Defense of the Assholes 2

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icyshadowlord
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Post by icyshadowlord »

I think it's either Winter Wyvern or Abyssal Underlord (who was Azgalor in DotA 1) being next on the list.
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GreatGreyShrike
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Post by GreatGreyShrike »

I wrote back in May that:
There's a lot of things which are legendarily bad and obscure for Dota that I think are quite real complaints about how the game work. These include, but are definitely not limited to:

...
- Damage types is a stupid mechanic, and the difference between physical/magical/pure/composite/HP removal/universal is way too many to fucking have and the fact that physical is broken into normal, pierce, siege, chaos, and hero damage is also bloody stupid.
...
Praise icefrog - http://www.dota2.com/rekindlingsoul/ has the changelog for the new 6.82 patch (deployed to test servers already and probably going into the main game tomorrow), and they've removed composite, hp removal, and universal damage. It's a bold new era of there being only three types of damage (physical/pure/magical) and I am only sad that this didn't happen sooner.

Oh, and there's a new item, hero reworks and rebalances, and a whole boatload of changes in general. A lot of really good balance changes for both high and low levels of play. It's a really great patch overall, IMO, and I look forward to watching the meta shift in response - we're in for some chaotic and interesting times.
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Post by ...You Lost Me »

Holy crap. Some of those changes are just crazy -- It looks like riki and blood got way buffed, we get a mini-omniknight ult on an item, and chen/earth spirit's aghanim's updates are just awesome.

PL still looks annoying, but in a brand new way.

EDIT: SUCK IT FACELESS VOID
Last edited by ...You Lost Me on Thu Sep 25, 2014 10:17 pm, edited 1 time in total.
DSMatticus wrote:Again, look at this fucking map you moron. Take your finger and trace each country's coast, then trace its claim line. Even you - and I say that as someone who could not think less of your intelligence - should be able to tell that one of these things is not like the other.
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Post by Surgo »

I didn't even realize that Chronosphere disabled passives. That's some crazy hidden power.
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Post by ...You Lost Me »

A lot of similar abilities ignore passives. It's just one of those things you memorize.
DSMatticus wrote:Again, look at this fucking map you moron. Take your finger and trace each country's coast, then trace its claim line. Even you - and I say that as someone who could not think less of your intelligence - should be able to tell that one of these things is not like the other.
Kaelik wrote:I invented saying mean things about Tussock.
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Post by ...You Lost Me »

I just got back in after a long break. Despite being disappointed that they released Oracle instead of Winter Wyvern or Pit Lord, I think Oracle is fantastic. So much fun to play, even if you can't carry your team by yourself at all.
Last edited by ...You Lost Me on Wed Jan 07, 2015 7:31 am, edited 1 time in total.
DSMatticus wrote:Again, look at this fucking map you moron. Take your finger and trace each country's coast, then trace its claim line. Even you - and I say that as someone who could not think less of your intelligence - should be able to tell that one of these things is not like the other.
Kaelik wrote:I invented saying mean things about Tussock.
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AndreiChekov
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Post by AndreiChekov »

So, I've been playing a lot of phantom assassin lately, and I was wondering what I should do against bloodseeker. I have no idea, and my team gets stomped by him every time.
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Nachtigallerator
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Post by Nachtigallerator »

I'm not sure how your games look like exactly, but I usually deal with Bloodseeker as I do with Phantom Assassin - avoid solo engagements, bring a stun and lot of burst damage and he should die. General rules for sticking wards in the enemy jungle and bringing TP scrolls to every fight apply. If Bloodseeker does get farmed, he's a problem, but that applies to any carry your team allows to get a lot of kills on them.

He *is* rather good at killing idiots, though.

In general, BS should be screwed if you gank him - Bloodrage increases his damage taken and he has no escape ability at all. Not even Blink Strike. Could you run me through how these games usually develop?

