SLARDARGUIDE (by Lady.Liuwa)

• Tittle: Spare the Pleasentries!
• Author: Lady.Liuwa

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Slardar is a powerful close range stunner and physical damage fighter. He excels at chasing down fragile heroes and bashing them into the dirt. Slithereen Crush and Bash allow him to stun and damage a target, then follow up with additional bashes to keep them stunned and finish them off. To get into close enough range to make use of his stun skills, Slardar uses Sprint. Sprint gives him a massive movement speed bonus for a relatively long duration, but causes him to take extra damage from enemy attacks and spells. This downside makes good Sprint usage critical for Slardar: trying to catch a fleeing hero with Sprint can often turn into a trap, and due to the extra damage Slardar can get into a lot of trouble. To help keep an eye on his target and make sure they go down quickly, Slardar uses Amplify Damage. This ability gives him vision of a target unit and drastically reduces their armor, making them easy prey for his powerful attacks. If faced with this dangerous hero, it's best to keep him as far away as possible.

Positives:

• Easy last hitter
• Anti tank
• Great dps
• Carry
• Looks badass
• Good initiater
• Decent ganker
• Strong ultimate
• Decent Laner (for melee)

Negatives:

• Melee
• There are stronger carries
• Somewhat Item dependend
• Needs baby sitters

Skills

 Sprint

Slardar increases his movement speed dramatically, but takes 15% bonus damage.

• 1. Mana 50 / Cooldown 28 / Duration 20 seconds / Increases speed by 20%
• 2. Mana 50 / Cooldown 28 / Duration 20 seconds / Increases speed by 27%
• 3. Mana 50 / Cooldown 28 / Duration 20 seconds / Increases speed by 33%
• 4. Mana 50 / Cooldown 28 / Duration 20 seconds / 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.

This is a very lovely spell, it dramatically increases your movement speed and comes in very very handy all game long. It is what makes slardar so versatile and dangerous early on. It can be used for escaping, no need for chinese pro juking anymore, try to the cut one corner as fast as you can to end up in the shades and you are gonna be long gone with your great ms. Ofcourse it works the other way arround aswell, it allows you to chase down heroes, when doing so beware of mass disablers like lion, they have the ability to run, juke and disable you long enough for help to arrive. And if you are tower diving against a hero like lion u better make sure his spells are on cd or he is out of mana. And last but not least it can be used for roaming, I personally havent done this a lot, but he is most defenitily capable of doing so. It would depened on the enemies a bit, because you will not be able to solo gank a disabler, in this case you will need another team to help with the initial disable, like venge or ogre.

 Slithereen Crush

Slams the ground, stunning and damaging nearby enemy land units. Slows enemy units by 20% for 2 seconds afterwards.

• 1. Mana 80 / Cooldown 8 / Duration 1 seconds / 50 damage, stun and slow
• 2. Mana 95 / Cooldown 8 / Duration 1.5 seconds/ 100 damage, stun and slow
• 3. Mana 105 / Cooldown 8 / Duration 2 seconds / 150 damage, stun and slow
• 4. Mana 115 / Cooldown 8 / Duration 2.5 seconds/ 200 damage, stun and slow

• Damage type: physical

This spell in combination with sprint or dagger can be used for both offensive and defensive purposes. Because slardar is very well capable of escaping he can help teammates in trouble stun them with your Slithereen Crush and sprint or dagger out of there. It has an 8 second cooldown and your sprint last 25 seconds, therefore you are often capable of using this spell twice when trying to kill someone. This also makes him more capable of killing someone on his own, unlike lets say venge. The power of this spell lies in the aoe, this is what makes him such a good initiater.

 Bash

Gives a chance that an attack will do bonus damage and stun an opponent for 1 second.

