General Discussion - “Everything has a price...” : A Bounty Hunter Guide, by Sampson - DOTABUFF

2014-02-18

[size=26][b][i][color=#00bfff]“Everything has a price...” : A Bounty Hunter Guide[/color][/b][/size][/i]
[size=24][i][color=#800000]By: Sampson[/color][/size][/i]

[IMG]http://i.imgur.com/YejiNgL.jpg[/IMG]

[Size=18][color=#ab0500]Introduction[/color][/size]

[url=http://dotabuff.com/heroes/bounty-hunter]Bounty Hunter[/url] is a melee agility Hero that excels in dealing high amounts of damage to single targets. Bounty Hunter can easily gank other lanes, using his Shadow Walk to sneak up on enemies and get easy kills. Shadow Walk also allows him to escape from dangerous situations, making him very elusive. Bounty Hunter is also extremely deadly as an offlaner, thanks to Track, which will grant True Sight, movement speed, and bonus gold, and Jinada, which amplifies the damage of his next attack every few seconds making snagging last hits in the offlane easy.

[color=#3cb371]Pros[/color] : Invis, High Burst, Great snowball potential due to track, elusive
[color=#ffff00]Cons[/color] : Low base health, Very mana inefficient

[Size=18][color=#ab0500]Abilities, Role and Skill build :[/color][/size]

[color=#ff2a41]Shuriken Toss(Q)[/color] : [url=http://dotabuff.com/heroes/bounty-hunter]Bounty Hunter[/url]'s main nuke ability. This ability has a high mana cost(in relation to Bounty Hunters mana pool) so should be used only when a fast kill is required or range limits you from reaching your target before they escape. This ability also has a mini stun so save it if necessary to break channelling abilities (TP scroll, bane ulti etc.)

[color=#ff2a41]Jinada(W)[/color] : This ability adds a 225% crit modifier to your melee attack (rank 4). Unlike most other attack modifier it has cooldown of 6 seconds (rank 4) instead of a flat %.

[color=#ff2a41]Shadow Walk(E)[/color] : This ability lets bounty hunter become invisible and gives increased dmg on his first attack out of invisibility. (you can attack during the fade time to gain a extra bonus attack before going invis)

[color=#ff2a41]Track(R)[/color] : This is [url=http://dotabuff.com/heroes/bounty-hunter]Bounty Hunter[/url]’s ultimate ability and the main reason why you pick him. Track gives true sight and bonus movement speed(20%) to any allies near the target. In addition it also gives bonus gold to bounty hunter AND all allies that participate in the kill.

[color=#ffa500]Hero Role :[/color]
The role of [url=http://dotabuff.com/heroes/bounty-hunter]Bounty Hunter[/url] is to put excess gold into the hands of your team with track and this is done by consistently ganking and playing aggressive. [url=http://dotabuff.com/heroes/bounty-hunter]Bounty Hunter[/url] should be placed in a solo lane because he need to reach level 6 for track as soon as possible and with invisibility he is hard for the enemy to kill which is why he commonly is put solo offlane.

[color=#ffa500]Skill build :[/color]

E-W-E-Q-Q-R-Q-Q-E-E-R-W-W-W-Stats-R

- 2 points into E are required to maintain invisible without becoming visible (more points = longer duration)
- Q is maxed first to give the highest amount of dmg in the shortest amount of time( the longer it takes to kill the target the more time it gives for support to back him up)
- W is maxed last due to the fact that it scales with the gear you will get later in the game
- After lv 8 there is some flexibility with your build (W before E) but I commonly stick to above option

[Size=18][color=#ab0500]Gameplay :[/color][/size]

[color=#ffa500]Starting items :[/color] A stout shield will help ward off harassment, 2 branches for a little extra stats, a set of tangos and a healing salve to keep your health topped off. Grab early boots if you come up against a really aggressive defensive trilane (CM & AA combo).

[color=#ffa500]Early/Mid game items :[/color] Your boots of choice for [url=http://dotabuff.com/heroes/bounty-hunter]Bounty Hunter[/url] will be [color=#737eff]phase boots[/color] to maximize your Jinada damage and increase your chasing power to find those bounties. Upgrade your stout shield into a [color=#737eff]poor man shield[/color] and branches into a [color=#737eff]Magic wand[/color] to increase your dmg output and defensive capabilities so that you can play aggressive without fear of trading right clicks. Pick up a [color=#737eff]Poison orb [/color]to make up for relatively long cooldown on your Jinada during the early game (sell it later) [b]My personal favorite item[/b] [color=#737eff]Drums of endurance[/color] brings bounty hunters stats up to an acceptable level to keep you alive in fights and the active ability helps you escape sticky situations (getting caught with dust you can outrun them with the active ability from drums)

