|
Good lord man, there is a LOT of writing here, and impressively comprehensive. Very nice. I've tried writing guides before but always flagged before finishing them.
As for my favourite hero, it's got to be Pugna. I used just to be terrible with him, I couldn't do anything other than make a dagon and run around hoping to find someone low hp, and that's still hilarious, but one day he just clicked. He can do pretty much anything you want him to, lane anywhere you want, agressively push, gank, and with just a few items he's terrifying. The trouble with choosing pugna is that your skill and item build depends on your allies and enemies more than most other heroes. Sven is a bit of a no brainer - you pick storm bolt, and then argue with yourself how many points of stats or warcry to get.
Pugna can choose any of his skills, pretty much in any order, and it can be the right decision at the time. I've had games where I've outlaned zeus purely through the power of ward, having level 4 ward up at level 7, and just daring him to nuke me. If you're with another nuker, decrepify is a death sentence, especially if it usually needs positioning. Laning with lina It's blast/decrepify all the way, and start rolling in kills at around level 3.
That said, probably my most common build is 1 point of decrepify, then maxing blast over ward, with his ulti whenever I can. I occasionally would skip the ulti, but I've had far too many attempted tower dives on me be completely turned around with a quick drain to pass up on it now. For items, unless there's a specific need or I'm in the mood to dagon, I tend to get an urn, a stick, piles of tp scrolls and then head for a guinsoo, with boots along the way, and depending on the game a point booster somewhere in the middle if I feel I need it.
One of my fondest dota memories is from games with friends where we'd impose silly restrictions, one set of which was: Basic boots, orchid and bashers only. By the end of the game I had three orchids and a basher, and out dps-ed a huskar with raw auto attacks, watching this little skelly flailing his arms about like a lunatic, spraying enormous balls of green death everywhere was hilarious.
I love pugna because at first glance, he's quite one dimensional - a pure nuke support, but when you play him a lot you realise how much nuance there is in his play, how many little tricks you can pull, just with decrepify - on his ward, on yourself to counter omnislash, stealing roshan with a decrep/blast. The amount of mindgames you can play with pugna is just awesome, and taking out a really farmed carry with a combination of ghost staff, decrepify and hex over what feels like years is one of the most satisfying things in dota, imo.
|
On November 02 2011 05:07 Kipsate wrote:
not really sold on the magic stick, I feel that its situational for AM.
It's only 200 gold for an amazing item, almost always worth it on pretty much every hero in the game.
Good guide though, covers pretty much anything you'd ever want to know about AM.
Personally, my favourite hero would be Puck, though. The skillbuild I go on him is orb, phase shift, orb, rift, orb, coil, orb, rift x3, coil, phase shift x3, stats, coil, stats. Reasoning behind this is quite simple really, you max orb first because it gives you mobility, does more damage, has a longer range and a lower cooldown than rift. One level in phase shift greatly helps greatly with your survivability, being able to just evade a storm bolt for example, is HUGE, but you only need one level in the early stages of the game. And since there's not much else to choose from, rift is going to be maxed out before phase shift, while taking ult at every level possible, because Puck's ult is incredible.
Start with a set of tangos, a flask, and 2 clarity pots for regen. Might seem like a lot, but I like it. For stat items, you'll want 2 branches and a ring of protection, then it's time to head off to your lane.
You should be soloing if at all possible, early game farm and XP is quite important for such a gank oriented hero like Puck, and the mid lane suits him perfectly since he can both push the lane and move around very quickly with illusory orb, meaning he has an easy time getting to the rune first vs most heroes. And, if you're going to be focusing heavily on getting runes, you obviously need a bottle, so here's the general item build I find works the best:
I already went over the starting items, but with your next 600g, you'll want to get a bottle, followed by boots, a magic wand, and a ring of basilius. Notice how the starting items all build into this. I find this to be the best way to build because the bottle's obviously going to be needed to maximize the effectiveness of taking runes, magic wand is just an unbelievably good item (one of the best in the game, imo) in general, and I prefer ring of basilius over, let's say a null talisman or a bracer, especially when taking the aura into consideration.
Once you've got all of this, you've got a choice ahead of you, what to turn your boots into. I think phase boots, power treads and arcane boots are all viable choices for him, but personally, I prefer treads, just because he's quite squishy and the extra strength can really help you with this, especially in the early game. But, it all comes down to preference and there's nothing wrong with another set of boots.
