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Welcome to Nikobaby's Book of the Lifestealer, a hero guide part of the Book of Dota series!
Here you will find all the information you need to learn to play Naix on a high level – from drafting and builds to the optimal playstyle in different lanes and situations. We hope you’ll enjoy this guide and find it useful!
Draft: As any pos. 1 or 2 hero, it is better to draft LS at the later picking phase in order to avoid counters. That being said, Naix is a very flexible and reliable carry and picking him early on is not that big of a deal. He works best against low-armor high HP cores and he has problems against heroes who can easily kite him.
Laning: Prioritize your farm, but try to dominate your lane with the help of your supports – harass with Feast and attempt kills with Rage and Open wounds. In a bad laning situation try to last hit and stay alive with Rage. You can even abandon the lane and go into the jungle in order to find farm, but try to avoid such situations because you want to snowball in the early-mid game.
Mid & Late: Participate in ganks in fights, ideally with the help of Naix Bombs (infest into ally initiators). Try to claim map control in this way, but don’t forget about farming. Once you have a resource advantage, siege the enemy base and slowly push their tower with the help of Rage.
Lifestealer is one of the most reliable hard carries in Dota 2. His in-built magic immunity makes him very difficult to control in fights. He scales extremely well with farm but does not need a lot of items to start contributing, which makes it very hard to stop him from early on. Moreover, due to his skill set, he doesn’t require a lot of help to win his lane or at least to find the required farm.
All of this makes him a consistent core hero who can thrive in difficult situations, where other more demanding carries wouldn’t.
MAJOR
Magic immunity and survivability: Lifestealer’s inbuilt magic immunity, as well as Lifesteal and Infest, allow the hero to survive longer and move freely during team fights.
Strong against melee heroes: Naix is one of the strongest heroes against melee offlaners, especially against high HP heroes.
Flexible: The hero can fit many different strategies and can go to almost any lane, making him a very versatile carry.
Scales very well with items but is not dependent on them: Lifestealer is one of the carries that can contribute a lot even with a few items, which makes him very strong at any stage of the game.
MINOR
Good movement speed: Lifestealer has a very high 315 movement speed for a carry.
Very good turn rate: Lifestealer’s has one of the best turn rates in Dota 2. He can switch from target to target, kite enemies by abusing his fast turning speed and almost instantly turn around to use his skills (Infest for example).
Decent disable (slow): Due to its low mana cost, low cd, long-duration and the amount of movement speed slow he applies, Open Wounds is one of the best slows in Dota 2.
Good damage and Fast Attack animation: Lifestealer deals a decent amount of damage and has a quick attack animation (Attack point 0.39), which allow him to last hit easily. Furthermore, Feast allows the hero to deal additional damage as a percentage of a target’s current life.
MAJOR
Weak against silences: Since Lifestealer depends mostly on his rage ability to be effective in fights, a silence can cripple the hero.
Vulnerable to disables that go through Magic Immunity: Because Lifestealer needs to get close to enemies in order to deal damage, spells that can lock him down during his Rage are very effective against the hero.
Can be easily kited: Mobile heroes with escape mechanism can easily kite Lifestealer and reduce greatly his effectiveness in fights.
MINOR
Very dependent on his Rage ability: Lifestealer relies on his in-built magic immunity to fight effectively in engagements. A mistimed use of Rage can then leave him vulnerable to enemies’ disables.
Na’Vi vs Vega Squadron, PGL Bucharest Major 2018
MATCH ID: 3765833999
Replay:
Crystallize plays a pos. 1 safe lane Lifestealer against Vega Squadron. He has a great laning stage and showcases how to farm both the lane and the jungle with Naix – on the 10th minute mark he has 71 last hits, putting him on top of the net worth graph ahead of the enemy Tiny.
He goes for a S&Y build in order to be able to stick to his target better, as his teammates don’t provide the great lockdown. Later on he buys Deso + AC because he is playing mainly against low armor heroes (Gyro is the only exception).
When you pick Lifestealer, your aim is to be aggressive and fight early on. You should consider whether your teammates could fit your offensive play style.
In addition, when choosing Lifestealer, you should take into account the composition of the enemy team – if they are very mobile and have a lot of disables through magic immunity, getting kills with Lifestealer will be really difficult.
In competitive Dota, Lifestealer is drafted because he is a very reliable and flexible carry. Due to his versatility, it is hard to predict where he will be laned. This allows you to be very creative in your drafting and in the laning stage, which may ultimately help you to outwit your opponents and achieve a more favorable laning composition.
Teams often choose to place the hero in an aggressive team composition that aims to dominate the early-to-mid game by seeking fights and ganking enemies. However, this does not mean that Lifestealer has a reduced carry potential in the late game. On the contrary, the hero scales very well with items and gets stronger as the game progresses.
