Some Idiot's Guide to Gyrocopter (6.83c Current)

Introduction

Hello one and everyone! Safecyn here, bringing...

You? Again? Really?

Don't be like that, man. I thought we were friends. You bought me drinks last time.

There's a good explanation for that.

Oh? And what's that, Friendy McFrienderson?

Your wallet's been missing for a while, hasn't it?

HOW DID YOU... oh.

Yeah. Anyways, this was a guide?

Oh, right! Gyrocopter! This guy's awesome, you'll love playing him. His voice acting is great, his lines are funny, and his skill set gives him an almost unmatched potential for DPS... for short bursts of time, anyway. He's decently flexible, too, and can be played as a ganker, a hard carry... even a pusher depending on how you build him. If you want to pull your best Clint Eastwood impression and tell the enemy team to get off your lawn, you should definitely give him a try.

And do remember, this guide is just suggestions based on my own experiences and understanding of the game, and shouldn't be followed to the letter. Being able to adapt to your specific game is what separates the pros from us rank amateurs. Feedback is appreciated, as long as it's constructive!

Pros / Cons

Pros Above average agility gain makes for fast, hard hitting news. Erm... right clicks. Versatile; can be built to match the situation. Above average movement speed. Good snowball potential as well as strong late game presence. 2nd highest INT gain of any AGI hero (after Sniper) Rocket Barrage is absurdly good at focusing down single targets. Flak Cannon gives him insane DPS potential. Scales well with items Incredibly good attack animation and missile speed for easier last hitting. Fun to listen to, and fun to play!

Cons Mana-starved in the early to mid game. Aghanim's Scepter upgrade is only really useful in select situations. Flak Cannon comes with a pretty long cooldown. Homing Missile is an unreliable stun. Below average strength gain makes him squishy at all points of the game. Low base attack damage makes for a harder time last hitting. Old and set in his ways.

Skills

Rocket Barrage

Launches a salvo of rockets at nearby enemy units in a radius around the Gyrocopter. Lasts 3 seconds.

Radius: 400
Duration: 3
Number of Rockets: 30
Damage Per Rocket: 11/15/19/23

Cooldown: 7/6.5/6/5.5 Mana: 90

Aurel's new craft has an increased payload for rockets, enhancing their rapid-fire capabilities.

Notes:

This skill is what makes Gyrocopter truly terrifying in the early and mid game. A 330 damage nuke is pretty good, right? Dragon Slave only gives you 280, though it's in an AOE, and Night Stalker's Void just barely beats it, and it's one of the stronger ones. All in all, pretty comparable to most level 4 nukes, eh?

Did I mention that 330 is the damage that this skill does at Level 1? Because it is. If you land every one of your rockets on one target, you will deal 330 damage at level 1, which amounts to basically half of all but the most tanky heroes health bars... poor, squishy saps like Sniper or Terrorblade will go down nearly instantly, assuming you're right-clicking during all this. Side note: Dotafire needs to stop living in the past. I even typed in Terrorblade to the html link, and it STILL comes up Soul Keeper. Honestly, I can understand pandering to the veteran players a little, but not at the risk of alienating noobs like me. Jeez.

Did you want some cheese with your whine?

Shush. Anyways, at max level this skill does a whopping 690 damage, which is slightly more than a level 2 Laguna Blade to put things in perspective. There are, of course, a few things to keep in mind about this skill, to really get the most out of it.

One: It hits random targets in an area that is larger than you think it is, so be careful when it comes to using this around creep waves. 400 radius has a little distance to it, it's equivalent to the range on Brewmaster's Thunder Clap actually. No idea why I knew that one. Not at all. Incidentally, it's also bigger than your attack range, which sits at 365, so that's something to keep in mind as well.

Two: You don't have to be facing your target when you use it. It may seem like a little thing, but keep this in mind: Gyro's turn rate is 0.6. This is pretty standard, to tell the truth, but it still means that he takes 0.157 seconds to turn 180 degrees. More than a tenth of a second! Seeing as this skill does 690 damage over the course of 3 seconds, you're doing 36 less damage by waiting to turn than by casting and then turning. How often have you escaped a gank or a teamfight with that much health? That's what I thought. It's because of stuff like this, man. Math is all things.

Three, and lastly: I'd encourage you all out there not to get locked down into the 'single target' mentality that this skill encourages. In a teamfight, damage is damage, and being able to spray fiery death at a cluster of enemies can be just as powerful as unloading an entire salvo on only one. 690/5 comes out to a non-negligible 138 damage, so even if the entire enemy team is soaking up the spell, you're still doing something, especially since you can right click while it fires.

