Strategy Guide for Raigor Stonehoof the Earthshaker

by Jesper2

(as of v6.59)

http://planetdota.blogspot.com/

Table of ContentsI. IntroductionA. Pros and ConsB. The Earthshaker's Role in the TeamC. Statistics

II. The Power of RaigorA. Skills InfoB. Items Info

III. On to the buildA. Skill BuildB. Core Item BuildC. Levels 1-7D. Levels 8-12E. Levels 13-16

F. Levels 17-25G. Alternative Item Build & Gameplay

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IV. Hero and Item AnalysisA. Good Supporting HeroesB. Good Supporting ItemsC. Tough Enemy HeroesD. Tough Enemy ItemsE. Easy Heroes to Kill

V. Replays

VI. Frequently asked questionsA. Skill QuestionsB. Item QuestionsC. Miscellaneous Questions

VII. Concluding ThoughtsA. Latest UpdatesB. Final Words

After another year in DotA, my game view is greatly changed, and i wasn't using my

old guide anymore Raigor is still one of my favourite heroes, but my take on him is slightly better now than before. Moreover, DotA changed a lot itself. So i think it's time for a little makeup to my guide on our favourite fat cow. This version is going to

be more concised and less visually challengin than my previous one, i hope Enjoy! NOTE: i'm a newb of both BB code and english language...so if someone wants to help me improving the layout of this guide just PM me!

___________________├A. Pros and Cons┤

¯¯¯¯¯¯¯¯¯¯¯¯¯¯¯¯¯¯¯Pros:

Lots of disables High STR gain for a caster (he IS a caster) High AOE damage Fissure is very versatile Best initiator in DotA

Cons:

Low INT gain for a caster, low AGI (actually, very low stat gain) Teamplay hero (well, that's a good point too...) Quite slow animation on Fissure, can be tricky in the beginning No farming tools until Arcane Ring He's now a top pick/ban hero

_______________________________├B. Earthshaker's Role in the Team┤

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Raigor is an AWESOME disabler. His main role is to initiate team battles with Dagger + Echo Slam combo. His second role is to use his skills to stun his foes, preventing their actions and denying every chance to escape a gank. His third role is to stop enemy pushes using his high damage, spammable AoEs. He can also push very well, but can't do it alone, having 0 escaping tools apart from stun&run.

___________________├A. Statistics┤

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Stats:

STRENGTH : 22 + 2.5 per level Agility: 12 + 1.4 Intellect: 16 + 1.8 Base HP: 568 Base Mana: 208

As said before, he has pathetic stats and stat gain: only 50 starting point and only 5.7 gain per level are quite below the normal. His base damage (46-56) is pretty low for a STR hero, and his armor is 2.7.His movement speed has been buffed from 290 to 300, and that’s cool.

Earthshaker is found on the northwestern sentinel tavern; he’s on the second row, last spot.

_______________├A. Skills Info┤¯¯¯¯¯¯¯¯¯¯¯¯¯¯¯

QUOTE

FISSURE [F]

Slams the ground with Raigor’s mighty totem, causing the ground to crack open in front of him, damaging opponents and leaving an impassable crevasse for a period of time.

Level 1 - 125 damage (100 after reduction), 1 second stunLevel 2 – 175 damage (132 after reduction), 1.25 second stun Level 3 – 225 damage (169 after reduction), 1.5 second stun

Level 4 – 275 damage (207 after reduction), 1.75 second stun

Cooldown: 15 secondsMana: 125/140/155/170

Raigor’s signature skill. This ability is AWESOME, cause it has so many possible uses. With its impressive 1000+ range, his impassable obstacle and the simple damage+stun combo, this skill can be used to kill, trap, prevent escape, gank, stop channelling, etc. This is quite a complicate skill, so it many uses will be explained in the gameplay part of the guide. NOTE: Rexxar's Wild Axes will cut your Fissure and open a gap as if it was made of trees. Other trees destroying abilities luckily don't work like this.

QUOTE

ENCHANT TOTEM [E]

Empowers the totem on Raigor’s back, causing it to deal extra damage on the next attack.

