Carry Enchantress for Casual Players

Introduction

Let me start by saying that I am not "good" at DotA 2. I typically buy 2 active items: one for center-mouse and one for space bar. I click on my TP scroll. At this point, I play almost exclusively Turbo. I'm a casual's casual when it comes to this game.

Nevertheless, I have a ~52% win rate with this character and I spam her constantly. Here's the strat I use to keep the other noobs at bay with Aiushtha, the Enchantress

General Strategy

The main strategy with Enchantress is to do a lot of damage and never die. You have three built-in tools for this: Impetus, Nature's Attendants, and Untouchable. Typically, Untouchable means after level 6, you don't have to worry about right-clicks until late in the game when enemies have A LOT of attack speed and damage items. Typically, Impetus means you can slay all but the tankiest enemies relatively quickly if they're at a distance. Sometimes things will prevent you from not dying, which can be troublesome. Usually, the way to deal with this is by getting a BKB early, but we'll get into itemization later.

Facets and Forest Freebies

The new (as of 7.36) facets are a big buff for Enchantress, and the innate ability is a modest but still substantial boost.

BRING BACK FOREST FREEBIE! Automatically getting neutrals was amazing.

Second, the facets! They're both good.

Spellbound (the buff to Enchant) is good and makes Enchant much more usable for ganking and initiation. Very helpful for the "do lots of damage" part of our strategy.

Overprotective Wisps (the buff to Nature's Attendants) is good and gives up to a half-strength heal for half the normal duration. This means you get up to 25% of a normal heal FOR FREE whenever you get heavily nuked. Very helpful for the "don't die" part of our strategy. I usually take this one and when I do I take enchant before leveling Nature's Attendants a second time because it substantially ups your survivability.

Laning

Enchantress is strong in the lane because:

- Her heal is very strong (I recommend taking it level 1)
- Impetus is good for harassment
- Impetus is good for last hitting

Harassing and Last Hitting with Impetus

If your support is pitching in, you should be able to out-harass the other team. Stay topped up on mana with mangoes and clarities. Impetus is costly, especially at first (and it's weak at level 1) but don't be afraid to use it to secure last hits.

Get Some Basic Items

Start building toward Null Talisman, Wand, Boots, and ultimately Dragon Lance, which gives you extra range, which means extra damage. The stats also boost your survivability a bit. Faerie Fire is nice as an initial buy as it slightly boosts your damage and compliments your heal for those awkward kerfuffles over the initial bounty runes.

Don't Die, Do Damage

Watch out for heavy nuking from the other team. Play it safe. If your heal is on cooldown or you're out of mana, you are very squishy until level 6. Once you get Untouchable, you can tank the wave and generally ignore many right-click heroes. Once you hit level 7, you will be able to use your impetus every attack. This is often around the time you get Dragon Lance. If so, it can be the power spike you use to start snowballing.

Neutrals to Watch For

Faerie's Trinket is good, Safety Bubble is good. Lance of Pursuit is good. Things that increase the effectiveness of your impetus or make you harder to kill should be your #1 priority.

The Mid-Game

Once you can throw impetus every attack, most enemy heroes should die pretty quickly unless they have disable or escape or can gap close on you. My opponents in lane are sometimes caught off guard when I fully skill Impetus and they will sometimes give up some quick kills (especially if my support has their 6 as well). This sometimes allows me and my teammate to pressure the tower. If that happens, it is time to take the tier 1 tower and start marauding.

Start with Orchid

My first mid-game item is typically Orchid Malevolence. It boosts damage and attack speed, which are what we need to do lots of damage. It also grants a strong way to initiate against many enemy heroes. Later in the game, it turns into Bloodthorne, which gives even more attack speed and helps counter enemies who have evasion.

As a noob, this goes in my center mouse slot, which is my "do bad things to them" slot.

Get BKB Against Heavy Nukes or Stuns

If I've been having a hard time because of stuns or nukes, I often opt for BKB as a first mid-game item. Enemies buying Blademail is another reason to get it (now that it provides protection against reflected damage). It is EXTREMELY EASY to kill yourself on a Blademail or a Tormentor if you have Impetus toggled on. BKB saves you from some of that as well as nukes and disables. If you die from getting chain-stunned ONE TIME, that is your cue to make BKB your next item.

Get Blademail Against Squishy Opponents

If I've been facing squishy heroes that do a lot of damage or getting focused in fights, I often opt for Blademail myself. Your heal can get you through a lot of tough spots (+1536 HP at level 4 with no talents) and with Blademail, making them go through all that HP means they also have to have enough HP to survive themselves. You aren't a front-liner, but you should think of yourself as a tank. Sometimes enemies will focus you in a team fight and you will die, but if you are the sacrificial deer that lets your team clean up afterword, that is an OK way to go.

