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Tinkering about! Gil Bot's guide for Tinker (updated for patch 7.01)

February 3, 2017 by Gil Bot
Comments: 7    |    Views: 21019    |   


my build

DotA2 Hero: Tinker




Hero Skills

Laser

1 3 13 16

Heat Seeking Missile

2 9 11 12

Defense Matrix

4 5 6 8

Rearm

7 14 18

Talents

10 15

Hero Talents

+0.2s Heat-Seeking Missile Ministun
25
+80 Laser Damage
-0.5s Keen Conveyance cooldown
20
Defense Matrix Grants 25% Cooldown Reduction
+1 Heat-Seeking Missile
15
+125 Defense Matrix damage absorbed
+8% Manacost/Manaloss Reduction
10
+50 Laser Radius


Tinkering about! Gil Bot's guide for Tinker (updated for patch 7.01)

Gil Bot
February 3, 2017


Introduction

Hi! Gil Bot here bringing you a guide to Tinker. This my 4th guide by the way. This hero is currently one of my favorite hero for some reasons that I can't explain. I think he become stronger than the old Tinker in the past 2-3 years because of his buffs, new Aghanim's Scepter upgrade etc.

I hope you will enjoy my guide :)

About the hero

Tinker, is a ranged intelligence burst damage hero that is considered as one of the most annoying hero to deal with if he played by the right hands. His abilities are quite simple but because of his ultimate called Rearm, he can basically abuse almost every item that can be activated which means if he does have a sufficient mana pool, he can basically wreck and burst almost every single hero that stands in his way. But playing him to his full potential is not a easy task because is very fragile and combined with his lack of escape mechanisms makes him an easy prey if you somehow caught him off-guard but if given enough time and attention for practicing him, he is one of the most rewarding heroes to master.

Pros / Cons

Pros

  • One of the strongest if not the strongest casters in the game
  • Strong laner
  • Best global mobility (with the right boots of course)
  • Can abuse most items that can be activated
  • Good at clearing creep waves
  • Science is just so cool so as this hero
  • High burst damage
  • One of the best splitpushers in the game


Cons
  • Very fragile
  • Requires a very good start in order to be effective
  • Somewhat high skill cap
  • Weak to silences
  • Can sometimes unintentionally steal the farm of your team's carry
  • Requires map awareness and good positioning
  • Low int gain for a mana-dependent hero
  • Relies on good item timings to be effective
  • He is considered good at pushing but he sucks at taking down towers (that's not just his thing)

Skills


Laser

Description

Fires an intense energy beam, dealing damage and blinding the target, causing it to miss all physical attacks.

Cast Animation: 0.4+1
Cast Range: 650
Bounce Radius: 0 (Can be Improved by Aghanim's Scepter. 650)
Damage: 80/160/240/320
Miss Chance: 100%
Hero Duration: 3/3.5/4/4.5
Creep Duration: 6
Damage: Pure
Manacost: 95/120/145/170
Cooldown: 14

Notes:

1. Plays a sound effect during the cast time, which is audible to everyone.
2. Can be Improved by Aghanim's Scepter. Causes Laser to bounce to nearby enemy heroes within a 650 range.
3. When upgraded, the Laser bounces to the closest enemy hero within a 650 radius of its current target.
4. The bounces happen instantly, with no time interval between them. Has no bounce limit.
5. Can only bounce to heroes. When the primary target is a creep, it still bounces to heroes.
6. Treats creep-heroes as heroes.
7. Does not bounce on invisible units or units in the Fog of War.
8. Can never hit the same unit twice per cast.

One of your best laning spells in your arsenal. This allows you to trade hits against your opposing laner without worrying of his damage auto-attack damage output even though you might want to consider the possibility of the opponent's creeps attacking you. It is also a good spell to use if you want to outfarm your opponent by blinding him/her with this spell if he/she is trying to lasthit/deny a creep then you take the lasthit/deny for your self. This spell also deals a huge chunk out damage in the laning phase since this spell deals PURE damage so it won't be reduce by any sort of magic resistance etc.

Aghanim's Scepter Upgrade

This allows your Laser bounce against all heroes within a 650 radius. So this spell alone will give your team a great advantage during teamfights by blinding and dealing crazy amounts of damage to enemy heroes. This also allows you to snipe fleeing heroes if the hero is outside the 650 range of your Laser by using this on an enemy creep/enemy unit that is nearest to the hero.


Heat-Seeking Missile

Description

Launches a pair of rockets at the nearest visible enemy heroes within 2500 range.

Cast Animation: 0+1.2
Search Radius: 2500
Damage per Rocket: 125/200/275/350
Number of Targets: 2 (Can be Improved by Aghanim's Scepter. 4)
Damage Type: Magical
Manacost: 120/140/160/180
Cooldown: 25

Notes:

1. Heat-Seeking Missile interrupts Tinker's channeling spells upon cast.
2. The missiles travel at a speed of 900 and can be disjointed.
3. When all missiles hit, they collectively can deal up to 250/400/550/700 (Can be Improved by Aghanim's Scepter. 500/800/1100/1400) damage (before reductions).
4. Does not target invisible, invulnerable, hidden or spell immune units or units in the Fog of War.
5. Does target illusions and Meepo clones.
6. When no valid targets were in range, the rockets are released and fall on the ground, showing that the cast failed.

A good spell in the laning phase since it allows you to harass your opposing laner by just pressing the hotkey of this spell provided you have vision of them and they are in the 2500 search radius of the spell. This also allows you to sniper fleeing enemies that otherwise you can't reach with your Laser or your other auto-attacks. Also a good spell for softening enemies before a clash starts. This is just a simple skill actually but the asset of this skill is its disgustingly long range.