Level 1 – 50% increased damageLevel 2 – 100% increased damageLevel 3 – 150% increased damageLevel 4 – 200% increased damage

Cooldown: 7 secondsMana: 50 at all levels

This skill is pretty pointless IF you don’t have Aftershock. Raigor is a caster and we won’t take any +dmg, +IAS item (and the +% dmg is based only on base damage anyway) so he will slam things with his big pole only when they’re stunned or when he can’t do something more efficient. With aftershock this skill became a usefull 1.5sec stun with only 7sec of cooldown and an abysmal mana cost.

QUOTE

AFTERSHOCK [passive]

The power of Raigor casting a spell causes the earth to shake below him, dealing additional damage and stunning.

Level 1 – 25 damage (19 after reduction), 0,3 sec stunLevel 2 – 45 damage (34 after reduction), 0,7 sec stunLevel 3 – 75 damage (57 after reduction), 1,2 sec stun

Level 4 – 115 damage (87 after reduction), 1,5 sec stun

Cooldown: 15 secondsMana: 125/140/155/170

This passive is really good: it adds a stun to both your ultimate and your second skill, so that you can stun an enemy for a long long time while dealing a lot of damage to him and buying time for your allies too. If you cast Enchant Totem (1.5s), then Echo Slam(1.5s) then Fissure (1.75) you can stun 1+ enemies for 4.75s (and you can further trap them with fissure and use Enchant Totem again if there’s the possibility/need). The damage done by this spell is really low, but it’s usefull anyway. The AOE of this skill is 250; it will work ONLY with Raigor’s own skill (so it won’t proc out of an item. If you ever get a Battlefury ( >.< bad choice) it will bug its animation, causing Aftershock one to be played any time you swing (but it won’t otherwise do damage nor stun).

QUOTE

ECHO SLAM (ultimate) [C]

Raigor sends shockwaves shooting through the ground, dealing damage ricocheting to nearby targets for additional damage.

Level 1 - 200 initial damage, 35 echo damageLevel 2 – 275 initial damage, 45 echo damage.Level 3 – 350 initial damage, 65 echo damage.

Cooldown: 150/130/110 secondsMana: 145/205/265

This skill seems pretty bad at a first look but it’s incredible for mass aoe damage, to stop pushes and to scare the hell out the enemy team. It can easily kill more than an enemy player or turn the whole enemy team into orange/red life depending on the difference of levels/equip. Basically it works as a stomp dealing X damage to enemies into 500 AOE. After the first big wave, a lot of smaller waves will start ricocheting through all the enemies in the area. Basically, for each enemy there will be a ricochet hitting every enemy into 500 AoE

radius from it, dealing the echo damage: this means that if you hit 10 targets in a 1000 AoE diameter , there will be 10 echo waves ricocheting through ALL of them. So basically you’ll do the base 200/274/350 damage to all the enemies in a 500 radius from you and 10 x the echo damage to all enemies in a 500 radius from each other. Pretty nice, uh?It just get better. If an enemy escapes the AOE (the waves are pretty slow) after you you’re your spell, the waves will follow him and spell his doom.

______________├B. Items Info┤

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After tweaking around for a while, i've found that classic item build on Raigor is by far superior, as long as you can manage Dagger+Echo Slam combo well.

ARCANE RING | (1700)Made of: Energy Booster (1000) + Ring of Protection (175) + Recipe (525)+300 Mana, + 3 Armor and Replenish (Heals 135 Mana in a 400 AoE radius, 33sec cooldown, costs 25 Mana)

KELEN'S DAGGER OF ESCAPE | (2150)Can be used to Teleport Raigor for 1200 Loc (a bit more than a Fissure in lenght). Cannot be used if Raigor has been damaged in the last 3 seconds.

BRACER | (510 each)Made of: Circlet of Nobility (185) + Gauntlet of Strenght (150) + Recipe (175)+6 STR, +3 INT, +3AGI

BOOTS OF SPEED | (500)50 increased movespeed.

That’s it. Togheter with your starting items, this is what you need to dominate every game with the aid of your team mates. Arcane ring is rushed so that you won't have mana problems anymore; with your new Mana pool, you can also farm a bit better and get your Dagger faster. Dagger is used for placing Echo Slam in team fights and, to a lesser extent, to escape. Boots and Bracers are auto explanatory.

