Invoker-What joy it is beholding me!

Introduction

Well hello there, this is my very first guide and I'm looking forward to feedback so I can possibly create more guides on higher quality maybe?

Invoker is my favourite char, one of the hardest to master but in my eyes he is exactly what I imagine under "caster" as he's not limited to just four abilities but to basicly 14, once he is mastered, it's a force to recon with.

In this guide I won't exactly explain everything in numbers, just basics, if you want to know the spell damage values, what exactly they do and all those numbers, go to http://www.dota2wiki.com/wiki/Invoker

Basics

Who is Invoker?

Invoker is whatever you want him to be, he can be built to fit any role but whatever way it allways tends to one and single and that is carry. Invoker scales stronger and stronger as game goes on and all those items just make him even more deadly. Invoker will not reach its full potential until he is level 25 but all along the way he is very strong, his spells can dominate lane, crowd controll team fight and boost survivability of his friends. Inovker is standart carrier of a Force Staff, Scythe of Vyse and/or Drum of Endurance. He is known for his sunstrike that deals great damage anyhere on the map, also for his chaos meteor that can burn to ashes even the strongest, and those who met invoker in 1v1 surelly know his cold snap and its stunlocking potential

Keys to good Invoker

• Knowing basics (last hitting, tower cycling, tp scrolls)
• Knowing Invoker- combinations for spells are important, nothing's worse than forgeting if ghost walk has two Quases or two Wexes
• Knowing Enemy- ex.: you want to gank Bane, consider invoking forge spirit even though it will be low leveled and not dealing much damage, but once he casts Nightmare on you, you can force the forge spirit to attack you,removing the nighmare and be free to kill Bane again.
• Inner clock- timing, timing and more timing, a lot of Invoker's spells have delay before they take effect, you need to time your spells to nesure their hit.
• Positioning- Invoker yields quite a few aoe spells, good positioning for the maximum effect is needed.
• Predicting enemy movement- antipacipating when it is more likelly an enemy won't move or they continue to move in one direction is the key
• Teamplay- someone missing their ultimate because some Invoker cast a tornado, that no good... Someone hitting everyone with their ultimate because some Invoker cast their tornado at right time, that good. Communication is win!

Skills

Quas- each level gives permanent strenght boost as we ll as increases health regeneration considerably when an instance of Quas is active, generally boosting survivability
Wex-agaility bonus, active instances boost attack and movement speed
Exort-permanent intelligence boost and each orb adds extra damage to your autoattacks

Now to those 10 spells he has, I'll start closer to Quas heading down to Wex then to Exort and back to Quas.

Cold Snap- if there is something Invoker is good known for it's Sun Strike and Cold Snap, this skill ministuns and deals extra damage every time target takes damage above 10 points, so you basicly cast it on whoever you want to die and then attack him for extra damage. I allways start with leveling quas and with it getting cold snap right away, on level 1 on you manage to land only like one or two autoattacks so it's rather a harras or punishment for harrasing you, later on it's really anoying thing, it basicly makes enemy unable to run or do anything. Use it for early ganks, later on on finishing running heroes or to break channeling spells, be aware that it has long casting range and deals damage on cast and thus can disable healing salves and Clarity potions, it is also instantly casted so you can throw an auttoattack and while it's on the way, cast it at him.


Ghost Walk- two Quases and one Wex makes this an awesome escape, almost instant invisibility, you are slowed and slow enemies around you so if they don't have any revealing items use it to slow them down and buy your friends some time either to finish them off or to run away, be aware that the slow gives your presence away as well that the spell costs a lot of mana so keep a mana reserve and when you need just a bit more mana to cast it, using Magic Wand might be good choice. Also stay away from Queen of Pain and Razor they can still kill you while invisible, aslo Axe can force you to attack him thus breaking your invis.


Tornado- two Wexes and one Quas, this thing sends a tornado that applies effect simillar to Elul's scepter of divinity on any enemy it passes along and also deals some damage once they land, depending on the level of Wex it can travel insane distances. Use this to initiate, buy yourself or your friends some time or to finish off fleeing enemies, aslo good for pushing a tower.


