(pa)TROLLING your way to victory, an (in-depth) guide on Slardar

Nothing is more sexy than voice of centaur roadrunner :)

and .... a point in slithereen crush and a early high damage lane partner always results in first blood. Viper, Juggernaut, silencer, ursa and even undying, they all work very well with Slardar.

initiate with sprint and you're a dead fish. You'll get whacked down before you can say 'ssssss'

-1 Puck's voice is much better!!!
Nah just kidding I voted it +1
Great guide but I won't be playing slardar soon as I hate carries. Helped me understand the hero better.
Now I really want to harass this guy in lane :).

Great guide, the only thing that i would change, this is just my opinion. I don't put any levels into bash until the stun and sprint are maxed. The idea behind this is that at low level lane phase, Sladar doesn't have a very good attack speed, so bash wont happen as often as you'd like. Sprint being maxed out before any levels of bash gives you a tremendous advantage on the battlefield; the speed it gives you, the fairly low cooldown, and the fact that it cost no mana is great. This again is just my opinion, since I've done this it hasn't failed me. But again, great guide. You might also think about adding Sange and Yasha, a great item on Sladar. Also add for the new players that when you stun an enemy, instead of running up on them and attacking, stun them, get behind them (or whatever direction they are going to run in) that way you can get 1-2 more attacks on them before they get out of range, that may make the difference in a kill or no kill.

You're wrong. Slardar is a carry. Granted he may not be the best carry but he is seriously ****ing strong 1on1 with bash and his ultimate. He needs a fair bit of farm to be effective, more than a hero such as Sven who only needs bkb/crit to start killing entire teams, but slardar is an awful support. Mana boots is a shocking idea.

Also the fact you listed storm as a top tier carry confirms your knowledge of the game is severely lacking.

Just a heads up to anyone that wants to use Slardar as anything other than a low level pub stomper... the hero is seriously miss categorized as a carry. I'll admit in "normal" tier and lower "high" tier matches he can be one hell of a pub stomp when played like this, however that is true with almost every hero and this is because not everyone understands all the mechanics within the game. After you get into upper "high" tier into "very high" tier games it becomes a different story. Slardar just doesn't have the utility or skill kit to be able to stand up against top tier carries in any game close to competitive, he will be shut down almost every time by a AM, PL, Storm, etc... that just carry so much better. Most pro's and Meta Game analysts place him as a very very SOFT carry at most but more often in the support/ganker/initiater position. His core item set should be Arcane Boots, Blink Dagger, then situational and tanky items.

His skill build should be as follows (in almost every case):

1) 0/1/0/0
2) 0/1/1/0 (or 1/1/0/0 if you are getting ganked heavily)
3) 0/1/2/0
4) 1/1/2/0
5) 1/1/3/0
6) 1/1/3/1
7) 1/1/4/1
8) 2/1/4/1
9) 3/1/4/1
10) 4/1/4/1
11) 4/1/4/2
12) 4/2/4/2
13) 4/3/4/2
14) 4/4/4/2
15) stat
16) 4/4/4/3

Focusing on Slithereen Crush doesn't do much for you except STRONGLY hinder your mana pool. all you get for the increased mana cost is 50dmg and a half second of stun and this hero already has significant trouble with his mana supply. Where as if you level bash it has no mana cost, gives you significantly less burst dmg but allows you to chase longer with bash procs. Admittedly if you are in a situation where the burst dmg is needed to get in and out quick before the enemy's team can show up then by all means level Slithereen Crush but hopefully you get a quick Arcane Boots to support the skill and your ult. Also, if you are going to level bash even once... focus it. 10% chance to bash is ridiculously low and not worth spending the skill point on unless you are willing to commit the 4 skill points as soon as they are possible. But once you get bash to level 4 it is a 1 in 4 hit (not guaranteed) bash. Also, sprint is another all or nothing skill, if you get sprint maxed out by level 8 and you have Arcane Boots then you are only 18 movespeed off of max when sprinting. Drum of Endurance also boosts this even more to max move speed with just the basic endurance aura, Arcane Boots and sprint, that's even without using a charge from the Drum of Endurance for the 10% extra movespeed. I almost guarantee that if you max bash then sprint you will spend more time with your enemy stunned and ultimately more dmg done than you ever would with the added 150 dmg and 1.5 second stun from lvl 4 Slithereen Crush considering bash is a 1 second stun every proc andit has no cool down so you can proc the extra dmg theoretically every hit if you got lucky. That also leaves a lot more mana for Amplify Damage which, at 25 mana, doesnt seem like it costs a lot of mana but it does when your base mana pool at level 7 is 312 which is only 3 Slithereen Crushs at level one and only 2 at level 4 not including casts of amplify damage.

Ultimately if your team already has a carry and you dont think it is a pub stomp, use the build i described and play in the 3/4 position (roamer/soft support) focusing on supporty items such as Arcane Boots and Drum of Endurance

Starting a game without any salve is not a good idea.
If you take some heavy damages early game (If you are ganked at level one, or are against an ennemy who have a powerfull nuke.) and are down to something like 100 hp, if you only have tangos, you will regen your hp very slowly, and during this time you will have to stay under tower and not take aany last hit if you don't want to get killed, so you can loose more than 45 seconds of farm if that happens.

Always take a set of tagos and a salve at the start of the game, especially on meelee heros.

Might want to consider adding an armor debuff option. If there are a lot of tanks and/or escapes on the other team I usually pick up desolator and assault curries, which removes 31 armor in conjunction with his ult. In fact, there really aren't a lot of times where this doesn't work. The only time where it would really fall flat is when you need a lot of crowd control, but in those situations it's not a great Idea to pick slardar anyways. It can also serve as an offensive defense against squishy casters and disablers such as lion, zeus, and shadow shaman as you can potentially kill them before they can even finish their combos. Might be tricky against shadow shaman and bane, but if you do wind up against them, it wouldn't be a terrible idea to get a shadow blade if thet are giving you a lot lot of trouble...

Outstanding Guide! +1!!

well you already have two bracers, why not finish Drum of Endurance? it makes your Sprint even better. +1 anw because it s still a solid guide.