Aghanim's Scepter Upgrade

Allows your missiles to hit 4 people instead of 2, giving you more teamfight potential when combined with your upgraded Laser too.


March of Machines

Description

Enlists an army of robotic minions to destroy enemy units in an area around Tinker.

Cast Animation: 0.53+0.63
Cast Range: 300
Robot Spawn Radius: 900
Robot Collision Radius: 50
Robot Explosion Radius: 150
Robot Explosion Damage: 16/24/32/40
Spawn Duration: 6
Damage Type: Magical
Cooldown: 35
Manacost: 145/150/165/190

Notes:

1. The robots move at a speed of 400 and move a distance up to 1800 forwards.
2. The 900 spawn radius is centered and fixed around the cast point, not on Tinker's location.
3. The spawn area is a line with 1800 length, which is centered 900 range behind the targeted cast point.
4. So the overall affected area is rather square shaped, with 1800 side lengths.
5. Robots spawn in 0.0416 second intervals at a random point of the line, which makes 24 robots per second, for a total of 144 robots.
6. Robots do not spawn at points of the spawning line which are outside of the map boundaries.
7. When an enemy comes within 50 radius of a robot, the robot deals damage in 150 radius around itself and then disappears.
8. If an enemy remains in the radius for the entire duration, they would take an average of 282/422/563/704 damage (before reductions).
9. If each explosion could hit a single target, it would deal up to 2304/3456/4608/5760 damage (before reductions).
10. Partially pierces Spell Immunity. Robots explode and deal AoE damage when colliding with spell immune units. Damage is blocked for spell immune units.

Some get this spell at level 9 above but for me this is a good spell to get and even max first if you want. Since for me farming an early Boots of Travel is more important than the burst damage you get from maxing Laser and Heat-Seeking Missile at level 8. This skill allows you to clear jungle camp stacks to obtain your Boots of Travel as fast as possible. And since Tinker doesn't have an escape mechanism, using this to create danger zones in your lane can prevent enemies from towerdiving you and also pushes the lane so you can take the rune or clear jungle stacks. Once you got your Boots of Travel, just telepport to lanes use this then Rearm and use it again then decide if you will go to the jungle,push a little bit further or refill your mana in the base. Doing this again and again will accelerate your farm which is almost required since you rely on items to be effective.


Rearm

Description

Resets the cooldown on most of Tinker's items and abilities.

Cast Animation: 0.53+0
Channel Time: 3/1.5/0.75
Cooldown: 0
Mana: 100/200/300
Ability: No Target/Channeled

Notes:

1. The following items cannot be rearmed:

Arcane Boots
Bottle
Black King Bar
Hand of Midas
Helm of the Dominator
Linken's Sphere
Necronomicon
Pipe of Insight
Refresher Orb

2. Visually resets the cooldown of Tranquil Boots, but does not skip the broken state.
3. Does not reset charges on charge-based items (e.g. Drum of Endurance, Diffusal Blade)
4. Only refreshes items in Tinker's inventory. Items in stash, in other units' (e.g. couriers) inventories or dropped items are unaffected.
5. Only refreshes items owned by Tinker. Allied items in his inventory are not refreshed.
6. WHEN THE CHANNELING IS INTERRUPTED, NOTHING IS REARMED.
7. Rearm's sound gets shorter with each level to match the decreasing channel time.

Your ultimate is basically a Refresher Orb with no cooldown and a lower manacost. This skill allows you to constantly nuke, disable and abuse items that can give Tinker benefits provided you have the mana to support it. All of your item and skill usage must be focused on your Rearm since the ability to abuse those skills/items is just insane.

Skill build

There are many possible skill builds for Tinker: The 4-4-0-1 build which means maxing Laser and Heat-Seeking Missile, the 2-1-3-1 build which means getting an early level of Rearm to clear jungle creeps if needed and so on. But the build I use the most is the 2-1-3-1 build which means getting a value point or two in Laser and Heat-Seeking Missile and maxing March of the Machines but still taking an early point in Rearm help in clearing jungle creeps. This build allows you to have better rune control because you have some sort of pushing capabilities because of the March of the Machines but still gives you kill potential with the value points of Laser and Heat-Seeking Missile. Yeah kills can help you obtain your Boots of Travel faster most of the time but kill opportunities don't happen most of the time and for me going for the 4-4-0 build means that if you get shut down very hard in the lane, you're screwed because you have no capabilities in catching up by clearing the jungle and you can't clear the jungle unless you have at least 2 levels of March of the Machines and a value point of Rearm. But if you are facing a lane that gives you almost no killing potential and farming is just your best bet, go for the Laser and March of the Machines build.

Talent Tree

Tinker's talent tree is very good since both paths can be good for him so you can experiment a lot with his talent tree. But I have chosen a path that I prefer the most but I am not saying that the other paths are not good, maybe I'm biased but its just my preference. Anyway I'll explain the situations that will give you an idea to go for other paths.


Level 10 talents: +8 Intelligence or +5 Armor

My preferred one here is going for the + 8 Intelligence since Tinker is an Intelligence hero which means this will give him +8 damage, 96 mana, 0.32 mana regeneration, and 0.5% spell amplification which is very helpful for a spellcaster hero like Tinker. But you can't be wrong in going for the +5 armor especially if you are facing physical damage-reliant heroes like Phantom Assassin.
Level 15 talents: +200 health or +4% spell amplification

I prefer the +4% spell amplification because it basically gives you the bonus spell amplification of Aether Lens for free which means your spells will do more damage than before but if you are dealing sufficient damage but you are getting focused a lot, going for the +200 health is a safer choice.
Level 20 talents: +75 cast range or +15% magic resistance

Both of these talents are really good but I prefer the +75 cast range since Tinker is the kind of hero who really appreciates the extra range for his spells but if you are facing lots of heavy magical spells, going for the +15% magic resistance will help you out.
Level 25 talents: +20% spell lifesteal (1/5 for non heroes) or +100 Laser damage

I spend a lot of timing thinking, balancing, knowing the pros and cons for these talents both are extremely good. Since I love going for an Aghanim's Scepter on Tinker, choosing from these talents is very hard since your Aghanim's Scepter can make use the most of these talents.

