Best time to pick Faceless Void?

On March 26 2013 11:06 idscy wrote:
Welcome to dota, you should call them heroes

In terms of pure 1v1 manfight 6 item (any 6 in the game, your choice), there are three heroes which are the top dogs. Void, ursa and tiny. Of these three, void will win because of chrono--the skill which really defines void.

That being said, using void with less than 6 items isnt quite as scary. What makes void a good pick is having the chrono for use in team fights. This and his jump allows your team to engage on any hero which gets caught in the chrono. This skill also makes requires the player on void to have very good decision making and good micro, especially at a high level, because a botched chrono could very quickly become a loss.

Often times void is easy to disable in his chrono assuming some support hero with a stun has very good positioning in fights, and this usually requires that void have a bkb. Other items like heaven's halbard and hex are also quite good against him. Note hex removes evasion but not backtrack.

The best time to pick void is when you know that you can secure your safelane--that is the combined power of your two supports plus void in lane isnt greater than the combined power of theirs. For this, and a few other reasons I will outline below, void has become less popular lately in the metagame. The other main reason to pick void, is if the other team is relying on one or two heroes for sources of damage in teamfights. Chronosphere will allow you to simply kill these heroes outright most times which usually allows you to take the fight and eventually the game.

Reasons not to pick void: He requires quite a bit of time to farm. To compare him and another popular hero right now, Phantom lancer, void is your smart missile while PL is the carpet h-bomb. What makes pl the more attractive pick, is with heart and diffusal he can push your towers with only illusions, kill the supports with 1-2 lances (manaburn against low hp int heroes is very very good) and is ok enough at fighting to carry against a few different types of lategame heroes. Void on the other hand sucks at pushing, farms slower than pl unless he has some farm item (and then usually still farms slower) and needs to initiate full on, often with chrono to get any kills. Pl arguably takes the same amount of farm to come online as a carry but does a better job of controlling space in teamfights as well as being incredibly fucking good at pushing. In the current meta, space controlling carries as well as ones which assist in pushes are more popular because it is easier to take fights on the high ground as well as retain map control by splitpushing/pushing/threatening towers.

That being said there are two main builds on void, both can be done with or without a midas.
Maelstrom, and Battlefury. battlefury gives you cleave but doesnt really kick in until you have attackspeed. The ais granted by maelstrom allows void to be more useful faster (the attack speed allows him to fight earlier) while his overall farm rate might be less than if you had gone battlefury. The rest of his inventory is largely situational, although a few popular items are bkb, mkb, buriza and butterfly.

Things which are good with void: many heroes. Void does in some sense require your supports to be dangerous at early levels or at least competent at lane control so that the other team cant do some visage luna +1 trilane or whatever and shut down your gameplan. He combos well with heroes that do burst damage (qop, lesh, sk, lina, rubick) and does not work well with a team that takes a long time to kill anything throughout the game although can be used very effectively with them (as long as you dont have too many on your team you shouldnt be worried). Other than that, heroes that can spam things in chrono--sk's ulti, lich, etc. But without getting too much into what makes a good team composition ill end my post here!

GL HF using void

On March 26 2013 19:50 Sickkiee wrote:
Void is often used to counter PL (most times anyway) as his Chrono also reveals invis units and if used right can catch out PL multiple times (if the PL is bad).

On March 26 2013 19:50 Sickkiee wrote:
Void is often used to counter PL (most times anyway) as his Chrono also reveals invis units and if used right can catch out PL multiple times (if the PL is bad).

On March 31 2013 02:51 BoggieMan wrote:
When your team has alot of strong aoe ultimates that can destroy them completely if you catch the enemy team in your bubble.
Also you want someone to support you on your lane, which makes it kinda silly to pick void in pubs unless you are playing with friends, cause mostly people don't give a damn and take the farm they can get and pick the heroes they want.
He is really good with heroes like sandking, dark seer, lich, etc.

On April 01 2013 08:07 GentleDrill wrote:
Surely you'd want to prioritise attack speed more than damage to capitalise on bash, especially given that it now does double damage in Chrono? And given that Chrono stops evasion anyway, why get MKB as your first real damage item instead of Mjollnir or Butterfly?

I've personally had fun with MoM -> Maelstrom -> Whatever's necessary. You can still farm pretty fast, but you actually do damage in Chrono, which isn't true of Bfury in my experience. A bit more greedy, though, I guess, and you don't have mana regen unless you wanna buy a casual Sage's Mask or something.

On April 12 2013 14:12 aintz wrote:
pick void when your not tired as fuck or drunk and can land proper chronos. or you will end up throwing a won game infront of 1k spectators. been there done that.