EMP- three Wexes, does exactly what it sounds like, drains mana and deals damage, 0.5 damage for each 1 mana points drained. has some build up time during which smart heroes usually run so you might want to use Tornado to trap them in the aoe for a while, be aware that it does not affect tornadoed units neither units without mana (melee creeps)


Alacrity- two Wexes and one Exort gives this castable buff that increases attack speed and damage of whoever you cast it on (only friends), affects siege creeps too. cast it on your hard carry and watch the rape, or just on yourself


Chaos Meteor- two Exorts and a Wex creates this aoe nuke, it calls down a meteor that deals damage once it lands and then rolls in the direction away from casting point dealing more damage and also some afterburn, takes some time before the meteor lands so they'll most likely run so use it when there's a chaos or in conjuction with other heroes' spells like Vacuum


Sun Strike- three Exorts, this one's pretty anoying, another aoe nuke that has global cast range, it splits the damage to everyone in the aoe so you want a surgical strike that hits only one hero, usually used to finish off fleeing heroes that think they have escaped and thus are not paying attention. Note: reveals the strike area(use to check rosh) and aslo has quite long cast down time and the effect is (hardly) visible so they might try to dodge it.


Forge Spirit- two Exorts and one Quas- creates these guys, you basicly don't want to use this before you have both quas and exort on 4th level as it creates two of them instead just one, forge spirits are ranged creeps under your controll that deal quite good damage on very good range and as well can melt down enemy hero's armor with each attack. Very useful guys as they greatly boost your damage and even if the enemy stuns you the forge spirits can still attack.


Ice Wall- two Quases and one Exort creates a virtually impassable wall perpendiculary to the direction you were facing, it deals some minor damage over time but the main reason why to cast it is that it slows any enemy that tries to pass. With higher Quas level it can slow up to 140%, I mean really 140% does that mean they will crawl backwards with 40% speed or what? Use to stop enemy from going somewhere, either escaping or chasing you or your friends. Also it is quite wide, you can turn to side from your target and cast it so they will suddenly find themselves in the middle of it. Warning: slows only movement speed, not attack speed( still devastating on melee heroes)


Deafening Blast and finally the last one, one of each elements creates another interesting aerial spell that knock backs and thus breaks channeling spells and then disarms anyone in the direction casted, deals some minor damage, although it requires one of each elements, the main is Wex as it lenghten the time enemies remain disarmed by the most noticable amout.

Combos

Tornado+ EMP+ Cold Snap
Excelent initiating combo, Tornado traps everyone in place for the EMP to build up, once they land choose one and cast Cold Snap on them, EMP explosion will stun them and leave them with a lot less mana, now finish them with autoattacks, on single target it's really devastating, especially if you silence them with Orchid Malevolence and should they manage to get out of range, hope that the 25% damage return will finish them. For team fights the Cold Snap is not that important, maybe save it for later on fleeing heroes.

Note: EMP has delay based on wex, and tornado has the duration of disable based on the level of Quas, on higher levels of Wex and Quas, the duration enemies are tornadoed is longer than EMP's build up time so do no longer cast it midlessly in a fast succession. Instead wait with the EMP for a while.
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Cold Snap+ Alacrity/ Forge Spirit(+ Tornado)
A ganking combo against single or a few targets, cold snap is devastating with alacrity or forge spirits, it will keep them locked in place, should they manage to escape use tornado to either finish them or buy yourself time to get closer again.

Forge spirits+ Alacrity
Standart pushing combo, forge spirits together with the insane speed/damage of your attack will quickly dispatch any creep wave in no time giving you a lot of gold.

Chaos Meteor+ Deafening Blast
After you carefully positioned yourself you call down a meteor, then us defeaning blast so that the enemy gets hit when they are in the aoe of the metor and they get pushed in the way of meteor staying in the aoe for a lot longer than they wanted.

Can't think of anything else, easy enough, use Alacrity on hard caries, have Forge Spirits up before every fight once you can have two of them, use Tornado to save some ***es, Sun Strike to finish off fleeing heroes that you can't reach or to deal damage to those that won't move for a while for some reasin and don't have any friends around and finally Cold Snap to mark anyone to die. rest of the spells either in combos or situationally.

More info in the tips and tricks section.

