Strategy
Gameplay
| Playstyle | |
|---|---|
| Tiny is a carry with a large amount of health and attack damage. In the early game, he uses his Avalanche and Toss combo to deal burst damage in ganks. As he acquires more items, Tiny transitions into a full-fledged carry, capable of wiping entire teams with his tree, and demolishing buildings in little time. With a Blink Dagger, Tiny also makes an effective initiator. However, Tiny is susceptible to disables, and can be shut down by intense harassment in the early game. | |
| Pros | Cons |
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Ganker
Tiny only needs Blink Dagger and levels in Avalanche and Toss to deal serious damage, earning kills for his team throughout the mid game.
Carry
Instead of farming heroes, carry Tiny farms stacks of neutral creep camps, especially ancient ones, by using Tree Grab's splash damage. He should invest in items that grant attack speed to complement his huge attack damage, resulting in consistent damage output in team fights.
Ability Builds
| Ganker Tiny | ||||||||||||||||||||||||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | 2 | 3 | 4 | 5 | 6 | 7 | 8 | 9 | 10 | 11 | 12 | 13 | 14 | 15 | 16 | 17 | 18 | 20 | 25 | |||||
 |  |  | | |  | | | |  | | | | | | |  | | | | |||||
| Carry Tiny | ||||||||||||||||||||||||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | 2 | 3 | 4 | 5 | 6 | 7 | 8 | 9 | 10 | 11 | 12 | 13 | 14 | 15 | 16 | 17 | 18 | 20 | 25 | |||||
| | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | |||||
Talents
| Hero Talents | ||
|---|---|---|
| 2 Toss Charges | 25 | -8s Avalanche Cooldown |
| Toss Requires No Target | 20 | +40% Grow Bonus Damage With Tree |
| +80 Avalanche Damage | 15 | +10% Status Resistance |
| +10 Strength | 10 | +20 Movement Speed |
Notes:
- Sstacks diminishingly with other status resistance sources.
Tips & Tactics
General
- Tiny has high base attack damage, which makes last hitting a breeze.
- Tiny suffers from low mana. In the early game, one ability or ability combo will often use up all his mana.
- Tiny has poor lane presence and should be supported by another hero if necessary.
- Tiny has great strength gain, but poor intelligence and no agility gain.
- Despite his appearance, Tiny's absence of armor in the early game make him vulnerable to physical attacks.
- While Tiny has the potential to be a relentless force in the late game, his scaling process is delicate. Good players must know how to farm well in the early game to keep pace with other carries.
- A poorly farmed Tiny will become a burden to his team in the mid and late game.
- To clear creep waves, Toss enemy ranged creep into enemy melee creeps and finish with Tree Grab attacks or Tree Throw.
Abilities
Avalanche
- Tossed units take triple damage from Avalanche, bursting most heroes in the early to mid game.
- To perform the combo, get close to the enemy, use Avalanche then Toss right after.
- Since the duration of Toss lasts longer than that of Avalanche, if Tiny wants to take advantage of triple damage Avalanche, he can take the talent that grants Toss charges.
- In the late game though, space out Avalanche and Toss to maximize disabling duration since Tiny relies more on attacks to deal damage at that point.
- When ganking, use Avalanche to stun enemies so Tiny can walk up to them and Toss them to his allies.
- Avalanche has a 600 cast range, and its radius is slightly larger than its visual effect.
- Use Blink Dagger then Avalanche to initiate onto groups of enemies.
- Even though Avalanche has no cast point, it still takes some time to actually damage and stun enemies.
Toss
- Toss must target an enemy/allied unit, meaning that Tiny cannot simply Toss units anywhere on the map.
- If Toss targets the enemy that is going to be Tossed, that enemy will be thrown straight up in the air, and come back down on the same spot.
- Toss cannot target buildings, but will damage them if the Tossed unit hits the building within its AoE radius.
- To do so, target Toss on an enemy unit next to the building.
- Use Toss as an initiation tool by throwing a hero like Earthshaker or Tidehunter into a group of enemies.
- When chasing a fleeing enemy, Toss an ally with a disable, buying Tiny enough time to catch up.
- Use Toss defensively to throw enemies away from Tiny.
- Use Toss offensively to throw enemies into Tiny's teammates.
- Tiny will Toss the unit closest to him. He cannot directly choose which target to Toss.