Once your boots are finished, you're looking to get a blink dagger, so you can really abuse mobility. Very few heroes can escape a gank when you have both a shell and a blink to chase them with, and it's great for survivability as well. Because of your phase shift, it's not that hard to time it so that you go 3 seconds without taking damage for you to be able to blink away from you getting ganked, and for teamfights, instead of using your orb to get into a group of heroes to land your silence as well as your ult, you can just blink in, drop your silence, send out an orb, phase shift and then port to your orb, and you're completely safe.
This is your core, and this is all you'll ever need on Puck. What you get from here differs from game to game, some good items to choose from however, are force staff, guinsoo's, eul's, orchid, linken's and shiva's. Personally, I prefer guinsoo's, but it's completely up to and your team what you should be getting. You have your core already, so all of this should be considered luxury. If your team needs it, you can even start helping out with wards from here.
And obviously, REMEMBER TO CARRY TP SCROLLS THROUGHOUT THE GAME, THEY'RE NOT CONSIDERED ONE OF THE BEST, IF NOT THE BEST ITEM IN THE GAME FOR NO REASON.
Your main goal when playing Puck is just to gank as much as you can, all throughout the game, while building towards your core, and once teamfights start to become the focus of the game, your job is to initiate, or work as a follow-up initiator with your silence and your ult.
And to finish the guide, some useful things to know when playing Puck:
- Illusory orb gives you vision of the vision the area it's passing through, even if there's trees or other things that would normally create fog of war in the way, this can be VERY useful when chasing someone.
- You can put your phase shift on auto-cast, and this can be very useful if you just know that Lina is about to ult you, for example, but, having phase shift on auto-cast will not work vs abilities with a stun portion, so if Lina decides to throw a stun at you first, it will not auto-cast, and you will be stunned unless you activated it yourself.
- Your ult has an initial ministun when you cast it, this can be useful for interrupting various channeling spells, despite being an ultimate disable however, the ministun nor the stun when someone breaks the coil will not go through magic immunity.
That's it for the guide, and a very memorable moment I have of playing Puck (or, in this case, since I was playing hon, Bubbles), was in a game where the other team had a very overfed Chronos (Faceless Void), and my team was pushing. As everyone in my team is quite clumped up, this slightly overbold (though he was RIDICULOUSLY fed) Chronos leaps in, and the moment I see this, I turn invulnerable with my take cover, and the chronosphere goes up only milliseconds later, but since I managed to take cover before it hit, I'm able to blink out of the chronosphere and use my sheepstick on this Chronos, which results in our Soulstealer (Shadow Fiend) just barely living through the ult. As the ult wears off, everyone immediately does everything in their power to kill Chronos, and he dies. We follow this up with a 5v4 teamfight, in which our Soulstealer pulls off an incredible ult, which leads to all 5 of us coming out alive, while their entire team dies, and as a result, we rax 2 of their lanes, which allows us to come back and win a game that I was completely certain was already lost.
Wow. Long post.
|
Amazingly guide.. this really sets the bar high for TL as a good source for DotA2 content. Here is my submission for the key contest!
My favorite hero is Sven the Rouge Knight, his utility in competitive matches and his ability to completely stomp unprepared pubbies is refreshing and that brief moment of anticipation before he starts attacking with his God's Strength increased cleaving swings of death is exhilarating.
Skill Build
+ Show Spoiler +If I'm playing Sven in a situation where I'm not that carry, and I need to support, I generally take Storm Bolt at 1,3,5 and 7, with Stats at level 2. This allows you to make use of your greatest asset early game, your aoe stun. It does good damage and has great range, but costs a lot of mana. This is where stats come into play as they allow you to be able to throw off more stuns. I usually pick up Warcry at 4 and Ultimate at 6, but they can both be put off for more levels of stats if need be, and I generally skill up to three levels of stats before I start maxing Warcry and Cleave, while taking Ulti when it doesn't sacrifice something more important, because you really don't get too much return from leveling God's Strength, and extra levels of Warcry cut the cooldown and increase benefits for no extra mana cost, a much better deal overall. Cleave is great for farming and allows you to carry pretty well if your opponents decide to group up too tightly in a team fight, but just isn't as useful as Warcry, and should only be leveled with a higher priority if stomping newbies.
