Some questions about the Chaos Knight core items

I don't really get some of the supposedly core items for CK.

1. Why Manta Style? the hero doesn't give any bonuses to Manta illusions besides them being a bit tankier than agi illus and he doesn't want to build Diffusal Blade, Radiance, or whatever. It seems like an item you get because he has a theme of illusions, like getting a Mjollnir on Razor because he shoots lightning.
   
   
2. Why are Drums a core item on CK in particular, when illusions don't receive the attack speed boost?
   
   
3. Why is Basher not listed as a luxury item for CK when it gives him several times as much damage as the strength on the item usually does for 2700 gold, lets him take out basically anyone because he can't be counter-bashed as effectively due to illusion-based damage, keeps heroes in range of the illusions, Treads and Armlet give okay enough attack speed, it's thousands of gold cheaper than Skadi which doesn't even stun, and leaves his attack mod slot open for Satanic, which brings me to...
   
   
4. Why Heart over Satanic? Yes it gives 20 more strength, but Satanic heals you in combat which means you can stay longer = more damage anyway, especially because the lifesteal takes advantage of the Armlet toggle, and with a Basher against the enemy carry there's no way it can force you away or beat you. Just as if not more importantly, Satanic has a way better buildup than Heart. We all know what HotD does but an ignored aspect of it is the creep control. How can you pass up a 250 aoe 2 second follow-up stun that comes with +20 damage, +5 armour, and anti-Armlet lifesteal on a 1800 gold item?
   
   
5. Pretty sure once I get ranked (I just switched from hon) and start playing this hero in CM I will be going: (optional) Hand of Midas (use on enemy hard creep to level a faster R, create gold swing, and even get more attack speed for bash later) > Bottle > Treads > Armlet > HotD and find a Centaur > Basher > Silver Edge/Abyssal Blade/Heaven's Halberd/Satanic. Solid, no?
   
   
6. I think CK is best picked not as #1, not as #2, but... as #3 to farm in a long dual lane. You make this work by picking other heroes that, especially in the short lane, push strongly to force an as immediate rotation as possible - I had an idea for short Leshrac with an Axe cutting that lane and then Shadow Shaman mid with Witch Doctor going with CK long. CK wants to be on push teams anyway because he's not a flash farmer, he wants the towers destroyed so he has the gold and space to kill heroes and snowball, and him being strength with that skill set is also a pretty decent complement to push teams in both combat and pushing. Right?

Thanks!

He does. Reality Rift. And Chaos Strike.
Rift moves his manta illusions as well. Crit makes his manta illusions crit. Also manta illusions can proc the armor reduction.
Besides, he has great stats, only build stat items, and manta is actually the highest damage item on any hero with high stats.



Drum is definitely not a core item on that hero, it's situational and honestly preference based. You'll find that some of the core items the game gives you are sometimes silly as hell : shadowblade on Sniper, linkens as core item on Medusa, orchid or desolator as core on Bounty, etc. Item builds are simply not updated and there's still some stuff there that was outdated 2 years ago already. Look at hero guides if you are wondering about builds.

Drum was bought on CK in competitive a lot because in competitive CK is only played with Io and drum gives movement speed to both the CK and the wisp, and gives mana pool to CK, making the duo a really good ganking combo. But on CK without wisp, it's honestly pretty bad since it slows down your farm...on a hero that's already terrible at farming.

Actually illusions do partially get the attack speed from drum. They get the passive attack speed but not the attack speed from the active.




Basher is situational, but it's far from being one of the best items on the hero because it's not really a stat item. Skadi is a stat item so there's no comparison. Skadi gives you tons of valuable strength, AGI and HP, and all those stats transfer directly to your illusions. It also gives tons of mana to use your skills. While basher is essentially just a bash.




Skadi attack modifier stacks fully with Satanic




Because illusions scale with your stats, heart gives +45 to your primary stat and Satanic is only +25.

Heart gives 650 HP more to your illusions than Satanic. And 20 damage more to each illusion than Satanic.




Your hero is not the one dealing the damage, the illusions from your ultimate are. They're the ones you need to keep alive to deal damage. Heart gives them 650 more HP than Satanic, and also more damage than Satanic.
And for your hero, sure lifesteal is nice but it only works when you're not stunned. So whether heart or Sata keeps you alive longer depends on the situation.




Sure, you can build helm on CK if you want, nothing wrong with that.

Only downside it that it does nothing to increase your farm. Generally you buy helm to stack ancients, but CK doesn't kill stacks.




Build is good, except two things :
- Bottle is terrible on carries now. Item got nerfed super hard. If you expect to regen anything from it, look at the stats and think again.
- Heart of Tarrasque is *core* on CK. He's the best user of this item in the entire game, and by far. You can buy Satanic if you want, but skipping heart is honestly missing out on his best item.




Nothing wrong with going dual offlane with CK and playing him aggressively. He's pretty versatile and doesn't have to be your team's hard carry. He can even be played as a #4 support :)

He's pretty good in push lineups that's true.

I have some ones too, does Octarine Core worth the cooldown Reduction ? it goes 130 to 97,5 seconds

Is Scythe of Vyse + Bloodthorn viable on him too ? :0)

Is it a good idea to buy Solar Crest Assault Cuirass to stack armor reduction ?

One thing hamster already suggested, does MoM + Armlet really gives him farm speed ?

How i can keep his mana early if i am planning to ganking early(4 position) ?

Aaaaannnndd for the last, does the hero need some sort of buff/nerf ?

Yeah, it is. It changes it from an awkward uptime to something that's available essentially every teamfight. Plus, it works on rift and stun, which is actually a pretty big deal in a fight.
Nice thing is also the synergy with Refresher Orb. Of course it's 6-slot stuff that you can only afford in 1 game out of 10 or something, but if you BoTs to base and refresh with your refresher in stash, you get reduced refresher cooldown as well, so you got insane uptime on your ulti. You can pretty much become Naga Siren like that. IMO that's the best way to play CK against full AOE lineups with Sven ES Enigma Magnus and friends.

The classic Armlet of Mordiggian Manta Style Octarine Core Refresher Orb Boots of Travel rat CK. Gotta make a guide on that XD




Naah.

Even I have to admit you're going overboard on the new meta with that one.

The sheep is good. The bloothorn is useless :)

Bloodthorn only gives damage but when your best damage item is heart or skadi you just stack hearts and skadis XD




Mass Clarity. It's ultra cheap. Then Arcane Boots into Aether Lens.
Tranquil Boots/ Soul Ring also works.

Tested it out on a 6 heart Pudge. It looked like treads + manta + heart had about a second or so of dps advantage to kill him over midas + treads + armlet + hotd + basher, which is an equal amount of gold. But the "big" items build will scale harder too. I guess now I know why you go manta :P

Had no idea satanic and skadi stacked, they don't in hon. Useful to be a noob now instead of in a match! haha.

Thanks bro.

CK's 6 slots are Heart, Manta, Butterfly, Skadi/Satanic, Octarine and BoTs, so keep that in mind as you're building him. Skadi or Satanic can be replaced with Sheepstick, which is perfectly legit, especially against Anti-Mage or Storm.

Why Octarine instead of another Heart? I mean by the time you get it, it's so late in the game that R's long cooldown is now quite short because of the increased death timers. Or I guess it's for when you snowball and no one else is 6 slotted so you just want the increased uptime to spam it? I mean, an extra Heart would give 239,4-284-4 dps and more tanking when you actually do have your R.

Death timers don't matter since you have buyback anyways. Your cooldowns are what limit you. With octarine you have ulti up every teamfight.


By the way CK with octarine and refresher has 65% uptime on Phantasm. This plus manta spam = new Naga Siren :)

Bloodthorn is legit on CK.
Stun, BT, Rift = Gang bang

Point is, rare are the games you will ever get to make it. Your core comes first.


Never rush BT. This gives me an idea on orchid CK. LEts see about that

Are there any items in-between? Not that I actually play CK, but I like to customize item builds for bots. For CK, I make him build Boots -> Midas (marked as sellable) -> Echo Sabre -> Manta -> Travels -> Skadi -> Heart -> MKB. Would you buy Sabre for the mid game, for example? Also, does he need anything to deal with evasion, or are his illusions enough?