net worth very soon. So, how does she do this? It’s actually quite simple: if the game is hard and your safe lane is very dangerous, you either farm backwards by taking these two camps and waiting for the wave to push in, or you go mid.

Farming Strategy and Timing for Ancients

I wouldn’t recommend taking Ancients yet. Wait until you have Maelstrom; until then, it’s possible but doesn’t feel very good. So, try to farm the back camps and wait for the wave to push in. Optimally, you’re winning your lane and just farming your area, which is the best-case scenario. But you can also go mid, because the mid lane plus these two camps is very efficient, and it’s an option you should keep in mind.

Using Teleport and Ulti Effectively

Lena can also TP into a bottom fight, and it’s important to remember that you’re not completely useless. At the end of the day, you have an ultimate that deals 500 damage and gives you 12 stacks of your E. That’s pretty scary, right? This hero does a lot of damage early on. The main problem is that you just can’t afford to get caught out. So, look for opportunities to TP into fights and clean up, but definitely avoid just holding your safe lane tower.

Playing as a Hyper Carry: Adjusting to Pressure

You don’t want to be the brunt of the gank, so don’t be afraid to give up your tower and move to different areas. Remember, you’re not TA or Windranger; you’re a hyper carry, more like Luna than anything else. Beyond Maelstrom, the hero just begins to go crazy. Maxing out W is important because it increases stun duration, which helps you man up during fights.

Farming Ancients and Sustain

Once you have Mask of Madness (MoM), you can farm Ancients faster than most heroes. However, sustain can be an issue, so in most games, you want to take Seeds of Serenity. It’s also nice to have something like Spark of Courage, which gives flat damage—particularly with Fiery Soul’s damage—but it’s tough. Ideally, you want Royal Jelly or Seeds of Serenity, in my opinion.

Reacting to Ganks and Maximizing Impact

What really makes top players stand out is how they read situations and react. They don’t panic; they just make the best play possible. For example, when getting ganked, instead of panicking and trying to run away, recognize that you’re likely dead. Get off your W and ultimate onto a key target, like Monkey King, to deal as much damage as possible. This way, your team has a better chance to secure return kills. It’s important to accept that you’ll get ganked and feel like you’re dying a lot in some games, especially against teams with strong gap closers. But it’s okay—just focus on getting your damage out and helping your team turn the fight. After that, continue farming Ancients.

Maximizing Farm and Leveling Up with Ancient Camps

I can’t stress this enough: you will reach an extremely high level if you just focus on hitting Ancients. You do need to kite the camp a lot, but if you have a damage-neutral item or take Seeds of Serenity, you’ll need to kite less. You can afford to tank some hits, alternating between the top wave and the Ancient camps. If you copy this exact item build, aim for around a 14 to 15-minute timing with 123 CS by that point. Keep in mind, this is achievable even with four deaths. Deaths should not make you poor on this hero because you farm way too fast.

Finding Farm No Matter the Situation

I don’t want to hear excuses like “there’s no space” or “my game was too hard.” You can always find farm with this hero. Lena can farm any part of the map—any neutral camps, anything. As he sets up a kill, it becomes clear how effective this strategy is. Once you have Gleipnir, you need to make sure your teammates use their Mana Boots on you whenever they’re off cooldown, because this hero has insane mana problems.

Itemization and Tempo Control

In fact, some carries might even buy Mana Boots at this point in the game, and I actually really like that choice. In this game, he’s opting for Boots of Travel (BoTs) and playing a fast-paced tempo. However, if you’re not opting for Boots of Travel, you’ll need to adapt your strategy accordingly.

Mana Management and Item Recommendations

I would highly recommend Mana Boots on this hero because you can drop Gleipnir, which gives 24 intelligence, pop your Mana Boots, and get a lot of value out of it. If you’re not going to do that and opt for Boots of Travel or another item, you’ll need to spam Clarities or buy something like Linken’s Sphere, immediately getting the Void Stone with more Clarities. No matter what, you need Clarities, or you need to rely on your support, like Tinker, to bring you a filled bottle every few seconds. This hero just has significant mana problems.

Itemization and Teamfight Execution

In the upcoming team fight, I want to highlight the execution. First of all, he’s using Grove Bow, which is completely broken on this hero because attack range is crucial for a positioning-based hero. The magic resist reduction is also great on a hero with a bunch of nukes. He’s also taking stats over Q. The reason he takes stats over Q, even though it scales well in terms of damage and cooldown, is that it increases in mana cost, and you have mana problems. You actually want to use Q at level one to keep your E stacks up rather than maxing W because of these mana concerns. This is what top players do. In this team fight, at level 13 with two points in his ultimate, he’s feeling good and ready to contribute effectively.

Positioning and Execution in Teamfights

I like how he waits on the outside with very good positioning. You do not want to get caught in the middle; instead, kite around and find the right opportunity. He finds a really nice setup here on three enemies. In my opinion, this team fight looked over, but unfortunately, he ran out of mana. This is where I actually disagree with his item choices a bit. Either Mana Boots or a Magic Wand would have allowed him to straight up use his ultimate here and cast his Q.

Importance of Mana Management in Crucial Moments

The ultimate is a big deal because it gives you 12 stacks of your E, which is not only good for bursting heroes like Monkey King but also for maximizing damage during stuns. When you hit a big stun, you want to instantly use your ultimate to capitalize on it. In this case, he would have been able to kill the Jakiro, who survived with 1 HP. If he could have used the ultimate immediately, he would have secured the kill. Running out of mana lost him two potential kills, which is pretty crazy. This example clearly highlights the hero’s mana issues.