Although Lifestealer excels at ganking, he is also a strong carry in team fight and pushing strategies as he is tanky, survivable from early on and can easily burst down single targets.
The hero has some limitations against heroes with illusions, mobile heroes and disables that go through magic immunity. To be effective in team strategies against such opponents, Lifestealer often relies on his allies to provide sufficient lockdown and freedom in engagements that would allow him to latch on and maul down single targets.
Generally, you put the hero in the safe lane to allow him to get farm and levels very quickly. Lifestealer needs to get some core items and levels before he can start dominating. Access to free farm in the easy lane would allow him to be active on the map earlier. Moreover, the hero has a great late game carry potential and ensuring that he gets a lot of farm would never be a bad choice.
Since Lifestealer has good damage and a very effective slow-disable, killing the enemy hard laner would not be difficult, in case he overextends.
Once Lifestealer has got his core items, he can start applying pressure on the map by ganking together with his teammates or forcing team fights. He is especially strong at the early-to-mid stages of the game when enemies do not deal much physical damage to bring him down while he is magic immune.
Juggernaut resembles Lifestealer most, as he is the only other carry with in-built magic immunity. He has HP sustain in the form of his Healing Ward and has good kill potential in the lane (higher than Naix) thanks to his Blade Fury and Omnislash. Unlike Lifestealer, Jugg doesn’t have any disable.
Apart from his hard carry potential, Lifestealer is also very strong at early levels due to his skill set and good damage/attack animation as well as probably one of the best turn rates in Dota 2. The hero has one of the most powerful slows in the game that allows him to latch on and disable targets. His Rage ability early on makes it very hard for enemies to control him or kill him in the lane. Therefore, he is a very good aggressive laner and could be placed in an offensive lane together with aggressive supports to disrupt the farm of the enemy carry and try to get kills.
It is prudent to have another carry in your team when you send your Lifestealer in an aggressive lane, in case he doesn't get as much farm as he would in the safe lane.
Gankers & aggressive lineups: Storm, Riki, Bounty Hunter, Puck, Queen of Pain, Nature’s Prophet
Lifestealer is very potent in offensive lineups that are centered around ganks and early-to-mid game aggression. He is strong with mobile gankers as he can infest in friendly heroes and so, catch enemy target off guard. As a result, Lifestealer can benefit from an ally’s higher mobility as it helps him to position himself close to a target. Then, he can jump out of the teammate and start hitting the nearest enemy. This tactic is called “Naix Bomb” and is the primary way for Lifestealer to reach his gank targets.
As he can fight very early on and does not need many items to be effective, Lifestealer fits well aggressive line-ups that rely on fighting and ganking from the start.
Heroes that can summon/convert units: Chen, Enchantress, Beastmaster, Nature’s Prophet
Lifestealer has a good synergy with heroes that provide him with creeps to use his ultimate on. The best example is Beastmaster’s Hawk – Naix can infest it and use it to fly around the map and find a good target to gank.
High HP, low-armor heroes: Pudge, Alchemist, Centaur, Tiny, Underlord, Axe, WK, Lone (with Bear build), Doom, Lycan
Since Lifestealer’s Feast allows him to deal a percentage of enemies’ HP as physical damage with every attack, the hero is particularly effective and deals a lot of damage against fat targets, especially if they have low armor.
Magic damage dealers: Zeus, Techies, Spectre, KotL, Lesh, Viper, Invoker, Gyro, Phoenix, Jakiro, Willow, Pugna, CM, Sky, OD
Due to his Rage ability, Lifestealer is very strong even early on against heavy magic damage dealers. His in-built spell immunity makes it very hard for enemies to bring him down with magic damage. Still, you have to be careful against this kind of heroes because if you don’t kill them early they can kite you.
For the same reason, he is good not only vs pure magic damage dealers like Zeus and Sky, but vs cores who rely partly on magical and partly on physical damage (e.g. Spect, Gyro, Invoker).
Last but not least, he is great against debuffs that he can dispell with Rage like for example CM's Frostbite, the DOTs of Phoenix, etc.
Heroes with illusions: Phantom Lancer, Naga Siren, CK, Terrorblade
As Lifestealer does not have any AoE ability apart from his ultimate which deals a relatively low amount of damage, so the hero struggles against illusion carries.
Mobile heroes: Weaver, Puck, Dark Seer, Wind, Morphling, Slark, Void
Mobile heroes can kite Lifestealer easily. Since the hero needs to latch on targets in order to deal damage, opponents that have a lot of escape abilities would reduce greatly his effectiveness in fights as he will most likely get kited all the time.
