Strategy Guide for Abaddon the Lord of Avernusby GoLd3nRat1o and Keritzel (as of v6.60)

By GoLd3nRat1o and Keritzel

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Authors' Foreword

This guide is the first collaborative effort between the two of us. Some of you may know GoLd3nRat1o for his Razor guide, which was the third runner up in the 10th HGC, and also for his other guide on Mercurial, the spectre. Keritzel, on the other hand, has written a guide on jungle undying. The two of us know each other in real life, so therefore we have decided to team

up and write a guide on Abaddon, a hero with a lot of potential. This guide will try to cover as much as possible on playing this hero, but in order to make this guide as precise as possible, we will ignore basic information/strategies with regards to general gameplay (eg. last hitting, how to animation-cancel etc.). Enjoy!

Table of Contents

Hero Overview Stats and Skills Skill Build Item Build General Walkthrough Advanced Techniques Strategies Allies and Enemies Replays FAQ Credits

Hero Overview

Probably the best melee lane controller, a good Avernus can be a real pain for almost any enemy hero. His shield gives him a nice set of options for harassing and protecting himself or allies, and with it, he can control a lane to an exceptionally well degree.

Abaddon is also probably one of the strongest tanks in the game. Aphotic shield makes sure he takes a minimal amount of damage at all times, and in the event that he somehow does, borrowed time will activate, saving you at the last possible moment, without even using a single mana point. In the event that somehow you have no choice but to fall, death coil can be used as a last resort to deny yourself, ensuring that your opponents do not get the gold they deserve.

Other than being an awesome tank, Abaddon can also serve as a decent support hero. Aphotic shield can be casted on a more suitable tank for you team, death coil can be used to save your allies lives, and frostmourne increases the damage output of your allies by a great deal. With such a great potential as both a support hero and a tank, Abaddon can be useful throughout the whole game. Well, without any further ado, lets get started!

Stats and Skills

Stats

Strength -23 + 2.7

Agility - 17 + 1.5Intelligence - 21 + 2Base armor - 2Base Attack Time - 1.7Attack range - 100 (melee)Movement speed - 295Sight range - 1800/800 (day/night)Damage point - 0.56/0.41 (point/backswing)Casting point - 0.452/1.008 (point/backswing)Acquisition range- 600

Skills

Death Coil

A coil of death that can damage an enemy unit or heal a friendly unit at the cost of his own life.

Level 1 - Heals or Damages for 100 HP. Deals 50 HP to himself.Level 2 - Heals or Damages for 150 HP. Deals 75 HP to himself.Level 3 - Heals or Damages for 200 HP. Deals 100 HP to himself.Level 4 - Heals or Damages for 250 HP. Deals 125 HP to himself.

Cooldown: 11

Level 1 - 75 mana, 11 cooldown, 600 cast range.Level 2 - 75 mana, 11 cooldown, 600 cast range.Level 3 - 75 mana, 11 cooldown, 600 cast range.Level 4 - 75 mana, 11 cooldown, 600 cast range.

Additional Information:

Damage to enemies is magic, which is reduced by heroes' spell resistance, damage to self is neutral and cannot be reduced in any way.

Aphotic Shield

Summons dark energies around an ally unit, creating a shield that absorbs a set amount of damage before expiring. When the shield is destroyed it will deal damage equal to the amount it absorbed to an area around it. If cast on self while using borrowed time, the damage you take

will heal you. Removes certain types of negative buffs on cast. Lasts 20 seconds.

Level 1 - 125 damage.Level 2 - 175 damage.Level 3 - 225 damage.Level 4 - 275 damage.

Cooldown: 23 seconds.

Level 1 - 100 mana, 23 cooldown, 800 cast range, lasts 20 seconds, 700 Damage AoE.Level 2 - 100 mana, 23 cooldown, 800 cast range, lasts 20 seconds, 700 Damage AoE.Level 3 - 100 mana, 23 cooldown, 800 cast range, lasts 20 seconds, 700 Damage AoE.Level 4 - 100 mana, 23 cooldown, 800 cast range, lasts 20 seconds, 700 Damage AoE.

Additional Information:

Damage type when the shield is broken is magic, which is reduced by heroes' spell resistance.