Homing Missile

Fires a homing missile to seek the targeted enemy unit. The missile gains speed over time, and deals greater damage and a longer stun the farther it has traveled. Enemy units can destroy the missile before it reaches its target.

Cast Range: 1050
Stun Duration: 2.2/2.4/2.6/2.8
Minimum Damage: 50
Maximum Damage: 125/250/375/500

Cooldown: 20/17/14/11 Mana: 120/130/140/150

The biggest missile Aurel could possibly attach to his craft, The Bomb has carefully calculated aerodynamics and explosives for maximum impact.

Notes:

There's a lot of mechanical things about this skill you should know about:

1) In the 6.81 patch, this skill was buffed so that the hits to destroy it changed from 3 to a scaling 3/3/4/5, While this doesn't change the fact that it's an unreliable stun, it definitely makes it much more powerful. Also, towers take twice the amount of hits to destroy the missile, and attacks by creeps do NOTHING, so casting it through the enemy creep wave isn't stupid at all.

2) Max damage occurs when the missile has traveled 1500 units, just a little longer than Earthshaker's Fissure to put things in perspective. You'll almost never reach this. Fair warning.

3) There's a 3 second delay before the missile starts moving. It isn't, strictly speaking, a CAST delay, though, as Gyro can move during this time period. It does give your enemy ample time to know what's coming, though, so it's best to cast this from fog of war when you can. Your enemy WILL get a one second warning before the missile starts flying even if you cast from fog, but it's preferable to the full three seconds of warning they'd get otherwise.

4) As of the 6.81 'Spring Cleaning' patch, this skill will now HIT INVISIBLE UNITS. This means that Shadow Blade users like Nature's Prophet or Sniper, or naturally invisible heroes like Bounty Hunter and Clinkz can't avoid being stunned and damaged anymore.

5) This skill will pop Linken's Sphere, but only on casting it. If you target an enemy during the item's cooldown and THEN it comes back up, it won't block the impact.

6) As of 6.83, you can now use Force Staff on the missile. I... I mean, yeah it's a buff for sure, and maybe this makes it a possible pick-up on Gyro? I'm more excited to see the fails: imagine someone on the opposite team Force Staffing a missile into their carry. TY ICEFROG-SAMA BEST BUFF.

Now for general notes: for starters, this skill is a 2.2 second stun at level 1. This is slightly longer than Storm Hammer and a level 4 Magic Missile. Poor Venge. The scaling on the stun isn't terribly great, but it's there. The damage boost SEEMS pretty nice, until you play against people who know better than to run away from the thing, or have actually cooperative teams who will gladly stop it from hitting its mark, though this is significantly more difficult now, thanks to the recent buff.

The main reason to level it up is the cooldown, which gets low enough to where you can reliably use it multiple times in a fight or a chase. In midlane, don't let the enemy's proximity to a tower stop you from using it: remember, everyone attacks slow in the early game, and the tower needs twice the shots to kill your missile than heroes do. Try to launch a missile at the :55 second mark before the runes spawn and, provided you have vision and know where to go, you're almost guaranteed to beat your opponent to the rune. I, who am terrible at Dota, have used liberal use of this skill to successfully out-mid and kill an Outworld Devourer before, so there's that.

And yes, the damage scaling is correct, regardless of what Dotafire is telling you. It's been that way since patch 6.74. Seriously, guys, what did I say about living in the past?

Cheddar or Swiss, sir?

PROVOLONE.

EDIT: Damage scaling actually went up in 6.82! This is your chance to redeem yourselves, Dotafire!

Flak Cannon

Gyrocopter's attacks hit all enemy units in an area around it for a limited number of attacks. Only the main target of attacks will receive attack bonuses such as Critical Strike. Lasts 15 seconds or until the attacks are used.

Radius: 1000
Duration: 3/4/5/6 attacks, or 15 seconds

Cooldown: 30 Mana: 50

This newly revamped Gyrocopter has attached enough armaments to assault in a 360 degree radius.

Notes:

THIS is the skill that makes you a carry. THIS is the skill that can turn you into one of the most insane DPS machines in the game. THIS is...

Alright already. Get on with it.

Shush. Anyways, there are four BIG things to keep in mind with this skill. The first is range: this skill will hit all targets within a whopping 1000 radius, which is just shy of three times your attack range. As with Rocket Barrage, you don't have to be facing them either: full 360 degree assault, baby. Keep in mind, though, that this skill does not MAKE Gyrocopter's attack range 1000. Your primary target still has to be within 365 units of you, or your attacks won't hit anyone.

