Ersatz.Facsimilie's guide to Tinker

Introduction

Hello, and welcome to my guide to Tinker. I've played a lot of this particular hero, and decided to write a guide.

As of the time of writing it is a work in progress, and I aim to make it as in-depth as possible.

Tinker is a ludicrously powerful hero in the right hands, with the capability of refreshing the cooldowns of all his skills (and most items). Due to this he is known as a high skill floor hero.

Pros and Cons:
Pros
+Insane disable
+Insane nuking damage
+Can always find farm
+Great pusher/rat
Cons
+No panic button
+Game can be easily ruined by ganks
+High skill floor
+Terrible lasthit animation

Skills

LaserLaser

Range: 550 (1100 with Aghs)
Disarm duration: 3 (6 on creeps)

Damage
[color:#ff0000]80/160/240/320[/color]

Cooldown
14 secs

Mana cost
[color:#ff0000]95/ 120/ 145/ 170[/color]

Laser is a very useful skill, and I would recommend taking it as your first skill 9.9 times out of 10, as it deals pure damage AND has the 3 second disarm. It also deals more single-target damage than Rocket at level 1 after reduction.
The disarm is very useful in lane, as it can be used to make an enemy miss their attacks, thus allowing you to take a lasthit or deny. For this reason I can recommend keeping laser at level 1 if you are having trouble lasthitting as the mana cost increases by a great deal as you put levels into it.

As previously mentioned, the laser deals [color:#3300ff]pure[/color] damage, meaning it is not reduced by magic resistance. This makes it very useful vs enemies with magic resistance, such as Huskar.

Worth mentioning

Miss chance is negated by

Monkey King Bar
Damage is reduced/negated by Pipe of Insight, but not reduced by magic resistance.
Negated by Black King Bar
Quite a long animation, but you can cancel the backswing.
Can be used on roshan.

Heat Seeking MissileHeat Seeking Missile

Range
2500
Damage
[color:##ff0000]100/ 175/ 250/ 325
Cooldown
25
Mana Cost
[color:#ff0000]120/ 140/ 160/ 180
This is your pickoff skill, and also useful for harassing enemies out of lane. With Aghanim's Scepter, the total damage dealt is doubled. It has massive range, but the damage drops off quite quickly in comparison to his other spells. It won't target invisible heroes or heroes in fog, and can be disjointed v. easily by blinks, euls, phase shift, going invis, or spiked carapace.
Worth Mentioning

Instant cast time. Practically no animation.
Useful for turtling, spam march> rocket> rearm.

March of the MachinesMarch of the Machines

Cast Range
300
Damage/robot
[color:#ff0000]16/ 24/ 32/ 40
Duration
[color:#ff0000]6
Mana cost
[color:#ff0000]145/ 150/ 165/ 190[/color]
Cooldown
[color:#ff0000]35[/color]
Your zoning and farming skill. Can be used to reliably stack the large camps, and the medium camps if mud golems don't spawn. No longer affects magic immune units as of 6.82. Somewhat useful in lane, as it forces your opponent to move back out of the aoe, and clears the lane to allow you to grab a rune.
Worth Mentioning

Fairly long cast time, most of it is backswing. Cancel that ****.
You can use it to clear and stack most jungle camps. If mud golems spawn, man up and hit them if you have your boots. Just ignore them otherwise.

RearmRearm

Channel time
[color:#ff0000]3/ 2/ 1
Mana cost
[color:#ff0000]150/ 250/ 350
Here we are, the hero-maker, the signature skill. It rearms just about everything, apart from Hand of Midas, Black King Bar, Arcane Boots, Helm of the Dominator, Refresher Orb, Linken's Sphere, Bottle, and Necromonicon. That said, some of these items are quite good situationally, mainly BKB and Linkens. BKB is good if vs mass stuns and silences as it allows you to go to town without being interrupted. Linkens if you are vs a few single-target spells or disables. Necrobook is also passable as a 7-th or 8th- slot item.
I usually take this at level 9 or 10, as its main utility comes from having Boots of Travel rather than any particular spell. If taken earlier you should get an early soul ring, as the mana cost for level 1 rearm is equal to the mana gained via soul ring. This can be useful for clearing stacks. I would only recommend doing this if you have maxed march, typically if you are having trouble in lane, as it allows you to stack and clear the jungle very easily.
Worth Mentioning

If interrupted or cancelled, mana will be wasted and no cooldowns refreshed.
Level 16 will enable you to perma-hex (2.5 duration of hex, giving you 1.5 seconds to act before rearming and hexing again.
Mana cost of level 2 is quite hefty at level 11, so delaying it if behind is recommended.
Rearms blink dagger if you have been damaged in the past 3 seconds. Very useful if you are running away- rearm and shift-queue dagger is quite likely to work if timed correctly and not interrupted.

Addendum

This guide is a work in progress. Further sections on allies and enemies, build explanations and more in-depth gameplay analysis and description will be added shortly in the future.