[Faerie Dragon] Puck You Pals

[Rmndk™]

Puck the Faerie Dragon

by Rmndk™
Guide Version | Forum Version

English is not my native language and I don't use it as my everyday language. So please, if you find any grammar or spelling errors, the correction would be appreciated.

Everything You Need to Know First

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Alt-Tab Mini Guide
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This is only an alt-tab guide, use it if you forgot something and want to look it up fast.

Core


Luxury


Role: Ganker
Initiating Combo if you doesn't have other initiator, Orb -> Jaunt -> Rift -> Coil -> Other Item (Shiva Guinsoo.
Fleeing Combo, Orb (ALWAYS in a different direction from running path) -> Phase -> (Wait three seconds) Jaunt
Orb can be used for scouting
Rift's silence can interrupt channeling.
Autocast Phase Shift for Instant Damage spells (vendetta/wrath)
Phase shift to lose aggro (creeps/towers)
Dream Coil has ministun (when initially placed)

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Skill Build
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1. Illusory Orb
2. Phase Shift
3. Waning Rift
4. Waning Rift
5. Waning Rift
6. Dream Coil
7. Waning Rift
8. Illusory Orb
9. Illusory Orb
10. Illusory Orb
11. Dream Coil
12. Phase Shift
13. Phase Shift
14. Phase Shift
15. Stats
16. Dream Coil

First Illusory Orb, due to the common Level-one Ganks, it would serve as an escape mechanism and also for harrassing enemies from level 1.
One level of Phase Shift is got early to dodge some attacks, nukes, stuns, etc. It is a really important skill due to puck's fragility.
Then Waning Rift maxed first because 3 seconds silence is superior than 40 damage that Illusory Orb provide.
Do not get stats before his active skills because all of them are very important.
You can trade levels of Waning Rift for Illusory Orb against hard lane/dual-disable lane.

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Item Build
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For item stats and description, click Here

Starting Item




Chicken will make you always a step ahead than your enemy. Get it if your team doesn't get it. Puck is the perfect chicken-buyer as his farming skills would allow him to recover the gold loss pretty quick.
Wards in pub are used for scouting the rune spots also known as solo-mid-rune-whoring. In competitive games, Puck is a great candidate for First-ward buyer since as stated before, he has nice farming skills as well as the ability to escape level one ganks which comes in handy in case you want to place a ward in enemy's territory.
Tango/Clarity/Salve is your primary item for early game regen. Only buy one of each since you have a chicken to supply you with additional goods and the starting gold can be spend to some +stats items so you can harass/farm better.
Magic Stick is bought if you think you could face a spammer (Zeus, BB) on the middle lane. If you are not mid, its better to postpone it a bit since it costs a lot for a starting item.
GG Branch is the best +stats item in DotA. Spend the rest of your starting gold for it.

The Core



Those four are the only core items for Puck.

Travel is your primary objective since in the current metagame, pushing is one of the most important aspects and Puck has two creep-clearing skills to help defend or attack. Teleportation is the reason for getting BoT since it allows you to travel around at the speed of light.
Bottle is a no-brainer item for a ganker and since Punk is one, he should be runewhoring a lot during the game so bottle would be perfect for store/refill.
Magic Wand is just simply imbalanced with its burst heal and will probably save your ass a lot. Charging the Wand is a walk in the park since spells are just fucking everywhere. Just remember to always keep a fully charged Wand.
Ward because Puck is one of the best heroes to be the ward bitch. The reasons are (not because that maelk or kuro or popeye guy does it), but:
1. He has two farming skills that would make buying wards a breeze.
2. He is a heavy ganker so he roams around the map 24/7 which allows him to place wards meanwhile.
For those who are more interested in warding, I recommend you THIS guide.

Get some Bracers/Nulls/Circlets if you are having troubles with game progress.

The Luxury

Get one or two of those after your core.



Guinsoo is a great item. No exception on Puck.
Get it When: Your team needs another disable.

Bloodstone is a new great item for him with the recent changes. Since Puck will get tons of assists (since 3 of his skills are aoe), this item will solve all of his mana problems. Don't forget the reduced cooldown on death as well as the Bloodpact.
Get it When: You don't need the disable Guinsoo provides but you need HP.