The second thing is ye olde 'Unique Attack Modifiers'. They only work on your primary target. Critical hits, slows, maims, feedback, whatever you decide to get on Gyro: it won't propagate to anything else in that 1000 AOE. This includes the bonus damage from Shadow Blade! My research on the interaction turned up mixed results, so I tested it myself and found that the bonus damage does NOT splash. Still, though: the skill does your full damage in a huge AOE, which is nothing to sneeze at, and is why going for massive damage boosting items like Monkey King Bar and Daedalus is typically the way to go on this guy.

The third thing, which may seem obvious, but is nonetheless important to remember, is that its a spell. With a cooldown. A decently long cooldown, at that. This is probably the most important distinction between this skill and its sister, Medusa's Split Shot. If you're silenced before using this, you only hit one target. If it's on cooldown and you've wasted your attacks, you only hit one target. If you don't have enough mana to cast it... you get the picture.

This is a pretty big deal, as Gyrocopter's carry potential comes from his ability to mow down an entire team at once. Since Gyro is pretty squishy, having a stray support survive and disable him can spell death pretty quickly, so always keep this in mind.

Lastly, though it pains me to say this, your Manta Style illusions will NOT get Flak Cannon, even if you cast it before activating the item. This doesn't mean you shouldn't get Manta, as my item build clearly shows, but... just don't factor that in when you run your DPS calculations.

Something that was pointed out to me that I shouldn't have overlooked is that, if you have a cooperative team that will stack jungle camps for you, you might actually want to max this skill out BEFORE Homing Missile, as it will increase your farming potential immensely early on. If you're going to do that, just make sure you pick up a quick Morbid Mask so the neutrals don't wipe the floor with you. Oh, and pick up at least one level of Homing Missile early on, as it IS a stun, and stuns are good.

Call Down

Calls down an aerial missile strike on enemy units in a target area. Two missiles arrive in succession, the first dealing major damage and major slow; the second dealing minor damage and minor slow.

Range: 1000 (Global*)
Radius: 600
Duration: 2/3
Missile One Damage: 250/300/350
Missile Two Damage: 100/150/200 (175/225/275*)
Missile One Movement Speed Slow: 30%
Missile Two Movement Speed Slow: 60%

Cooldown: 55/50/45 Mana: 125

Aghanim's Scepter: Increases the damage of the second missile, and gives global cast range.

'Bombs away!'

There's not much to really say about this skill: it's an ultimate that does OK damage in a decent-sized area, and has a pretty nice cast range: almost equivalent to your Homing Missile, in fact. Since Gyrocopter is all about the AOE damage, it makes sense for this to be on him.

There's also the slow, which is where the real synergy lies. Hitting multiple enemies with this means keeping them grouped closer together for longer, which means Flak Cannon and Rocket Barrage can do their jobs and deal some serious DMGs.

One of the lines that Gyrocopter HIMSELF will say is 'Oughta lead the target next time', which is some pretty solid advice when it comes to aiming this. The enemy can't see that giant, glowing circle that appears when you cast it, so if you aim where they're GOING to be, they'll run right into it, and possibly will get slowed enough to have your second missile hit as well. Practice makes perfect and all. I have faith in you.

Item Progression

Alright, here we go! Second time around should be a piece of cake!

Not really. This is still the make or break section; the deciding factor to whether or not your readers consider the title of this guide to be ironic or literal.

I'm... pretty sure it's literal either way, actually.

Oy! No insulting yourself! That's MY job!

Starting Items: Safe Lane

The concept is pretty simple here: basic regen and stats for last hitting. Since Gyrocopter's health pool is on the low side, that Healing Salve is a must unless you KNOW you're going to have an easy time laning. Like... off-lane Sniper easy, I mean. If this happens somehow, go ahead replace the salve with another Iron Branch.

Two slippers and some branches, eh? I thought you were a " Circlet first" type of guy.

Hardy har. As I said, Gyrocopter is squishy, so piecing together a quick Poor Man's Shield can really do wonders for your survivability. I will admit, however, that going for an early Ring of Aquila might be preferable, since it really is a ton of damage early on. If you're going to be greedy like that, your starting items should look like this:



It's not TERRIBLE for survivability: Gyrocopter's starting armor IS 4, meaning that the ring pumps you up to 6, but... I dunno. Call me a wimp, but I like my extra regen. This build might be preferable if your laning with a stunning support that can near guarantee a first blood between that and Rocket Barrage, though, as an early Aquila can really get the ball rolling for you.

Early Game: Safe Lane

and , or , probably a and then

Poor Man's Shield and Ring of Aquila are both pretty cheap items, and can be built off your starting items fairly easily. If you went the first starting item build, and can last hit well, you should be able to get your Poor Man's after the first wave of creeps is cleared. The effect might be lessened by the fact that Gyro is ranged, but it's still a really good survivability asset, and provides some item slot space by binding your two Slippers of Agility into one.

