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Tango
Null Talisman
Bottle
Power Treads
Aghanim's Scepter
Blink Dagger
Force Staff
Refresher Orb
Necronomicon
Eul's Scepter of Divinity
Ghost Scepter
Shiva's Guard
Rod of Atos
So you're getting owned by loads of annoying late game heroes? Phantom Assassin, Slark, Slardar, Riki, Sniper... any of those names ring a bell with you? Well then it's time you learnt to play Warlock. I'll list his pro's and cons:
Pros:
- Incredibly reliable
- Absolutely crushes teamfights
- A beast of a pusher
- Has a sick heal
- Has easy rampage potential
- Survivable
- Golems surprise enemies with their burst damage
- Long range
Cons:
- Takes skill to lane/play PROPERLY
- Squishy
- Agh Refresher is countered pretty hard by Ember Spirit
- Close combat
- Long cooldown on ultimate
The two viable spots are:
1. Babysitting someone
2. Mid - CAUTION: Only go mid as him if you are GOOD at last hitting. If you ARE NOT then play him as a support. Sure you won't get as fast an ult and items quickly but it's better than feeding/failing mid.
You should pick according to how your team picks but I can assure you if someone tells you Warlock is not a mid hero they are a fool. True he doesn't have an easy way to push a lane without his ulty but if you get early levels on him ganking is a dream with him. You know his ult is basically impossible to miss right?
Reasons I think Warlock is a brilliant mid:
1. Has a very decent attack animation
2. He has the DoT to put on enemies
3. But he has the heal to save himself in tight spots.
4. His ganking potential is brilliant
5. As soon as you hit level 6 you can start pushing any lane you want.
Wrong. Very. Wrong. Upheaval is a ridiculously over powered skill, ESPECIALLY when the enemies don't have magic immunity. Sure it can be a bit annoying when they have magic immunity and can just stroll through it but by the time that even happens you should have played Warlock correctly and be smashing down their base.
My thoughts on his skills:
Q: Amazing later in the game, early on it's really meh and doesn't do much.
W: Can be utilised as a powerful heal or damage over time on the enemy. This spell is great to harass people out of lane when you're mid.
E: As I said it's over powered. Let me explain.
At level 3... saying you followed my build then you'd have level 3 by level 7. Let me repeat. You are LEVEL 7.
You stroll along to a lane put this HUGE AoE onto the enemies... positioned just behind them a little so if they ran forward they would hit your creep wave and enough space behind so when they run back they will just stop moving. And you channel the ability for 30 SECONDS. You maybe like omg now I can't move for 30 seconds... that's what the ENTIRE enemy team is feeling like too. At level 3 it slows the enemy's movement speed PER SECOND 21% up to 84%. Say you have someone with 400 movement speed... that in itself is pretty darn fast... well in 3 seconds over channeling they will have lost 240 movement speed and be left with 160 movement speed...
160 movement speed. And that's not even 84% reduction yet. That was only 60%. You realise the slowest BASE movement speed of ALL THE HEROES is 270? Yes that's right. 270!!!! You will have slowed them SO MUCH that they may as well have been stunned for 30 SECONDS.
So sure overlook this spell if you want but at Level 7 we're looking at basically a 30 second stun.
R: Amazing. You can't really miss and the stun even goes through magic immunity... So if you see an Enigma ulting a bunch of people, even if he has BKB, his black hole will end. Chains perfectly with the E and even if the enemies turn and attack you once you start chanelling your E just get your golem to go attack them. It gets a bit of getting used to to control the golem but I find it easiest literally just to left click the darn thing and move him round. When I'm chanelling with Warlock I normally just ignore him and focus on controlling the golem instead. What else are you gonna do with Warlock whilst he's chanelling? Now why I say level the Q later is because when you get Aghs having the Q can make cleaning up enemies with your golem that much easier. It'll still be pretty easy even without the Q. I'll just show you this video to persuade you :
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=s9zYCABEw1M&list=UUbZf8l0OKOxFH025hMytEEA
My skill build:
Level 1: W
2 - 4: E+W (favouring E over W)
5: Either Q or E depending on if the enemies have grouped up already.
6: Ulty
7 - 11: You can really skill whatever, for obvious reasons I then proceed to max W+E first and then continue with Q.
There's really not much to the skill build once you realise you can kill anyone with allies by just plonking your E down.
Default items are grand. Aghs and Refresher is what I get in the majority of my games. I once got Desolater but that was for pure lols.
Pushing:
So you just ported to a lane from mid or walked to a rune and got a nice rune to gank with. You popped out of nowhere cast your ult put your E down and watched all the enemies in the lane melt away. Easy triple kill for the team. What now? Run back to base or mid? Wrong. You shouldn't have used your W by this point and your golem could be at about 50% HP. If he's on full HP even better. Send your golem to every incoming creep wave. If he starts to get low walk him back to you and put your heal on him. What I like to do is finish the current creep wave, put my W on him so he tanks the tower, walk past the tower take the next creep wave easily go back to the tower hit it a few times and then tank the last creep wave - or just go straight down the lane and take the next creep wave ignoring the tower completely. This last creep wave your golem can get very greedy with. He should have about 1/4 of his time left and his hp should be very high so even if the enemies come to deal with the golem he can just stand there and hit everything without giving away gold because by the time he's low enough then he'll probably just tick out and end.
Teamfights:
Focus down all the stunners on the team first and foremost so that they can't cancel your E. As a rule of thumb only ult, especially later in the game when there at minimum 3 enemies in your AoE and immediately afterwards use your E. It's fine early to use it on 1 or 2 heroes because at that point you're really looking to gain a lead more than anything and any kills are good kills.
Friends:
Warlock fits most lineups although he works amazingly with Lich, Sand King, Witch Doctor... anyone who works well with Void will work well with Warlock. I can't actually think of one he doesn't fit. If you want a low-flame pub game too he's great to pick because everyone loves to see people pick supports and even when I mid as him most people are too confused to get angry.
Most people will be thrown that you're going mid as him but trust me it works. I beat a Death Prophet and Invoker as him mid. It wasn't hard, obviously I am good at last hitting which you NEED to be good at to go mid as him. For all their damage I had a heal. You could say why not just play Necrophos then?
Necro is worse because:
1. Awful attack animation
2. Doesn't have Warlock's E
3. Doesn't have Warlock's ult.
Foes:
Nyx
OD
Silencer... I guess
Pudge
Riki - if you don't get detection but that's pretty normal
But even then I have dominated against those foes before.
Who Warlock absolutely pwns:
Meepo
Enchantress
Sniper
Slark
Phantom Assassin
Tiny
Slardar
People who like to get up close and personal because if your E is done correctly they won't be able to get there
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