Viper Item/Skill Build and General Strategy

[dowtaa]

Please post your Viper Item/Skill Build and General Strategy + starting items.

[Peons Are Imba]

I max out Poison Attack then Nether Toxin taking Viper strike at 6. I get boots of speed + 2-3 wraiths for early game after which I upgrade to treads and make mkb to prevent people from teleporting away. After MKB, its usually Heart or Butterfly depending on the situation.

If there is sufficient nuking power on the other team, I take Corrosive skin after maxing out my other 2 spells. Otherwise I go stats.

[regulator_mk]

skills: slow > toxin > skin, ulti whenever possible
starting items: circlets/branches/tangos
harass with slow, toxin really helps last hit
when you get your ulti, use it to gank (with orbwalking and toxin)
then get wraiths, vanguard, phase boots, maybe a hood/pipe, heart, and talisman=>butterfly if the game goes really long
later in the game you're a tank (thanks to skin and the hp items), and you finish off low hp heroes at the end of skirmishes with slow and toxin. you don't need to worry about buying damage because you really shine at the end of battles, so the point is just to live until then, so you can pwn with toxin.

[Shiz_]

Orb
Toxin
Toxin
Orb
Orb
Strike
Toxin
Toxin
Orb
Skin or stats whatever.

3 levels of orb early so you could start abusing orb walking at level 5. Priority is then given to toxin.

Defensive items like Vanguard, Phase, Buckler, hood, Vitality boosters. Rule of thumbs is always get Stick + Boots and always get first HP over EHP.

[DrDragun]

Whether you max orb or nethertoxin first in the middle levels, make sure you have L3 orb at Level5. 0-cooldown orb is vital for you to function.

Bracers are an excellent way to boost your hitpoints, and like Shiz says your character already has good forms of reduction, so the best way to boost your ehp is with straight hitpoints rather than stacking on more forms of reduction.

I'm drafting a guide here, I know it's too long and I'm working to shorten it:

http://www.playdota.com/forums/showthread.php?t=3974

[Luxis]

Yeah, its quite obvious you start out with orb and tox, and ult ofc.

About the Item build you might wanna start out with 1/2 bracers, pt str/agi depending on your situation. Imo you should from here make an offensive based item, because you ain't no tank and orbwalking won't work all game. Once that's done you could get a HoD / Heart.

[Drathmar]

Skill Build:

Toxin/Orb
Orb/Toxin
Toxin
Orb
Orb
Ult
Toxin
Toxin
Orb
Caustic
Ult
Caustic
Caustic
Caustic

Items:
2x Wraiths or Bracers
Vguard
Phase Boots or Power Treads
MKB
Heart
Bfly

Why? VGuard because you need survivability more than damage early/mid game. You go MKB after that because you need damage for late game when nethertoxin and orbwalking won't be enough for you. Then more survivability, then another offensive item if game goes that long.

Originally Posted by Luxis

Yeah, its quite obvious you start out with orb and tox, and ult ofc.

About the Item build you might wanna start out with 1/2 bracers, pt str/agi depending on your situation. Imo you should from here make an offensive based item, because you ain't no tank and orbwalking won't work all game. Once that's done you could get a HoD / Heart.

Actually viper can be a damned good tank with vguard and heart alone. Over 3k hp, great regen,spell reduction, a return ability when attacked. You also lack survivability NOT damage early/mid game so there is no reason you should go an offensive item as your first high level item over survivability. And you should go vguard over HoD because you need HP over regen/more spell reduction (do they even stack anymore?)

[gwho]

items
i do 2 or 3 wraiths, power treads, ring of health (along the way cause u need some sort of survivability). then work to butterfly. butterfly is the first ultimate goal. then make buriza, but it's ok to stop at crystalis, and work on something else if needed. (say like heart, or bkb) if you're team is doing well, and surviavility isn't an issue, then u can press on with more attack power by finishing buriza.

i think critical from cristalis and buriza don't work when u orb attack with poison. (someone correct me if i'm wrong). but critical is very much worth getting nonetheless. why? by the time u get critical, u have good attack speed. orb lasts long enough that u dont have to hit them every time with it. once every 2-4 times is enough to keep them perma-slowed. (use manual cast) in between those attacks, let loose with criticals. your base attack is very high naturally, and even better augmented with butterfly. plus you will have great attack speed. you see? viper is just begging for critical. criticals will add more damage than further boosting damage or attack speed. (again, marginal benefit analysis)