• 1. Duration 1 second on heroes (2 seconds on creeps) / 10% chance per attack , 40 bonus damage
• 2. Duration 1 second on heroes (2 seconds on creeps) / 15% chance per attack , 50 bonus damage
• 3. Duration 1 second on heroes (2 seconds on creeps) / 20% chance per attack , 60 bonus damage
• 4. Duration 1 second on heroes (2 seconds on creeps) / 25% chance per attack , 70 bonus damage

• Damage type: physical
• Deals a separate instance of damage.
• Stun works on magic immune units, but damage does not.
• Does not stack with Cranium Basher.

Wonderfull spell, it provides more late game potential and deadly against carries without images. Bash is best used in combination with Slithereen Crush. Use crush, hit the enemy and optimize your positioning, for example lets say you are still laning and playing for the sentinel. The hero you just stunned with Slithereen Crush will most likely run towards his tower, so move slardar a bit that direction to get off 1 or 2 extra hits and maybe even try blocking his path. In late game this can be used to stun lock certain enemies and kill them before they get a chance to do anything.

 Amplify Damage

Amplifies physical damage against enemy units by reducing their armor.

• 1. Mana 25 / Cooldown 10 / Duration 25 seconds / Reduces armor by 8.
• 2. Mana 25 / Cooldown 10 / Duration 25 seconds / Reduces armor by 14.
• 3. Mana 25 / Cooldown 10 / Duration 25 seconds / Reduces armor by 20.

• Works on magic immune units.
• Gives True Sight of the target, as well as shared vision of the target.

This is the reason slardar is picked, the best single target ultimate in the game! It can be used for a variety of things. First of let me start by saying slardar should not just be picked for beating invis heroes, yes it is the most obvious thing to do, but amplify works wonders against almost everyone. Think about those fragile supporters you can kill with 1 stun, amplify and a few hits? Think about those carries that do not have images, or tanks that are now longer really a tank. It can be used on gankers, to provide your team with vision of where the gankers are. Think about heroes such as pudge, venge and veno. In those cases you should use amplify all the time. When you are defending your base, you usually have time to amplify several enemies while you turtle in base. However make sure you do not get initiated while you are amplifying enemies. If you are ganking first you use sprint (later perhaps dagger), followed by slithereen cursh followed by amplify and your bash. I know Slithereen Crush would deal more damage if you would amplify the target first but this takes too much time, this way you can be disabled before you get a chance to stun him.

Skill Order

• 1 Slithereen Crush
• 2 Sprint
• 3 Slithereen Crush
• 4 Sprint
• 5 Slithereen Crush
• 6 Amplify Damage
• 7 Slithereen Crush
• 8 Sprint
• 9 Sprint
• 10 Bash
• 11 Amplify Damage
• 12 Bash
• 13 Bash
• 14 Bash
• 15 Stats
• 16 Amplify Damage

Max Slithereen Crush first because it is your only "aoe" disable. Almost always max stun first. Sprint second because the movement speed is very important all game long. This seperates you from other heroes in early in the game. Its vital for ganking, chasing and escaping. Slithereen crush has a short cooldown and sprint allows you to keep up with the target this way you will be able to use crush twice making sure you are defenitly going to kill the enemy. Bash would only be usefull if you were able to attack the enemy several times, in order to do this you need sprint, so you can hit and run him. Besides movement speed bash also relies on attack speed, which you dont have in early game either. Always skill your ultimate since its probably the reason you picked slardar in the first place.

Items

I will discuss several item builds, depending on the role you are going to forfill.

Dual Lane Supporter

Starting items

• You are on a dual lane, as a melee, your focus is surving, leveling, farming what you can, and perhaps gank (either on your lane or elsewhere). Therefore you need plenty of regen, plus a stout shield for protection. The branches and stout shield can be turned in a magic wand and vanguard later on.

Core

• This is your core, its the first thing you should try to farm, you have taken the role of a suppporter, you have to play to your strenghts in the easiest way possible. Which is ganking and initiating with your dagger. 

