AngeloBangelo's Guide to Support Shadow Demon

Introduction

Hello, and thanks for taking the time to read my Shadow Demon guide. I've wanted to make a guide on Shadow Demon for a long time, but I wasn't really inspired to until recently... A quick look at DotaBuff.com shows that Shadow Demon is currently one of the least picked heroes, with one of the lowest win rates in the game(Roughly bottom 5 for both categories). This is really surprising to me, because I feel that Shadow Demon is an amazing hero. This just means that players aren't playing him correctly, and it's probably discouraging them from continuing to play him. Hopefully my guide can change your mind about him, and you'll give him a second chance.

When playing SD as support, you will have to make decisions that can win or lose every team fight. Positioning is critical, your choice of targets are extremely important, micromanagement of your illusions (which can give your team a boost to DPS that no other support can give 75 minutes into a game) are just a few things that separate SD from every other support... And a good SD player from a professional one.

I love the challenge of playing SD, and the activity that is necessary to play him. You need to be everywhere on the map. Ganking lanes, TPing to save heroes, and harassing junglers. He is usually played as a support that can either initiate or counter initiate. He is used to boost your teams DPS through his skills. One of the most unique attributes of this hero is that he is probably the only support that gets incredibly strong late game. As a late game SD (With no items) you can 1v1 most fully farmed carry heroes with proper positioning and spacing.

Hero Information

Among the sovereign Demons with explicit access to this world, Doom Bringer scarcely bothers with the affairs of Noninfernals and Lesser Spectral Consorts, while Shadow Fiend passes through almost exclusively on collecting expeditions. The Shadow Demon, however, has always taken a deep and abiding interest in the material plane, as if sensing that mastery of this gritty dimensional nexus might be the key to total domination of all realities. Summoned first by minor wizards, the Shadow Demon granted every wish and put on increasingly impressive displays of power until he had the full attention of the greatest demonologists, and through them the various lords, tyrants, autarchs and heirophants who depended on sorcery to buttress their mundane power. So great was his deception that all his summoners considered themselves the master and Shadow Demon the servant; meanwhile, he eroded their identities and made their minds his own. In the end, most members of the cult were hollow puppets, extensions of his evil will.

What Shadow Demon's next step would have been remains open to speculation, for around this time, Nevermore the Shadow Fiend bit into a particularly nasty-tasting soul and discovered that it held nothing but a foul nougat of Shadow Demon's essence. Alerted that a coup was underway, and that the ancient equilibrium of the Umbral Pact was about to be destabilized, Doom Bringer and Shadow Fiend briefly joined forces to destroy the burgeoning cult. Combing spells of incredible force, they undid Shadow Demon's centuries of patient work, reducing his cult to smithereens--and all its members to a bloody splatter. Nothing remained except a tiny speck of demon shadow. Immortal and irreducible, this mote of evil was enough to seed the Shadow Demon's next scheme, and in fits and starts, over further centuries, he began to regroup. Whatever that speck of shadow touched, it tainted, and its influence gradually grew. A chaos of damaged parts pulled together, reknit, and combined to give Shadow Demon a form even stronger than his former. He is all but complete now, and his plan for infinite dominion lacks all of its former weaknesses. It would seem that such a being of pure malice and malevolence, a threat to all creation, would be forever out of place in our world...yet Shadow Demon does not lack for followers.

I like Shadow Demon's background story because it involves a few other heroes from the DotA 2 universe. He basically corrupts people's minds into thinking that Shadow Demon works for them, when really it's the other way around. As people begin to fall under his power, he begins to create a cult that worships him. He is looking to dominate all living beings and have them join his cult. After Shadow Fiend devourers a soul that is hollow, he realizes something is up. Doom and Shadow Fiend join forces to destroy his cult of followers, and now Shadow Demon has to slowly build it back up. Pretty cool, eh?

Pros / Cons

Shadow Demon is a VERY strong support at all stages of the game. The strongest (and most obvious) way to use Shadow Demon's spells are all on a single target. Few heroes can survive the burst that comes with a full SD combo. Although he can turn the tide of a team fight, it's much harder to do. Shadow Demon's tool kit really lean towards a gank oriented lane partner with a single target disable that is hard to land (Like Mirana, Kunkka, Leshrac, or Lina).