Ring of Aquila might just be the highest cost/damage ratio item in the game, as long as your hero is Agility based. 9 damage, + 9 more from the bonus agility for a total of +18, for a mere 985 gold! That's a damage point per every 54 gold, which... yeah, ok, still loses the cost/damage war to the GG branch, but... still! It also provides that armor and magic regen aura which'll make both you and your lane partner smile.

After this, you have a choice to make: Phase Boots or Power Treads? Treads is without a doubt the 'safer' option: leaving them on strength gives you some much needed HP and that +30 attack speed really does shine on Gyro, especially considering his insanely good missile speed. (3000! He's tied with Sniper for the highest.) You can also tread switch to Intelligence to cast your spells more frequently, or to Agility to really pile on the DPS.

Phase Boots are definitely an option, though, especially if you don't have to worry about TOO much lockdown. Positioning is important for the majority of Gyro's skills, and Phase Boots gives you that extra move speed and unit-walking to make sure your enemy takes every single rocket you fire at them. The damage is nice too, and Gyrocopter LOVES him some damage.

Magic Wand is, of course, a beautiful item for beautiful people who want to make beautiful plays.

So not you, then?

WHY DO YOU HURT ME? But yeah, the burst heal and mana regen is great for escaping ganks or firing off a clutch spell, and the fact that it binds up your Iron Branches is always a big plus. The 'probably' is because there are definitely some cases where you might want to skip it. Particularly if you went the 'greedy' starting item build, it IS gold that can be put into something else. There's also the fact that, because Gyrocopter is so squishy, if the enemies are casting spells around him he can very easily die without being able to use it. Still though, it's a great item on virtually every hero, and should always be strongly considered.

Which brings us to Yasha, which is a great item on any DPS-focused agility hero. Depending on your farming skill, you may be pushing mid-game by the time you pick this up, but I've put it here because it's pretty key that you get it early.

Why's that? Wouldn't getting Helm of the Dominator first make him more survivable?

Well, yes, and it's probably worth mentioning that if you have no intention of doing anything but farming for the first 20-30 minutes of the game, you probably SHOULD go Helm first. The reason I recommend Yasha, though, is that it allows Gyrocopter to really capitalize on Rocket Barrage early on, while also giving him some really nice right click. Gyro is a carry that can be useful to his team early on thanks to his high-damage nuke and stun, and getting a Yasha will really increase your effectiveness in ganks and help you bully out those carries that can farm harder than you.

Oh and, though it's not in the item build section: always carry a Town Portal Scroll. Just, on EVERY hero. Your Dota life will be so much easier.

Mid Game: Safe Lane

You might notice a theme here.

Is it... survivability?

Nice job! Black King Bar is one of your first priorities as far as bigger ticket items go. The strength keeps you alive longer, the magic immunity keeps you from getting locked down: there's even damage with the deal! This item is especially important since Gyrocopter lacks any true escape mechanisms, outside of a stun and an AOE slow. Pop it and right click, then use your superior move speed to either chase down fleeing enemies or GTFO.

Helm of the Dominator is an item that will increase Gyrocopter's tank-ability, enabling him to survive long enough to right click down the enemy team. It also builds into the almighty Satanic which, if gotten, can make you nigh-on un-killable. Probably.

More importantly, though, the ability to dominate a creep allows you to stack the Ancient camp, and the lifesteal it grants will allow you to CLEAR said camp with a round of Flak Cannon, plus jungle all day every day. If you're doing well enough, or surviving just isn't an issue for some reason, getting this before your BKB can increase your snowball potential by monumental degrees. Just to give you an idea, a Gyrocopter I once played with ended up with 564 GPM and 690 XPM because a support was stacking the Ancients for him. Stacking it yourself and clearing it at every opportunity should propel you even HIGHER than that.

Manta Style is a big one as well, and it's a nice build-up since you should have already gotten a Yasha. Gyro benefits from all the stats it gives, of course, but the real beauty is the purge effect. Remember how, earlier on, I said that silence was Flak Cannon's enemy? Well, pop Manta and the silence is gone, plus slows, miss chances... all sorts of debuffs. Plus, more AGI and two more of you makes for higher DPS, which is the name of the game here.

I thought the name of the game was Dota.

Was that... a joke? From you?

No. Maybe. No.

The late game extensions are virtually identical for both builds, so I'll be writing that at the very bottom of this section. Now, we'll be switching over to the mid-lane build!

Starting Items: Mid Lane

for a fast

The classic fast bottle build. I didn't invent it, and I'm certainly not going to fix what isn't broken. Mid-lane Gyro's priority is to gank and MAYBE snowball out of control into the team's carry, so being able to keep your mana and health topped off is key. It's also good for spamming Homing Missile on your opponent mid, which can be some pretty powerful harass when coupled with the constant threat of Rocket Barrage. If they stand still, it's easier for you to close in for the kill, and if they back up, they take more damage. Win/Win.