Physical damage nukers: Ursa Warrior, Phantom Assassin, Terrorblade, TA, Troll
Although Lifestealer is generally strong in a 1vs1 man-fight, some physical damage nukers can bring him down very quickly. Also, his magic immunity spell would not help him survive against a physical damage burst.
Launch into a maddened rage, becoming Spell Immune, 100% resistant to magic damage, and gaining increased attack speed.
Cast Animation: 0+0
Attack Speed Bonus: 40/50/60/70
Duration: 3/4/5/6
CD: 16
Mana: 75
Rage is probably the reason why Lifestealer is so often picked as the spell provides the hero with a temporary magic immunity even at the early stages of the game, which allows him to be very aggressive and almost impossible to control and disable during fights. In addition, it increases his attack speed by a large amount, which helps him deal a lot of damage to single targets and synergizes very well with Abyssal Blade/ Basher (one of the core items for the hero).
Usually, you use Rage to increase your damage when you latch onto a target and to prevent enemies from using disables on you during fights.
Rage can be also used to dodge projectiles flying at you such as stuns or to dispel disables such as slows. If you pop Rage when a spell’s projectile is moving towards you, you will not get harmed by the ability’s effect and magical damage.
It is worth mentioning also that Rage is a slightly different from the item Black King Bar as you cannot cast Rage when you get silenced, whereas you can use Black King Bar to dispel the silence (because it is an item, not a spell). Therefore, it is smart to use Rage sometimes right before you engage your enemies if you expect to get silenced.
Lifestealer's attacks damage enemies and heal himself for a percentage of his target's max health.
Enemy Max Health as Damage/Lifesteal:
1.5/2.25/3/3.75%
Feast is a passive spell that makes Lifestealer especially potent against high HP (usually Strength) heroes. The more Health his target has, the more damage Lifestealer would deal to it. As a result, the hero is considered a counter to fat low-armor heroes such as Pudge, Centaur etc.
The skill steals a portion of his target’s max HP, which allows Naix to sustain himself easily in the jungle or in the lane.
Moreover, during fights, attacking high HP heroes would let Lifestealer leech a lot of life with each hit. As a result, sometimes even when you are very low on health, you can turn around and start hitting a fat enemy with Open Wounds, Feast and Rage to heal yourself rapidly.
Feast works on all neutral creeps apart from Roshan. It can be used to regenerate health very quickly when you attack Ancients that have a big HP pool. Additionally, it allows Lifestealer to bring down Ancients relatively quickly (since the % life leached is dealt as physical damage to the enemy).
Lifestealer rends an enemy unit, slowing the victim's movement speed and allowing all allies to regain health for a percentage of the damage they deal to that unit. All damage dealt will steal life, including damage from spells. The victim recovers movement speed over the duration.
Cast Animation: 0.2+0.4
Cast Range: 200/300/400/500
Lifesteal: 50%
Max Move Speed Slow: 70%
Slow Duration: 8
CD: 24/20/16/12
Mana: 140
Open wounds are one of the best slows in Dota 2. It allows Lifestealer to latch on and stick to a single target, which increases greatly his killing potential.
Furthermore, the spell allows the hero to regenerate (life leech) additional health while attacking. The ability is usually used to start off a fight by slowing a target. Then, you usually choose to focus this enemy and bring him down as quickly as possible. Keep in mind, however, that the affected enemy gradually recovers his movement speed, even though the spell itself lasts for 8 seconds.
As the spell has a relatively low casting range at early levels and you might need allies to help you shorten the distance.
The 50% life leach from any damage source is a very powerful utility tool in fights and something LS’s allies need to keep in mind. E.g. if you are a hero with high nuke damage but you are low HP, it is a great idea to focus the enemy hero with Open Wounds on it in order to heal up.
For the same reason Open Wounds is great on Roshan (don't forget to disable his spell block effect before you use it).
Lifestealer infests the body of a target unit, becoming undetectable inside. He can then explode from the host body, dealing damage to nearby enemies. If the infested unit is an enemy creep or a neutral creep, he can take control of the unit's ability to move and attack, and when consumed the creep will heal Lifestealer's health equal to the creep's current health. Does not work on enemy heroes.
Cast Animation: 0.2+0
Cast Range: 150
Damage Radius: 700
Damage: 150/275/400
CD: 100/75/50
Mana: 50
Grants the Assimilate ability.
Infest is the spell that allows Lifestealer to survive when he gets focused either during team fights or ganks. You can Infest into an enemy/ally creep or a teammate to become temporarily invulnerable to attacks or effects as long as the target you’ve infested into is alive. You can also use Control in order to run away from danger while inside the creep.
Bear in mind that if you Infest into a friendly creep, it will be easier for enemies to kill it off. Infesting into an enemy creep will make you practically untargetable until the creep is on low HP. When you use control, however, your opponents will be able to focus the creep.
