Leshrac is one of the more versatile heroes in Dota. He can easily fit in different situations and contribute thanks to his skill set. He is a great pusher and flash-farmer and unlike most spellcasters in Dota 2, he scales well with items. Nevertheless, Lesh is one of the easier heroes to kill in the game, which is even a bigger drawback bearing in mind that in order to maximize the efficiency of his skills, he needs to be in the middle of the fight.

Picking him as a support allows you to exploit his pushing and early game killing potential without relying on him to carry the game in its later stage. However, this means that he will most likely lack sufficient farm to allow him to scale well in the mid/late game.

Picking him as a core (most likely solo mid or safe lane) will allow you to get the needed resources to flash farm and dominate team fights in the mid and late game with your powerful AoE potential.

It is very hard to say with certainty in what situation the hero should be picked (or drafted) because as we already said, he is very versatile, especially in the support role. One thing to always bear in mind should be his early-mid game kill potential and his amazing ability to push. Whatever your game plan, you should accommodate these two abilities and aim to accomplish something with them.

When you draft Leshrac in a strategy, it is usually to utilize his pushing ability. How you do this depends on what role you give to the hero. A support Lesh will not scale well into the later stages of the game but can give you the opportunity to be very aggressive (with ganks and pushing) in the early game. A farming Lesh, on the other hand, could help you dominate the mid-game with his team-fight presence.

Usually, the main idea of drafting Lesh as a defensive 3-lane support is to push the enemy towers quickly. Otherwise, Lesh is played as a traditional support at that position - providing vision, babysitting the carry, pulling for levels and farm or initiating ganks.

Partnered with another support with disable, Lesh can be part of a very strong roaming and ganking support duo in the early game as the two heroes should have very heavy kill potential.

Finally, since Lesh scales well with farm, he could benefit a lot from stacking and pulling the jungle as he could farm rather efficiently this way and be a formidable team fight presence in the mid stages of the game.

Hence, the general idea behind drafting Lesh in a defensive 3-lane is:

• To push down towers in the early game and provide map control
  
  
• To be a part of a roaming support duo in order to gank enemies in the lanes
  
  
• To pull and farm the jungle, getting enough farm and levels to have a significant impact in fights
  

Substitutes:

The major idea behind putting Lesh in the second position could be to facilitate fast pushing and strong mid-game team fighting potential - in the mid lane Lesh will gain levels faster and will be able to provide AoE DPS sooner.

Leshrac is very susceptible to ganks early on and is thus a situational middle hero in team strategies. Picking Leshrac mid is only a good idea if you are relatively certain that you will be able to win your lane versus the opposing mid hero, and in addition, you know that it is unlikely that you will be ganked in the early levels (because, for example, you are running an aggressive 3-lane, and the enemy supports will have trouble rotating).

Substitutes:

The best partners of Lesh are heroes that amplify his two key talents: pushing and kill potential.

Good friends to have are:

It could be said that Lesh has no hard counter and is himself not a hard counter to anything. When you pick him, it is good to have at least a few reasons why he would fit in the game. 

For example, if you want a support hero that can both gank and push, and the enemy team has no natural magic immunity/resistance, then Leshrac could be a great idea. However, if you want to deal with enemy illusions through Leshrac’s AOE, but there is magic immunity on the enemy team, you might want to consider your other options.

Weak Against:

Strong Against:

The versatility of Leshrac comes mainly from his skills which are useful in various situations. Therefore, it could be said that there is no “right way’’ to level him up. Every possibility, however, has its strengths and weaknesses. This should be considered when a build is chosen. Finally, a build should not be chosen before the game. The picks (both allies and enemies) and the lane in which Lesh will be should be the main determinants of the choice.

Try to avoid leveling up your 1^st level spell from the get-go and save it until you need it. Most of the time Split Earth will be your choice; nevertheless, if you catch a single enemy in your jungle with an ally or something similar, 1lvl on Edict can net you a kill.

Lesh could make use of a very large variety of items, so his item builds are not set in stone. Rather it is more important to judge the game and your current situation in order to make the right choices. Whether you are playing a farming Lesh or a support Lesh, the level of farm you currently have and the heroes you are playing with/against will be the main determinants of your choices.

