How To: Necro'lic, the Visage

Visage is actually my favorite hero in pub games coz my enemies dont know what are the capabilities and kill potential of visage in early levels. I find 1 lvl of chill in lvl 1 the most useful. Tranquil boots is not really the best item for visage because im always hitting and getting hit so threads is actually a better choice as it offer aspd and str. I really dont find using orchid as my item because it is really costly for a support and you should be taking a much more team oriented items like drums or pipe. Your role in team fights are just not to kill 1 hero you need to stay alive and throw as much soul assumptions as possible into squishy heroes so tanky and support itmes really suits visage like rod of atos, meka, pipe, vanguard. I dont know but we may have a really different style in playing visage. :(

I also find the color thing in the guide unique. +1 for effort.

Nice guide. Whenever I randomly picked Visage, I usually try to repick immediately since I don't fully understand his skills . With your guide, I can now play this hero again with more confidence! Thanks a lot! +1

I don't know how you expect to write a visage guide without talking about good ways to use familiars. I came here to learn how to play the hero, and I'm leaving with very little useful information...

Its acutally flak cannon thats the problem. Familiars have 96% Magic resistance so they are very good at tanking the rocket barrage. What I like to do against gyro is keep hte familiars away until flak cannon is over and then use them as a chasing tool or just use the stun as a way to avoid it. Other players just resummon in the middle of a fight.

I would recommend to add foes, gyro is pretty annoying his rocket barrage will destroy the familiars easily when team fights occurred.

why is puck your worst foe, or drow ranger, or bloodseeker. Visage can melt ANYONE who tries to engage him at level 6. except for the illusion ones, which he can stun although. poeple dont understand power of familiars, they confuse them with lycan's wolves, or prophets treants, spend their charges on creeps and rendering them worthless. they don't know that their stone form restores those charges. actual counters are ones that instakill your familiars, for which that 96% magic resistance of your birds dont do anything. I had problems with: axe, omniknight, kunkka, but noit with drow ranger, or bloodseekeer.

Hello. I just read your entire guide and I have to say that I feel you did a very good job of making it visually appealing and making it easy for a user to quickly scan for the information they really need to play this hero.
What I would like to see, though, is justifications for your item and spell build orders. For example, I don't understand why I would pick up my passive at level 1 (as instructed by 2 of your 3 builds). I would love to see a section dedicated to explaining how each of the skills and items contribute to Visage's ability and effectivness. Let me see your motivation for every argument you make. (Seeing numbers would be awesome, but I understand that that is a lot of work).
Now, back to the question of picking up Gravekeeper's Cloakat level 1. In my limited experience with this hero, I feel that his passive doesn't level very well. I believe that getting an early level of Grave Chill will do a better job of both keeping Visage alive while allowing him to provide utility to his team. Also, level 2 of Grave Chill more than doubles its effectiveness, giving the player strong incentive to pick up as soon as possible; this takes a lot from the effectiveness of the entire build. Why is it that you emphasize getting only one level during the early game? Why not ignore the passive completely (until probably level 8 or 9) and focus exclusively on creating opportunities for the team, not the individual. Again, all this could be explained in a dedicated section of your guide.
I haven't taken the time to read all the other replies, meaning my ideas could have already been discussed. If it has been, I would love to get a link to that post.
Thank you for a decent build. I look forward to watching this one in the future.
See you on the battlefield.

Tried Visage out in competitive gaming, and I've found some very interesting results.

Not sure if I posted way too late for this, but personally I'm one to build Rod of Atos as my first extension after Mek/Arcane. The additional tankability and mana to spam Soul Assumption makes it very worthwhile. Also guarantees you two stuns, even with little to no micro ability.

Don't bother rushing Orchids' unless that stupid Lion or Lina keeps feeding you. Besides, your autoattacking power is pathetic, and if a silence is needed in your lineup, chances are your team ought to have one on hand already.

I would highly discourage picking up Gravekeeper's Cloak very early on, unless you have a lot of nukes in lane ( SD, lina etc). Even then, Grave Chill has far more utility as it ensures your potential gankers have more difficulty in catching up with Visage.

Some other items to consider are Euls, which provides nice movement speed bonuses and sets up your stun nicely, assuming you have good timing, and a Force Staff, which is great for Visage who, at best, has a dodgy escape mechanism. Shiva's is tricky to farm, but if you can pull it off, it forces the enemy to prioritize you, who will be close to impossible to kill with autoattacks, or risk flopping about while killing your team, and worse, risk being incapable of escaping.

I would discourage building the following on him as well:
Ethereal Blade: Sure, it saves you from autoattackers, but the slow and the magic damage output bonus is not worth it. Visage thrives off longer engagements.
Veil of Discord: Same reasons as above; in a short engagement this item simply isn't worth it unless you have a nuke heavy team and nobody else is going to get it.

Visage is a flexible hero, but at best he can only be the secondary initiator, tank and CC. The sheer damage output from Soul Assumption is highly demoralizing to the enemy, assuming you can stay alive long enough to repeatedly churn damage; whereas the Familiars' Stuns can be crippling as a follow up stun on a target, forcing the victim's allies to either run and sacrifice that teammember, or save him and risk being stunned in place as well.

As for counters to Visage, stay away from the likes of Viper, Drow and Ursa, who will melt through your cloak with ease to set up an easy kill for that irritating Lion who's hiding by the side. Did I also mention they'll eat away at your familiars, especially if you attempt to stun them? Or that their slow takes advantage of your lack of real escape mechanism?

Guide's pretty good, though. I have doubts about building Orchid or Mjolnir on him, as he is really not the best carrier and if he can farm this up, he's better off building Heart or Shiva's.

Thanks, the teamfight section is coming out after my next two guides, then each guide is getting completely re-done up to the standards of something like the "You know what I love? Everything" Ench guide, or Dr.D's guide.

Wc3
||I've been working on it periodically, not for a while though. Mostly hero development so I can just release the map and have a few revisions without having to update it to v6.58694659. xD

I'm looking forward to see the "Teamfight" of the guide. Anyway up +1 ^_^, also WHEN IS THAT W3 MAP COMING OUT !?

On (B) Ganking Oriented, what is your opinion of swapping Orchids with Atos as the core item?

I have used Atos as core on Visage multiple times and I find Cripple a very strong ability. The synergy with grave chill is great, awesome for getting familiars charges used + setting up the stone form stuns. I have even had use for it slowing that hero on the edge of my FOW to get that last soul assumption off. The build up for the item is great too, the Vit. booster has come in handy much more than an Oblivion staff has. Orchids is still a solid choice, but I reckon RoA is right up there next to it on Visage.

Again, I would really love to know your thoughts on this. I'm not new to Visage by any means, but after reading your guide (Which is mega kickass btw) I would love anothers insight into this underrated killing machine.

Just because something worked once or twice doesn't justify it being an elite build. I already have a bottle build there that can be optimized a middle lane. I just personally wouldn't have my Visage as my mid-solo. I might make a write up on it, but like I said, I'm not very comfortable with all the other dominate middle lane heroes.