On April 01 2013 06:55 FinestHour wrote:
aghs is not necessary at all in reality

On April 16 2013 00:34 aintz wrote:
unless aghs gets buffed to the hon state (where your teammates can cast/move slowly in it in addition to the reduce cooldown and longer duration), its not worth a item slot on void.

On March 27 2013 06:08 Noak wrote:
A very sucessfull way to play void is to force a lot of early fights by rushing an aghs and having heroes like WD or jariko to combo really well with the chrono, with aghs you get a long duriation big strong disable on a stuipidly short cooldown.

During these fights you dont play as the massive dps monster but rather as initiator, pop your buble and try not to get picked off, note that you have to be making something happen with this kind of build as you're delaying your damage.

On April 15 2013 11:01 Discarder wrote:


It is situational. In more competitive games with aggressive 5 opponents in the mid-game ,you'd like to use a lot of your chrono. There are games who won't allow this farming space and an aghanims would give you the cooldown you need for a more earlier teamfight. It also gives you enough HP, Mana and Stats to last longer in fights. But I would admit that any damage item can help you farm better.

But it should be coming from a MoM opening since you are expecting less farming..

I'm assuming you play a lot of passive games from both sides and the chrono usually doesn't come into action because
the void just farms for like the entire game right?

On April 18 2013 13:47 Erasme wrote:
Disagree. Difference is 40sec. You die, bb, and unless you jsut used it to defend your base, youll have it if they try to break it.
It's situationnal but not bad.

On November 14 2013 14:42 SolarSuplex wrote:
Is void still usable in the current meta? He seems to be so frail and support dependent until hes got a few items. (mom, treads, etc.) And with the changes to the game making trilanes less appealing, is he still a worthy pick?

On November 15 2013 01:13 saltywet wrote:
i saw void being played as a #3 support with a clinkz where void goes vanguard deso and clinkz rapes everyone inside the chrono from outside.. i imagine next items could be AC, aghs, refresher for void.

but yeah, i think void is viable if you go for longer duration ult/-armor items and support for rapists on your team

On November 16 2013 04:53 mizU wrote:
You basically want to pick him vs a melee heavy (especially carry) line up
That's about it

Trying to get a chrono vs ranged carries is sooooo difficult

On November 16 2013 05:32 CosmicSpiral wrote:


Void destroys most ranged carries.

On November 16 2013 05:52 mizU wrote:


i was trying to say that it's easier to hit a good chrono against melee carries

where as vs a decent line up with ranged carries you have a lot more you need to worry about (esp pre bkb timing)

On November 26 2013 04:08 ref4 wrote:
Your team will have to be really 4 protect 1 (all of them protecting you) for Void to work. He comes online later than all carries, can't split push and have terrible laning phase. He shines at the 50 minute mark, 6 slotted with beastly items. Problem is getting him there and not dying to the enemy team push.

On November 26 2013 04:08 ref4 wrote:
Your team will have to be really 4 protect 1 (all of them protecting you) for Void to work. He comes online later than all carries, can't split push and have terrible laning phase. He shines at the 50 minute mark, 6 slotted with beastly items. Problem is getting him there and not dying to the enemy team push.

On November 26 2013 05:16 CosmicSpiral wrote:


He comes online faster than most carries. Unless you exclusively rush for BF every game, Void can start fighting very early as he prefers cheaper IAS/damage items early on instead of stats items. Level 6 Chronosphere starts off very powerful and only improves incrementally.

On November 26 2013 11:02 Kipsate wrote:
He does not come online faster then most carries, maybe faster then most hard carries(which are limited to AM, Dusa, and arguably PL and Spectre).

He has the potential to do significant things early with Chrono but those opportunities are not very common.

On November 26 2013 12:44 TheYango wrote:
AM comes online faster because of how much faster AM farms.


He can split-push. He can't teamfight effectively without BKB, damage, and attack speed, which is 2 small items + BKB at the earliest (e.g. MoM BKB Mael).

On November 26 2013 13:49 DucK- wrote:
Spectre is relevant early on because of haunt and desolate. That alone makes her very effective in the early phase.

FV is junk until the late game. You could go support fv or farmed fv, it doesn't matter early on. That's because the only thing you contribute is chrono. Regardless of how farmed you are, the quality of the chrono is what win or lose fights.

Its only late game where fv is relevant damage wise. Even then, his entire game is still dependent on the quality of the chrono.

PS. It is for this reason that I rush Agha on fv in pubs. Chrono is a game defining spell, and the ability to use it freely makes it a good investment. Of course there shoukd be other DPS outlets in your team too.

On November 26 2013 15:19 CosmicSpiral wrote:


Sorry, I meant he can start fighting earlier than most carries. It takes him a long time to come online.