His above average movement speed and his stun also help with rune control, and boy oh BOY does Gyrocopter go well with runes. Haste and Invisiibilty make landing Rocket Barrage on your gank target easy as pie in the sky, and if you trick your mid opponent into thinking that an illusion is you, you can sneak up on a side lane undetected and shoot Homing Missile from the fog. Double damage is great too, as it buffs his sub-par starting base damage, and Regen... who DOESN'T love Regen?

Early-Mid Game: Mid Lane

, or , and

Ring of Aquila for all the reasons I said earlier. Mana regen + armor + tons of damage for cheap is very much win.

The choice between Phase Boots and Arcane Boots might surprise some people, and to be honest, between your Aquila and your Bottle you should have enough mana regen to sustain your ganks, so Phase is typically the way to go. There are those games, however, when ganks require a lot more spells than normal, or you're going up against a line of heroes that's easier to gank and you want to be able to do it as non-stop as possible. In these scenarios, the padded mana pool and burst mana replenish from Arcanes can tear your opponents a new one.

You probably noticed that I didn't list Shadow Blade as an option on carry Gyro, and some of you are probably kind of upset about it.

I know I am.

Shush. Gyrocopter is a classic case of a hero without a real escape, so Shadow Blade is usually a pretty standard pick up. The thing is, if you're farming the safe lane, your skills combined with your movement speed and the support of an ally SHOULD be enough to keep you alive. As for the item itself, it's barely more damage than Helm for more than 1000 extra gold, and the attack speed is... ok. There are better items, is the thing.

Mid-lane, ganking Gyro though... that's a whole 'nother boat. Being able to sneak up on someone and unload a Rocket Barrage on 'em is... well, there aren't too many spells out there that are more terrifying to have happen to you from out of nowhere. I'm giddily reminded of one of my games as Skywrath Mage, where I got an invisibility rune and dropped a Mystic Flare riiight on top of the enemy carry... they freaked the hell out, man. I know, I watched it from their player perspective.

You're the worst kind of human being.

Thank you! But yeah, an item that gives you damage, lets you avoid detection, and lets you get in position to cast your spells is pretty darn good on a roaming Gyro, and don't forget it buffs your movement speed and gives you bonus damage too! The 6.81 patch even increased the length of the invis by two seconds, so... you know. Good stuff.

Late Game Extensions

Late game really is the 'choose your own adventure' portion of any Dota game, and it's where Gyro can REALLY shine if he gets farmed enough. You may have noticed there's a LOT of options listed, and that's mostly because of how versatile the hero really is. I'll list the pros and cons of each item here, and it'll be up to you to figure out what's best for your particular game.

Satanic is a nice pick-up on Gyro, especially since it builds right from his Helm of the Dominator. It beefs you up with a bunch of bonus strength, keeping you alive longer in team fights, and gives you the downright godly 175% lifesteal active that can replenish your health bar in a matter of seconds. Which is good, because that's all it lasts for.

Monkey King Bar gives Gyro a LOT of what he's looking for. A solid chunk of damage to tear through an enemy team, as well as some attack speed, which is often forgotten by yours truly when not knee-deep in Dota files doing research. The true strike passive that it gives will ensure you can hit even the most evasive of heroes, and the mini-bash is just hilarious on someone who attacks as fast as Gyro.

Linken's Sphere is for those games where there's just too much lockdown to deal with. It may seem redundant to stack this with Black King Bar, but it's all on how you use it. Typically, you want to use your Linken's ability to escape ganks, and try to save your BKB for big team fights. In addition, the stats Linken's gives are never to be overlooked, it solves pretty much all his mana issues, and there's even some HP regen and damage thrown in!

Butterfly is pretty much a no brainer here. It gives you 60 total damage, a ton of attack speed, and 35% evasion to keep you in the skies longer against those pesky right clickers. Juuust think twice about getting it if you see the other team has a Monkey King Bar, ok? You can thank me later.

Refresher Orb is an item that I'm probably a little biased towards, because I love it so dang much. But it gives Gyro a lot of good stuff: HP and mana regen, attacks speed, damage... but that's not the reason we pick it up, or the reason you're scoffing at it. The question is this: is Call Down really a good enough ultimate to be worth getting a refresher for?

And the answer, I think, is no. Not by itself, anyway, which is ok, because I didn't put Refresher on here to give you two Call Downs. That's nice and all, but the real reason is to give you twice the duration of Flak Cannon in a team fight, AND two Call Downs. It's a big investment, but against a team with a bunch of tanky heroes, you might very well NEED those six extra attacks to mow down everything in front of your face.

