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United States47024 Posts
The thing is, Vlad's isn't an item choice consistent with your game plan. Vlad's isn't an early teamfight item. The % damage aura isn't better than raw damage until you have a lot of inherent damage. Vlad's Lifesteal isn't better than raw HP/HP regen until you have a lot of inherent damage. It just doesn't make sense as a first item compared to, say, Drums, which gives more of everything at the time you'd buy it.
Compare Vlad's to Urn+Aquila for example. Urn+Aquila costs less than Vlad's, gives more damage until your base damage is high (15% damage aura requires 100 base damage to be worth more than Aquila's +15 damage--which you don't pass until level 17 with your build). It gives the same Basi aura (less armor, but it provides an additional 2 points of self-armor from the item itself and the Agi gain, so for you it's the same), additional regen on Urn, flat 171 HP from Strength, and some attack speed from the Agility. The Urn active is more useful than the Vlad's lifesteal early (especially on a hero like PA that can easily disengage, apply an urn charge, and come back into the fight with 400 more HP).
As a direct comparison, I can't understand the logic of seeing Vlad's as an early teamfight item when actual early teamfight items outperform it in every way.
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Mataza, this is the Simple Q&A Thread. Keep it concise, keep the rest to General Discussion. Otherwise....let's respect the veterans that answer in this thread.
I echo what Yango above has said. If you're insistent on playing PA as a roamer/ganker (instead of another more suitable hero) then building for the early-mid game with Drums, Aquila, Urn, Medallion, etc will serve you better than Vlads.
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On March 14 2013 10:57 Slardar wrote:
Mataza, this is the Simple Q&A Thread. Keep it concise, keep the rest to General Discussion. Otherwise....let's respect the veterans that answer in this thread.
I echo what Yango above has said. If you're insistent on playing PA as a roamer/ganker (instead of another more suitable hero) then building for the early-mid game with Drums, Aquila, Urn, Medallion, etc will serve you better than Vlads.
Actually I understand what Mataza says and agree with it more than Yango.
I play pretty much the same style as Mataza, i like early game skirmishes, but i do not roam for it. I find the skirmishes in my lane(people will hunt PA) or TP to help fights. Slardar i would like to say,yes respect veterans, but their status aren't everything.This is a forum afterall, we're here to dicuss & have debates on things in a respectful manner 
Drums/Aquila/Urn/Medallion...i only agree with drums. The other 3 gives lousy stats & mana regen, thats it.Drums huge stats boost & good aura makes it worthwhile always, especially on a low hp hero like PA.
I usually start off with Ring of Basi for PA too because farming with dagger is effective, and solves all your mana issues...from Ring of Basi, you can either go Ring of Aquila or Vlad.
I will choose Vlad simply because it gives Lifesteal which provides flexibility for the PA to go Jungle...i would like to point out lifesteal is invaluable when PA crits(large boost to health). It really matters. I've been in many situation where that lifesteal won me a close fight. If your looking for mana regen, Vlad is superior than Aquila/Urn/Medallion. I value Lifesteal over Aquila +3all stats, or Urn's charge & Medallion armor reduction(because it also reduces PA's armor, i dont want to be fragile)
Thing is, most of PA damage comes from the insane crit & chasing power. Because of PA having that crit, low damage but stats/hp boosting items are better on PA. As a slight comparison, i've done the straight Skadi PA build before, you will be surprised at how much dmg PA does even though it does not have a damage item(skadi isn't considered a damage item,more of a stat item to me)
Slardar, Mataza did not claim to play PA as a roamer/ganker. He only says do not underestimate PA's early game fighting power. He recommends that we do not play it as a AFK farmer like AM, but make more use of the PA power, do not avoid teamfights & small skirmishes. Feel free to participate in them,thus he builds PA to be a more early-mid game carry rather than a hard late-game carry....which i agree. It just so happens she's also one of the best lategame carry later on, that most people do not see PA in a mid-game skirmisher role.
EDIT: Compare Vlad's to Urn+Aquila for example. Urn+Aquila costs less than Vlad's, gives more damage until your base damage is high (15% damage aura requires 100 base damage to be worth more than Aquila's +15 damage--which you don't pass until level 17 with your build). It gives the same Basi aura (less armor, but it provides an additional 2 points of self-armor from the item itself and the Agi gain, so for you it's the same), additional regen on Urn, flat 171 HP from Strength, and some attack speed from the Agility. The Urn active is more useful than the Vlad's lifesteal early (especially on a hero like PA that can easily disengage, apply an urn charge, and come back into the fight with 400 more HP).
