What a gank and smoke are
A gank is a kill on an enemy who is out of position: one or more heroes show up where the opponent does not expect them and take them down before they can react. Smoke of Deceit is a consumable that hides your group from enemy vision and the minimap while you move. Together they turn map knowledge into clean kills.
A smoke gank is the cleanest way to convert an advantage into kills: you arrive unseen, open first, and kill the target before it understands what happened. One good smoke can flip an entire game.
Smoke of Deceit: how it works
Smoke costs 50 gold and covers every allied hero within 1200 of whoever used it. It lasts 45 seconds. While under the effect you:
- Disappear from the enemy minimap and from their normal vision — even when you walk past wards.
- Gain +15% movement speed — to reach the target faster while the 45 seconds tick down.
- Lose the effect near the enemy. Smoke breaks on your own attack or when you come within 1025 of an enemy hero or tower. Creeps and wards do not break it, so plan the route around heroes and towers, not around lanes.
- Stay invisible even to detection. Smoke is the one invisibility in the game True Sight does not break: no Sentry, Gem or Dust will show a team under it. How that differs from ordinary invisibility is covered in the guide on detecting invisibility.
- Pick up stragglers. An ally who comes within 300 of a smoked hero gets the buff too — but each charge only shares once.
That leads to the core rule: smoke is used in a group and away from the enemy. Solo the effect is nearly useless, and if you are already seen, the smoke animation only gives away your intent.
How to set up a smoke gank
A good smoke gank is four simple steps that work at any rank:
- Group up. Smoke buffs nearby heroes — gather two or three of you before activating it.
- Use smoke in the fog. Activate it where the enemy cannot see you, or they will spot the smoke and know a gank is coming.
- Move around vision. Travel through the fog of war, staying away from enemy heroes and towers so the effect does not break early.
- Commit together. Approach from the right angle, open with control, and focus a single target — agree in advance who starts.
To know where the enemy has vision and where to go, the warding in Dota 2 guide helps, and to see which enemies have vanished from the map — how to read the minimap.
Who and when to catch
Smoke ganks do not work on just anyone — they work on the right targets at the right moment. That moment often lines up with a fresh power rune, or with an enemy core lost in farming — busy with stacking and pulling in the jungle and not watching the map:
- An enemy out of position. A core farming a side lane alone, or a support caught placing wards, are ideal targets.
- A target with no escape. If the enemy has no escape spell or it is on cooldown, they are almost guaranteed to die.
- Before an objective. Smoke ganks are often run before Roshan or a tower: clear the enemy, then take the objective in peace. On Roshan — the Roshan and Aegis guide.
- When you have an advantage. An extra hero, a power rune, a favorable trade, or enemy ultimates spent are the best moments to commit.
Common mistakes
These slip-ups turn a clean plan into a free kill for the enemy — and they happen all the time:
- Smoking solo. Without a group the effect gives almost nothing — gather first.
- Smoking in plain sight. If you are already seen, the smoke gives away your intent. Activate it in the fog.
- Walking up to a tower or hero too early. Smoke breaks and the enemy sees you coming. Build a route that goes around.
- Ganking with no plan for the target. You arrive but do not know who to hit first or who lands control — the target escapes. Decide before you commit.
Where to stand on commit so your control and damage land — that is the teamfight positioning guide. And a kill won with smoke is worth converting into map control right away: a clean gank often opens a push onto the high ground.
