6.79 Crystal Maiden Guides

So I know I’m quite late with this, but I thought that now might be the time to sit down and put a little time and effort into writing up a guide for Crystal Maiden now that we’ve seen Dota 2’s metagame shift a little. I’ve played a fair bit of 6.79, and I think that it’s only now that I feel as though I’m getting to grips with CM. She’s fast become my favourite support.

As with so many things, I can’t take all the credit for the builds you’re about the read. There is no skill acquired in a vacuum, so I have to thank my good friend Ian for helping out. He’s been a huge influence on how I play not only Dota, but all videogames. So, without further ado, four builds that will help stabilise the way you play Crystal Maiden.

Hand of Midas -> Ethereal Blade & Dagon

Francisco Scaramanga, the man with the golden gun. As well we all know, the golden gun kills its targets in a single hit. The only way to replicate this is to rush your Hand of Midas (as is by now standard) and then immediately plough your way towards an Ethereal Blade and a Dagon.

In spite of his reputation as the man with the golden gun, Scaramanga’s original villainous moniker was, simply, “Pistols.” With your akimbo armaments, you aim to shuffle your targets free of their mortal husks.

Hand of Midas -> Wards, Dust, Gem, Smoke

For the less skilled among you, the Seán Bean build is perhaps easiest to mimic. While the Goldeneye Crystal Maiden might look, from the outside, like a team player, it’s important to remember where all that midas gold is going. If the shopping list above looks a little on the light side for someone carrying around a Hand of Midas, that’s because the Seán Bean build is characterised, like the man himself, by the frequency with which you’ll be dying.

Bonus points if you manage to kill enemy intelligence heroes using only Frostbyte, as in the case of Boris “I am invincible” Grishenko.

This build is simpler than some of the above. It starts out quite sensibly, rush the metagame-appropriate alchemical accoutrements, but from that point onward you are only allowed to purchase fully completed golden items.

Six acceptable items include:
Hand of Midas
Black King Bar
Medallion of Courage
Sacred Relic
Boots of Travel
Divine Rapier

At this point, you can consider yourself pretty much done with buying items. Consider buying some wards for your supports, but only observer wards. Let's not start breaking the theme just as you were getting things together.

This one is more straightforward and should be easy enough to follow. It’s less a question of an item build than it is of how you approach the game and what you hope to achieve with it.

1) Accumulate gold, do not stop, never stop, hoard it, be a monument to avarice
2) Buy back into the game whenever possible
3) Paint your genitals gold
4) Attempt to use them to control your in-game actions