Dota is Fun: Invoker

Introduction

Hi, I am Grimorum and I hope you find my guide helpful. I have played over 6000 games with invoker between Dota 1 and Dota 2.

Invoker was once an amazing Tier 1 hero; he was almost always banned or picked immediately. With 6.80 patch, Invoker might be a top pick hero once again! He is one of the top ten hardest hero to play, you must remember the orb combinations, and practice on invokergame.com and/or with bots. My recommendations works in most scenarios; adjust accordingly as you see fit.

Invoker combos and highlights are available on YouTube:

What is Invoker's Role?

Invoker is best played as a semi-carry. Normally, invoker needs to stay in lane until level seven and farm an important item or two. Invoker is too valuable to die, so avoid putting yourself in the front line after initiation. Positioning is supremely important for invoker; his best aoe spells are linear. Analyze whether you or your team should initiate. If the opposing team has better initiation, then you need to counter their initiation. My favorite section of this guide is about Tornado. To counter an initiation, always consider Tornado. It removes many buffs like Drum of endurance's active buff, Empower, Enrage, etc.

What Orbs Do I Focus?

If you are unsure, use wex build. EMP is invoker's best spell in v6.80. Cold Snap is Invoker's second best now. Ghost walk was massively buffed and tornado deals good damage with amazing range. Wex/Qua's EMP is great against heroes with small mana pool. Unfortunately, Invoker's low damage base makes it very difficult to farm and level without Exort. If you have 3+ carries on your team, go W/Q, but that game is probably too hard to salvage. This build has very good crowd control, but you are unlikely to get kills in a team clash. I really like the new EMP buff in 6.79. My favorite build is v6.80: Day Stalker.

4-1-4 got nerfed hard in 6.80. Spirits are more vulnerable and their range are reduced. Furthermore, Necronomicon received a nerf too. It is still a decent build. Consider this build when you are middle against SF/BS. This build hits single targets very hard, but does not have much mobility, crowd control, and lack early-mid game initiation.

Full Exort's Sun Strike is great against heroes with low health points; it synergizes well with Spirit breaker, Sand King, Naga Siren, Bane, Nyx Assassin, Bounty Hunter, Night Stalker, Storm Spirit, Nature's Prophet, etc. The biggest drawback to this build is that it completely relies on your team to initiate. Fortunately, obtaining Eul's Scepter of Divinity will allow you to execute sneak attacks on a lone player; however, do not initiate with Eul's Scepter of Divinity in a team clash. I would only consider this build if you absolutely need exort and have good gankers. Bloodseeker comes to mind.

Helpful Tips for Invoker's spells

Tornado can be used to stack creep camps by lifting them in at the spawn time. Tornado is a good spell to have ready against Pudge. If hooked, Tornado nearby anywhere asap and you might avoid Dismember. Tornado also gives a great area of vision! You can use it for Sun Strikes or hunt heroes in the trees. Tornado removes the following buffs:

Special Thanks to Mint & my brother for helping me test Tornado:

Debuffs Spells:

Debuffs Item's Active:

Debuffs Runes:

Invisibility
Haste
Double Damage
Regeneration

If timed properly, Tornado will ignore Spiked Carapace as long as carapace expires before lift duration.

Spirits with 6 levels of quas attacks further than towers. You can also block hooks/arrow by summoning spirit! Use smoke on Forge Spirits and have entire team backdoor by teleporting on Forge Spirits (Beware backdoor protection)! On Radiant's side, consider stacking ancients with Forge Spirit. Rune spawn is random, therefore, before the rune spawn, I like to send a Forge Spirit to destroy bottom rune at the 46th second and grab top rune at 55th second (during lane phase). Push lanes with Forge Spirits or scout with them. You could also pull incoming creep wave away from tower with a Forge Spirit; you can now attack the tower without enemy creep.

Cold Snap has 1000 range, but Invokers attack range is 600. If Quas is low level, cast Cold Snap with a distance around 300 or your next attack will not trigger Cold Snap because it will be on cooldown. Most of the time, it is a good idea to use animation canceling during Cold Snap's duration. Damage over time spells works wonders with Cold Snap. Note: the stun only triggers on damage greater than 10 after reductions (creeps does not trigger cold snap against heroes with high armor). HP removal abilities like does not trigger Cold Snap.

If Ice Wall deals 10 or more damage after reduction, it will trigger Cold Snap. Ice wall with two or more Exort will remove Templar Assassins refraction every second. Casting ice Wall in front of your tower can provide a great defense. Although opposing heroes are unlikely to be caught, you can destroy all the creeps with tower and Forge Spirits. Ice Wall does not necessary have to catch any enemy. You could use Ice Wall to block reinforcements. Ice Wall normally does not affect BKB/magic immunity users; however, if enemy runs into Ice Wall and activates magic immunity afterward, Ice Wall's slow lingers for approximately 1.75 seconds.

Meteor provides a small vision; Cold Snap that fogged target quickly! Double Meteor does not stack anymore; however, if you keep the distance between two Meteors greater than 275, Meteor will deal most of it's damage. Meteor with one level of Exort can be used as a scare tactic (Do not consider this without .). Meteor can also be used defensely; opponents will reconsider chasing you when meteor is following you.

Besides your team carry, Alacrity on Forge Spirits or siege creep is a great way to push towers from a distance.

