There's no need to replace tranquil with GG,you don't replace your boots with GG,as later on in the game you might need to buy travels.Like I said you just need to learn how to use euls more effectively,euls was fine that game.
Also if you're looking to just dispel silence euls is always better than lotus,it's cheaper,gives MS,active is useful for multiple situations and gives more mana + mana regen.For that game actually you could have won it with just euls as your only item(including midas and boots),your opponent are just as bad.Ahh but if you went for mek and need a dispel for silence but not immediately,you can go for greaves instead as well.
However,as long as you're willing to learn and improve yourself as a player overall,in time you will be able to understand and use phoenix much more effectively.
i see, well i guess its partly since u go mek so there isnt an mana to cast ray i guess, ive heard that some phoenix in comp go ray, not sure if thats true or not
btw could you have a look at this game? played phoenix for my hero challenge. not too sure about the veil, but my team wanted me to go hex for the puck
http://www.dotabuff.com/matches/2172941893
Sorry I won't go into every particular detail regarding skirmishes like I did with OP,that's just too tiring and I'm quite busy @@.Also I don't think I'm qualified enough to analyse every thing you do.
However I did look at your replay and the one thing that stands out,is that you're always caught by ES and puck.Also you shouldn't continue to use sun ray on WK with blademail when he is full,it really HURTS you a lot,and please don't move towards him while doing it lol it was really suicidal.
When playing against heroes like ES and puck who can catch/stun you at a long distance you have to stay far back behind your team.Be REALLY careful when you're diving in against heroes like ES and slardar as they can immediately stun and kill you,dive in if they have used their stuns or they are not in range.If you can't and relaly need your ulti then just stand back and use spirits + sun ray,walk to a proper position and egg.
Also there is no need to stand in front of enemies and use sun ray that is really bad,as evidenced by how you were cut down so fast and getting hit again and again by ES echo slams and stuns.At the final parts of the replay you also push with your ulti on CD,which cost you team fights that could have been won.Always only push during late game with ulti ready or when you teamwiped the enemy,this of course applies to all heroes.
Regarding sun ray it's fine to go 1 - 4 - 4 if you want to,I personally go 4 - 4 - 1 as I want dive to deal as much damage as possible when I execute the combo,also it's much faster to max dive.Though there are times it's better to go 4 - 4 - 1 whenever you're facing heroes that are mobile like ZZIIIPP ZAAAP (you know what I mean),since they can disengage easily from ray while dive damage still hits them.Also use sun ray at a distance so the enemy won't smash your face right in front of you or catch you with disables/stuns.
Also this is why I go for mek + pipe in my games,looking at your team being shredded and not being able to do something about that really hurts :(.Your item choices are fine though,you need to use your veil more often,though I personally feel that you should get at least a pipe for ES + puck when pushing,it will help a lot soaking up damage.
yea i realised i had pretty bad sunray usage, forgot to keep my distance sometimes. was pretty confused with the hotkeys too, i probably didnt make enough use of the "stop moving when sunray" command.
against es i think i tried not to dive directly into him a couple of times, think it slipped my mind a few times unfortunately. and yea that last failed push was definitely on me, probably should have called my team to wait for my ulti, though maybe one or two of their puck +1 was dead at the time, cant remember. i made a super game losing hex on a lagunaed dazzle instead of waiting and spam clicking hex for es though, made my team get wiped gg.
i havent tried mek enough (only got it once when my team was super ahead so we just 5manned towers) so dont have much experience about it, but yea should have probably went for pipe. Would you get it before or after midas? Also i usually go urn for phoenix before my midas, but since my team was losing so i ddint bother with it.
super sad game though, was feeling happy that we beat the beastmaster who was 7k but late game decision making
Sure NP,it's best to go midas 1st after boots IMO you don't want to delay it.For itemization it depends what your team need as always,if your team lacks damage then go for damage route by rushing rad straight after boots > shivas > other luxury items depending on the game.
I know I said this previously but just gonna say it anyway,I always go for mek +/or pipe as I feel that it would really help my team out by "beefing" them up with heals + armor buff + magic barrier.Notable examples would be against really teamfight heavy line ups like UD + ES that would deal a lot damage to my team,then I would just pipe + mek my team and brute force our way through them.I am,however,guilty of auto building mek + pipe at times,as there were games where going damage route would be more useful and better.Just improve as an overall player and you will do much better with many heroes naturally :))
"Well, I do know what Shivas does because I play Phoenix a lot and I also built shiva's guard a lot.