Item Build
+ Show Spoiler +My favorite item build with Sven is to begin the game with cheap stats and some regeneration items, like Ironwood Branches and Tangoes. Opening up with Gauntlets and branches allows you to last hit and deny easier, and builds into Urn, which is a core item. Generally getting Clarity potions isn't a terrible idea, but shouldn't really be necessary, because you should save your stuns for key moments. Sven is very versatile because his core items consist of very cheap items that are purchasable in small, easy to farm parts. My core item build is usually Magic Wand, Urn, Boots and sometimes a Bottle. These items allow Sven to be aggressive and safe at the same time. Boots are a personal choice as Phasers will allow you to engage better, but don't offer the versatility of Treads and don't factor into God's Strength damage increase, and Treads will offer greater flexibility and welcome attack speed. From here builds diverge a bit, because if you're supporting, you don't need more farm or items, and should start warding and maybe working towards some team friendly items like Vlad's. If you find yourself carrying, however, consider picking up a Blink and BKB, as this combination allows you to get up close and gives you immunity to stuns and purges, Sven's greatest natural enemies (God's Strength is purgeable), as well as much needed closing and stats.
Playstyle
+ Show Spoiler +Sven's role in teamfights is generally to stun the biggest baddest target, and maybe go after the supports. When looking for targets for stun, consider the following, am I carrying? If no, then you should do your best to keep your carry alive and to pick off vulnerable targets. If yes, then you should probably be doing exactly the same thing, except now you're the one who is calling the shots on who to engage, because your stun and Warcry will set the terms of the engagement.
Another big reason for Sven being my favorite hero is because I was playing him when I got my first ever Rampage! It was the version right after the Rampage sound effect was added, and a CM on my team allowed my to roam and get lots of kills because of the mana aura, and I got up Blink, BKB and MoM pretty quickly. Needless to say, a Dark Seer Vacuum later I had my first Rampage.
|
Sick guide! Magebane was my favorite hero to play in HoN and I can't wait to get Dota 2 so I can try antimage out.
|
My favorite hero would be Crystal Maiden. I've grown to love the support role. And with ice spells and an aura I feel that I can both control enemies, and provide a passive bonus to my teammates over time.
Obviously the gear I usually get is limited to a pair of boots and a lot of wards. Sometimes during late game I'd like to get a pair of Phase Boots, even after the "nerf". But I love it, I cannot help the relaxed feeling I get when I don't have to stress my ass farming. Instead I can focus on my placement and provide the best babysitting/warding humanly possible.
Of course I like heroes with direct heals aswell, but different team setups requires different supporters! And also, Crystal Maiden happens to be the first hero I ever played!
|
Oh man nice guide. I loved Antimage in DotA...BFly + Basher into LOL I HIT YOU TOO FAST AND STUN YOU TOO MUCH AND NO SPELLS FOR YOU epicness? I think so.
|
I'll be honest. I've never played Dota before. I'm against torrenting games and none of the Best-Buys near me have it. I've been studying Dota-allstars relentlessly though, memorizing stats of heroes, items, and strategies. A Dota 2 beta key would mean a lot to me because I will finally be able to play the damn game!
I'm definitely going to start out with Lich. I've heard he's a good hero to learn with, and he seems like a badass. The videos I've seen of his ultimate make me hard. I would probably go a heavy support role with mekans followed by boots. I'll spam my q and keep my mana up with Dark ritual. I can't wait for my first Lich ultimate. It will be like losing my Dota Virginity.
|
My favorite hero is probably Earthshaker. He fits my play style and is just such a fun hero to play.
Most memorable game would have to be the time i went 0/0/30 with friends just spent all game ganking and managed to get so many assists.
|
Did Battlefury get way better? Because I remember that back when I played DotA, people on the forums would trash you if you recommended using it anywhere. A lot seems to have changed since the glory days of 6.59d.
|
Cool guide, I'm getting excited for this game!
My favorite hero is definitely Syllabear, though my favorite times playing him is when i skip his bear and max his other abilities first. I rush Boots of Travel and Yasha so he goes scary fast and just mow people down by orb walking behind them haha. It's always great when my enemy finally realizes I'm too fast for him to run away, but by then, it's already too late! ^^
|
Heard a slight comment about this blog on linklink's stream and came to check it out. Really fantastic job you've done with this blog 
|
My favorite hero might have to be Sacred Warrior. I love his Burning Spears because the damage from it makes me smile. He has a heal, which god knows I need, and his passive ability makes for some awesome kills from low health. Life Break is one of the most satisfying abilities I've ever seen, because it changes the tide of battles and is really fun to use.
