[Guide]Krobelus, the Death Prophet

[unqART]

Ok Guys First Start with  credits .. credits goes to me and to JooN is one guide for one event in one forum ok lets star

 

Krobelus, the Death Prophet

 

1. Goal and Hero Concept

 

 

Goal: The goal of the guide is simple: to show how a properly played death prophet can change the game through proper build and knowledge of the hero. I won't be going into every single detail. I will try my best to advocate certain concepts that I feel must be understood in order to fully utilize a great hero like the death prophet.

 

My personal concept of the death prophet determines how I build and play the death prophet. I see her as one of the strongest pushers who depend on items to function well. This concept will be the guiding light in understanding where my reasoning comes from.

 

It is very important to keep the hero concept in mind. While many may disagree on many elements of a guide, if they agree on the concept or the role of the hero, then the disagreements tend to be smaller. Constructive discussion can then take place because the concept is the same in both minds.

 

2. Hero Overview

 

Base movespeed is 285.

Base STR is 19 + 1.8 per level.

Base AGI is 14 + 1.4 per level.

Base INT is 20 + 3.0 per level.

Base Damage is 39-51.

Attack Range is 600.

 

3. Hero Abilities

 

Carrion Swarm

 

Sends a horde of bats to damage enemies.

 

Level 1 – 100 damage

Level 2 – 175 damage

Level 3 – 250 damage

Level 4 – 300 damage

 

Mana cost: 105 / 120 / 140 / 165. 9 second cooldown at all levels.

 

 

Silence

 

Stops all enemies in a target area from casting spells.

 

Level 1 – Lasts 3 seconds.

Level 2 – Lasts 4 seconds.

Level 3 – Lasts 5 seconds.

Level 4 – Lasts 6 seconds.

 

80 mana cost and 14 second cooldown at all levels.

 

This is a very strong skill that you MUST master. It will save your allies and yourself many times and it will grab your team kills that would be impossible without this skill. This is the first and foremost skill that you must master and abuse. Having an AOE silence is a great asset in any team.

 

 

Witchcraft

 

Increases the potency of each of Krobelus’ spells:

 

Passively increases movement speed by 3/6/9/12%.

 

Each level of witchcraft does the following:

 

Carrion Swarm: Decreases cooldown by 1 second and mana cost by 5.

Silence: Decreases cooldown by 1 second, starting from level 2 witchcraft.

Exorcism: Increases the number of spirits as follows:

 

Exorcism without witchcraft: 5/10/16 ghosts

Level 1: 6/11/16 ghosts

Level 2: 7/13/18 ghosts

Level 3: 8/14/20 ghosts

Level 4: 9/16/23 ghosts

 

Total effect of level 4 witchcraft on level 4 skills:

 

Carrion Swarm: Mana cost - 145. Cooldown - 5 seconds

Silence: Cooldown - 11 seconds

Exorcism: 23 ghosts

 

Witchcraft is an icing on a very awesome cake. The biggest noticeable advantage of taking witchcraft is the number of spirits increased and movement speed boost. A very solid skill IMO. It bumps your movement speed up to average and let’s you cast carrion swarm without too much hindrance to your mana.

 

 

Exorcism

 

Unleashes evil spirits to attack your enemies.

 

Level 1 – Summons 5 evil spirits.

Level 2 – Summons 10 evil spirits.

Level 3 – Summons 16 evil spirits.

 

Mana cost: 200 / 300 / 400. 100 second cooldown at all levels.

 

Your ultimate pushing ability. This skill absolutely demolishes towers. Exorcism is the reason why you’re built as a super pusher and it is also the reason why you will be horribly focus fired in team battles.

 

 

Part II – Skill and Item Build

 

1. Introduction to Build

 

The focus of my build is to make you a strong pusher. Nothing else. We will turn that bony, fragile DP into a meaty, durable DP in order to stay alive in the midst of a team battle with her spirits unleashing hell.

 

2. Recommended Skill Order

 

Level 1 - Silence

Level 2 - Carrion Swarm

Level 3 - Carrion Swarm

Level 4 - Silence/Witchcraft

Level 5 - Carrion Swarm

Level 6 - Witchcraft

Level 7 - Carrion Swarm

Level 8-9 - Witchcraft

Level 10 - Exorcism

Level 11 - Exorcism

Level 12 - Witchcraft/Silence

Level 13-14 - Silence

Level 15 - Stats

Level 16 - Exorcism

Level 17-25 - Stats

 

3. Skill Build Justifications

 

Silence at level 1 is usually desirable. Even at level 1, silence is a great skill that will help you against any weird first blood attempts. First level of carrion swarm is... pathetic. However, do get carrion swarm first if your team wants to do a surprise level 1 gank or something. In that case carrion swarm should be beneficial. In other cases, don't bother.