Pros Versatile Disable Amplify Damage Spammable Vision Counters BKB melee heroes Great Initiation/Counter Initiation Ability To Remove Most Buffs Scales Into Late Game

Cons Mediocre Stats Extremely Squishy Poor Mana Pool Expensive Spells Low Attack Range No HARD disable

Skills

Disuption

Type: Targets:

Heroes Only

Banishes the targeted unit, removing it from play for the duration. Upon returning, two illusions of the unit are created under Shadow Demon's control.

Notes:

• Disrupted units are still affected by Soul Catcher Shadow Poison and the damage at the end of Demonic Purge
• Most effects that occur over time, remain constant during Disruption. Things like Static Link and Healing Salve. If something does damage to you, like Battle Hunger, you can cast Disruption and will still take damage, but you cannot die while under the effects of Disruption, so keep it clutch.
• Some orb effects like Mana Break are transferred over to the illusions after banish wears off.

This skill will banish one hero for 2.5 seconds, and when they return they come back with 2 illusions that deal a fair amount of damage. The illusions are controllable, so I suggest you learn how to micro them after banish ends. Leveling up this skill will make the illusions last longer, do more damage, and reduces the cooldown.

Early game this skill is used to catch a hero that is out of position, so that your allies have adequate time to react, and improve their position for when they come out of the banish. Later in the game, this skill is used as a counter initiation tool. Let's say there is a small skirmish in the jungle, with all 10 players, but both teams decide to run. Now your carry player is Glimpsed into Kinetic Field and has Static Storm casted on him or her. Past that, Chaos Knight lands a 4 second Chaos Bolt. This fight should be very winnable, if you banish your ally with Disruption. They are out of the game for 2.5 seconds. By the time, they back, all of those spells will have been wasted, essentially. They cast 4 spells total, while you cast one, and they were not able to capitalize on them. Not only that, you now have 2 illusions, that each do 60% of your carries damage each, to turn the fight around.

Don't be afraid to use this skill to help push either. If you have killed the most powerful heroes on the enemy team, and you feel that they are powerless to defend a push, banish your highest DPS hero. Then use the illusions to help damage the tower. If the tower ever attacks you, you can A + Left Click the illusions to make the towers attack the illusions instead of you.

Advice from our favorite cult leader: Have you ever seen a good player banish an ally in the fountain, right as the game starts? There's a reason for this. You can hotkey the illusions several times (I use 3), and that will be your hotkey for you illusions for the rest of the game. So if you banish a drow and she uses Shadow Blade, you can press "3", and micro the illusions immediately so they don't sit there attacking randomly. Learn to do this at the beginning of every game.

Soul catcher

Soul Catcher

Type: Targets:

Point

Curses a random enemy in an area to take increased damage. The bonus damage is dealt as a separate instance of damage. Units under the effect of Disruption can still be affected by Soul Catcher.

---

Notes:

• Extra damage is dealt as PURE damage.
• Debuff will stay on during magic immunity (Like a carry that pops BKB), but damage will not be dealt.

This is one of Shadow Demon's skills that scale into the late game. You target an area, and one unit in that area receives a debuff. While this debuff is active, any damage they received, is received a second time at a percentage of it's original strength, but as pure damage. This means that it is not lowered through any means. If a target is hit for 100 damage, they receive an additional 50 damage (At level 4) with no reduction from magic armor or anything. You will want to aim this skill as poorly as possible, to catch only the desired target in the AoE, thus taking out the randomization that comes with the AoE. If you only catch one target in the AoE, the "random" target isn't random anymore. It's incredibly easy to land this skill with the help of Disruption. As I said earlier, they can still be affected by this spell while under the effect of Disruption (During the banish portion of the spell, I mean).

Shadow Poison

Type: Targets:

Ground

Deals damage in a line, and afflicts enemy units with a poison effect. The poison deals 1/2/4/8 times the stack damage based on the number of stacks on the target, up to 5 stacks. Additional stacks cause 50 damage each. This deferred damage is dealt when Shadow Poison's duration is expired, or the Release sub-ability is used.