I always max out Burning Spears and Berserker's Blood before anything else, because it allows for potential kills on targets who overextend themselves. My favorite items to grab usually are Dagger to help get in range for Life Break and to spam more spears, and Armlet because it's awesome.
I was at a LAN center once with a few friends. My friends and I were all pretty bad at the game, but we enjoyed playing it. I picked Huskar out of the Single Draft, and my friend Tyler got Kunkka. So we ran around throwing spears and boats at people yelling things at random. (LAN centers are great places for DotA. It's always more fun when you're in trash talk range of your enemies.) One of the guys on their team saw us running at him, but he forgot to buy boots so he wasn't as fast as us. Kunkka throws that X on him while I throw as many spears as my health pool will allow. As the guy is just about to get away, Kunkka pushes his ultimate, and a boat flies across the screen. An ear piercing scream of "NOOO!" fills the room as the guy who is running from it enters panic mode. He spams right click so hard, he somehow manages to snap two of the wheels off his chair and fall to the floor. As soon as the sound of his body hitting the ground fades off, M-M-M-Monster kill plays through 10 sets of computer speakers.
|
Nice presentation, in depth and easy to read, got a better understanding of the hero and the stuff going around in the beta streams :p Congratz. Thank you as well for the opportunity to get a beta key, here's my submission:
I started playing dota a looong time ago. At first alone but after a while some of my friends joined in. Fun times were had wether winning or losing ( not really actually, when we were losing we were always arguing of who did what on which hero). Although we were new to this kind of genre we already had our favorite heroes. Can't count the times we had a team consisting of Riki.Gondar.Ursa.Trax and me trying to pick something usefull. I had to choose from a lot of heroes, maybe Axe to support them or Lich for the baller ulti nah as soon as i set my eyes on the "do it all" blood elf i fell in love ( not in a man love way, not that it's anything wrong with it). The "infinite" number of skills he possed coupled with the short cooldown at higher levels made him a great carry.support.burster. If you don't know him Invoker is his name and i'll try to make a short introduction and the way i played him.
![[image loading]](http://www.iccup.com/upload/images/gallery/1891/n22202.jpg?1272647097)
He's an Intelligence hero with 3 skills consisting of elements (Quas, Wex, Exort) and a mixing one ( Invoke) that creates a new skill based on the elements combined. Fast fingers coupled with a good memory cand create no less than 10 skills with a plethora of uses from summons to burst spells to buffs/debuffs. The complexity of the hero in my opinion rivals no other. Aside from knowing the combos most of the spells are skillshots, including a global one
"Sun strike" ( 3 Exort)
![[image loading]](http://media.playdota.com/hero/118/skill-10.jpg)
( a burst skill that does a lot of damage anywhere on the map) which is one of my favorites. Another skill that i liked to use is
"Deafening Blast" (1 Quas, 1 Wex and 1 Exort)
![[image loading]](http://media.playdota.com/hero/118/skill-13.jpg)
( another damage skill which based on the lvl of the elements can knockback and prevent atack of enemy heroes)
coupled with
"Chaos Meteor" (1 Wex and 2 Exort)
![[image loading]](http://media.playdota.com/hero/118/skill-9.jpg)
( high damage spell which left a trail behind it damaging over time) could devastate a whole team.
"Emp" (3 Wex)
![[image loading]](http://media.playdota.com/hero/118/skill-7.jpg)
is another usefull skill. Being on a starcraft forum i guess people know what it does and why they hate it. Well in Dota it does mostly the same thing with an added knockback based on the lvl of the elemets used. These are only 4 of the most used skills on invoker the other 6 having no less of an utility depending on the build you were going and the role you were trying to cover.
Moving on to the item build i have to say, being such a versatile hero Invoker had no cookie cutter build like some of the other champions. You could either go support focusing on buffs and disables or even carry relying on high damage, atkspeed buff and your trusty armor reduction companion ( summoning spell) . I would usually go for the damage type of Invoker.
