DOTA 4 YOU: September 2013

Beginners' Guide On Soul Ring Usage

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You think that cheap items are unuseful? Better think again.

FIRST AND FOREMOST

My first DotA Guide,.I should point out that this is a guide for either beginners who haven't used Soul Ring yet or experienced players that still didn't used Soul Ring. Contents are just some basics of Soul Ring; the right usage of it, and heroes to use it with. Done with the introductions, so lets begin.

ITEM SUMMARY

Recipe: Total (800g)

Ring of Regeneration (350g)
Sobi Mask (325g)

Soul Ring (125g)

Gives:

3 HP regeneration
+50% Mana regeneration
Sacrifice (active)

Effects of Sacrifice

· Sacrifices 150 HP to instantly gain 150 Mana

· 25 seconds cool down

· If the Mana obtained exceeds to your Mana pool, it will create a buff which will be used before your Mana pool

· Mana obtained lasts for 10 seconds, and the unused Mana gain on this period will be lost

· Sacrifice damage type is direct HP removal

Advantages:

If you need Mana to cast spells in an instant, using Soul Ring would be the answer.

You won't die using Soul Ring (i.e. kill yourself). Even if your HP is below 150, your HP will always be reduced to 1 whenever it is used (e. g. from 50 - 1, not including your HP regeneration) .

If your Hero receives less harassments, you can use Soul Ring continuously to spam your skills. Your HP will regenerate on time given by the HP regeneration of Soul ring.

WHEN TO BUILD

Soul Ring is best to build on early game, or you can get as your first item. If your hero depends on Mana items for spamming your skills, it is necessary to build this as soon as you can. You need this item on early game for you to spam those skills to money shot creeps as well as damage enemy heroes. That 3 HP/s is fare enough to regenerate a low level unit, plus a good Mana regeneration.

If you find it hard to buy Magic Bottle ASAP (e.g. SF on grim situation) or you really prefer Soul Ring instead of bottle, you may build Soul Ring for replacement for the bottle. These two items have same purposes, HP and Mana regeneration, with little differences.
If you want to stay on farm sites early for raising your level and gold farm reasons using your summon/ illusion skills, you may want to build Soul Ring. All you'll have to do is use your skill (e.g. Summon Wolves), then farm, wait for the skill cool down, soul ring then use skill again. You'll receive 0 damage (or maybe some if hit) cause your summons/ illusions would tank them for you. You won't mind for the HP lost cause it would be regenerated on time by the aid of your Soul Ring.

BEST HEROES TO BUILD WITH

Heroes with healing-damage ability:

For Bane Elemental (Atropos), his Brain Sap (lvl 4) can absorb 300 HP and deals same damage at the same time.
So if you use Soul Ring before using Brain Sap, you'll only spend 50 Mana, you damaged your opponent by 50, and you gained 150.
You could spam this skill as long as you're soloing your lane, so if you used it for 3 times, it would deal 900 damage, and a 450 HP gain,
with only 150 Mana used. Besides, Atropos' other skill costs high Mana to use, so a Mana burst from Soul Ring is a really great aid.

As for Omniknight (Purist Thunderwrath), his Purification (lvl 4) skill gives him or his ally a 360HP heal, and same damage to enemy units near the target. So if we use some computation (I'll put the heal before the sacrifice just to see the difference), 360-150=210, this shows that you'll receive no damage for the sacrifice, perhaps you'll gain 210HP with just 10 Mana cost (160 Mana to cast minus 150 Mana gain=10) plus 360 damage to nearby enemy units. In addition to, that 50% Mana regeneration is very helpful to him to save his Mana for casting his spells, specially Guardian Angel.

And for Shadow Priest (Dazzle), his Shadow Wave (lvl 4) is a healing wave that would bounce up to 5 units (the first wave starts from Dazzle, so it is included on the count) with 140 HP heal on each and deals same damage on enemy units around them. If we use some computations again (heal before the sacrifice), 140*5=700-150=550, so 540 HP for your allies and to remaining 10 is yours, with no Mana used perhaps you gained 40 (remember: if the Mana gain on the Soul Ring is not used under the 10 second limit, it will be gone, so better use other skills rather than just to let it expire). You may use Soul Ring on him if no Mana auras are on your side or if you are self-dependent for Mana regens. Besides, you can provide your team with heals without worrying about your HP, and use your remaining Mana on your other skills to help them with.