MKB costs around as much as butterfly. butterfly is way better.

skills
1) orb 1 / nethertoxin 1
2) nethertoxin 1 / orb 1
3) nethertoxin 2
4) orb 2
5) orb 3
6) ulti

-take orb first to harass without creep agro. but if ur facing deadly nukers or a harasser yourself, then take nethertoxin first to help with last hitting.
-take orb to level 3 for the autocast. but u dotn really need level 4. 30% slow is enough, and upgrading it to level 4 does negligible damage. ur much better off with upgrading nethertoxin again. you also have ur ulti to slow, if continual slow spam and your own MS from power treads isn't enough already.

7) nethertoxin 3
8) nethertoxin 4
9) corrosiveskin 1
10) corrosiveskin 2
11) ulti
12) corrosiveskin 3
13) corrosiveskin 4

marginally, corrosive skin level doenst do much. early on doenst do much. 5% slow, 15 damage, 5% reduction, increments big whoop. u gotta get up to level 4 to have it amount to something significant. this is a good time to get it. earlier on, ur better off with orb and nethertoxin to boost your damage, which is worth a lot early on.

14) stats
15) stats
16) ulti
17) orb 4
- the rest is stats.

honestly, i dont find level 4 orb that useful. doing marginal opportunity cost analysis,2 stats, or choosing to upgrade antoher ability earlier is worth much more 12 more damage and 10% more slow. of course more slow could always be helpful in certain situations. if it helps you and u like it, then get level 4 orb. but if u can do without it, i think theres much more to be gained by spending that ability point on something else.

[tangiers]

Originally Posted by Shiz_

Orb
Toxin
Toxin
Orb
Orb
Strike
Toxin
Toxin
Orb
Skin or stats whatever.

3 levels of orb early so you could start abusing orb walking at level 5. Priority is then given to toxin.

I go for this skill build. Start with 2x slippers and a circlet. Get boots / treads and MKB, then lothars. I find it insanely easy to get MKB early on him because he is so good at getting early kills and last hitting. The extra 125 backstab damage from lothars seems nice on him.

[Zakharov]

I haven't tried this in a game, but could raw HP and Blademail work? Something like Bracers, Strength Treads, Blademail, Heart, with the usual skill build. Viper's second-biggest problem (after TPs) is that many heroes can turn around and kill Viper before Viper kills them. Blademail removes that option, forcing them to flee and die. In team-fights, you're quite likely to get focused due to your high DPS, and also get hit by random AoE, so Blademail helps there too.

[Rebonack]

I've been fiddling with Viper since the new patch. N-Toxin is a lot more fun than the old frenzy.

As for skills I usually shoot for Lvl3 Poison by level 5, Viper strike when it's available, and max N-Toxin first. Then go for Skin.

My item build generally starts with two gauntlets, two GG branches, a set of Tangos and a Salve.

Then get boots. Move speed is important. Then finish the Bracers. That's the build foundation right there. Where you go from there depends. Viper gets spectacular damage from N-Toxin, amounting to an average of +50 or so if you catch someone at full health. Because your damage from Toxin, Viper Strike, and Poison is so good right of the bat Viper is pretty much wide open. All DPS items work well on him. Which ones you get depends on your personal style and the enemy line-up.

I personally favor going Lothar's, Ptreads, and Orchid.

Stealth, backstab, silence, then viper strike. By the time the silence wears off your target will probably be so crippled that fleeing is the only viable option. And we all know how poorly fleeing works against Viper.

Lothar's grants some extra speed, burst damage, and survivability.

Orchid grants the deadly Soul Burn to keep foes from nuking you when you pop out of nowhere to murder them.

The DPS isn't quite as good as, say, going with MKB and Bfly, but never underestimate how powerful the element of surprise is.

[basher0811]

hey guy's!! viper is one of my favorite hero, can i combine mask of madness during autocasting poison attack, coz i luv the old viper that has A 1ST SKILL like madness. tnx! newbie

[Asian]

Originally Posted by basher0811

hey guy's!! viper is one of my favorite hero, can i combine mask of madness during autocasting poison attack, coz i luv the old viper that has A 1ST SKILL like madness. tnx! newbie

You cannot combine MoM with poison attack as it will not slow.