---

Notes:

• Stack duration is given an additional 10 seconds, every time another stack is added.
• The poison released provides vision.
• Poison can be released prior to 10 seconds by using Shadow Poison Release, which is the D key, by default. This is useful if you have multiple stacks, but Soul Catcher is about to wear off, and you want to maxmize your damage.
• Will do damage both when the unit is afflicted with poison, and when it is released. Great for stopping HoT regen, blink dagger, etc etc...

This is a great nuking and lane control skill. It is very cheap for the damage it can potentially do. Typically if you get 2 stacks on a hero, it is a good idea to commit with a full combo, since it guarantees at least 4 total stacks, which is enough to kill most heroes early game. Throwing poison out into the fog can be a good idea if you have no wards, but early game it's too expensive to spam because of the short vision duration. Landing one stack on a hero gives you vision of that hero for a moment. This makes it easier to land poison on them again. If you land another poison on them within 10 seconds, the poisons stack on top of one another, and do not reset to 0 stacks until a full 10 seconds go by in which the hero has not been hit by a wave of shadow poison.

If you are unsure about exactly how the stacks/damage work on Shadow Poison, here is a small reference guide to give you an idea. This way you know whether or not the hero you're fighting is within kill range with the stacks he or she has on them.

Demonic Purge

Type: Targets:

Enemy Unit

Purges the target enemy unit, removing positive buffs, and slowing the target for the duration. The unit slowly regains its speed until the end of the duration, upon which damage is dealt. Units under the effect of Disruption can still be affected by Demonic Purge.

---

Notes:

• When upgraded with Aghanim's Scepter, cooldown for both charges is counted in sequence, not independently.
  - 40 seconds: 1 charge ready
  - 80 seconds: 2 charges ready
• Buff removal.
• The damage can affect a unit affected by Disruption.
• Unlike a Diffusal Blade Purge, no extra damage is done to illusions or summons

Your ultimate is essentially a Diffusal Blade charge with huge damage at the end. The range is 800, which is very far. As this skill is leveled up, it takes longer and longer for your opponents to recover from the slow. The slow goes through Black King Bar, but the damage does not. This means that a hero like Lifestealer or Sven are perfect targets for Demonic Purge because it makes them easier to kite.

You can also use this spell to take off a buff being used to save an opponent (Like an Omniknight on the other team that casts Repel on the enemy carry). Again, heroes with buffs on them are usually much more confident than without. They think to themselves "Well, I have repel on me so I can just dive through the team and I'm only vulnerable to physical damage from right clicks!" then when they dive, the buff is taken off, and their movement speed is reduced to nothing, it's very easy to turn their overconfidence into a kill.

Item Choices

The starting build that I suggest minimum HP regen and two Clarity potions. The reason is because using a full combo of Disruption, soul catcher, and 2-3 stacks of Shadow Poison will drain your entire mana pool. At this point you must stack/pull while using your clarity for your next combo. Shadow Demon has a VERY expensive but powerful combo, so you need to make everything count, or you will lose early momentum.

Magic Wand- Probably one of the best items for all supports. It can be dumped when you're 6 slotted (Including wards and town portal scrolls), but from minute 5-25 or so, it will save your life and give you extra Shadow Poison stacks which will spell the difference in kills.

Tranquil Boots- Probably the most common pick up for Shadow Demon players because of the HP regen. Shadow Demon is very active early game, and he needs to be constantly dipping in and out of lanes to scare/gank opponents. If you take damage, it's a trip back to the fountain without these boots. Shadow Demon is just too squishy.

Arcane Boots- This is a very common pick up in public games, but in higher tier I think tranquils are more realistic. Although the extra mana is very nice and aids the team with some sustain during pushes, the cooldown is really too long and the mana boost just isn't enough. The regen you get from one of your two "early core" items is sufficient. These are a great boot choice if you are going 100% #yolo, but I feel tranquils are superior most of the time.