The Goblins:

Goblin Techies (Squee Spleen and Spoon)

- YEAH! If you love Techies like I do, I suggest you should buy Soul Ring on him. This would make him plant mines non-stop, and because you're placing mines on fogged and hidden areas, so you would receive 0 damage, and your HP should regenerate on time after using Soul Ring. Magic Bottle could be his main Mana and HP item, but Soul Ring could be the BEST replacement for it. And, you can use Soul Ring then suicide if you lack on Mana to cast it (don't mind the HP lost, cause you wouldn't use any HP on the graveyard).

Alchemist (Razzil Darkbrew)

- This dude needs that Mana gain and regeneration to spam his Acid Spray and Unstable Concoction. Besides, Alchemist have a high HP regeneration while in state of Chemical Rage, so paying 150 HP won't be a problem for him (plus his STR/HP regen items). Resulting to endless spray, that would make his enemies to suffer HP degenerate and more bitter on cheap attacks.

Tinker (Boush)

- For sure, you want to get BoT on him. Which means, you'll use Re-arm a plenty of times for spamming and ganking reasons. So, using Soul Ring on him will provide you 150 Mana for every 3 seconds (well take it that 150 Mana gain is the Mana you'll spend to use Re-arm) and spend your Mana to your damaging skills. For the HP, every time you reach near empty HP and Mana, you'll use BoT to teleport to your fountain to regenerate then teleport back to spam/ gank , repeat and so on. So Soul Ring would be a great aid on your Mana needs besides teleporting back to your fountain would restore those HP losts. Magic Bottle, on the other hand, doesn't give an instant Mana and doesn't gives Mana gain everytime you use Re-arm, but doesn't sacrifices HP, perhaps gives you HP restoration plus Mana.

Note: Soul Ring is the best REPLACEMENT, and its not good to skip bottle to Tinker. If I would give marks on these two items for Tinker, Magic Bottle = 99 out of 100, and Soul Ring = 90 out of 100. You should give it a try.

SOUL RING IS QUITE GOOD TO ALL HEROES EXCEPT FOR

Heroes with Mana replenishments as their skills:

- It's because these heroes already have skills that provides enough Mana for themselves or on allies. So Mana gain in the Soul Ring isn't necessary, and the HP they would sacrifice is a great lost for them.

Gankers having low-magical damages:

- These gankers that have low magical damages don't need Soul Ring. It's because spamming their skills and using Soul Ring would bring their HP near death, while they would only bring minimum damages to their enemies. However, the HP and Mana regeneration Soul Ring would give is pretty good for them, but it's better to get Perseverance or RoB rather than Soul ring.

Tank Heroes:

- Tank Heroes shouldn't get Soul Ring. Having enough HP to tank and start a team fight is their role, so reducing your HP down inside or before a clash makes yourself easier to get killed, which you and your team don't want to happen. Getting other Mana items except Soul Ring is better, RoB or Perseverance as I said earlier, or you can rely on your ally supportive items and skills like Vladmir's or Arcane Boots.

DPS carry heroes:

- These heroes doesn't use Mana that much. Instead, they go for basic items with better bonuses on them rather than Soul Ring. They don't want to sacrifice any HP, and they don't have any skills to spam with, which means the Mana gain will go wasted.

Special Mentions:

Geomancer (Meepo)

- Whoa! You've got 4 Meepos, so you'll gain 150 Mana for each of them? Nah, it would only give Mana for the main Meepo, and don't give any Mana for the rest. Besides this dude goes for AoE items, (e.g. Mekanism, Vlad's) , so Soul Ring's regenerations isn't necessary.

Abaddon (Lord of Avernus)

- If your intention is to trigger your Aphotic Shield or Borrowed Time, or heal yourself while Borrowed time is activated by using Soul Ring, IT WONT! Soul Ring's sacrifice is a direct HP removal, and so it doesn't interrupts any potions on use. It would only reduce your HP, cause it won't trigger any of them, even your HP is near 400, cause it's a direct HP removal (your HP was directly removed, and not a damage of any kind).

SITUATIONS THAT MUST NOT TO USE SOUL RING

If your HP is currently on red and you're facing enemy heroes. This is for the fact that Sacrifice would reduce your HP, making you more vulnerable so that simple nuke skills on your face would bring you down.
All of your active skills are on cool down. This means you can't use any skill, together with your Mana. The Mana you should obtained wouldn't be used and will be gone, which means Sacrifice on this situation is just a waste of HP.
Your current Mana plus the Mana to be gained on Sacrifice isn't enough for the Mana cost of your desired skill, more likely, your ultimate (e.g. to cast Freezing Field). For example, Rylai Crestfall on level 16, your Mana regeneration items and bonus are Bracer, Urn of Shadows, Magic Wand, plus Soul Ring (your Treads is STR based, so no Mana upgrade). You currently have 100+ Mana, and you wanna cast Freezing Field which costs 600 Mana. So if your current Mana is 130 plus 150 Mana gain would be equivalent to 280, still isn't enough to cast Freezing Field even if you wait for your Mana to regenerate. Hence, another waste of HP, and your Soul Ring on cool down.
Radiance, Heartstopper aura or any other enemy damaging aruas is near you while you're HP is 150 or below. Use Soul Ring on this situation and just a little 'twink' and you're in heaven.
If your intention is to kill yourself using Soul Ring. As I said before, Soul Ring is non-lethal, and always reduce your HP to 1 even if your current HP is 150 or below. By doing so, any normal attack, even neutrals could easily kill you.