Shiva's Guard is an item that I don't think gets bought enough in Dota. Maybe it's just me. The extra intelligence solves your mana problems, and the armor and the aura make you way more survivable. The only real drawback is that it doesn't give Gyrocopter any damage, apart from the arctic blast active. That active DOES keep your enemies in place for you, though, which can help you land a good Call Down and Flak Cannon, so there is that.

Desolator should be pretty straightforward, right? It's an item that gives a bunch of damage with a pretty nice build up, and even gives you armor-piercing rounds to take out heroes and buildings quickly. Keep in mind, though, that the armor debuff will only go to your primary target! On the other hand, you'll shoot out those red, flaming beams which are baller as all hell, which is pretty much all the justification you need, right?

Daedalus is also pretty straightforward. It's a bunch of damage, and gives you the chance to crit on your primary target. That's all it does, but that's pretty much what Gyro wants, so you should probably get it if you can afford it. Just saying. Focus the enemy carry so the extra damage procs on him, and watch the others around him die from the crossfire.

Assault Cuirass isn't the most optimal choice, as it doesn't give you any damage, but attack speed and armor ARE two things that Gyro loves. If you're not the team's primary carry, it might be good to pick this up for the aura, as it really helps your team out.

Eye of Skadi is... I mean look at it. +25 to all stats, plus additional mana and health, and a slow which stacks with Lifesteal. While not the greatest item for straight up DPS, this can make Gyro an absolute PAIN to kill, leaving you the last man standing. Always. Sometimes. If you keep dying, get two. If you still keep dying, get three!

Is that real advice?

I mean... if you can afford three Skadi's, you're probably going to win the game anyways, so... why not? It's hilarious seeing Gyro be tankier than everyone else.

An item you might notice is missing is Aghanim's Scepter. which does give Gyro some extra oomph to his ultimate. The thing is, unless you're playing Gyro as a hardcore pusher, it's not... great. The extra damage isn't really worth mentioning, and the global cast range doesn't really help teamfight much, as you should honestly be there using Flak Cannon on everyone.

The stats it gives are nice, though, and if picked up early enough it gives Gyro some extra farming potential and some constant teamfight presence. If you're using him to Rat Dota, you can always use your ult in one lane and your Flak Cannon in another to pressure two towers at once. In the vast majority of games, though, there are just better items to get, and you don't reap a lot of benefit for the amount of gold you sink into it.

The last item, which you'll notice isn't even officially mentioned up top, is Divine Rapier. To get one thing out of the way: if you are winning, DO NOT PICK THIS UP. All it takes is one mistake, one death, and the enemy carry is hitting for 300 additional damage and tearing through your barrel-rolling *** like its made of tissue paper.

There is, however, something to be said for it. Gyrocopter utilizes it better than most every other hero in the game, simply because he has Flak Cannon, and can spray that +300 damage across the entire enemy team. When done right, the opposite side should die before they can land even a single stun on you, and then you push and win. GG.

Suggested Viewing: Offlane Gyro by slahser

You know, I put a lot of research into my guides, right? I play games with the heroes, I see what other people do with the hero and such...

And they still come out mediocre? Is that where you're going with this?

HOW DID YOU KNOW??? ;_; But uh... yeah anyways, it's a little disheartening when someone who's insanely better than me comes along and is like 'this works too! It's actually really good!' And I watch and I'm just like... uh... yeah... yeah, you're right, that's awesome.

The culprit here is slahser, whose guides I've admired for some time, and who has the absolute GENTLEST VOICE EVER.

Ever?

EVER! Seriously, I could fall asleep in it it's so damn comforting. Anyways, rather than summarize what he has to say about it, you should watch it yourself! It's so damn awesome. I wanna try it immediately.

Play Video

Wait... he gets a...

AAAAAAAAAAH! SPOILERS! SPOILERS!

Allies and Enemies

There we go. Relatively painless, if I do say so myself.

Another item section down. I'm so proud.

Really?

What do you think?

Oh... shush. I'm going to do the next section now.

Allies

Gyrocopter and Vengeful Spirit. I'd ship it, if I were the type to do such things and wasn't horribly put off by the age difference. Her Magic Missile sets up your Rocket Barrage, as well as chains perfectly with your Homing Missile for additional lockdown. Vengeance Aura gives Gyro more damage, which is what he really loves, AND, as of 6.81, when Vengeful Spirit dies she afflicts the enemy team with a NEGATIVE damage aura, increasing your survivability! That's right, ladies and gents, you heard it here first, Vengeful spirit is now even MORE a Maelk hero than ever before.