Medallion of Courage- Your full combo (Once you're past level 6) will focus one hero down very quickly. Once you use your spells, you normally will stay back and spam shadow poison. With the range of this item, you can spam it from a safe distance. This item helps in ganks with your combo, or team fights because you need to be positioned so far away. It also allows you to contribute to Rosh. Heroes that can't contribute to Rosh really hurt your team mid and late game.

Urn of Shadows- Again, this is typically used with your full combo, since soul catcher amplifies the damage from an offensive urn charge. Also, since Shadow Demon is so active, it gives you a lot of charges early game. This can also provide your team with some sustain in the absence of spells like Voodoo Restoration or Healing Ward. This can also somewhat help a teammate tank against Roshan since he will not remove the urn charge, but it is not as strong as Medallion for that purpose.

Blink Dagger- This is picked up for surprising enemies with ganks. It is really only used to initiate, and rarely to escape. Keep that in mind when looking at your opponents team composition. If you have a team with a lot of pick off potential like an Alchemist with Shadow Blade then this can help you land a Disruption and a soul catcher without the delay of Force Staff, and the mobility is much more forgiving/easier to aim.

Force Staff- Even though this item can be used the same as Blink Dagger, it is typically picked up to kite and counter initiate. When someone is stunned, for example... if you cannot cast Disruption on them for any reason, you can use Force Staff to push them out of harms way. You can also push a chasing opposing hero (Maybe an Undying trying to get decay stacks) farther into your team. Now they are out of position and you can land an easy Disruption/soul catcher combo.

Aghanim's Scepter- This item gives you an extra ult and lowers to cooldown from 50 seconds to 40 seconds. The only reason you would want two charges of your ult is to further kite melee carries. If the opponents have 2 melee carries, this is a very strong pick up. If they have one ranged carry (Like a drow or something), I don't think this is worth picking up. Your ult is used to lower the opposing teams DPS significantly, and slowing ranged heroes does very little for that.

Rod of Atos- This is like a poor man's version of Aghanim's Scepter. If your team is losing against two melee carries and you need an additional slow, this is a slightly cheaper option. You would obviously want to cast this item on a carry without BKB, while saving Demonic Purge for another melee carry when he activates BKB.

Heaven's Halberd- Gives you some survivability with strength and evasion while allowing you to disarm ranged carries. Shadow Demon's ultimate allows you to kite melee carries very easily, but he has a problem against ranged carries, since they can switch targets even with restricted mobility. This item can disarm a ranged hero for 4.5 seconds, while only lasting 3.0 seconds on a melee hero. This makes it great for supplementing Shadow Demon's already strong anti-melee toolkit.

Mekansm- Not the strongest pick up for Shadow Demon, since usually Mek is picked up by a hero with extra mana to spend (Like Lich), and Shadow Demon's mana pool is very poor. However if you have a pushing line up, it can certainly picked up. It just doesn't suit Shadow Demon's gank heavy playstyle or his preferably positioning during team fights (Hiding in the back while spamming poison).

Pipe of Insight- Again, this is not the strongest pick up for Shadow Demon because he is not the best team fighter, and is usually not in position to get a good pipe off (You are normally in the back). If you're against a Lich or Tidehunter then this can be an OKAY pick up, but it is a very specialized item.

Ghost Scepter- This item gives you great stats and a very useful active ability. The active ability combined with casting Disruption on yourself afterwards can stall a team fight out significantly, and make carries on the opposite team waste a lot of time trying to pick you off in a fight. This can also be used to disjoint/stall skills like Omnislash.

Drum of Endurance- This item helps you tank up, adds to your max mana, and adds movespeed. Your positioning should normally be in the back of the fight, but sometimes you don't have the luxury of hiding and you need some extra health to survive Thundergod's Wrath, Haunt, Wrath of Nature, etc etc... As a support your slots are extremely limited, and this item is very expensive. Only buy it if you're going to die without it.

Eul's Scepter of Divinity- Use this item as a secondary disruption, essentially. Disrupt an ally when they are initiated on, and when the carries change targets to you, you are able to put yourself up the air. At this point the enemy carry has done little to no damage. When you drop from the tornado, you may ult if you feel necessary to further kite them.