If can also use the spell simply as a source of AoE damage to secure a kill - usually used in the laning stage this way. Enter an enemy creep and then instantly pop out to heal yourself and deal the AOE damage.
Most importantly, infest is used as a much-needed source of initiation. You can use it to get into an ally hero (usually mobile heroes such as Puck, Storm Spirit, Nature’s Prophet) to gank enemies on the map.
Once you are in an ally, you can even wait until Infest gets off cooldown. Then, you will have the spell available during the engagement and you will be able to use it defensively to disengage or offensively to finish-off kills. The downside is that you will have to waste a lot of time being infested in an ally and will miss a lot of farm on the map.
Lifestealer has relatively versatile skill builds. You usually want to invest at least 1 point in each skill because the first level in Lifestealer’s case provides the most utility and afterwards all skills scale gradually. This means that most skill builds level up all three skills simultaneously, prioritizing whatever feels most useful in the current game and situation:
Feast gives you attack damage which helps with harassing in the lane, last hitting and farming faster in addition to HP sustain form the heal on attack. You usually get Feast on lvl1, but max it later on in the game. It's possible to max it first if you intend to spend most of your time farming.
Rage is a combination of survivability and burst DPS. Consequently, you usually prioritize it when you feel you need DPS for kill attempts or survivability against disables and magic DMG. Rage is usually the most common skill to max first.
Open Wounds gives you control and an additional source of sustain (although relatively expensive in terms of mana in the early game). Only the cast range and cooldown scale with levels. Consequently, you usually prioritize leveling Open Wounds when you want to be able to initiate on enemies easier. If you have teammates that can do this for you, you can get away with only 1 point in the skill for a while.
Most often, on lvl1 you get Feast to help you with last-hitting and harassing in the lane. Nonetheless, if you see a kill opportunity getting Open Wounds on lvl1 is also possible. Skilling Rage in order to survive is also possible, but undesirable.
This is a common build for Lifestealer because it gives you all the tools you need ASAP (1 point in each skill by lvl3) and then prioritizes what you are most likely to use.
You get max lvl in Rage almost as fast as possible, which makes you survivable and helps you deal high levels of burst damage in the early game. You get 1 point in Feast on lvl1 as usual and max the skill right after Rage to further increase your DPS potential.
The two levels in Open Wounds are sufficient to allow you to control heroes in the early game. You max the skill last, since in the mid and late game the range on Wounds isn’t this detrimental – your allies will provide the major sources of control and can even get you next to your target through Infest bombs.
+2s Rage Duration
+1% Feast Damage/Lifesteal
20% Evasion
+25MS
+20 Attack Speed
Lvl10: Generally speaking more attack speed means more lifesteal for you, but if you are playing against heroes that can burst you quickly you can take the HP talent.
Lvl15: Since you are not the most mobile hero in fights, the MS talent combined with some MS items (Yasha/Drums/Phase) can solve that problem.
Lvl20: Evasion is always good against Physical DPS lineups and it is the usual choice. Nonetheless, the Open wounds LS is ideal for man-fighting situations and can be good for your teammates as well, not only for you.
Lvl25: In the late game more Rage duration means more survivability. Hence, it is the usual choice. There are some cases in which you are going to play against very high HP cores (Pudge, Cent). This is the only case you should take the Feast talent.
The proposed build is a DPS build that focuses on items that give Lifestealer a lot of burst potential. In particular, the item build is useful when you want to lock down and nuke a single target very quickly. It is very effective against mobile heroes such as Storm Spirit or Puck that can be disabled (using Abyssal Blade’s stun) and burst down in a fight. It is a good choice if you know that you won’t get controlled/kited during fights – i.e., if your allies provide sufficient disables for you to get close to deal damage or/and if enemies do not have the mobility or cc to lock you down. Otherwise, you would lack mobility with this build. The late game AC has good synergy with your Abyssal Blade (you attack faster and so bash more often).
Stout Shield: a very good starting item for any melee carry as it reduces harassment damage and allows the hero to tank up lane or neutral creeps. Therefore, it is a must-have item for Lifestealer.
Quelling Blade: the item allows the hero to last hit much easier and increases his farm rate.
Magic Wand: since Lifestealer has mana problems early on, Magic Wand can be a partial solution as it can give the hero an instant boost of mana as well as health in a team fight.
Phase Boots: the item provides Lifestealer with the mobility he needs to get close to his targets.
Armlet of Mordiggian: the unquestionably most important item for Lifestealer. It complements greatly his early-mid game strength as it provides the hero with survivability and damage that allows him to fight effectively very early on. As the hero has high
Echo Sabre: The item gives you survivability (cost efficient stats), burst DPS, a little bit of control and even helps solve any mana issues you might have for a low price.
