Hero Discussion 12: VISAGE

THIS GUY is called VISAGE. Did you even know his name?
He is Visage a hero that according to dotabuff is one of the least played heroes. with only 1% pick rate. He is bested in this matter only by Chen, who has usage in the pro play. But even in pro matches he's not picked much. Why you ask?

Because hes action intensive and team reliant. But he is the best god darn #4 that you can ever desire. Let's go take a look at his skill set and apprise you of what havoc he can wreak at your enemies:




CASTING METHOD: TARGET UNIT
Visage drains the movement and attack speed of the targeted unit, gaining it for itself.

Movement speed drained: 32%
Attack speed drained: 64%
Duration: 3 / 4 / 5 / 6
Range: 650
Mana Cost: 100 Cooldown Time: 16 / 14 / 12 / 10

KCAF's take on this Ability

• For 3 seconds you steal a third of move speed and around TWO-THIRD'S of attack speed and add it into your own stats. Consider taking it at level one and it becomes an imba roaming spell that rewards rotations in a meta that has accepted roaming as an everyday thing. So why dont you play him!
  
• If you use it on a troll warlord with max attack speed, you CHOP IT TO A THIRD and become that imba monster yourself
  
• At level 4, it has only 40% downtime and it's Awesome. Seriously go into demo mode and try him!

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CASTING METHOD: TARGET UNIT
Visage damages the targeted unit based on the number of soul charges. Visage gains a soul charge when damage taken by all heroes around him reaches the damage threshold.

Base damage: 20
Soul damage: 60
Assumption radius: 1375
Maximum soul charges: 3 / 4 / 5 / 6
Damage threshold: 110
Duration: 6
Range: 900
Mana Cost: 170 / 160 / 150 / 140 Cooldown Time: 4

KCAF's take on this Ability
Dont become astounded after reading this ability or say oh i can do Kunkka KOTL shenanigans because its only 4 seconds CD. No thats not how it works!

Visage basically becomes a counter of damage done during 6 seconds, it counts all damage done by either friend or enemy and gains one charge ( it looks like that SF's arcana where he gets a slash at his head when he lands a raze) for every 110 damage dealt.

Now what visage does is, it stores charges and each charge is worth 60 damage. and whenever you cast this ability, it deals 20+ 60* Soul charges assumed (Just count the number of bars lighting up at his head)
So the numbers are something like this,

• 1 Charge = 80 damage
• 2 Charges= 140 Damage
• 3 Charges= 200 Damage
• 4 Charges= 260 Damage
• 5 Charges= 320 Damage
• 6 Charges = 380 Damage

Thats pretty Insane at a 4 SECOND COOLDOWN. Your Lion used his finger of death, Gratz you just gained 5 charges and 320 damage on cast. And imagine this adding up quickly whenever you are roaming!. With your familiars (explained later) it kinda becoems an always on thing~!!

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CASTING METHOD: PASSIVE
Visage generates a layered barrier that protects him from physical and magical attacks. If he receives damage from a player, one layer is removed, and takes time to recover.

Armor per layer: 1.5 / 3 / 4.5 / 6
Magic resistance per layer: 5% / 10% / 15% / 20%
Maximum layers: 4
Recovery time: 3

KCAF's take on this Ability
Just interpret this as no one can do a 1 hit KO at you for all of the game.
While visage only has 10% innate magic resist, this makes it a bit complicated for any person to look down at him when he has full stacks of this ability

Every time when Visage takes 15 or more damage (after all reductions) from a player (including allies, excluding himself), a layer is removed after the damage instance.
This is how much armor and magic resistance each amount of layer grants on each level, and how high Visage's total magic resistance is, considering only base magic resistance:
Level 1: 0/1.5/3/4.5/6 armor, 0%/5%/10%/15%/20% magic resistance, 10%/14.5%/19%/23.5%/28% total magic resistance
Level 2: 0/3/6/9/12 armor, 0%/10%/20%/30%/40% magic resistance, 10%/19%/28%/37%/46% total magic resistance
Level 3: 0/4.5/9/13.5/18 armor, 0%/15%/30%/45%/60% magic resistance, 10%/23.5%/37%/50.5%/64% total magic resistance
Level 4: 0/6/12/18/24 armor, 0%/20%/40%/60%/80% magic resistance, 10%/28%/46%/64%/82% total magic resistance