Skill Builds

Shadow Demon can be built in several ways, and you'll need to think on your own to decide the best way to build him for your particular game. Here is some general information on each skill build to help you decide which to use:

Skill Build 1, Single Target Burst:

This skill build is one point into Disruption, then maxing soul catcher, then maxing Shadow Poison, then maxing Disruption.

This skill build is best suited to a higher damage lane partner that has a very unreliable stun that you're able to set up for. Heroes that would benefit from this skill build would be Leshrac, Lina, Kunkka, Mirana, Slark, Centaur Warrunner , etc etc... This build will be especially effective against a solo long lane because it is easy to land soul catcher. When you have more units/heroes in the lane (Like against a tri lane), this build will not be as effective because soul catcher is not as reliable in lane.


Skill Build 2, Counter Initiation:

This skill build is only slightly different from the first. The only difference is you will max your Disruption over your Shadow Poison after level 7. This build excels in team fights versus melee carries and single target initiation in team fights. The reason you would max Disruption is the lower cool down on the spell. This allows you to get 2 or even 3 casts off, which is great when used defensively in battle. Typically a melee carry with push through your team and target a hero in a team fight. At this point in time you will cast soul catcher on him (Because he is in the middle of your allies, so it should be easy to land), and cast Disruption on the hero that the melee carry is chasing. Disruption will be up again shortly to save another ally.


Skill Build 3, Lane Control/Zoning:

This skill build is mainly used against a tri lane. This is because each stack of poison will do a lot of additional damage, and it's very easy to hit 1-2 heroes with each wave of poison. When you get a hero to approximately 3/4 or 1/3 of their health, you should land 1-2 stacks of poison on them, then do your full combo which allows 1-2 more stacks of poison. The downside to this build is that soul catcher is not maxed for a while, so your ability to gank middle lane is much weaker and takes more mana commitment with several stacks of poison.

Playstyle/Teamfight

Early Game

Buy your starting items and pool your middle player two tangos. This is important! It allows your mid a stronger start. SD doesn't need very much regen because he will not be trading very many hits with heroes.

Early on you need to be very careful with your mana. Your combo will take almost all of your mana, and if you do not get a kill you will have to pop clarities, go back to the fountain, or leech EXP while you regen slowly. Shadow Demon is not very strong in lane. This combination of low health, low armor, low attack damage, and low range make him very bad at trading hits with off laners or opposing supports. When you are level 3 you can attempt a kill in lane. This is especially effective if the target doesn't have a salve (In case you fail). If you do not kill the opponent you should just stack, pull, and use a clarity. When it's four minutes into the game, you can attempt a gank middle. Night time lowers vision significantly for most heroes, so it is much harder for them to respond to a gank.

Grab a TP, and watch middle's creep equilibrium. You will want to smoke and start heading to middle lane when the creeps are deep into your opponents tower. By the time you arrive in middle, the tower will have pushed the creep equilibrium on to your allies hill, forcing the opponent to stand in river, or at the top of your own hill to get farm. This means you will not have to dive for a gank. Start with Disruption, then get one stack of Shadow Poison, then land your soul catcher. By now the opponent will be running back. Keep attack-moving, while spamming Shadow Poison in between each attack to maximize your DPS. When you are unable to land another stack, press D to pop your stacks and hopefully the gank was successful. If your carry is getting ganked because you have left the lane, use your TP scroll to get back ASAP and save him/her. If they are not in any trouble, save the TP. Pop a clarity and walk back to lane.

Early game you need to establish a presence, and make your opposing middle think that you're constantly ganking. This means that you can NEVER appear on the mini map. When you're on the mini map, the opponent knows you are not ganking, and they will farm freely. You need to be CONSTANTLY missing from your lane.


Mid Game


Mid game is when the supports will gank (The mid will assist if the hero is able to) while the carries farm their items typically. Your best targets are melee carries that do not have illusions or an escape mechanism. Heroes like Weaver are very difficult to gank because of your lack of a hard disable. Heroes like Phantom Lancer are hard to gank because their illusions make soul catcher hard to land, and his invis makes him hard to catch as well. If you're going after an invis hero, grab Dust of Appearance and a Smoke of Deceit. Smoke and run into their jungle (Lead the march with dust ready). When you are revealed, use dust. Smoke breaks at 1025 range, while dust has a range of 1050. This means that if you dust the moment you are revealed, you will hit an invis hero.