A support Leshrac, as most other support heroes, should prioritize the needs of his team instead of his own. After those needs are met, Leshrac should focus in solving his biggest problem - lack of survivability.

A farming Leshrac should prioritize boosting his survivability before all else. It is important to note that Lesh deals sustained damage. Therefore, the longer he survives, the more damage he deals. Nevertheless, items that would benefit the team or counter the enemies should be considered.

Mobility, Survivability and Mana items are key to Leshrac’s item builds. You should be able to sustain using your spells often, as well as be survivable enough to not die in engagements. Movement speed is also vital as Lesh has no means of getting in position other than running.

The proposed build focuses on utility items that give survivability – Eul’s and Glimmer. You can use Eul’s either to set up your stun or defensively, on yourself while dealing pulse nova damage. Glimmer could also be used either on an ally on in case they go on you – on yourself. In the late game you need BKB to be able to stay in the fight and Octarine is just a great source of HP and Mana to keep you fighting for longer and spamming your spells.

This proposed build focuses on survivability and mana pool/regen, which will allow Lesh to go deep in group engagements and deal sustained damage for a long time. The combination of Bloodstone, BKB and Octarine Core makes him an incredibly hard hero to bring down.

Leshrac has high range and decent animation and base damage. As a result, last-hitting should not be a real problem versus most heroes. Furthermore, he has a high mana pool, so if he needs to, he can continuously use his nukes to get last hits that he otherwise wouldn’t be able to. Flash farming the jungle or the lane creeps with your AoE nukes is possible in the late laning stage if you don’t need your mana for more important things, like fighting.

Passive Harass: His good range allows him to easily harass heroes without exposing himself to danger or aggroing the creep wave, especially if his enemy is melee (or has a short range).

Active Harass: Because of his good mana pool and good nuke damage, Lesh can use his spells to harass his enemy (or enemies) out of the lane. 

Generally, it is easiest to harass with Lightning Storm (if you don’t want to push the wave, be careful not to cast it too close to the creeps). If you haven’t leveled it up, however, you might want to try and harass with Edict. To do this efficiently, you need to position yourself away from the creep wave as otherwise the enemy creeps will tank most of the Edict damage. Harassing with Edict is generally easier in the side lanes, as the mid lane is very short and you don't have a lot of distance between the creep wave and the towers.

Although Split Earth provides decent damage, it is quite hard to hit especially at low levels. So, try to use it for harass only when you are certain you are going to land it. Otherwise, it could be a waste of mana.

You are one of the heroes with the highest kill potential in the early stages of the game. You have good nuke damage and control (thanks to Split Earth and the Storm mini-slow). Despite that, you are most dangerous because of Diabolic Edict - even at lvl1, you could possibly do up to 400 damage to a hero. Of course, maximizing the DMG output of Edict is not that simple because your target needs to be isolated, and you need to be able to stick to it for a rather long period (8 seconds). Nevertheless, with some smart positioning (like initiating from behind) and control of the target from your lane partners, doing lots of Edict damage is not impossible.

At low levels, landing your Split Earth is hard as it has a long casting animation, and the AoE is rather small. The 2sec stun, however, is incredibly important for getting a kill. That’s why it is very smart to have a lane partner that can setup for your stun with another disable or good slow. With such a combo getting a kill at lvl2 or even sometimes at lvl1 is possible.

To land your stun without setup you can try to start casting it from the fog of war. Get in the trees or on your high ground, don't attack the enemy hero and cast Split Earth. If your opponent doesn't know you're casting it, he/she wouldn't try to dodge. In the later laning stage it's also a good idea to use your nukes to hit your opponent and clear the creep wave at the same time - this way Edict will have only 1 target to hit.

At lvl2 you would probably have both your disable and your damage spell which will make you a formidable opponent.

Bear in mind that you have a large mana pool. This means that you could try to score a kill and even if you fail, you will most probably be able to try again when your spells are off cooldown. Therefore, don’t be too stingy and use your spells often.