Items

Although Invoker is item dependent, there are justa few items you need to work good enough, therefore you can afford to buy Animal Courier, occasionally observation wards or setnry wards or Smoke of Deceit and even a gem of truesight.

Starting items

With Quas you gain extra strenght and health regeneration, that means you do not need a load of consumables and stat boosting items, but you have kinda poor starting damage, therefore I recommend Blades of Attack, they give you just enough extra damage to deal more damage than two strikes from a melee creep, increasing last hit opportunity window. That's basicly all you need to start with, buy an Animal Courier if nobody else did otherwise use the remaining money for a Iron Branch as start for the Magic Wand and a patch of tangos, they will give you same regen as three orbs of lvl 2 qu*** effectivelly healing over 200hp during 16 seconds up to three times, you make more use of them than with a single Healing Salve. Buy a potion of Clarity if you feel you don't need either of them.

Core items

Magic Wand is a must have, it rids you of Iron Branches and gives you this priceless active, really this will save your *** more than enough times, especially good if you need mana for Ghost Walk. Then get second Blades of Attack to boost your last hitting chances and finally Boots of Speed to turn them into Phase Boots, these are definitely best for Invoker as with Wex he will be literally gliding across battlefield and without Wex you will need that speed anyway, they also give extra damage that goes well with attack speed from Wex.

Then any items that give you at least +100% mana regen and +100hp.

Orchid Malevolence build

Works well with Quas- Wex build, useful vs dangerous casters.

Two Sage's Masks to give yourself the needed mana regen. Now get a Bracer for survivability. Then buy a Robe of the Magi and Quarterstaff to upgrade each of the Sage's Masks into Oblivion Staffs, these further boost the mana regen as well as gives you more damage and attack speed, finally buy the recipe and get Orchid Malevolence- I find orchid a best core item for Wex-invoker as it gives you mana regen, attack damage and attack speed, it's active works very well with cold snap as should you catch a hero alone you can kill him 1v1 without problems with the silence , Cold Snap and finally the 25% damage boost. In teamfight silence the most dangerous casters, like Leshrac.

Eul's Scepter of Divinity build

Useful build for starters, you relly on your teamates and support them with your spells while learning the combinations, keeping yourself out of the real heat of fight. Also gives you more movement speed, useful for even greater speed with Wex

A Void Stone for mana regen, then a Bracer for the strenght boost and also start for Drum of Endurance, then rest of the items for Eul's Scepter of Divinity. The item you might want to get next is a Drum of Endurance to further boost your movement speed and finally an Aghanim's Scepter to remove mana cost of Invoke and let you invoke a spell anytime you need.

Linken's Sphere/ Scythe of Vyse build

A classic build for any element you choose but generally I go for Quas- Exort with thse ones.

A Void Stone for mana regen then an Ultimate Orb to greatly boost you stats. Now up to your choice whether you want to play more offensively or defensively go for either items for Linken's Sphere or items for Scythe of Vyse also of you feel you need an escape item a Force Staff is a common item for Invoker. If you went Quas- Exort you might want some attack speed, start building a Mjollnir for a lot of a ttack speed and the damage boost that it offers.

General

Post core

• Aghanim's Scepter is your best choice as it further lovers your Invoke's cooldown allowing you to chain cast all of your spells in short time span. Also removes mana cost, very usefull since you will be invoking a lot of spells and each Invoke cost 80 mana on lvl 4.
  
• Black King Bar/ Linken's Sphere- this is pretty obvious, should they have a lot of targeted disables and you feel threaten get a Linken's Sphere if they have non-targeted disables or you're getting focused too much for Linken's Sphere to handle or you just need cheaper solution, Black King Bar is best choice.
  
• Shiva's Guard- excelent mid-late game choice for protection, you can even buy the Platemail a bit earlier and finish it after the core.
  Compared to Rod of Atos this item gives extra health in form of armor (EHP), a bit more intelligence but mainly it's active is aerial and deals 200 magic damage, and when not active it still has the attack speed slowing aura. So even though it's a bit more expensive, I find it a better choice than Rod of Atos any time.
  
• Mjollnir- a lot of extra attack speed for non-agility heroes, works pretty well with exort build. And with speed there are more rolls for that extra damage which bounces around, with alacrity it's gonna be a real storm. The static shield is rather just a fancy addition, but it can turn them off attacking you.