Desolator: desolator is the traditional DPS item for Lifestealer because of two reasons: First, it decreases the enemy armor, which increases Lifestealer’s damage greatly (Feast deals physical damage). Second, it is cheaper than the other pure DPS alternatives (MKB, Daedalus, Radiance). This enables you to get it in the mid game, even further increasing Lifestealer’s powers spike in this timing window.
Assault Cuirass: An item that synergizes very well with Lifestealer’s skills and items. In particular, Basher/Abyssal Blade is complemented greatly by the increased attack speed of Assault Cuirass. Additionally, the item is very effective against low HP heroes and against physical damage dealers (since the item grants Lifestealer and his teammates a lot of armor). Moreover, you can use the item to push towers faster as Assault Cuirass reduced armor of buildings.
Abyssal Blade: as an upgrade to Basher, the item grants Lifestealer an active lock-down ability which can be used to initiate upon and instantly lock down mobile or magic immune targets.
A cost-efficient build emphasizing on MS in the early and mid game and the ability to stick to your target in the late game.
Stout Shield: a very good starting item for any melee carry as it reduces harassment damage and allows the hero to tank up lane or neutral creeps. Therefore, it is a must-have item for Lifestealer.
Orb of Venom: provides the hero with a slow that can be used to stick to enemy targets more easily. The item is very effective in a 1vs1 situation early on as you can slow the enemy long enough to secure a solo kill.
Quelling Blade: the item allows the hero to last hit much easier and increases his farm rate.
Magic Wand: since Lifestealer has mana problems early on, Magic Wand can be a partial solution as it can give the hero an instant boost of mana as well as health in a team fight.
Phase Boots: the item provides Lifestealer with the mobility he needs to get close to his targets.
Armlet of Mordiggian: the unquestionably most important item for Lifestealer. It complements greatly his early-mid game strength as it provides the hero with survivability and damage that allows him to fight effectively very early on. As the hero has high
Sange and Yasha: a mid game oriented item that synergizes well with Lifestealer’s skill set and other items. The item grants a permanent movement speed boost as well as some bonus HP and strength that makes the hero mobile and increase his combat potential. It works very well in combination with Phase Boots and Drums as all three items boost the movement speed of the hero.
Abyssal Blade: as an upgrade to Basher, the item grants Lifestealer an active lock-down ability which can be used to initiate upon and instantly lock down mobile or magic immune targets.
Bloodthorn: An expensive DPS option for Lifestealer, even cost inefficient (since he doesn’t need the INT or mana regen), but with one big benefit – the silence. LS is very vulnerable to being kited by mobile heroes like Weaver, Storm or Puck and Bloodthorn provides a very good solution to this problem.
The Radiance build is very good against heroes with illusion and units (PL, CK) or high physical dps cores (TA, Drow). Since you are rushing Radiance here, you need a good early game to go for this build. Stacking Radiance with Solar Crest and your evasion talent will make you almost unkillable against DPS cores (ofc. if they don’t have MKBs).
Radiance also increases your flash-farming capabilities a lot, so it is a great build for slower games.
Linken`s can be very good in some situations (against Beastmaster, Legion). Bloodthorn/Nullifier are always good for you, allowing you to solo-kill heroes easily.
Stout Shield: a very good starting item for any melee carry as it reduces harassment damage and allows the hero to tank up lane or neutral creeps. Therefore, it is a must-have item for Lifestealer.
Quelling Blade: the item allows the hero to last hit much easier and increases his farm rate.
Magic Wand: since Lifestealer has mana problems early on, Magic Wand can be a partial solution as it can give the hero an instant boost of mana as well as health in a team fight.
Phase Boots: the item provides Lifestealer with the mobility he needs to get close to his targets.
Radiance: Radiance fills the same role in Lifestealer’s item build as the other DPS items. Nonetheless, there is an interesting interaction between Infest and Radiance – while you are infested, the burn aura still works. This gives you the opportunity to infest Ancient creep and to slowly but steadily deal damage in fights, jumping out just at the right moment to secure kills. The AoE damage is also useful in prolonged team fights against heroes that can kite you but cannot kill you fast enough.
Solar Chrest: Very situational; you can go for SC if you combine it with Radiance (more evasion) or simply against some high DPS cores (TA, TB).
Linken’s Sphere: a very rare item choice for Lifestealer. It is purchased to counter some targetable initiation spells that go through magic immunity and would cripple Lifestealer’s effectiveness in a fight. Example of such spells would be Bat Rider’s Lasso, Beastmaster’s Roar, Bane’s Fiend’s Grip.