Most team fights you will do the same thing every time. You will wait to be initiated on (Unless you are able to catch a melee out of position with a combo). If you are initiated on, cast Disruption on your ally to stop the initiation. This allows your team to counter initiate. You can normally land a soul catcher on a melee hero during the beginning of the initiation, which is ideal. Most melee carries need to be in the middle of everything to do damage, and with 50% extra pure damage being taken they have to back out much faster. Use Demonic Purge on a melee carry to lower their DPS. At this point you just back up and spam Shadow Poison to hit as many heroes as possible. Rinse and repeat until the fight is over. If they have a ranged carry (Like a drow, you are pretty helpless until you get a Heaven's Halberd. Disrupting her commits too much space for a squishy support like yourself. However, if somehow you're able to sneak to the back of the fight (By hiding in the trees or something), landing a full combo on a ranged carry will kill them 99% of the time.


Late Game


At this point you will use the exact same tactics as mid game for your team fights. Unless you are smoke ganking, you will ONLY use your Disruption defensively. The only difference here is the items that you get. You should have one early core item, and one luxury item. If you picked up a Medallion of Courage, your team can usually kill Roshan very easily. If you have Disruption maxed, you can use them to tank Rosh hits (Make sure to spam the "stop" command so that they don't attack Rosh, or they will die. However he can attack them, and they will take their normal damage).

You can never farm, and you can never be alone. Normally at this point you will be sitting with your hard carry as they farm (Hide in the trees, you cannot be seen). The opponents will be prioritizing your carry for ganks typically, and since you're so good at counter initiation, it's perfect for you to pair with him or her while they farm. Disurption will stop almost any gank. If your carry does not have an escape mechanism, remember to do this: After Disrupting them, just click Shadow Demon back to the well or something. Get ready to micro your illusions. If you can mimic your allies movement (Usually they just run straight backwards), the opponents will not know which illusion is your carry. You can also click both illusions back to the fountain, then manually move one in an odd direction. This will fool most players into thinking that the illusion that separated from the pack is your carry, and they may commit more spells (Or even an ult) to kill the illusion.

Here is an example of saving an ally with Disruption. Queen of Pain is jumped on by Storm Spirit. Orchid is cast on her, as the supports TP in to save her. I not only disjoint the SS attacks, but help her dodge the Orchid burn that would have killed her. This is very important, because she was 5-0, and Storm spirit would have gotten her streak otherwise.

Also, notice my score: 3-1-5 hero score, 6-3 creep score. Those 6 creeps were from stacking and pulling. This is 20 minutes into the game. Please believe me when I say you CANNOT show up on the map, and DO NOT have the luxury of farming on this hero. You only need enough items to stop initiation, and ensure the survival of your team. That is IT!





Advice from our favorite cult leader: If you went a item build with high mobility (Like Force Staff and Blink Dagger) you actually can wander around quite a bit by yourself without any help. If you're able to catch a carry out, do you standard combo. Each illusion does 60% of the heroes base damage, so 120% cumulatively (Since there are two illusions). Add in the fact that they're taking an extra 50% as pure damage, along with stacks of poison, and they're about to take 400 damage from your ult (600 with soul catcher landed), you can solo most carries late game. Worst case scenario: They use a charge of Black King Bar, the carry now cannot fight for 60 seconds, and they permanently lose one second on their Black King Bar. That's still a win for your team. The only problem is that when you're running around in their jungle, it's very dangerous late game. This is why you need a lot of mobility, in case you are caught out.

Strong allies/enemies

Allies of the cult

Alchemist- Alchemist has a very solid stun that allows you to follow up with a ton of right click. Make sure that when he's charging it, you banish the target with around 4 seconds left before he has to toss the stun. Acid combined with Medallion of Courage gives you some very scary melting potential against enemy carries. Especially since they can't run because of stun/purge.

