Strategy Discussion

The Early Stages ( Levels 1 — 9)
Tiny, being a melee hero, is at a natural disadvantage when it comes to lane control. But within the confines of being a melee hero, you have every advantage. Massive base damage, disables, and two devastating AoE nukes.

Early game isn’t a huge problem for Tiny if you play it smart. Firstly, don’t call for solo. You don’t need it, you don’t want it, and you will get less kills because of it. Tiny works best with a teammate early on, preferably one with a disable or two. For the first few levels play conservatively. Don’t cast any spells, just concentrate on denying well and earning a solid amount of cash.

At level 5, it is entirely possible to get first blood. To take an example, lets assume you have a PotM in your lane. You have a number of strategies at your disposal: one is that the PotM can line up an arrow, whilst you then proceed to do an Avalanche + Toss combo. Alternatively you can open with avalanche and she can pull off a starfall. Co-ordinate a plan so you don’t wind up doing something silly like Tossing an enemy hero over an arrow.

At level 8 you have maximized your nuking power, and a simple Trampoline Act does in excess of 700 damage with melee hits included. Take advantage of this and concentrate on taking down anything with HP less than 500: that way if you Toss the wrong enemy the AoE damage should still earn you a kill. Often the simple things work best: such as stunning an enemy hero as your tower pelts him. Be creative.

During the later stages of the Early game you can play it two ways: you can either play like Pudge, running around the map earning kills under your belt with your combo, or, you can do Avalanche / Toss farming all the way through. It comes down to your motivation, as Tiny works well as an early game and a late game hero. If you intend to dominate throughout this stage of the game, go for a blink dagger. If not, save for the offensive or defensive items listed.

The Middle Stages (Levels 10 — 16)
This part of the game generally revolves around ganking and the like. Whether you choose to be the gankee or the ganker, is up to you, though I recommend the latter. Your spell combination now isn’t lethal, but it still hurts like nothing else. Here you should focus more on using the actual utility of Toss and Avalanche as spells than using them for raw damage as you did in the early game. Remember the variety of Tosses now at your disposal and use them to your advantage.

This also happens to be the stage in which your fate late game is decided. It is important that you both farm items and gain a significant level advantage: falling behind is a disaster for Tiny. Tiny does well farming neutrals: the kind in which there are many weak units as opposed to a few stronger ones. Use Toss to kill these units as it has a shorter cool down, does more damage (the bonus damage to a single unit) and keeps Avalanche available, which is your escape spell.

The early and mid games are also advantageous for Tiny for another reason: enemy creeps have less than 600 hit points. This is as important for Tiny as it is for the Goblin Techies. Enemy creeps gain hit points as the game progresses, and as they exceed 600 HP your Toss/Avalanche combo becomes less useful in clearing creeps. You really want to get an impressive creep count, so stay out of a few unnesecary pushes if you can.

Because you can kill enemy creeps so quickly, it is important that you do not stay in a single lane for too long. The reason is you will push far into enemy territory and will quickly find yourself castrated. Switch lanes often, or alternate between neutral creeps and enemy creeps accordingly. Always have a means of escape (a scroll or BoT) when farming behind enemy lines, which can be highly profitable if you can nab a tower kill with toss.

As for the effectiveness of Avalanche / Toss for farming, the cool down for Avalanche is 18 seconds, meaning you should be able to use it on every enemy creep wave. If you don’t have a Eul’s, no soup for you, because you can’t farm for squat.

Newb.

The Later Stages (Levels 17 — 25)
Its all about the pushing at this stage of the game. It’s a good thing you are a fantastic pusher: as well as a late game powerhouse. If you have invested in a few offensive and defensive items, you can really shine in this period of the game. On the other hand, if you have gone utility heavy, you will have to take a back seat.

Concentrate on setting up strong combos with Toss, not forgetting to put your massive physical damage to use. Once you get into the enemy base, the rest becomes history, because you wreck buildings very quickly. This is important to remember, as it is easy to carried away with obtaining hero kills. Tiny works well in the earlier stages of the end of the game, if you let the game roll on too long you will never be able to compete with an enemy Terrorblade.