He can split-push...kinda? He has a good escape and can make anyone pause with the threat of Chrono, but he's not great at it. He's not even efficient at clearing creep waves until he gets BF or Maelstrom.

FV will not have the damage output to threaten more than 2 opponents without either a MoM-oriented build (which I feel is deficient in several ways) or 2 IAS items. But the way his ultimate works, he doesn't need to build the former or wait for the latter to start picking fights.



Or you can go midgame FV, which can be more relevant in fights than AFK-farm FV and not as useless as support FV?

On November 26 2013 17:47 Eriksen wrote:
It's hard to conclude whether Void's relevant in the early, mid, or the late game because it all depends on the situation in-game. And yes, I can't deny that Void's so useless until he's ultra-farmed, but all in all with the Yasha-Maelstrom (as in my experience) you can almost make your presence felt throughout the mid-game (in case where you are able to outfarm / on an equal footing with the opposing carry).

I never get a BKB for Void. Any personal thoughts about BKB for him (to motivate me)?

On November 26 2013 17:47 Eriksen wrote:
It's hard to conclude whether Void's relevant in the early, mid, or the late game because it all depends on the situation in-game. And yes, I can't deny that Void's so useless until he's ultra-farmed, but all in all with the Yasha-Maelstrom (as in my experience) you can almost make your presence felt throughout the mid-game (in case where you are able to outfarm / on an equal footing with the opposing carry).

I never get a BKB for Void. Any personal thoughts about BKB for him (to motivate me)?

On November 26 2013 19:42 DucK- wrote:


When I say support fv, its just meant to emphasise on the point that it doesn't matter how fat fv is, his entire early mid game is based on his chrono usage.

Even if you go for a 'mid game' build, you are still essentially useless outside of chrono. Being melee and with no burst or steroids, Fv needs attack speed, damage, magic immunity, and hp to be useful as a DPS source outside chrono. Unfortunately all this means you need massive farm and levels. Which then all leads back to the same thing: his early mid game solely revolves around his chrono usage.

On November 26 2013 17:47 Eriksen wrote:
It's hard to conclude whether Void's relevant in the early, mid, or the late game because it all depends on the situation in-game. And yes, I can't deny that Void's so useless until he's ultra-farmed, but all in all with the Yasha-Maelstrom (as in my experience) you can almost make your presence felt throughout the mid-game (in case where you are able to outfarm / on an equal footing with the opposing carry).

I never get a BKB for Void. Any personal thoughts about BKB for him (to motivate me)?

On March 26 2013 11:06 idscy wrote:
Welcome to dota, you should call them heroes

In terms of pure 1v1 manfight 6 item (any 6 in the game, your choice), there are three heroes which are the top dogs. Void, ursa and tiny. Of these three, void will win because of chrono--the skill which really defines void.

That being said, using void with less than 6 items isnt quite as scary. What makes void a good pick is having the chrono for use in team fights. This and his jump allows your team to engage on any hero which gets caught in the chrono. This skill also makes requires the player on void to have very good decision making and good micro, especially at a high level, because a botched chrono could very quickly become a loss.

Often times void is easy to disable in his chrono assuming some support hero with a stun has very good positioning in fights, and this usually requires that void have a bkb. Other items like heaven's halbard and hex are also quite good against him. Note hex removes evasion but not backtrack.

The best time to pick void is when you know that you can secure your safelane--that is the combined power of your two supports plus void in lane isnt greater than the combined power of theirs. For this, and a few other reasons I will outline below, void has become less popular lately in the metagame. The other main reason to pick void, is if the other team is relying on one or two heroes for sources of damage in teamfights. Chronosphere will allow you to simply kill these heroes outright most times which usually allows you to take the fight and eventually the game.

Reasons not to pick void: He requires quite a bit of time to farm. To compare him and another popular hero right now, Phantom lancer, void is your smart missile while PL is the carpet h-bomb. What makes pl the more attractive pick, is with heart and diffusal he can push your towers with only illusions, kill the supports with 1-2 lances (manaburn against low hp int heroes is very very good) and is ok enough at fighting to carry against a few different types of lategame heroes. Void on the other hand sucks at pushing, farms slower than pl unless he has some farm item (and then usually still farms slower) and needs to initiate full on, often with chrono to get any kills. Pl arguably takes the same amount of farm to come online as a carry but does a better job of controlling space in teamfights as well as being incredibly fucking good at pushing. In the current meta, space controlling carries as well as ones which assist in pushes are more popular because it is easier to take fights on the high ground as well as retain map control by splitpushing/pushing/threatening towers.