You read that right, 82% magic resist and 24 armor thats about 60% physical resist. Late game when supports are food and die at one or wo hits, he is sure to hold on for an initial bit. and thats just awesome. A value point in this ability is recommended for all those failed ganks and Tower Dives xD.

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CASTING METHOD: NO TARGET
Conjures up two blind Familiars to fight for Visage. Familiars have high attack power, but each attack drains a charge of damage that recharges slowly over time. Familiars possess the Stone Form ability, that allows them to turn into stone, stunning enemies upon landing. While in Stone Form, Familiars are invulnerable, and rapidly regenerate their health and damage. Familiars grant high bounty when killed.

Familiars summoned: 2 (3*)
Familiar duration: Until Killed
Hero Attacks to Destroy: 3
Tower Attacks to Destroy: 8
Non-Hero Attacks to Destroy: 16
Familiar armor: 0 / 1 / 2
Familiar movement speed: 380 / 390 / 400
Familiar attack range: 160
Familiar maximum bonus damage: 56 / 98 / 154
Familiar bounty: 100
Mana Cost: 150 Cooldown Time: 180 / 160 / 140

KCAF's take on this Ability
Now this is what makes Visage OP. His main character is only part of the hero. This summons two familiars that work like this

• They have 7 damage charges and all 7 charges together result in 56/98/154 bonus attack damage (66/108/164 damage including their base attack damage)
• They benefit from drow's aura or vengeful aura
• they are valid targets for Boots of travels and Dark Rift. Now whos in the mood for comeback dota???!!!!
• go here for full interactions: here
• Did i tell you they are totally Spell immune ,take 3 attacks to destroy so no ember can sleight offist them to kill them with one rapira filled attack
• they are portable stuns that you can chain easily by Tab and Q on familiars such crowd control, much wow.
• Total Unit walk capability. Scout around easily

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Now as to why hes unplayed, i wish to add this:
You might not learn this hero because you dontcare about him, you may think that oh its just not played i pro scene or its too much work. But the day you encounter him, because you have so little experience, a hald deent visage can and will rekt you. I kid you not.
Perhaps he has meta problems i disagree. WHY? DROW STRAT. Drow is popular so why not get visage?
or Underlord Dark Rift. Where are the shenanigans?

So my suggestions to IceFraud
Increase Grave chill cast range and attack range of Familiars because 160 is so bad and it's out of date bro

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With this i end my brief introduction. Hey, you gotta add in your bit also! tell me what irks you, why dont you pay him? Bee sure to use the poll! What changes you would want?How do you itemize him(if you play him, LUL)


Let's discuss!!! :D

I have watched the dead cross over for an eternity. Many have I seen pass below, and beyond: kings and tyrants, peasants and knights, creatures large and small.And so i will see you pass also.

I've always thought that Visage suffers from what I used to call " Mirana Syndrome." He's a cool hero with interesting abilities that have a decent skill cap to get the most out of, but... how do you build him?

This used to be an easier problem to solve: back when Mekansm didn't cost a ridiculous amount of mana and actually healed his familiars, it was a no-brainer. Mekansm is great on a hero that can't be burst down quickly at the beginning of a fight like Visage, and other aura items like Pipe of Insight or Shiva's Guard made sense as well... except oh wait. Visage doesn't get to farm those items, since he has no real scaling to speak of apart from (arguably) his anti-carry prowess with Grave Chill, and his ability to take the enemy's farm and use it to deal damage of his own.