The problem with it is just that it's lacking especially in team fights and defensive situations. It mostly just accelerates clashes by being able to drop more at once (-> Combo). But the problem is, once you used it, you're pretty much done with the clash and can run back to base because all of your spells are going to be on cooldown for the next 20 seconds. If you can finish the clash with just one combo then you're good with Shiva's. But these clashes they took ages. I just had to do something to help my team.
I had 2nd highest hero damage in my team (28k, Viper had 30k), I also had highest hero heal in the game (5.8k, that's more than the BH with his Greaves). I just can't afford spending the majority of the clash inside my Egg hoping that my team survives.
Don't get me wrong, Shiva's is a great item on Phoenix, but it also has a lot of disadvantages. Silencer is the other problem. The Octarine core gives me so much Bonus Health that I need to survive global silence. Octarine is the reason why I have the lowest amount of deaths in my team (2nd lowest in the game). Octarine core is also the reason why we didn't lose this game in min 30 when they tried to push our highground and I was the only dude in my team that was alive and had to spam the ray + spirits to drag out their push as much as possible.
I don't want to talk down Shiva's Guard. I personally like that Item on Phoenix just as much. I just feel it doesn't do too much.
http://www.dotabuff.com/matches/2155163200
This is the last match I bought shiva's on, and after it I decided to not build it anymore. The replay should still be available, so if you find some things particularly related to Shiva's Guard (wrong use of it for example) in that game and how I played that build badly, it would be helpful if you could find and criticize it.
I just want you to know, I dropped Shiva's for the exact reason that I felt it doesn't do enough. I go Octarine because I feel a lot more useful with spamming Ray and Spirits than I feel with 1 occasional Shiva's Guard use (+ its passive aura)."
I am a top 100 pheonix player, and I feel like there are two ways to play the hero; very aggressive (my playstyle) or more of a supportive role (mek, urn, atos builds). Whilst I personally feel like the supportive side playstyle isn't using pheonix to his/her full potential, there are some things in general pheonix players need to know to become better at the hero in general.
1) Abusing the lane stage -
Phoenix before level 2/3 is a very weak laner imo, if you don't have a point in both q and w its very easy to zone out a phoenix with a solo support. Making sure to let the range creep first so that the wave pushes towards your tier 1 offlane tower is essential. If the enemy know how to lane control and you have failed to make that important block it sometimes means you end up being level 1-2 6 or 7 minutes.
If you are able to get a decent amount of exp during the laning phase you need to know what your kill potential is. At level 6 you can kill any hero 1v1 that has 800-900hp with a 2-3-0-1 build, this is taking into account that you land your dive burn and 4 full duration fire spirits, with some right clicks as you wait for the next fire spirit to be launched. This may not count for people who have some sort of bonus magic resist, heals, shields or magic-immunity.
DO NOT be afraid to focus on killing the supports if you know killing the carry is either difficult or not going to happen.
2) Timings -
Aim to get your items in a timely fashion and then abuse the fact you got those items fast. Nothing says "we've won this fight" with a 15-20 minute shivas into ult combo.
3) Farming -
If you aren't team fighting then fire spirit a large (or any) jungle camp every so often, you'll be surprised about how much gold racks up. A habit to get used to is to only fire spirit creep waves to push them out and not farm with them. The amount of phoenix players I've killed because they used up all their spirits on creeps and then were unable to defend themselves is stupidly high.
Also please don't farm with the dive. The dive DOT is so minuscule compared to the fact you have no solid escape ability for 30 seconds, you're right click should be enough. Of course there are exceptions, the only time i would farm with my dive is if I was in desperate need to kill a jungle camp to get my early levels due to a awful laning stage .
Just my two pence.
Also a quick personal note, I looked at a couple of your phoenix games and I feel like your hero damage dealt is far far to low for what the hero can offer.
Octarine does a real good job and though I'm not much of a support, I build Urn to keep my health up during Sun Ray.
I used both Shiva's and Octarine and it was effective clearing and delaying waves.
Thanks for the insight,as I mentioned earlier I only consider myself a decent phoenix player.I am always looking out for good phoenix players to learn from.Though can I know what's your MMR?I'm not asking because I'm gonna discard your opinions if your MMR is low,but I want to know what skill bracket are you playing in which your playstyle is successful in.
Like I said in the beginning of the thread I'm a supportive type of phoenix,it's just my playstyle since I prefer to bulk my team up for fights.I do understand your point in not using her to her fullest potential with the supportive type of play since items like shivas synergize better with her skillset,but for me I buy whatever items I feel that can win the games for my team.And of course,there are multiple ways of doing that,yours included and also might be better than mine.
