Sheep Tag Community

*Breathes deeply* Long post incoming

1. I go midas on invoker when... I get firstblood, my other lanes are secure and strong enough that I don't have to leave my farm for a while (basically if lanes have stuns and slows then you don't need to leave mid cus of sunstrike). Midas is sick on invoker because that attack speed makes you a viable physical hardcarry, gives you extra levels (which are oh-so important), and pays itself off in 10 uses or about 15 minutes, if you don't include selling it for half-price. I don't go midas when my allies are losing like hell or I feel that I'll need to leave my lane to gank early on. If I don't go midas I generally go force, drums, or cyclone. Obviously this is assuming you are solo middle.

2. There's a lot of reasons why Visage is such a popular support (and typically is put in a trilane and against trilanes):
a. He is powerful at any point in the game unlike a lot of heroes that require farm, though he falls off a bit in the lategame.
b. He's very survivable using his first ability for near max movespeed, and his 3rd ability giving him physical and magical dmg reduction.
c. He has the highest dmg semi-reliable nuke at level 1 (215 dmg with max charges). I say it's semi-reliable because you can't initiate with it as you need allies and enemies to take damage first. Obviously sunstrike or maybe mystic snake can do more dmg at level one, but visage's nuke is pretty easy to get off.
d. He is useful even if he dies due to his familiars being able to survive even after he dies. Not only this but they're free vision, have stuns, and deal quite nice burst physical dmg (not many supports have burst physical).

When I was a nub I'd play visage as a carry *Facepalm*. It's so easy for lesser experienced players to play him as a carry because of the attack speed bonus from his first ability, and he can easily rack up a ton of kills early on with his huge burst dmg, but he's most effective as a support, as his abilities don't require items to work well.

3. SF is a decent solo mid, but he requires so much babysitting and careful maneuvering by allies that it's often very risky and most teams have stopped picking up SF.
Why?
a. He's paper. If someone picks SF they have a huge target on their forehead because he has no escape, insanely low hp, and requires a standard amount of farm in order to be effective (he needs bkb, pretty much).
b. If you give firstblood it can feel like the game is already over. SF loses so much from dying early on, because he NEEDS those souls in order snowball and be effective in the midgame, which is his time to shine. Unlike say, nature's prophet (furion) or a few other heroes who can die early on and still have ways to catch up.

He can be played as safelane carry or middle. You will never see him as a offlane in a pro game. He's most popular as a solo mid, though. If he manages to tough it out those early levels and get souls then he can deny EVERYTHING to the other person, which is why he's so strong mid (he's like OD in the sense that he doesn't really need to kill early on (unlike nightstalker who heavily relies on early kills), but rather focus all out on creepscore. Not only that but he has one of the highest burst damage outputs in the game at level 7, if you don't include ultimates, making levels and creepscore on him insanely important. Sf is a risky mid because he can lose easily if the other team has rune control, heavy burst, or high amounts of base dmg at the start. Sf doesn't do well against heroes like zeus, pudge, ta, nightstalker, qop etc. In fact he usually gets **** by those heroes. He is not a safe pick in drafting because of how easily he is countered. If sf is being picked up it's usually later in the draft or after the other team has established their mid hero. However, big risk big gain... an SF who dominates mid can snowball out of control really easily with his insane burst/flash farming capabilities, and very high physical damage with souls and -armor aura.

4. Broodmother can be dealt with a number of ways. Chainstun does the trick... but it's usually nice to have someone that can kill trees or jump onto them otherwise she'll troll you all game. A few heroes come to mind: Bounty hunter: he does lots of burst early on, and track is amazing against her. Slardar- aoe stun, mass movespeed allowing him to get it off, and of course his ultimate gives vision of her. Beastmaster: Axes kill trees, can use bird to see in trees, nasty long stun with ult allows for easy chaining against her (also she is a very common bkb holder, so bm is rly nice). Naga siren- net is so good against her since if you get it off before she goes invis she is revealed and can't escape to the trees, and her rip tide is great for brood's pushing abilities. Axe- Pretty self-explanatory blink on mass summons and brood = tons of spins and a quick death. But, really... killing brood is just about coordinating.. there is no big secret to beating new brood. Try ganking her early when she's vulnerable, don't give her free towers, and most importantly, get sentries and dust against her. Don't be cheap, lol. Making sure she loses her lane can pretty much devastate her. She only really becomes a problem when she's taking free towers, winning the lane, or there is no aoe to stop her spider push.