First of all, lets talk about the +100 Laser damage. Since I love going Aghanim's Scepter on Tinker, I can basically deal +500 more damage to the enemy team if I can get the Laser bounce off to all the enemy heroes which results in 2100 damage on the enemy team which can be amplified further with your spell amplification from your Intelligence which is very nice.

On the other hand, the +20% spell lifesteal allows you to sustain your health by constantly nuking your enemies which getting an Aghanim's Scepter can make its effectiveness better.

Let's do some math:

Without taking your bonus spell amplification into account, your Laser deals 320 damage which means you will heal for 64 health per hero which means buying an Aghanim's Scepter will heal you more.

Hitting 2 heroes: 128 health
Hitting 3 heroes: 192 health
Hitting 4 heroes: 256 health
Hitting 5 heroes: 320 health (this means if you somehow hit 5 enemies with your upgraded Laser, you can heal for 100% of the Laser's damage.

Without taking bonus spell amplification and magic resistance into account, your Heat-Seeking Missile deals 350 damage which means you will heal for 70 health.

Aghanim's Scepter upgraded Heat-Seeking Missile allows you to release up to 4 missiles depending on the number of visible enemy heroes are in its search radius which means:

Hitting 2 heroes: 140 health
Hitting 3 heroes: 210 health
Hitting 4 heroes: 280 health

These numbers might seem negligible in the first glance but with Rearm, you can heal more than that.

In these talent tree, I simply get what I need the most. If I'm facing teams that I will need the sustain, get the +20% spell lfesteal but since Tinker is the hero that doesn't want to be focused, sometimes this talent is wasted which getting the +100 Laser damage is the better choice. So I prefer the +100 Laser damage a bit more than the +20% spell lifesteal.

Items

Note: Tinker's item selection in the old Dota days is kinda one dimensional but after the release of the new items and giving some changes to the hero, various items selections are now applicable for him. Just adapt to the situational and get the items you will need the most.


Starting Items


This is the item that you will start of almost 100% of the time (the only exception is when your team doesn't pick supports which forces you to buy your own Tangoes :(). This gives you good stats, damage for contesting lasthits and denies and quite sufficient regeneration with the Faerie Fire and the Iron Branch can be used to double the effect of one of your pooled Tango (Shared).

Early-Game Items

This item is a core item for Tinker. As a mid hero this allows you to sustain yourself by bottling runes and since the rework of the map in the 7.00 patch which creates 4 Bounty Rune spots means you have more work to do. This item is very valuable even in the late-game because this speeds up your regeneration when healing in the fountain to go back to work faster than usual so keep it in your stash in the late-game.

Pretty mandatory on any hero. Since Tinker doesn't have an escape mechanism and doesn't spend gold on survival items like Magic Wand, having this gives him some sort of escape mechanism by outrunning enemies which is not that reliable but it's still something.

This cost-efficient item can save your life in many situations by giving you a 120 magic block that is HUGE in the early-game. Also gives you a flat bonus of mana regeneration which is a nice bonus. A good item to get if you are facing heroes that deal magic damage like Zeus, Puck or Storm Spirit.

I always buy this after getting the first Bounty Rune to have extra regeneration while farming my Bottle. This also allows you to be quite aggressive when trading hits since when used with Laser can allow you to win most trades. Also not a bad choice to ferry one more just in case you get harassed a lot to prevent going back to base which will make you miss valuable gold and experience.

Most of the time you will get this after buying your Boots of Travel but if you are somehow get shut down in the lane, you can get this before Boots of Travel to allow you to farm jungle with March of the Machines and Rearm. The active of this item allows you to partially negate the manacost of the Rearm (using this item allows you to use level 1 Rearm FOR FREE!!!). You can also turn this into a Bloodstone. I also suggest that buying a 2nd one to keep on the stash to help in regenerating your mana quickly.

Core Items

This is the ONLY boots of choice for Tinker. Having this boots allows you to join fights, push and farm lanes, and heal back in the base with ease since your Rearm can refresh the cooldown of this boots which allows you to do multiple objectives in the shortest time possible.

This item gives the mobility that Tinker needs the most. Since Tinker is a very fragile hero, this allows you to escape ganks, hide in the trees when casting March of the Machines, and chase fleeing enemies.

Mid-Game item selection

Ever since the release of this item, I really liked it for Tinker since the bonus cast range allows you to reach enemies with your spells that otherwise you can't reach. The bonus spell amplification is also a nice bonus and since this item is so cheap, I recommend this to buy in 100% of your games.

Ahhh this item is just so sweet for Tinker. It gives nice stats and improving your teamfight capabilities by allowing your Laser to bounce to nearby opponents which damages and blinds them all and your Heat-Seeking Missile can hit up to 4 targets instead of 2 which can turn the tides of teamfights easily which comes with a relatively very cheap price. This also makes Tinker much more better on defending highground by blinding and softening all enemies that will attempt to push that makes pushing against you will be a very hard task. This also synergizes very well with you level 25 talents so what's the reason not to buy this lovely item?

Usually you will buy this if you are snowballing hard to get the charges which will give you a massive amount of mana regeneration but I buy this after Aether Lens and Aghanim's Scepter if I don't have the feeling of going for Dagon. Also this gives your Soul Ring an upgrade which is nice but the thing I like the most about this item is you can use this to deny yourself if needed and respawn quickly if you have sufficient charges(keep in mind that you will lose 1/3 of your current charges upon death) and the fact that YOU CAN REFRESH ITS VERY LONG COOLDOWN WITH Rearm allows you to deny yourself almost all the time unless the enemy lock you down really,really hard. Also gives you a very good chunk of health and mana.

