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Friday, May 4, 2012

Slardar - The Slithereen Guard Item Build


After a millennium of being trapped under the raging waters of the Maelstrom, Slardar rose from its chaotic depths with his brethren to serve the mighty demon lord, Illidan Stormrage. Fanatically devoted to his cause, this Naga fought valiantly along his side until he succumbed to fatal wounds in the heat of battle. Salvation finally seemed within grasp - that is until his fate became intertwined with the grim reach of the Lich King. Reincarnated as a soulless beast without emotion, Slardar tears through the enemy lines with inhuman speed, striking them out cold with mighty blows, undeterred in his quest to fulfill Nerzhul's every whim.

Slardar - The Slithereen Guard  
Slardar - The Slithereen Guard
Range: 128 | Move Speed: 300
Primary: STR
Str: 21 + 2.8 | Agi: 17 + 2.4 | Int: 15 + 1.5
Damage: 51 – 59 | HP: 549 | Mana: 195
HP Regen: 0.88 | Mana Regen: 0.61
Attack Speed: 0.69 | Armor: 5

Sprint Sprint (T)
Slardar increases his movement speed dramatically, but takes 15% bonus damage. Lasts for 20 seconds.
Level 1 - Increases speed by 20%.
Level 2 - Increases speed by 27%.
Level 3 - Increases speed by 33%.
Level 4 - Increases speed by 40%.
• Activating this skill does not cancel channeling spells, meaning you can use Boots of Travel and then use this skill without canceling the teleportation.
• Does not stack with Mask of Madness.
• Amplified damage is the same type of damage dealt.
Mana Cost: 50
Cooldown: 40

Slithereen Crush Slithereen Crush (R)
Slams the ground, stunning and damaging nearby enemy land units. Slows enemy units by 20% for 2 seconds afterwards.
Level 1 - 50 damage, 1 second stun.
Level 2 - 100 damage, 1.5 second stun.
Level 3 - 150 damage, 2 second stun.
Level 4 - 200 damage, 2.5 second stun.
• Damage type: physical
• Area of Effect: 350 stun AoE, 360 slow AoE
Mana Cost: 80/95/105/115
Cooldown: 8

Bash Bash (B)
Gives a chance that an attack will do bonus damage and stun an opponent for 1 second.
Level 1 - 10% chance per attack, 40 bonus damage.
Level 2 - 15% chance per attack, 50 bonus damage.
Level 3 - 20% chance per attack, 60 bonus damage.
Level 4 - 25% chance per attack, 70 bonus damage.
• Damage type: magical
• Stun works on magic immune units.
• Does not stack with Cranium Basher.

Mana Cost: N/A
Cooldown: N/A

Amplify Damage Amplify Damage (G)
Amplifies physical damage against enemy units by reducing their armor. Lasts 25 seconds.
Level 1 - Reduces armor by 8.
Level 2 - Reduces armor by 12.
Level 3 - Reduces armor by 16.
Mana Cost: 25
Cooldown: 10 seconds
• Works on magic immune units.
• Provides True Sight on enemy unit.
• Casting range: 700

