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4 Votes

Slark, Short guide. How to really play him

April 12, 2013 by J.FoX
Comments: 11    |    Views: 30301    |   


shartlane orchid slark.

DotA2 Hero: Slark




Hero Skills

Barracuda (Innate)

Dark Pact

2

Pounce

1 3 5 7

Essence Shift

4 8 9 10

Shadow Dance

6 11 16

Talents

12 13 14 15 17 18

Intro

Hello.
I'm J.FoX, Used to be a professional gamer in CoD2, but this was 4 years ago and haven't played the game since.

I'm someone who learns stuff fairly quick and get better at games quickly.

lately I've seen alot of slark players, playing this hero wrong. So i decided to help the community out with a very build of my own.

This isn't going to be a very detailed build for lets say the person who just started playing dota, but for the players who got some games and havent played slark or are playing him but are having trouble.

PS. English isn't my native language so there will be some grammar/spelling mistakes along this guides way. hope you don't mind.

Where I lane slark and how.

I always lane slark at the easy lane, with a support or solo.
because slark is not a real lategame carry, its smart to run a jungler like naix in your jungle. this because if your game isn't going well you can always fall back on him.

Don't get me wrong slark can carry, but he is more like a semi carry.

how to behave in lane.

Slark has a strong nuke, i try to spamm that all the time, if opponent gets to close. However don't do it like this when you think he can kill you. when this is the case get your support buddy to help.

Some nice supports for slark are heroes that have a stun or a slow.

few examples of good supports: Ancient Apparation, Venomancer, Vengeful spirit. and alot more.

Explaination of my skillbuild, and item choice

So there is a discussion going on about getting the first ability named ''Dark Pact'', people tend to over do it or not skill it at all. As you can see in my skillbuild I'm getting this spell fairly quick.

Why ''Darkpact''?
Well as you may or may not know there is a purge effect on the skill, this means almost all debuffs are getting dispelled. examples, Dust, Track, but also STUNS. For this reason it's always handy to get one point in it fairly quickly.

Why don't you max ''Darkpact'' in the beginning stages of the game and max it at the end instead?
Darkpact is in my opinion one of the most important spells for slark, this skill makes you a good slark player or a bad one (Due to purge). if you are a experienced player you know when a hero will stun you and you just get out of it by this spell, but the thing is the higher you skill it the more damage it does to yourself. for this reason i keep it level 'one', because you are fairly squishy and the damage is there due to the 'pounce' ability (the jump).



Item choice: Orchid is your CORE item
. and I most often follow it up by Maelstorm, this item will give you the rightclick power you need. (due to fast attack speed, where your passive really benefits from and some nukes (chain lightning)
as you can see in the item build i've given you choices on what items to get for lategame. just get the item you think you need, let's say enemy has a windrunner or phantom assassin get a mkb. always make choices of items depending on the heroes the opponent has.

How to succesfully get ganks off.

Your ultimate gives you a passive, this passive gives you a massive movement speed bonus and health regeneration, but only if the enemy has no vision of you!

While most heroes have 1800 daytime vision and 800 nighttime vision, slark eyes are a little better.
his nighttime vision is something you can really exploit

Slarks vision:
in daytime 1800
in nighttime 1800





How to gank with slark in a nutshell

Step one. Find a target. (preferably one that's alone or squishy, when you think you can't kill him alone get a support from your team with you)
Step two. Make sure the enemy hasn't spotted you.
Step three. Ambush the opponent and Orchid him after that Pounce him and start rightclicking.
Step four. He's dead if he ain't Chase with ultimate if needed and rightclick/pounce again. (8sec cd)

So you see this gank didn't include 'darkpact' (aka Purge)
That's because it is situational. in the start (when you're squishy) you only use it for making sure people aren't stunning you. so you can rightclick without some seconds delay.

Ofcourse it's always smart to focus your ganks on the opponent heroes that are (with farm) a real threat to your team. but this is something you guys know.

heroes who WILL annoy you.

Nukers: Lion, Lina
(once you get your orchid it shouldn't be a problem)

Beastmaster (his vision from bird can really screw you over.)

and the most annoying of all

heroes with silence that you can't purge.
Doom and disruptor.

i suggest if those heroes are picked, not to play slark.

There are more but can't really think of them, remember if you time your Darkpact right one stun will never be a problem.

heroes you like.

squishy heroes, heroes without escape, slow heroes.

Special mention to Slardar and Bounty hunter. you can dispell there true sight giving ultimates with just one click on 'darkpact'.

My last words.

I hope you enjoy this guide. I know this is not really into depth and I know it lacks pictures and colours, maybe i'll add that in future.

this is my first guide, please use it and tell me how it worked for you, and rate this guide.

I could make more guides, thinking about launching the way i think about Weaver and Visage aswell. but for this to happen i want to see how this catches on.

Currently my slarks winrate is about 71%, and with this build i usually have really good results.

here are my game ID and such.
Record
694 - 656
Win Rate
51.41%

http://dotabuff.com/players/36914299/heroes
The winrate isn't something I'm proud on, I think it's a bad reference to my play lately.
this due to i havent played the original dota and had to learn this game myself ;)

Peace out and Have fun. Good day, sir!

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