Dagon This item gives Tinker a very good addition to his burst damage since you can basically nuke the **** out of your enemies with this and your other spells as long as you have the mana to refresh their cooldowns. But for me going for this item is not 100% necessary in all of your games with Tinker especially when you are losing and you need to lock an enemy down not the burst damage or during games that your team doesn't you to buy this item. But overall in the super late-game if you go for the non-Dagon build, you will still go for this item to supplement your lacking burst damage in the late-game.

Yes, Blink Dagger is superior to this item but sometime there are games which you will face heroes that basically your Blink Dagger can't be effective especially heroes like Nature's Prophet, Clockwerk, and Pudge even though you can buy both for insane mobility. Also gives extra Intelligence and health regeneration which is a nice bonus.

Upgraded Boots of Travel Boots of Travel is your core, isn't it? Why not give it an upgrade since you can't always come in ganks in time especially you are joining fights in the jungle (even though this thing is less of a problem because of the addition of shrines in your jungle) and assist by teleporting to your allies.

For a core hero, you might think you won't need to buy one but this item is very useful for Tinker especially when pushing a lane that you think is not safe for you to push since this allows you to anticipate enemy heroes that will come to the area you are pushing.

Late-Game items


This is one of the best if not the best items you can buy on Tinker. This gives you insane mana regeneration, a large chunk of Intelligence and the very hard lockdown which means that you can lockdown enemies multiple times as long as you have the mana to use it which can give your team an advantage in teamfights.

Another good item but not as good as the Scythe of Vyse. This gives you a lot of armor, a high amount of Intelligence and an aura that is useful against enemy carries. The active also can be used for nuking, for the slow and for vision to prevent someone from juking on you and for you to spot nearby enemies.

A great addition to your kit if your looking for some extra burst damage. Gives a lot of agility which give you a lot of armor even though the attack speed is pretty trash for Tinker and the active can be used for many purposes like preventing yourself to receive physical damage, nuking enemies to amplify your spells even more or to save teammates from enemies in the right situations.

Situational Items

This item is not an the you might look for but if you are constantly being controlled and nuked to death, you might as well go for this item. A very good item to have in the backpack especially in the late-game. Take note that Rearm can't refresh the cooldown of this item otherwise it will be very broken in the late-game.

A very cheap item that can be life-saving that can remove many debuffs and to deal with Orchid Malevolence carriers like Storm Spirit, Queen of Pain etc. Also gives you some sort of disable which can e useful if you are short on gold for a Scythe of Vyse. Also gives a decent source of mana regeneration.

A good thing to buy if you somehow bought a Force Staff. The active of this item allows you to keep your distance from enemies that can wreck your face if they manage to get close to you like Slark, Sven and Lifestealer. But this item is not that good for an upgrade since the extra auto-attack range and the attack speed from the active is wasted for a quite expensive item.

Not all games will be easy. Sometimes you will have games that you barely have the gold to buy items so spending money on cheap but cost-efficient items can be a good call especially if you are shut down very,very hard in the lane. Well this item is one of those cheap items since it gives you a source of magic resistance, attack speed (this aspect is trash for Tinker, and the active can be use to temporarily hide yourself which can be useful in certain situations.

This item may seem like a joke in the first glance but this can save your life especially when facing dangerous single-target Black King Bar-piercing disables like Flaming Lasso, Primal Roar etc. Also allows you to remove debuffs from you and your teammates and gives extra armor and mana regeneration.

Ever since the rework of this item, this item is quite a good item to use especially in situations that you can't afford a Scythe of Vyse but you need a lockdown for a slippery hero like Queen of Pain, Puck or Anti-Mage. Also makes you a little bit tanky and gives some Intelligence as well.

A cheap item you might as well invest especially of you are going for an Aether Lens and Aghanim's Scepter build. This allows you to upgrade your Null Talisman into another item if you don't want to build Dagon. Gives you more teamfight potential especially if you go for the Aether Lens and Aghanim's Scepter build and makes farming much faster by amplifying your magical damage to creeps which is a very good thing for an easy-to-build item.

Basically a better and more expensive version of the Lotus Orb. Not much to say here, it gives scaling mana regeneration, quite "meh" stats and a very handy spell block.

Got lots of cash?

Tinker is a hero that is a very fast farmer so in the late-game you will find yourself swimming in cash and have lots of money to spend so feel free to some items as long as you can use them effectively and you have buyback gold.

Spending 370 gold for this won't hurt in the late-game even though you won't need this much since you can simple go back to base but this can be helpful if you buying something in the secret shop and you know it is not safe to go there.

An item that you can buy in the very late-game if you are swimming in cash and have no gold to spend. The use of this for you is to create illusions to make pushing much faster after than that there's no much use for this item.

Just like Manta Style, this item is for pushing purposes only but this item gives you more pushing capabilites than a Manta Style and you can also use this on fights to detect invisible units.

Stash and Backpack Items

Stash Items

Look for the previous details of Bottle above for description.

During teamfights, you will be run out of mana at some point which forces you to leave the fight and go back to base to regenerate your mana back. This item helps by giving you a flat source of mana in an instant to speed up your healing so you can go back to action as soon as possible. So in the mid-late game, have a couple of these in your stash.

Just like the Enchanted Mango, this item helps you to heal faster to go back to action in the least possible time.

Look for the previous details of Soul Ring above for description.
Backpack Items

Look for the previous details of Black King Bar above for description.

Look for the previous details of Manta Style above for description.

Look for the previous details of Necronomicon above for description.