Damage is dealt in a 700 AoE when the shield is broken

Damage will not be dealt to heroes if they are not in your vision, even if they are within the 700 AoE

When the shield is activated on a target and he gets cycloned, the graphical aspect of the shield disappears, but the triggered part, which is the important part as it blocks and deals damage(when the shield bursts), will not disappear.

Aphotic shield is a skill that artificially block the damage taken by using heal triggers. Therefore, the damage will be "blocked", but not other effects such as Maim and Bashes. Note that there are no cooldowns for triggered evasion skills, and that multiple triggered heals(aphotic shield + any heal) will result in a net gain of life as the triggered skills work independently of each other.

Aphotic shield dispels:

Shadow StrikeViper StrikeBloodrage*Fiend's grip*Nightmare*Shackles*Dismember*Voodoo*Battle HungerStorm Bolt**Primal Roar**Magic Missile**Dragon's Tail**Elune's Arrow**Charge of DarknessEnsnareEntangling RootsFrostbite

Notes:* = You can use it to save your ally.You cant use shield while you are bloodraged(hexed,shackled etc)** = Removes stun from your ally after casted.

Doom,Rupture,spectral dagger,maledict,shadow word cannot be removed by aphotic shield

Frostmourne

Abaddon strickens an enemy with Frostmourne's chilling power on each attack, causing all units who attack the slowed enemy to gain 10% increased movement speed, along with faster attack speed, for a limited time.

Level 1 - 10% increased attack speed, slows enemy by 5%.Level 2 - 20% increased attack speed, slows enemy by 10%.Level 3 - 30% increased attack speed, slows enemy by 15%.

Level 4 - 40% increased attack speed, slows enemy by 20%.

Level 1 - lasts 2 seconds, 0.05 Attack Speed Factor, 0.05 Movement Speed Factor, 4.5 Speed Bonus Duration.Level 2 - lasts 2 seconds, 0.1 Attack Speed Factor, 0.1 Movement Speed Factor, 4.5 Speed Bonus Duration.Level 3 - lasts 2 seconds, 0.15 Attack Speed Factor, 0.15 Movement Speed Factor, 4.5 Speed Bonus Duration.Level 4 - lasts 2 seconds, 0.2 Attack Speed Factor, 0.2 Movement Speed Factor, 4.5 Speed Bonus Duration.

Additional Information:

Frostmourne goes through avatar.

Borrowed Time

When activated, most negative buffs will be removed and you will no longer take damage for the duration of the ability. If the ability is not in cooldown, it will passively activate when your hitpoints drop below 400.

Level 1 - Lasts 3 seconds.Level 2 - Lasts 4 seconds.Level 3 - Lasts 5 seconds.

Cooldown: 45 seconds.

Level 1 - 45 cooldown, lasts 3 seconds.Level 2 - 45 cooldown, lasts 4 seconds.Level 3 - 45 cooldown, lasts 5 seconds.

Additional Information:

Like aphotic shield, borrowed time is a skill that artificially block the damage taken by using heal triggers. Therefore, the damage will be "blocked", but not other effects such as Maim and Bashes. Note that there are no cooldowns for triggered evasion skills, and that multiple triggered heals(borrowed time + any heal) will result in a net gain of life as the triggered skills work independently of each other.

Skill Build

Lvl 1: Aphotic Shield

Lvl 2: Death CoilLvl 3: Aphotic ShieldLvl 4: Death CoilLvl 5: Aphotic ShieldLvl 6: Borrowed TimeLvl 7: Aphotic ShieldLvl 8: Death CoilLvl 9: Death CoilLvl 10: FrostmourneLvl 11: Borrowed TimeLvl 12: FrostmourneLvl 13: FrostmourneLvl 14: FrostmourneLvl 15: StatsLvl 16: Borrowed TimeLvl 17-25: Stats

Explanation

Aphotic ShieldThis skill is your bread and butter skill, and it is basically the best thing a tank can wish for. Aphotic shield does a lot in protecting you from harrasement early game, because as long as you have it on, your enemies would probably not dare touch you, and if they do, the shield will explode and might damage them. This ensures you and your lane partner optimal lane control, and thus it should not be skipped under any circumstance.

Death Coil or Frostmourne?Our old skill build used to recommend frostmourne over death coil, but since we have revised our item build, we have found that death coil is in fact superior to frostmourne early. RoB will allow you to have a reasonable good mana upkeep, allowing you to use both death coil and aphotic shield. Besides, death coil has a rather cheap mana cost for a 275 damage nuke at level 4.

