Meepo

Meepo the Geomancer is a melee agility hero who is notorious for being one of the hardest heroes in the game to play effectively due to his heavy reliance on micromanagement. Meepo's defining ultimate, Divided We Stand, makes Meepo four individual clones of himself. The clones cannot use any items besides the boots that the main Meepo himself wears, but each come with their own individual spells and spell cooldowns. As well, they all gain experience and gold additively with the original Meepo. This means that a well-played Meepo can gain experience faster than any other hero, capable of reaching maximum level extremely early into the game and overpowering his unsuspecting opponents. With Earthbind, enough Meepos can permanently root someone in place while the clone army pummels them. Poof allows any Meepo to globally teleport to any other Meepo, as well as deal significant area of effect damage when cast enough times. Geostrike is Meepo's passive, which slows and deals damage on attack, as well as stack with each individual Meepo, permanently bringing them to dust. With this skill set, Meepo can be everywhere on the map at once, and can group up on an unsuspecting victim in a moment's notice. Meepo redefines the power of numbers and is played mostly as a carry.

Unlike most other heroes in Dota 2, Meepo has a base 35% magic resistance instead of 25%.

Tips

 * Standard "Recommended items" build is somewhat obsolete and does not reflect the latest meta-game adjustments from the latest patches, since 6.79. Nowadays, very early-game Aghanim's Scepter followed by stats-enhancing items is now the item build norm. Aghanim's Scepter roughly gives +25% Experience, +25% DPS and stats sharing.


 * Meepo's gold is best spent on items which benefit all Meepos. This means aura items and stats.


 * Meepo has huge damage potential in the mid-game. Four successful poofs in the middle of a team fight equates to over 1,000 AoE damage. Especially in the 10-25 minute mark when Meepo can really kick into gear, this is well over half the HP pool of most heroes, and may in fact just one-shot squishier heroes. Similarly, four (five with Aghanim's) Meepos hitting a single target provides nearly unparalleled DPS (especially combined with Geostrike). Unlike other carries, he is not reliant on DPS items to reach this damage potential.


 * That being said, his greatest weakness is his survivability. With a measly 1.6 Strength gain, clones are very squishy targets. The most reliable way to increase clone durability is by getting Strength items. To this end, Aghanim's Scepter can give clones a massive boost. If you're not off to a great start, Mekansm is a cheaper alternative that gives more immediate bonuses. This weakness is very apparent early game, since he's not a fantastic laner and before level 3 doesn't have much of an escape. This makes you quite vulnerable to early game aggression.


 * Meepo can level up much, much faster than other heroes, thanks to his clones; Dota counts each clone as a separate hero for experience mechanics. This means you can get two lanes, or lane and jungle experience, the same time. It also means you get a more significant chunk of experience for hero kills in team fights. If you are behind in levels, make sure to farm as much as you can (even if it means farming on the opposing team's jungle) to catch up to your opponents. One or two Meepos can farm in the lanes, while the rest can farm the jungle. Three clones can easily take out the whole jungle in less than a minute. This accelerated farm and experience is what gives Meepo his midgame dominance.


 * In order to maximize the effectiveness of his clones, don't always group them up in one; you can split them up to groups (preferably in two). In ganks, this can mean that one group of Meepos can initiate a fight, while the other can wait and ambush. Also, splitting them up to groups can make Poof an effective escape mechanism, so long as your secondary group is safe from harm.


 * Keep in mind that casting Earthbind has a delay in deploying, so predict your target's path and throw accordingly. Earthbind's area-of-effect ensnare can be deadly to multiple heroes if used effectively. Also, Earthbind stops channeling abilities and prevents invisibility during its duration. Earthbind is also very effective for scaring opponents - even if they have the upper hand, two or three consecutive Earthbinds on enemy heroes (even without any followup) is enough to scare many people into turning around.


 * Meepo has great split-pushing power. His clones can quickly take down a tower while the opposing team is engaged in a team fight. This works especially well when you see your opponents grouping up for a push - send your clones into an uncontested lane and push it. When the team fight begins, you can Poof all of them in (alternatively your counterpushing may just force them to back off). If the enemy engages on your clones, you can Poof them back to the main Meepo.


 * A large part of playing a good Meepo is effectively and quickly controlling all the clones. To this end, finding a good set of control groups and item/ability hotkeys can greatly improve gameplay. Ingraining various muscle memory patterns can help a lot to, say, select a dying Meepo and move him to safety in the middle of battle.


 * Meepo is vulnerable to heroes who can single out and kill one of his clones or do AOE damage to all of them. In this aspect Meepo players should especially be wary of Pudge's Meat Hook, Vengeful Spirit's Nether Swap, Kunkka's X Marks The Spot, Faceless Void's Chronosphere, Warlock's Fatal Bonds and Chaotic Offering Combo, Tidehunter's Ravage and Lich's Chain Frost among others.


 * From levels 1 to 3, you should play super safe and last hit and deny only. Don't try to go for kills. This is because Meepo is very squishy and is quite easy to shut down at early levels. It is never a bad idea to just stand back and take exp without putting yourself in harms way. When at level 3, you can go farm at the jungle with the clone Meepo as a source of gold.

Trivia

 * Several of Meepo's lines reference the Scout from Team Fortress 2, another title by Valve.
 * Meepo's response to meeting Windranger references Joey Tribbiani's catchphrase from the television sitcom Friends.
 * Each consecutive Meepo made has a higher pitch in voice.