That being said there are two main builds on void, both can be done with or without a midas.
Maelstrom, and Battlefury. battlefury gives you cleave but doesnt really kick in until you have attackspeed. The ais granted by maelstrom allows void to be more useful faster (the attack speed allows him to fight earlier) while his overall farm rate might be less than if you had gone battlefury. The rest of his inventory is largely situational, although a few popular items are bkb, mkb, buriza and butterfly.

Things which are good with void: many heroes. Void does in some sense require your supports to be dangerous at early levels or at least competent at lane control so that the other team cant do some visage luna +1 trilane or whatever and shut down your gameplan. He combos well with heroes that do burst damage (qop, lesh, sk, lina, rubick) and does not work well with a team that takes a long time to kill anything throughout the game although can be used very effectively with them (as long as you dont have too many on your team you shouldnt be worried). Other than that, heroes that can spam things in chrono--sk's ulti, lich, etc. But without getting too much into what makes a good team composition ill end my post here!

GL HF using void

On March 26 2013 11:06 idscy wrote:
Welcome to dota, you should call them heroes

In terms of pure 1v1 manfight 6 item (any 6 in the game, your choice), there are three heroes which are the top dogs. Void, ursa and tiny. Of these three, void will win because of chrono--the skill which really defines void.

-snip-

On November 27 2013 02:37 Piledriver wrote:



I know this is a 6 month old post, but I have a minor quibble. Ursa is a terrible hero ultra late game in the 6 slot stage. The fixed damage from fury swipes doesnt scale into the late game, and requires you to get a lot more auto attacks in to build up the stacks, whereas most other late game carries hit like a truck in the ultra late game. Ursa usually has many wasted item slots like blink (as a gap closer), bkb and vlads (along with boots), which give him only 2 slots for DPS items. Couple that with the fact that Ursa is a horrible flash farmer, and you can see why he is like chaos knight. His strength is at its peak when he has just acquired blink + vlads around 18 minutes into the game, and you're pretty much hoping that he can snowball carry your team to a victory before 30 minutes. After that he's just a shit hero.

On November 27 2013 03:14 ref4 wrote:


Ursa is a gimmicky hero only useful for the fact that he can solo Rosh/take down Rosh really fast so the only time he's picked in competitive matches is for cheesy shit like level 1 Rosh (I think Alliance did this vs. DK sometimes back)

Yeah other than that he is shut down by the enemy team's forcestaffs

On November 27 2013 02:37 Piledriver wrote:



I know this is a 6 month old post, but I have a minor quibble. Ursa is a terrible hero ultra late game in the 6 slot stage. The fixed damage from fury swipes doesnt scale into the late game, and requires you to get a lot more auto attacks in to build up the stacks, whereas most other late game carries hit like a truck in the ultra late game. Ursa usually has many wasted item slots like blink (as a gap closer), bkb and vlads (along with boots), which give him only 2 slots for DPS items. Couple that with the fact that Ursa is a horrible flash farmer, and you can see why he is like chaos knight. His strength is at its peak when he has just acquired blink + vlads around 18 minutes into the game, and you're pretty much hoping that he can snowball carry your team to a victory before 30 minutes. After that he's just a shit hero.

On November 27 2013 02:19 emythrel wrote:

So to sum up, the answer is...... Never.

lol

On November 27 2013 05:56 TheYango wrote:
One of the things people don't notice but is very significant against Ursa is that while Magic Immunity does not reset Fury Swipes stack count, Manta/Purges DO. Consequently this means that intelligent usage of either of these neuter Ursa's damage output in a man-fight against another carry. However, many carries (Naix being one of them) do not practically buy the relevant items for this.

On November 27 2013 00:05 CosmicSpiral wrote:


Backtrack only removes damage, not status effects. If your team relies on you for late game damage output, you absolutely need it. If you have Dark Seer-Jakiro, meh.

How's S&Y on him? I'm itching for practical ways to improve his MS.

On November 27 2013 15:11 Eriksen wrote:


I had never tried S&Y on Void, though I keep making Yasha onto Manta. To be honest I always build him using the old meta (replace MoM with Midas): Manta ; Mjollnir ; Butterfly ; Cuirass / Desolator / Skadi ; + Travel

I may try BKB later, still curious with various builds actually.

On November 27 2013 15:52 Eriksen wrote:
Anyway, what is TC? I can't comprehend that acronym :O All I got is our Liquid's 1-spot player, which is also TC lol

On November 27 2013 15:40 CosmicSpiral wrote:


I've never tried it either, mostly because it seems counter-intuitive on the surface. S&Y is not a late-game item and Void doesn't hit his peak around the time when you will assemble it. S&Y's base stats are pretty mediocre compared to what you could get for a little more money.

Why not try Midas -> Armlet -> Maelstrom -> Hyperstone -> Mjollnir/AC instead?