 

Carrion swarm should be maxed as it will help you farm and kill when the opportunity arises. Your reliance on that nuke early to mid game is inevitable.

 

At level 4, I personally take silence to the next level rather than add a level in witchcraft. I enjoy the increased AOE and the additional level of silence. Personal preference. One of the sections below should show a screenshot of the difference between level 1 and level 2 silence. If you're not comfortable with this, then take witchcraft. No biggie. I'm going to emphasize this again, it's not such a huge deal, you can go either way as long as it satisfies your way of playing. If you want to be able to spam carrion swarm a little bit more, then take witchcraft. If you're really on the defense, then take silence to another level.

 

Maxing out witchcraft after carrion swarm is a no brainer. Takes your hero to the next level.

 

Exorcism: There's a reason why you don't get exorcism at level 6. Simply put, it costs too much mana for minimum benefits. Many would disagree with this assessment and some might even call it a fatal flaw. It just puts a huge I'M HERE sign on top of your head and quite frankly, it's a horrible skill to gank with (which is the main focus of early/mid game, I mean generally, not referring to death prophet) and a horrible laning skill (which is the early game phase). However, if you're not comfortable with not skilling exorcism at level 6, then go ahead and skill it. It's not such a huge deal to be honest.

 

Some people vomit at the thought of getting exorcism at level 10/11. All I'm going to say is it depends on your playstyle and how the game is going for you. Like I said above, it is not such a big deal that you must get it at level 6 or you must get it at 10/11. Personally, it doesn't make sense to me. Early game laning and early/mid game ganking revolves around instant damage or reliable DoT spells that don't require you to be in the thick of battle. Most likely you will benefit from using the mana to cast carrion swarm (burst damage) rather than cast exorcism.

 

Exorcism is the centerpiece of death prophet. We build her around this skill. Exorcism demolishes towers in a matter of seconds and wrecks havoc in team battles. There's only one true way to counter exorcism: kill death prophet. BKB does not help. Disabling death prophet does not help. Even using song of the siren does not help (this actually helps death prophet, since you are giving her full immunity while ghosts are swarming around). You kill the spellcaster, and the ghosts disappears.

 

Another important thing about exorcism is that when the ghosts return to you, it heals you based on 25% of the amount of damage each ghost dealt while they were out. So this means you get a free heal if you manage to survive the entire duration.

 

4. Items

 

The item build will reflect death prophet's skill set. Durability, durability, durability. How do we counter exorcism? You kill her. That means increasing death prophet's survivability is increasing her potency in team battles. The main focus is durability. You want to be able to stay alive during the entire duration of exorcism for two reasons. First, the longer the ghosts are out, the more they wreck havoc. Second, if you manage to survive the entire duration even with 1 HP, the ghosts will return to you and heal you for a substantial amount.

 

Three ways to improve durability. First, increase her HP. Second, increase her armor. Third, increase her HP regen (in conjunction with HP and armor, not as a stand alone quality). Silence should help you with spells so magic resistance isn't as important. One exception: if the other team has necrolyte, get hood before shivas and after bloodstone. Reaper's scythe used solely to shut you down can be devastating, as seen by my second replay. I would even go as far as to say reaper's scythe is what did our team in. This holds true for other devastating spells like doom.

 

Get any item that fulfills any of the three criteria I mentioned. HP, armor, and HP regen. Another important criteria is the cost and the build up. This is very important for your first major item, but less so when you move on to bigger items.

 

My recommendation: Bloodstone, vanguard, bracers. Whatever floats your boat. Just keep in mind the three criteria I mentioned. As the game goes on, you do want to start getting bigger items, even if the cost and build up are horrible. Such items are heart, shivas guard, even skadi if you want to.

 

Focus on HP if your opponents are more spell oriented. Focus on armor if they have dangerous late game heroes that rely on physical attacks. The key is to strike a balance between HP and armor. HP regen is nice, but the first two have higher priorities. The best course of action is HP → armor. Nukes dominate early to mid game and physical damage starts to take over late game. Good thing about having HP is that it works against spells and physical attacks, but like I said earlier, there needs to be a balance.

 

The main point of the item build is that each and every item must be focused on increasing your survivability. Items that focus on other things such as disables (guinsoo), augmenting your killing power (dagon), and pure support items (mekansm) are not your priority. Durability, durability, durability. Keep that in mind.

