A Divine Strike! - A Guide To Mortred, The Phantom Assassin

Introduction

Hello there viewer! First off I would like to thank you for taking your time and viewing this guide. Any kind of feedback (constructive or not) you can give me in the comment section will be greatly appreciated!
This guide will show you the ins and out of playing Phantom Assassin, and hopefully teaches you some cool stuff along the way.

What makes your guide credible?

First I would like to talk a little bit about myself.(If you don't care, feel free to skip ahead to the actual guide) Three years ago me and my friend stumbled upon a game called League Of Legends. I had heard about it before, but had no idea what it was about. So we both downloaded it and started playing. I progressed quickly and soon found myself wanting to play Ranked. After my placements I was put into Silver. I latched onto streams and replicated what I saw in higher level play. Through trial and error I managed to climb my way up to Platinum 1.

At this point I could have very easily kept going and hit Diamond; however, I just didn't find the game fun anymore. Throughout my LoL career, I dabbled into DotA now and again. So I'm no newbie when it comes to Mobas. I understand the value of game knowledge and many other things. So fear not my friend, I will not lead you astray.

So here I am now. I've only been playing for about a two months and I'm 3k MMR at the time of making this guide. I've put a lot of effort into it and I hope that it shows. So without further ado, I present to you, my Phantom Assassin guide!

Summary

The Phantom Assassin is a very unique hero in DotA. She has the ability to completely obliterate enemy heroes in a single graceful hit! She excels at chasing down heroes, killing supports quickly and potentially out-dueling other carries if the opportunity presents itself.

Pros and Cons

Pros:

• Four Digit Critical Hits
• Very Sticky
• Snowballs out of control with a lead
• Incredible evasion rates which force Monkey King Bar to be bought

Cons:

• Very item/level dependent
• BKB/Ghost Scepter will make you sad
• Monkey King Bar will also make you sad
• Ultimate is entirely luck based

Skill Overview

Item Choices

There are a lot of good items that you can build on Phantom Assassin. Somethings are good ideas, while others are not so good. So I'm going to walk you through my general build path, and why I think it is a good idea!

Starting Items

This is a really good item to help you last hit. It gives a much bigger window to last hit the creeps in your lane. It also has many other uses outside of last hitting. If you find yourself getting ganked, running into the trees is a good idea. You can cut down a path for yourself to buy some time. Hopefully by the time the enemy finds you, your support will be there to assist you. Or someone from your team will teleport to help you.

If you expect to be poked constantly in lane, this item is fantastic for you. It also builds into the incredibly cost efficient Poor Mans Shield. But the main reason why people choose this over Quelling Blade is the ability to tank creeps. In higher MMR play, supports will be constantly pulling creeps. Which means you will be tanking creeps under tower. Without this item you will burn through all your healing items incredibly fast. In lower level play, I would recommend buying Quelling Blade over this item. AS it helps you last hit the creeps while your support auto attacks the wave.

Early Game

Movement speed in this game is so important! Having the extra movement speed is incredible. With a base speed of 310, you run just like Sonic. Seriously though, getting these early can really help you chase and run away from people.

This gives us some decent sustain and builds into one of our mid game core items, Helm of the Dominator. It doesn't do anything fancy other than give lifesteal. But a good item to have early.

If you're doing really well in lane, having this item fast really increases your damage output. Which makes you more of a threat early. It also builds into the super useful Maelstrom, which is really important in our build.

Mid Game

Treads are fantastic items for Phantom Assassin. The extra attack speed give you more opportunity to hit a critical. You can trade these out for Phase Boots. The extra attack damage makes Coup de Grace stronger, faster. But I prefer the attack speed over raw power.

I personally thought battlefury was a better item to go. But Maelstorm is much cheaper and lets us be dangerous faster. It also builds into the incredible powerspike called Mjollnir. It helps us farm the jungle and push lanes super fast with it's passive.

This item is a super good buy. It provides us with everything we need. Lifesteal, more damage, armor and some passive HP Regen. It also provides us with a pretty neat ability. It gives us the option of taking control of a creep. What you can do is take control of an Alpa Wolf and have it follow you around. 30% bonus damage aura following you around is pretty nice. It also gives us something to Phantom Strike to if we're in trouble. It also builds into the super useful Satanic.

Another item oldKainen recommended for the guide. This item provides us incredible stats for Phantom Assassin at a reasonable price. It doesn't get much better for us than this item. The bonus movement speed is super crucial for us as well.

Late Game

This is truthfully a good item in every game. There is no reason to not buy this item in a game. It gives us a good amount of damage, It also gives us the ability to become magic immune. It starts off with ten seconds of magic immunity. With every use, it degrades by one second. It reaches it's weakest state at five seconds. Five seconds is still quite a long time to be fully magic immune though. Use each and every charge very carefully. As using it willy nilly isn't a good idea.

Getting this item makes you even harder to deal with. The chance of a bash just makes it even harder for people to fight you. If they run they can't get away, and if they try to fight you without Monkey King Bar, it's almost impossible. It also gives us a pretty large amount of damage for just one item. Later in the game Abyssal Blade is available to us with this item.

Extra Items

At this point in the game, you should have your item foundation set. This is when you get into some of the really expensive items that you can buy. This section will also give you some item recommendations to finish off your build.