@Autumn
My MMR for a few years was sat at 4k as I never played to better myself however I am now within the 5k bracket and heading higher with a 60-odd% winrate in ranked.
Going back to my previous post; I abused the laning stage and got my item timing nailed, meaning I can snowball without the assistance of my team well into the midgame.
Cool,do you always midas > shivas > rad?I've seen some 5 - 6k phoenix players while I'm playing rush straight for rad > shivas when they can thus skipping midas,I really wanna try that someday.Also how do you deal with omni,I assume by going shivas + rad you aim the other 4 enemies without repel with massive AOE damage,I also think that going shiva + rad in this case is better than going mek since your team is not going to out last them.
I do go urn, mek only if I have lost my kill window and won't ever snowball in the game. This goes back to being able to manipulate the laning stage to your favour, but yes my build is as follows:
If I am counter picked with a someone like silencer, disruptor, etc then I go midas into euls and then shivas and carry on from there. I can't see rushing radiance that viable for phoenix? he is quite squishy until he buys the heavy armour items like shivas, ac, even a veil.
Healers are a special blend and you have to essentially get them to play into your hands without them realizing. In the laning stages essentially throw out false intentions of going on the carry so when he repels the carry you kite the carry around whilst bombing the omniknight that has left himself vulnerable, however even then with the heals it is still tricky to get a kill.
When it comes to dazzle, its A LOT easy to play around him as it is just timing your dive, egg or spirits to burn past the grave timer and usually they don't have the mana or its on cd to heal off the fatal burn damage.
During the mid game it is very much as you say, trying to burn everyone I can with the aoe damage, though i try to prioritize the squishies in the team fight, as people love to panic when their hp is ticking for a 1/4 total hp per second meaning when you egg they usually are dead or running away to attack you leaving the egg to burn their cores or stun them if they have bkb.
@OP
There's no need to replace tranquil with GG,you don't replace your boots with GG,as later on in the game you might need to buy travels.Like I said you just need to learn how to use euls more effectively,euls was fine that game.
Also if you're looking to just dispel silence euls is always better than lotus,it's cheaper,gives MS,active is useful for multiple situations and gives more mana + mana regen.For that game actually you could have won it with just euls as your only item(including midas and boots),your opponent are just as bad.Ahh but if you went for mek and need a dispel for silence but not immediately,you can go for greaves instead as well.
However,as long as you're willing to learn and improve yourself as a player overall,in time you will be able to understand and use phoenix much more effectively.
i see, well i guess its partly since u go mek so there isnt an mana to cast ray i guess, ive heard that some phoenix in comp go ray, not sure if thats true or not
btw could you have a look at this game? played phoenix for my hero challenge. not too sure about the veil, but my team wanted me to go hex for the puck
http://www.dotabuff.com/matches/2172941893
@Vohiyo
Sorry I won't go into every particular detail regarding skirmishes like I did with OP,that's just too tiring and I'm quite busy @@.Also I don't think I'm qualified enough to analyse every thing you do.
However I did look at your replay and the one thing that stands out,is that you're always caught by ES and puck.Also you shouldn't continue to use sun ray on WK with blademail when he is full,it really HURTS you a lot,and please don't move towards him while doing it lol it was really suicidal.
When playing against heroes like ES and puck who can catch/stun you at a long distance you have to stay far back behind your team.Be REALLY careful when you're diving in against heroes like ES and slardar as they can immediately stun and kill you,dive in if they have used their stuns or they are not in range.If you can't and relaly need your ulti then just stand back and use spirits + sun ray,walk to a proper position and egg.
Also there is no need to stand in front of enemies and use sun ray that is really bad,as evidenced by how you were cut down so fast and getting hit again and again by ES echo slams and stuns.At the final parts of the replay you also push with your ulti on CD,which cost you team fights that could have been won.Always only push during late game with ulti ready or when you teamwiped the enemy,this of course applies to all heroes.
Regarding sun ray it's fine to go 1 - 4 - 4 if you want to,I personally go 4 - 4 - 1 as I want dive to deal as much damage as possible when I execute the combo,also it's much faster to max dive.Though there are times it's better to go 4 - 4 - 1 whenever you're facing heroes that are mobile like ZZIIIPP ZAAAP (you know what I mean),since they can disengage easily from ray while dive damage still hits them.Also use sun ray at a distance so the enemy won't smash your face right in front of you or catch you with disables/stuns.