Why not try Midas -> Armlet -> Maelstrom -> Hyperstone -> Mjollnir/AC instead?

On November 27 2013 15:56 Eriksen wrote:


I find it strange if Void uses Armlet. I mean, I've used PA-Armlet in the past and it was outrageous (added with her massive critical output). But IMO, Void with Armlet would be very strange, in addition he doesn't have the lifesteal effect unless he bought one.

I do understand it gives massive strength (health), damage, and IAS, but I can't say it will benefit Void.

Yea I will give them a try.

On November 27 2013 19:21 Discarder wrote:


nice idea. armlet looks like a good idea because you want to get the regen (helm of iron will) and you can fight earlier instead of getting battlefury (yuck). Threads is also important because you would want to switch to buy another timewalk/chrono at a crucial time.

mine will go:
Midas -> Armlet -> Power Threads ->crystalys -> whatever..

On November 28 2013 03:02 CosmicSpiral wrote:


With Void you can never give him exactly what he wants. He demands health, damage, IAS, MS, a farming mechanism, and mana regeneration. Armlet gives him the first three and Unholy Strength toggle works wonderfully with level 4 Backtrack. The buildup gives you lane sustenance (HoIW) and the pieces are individually cheap, so there's little chance the progression gets thrown off. He can start to effectively jungle right after Armlet finishes. It's a stable compromise that doesn't force you to commit to a certain approach.



I assume Power Treads because it's standard on all FV builds. You only stay on Boots of Speed if you're rushing Battlefury.

On November 28 2013 06:01 Sn0_Man wrote:
Cosmic is obsessed with Armlet void for unknown reasons. Its clearly awful lol.

Honestly though, void is far more about having money and hitting chronospheres properly than he is about "specific" itemization. 20K worth of damage items on void is gonna win you the game, regardless of which items those are (within reason). Just buy whatever kinda fits in that game. If they have a ranged carry consider butterfly for example. If they have a PA or Brew you need to look at MKB.

The hardest balance with void is determining when to buy defensive items (BKB, Satanic), when to buy hybrid items (Manta, butterfly, AC) and when to buy pure offensive items (Mjollnir, Daedalus, MoM). That basically relies upon what other disables your team has and what disables THEY have that you won't be able to chrono reliably. And what their damage looks like.

On November 28 2013 06:01 Sn0_Man wrote:
Cosmic is obsessed with Armlet void for unknown reasons. Its clearly awful lol.

Honestly though, void is far more about having money and hitting chronospheres properly than he is about "specific" itemization. 20K worth of damage items on void is gonna win you the game, regardless of which items those are (within reason). Just buy whatever kinda fits in that game. If they have a ranged carry consider butterfly for example. If they have a PA or Brew you need to look at MKB.

The hardest balance with void is determining when to buy defensive items (BKB, Satanic), when to buy hybrid items (Manta, butterfly, AC) and when to buy pure offensive items (Mjollnir, Daedalus, MoM). That basically relies upon what other disables your team has and what disables THEY have that you won't be able to chrono reliably. And what their damage looks like.

On November 28 2013 07:19 CosmicSpiral wrote:
[*]Accommodates an early Hand of Midas. Midas + Battlefury delays your core items too much for my liking. Midas + MoM delays your fighting potential and the impact of +30 IAS diminishes just due to simple math.

On November 28 2013 04:32 idscy wrote:
Firstly, on power treads:

There has been a bit of a debate about antimage and battlefury which is a bit telling regarding the usefulness of power treads as a farming (and sustaining a la switching) tool. Classically the argument has been to 'always' rush battlefury, the -farming- item as fast as possible, going back for treads later. However due to the pace of the game becoming much faster... especially now with the first night coming at 4:00, it is MUCH riskier to sit around for the next 6-10 minutes in lane farming (although can still be done if picks, strategy, vision, dedicated babysit support, etc exist for you, but this is rarely the case nowerdays with more greedy and active support play, the 'position 4' has become a pseudo-core of sorts)

So it seems like there would be some time where lots of enemies are off the map, antimage the highest priority target, etc...

It then becomes not only prudent, but necessary for any high level antimage to get his ass into the woods. Farming the woods take a fucking long time if you have basic boots, quelling, maybe pms, and a perse. It goes MUCH faster when you have treads. Furthermore it is easier to pressure lanes with treads, and farm waves faster (allowing you to go back to the jungle), and you can even 'participate' in fights earlier with the added agi/health.

So the theory is that getting treads before battlefury doesnt slow down your farm (you get them immediately after anyway) and allow you to be a bit more flexible than the classic afk farm antimage.

This is entirely applicable to void--even moreso because am has a sick animation whereas void is slow.

