The game Deadlock by Valve is still in the early closed-access stage, but it's already gaining immense popularity. Every day, players are improving their skills in this competitive project, making knowledge about how to play better increasingly relevant. In this article, we've prepared useful tips and tricks for beginners in Deadlock.

Adjust Controls

The default controls in Valve's new game Deadlock are quite good, but some aspects might feel unfamiliar to many players. This is particularly true for the key bindings related to abilities.

By default, abilities are mapped to the numbers 1 through 4. However, during combat, it may not be convenient or intuitive for everyone to use numbers for abilities, especially if it involves fingers that you can't easily move from the movement keys.

Therefore, go into the game settings, navigate to the hotkeys tab, and customize the controls to your liking—not just for abilities, but also for other functions that you might want to adjust.

Play in the Deadlock Sandbox Mode

Before jumping into the game, enter the sandbox mode and try out all the available heroes before selecting them in multiplayer matches. Determine if these characters fit your playstyle, how their abilities work, and more. This will help you avoid ruining the game for yourself and your team if it turns out that the character isn't right for you or if you can't play them effectively.

Take a walk around the map to visually familiarize yourself with key points of interest, like the locations of shops, neutral enemy camps, buff crates, and other practical things that will come in handy during the main game

Shops, Items, and Builds

In the same sandbox mode, you can visit the shop to familiarize yourself with the various items you can purchase to enhance your hero. Create your own item build tailored to the specific hero you'll be playing, or use popular pre-made templates if you can't come up with your own build.

How to Heal on the Lane

To restore health while on the lane during the game, you can rely on special creeps on the lane. These can be identified by the flags they carry on their backs.

From time to time, they will emit a green wave that heals you if you stand near these creeps. This way, you won't have to constantly return to base to restore health.

Lane Shops

To purchase a new item in Deadlock, you don't necessarily have to return to base, as there is a shop near your lane's tower. There, you can buy all the same items as at the base. This allows you to save time and maximize your hero's potential, survivability, and power right on the lane.

Discoveries and Buffs

Across the Deadlock map, there are various crates, statues, and vases that you can destroy, potentially earning a boost for your hero.

Some types of crates drop additional souls, allowing you to buy needed items faster. Meanwhile, golden idols drop permanent buffs that last until the end of the match:

• Increased health
• Enhanced regeneration
• Reduced cooldowns
• Increased attack speed

Special Movement Mechanics

Besides the standard movement options like walking and jumping, heroes in Deadlock can perform special maneuvers that help in combat, movement, or survival. These abilities include:

• Sliding
• Dashing
• Jump dashing
• Slide-dashing
• Double jumping
• Wall jumping
• Various combinations of these

At first, you might forget they exist, but once you get used to them, they will become an integral part of your playstyle and gameplay. They help you escape from enemies, dodge their abilities, close distances during lane rotations, chase down targets, and more.

An interesting detail: while sliding, your hero has infinite ammo, allowing you to use this moment to finish off an enemy during a chase or assist your allies.

Rail Acceleration

While riding the rails, you can use a 30-second speed boost to move faster. However, don't waste this ability carelessly, as its cooldown is 340 seconds—over five minutes.

It's better to save the acceleration for when it's really needed: engaging in a mass fight with enemies, helping someone, or wanting to go to the base and immediately return to the lane.

Also, avoid using it at the beginning of the game, as arriving quickly on the lane won't give you a significant advantage. You'll still have to wait for the enemy creeps.

Constantly Farm

Like any MOBA, Deadlock by Valve is based on the principle of leveling up your hero through items you can buy with the currency earned. In this case—souls. You can earn them by killing creeps, enemy heroes, neutral creeps, as well as finding them in crates or delivering an urn.

Additional Valve Deadlock game Tips:

• Finish off the orbs that fly out of dead enemies to get more souls.
• By finishing orbs in melee, you immediately receive all the souls, and the orbs won't fly out.
• After the tenth minute of the game, it's better to stay alone on the lane, as the souls earned will be split among all players nearby.
• Kill neutral creeps near your lane and break crates to earn more souls.
• Finish off allied soul orbs to prevent enemies from gaining more in-game currency.

Mid Boss

In the center of the map in Deadlock, there's a boss that you can defeat to gain a powerful buff. However, before heading to him, you should strengthen your hero and eliminate the enemy team when they have a long respawn time, and only then go for the boss.

If the enemy team is alive and the boss's health drops to 50%, your opponents will know what you're up to and will try to attack you in the boss's lair to steal the buff.

Conclusion

By knowing these tips and tricks, you can stay one or more steps ahead of other players, especially beginners. You'll also be more knowledgeable about the game's mechanics and nuances when Valve's Deadlock is fully released.