Boots of Travel: A Double-Edged Sword

While Boots of Travel are good on this hero because you can farm the entire map at flash speed, the lack of mana management can cost you in critical moments like the one mentioned.

The Power of Farming and Timing with Boots of Travel

It’s ridiculous—you can farm everything, and that’s why Boots of Travel (BoTs) are great. I would just buy one and move on from there. The key is to show up to fights late. We see him clean up a mid fight here, and after that, he goes back to farming. You just rinse and repeat: farm Ancients, then, if you have BoTs, TP into a fight, rinse and repeat. For instance, here, he TPs in late, responds to a gank, and lands a two-man stun. The damage this hero does is incredible.

Lena’s Early Game Damage and Magic Resist

There aren’t many heroes that do as much damage as Lena in the early game—it’s ridiculous. At level 15, he now has the talent that gives him 59% magic resist, which is just insane. To put it into perspective, this is what heroes have when they buy Pipe of Insight, and it’s actually less because Pipe gives 30% magic resist, whereas Lena has 35% when she has max stacks. It’s just funny how strong this hero can be.

Compensating for Lena’s Armor Weakness

You might be wondering how to kill Lena then. Well, she has only 11 armor, and that’s why, if you’re picking Lena, it’s best to pair her with heroes that can provide armor. A couple of meta examples include Sven support, which is absolutely fantastic for this.

Synergistic Lane Combinations for Lena

It’s a great lane when paired with stuns, like Sven’s stun combined with Warcry in the mid game, or Treant Protector, who is also a fantastic lane partner. Living Armor from Treant gives 10 armor in the mid game, making these combinations with Lena‘s level 15 talent nearly unkillable. She will have 60 to 70% resistance, depending on whether she has her ultimate active, in both magic and physical resistances.

23Savage’s Unconventional Build

What’s cool about 23Savage’s build in this game is that he doesn’t go for the standard Hurricane Pike. I really expected him to buy it to escape from heroes like Monkey King or Razor, but no—he goes for a full Chad build. This build is really good in average pubs as well because even if your team is playing poorly and not finding team fights, you can just use the Shadow Blade to Split Push or get solo pickoffs. This is high value and easy to do on Lena.

Executing High-Impact Plays

In this team fight, he Boots of Travels onto Visage’s birds, which I didn’t even know was possible when they’re in stone form, but apparently, you can. He then goes in, pops the Shadow Blade to avoid being stunned, and drops the ultimate. He cleverly relies on Maelstrom Procs, which go through evasion, to try to kill Windranger during Windrun, and it actually works. It was an awesome, heads-up play. From there, look at the damage on Razor—just strict auto-attacks almost kill him from two-thirds HP. They end up winning the fight as a result because Visage was able to finish off Razor. Just crazy.

Evaluating Lena’s 15 Talent and Itemization Choices

There isn’t even that much magic damage in this game, which is kind of a shame because I can’t fully highlight how good Lena’s level 15 talent is. However, in an average game—let’s say there’s a Zeus nuking you—you’ll quickly realize that his damage just doesn’t do much against you.

Common Item Builds and Considerations

In terms of your next items, the most common build on this hero is Gleipnir, Boots of Travel, into Black King Bar (BKB). I used to agree with this, but now that you have this 15 talent, I would actually try to shy away from BKB. It’s a bit greedy and can cause you to get chain-stunned, especially by heroes like Sven who might go on you with a stun plus physical damage. It sometimes feels frustrating not to have BKB in games like that, as people often see BKB as a magic resist item, when it’s actually more of a stun resist item.

Alternative Itemization: Linken’s Sphere and Force Staff

I like what he does here by going for Linken’s Sphere—it’s effective against Windranger, Spirit Breaker, and Razor. Personally, I would buy Hurricane Pike in this game. I’m usually the type of player that prefers buying items like Linken’s Sphere and Hurricane Pike. I just feel that this hero does more than enough damage, especially now that you hit level 20 and get 10 more attack speed per stack. You do more than enough damage without relying on BKB.

Adapting Lena’s Build Based on Game Flow

I lean towards staying alive and being able to siege effectively. If you want to siege early game, Dragon Lance from Pike and the mobility it provides will allow you to do that. The build he’s going for, however, is more oriented towards Split Pushing and pickoffs. So, you should feel out the game—if your team wants to end the game and hit buildings, you should have Dragon Lance at a minimum, with Pike being even better. If you’re playing more of a split-push and late-fight joining style, then this build with Shadow Blade and Linken’s Sphere is wonderful.

Adjusting to Game Situations and Lena’s Strengths

Just adapt to how the game is playing out. It’s challenging, and definitely one of the difficulties of playing Lena, but also one of her strengths. At this point in the game, with Tinker support and the 15 talent, I don’t want to say he’s invincible—he could still die to physical damage—but he’s very tanky. He also has an Assault Cuirass from Visage behind him, along with Vlad’s armor and Solar Crest armor. The aura meta, combined with Lena’s ability to sometimes skip BKB due to her 15 talent, is super powerful. This hero fits the meta incredibly well. Her only real weakness is Crimson Guard, but that’s an issue for a lot of heroes, so it is what it is.

Executing in Team Fights

When a team fight breaks out, it’s really impressive how much he relies on a 30% chance to proc Maelstrom and how effective that can be. It’s not something you typically see, but it works well in this game.

Unexpected Strategies and Itemization

I’ve seen very few players do what he’s doing, but it actually looks good—pretty shocking, considering the damage output. You can kill Windranger by hitting her just 30% of the time, which is quite amusing. And then there’s this item; while the attack speed is pretty terrible and the slow resist is mediocre, the 20 armor when stunned is really good on this hero. It’s definitely something to keep in mind.

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