Possible Follow-up Items

• The good thing about all of these items is they buff your hp. Which make you more capable of initiating and getting out alive. I don't recommand getting all of these items, but depending on what you think is best for a certain game, jango is often an item gotten by other supporters aswell. The urn provides some nice hp regen due to the charges which you can use very well. Medallion provides even more armor deduction which fits well for a ganking style.

Extended Core Items

 Vanguard provides you the hp you need to survive in battle, which is what you are aiming for, you are there to disable with your stun and amplify as many heroes as possible. You have great mobility with dagger and sprint, with a low cooldown on stun and amplify you can go in and out of battle several times without a problem.

Luxuries

 Assault would be your very late game option, which makes you very deadly and also helpes the team a lot. It works wonders with your bash and decreases the enemies armor even more. However it is very expensive and depening on what your team needs you can decide to get either a hyper stone or plate mail first.

Tri-Lane Initiater

Starting Items

OR

OR

• On a tri-lane your items can vary greatly, i recommend the first option if you do not have a single healer on your tri-lane. The second options if you are going to play agressive and looking for kills, with lets say undying and veno. The third option can be used if you are going to play a more or less passive farmer with atleast 1 healer. A stout shield is a must in all situations. 

Core Items

• This is your core, an early vanguard allows you to take damage while tower diving for ganks. The faster you have boots and vanguard the faster you are deadly. A dagger as quickly as possible after vanguard and boots, you will be set to go for the rest of the game.

Possible Follow-up Items

• These 2 items are cheap, provide mana regen and urn even hp regen with charges. I do not recommend getting jango or medallion because they are too expensive and do not provide the things you are aiming for while playing a tri-lane initiator. 

Extended Core Items

• This is what you are looking to get, your job is to initiate, the more disable an initiater has the better. You need to focus on important targets such as enigma and in late game you might not be able to kill the target within 1 stun, you are going to need to disable them for longer. Now that you have hex you do not have to worry about mana problems. You can dagger sprint and stun all you want. Because you are such a great disabler at this point you can be effective in teambattle with 300 hp or less. So never go back to base when you are low hp. Stick arround dagger in stun some enemies and save a friend, or even get a kill. And ofcourse finish your treads.

Luxuries

• There could be many luxury items after this, it souly depends on what the team needs from you. Do you need to tank? Get a heart, maybe assault cuirass which will benefit the entire team and also make you more of a killer. It is a better item against strong carries. Armlet if you want to get more into the killing zone for not a lot of money. Perhaps vlads if you want to push or your carry needs it.

Tri-Lane Tank

Starting Items

OR

OR

• On a tri-lane your items can vary greatly, i recommend the first option if you do not have a single healer on your tri-lane. The second options if you are going to play agressive and looking for kills, with lets say undying and veno. The third option can be used if you are going to play a more or less passive farmer with atleast 1 healer. A stout shield is a must in all situations. 

Core Items

Note: First of all let me explain why a tank slardar works, slardar is a str hero which can be a deadly hero with only a few items. Either items that provide attack speed or a little bit of damage. Since he is a str hero, he will automatically gain huge amounts of hp but damage at the same time. If they do focus you, will have trouble killing you and fire most of their ammunition on you, which leaves your teammates in a easy battle. In my opinion a tank slardar can be played in many different ways all depending on the enemy line-up, i can not think of 1 item that should always be the first item you need on a tank slardar. Therefore i will give several examples of how to build a tank slardar which can be highly effective given the right situation. 

 Armlet +  Heart: If you are farming well on the tri-lane and you can get these 2 items fairly quick, your enemy is not gonna have a chance of killing you, and you are going to be a pretty dangerous killer yourself. Besides, with heart you will never have to go to base, and the massive hp provides the perfect foundation for items such as pipe and assault cuirass. Armlet gives damage, attack speed and bonus hp. 

