Pro dota: Guide To Dark Terror

Faceless Void is a very fragile agility carry hero. Starts with very few hp, but good base damage. Getting farm at early stages is not hard, it is risky. You might just get harassed to death and lose a lot of xp/gold while you go heal at fountain or wait for provisions on your courier or are even dead. Scoring kills at the early phase of the game is pleasing, but it is very hard for you. When at ganks, you are suposed to fight, just don't overdo it or you'll get killed and lose gold/xp. Play it safe, get your gold when possible, do your role.

At the mid game, you are suposed to keep farming until your ult is ready, then either TP to gank or call for a gank on your lane. You are not suposed to be fighting for farm against your enemies, go to an empty lane and farm. Pay close attention to the map so that you can evade ganks and make ganks yourself.

[center]Mecha

Skills

Time Walk:

Level 1: 120 mana, 13 cooldown, 700 cast range, 300 AoE, 10% slow.

Level 2: 120 mana, 13 cooldown, 900 cast range, 300 AoE, 20% slow.

Level 3: 120 mana, 13 cooldown, 1100 cast range, 300 AoE, 30% slow.

Level 4: 120 mana, 13 cooldown, 1300 cast range, 300 AoE, 40% slow.

It has a short casting time when void raises his hands. When you travel you become invulnerable so you won't take damage and cannot be targeted. This skill is similar to morphling's waveform. When TW is finished there's a small period when you cannot issue commands to faceless! Since you don't have channeling spells just repeat the same command until void moves again. TW can be used under some spells like: ensnare/bite and those that are similar to these two.

Backtrack:

Level 1: 10% chance.

Level 2: 15% chance.

Level 3: 20% chance.

Level 4: 25% chance.

Whenever faceless receives damage (if the damage is above 6) there's a chance that this skill will trigger and that it will heal void back. This skill won't evade stuns even if the damage is backtracked! Silence and Doom and hex won't disable this skill! Actually nothing can. Bactrack is one of the most relaiable skills of dota! A disabled skill (most passives can be disabled) has a chane of 0% to work while BT 25% from level 7 till the end of the game.

Time Lock:

Level 1: 10% chance per attack. 40 damage.

Level 2: 15% chance per attack, 50 damage.

Level 3: 20% chance per attack, 60 damage.

Level 4: 25% chance per attack, 70 damage.

It is the same as melee bash. The damage it deals is magical and avatar can block it, but the stun effect will work even if it doesn't deal damage. The effect lasts twice as long on creeps and half on Roshan.

Chronosphere:

Level 1: 3 Seconds, 150 mana, 120 cooldown, 500 cast range, 425 AoE.

Level 2: 4 Seconds, 175 mana, 110 cooldown, 550 cast range, 425 AoE.

Level 3: 5 Seconds, 200 mana, 100 cooldown, 600 cast range, 425 AoE.

This spell has a 0.5 casting time and there's another little pause before it will stop the units. This spell only stops units and will never stop spells. Of course it will stop channeling since it is the same as a long duration stun. Avatar won't work against this either. This skill won't stop: omnislash, wards and spirits (like Exorcism) after they've been casted.

[Build

Skill Build
.
1. Time Walk
2. Backtrack
3. Time Walk
4. Backtrack/Time Lock
5. Time Walk
6. Chronosphere
7. Time Walk
8. Backtrack
9. Backtrack
10. Time Lock/Backtrack
11. Chronosphere
12. Time Lock
13. Time Lock
14. Time Lock

Time Walk has its obvious use to dodge enemy ganks and get into allied ganks. Backtrack is the follow up for having a safer time farming, building a little bit tankiness, so that you can stand more harassing and farm longer.
A rank of Time Lock can be skilled for ganking purposes. Also, it may just come in handy for farming because it gives you a little extra damage every now and then.

Starting Items

Early Items

Optional:

PT Wand are the best fitting survival boosting items for Void. PT gives you IAS and stats for a very cheap price, Wand is good on the majority of heroes, I would say all the heroes benefit of it. TPs for aiding on team battles you have the upper hand on it.

Follow-Up Items

OR/AND

Extension/Luxury Items

[Strat

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Early Game

Take the upper lane on scourge, or the lower one if you are with the sentinel. The next thing you should know is creep controlling, which is essential for voids lane management. The most important thing next to denies, and last hit is this! Creep control is about to lure the creeps under your tower using their scripted AI. This will screw the enemies framing, since they won't be able to last hit effectively. The next part is very important! There are only two guides including this that explains. Remember this is not creep pulling!

Creep Lure Technic:

Basics: creep, and tower AI: If you are close to the melee creeps, and you issue an attack command against the enemy hero the creeps will start to attack you. Because of that your own creeps will attack the other creeps. If the creeps are close to you, and the tower isn't attacking the enemy hero they will follow you even if the tower is hitting them. The towers priority is: those that attack the allied hero, the one that attacks the tower, the one that is close. This is all you have to know to accomplish the following movements:

If enemy creeps are coming for the tower and your creeps are still far, then: Stand next to the tower with the Hold Position key and when the creeps get close start to run backwards until you reach your own wave. If the enemy attacks the tower the tower will fight back, since no one else is hitting it, and you are already far away.
.
If the fighting is close to your towers attack range then you could lure the creeps by attacking the hero (you don't need to hit him!) and running instantly backwards. This will draw all creeps towards your tower thanks to the simple AI. If you are close enough to the creeps they will attack you, even if you targeted the hero on the other side of the map.