Borrowed Time at level 6?At level 6, borrowed time will activate whenever your hp goes below around half, so it may not be as useful and might activate at the wrong time. However it is still gotten because it does not cost any mana and has a short cooldown considering its value.

Item Build

ExplanationWe offer you three different ways to build Abaddon, namely the protection build, the retribution build, and the holy build (all with names shamelessly ripped off from WoW's paladin talent trees), and each of them have their own charecteristics, as listed below.

Protection Build

Capitalises on Abaddon's tanking abilities. Optimal during late game. Expensive.

Retribution Build

Mainly improves Abaddon's damage abilities, slightly boosts his tanking abilities at the same time.

Optimal during mid game. Moderate Cost

Holy Build

Capitalises on Abaddon's support abilities

Optimal during early game Cheap

Each of the builds above cater to a different niche of Abaddon, so follow the right path to cover up what your team lacks. If your team lacks carries/tanks, pick prot, if you team lacks dpsers pick ret, and if your team needs added support, holy will do nicely. Abaddon is a hybrid hero who does relatively well in tanking, damaging, and supporting, so he can be very versatile and adaptative to all sorts of situations.

Cores

Ring of BasillusRoB early is taken for the mana regen and increased armour which will benefit both your partner and yourself. It can allow you to use your skills a lot without mana problems. After you buy RoB click it to change the aura to a heroes only aura to prevent your creeps from having the buff and as a result pushing too far. Try to finish your double bracers and boots of speed as soon as possible.

Bracers + Boots of SpeedBracers are taken to give you extra survivability and therefore boost your abilities as a tank, and it even gives you some damage since you are a strength hero. Try to finish your double bracers and boots of speed as soon as possible. Bracers are taken to give you extra survivability and therefore boost your abilities as a tank, and it even gives you some damage since you are a strength hero.

Boots of TravelRushing BoT is optimal because it boosts your movespeed a lot with frostmourne's percentage based movespeed boost. Rushing BoT will allow you to farm, push and defend much better. When you notice large creep waves attacking your tower you can get there fast enough to defend and you can also help push when you notice your creeps attacking a severely damaged tower. Farming is also made easy with BoT due to the extra ability to travel between lanes, thus with BoT you can get your next core items much easier. You do not have to rush your ArmVlad or radiance because you are not entirely item dependent.

Armlet + Vladmir's OfferingThis combination of two lower tier items gives you impressive boosts that can be compared to some tier 3, or even tier 4 items, a good example being SnY. Even though ArmVlad costs only 100 gold more than SnY, the only thing more that SnY has to offer would be the 10% MS boost, and the luxury of having one less item slot. Since Abaddon already has a nice movespeed boost from frostmourne and BoT, and will not be holding a lot of items, it would be better to pick an item that would boost other areas to a greater extent. Getting ArmVlad turns Abaddon into a

DPS-tank hybrid, allowing him to deal much more damage. Vladmir's also helps the melee heroes in your team a nice bonus with its 16% lifesteal boost, and might eventually draw focus fire to you as well. Another great use of ArmVlad would be the hp boost, which can be used when your hp is dangerously low to perhaps safe your life. The only downside of ArmVlad would be the 27 hp/sec degen, and even though aphotic shield does not block this degen, Abaddon should be able to negate this with his decent hp and the lifesteal from Vladmir's.

RadianceThe main benefit of radiance would come not from the damage or evasion, but the immolation aura which benefits Abaddon to a great extent. 35 damage per second is nothing to scoff at, particularly since it will help Abaddon in team battles, pushing, and farming. During team battles, radiance will burn your enemies slowly but steadily, and the longer they put off trying to take you out, the more damage you will take. This will draw you focus fire - the very thing a tank would wish for. Pushing with radiance also becomes much easier. Your shield and radiance will take out a whole row of ranged creeps, and also reducing melee creeps to red health, allowing you to push creep waves at a significantly faster speed. The farming aspect would apply to both lane creeps while pushing, and also neutral creeps. Radiance can totally devastate creep waves, and you might not even need to use your shield to clear the neutral creep camps. The main downside to radiance would be that it is rather difficult to farm up, but once you do so, you'll get your money back in no time.