Any hero than can make sure multiple enemy teammates are within 1000 AOE of each other is alright in Gyro's book. Magnus can even Empower you, giving you some nice bonus damage to spray around, and Dark Seer can Surge you to get you in position or help you escape a tight spot.



I love this guy. But who doesn't? His entire kit synergizes pretty well with Gyrocopter, able to stack stuns and slows thanks to Fireblast and Ignite, but what we're really looking at here is Bloodlust. Attack speed, movement speed. Both things that Gyro loves.



Elder Titan is always a pretty nice ally to have. His Echo Stomp has almost the exact same radius as your Call Down, so you can near guarantee that all enemies hit with one will get hit by the other. Natural Order is also an insanely good passive that will increase your AOE damage. Earth Splitter is just the icing on the cake. So much AOE. It's glorious.



6.81 saw some major buffs to Guardian Angel, namely it now lasts 8 seconds at level 3, and TEN seconds if you get an Aghanim's Scepter. There's also Repel which will make Gyro magic immune, and now it doesn't remove positive buffs, either! So basically you have a hero that can give a squishy hero who wants to focus on DPS a ten second window of invincibility where he can right click to his heart's content.

Come to think of it, I might ship this before VengexGyro. You know, if I were the type of person to do that sort of thing. Hehe. Heh.

Enemies

Ah, c'mon Venge, I was only playing! Sort of. Not really. But yeah, as great as Vengeful spirit is to have on your side, she's also terrifying to play against. Nether Swap will pull you right into the middle of an enemy team, plus the lockdown from Magic Missile and the armor reduction from Wave of Terror will tear through you in seconds.



These are just a few good examples of heroes that can catch Gyrocopter off-guard and tear through him. Bounty Hunter and Nyx Assassin will hit you for a bunch of damage out of nowhere, hold you in place, and tear through your squishy butt faster than you can type 'gg'. Ursa, who is doubly terrifying now that Fury Swipes isn't a Unique Attack Modifier anymore, will either Blink or Shadow Blade on top of you, slam the ground, and proceed to do the same. I'd be very, very surprised if people don't start picking up Desolator on him now that it'll work, so watch out for that.



Distance closers of all shapes and sizes are also the bane of Gyrocopter's existence, as they can catch up to you regardless of your superior move speed and proceed to rip your aircraft to tiny, bite-sized pieces. If they get out of hand, you may have no choice but to buy a Shadow Blade or even a Force Staff even when playing carry, just to keep them from murdering you.



A special shout out goes to Bloodseeker, and the horrible future that 6.81 has in store for him and Gyro's rivalry. With the recent patch, Bloodrage is now a silence that can not be purged, meaning that your manta style will do nothing. Also, thanks to Thirst, he will laugh at your movement speed, and catch up to you, and murder you, and then bathe in your blood as is his wont. Though if he's bad on the timing of Bloodrage he can end up giving you a massive damage boost to your Flak Cannon assault, which can be pretty hilarious.



This may seem like a weird item to place on this list, but it's definitely worth a mention. Gyrocopter gets his carry potential from Flak Cannon which has no limit on target number and can not EXCLUDE targets within its 1000 AOE. This means that if a melee Necronomicon minion is present in the teamfight, you'll be attacking it, killing it, and then taking up to 600 pure damage from Last Will. For a squishy like Gyro, that's not something you can just ignore, so be careful around heroes that typically grab this item, like Nature's Prophet or Lycanthrope.

Also, way to live in the past again, Dotafire. His name got changed to Lycan AGES ago.

The Colby-Jack is good today, sir.

I SAID PROVOLONE, DAMN IT!

Discussion

It's about time. What the heck took you so long?

Oy, I'm an adult, you know? With responsibilities? Bills to pay? A JOB? I wouldn't expect a disembodied voice of negativity who CAN'T EVEN LOAD THE FREAKING DISHWASHER like you to understand, but that takes stuff takes time.

That... was harsh.

I... yeah... yeah it was. I... look, I'm sorry, ok? Let's just... let's just do this.

Right...

Timminatorr wrote:

I dont really like the build. Both the skills and items.

There is too much random stuff in early game items, you shouldnt really need much damage so i would start with a ring of protection and get a quick basi. You can get an aquilia but its not really needed. The shield is unneeded and not cost effective, if you want to fight early before BKB get your drums or even just a bracer.
I dont know why people always say that gyro has mana problems, but with a basi you should pretty much be able to spam barrage and flak cannon to farm faster.