Luxury

Should you be really really rich and the game still hasn't ended and it still seems like you need to buy stuff to win

• Eye of Skadi for the amazing slow and as your Forge Spirits already melt down enemy armor, a better choice than Desolator to fill your unique attack modifier slot, not to mention the amazing stat boost that greatly boosts your health.
• Heart of Tarrasque to keep yourself healthy.
• Crystalys or Daedalus to boost your damage that will work well with your speed of attacks with Wex.
• Monkey King Bar if they have a lot of evasion.

Situational

• Animal Courier if nobody else did and if you have the money
• Drum of Endurance- if you already have Bracer, this is a cammon item for Invoker, as it gives extra movement speed that wex can work with, but if you went quas-exort and someone else already got it, you don't really need it.
• Medallion of Courage extra armor always comes handy, a bit extra mana regen as a bonus, use the armor reduction when you're not focused and you need to deal a lot of damage quickly, best used with forge spirits or alacrity (and cold snap), also excelent for killing rosh.
• Hood of Defiance for magic protection, never bad idea. Buying a Cloak early can help with survivability greatly if playing against caster heavy heroes. Hood of Defiance is an excelent upgrade that also gives a lot of extra health regen, with quas it's almost as effective as heart of tarasque (not really, but still good enough), finally if nobody else goes for and you already bought the hood, Pipe of Insight is a kinda cheap awesome upgrade.
  
• Force Staff is a common item on invoker, this will save you a lot of times or your friends, or get you more kills or whatever. If enemy has a lot of powerful melee heroes with slows, using this can help you get out of heat of battle and with icewall possibly even escape(if for whatever reason you couldn't cast ghost walk before).
  
• Ghost Scepter Good if you get focused by a lot of dps heroes or after everyone casted their nukes, you phase out and are still able to cast, your forge spirits can continue to deal damage, enemy will have to ignore you, this item's phylosophy is about your teamates, should you get focused by a Ursa or Bloodseeker then this will ruin their plan, now if your friends kill them you just rematerialize and continue in the team fight, if they fail well you return to join them in grave, isn't that awesome?
  
• Rod of Atos- meh this item. But overally gives quite nice health and intelligence, but still is not very cost effective, slowing one hero for 4 seconds would be awesome early game but by the time you would get this, teamfight would be a lot more common than meeting a lone hero. Only option would be rushing this but I've seen none guides that would have it as a core. I would rather save up a bit more money and buy Shiva's Guard or Scythe of Vyse.

Items of choice

These items I don't exactly recommend but some might find them to their liking


• Blink Dagger expensive and no bonuses besides not very reliable active, but very useful for positioning. However your spells can be positioned easyly, only chaos meteor and icewall are position heavy, otherwise you can use tornado to buy yourself time to get into position.
  
• Manta Style though giving mostly boost for agility which is not very helpful for intelligence char, the active is good to fool enemy and allow you to execute advanced tactics, or to just enhance your damage
  
• Power Treads, personally I prefer Phase Boots over all other boots but Power Treads are viable option too if you need more stat boost, moreover with good micro you can use the changable 8 point boost to enhance your survivability and casting potency, though with +150% mana regen you won't really have to care about mana managment. They give more attack speed so prehaps they would fit more Quas-exort invoker.
  
• Shadow Blade, well you already got Ghost Walk but if you really like invisiblity or you need an escape with lower cd and lesser mana cost, this blade gives it and also some damage and attack speed boost.
  
• Soul Ring is not at all bad item but it's meant for strenght heroes or overally heroes that have low manapool and lesser intelligence gain and invoker is not one of them, it however works as a failsafe for Ghost Walk if you manage to have Magic Wand without charges or worse not have Magic Wand at all (shame on you!), otherwise if you are not going for mana regen and going just for a Force Staff it can fund your spells while Quas will regen the health loss.
  
• Tranquil Boots are stupid choice, your Quas will have you at full health any time you need, however for wex-exort build(about which I do not talk here, because I don't think it's a good idea, I mean Quas gives you strenght and health regen for survivability, with only Wex and Exort you gonna deal a lot of damage but you'll be very squishy and that's not good) it can be an item of choice to keep you healthy...
  