Shiva for the obvious combo with his skill set and also for the tanking power granted by its armor bonus.
Get it When: You have enough HP to start turning that armor into good EHP. Get it also if there are a lot of heroes who depend on normal attack or if your team needs an initiator.

Blink Dagger is another great item for him. Phase Shift + Blink makes you invulnerable since the damage penalty on the dagger lasts 3 seconds which equals Phase Shift's duration. Dagger also serves as an alternative way to initiate or to escape when you have initiated a battle but your teammates have failed to follow.
Get it When: You are on fast-paced game. Also if you are destined to be the sole initiator of your team.

The Situational

Item listed here can be bought after the core and before the luxury. Just as its name, its situational.



Dagon for the burst damage and its smashing success in pubs. Only in pubs though. In competitive play, this item can only succeed if you against fragile team and you can get this item in 20 minutes or below.
Get it When: It's a pub game or competitive game when enemies' heroes are fragile.

Diffusal Blade is a very situational item for Puck. The feedback and the provided stats just don't suit him well since STR is what he needs. The only thing that connects this item to Puck is the Purge, which is an awesome ability for any ganker in DotA.
Get it When: Your teammate is a bitch who doesn't buy it when facing Warlock/Omni.

Orchid Malevolence's silence is the reason to buy this item, not the stats it provides. You can only afford to buy it when you already have enough hp.
Get it When: You need the silence.

Necromicon is generally a great item for him. The +stats are great and Puck has Dream Coil so the summons can attack your enemy freely. But to be honest, I rarely buy this thing because Guinsoo/Shiva + Blink dagger suits my playstyle more. Avoid this item if you are poor at microing.
Get it When: There are a lot of heroes that can go invisible. Also if you know that the enemy wards a lot.

Other items that are not mentioned are worth buying after you buy 3/4 of the luxury/situational. But if you manage to farm that much, it's mean that you are farm too much and need to do more ganking.

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Playing Puck
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Role: he is a pure ganker. Not a supporter, roamer, semi-carry, babysitter, etc. If your team doesn't have any hard initiator (e.g. Levi/Shaker), he gets the initiating job in team battles.

Drafting: Puck is a very flexible pick. He can also be a decent pick if you need a strong short lane solo. Due to his skills, he can fit any line-up and strats. But don't first pick him since he is not gamebreaking enough to worth the first pick.

Lane Choosing: Solo mid is great on Puck. It makes him faster to level six, allows him to rune-whore, and also gank the bottom or top lane.
Soloing short lane (top sentinel/bot scourge) is fine even in above pub game since you got two nice skill to escape.
Don't ever try to jungle or roam.
As a lane partner, you will prefer a hero with a long range stun (Raigor, Sand King) since you will be able to kill the enemies without being requred to move closer to them.

Animation Cancel: In my opinion Puck has a nice attack animation because it's easy to animation cancel it. Using Illusory Orb and Dream Coil cancels any previous orders (attack, movement, etc.), so resuming your attack/movement requires a new command.

Laning Phase: Give priority to last hit over deny and harrassing since you need to get lvl six fast. If you get a dual disable lane, play safe and use your Illusory Orb to get creep-kill. If it's a 2v1 lane, try to get kills whenever possible. Illusory Orb push the lane, but pushing the lane also gives you free time to check the runes, so you have to weigh both choices. When you are level six, it's time for non-stop ganking.

Ganking: Let Allow your teammate to disable the enemy first if you're not sure that your illusory will hit enemy. Always ganks everytime your Ultimate ready.

A Reference so you wouldn't have a fail-gank,

Team Battle: The enemy spellcaster is your primary target, so aim Illusory Orb and use Jaunt next to them. Best time to engage is when your team hard-initiator (Tide,Raigor,Warlock) initiates. If you don't have any hard-initiator, just initiate yourself with using Illusory Orb - Jaunt - Waning Rift - Dream Coil.

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Skill Exploitation
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Ethereal Jaunt


Use that pic to memorize when the orb vanishes.
This skill is an instant cast with no spell animation, so it swaps you instantly. And since it have instant cast animation, it can not be used to dodge spells.
If you attempt to use this spell without an active Illusory Orb, it will display a "No Illusory Orb found." error message.

