Spectre Help

I know a lot of you here play Spectre, and I was wondering if you could take a look at this game and maybe give me some tips. Now playing Hard Carry is not my forte, but I've always wanted to get better at playing Spectre so.. I played a game! My lane was really hard, was against a Riki and Venomancer and it was really hard to farm (I died once there as well, stupid mistake, I guess). Due to my mistakes and failure to last hit, I ended up with a 21 minute Radiance which my friends assured me wasn't too bad considering the messy start, but I still think it was a horrible fail. Once mid game came, we actually started coming back, and I got about 5 or 6 kills around this time, so at about 30 (?) minutes I had a Diffusal Blade, Radiance and a Manta Style... then the late game came. I figured "well the longer this game goes on the better, right?". Well it seems I was wrong, we got ANNIHILATED by a carry Venomancer I am sad to say. If i managed to kill him, I died to the damage over time afterwards, and if I died to him... well I died. I managed to get a Heart afterwards, but we had pretty much lost at this point, and I managed to kill one or two of the enemy heroes every fight, but I always died after for this.

My skill build by level 6 was 2-2-1-1 and then I maxed my Desolate by 8 and Spectral Dagger at 10.

My item build was Boots of Speed, Radiance, Diffusal Blade (1), Manta Style, Boots of Travel and then Heart of Tarrasque.

My gpm was fairly low, but I guess it would've been higher if I hadn't died so much and possibly farmed more efficiently. Should I have itemized differently? I have no clue what went wrong.

The replay is available still, but only watch if you need more details. Some general tips/good item builds and skill builds for different situations would be awesome.

Thanks!
¬Bunkansee

Without watching the game, I'd just say you got outfarmed by a lot. Of course even a 6-slotted carry Veno (lol) will wreck a 3-slotted Spectre :)
If you managed to get a 20 min Radiance you should have far, far more farm at 1 hour.

You screwed up your item build. If you go radiance first, you should generally go Manta Style second not Diffusal Blade. The reason is because radiance on its own is a horribly bad farming item but if you combine it with the ultra-spammable manta you can spam manta illusions with the radiance aura which essentially triples your farming rate (and allows you to counterpush).
Radiance is only a farming item if you use it with an early manta. Otherwise pretty much any other item gives you more farm.

So yeah if you go radiance first just skip diffusal completely (unless you're facing Omniknight or something) and go either straight manta (farming build) or skadi or heart (tanky fighting build).
You get nothing out of a diffusal after a radiance essentially so only buy diffusal if you absolutely need the purge (here you don't).
If you go radiance first your second item should be either manta to farm, or an item that increases your HP by a *lot* so you can be in the middle of fights with the radiance aura and tank up damage.

...Especially against heroes like Invoker, Veno or Pudge. You needed HP, and you needed HP early. Radiance into diffusal in 9K gold of farm that gives zero HP. Dispersion is only good if you're sitting at 3K+ HP, Spectre needs to be tanky, and be tanky early.

Ever seen Naga Siren played? Constant manta/illusion spam? Radiance Spectre is the same. Always have manta on cooldown. Manta illusions farm not the hero.

Never max Spectral Dagger, it's only waste of mana, get other skills first

-Wulfysten, probably

Thank you for the detailed response. Do you think I should've bothered with radiance at all this game? I never know whether to buy Skadi or heart but I suppose each are better in different circumstances. Should I buy items like phase boots and urn in the early game? I never know whether to just rush radiance or go for some early stuff. Thanks again for the help. :)

I'm surely not as good as you Bunk since youre a Veteran and all so I feel kind of stupid / hypocritical critisizing you, but to the best of my knowledge:

The build to go is:(De = Desolate Di = Dispersion)

SD, DE, DE, DI, DE, H, DE, DI, DI, DI, H, SD, SD, SD, Stats, H. Possibly take stats over SD.

Typical Item Build is Poor Man's Shield > Boots of Speed > Radiance > Manta Style ( this particular game I would have gone Pipe of Insight or Lotus Orb. The pipe nulls that damage from Venos spells fairly easily, you can shrug off the rest with Dispersion. Maybe a raw Health Booster would have been good here, for a later heart :D ).

In lane, the Riki should have been fairly weak, and since Venos went max ward build, couldn't you have just gotten gold off of attacking wards? He didnt even get Gale until way to late. I cant really say without watchign the game but I'd guess that the wards were a problem because he placed them behind the creep wave so you couldnt go in and farm. The CM should have used Crystal Nova on the wave, so then you could go in and get last hits ans kill the wards while also discouraging Riki from going on you.

Thats just my analysis, because form the sound of it the laning was the thing that ruined the whole game. Wont go into mid and late game, other than saying you dont get DB after Radiance because Manta illusions make Radiance good, but thats been stated already.

-Blubbles

Here's mine

Roughly the same duration as yours.
I went for a vanguard this game, if memory serves me right I had it before 11 or 9 min.

The enemy slark + spirit breaker combo really snowballed hard but I kept farming.

