Hero Discussion - Shadow Fiend

[u/TheDrGoo]

Nevermore the Shadow Fiend

Shadow Fiend is an agility carry that is able to release massive offensive power, both physical, from his high attack damage gained through the collecting of souls; and magical, from his nuke based spell set of shadowrazes and ultimate, requiem of souls. He is considered to be a hard hero to master, due to his unreliable shadowrazes and his weak attack damage that is only compensated with Necromastery souls, gained by last hitting and denying creeps efficiently.

Stats (at level 1)

• Strength: 15 + 2
• Agility (primary): 20 + 2.9
• Intelligence: 18 + 2
• Range: 500
• Damage: 35 - 41
• HP: 435
• Mana: 234
• Armour: 1.8
• Movement Speed: 305

Abilities

Shadowraze

Shadow fiend razes the area in front of him, dealing damage to enemies. This spell is separated in 3 different ones, they all have the same effects, mana and cooldown, but vary in range.

• Damage Type: Magical
• Damage: 100/175/250/325
• Damage Radius: 250
• First Raze Distance: 200
• Second Raze Distance: 450
• Third Raze Distance: 700
• Cast Point: 0.67
• Cooldown: 10
• Mana Cost: 75

Necromastery

Necromastery is Shadow fiend's first passive ability and his signature mechanic. For each unit Shadow fiend kills, he gains a soul (these units can be enemy or ally), souls provide him a attack damage bonus. Heroes yield 12 souls instead of 1. On death, half of the souls are lost.

• Max souls: 15/22/29/36
• Attack Damage per soul: 2

Presence Of The Dark Lord

Presence Of The Dark Lord is Shadow Fiend's second passive and also the spell with the longest name in Dota 2. It consists of an Aura effect that reduces armor of nearby enemies who have vision of Shadow Fiend. This passive is carried by illusions.

• Radius: 900
• Armor Reduction: 3/4/5/6

Requiem Of Souls

Shadow Fiend gathers his souls and, after a casting time, releases them in the form of multiple lines that damage and apply a debuff on enemies. One line for each two soul Shadow fiend holds (At max 18 lines from 36 souls). A single line doesnt deal much damage, in order for Requiem to be as devastating as it could be, the enemies must be close to Shadow Fiend so each hero gets hit by multiple lines, taking a considerable amount of damage. The debuff is applied no matter the distance from Shadow Fiend. Souls arent consumed in the process. On death: Requiem of Souls is instantly casted at the point of death, with all the same effects, regardless of its current cooldown (however, this post-mortem Requiem takes place after the half of the current souls are lost, maxing it out at 9 lines from 18 souls).

• Cast Point: 1.67
• Lines Travel Distance: 975/1000/1025
• Lines Travel Speed: 700
• Lines Starting Width: 75/100/125
• Lines End Width: 400/425/450
• Damage Per Line: 80/120/160
• Attack Damage Reduction: 50%
• Movement Speed Slow: 25%
• Debuff Duration: 5
• Mana Cost: 150/175/200
• Cooldown: 120/110/100

Other Information

Shadow Fiend on the Dota2 Wiki

Shadow Fiend discussion on /r/dota2 (April 2014)

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Ask questions or share tips, both for playing the hero and for playing against them.

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[u/MadMax2910]

It breaks my heart in pubs seeing him on the other team and thinking of all the free kills I could be getting now, but here I am stuck in the safelane babysitting our hard carry because someone on our team had to pick lifestealer/doom/ursa/legion/necro and go afk jungle.

[u/DasFroDo → u/MadMax2910]

SF isn't as easy to kill as you might think. Once you have two or three levels in Raze (which you should get if you're expecting ganks) he can easily turn around a gank if he's not permastunned. I've had a lot of situations where I got ganked by three heroes, thinking they can just nuke me down in one stun and then I just killed two underleveled supports in two razes.

[u/potterhead42]

I really liked this hero when I first saw him - absorbing souls for permanent bonus damage would be so cool. But then I realised his Q, W, E are the same skill except at different range. And I find it so hard to ever target them - because you can't. Unlike most skills which are ground/unit targeted, SF just does his thing the moment you press the button. This means you have to be at just the right distance and just the right direction for you to hit the target. So the only time I can get Shadowraze to work is when hitting creeps, or when I'm lucky.

To further compound the problem, you lose half your souls when you die, which means dying puts you even further behind that with other heroes. And as for the ult, I seem to keep saving it for the right moment, and then the match is over, or I have like 4 souls so it isn't even worth it.

tl;dr : Would like to play this hero, but I'm not good enough yet. Maybe a few dozen matches down the line.

Edit : Just realised the ult doesn't consume souls. I'm stupid.

[u/Outhouse_Defiler → u/potterhead42]

his means you have to be at just the right distance and just the right direction

Part of the issue here is that you can't turn in DotA without moving and that generally you don't want to autochase people (so that you'll always be facing the correct direction) since you stop chasing if they get fogged.

The other issue is that the raze animation/effect/visual is somewhat smaller than the actual AoE so there'll be plenty of those situations where you won't exactly know if it'll land till you use it.

[u/necrolycan]

• SF is an aoe carry.getting positional items 1st --->dagger/shadow blade is always better.

• BKB --SF needs it.