Gameplay

Start of the game

In the start of the game, after you buy your starting items ask your supports to to give you at least 2 Tango (Shared) then quickly go to the bounty rune spot nearest to the midlane then after getting the 1st Bounty Rune,quickly buy a Healing Salve and send it to you by using the courier but be sure to to do that while your hero is still walking toward the lane to block the creeps but if your supports are good they will block it for you to give you an edge against your opposing laner.
Early-Game

If you have the better block than your opponent, then good job and try to keep that advantage but if the opponent somehow did have a better block than you, try to pull their creeps towards to by issuing an attack command on the hero you lane against to aggro the creeps but be sure to do it fast and quickly get back because if you did not, you will receive a lot of creep damage. As a Tinker, you should be out-csing your opponents in lane most of the time by screwing their la***** and denies by using Laser as soon as they issue an attack order on to lasthit/deny. Since your Laser does have a quite little manacost early, you should be able to use it whenever you need it. Don't use your Heat-Seeking Missile to harass because for me Laser is better for harassing since your opponents won't be able to trade hits with you and it deals pure damage and Heat-Seeking Missile for me, should be reserved to cancel the effects of Healing Salve and Clarity in case your opponents will have one. In most of the cases, your item progression in the early-game will be Bottle-> Boots of Travel then Soul Ring this item progression should be done as soon as possible so you can start farming and helping throughout the map. Assuming you followed my skill build and went for the 2-1-3-1 build, use your March of the Machines to push the lane at during these time in the laning phase:
  • 1:53
  • 3:53
  • 5:53
  • 7:53
  • 9:53

Pushing the lane at this time makes it harder for the enemy team to contest the power up and it secures you the rune most of the time. If you somehow get the urge to stack for yourself, consider pushing the lane as soon as they meet so you can quickly head back to the jungle to stack. These are the recommended times to push the lane if you are stacking:
  • 2:45
  • 4:45
  • 6:45
  • 8:45

Since runes don' spawn at minutes 3, 5, 7 and 9, consider stacking up creep camps after pushing the wave to save precious time and to be efficient.

But your main goal here is to farm your Boots of Travel without dying. This means that good map awareness and communication with your supports is required since you are a hero with no escape mechanism but your Laser if used, correctly can turn ganks around since the 100% blind is just broken in the early-game which is the time that no one can buy a Monkey King Bar or have items to remove the blind effect.

Once you got your Boots of Travel, it is time to move around the map to join small skirmishes, or just to farm more items. If you are joining small skirmishes, especially if it happens in the enemy territory, always put at least 2 casts of March of the Machines on your place to create danger zones to discourage enemies from going near you don't have a Blink Dagger yet and stay there and nuke them with your Heat-Seeking Missiles because the damage of March of the Machines is very high in the early-game and can put overconfident opponents off-guard because trust me, your March of the Machines is very underrated. And even if your opponents will try to go near you and kill you in the process, you might take them with you since most the time they will die to your March of the Machines. Using your Laser on enemies in the early-game is not that required but it can easily turn ganks especially if you blinded an enemy carry in the process but be aware since the cast range is pretty short and can put you in a bad spot unless you can use it and get away with your life, just spam your Heat-Seeking Missiles. Always save at least 75 mana since draining all of your mana will mean that you will walk all the way into the fountain or to the nearest shrine unless your team has Arcane Boots or Clarity for you. It is okay to leave a gank if you run out of mana instead of hitting you opponents with your auto-attacks unless they are just one right-click away from death because auto-attacking is just not your thing. If you run out of mana, just go back to base, refill your mana and join the fight again if it is not over.
Mid-Game

Mid-Game using Tinker applies almost the same mechanics of joining fights in the early-game but with a different twist, and more, more farming..... I would say that Mid-Game starts after you finished your Blink Dagger and your farming for your next 2 items which can be Aether Lens into Aghanim's Scepter or other items depending on your preference. But this time your are more focused on farming your big items and pushing out the lanes but still join skirmishes because that's what you do best, splitpushing to apply pressure to the enemy team then joining if your team needs you. But since you are a fragile hero, splitpushing is not a easy task especially when facing certain heroes that can catch you even if you blinked into the treeline. So check the "tips and tricks" section for details about avoiding this situations.

It is an option for you to intercept the next creep wave but you this requires you to be aware of the time it takes for the creeps to reach the destination you are going and also consider if there are missing opponents missing on the map but this is a high-risk, high-reward move.
Joining skirmishes/Teamfights

Joining fights in the mid-game as I've said is almost the same in the early-game but with a few twists. So basically you will teleport to the lane, then quickly blink into the treeline if it is not safe which almost is most of the time, then use Soul Ring into March of the Machines then Heat-Seeking Missile then Rearm. Using Laser is not required unless you are needed to blind someone or to finish an enemy but still take the your positioning into account. Just spam your Heat-Seeking Missile but every Rearm, I usually blink into another safe spot to make it hard for the enemy team to find me but if there are chances to snipe an enemy, I will use Heat-Seeking Missile then as the missile is near to reach my target, I will blink into a safe spot near to him/her and take him/her out with my Laser.
Late-Game

Late-game with Tinker is a very complex one since at this moment you will have a lot of items to use properly and one mistake can ruin the game. Splitpushing at this moment is still a thing but you will focus way more on teamfighting than before. In teamfights focus more on the heroes that can lock you down or the heroes that is needed to be eliminated first and quickly disable or burst them down. But sometimes focusing on a nearest enemy target is your best bet especially if it is dangerous to be over aggressive. But during this time using March of the Machines in teamfights is not required anymore because it is better to save mana for your Ethereal Blade, Scythe of Vyse, Dagon etc. If you are winning the game focus more on splitpushing other lanes to give your creeps time to siege structures easily while your team puts pressure in other lanes since that's what you do best and destroying structures is not your thing so be productive and push other lanes.But if your team is losing, fear not. Tinker is very good on defending highground because of his kit especially if you will go Aghanim's Scepter. His Laser can blind the whole enemy team which can give your team time to prepare while you are saving your structures from damage, his Heat-Seeking Missile softens the enemy heroes which will make them think if they will commit on pushing of go back to heal and his March of the Machines can easily wipe creep waves which protects your tower.