You could also study Bloodseeker from his perspective to get an idea of what he has to watch out for: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=A5kFPLctSbs
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GreatGreyShrike
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Post by GreatGreyShrike »

Yes. If you find bloodseeker ganking early is a problem, try carrying TP scrolls - he can't break the channeling alone, and at lower tiers people tend not to save spells to break channeling later on. In the midgame and in fights, kiting him works like kiting other melee heros - you can use a combination of stuns, slows, mobility spells, force staffs, ghost scepters, and blink daggers. Remember not to be running around with less than half hp, and ideally not with less than 3/4 hp. Don't overextend alone. BS can be scary when fed, but otherwise isn't.

My favorite general suggestion for people having problem with a single particular hero (as opposed to wider issues) is to *pick that hero yourself*. Either you will get free wins (always a good thing!) or you will learn intimately and quickly every method everyone else has developed of countering that hero (including hero choice, item choice, and strategic/tactical plans).
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Post by ...You Lost Me »

Buy wards if no one else does. Farm the jungle and run away from fights until you outscale him.
DSMatticus wrote:Again, look at this fucking map you moron. Take your finger and trace each country's coast, then trace its claim line. Even you - and I say that as someone who could not think less of your intelligence - should be able to tell that one of these things is not like the other.
Kaelik wrote:I invented saying mean things about Tussock.
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AndreiChekov
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Post by AndreiChekov »

So, gank him a lot, and avoid fighting him alone.

What about using cyclone on yourself when he ults?

My games usually end up with me top as phantom assassin, and the rest of my team feeding to various degrees, depending on how effective my mid ganks are. by mid game I usually have a vanguard and whatever aggressive set of items seems to fit the scene. I always build phase boots.

Then, when end game comes around, phatoms blur, and vanguards block chance make so that I'm hard to kill with autos, so then I get focused by their casters and absorb a few ults and die.

Against bloodseeker, I'm in noob tier. I've played 89 hours. So idiots are everywhere. I played league for 3 years before switching, so I'm not the worst player out there, but the differences are enough that I still haven't fully ported over.

EDIT: I just looked 92 games total
Last edited by AndreiChekov on Sat Jan 17, 2015 10:52 pm, edited 1 time in total.
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Post by Nachtigallerator »

Vanguard is not an item people usually build unless they're Axe or Bristleback. I'm not perfectly clear on the reasons, but I guess the damage block scales badly and overall stats are not that impressive. Drums of Endurance are a common pickup to make PA tougher.

Anyway! What you are afraid of as PA are stunlock, magic damage, and accidentially jumping into too many enemies. The solution to two of those three problems is Black King Bar, the solution to the last one is to have someone else initiate. Choices are practically endless here, but you can not win the game by yourself with PA. She is not the kind of hero who does that unless you really outclass your opponents.

Phantom Assassin is best thought of as an actual assassin - she goes toe-to-toe with one enemy at a time, so in a team fight, you'll have to cut your way through them one by one while somewhow avoiding being focused down.
The area where she really shines when you CAN'T rely on support is ganks and assymmetric engagements - chasing fleeing enemies from a teamfight (Stifling Dagger gives vision over the target, which is the point where most chases fail) or suddenly running up and instagibbing someone on your team's tail. If you don't have that kind of situation, you have to play it safe and wait for initiation to start something.

Euls Scepter does work to some degree, but it's just 2,5 seconds. The ideal solution would be Ghost Scepter and then running *OR* Cycloning Bloodseeker, timing a stun, and blowing him to bits because he has Bloodrage on. But I think that only works if you're Lina.
Last edited by Nachtigallerator on Sat Jan 17, 2015 11:05 pm, edited 1 time in total.
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Post by ...You Lost Me »

You do not want to build Eul's, ghost scepter, or vanguard on PA. I recommend an early battle fury so you can farm really hard when your team feeds, then pick up a skull basher and morbid mask so you can 1v1. Get BKB at some point so you can eat the inevitable crowd control, but all anti-attack items are 50% less effective on PA than normal so you don't want to buy any unless 2-3 people build MKBs.