Ring of Aquila +15dmg is an unfair comparison. Vlad is a lifesteal+dmg aura which also helps your team....+15 RoA dmg only applies to yourself. If there's even 1 ally hero next to you, Vlad's aura should give more damage than the +15 RoA dmg already.
As for Urn, I do not think it's easy to disengage in a fight,heal and come back. That takes a lot of time, most fights dont last that long, yet another unfair comparison i feel. In that drawn out fight,of course Urn is better. But in a fight where everyone goes in and the fights end in a few seconds(like most fights,seriously how many drawn out battles do you see, really) and it become a chasing battle...vlad's lifesteal is more useful than a Urn charge.
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Vlad shines as early as in early-mid and it is a very nice item for the team during mid/late game but if you made it as a first item, is either you had the advantage so it doesn't matter what you made first anyway (and you can get your next item with ease) or you are pretty much gamble on winning alot of teamfights during early to mid game because you would have very limited plans to fall back on (ie hard to get the economy running to get the big items).
There is a reason why only the heroes like ursa/lycan are commonly rushing vlad first because vlad gives them significant farming/killing power and they have decent hp pool compared to PA, some lycans nowadays dont even get vlad first and in ursa case it has more to do with his orb.
Urn is definitely more cost efficient and useful than vlad in early team fights (400hp healing per charge!) and it gives you some nice stats for a 1 slot item. In the end of day it is more about personal choice and it depends on your playstyle i guess.
and this is a nice video where nada discussed how to make PA to join team fights early due to the needs of current map/meta (but it has no english sub-_-):
+ Show Spoiler +
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I often see carries going maelstorm - crystalys - daedalus - mjolnir, or just going maelstorm for heroes with critical strike from skills. My question is what's the idea behind this build? The maelstorm seems like such a waste if I'm going to get crits because the proc doesn't scale with them at all. Is the attack speed and possible upgrade to mjolnir the reason? In similar situations I usually get desolator when I don't really need lifesteal, bad decision making?
Thanks.
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Maelstrom/Mjolnir on PA over Battle Fury makes no sense.
That said - your primary concern with PA is reaching level 16 and getting BKB before the game is decided. Ive had success going Treads/wand/hotd into BKB but if you dont utilize the dominate to grab creeps for fighting or stacking ancients then hotd doesnt do much for you. Getting Battle Fury after BKB is still viable as it a) prevents you from falling too far behind in items compared to their carry and b) helps against illusion/manta based carries and works well if you any hero that can keep enemies gathered. HotD builds into satanic which is ridiculously good as long as the opponents dont have multiple BKB-piercing disables.
If you want to play a PA with early presence you need level 4 blinkstrike asap, Id rather keep dagger at level 2 or 3 because you need the mobility of 5 sec CD.
PA is actually a very viable mid hero at medium and lower levels with the pers -> battle fury build thanks to the free farm dagger spam can provide her.
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What would be the best way to get started on invoker? Just played him in all random, I took the first guide I could find, told me to get 2 quas then max wex and then max exort. Is that okay?
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Lalalaland34510 Posts
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+ Show Spoiler +On March 14 2013 12:33 Mithhaike wrote:Show nested quote +On March 14 2013 10:57 Slardar wrote:
Mataza, this is the Simple Q&A Thread. Keep it concise, keep the rest to General Discussion. Otherwise....let's respect the veterans that answer in this thread.