Get Shadow Blade in Certain Other Cases

Sometimes you die and neither BKB nor Blademail will do the trick. Witch Doctor's Death Ward is a great example of an ability to watch out for: it goes through Untouchable and BKB, plus WD is not the source of damage so Blademail doesn't work. In this case, invisibility is probably your best bet. Break is also a problem for you, because it makes you suddenly MUCH more vulnerable to right-clicks. If an opponent builds a Silver Edge, you may want to build one of your own to escape (and also do lots of damage).

As a noob, I put these reactionary "AHHH! SAVE ME!" items in my spacebar item slot so it's easy to deploy when something bad starts happening.
(Please note that I'm joking a little with this stuff. I do use other key mappings and you should too. Dota 2 is a game with a high skill ceiling and as someone content to scratch the surface of that, I encourage you to dive in and be [way] better than me.)

Picking Targets in Team Fights

In team fights, remember that Impetus is best served at a distance. Ignore that melee hero who's trying to get up close and personal. Focus the back-lines. It's not like most melee right-clickers are a big threat to you anyhow. Silence and kill their casters. Trade with their ranged heroes. Pop your heal early and watch them struggle to take you down.

Here's the thing: You can do a lot of damage, so if the enemy team doesn't stop you, you can kill their supports (and carries). However, if they choose go on you and you're itemized well, it is very difficult to take you down. If you're having a good game, this often means either you can waltz around killing who you want, or you get focused hard and hopefully your team can make the other team pay for that.

Teleporting Out When You Get Caught Out

If you're caught out of position, pop your heal immediately but don't TP until they have cast their stuns and roots. There's a good chance Nature's Attendants + Untouchable will keep you alive through the stun and the TP cast time. If you have a BKB as well, it can be nearly impossible to kill you before you escape or your team shows up.

Neutrals to Watch For

For neutral items: Look out for Grove Bow and Gossamer Cape. More range is obviously good with Impetus, and Gossamer Cape works really well with Untouchable.

The Late Game

Hopefully at this point, you have done a lot of damage and have not died [much]. Hang out with your team mates and back them up. If an opponent tries to go on them, silence the opponent with Orchid and melt them with Impetus. Focus the back-line first in team fights. Once you have what you need not to die, focus on attack speed and damage items. Hurricane pike is good for mobility and for gap-open and it builds from one of your core items.

More Items for More Situations

If you're taking more nukes than you'd like, get an Eternal Shroud for extra HP and magic resistance.

If you're having trouble with an opposing over-powered right-clicker, consider Butterfly.

If people keep getting close to you and Impetus doesn't feel as good as it should, definitely get Hurricane Pike, but also maybe get a Daedalus or Revenant's Brooch and just do lots of damage.

If someone over there is healing and you want to stop it (and you want more stats because you want to be generally tankier), get Eye of Skadi.

If someone over there is healing and you want to stop it (and you want more armor because you're taking physical damage) get Shiva's Guard.

If someone over there is going ethereal and it's costing you kills, get a Revenant's Brooch. In fact with the +70 damage and +20% spell lifesteal, this could be a solid pickup in any match, especially if an enemy has a lot of survivability.

Assault Cuirass is good if there are many other right-clickers in the game.

Mjollnir is good if the enemy has creeps or illusions.

End-Game Neutrals

Paladin sword is good. Enchanted Quiver is good. Telescope is good. Giant's Ring is hilarious. Pirate Hat is like *PEW PEW PEW*. Other neutrals that give attack speed or damage or make you even harder to kill are also good. I sure do miss Ballista. LOL.

Strategy in the Late Game

Continue not dying and continue doing lots of damage. Always have a creep split-pushing lanes with Enchant (but don't feed them when you know the enemy team is there). Then, hopefully, you win.

On Using Enchant

Enchant is a Strong Slow

Hasty update having played with the new Ench facet

Damn the "range increase on Enchant" perk (and the additional range on enchanted enemies it provides) makes this much more of a viable spell for combat and initiation. Just played with it and it felt much more like part of the kit. Might update this more later, but it's pretty straightforward - stay far away, do damage, kill the enemies. BOOP!

And don't forget to farm neutrals with it when the clock strikes Neutrals.

END UPDATE

I haven't said much about Enchant. It's not core to my strategy, in part because usually my attack range is larger than my cast range, so I just go Orchid > Impetus when I initiate. That said, it can defintely help you get away and keep an enemy from getting away and should be used for this purpose. 50%+ movement speed for 5 seconds is a heck of a slow!

Always Be Split Pushing

You can also use Enchant to jungle, but mostly I use it to push lanes and AFK farm. Stealing an opposing ranged creep is very strong because it can stay behind the wave (so it doesn't die easily). Also, because ranged creeps are piercing, they to an additional 50% damage to most other lane creeps which stacks nicely with Enchant's bonus damage. Enchant is a decent way to add additional pressure to lanes in the late game while soaking up a little extra gold.

Lead Them a Merry Chase

One of my favorite things to do with my enchanted creep is to notice when its wave has reached an enemy hero, and micro it just out of lane or lightly harass the opposing hero. If they attack it, you can sometimes get them to chase and waste substantial amounts of time and/or miss lane experience.