This item costs some serious gold. But it is well worth the cost. You don't buy the item for it's stats. You buy it for the active ability, Unholy Rage. Sending your lifesteal to a completely different level. 150% lifesteal is nothing to joke about. With a single Coup de Grace, you can easily send yourself from 5% to 100% HP.

This item is a complete must against heroes with Butterfly. It gives us some good stats for the cost, and the ability to never miss is really nice. On top of that, it also gives us the chance to mini-bash people.

This is another item that makes you even harder to get away from. Apart from giving some really high damage, it also comes with an active. It stuns the target almost instantly on cast. Which means we can rely less on sheer luck, which is always a good thing.

This item provides us with a lot of stuff that we like. It fixes our low HP pool, gives us more mana and gives us a TON of attributes. On top of all that, it gives us a slow that pierces BKB. So it also helps fix our problem chasing people with BKB

I haven't had a lot of reason to buy this item in my games. But if the enemy team is stacking armor this can be good. It gives us some good damage and it lowers armor on auto attack. Which mean we can hit even harder with our ultimate.

oldKainen brought this item to my attention. So thank him for that! With the ability to use the Blur passive and activate Coup de Grace, they prove to be very dangerous. This item also gives very good stats for us to work with.

This item is a terrible buy in most cases. Lots of money and it drops on death. So why am I recommending it? It's a fanastic last resort item, that's why. If it's only a matter of minutes before you lose the game, consider buying it. This item can change the tide of the game with one simple auto attack. A Coup de Grace with this item is beyond devastating. It brings explosive power to Phantom Assassin. But DO NOT BUY THIS ITEM IF YOU'RE AHEAD. It is very easy to throw a game getting overconfident and losing this item.

Gameplay

EARLY GAME: This is your weakest point in the game. Your dagger is really your only damage source right now. Your job right now is farm, stay safe and don't die. This is a crucial time period in the game. Your early game actions will effect you later in the game for better or worse. YOU DON'T NEED TO CARRY RIGHT NOW. Don't act like it! Let your mid, offlaner and supports do that. Your job is to farm. Level six isn't really a power spike for you like most carries. You don't have enough Attack damage to utilize the critical strike power. Aiming for 50 CS(Creeps) every ten minutes is a decent goal for you to set if your CSing isn't very good.

Summary

• Aim for ATLEAST 50 CS every 10 minutes
• Stay safe
• Get levels
• Farm

MID GAME: At this point you should be sitting on Power Treads, maelstorm, and Helm of the Dominator. You're significantly stronger than you were earlier. At this point, farming the jungle and pushing lanes is your priority. Yasha is also a really good pick up at this point. It doesn't cost much and provides us with a lot. Don't be afraid to jump into fights with your team now! With level 11 you have a big critical hit modifier, especially because you should have some items under your belt by now. You can really start utilizing your ultimate in fights now.

Summary

1. Keep farming
2. Teamfight
3. Keep getting levels
4. Push Towers

LATE GAME:This is when you truly become a carry. Your Black King Bar and Skull Basher make you a serious threat. A threat that is not easily handled I might add. Coup De Grace will be maxed out by this point. Four digit critical hits are no longer just thought about. They are a very scary reality for the enemy team. Meaning you can easily one shot squishier heroes with a critical hit. Correctly choosing a target is very important for you. Choosing a hero to kill always depends on the game. But the list below is generally a good order in most cases.

1. Mid Laners
2. Supports
3. Carries(Agility/Intelligence carries only)
4. Tanks/Strength heroes.

Why are carries so low in the priority chart?

Because at this point they will most likely have a Monkey King Bar. Which completely negates your ability to dodge their main source of damage. So instead of burning through your HP and banking on a critical to fight another carry... Just kill someone who can't fight you effectively. Your Black King Bar keeps you safe against mage's nukes and support's Crowd Control. Which is why they're easy targets for you.

Banking on Critical Hits

This is the thing I can't preach enough. DO NOT BANK ON CRITICAL HITS! It kills me to watch people dive into a fight they can't win without Coup de Grace. These are the same people who say "Well he only won because I didn't get any crits." *Face Palm* At a 15% chance to activate this ability, It's not the most reliable thing in the world. Extremely powerful and extremely unreliable at times. Sometimes there is just no other choice though. If Lycan is chasing you, the odds of you getting away are low. So pray to thine god, RNGesus, and put all the money in the bank.

Summary

• Teamfight
• Farm for your last items
• DESTROY THE ANCIENT!

Learn From Your Mistakes

This section is really targeted at newer players, but possibly more experienced players. One thing that I can't stress enough is not giving up. You're going to have bad games sometimes. You're going to have games when your entire team turns on you. Where they flame you, and tell you to uninstall. But these are the games that you can grow from as a player. The games where you get your *** handed to you from beginning to end. Download the replay and watch it. Watch where you do something stupid and get yourself killed. Make a mental note to never do that again. I promise you, you will improve so fast by doing just that.

Conclusion

Phantom Assassin is a very fun hero to play. She has explosive damage potenial and is very unique compared to the other carries. Hopefully new and more experienced players learned something from reading this. If there is anyway I can make this guide better, please let me know and I will work on it. Again, I can't thank you enough for reading this guide. As a final note, I will leave my fellow Assassins with this video.
Play Video
Also a big thanks to oldKainen, for helping me improve my guide dramatically.