 Vanguard +  Pipe: A very classical tank combination, which provides protection against both base damage and spells. Pipe is a great item against heavy aoe nukes and can truly be the difference between winning and losing a team battle.

 Vanguard +  Assault Cuirass: This build is a bit more unorthodox. However assault cuirass is a very good team item and the attack speed and armor deduction turn you into a killer tank once again. This build also works very well with a blademail. A blademail provides damage, mana, armor and ofcourse the damage return. A blademail could be gotten if for some reason you are farming bad. It can also be bought as a follow-up item but i will discuss the blademail later on.

 Vanguard +  Armlet: This is a fairly cheap tank build compared to the others, gives nice hp regen and is a pretty decent killer.

 Armlet +  Pipe: Again a fairly cheap combination compared to the other builds. This is good against casters and if you still want to have some more kill potential you can get armlet instead of a vanguard.

General Conclusion

There are many many item combinations you can get to make slardar a tank, i have only give a few logically and common examples. It is up to you to decide which items are going to be the most effective against the given enemy line-up.

 These items could be used to solve your mana problems, and all of them also increase either armor, or hp.

Possible Follow-up Items

 Slardar with dagger is always good no matter what items you had in mind for slardar. And vlads provides lifesteal, is a good item for perhaps your fellow team mates, it helps push lanes and provides even more armor.

Tri-Lane DPS

Starting Items

OR

OR

• On a tri-lane your items can vary greatly, i recommend the first option if you do not have a single healer on your tri-lane. The second options if you are going to play agressive and looking for kills, with lets say undying and veno. The third option can be used if you are going to play a more or less passive farmer with atleast 1 healer. A stout shield is a must in all situations. 

Possible Follow-Up Items

• I wouldnt get too funky and go for jango or medallion, dps slardar requires a lot of gold and its best to skip the possible follow-up items because you need all the gold you can get.

Core Items

• Armlet is the core set-up for your attack speed and damage. Bkb is simply needed because you are not tanking or initiating, you have to be able to inflict your damage one way or another. The best way is the BKB way, the enemy will run in fear when slardar with bkb comes sprinting at them. Too bad for them you will catch and kill them.

Extended Core

• Ideally this is what your build would look like, its expensive, its fantastic and it hurts like a mother. With these items you can literally kill any single target with a few hits (if you used amplify ofcourse). Desolator and Assault Cuirass will provide everything you need, armor, attack speed, damage and lets not forget the massive armor deduction! If you are playing along side other heroes with ability to massively deduct armor you may wanna skip desolator because it could become useless when reaching the -20 armor limit.

Alternative Items

• If you need even more damage, get buriza. When facing PA, get mkb. If you need more hp and dont have an orb yet, get satanic, could be an option against void or pa. Mjollnir, sure why not but you did forget deso ...provides nice attack speed and a funny orb. Dagger is always good on slardar, with dagger you might not need bkb and go faster for your extended core items.

Rejected Items

 Sny is rejected because it provides everything you already have. Movement speed you have in sprint and the maim you have in bash and slithereen crush, which btw is much better then stupid maim. There are simply much better options out there such as armlet. For a lot less gold too.

 Phase boots are rejected because you have bash, you need attack speed, now some would argue that phase is great for chasing heroes and attack speed you gain by getting hyperstone or armlet. Thats very cute but the faster you maximize your potential the better. You can chase just as well with treads and they provide more attack speed and above all some vital hp. 

 Where do you place this? DPS? No because there are much better items. Support? no because its to expensive and its not supporting. Tank? No because it actually anti-tanks. Initiater? No because there are better ways to initiate and fit that role. Its a fun pub item, use it there and keep it there.