So that being said, power treads after midas seems optimal, obtaining your first core after this rather than keeping regular boots and 'rushing' the core item (theory holds that the timing doesnt change much on the item after the first core item if you go treads->core or core->treads BUT the former is much safer and more practical).

On November 28 2013 04:32 idscy wrote:
On armlet:

There are reasons this item appears attractive on void, but there are also numerous ones outlining why it is not.

Firstly, void is a hero that is VERY strapped on items. The hero does not farm very quickly, and doesnt want to buy 'setup' items like drums because it severely delays his ability to have the teamfight impact he wants (read: get more than 4 attacks off during chrono before 20minutes).

Therefore he requires the bigger items faster, or at least items which allow his ias to become usuable (MoM).

On November 28 2013 04:32 idscy wrote:This build midas->armlet->mael->dps item is simply WAY too slow to be applicable in contemporary comp dota, and is even a bit risky in pubs because you are waiting too long to get up any 'farming dps' item. Your bkb timing will be slower than if you went midas->treads->battlefury->X (bkb) or (eaglesong/hyperstone/baby crit/demon edge/deso/etc)->bkb because battlefury kills mad creeps while armlet lets you maybe not die once or twice when you would have with proper micro.

On November 28 2013 04:32 idscy wrote:Armlet is giving you meager damage output in a nonactive state, and its strength gain during active state is being almost totally wasted on void who is not a strength hero, so armlet is not amplifying his dps even close to the same level as it would a niax.

While active: +31 damage, +10 attack speed, and +25 strength, 31 damage good, 10 attack speed okay, 25 str.........well maybe thats ok since void doesnt have much hp, but armlet is draining his limited hp pool and this str doesnt contribute to his damage (it does with ck, niax, alche, etc)

On November 28 2013 04:32 idscy wrote:While nonactive:

+7 HP regeneration
+9 Damage
+5 Armor
+15 Attack speed

Compared to maelstrom (nonproccing) :

+24 Damage
+25 Attack speed

okay so armlet is giving you more sustain with the armor and hp regen, but doesnt provide even close to the same passive damage/ais--things which void really needs. (void has reasonable sustain just from backtrack or even better if youre a hacking piece of shit like me :DDD)

Getting midas->treads/armlet->mael is more greedy than battlefury and your bkb timing is going to be very late unless lots of tower gold etc are coming in (that is a special case, if you team is winning so hard you can argue for a dagon, and this case is not relevant to our discussion).

On November 28 2013 04:32 idscy wrote:Furthermore I argue that MoM is strictly better than armlet.
+100 attack speed and +30% movement speed but causes you to take extra 30% damage and 17% lifesteal

The sustain away from fights is good (lifesteal) and the 100 attack speed is superior to both armlet and mael. The 30% extra damage is maybe a bit more severe than armlet's life drain, but armlet doesnt provide lifesteal.

The idea is that MoM minimizes the time it takes void to fight (armlet still seems more of a transition item) while providing him passive sustain. It also relies a bit more on positioning and skill with chrono whereas armlet is more of a blunt object (I WILL HAVE 25 STR; I CHRONO WHERE I WANT------ BITCH) :D

On November 28 2013 07:19 CosmicSpiral wrote:
I really do love the item and I don't understand the rationale of "it's awful" on him. He's not a strength hero so clearly he fails to get the sheer damage output that a Lifestealer would with toggle. That's not why you buy it though. There are plenty of good reasons to buy it; none of them are apparent if you buy into the traditional philosophy of "Void should only be built with DPS items". I should probably just explain all the reasons why I prefer Armlet/Maelstrom over all his other builds.

On November 28 2013 08:46 DefMatrixUltra wrote:
I usually stay out of these discussions, but:

Saying that Midas + MoM "delays your fighting potential" as Void is completely nuts and could hardly be farther from the truth. MoM is the best single early fighting item you can build on Void. Void's biggest problem early game is that he is not very threatening except in a supporty kind of way. MoM + Chronosphere makes him a legitimate threat from the moment he gets MoM.

Armlet does give a very good all-around collection of stats, but it does not provide the level of threat that MoM does to let Void fight. Armlet + Chronosphere is not even comparable to MoM + Chronosphere. The regen is not very effective if you're using the armlet all the time (same as on almost every other hero) and really what results is that your non-toggled HP is always going to be well below 100%. MoM has you at 100% HP all the time if you're farming, and there's no reason not to spam the ability if you're just jungling.

On November 28 2013 07:41 Sn0_Man wrote:
The fact that you imply anybody in any lane would level backtrack past level 1 indicates a lot about how well you understand... things.

If you feel like you are getting harassed unduly in lane, stats are better than backtrack for damage mitigation (after level 1 backtrack).