Early on, Lesh is one of the fastest pushers in the game since Edict deals a lot of damage to towers. You have the option to bring down towers from very early on in the laning stage, which will provide you with a gold advantage. To maximize the damage output on the tower, the enemy creep wave must be killed beforehand or at least aggroed to the side. In addition, it is a good idea to have somebody else tank the tower hits as Lesh is squishy (your creep wave or other units). You need to position yourself so that the tower is the only enemy unit in the range of the Edict - this way it will take the full damage.

A good idea to begin a push in the safe lane is to stack your creep waves by doing a single pull. Afterwards, try to clear the enemy creep waves as fast as possible when you near the enemy tower (use your Split Earth/ Lightning Storm if you have to). Once you have a huge wave of creeps to tank the tower shots and no enemy creeps to tank your Edict, bringing the enemy tower down should be relatively easy. In the other lanes, an ally hero might have to tank some tower shots for you.

• Ganking

As Lesh, you get the majority of your kill potential at lvl2 (Split Earth+ Edict), which means that when you hit that point, you can choose to rotate for kills. As mentioned, you are not a good initiator because of your unreliable stun, so it is a good idea to rotate with a partner that can latch onto enemy heroes. If you are rotating alone, make sure you are going to a lane where the ally in the lane can latch onto the target and provide you with time to use your spells efficiently.

• Counter-Ganking

Whether you will be able to save a hero which has been ganked, depends mainly on if you are able to land your Split Earth well. If your ally is running in one direction, the enemy heroes are likely to run in a straight line behind him in order to catch up to him and kill him off. As a result, aim your stun a bit to the front of your opponents, and you should be able to land even a multiple-target stun. The 2 sec might be enough for your ally to get out of danger.
Generally, with a support Lesh, it is worth it to TP and attempt to save allies which are being ganked. Nevertheless, make sure your Split Earth counts, otherwise your efforts would have been wasted.

Whether you will be able to get counter kills is very situational. Generally, after you land your stun, you might want to run in with your Edict to finish off an enemy. This will be much easier if the enemy is one (since he/she will get all the Edict damage). If there are multiple enemies, it is better to disengage. The Edict will deal much less damage, and you are pretty squishy, so you might end up dying.

How fast you could afford to push depends on your lane partners. Having summoners that could tank the tower with their units could allow you to push from the very start of the game.

Bear in mind that when you are pushing, you are inevitably giving XP to the enemy offlaner. It is a tradeoff that you need to consider - sometimes it is better to simply zone out and go for a push later, especially if you are unsure whether you will be able to kill off the tower in the first place.

Remember that you are good both at pushing and zoning out. In case you can’t zone out, you might opt to push. If you can’t push, it is better to zone out.

Since Edict deals damage to units you don’t have vision of, a cool trick you can do is to push towers while in the same time hiding in the trees:

Leshrac  is a surprisingly dominant solo laner. As Lesh, you are not in the mid lane because you want to counter the hero against you. You are there to get fast levels and farm. This will allow your team to dominate fights and push immediately after the laning phase. This is why you must prioritize your own safety and development.

The main problem with solo Leshrac is that he is easy to gank. If a support rotates to the mid lane, usually two heroes could bring down Lesh very quickly because of his low HP, no escape mechanism and his disable being very hard to land without setup. Nevertheless, some good positioning could help escape such ganks. Try to always be positioned defensively on the high ground. If the creep equilibrium doesn’t allow you to do this, it is worth using your nukes to clear the wave so that you minimize the time you are in a more dangerous position rather than stand in the river/ enemy HG and passively last hit.

He starts with Null Talisman so he can get last hits easier and branches, which he will use to make Magic Wand later on. He is using Split Earth often to secure the last hit on range creeps and harass the enemy Arc.

He is trading hits favorable since he has higher range attacks. He rushes the second Null for better last hits and harass.

Getting an early Bottle is always good for Leshrac, even now when Bottle is not that prominent in the mid lane (can`t bottle crow). Still, there are at least 3 good runes for Leshrac (Invis, Haste, Arcane) that can secure him a kill.

At 5.15 game time he comes very close to dying, but abuses one of Arc Wardens weaknesses in order to survive – Arc has no disables to stop the TP of Leshrac. About a minute later he manages to get a kill on the Arc in turn, which propels him ahead in the lane and allows him to pressure the T1 mid tower with his Edict.