2. Item build Slardar has a weak early game and not any innate ability to farm. Therefore we are looking for a cheap but effective build.
Core items
IPB ImageIPB ImageIPB ImageIPB ImageIPB ImageIPB Image
No surprise. Those items gives a total of (with Armlet activated) 1007 HP, +69% IAS and +103 dmg. There is not any ideal build order, though we can notice 3 main orders:
- against harassers an early Helm of Iron Will can be interesting,
- against nukers it is better to get more HP (thus bracers) as soon as possible,
- against weak enemies early treads increase nicely Slardar’s ability to be agressive.
Not any other build gives as much as HP, dmg and IAS for such low price. In any case you always have to carry a TP.
Items to get afterwards
IPB ImageIPB ImageIPB Image
With Amplify Damage, Sprint, Armlet and +103 dmg, Slardar is strong but may end up being a glass canon. He can tank but not always enouth effectively to be able to chase afterwards. To solve this problem we must choose in between Heart, Cuirass and Black King Bar. Heart : must be purchased when the enemy has too many spells to prevent Slardar from specializing his defense. Cuirass : it gives approximately as much as HP against physical attacks than Heart, but not any against spells. Thus it must replace Heart only if enemy’s team rely upon physical attacks. Beside that, Cuirass gives of course more damages than Heart (cf. the armor table). Black King Bar : it is only against well coordinated nukes and disables that Black King Bar is absolutely needed, and since this point is relative to the enemy’s you’re facing I suggest you to listen more to your feeling than to any theoretical argument. Sometimes enemy’s disables can be dangerous enough to force you to get BKB before Armlet.
Sometimes you may feel strong enough to start to work on a damage item. It is almost alway an error. You must keep in mind that Slardar is a bad farmer. He needs to anticipate enemy’s carries takeoff rather than being (stupidly) lured by Armlet’s short domination.
Luxury items
IPB ImageIPB ImageIPB Image
Desolator : as it is proven in the mathcraft section, reducing too much armor isn’t interesting, as the effect start to decrease at -5 armor. But if you’re playing against some agility heroes supported by a Mekansm, they will have around 20 armor, and with Amplify Damage, Cuirass and Desolator they will have -6 armor, which is still an interesting value, especially because agility usually carry in late game, so every percentage gained on them is important. You should get it over Buriza only if you are playing with another physical damage dealer. Buriza : Amplify Damage only amplifies physical damage. And Buriza is the best way to increase it. Satanic : if you go for Buriza, Satanic is an excellent option since high damages + lifesteal synergizes well. It’s good to know that the lifesteal is increased by the armor 
 reduction. 
3. Items to consider 
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Hood of Defiance: As I said above, Slardar can’t really specialize his defense (to magic/physical), because Sprint make him vulnerable against both physical and magical attacks. Even against an magic-oriented line-up, he will have to tank creeps and towers during chasing. Hood is, of course, a good option, but only an good, against an extremely specialized line-up or a couple of heavily fed int heroes. Boots of Travel : Sometimes, the teleport is just needed, especially when the game turn into a push-fest. In those case, it can be interesting to get BoT. Dagger : Slardar is an hybrid hero. He is a semi-tank, semi-DPS and a chaser as well. As a semi-tanker with an excellent AoE stun he can be used as an initiator when it absolutely needed, though it shouldn’t happen often. 4. Items to avoid 
 IPB ImageIPB ImageIPB ImageIPB ImageIPB ImageIPB ImageIPB Image
Bottle : Slardar doesn’t need it to refill his mana since his spells are extremely cheap and he can’t gank effectively before mid game, and Armlet cover his lack of regeneration. Many other heroes benefit a lot more from the bottle and as there aren’t many runes, Slardar shouldn’t be getting it. Radiance : Slardar isn’t a good farmer (he can’t rush it, and the effectiveness of Radiance decreases in late game), and he doesn’t need the immolation aura to deal damage when he chase, thanks to Sprint. Vanguard : Vanguard is much less interesting than Armlet in early and mid game and doesn’t cover Slardar’s need of HP afterwards. Basher : Slardar doesn’t need more chances to bash, as long as he hit often his target. It’s better to get more IAS to improve his natural bash, since it increase much more his damages. In addition, damages from bash are magicals, so it doesn’t synergize with Amplify Damage. Monkey King Bar : same story: the bonus damage (from the ministun) is magical on melee heroes, so it doesn’t synergize with Amplify Damage. Mask of Madness : as I explained, MS is what we need the most to be an extremely efficient ganker. Sprint give 40% more MS, MoM only 15%. Of course it give more IAS, but it is better to play with Sprint and some IAS items as the MS difference is too good to be ignored. Sange & Yasha : like Vanguard, S&Y is much less interesting than Armlet in early and mid game and doesn’t cover Slardar’s need of HP afterwards. Click on the Hidden button for in-deph analys.
As I already said S&Y is a terrible item for Slardar. By itself it is good, but in does not solve Slardar’s survivability problems throughout the game, as it is proven by the following calculation:
Slardar lvl 25 with Treads (strength) + Black King Bar + Armlet + 1 Bracer + 1 item (considering the last slot being filled up with a TP)
S&Y
HP : 3000
EHP normal : 6780
EHP spell : 4000
DPS : 347,7
HEART
HP : 3661
EHP normal : 7790
EHP spell : 4881
DPS : 310,8
CUIRASS
HP : 2696
EHP normal : 8193
EHP spell : 3594
DPS : 325
As we can see we are basically trading 1000 EHP for approximately 35 DPS. It is enouth to take on Heart or Cuirass over Sange & Yasha, though the pieces are much more expensives.
IV. Strategy
As I said earlier, Slardar’s early game is one of the worst in the whole game: he is a melee hero without any good initiating spell and with low magic damage. So, this section will be mainly about surviving in this part of the game.
I will indicate in what part of the game each strategy is mostly used, rather than dividing rigorously them in three parts called Early, Mid and Late game.
1. Lane control First of all, the lane control. This is exactly what Slardar lacks. I’ll quickly point out what is the best strategy to employ, rather than being exhaustive, because there are already excellent guide on lane control on this forum. Here are the link:
- Maju’s Guide to Lane Control
Picking a lane
I’ll never repeat this enough: Slardar is weak in early game. Because of that, he need to pick his lane extremely wisely. If you are Scourge, go top, and if you are Sentinel, go bottom. This is because the meeting point of the first wave is naturally near your ally tower in those lanes, hence it’s easier to keep it here.
But this isn’t your only criteria when you choose a lane. It can be interesting to swap lane if you’r facing some extremely dangerous early heroes or chain-nukers. You must absolutely go in the easiest lane, and if you can’t, just don’t take any risk: keep out of their range, block creeps and pull neutrals to fight under your tower: that will prevent them from keeping you out of exp range.
Your lane partner is also extremely important. Choose a good supporter or a strong early hero who can carry you to mid game.

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