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_______________├A. Skills Build┤¯¯¯¯¯¯¯¯¯¯¯¯¯¯¯.FISSURE: 1, 3, 5, 7 ENCHANT TOTEM: 9, 23, 24, 25AFTERSHOCK: 2, 4, 8, 10ECHO SLAM: 6, 11, 16Attribute Bonuses: 12-15, 17-22.ALTERNATIVE BUILD.FISSURE: 1, 3, 5, 7 ENCHANT TOTEM: 12, 23, 24, 25AFTERSHOCK: 8, 9, 10, 13ECHO SLAM: 6, 11, 16Attribute Bonuses: 2, 4, 14-15, 17-22.

Those two templates are really similar, but they have one main difference: the first one has Aftershock raised to have it maxed at level 10 with level one of Enchant Totem. This way you will have a usefull ministun on your ultimate at level 6 (it may be usefull to better aim your fissure if you're not going to kill your enemy with fissure+echo slam only) and you'll have a nice stun pretty early; in exchange you loose +4 on each stat. .

Take the first template if you think you can farm well and get the pieces for Arcane pretty soon. And/or if your team is going to push/gank early.

Take the second one if you face a fierce lane and/or if you think your team won't start push/gank early in the game.

___________________├B. Core Item Build┤

¯¯¯¯¯¯¯¯¯¯¯¯¯¯¯¯¯¯¯STARTING ITEMS

1 x Mantle of Intelligence (150)

3 x GG Branches (57 Each = 171)

2 x Tangos (90 Each = 6 Tangos for 180)

2 x Clarities (50 Each = 100).Those items will cost you all your starting money, leaving you with only 2 golds. It gives you a Stat boost equal to a Null Talisman (6 INT, 3 STR, 3 AGI) and a good quantity of both HP and MP regen. You will sell both the mantle and the branches as you get your core items, so this starting set cost 161 gold less.

.CORE ITEMS

Arcane Ring = 1700 Kelen's Dagger of Escape = 2150 Boot of Speed = 500 Bracers (2) = 1020

.TOTAL COST OF CORE BUILD = 5370.

ITEMS AFTER CORE BUILD The core Items are all you need to be effective as initiator. If you want to survive endgame after your Dagger+ES combo, you'll need something to beef you up. .

SCROLL OF TOWN PORTALWith the recent changes to scrolls "buyability" and its placement into side merchants, this is the item to have. ABUSE IT. You can TP and Gank, TP and defend, TP and farm.

PHASE BOOTSWith the nerf on BoT, this item is a solid choice on Raigor. Its cost is low, it gives you a nice MS and the phasing buff can be really useful to place Fissures in ganks and to run away from ganks on you. The damage part is not so great, but still i like this item better than treads on every hero that needs perfect positioning.

GUINSOO’S SCYTHE OF VISEThis item is no longer an upgraded Eul, so it will be quite pricey if you have to make it

from scraps. Anyway, it gives you another powerfull disable, a lot of mana and mana regen and some other stats. It’s probably the best item in the game, and on Raigor is just terrifying.

BLOODSTONEBloodstone gives you a lot of HPs and Mana, plus it gives you a powerful life/mana restore on your death (making it a good team item, being you an initiator), gives you a bonus on your respawn rate and make you loose less gold when you die. It gives also A LOT of regen…maybe too much. With charges on it, you will have a redundant mana regeneration: you won’t be able to use it all even spamming your abilites. This is both a good and a bad thing: you won’t run out of mana, but surely it’s not the best gold/efficiency item for ES.

SHIVA’S GUARDShivas guard gives you a lot of armor, a lot of mana and an aura that makes you even more useful to your team. It give you another aoe damage+disable (even if it’s only a snare). It’s a good item, but won’t give you Hps (even if +15 armor will boost your survivability greatly). It won’t give you any kind of regen either. If the game last long enough, this is a good item.

REFRESHER ORBThis choice is a classic. Since Echo Slam’s echo waves will ricochet on dying units and on corpses, you can deliver quite a punch with double ultimate, not counting your other tools. Double Fissure is nice too. The problem is, this item won’t give you any stat point, so you will be more fragile and you’ll have less mana. The damage is wasted too.