Assault Cuirass: An item that synergizes very well with Lifestealer’s skills and items. In particular, Basher/Abyssal Blade is complemented greatly by the increased attack speed of Assault Cuirass. Additionally, the item is very effective against low HP heroes and against physical damage dealers (since the item grants Lifestealer and his teammates a lot of armor). Moreover, you can use the item to push towers faster as Assault Cuirass reduced armor of buildings.
Bloodthorn: An expensive DPS option for Lifestealer, even cost inefficient (since he doesn’t need the INT or mana regen), but with one big benefit – the silence. LS is very vulnerable to being kited by mobile heroes like Weaver, Storm or Puck and Bloodthorn provides a very good solution to this problem.
Nullifier: Increases your DPS and combined with Nullifier it can totally disable a target from escaping, which is extremely useful against heroes with defensive items or abilities.
Power Treads: a situational item for Lifestealer. It grants more survivability in terms of higher STR and hence, a larger HP pool. You could opt for Power Treads when you know that you will have to tank a lot of damage in team fights, and your allies have enough disables to ensure that you can reach your opponents.
Drums of Endurance: a well-rounded item that provides sustainability, mana and increased movement speed to Lifestealer. As the hero needs to get close to his targets and needs some extra mana to use his spells in fights, Drums of Endurance is a very good Early-Mid game item for Lifestealer.
Hand of Midas: an early game item for a safe lane Lifesteler. The idea is to speed up his farm and ensure that he will get many strong items later on. Purchasing Hand of Midas will delay Lifestealer’s effectiveness as his core items such as Armlet will be bought at a later stage. It is a good choice to opt for the item if you do not expect to fight early.
Basher: Since Lifestealer does not have another way to disable targets apart from his slow, Basher can give him an extra disable that can lock down mobile heroes such as Anti-Mage or Storm Spirit and ultimate grant Lifestealer a higher killing potential.
Heaven’s Halberd: grants Lifestealer survivability in terms of HP and Evasion and also allows him to disarm and so, counter strong physical damage dealers.
Blink Dagger: If your team doesn’t have any good targets to infest for a Naix Bomb and in the same time you have trouble reaching your targets (you are getting kited), then buying a Blink Dagger wouldn’t be a bad choice. Moreover, it has great synergy with Abyssal Blade (your traditional DPS and control late game item for LS) and makes you a very good single target initiator.
Heart of Tarrasque: an item that provides Lifestealer with a lot of survivability and allows him to tank up during engagements.
Monkey King Bar: a very situation choice. Often purchased to counter heroes with evasion.
Aghanim’s Scepter: Allow’s LS to “assimilate” allies or
in other words allows an ally hero to infest into Naix. In ganks this could be
very useful as after assimilating LS can infest
into another hero – this allows 3-man Naix Bombs. Moreover, if LS has a
mobility item like Blink Dagger it might allow him to take other immobile
heroes into the fight vie this mechanic.
Inside fights assimilate could be used to save allies that are getting focused
down – assimilating an ally, which is disabled could save his/her life and
allow him/her to either exit your hero and fight back or stay inside you in
safety.
The main problem with Agh’s on LS is that for its relatively high cost it
doesn’t increase your DPS significantly, which could be a drawback especially
if you are the hard carry on your team and you want to deal as much physical
DPS as possible.
As a carry in the lane, you should try to get as many last hits as possible. Since the hero is strong in the laning stage due to his skill set and stats, you should try to be aggressive and pressure your opponents as well. In combination with some strong early game supports, Lifestealer could even have decent kill potential.
If you are getting harassed a lot, stay back and go in only for the last hits. Provided you get initiated upon, use Rage to disengage or to dodge projectiles.
Last hitting is easy for Lifestealer as he has good damage and a fast attack animation. His attack duration is very fast: he has a 0.30 seconds attack point and a 0.44 attack backswing. Additionally, his passive Feast skill allows him to deal extra damage with each attack, which makes farming a lot easier.
Since you also have life steal from your passive, you can easily sustain yourself against moderate harassment. You can use the passive to leach HP off a large neutral creep or even kill Ancients relatively quickly in the late laning stage (the more HP a target has, the more life you would leach back, moreover the same % amount is dealt as damage to the target).
While you are farming in the early game, you can use your infest on a large neutral creep or an enemy lane creeps to instantly restore life back. This will also increase your farming speed since you will be able to instantly kill 1 target.
Lifestealer does not excel at harassing due to the fact that he is melee and does not have ranged spells that deal damage. However, you can harass melee heroes quite well since trading blows would always be in your favor due to your Feast passive. Furthermore, if an enemy is out of position and close to you, you can use your slow to initiate on him. Even if you do not get a kill, the harassment will force the enemy to go back to regenerate, and you will have some time to farm freely. Against ranged heroes, you should stay further back and go in for the last hits and denies.