PA outcarries bloodseeker fairly well, so even if your whole team feeds and BS stacks lategame items, you can farm up and wreck him. As soon as you pick up battle fury and mask you can farm jungle all the time, so you should do that. Once you're rich, search for opportunities to fight people 1v1 and delete them.
DSMatticus wrote:Again, look at this fucking map you moron. Take your finger and trace each country's coast, then trace its claim line. Even you - and I say that as someone who could not think less of your intelligence - should be able to tell that one of these things is not like the other.
Kaelik wrote:I invented saying mean things about Tussock.
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Post by Jilocasin »

The only reason Bloodseeker kills new (or bad) players is because they don't carry tps. Most low level Bloodseeker ganks involve him rupturing you from max range, using circle of bloody silence, and hoping you 1v1 him. New bs is clearly worse than old bs at solo kiling because rupture doesn't deal any initial damage. Most times he won't have an ally with a stun around so if you tp as soon as you're ruptured he literally cannot do anything to you. Now of course you can't prevent him from killing your allies except to kindly suggest that they carry tps.

Winning as Phantom Assassin presents some other challenges. She's absurdly good against some lineups and really really bad against others. Mostly though it depends on your team having good initiation and cc. The strength of PA is in weaving in and out of battle, blinking in for crazy attack speed and damage, getting out then blinking back in (although I have had great success with things like BKB, AC, Mjollnir, Abyssal, Satanic for stand your ground version of PA). If your team has something like a Tidehunter and then a couple of stuns or hexes PA is awesome, but if you don't have good crowd control and the enemy has something like Lina with Aghs and a couple MKB carries then you just don't win with that hero unless you outplay the enemy like mad. PA builds always have to be adaptable, she can be a powerful late game carry, but she also just wrecks certain lineups early to midgame with the right items. I mean, if you can get an 11 minute battlefury (edit: this is hyperbole, 15 minutes is okay if the enemy team isn't fighting like crazy and winning at the ten minute mark) go for it but something like PMS > Phase > HotD > Basher (or BKB then basher) means you can fight like mad. Oftentimes its best to put BKB before HotD depending on the enemy heroes and how well your team fights together. Hell if you want you can throw a medallion in there for even better early fighting potential.
Last edited by Jilocasin on Sun Jan 18, 2015 11:22 pm, edited 1 time in total.
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AndreiChekov
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Post by AndreiChekov »

Jilocasin wrote: PMS > Phase > HotD > Basher (or BKB then basher) means you can fight like mad.
I don't know the game well enough to fully understand that statement.


In other news, I will be playing 6 or 7 games more as PA, and then report on my progress.

The reason that I built vanguard of PA, is because of how awesome an early poor man's shield seemed to be. Especially if I'm top lane on the Dire side(considering the distance of the secret shop, and how people are assholes about the courier)
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GreatGreyShrike
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Post by GreatGreyShrike »

PMS > Phase > HotD > Basher (or BKB then basher) means you can fight like mad.
I don't know the game well enough to fully understand that statement.
This is a suggested order of purchasing items - get PMS then Phase then etc.

Poor Man's Shield (PMS) is a early defensive item that also gives a bit of an edge for last hitting with.

Phase boots (phase) are made from 2x blades of attack and a normal (brown) boots, and give +24 damage and an activatable ability that gives you a little movespeed and lets you 'phase through' units (ignoring clipping - and therefore making chasing way easier). It's good for fighting and last hitting early on - especially for chasing people down; you get attack speed to some extent already from your phantom strike ability so the other major option in 'moar right clicks' for boots, the Power Treads, are usually not as good an option for PA.

Helm of the Dominator (HotD) is an item made from a Helm of Iron Will and a Morbid Mask. It gives you a few things - passive hp regeneration, bonus armor, +20 damage, and lifeleech on attacks, which provides a nice mix of offensive ability and the ability to clear neutrals without losing HPs. Once you have learned the game more, you can investigate it's active ability.

Helm of the dominator lets you take over control of a creep. The most common use of this is to grab something and use it to 'stack' camps (especially ancient camps) so you can farm them more efficiently later. Stacking camps: When a neutral creep camp is due to spawn (at 0:30 then 1:00 then every minute thereafter, e.g. 2:00, 3:00) it checks in an area around the camp for units, including wards, heros, creeps, etc. if units are there, the camp doesn't spawn new creeps. If units *aren't* there, creeps will spawn in the camp. "Stacking" refers to baiting the creeps out of a camp by attacking them and running away so that when the game goes to check if there are any units are there, they're chasing you and far enough away that a new set of creeps spawn. Stacking is usually done by attacking the creeps around the X:53 mark and running away in a mostly straight line (varies a little from location to location, and as the number of creeps stacked up in a single camp increases the timing gets more tight and also changes).