I echo what Yango above has said. If you're insistent on playing PA as a roamer/ganker (instead of another more suitable hero) then building for the early-mid game with Drums, Aquila, Urn, Medallion, etc will serve you better than Vlads. Actually I understand what Mataza says and agree with it more than Yango. I play pretty much the same style as Mataza, i like early game skirmishes, but i do not roam for it. I find the skirmishes in my lane(people will hunt PA) or TP to help fights. Slardar i would like to say,yes respect veterans, but their status aren't everything.This is a forum afterall, we're here to dicuss & have debates on things in a respectful manner Drums/Aquila/Urn/Medallion...i only agree with drums. The other 3 gives lousy stats & mana regen, thats it.Drums huge stats boost & good aura makes it worthwhile always, especially on a low hp hero like PA. I usually start off with Ring of Basi for PA too because farming with dagger is effective, and solves all your mana issues...from Ring of Basi, you can either go Ring of Aquila or Vlad. I will choose Vlad simply because it gives Lifesteal which provides flexibility for the PA to go Jungle...i would like to point out lifesteal is invaluable when PA crits(large boost to health). It really matters. I've been in many situation where that lifesteal won me a close fight. If your looking for mana regen, Vlad is superior than Aquila/Urn/Medallion. I value Lifesteal over Aquila +3all stats, or Urn's charge & Medallion armor reduction(because it also reduces PA's armor, i dont want to be fragile) Thing is, most of PA damage comes from the insane crit & chasing power. Because of PA having that crit, low damage but stats/hp boosting items are better on PA. As a slight comparison, i've done the straight Skadi PA build before, you will be surprised at how much dmg PA does even though it does not have a damage item(skadi isn't considered a damage item,more of a stat item to me) Slardar, Mataza did not claim to play PA as a roamer/ganker. He only says do not underestimate PA's early game fighting power. He recommends that we do not play it as a AFK farmer like AM, but make more use of the PA power, do not avoid teamfights & small skirmishes. Feel free to participate in them,thus he builds PA to be a more early-mid game carry rather than a hard late-game carry....which i agree. It just so happens she's also one of the best lategame carry later on, that most people do not see PA in a mid-game skirmisher role. EDIT: Show nested quote +Compare Vlad's to Urn+Aquila for example. Urn+Aquila costs less than Vlad's, gives more damage until your base damage is high (15% damage aura requires 100 base damage to be worth more than Aquila's +15 damage--which you don't pass until level 17 with your build). It gives the same Basi aura (less armor, but it provides an additional 2 points of self-armor from the item itself and the Agi gain, so for you it's the same), additional regen on Urn, flat 171 HP from Strength, and some attack speed from the Agility. The Urn active is more useful than the Vlad's lifesteal early (especially on a hero like PA that can easily disengage, apply an urn charge, and come back into the fight with 400 more HP). Ring of Aquila +15dmg is an unfair comparison. Vlad is a lifesteal+dmg aura which also helps your team....+15 RoA dmg only applies to yourself. If there's even 1 ally hero next to you, Vlad's aura should give more damage than the +15 RoA dmg already. As for Urn, I do not think it's easy to disengage in a fight,heal and come back. That takes a lot of time, most fights dont last that long, yet another unfair comparison i feel. In that drawn out fight,of course Urn is better. But in a fight where everyone goes in and the fights end in a few seconds(like most fights,seriously how many drawn out battles do you see, really) and it become a chasing battle...vlad's lifesteal is more useful than a Urn charge.
I get what you're saying in taking advantage of a carries early-mid fighting prowess. Other heroes have similar builds formed around that and have developed in the meta. Notably mid-game Weaver (Drums+Urn/Medallion and Treads) Luna is in a similar boat. (Drums, Aquila, Tranq, BKB). Except those latter heroes strength outperforms PA in any early-mid game situation.
Trust me when I say, Vlads first is awful. I've been playing this game since I was born. It gives you 0 survivability, (Miniscule armor and regen) while you're basically rolling the dice on critting to sustain yourself with that life-leech. PA early-mid has pitiful attack speed discounting Blink, and normally that isn't maxed anyway. 14 Second cooldown on level 1, those vegas odds of you sustaining yourself aren't high, not to mention any haphazard blink in a fight and PA is dead (regardless of items at this stage).
Now, if you prioritized maxing Blink and only 1-2 in Dagger, the probability of you sustaining with constant blinks goes up a notch. Urn is probably the item that synergies the best with PA imo. How does PA escape without BKB? You run, you deek, you blink to safety. Then you pop urn immediately, heal up 200-300 before anyone catches you and potential other teammates arrive. Then you turn around on them and unleash hell.
All the arguments that have been made for pro-Vlads, can easily be made for Pro-Drums and Pro-Urn while the latter two make more sense. Now, if you got Vlads after Drums or Urn it would go with the play-style and imo be more effective.
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putting the vlads argument aside
why is no one talking about deso on pa
those of you who are arguing that battlefury pa is the wrong way to play him, how can you not include deso?
to an extent i do agree that bfury isnt optimal (good, but not always the best), and i do recall that back in the old days deso/vlads was the item set for pa.
although his blink strike has changed since then, if you want a single target mid game carry deso pa is legit. it was the reason why people even went for vlads on him anyway, since the orb doesnt stack with hotd
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It's 1 armor every 7 agility right? So aquila should be slightly less than 4 armor to self total, with a 2 armor aura.
I see early vlads (not PA but just in general) mostly for the armor, maybe not so much teamfight as pushing/diving,
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I think the biggest advantage on Vlads on PA is that it allows you to farm jungle and ancients when lanes are pushed or inbetween ganks/teamfights. Other than that it is a bit lackluster in early fights, though the armor aura is nice. I'd go for Aquila, which you can disassemble later on in the game and upgrade the RoB to Vlad. HP and damage are of more importance early-mid. If you really want lifesteal, there's also HotD, which I feel is a better choice than an early Vlad most of the time.