Item build:
Starter items:
1.![[image loading]](http://media.playdota.com/items/31/thumb.jpg) ![[image loading]](http://media.playdota.com/items/32/thumb.jpg) ![[image loading]](http://media.playdota.com/items/24/thumb.jpg) ![[image loading]](http://media.playdota.com/items/23/thumb.jpg) which later on turn into
2.![[image loading]](http://media.playdota.com/items/97/thumb.jpg) ![[image loading]](http://media.playdota.com/items/96/thumb.jpg) ![[image loading]](http://media.playdota.com/items/66/thumb.jpg) now after you got these, depending on how you're doing you should go for one of the fallowing
3. ![[image loading]](http://media.playdota.com/items/88/thumb.jpg) for the extra health ( think i forgot to mention Invo is a really squishy champ) and slow
![[image loading]](http://media.playdota.com/items/100/thumb.jpg) for the extra attack speed and silence
![[image loading]](http://media.playdota.com/items/71/thumb.jpg) for the dmg and high proc chance based on your attack speed and finally ![[image loading]](http://media.playdota.com/items/769/thumb.jpg) ![[image loading]](http://media.playdota.com/items/770/thumb.jpg) as final items.
Obviously that's a full build, you'll never get to get all those items unless the game drags for a long time or you're getting all the kills. Basically you should easily get to the second step, after that i'd start working on , it's composed of cheap items and it helps you with mana regen aswell. You could go for a ![[image loading]](http://media.playdota.com/items/771/thumb.jpg) for the extra survivability early on aswell. After that start building your ![[image loading]](http://media.playdota.com/items/75/thumb.jpg) and it should roll easily from there on.
Skill build:
+ Show Spoiler +
1. Exort
2. Wex
3. Exort
4. Wex
5. Exort
6. Invoke
7. Wex
8. Exort
9. Quas
10. Quas
11. Invoke
12. Exort
13. Wex
14. Exort
15. Wex
16. Invoke
17. Wex
18. Exort
19. Wex
20. Invoke
21. Quas
22. Quas
23. Quas
24. Quas
25. Quas
Exort ![[image loading]](http://media.playdota.com/hero/118/skill-2.jpg) boosts your damage, intelligence and is part o every high damage dealing combo.
Wex ![[image loading]](http://media.playdota.com/hero/118/skill-1.jpg) Gives you attack speed and increased agility
Quas ![[image loading]](http://media.playdota.com/hero/118/skill-0.jpg) Gives you hp regen and strength
I max Exort first for the extra damage, taking Wex right after for the attack speed and maxing Quas last, taking only 2 points early for the combos and extra regen during lane phase. Invoke is skilled every time it's available. Until lvl 6 you just farm your lane with Exort on for easier last hitting and harrasing after that you start controlling the lane with your skills.
The combos you'll usually use are the ones i preseted earlier. Deafening blast fallowed by chaos meteor will do tons of damage on anyone caught by the blast. Check the other lanes for low health heroes and use Sun Strike to finish them off ( had quite a few laughs with this one, enemies thinking they're safe just to be struck down in the next second %&%&$ fallowing on all chat). Another useful skill for evading ganks or getting away in a dire situation is
"Ghost Walk" (2 Quas and 1 Wex)
![[image loading]](http://media.playdota.com/hero/118/skill-5.JPG) Whenever you fell you're in trouble just pop it on and you're invisible for 100 sec. The downside to this is you'll be slowed depending on the lvl of the elements but your enemies will be aswell.
There's so much more to write about this hero and i'm not that of an experienced person either. As i stated earlier the possibilities with this champ seem endless thus making him a very fun and hard to master hero. When you'll first play him you'll feel overwhelmed with all the skills that you need to memorize, there's a helpful tool for the beginners, just write "-invokelist" in chat and all the skill combos will appear on your screen.
Well guess that's it for now, sorry if i offended anyone with my reasoning and "guide", i'm open to suggestions. Heh guess this is my first post on TeamLiquid too ( hooray), long time lurker though. Good luck and don't forget the game's about having fun.
|
My favourite memory in DOTA, which also brings me to my favourite hero, Invoker, has to be when I literally stacked only Boots and Mana Masks and a Blink Dagger (just trolling around, ofcourse), and I remember my team dying to the entire enemy team, but leaving them quite low, and then the enemy team stacked, and I blinked in and dropped my meteor.
Massacre ensued with the cindering flesh of my foes infront of me.
Ofcourse, I should mention, that's an incredibly silly build but it allowed to to continuosly spam my spells which is what Invoker is about and it's just fun to mess around a few times!
|
This was an amazing post, though I generally don't like melee or carries this was a great read. I spent so much time though comparing the images to find the HoN equivalents of everything to know what the hell you were talking about.  Epic writeup, thank you!
