

Lone Druid's fancy Spirit Bear likes to wear fancy clothes, and you're going to buy them for him.

And of course the clarity of mind and concentration that we'll refine while mastering pet control in the heat of battle will come in handy even when you're on your own out there. All these skills should help you make the best of a bad situation when forced to control heroes abandoned by teammates. Our goals this week are to master the mechanics of controlling your pet, look at some best habits at a big-picture level, and try to come up with clever ways to use pets to our advantage that might not be readily apparent to new players. Learning when to use each form is key to mastering Lone Druid, but will not be covered in this guide, which is focused on controlling pets. This is the template we'll follow while we learn to manage pets, but don't be afraid to experiment with Sylla's melee bear form as well. A common strategy is to outfit the Spirit Bear as melee DPS (with some light tank for jungling) and aura buffer/debuffer, while Sylla hangs back in ranged form to support and DPS. It's useful to think of Sylla and his bear as two separate heroes you're in charge of. His Spirit Bear is meant to be active at all times, which can easily be achieved if you don't casually send it to its death. Lone Druid is an Agility hero that can be played as melee or ranged, and can excel at pushing, jungling, and carrying. And let me be clear: this is a bear who is dangerously close to achieving a mohawk, so he absolutely deserves your respect. It's not uncommon for his giant bear companion to be more useful to the team than the druid, Sylla. Lone Druid relies on his pet more than any other hero in Dota 2.
