Meepo

Meepo the Geomancer is a melee agility hero who is notorious for being the hardest hero in the game to play effectively due to his heavy reliance on micromanagement. Meepo's defining ultimate, Divided We Stand, makes Meepo not two, not three, but four individual clones of himself. 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.

Tips

 * 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 teamfight 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 6 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 teamfights. 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 teamfight. 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 teamfight 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.

Trivia

 * Several of Meepo's lines reference the Scout from Team Fortress 2, another title by Valve.
 * Meepo's response to meeting Windrunner references Joey from Friends' catchphrase.
 * Meepo, along with Enchantress,  Slark,  Drow Ranger, and  Luna (with Lunar Blessing), is one of the few heroes to have 1800 sight range at both day and night.