Kunkka- Probably one of the oldest SD lanes, good ol' SD/Kunkka. It takes some timing to set up Torrent and Disruption, but with a soul catcher the pay off is huge. Even better is it's very easy for Kunkka to land a Torrent/ghost ship combo, which will kill 99% of heroes effortlessly with a soul catcher.

Lina- You will get a lot of kills with this lane, but it won't turn into much late game. Not many players fear a fed Lina, so you will need another carry to take the farm from this lane. Regardless, Disruption sets up perfectly for Light Strike Array, and tons of follow up to get kills.

Leshrac- One of the best pushing lanes. Once you get a kill with Disruption and split earch, he will pop edict. Run past the tower and drag the creeps around the jungle and into your tower. This is one of the most reliable gank/push lanes available.

Slark- The idea is to land an easy Pounce and get the off lane to leave to stop feeding. Give Slark free farm, and once he gets his Shadow Blade or Blink Dagger he starts roaming with you. If you are able to deward one or two Observer Wards once Slark starts to snowball, the opponents will be terrified to farm. Crazy economic damage.

Mirana- Another great burst lane. Disrupt into an arrow for huge damage. Mid and late game Mirana can really take off and carry if given a strong enough start. Her ult can can keep the ganks coming, and 5 second arrows combined with your medallion make for very fast Rosh kills.

Slardar- Giving this fish a strong start can mean a fast blink dagger and very scary early game activity. The negative armor from his ult when combined with soul catcher will allow him to 2-3 shot support heroes. Also, his ult with your medallion = rosh.

Centaur Warrunner - h00f st0mp after a disruption set up into Double Edge is HUGE damage. Let the guy regen his health from tranquils, rinse and repeat. You guys are the ultimate ganking duo once he gets a fast blink. Get a fast gem, spam shadow poison, establish map control... The opponents will be terrified to farm lanes unless under a tower. Even then, Centaur isn't afraid to dive in the least bit.

Razor- Static Link followed by a disrupt gives you 2.5 seconds of free damage steal, plus Razor can position himself better. Late game this combo doesn't turn into much unfortunately, so the game has to end quickly with this duo.

Ursa- Decent lane with clap and fury swipes. Ursa has a lot of problems chasing and getting kited. Purge really helps him deal maximum damage to enemy heroes, especially considering it goes through BKB (Which most carries pick up). This means Ursa can take out any hero on the field as long as he isn't stunned/slowed whether they have BKB or not.

Enemies of the cult

Weaver- Weaver has been stomping SD as long as I can remember. You just have nothing to stop him. He's too evasive to land poison on, too fast to get a good soul catcher, disruption does nothing to him, and purge doesn't affect him very much either. This is literally your worst matchup.

Phantom Lancer- You can't disrupt him... If you do, you won't land soul catcher. Poison and purge can do some damage to him, but he's just too hard to kill for SD's kit. You need a lot of single target burst, and your burst comes from landing soul catcher. Early game this guy is manageable, but don't let the game go on for too long or you will be overwhelmed.

Riki- You rely heavily on Disrupting to stop initiation and purge to kite melee carries. Rikis usually get 2-3 wraith bands and agi treads with max backstab early and just hunt supports. You have to man fight this guy in cloud, or you will be 2 shot and not be able to save yourself. Stack up on HP and sentries vs this guy. Announce that you're pushing one lane and sentry it while five man pushing. Riki is very strong against split push and pick offs. Stick as 5 and steam roll him with team fight.

Ember Spirit- Purge takes off flame guard, which is nice... But this guy just can't sit still. He will jump to a remnant immediately. You need to lock him down and just hit him with soul catcher and Demonic Purge. He's like Weaver in a way... He just escapes everything and you need hard disable to burst him. Look into Chronosphere or something. Easy to land soul catcher and purge from outside of the bubble.

Silencer- Not a HARD counter to SD, but he can be annoying. Luckily his early game is absolutely awful and he can be picked off time after time. Against this hero you will need mobility items. Since he only disables spells, you just need to dodge fights and outlast his ult before you engage. Blink and force are key here.