[color=#ffa500]Mid/Late game items :[/color] The mid/late game items for [url=http://dotabuff.com/heroes/bounty-hunter]Bounty Hunter[/url] tend to me more luxury items because by this stage of the match you are either ahead (and with track that lead becomes exponentially higher) or you are just a over glorified mobile ward. I tend to build [color=#737eff]vlad’s offering[/color] after drums to help my teams pushing power (you do not want to drag on the match too long or else you give your opponent room turn around the match) and help with your sustainability issues (both mana and health). Of course [color=#737eff]Black King Bar[/color] is always an amazing pick up to deal with nukes and disables but do not neglect the choice of picking up [color=#737eff]Linkens Orb[/color] to deal with deadly single target spells like Doom and Duel. Last but not least [color=#737eff]Desolator[/color] to make those supports drop like flies

[color=#ffa500]Situational picks :[/color] [color=#737eff]Orchid, S & Y[/color] and [color=#737eff]Abyssal Blade[/color]

[color=#ffa500]Laning, Mid and Late game play styles :[/color]

[color=#ffa500]Laning Stage :[/color] Your job is to stay alive and obtain level 6. To do this you must keep track of which forms of detection the enemy has in the lane. The enemy will either have sentry wards or dust(or both) and you will have to adjust how you will place yourself in relation to that. For sentries you need figure out where they placed the sentry and maintain a safe distance from that. A trick I like to use is to use the tangoes I bought to start with to create additional paths in the trees to hide in (do not use them until you need the regen). If they have dust you have to play much more defensive because their goal is to kill you. Get 1 obs ward from your support and place it in the forest beside the offlane to have vision of any attempts at your life. Do NOT block the pull camp because you can sneak up and soak up the exp from the pull while invisible.

[color=#ffa500]Mid game :[/color] Mid game starts for [url=http://dotabuff.com/heroes/bounty-hunter]Bounty Hunter[/url] once he hits level 6. Once track is online you need to start roaming and start trying to obtain track kills. A common mistake most inexperienced bounty hunter players make is that they only try and start making solo kills. With track the more people involved in kills the more gold the team gains. So when you gank you want to engage with your teammates. An example of this instead of trying to solo kill in your own lane it is much to help your struggling mid teammate with a gank and changing the gold advantage into his favor. You must do this constantly because bounty hunter is a fairly weak late game hero that uses mid game dominance to overshadow his late game weakness.

[Size=18][color=#ab0500]Playstyle, Common errors, Tips, and suggested material :[/color][/size]

[color=#ffa500]Mentality :[/color]
The main thing you must keep in mind while playing [url=http://dotabuff.com/heroes/bounty-hunter]Bounty Hunter[/url] no matter the situation you must be always planning your next track kill. This requires you to play extremely aggressive and have great map awareness (ALWAYS HAVE A TP SCROLL). I do not advise picking [url=http://dotabuff.com/heroes/bounty-hunter]Bounty Hunter[/url] if your team does not have good mid game heroes to compliment bounty hunters best stage of the game.

[color=#ffa500]Common mistakes:[/color]

[color=#ffff00]Battlefury[/color] : while battlefury gives more + dmg than desolator the armor reduction makes desolator do substantially more damage.
[Url=http://dota2.gamepedia.com/Armor]References about armor[/url]

If you still believe your build is the way to go, I'm going to explain how,

Compare Boots + Battle Fury to Phase Boots, Vlads and Drum.

[color=#ffa500]Stats of brown boots + BF[/color]
• 450 + 4350 = 4800 gold
• 65 damage
• 6 HP regen
• 150% mana regen
• Cleave which is useless because only retard Bounty's afk farm
• 0 HP
• 0 mana pool
• 0 armour

[color=#ffa500]Stats of Phase + Drum + Vlads[/color]
• 1350 + 1775 + 2050 = 5175g, 375 gold more
• +36 damage (Phase +24, Drum +9 agi and +3 damage)
• 15% damage aura for you and your team
• +2 HP regen
• 16% melee lifesteal aura for you and your team
• 0.8 mana regen aura for you and your team
• 0.36 additional mana regen from int
• ~6 armour (5 from Vlad's aura, ~1 from +9 agi)
• 9 str = 9 x 19 = 171 HP
• 9 int = 9 x 13 = 117 mana
• Phase gives unit-walking and a temporary 16% speed boost
• Drum +5% MS/AS aura
• Drum +10% MS/AS active

I'd say it's definitely possible for a level 11 Bounty to have this much net worth, so I'm basing my next calculations on the stats of a level 11 BH.

