IO - The Most Glowing Support

Introduction

Io is one of the best and most interesting support heroes in game. His Skillfloor is quite high. Don't give up on the glowing ball if it doesn't work out the first few times, this hero is worth to invest some of your time practicing. Some groundrules I'm following when playing IO to keep the frustration level low:

Do not play IO in soloqueue
Do not play IO without established communication
Do not play IO without a full team

IO is a very rewarding hero but he requiers a LOT of teamplay to work out. However, if you are still interested I'll tell you more about it in a second.

Pros / Cons

Pros

- Very flexible hero
- Great escape
- Global presence
- Insane buffing potential
- Considerable nuke early game



Cons

- Squishy
- High skillfloor
- Highly teamreliant
- A little itemdependent

Friends and Foes

Foes
There are actually three things that can kill you:

- Lockdown
- High Nukes
- Your own fails

So what does this mean? It means that if you are playing against a line up with several stunners and/or nukers you might want to reconsider your choice of hero. A Lina/Lion combo will knock you out for 101% sure. Keep in mind that you are a high-priority target - or at least should be.

Friends
Io plays very well with heroes that have normal movement speed, no or short length teleports and concentrate on right-click damage.
Why this? It is all about the tether. If the tethered unit moves a lot faster than you or teleports it is verly likely that the link will break - over and over again. On the other hand during the laning stage you need a lane partner who can protect you from enemy ganks. in any way. This can be a stun, a leap (where you can tether too, more about this later or overwhelming early kill potential).
A little list of good lanepartners for IO:

- Tiny
- Mirana
- Drow Ranger
- Dragon Knight
- Chaos Knight
- Juggernaut
- Sven


Bad laningpartners generally are:
- Slark
- Phantom Assassin
- Weaver
- Anti-Mage
- Axe
- Viper
- Spirit Breaker

Items

Like with every hero your items have to provide you an advantage. But what should this advantage be when playing IO? In my opinion IO benefits from those things:

Regeneration (HP and Mana)
Burstheal / Burstmana
Strength / HP / Armor
Movementspeed

This is how I feel you should choose your items.

I think the starting items are self-explenatory.

Soul Ring
Soulring provides you two things. It gives you burstmana and regeneration in three different ways.
You get enough mana to spam your spirits and to (almost) refill your carrys manapool. on top of that it allows you to lower your hp so you can heal your carry efficently with the regen it provides.

Don't pick up a Soul Ring every game. It is just worth it if your carry has some spammable skills like tiny. If your carry doesn't benefit from manabursts don't buy it. If you manage well the early levels you can come by with a bottle, but if you are new to io just buy a soulring



Tranquil Boots
Considering all available boots they are the ones that provide most of the above. They give you Regenaration, Armor and very high movementspeed. Since you need some survivability early on they are the boots of choice in 90% of the cases.
In my opinion the only other viable option are Arcane Boots. Considering that they are quite expensive and don't give a lot more mana than a Soul Ring only pick them up, if you have two teammates that REALLY need the additional mana. Be aware that this hurts your survivability a lot.

If you want to build a Guardian Greaves go for Arcanes. No boots at all is very viable as well, its just personal preference.

Magic Stick
Provides you with some cheap stats and a considerable burst. Pick it up if you feel like your laning setup will give you a lot of charges. Make sure to always be tethered if you use it.



Urn of Shadows
Urn is pretty much the standart item on Io. It gives you everything you want. You get a lot of regeneration and strength. Since you are going to be ganking a lot you will have the charges you need. On top of that you can use it in fight to heal your carry an insane amount.

Urn is a must-have Item in 95% of the matches in my opinion



Cloak
If you feel like you can easily be nuked down by the enemies just buy one. It's not super expensive and keeps you alive. Its new buildup into Glimmercape makes this one a must have.


Mekansm
Provides you with strength, armor and a lot of burstheal. Just look at the math: If you are 250 hp low and use it while tethered, the linked unit get a healing burst of 250 + 1.5*250 = 625 HP. This amount is even huge in the late late late game not to speak of at the 30 minute mark.

So if you get the money it is probably well worth buying one. The upgrade makes the manacost well bearable.



Ghost Scepter
Pick it up if you are getting right-clicked down way too fast. It's a very situational pick up.