Chaos Knight- Too many illusions, too much burst. The best you can do is wait for him to stun and reality rift an ally and hope to Disrupt the initiation. Late game, you have nothing against this guy. You can't land soul catcher, and he doesn't care about your poison at all. Get an aggressive lane and send it to his lane to shut down his early farm. If you can slow his drums and armlet, you're in good shape to end before he takes off.


Easy conversions


Anti-Mage- AM is a great match up for Shadow Demon early game when paired with a stun. The illusions spawned from a Disruption retain his Mana Break ability, so he will burn his own mana if a stun follows your Disruption. This zones him out of the lane extremely hard. The only problem is that once he takes off, he's not a good matchup anymore. He will blink on you and use manta, and at that point you don't know which one is real. So you just have to run. Keep the pressure on and end fast.

Omniknight- Your ult is able to take Guardian Angel off of the enemy carry... Which means you're essentially forced to kill the carry. The carry will back in the ult duration and it will be wasted. It's just THAT much better if the carry also has Repel on him or her, because Demonic Purge will remove ALL buffs from the target.

Abaddon- He relies heavily on shielding/healing during team fights. Usually a hero will dive and expect to be shielded in the middle of the fight. When a melee hero dives into the fray, just cast soul catcher on them, and ult the shield off. If Abaddon is going to cast another shield, feel free to Disrupt him to stop any further support for 2.5 seconds.

Viper- Viper illusions are incredibly strong and keep the Corrosive Skin buff. You can take away his natural tankiness with a well placed soul catcher. Even his Mekansm rush will not be enough to save him provided you have proper support.

Luna- Luna is one of my favorite matchups as Shadow Demon. First of all, she is pretty much the definition of a glass cannon early game. She needs drums, BKB, helm, etc... or she is very squishy. If you land a full combo on her, she will die or be forced to ult. Either way, you can push a tower off of it typically. You can Disrupt her when she ults in team fights. If she pops BKB, just purge her to stop her chase while ult is active. If she tries to lose you in fog of war, throw out poison and purge off of the vision.

Storm Spirit- Although you will have a lot of difficulty killing this hero since you lack a real disable, you're able to stop his initiation immediately. Typically he will zip in, pull a hero, and combo with right clicks. Disrupting the hero he targets forces a lot of his mana to be committed for no real pay off. So although you aren't great at killing Storm Spirit, you can completely counter his initiation every fight. Stay in the fog, because once he picks up Orchid he will silence you while he combos another hero, then he will chase after you.

Clinkz- Remember that smoke/dust trick I told you about? Do that and search for Clinkz. This hero is made of paper. Once you get your level 6, go hunt him and keep picking on him. His illusions combined with amplify damage and purge are WAYYYY too much for him to tank for almost the entire game. Especially since most Clinkz players just rush an orchid with no HP.

Templar Assassin- TA is squishy without Refraction, and she will never have it against you. The reasons for this are: Soul catcher counts as two instances of damage, so it burns two charges per attack, remember you will have two illusions to burn charges, shadow poison counts as 2 damage instances (Once for landing it, once for releasing it)... Or if you're really lazy, just purge her. You can also counter her blink initiation with Disruption.

Conclusion

Thank you very much for taking the time to read my guide. Hopefully you learned a bit about one of my favorite heroes, Shadow Demon. Remember!... Use Disruption offensively for ganks and try to land a full combo. Use Disruption defensively in large team fights. Kite the carries and make them waste as much time as possible chasing heroes around. Stay active, never farm, never appear on the map, always TP to save allies.

I wish you the best of luck in repopulating the cult! #TheDreamIsReal

Thanks guys!

-Angelo

(A little throwback to DotA 1 players, before Eredar was changed similar to Lycan's model) d(^_^)b

Bonus idea? Live SD vids.

I'll use this section to add a few videos of me playing Shadow Demon so you get an idea as to how I play him. Maybe it's completely different from how you think he should be played. Hopefully it helps.


Video 1: I roam with my friend on vengeful spirit. We have very weak late game compared to the opponents, so we stay active and try to end as soon as possible.

Link: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZDxBHObbEs8