Support-Killer (6.84 Update, Laning and Supporting) - A Guide to Tresdin

Introduction to Yasutsuna

Let's ward off boredom with music shall we?

Major Patch 6.84

The new items of DoTA 6.84 opened a lot of different possibilities for Legion Commander. Most new items actually works quite well with her. Below, I will cover a summary of the item for her and her new Aghanim's Scepter upgrade.

Regarding the new game mechanics, the game has tilted closer and closer towards early kills and less farming. This is, actually quite good for Legion Commander as her Duel makes her a very dangerous threat early on, especially during ganks. Just remember that farm is still important, do not always leave lane to gank. Just farm up.

Her Moment of Courage receive a very big buff and nerf (to me, it's more nerf) while the 25% chance lets you lifesteal more often, due to the 2.7 second cooldown it is relatively unreliable especially when you're Dueling. Although the lifesteal in increased to 55%, your damage early on is still weak. So maxing Press the Attack and Overwhelming Odds are better now.

The Aghanim's Scepter is interesting. But, if anything, I will put is as situational.

Lotus Orb is interesting for Legion Commander, but it is situational, mainly depending on your enemy composition.

Moon Shard is much of a late game item as it grants nothing but attack speed, which is kind of meh, to be honest. Mjollnr and Assault Cuirass is way better. However, when you have full items, you can get it for the buff.

Silver Edge is very good on Legion Commander due to the Break which was removed from Legion Commander's Duel some time ago. Also, the reduction of damage gives Legion Commander an edge in Duels.

Solar Crest is an interesting pick for Legion Commander if you picked up Medallion of Courage early on. But, I still prefer this on a support over her.

Introduction to Legion Commander

Tresdin lacks lane-control in so many manners, so I would like to use him to jungle as soon as the game starts, or in the most, once he reaches level 2. His skills, Moment of Courage and Press the Attack are actually made to jungle early. His role in team fights is to go for the painest support of the team with his Duel, since most support relies on their magic to fight, Duel is a good skill to kill them with.

LORE

Merits + Demerits

The Commander's Skills

Icons are from DotA 1.


From left to right:
Overwhelming Odds, Press the Attack, Moment of Courage, Duel

Type: Targets:

Active Area

Turns the enemies numbers against them, dealing damage and granting you 9% bonus movement speed per hero and 3% per unit in the 315 AoE for 7 seconds. Deals bonus damage to illusions and summoned units.

Use Overwhelming Odds to push your enemies out of lane or force them to back or heal. The damage early game is quite good and the movement speed bonus makes it easy for you to enter and retreat from battle. Max this first in laning so you can easily push your enemies from lane.

Type: Targets:

Active Allies + Self

Removes all debuffs and disables from the targeted ally and grants them bonus attack speed and health regen for 4 seconds.

Type: Targets:

Passive Enemy Units

When Tresdin is attacked, he has a chance to gain a moment of courage, instantly attacking again with bonus lifesteal.

Type: Targets:

Active Enemy Units

Calls the targeted enemy for a duel. Both you and the enemy will be forced to attack each other and will both be unable to use items or abilities. The victor gains 10 permanent bonus damage.

Best targeted on support since it will force both of you to be unable to use skills and items so please cast Press the Attack and/or Black King Bar before you start this. Note that, allies and enemies can illegally participate in this Duel, so it is vital for you to have Black King Bar. Also know that the range is 100, so you need Blink Dagger or Shadow Blade to use it efficiently. If nobody dies within the time limit, Duel ends as a draw and no bonus or whatsoever it give.

Items + Their Builds

This is the only build I found useful so far, but I'll try to find some additional ones.

Phase Boots allows you to chase down enemies and Duel them if needed, ignoring all the pesky creeps that might block you. Furthermore, since Moment of Courage proc when you're attack, it is a better choice to increase Legion Commander's damage compare to attack speed. Armlet of Mordiggian gives you extra STR which allows you to be meaner and painer in Duels. Since you have Moment of Courage, the life drain isn't much of a problem, unless you're very, very unlucky. REMEMBER TO TURN OFF WHEN NOT IS USE! As said in the skills, Blink Dagger is a core to Legion Commander since Shadow Blade can be easily countered by wards. It allows you to blink behind a target and Duel him or her before they can respond. Black King Bar is also a core since you don't want to be disabled to moment you blink in before you can Duel. This can also prevent other people from interfering with you during your Duel since a good stun will easily finish the duel with you losing. Depending on the situation, you might get Blade Mail instead of Black King Bar since there are right-clickers going about. But since you'll be targeting supports normally, it shouldn't be much problem. Still, this is something to be noted about. Assault Cuirass, since you need to take a fair amount of damage in a duel, having this armor generating item is a good thing. It also effectively reduces enemies armor so they can be killed faster.

Situational + Rejected Items

Situational Items:
Moon Shard
Never get this as your first few items until your damage is high enough. As it provides nothing but attack speed, it can be a little bit lack-luster as you need the damage to finish Duels and for Moment of Courage. This is a good pick in very late game when you are 6-slotted and have excess gold as the extra attack speed buff is very much appreciated.

Silver Edge
With this new item, it's really hard to decide on Blink Dagger or this. The Break allows you to cancel enemies' passives for a time, which is good, since Duel can't do it anymore. Just remember to hit him once before Dueling. I would pick this up to use as an initiation if my team don't rely on invisibility too much Mirana and Bounty Hunter.