Getting lots of creeps in a single camp gives you a place where you can farm lots of gold without moving (maximum efficiency), and can be cleared especially fast if you have any AOE abilities or have 'cleave' to make your normal attacks splash damage from e.g. the item Battlefury.

Sometimes supports do the stacking for you, but you can get a creep you control with a Helm of the Dominator and you can stack creeps in a jungle camp while your hero is busy autoattacking creeps in another jungle camp or running from lane to lane or whatever - it's a micro task that you can practice and get fast at.

Don't waste time practicing things like stacking until you have learned the absolute core basics of the game such as what the items all do and are named, first.
Skull Basher (basher) is an item that gives your attack as 25% chance to stun enemies for a second if you are melee, and gives some decent damage too (built out of a Javelin, Belt of Strength, and Recipie). This lets you win 1v1 manfights a lot better (because they spend so much time stunned) and stops people from doing the 'just teleport away!" advice we were all just giving you for fighting bloodseeker (because the stun breaks the TP channeling).

Black King Bar (bkb) is an item that gives you temporary immunity to a lot of magic spells and magic damage. Many ults that have disables have the disable part go through it, but most other spells don't (guideline - not rule). This item lets you hit people without them being able to stun you, slow you, nuke you, and in general do other things that make you sad. Warning: every time the item is used the magic immune duration goes down (from the starting 10 to the lower limit of 5) so wasting it is bad. But still this item is great and makes you win games. Note the item also gives passive damage and strength (HP and hp regen) which are both helpful for a PA also.

The advice to fight instead of farm is one I broadly agree with. At lower levels *many* new players play too passively - if you have a lead, you should fight the enemy and take objectives and increase it. PA can fight and win the game in the midgame; there are other heros who can eventually outscale a PA in the endgame.
The reason that I built vanguard of PA, is because of how awesome an early poor man's shield seemed to be. Especially if I'm top lane on the Dire side(considering the distance of the secret shop, and how people are assholes about the courier)
Early PMS is really strong, I agree. That said, as you get levels in your passive evasion items like vanguard that defend against physical attacks do less and less for PA because you are evading 50% of physical attacks anyways, and the fact that vanguard doesn't increase your offensive abilities at all means that you will likely continue to have the major problems PA faces early game (you get kited, disabled, and nuked to death). Vanguard gives you enough HP to take another nuke or so (250 hp, compared to average lvl 4 nuke damage of 225 after magic resist) but *very often* it would be better to kill your enemies faster instead via having more damage (from e.g. Basher, 1k gold more than a vanguard) or ignore the nukes and associate disables entirely (from e.g. a Black King Bar, 2k gold more than vanguard). Vanguard will let you clear neutral creep camps without taking damage, but so will Helm of the Dominator, and HotD costs less and also gives you more damage so you clear those camps faster and hp regen and builds into Satanic which is a great lategame pickup after getting some other items.

Vanguard might be marginally stronger than HotD in the extreme early game, but as people level up and max their spells all out and get more damage on their physical attacks it falls off *fast* and the only thing it builds into is Crimson Guard, an item a PA should basically 100% never buy, whereas HotD builds into a Satanic that makes you super tanky and gives you an active that makes your attacks steal >200% of their damage for a few seconds and can change the game. [/spoiler]
Last edited by GreatGreyShrike on Mon Jan 19, 2015 2:45 am, edited 1 time in total.
Jilocasin
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Post by Jilocasin »

AndreiChekov wrote:I don't know the game well enough to fully understand that statement.
Oh, sorry. For some reason that didn't occur to me.

GreatGreyShrike explained it all quite well though.

Also, now that I know there are in fact people on here who play dota I'd be happy to play with ya'll.
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Post by GreatGreyShrike »

If you're trying to learn, reddit's /r/learndota2 is a really good place to ask questions and the wiki section is a reasonable collection of guides and advice.

I'm always happy to play with people who can communicate in English and are reasonably willing to try to win, so I'd also be happy to join a group trying to get a game together; the weekend is usually the best time for me.