• Veil of Discord is actually good item, it boosts your armor by 5 points, intelligence by 12 points and thus +12 damage and gives you +5hp/s regen that will allow you to regenerate even with Wexes or Exorts up, but the main reason is it's active. Let's have some numbers: all heroes have natural 25% magic resistance, meaning that those awesome numbers bellow your spell might say you will deal 1000 dmg but as long as it's magical damage you'll deal only 750dmg to heroes, unless they have Cloak or Hood of Defiance, then you'll deal even less. Veil of Discord will enhance the damage by 25%, unfortunatelly it will enhance the damage after magic resistance reduction, meaning you'll deal only 93,75% of damage stated in label, if they don't have any other magic resistance boost. Still very useful if we take in account the aoe and duration of the debuf.
  
  

Skill build general

Whatever build you select I recommend allways take Quas first, taking Exort sure gives you better last hit chance but leaves you with sunstike, lvl 1 sunstrike is ****, you get no reward for successfully landing it and it cost a buckload of mana. Taking firs Wex is even greater nonsence, the bonus is hardly noticable, and lvl 1 EMP cost more mana than it drains, if you even manage to land it...

Level 1 cold snap however has a potential to deal up to 180dmg on level one should you successfully land two autoattacks, lvl 1 Quas gives you same regen as a Headdress or Helm of Iron Will and also extra 2 strenght points, so no need to buy another two Iron Branches.

Then unless you go Wex- Exort, you want to get at least 4th level of Quas before lvl 12 and then max out the other two. Quas lvl 4 gives you +12hp/s regeneration that will keep healthy and aslo gives you permanent +8 strenght bonus, that's basicly another Bracer or Ogre Club.

Gameplay Quas-Wex

You start with Quas for the regen and then get Invoke on level 2, invoke Cold Snap and get another Quas, now you have enough regen so start getting Wexes, it really is up to you what you need, if you're getting harrased too much, pick more Quases otherwise get Wexes, up to level 12 you want to have lvl 4 Quas lvl 2 Invoke and rest skillpoints goes to Wex. After this you might want to start with Exort so you can get Deafening Blast or Alacrity or Ice Walland eventually Forge Spirits, after 4th level of Exort consider giving few levels to Wex again or alter it like I did, finish with Quas

Early game
You basicly want to go mid, get as much last hits as possible, deny anything you can and harras with Cold Snap, best is when they get creep agro then they'll pay double time, should they be stupid enough to close your tower, cold snap will most likely kill them, pick runes if you need them and use them at your disposal.

Whenver you're full health have Wex orbs up and exploit the damage from your Phase Boots and the speed of your attacks to get ALL the least hits, if you get hurt pull out Quases and heal up to full and then Wexes again

Once you have Phase Boots start ganking, ping and Cold Snap your target so your allies attack them too and get an easy kill.

Mid-late game it's all about team fights, stay with your team and cast those combos I mentioned, silence dangerous enemies, and do all the things I already wrote about...

Note: consider casting defeaning blast instead Tornado when your friends already casted some of their disables as Tornado removes enemies from a fight for a while, ruining the opportunity that was given.

Note: Wex+ Eul's Scepter of Divinity+ Drum of Endurance+ Phase Boots and their active= fastest char ingame at all times, no longer need tp scroll as you will get anywhere in a second (just a joke, allways have a tp scroll on you).

Gameplay Quas-Exort

As quas exort your main spells are going to be Cold Snap, Sun Strike, Wall of ice and Forge spirits.

You again start with Quas for health regen and Cold Snap, then Invoke and another Quas now you want to start getting Exort and keep harrasing and last hitting, it's extra easy with damage from Exort, should you get harrased too much pick another Quas otherwise Exort is better, you want to get 4th lvl Exort and 4th lvl Quas and start invoking Forge Spirits then a Wex to have acces to all spells, especially Ghost Walk.