Disclaimer: This is from playing HoN, but I will explain everything using Dota equivalents as best I can. If somethings seems off it may be because of the differences between abilities and items, but I will try outlining it with an asterisk. Also this is not really viable or possible outside the often uncoordinated pub games.
I'm not really an active player, but what I have had most success and fun with is something that in HoN is really a non serious build. I love building me a Vol'Jin the Witch Doctor with a rank 5 Dagon*, and be an awesome mid to late game ganker. Now into more specifics on how I do this in the various stages of the game.
*In HoN it is called a Codex and is built differently using 2x Blades of Attack and a Staff of Wizardry.
Early game:
+ Show Spoiler +Items:+ Show Spoiler +I start off by buying two wards*, two Clarity Potions, a Tango and a Circlet of Nobility.
After that I either go for Striders** or Phase Boots.
Phase boots are nice because early Blades of Attack makes harassing heroes in my lane so much more effective. I can either opt for them or in HoN split them up to get an earlier Dagon.
*Wards only cost 50g in HoN.
**Striders is a new item in HoN which increases your movement speed outside of combat dramtically, makes roaming so much better. First thing I go for is the Paralyzing Cask, I find it amazing to either get the bloodlust or prevent it. Works wonders stopping two heroes chasing your teammate. I only put one point into it until quite later because of the way it isnt necessary for the many bounces early. I use it quite extensively though to help with ganks during the early game.
After that I focus mainly on skilling up Voodoo Restoration. I do this because now is the time where I don't do much but farm, and help keep my team(lane?)mate safe, Voodoo Restoration keeps us both at high health rather easy and keeps the costs of buying Tango or Healing Salve down for both of us.
When I can't upgrade Voodoo Restoration I upgrade Maledict to prepare for later when I have my Dagon. It won't really be used much until then because in HoN only magic damage triggers it, and I don't do much of that yet. At the beginning I just do whatever I can to stop the bloodlust from happening to us in my lane. If I am teamed up with a hero with some good offensive abilities it may be very likely we will get the pick of one of the opposing heroes because of Paralyzing Cask. If the hero joining me is a carry I just focus on denies and major harass by poking at their heroes with my auto attack. If they don't stay back or are melee I will be extremely annoying. Otherwise I will focus more on last hitting. When I get Death Ward and hopefully have Boots of Speed I will go try to set up some ganks, but mostly focusing on the lane and not getting killed.
+ Show Spoiler +Items:+ Show Spoiler +I will go first for the Phase Boots to help my chasing or running away, but also because of the extra attack damage. Then I will work towards the Dagon, and will hopefully get it before it enters the lategame, this often depends upon how many wards you have to purchase (because of counterwarding, not often seen in pub games), and how many times you have been ganked and your farm of course. In special situations I may split up my Phase Boots to get an earlier Dagon if there is potential for a teamfight soon, or there are a lot of gankable heroes around. I now focus mostly on the Maledict and the Paralyzing Cask, because I will soon enter the gank a lot phase of this build, which is often late mid to early late game. Ofcourse I always upgrade Death Ward when I can, but now Voodoo Restoration wont be that useful unless we are pushing a lot. Until Dagon is finished I mainly stay in lane farming unless needed elsewhere. Being really careful because now is the time to get a lot of gold and you don't want to be dying then.
When I get Dagon I will flip over into the gank every vunerable hero I can find phase. Running around with Phase Boots and jumping on heroes using first the Maledict, then Paralyzing Cask and Dagon will leave most supports very nearly dead. Then you either finish them off with auto attacks or your ultimate. In this phase so long as you get them alone you will be a burst monster they wish they never met. The Dagon / Maledict synergy is amazing* because of the immense damage Dagon gives the Maledict DoT.
Deathward is also freakin good now if you have a teammate with stun or similar near. Most heroes drop like flies, they often underestimate you and try to kill you, but the damage it brings is insane you will most often get them down if you jump them or with support if they jump you. Note that how succesful you are during this phase of the game will dictate how useful you will become later greatly. If you manage to gank loads of them you will be set up to keep doing it well into the lategame by upgrading you Dagon, and then be able to get items which will greatly increase your presence in teamfights later.
*Maledict equivalent in HoN is only affected by magic damage, but the damage the DoT does from magic damage dealt is greatly increased. It nearly doubles the damage your Dagon would have done.