Believe it or not, the Gaming Den cordial greeting of telling people to go suck a barrel of cocks is on the politer, nicer end of the spectrum of people who play these sorts of games...

I mostly queue US East in the past, but can also play on US West and EU West - and I have been, since in the past week US East's been having really bad server issues. I am at ~4k MMR but I'm always happy to learn from those better than me or, especially, to offer advice/guidance to those newer to the game.
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Post by Nachtigallerator »

I don't even know my MMR - I've avoided calibration ever since a bunch of friends who are into the game even more than me told me that ranked is about the same as unranked, but with more tryhards - but the guys I usually team up with hover around 3,5 - 3,8k and say that I can keep up solidly (which may of course be pure flattery or their teamworking carrying me).

I'm perfectly willing to discuss things in english (I think a substantial part of my deaths can be attributed to me typing at the time) and follow reasonable advice. I'm even willing to build what you tell me when I carry!

Common faults include ill-fated rescue operations, forgetting to activate pipe/mek for too long, and getting caught out while warding. Best heroes according to my ingame-profile are Zeus, Lina, and Wraith King (aside: anyone not following the CAPSLOCK GUIDE should be executed by royal decree) and I'm usually happy to support or nuke in some capacity. Current project: Learn how to hit Riki with Ice Blast.

My steam alias is Ethyldiaminetetraacetate. People know what it means about once every three months, which makes me really happy for the rest of the day, and tells you all you need to know about my sense of humor.
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Post by AndreiChekov »

Thank you for the help. I'm still trying out this stuff.
Btw, I'm Nightofrakdos on steam. And I'm decent at not feeding.

edit: and not much else :(
Last edited by AndreiChekov on Tue Jan 20, 2015 4:30 am, edited 1 time in total.
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Post by AndreiChekov »

one other thing, does daedelus stack with PA in anyway?
as in, crit chance with the ult?
and does the damage multiplier work with the ult?
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Post by Jilocasin »

No, they don't stack, and the interaction is somewhat bizarre. This video explains it pretty well.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=I57DUQknFdM
Last edited by Jilocasin on Tue Jan 20, 2015 9:41 am, edited 1 time in total.
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Post by GreatGreyShrike »

That video is super long and confusing for something that is sort of simple. Only a single critical strike can occur ('proc') on any attack, and the chances of the crits occuring are independent; so if you have two daedaluses, the chances of NOT critting are (1-.25)^2 = 0.5625, and the chances of criting are therefore ~44%. If you have a 15% crit as an ult, and a 25% daedalus, the higher crit from the ult will work 15% of the time and the daedalus crit will happen 18.75% of the time.

Getting a critical strike on a hero with one already gives less return than it would otherwise. Usually it's better to get another item that gives more utility and different abilities instead. The only heros who tend to get multiple crits from e.g. stacking Daedaluses are heros with weird risk/reward ratios and methods of getting hits off that make having a high crit chance disproportionately good - the two big offenders here are Kunkka, who has a short cooldown 100% cleave in a massive area which can literally one-shot entire teams if it crits and he has enough farm, and Ember Spirit who has an ability that gives him an attack while invulnerable against every target in an area - in both cases these heros like the ability to crit and get an instant kill on weaker heros to start fights off, and because of their free attacks on everyone in an area mechanism they have a really good chance of that happening with a better crit chance. In most cases, you want to stack different effects and items, not more of the same together. It's the same reasoning how you *could* get 6 butterflies on PA to reach a 4% chance of being hit by any physical attack (96% evasion)... but if you do that a person with a single MKB will ignore all of them and murder you anyways, and therefore even one butterfly is not a great choice for PA.
Last edited by GreatGreyShrike on Tue Jan 20, 2015 11:44 am, edited 1 time in total.
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Post by ...You Lost Me »

Nacht and Andrei, I added you both.
DSMatticus wrote:Again, look at this fucking map you moron. Take your finger and trace each country's coast, then trace its claim line. Even you - and I say that as someone who could not think less of your intelligence - should be able to tell that one of these things is not like the other.
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Post by Jilocasin »

Well if you want to do math.
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