QoP - No Pain No Game (Detailed)

Table of Contents

Table of Contents
Hero Introduction
Author Introduction
Stats & Lore
Pros & Cons
Skill Info & Skill Strategy
Skill Build & Usage
Item Build
Game Presence
Enemies
Video Demonstration
Final Comments

Hero Introduction

Queen of Pain is an intelligence hero that is both a ganker and a semi carry. She has high mobility with her blink great aoe spammable ability coupled with her ult she can just do massive aoe damage throughout the game. With her snare and high burst potential she can gank very efficently while also being able to control her lane with the aoe damage she can do. With the farm she gets easily she turns into a semi carry late game. She is a very strong hero and you will see her a lot in both high tier games and pubs so its a good idea to learn this hero well.

Author Introduction

I'm a dota player who has been playing this game for many years now since back in 2006. I try and teach as many as I can different ways to play this game effectively so they can have fun while doing well. I stream Dota 2 often on twitch.tv and been trying to make as many detailed guides as I can for the Dota 2 community both written and video guides. I'm still trying to perfect my guides they still need a lot of work and would like any constructive criticism.

When making my guides I keep in mind both competitive play and lower play and try to describe events for both so I my guides reach more players. I do play on team its called TB a team that was made during the Dota 2 beta but is advancing nicely. Can check us out or watch us play @ www.twitch.tv/afkz

Stats & Lore

Lore:

The Ecclesiast-King of Elze nursed a desire for pain--forbidden pain. In a less prominent political figure, such desires might be considered unwise, but in a monarch of his stature, to satisfy such thirsts would have threatened the virtue of the Divine Throne itself. Therefore he turned to his dungeon full of demonologists, promising freedom to whoever could summon a personal succubus of torment and bind it entirely to his service. The creature who arrived, Akasha by name, visited upon him such exquisite torments that he named her his Secret Queen, and he began to spend all his spare moments submitting to her clever torments--eventually abdicating all his responsibilities in his pursuit of the painful pleasures that only she could bring. Queen of Pain could bring him to the brink of death, but she was rune-bound to keep him alive. At last the King's neglect of state brought on an uprising. He was dragged from his chamber and hurled from the Tower of Invocations, and at the moment of death, Queen of Pain was let loose into the world, freed from servitude--freed to visit her sufferings on anyone she deigned to notice.

Pros & Cons

Pros:
High mobility
Huge burst potential
Great aoe damage that is spammable
Strong mid laner

Cons:
Low hp pool
Level dependent so needs to solo
Position dependent

Spells Overview

Shadow Strike:

Hurls a poisoned dagger which deals large initial damage, and then deals damage over time. The poisoned unit has its movement speed slowed for 15 seconds. An instance of damage is dealt every 3 seconds.
Range: 400 Duration: 15.1 Seconds Movement Slow: 20%/30%/40%/50% Damage over Time: 30/40/50/60 Damage: 50/75/100/125 Cooldown: 20/16/12/8 Mana cost: 80/100/120/140
Blink:

Short distance teleportation that allows Queen of Pain to move in and out of combat.
Range: 700/850/1000/1150 Cooldown: 12/10/8/6 Mana Cost: 60
Scream of Pain:

The Queen of Pain lets loose a piercing scream around her, damaging nearby enemies.
Radius: 475 Damage: 85/165/225/300 Cooldown: 7 Mana Cost: 110/120/130/140
Sonic Wave:

Creates a gigantic wave of sound in front of Queen of Pain, dealing heavy damage to all enemy units in its wake

SCEPTER UPGRADABLE: Reduces cooldown and increases damage. Range: 700 Radius: 100 (Starting Radius) / 800 (Distance) / 300 (Final Radius) Damage: 350/475/600 (350/530/725*) Cooldown: 135 (100/70/40*) Mana Cost: 250/360/500

Skill Usage

Shadow Strike:

This spell does a lot of single target damage at max rank, but its main use is the slow. At max rank it slows the target by 50% which lets you kite the target if needed or easily keep the target from escaping from you or your team. Early on depending on how your playing it will be hard to get all your spells in due to the intense mana cost so make sure you judge your mana well. At Max rank it does 125 strike damage then ticks for 60 damage every 3 seconds for 15 seconds so that means this spell alone does 425 damage if you get all the ticks plus its slow simply amazing.

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Blink:

Blink is well just one of the best spells in the game in my opinion it gives huge mobility to either get in the fight to position yourself well or to get out and escape a gank. This allows you to get in positions other people with her hp pool wouldn't be able to get into and still survive. Even though this spell gives you huge bonus to your survability make sure you understand its cooldown and mana cost. Always same mana so you can blink out if necessary and the cooldown on it in the beginning is long so be wary of blinking in to do damage and not being able to get out because of its cooldown.

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Scream of Pain:

Scream of Pain makes her farming extremely good while adding to her burst damage as well. You can use this spell to farm, to kill, or just simply push a lane so you can rune control extremely well. Using this spell to push a lane before a gank is a great idea because it pushes the lane allowing you time to leave and still come back for exp later on you want to use this for rune control as well.