Your main spell is now Forge Spirits, if you stand agains single hero you you have a priority target in teamfight, Cold Snap and Forge Spirits are devastating. Anytime it seems a teamfight won't come soon, send Forge Spirits down a lane to get you some farm without risking your life standing there. Your teamfight spell should now be Chaos Meteor, it does enormous damage but you want at least second level of Wex so it lasts for a while. Position your self, wait for opportunity and cast it down, to enhance damage use defeaning blast to send enemies in the direction of rolling increasing time they take damage as well as disallowing them to escape. Best opportunities are when they are somehow disabled, Black Hole or va*** are best as the get all of them into single place for super heavy damage.

Keep leveling Wex and Exort until it's maxed then rest goes to Quas.

Tips and tricks

• Sun Strike

  
  Sun strike is mostly used for finishing off fleeing enemies but it deals enormous pure damage anywhere on the map, standart scenario: enemy bellow 50% health knows enemies are on the other side of the map and feels safe, he wants to kill a creep wave alone to get some gold and then he will retreat to heal, foolishly he stands alone surounded by your creeps getting free farm and is not very likely he will move anytime soon, sun strike divides its damage equaly to all enemies in its aoe but it does not count with friendly units meaning this guy will take full damage, if he survives there still chance that the creeps will finish him off.
  Use sunstrike to deal heavy damage to unaware opponents, mostly standing and waiting for their opportunity for last hits, this will force them either retreat to heal or stay and fight with less health. Sunstrike is very powerful nuke, even when it won't get you last hit use it on enemies that are not going to move anytime soon because they are stunned or for melee heroes that are engaging believing themselves stronger than their target and tryingt to outpower them with autoattacks, sunstrike will make them regret the same way Purification would.
  Finally for quas-exort invoker, you can use sunstrike on stationary enemy before you hop out of forest and cast cold snap on him to have him even more weakened and ready for death.
  
  

• Forge Spirits

  
  Any time you are around a lane and not going to need them for teamfight invoke and send them with standart a-move down the lane not worrying about them, they'll get you a lot of last hits and they push the lane without you even caring, they let you run around the map preparing for a big fight while still getting you farm and bringing imballance to the lane eventually making the lane push itself with cumulation of ranged creeps, then whether you win or loose the teamfight, this lane is pushing towards enemy tower, should you loose, enemy has to choose if they want to push your tower or defend theirs leaving you time to respawn.
  
  

• Chaos Meteor

  
  This thing does enormous damage to enemies unfortunate enough to be in its aoe for too long, upgraded enough it can alone kill even the strongest heroes should they panic and run away in its way receiving more and more damage, use this together with Scythe of Vyse or Eul's Scepter of Divinity to make sure enemy is going to be in the aoe then use defeaning blast to enhance the time they will be there(knocking them back in the way of rolling).
  
  

• Rescuer

  
  You have more than enough spells that will disturb enemy movement and their plans, use them to save your friends, tornado will remove everyone in its way from the battlefield for a while clearing way for your friends and buying them some time as well interrupting enemies that were trying to cast something, same does defeaning blast but instead removing from battlefield it just knocks them back, even that is enough but it also disarms their attacks meaning ranged heroes won't be able to attack, but are still able to cast spells. Finally we got here icewall that will close any pathway the same way Fissure would except that your friends can pass, enemy can still blink through but if they have that option, none of your spells would really save your friends from that. Another option is using sunstrike or forge spirits to deal damage and scare off the enemy.
  
  

• Roshbuster

  
  Your forge spirits can tank damage from rosh, with some micro you can send one of them back once its low health and letting it contionue dealing damage while the other is tanking damage, use alacrity on yourself or your carry to deal more damage, use cold snap to break the spell block or if it's down already cold snap will greatly degrade rosh's damage output, you can use one of your forge spirits to scout the are if enemy is closing in. To warn you, chaos meteor, defeaning blast, ice wall or EMP seem to have little to no effect on rosh.
  
  

• Cold snap

  
  Besides using this skill mindlessly when you just want someone dead, it can be extra deadly early game if casted in the right time:
  Should an enemy be targeted by your tower, cast it on him to make him regret, even if you have very low health, the enemy won't be able to hurt you if he is simultaneosly attacked by a tower and your attacks .
  Another good time is when they attract your creeps' agro, however normally this will last only for a while before the creeps return to attacking other creeps again, but if you get into pushing mood and your creep wave still has a lot of creeps alive while enemy has just a last ranged creep, worst mistake enemy can do is to try and deny it (especially if they're melee), once the creeps start getting closer to him, cold snap him and watch him unable to move as he is getting stunned every time coldsnap stun's cd is down from all those attacks, these moves are deadly.
  