 

Special word on Mekansm: Wrong item to put on death prophet. It drains too much mana, simple as that. You have one huge mana draining spell (exorcism) and two spammable spells (carrion swarm and silence). It's hard enough managing your mana without additional drainage.

 

Choice of footwear: Phase boots or boots of travel. Either one works fine. Phase boots if you think you can end the game fast (cheap and offers good mobility boost and ARMOR). Boots of travel if you think the game will drag on and you absolutely NEED the ability to jump around the map to push.

 

For those who do not like just mere “criteria,” this section will show you a core build, for the lack of better wording, to follow and then work upon that. This build reflects my personal choice.

 

 

Bloodstone

 

The only way to counter exorcism is to kill DP. It's a catch 22 situation for your opponents. Let you live ,and your ghosts wrecks them. Kill you (after a hard fight of course), and you heal your teammates around you. Of course, getting rid of the ghosts in the end is highly desirable, but you can't go down without a fight right? This item satisfies the HP requirement and let's you use your spells with ease, enabling you to throw down crucial silences without having to sacrifice other spell casting abilities. And as mentioned above, bloodstone's effect is highly desirable on a hero who is always a top priority on the must kill list.

 

 

 

Shivas Guard

 

Your HP is taken care of with bloodstone, next up is armor. Boosting your armor by 15 is no joke, not to mention the aura that decreases your opponent's attack speed. It's the perfect item to mitigate a late game DPS hero. The AOE slow that comes from shivas guard is also beneficial in chasing and running away in tight spots.

 

 

 

Boots of Travel

 

You need BOT to push. TP scrolls will not let you push, but BOT will. Being able to teleport anywhere your creeps are is crucial to any pusher. It also let’s you defend and farm by jumping lanes. The movement speed boost is superior to treads and you don’t need IAS on DP to warrant getting treads over BOT. However, get this item after you finish your bloodstone/shivas guard.

 

OR

 

 

Phase Boots

 

Up to you to decide if you're going to need the BOT's for that valuable mobility, or if you want that phase boots which is a blessing to your movement speed and a quick small boost to your pathetic armor. Most games I usually go phase boots, but sometimes I just rush the bloodstone and find myself wanting the mobility to jump around for pushes.

 

 

Part III – Strategy

 

 

Generally speaking, you want to stay in a safe lane. That means bottom/mid for sentinel or top/mid for scourge. Solo is more than possible, but death prophet is not the best solo so keep that in mind. Having some sort of HP regen (tangos, flasks) and stats (branches, gauntlet) is preferable. Having a chicken is a must, so if someone on your team doesn't buy one or they refuse to share with you, then be sure to buy one for yourself. Having items delivered to you allows you to stay in the lane at your best, and this is more so important if you're in the long lane (longer distance to your fountain).

 

Your priority is to level and farm. The faster you max out all your skills, the better it is for your team. Maxed silence as well as exorcism, boosted by witchcraft is a sight to behold when you out leveled your opponents. If you're in a horrible lane, rush a void stone ASAP. Use carrion swarm to farm, grabbing two creeps if possible. Stay back just enough to gain experience and have your finger ready to silence. Grab a couple clarities if you need. The key to surviving a hard lane is to grab creep kills and harass with your carrion swarm. The emphasis here is being able to farm and gain levels.

 

Two things to keep in mind. First, buy observer wards. You will not survive a gank easily. Death prophet is fragile early game with no escape mechanism. Avoiding ganks is the best way to survive.

 

Second, do not gank. Stay in your lane and farm. Hop around the map with TP scrolls to keep on farming. However, if your teammate comes to gank your lane, help out with carrion swarm and silence if needed. The main point is not to FORCE a gank, but to HELP if it COMES to YOU. Don't go out of your way to gank other lanes. Death prophet's ganking power is dismal. No stun, no slow, nor does she have a powerful single target spell. Exorcism is a bad spell to be used in ganks because it doesn't have burst damage that is important in ganks. The essence of ganking is swift and strong. The longer it takes to kill the enemy, the higher the chance their teammates will arrive to fight. This also ties in with another advice: don't get greedy for kills. That means no tower diving and no chasing for an extended period of time. If you have a choice between staying alive or killing someone and dying, then choose to live. Certain heroes are designed to gank till they die such as venge and lina. Death prophet is not one of them.

