LogFAQs > #962660477

100 - Lone Druid (ranged Agility) (aka Sylla)
https://gamefaqs.gamespot.com/a/user_image/3/8/0/AAAACbAAC7WU.jpg
Basic Abilities: Summon Spirit Bear, Spirit Link, Savage Roar, True Form
https://gamefaqs.gamespot.com/a/user_image/3/8/1/AAAACbAAC7WV.jpg
Spirit Bear Abilities: Return, Demolish, Entangling Claws, Savage Roar
Shard Ability: Improves Savage Roar to provide a "Rabid" buff to allies in an area around Sylla and his bear, improving their attack speed.
Scepter Ability: Improves Summon Spirit Bear to allow it to attack any distance from Sylla, and the bear no longer dies if Sylla does.

This one was a bit difficult to write, and I'll chalk *this* guy's position this low based on my own experience - I don't think I've ever willingly played him in Dota 2 beyond trying to clear out Cavern Crawl in Turbo mode, yet I sourly remember when he was another International front-runner.

So, Sylla+bear: this whole guy's shtick is that the bear itself counts as a hero, and as such, most tend to run Sylla one of two ways - focusing on itemizing the bear (by far the most common method of playing him) or focusing on itemizing the hero. As such, he's a bit more user-friendly than Meepo was, but there are some problems with going too far in one direction.

If you're focusing as main-body Sylla, you're going to have an extremely rough early game. The bear is far from useless; a lucky entangle will get you an occasional kill, but if you don't focus on leveling it a bunch early for durability, Sylla himself is going to have a bit of a problem when it comes to getting ganked, *especially* if the bear dies and leaves a fat bounty to his killer, a 120 second cooldown from the last summoning time, and a 20% health chunk. Also, the bear will die if Sylla dies. Savage Roar will help to mitigate these, since it makes enemies scurry away from both Sylla and his bear back to their fountain, but it doesn't last very long unless you're actively leveling it, and given the potency of both Spirit Link and Savage Roar, he very much needs to hit level 12 in a hurry to max them all out (ignoring True Form) bear/spirit link/roar to give him the safety to farm further, which kind of puts him into a rough spot with his base stats. Building this way also will need to pick up a Shard to provide the Rabid buff, until eventually at some point, Sylla will be able to attack quickly enough to offset his personal poor base damage to use on-hit items (read: Maelstrom->Mjollnir, MKB, Diffusal Blade, Desolator, or some combination) or try to buff up his own stats to not immediately drop dead outside of True Form. It can work both as a hero killer that transitions to a building killer when he gains the Bear's Demolish buff during True Form, but your bear will be nothing but an aggro drawing 200 gold chunk of lard that occasionally heals Sylla a bit through the Spirit Link lifesteal. Yes, it can work, but it takes a *very* long time to get off the ground when there are so many better range-carry options with more effective kiting.

So let's move on to bear-focus Sylla - since the bear itself does not gain any benefit from stats themselves and gains a flat 5 damage for every level from Sylla, it gets an easier selection of items to work worth. It can either double down on the heavy damage mauler and try to slay towers by going for a flat damage build to coincide with its built-in Demolish, or focus heavily on attack speed to try and fish for Entangle procs, which usually spells doom for any squishy hero if it pulls it off. Most items that work well on Sylla will work equally well on his bear (except for Power Treads as a boot choice) but this is, again, not without its downsides. Again, having the bear die is a costly 120 second cooldown, and given that Sylla himself is made of paper, it frequently will be dead if Sylla himself isn't careful. Also, if the bear dies? Sylla is now useless for the resummoning period. Have fun with that.

A lot of Sylla's problems revolve around "can the bear take this" and if not, how heavily he gets punished for it. He plays a bit oddly for a carry because he's at his most effective at the midgame and piss-weak early, pushing way more than he murders people, and while he has the frightening potential to be the only lategame hero in with 12 item slots filled (and then some, if we count consumable Moon Shards on both Sylla and his bear, and consumable shard for Sylla, and consumable Scepter, and neutrals) games will typically never last that long, even with a Techies, Sniper, and Venomancer all on one team to stall the shit out of it.

As far as "disregard gameplay, hit face" goes, you could do worse, I guess, but when your offensive 12 items get countered by a single Ghost Scepter, it's time to rethink most of your game plan, doubly so if you wind up killing yourself because someone picked a Lich and you suck at micro.

Next hero hint: Disregard gameplay, hit face, except this time with a nuke for an ultimate.