- Be careful not to Toss an ally to their death.
- Toss interrupts channeled abilities.
- Toss will remove the Cold Feet debuff when used on enemies, even when the target is tossed straight up.
- Tiny may choose to use Toss after the full duration of Avalanche's stun if he wants to prioritize disabling over damaging, buying time for allies to follow.
Tree Grab
- Tree hit charges last until used, so the ability does not need to be conserved while travelling to a fight.
- Use Tree Grab in the laning stage for bonus damage to last hit.
- Area damage from Tree Grab also serves as harassment against enemy heroes.
- Denying a friendly creep does not splash, but still consumes a charge.
- Conserve Tree Grab charges to deal bonus damage against buildings.
- Try to clear creeps with regular attacks or Toss if planning to push soon.
- See here for more detailed mechanics of Tree Grab.
- Tree Throw deals more splash damage than Tree Grab attacks, allowing Tiny to clear creeps faster.
- Choose to use Tree Throw on the last charge of Tree Grab to increase damage output because Tiny has slow attack speed without items.
- Tree Throw gives vision along its path, revealing enemies hiding in trees.
- Tree Throw can kill courier in one shot.
Grow
- Grow buffs Tiny's attack damage, at the cost of degraded attack speed.
- His slow attack speed can be further exploited by enemies with abilities that slow attack speed.
- Grow grants Tiny a large increase in armor to resist enemy attacks, allowing him to be more aggressive in fights.
Items
Starting items:
- Tango keeps Tiny's health up in lane.
- Healing Salve restores health to Tiny.
- Stout Shield blocks physical attacks received in the laning stage, making up for Tiny's lack of armor.
- Iron Branch gives attributes, increasing health, mana, and damage.
- Enchanted Mango's passive health regeneration helps Tiny stay in lane longer; the burst mana also allows Tiny to use more abilities.
Early game:
- Magic Stick restores some health and mana so Tiny can sustain more damage in lane, or use his abilities in a pinch.
- Boots of Speed provides movement speed bonus so Tiny can get close to targets and use abilitites on them.
Mid game:
- Magic Wand gives useful bonuses to Tiny's overall attributes and increases its charge storing capacity to restore health and mana.
- Power Treads gives attack damage and appropriate attributes. Switching to intelligence sustains Tiny's abilities usage, while switching to agility grants more attack speed to complement his high attack damage.
- Echo Sabre's double attack compensates for Tiny's low attack speed and synergizes well with his high attack damage, adding even more burst damage to his arsenal. It also grants much-needed mana regeneration and is a reasonably cheap pickup.
- Blink Dagger facilitates Avalanche and Toss combo, causing massive burst damage to one or more enemy heroes.
Late game:
- Assault Cuirass gives attack speed to increase Tiny's damage output and armor to help Tiny tank physical attacks. The aura lowers buildings' and enemies' armors, complementing Tree Grab's and Grow's bonus attack damage.
- Daedalus helps Tiny inflict massive critical strike damage, thanks to his absurd attack damage from Tree Grab and Grow.
- Black King Bar gives strength and damage, as well as spell immunity to allow Tiny to move and attack enemies freely for several seconds, delivering consistent damage in team fights.
Situational items:
- Phase Boots grant attack speed and movement speed so Tiny can better approach opponent before having Blink Dagger, suiting an aggressive playstyle.
- Drum of Endurance gives attack speed, movement speed, mana, attributes, and damage for a low price.
- Mask of Madness gives a huge attack speed and movement speed buff in addition to lifesteal for cheap, but might backfire as it silences and reduces Tiny's already pitiful armor.
- Sange and Yasha grants movement speed, strength, and much needed agility, raising Tiny's attack speed to increase his damage output.
- Shadow Blade, an alternative or a complement to Blink Dagger, supplies attack speed and attack damage bonuses. The active Shadow Walk grants invisibility, speeds up Tiny's movement to get in position quicker, and applies burst physical damage when attack out of Shadow Walk.
- Heart of Tarrasque turns Tiny into a true tank, giving him lots of strength, health, and health regeneration.
- Moon Shard grants Tiny massive attack speed increase to complement his powerful attack damage and Tree Grab's splash. Tiny may also choose to consume the shard to gain some attack speed bonus but clear an inventory slot for another late game item.