MekansmMekansm would be the perfect item for a support Abaddon, due to its wonderful team-oriented effects. The 250hp AoE heal gives Abaddon a nice self-heal, and it can also stack with death coil, resulting in a 500 hp heal on single target, and the extra activated armor boost will also help your team in pushes and team battles. Even if you do not activate mekansm, the passive +5 armor helps boost Abaddon's already good survivability, and the 3hp regen will help nearby units, not to mention this item's low cost also means that you can farm it up quickly.

Luxuries

Heart of TarrasqueHeart of Tarrasque beefs your hp up by a great deal, making you far harder to take down as a tank. Since Abaddon is also a strength hero, the extra strength also boosts your damage output by quite a bit. Optimal choice for after all the core builds.

SatanicSatanic is another good choice because during late game your damage would be huge, so indirectly satanic boosts your survivability because Abaddon has a rather decent attack speed with frostmourne, and his high damage output would mean more lifesteal. Satanic also gives some armor to help Abaddon in tanking. Best gotten after the retribution build.

Assault CuirassAssault boosts your teammates' attack speed as well as yours and synergises with frostmourne at the same time, allowing your team to pummel your opponents with their insane attack speed, not to mention boosting your armor and drawing focus fire to you at the same time, allowing you to fulfill your role as a tank to a greater extent. Best gotten after the protection build

Alternatives

Blink DaggerBlink Dagger allows Abaddon to get into the heat of the battle, a common move made by tanks. Blinking also helps you chase heroes better, and thus allowing your teammates to catch up after you drop your slow on your target.

Black King BarA perfect counter to disables. Avatar allows you to stay longer in team battles if your opponents have decent disablers (eg. Earthshaker, Bane Elemental) or a guinsoo. This will allow you to help your team for an extra amount of time, and can be the deciding factor between victory or defeat.

NecronomiconNecrobook is pretty much a hybrid item, giving several different bonuses at the same time. One good thing to note about necrobook is the movespeed aura that it comes with. Necrobook 3 would give a 9% movespeed aura, which would equate to 456 movespeed when coupled with frostmourne and boots of travel, allowing Abaddon to outrun almost anything. the 225 damage mana burn, 75 mana break, last will, true sight, 9% attack speed aura, 14 strenght and 24 intelligence also helps Abaddon and his teammates quite a lot, thus fulfilling Abaddon's role as a support hero. With some micro, you can also use the minions for several nifty tricks, such as tower rushing with a shield on them.

Rejects

Mask of MadnessMoM isn't really a viable choice on Abaddon because of the unworthy extra damage. Another main reason that we do not suggest MoM is because there are better orb choices over it, such as satanic, and money can also be spent on better items.

Cranium BasherBashers should almost never be gotten on any hero at all, with only a few exceptions. The only heroes who can use bashers to their full potential would be heroes with an extremely high attack speed, thus allowing that hero to permabash. However, Abaddon's attack speed, while decent,

isn't amazing, and therefore basher should not be gotten on him. If you want a way to chase enemies better, Sny would be a better choice.

VanguardThe extra blocking of damage is not required as it makes Abaddon's shield harder to explode. That being said, you can get the extra hp boost just by getting a vitality booster, therefore you should not waste your money completing the entire vanguard.

Power TreadsTreads, despite the buff, provides abaddon with too little movespeed as compared to boots of travel, and thus not allowing Abaddon to fulfil his secondary role of a hero chaser to its full potential. Besides that, teleport is too good to pass up.

General Walkthrough

Early Game

A RoB should be first gotten. Abaddon is more suited to go to the top or bottom lane because there is usually where your weaker allied heroes will go to for farming, rather than middle lane. Abaddon's early game role is a supporter and a killer. Aphotic shield should be used on allies or yourself when ganking or being ganked. Basically you do not have to spam shield on your ally though, shield usage is pretty versatile as shown in the Advanced Techniques section. You can shield yourself and harass the enemy. If his partner turns to harass you back, the shield may explode and damage them and not yourself. In both situations, your ally benefits most from the undisturbed farming. After returning to the fountain, you can also proceed to other lanes which need help . You really need to use coil+shield combo a lot to net some early game kills, because it is most effective during early-mid game. Try not to use coil when your shield is not on because it makes you more vulnerable. Try to use it with shield or borrowed time. There are actually 2 ways to turn you into a good tank, or make people focus fire on you during mid-late game. The first, of course is to get radiance and stuff which boost your hp a lot. The second is actually to try to own early game, in which abaddon is really capable of. If abaddon kills a lot early game, in mid game enemies will try to focus fire on abaddon first because he has the most threat. Thus killing early game is also very important.