Force Staff
If you have trouble positioning yourself or if your carry needs a little positioning help Force Staff is always a nice pick up. Pick this up if you have to be able to splitt up fast like against lich, dark seer or magnus.



Heaven's Halberd
This is a very lategame item. Normally you wanna pick up the talisman first. Get this item if you feel like the enemy has a hero snowballing totally out of control and your survivability is low. As it is very expensive be really sure you need it before buying it.

Skills

Ios skillset is fairly unique. You have no skills to handle anything on your own. Without a teammate you are literally useless. Just keep this in min all the time.

Tether

This is your absolute main ability. How it works:
You can use this skill on all your allies. While you are tethered to them, they get 1.5x all the healing, mana and regen you have. Let's say you have 10 hp/s regeneration. While you are tethered to an ally he gets 15 hp/s.
BE AWARE: The ally only gets the regeneration if you do too. This means that if you are at full HP and/or mana the tethered unit won't get anything. So be sure to always have some hp and mana missing. If you need to loose hp or mana just use Soul Ring or Overcharge

The second thing tether provides is a 20% movementspeed bonus to you and the tethered unit. While you are tethered to your carry you can easily chase down running heroes or just travel the map faster.
The last thing Tether provides is a slow. Every enemy unit that crosses the tether gets slowed by 100% for 0.75 up to 2.25 seconds. Be aware that this is not a (mini)stun. You can't interrupt an enemy or hinder him to cast a spell.
On top of that if you use this skill form over 800 units away from a unit you will leap up to this unit.

How to use this skill

Try to be tethered as much as possible. Use this to your carry as often as possible. Try to provide regeneration by using items on yourself or by just not being at full hp/mana. Whenever your carry is engaging in a fight make sure to be tethered to him. He can position himself and chase better, on top of that he regenerates more and by moving smart you can slow the enemy.
Use the leap to escape dangerous situation. Use every friendly unit that is in an appropriate distance. This can be creeps, heros, summoned units. Be aware that you can NOT tether the courier.

Little tricks using this skill

- Cast the Tether 5-6 seconds before engaging. So after getting the enemy slowed by forcing him through the tether you can immediatly retether to your carry to enforce a second slow
- Use the leap that tether provides you to overcome unpassable areas like cliffs or trees
- Use the leap to cut down trees by leaping through them. You can create better vision in your lane or while pushing to avoid ganks
- Use Tether on a creep while walking down a lane to gain some speedbuff

Spirits

This is your nuke and damage spell. Activating it will cause five spirits to circle you. They do minor damage to enemy units if the pass through them. If they hit an enemy hero the spirits explode and do 25 to 100 damage each. By using Spirits In and spirits ou you can control the radius in which the spirits circle you. This is how you can aim them. Be aware that those skill are toggle skills. So be sure to deactivate them if the size of the circle fits your purpose.

How to use this skill

Use this skill to harass the enemies in lane or to provide some additional damage during ganks or teamfights. Just practice in aiming them. In the early game hitting all five spirits is a considerable nuke that can make kills happen. There is not much more to say about this skill than practicing using it.

Little tricks using this skill

- The spirits provide a very limited vision. You can use this to scout.
- Invisible heros will make the spirits explode. This can be use to determine the position of invisible heroes in your lane.
- By pulling the spirits very close before they end you can deal a massive aoe nuke right around you, this can be used to jungle some camps if you need farm or to get the finishing blow on an enemy.
- They look scary, pubplayers will run away from the spirits in most cases ;)
- The spirits do a little towerdamage. Be sure to get them up if you are pushing.

Overcharge

This skill is what makes Io so incredibly strong. By toggleing this skill on you will loose HP and mana per second. In return you and the tethered unit gain 5% - 20% damage reduction and 40 - 70 additional attack speed.

How to use this skill

This skill needs some getting used to. While in the early game it's more of an offensive skill, as 40 attackspeed is a lot that early on it transitions into a very defensive skill late game. Use it sparly in the beginning. Just use it to score a kill by buffing your lanepartner a little or to loose some hp and mana to provide regeneration.
As soon as teamfights start the defensive potential of the skill is more important. Use Overcharge to minimize the damage your carry recieves. 20% is a LOT of damage reduction. Just use overcharge while pushing towers, teamfighting, ganking or getting ganked.