 

However, this does not mean stay in your lane and farm while your teammates are defending a tower. Always carry a TP scroll and TP in team battles to be of some help. Help out with silences and carrion swarms. If the team battle is big enough, use exorcism, even if it's level 1. In team battles, use carrion swarm sparingly depending on how much mana you have. If you have to debate between saving your mana for carrion swarm or silence, then choose silence. If your team is outright dominating the team fight, then use carrion swarm with discretion.

 

When you hit level 11, now is the time to start pushing the outer towers. By this time, all the level one towers should be down by at least half their HP and some second level towers might be down. Ask some of your teammates (your team's gankers) to accompany you so you guys can push down lanes. Your strength comes from tower razing so use it! If the tower is going to fall relatively easily, then don't turn on exorcism (tower with 50 HP does not warrant an exorcism).

 

Level 16 is the ripe time to start pushing in the base. This is the time where you are at your peak, and the longer the game drags on, the worse off it is for your team if your team depends on you to push. The most optimum situation is where you're level 16 with a decent item and in the making of another, while the other team's carry is lower and significantly underfarmed. The worst case is if the other team's carry is farming nicely and they have turtle heroes (pit lord comes to mind).

 

Your role in pushes is pulling off important silences, using carrion swarm to take down waves, and survive the full duration of exorcism. The goal of course, is the tower and raxes and to win the team fight. Do NOT stay in the front lines. Try your best to keep yourself as conspicuous as possible, even though this is near impossible considering all the ghosts attracting attention to you.

 

 

Part IV – How to use your Skills Effectively

 

1. Carrion Swarm

 

 

This is the range of carrion swarm. The distance between where the first observer ward is and DP is the maximum casting range without moving forward (600 casting range). It’s good to have a mental note of this range. As you can see, the range of this skill makes it easy to hit heroes with carrion swarm. You will rarely miss since the range is ungodly.

 

When you use carrion swarm to farm, don’t ever use it at the beginning of the creep wave. You’ll just mess things up. Always try to last hit the first creep that all your creeps are focusing. Then hit the ranged creep once and focus on a creep that your creeps aren’t hitting. This should grab you at least three creep kills.

 

Carrion Swarm mechanics:

 

- 110 starting AoE/700 distance traveled/300 final AoE. To sum it up, you can hit a unit up to 1,000 distance away from you (add 700 + 300).

 

2. Silence

 

 

This is the maximum casting range for silence. You can tell right away that the range is imba. The AOE of this silence is level 4. Always try to position your silence to hit as many opponents as possible. You should never miss hitting silence since there is almost no casting time and the AOE is huge.

 

In team battles, this skill should always be in cooldown. It creates a huge advantage for your team so take advantage of it. Use it to stop channeling spells and use it to stop windwalkers and blinkers from escaping your teammates. Always aim this skill at a disabler or a nuker if your opponents are scattered and you just can’t get everyone in.

 

If you or your teammate are being chased, always remember that you can use silence to stop them from stunning, slowing, or nuking you.

 

Early game, you must be quick with your fingers to stop your opponents should they initiate a combo. The casting range for silence is larger than most, if not all spells that other heroes can dish out. Notable exceptions are swap, assassinate, rupture, and more that I can’t think of.

 

The key to using silence effectively is to use it calmly. What do I mean by that? It means don't silence your opponent when he already used his important spell. Most spells have more than 10 seconds cool down. Time that and then silence to “increase” their cool down time.

 

It also means use silence as a follow up. What do I mean by this? It means do not silence opponents who are in no position to use spells, i.e: caught in blackhole, reverse polarity. Use silence right before the spell is about to end. So if your enigma caught 5 of your enemies in a blackhole, turn on exorcism, use carrion swarm, and THEN silence when they are about to escape blackhole.

 

The key to silence is timing it correctly based on the situation, as mentioned above. It means do not panic and spam silence when it is obviously not needed. This also means you need some basic understanding of what spells other heroes have and their cooldown. This paragraph is just reiterating the previous two paragraphs, but I feel it is important to emphasize the GOAL of silence. You do not achieve anything by silencing the enemy when they have no spells to use. You do not achieve anything by silencing enemies who are in no position to use spells.

 

The following screenshot shows the difference between silence level 1 and 2. While not a huge difference, you gain more benefits from the second level of silence than adding the first level of witchcraft in the form of an additional second of silence and increased AOE.

 

Level 1 silence

 

 

Level 2 silence

 

 

Silence mechanics:

 

- Casting range: 900

- AoE of silence: 200/275/350/350

 

3. Exorcism

 

Only one way to effectively use exorcism: survive the entire duration. Oh, and not using it frivolously before a major push.