Mid Game

Mid game abaddon can be in any lane supporting in team battles/pushes/defence sort of things

because he is the best supporter mid game when both his best supportive skills are maxed. You should have rushed BoT so you can teleport around the map to support and participate in team battles. Simply shield the initator and help heal or damage some fleeing hero. Help tank as much as possible after the initator starts the battle. Thus many of the combos/tips in the advanced strategies can help you a lot. However you don't have to worry too much because your ultimate and allies can help you in most situations. If you really find difficulty in tanking you can just support first because you are not a full fledged tanker yet. When there are no team battles going on simply teleport around the map to help to push down towers or defend. Simply shield and charge at the tower or creeps. Of course, your hp isn't that impressive at this point of time yet so be careful.

Late Game

Late game abaddon turns into a full fledged tanker because his killing combos are not so effective with heroes having better items which will in turn increase their hp. His supportive skills(death coil/shield) are also not so effective because they can easily be countered by a 300 damage nuke. Most prominently, his ultimate in late game lasts for 6 seconds, which has only a 45 second cooldown duration! Thus abaddon should be the leader of the pack in pushing or defending. Of course, with the ArmletVlad you have gotten, you will become a bigger tank and better damager. You can help damage heroes and provide your allies with more damage. You can also help damaging some heroes with the Aphotic shield+Death coil combo you would be able to perform at this point of the game. If you have gotten radiance, you don't have to chase so much in team battles. However you can help damage by attacking heroes with your +60 damage and burn the enemies' hp down with immolation from radiance. In both cases, you should be focused fired quite a lot. You do not have to use borrowed time only in danger. You can use it when you are being focused fired too, so the enemies will have a psychological "this guy can't be hurt" mindset and retreat, in which your team can invade and kill. Good luck!

Advanced Techniques

Aphotic Shield on yourselfAphotic Shield should be used on yourself to aid in farming, harassing and killing. For farming early game, shield yourself and try to get last hits because you can't even get hurt. Mid-late game simply walk in front of your on creeps and allow the enemy creeps to focus on you so that the shield will explode. Harassing will make you take some hits from the tower and the heroes to make the shield explode and damage the enemy. Killing is used in conjunction with coil, as explained in the shield-coil combo. However if you are targeted of course use it on yourself, or if your ally has his own escape mechanism. In other cases try to save your ally before yourself, because you still have your ultimate to save you.

Aphotic Shield on creepsThis should be used as a last resort if you need the enemy to take some damage and the enemy keeps on moving out of aphotic shield's range whenever you use aphotic shield on yourself. It is used when your creeps proceed to attack the enemy's tower and so you shield the creep who is being attacked by the tower. It will explode in a few hits, giving the enemy no time to react or to back off from the exploding range.

Borrowed Time+Aphotic Shield comboBasically it is about using aphotic shield and activating borrowed time after that. Attacks/Spells on you will add to your hp, for a maximum of 300hp, because the aphotic shield will explode after that. This combo can save your life because not only it provides 300more hp, it allows you to not take any damage. This combo can be used when being you are being targeted so it will make you more difficult to kill. You can also use this when neutral creeping to regain your hp. Do note that it only lasts for 3 seconds in level 1 so you have to fight stronger neutral creeps to use it to its maximum.

Death Coil UsageTo reduce the damage you take to yourself, death coil is most preferably used in conjunction with aphotic shield/borrowed time or both. For example, when you are using the Borrowed Time+Aphotic Shield combo, a death coil on your enemy/creep/ally will increase your hp by 175hp(level 4).

Death Coil Self DenyingContradictory isn't it? Just told you to reduce the damage you take to yourself, and now here I'm telling to use it without aphotic shield/borrowed time or both. This should be done in the most desperate situations, when there is absolutely no escape. Basically just use death coil on anything when your hp is below 125hp and there you go, XXXXXX has killed himself! This is good to deny your enemies from experience and gold. You don't have to worry about spell reduction on yourself, because damage to self is neutral and cannot be reduced in any way. Thus you can use it once your hp is below 125hp.