[Merkaba]

I usually babysit with viper, so I normally go 9 tangos/chick/ironwood branch/1 clarity and get boots asap. Then bottle and wards so I can whore runes and keep up my mana/health supply. I always carry TPs to get in ganks. I get 2 gauntlets and move ASAP to lothars, so I can flank in and out of battle at my own pace while supporting it with bottle. This also prevents largely me dieing in most circumstances and aids my chasing ability greatly. I don't bother getting much after this, but after this I would probably get treads or heart. Usually heart. Viper is a very efficient tank

If you are playing carry, you should still get the beforementioned, but move to bracers/str treads/butterfly or mkb/heart.

For skill build, max poison attack first with nethertoxin, then get your poison skin thingy, and then stats. All of these skills follow the logical 1-2-3 order so there's really not much to debate.

I attached a replay of me playing viper on one of my better baysits (except my first death, that was fail x_x)

[Antifate]

I really dislike using Viper's epic laning abilities for babysitting. WL, LoA, or even Omniknight is more suited to the task. I believe Viper should lane solo to quickly reach that critical level 6 where he becomes a ganking monster. Also, he can completely shut down the opposing side's solo, which is priceless.

As for items:

Wraiths - Self explanatory, these can be substituted for Bracers if you need the extra HP against a hard nuker mid (which isn't uncommon).

Perseverance - You should get this from the secret shop and check runes while you're at it. The HP regen is definitely useful for tower diving, and the mana regen is irreplaceable because Poison Attack costs 20 mana each hit. Plus, the extra damage adds to your insane last hitting.

Treads - Self explanatory. Your strength increases like a billion fold with faster attacks. By applying the bonus damage from Nethertoxin to more attacks, you become ridiculously strong.

Lothars - Great weapon. The new backstab damage is AWESOME and synergizes with Nethertoxin. Furthermore, you can use this as an escape mechanism. Even if they see you, the slow they receive from Corrosive Skin, Poison Attack, and/or Viper Strike will prevent them from following you, especially if you pass through other units.

Manta - Provides stats, more -ms, and illusions. All of these are A+ things to have.


After that you can work on any number of luxuries.

[dondy]

generally i would say viper doesn't need more items besides
boots of speed
2x bracer
to dominate in a game (so he can buy wards / dust / chicken / crow for the team)
but:

phase boots makes orb walking easier

my (in theory) pick would be necronomicon (lv2/3) rather than manta style since the manaburn synergizes well with nethertoxin, the ms bonus synergizes well with poison attack-orb walking, and finally the two minions synergize well with your slow while true sight helps to kill invis people without interruption, str bonus isn't too bad and int bonus helps too
thus overall synergy is great between those two

please note, in my opinion anything works on viper after 2x bracer and boots of speed - simply because his skillset is very very good but note

ias is pretty wastefull on any orb walker (that's why drows ult sucks bad - besides autoattack farming) and that's probably why viper got frenzy replaced

viper is no carry - don't farm him and equip him like that

my favourite allies would be:
huskar, zeus, naix, abbadon and ogre magi - while ogre magi is prolly the best, the others are a nasty combination too.

http://www.playdota.com/guides/143

[Merkaba]

Originally Posted by dondy

generally i would say viper doesn't need more items besides
boots of speed
2x bracer
to dominate in a game (so he can buy wards / dust / chicken / crow for the team)
but:

phase boots makes orb walking easier

my (in theory) pick would be necronomicon (lv2/3) rather than manta style since the manaburn synergizes well with nethertoxin, the ms bonus synergizes well with poison attack-orb walking, and finally the two minions synergize well with your slow while true sight helps to kill invis people without interruption, str bonus isn't too bad and int bonus helps too
thus overall synergy is great between those two

please note, in my opinion anything works on viper after 2x bracer and boots of speed - simply because his skillset is very very good but note

ias is pretty wastefull on any orb walker (that's why drows ult sucks bad - besides autoattack farming) and that's probably why viper got frenzy replaced

viper is no carry - don't farm him and equip him like that

my favourite allies would be:
huskar, zeus, naix, abbadon and ogre magi - while ogre magi is prolly the best, the others are a nasty combination too.

http://www.playdota.com/guides/143

spot on