5. I don't play earth spirit to be honest so I wouldn't even know where to start with him. Mana boots, meka is the most common build I see on earth spirit as far as his skill build I have no idea. Ember spirit can be played a lot of different ways, but he usually either goes mid ganker or hard carry. Also depending what role he is filling it drastically effects his skill build. This isn't the end-all-be-all build but here's what I generally go for hard carry sidelane:

If I'm against heavy magic (kotl, lina etc):
lvl 1- chain (disable for firstblood potential)- you're going to want to keep this at lvl 1 since your dps doesn't come from disables, but your other abilities. One level in this is vital, though.
lvl 2- flameguard (blocks magic and deals 240 dmg over time... lots of dmg for 1 lvl ability, also helps survivability a tidbit)
lvl 3- flameguard (quadruples the magic block (200), and increases the dmg over time... leveling up this ability allows for you to farm jungle really fast and you can kill stacked camps at an early level if you're being harassed out of the lane)
lvl 4- fist (nice aoe dmg ability, also you can use this to jump and chain them in place if you time properly (it's not hard to do) and it's a tactic you can't overlook, especially since getting in melee range can be hard sometimes)
lvl 5- flameguard (more magic block, more dmg over time allowing you to focus on just chasing instead of timing hits on them) - that's the last level I get in flameguard for a while because it doesn't scale well at the last level.
lvl 6- ulti, duh
lvl 7- fist
lvl 8- fist
lvl 9- fist: It scales really well, but I value the survivability and dmg over time over fist typically because fist doesn't help you farm much, and it doesn't scale well early on. You could level up fist first if you were against a trilane and that would deal a ton of dps, but again you're either getting survivability or a slight increase in damage since the cooldown on this ability only scales really well from 3->4.
lvl 10-chain (grab this at lvl 12 and 13 for 3 second disable and great scaling of cooldown)
lvl 11- ulti, duh
lvl 12-13- chain
lvl 14- flameguard (better than stats...)

items: Starting items vary... if you think you're against more than one ranged then it's necessary to get a stout shield (build into pms), salve, tango, clarity, branch (or another clarity... doesn't rly make much difference). Otherwise swap out the stout for a quelling if you don't think you'll be harassed very much. (your base dmg is like 47 I think at the start... it's not good so getting quelling can be a great option) into phase/mana boots or midas* (if you get fb or are having really sick farm then midas is a great choice since it basically prevents you from falling behind in exp and gold). I build bfury on this hero almost every game now, though it's completely reasonable to go maelstrom a lot of the time as well, but it doesn't scale as well as bfury does later on. I build ember like a glass cannon everygame, unless I'm supporting. Bfury, crit, mkb.

As a second support I might opt to level up my chain, go mana boots into drums, maybe even meka. He's not really good as a ward **** because he CAN scale into the midgame and lategame pretty well, and he requires at least a decent amount of farm to be of much use.

Honestly there are so many different ways to build this hero, and a lot of it depends on who you're laning against and what heroes are on the other team. As a solo mid I might opt for leveling up fist so I can spam and have nice lane control or fist is also good against a trilane, but if I'm against a melee hero I might go for flameguard even if they don't have lots of nuke just to push the lane, and keep them off the wave. Getting bottle or mana boots is pretty standard, though phase is completely fine as well (more damage and mobility). If you have multiple allies who are going mana boots then it might be better to get phase boots but gank-role or support puts a TON of pressure on your mana pool, because you're not staying in lane and creepscoring, but using mass abilities to rack up that kill count.

I love midas on pretty much every carry nowadays, even if it's late (12 mins? why de **** not?). And even as a mid hero. It's such a sick item. If your team is relying on you to carry the game super early on and not giving you time to farm then they're not treating their carry very well, and are probably getting outplayed anyways. If you can manage to get it before 7 minutes then I'd say go for it 9 times out of 10. Though I'll admit there are times when going midas isn't that strong such as when you're the only support, not going to get it at a decent time (before about 15 minutes), or require certain other items to function (such as axe going vanguard or pipe, sf going middle needs bkb or shadow blade asap). If you notice many on the other team going midas, and you don't predict an early win or nasty pushing for a while then why not go midas? Though, even on a support it can be amazing since it allows you to keep up in levels and if the game drags then you have free attack speed, and bonus gold allowing you to get M04r items. If you are managing to buy out the wards, contribute well to your team's killcount, have finished boots (tranquil, mana boots), have lots of hero-kill gold, and given you aren't losing miserably (ie you aren't being forced to buy meka or drums early on) then why not go for it? I look at it as you're basically buying levels. DK recently has been putting midas on pretty much everyone. Even carries who are seriously behind to get back on track (sometimes you'll hear someone refer to it as a catch-up midas if it's on the hard carry past 10 minutes).

Man... that was a long post. NEXT!