Death Coil+Aphotic Shield comboThis is the combo which deals most damage to the enemy. Basically you have to use shield on yourself and tower dive the hero and estimate when you have been damaged for more than 125 damage. Then death coil the enemy, in which the shield will explode because it has absorbed more than 300 damage and the enemy will have been dealt 575 damage! Suitable to use on heroes lesser than 350 hp to kill because the 575 damage has not been reduced by spell reduction yet. It can be used for killing early game.

Borrowed Time+BoT comboThis combo can also help escape when your enemies have no stun/ministun items/skills. Simply juke around and use your ultimate then BoT. This is used so your enemies cannot damage you and try to kill you when you are teleporting. However beware, if your enemies land a stun/ministun when you are teleporting, you take no damage but will still stay at the same spot, so be careful when you teleport. Of course, you can also use aphotic shield+BoT, but borrowed

time is safer.

Aphotic Shield DispelYou can use aphotic shield to help yourself and your allies by removing certain buffs/spell effects on them. Refer to the additional information of the skill for a list of what it can dispel.

Strategies

Radiance FarmingSome facts about radiance: It has a 35dps immolation effect on a 550 aoe.

Some notes on radiance farming: You have to make the creeps focus on you, so you use shield on yourself and walk in front of your own creeps to make them attack you and you start attacking the melee creeps. The shield will explode after a while and the ranged creeps will be instantly killed by the immolation+shield explosion. Most melee creeps, too will be killed. If not, simply last hit them. Here are some math regarding damage from radiance's immolation and aphotic shield:

Melee Creeps/Treants or Ghouls have 550 hp.Ranged Creeps/Druid of the Talons or Necromancers have 300 hp.Aphotic Shield's damage at level 4: 275 damage. Radiance immolation damage: 35 per second.

So ranged creeps can be killed with the aphotic shield's damage +1 second of immolation. Melee creeps cannot be killed with the aphotic shield's damage. 550-275=275; 275/35=8; Melee creeps can only be killed with the aphotic shield's damage +8 seconds of immolation.

Team BattlesNo matter in defensive or offensive team battles, shield should always be used on the initiator because he is the one to risk his life most. Try to keep the carry alive once he has been targeted by healing him. You don't really have to worry about yourself because you are a full fledged supporter. Especially when you successfully save many of your allies you will feel a sense of satisfaction!

Neutral CreepingAbaddon can neutral creep pretty well too because of his shield. You can try to creep pull some camps to get more neutral creeps. Then attack each of the creeps till their hp is lower than 300 and death coil one if you have sufficient mana to make the shield explode. If not just continue hitting to wait for the shield to explode. In both situations after the shield explodes all the creeps should be dead!

For more information about neutral creeps you can visit MrX's Guide to Neutral Creeps.

JukingJuking is very important in the game, all heroes need it to to cleverly get away from enemies in a very difficult situation. As a support tank, your hp may drop to red fast and your ultimate will be used. Within the number of seconds you have to react fast and juke well enough to escape from your enemies. Quoted from BLAOW's guide to Lane Control:

You can evade chasers with ease, leaving them grumbling about hax on the way back to their fountain. You can lay in wait and come from literally out of the trees, shocking your opponents. Mastering juke points and secret paths will bring your game play to the next level.

Key

* Cyan Line: One of the three major lanes; top, middle, or bottom* White Line: A main path on the Dota Map besides the three lanes* Red Line: A secret path through the forest, or a juke point, or both* Yellow Line: For clarity's sake when Secret Paths are far from the Main Roads

This is an image from BLAOW's guide to lane control showing paths to take for juking. It will help if you can memorise some juking points.

Armlet UsageArmlet can be used for 3 main uses, as shown in Patccmoi's Mini-Guide to the Armlet of Mordiggian. Firstly, it is for the burst damage which can turn abaddon into a semi-dps role.