Laning

Tri-Lane

Slardar can be used in a variety of ways, therefore he has several laning options. I have to say a thing or 2 about laning now because I will discuss several item builds on slardar after this. The one I prefer the most is on a tri-lane as the farming hero. This way he will get a ton of farm, get his items and forfill the roll you think is best for this particular game. By putting him on the tri-lane he is gonna be a vital part of your team and is the only way to get a dps slardar going. Here are some examples of line-ups that could work on a tri-lane:

 Lich +  Veno +  Slardar is a very strong tri-lane, the slow that veno and lich hand out is ridicilous. Along with the damage output, their harass potential is very great aswell. And slardar provides the stun . Along with his sprint he is gonna be able to chase the target with ease. Dark ritual is always awesome on any lane. It prevents the lane from being pushed enhanching farm and gank/kill potential.

 Doctor +  Undying +  Slardar provides a lot heal and aoe damage. Tomb and paralyzing cask are a nice combination, add anoter stun and its a party. Yes the downside is that you have 2 melee heroes on a tri-lane, however i believe that undying is such a well rounded hero that he can handle it, you also have 2 healers which can compensate the extra harass you take.

 Ancient Apparition +  Veno +  Slardar is another solid tri-lane, 2 long ranged harassers with slow and a very strong disable if succesfull. Veno is one of the best roamers in the game and could leave the lane to gank mid for example.

 Maiden +  Lion +  Slardar, I am not a very big fan of this line-up but it could be picked depending on the enemies line-up, it does have very stong single target kill potential. Since maiden is capable of casting 2 spells, with lions stun and slardars stun thats going to be a kill. Lion is able to hex another caster that i going to try and save his friend. Also slardar and lion both have aoe stuns, how maiden and lion are very low hp.

General Conclusion

I have given only a few examples of tri-lanes, you always have to take into consideration, the laning against the teamfights, is veno going to usefull in teamfights or am i going to need warlock to counter an enigma pick? I do like to say that the most usefull spells on a tri-lane have some sort of aoe, such as the tomb from undying, the stun from es, doc and sven, the slow from veno and ogre, or the enormous damage output from bat with his firefly. This is also an upside to slardar on a tri-lane he has a little aoe stun which can come in quite handy. 

Dual Lane

The other option would be on a dual lane, i recommend doing this with a ranged healer. In CM games most people tend to use tri-lanes, if slardar with lets say doc faces a tri-lane they are gonna have a very tough time stopping the enemy from farming and pushing, also slardar is most likely not to get any farm. In situations like this you have to addept and get the supporter from the other lane to come help you. There aren't many dual lanes that can hold a tri-lane and slardar in combination with another hero isn't one of them. The upside to dual laning is that you level up faster then the tri-lane and are gonna be able to gank faster. However because you are definitly getting less farm then on a tri-lane you are most likely to forfill the role of supporter / ganker / initiater but not from a dps carry. Here are some good dual lanes with slardar:

 Lich is a very fine supporter in general, has very long range and an execelent harass spell in nova. What makes it even better is dark ritual, this allows you to kill one of your own creeps and makes sure you do not push the lane. This can be vital against a tri-lane, this way you are capable of hugging the tower and getting some farm. However if the enemy tri-lane is capable of pushing or they are starting to pull your creeps (if you are on sentinel down lane) you can still be in trouble. 

 The doctor is your best bet, doc has awesome kill potential for a supporter. His stun and maledict in combination with your stun and sprint is deadly, this dual lane has potential to kill someone. The other reason why doc is great is because of his heal, a dual lane is risky and slardar is most likely gonna need some extra healing.

 Dazzle has a little bit less kill potential compared to doc, however this is also an excellent supporter with plenty of heal and his life saving shallow grave. You do have a bit of kill potential with his poison touch in combination with timed healing but i wouldn't count on it.

 Warlock is the ultimate babysitter, he is my favourite babysitter. A very capable harasser with a beautiful attack animation and spells. His heal is the strongest of the 3 but the kill potential has really dropped this time, you are very unlikely to get a kill, with this combination you should really focus on farming and start pushing towers and ganking when you both hit level 6.

Edited by basicdotaguide.blogspot.com