Little tricks using this skill

- As mentioned before use this skill to loose hp and mana
- Early on you can use this skill very punctual. For example if you got ganked and you are running away from a drow. If you just toggle on and keep running you will die. But if you wait for her arrow to be in the air and just toggle on to reduce the damage and toggle off again you barly loose any hp and you highten the chances of you both getting away.
- This skill allows you to get roshan earlier than usual
- Make sure to turn that skill off properly or you will degenerate massivly

Relocate

The one skill everyone fears. Io can teleport anywhere on the map and bring along a unit he is Tethered to. After 12 seconds Io - and if a unit is Tethered to him the unit too - teleports back from where he came from.

How to use this skill

Use this skill to gank other lanes. Just Tether to your lanepartner and tell the other lane you are incoming. If they are smart they will stun the target and you can teleport right on the head of the enemy. After your carry got a good meal you can just take him back from where you came and continue laning. Use this whenever you see an opportunity to catch somone out of position or if a lane needs a gank. Be sure to communicate well.
Be aware: You can not stop Io from teleporting back, so be sure that from wherever you teleport from, you still want to be there 12 seconds later. On top of that enemies see the relocate on their minimap. There is also a small animation on the ground before you arrive.

Little tricks using this skill

- You can use this skill to swap your lanes. For example Tether you Tiny, teleport him top to gank somone then Tether to the offlane Juggernaut and teleport him back with you to the safelane. Now Tiny is offlane and Io, Juggernaut are safelane.
- Use Relocate to safe a dying carry in a teamfight by bringing him back to base and to rejoin the fight with full hp and mana.
- Use Relocate to teleport somone who died from your base into the enemy base to finish
- Use Relocate for whatever comes to mind, the sky is the limit with this skill

Gameplay

General
- Never be on your own. You don't have the skillset to survive or kill on your own. The only time you may be alone is while you are warding, but even then be sure to have a secure escape route.
- Don't be at full HP - Your main value lies in providing regeneration.
- Never Relocategank if you have no vision on the other enemy heroes.
- Kite as much damage as u possibly can, only right-click attack if you don't get attacked yourself
- Be Tethered as often as possible

Early Game
- Do not feed. This is the golden rule when playing Io
- Like every other support place wards, stack as many camps as possible and pull if needed.
- Provide regeneration to your lanepartner
- Harrass as much as possible. You can easily use your Spirits to do so.
- If you can try to play aggressive with your carry. Use the advantage in movementspeed and regen your carry has and score some early kills.
- Adapt your skillbuild accordingly to the enemy lineup. If they are playing very aggressive concentrate on maxing out Overcharge else try to max out Spirits
- Deny as many creeps as possible
- Use Tether and Overcharge to get your carry out of risky situations or to score kills.
- Always use Healing Salve or Tangos on yourself and heal your lanepartner by Tether, he gets a higher amount of heal out of it.

After Level 6
- Keep doing the same things as before.
- Communicate with your other lanes to look for oppertunities to use Relocate
- Try to get some aggressive Observer Wards up
- Punish every enemy that is out of position with Relocate
- Use Relocate to engage in teamfights or to teleport somone back to base to regenerate
- Stay in a defensive position during fights, fully concentrate on landing your Spirits and buffing your carry using Tether, Overcharge and all your items.
- Use Relocate to swap lanes if needed or to get a hero from another lane to accomplish a push.
- Do NOT use Relocate to ward or scout it is not worth it
- If you are very underfarmed you can jungle some camps using your Spirits

Late Game
- Fully concentrate on buffing your carry
- Use Relocate almost only defensivly
- Only Relocategank on 100% sure kills, don't risk teleporting your carry into a situation where he might die
- Use Overcharge a lot
- If needed safe your carry with Relocate even if you will die

General DON'Ts
- Do not Relocate alone both ways, take an ally with you at least for one travel
- Do not be on your own EVER
- Do not stand in the frontline
- Do not be at full HP
- Do not use any item un Tethered

Summary

Overall you can say Io is a hero you can play a lot and you will never finish learning new stuff to do with him. He is unbelievable strong and fun but can be as frustrating to play.
However I believe I have given you everything you need to start your Io career. Feel free to modify and test on your own because after all this is just my humble opinion here. Every kind of feedback is very welcome.