Ghost walk can dodge certain projectiles. Invoke interrupts TP scroll, but Ghost Walk does not. Ghost Walk's slow aura is not blocked by magic immunity! In the lane phase, if you have QQQ orbs active, you could quickly hit WRV to Ghost Walk. Eul self, then shift QQWR works in Dota 1, but not in Dota 2 if an enemy creep is nearby. Perhaps Ice Frog will fix the auto attack bug one day. Ghost Walk and 7 levels of wex orbs provide near max movement speed!

This spell can push opponents on/off cliffs. If you invoke Meteor with EEW, a simple QR can invoke Blast after invoking Meteor. If you cast Sun Strike behind an opponent, but he does not run back, you could push him/her towards Sun Strike. Blasting an opponent can break trees if he/she backs into it.

Deafening Blast can also be used to "PULL" targets! Use Tornado or Eul first. If you time it properly and your target lands on Blast, they will get pulled towards you. However, this is probably one of the hardest things to do in Dota.

Works great with Eul's scepter or two second stuns by allies. If someone is using TP scroll with low health, but your Sun Strike will not hit him/her before he/she TP, then target near the fountain instead. Bloodseeker may discreetly guide your Sun Strikes with vision. Sun Strike provides XP if you kill the hero with it! If you are running back to fountain, consider using Sun Strike to farm a creep or two or hurt enemy hero.

Countered by Arcane Boots and Obsidian Destroyer's Essence Aura. Do not focus Wex build if you predict two or more opposing heroes will get Arcane Boots. You can lure opponents out of position with EMP. Casting EMP in fog or directly on the tower might conceal your spell.

If you desire, four levels of Quas can be obtained by level seven if you do not use the skill point yet at level six. Likewise for four levels of Exort.

Items

This is my favorite item. However, Doom, Silencer, Nyx, OD, and NS counters this item. I like to get this item after one of the following: Force Staff, Drums of Endurance, Euls Scepter, Rod of Atos, or Orchid Malevolence.

Great item for the Hybrid invoker. Activate this item after Silencer uses his ultimate. Enemies will charge in thinking they have impunity. Now is your best chance to Tornado, Meteor, Blast, and Ice Wall. On the other hand, if you activate BKB too early, Silencer can penetrate your BKB with ultimate.

Great mobility item in conjunction with force staff. Decent item to assist you in positioning for ice wall, cold snap, etc. I prefer forcestaff in most occasions. However, this item works well with max exort skill build. Eul/SS/Meteor/Blast deals about 1100 damage after reductions. Dagger can help you catch those elusive heroes with low HP like Anti-Mage, Slark, Storm, etc. Dagger also works amazingly well to help you setup the perfect tornado/meteor/blast/etc combo.

Great affordable team item. However, this item does not solve invokers mana troubles.

Great item for any invoker build. However, it does not solve the low damage output of wex invoker. The 2.5 second lift duration is a perfect setup for sunstrike, meteor, and blast combo (Around 1100 damage after reduction). Also works great with dagger; Eul's 2.5 second invulnerability will buy time so you can dagger away.

Slow effect penetrates magic immune heroes! Very good item choice to counter back! If many opponents have magic immunity, consider skipping aghanim scepter all together.

Great item for the team! This item has the most flexibility. Highly recommended against Stealth Assassin, nature's prophet, and clock. In addition, you can push enemies out of position, save your team, force enemy onto impassable terrain, etc. If you have fast reflexes, Force Staff yourself to dodge Impale after Vendetta.

Gem works great with wex build. High movement speed and invokers disables makes him difficult to kill.

Good stats gain and survivability against Ursa, SA, Huskar, etc.

Get this item if you can do so around the 6th minute. Otherwise, forget it. Invoker is more concerned about levels than gold, so transmute level six creeps for 2.5x the experience! Note: an entire set of beginning creep wave gives 227 XP. Transmuting with Midas on a level 6 creep gives 387 XP!

Great item against Doom, Nyx, and sudden Hex/Orchid. However, this item is very costly.

Amazing synergy with spirits/snap combo. True sight makes this item very useful against TA/BH etc. Great defense against Pudge's hooks. 4 summons and Cold Snap will likely kill your target. 4 summons plus alacrity can hurt towers real good.

Love this item for Wex build. It solves Wex invokers lack of damage and mana regeneration. This item works amazingly well with Cold Snap. Morph, Anti-mage, Lifestealer, Storm, etc are all going to hate you for this.

This works marvelous with cold snap, but this is not your item to buy.

I discourage 99% of invoker users to get this item. It is highly situational and requires perfect spell executions as well as positioning. Furthermore, BKB users will laugh in your face. You will need a minimum of 1700 mana to make good use of this item.

Works supremely well for the hybrid invoker. Unfortunately, Force Staff and blink counters this item. I find this item a lifesaver against Nyx Assassin. The active slow ignores spiked carapace, and the extra health helps invoker to survive Nyxs deadly combo.

Best item for ganking. Very costly, but it is worth the price. Get this item before Aghanim Scepter if you are desperate to end the game.

Works good if you manage to activate Discord before Tornado/Meteor/Blast combo. However, it delays your tornado slightly and reveals your location. As a result, your opponents have a better chance of dodging your combo. For this reason, I do not recommend Veil on Invoker.

Dota is Fun

Sunday, April 27, 2014

Invoker

Introduction

Helpful Tips for Invoker's spells

Items

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