Nightstalker?

where to play him?
what to draft him in?
where is he viable?
why is he never picked in the pro scene?
should he be buffed?

i love this bloke his audio is hilarious his game play is exciting he is such a clutch pick that even clutch picks look at him weird like "what the hell are you doing here?"
the only problem is he is so easily countered.
how? its easy...

at night stay out of sight.

but still why do we not see more of him? :(

Nightstalker is good at applying pressure during the night, and only the night, and with a 4 minute rotation, that was a psudo nerf to him, because it means he doesn't have enough levels or farm for the first night. So during the day, you are a below average hero, but during the night you are above avarage. The reason he isn't picked, is because he isn't a great death baller, and because he is a meele hero, can't easily win the mid lane (and he almost needs that), he isn't veristal enough to take the solo offlane, and isn't a true hard carry, so you don't want him in your safe lane, because he will leave the lane to gank during the night, so that would be lost farm.

Usually mid and try to absolutely snowball out of controll.
Alliance S4 did it in game 3 or 4 of the grand final against navi. 1 overextention and some kills to him and he starts wrecking. The thing is that he is a risky pick and doesnt fit in the way teams currently play.
Personally i like him with spectre, she wants to be in fights early when you are chasing them, and NS brings that agression.

Or you can go full TI2 IG, play him on the safelane with a hero like templar in the mid and just rush them down with max agression.

i run him in mid against a melee hero and i basically farm until first night then gank until second day.

he seems great at creating space for carries to farm as it forces the enemy to play cautious from 4 minutes on and his early aggression is great with a early fight draft.

the reason why is because he can basically just hunt the supports from 4 minutes and i think that with the current meta having roaming supports who are usually under level'd he would make quite an impact.

the problem is.... day time.... i cant seem to figure out how to work a draft around this.

it puts you at such a disadvantage as a team since your basically going from an aggressive strategy to a defensive one every 4 minutes ... and no one really accommodates this.

i was thinking having a either a safelane tri impact support( like sky) or a jungler/pusher like enigma rotate into mid for the first and second night. but i cant seem to work out the rest of it .

he creates such space for your team that he can effectively shut down death ball strats with his presence as it forces the rotations and the focus to be changed plus early game he can basically rek face.

what drafts and strategies you guys think will work ?

He's pretty much Pudge, a mid who's weak in lane and needs to be ganking a lot to stay relevent (except he's not quite as bad in lane, and he's not quite as gank-dependent).

Personally I would never pick him and I never see him get picked, but like most gankers, he should do well against lineups that lean towards high farm dependence and few disables. Against a deathball however (which is the most common strat right now), he's one of the worst possible options.

Go Mid or Solo Safe Lane (if you have an Aggressive Tri-Lane) and go for a 20:00 GG.

I don't know why everyone is complaining about daytime, once he hits 16, he can get 80 seconds of Night every 120 seconds. Spamming this from the start of every night means that only 40 seconds of Nighttime pass every 120 seconds, i.e. Night lasts 720 seconds or 12 minutes if you like. That's 3 times as long as normal!!!

If they stay out of sight at night, wreak havoc on their Towers!

As for fighting during the day, you still have a good Nuke in Void and Crippling Fear is still usable. Worst comes to worse, you have 20 - 80 seconds of Night at your Disposal, more than enough to make a Gank and a subsequent Push happen. If you think your opponents are going to go for you, wait for them and use Darkness to turn it to your advantage. Are they playing passively? Use Darkness to get in some surprise buttsex during the day, e.g. around 8:30 - 9:00 when they think it's safe, but you have long enough for Darkness to come off Cooldown ready for 2nd night >8{D

So long as you build around him by getting an Offlaner and Supports who are free to Roam and can Push when you're done, e.g. Shadow Shaman, Leshrac, Nyx Assassin, Centaur Warrunner , Clockwerk, Bounty Hunter etc. You can easily force fights or take Towers while the other Team cowers in a corner. Add in a Safe Laner with something Global to match like Mirana, Spectre, Tiny+ Io, etc. and you can easily pummel your opponents into a 20:00 GG! 8{D

deathball strats rely on turning an early teamfight victory into a tower then rushing into a second tower (with the other team not being able to defend it). most early carries have a hard time dealing with a 6 min team fight except for mid's but most mids require a bit of help to turn the tide. deathball usually starts from 6-8 mins and rolls on from there for a 22min gg. they also rely HEAVILY on having all 5 there as well as including impact supports. my reasoning behind the nightstalker pick is that he comes online 2 mins before they can start and for 4 mins he can move faster then anyone on the map and his silence turns from a 3 second one to a 5 second one at LVL 1!!!

by forcing the enemy to focus on him or play cautious till the 8 min mark your basically forcing them off their early start by 2 - 4 mins. in that time you have created space enough for a carry who usually doesnt come online at 6 mins to be able to come online where he can defend against a death ball.

the strongest aspect and the weakest one of a death ball is that they rely on their supports more so in teamfights due to the fact that they need those early lvl disables and nukes. which a hard carry will not have.

and by taking towers early and giving gold to your team you are basically pumping your advantage up quicker and zoning the enemy carry out. but if nightstalker can effectively shut down their supports which is what he is best at then they will have a hard time rolling into a ball.

here is one draft thanks to all of your idea's

solo safelane

Spectre

mid
Night Stalker

agrro trilane

Skywrath Mage

Leshrac

Tiny or Wraith King


thoughts?

Draft looks good, but I am unuse that the specter will be safe all the time, depends on the match ups though

Never leave Spectre by herself in a Solo Lane, she loses hard to most good Offlaners 1 vs 1 in the early game. Oddly enough, this is why in British Doto, you'll see an Offlaner in the Safe Lane when there's an Aggro Tri-Lane, if they can be effective 1 vs 3, they can be effective 1 vs 1. 8{D

Try putting Batrider in your Safe Lane, he'll get his Blink Dagger pretty fast if he doesn't have to worry about being Ganked in a 1 vs 1 Lane, even if the enemy Team decides to go Deathball at 6:00, he'll probably get his Blink in time to fight them. Centaur Warrunner , Doom, Mirana, etc. are all viable options too since they can either get fast Blink Daggers or only need the easy Exp to be effective.

Also, never put Tiny in an Aggressive Tri-Lane, with such low Armour and barely any Mana, he doesn't have what it takes to survive in 3 vs 3 for very long. You want Heroes that are more self-sufficient. Wraith King can work as a Support or a Core, and some alternative Cores could be Mirana, Viper, Razor, Silencer.

Bear in mind that any Aggressive Tri-Lane should have good Control, Damage and Survivability even at lvl1. Skywrath Mage gives you Damage, as does Leshrac, so you'll need a good Tanky Initiator, so Wriath King suits your Lineup best.

Deathball means the enemy team will always be together. NS needs his targets to be isolated. No gank targets means NS has very little impact. He's also next to useless against an organized push without any sort of wave-clearing ability.