[color=#ffa500]Damage [/color]
• At level 11, a Bounty will have 85 base damage (45-59 base, 52 average, and 11 levels of agi growth @ +3.0 agi per level)
• With Drum, add 9 from the +9 agi, so 94 base
• Vlad's gives 15% more base damage. 15% of 94 = 14.1 -> Vlad's gives 14 damage
• So in total, PB + Vlads + Drum gives 50 damage (24 Phase, 12 Drum, 14 Vlads)

Assuming a 4-3-2-2 build to be in favour of the Battle Fury while also being reasonable (4-4-1-2 is unlikely), that 15 less damage results in a level 3 Jinada doing a measly 30 less damage, but it makes your team hit 15% harder which more than makes up for it.

[color=#ffa500]Mana regen[/color]
At level 11, Bounty will have 30.4 int (19 starting int, 11 levels of int gain @ +1.4 per level), so 31 int.
• BH's mana regen without items would be (0.01 + (31 x 0.04)) = 1.25 mana per second
• BH's mana regen with BF will be (0.01 + 31 x 0.04) x 1.5 = 1.875 round up to 1.88 to try and favour BF as much as possible
• BF gives an increase of 1.88 - 1.25 = 0.63 mana regen per second
• Vlad's gives 0.8 extra mana regen per second, and also gives it to nearby teammates.
• Drum would also give an extra 9 x 0.04 = 0.36 mana per second from the int, so a Bounty with Drum + Vlads gains 1.16 mana per second

Ring of Basilius alone gives more mana regen than a Battle Fury at +0.65 per second too, and it costs 9 times less than a fucking BF, you could build that shit in lane 2 minutes in, and be reaping the benefits of it for 20 minutes more than a BF.
On top of the higher mana regen, Drum also gives you an increase in maximum mana of 117, which is another level 2 Shuriken, which deals 200 magic damage.

Even if PB + Vlads + Drum gave 0 extra mana regen, with the extra 0.63 mana regen that the BF offers, it would take 185 seconds (3 minutes) for you to gain an extra 117 mana. So for fights longer than 3 minutes, you'll get more mana from BF's passive regen. For fights less than 3 minutes (i.e. every fight ever), Drum's mana pool increase of 117 gives you more mana.

[color=#ffa500]Survivability[/color]
Bounty's strength gain is also terrible, with no stat items, he won't even have 1000 health until level 16. Drum gives you +9 strength, and with Bounty's strength gain of 1.8, 9 strength is equivalent to 5 levels. i.e. a level 11 Bounty with Drum has the same HP pool as a level 16 Bounty. HP does matter on BH because you will take damage at some point in the game, even in the shit tier that you're in, enemies will at some point, get detection against you, or damage you when you break invisibility.

Movespeed is also an important factor in escaping. Activating Drum and Phase will give you a 31% increase in MS, boosting your MS of 365 (base 315 + 50 from brown or phase) to a ridiculous 478. Most heroes will only get 400 MS tops.

[color=#ffa500]Advantages of Battle Fury[/color](at level 11)
• 15 more damage per hit

[color=#ffa500]Advantages of Phase, Drum + Vlads[/color]
• Gives you and your team more survivability
- Vlads gives melee lifesteal, and armour
- Drum gives you 171 HP and ~1 armour
• Gives your team more damage from Vlad's aura
• Lets you and your team chase after Jinada has worn off - damage doesn't mean shit if you can't hit people
• Gives you and your team more mana regen
• Drum's mana pool increase allows you to stay on the map longer before returning to base
• Helps your team take Roshan much faster
• Easier to build - individual components increase your stats, increasing the chance of success of the next gank
- individual components are cheaper than Broadsword and Claymore, gold can be spent before death
- items range from 175g to 900g. Of the 13 items required, recipes included, only 2 are above 450g in cost
- individual components are not from the Secret Shop, they can be "panic-bought"

[color=#ffff00]Bottle[/color] Unless you are actively obtaining runes (do not steal them from your mid hero) this item is not worth the gold investment nor the item slot.

[color=#ffff00]Giving away your location :[/color] The fear that you COULD be there should always be in the back of your enemies head. This fear will limit how far they push in to farm and how much they will jungle. By showing yourself on the map to score a couple creep kills you give away that control you had over them.

[color=#ffff00]Track can save lives :[/color] Track can be used defensively to help save your teammates escaping. It gives them vision to juke in the forest and it also gives them a 20% bonus movement speed.

[color=#3cb371]Suggested Material:[/color]
[youtube]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=CvjerN6S9jU[/youtube]

[color=#3cb371]Amazing Pro BH players:[/color] [url=http://dotabuff.com/players/86723143]Funnik[/url] (NaVi) and [url=http://dotabuff.com/players/88719902]Bone7[/url] (Cloud 9, formerly Speed Gaming)

This topic was edited 2014-04-16

General Discussion“Everything has a price...” : A Bounty Hunter Guide, by Sampson