Aghanim's Scepter is also an item you want to build on the hero for that extra familiar (aka extra stun and extra damage), and Rod of Atos is a great way of padding your mana pool, tanking you up, and giving you a longer range slow to allow you to get Grave Chill off. Heck, combine those two together and it's almost but not quite 100% movement slow: if you can't land your familiar stuns after that, then get out of the kitchen. I mean the Visage.

Being 'in the Visage' makes no sense

Shush.

I guess that's where I'm going with this, though. He's a great hero, I have fun playing him even when I lose horribly because I don't know what I'm doing. But he's a hero who wants items that has no good way of farming and, honesty? Doesn't have that much of a teamfight presence if his team doesn't know how to play around him. A high entry skill cap combined with a seemingly low amount of reward makes for a hero who never sees the light of day. :(

Mobility is the answer. Grave Chill is completely core to his playstyle because it's the only thing that prevents his familiars from getting endlessly kited. It's a 6 second duration slow with a short cooldown, you need to spam it in teamfights and have familiars right-click things.

And Visage is slow like a brick.

Force Staff into Aghanim's Scepter works fine if you want a cookie-cutter build.

As to why Visage isn't picked more, for me he fits the awkward spot of "support without a hard disable". That's never a good thing in pubs. (if you think the birds' stone form that you can see coming from light years away is a hard disable...please xD)

FYI Grave Chill drains 64 attack speed. Not 64%. So if you cast it on a Troll...the AS change on him does pretty much nothing.

VISAGE <3

I would play this guy every game if I had the concentration to (and he was actually ok in the meta).

When I was still playing him, the Solar Crest >> Agh's build was still very popular, so that's what I build on him.

I want him to have a buff to his passive - right now I don't really think it's that great/or fits with his theme.

I'd also want precision aura to be nerfed.

I think grave chill needs to be just a bit better. Still.dont know what's wrong with this cloak bit I am fine with most people not knowing how to go about it.

And hamster is correct, you only take 64 as out of TWs kitty, which he won't mind later in the game. But at level6, that's his ultimate nullified on one hero.

Shiva's guard, evasion, are good on him. Tell you what, buy a halberd on him .

Why don't people buy aether lens on him for the cast range? Why? It makes grave chill awesome and soul assumption just as good. You can stay at the periphery and let your familiars do the work.

Most of visage players feed the birds. And create a gold.difference that makes the game hard. Now i don't want the gold bounty gone and that's certainly a pain.for many visage players.

Option 1 in the list pretty much sums him up. To play him properly you need to have good enough micro to look after his familiars and not be constantly giving away 100 gold bounties. Much as I admire good Visage players I just CBA actually learning him.

Another tip : Visage is meant to be played extremely aggressively in the early game.

If you just sit in your safe lane AFK pulling while your Anti-Mage is farming...you're pretty much useless. However if your team initiates early engagements, double Soul Assumption really kicks ***. At only level 2, it's a 260 damage nuke, on a 4 second cooldown. That's why Visage was the go-to hero for aggressive trilanes back in the TI3 era. He only needs level 2 or 3, and he can deal tons of damage with his W.

So go dual offlane with him, or lane with aggressive carries. Don't spend too much time pulling, and don't try to harass, he sucks at it. He's the polar opposite of Lich.

If your lane is degenerating into a passive farm fest, go roam. He only needs level 2 for it. Grave Chill cast range is pretty decent, and if your mid hero or offlaner has good burst damage, you can seriously amplify that damage with Soul Assumption for a pretty reliable kill.

So yeah, follow the aggressive heroes in your team and go for early kills. That's really his strength. That's also how he gets gold (through assists), because he's pretty item-dependent even for a 4 and he can't farm creeps at all.

New Account guys, the new system you have to enter your email destroyed my old profile.

How Good was his combo with drow back in 6.83 ? Can we still do the combo (assuming you are playing with a friend or party, in normal pubs must be impossible) ?


Can he still be played in core role in offlane or mid like old days(late game of int heroes have been buffed, also Aghs + Bloodthorn is insane damage) ?

Is Solar Crest still good/core ?