Also, Basher is really good.
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The argument is about vlads on PA now?
The reason to get Vlads is to save an inventory slot. Basi solves mana issues. Lifeleech lets you regenerate hp by attacking and allows you to jungle indefinitely. Vlads compresses these 2 things into 1 slot.
Of course Urn/Aquila is better is better for damage. But likewise wraith/wraith/wraith/magic stick will far outdamage urn/aquila while being cheaper.
Now around 10 minutes later you will maybe have boots/magic wand/tp/hotd/aquila/urn and be forced to replace items or go straight satanic.
I will have something like boots/magic wand/tp/vlads/OoV/drums.
Cost difference here is 340 gold.
Now we both want to get another 2 items, like a demon edge+javelin for mkb, or hammer+orge club for bkb, or 2 ultimate orbs for skadi.
Your build has to stow away the magic wand and either the aquila or the urn.
My build can just stow away the magic wand and the OoV for the time being.
As for why I don't like deso on PA is the bumpy build-up of 2 hammers for 1600 each and it does nothing for your hp. You also have to finish vlads asap to keep lifeleech when building deso, while with other items you have some leeway.
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Personally i think we each have our ways of building PA. There's no clear cut way of playing a PA So i am bowing out of this conversation before we become Shikyo, with one last post summarising my ideas.
I am a believer of Lifesteal on PA, and that we should actively join fights especially early game. Drums are awesome on PA, Aquila not.
PA crit allows for non-dmg items to be built(BKB/Skadi).
I fully understand the calls for RoA/Urn, that has its role. But i still believe Vlad does it's job well and the aura provides a lot more to the team than a RoA/Urn does, while basically doing the same job.
Actually I would agree vlad first is usually a bad idea, but on PA it's actually okay, if you go BKB(my build) straight after vlad. The vlad helps in farming NCs & the mana regen from Vlad is all you need. After BKB your options just open up regarding what do you want to do.
As for attack speed of PA, notice Mataza build goes Maelstrom? Attack speed there man. Treads(str) are also the better boots for PA. With Maelstrom & Treads, PA attacks fast enough for all intent & purposes.
Alright im stopping with all PA discussion from my end :D It's just a hero that causes controversy with whatever you build to be honest, the only thing everyone agrees on is to get BKB.
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Honestly deso isnt that hard to build. Im pretty sure it as the best cost to dmg ratio of all items.
Its much easier than building a bfury on am imo, you only lack hp regen but you can make up for it with a temporary tranq boots and dagger. Obviously the return on building an early bfury is higher vs a deso, but it thats only if you proceed to farm with it. If you start hunting heroes youll keep a steady rate of income while keeping theirs down. Just a different playstyle
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Alright, dumb general question, but.... how and where do you farm in the midgame?
I feel like there's an awkward window around 15:00-25:00 where most of the T1s are down and the lanes don't feel safe unless they're pushed, and most pubs tend to kind of just awkwardly mill around mid for five minutes, waiting for a teamfight.
If I join them I tend to fall horribly behind in levels and farm, but if I farm lanes I push them and risk being ganked, and if I jungle I'm usually competing with void or whoever the hard hard carry is.
Obviously there must be some way to do it, but I'm too noob to work it out.
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On March 15 2013 15:56 Belisarius wrote:
Alright, dumb general question, but.... how and where do you farm in the midgame?
I feel like there's an awkward window around 15:00-25:00 where most of the T1s are down and the lanes don't feel safe unless they're pushed, and most pubs tend to kind of just awkwardly mill around mid for five minutes, waiting for a teamfight.
If I join them I tend to fall horribly behind in levels and farm, but if I farm lanes I push them and risk being ganked, and if I jungle I'm usually competing with void or whoever the hard hard carry is.
Obviously there must be some way to do it, but I'm too noob to work it out.
well what role are you playing?
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Let's say something like a QW invoker, where I want to be in the teamfights without standing around waiting for them to happen.
Scenario 2 would be something like a kunkka that started mid and has a void on the same team, so isn't the #1 priority for farm.
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with puck you can farm pretty much anywhere, you have so many escapes. Its often worth it to be in the offlane or top lane or somewhere to farm, and just always have a TP scroll to get to fights
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Edited to invoker, sorry, puck has plenty of escapes so he can just do whatever, you're right. What about some other dude similar to puck that isn't immortal?
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EPT