Example:

You can see that this trick is pretty useful. Sometimes I start it from halfway between the two towers, and end up farming at my own tower. I haven’t seen anyone do this in games, so I think players don't really know about it. We may receive some hits by luring the creeps, but it is regenerated pretty fast and backtrack might evade it.

Depending on the heroes you face, and the players agression you have to play a passive or a farming style. Passive style is used to stay in XP range and out of spell/attack range. You are suposed to wait until the creepwawe reaches their safety zone (tower) where you will be able to farm a bit. When using this style you have to match your movement to the enemies and maintain the distance, as much as possible. Otherwise you may get killed. Time walk can save you one time, but it doesn't give you any hp regen to stay in lane longer. Remember this: you may lose more by being greedy epecially when one creep kill means half of your hp! If the enemy group don't play agressively, then you can use the farming playstyle. Concentrate on lasthits and lane deny. As long as no creep can be last hitted attack your own creeps under half hp to draw the lane towards your tower!

Help your ally if possible. You can time walk to an enemy slowing its move speed so that your friend might escape. Be careful this is a double edged sword, since the next target is obviously you! Never stand still! Move forward and back or move vertically, but try to remain in xp range. Standing units are targets. They get easily ganked, harassed, hooked. You can use time walk to avoid some annoying spell like the lich or Yurnero's ulti, and it's good (yet expensive) against impetus.

Mid Game

You can do three things at this time: push/farm neutrals/gank

If the wave is already at the enemies tower, then go and kill some neutrals. If they try to gank you while you are killing neutrals (they have wards), don't worry! With time walk you should be able to get away. Help in team fights, but don't die if possible! If you have time to farm, and you see no chance to be ganked then you can bother with last hits. If you don't kill creeps enough you won't farm anything before you are ganked. Simply start frenzy when the first creep gets below half hp. This will push our lane towards the enemy. As I sad earlier when we get close to the enemy, go back and farm neutrals. During your period of neutral creeping, the enemies will most likely push back, and when the creepwave gets big enough go back there, and start the process all over. If an enemy is farming on your lane call for a gank or move to another lane.

Farming neutrals:

The true power of MoM is farming, and farming fast so that you can move on to the next creep camp. We will do this pretty often if there are no free lanes for pushing. Always keep one finger on "w", so in case you are ganked you can escape instantly! The damage from ganks (if avoided with TW = you didn't die) can (should) be regained by killing neutrals. After that go back to push...

Excaping:

Running away with MoM? It sounds stupid, but it's pretty effective to save you. First you Time Walk away and after that you maintain the distance between you and the enemy with frenzy. Since it gives you insane MS and lasts as long as the time-walk's CD you just have to run for 10 sec and TW again.

After Butter(late game)

With proper chronoing, and good team members we can defeat the enemy at their own towers. If the attack is finished and our team is retreating, and we have half of our hp, than we should kill some ancients to regain our hit points. It is unlikely for the enemy to go there, when they need to push back the creep waves, even if, they get there: you always have time walk.

Note:

With butter you can solo roshan without loosing 1 point of hp! That's because the lifesteal from mom will be greater than roshan's damage output. If the enemy team is killing Roshan you can chrono them so you can kill him instead of the enemy. Do this when Roshan has nearly no hp left. Even if you cast chrono late you can steal the aegis and time-walk away.

Using Time Walk

Example

When chasing an enemy use time walk to block his path. When running away, use any possible terrain obstacle to lose the heat. The slow effect can help you deploy chrono properly. Always think forward! Try to guess the enemies movements. Time walk makes you invulnerable, but you can still use items like MoM.

Spell dodge: Dodging needs three things: no lag, good timeing and a lot off luck. Even though it's hard to do it's still more reliable than backtrack! Just remember that if you try to use time walk over the casting range void will start to walk instead of casting. Some spells may hit even if we manage to escape, if the effect has a longer delay than the time faceless is invulnerable. On the other hand some spells can be avoided without having good tieing since they need to search for targets over time! Omnislash for example or chain frost. Some spells work on invulnerable heroes too! There are two that I know off: Hook and Nether Strike.

Example:

The difference between Time walk & blink:

Although time walk is similar to blink, the differences between the two spells are very important. Blink spells have lower CD, mana cost and no slow effect. In addition if a hero blinks in to fog of war the enemy won't be able to trace him. Time-walk shows the direction in which void travels, so fast heroes like balanar can still catch them! To avoid this there's a simple, but effective trick: If you can travel to the other side of the forest, don't do it instead TW in the forest itself! Since both the forest and the other side is in fog of war for the enemy, they will think that you escaped to the other side, and will continoue to pursue you there. When the coast is clear you can get out of the forest, or use a TP scroll before that. There are spots in forests and on hills, that can be only reached by time walk/blink and thoose around it cannot see this place.

