TwillyFSniper's guide to Sniper (for 6.83 )

Claymore for Shadow Blade is correct. I used to have Broadsword on here, but I fixed THAT. Shadow Amulet would make little sense first being a DPS carry truly. And my logic is sound. It'd not be if I didn't take Take Aim and said half of what I did say. Though I guess the Shrap Sniper build is not quite the same, so I guess I give you that. Yes, Tinker's Heat-Seeking Missiles hurt, but not enough to create an awful lot of problems if you build up your DPS. Just get the minions down, and build the dang lifesteal, heck makes me think I should have put Mask of Madness for this situation of high damage nukers like Tinker. Really what strikes me about this comment is how you act like you know all and a 2k MMR level player just told you what's up. That's almost funny because of how cruddy my MMR REALLY IS! (It's in the 600's!)

(I really need to fix the double bracket stuff on this guide, but oh well. I'm too busy.)

You forget his missiles will hurt you as you are squishy. All in all, improve you logic as to who to fight and fix Claymore for SB. Until then, -1

Your welcome. After all, it keeps trolls away. Still won't use it a lot. Still prefer Take Aim's ranged aggravation factor.

I'm sorry, but it's the grammar Nazi inside me that sent that :P

Also thanks for adding a Shrapnel build :D

It's a possibility (might do it to get the people who think DotA has a meta off my back), but there are issues to leveling shrapnel, particularly against higher range heroes. This is kind of a waste of time, since I already explained why I don't like it personally.
1. The damage output is really low. 12 DPS. With all three stacks lined up, 36.
2. It does not push towers anymore (that's a pity).
3. It costs quite a bit of mana to stack three times. 150. Razor's Q does a heck of a lot more damage than 3 stacks, and costs only 125 mana.

But, I can see why you would. After all, the slow stacks and the vision. But I do acquire it at level 3 with that in mind. I respect the community's opinions, however. I'm repeating myself, certainly. Editing in a build 2.

I'm sorry, but this is just an inexcusably horrific waste of a post. Please meaningfully contribute to a discussion instead of saying nit-picky junk like this.

So I don't break my own rule, I gotta agree with everyone else on this, Shrapnel is pretty beast right now, and gives you impact much earlier in the game than you would have otherwise. Consider adding in another skillbuild where you do max it!

^You made a grammar mistake... You said "It's simply to good not to take very early".
You should have said "It's simply too good to not level up early"

Shrapnel is good because of 3 things;

1.) It gives you amazing level 1 (And arguably later) team-fight. 3 Shrapnel charges means people just can't fight into you +1 without a major numerical advantage. Which means you can either guarantee yourself one of the 100/100 bounty runes, or get a kill as compensation.

2). It increases your in lane harass. Yes, you are right, Shrapnel is easy to dodge. But, well placed Shrapnel in lane is placed such that when the enemy goes into last hit, they start getting hurt by it. You can thus walk up to them, and start right-clicking. In combination with Headshot this gives you large amounts of slow, and thus lots of harrassing chip damage. It single-handedly makes you pre level 6 laning presence much stronger, which is important.

3). It makes you stronger through the mid-game into late. It gives vision for you to siege towers, and to seige them safely (Even if it doesn't deal damage anymore, you still get vision, which lets you be a great seiger. Especially since you can use it to stop rotations to towers when placed well). It gives you team-fight presence, because you now massive AOE slow. (And you don't level it up for the increased dps (Though that is good in prolonged fights), but because the slow scales really well.)

It's simply to good not to take very early, if not max first, nowadays. It's also the buff which made Sniper somewhat viable (Or at least less niche) as a competitive hero. So take it as you will.

I just read some mis-information...

You said that you buy that Broadsword for Shadow Blade. You buy Claymore for Shadow Blade so you may want to change that.

You make an interesting argument. I have now gotten sick and tired of people under-estimating Shrapnel as an ability though. Because of this I have gone to the trouble of seeing if MerliniDota talks about how good Shrapnel is ATM. I found one. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4lDfiVzXty0.

In that video he plays a solo offlane Sniper and he and a Bounty Hunter show off how good Shrapnel can be. Also in one of the games in the XMG 2.0 finals KuroKy shows us how devastating Shrapnel is if used well.