.OTHER ITEMSThose items are good on Earthshaker, but not great.

BOOTS OF TRAVELWith recently changes in DotA and the reliability of scrolls, Boots are no more a must on Raigor. You can defend well enough with Scrolls, and you won't push alone anyway.

NECRONOMICONThis choice is a solid one. Necronomicon gives Raigor what he needs: HPs and Mana. Obviously, we can make a good use of those Necro Warriors with all of Raigor’s stuns. If an enemy is caught by all of you spell it will be stunned up to 4.75seconds, so your Necrocreeps have a lot of time to hit, manabreak and manabur him. Necronomicon is also

quite cheap, mainly because you can farm 1300gold for the recipe quite easily at this point of the game. Sadly, Necro is usually good only when rushed, but Raigor has other priorities

HOOD OF DEFIANCEThis item is situational. If you’re fighting a lot of heavy nukers, you can insert this item after the core building. Still, you have a lot of HPs and can do your whole combo while enemies are stunned, so you won’t be a primary target, especially if you’re not your team initiator. BLACK KING BAR can be taken instead of Hood if you prefer, but your main role in fights is so fast and so sudden you won't need that usually.

HEART OF TARRASQUEHoT will greatly enhance your survability. You may want it for this reason, not for the damage. You’re not a tank, so maybe you don’t need so many HP to be effective in a teamplay situation.

LINKEN’S SPHERELinken’s Sphere is a so-and-so item. It gives you some juicy stats and a nice regen rate, but the reason to buy it is it’s Spell Shield (buffed to 20sec cooldown recently). It’s a very nice feature to have on every hero and can save our life…but it’s also incredibly pricy for what it gives.

.ITEMS TO AVOIDThose items are a no-no.

MELEE ORIENTED ITEMSRaigor is a melee hero, but it’s a CASTER. You won’t be hitting stuff with your weapon apart from creeps (and occasionally disabled heroes). You need Mana and Mana regen to execute your combo, HPs to survive battles and stuff to be more usefull to your team. Let your friendly Clinkz nail your enemy while you stun him.

BATTLEFURYThis item simply doesn’t work on Raigor. You don’t need the damage and splash damage = less creep alive for your ultimate to work. Heck, you don’t even need this to push, if you are pushing, cause you can clear creepwaves with Fissure+Enchant Totem and Aftershock!

DAGONI don’t like Dagon, expecially on Raigor. It’s very mana intensive and gold ineffective. If you want more magic burst damage, go Refresher.

________________├C. Levels 1-7┤

¯¯¯¯¯¯¯¯¯¯¯¯¯¯¯¯Skill orderLevel 01 | FISSURELevel 02 | AFTERSHOCKLevel 03 | FISSURELevel 04 | AFTERSHOCKLevel 05 | FISSURELevel 06 | ECHO SLAMLevel 07 | FISSURE.OR.Level 01 | FISSURELevel 02 | AttributeLevel 03 | FISSURELevel 04 | AttributeLevel 05 | FISSURELevel 06 | ECHO SLAMLevel 07 | FISSURE

Item order.Energy Booster (1000)Ring of Protectiob (175)Arcane Ring Recipe (525).Boots = (500).TOTAL = 2300 gold.If you are doing really good, you can buy 2 Gauntlets of Strenght now. If you are doing poorly don’t worry: you will do better once you've completed your Arcane Ring. Energy Booster by itself gives you a nice boost to Mana Pool.

STARTINGWhen the game starts, ask for Sentinel Bot or Scourge Top. Note that Sentinel Bot is just plain amazing for it’s trapping potential, so try to play in that lane..Try to lane with a disabler/nuker; it’s better if he can disable and do damage at the same time.

Try to lane with a ranged hero, cause you’re melee (this is less important anyway, cause you are not playing league games, so if you can last hit well enough the deny rate will be quite low). Don’t solo with Raigor, ever. .If you want to check the rune you'll miss a great chance to use below tactic. Ask someone else to check it, or ask for a gank on the rune spot if you believe your opponents are going to check it too. Remember that with Fissure + another stun you can achieve FB at rune spot very easily.