Tips, Tricks and Combos

In this section you will see some tips, combos or even tricks that can be done when playing Tinker. Some of this are for enjoyment and entertainment purposes only because why not enjoy playing instead of being serious, it was just a game after all.


Securing a Kill

If you are trying to get a kill on a low enemy hero with your Laser and Heat-Seeking Missile, always use your Heat-Seeking Missile first then after the missile is released immediately use your Laser.. So why do you have to do that? Well as you can see the Laser does have a very long cast time of 1.4 seconds (that's so long) while your Heat-Seeking Missile has an instant cast time. So if you use Laser first, you can only use your Heat-Seeking Missile after 1.4 seconds then after that your missile will be launched but it will still travel to reach to target so if the target has a Magic Wand or let's say a Faerie Fire, there's a big chance that you won't get the kill but if you cast Heat-Seeking Missile first before using Laser, the missile will travel immediately while you are still on the cast animation of Laser which causes the interval of the damage of the two spells to be reduced (sometimes they will at the same time) which can prevent clutch Magic Wand or Faerie Fire saves most of the time.
Using the SHIFT key

The use of the "SHIFT" key

So if you are not familiar with the usage or even the use of SHIFT, it sets a queue command on your hero that makes it do tasks immediately right after one another which can be done by pressing SHIFT then pressing your next thing to do whether it is blinking into the treeline, using Soul Ring etc. while still pressing the SHIFT key which means example if you are teleporting into a lane then you press SHIFT then use your Blink Dagger, your hero will immediately blink into your selected destination of your Blink Dagger after teleporting which means catching you by waiting you to finish your TP then immediately casting a disable on you won't work because by the time their disable lands on the position you finished your TPing, you are already in the treeline which can be useful if facing heroes that can and will try to catch you like Invoker, Storm Spirit, Axe etc.
Quickcast

Sometimes you are wondering how pros are pressing and using spells or items to fast. Well the answer there is they use quickcast. So what's quickcast?

Quickcast allows you to cast spells without using the left key of your mouse. Instead it will just automatically cast the spell right where you are pointing. This can sometimes ruin your day especially if you are just starting to get used to it and you suddenly used Dagon on a creep nearby your target that otherwise you can kill but after some practice you will get used to it. But I don't suggest putting all of your items to quickcast since teleporting is a bad thing to quickcast because it is very annoying if are getting out of trouble by double-tapping the Boots of Travel then suddenly you will teleport in the creep next to you then you died because you put it in quickcast. I always put everything on quickcast except my slot of Town Portal Scroll or Boots of Travel. So here's how to do this:

1. Open settings.
2. Click "To advanced hotkeys" (at the bottom).
3. Click "Enable Separately Bindable Quickcast Hotkeys".
4. Proceed to bind quickcasts and normal casts separately for each hero.

Here is my list of item slots
  • Item slot #1: alt+Q (quickcast)
  • Item slot #2: alt+W (quickcast)
  • Item slot #3: alt+E (quickcast)
  • Item slot #4: alt+A (quickcast)
  • Item slot #5: alt+S (normal cast) < this is my slot for Town Portal Scroll or Boots of Travel
  • Item slot #6: alt+D (quickcast)

Making your Laser appear longer

Well this trick is not that helpful but more on the "style points" thingy because why not? Why not be cool even you are in a teamfight? Here's how you do it.

Your Laser has a very long cast animation so as soon as your Laser reaches the enemy target, quickly use your Blink Dagger to blink out and it will appear that your Laser extended up to the distance you've blinked in.
Farming Pattern (Requires Blink Dagger and Soul Ring)

Your main farming pattern should be like this most of the time:

Boots of Travel to a lane > SHIFT > Blink Dagger into the treeline > Soul Ring > March of the Machines > Bottle > Rearm > Release SHIFT
Fighting/getting solo pickoffs in the Late-Game (Requires Blink Dagger, Scythe of Vyse, Ethereal Blade, and Dagon)

Boots of Travel to a lane > SHIFT > Blink Dagger near the enemy > Scythe of Vyse > Release SHIFT

This allows you to disable the enemy immediately after teleporting that is very useful against slippery foes like Anti-Mage, Storm Spirit, Puck etc. Then follow up with this:

Ethereal Blade > Dagon > Rearm > Scythe of Vyse > Dagon > Rearm > Scythe of Vyse > Ethereal Blade > Dagon and repeat this steps on until the target is eliminated > Blink Dagger in a safe spot and Boots of Travel back to base the heal

As you can you will only use your Ethereal Blade on the enemy ONLY ONCE EVERY TWO Rearms. That's because your Ethereal Blade's active lasts for 3 seconds which is enough since your level 3 Rearm has only a 0.75s channeling time which allows you to use the Dagon at least twice before the Ethereal Blade's active wears off and the reason that we will use Scythe of Vyse every Rearm is because you must be sure that the enemy hero is locked while you are nuking him and rearming.
Refreshing the cooldown of your disabled Blink Dagger


All of you know that a ready-to-use Blink Dagger will go on a 3 second cooldown if you received damage from a hero or any hero-controlled unit even though there are some exceptions like e.g. Heartstopper Aura and with a hero with a no in-built esape mechanism, this can be fatal but fear not! Your Rearm is here to save your day. If you might haven't know, your Rearm can refresh a disabled Blink Dagger so if your Blink Dagger is disabled, immediately Rearm then after the channeling if finished, quickly blink out and escape. This method is very useful if you are facing heroes with damage over time abilities like Venomancer, Viper, or any Radiance carrier.