Lifestealer deals good physical damage in the laning stage. Nonetheless, usually, you won’t have enough to bring down an almost full HP target by yourself. Therefore, your partners in the lane should provide some extra nuke damage and/or disable. As Lifestealer has a limited range of initiation (200 range of Open Wounds at level 1), it is preferable that your partners have some longer range initiation spell that can allow you to get to your target. Once you have initiated on the enemy either with your slow or your partners’ disables, you should use Rage to increase your damage output and to prevent enemies from disabling you.
Open Wounds should be used on a target only if you think that you might get a kill. Otherwise, it is a waste of mana. Always consider the positioning of your lane partners if you are the one initiating with Open Wounds. If your allies are too far away, the slow’s effect will have worn out before your partners get near the target.
Lifestealer is a very flexible laner and could do well in all lanes if he has support:
Good laning partners are:
Because Lifestealer is a melee carry, you should combine him with a ranged support, preferably one that has a long-range initiation spell and some nuke damage. Naix provides some damage and some control, but not enough of either to secure kills easily. Because of this your lane partners should also provide some of both to complement your skillset.
At the beginning of the game, he saw that Weaver is trying to steal the creep wave behind the T1 tower, so he takes the enemy creep wave and drags it around. By doing this he keeps the lane equilibrium near his tower.
Nothing much happens early. Naix knows that it is almost impossible to kill Weaver, so he just controls the creep wave as best as he can. To get farm Weaver is out of position all the time and is afraid of support rotations.
Against less mobile lane opponents he would try to harass more actively, but against Weaver this is not possible, so concentrating on getting all possible last-hits and denies is the correct choice.
Since Lifestealer is very strong in the mid game, you should be proactive and aggressive in your playstyle. In particular, Lifestealer excels at ganking due to his infest ability; therefore, ganking is your top priority. If, however, the members of the enemy team stick together, you will be left with two other options: to force team fights or to farm. If the enemy carry is farm dependent and hence, hits his peak in the late game and/or the team against you, does not have a bigger team fight potential than your team, then you should seek 5on5 engagements. In any other case, if you feel that fighting is risky at a point, farming suits you well too since Lifestealer scales very well with items in the late game.
The first important timing for
Lifestealer would be when you get your first “fighting” item. That would be
usually Armlet or Drums - both allow him to be more effective in fights. Once you
get Armlet, for example, you can start
forcing engagements or ganking with Infest. The second timing for Lifestealer
is when he gets his second key item – this could be either Sange & Yasha,
Abyssal Blade, or a tanky item such as Assault Cuirass or Heart of Tarrasque.
S&Y gives Lifestealer a lot of mobility in team fights and will allow him
to be even more aggressive in the mid game. Abyssal Blade gives him a lock down needed to burst important heroes. AC
and Heart could be used, for example, to push down towers or to even attempt to
siege enemy barracks.
If the laning stage went well, and Lifestealer got his key items (Phase
boots, Armlet etc.), then you should apply further pressure on enemies by
ganking and forcing engagements since the hero excels in the mid game.
Provided the laning stage didn’t go as well, Lifestealer still has ways of catching up. You can farm neutrals/ancients relatively fast due to his Feast and can also farm more aggressively in lanes due to his Rage ability – meaning that you can go to places where you have little map control or vision to farm. The only thing you need to be worried about are heroes which have disables that go through bkb. You can also try to gank (Lifestealer bomb) with Lifestealer by infesting into a mobile ally in an attempt to regain map control. Even when you are behind, the power of the Lifestealer bomb allows you to win engagements.
Although Lifestealer is very
strong in team fights, it is very
predictable what he can do and who he could initiate upon. Overall, his movement on the map is rather
obvious. Once you get close, enemies will scatter, thus making it hard to focus
on a target. Therefore, running in to start an engagement would not catch your
opponents off guard. On the contrary, you might give them a chance to disable
you, kite you or even bring you down if your supports do not follow up fast
enough.
There are better ways to start off a fight with the hero:
Firstly, you can infest into a mobile ally (usually an initiator) that can initiate a skirmish by jumping on an enemy hero. Opponents will not be aware of your position and will be certainly caught off by surprise once you infest out.
Secondly, you can follow up an initiation of your teammates. Wait for an enemy to be disabled by one of your allies, then run in, use slow on the initiated hero and start hitting the target. Use your Rage once you get close to the target to prevent getting disabled.
Lifestealer is a good man-fight hero, and for that reason, the enemy carry will be at a disadvantage in a 1vs1 situation. It is, therefore, smart, most of the times, to focus the enemy carry and try to bring him down with the help of your allies. In other cases, however, there might be a more important target for you to focus down - for example, a mobile but squishy hero such as Storm Spirit or Puck. You can either disable that hero on your own if you have Abyssal Blade/Null/Bloodthorn or rely on an ally to lock the target down. Then you should bring down that squishy but elusive hero very quickly.