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Sonic Wave:

Sonic Wave has a huge aoe and does massive damage. Early on you will be able to burst down people extremely fast with this coupled scream of pain. Whats unique about her is not only does this give her good burst damage on a hero if she position herself well enough she can do this burst damage on multiple heroes. When you get scepter in mid game it reduces the cooldown on and if you don't see a kill attempt soon or a team fight you can use it farm or push the lane out.

Game Presence

Early Game

More often than not you will be playing QoP as mid so for early game I will mainly be going over rune control it has a huge impact on who will win the mid lane. Luckily QoP has some of the best rune control in the game and to be good w/ her early on you want to abuse this to its fullest. 15 seconds before each rune spawn you want to use your scream to aoe the creep wave and while you do this try to get some harass in on the hero too if possible, but the main goal here is to push the lane. Reason behind this is your forcing the wave to their tower so when you go for the rune they have to choose to contest you for it and loss experience and gold or continue farming and let you have the rune either way its a win-win. You can use your blink to get the runes faster if they are contesting you for it just keep in mind that at early levels your blink has a longer cooldown so watch your positioning. Other than this you want to make sure you keep your last hits up if you get a good rune and there is a gank possibility try to make the most of it. Ganking is strong on her however don't force it when you feel the lanes will be able to win if you try to force it you can get you or your team killed plus your lossing farming in mid lane so make smart use of your time.

Mid Game

At this point in time the amount of burst damage you can do is insane and can easily take out a squishy with a combo. So whenever your ultimate is up you want to look for that chance to do so just don't bait yourself or your team to their deaths its a big mistake a lot of new plays do. Keep your farm up though even when trying to get kills that means even jungling at times if need be to keep the gold flow going you need the items to be able to semi carry effectively.

Late Game

The late game for QoP really varies from game to game reason being is you don't play her the same each time at this point it depends on your team make up. You may be more of a supporter going in cc setting up kills, initiator, or you may be filling that semi carry role and need more dps. Each of these roles have different play styles and different item builds which I have gone over in this guide. You want to master all the different play styles of QoP because you never know which one you will need next and can make or break the game.

Enemies

QoP is a very squishy hero and if caught in a stun or silence she can be bursted down very easily because of this heroes that can catch her in those crown controls easily are very dangerous for her just have to know this and keep good positioning to avoid these at all cost. These heroes you will also see in mid lane often as well so its good to know what to do against these.

Doombringer
When laning against Doombringer you need to harass him a lot, but dont sacrifice your last hits for it though. He doesnt put up much of threat until your are both level 5 then he will be able to nuke you really hard until you finally level up but thats just the beginning. When you do get 6 you dont have to worry about the mass nukage you just received its just now you have to be scared of doom which really counters you. Its a 11 second silence you cant use any spells or items during this and very vulnerable to dieing. The only way to counter this early is to have good positioning all the time and keep track when his ult is on cooldown. Late game linkenss sphere can counter his ult, but a good doom with nuke first then doom so build it with caution.


Bloodseeker
This will be a hard lane throughout the game because he will more than likely have a stout shield plus with his regen after last hitting creeps makes harassing him extremely hard. Plus you have to deal with his silence that lasts 6-9 seconds depending on the rank. You dont really have to worry about being killed by him until he reaches level 6 so when this happens you need good positioning like always. Being by the tower really helps that way if he tries to kill you, you should be able to counter it. Never let your hp get low here try to always be full or 3/4 health at max or he will destroy you early.


Drow Ranger
Early on this fight is pretty fair her damage is about average just have to watch her harass and be able to counter harass better which you should be able to do with your nuke. She does have a silence you have to watch out for other than that no nukes at all the problem is though the later the game gets the harder this match-up becomes for you because of the way she scales. So use your advantage that you have early and be cautious later on.


Silencer
This guy is really annoying for you in your lane and especially in team fights. His ult is a global 3-5 second silence depending on rank on top of that every time you cast a spell you are silence for 3 seconds from Last Word when its maxed out which is huge for QoP because she has to cast a lot of spells fast. When facing this guy you will more than likely need BKB to able to do what you need to in a team fight. Early game he will harass you with Curse of the Silent which makes you loss mana and take dot damage for 5-8 seconds depending on rank or until you use a spell. So when he does this you want to use your blink the second he uses it to prevent the damage and the mana loss is more than the blink cost.

Videos

QoP Basics Guide - This is for those who would rather learn from watching and hearing than reading. A lot more of these are coming including gameplay, tips and tricks, and much more. Play Video

Final Comments

QoP is an amazing hero in all tiers of play including top tier she has so much mobility, burst damage, great farming, harass, awesome team fighter. She just excels in the right hands and can turn the tide for any team. I recommend learning this hero even if you dont plan on playing her just so you know what to expect and how to face her because you will face her a lot. Shes a top pick and will be for a very long time. Long live the Queen of Pain!

This guide is far from finished it has a lot more work that needs to be done, and I will constantly update this and on that note if there is anything you would like to see in this guide or have any constructive criticism please leave a comment. I'm trying to provide quality guides for the Dota 2 community.


Coming Soon..
- Will add the reason why I build the items that I do in depth till then my video explains why.
-Skill Build explanation, its in my guide atm but will add it to the written one soon.
Ex. Getting Ultimate at level 6 is not always a good idea often you will wait till level 8 or 9 to pick up the first rank unless you feel you have the mana and option for a kill with it at 6.