Beyond that, if you are being harassed in lane then YES you have an issue but NO helm of iron will is not the way to fix it. Grab a poor mans shield. Ferry yourself a set of tangoes. Realize that without a free lane you probably shouldn't be playing void.

Anyway, the deal is that armlet sucks mostly since it doesn't give you the damage to kill them in chrono and it doesn't give you the survivability to kill them out of chrono. The regen sucks compared to lifesteal (if you don't like mom go HoTD on the way to satanic) and hurting yourself makes it uniquely bad at farming since void lacks the kind of innate regen that most armlet heroes have. Void needs items that help him farm.

Wodota armlet toggles got worse not better and are a terrible reason to use the item in the first place. Void doesn't need to extricate himself from fights at 1hp or whatever. Void needs ways to make sure the fight works out.

I'd take blink dagger void over armlet void every time I think. At least theres a key reason why you would get blink (Better chronos that are harder to respond to). Armlet's just inefficient.

ALL THAT SAID yeah whatever void works with most items. As long as you can keep farming most games armlet doesn't just lose you the game. Just be aware that it is STRICTLY suboptimal and realistically you shouldn't ever actually get it.

On November 28 2013 07:41 TheYango wrote:

This is just wrong.

I don't know if it's you that tried to convince people of Orchid Void, but the argument is essentially the same. You don't try to pair a hodgepodge of items that do different things to try and do everything well. You assess the needs of the particular game and get focused, sometimes lopsided item choices that suit those needs. If you need to fight, commit to fighting items. If you need to farm, commit to farming items. Midas + Armlet is just schizophrenic and bad because the Midas weakens your Armlet timing from the fact that it hasn't kicked in yet when you finish Armlet.

In fact, this entire discussion seems like you're searching for a one-size-fits-all item that fits every possible scenario, when there is none. Every item seems imperfect and the ones that don't are just bad at everything so they seem well rounded. That's the depth of itemization in this game. You pick from items that are not well rounded to accomplish specific needs, and correctly assessing those needs in a particular game puts you ahead.

On November 28 2013 08:57 CosmicSpiral wrote:
What exactly made you think I would advocate Midas -> Treads? I prefer having Tread Switching in almost every scenario.

AM's animation has zero to do with farming. His BAT is lower (1.4 compared to 1.7). FV compensates with higher base damage.

On November 28 2013 08:57 CosmicSpiral wrote:
"Very strapped on items" is a nonsensical term unless you mean that his item slots are precious so he cannot afford to fill them with suboptimal items. If that is the case, then I agree. However, rushing for late game items is not practical for a character with as many issues as Void. Yes, not practical. It's fine for other carries who can naturally compensate, as their skill sets let them do some things well without items. Gyro will always clear jungle stacks as long as he gets levels. Weaver can always chase and avoid ganks as long as he has mana. Void can run away and throw an ultimate out. You can't

His "teamfight impact" consists of Chronosphere. How you want to exploit it to up to you.

On November 28 2013 08:57 CosmicSpiral wrote:
If you're good with Armlet toggle, you'll be saved a lot more times within a single game. You can take greater risks in a team fight when you get 475 health on demand.

On November 28 2013 08:57 CosmicSpiral wrote:
Armlet giving you meager damage output without toggle is fine. Mask gives you worse damage output and less sustain while farming creeps.

+475 HP is amazing for a carry hero whose STR gain is so abysmal he barely cracks 1000 health at level 15. And this is a carry who traditionally does not buy stats items like Weaver or Medusa. Armlet is his best way of addressing this issue without committing to a very expensive item like Linkens. He doesn't need more health when farming creeps; the HP regen + armor takes care of that. Having an optional increase in health whenever he needs it is great.

On November 28 2013 08:57 CosmicSpiral wrote:
Not really. Of course Midas is the definition of greedy but the items in total make him pretty well rounded (as well rounded as he can be without completely committing to a midgame build). He'll have 100 IAS + natural AGI gain, reasonable transition into Mjollnir/AC/BKB depending on situation, and a lot more survivability in scenarios where he is getting attacked.

Backtrack doesn't give him reasonable sustain. Since the 25% chance applies to individual instances instead of operating via PRD, the description only applies when you're getting pelted by peashooters. Sometimes you dodge Laguna Blade and get away scot-free, sometimes you eat Soul Assumption + Dragon Slave + Venom Gale and dodge that one spit from a Plague Ward. Also remember that Backtrack does not remove secondary effects.

He "really needs" health so he doesn't play the lottery when faced with high burst damage. He "really needs" mana regeneration so he can use Time Walk to farm as quickly as possible. He "really needs" MS so he's not useless once Chronosphere ends. People only choose to emphasize damage/IAS because they are convinced he has to be the main damage-dealer within Chronosphere. It's one of his top concerns but it is not his only one.