Item build :
Starting : qb, stout, tango, branch
Progression : brown boots, vang, radiance, diffusal, manta, crimson, diffusal 2, skadi


Tips :

Make the most of your new dispersion, get as much armor, damage block ( or magic resistance ) as you can.
The new diffusal is INSANE , managing to use all 16 of its charges means the your enemies should always be purged.
Play safeish, but never stop farming, you have manta ,dagger and haunt to get out of trouble, keep farming EVERYWHERE.

Radiance was good this game because you were the only "farmer" in your team, and your team had a lot of space creators. You could be sure that Clockwerk and Clinkz would be hunting for kills, and Enigma would be joining teamfights, etc. So you would have the space to sit in the back farming, and joining your team in their pickoffs with Haunt.

Radiance is bad if you have one or more other farmers in your team (e.g there's that scrublord who last picks Anti-Mage, or you have an AFK jungler, or a mid hero who sits mid AFK farming for 25 minutes and having no impact, you get the idea). Of course that stuff should never happen unless your teammates are extremely bad...but you're playing a pub so that happens.
Radiance is also bad if you can't get one at a good timing (e.g you get aggressive trilaned, or Xyrus is supporting you, you get the idea Kappa XD)

So yeah if you have fighting heroes in your team who can make space and you can get it early, radiance is always good. But you never "have" to go radiance on Spec, it's only one build among others.

While the fighting build is the best if you have a lot of space hogs in your team (e.g a mid Shadow Fiend or Tinker, an offlane Timbersaw or a jungle Furion) ; the kind of heroes who won't hesitate to oneshot creepwaves while you're left with nothing, so that your farming speed is completely irrelevant at the end of the day so you're better off going midas into cost-efficient fighting stuff, while you get your farm slowly but surely from the jungle whenever your ult is on cooldown.

Heart or skadi is purely a matter of personal preference. Personally I think skadi is always better because of the 25 agi, the slow, and the infinite mana to spam manta, while heart only gives HP and unneeded regen. But that' a detail really, don't bother with that, both items are good on the hero and you shouldn't hesitate to even get both. A good Spectre sits at 4K HP :)

Phase Boots are for the early fighting build and are only good if you don't go radiance, because chasing power does nothing useful in the radiance build. If you go radiance, it's either no boots at all, or Power Treads for the HP.
Urn of Shadows is good in any build if there's a lot of early action.

This game, as well, is a reference point. Choo choo!

So, the reason I went Radiance here was because I felt we needed counterpush and it turns out I was right... also, the burn was malefic in fights and they had a lot of squishy heroes. PA went Bfury because... ******ed pubbie, I assume.

Now as has been previously said Diffusal doesn't usually fit into a Radiance build. You need HP, and Manta, to take advantage of that build. I don't really think I need to explain the rest of those items I got, since their damage was primarily magical.

Skillbuild was fine, no concerns there. But you did need HP - consider a casual Point Booster (or Vitality Booster, since you went Heart - don't do that. Skadi's pretty much always better now).

Hate to point out the obvious, but I think you missed a trick here, as did the rest of your team. Even with that ridiculous hard carry build, a lot of Veno's damage is magical. Where's the pipe? Where's your BKB? I know it's not a normal Spectre item, but it would seem to make sense here.

BTW, this is my recent attempt at a Spectre game - it was random draft, had to last pick a hard carry...think I'd seen someone's recent most discussing his builds so managed to pick something not terrible. Rest of the team did a pretty decent job supporting me, but had to lane with Dazzle against Phantom Lancer and Silencer. Oh, and apparently I don't know how to build a Manta Style...the S&Y is an oopsie :)

Thank you everyone for all the help:

@Blubbles

Just because I'm veteran, doesn't mean I'm pro at dota. :P
I made this thread since I suck with Spectre, so any help is appreciated, thanks!
I never considered Pipe as an item for Spectre to carry, but I assume the Magic Resitance works on Illusions too? So I can see it being good against burst.

@Ab4ddon

I always see some people buying Vanguard but I've never actually bought it. I tend to try rushing Radiance asap, because since my farming skill is lacking slightly I feel that I'll only slow myself down. However I will have to give it a try.

@HamsterTamer

Thanks again for the reply. If I choose not to opt for the Radiance build, should I just go for Midas, Manta, Skadi/Heart or something similar to what you suggested?

@Terathiel

Thanks for the tips. So I need to get some early hp (I suppose I didn't really buy any hp for a long time... oops!). I'll try Skadi next time, since everyone here seems to prefer it.

@Sando

I considered stuff like BKB and even MKB for veno (he had evasion). But I think MKB is really bad on spectre. As for BKB, I didn't know whether it would be good or not, so I decided to just finish off my Heart to be safe. I can maybe try that next time I'm being rekt by some magic damage, thanks!


So what I have learned from this: Skadi is something I should consider instead of heart. Diffusal Blade isn't good as my second item after Radiance. Sometimes I should use early fighting builds instead of a Radiance build. Pipe is a possible pickup? Vanguard is good sometimes early.

Can't thank all of you enough for all the help! :3

¬Bunkansee