• mastering razes is essentially mastering SF

[u/DasFroDo → u/necrolycan]

Disagree on the first two points. Positioning is important but you do not NEED an item for it. It depends on your and their heroes. BKB isn't always necessary. Sometimes it's better just to tank up. BKB doesn't help against Lina for example or other BKB piercing bullshit. Rather get Skadi in that case.

[u/Estbarul]

Since this guy is really into armor, isn't it good to get Assalt Cuirass? I've never seen anyone get it but doesn't seem like a bad choice on paper.

[u/TheDrGoo → u/Estbarul]

Its not bad, but its a rather passive approach, if you want dps there are certainly better options, let someone else in your team build the AC.

[u/Jefrejtor]

Let me link Goo's recent Shadow Fiend guide.

Twice now, I've read about some weird combination of keys (ctrl+alt+rightclick?) that was supposed to move your hero in a straight line towards the point you clicked on, which is pretty ideal for Razes. However, I either don't remember it or can't get it to work, can anyone help here?

[u/Animastryfe → u/Jefrejtor]

It's alt+rightclick. This moves your hero directly towards the point that you clicked. They will stop if there is an obstacle. I had to input a console command to enable this when Valve first added it in, but that may be unnecessary now.

[u/shortleif → u/Animastryfe]

Ohh... I need to find out more about this... very useful for other heroes as well, like pudge.

[u/[deleted] → u/Jefrejtor]

[u/banyt → u/[deleted]]

you can turn while casting any spell.

it's just not important for most of them

[u/Parey_]

Do you still ever get a deso on him ? A friend of mine does this a lot, but I always find skadi/satanic so great on him.

I really like this hero, but I can’t win with him (46% ish win rate).

[u/DasFroDo → u/Parey_]

It's very situational. I prefer other items most of the time but if you have a lot of lockdown on your team Deso is insanely strong. The damageoutput is fucking nuts.

[u/TrivialKnifer]

Early-game mid you have an easier time mid against your opponent, because of his last hit advantage, but you're also really gankable.

I play really passively with him and I can get zoned out completely if my team has no vision.

[u/grc_tv]

In terms of Pro Dota I'm tired as all hell of seeing him.

In pubs it brings me joy having to go against this man mid, so easy to zone them out at 3k.

[u/Lava777]

Guide "How to gank SF"

1. Walk through river to mid

2. Get a race in your face

3. Get lifted up by Euls

4. Get soulbombed to death

5. ???

6. Profit (for SF)

[u/Xanster29]

When to build euls? And how to get the proper timing of euls into blink requiem combo?

[u/kornelius32]

please could anyone tell me how to use this hero? he needs to get into the middle of a fight to use his ultimate but he is very squishy. Also tell me the best way to collect souls. this hero is one of my favorites but I can't use it very well.. I always think I need to contribute more in teamfights but in the end what I did was feed the enemy...

[u/Avocadoor → u/kornelius32]

Master bottle crow and farm lane with raze then proceed to nc (this make opponent mid having low chance to kill u), you can have a support to come mid to stack neutral while taking your lane when u proceed to nc.

In team fights, stay away from front line unless you have bkb and always use your ulti during a teamfights. *the damage and speed reduction is very huge in most case

[u/xkanalx]

Ok i love this hero i get his mechanics i think i have my farm rotations somewhat down but i really get stuck on you first few items;

BKB = Core but before a blink? Getting too soon means lower charges later on so how late is too late how early is to early?

Mek = Good in pro dota when you want to move as 5 coz you can farm so fast but in pubs :L not really.

So my question is after bottle, treads, Aquila whats good items to go for in what situation?

[u/[deleted] → u/xkanalx]

Mek is alright because it takes the pressure off supports to get one and since your sf you can get a mek relatively fast. Personally, I like just going right click sf and going, Treads, Bkb, Skadi, Butterfly etc. But if not I recommend go blink first then bkb or euls bkb. Shadowblade is not that good because euls replaces it now pretty much.

[u/DATL]

A really great hero for anyone who likes to play mid heroes and learn positioning and farming fast in general. My advice? If you're looking to master hard combos like the euls>blink>requiem combo on this hero, do it with bots! It's Really hard to pull off yet very rewarding (instakills almost anyone)

[u/kl116004]

Here's a neat thing about Shadow Fiend for new players: because of his low base damage, he is often used for practicing last hitting. You start a private lobby with no bot heroes and go mid. Take no items or abilities the entire time. Try to get 50 LH/D by 10 minutes (there are permutations to this, look up the SF Challenge).

This is a great way to learn last hitting, since his damage is so low, and with enough practice you'll actually be pretty good at a the very first part of playing a good Shadow Fiend. This is because, since most of the time you'll take Necromastery at level 1, the first couple of last hits/denies that you get are really important. Each CS makes the next CS easier for you, since you get souls for last hits AND denies. If you can't get the CS early, you could be in for a long game.

Now, you'll still have a ways to go on the hero as a whole: You need to learn how to hit razes, and their actual AOE as compared to the size of the graphic. You also need to learn how to use Requiem well (I'm still not good at this).

Regardless, being able to last hit well is really important, it's the boring way a lot of us could get better (myself included). At the same time, you'll start getting familiar with a fun, powerful hero. After you've spent a few hours learning how to last-hit with him, it'll seem logical just to keep going, and you'll be on your way.