Immediately after he starts joining fights and trying to pressure towers whenever it’s possible.

A support in a defensive dual or trilane is one of Leshrac’s usual positions. He is very strong at zoning out the enemy offlaner and could use his Edict to push down the towers very early on in the game, with the help of his other allies. Your priorities are:

Either one is OK for Lesh (he is a versatile hero). However, since he is one of the best heroes in the game to zone out single targets (thanks to Edict) in a defensive lane, Lesh is usually the babysitter.

Pulling

If a single hero comes to challenge your pulls, you can use your good zoning potential to drive him away from the camps by using mainly Edict. Fighting multiple heroes off, however, is not a great idea as you can easily die while you are away from your allies.

Pulling for farm or rotating for ganks are also not bad options if you have another potent babysitter. You can use well the levels and farm from the pulls - they will allow you to have a greater impact in fights and push more aggressively in the early game. In addition, you are a very strong ganker with a setup for your stun.

Provided you are a support, you should focus on the regular support activities - warding, dewarding and sticking to your team (supporting your core heroes). Nevertheless, if your team allows you to do so, try to utilize your pushing potential - even though you don’t have items your Edict will bring towers down very fast.

As a farmer, if you had a good laning stage, you should aim to force the issue. Gather your team and try to force fights and push. You are always at a fighting advantage if your opponents have trouble killing you and don’t have magic immunity. This, in fact, is your most important timing window. Try to utilize it to secure the game. Whenever you let your opponents get their BKBs/Pipe, while you haven’t pushed most of their towers, your impact will decrease severely.

If your laning stage was bad, and you didn’t manage to get enough levels and items, you might want to transition to a semi-support role. Try to play more defensively - provide wards, don’t force fights, follow up on the initiation of your other teammates, etc. If there is space on the map, you can try to catch up on farm by flash farming. Bear in mind, however, that since you were unable to have an impact in the early and mid-game, your timing has likely passed. This means that your priority regarding farm is low, so don’t steal farm from your physical damage dealers. 

Pushing is Leshrac’s forte, so basically in the later stages of the game, whenever you have some kind of advantage over your opponents (for example, you have killed one or two of them), you should push. As Lesh does this very quickly, often you can snatch a tower before your opponents can set up a proper defense.

5-man Pushing

If you are pushing together with your team while your opponents are alive, you need to make the decision whether you want to stay close to the tower to deal damage with Edict. Bear in mind that in the mid and late game your carries likely have more than enough damage to bring a tower down, so your Edict might not be that important - you, being alive, on the other hand, might be very important for the upcoming fight.

It is a fact that the tower will fall faster with the help of your Edict. Despite that, if you are squishy, you will be a very good target to initiate on and to kill instantly. So, the main decision whether to stay on the front lines and deal damage to the tower or to stay behind your team more safely comes from two things. 

Firstly, if you don’t expect any defense (most likely because you have a number advantage or you are trading), you should deal as much damage to the tower as possible (this means, as explained before, positioning yourself in such a way that the Edict deals damage only to the tower or simply killing all enemy units before that so that they can’t tank up Edict damage).

Secondly, if you expect that a fight might happen, you should consider how tanky you are, and what will happen if the enemy team initiates on you. As a support Lesh, it is better to stay behind your team. This way you will be able to help with a crucial Stun and the damage from your spells after the enemies initiate. If you are a farming Lesh, however, you can usually afford to stay at the front lines and deal damage to the tower. You should be tanky enough to survive the initiation and deal damage with your Pulse Nova in the middle of the fight. Bear in mind that if you manage to switch the Nova on before you get disabled, it will deal damage even while you are disabled. This might make initiating on you instead of your allies actually something positive.

Split-Pushing

As a farming Lesh, you could clear waves and push towers on your own incredibly fast. The problem is, however, that you have no escape mechanism, and if you get caught by a gank, you are likely to die. This is why split pushing with Lesh could be very rewarding but also very risky. Generally, you should do it only if you see the whole enemy team (or at least all heroes that can kill you) somewhere on the map (this way there will be no risk from getting ganked). This will give you an opportunity to split push and force the enemy team to react (by TPing to defend). If they don’t, you might get a free tower.