Also this is why I go for mek + pipe in my games,looking at your team being shredded and not being able to do something about that really hurts :(.Your item choices are fine though,you need to use your veil more often,though I personally feel that you should get at least a pipe for ES + puck when pushing,it will help a lot soaking up damage.
yea i realised i had pretty bad sunray usage, forgot to keep my distance sometimes. was pretty confused with the hotkeys too, i probably didnt make enough use of the "stop moving when sunray" command.
against es i think i tried not to dive directly into him a couple of times, think it slipped my mind a few times unfortunately. and yea that last failed push was definitely on me, probably should have called my team to wait for my ulti, though maybe one or two of their puck +1 was dead at the time, cant remember. i made a super game losing hex on a lagunaed dazzle instead of waiting and spam clicking hex for es though, made my team get wiped gg.
i havent tried mek enough (only got it once when my team was super ahead so we just 5manned towers) so dont have much experience about it, but yea should have probably went for pipe. Would you get it before or after midas? Also i usually go urn for phoenix before my midas, but since my team was losing so i ddint bother with it.
super sad game though, was feeling happy that we beat the beastmaster who was 7k but late game decision making
thanks for watching my replay, appreciate it.
@vohiyo
Sure NP,it's best to go midas 1st after boots IMO you don't want to delay it.For itemization it depends what your team need as always,if your team lacks damage then go for damage route by rushing rad straight after boots > shivas > other luxury items depending on the game.
I know I said this previously but just gonna say it anyway,I always go for mek +/or pipe as I feel that it would really help my team out by "beefing" them up with heals + armor buff + magic barrier.Notable examples would be against really teamfight heavy line ups like UD + ES that would deal a lot damage to my team,then I would just pipe + mek my team and brute force our way through them.I am,however,guilty of auto building mek + pipe at times,as there were games where going damage route would be more useful and better.Just improve as an overall player and you will do much better with many heroes naturally :))
So for the doubters, here is what 1800 game 6.5k phoneix player Smaug says about Shiva's vs Octarine Core.
https://www.reddit.com/r/DotA2/comments/47kwve/dendis_song_of_defeat/d0dryo6
"Well, I do know what Shivas does because I play Phoenix a lot and I also built shiva's guard a lot.
The problem with it is just that it's lacking especially in team fights and defensive situations. It mostly just accelerates clashes by being able to drop more at once (-> Combo). But the problem is, once you used it, you're pretty much done with the clash and can run back to base because all of your spells are going to be on cooldown for the next 20 seconds. If you can finish the clash with just one combo then you're good with Shiva's. But these clashes they took ages. I just had to do something to help my team.
I had 2nd highest hero damage in my team (28k, Viper had 30k), I also had highest hero heal in the game (5.8k, that's more than the BH with his Greaves). I just can't afford spending the majority of the clash inside my Egg hoping that my team survives.
Don't get me wrong, Shiva's is a great item on Phoenix, but it also has a lot of disadvantages. Silencer is the other problem. The Octarine core gives me so much Bonus Health that I need to survive global silence. Octarine is the reason why I have the lowest amount of deaths in my team (2nd lowest in the game). Octarine core is also the reason why we didn't lose this game in min 30 when they tried to push our highground and I was the only dude in my team that was alive and had to spam the ray + spirits to drag out their push as much as possible.
I don't want to talk down Shiva's Guard. I personally like that Item on Phoenix just as much. I just feel it doesn't do too much.
http://www.dotabuff.com/matches/2155163200
This is the last match I bought shiva's on, and after it I decided to not build it anymore. The replay should still be available, so if you find some things particularly related to Shiva's Guard (wrong use of it for example) in that game and how I played that build badly, it would be helpful if you could find and criticize it.
I just want you to know, I dropped Shiva's for the exact reason that I felt it doesn't do enough. I go Octarine because I feel a lot more useful with spamming Ray and Spirits than I feel with 1 occasional Shiva's Guard use (+ its passive aura)."
@murranji
Do you even understand what you're posting anyway?
I am a top 100 pheonix player, and I feel like there are two ways to play the hero; very aggressive (my playstyle) or more of a supportive role (mek, urn, atos builds). Whilst I personally feel like the supportive side playstyle isn't using pheonix to his/her full potential, there are some things in general pheonix players need to know to become better at the hero in general.
1) Abusing the lane stage -
Phoenix before level 2/3 is a very weak laner imo, if you don't have a point in both q and w its very easy to zone out a phoenix with a solo support. Making sure to let the range creep first so that the wave pushes towards your tier 1 offlane tower is essential. If the enemy know how to lane control and you have failed to make that important block it sometimes means you end up being level 1-2 6 or 7 minutes.