I take no offence to your comment about the Pudge not being good. But if he was bad he would never have hooked me ;) The only reason I survived was he was under-estimating Shrapnel, huge mistake. I think I was lvl 3 when he hooked me and I managed to use my lvl 2 Shrapnel and lvl 1 Headshot to kite him around (Old Shrapnel though). I went Take Aim at lvl 4 of course.

In that game I managed T1 tower at 6 mins in. Blink Dagger, Phase Boots, Bottle and Magic Wand 10 mins in. Black King Bar 15 mins in. I then proceeded with my standard Sange and Yasha then Eye of Skadi. That was a ranked game in which I was testing out the max Shrapnel first against humans. Never went back after that first blood *Sniffs and wipes tear from eye*

No offense, but there's no way you did that against a decent Pudge. He was bad to be killed by that. Probs greedy. Good players can EASILY dodge even a well placed shrapnel. I only use it to slow, haven't found use for it otherwise. Nobody is that bad in lobbies I see, and most have MMRs of like 800. Mine is only crud because the game is not well balanced, and I play too much Sniper. I can't get out because most of them play OP **** (sorry for that, but it's actually a nice word for what they are) heroes like Viper, Huskar, and Zeus. Then turn around and call me a noob because I play Sniper. Wow. I would still have it maxxed last if it wasn't buffed. After stats still. Not kidding. I gave your kind of Snipers the benefit of the doubt. It would work if it had a larger AoE. I use Take Aim because of the potential to completely outrange everyone, and this is actually really useful early. It allows for safe farming throughout the game.

OP Shrapnel is not. Shrapnel deals only 12 damage per second at level 1. It only goes up to 48 DPS under Shrapnel. It's slow isn't nearly as useful as safely farming and poking out of range, but I get it at level 3 just for slow and minimal creep wave clearing. Only time I get it until level 12. If we were talking about Razor's Q instead of Sniper's, I would agree with that. Just orbwalk and you just dealt damage comparable to Sniper's ult damage. Whoa. Makes me wonder why I'm not called a noob for playing him. Or Sven. OR EVEN CLINKZ. OR SLARK TOO. Not arguing with you there, but with the community.

I can at least take your argument into consideration, and actually farther than that. The others I can tell troll.

@Michimatsch- Interesting, but not reliable tactic. Headshot procs may be common and really painful, but leveling it first is not necessarily good to do because it is probability-based. Also, I'm considering getting rid of Daedalus, because it may not stack with Headshot properly to cause large damage. Plus, crits aren't reliable enough.

Wow. Why do I keep seeing people maxing out Shrapnel last?? Or skipping it entirely? Since the major change to the ability it is much stronger then it was. I'm not even joking, just look at the standard pro skill build. They will almost always do 4-1-4-1 at lvl 9 since that gives you the most damage. Until you have a good amount of attack speed Headshot is unreliable. And your comment about how Sniper players who prioritize Shrapnel over Take Aim and Headshot are idiots.. That's frankly extremely offensive, as I happen to pride myself on mastering the new Shrapnel. The amount of damage the new Shrapnel provides is better than the last one, can't remember the exact damage increase. But maxing it out first or second is the way to go ATM since Shrapnel is so cheap to use (50 MANA COST!!!! That's frankly nearing OP), has three charges, lasts 10 secs AND slows. What more could you want from an ability on a hero like Sniper?? Maxing Headshot+ Take Aim first is really not the best route to go, though I will admit that in some situations it is a good idea to do a 1-1-3 and then 1-4-4 against some heroes. But in 9/10 situations you should max Shrapnel first. You seem to really under-estimate Shrapnel like most other pre-5K MMR players do (I should know, I'm fairly low MMR myself, but the amount of first bloods I've gotten because I took Shrapnel at lvl 1 is insane. Seriously when you solo kill a Pudge mid AFTER he hooks you is frankly ****ing good {Sorry for the profane language})

I hope you take this comment as less of a flame but more of constructive criticism which could help your guide to become better than t already is. I think I will hold my +1 for now though.