+ Show Spoiler +Items:+ Show Spoiler +You work all you can to get that Rank 5 Dagon, because it scales so well with Maledict*. Also note that many games end way before you actually reach that rank 5.
After you've got it it depends on what you want need. Are there enemy ranged heroes with an easy magic stun waiting to stop your ultimate? Then getting the Black King Bar is a great choice. Otherwise Aganim's Scepter is a really good too. If you get Black King Bar and amazingly the game is still going on, definately go for Aganim's Scepter.
*See the last asterisk in the mid game section. When both Maledict and Paralyzing Cask is maxed out get Voodoo Restoration. Now you will have decent enough mana regeneration to actually use this spell as well as your others often. It may very well be the thing that keeps you or your teammates alive! Get the attributes last. Your playstyle now really depends on how they game is unfolding, and how well the previous phases of the game have gone. If you dominated through the mid game you may still run and gank like crazy, though watch out for their carries. Now they will most likely tear you a new one just by looking funnily your way. Most likely though you will have to huddle with you team and support them. Focusing on teamfights especially.
How I like to do it is getting the Paralyzing Cask in to bounce like crazy among them, while trying to nuke one support through the Dagon / Maledict combo. Afterwards getting off a good Death Ward, from where it is in range of as many of them as possible, but where you are not too vunerable to be focused and crowd controlled. Seeing how the Death Ward does its damage through anything it may very well be the thing that allows your team to take out their carry!
Note: The writing style of this sort of shifted from explaining how I play something, to a sort of a guide. Also I for some reason keeps shifting between talking about me to you. That was unintended. I am in no way, shape or form able to write a guide, and have no skill what so ever to speak of. So what I'm saying is
+ Show Spoiler +please don't flame me 
Edit: This was supposed to be a short blurb, but damnit it was fun attempting to write somthing like this!
|
I love beastmaster, he was always my best hero, i typically go axes and pig/eagle 2ndary going on a ganking spree once i get level 6. I was always able to control multiple units easily so having an extra pig with slow, and bird to scout was always advantageous for me. My favorite item combo to use with him was going for a fast necromicon lvl 3. The timing of it almost always caused heavy punishment for cloak carries right as they were about to finish large components of their final item builds, and also helped against people who largely would get their lothar's around this time. That combined with the insane damage of the lvl 3 minions, the slow of the pig, and the ability to micro the 5 units all together made for a truly fearsome half orc half ogre =] The high int also meant i could be more friviolous using my axes to poke/farm lanes which was always good if you knew how to abuse the axe range, and tree cutting.
Woo dota 2!
|
Nice guide! Especially cool since I tend to fail with Anti. lol (Hard carry is not typically my style)
Now, for me as a HoN player, Sand Wraith (or Spectre) is my favorite hero. A simple but effective hero, though admittingly boring at times due to the sheer amount of farm you require (Radiance is still a pain to farm regardless of game). I'll typically alternate between Spectral Dagger and Dispersion starting with Dagger and maxing it after I get level 1 Haunt. From there, max Dispersion for survivability and then I'll skill Desolate (again, a pause to get Haunt) to finish up before Stats. I'll start with 3 Ironwood Branches, 2 Tangoes, and a Hatchet and attempt to work my way to Vanguard (or at least Ring of Health) then Power Threads and spend the majority of the midgame rushing for that Radiance. From there, I'll work towards a Heart and Diffusal. My end late game tends to look like this: Treads, Heart, Radi, Diffusal, Butterfly, and Manta.
Every game I play with Spectre turns out to be a self troll fest since I play a rather passive style till I have my Radiance and I tend to fail to KS any hero kills, leaving me with a score of like 5/5/26. My friends think I'm play support when I go Spectre, that's how many assists in general I'll reap with this hero. Still, it's always nice for me to play.
|
Great Guide =), personally I have never gotten manta-style on Anti-mage but it is something I should start doing >_<
I used to play quite a bit of competitive DoTa in NA with CheckSix Gaming. While I have retired since, many of my old teammates have branched out into LoL, HoN and DoTa 2 (Such as EGYoda, EGDemon and EGSilent-Merc)
My favorite hero of all times is Magnataur.
I used to use 2 builds for him. One specifically for Leagues Games and Fun Games and the other specifically for Tournaments and Matches.