If you are able to get a decent amount of exp during the laning phase you need to know what your kill potential is. At level 6 you can kill any hero 1v1 that has 800-900hp with a 2-3-0-1 build, this is taking into account that you land your dive burn and 4 full duration fire spirits, with some right clicks as you wait for the next fire spirit to be launched. This may not count for people who have some sort of bonus magic resist, heals, shields or magic-immunity.
DO NOT be afraid to focus on killing the supports if you know killing the carry is either difficult or not going to happen.
2) Timings -
Aim to get your items in a timely fashion and then abuse the fact you got those items fast. Nothing says "we've won this fight" with a 15-20 minute shivas into ult combo.
3) Farming -
If you aren't team fighting then fire spirit a large (or any) jungle camp every so often, you'll be surprised about how much gold racks up. A habit to get used to is to only fire spirit creep waves to push them out and not farm with them. The amount of phoenix players I've killed because they used up all their spirits on creeps and then were unable to defend themselves is stupidly high.
Also please don't farm with the dive. The dive DOT is so minuscule compared to the fact you have no solid escape ability for 30 seconds, you're right click should be enough. Of course there are exceptions, the only time i would farm with my dive is if I was in desperate need to kill a jungle camp to get my early levels due to a awful laning stage .
Just my two pence.
Also a quick personal note, I looked at a couple of your phoenix games and I feel like your hero damage dealt is far far to low for what the hero can offer.
Any tips needed then feel free to ask :)
Octarine does a real good job and though I'm not much of a support, I build Urn to keep my health up during Sun Ray.
I used both Shiva's and Octarine and it was effective clearing and delaying waves.
Holy shit Smaug started spamming phoneix now when OD is really strong? Lol
Gotta try Octarine and aether lens now :o
@~Guardian~
Thanks for the insight,as I mentioned earlier I only consider myself a decent phoenix player.I am always looking out for good phoenix players to learn from.Though can I know what's your MMR?I'm not asking because I'm gonna discard your opinions if your MMR is low,but I want to know what skill bracket are you playing in which your playstyle is successful in.
Like I said in the beginning of the thread I'm a supportive type of phoenix,it's just my playstyle since I prefer to bulk my team up for fights.I do understand your point in not using her to her fullest potential with the supportive type of play since items like shivas synergize better with her skillset,but for me I buy whatever items I feel that can win the games for my team.And of course,there are multiple ways of doing that,yours included and also might be better than mine.
@Autumn
My MMR for a few years was sat at 4k as I never played to better myself however I am now within the 5k bracket and heading higher with a 60-odd% winrate in ranked.
Just had this game:
http://www.dotabuff.com/matches/2178768869
Going back to my previous post; I abused the laning stage and got my item timing nailed, meaning I can snowball without the assistance of my team well into the midgame.
@~Guardian~
Cool,do you always midas > shivas > rad?I've seen some 5 - 6k phoenix players while I'm playing rush straight for rad > shivas when they can thus skipping midas,I really wanna try that someday.Also how do you deal with omni,I assume by going shivas + rad you aim the other 4 enemies without repel with massive AOE damage,I also think that going shiva + rad in this case is better than going mek since your team is not going to out last them.
I do go urn, mek only if I have lost my kill window and won't ever snowball in the game. This goes back to being able to manipulate the laning stage to your favour, but yes my build is as follows:
Tranqs > wand > midas (10mins -15mins) > shivas (15mins - 22mins) > radiance (asap) > veil > refresher/ octarine.
If I am counter picked with a someone like silencer, disruptor, etc then I go midas into euls and then shivas and carry on from there. I can't see rushing radiance that viable for phoenix? he is quite squishy until he buys the heavy armour items like shivas, ac, even a veil.
Healers are a special blend and you have to essentially get them to play into your hands without them realizing. In the laning stages essentially throw out false intentions of going on the carry so when he repels the carry you kite the carry around whilst bombing the omniknight that has left himself vulnerable, however even then with the heals it is still tricky to get a kill.
When it comes to dazzle, its A LOT easy to play around him as it is just timing your dive, egg or spirits to burn past the grave timer and usually they don't have the mana or its on cd to heal off the fatal burn damage.
During the mid game it is very much as you say, trying to burn everyone I can with the aoe damage, though i try to prioritize the squishies in the team fight, as people love to panic when their hp is ticking for a 1/4 total hp per second meaning when you egg they usually are dead or running away to attack you leaving the egg to burn their cores or stun them if they have bkb.
@~Guardian~
Thanks for your tips,it's always a pleasure to have someone with a different playstyle and have more experience commenting about the hero :D
I think Smaug's spamming Phoenix because, now that OD is strong, he doesn't get to pick him first.