QUOTE(Patccmoi @ Oct 31 2007, 12:14 PM)

US's main use is obviously for burst damage. For Strength heroes, it gives you an instant +56 damage/+10% AS (for a total of +65 damage/+25% AS), which is seriously massive midgame. In fact, +65 damage/+25% AS beats about anything else in terms of DPS at this stage of the game. You wouldn't do much better with a MKB (not enough AS yet to proc often) or Burriza (not enough damage to make the crit truly worth it, the 25% AS is worth as much). And while the other improve as the game go on in a sense with bigger crits and more proc of MKB, Armlet with US remains a solid DPS item at all stages of the game.

In team battles, whenever you think you need more damage to help kill the enemy, the burst damage comes in handy. A +65 damage is not to be underestimated.

Next, it also provides abaddon with more tanking potential with the hp increase when it is activated.

QUOTE(Patccmoi @ Oct 31 2007, 12:14 PM)

US's second main use is a health buffer. This is especially useful midgame when nukes dominate. Many heroes, pretty much all nukers, have basically no attack DPS midgame. Their damage is fairly bad, and they kill through nukes. Surviving the initial nuke wave is usually what matters the most to either run away if you're getting ganked or finish the kill if you're fighting. As such, US gives you an instant +475 health, which absorbs 2 x 300 damage nukes. Ofc, it will degen you, but at a rate of 26.25 health/sec, assuming you have no other regen item at all. This means that it will take around 18 seconds before dealing as much damage to you as it gave you health. How many fights last over 18 seconds? Out of hit and run skirmishes at towers, pretty much none. In that sense, in the duration of a fight, activating US will nearly always give you more survival than leaving it off. The fact that US can't kill you also means that if you're running, as long as you get out of combat range, you're safe.

In team battles, when you activate US you can tank much better with the +475 hp. For example when borrowed time is activated, it may give the enemies the mindset that you are going to die. Using this to your advantage, you can activate US and start attacking them. Since you are in borrowed time, they will not attack you. However, they will be suprised at the +475 hp you've

got after borrowed time is over and they will have a harder time killing you.

Lastly, it acts as a self-heal for 475hp. Since you cannot heal yourself, armlet provides a good sort of 'heal' which can help you in desperate situations. Unless you still can't escape then you can use the death coil self denying technique.

QUOTE(Patccmoi @ Oct 31 2007, 12:14 PM)

US has a third use, that is quite incredible yet many don't know how to use it atm. And that's acting as a last resort straight heal in combat/while running. How does that happen? Remember that US has a 10 seconds cooldown to reactivate it. But that this cooldown is counted WHILE US IS ACTIVE. This means that once that 10 seconds is over, you can deactivate US and reactivate it nearly instantly (lag can be an issue here though for real midfight use). Why would you do this? Because there is no 'negative' health in dota. This means that say you are at 100 health with US active, and you turn it off. In reality, you should lose 475 health, but you don't, you only lose 100 (well, like 99 since it can't kill). Now if you reactivate it, you will gain 475 health AGAIN. This efficiently healed you for 375 health in less than a second. Ofc there's an obvious risk : deactivating it drops your health to 1-2 for a fraction of second. But then again, when you're low like that and you use it to heal, it's cause you would've died anyway, so that's not really a 'risk'.

For more information on armlet, you can visit Patccmoi's Armlet Mini-Guide.

While in the middle of a fight it can be very hard, sometimes pretty much impossible, to time it as a heal, this can be extremely useful while running away while you spend some time running/juking/hiding in fog where they're not directly damaging you. Basically, the instant you see a gank going at you, or you start a battle, activate US. This will give you some buffer health instantly, and start your 10s cooldown (can be wise to check time in the top right corner not to do the trick too early, which can really kill you if the cooldown isn't over). If you can survive for 10s and your health gets below 100-200 health (the lower the better, the risk to use it is the same at any health since no matter how much you had below 475, you'll drop to 1), try to time it when you will have 1+ second without being damaged (safer with lag issues) and double click your Armlet. It will turn it off and on, raising your health back to 475. This extra 200-300 health can very easily be the difference between survival and death, so if you use Armlet, learn how to use this trick.

Allies and Enemies

Allies

Heroes with invisibility skills

When these heroes break out of invisibility, they will get focused quite a lot. Aphotic shield used on them can aid them in their killing as they will be protected from the shield. When they are lower on their hp you can heal them, so that it will give the enemies an unexpected suprise when the low hp invis hero turns stronger with more hp and shield!