EARLY GAME

When you’re done with your items move to your lane. BEHOLD! You can do a first blood in your first creep wave. How? With this wonderful (dunno if legitimate in higher level games) tactic!

First Wave Kill Tactic

This tactic revolves around 2 concepts:

You do your creep block better than your enemies, or at least equal to them. You are playing in the Sentinel bottom lane

If those conditions are satisfied, you can try to get a kill on the first creep wave. You will notice that you’ve done a better creep block than your opponent if their creeps are in this zone:

From this position you can use this tactic to kill even ranged enemy heroes. Don’t block too much or enemy heroes won’t come close. If you’ve done it right, enemy creeps will die fast: enemy heroes (at least ranged ones) will try to deny you, so they’ll stay just where Nevermore stands in the screenshot above. Ask your lanemate to play passively and tell him to be ready; meanwhile you take position for your tactic to work, going behind the trees (you can see my position in the first screenshot in the upper left corner; in this screen I’m moving to the real spot, shown in the screenshot below)..When it became obvious that all of his remaining creeps are going to die, your enemy will start to retreat. You have to anticipate this and move in to block his path like this:

If you’ve done it right, he’s pretty screwed. If he’s good, he will try to stay rightside, moving to avoid most attack as possible. He can also try to reach the jucke point near Sentinel tower, but

this is an almost assured death; this is more frequent if both enemy heroes are trapped and they both try to run; you should block one of them in the jucke point if that’s the case. Anyway, here’s the end of poor Nevermore: it seems that the tower is killstealing (as I say in the screenshot lol) but actually the WD firstblooded him with Maledict.

If he manages to escape this trap he will be in Red Life Zone. If you’ve got your circlets (you have to have them for this purpose also) you can chase him and finish him with another Fissure 7 seconds after the first one disappears..Here’s another example of the same tactic.This time we’re facing Lina + Omniknight.

They are 2v1 so they play aggressive and try to gank Zeus. Zeus falls back and they both get hit few times by our creeps and our tower.

They attack him and both get hit by our creeps (theirs are dead) and by our Tower. Omniknight heals himself and Lina cast Dragon Slave and attack Zeus. When she realizes she’s alredy dead it’s too late.

After that, Omni get harassed back to his tower and have to go home to heal; I didn’t have Circlets as starting items (got to get Rob) so I can’t Fissure kill him. Even if you can’t kill both enemy heroes every time, you can at least make their early game miserable. They’ll have to go back home if they don’t have a Flask: Tangos can’t heal all that damage and if they show up, you can simply Fissure snipe or block them and they’re screwed just like here:

You can also kill enemies in Fog of War with Fissure: you simply have to guess their last movements:

.You can realize a First Wave Kill also from another, better positionThis is another good spot to wait for the right time to Fissure.

NOTE: if you stay in this place to First Wave Kill there will be 3 problems:

You can’t creepblock or rune check, or you won’t arrive there quite soon enough to be invisible. Your ally should creep block alone.

You have to issue a movement order (look at screenshot) again and again or spam stop command to avoid movement: if you move to autoattack, your enemy will see you.

You can be blocked by your own Fissure if you don’t move before Fissuring: if you move, you may be tricked and cast your Fissure with a bad aim, as show on this screen

Anyway, this position has a nice advantage: if you do all your homeworks right, you are here to help stomp the trapped enemy hero.

.IMPORTANT 6.57b DISCLAIMER on this tactic:

Latest maps changed how trees are displaced near the last sentinel tower in bottom lane. This tactic is STILL THE SAME, but the positioning is a bit different. It works exactly the same using this tactic from the first spot. The second spot is a bit different however: here's how it works.

.Extra Tips:

As a golden rule, if your enemies are a ranged and a melee hero, try to trap the ranged one. In this way, the melee can’t help him attacking you through the crevasse. Blinkers are an obvious exception to this rule, and so are healers generally.

If the first enemy wave is too far away from the tower, ask your ally to attack the enemy creeps instead of just lat hit them. This way you get more allied creeps to fight at your side when you’ll trap the enemy heroes. More than that, your enemies will think he’s a noob and may play more aggressively, making their entrapment more easy to accomplish.