Starting Items (Always) - Gauntlets of Strength, Tangoes, Potion, Clarity Potion, Circlet
For "Fun" Build:
Bottle
Power Treads
Blink Dagger
Battlefury
Mask of Madness
Burize
(Sell Bottle for Assault Cuirass)
(Sell Power Treads for Boots of Teleportation)
This is strictly a pub stomp build. Magnataur was not built to be the best carry in the game (he has no scaling damage). But against lesser players and great early game farm/levels he is quite viable to be the funnest carry ever. Aggressively blinking into groups of 3-5 enemy heroes (being careful to get all stun/silence heroes) and using "Reverse Polarity" and turning on your "Mask of Madness" crushing heroes and creeps with 100% cleave (with a Battle Fury) could get you rampage if you were lucky. Wave was a great skill for early game harass and farm (in use with a Bottle). His key problem is that his ultimate has a very very long cooldown and if he does not initiate properly he can be almost useless, and die very easily.
For "Serious" Build:
His only real purpose in professional games (and sadly he was not very popular in professional DoTa) was his AoE stun. If he could get 3-5 heroes with a well timed and placed blink, he could turn the tide of any team battle. Unfortunately he was not a great laner and only a defensive solo at best (with even skill levels)
Bottle
Power Treads
Blink Dagger
Assault Cuirass
Heart of Tarrasque
Shivas
One very funny and not so funny game I played with Magnataur was versus the old Scythe (known as Zenith) and was unfortunately elected to solo against Yamateh. Yes THE Yamateh. And it was at 5 in the morning (For MyM PRide #7 or 8?)
He played PoTm at mid and it was the hardest and most frustrating lane ever. I ended up begging for a gank. He went "Beyond Godlike" that game but because we had very good team battle AoE heroes ( I don't recall the specifics) we were able to keep up somewhat, although always pressured. We were both farming up throughout the game and near the 50 minute mark we knew one battle would decide the game. We roamed as five into their forest and saw the key moment as all five of their heroes were hugging their tower in a very very close proximity and they had no vision of us. I licked my chops in anticipation and got into range of blink. My captain yelled "GOGOGOGO" into ventrillo and I clicked the ground shift+Blink Dagger+Reverse Polarity...and...and...wtfMATE?I had ulted the ground without blinking. I had ulted nothing. My teammates were not aware. An arrow hit my face. One by one we were all hunted down, without My (Magnataur's) ultimate we had no chance. A quick gg and we lost the series 1-2. Later after the adrenaline I quickly realized that their "Zeus" used his ultimate in a very skillful and probably lucky timing and disabled my blink. We were crushed.
I still love you Magnataur. There is no better feeling than Reverse Polarity'ing five heroes and getting a Rampage. None.
Farewell
|
great post, outclasses most of the dota writers, well done FW
|
Wow amazing guide, it really takes me back to when I first started playing and was addicted to guides.
I have gone through many phases of favorite heroes, I would say (despite my username) my all-time favorite hero is Mirana, Priestess of the Moon due to my fanatic passion for Vigoss and his Mirana. I spent many hours studying and emulating Vigoss, trying to perfect my PotM. Sorry Mangix, I still <3 u too.
For skills I go:
Leap, Elune's Arrow, Elune's Arrow, Moonfall, Elune's Arrow, Moonfall, Elune's Arrow, Moonfall, Moonfall, Moonlight Shadow, Moonlight Shadow, Leap, Leap, Leap, Stats, Moonlight Shadow, Stats, stats...etc.
I start off with a bottle and usually go mid. I can gank easily at lvl 6 with any rune. Using the combo: Elunes Arrow > Leap > Moonfall > attack, I can usually net an easy kill. The hardest part is landing the arrow. Next, I get 2 wraith bands and boots. Eventually I acquire boots of travel, and then attempt to get a butterfly. Boots of travel is extremely important for me because I need to be ganking and mobile. If they are spellcaster heavy, it may be safe to opt for a hood of defiance sooner or later. Mirana is such a versatile hero, with moonfall and elune's arrow, she has a ton of early gave burst damage not to mention range. She can also carry late game with decent dps. Her ult and leap allow her to escape from almost any sticky situations.
The most memorable moment with Mirana for me was when I was fighting a bounty hunter in the forest and we were trading blows quite evenly. At about 300 health each he shuriken tosses me and I am able to dodge it by timing my leap with the shuriken (exploiting the temporary invulnerability. He goes invisible and I arrow in a predicted escape route and net the kill. I love sniping with my arrow!
Thanks.
|
|
|
|
|
|
EPT
