Wards and vision: where to place, and why almost every ward is wasted

A ward is for seeing the enemy coming. That is the answer almost every mid bracket student gives, it is not wrong, and it is the less valuable half of the thing. It is also what produces the pattern that shows up in nearly every replay review I do: wards in the same four spots, game after game, dying in ninety seconds without ever having changed a decision.

The best definition is this: vision exists to allow your team to occupy territory. Seeing the enemy is the mechanism. Occupying the map is the product.

Why difference matters

Compare two placements of the same ward, in the same minute:

• Ward A, on the river, near your middle tower. He sees who passes by. If someone passes, you retreat. Result: you don't die.
• Ward B, at the entrance to the big jungle on the side where your carry will farm for the next five minutes. He sees who comes to deny that farm. Result: your carry stays there and converts five minutes of map into gold.

Ward A protects a person for a few seconds. Ward B unlocks a territory for minutes. In the games we reviewed, it's always the second type that appears in wins, and it's always the first type that players place.

The placement criterion, in three questions

Before planting any observers, answer:

1. What piece of map will my team use in the next three to five minutes?
2. Where does those who want to deny this piece go?
3. Does this ward live long enough to pay what it cost?

If you can't answer the first one, the ward is a reflex, not a decision. If you can't answer the second one, you'll plant it in the usual place. And the third one is the one that most people ignore: ward at the obvious point, within their territory, with the enemy support passing through there anyway, it's donated gold.

Defensive vision and offensive vision

The rule that guides the exchange between the two is simple: reactive vision protects, offensive vision produces. A team behind in the game needs the first. A team ahead that keeps buying only the first stops growing.

The places that count, by game phase

From 0 to 10 minutes

The goal is the lane. Prioritize, in this order:

• The ward that sees the river lane next to your safe lane, for the carry to see the gank coming.
• The ward that sees the field that the enemy support pulls, when he is using this to disrupt his lane.
• The rune ward, if your mid depends on rune to exist.

Don't spend the first two observers inside enemy territory. Before minute 10 you have no way to defend that.

From 10 to 25 minutes

Here the vision changes function and starts to follow the territorial decision of the team. If the doctrine we follow says "defend your big jungle, attack the enemy's", the vision goes after this:

• Entrances to your big jungle, on the side where your cores farm.
• Entrances to their big jungle, on the side you want to invade.
• The way the answer arrives when you break in.

The classic mistake of this phase is to put a view on where the fight happened last time. The past fight does not indicate the next one: the territory you chose to contest does.

After 25 minutes

The vision becomes about the goal. And here is a reading that few people apply: the position of the Roshan hierarchizes the two sides of the map. The territory on the Roshan 's side is worth more than the one on the opposite side, because it is where the next big goal will be disputed. Your vision should be concentrated there before the discussion begins, not during.

Placed Ward while the Roshan is already being done arrived late: the information he brings no longer changes anything.

Sentry: the half that no one trains

Observer shows. Sentry denies it. And denying vision is usually worth more.

Three uses that appear little in mid bracket and always in high bracket:

1. Before a smoke. A sentry in the path you're going to use kills their smoke and reveals your advantage. A sentry in their vantage point makes your smoke work.
2. Before the Roshan. Warding the pit is cheaper than winning the fight that happens when they see.
3. At the entrance to the jungle you invade. You don't just want to see: you want them not to see you coming.

And the basic use that many people forget: against an invisible hero, a sentry in the bag is a mandatory item, not optional. Without detection, everything else in the team's plan doesn't matter.

The ward that dies for free

Three patterns that appear in virtually every mid bracket replay:

• The usual place ward. If you know the four points, the enemy support also knows it, and he passes there with a sentry out of habit.
• The ward planted with the enemy watching. You crossed the map, planted in their faces, and died. It cost the observer, the displacement, and your respawn time.
• The ward that no one uses. He saw the enemy pass, no one looked at the minimap, and the information didn't become a decision. This is the responsibility of the entire team, not just the support, and it's the most common of the three.

How to turn vision into decision

Ward is only valid when someone acts on it. Two simple practices that change this faster than it seems:

• Tell us what you saw, and what it allows. Not "top 2", but "top 2, you can take the jungle from below now".
• Look at the minimap when a ward of yours is about to expire. It's the moment when you still have information and you're going to stop having it: if you were going to do anything with it, it's now.

How much ward is enough ward

A practical question that comes up a lot: how many observers should a team be fielding per match?

The number is not the point, but it serves as a thermometer. In a 40-minute match, a team that plays with vision puts something around 25 to 35 observers adding the two supports. A mid bracket team usually puts half of that, and the difference is almost never a lack of gold: it's a ward stopped in the bag.

Ward in the bag is dead ward. It costs nothing to the enemy and produces nothing for you, and the support who dies with two observers guarded lost two pieces of information he had already paid for. The rule of thumb is silly and works: left the base with a ward, plant before doing anything else, even if it's not the perfect place. A bad ward placed is worth more than a great ward in the bag.

The same reasoning goes for the other side of the budget. The cores can also buy observer, and they should when the team is out of vision and the supports are dead. Vision is not the exclusive responsibility of position 5: it is the responsibility of whoever has the gold at that moment and will use the map in the next few minutes.

Before you place your next ward

• Vision allows us to occupy territory. Seeing hero is the mechanism, not the end.
• Before planting, answer: what piece of map are we going to use, where does the denier go, and does this ward live long enough?
• Before the 10, defensive view. After the 10, view that accompanies the territory you have chosen.
• After the 25th, the vision goes to the side of the Roshan, before the discussion.
• Sentry denies it, and denying is usually worth more than showing.
• A ward that doesn't turn into a decision is a wasted ward, and that's the team's fault, not just the support's.