Matchups

In this section, I will discuss some of the heroes that you can meet in the midlane and their possible threats to you and how to play around with them.




Not a common mid to see these days but if you might face one in your games, fear not because you can easily lane against him. He relies on auto-attacks and he is a melee hero, so you can easily harass him and your Laser screws his farming. Well he can try to zone you out with his Acid Spray but by bottling runes and with the shrine, you should be fine most of the time. He is also easy to kill because of his low health gain and low armor so even your auto-attacks will pack a punch against him. But be sure to shut him down as hard as you can because you want to deny him as much farm as possible or else he can get his items very fast. Killing him past level 6 is not an easy task because his Chemical Rage gives him so much health regeneration which allows him to soak up your burst damage and still live to tell the tale.

How to deal with this guy:

At levels 1-5, you can easily trash him in lane because he is a melee, has a low armor and no spells to zone you out (he has one but it's not that good) so laning against him is very easy. But be aware of his Acid Spray because you might not be aware in the first few seconds but it can deal quite a lot of you stay there for long periods of time but since you are a ranged hero, you should be fine most of the time. Always ask for support rotations to get successful kills on him to slow his item progression because if doesn't have a head start on his items, he may catch up but at that time, your team should be ahead by a lot if you know what are you doing. Always be aware if he is missing especially if he is missing for quite a long time in the laning phase because.... nope he is not ganking because he is farming his stacks and then suddenly you will be surprised that he has Armlet of Mordiggan and Radiance so ask your team to smoke-gank him in their jungle. But once he got his items, fear not because you can burst him down easily and as long you are maintaining your distance, he will not be able to reach you. In the late-game you can basically murder him with multiple Scythe of Vyse, Ethereal Blade and Dagon rotations. Your Laser can screw him up on fights unless he has a Monkey King Bar and with Scythe of Vyse, you be able to control him in fights. If he goes Black King Bar, just don't mind him and burst his teammates then just mind him as soon as his Black King Bar wears off. Since he is a Radiance, he can pose some issues to your Blink Dagger because if you don't have fast reactions, he can disable your Blink Dagger and after that he can reach and pummel you if someone on his team disables you (practice the "Refreshing a disabled Blink Dagger" from the tips, tricks and combos section.


This guy can **** you up if you are not careful. His ace is his Flame Guard which negates your burst by a lot in the early-game and the fact that he doesn't rely much on his right-clicks in the early-game (and pretty much most of the time because of the introduction of the "magic damage" Ember Spirit) means that he can kill you easily with his magic damage over time spells. In the mid-game if he goes Veil of Discord+ Radiance build, he can be a pain in the *** because he can easily catch you in the tree line because of he is a natural Blink Dagger and he can easily chase you with his Fire Remnants and burst you to death with his high magical damage. He farms quite slowly in the early-game but once he obtained his Boots of Travel, he can farm almost as fast as you can do.

How to lane against this guy:

Your Laser can seriously harass him and since he is a melee hero, try to harass him hard because his low armor and health makes him prone to auto-attacks so try to poke him a lot but his Flame Guard allows him to soak up your Heat-Seeking Missile and March of the Machines. Be aware of the map and your positioning because any support with a hard disable that rotates spells your death most of the time. Try to delay his farm because he doesn't catch up very quickly especially if he is far behind from you. But he can be quite active unlike the old build for him because with just a Veil of Discord and some mobility items, he can wreck havoc during fights. Even though his Flame Guard provides him resilience against magic damage, your magical burst can easily get rid of it and without it, he is very fragile and easy to burst down but he can be quite elusive because of the mobility from his kit and be aware because he can and will try to find and kill you so maintain your distance. A Glimmer Cape can be a good pickup especially if you having problems against his magic damage. Watch out for Rune of Haste, because if he can get into his Searing Chains range, you will spend your next few moments in the graveyard.


This mage usually crushes every matchup but you can stand you ground against him because you kit kinda deals with him since he relies on his Cold Snap as source of his early-game damage, your Laser screws it up because you can blind him so he can't hit your with his auto-attacks but still consider his damage over time spells and the units around that might attack you. But still respect him the player is good since even you might him down, he can still catch up and in big team fights, he can cream your team with his combos.

How to deal with this guy:

Well that depends on what type his skill build will be because his skill build dictates your kind of approach against him. If he goes Exort- Quas type, you can trash him in the lane because he will rely most on his Cold Snap-boosted auto-attacks and your Laser deals with that but be aware if he gets a value point on Wex because a Chaos Meteor, Cold Snap and Sun Strike will take you out before you can even land your Laser since his Cold Snap screws spells with long cast animation and yes that includes Laser. He can be also quite annoying because his Quas gives him lots of sustain which means zoning him out completely will be hard but still doable. Ask support rotations to shut him down because if you manage to get a lead against him, you can exploit that and have a lead throughout the whole game. If he goes Quas- Wex, respect his ability to kill you because he can will try to do so. His Tornado+ EMP into Cold Snap combo can seriously screw you up because it will hurt you a lot and burn your mana to prevent retaliation and after that he will auto-attack you to death. Be aware of split pushing because his Tornado allows him to catch pesky splitpushers like you and after that he will combo you to death so be ready if you are teleporting to a lane and he suddenly shows up, quickly shift-click your Blink Dagger to the treeline to prevent him from catching you. In fights keep your distance and if the situation or chance for you to strike arrives, quickly take him out before he can cause serious damage to your team. Once you've got a Scythe of Vyse, you can start killing this cocky narcissistic **********er a lot. Consider buying a Black King Bar or Eul's Scepter if you need some defensive items against him.