Proper Chronoing

Our goal is to freeze as many enemies as possible. If we can freeze a tower by freezing others, than we should do it, if it's not ours. You should know that the chrono's casting range inproves with level, and there's a little casting time when void raises his hands. Before you use it hit 'c' to see the area of effect, and then right click to cancel it. If you use it after Time Walk, than void might not cast it, because of TW-s order canceling effect). To avoid this hit 'c' and after that left click, and repeat this until you see the bubble. Kind of a stupid way to do it, but it is effective and you can adjust the chrono every time you recast it. To adjust chrono don't bother with the circle you see! Instead concentrate on the units highlighted in green. Because of the strange shape of the circle some highlighted units won't be affected, since they aren't in the circle. The more time it takes to place chrono the less effective it will be. Don't place it if the heroes are too far on the edge of the AOE. This ulti is too good to make one waste. Try to cast chrono so that your team will benefit the most. That means place it as far from than as you can. Ranged heroes can attack the hero in the middle. This is important, so never forget! Placing chrono so that your melee heroes can attack the enemy stuck on the edge is too risky. Always make sure that you catch all the heroes you wanted. If you miss one, then attack him, if your teammates can deal with those caught in chrono.

Who to attack first?

When chrono is placed, and we managed to capture more than one hero, we have to decide which one to get first. Even without chrono we can decide which enemy to attack, since we can get anywhere with time walk. With bash we can disable this hero, so which one to choose is important! So the list goes by this: I. Disablers/stunners, II. Damage dealers, III. Tanks, IV Heroes with Blink. You might also get a hint by reading the "things to avoid" section.
Chrono has great synergy with: Omnislash, Macropyre, Mass Serpent Ward, Exorcism, Poison Nova, Death Ward and with Epicenter plus blink. Here's some extra inf thanks to Rémi "strikes_ is right about Radiance's immolation, it doesn't damage freezed units inside Chronosphere, regardless of the position of Radiance-equiped hero (inside or outside the sphere). The same for similar spells such as Infernal's immolation, Leshrac's Nova, Pudge's Rot..."

Art of Ganking

First of all know that ganking won't give you the same amount of money, which you would gain by farming. Gank is optional.. sometimes is worth it sometimes not. Since you have TW as an escape skill you can farm lanes in a relatively safe status. Ganking-time starts when you have MoM. Ganking is not the same as freezing people with chrono. First of all chrono doesn't last long enough, and secondly it costs too much mana which you will need for TW. Don't start the gank with TW! Just go there, and start hitting one of your opponents. Since in ganks you have the advantage of numbers he (or them) will try to escape. If the enemy can overpower your team, than cast chrono. That is not necessary in most cases, so if you see that the enemy is trying to escape than activate berserk to catch them (no extra damage while you chase). If you still can't get to them, than cast TW to slow them, and to bash them into tiny pieces. Remember this: never start with chrono unless it's a team battle or you need it to overpower the enemy. You will lose many kills if you can't support your timewalk spell with mana! Also if the enemy is lucky enough to reach their tower you will need chrono to freeze both the tower and the hero. With lifesteal you can regain much of your hp under chrono. This is the last reason why you shouldn't rush casting it. Chrono will be great later when teams will move as one, but untill than bash and time-walk is much more effective, because of the small number of heroes in one place. Don't forget: the best way to make a successful gank is called cooperation!

Chrono Pictures

Chrono explained in high detail!

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Team

Supporting heroes

Void is very weak early game, so he will need someone to look after him in higher level games. Most healers can support faceless, but some of them are better than the others.

Chrono heroes

Chrono heroes are the ones that need a long duration AOE disable to work properly, but in return they can deal lots & lots of damage. Since chrono can stop chanelling spells some heroes won't work properly with faceless. Enigma for example. Although Witch Doctor's ultimate is also chaneling he can use it from the outside of chrono.

[Enemy

Disablers (silence, hex, stun, doom, smoke):

We won't be able to cast TW to get to safety, if we get too many of these. We will lose our awesome Chronosphere too. Get BKB if this becomes too troublesome. Doom is an exception since it disables items too along with stun and evasion except backtrack. Backtrack works fine, and if we concentrate on hp we should survive no matter how many stuns we receive. Disable can make you useless. A damage void can be easily killed outside chrono with the help of these. Remember that hit-points and backtrack are the only things you have in all situation. Silence, hex, doom, smoke cannot disable backtrack.

Melee damage counters (blade mails, Tiny):

This is a real pain especially if frenzy is on. Avatar blocks return damage according to the mechanics forum. So buy BKB if they go mass blade mails. Buying Heart also helps with return damage and stuff. As I said avatar blocks it. Never forget that the damage from blade mails can be greater than your own damage! The armor blocks much of your damage, but you will get back the full amount (X percent of it) in magic damage!

Pro dota

Tuesday, December 20, 2011

Guide To Dark Terror

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