The way you use the spells in team engagements is pretty straightforward – you initiate with and latch on a target using Open Wounds, and you usually use Rage when you get in range to hit the target or a bit before that to prevent enemies from using disables on you. Rage usage is key since the spell has a relatively long cooldown, and you will most likely use it only once or twice in a fight. Therefore, you should not use it prematurely. Instead wait for the right moment – when you are sure that you can hit and continue attacking the target you are going to focus, i.e. when the target is locked down and does not have any escape mechanism to run away.
Lastly, you should play more cautiously if enemies have disables that go through magic immunity. Even if you manage to initiate on a target and start beating it down, you might get disabled and controlled and, as a result, brought down. You should be, consequently, aware of the positioning of that hero (for example Bane) that can (has the spell that goes through Rage) lock you down. If that hero is far away or not present during the fight, you can go in more aggressively and start focusing your primary target. In case, however, that hero is nearby, it might be better to leave the initiation job for your allies as explained above and then follow up.
He enters the fight by infesting his Shadow Blade Doom, which ensures he’s not going to get disabled from a far. Notice the great rage usage to maximize his DPS and to disengage the fight (dodging the Glimpse).
When he has DPS items, Lifestealer is excellent at sieging the enemy base. You can use your Rage and chip at the tower and get back to safety when the Rage is over. You can use this tactic repeatedly, slowly pushing the enemy tower, without giving the enemy team a chance to initiate on you (without abilities that go through magic immunity). Desolator and AC greatly increase your pushing speed.
Lifestealer does not excel at split-pushing as he does not have an AoE ability that can be used to clear creep waves or an ability that brings down towers fast.
Due to his Infest ability, Lifestealer is an excellent ganker. Once he is infested in an ally, Lifestealer can benefit from his teammate’s mobility. Thanks to his Rage ability and Open Wound’s disable, the hero can deal a lot of burst damage and provide a great CC – both are essential in ganks. As the hero cannot stun or lock the position of opponents, it is preferable that you gank together with an ally that has a good disable (stun, hex). Ganking alone with Lifestealer is possible but not very useful as the hero is not mobile enough to catch enemies off guard, and does not have high enough damage to burst down farmed heroes on his own.
In most cases, your allies should have a blink or invisibility that will allow you to get close unnoticed. You should, therefore, always try to infest out of your teammate when you are close to the target since Infest deals damage.
Ganking is a great method to gain map control. Enemies will always fear an “Infest bomb” from Lifestealer and would thus play defensively. Moreover, if you manage to successfully execute a gank and bring down an important hero, you can then push a tower or kill Roshan while the enemy hero is dead. Sometimes, even being beyond enemies’ map vision (for instance farming the jungle) is beneficial as enemies will not know where you are and they will play more cautiously.
Since Lifestealer is always played as a carry, farming is one of his top priorities in the Mid to Late game.
As he is particularly strong in the mid game, you should definitely take advantage of his strength and attempt to fight. This should not leave you with the wrong impression that you should not farm, though. You are a carry, which means that having enough items is incredibly important. Moreover, you are a fast farmer that scales very well with items – you should not feel pressured to gank or force fights since you can keep up with the farm rate of most heroes in the game.
You should farm whenever there is some off-time in-between fights and ganks. Ideally, you will successfully gank and then go for an objective: you can push out the lane, farm the creeps there and push the tower if possible. Then you reposition and wait for your Infest to come off cooldown. In the meantime, you are farming (for example – the jungle). Search for another gank when the spell is ready and repeat.
While ganking or roaming, make sure that other teammates farm the lanes/jungle. Giving your allies some farm, while you are ganking is very important as they can thus catch up in terms of levels and experience.
If you are not ganking, farming as a Lifestealer is pretty straightforward. Feast allows you to regenerate health when you attack creeps, and Infest can be used to regenerate a portion of your HP. Consequently, Lifestealer can sustain himself for a long period whilst farming and does not need to go back to the fountain to heal up.
If enemies do not have a disable that goes through magic immunity, you can even farm lanes away from your teammates as you can always use Rage and Teleport back to your base if you get ganked.
It is important to bear in mind that although Lifestealer is a fast farmer, he cannot outfarm some carries such as Alchemist or Anti-Mage. As a result, it is not smart to trade farm for a long period. Moreover, Lifestealer can be a potent carry in the early-to-mid game already, even while other carries normally need a lot more time to become a threat and start fighting head-on. Once you get your core items on Lifestealer, you can use this advantage and pressure enemies that have a more late-game-oriented line-up.