If there is only 1 enemy hero trapped and he’s clearly hopeless, try to lasthit him. Do this only if you are sure he will die anyway, otherwise it’s a very sad choice. +50g to all your team is still better than no gold at all; if your lanemate gets the kill, it’s a good thing.

Remember that the second spot works better for this tactic because you can help your ally beating the living pulp out of your enemy BUT this way you can't creep block: this can be a problem with new creeps walking routine.

.If this tactic nets you a kill or maybe a first blood, you’re doing greatly! Try to last hit and deny; if you can’t do both, simply last hit and let your ranged ally deny for you. As a general rule, don’t buy too many clarities: you won’t be spamming Fissure to simply damage enemies and you have to wait till it’s the right time to Fissure Trap your enemies and maybe kill them. How? This way!

Fissure Trapping Early Game

A lot of people simply go Arcane Ring and spam Fissure early on, using it mainly as a nuke. We won’t have all that mana until we get our own Arcane; and even then, there are far better uses for Fissure than simply damage your enemy. Think of Fissure as a 0 skill damage for our purposes: we want to use it to gank our enemies, and damage is just a bonus, not the big thing itself. The impassable crevasse is what makes Fissure so great. You should use Fissure as a damage skill only to prepare future ganks (lowering enemies’ HPs), obviously only if you can cast another one in order to gank in the near future. You should use it as a pure damage spell only if you can hit more than 1 enemy hero and kill 1+ creep at the same time (and only if you won’t need it soon to gank). Remember that if you use it to damage, you have a 15sec window in wich you are completely gankable!

.First of all we have the Loose TrapThe Loose Trap concept is basically to use Fissure to block enemies retreat and to bash it together with your allied creeps and your lanemate. Remember that early in the game a bunch of creeps does almost 3 times the damage you can do to a hero. This trap is Loose, simply because it does not really entrap an enemy; it simply gives to you an your allies more time to hit the enemy hero. If done correctly, he will loose a lot of life; try to do this tactic on an enemy hero that isn’t full life (unless you know you can kill him or severely injure him even if he’s full life: it dependa mainly on your lanemate). This screenshot is an example of Loose Trap. As you can see there is a gap on the rightmost side of the Fissure crevasse, so Spiritbreaker will escape the trap. He’s still doomed, as he is Maledict’ed. This is how it ends after a couple of seconds.

Here’s other examples of effective Loose Trap:

.More difficult to achieve than the Loose Trap but more deadly, we have the Spike TrapYou realize a spike trap when you trap your enemies together with your allied creeps in a sort of loose triangle formed by a natural obstacle (IE: trees, water, etc) and your Fissure’s crevasse. This trap is deadlier cause your enemy needs to run towards you in order to escape it, and has to travel further more to escape you, your ally and your creeps.

This is one of the most powerful use of Fissure, as it works as a very long time “disable” this way. The only chance for your enemy is to outrun you, going towards the bottom of the screen and towards your next creep wave / tower. With another disabling hero by your side, his fate is almost sealed.

Remember: you can Spike Trap effectively only enemies that walk near a natural obstacle (IE: map border, trees, etc), trapping them in the most distant corner: if they walk near the middle of a lane, even if you block their path they will have a lot less road to roam in order to get back to safety (in other words, it will be more a Loose Trap than a Spike one.

.Using these tactics in conjunction with the First Wave Kill one will earn you some money. Use it to buy your Arcane pieces, starting with Energy Booster. Buy TP scrolls and gank other lanes when needed/possible: now you can be back in lane in 30s with Scrolls. If you’re doing it right, you’re overexping your opponents, and when you get your Ultimate ability this gap became even more wide..You can also use Fissure defensively as shown in those pictures

Your team mates will love you for this! You can also try to block a chasing enemy, putting fissure between him and his prey. This is quite difficult to do if they’re close, as you will risk to trap your mate with the chasing enemy.

.Last but not least, you can use you Fissure to Redirect your enemy path. This is mainly used to setup ganks; it is most effective when you have a Techie on your team, as shown by this screenshot:

Long story short, you use your Fissure to prevent your enemies to step on a particulart path, or to force them to take a particular path.

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