SOUL RING + POWER TREADS

If you already know that changing your Power Tread's attribute is good, then this one comes handy for you.

If not, here's a Power Tread Attribute guides:

Here's how it works. Your Power Treads should be always on INT based before you use any skill (this is to maximize your Mana pool).Put your Treads to STR before using Soul Ring (INT to AGI to STR = by doing so you have lowered your Mana pool because low HP/ Mana pools can be restored more by fixed heals). And before you use your skills, switch your Power Treads back to INT, to maximize again your Mana pool. You could use potions after you used your skills, but before it, switch your Power Treads to AGI to lower again your HP/ Mana pool (as I said earlier, low HP/ Mana pools can be restored more by potions).

NOTES

Remember, Soul Ring is very effective on EARLY GAME, and would be less effective on late game cause for sure you would get your desired Hard-Core items.

Do not use Soul Ring to kill yourself!

And, note, this item is probably the best REPLACEMENT, not the core, with heroes who's main item is Magic Bottle, because ganking with runes would be a pretty sure kill.

Oh well, that's all. I hope this one would help even a LITTLE. If you don't find Soul Ring a good item, well, I think I don't have anything to do with it. And if you have something to add or you see something wrong on this, please feel free to post a comment for your feed backs.

1. What is My DotA Blogger?

My DotA Blogger is a blog composed of my DotA knowledge and experiences that I wanna share to everyone.
Out of boredom, I just realized that I could make a compilation of things that I know about DotA, with some facts that I just noticed on my surroundings in relevant to DotA and the results of playing it.

2. I? You mean, you wrote those posts and created this site alone?

Oh, yes. Actually, this is the first time I created a blog. And I think this one still needs a lot of things to work on, specially designs, scripts, etc. On about myself, I'm just another DotA player who loves to sit in front of my computer. Pretty good at drawing (that's what they say), and loves to imitate L (Lawliet).

3. What kind of guides do you have in here?

I'm working more on 'new items' guides, pretty simple to start with but I can be proud of that they are my very own. And there's Tip-Bits, a mini trivia-like guides which are easy to understand, yet filled with infos that I think some of you didn't know. Gimme high five if you agree with "Simplicity is beauty."

4. Do your guides work?

100% sure. I tried them many times before, so no need to worry. Or if you're still curious, I suggest you try them yourself.

5. Why not on hero guides? Like a hero skill+item build guide.

Uhm, I've seen plenty of them, and each of them are very good. I think I'll lie low on competing other blogs, instead, I should make a good guide yet unique in style. But I'll reconsider about making one.

6. Are you a Pro? Can we play a match?

Oh, sure. I play most of the time whenever I got bored on doing this blog. Catch me on Garena, username evilmaron.On being a pro thing, you could just try me out.

7. Say, what makes you want to play DotA rather than other strategy games? Isn't controlling a single unit boring?

Hmm... it seems you still haven't experienced the DELIGHT after murdering 5 heroes on a single clash of massive skills, the THRILL when escaping near-death situations, and the STORM every time you throw your enemies with your outraging trash talks. They've got nothing on DotA, I tell you.

8. Can you teach me how to play this one nicely? I've just heard from my friends that this game is really cool, so I tried to play this but I still don't get the whole mechanics of it. Little help in here?

At the moment, I don't have any guides for players whom just started playing DotA. All I can say is, the best tutorial would be the assistance from your friends (No worries for the tutorial fee!). If you don't have any friends to help you, try to search for videos on YouTube, just watch carefully and try to follow what you've learned.
And oh, one more thing, PERSEVERE! Most of my friends suffered (rather enjoyed) 2-3 years of DotA gaming, from being the food on every game (the fast-learners have taken the advantage) up to they could carry the whole team by themselves. How? They have spent their vacant hours (sometimes they cut their classes -- which you don't have to follow) just to play and compete. Plus they rent overnight, still playing DotA! Conclusions? Practice doesn't makes anyone perfect, perhaps it could make them better (together with the addiction).