What high ground is
High ground is the elevated terrain a team's base sits on: the throne and the towers defending it. To win, you have to enter the enemy high ground and destroy the throne. But high ground is built to give defenders a serious advantage — which is why storming it is almost always the tensest moment of the match.
High ground is taken not by heroes but by conditions: vision on the elevation, a large creep wave, an advantage after a fight, and gold for buyback. An unprepared entry is a gifted game, even when you are ahead in farm.
Why it is hard to take
High ground protects the defenders through two built-in mechanics and one positional factor:
- No vision up top. An attacker below cannot see what happens on the elevation until they go up themselves or place vision. The defenders see everything.
- Misses when attacking up. An attack from below misses 25% of the time: every fourth hit lands on nothing. It applies to attacks only, not spells, and heroes with True Strike never miss. Since patch 7.41 even units with free movement miss uphill, where they used to be exempt.
- The defense plays at home. At the throne respawn is fast and buyback is available, while attackers are far from their base. Lose once on the high ground, and a counter-attack follows.
So you do not grind high ground head-on. You take it when the sum of conditions outweighs the defense's advantage.
How to take high ground
A successful storm is not heroics but a sequence. Most often the reason to enter comes from a caught enemy — for how to hunt an opponent under Smoke, see the smoke gank guide. The basic entry plan:
- Create a reason. Go in after a won fight or with the Aegis — when an enemy is dead and cannot buy back.
- Place vision. Sight on the elevation removes the defense's main advantage — now you see who to hit.
- Enter behind the creep wave. A large wave tanks the tower damage and distracts it while you grind the building.
- Take the target and pull back. Take the tower or throne and leave if the trade turns against you — do not get greedy.
For the entry to land, the team must position and focus the defenders correctly — that is the teamfight positioning guide. And the advantage to enter often comes from Roshan and the Aegis.
How to defend the base
On defense, time and vision work for you. A lot comes down to controlling the waves under the tower — the basics of managing creeps are covered in the stacking and pulling guide. What to do while defending:
- Stay in your vision. Do not go down without a reason — up top you are stronger thanks to sight and the enemy's misses.
- Pick off one by one. Kill an enemy who entered alone before the rest arrive.
- Do not let them grind under the tower. Clear creeps so the wave does not tank the building — without it the enemy cannot stay.
- Stall for time. Respawn and buyback bring the defense back quickly. A drawn-out storm almost always falls apart.
Common mistakes
High ground forgives little — one mistake on entry often costs the game. The most common ones:
- Entering with no vision and no wave. Blind and without creeps, you lose heroes under the towers for nothing.
- Storming with no buybacks. If the team has no gold for buyback, a lost fight on the high ground ends in a counter-attack and defeat.
- Greed after a taken tower. You dropped the building — do not push on impulse. Pull back and enter again.
- On defense — going down. By descending from the high ground, you give away its advantage yourself.
To know when you are strong enough to enter, reading the map and tempo helps — the how to read the minimap guide, while river control and timings come from the runes guide.