Anti-Pushing

Lightning Storm is one of the most potent spells for stalling pushes and defending towers without initiating. Provided you cast it on the enemy creep wave, you will damage both the creeps AND the enemy heroes that are nearby, and you will draw the creep aggro. The best part is that in 4 seconds you will be able to do this again.

If you are a support Leshrac, winning the Ward Wars against your opponents is very important. This way you will provide the map control your team needs in order to find favorable engagements, to push, or simply to farm safely.

In case you are not able to push, it is smart to try and create an opportunity for yourself to push. One of the best ways to do this is to gank. Bear in mind, however, that Lesh is not the best ganker in the game, so you should do this with some help. Especially in the later stages of the game, ganking can become more difficult and risky, so it is preferable to do it with multiple heroes as a gank could easily escalate to a team fight. Try to have an ally hero with you that can easily setup for your stun. If you manage to disable the target for long enough, you should be able to bring it down with Edict, Pulse Nova and Lightning Storm.

Provided you think you are in a position to win a team fight as a team, you should try to force one. Especially if you are a farming Lesh, team fights are where you shine (provided the enemy doesn’t have lots of magic immunity). This is why you should try to force fights earlier rather than later.

Core Lesh

 If you have a good level of farm and XP, your job would be to enter the fight and deal as much damage as possible. You should aim to be in the middle of the engagement dealing Pulse damage to as many targets as possible. This aggressiveness, however, could be very dangerous, and if you are under-farmed, e.g. because you had a bad laning stage, you could die very easily. This is why you must judge your position in the game. In case you are one of the most farmed heroes on the map, you should force team fights, get in the middle of them and deal as much damage as possible. If you are not, however, and there are farmed enemy heroes that can kill you quickly, you need to position yourself more defensively. Pulse Nova deals damage over time, so the longer you live the more damage it will deal.

Support

As a support, you rarely have enough tankiness to stay alive in the middle of the fight. In that sense, you should keep your distance. Your main DPS source would be Lightning Strike (remember the skill has 4 sec CD, so it shouldn’t be underestimated). If you use an isolated enemy, though, you might try to deal concentrated Edict damage to him/her. In most cases, however, Edict is hard to use in a team fight, and especially as a support it is not worth it to get in close just to deal some Edict damage that is most likely going to be spread out among the multiple units in the fight.

Particularly as a support, but also as a carry, you should be very careful how you use your stun. If you manage to hit multiple targets, this could give your team a significant advantage (2 seconds of freedom to deal damage). In team fights, where heroes are clumped up, this might be significantly easier. Otherwise, you might want to wait for some ally to disable someone and follow up afterwards. Provided this doesn’t happen, you might as well try to land a stun anyway. With some practice, aiming a high lvl Split Earth becomes easier, especially on less mobile heroes.

After the fight is won (if you are alive), you should try to push as many towers as possible by exploiting Edict. 

In this team fight S4 demonstrates the extremely high team fight damage capabilities of the hero (with the help of a great sunder by Notail, which helps him survive). Winning fights before the enemy team has BKBs is a great way to claim map control with Lesh.

You are a fast farmer, but you are usually fighting against the clock - whenever your enemies get BKBs, you will not be able to do much in an engagement. Therefore, try to achieve as much as possible before this moment comes - push down towers and win fights. In the meantime, of course, you should try to flash farm with your spells (if you are a farming hero) - getting too fat too soon might prove very difficult to deal with for your opponents.

Often there are limited sources of farm on the map. Therefore, you should consider which hero in your team scales the best with items - usually, this is the hard carry. Even if you are a farming semi-carry Lesh, it is more important to leave the hard carry farm than to farm yourself as the hard carry uses farm better than you and is typically not countered by BKB. In case there are multiple sources of farm, however, feel free to farm away. You can farm very quickly and efficiently both the Jungle and lanes.

As a support, of course, farming is not your priority and you should leave it to your core heroes. Usually, there will be more important activities you should take care of (warding/dewarding, etc.). Nevertheless, if there is untaken farm on the map that your cores don’t need, you might want to flash farm it - you can catch up on items pretty quickly.