A very popular mid hero to see in very high skill brackets, this cute little guy if played by the right hands can single-handedly win games. You may think that you have the advantage because he is melee but he has respectable armor and starting health so you can't bully him out of the lane easily and when he got his ultimate Divided We Stand, he can just simply leave the lane if he got shut down hard and farm the jungle (he is a very fast jungler) but if you didn't manage to shut him down, you will feel like the lane is like hell since yes you can blind one Meepo, but what about two Meepo]es? Since you don't have an escape mechanism, he can just root you with his [[Earthbind, nuke you with his Poof and if you managed to survive his burst he will just pummel you to death with his Geostrike-boosted auto-attacks. And oh I almost forgot that he can reach level 25 before all of you can even reach level 16 or 18 which means with his level and item advantage, he can just go ham on your team if the player is good.

How to deal with this guy:

It is very, very important to shut him down in the laning phase because you want to delay his powerspike to give enough time for your team to farm up since he capitalizes on his ability to outlevel and outfarm enemies because he is not that strong if he is fighting against enemies that stands on equal footing with him. If he goes farming the jungle, ask your team to gank him there and join them if they will need your damage as well. Be careful when you are splitpushing since if he manages to catch you with his Blink+ Poof combo, your pretty much dead. If your carry manages to get very fat, late-game against him is easier since he starts to fall off in the late-game but still be aware because is doesn't mean he can't do **** in the late-game because he can still kill you or your team's carry because he is a natural Scythe of Vyse carrier. Since he is not the type of hero who will buy Black King Bar, you can easily nuke or disable him with your spells. Buying an Aghanim's Scepter is a very good choice since you can blind all of his Meepo clones with your upgraded Laser to prevent him from beating you to death. A Shiva's Guard can also be considered to reduce his damage output.


You can definitely **** this guy in the lane since he relies too much on his auto-attack damage a lot, your Laser can deal with that. Just be aware that his Astral Imprisonment deals a lot of damage and provides him with a very good waveclear so he can contest you especially when in comes to runes and his Essence Aura provides him also infinite mana and since you are an intelligence hero, his Arcane Orb auto-attacks will cause you to temporarily lose damage and mana and will give him what you lose but anyway you have Laser for that. This matchup is heavily favored for Tinker.

How to deal with this guy:

This guy does have lots of base armor but his health is somewhat lacking so exploit that by nuking him with your spells to force him out of your lane. Try to poke him a lot since his auto-attack range is short (450) compared to yours (500). Try to outfarm him since he does struggle if he playing from behind so ganks will hurt him a lot. During fights, since he relies on his auto-attacks to do work, just keep blinding him with your Laser which means buying an Aghanim's Scepter is a good choice against him. If he goes Black King Bar, just keep your distance from him and go for his teammates instead. Avoid being caught if he manages to farm a Scythe of Vyse since he can shred you with his Arcane Orb-boosted auto-attacks and his Sanity's Eclipse can remove a lot of your mana. Buying an Ethereal Blade is a very good choice against him.


This chick can cause serious problems if left unchecked but fear not because you counter her a lot. Since she is just like a melee hero, you can poke her a lot be even though be aware of your positioning to avoid her Psi Blades. You can easily get rid of her Refraction charges with your March of the Machines so she can't play too cocky against you. But if she manages to farm up and snowball really hard, she can also win games single-handedly.

How to deal with this girl:

Exploit her lack of range by constantly poking and harassing her with your auto-attacks and your Laser to deny her the farm that she needs. Fighting her in the mid-game is easy since situations that she will catch you is almost non-existent if you are positioning yourself on the right place and since just like Outworld Devourer that relies on attacking people, buying an Aghanim's Scepter is very good against her. Going for the build #3 ( Shiva's Guard, Ethereal Blade, Aghanim's Scepter and Scythe of Vyse is very good against her.

MORE HEROES SOON TO COME!!

Tinker is a very, very strong laner because of his Laser which allows him to ourfarm his opponents while harassing them in the process but there are some heroes that can contest your lane and prove to be a good opponent because just face it, every hero in Dota 2 is not overpowered and have a weakness that your opponents will try to exploit.

Closing



So that's all folks!! That's was a long guide, eh? But I'm pretty sure I haven't put all of my knowledge there and maybe I'll update within a few days because I need to be busy for my college but I'll update as soon as I have free time to do so. If some of the contents are wrong or inaccurate or maybe my grammar is incorrect, please feel free write your comments below.

Any comments about the guide as long as it's informative and not offensive will be accepted. :)

If you found my guide useful and you like it, leave a thumbs up. ^_^

I also want to give a shout out to some people in this community and to my friends out there!

Hades4u, thanks for your awesome work in this community and for being nice. I commend you bro that was a very tiring thing to do.

TheSofa, thanks to you for giving tips on making my guide presentable. You are a great help man. I hope we can play sometime, that will be a good idea man.

Mowen, thanks for giving information about the talent tree section in my Invoker guide. I almost screwed up there because I didn't know there was a little error when it comes to skilling the talents.

Ee
Str!
EG.Sayonara ****ers!
Freak-
Regret
Drew
crostheaven
Lucifer Morningstar
Solid


Shout out for my friends. Thanks for the time we've spent playing since it helped us a lot when it comes to improving ourselves.

Thanks to you all!!

-Gil Bot

Guide Changelog

January 22, 2017

  • Guide published
  • Fixed a little typographical errors

January 29, 2017
  • Fixed some mispelled words and errors

February 3-4, 2017
  • Created the "Matchups" section
  • Removed the "starting items #2"
  • Added Meepo, Outworld Devourer and Templar Assassin in the matchups section.

More to come! I will add the "matchups section", farming the jungle etc. later on.. ^_^

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