 

Exorcism mechanics:

 

- Spirits have 500 movement speed.

- The spirits circle around you in an AOE of 700.

- Spirits disappear if they are more than 2000 units away from death prophet.

- The spirits attack the target death prophet is attacking. So contrary to popular belief, they aren't always attacking random targets.

- Death prophet is healed 25% of the total damage dealt by each spirit after exorcism ends (and the ghosts have to return to you).

- Spirits do 43-48 hero damage. (So magic immunity [rage, BKB] does not work against spirits)

- Spirits attack anyone in in 900 range.

- Vanguard/stout shield block effect does NOT work against spirits.

 

tnx for reading credits: me and JooH

[|Itachi]

The guide is awesome thank you! And as I promise your karma  +1 by me for all you lately shares!

 

This doesn't mean you have to stop posting guides ;) keep posting useful guides

[Reptant_]

good but in DotA there are no guides-every enemy and situation needs a different reaction

[unqART]

The guide is awesome thank you! And as I promise your karma  +1 by me for all you lately shares!

 

This doesn't mean you have to stop posting guides ;) keep posting useful guides

tnx a lot boy! im little tired today more guide tomorrow i hope to be better the dota section!

[JuStAGaMe]

Take a look here : http://forums.dota-allstars.com/lofiversion/index.php?t270243.html

 

You have copied a part of the guide and posted it here claiming that credits go to yourself and ....jooh....

 

You've also erased the real credits of this guide.

 

5. Credits

 

- BloOdy for his carrion swarm picture.

- My now dead death prophet guide rotting away in scourge guides.

- Dota Wiki page for providing valuable information on the mechanics of witchcraft and exorcism.

 

Edit: And as i see, all "your" guides are a copy from dota-allstars forum...

[|Itachi]

@JustAGame i dont care really just the share deserves karma

 

@Wraith Band there is no hurry i just tell you to keep an eye on dota section ;)

[Reptant_]

It's not bad to C/p things,if you give RIGHT credits

 

Really,Wrath what did you put in this guide ?

[unqART]

Take a look here : http://forums.dota-allstars.com/lofiversion/index.php?t270243.html

 

You have copied a part of the guide and posted it here claiming that credits go to yourself and ....jooh....

 

You've also erased the real credits of this guide.

 

Edit: And as i see, all "your" guides are a copy from dota-allstars forum...

first of all JooH is friend real life and secont the 1/3 of guid is my work .. you can pm the JooH .. and the credits are right ..

 

It's not bad to C/p things,if you give RIGHT credits

 

Really,Wrath what did you put in this guide ?

i put the pic's and the stats

the strategy part is the JooH's work ..

[Noble®]

if you know dota then you can make your own guides without using anything from other users but if you use something from them it should be the 1/10 not the 2/3...

 

btw i disagree with the part III.

 

Krobelus is the best pusher,farmer,destroyer,pvper,harasser,soloer,lane holders and becomes extremely powerful after 6lvl.

she is one of the best finishers in game+ tower destroyer in a single pvp...i agree she is fragile thats why she is item dependable and she is dead meat against kardel(from range heroes)

if played right she can turn the odds in a single fight only

 

gj for the rest parts

 

 

[unqART]

if you know dota then you can make your own guides without using anything from other users but if you use something from them it should be the 1/10 not the 2/3...

 

btw i disagree with the part III.

 

Krobelus is the best pusher,farmer,destroyer,pvper,harasser,soloer,lane holders and becomes extremely powerful after 6lvl.

she is one of the best finishers in game+ tower destroyer in a single pvp...i agree she is fragile thats why she is item dependable and she is dead meat against kardel(from range heroes)

if played right she can turn the odds in a single fight only

 

gj for the rest parts

 

 

ofc and i know from dota i post the 2 more post here with right credits and in this post the credits are right any way on topic yes he can farm easy with Carrion Swarm

[Noble®]

the best way to imbaness is your own work and gamestyle so that the credits will always be yours :D ;)

[unqART]

the best way to imbaness is your own work and gamestyle so that the credits will always be yours :D ;)

receiver and correct your opinion!

[Noble®]

receiver and correct your opinion!

i meant that the most appreciated work is a 100% completely yours work,with credits only to you...

[DreaM]

i meant that the most appreciated work is a 100% completely yours work,with credits only to you...

 

The only credits he has for this guide is putting JooH's name in it rofl.

[Noble®]

The only credits he has for this guide is putting JooH's name in it rofl.

hey filip whats up? the reason i posted about credits was because i dont want to see other names or sites  credits on guides :)