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| Krobelus the Death Prophet, |
Powerful necromancy was required to bring our latest hero, Krobelus the Death Prophet, back from the grave.
How much you enjoy a game like Dota 2
is highly dependent on how good you are. If you suck and your team is
yelling at you for "feeding" or getting killed, you're probably not
going to have a super great time. Not sucking is often dependent on
which hero you're playing. And finding a hero that suits your play style
is key to success.
I've spent the last few days playing a bunch of heroes, and I've
discovered I'm more inclined towards the intelligence heroes, the ones
who live and die by their spells. More than that, though, I tend to
favor heroes that use strange methods for killing enemies.
Nature's Prophet is a perfect example. As an intelligence hero, his
damage comes primarily from his spells, right? Not exactly. Nature's
prophet only has one damaging spell -- his ultimate ability -- and it's
highly circumstantial. Where Nature's Prophet excels is in his ability
to surprise an enemy and trap them. His primary spell creates a ring of
trees on a target location, trapping whoever it sprouts around within
(or keeping everything else out). He can turn those trees, or any other
trees, into living treants with yet another ability. They don't put out
much damage, but can be used to push down an enemy turret. But while
these abilities impress, they don't really help with the whole
surprising-an-enemy thing.
That's where his amazing teleportation skill comes in. Nature's Prophet
can, at any time, teleport anywhere on the map that has been explored.
That means if the enemy team is knocking down one of your structures,
you can zap yourself in behind them, lay down a ring of trees, and begin
bleeding them of health with your auto-attack. Of course, if no allies
arrive before the ring vanishes, there's a solid chance you've just
teleported into your own doom. Nature's Prophet has no real stopping
power and is extremely reliant on the rest of his team to finish what he
starts.
As is Shadow Shaman, one of my current favorite heroes. Like Nature's
Prophet, Shadow Shaman is all about locking down the enemy. The
difference, though, is that Shadow Shaman has way more killing power.
His primary damaging ability fires a burst of damaging lightning at a
target and up to eight nearby enemies. When the bear you've poked
inevitably tries to attack, Shadow Shaman can keep the angered enemy
from mangling your face with Hex, turning the fearsome foe into a
chicken. Any hexed enemy is slowed and can't attack or use any
abilities.
Follow the hex up with Shackles, locking an enemy in place for almost
five seconds, and it'll be a good long while before you take any hits.
But where does the killing power come in? Shadow Shaman's ultimate
ability throws down eight angry Serpent Wards. Essentially mini-turrets
that attack quickly and for decent damage, if you throw Mass Serpent
Ward down directly on top of an enemy they'll be locked in. The general
idea, therefore, is to surprise an enemy with Mass Serpent Ward, then
Hex and Shackle them while the Wards do the dirty work.
I haven't exclusively enjoyed Intelligence heroes, however. Anti-Mage,
an Agility hero, has caught my attention thanks to his fearsome
mobility. Anti-Mage, if the name didn't give it away, is awesome at
killing casters. His attacks passively burn mana from whoever they hit,
dealing damage and ensuring they can't return any fire. He also comes
with the ability to build a high resistance to magical damage. What
makes him so sweet, though, is his ability to blink -- or teleport short
distances -- really frequently.
I can't express enough how enjoyable it is to zip up cliff faces on the
fly, or pop myself directly behind an enemy and begin tearing into their
health (and mana) with my high-speed attacks. My issue with him,
however, lies with how little he can seemingly contribute to a
team-fight once a large-scale battle is in full swing. With only his
ultimate dealing damage over a wide area, and it being highly dependent
on being able to target a caster with very little mana left to deal
decent damage, Anti-Mage seems out of place in team battles.
As a relative newbie to DotA perhaps I'm totally missing some of the coolest heroes. If you've got a
favorite that I definitely need to try, let me know in the comments
below.
(Spanish: "ball of cheese", which is edam cheese) sealed with red wax; tsokoláte, pasta, fruit salad, pan de sall, relleno and hamón (Christmas ham). Some families would also open presents at this time. :D
