Ganking heroes means ganging up on one or more opponent heroes and outnumbering them in a battle. Gank is short for gang kill.
Gangking is carried out by launching a sudden attack for the purpose of:
- slowing down opponents farming for gold, this happens as small skirmishes during early mid game
- getting gold and experience for the allied hero or heroes themselves
- to push the creep line towards the enemy line specially if the game seems to be on a stall
One of the most useful item for ganking is Observer Wards. It can be used offensively and defensively. Common locations for Observer Wards are:
- inside enemy forest, to locate heroes farming in the neutral creeps
- inside allied forest, to warn against gank attempts from the opponent
- near the rune spots, to spot runes when they appear and see if an opponent has them
Always remember that it's important to have a proper balance between ganking and farming. Spending more time in one than the other may result to becoming underleveled and/or underfarmed for the hero.
Heroes which are effective gankers are those that can deal a lot of damage in a short time, have great mobility and has a disabling ability. Two or more heroes should have one or a combination of these abilities.
Burst damagers examples are the Nerubian Assassin, Slayer, Zeus, Tinker and Lich. Heroes which have great mobility are Queen of Pain, Puck, Mirana, Morphling and Slithereen Guard, while good disablers are Vengeful Spirit, Clockwerk, Rhasta, Lion and Jakiro.