Heroes which need to get into the "heat of the battle"/will get focused fired

These heroes will get focus fired a lot. For example when Puck orbs in to deal the combo many heroes will try to stop her and kill him. An aphotic shield will not only protect him, but also give the psychological effect to the enemies that he cannot be killed easily and try to run. Axe is one of the many example where tanks have to get into battles to get focused fired. Especially when axe uses beserker's call, the shield on him will explode very fast and the counter helixes he proc will deal great aoe damage.

Enemies[Bad Enemies]

Heroes with disables/chasing abilities

Heroes with disables like lion can stop you from escaping when you use borrowed time. When you get hexed/stunned all the allies can catch up with you and wait for borrowed time to stop so they can kill you after that. Same for heroes will chasing abilities, like anti-mage who can blink in front of you to wait for your borrowed time to stop and kill you after that.

Heroes with a high damage skill

Heroes like lina or lion have high damage ultimates which can kill you before borrowed time is even activated. To counter that, you have to time your borrowed time very precisely, like when lina is halfway doing her combo use borrowed time and escape and hope she doesn't tower dive for the kill.

Axe

Ok, he is the perfect counter for LoA. Beserker's call makes you unable to use any skill to try and escape, counter helixes makes your shield explode in a second or two, and his gay ultimate goes through yours! So when your hp is lower than 450, no matter if you have shield/borrowed time or both cast on yourself, you will still die to his ultimate.

[Easy Preys]Lucifer

Lucifer's doom can bring you down to 400 hp, in which your borrowed time immediately activates and doom will be dispelled.

Heroes with chain combos

These heroes need to use one spell other another to perform at his best. For example, when Pudge hooks you in, simply activate borrowed time and run. Or when shaman voodoos you and places serpent wards, press the borrowed time button immediately. In that way they will not be able to successfully perform their combos.

Replays

 abaradbuild.w3g ( 489.08k ) Number of downloads: 107

Abaddon Rad WonA replay demonstrating the radiance build. I achieved radiance along with the core items in 30 minutes, followed by a boots of travel later. My k/d ratio wasn't really fantastic, but our team still won. By Keritzel

 loa_support_2.w3g ( 570.92k ) Number of downloads: 67

Abaddon support 2This replay demonstrates the radiance build, skill build coil shield where I was against ursa early game and killed him a few times with many instances of coil+shield combo. Many cool ganks and saves with shield and coil. Our team won. End game score 7-8. By GoLd3nRat1o

 aba_dps.w3g ( 769.39k ) Number of downloads: 122

Abaddon Armlet BuildA basic demonstration of the armlet build, with abaddon getting a lot of kills. Lost in the end due to opponent team's carries. By Keritzel

 _mym11474__MYM_Prime_Nations_Ukraine_vs_Sweden.w3g ( 2.5mb ) Number of downloads: 175

MYM PrimeNations UkrainevsSwedenThis is a demonstration of abaddon being used in a high level game. The abaddon went for bracers-mek-vanguard-bot and was a complete supporter and tanker. Nice shields and coils to save allies and to deny oneself shown in the replay.

 Abaddon__1_.w3g ( 578.25k ) Number of downloads: 99

Abaddon Armlet Build 2Armlet Build Abaddon by d07.RiV, builds were all similar except for the bottle he got early game. Shows the effective burst hp and damage from the armlet. End Score 7-0.

FAQ

1 Level of Frostmourne early?Some people have given comments on adding 1 level of frostmourne early game for the slow. By extremexunyi:

QUOTEI think frost or coil depends on enemy hero. For frostmourne to be effective early, first you must attack at least TWICE on a creep/hero whereas Coil is a nuke. Considering the fact in the beginning the chances of you attacking twice on a hero is not as high, coil is usually taken. However, if you got a person like...Razor or someone with high dps. I usually get frostmourne as if I'm not wrong, frostmourne benefits allies.

I agree with him actually. If you are laning with an ally with a slow(visage,viper) or pretty good dps(clinkz,razor), a level of frostmourne is actually useful for further slowing and movement speed boosting. However if you are laning with a nuker sort of hero, there is not a need for the slow so the +50 damage you get from adding more levels of death coil is needed to finish off heroes.

Credits

Mechanics Patccmoi's Armlet Mini-Guide

BLAOW's guide to Lane Control MrX's Guide to Neutral Creeps

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