After that dominator outclasses yasha, yes yasha is a great cost effective item but you dont need attack speed, and stacking ancients outclasses yasha.
That is also the main reason i dont like your skillbuild, you should have more points into flak cannon. I used to get one point and skill the rest for stats but i think ill level it in the next patch.
After that get BKB of ofcourse.
I dont like the manta choice. It is a very awkward on gyro and since you have no real steroid apart from farming speed at that point you need raw damage.
I would get an MKB since it gives massive damage and if gotten early enough (pre 25 min) gives you a peak where the enemy cant handle that amount of flak cannon damage.

After that it is pretty much butterfly satanic and the occasional emengency rapier.
You can change the order of the items a bit depending on enemies though.

Well, yeah, but...

Peppo_oPaccio wrote:

Sorry, but I agree with Timminatorr: the starting items aren't that bad, but the Poor Man's Shield is a waste of money on ranged Heroes.

Also, in my opinion you should leave Homing Missile at level 1 and use it as a zoning tool: the extra damage from levels is nice, but the enemies can destroy it really easily and it makes Heroes run away from it even at level 1.

Yasha is an item I never take on Gyrocopter because he doesn't benefit from it at all: extra movement speed? get a Drum of Endurance. Extra attack speed? You'd better build raw damage, as your main source of late game damage comes from the Flak Cannon which has a fixed amount of shots. You don't need the Manta Style that much either, as the usual late game items for Gyro are - as said before - damage items like the Monkey King Bar and the Satanic (though this last one also bulks up your illusions). I usually buy a Drum of Endurance on him because of the stats and movement speed, plus the active is way more valuable than a Yasha early on; it also increases your stats.

The Shadow Blade, though, is kinda good if you take it early (12-15 minutes?): you don't benefit that much from the extra attack speed, but it's a good snowball item as you can make good use of the invisibility and land surprise Rocket Barrages behind the enemies.

Lastly, looks like you underestimate the power of the Flak Cannon: during the laning phase, 3-4 AoE hits deal huge harass damage to the enemies; it does push the lane, so you have to be careful while using it, but a pulling support should do the job. My usual skill build is 4-1-1-1 (or 2-1-3-1 if I want to keep Rocket Barrage at level 2 because of an uncontested laning phase) by level 7, then proceed maxing out Flak Cannon and take stats until level 23 (or 21).

I... hmm... yeah...

I was talking about this with one of my friends and Dota-mentors Bulb the other day (not like, Bulba... like... Safebulb? We're named after Pokemon. We're totes cool.) and he pointed out that while Manta Style is a good item for Gyro in that it gives him stats and the purge, the fact that you're not always going to NEED a purge makes it situational at best, and not core.

To which I was like... ah... yesh... this is a fair point.

One of the things you'll note about me is that I don't like dying, which is why a lot of my builds focus more on surviving than dominating. While I still personally think that the damage blocked by Poor Man's Shield is really good early game (10 damage from all attacks by heroes, keep in mind! The difference between surviving a gank or not, unless there's a Zeus), I understand that Gyro is a carry because of his DPS, and that delaying high damage items for the sake of survivability isn't always either necessary nor recommended.

So I added a build that skips all the extra stuff and focuses solely on that DPS. You'll notice Ring of Aquila is still on there, mainly because it really is an insane amount of damage for its cost, and it's just USEFUL. The skill build has also been changed up, as you're not going to be shooting a whole lot of missiles if all you're doing is sitting down to farm.

Anyways, these are both good comments! All y'all readers take notes! There will be a test.

samukobo wrote:

PERHAPS Homing Missile will be worth maxing out by 6.81?

I know your comment was longer than this, but I already covered your second point above. Forgiveness is asked.

As for Homing Missile, I honestly think the buff it got to the number of hits required makes it more viable. When it was just three hits to kill, there were already times when the skill would hit, even if your team was trying to focus it. Now that the max is FIVE? It should take a really coordinated effort to deal with it in the early to mid game, even the late game if heroes are spread out a little.

You're almost never going to get full damage from it, but that doesn't automatically make it useless, is the thing. A Homing Missile is a target that people have to focus, and a team that's grouping up to focus one might make a delicious target for a Magnus or an Enigma... or a Gyrocopter for that matter. I think it's a highly underrated ability and should at the very latest be maxed third, but... hey. Look at the title of the guide, right?

Conclusion

And that wraps it up! Be sure to look forward to the discussion section, in which thousands of people tear me apart for my poor understanding of this hero's strengths and weaknesses!

Ah, c'mon. It's not that bad. I've seen worse. Boy have I seen worse. Plus, this should be the only Gyrocopter guide that's decently current on the site, at least for a while, so you've got that going for you.

Yeah... yeah, I suppose... I can't help but feel I missed some stuff, though, which is where you guys come in! Obscure mechanics, surprisingly effective skill/item builds, I'd love to hear them! Just be nice when you criticize.

He's a big baby, after all.

SHUSH!