On November 28 2013 08:57 CosmicSpiral wrote:
Yes, Armlet is a transition item. That is the entire point of getting it.

The Lifesteal passive is a poor feature as it scales based on damage; it takes a very long time for it to be useful in a direct engagement with, well, anything. It is also inconsequential in scenarios where you are not actively bashing away at someone's face.

Your argument doesn't take into account all the other features that make Armlet the superior choice.

• Actually being toggable with 0 cooldown.
  
• Easier to retreat from failed fights.
  
• Easier to deal with right-click damage and DoT spells.
  
• Many more useful applications of Unholy Strength passive.
  
• Far superior item during downtime.
  
• Far superior item when you are getting initiated on.
  
• Overall better for jungling once the laning phase ends due to superior EHP.

On November 28 2013 06:01 Sn0_Man wrote:
Cosmic is obsessed with Armlet void for unknown reasons. Its clearly awful lol.

Honestly though, void is far more about having money and hitting chronospheres properly than he is about "specific" itemization. 20K worth of damage items on void is gonna win you the game, regardless of which items those are (within reason). Just buy whatever kinda fits in that game. If they have a ranged carry consider butterfly for example. If they have a PA or Brew you need to look at MKB.

The hardest balance with void is determining when to buy defensive items (BKB, Satanic), when to buy hybrid items (Manta, butterfly, AC) and when to buy pure offensive items (Mjollnir, Daedalus, MoM). That basically relies upon what other disables your team has and what disables THEY have that you won't be able to chrono reliably. And what their damage looks like.

On November 29 2013 19:58 AwfuL_ wrote:
Why do so many people get MKB on Void? I see many people (pubs and pros alike) get MKB on Void as the first big damage item. I've always wondered why anyone would get that item on him, let alone rush it as the first damage item. Chronosphere disables evasion, and crit gives a higher DPS increase. Mjollnir and Butterfly are better options too.

On December 12 2013 10:15 infiniteJest wrote:
Hey guys. I recently became addicted to faceless void and have been trying a lot of different builds trying to figure out which is best. I was surprised to see the debate over armlet vs mask of madness. One of the better builds that I don't see being discussed is

Boots- -> Midas --> Treads --> Maelstrom or Battlefury --> Mjollner or Daedalus or Butterfly.

I've had some good success with this build and it makes void feel a lot more tanky and hard to kill when not using the armlet or mask of madness. You could also add a poor mans shield or skip the midas completely.

If you are looking for a build try this one out.

On December 13 2013 03:05 infiniteJest wrote:
Thanks Eriksen I appreciate the more efficient build. Another interesting build I saw while watching a game was a void who was doing very well and his first 3 items were treads mjollner and vanguard. He did not buy midas or mom. Then his next item was butterfly. I'm going to try this build but I haven't yet. I'm trying to find ways that help void participate in more fights without chrono or when it is on cooldown. What are your opinions on vanguard on void? Also possibly Assault Cuirass. Thanks for the help.

On December 14 2013 16:10 Mutineer wrote:
My personal; opinion is to pick him with heros that can use crono to do damage. Sky is an example, he can ulti into crono.

CM can, but more limited in positioning. DK as a carry work good, aoe into crono - nice.

On other hand he is bad with other melee carries.

On December 27 2013 00:37 Dreamer.T wrote:
Void is actually pretty interesting as a semi-carry for the team. You just roam around with him and try to build an aghs, while another ranged dps carry takes on the role of primary hard carry late game. It's worked quite well in the few games I've tried it, but definitely limited to pub games only.

On December 27 2013 04:42 mizU wrote:


You're only using him for chrono? It's going to be pretty difficult to build aghs + damage item in a timely manner on a void that isn't your 1st pos.
If you need multi target lockdown, magnus or tide require less farm and also provide ganking/support skills
Void is pretty crappy in lane so unless you're devoting the attention of your supports he isn't going to get farmed.

On December 28 2013 10:45 Severedevil wrote:
Question -- how quickly can a Faceless Void get the items necessary to jungle effectively? Once Void has that, there's little need for more babysitting.

On December 28 2013 11:19 TheYango wrote:
It depends whether you mean "effectively" or "quickly". RoH or Mask of Death let you do so sustainably but you don't farm it fast enough to be relevant until you have ~3-4k in items (BF, Midas+MoM, MoM+Mael, or similar).

EDIT: fuck

On January 03 2014 05:34 sc14s wrote:
a wonky pick, that i played against the other day was void WD.. dear god a good void with WD ult is the most retarded thing ever though i know WD is fairly niche pick for pro level dota.