  

• Tornado

  
  Tornado makes target unable to do anything for the duration of Quas, on 4th level this duration is 1.7 second, use it together with spells that have delay to ensure a hit, for example sun strike has delay 1.7 so if you cast it once the enemy is hit by the tornado they will take a hit once they land. Chaos meteor has a landing time of 1.3 seconds, use your inner clock to ensure the enemies find themselves in rolled over by a meteor once they land and, befory they have time to react, getting hit by a defeaning blast that ensures another one second of presence in the aoe of the meteor. However for these combos you need Wexat level two at least where the tornado will have range of 1200, on 1st level of Wex it's just 800 which is slightly more than your attck range. Eul's Scepter of Divinitycan be used in simillar fashion, it disables target for 2.5 seconds and has a casting range of 700.

Countering Invoker

• Black King Bar is an anoying way to counter Invoker as it will make most of his spells useless, defeaning blast, chaos meteor, tornado, icewall, all of these you can pass without noticing.
• Silencing invoker is also good idea, it's very frustating when you can't even change your orbs, but should it come after forge spirits were summoned and alacrity was cast, it won't really matter.
• Doom- ultimate counter to everything, beeing unable to change orbs to wex is bad enough but beeing unable to use Phase Boots to run is really cruel.
• Another interesting tactic vs Invoker that likes to cast chaos meteor is getting Blade Mail and intentionally walking along the meteor letting it damage you, fully upgraded metero does 325 magical damage every second, this damage return will tear the invoker's insides out, of course it will tear your insides out too, therefore it's a tactic for heroes with good strenght gain and powerful healthboosting items. I wouldn't recommend it.
  

Summary

Observe enemy, choose exactly what you need, all my builds start the same: two points to Quas, one Invoke, Magic Wand and Phase Boots. Now you have to choose what you need:

• Do they have a dangerous hard carry that needs to be taken care of? Try Scythe of Vyse build, it works both with Quas-Wex and Quas-Exoort.
• Do they rather have heroes with dangerous spells? Try Orchid Malevolence build.
• Do you lack a initiator? Quas-Wex and the Tornado+ EMP combo is great for bringing havoc to enemy ranks and let your teamates position themselves, later combine with Chaos Meteor as it is good aerial spell too, defeaning blast is aerial disarm, great to buy you some time against dps heroes.
• If you have an initiator and you want to go Quas-Exort, look if they have dangerous targeted spells, if they do, Linken's Sphere build is very good, if they don't, go Scythe of Vyse.

Don't be afraid to change the build to your liking, you only need at least 100% mana regen boost and some extra protection, either in form of strenght or if they have mostly autoattack dependent heroes, then armor. Like casting spells to deal damage? Try Veil of Discord, it boosts damage of your spells (not sunstrike, that deals pure damage, not Emp, that deals direct hp removal) and gives you more intelligence and hp regen. Like fooling enemy? Manta Style! Why not, there one time I had a strong melee hero getting my *** kicked, it was with illusion rune though, I picked it and had one of the illusions to run away while real me attacking him, melee hero doesn't have many ways of checking who is illusion and who is not, so he was chasing the illusion while getting heavy damage from real me, after casting his stun and killing the illusion it was too late for him to escape and I killed him. It's up to you what you like, there are only two items I would never take and those are Battle Fury(for obvious resons) and Refresher Orb (no need to refresh anything), some say that Armlet of Mordiggian is bad idea too, I don't say it is exactly good idea but if someone likes extra strenght and damge, why not...

Outro

There's a lot of work in progress about this guide, I want to create a build for quas-exort, then modify the quas-wex for caster purpoes (without orchid) and then after I collect some skills as wex-exort invoker, create a guide for that too.

I'm looking foward to feedback, maybe I can learn something from you that will come handy :)

Please excuse grammar problems.

20.7.2012 - Rebuilt the whole guide removed and added a lot of different stuff.