How is pos 4 different from pos 5?

The fourth position is an aggressive roaming support that creates tempo with early ganks and vision. The fifth position is tied to the carry on the safe lane and focuses more on protection and saves.

What matters most on the fourth position?

Tempo and initiative: early ganks, aggressive vision and creating space. The pos 4 should make the game active rather than passively standing in lane.

Which heroes suit pos 4?

Playmakers with control and mobility who gank and initiate well. Specific picks are in the hero tier list.

Where should a pos 4 be in the first minutes?

On the offlaner's lane until the first power rune, then by the map clock. Bounty runes come at 0:00, water runes at 2:00 and 4:00 for the midlaner, and a power rune every 2 minutes from 6:00 — most early fights start over those. Between those points the soft support builds vision and hunts for a gank instead of standing next to the core and eating its creeps.

What items should a position 4 build?

Consumables first: Observer and Sentry Wards, Smoke of Deceit, Blood Grenade and Magic Wand. Then tempo and save items: Urn of Shadows and Spirit Vessel, Blink Dagger, Force Staff, Glimmer Cape, Solar Crest. Later — Aghanim's Shard and Aghanim's Scepter if they noticeably upgrade your hero.

What did patch 7.41f change for position 4?

Mirana (slower Celestial Quiver charge, shorter max Sacred Arrow stun) and Earth Spirit (slower attack, fewer Stone Remnant charges) were nerfed, and Bounty Hunter gets less gold from Track. Tusk, Snapfire and Pangolier were not changed.

Soft support (position 4) in Dota 2

What the soft support does

The fourth position is a flexible support that isn't tied to a single lane. It roams, sets up early ganks, plants vision and helps the midlaner and offlaner. Unlike the hard support that stays with the carry, the pos 4's main value is tempo: early kills and pressure that hand the team an advantage before the cores come online.

Early game and the lane

How the game begins on position 4 — you usually help the offlaner (pos 3) on the tough lane and roam out from there:

You don't stick to one lane — you roam between mid and the offlane.
You set up early ganks and create a numbers advantage in skirmishes.
You plant aggressive vision and control key zones.
You help the offlaner push and contest the tough lane.

Dota 2 map diagram: the position 4 support starts on the offlane and roams the map — Position 4 on Radiant starts on the top lane, the offlane, together with the offlaner, and then roams: mid, river runes, the enemy jungle. On Dire the starting lane is the bottom one.

The map clock for a pos 4

Roaming without a clock is just wandering. A pos 4 moves not when the mood strikes but towards the moments the map sets itself: runes, the day/night flip, the first objective. The minimum worth keeping in your head:

0:00 — two bounty runes in the river. After that they come every 4 minutes in each side's jungle and give gold to the whole team. Making sure they get taken rather than gifted is usually the pos 4's job.
2:00 and 4:00 — water runes. Two of them in the river, early sustain for the midlaner. Covering them at those timings is your job too.
From 6:00 every 2 minutes — power runes. The most common reason for an early fight: holding the river for a rune timing matters more than one extra jungle camp.
From 7:00 every 7 minutes — Wisdom Shrines. Wisdom runes are gone since patch 7.38: a shrine stands in the side jungle between the tier 1 and tier 2 towers, and its experience goes both to whoever stood at it and to the ally furthest behind on experience. For a support it is the cheapest way not to fall off in levels.
Every 5 minutes — the day/night flip. Vision is shorter at night: wards behave differently, but ganks land easier.
20:00 — the first Tormentor. By that timing free roaming ends and objective play begins.

The full list of timings is in the Dota 2 timings guide, and where to place wards for these moments is in the warding guide.

Key skills

What to develop to carry your weight in this role:

Roaming timings — arriving at a lane at the right moment.
Vision and map control: wards, dewarding, rune control.
Aggressive tempo and initiating early fights.
A sense of when you create space versus when you crowd the core.

Tip

Progress in any role comes faster when you review your own games. In coaching with a trainer we review exactly your position 4 matches and show what to fix first.

Position 4 items

A position 4 has more gold than a position 5 but less than the cores, so every item has to create tempo or save an ally. Prices are from official Dota 2 data for patch 7.41f.

Consumables and lane

Observer Ward is free (limited by shop stock), Sentry Ward and Smoke of Deceit cost 50 gold each, Blood Grenade is cheap damage and slow for the first fights.

Observer Wardfree

Sentry Ward50

Smoke of Deceit50

Blood Grenade50

Magic Wand460

Tempo and saves

Urn of Shadows and Spirit Vessel gain charges from kills and spend them to heal an ally or damage an enemy (Vessel also cuts the target's healing), Blink Dagger gives a surprise entry, Force Staff and Glimmer Cape save an ally, Solar Crest empowers an ally before a fight.

Urn of Shadows825

Spirit Vessel2,725

Blink Dagger2,250

Force Staff2,200

Glimmer Cape2,150

Solar Crest2,575

Late game

Aghanim's Shard and Aghanim's Scepter when they noticeably upgrade your hero, Aether Lens for cast range on heroes with short-range spells.

Aghanim's Shard1,400

Aghanim's Scepter4,200

Aether Lens2,275

Where to place the wards you buy — see the warding in Dota 2 guide.

What patch 7.41f changed

Patch 7.41f came out on September 15, 2026. Two heroes from this guide were touched, plus a few popular position 4 picks outside the list.

Mirana: a Celestial Quiver charge restores in 7 seconds instead of 6, Sacred Arrow max stun is 2.3/3.2/4.1/5s instead of 2.6/3.4/4.2/5s.
Earth Spirit: base attack speed 95 instead of 100, Stone Remnant charges are 7 + 1 per 5 levels instead of per 4 (max 13 at level 30 instead of 14 at level 28), level 20 and 25 talents reworked.
Bounty Hunter: Track gives less gold — 80/160/240 to himself instead of 130/225/320, 40/80/120 to allies instead of 50/90/130.
Hoodwink lost one point of base strength, and Marci's Rebound ally speed bonus is now 25% at every level (was 15/20/25/30%).

Patch 7.41f

Tusk, Snapfire and Pangolier were not changed in 7.41f — everything written about them above still applies as is.

Starter heroes

To start out, take playmakers with control and mobility — they gank well and create tempo. Good examples: Tusk, Mirana, Snapfire, Earth Spirit, Pangolier.

Which heroes are strong right now and carry games the easiest — see the hero tier list for MMR boosting.

Common mistakes

What most often holds players back on position 4 and stalls their MMR growth:

Passivity: the pos 4 should make things happen, not just stand around.
Bad vision and no dewarding in the spots that matter.
Feeding in poorly prepared ganks.
Taking farm from the core instead of giving it up.

Soft support — position 4