Aghanim's Scepter
A very situaional item. It might be good if your enemy has one major threats and a few minor ones. You can Duel them, occupying them while your allies finish up the others. The only drawback? If it fails, you will be the dead one. Also, you need to be able to duel the target over long period of times, which isn't always good especially if the enemy are hard carries like Anti-Mage.


Rejected Items:
Lotus Orb
It allows you to mirror back most single targeted spells. Personally, I don't really like this item on Legion Commander. When she is Dueling, she must not be stunned in order to win. This does not block them and only reflects them back, which in a way, is kind of pointless and you're still be on the losing end in the Duel.

Solar Crest
While it might seem good on paper, it actually is quite mediocre, know that you lose all the benefits when you use it on someone as you can only dodge attacks from that one person and both of you will also become squishier as you give up the armor. If you want the evasion, getting Heaven's Halberd is better. IMO, this is more of a support orientated item who don't really need the benefits if they're good at positioning.

Runes

Haste: A good choice since it lets you hunt down enemies and Duel them, only take if your team doesn't need it. Don't touch once you get Blink Dagger or Shadow Blade.

Illusion: Not really useful for Legion Commander, not advisable.

Invisibility: This is your rune, especially in early game when Blink Dagger and Shadow Blade is not available to you yet.

Double Damage: This is also your rune, the bonus damage can allow you to finish off Duels faster.

Regeneration: Only grab it when you need it.

Laning with LC

Lane Legion Commander just like how you would lane any other carry. The reason why I take Overwhelming Odds early on instead of Moment of Courage is because you don't need the lifesteal since you're not suppose to take hits as a carry. If somehow, you keep getting attacked, getting an early point of Moment of Courage will keep your health at top notch.

Legion Commander items doesn't change whether she is jungling or laning, it just stays the same.

Jungling + Roshan

JUNGLING

Legion Commander

Moment of Courage

ROSHAN-ING

Legion Commander as a Support

Normally I wouldn't use this. To those players who are new to Legion Commander, I suggest you not to do this until you used her at least 50 times or so.

The beauty about Legion Commander is she can support and yet transits into a carry later on. Because her Duel doesn't make her kill steal, meaning she can Duel a target, let the carry kill the target off and she can still get the STR bonus.

Accumulated, she can easily get better items by kills and move on as a carry.

Friends + Foes

FRIENDS Windrunner

Basically, Legion Commander's friends are heroes can can stun or disable enemies, whether during or before a Duel. Before to allow Legion Commander to start a Duel easier and during to stun the enemy, rendering it useless. Good examples of these stuns are Chaos Bolt and Shackleshot. Fiend's Grip is very good since it will put an enemy useless for 5 seconds, long enough for you to kill them. Disablers that render people unable to attack is also very good, especially against auto-attackers. Such exmaples are Lion's Hex and Voodoo. On the other hand, Legion Commander;s enemies are those who can somehow react against him when attacked. Craggy Exterior is a good example. He's other enemies are those that can stun him during attacking, like Time Lock, Greater Bash and Bash, along with [{Skull Basher]]. Know that other skills will also affect you during a Duel, so activating Black King Bar is important, especially during a teamfight.

FOES

Heroes You Will Meet...

Difficulty: Easy or Hard

This goes back to all the depends again. If you were to meet Chen early on, it might be possible for you to chase his out the jungle. True problem starts when he comes to you with two creeps which possesses stun, he can easily kill you since going against two creeps with Chaos attack isn't very fun. But if you catch him off-guard, you can easily Duel him to death or just punch him until he gets away.

Solution: Map-awareness is the key here, try a little warding.

Difficulty: Hard

This is probably the worst thing that can happen, a jungling Lifestealer normally has Rage and Feast, which means he can beat you up quite easily. However, I don't think you will die here. Problem lies when you become underleveled and undergold. Early on, both of you can't really kill each other. But, in later on, with Skull Basher, Lifestealer can easily rape you.

Solution: Wardings, again. Avoid a direct confrontation with him. His Feast is the most annoying thing. If you really can't avoid him after two tries, immediately go to a lane and forget about jungling.

Difficulty: Medium

Thank God you're melee, then her ulti will nearly be worthless on you. Depending on the creep she gets, she can either rape you and/or kill you. The annoying part is she can remain in tip-top condition with Nature's Attendants, so you're at a pretty big disadvantage here. The only thing you can do is Duel her before she uses Nature's Attendants, since she is fairly squishy.

Solution: Wardings, again. If she really kites you to the max, just head back to the lane.

Team Fights + Solo FIghts

SOLO FIGHTS

Press the Attack

Black King Bar

Duel

Phantom Assassin

Blade Mail

Duel

TEAM FIGHTS

Overwhelming Odds

Duel

Duel

Legion Commander

Final Words

Well, with this I end my guide of Legion Commander. Since I am getting tired already, I'll leave the Friends + Fiends to a later date this week. (Well, it is Sunday now)

Currently, Legion Commander have not been released and I hope he will soon. Since this is not a one-man show, I would appreciate people giving feedbacks and cooments on this guide. Thanks!

A special thanks to:
- Dr. D for his formatting guide!
- Nubtrain for his tips about guide writing!

-Yasutsuna

Changelog:
19.5.13 - Guide started and published!
21.5.13 - Added section: Friends + Foes
22/5/13 - Added section: Heroes you will meet...

To-Do List

1. Wait patiently for Legion Commander to be released.
2. Get some replays.
3. Add a few more builds.
4. Add Section: All the Items
5. Add Section: Friends and Foes.
6. Add Section: Heroes you will meet.