To Harass
Always use this skill whenever your mana is full so you won't waste your mana regen. Also try to get creep kills as you harass the enemy. Let me show you an example,

To Escape
Simply target the orb to a cliff or an unreachable location when you're in pinch.
One of the best techniques of escaping with this skill is to shoot the orb and as it travels to your target location, use Phase Shift so the enemy can't stop you from using Ethereal Jaunt.

Another technique with this skill is to run in different direction than your orb so the enemy must choose between chasing you or guarding the orb. If they follow the orb, just don't swap yourself unless you cast it through cliffs or behind trees etc. If they follow you, which is most common, just swap yourself from a good distance.
An example of that technique.



To Initiate
Simply cast it to a bunch of enemies to initiate and don't forget to follow it with Waning + Coil. Don't forget to pop out behind the enemy so you can hero-block them thus preventing them from fleeing.

To Scout
The Orb gives sight to the area it passes through. If you think you are about to get ganked, it can be worth to throw it into the fog to see if someone is charging.

To Neutrals
When you're neutraling, position your orb so it will hit 2 camps at once. Very useful for quick cash.

Faster Fountain
Spam this skill to your fountain when you want to go home.

Waning Rift AoE

The AoE of this skill is quite big so don't be afraid of missing the enemy when you are chased. Also the combination of this skill and Illusory Orb can clear a creep wave in a split second.

Channeling Canceling
Since this skill has instant cast animation, don't hesitate to approach the enemy's Sand King who is starting to shake his tail.

Manual Cast
Use this skill on manual cast if you face enemies who have projectile skills.
Ex: Venge's Magic Missile, Sven's Bolt, Leoric's Blast, etc.

This skill can be also used to dodge AoE Spell.
Ex: Lina's Earth, Centaur's Stomp,etc.
The key to perfectly dodging an area stun is the caster animation. If you see Lina pulling her hands back, press F. If you see Centaur raising his axe, press F.

Auto Cast
Use this skill on auto cast if you facing enemies who have instant damage skills without any other effect like stun/ministun/etc.
Ex: Nerubian Assasin's Vendetta, Gondar's Windwalk and the variety, Lina's Laguna, Lion's Finger,etc.

Some special cases,
Nether Strike: the damage will be blocked but the knockback and stun effects still apply which means that it could break your shift.
Lightning Bolt: even if it has mini-stun effect, it's still blocked by autocast phase as long as you are in the damage range of static field.
Elune's Arrow: The damage apply first before the stun so it will blocked.

Aggro Lost
Phase Shift forces your foes to target someone else, so you can use this to lose tower/creeps/neutrals aggro. If a tower/creeps/neutrals are attacking you, simply use phase shift to force them to choose new target.

Snap Range

The screenshot above is to shows you the snap range. Don't forget that the snap range is longer than the AoE Range when you cast this skill.

General Use
Best use of this skill is to initiate team battles so the enemies won't be able to run away from your team combo. And also don't forget that this skill has a tremendous cast range so you can cast it to kill fleeing enemies. Remember that the coil only affects heroes that are inside the AoE range when you cast it. Heroes that come near the ball after you've cast it will not be affected.

Tower Ganking
When ganking enemies near their towers, place the coil as far as possible from the tower or the edge of their position so they won't be able to run to safety.

Save it
Don't forget that Coil has a ministun which is very good at interrupting TP-ing or channeling spells so it's better to save it if you gank someone in the forest since usually their first reaction is to run and search for fogged place to TP.

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Fucking Fags
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Nortrom the Fucking Silencer

Don't ever fucking pick Puck if this fucking hero is fucking picked. His fucking Last Word will fuck you up. You fucking use fucking Illusory Orb, fucking Jaunt to the fucking enemies to fucking initiate and boom, his fucking Last Word fucking silences you in the middle of the fucking enemies.

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Replays
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Puck By Swedic [6.61c,1.24,cm]

Item Build:

Puck by Misery [6.61c,1.24,cm]

Item Build:

Puck by Miracle [6.62b,1.24,cm]

Item Build:

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Credits
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Those Advanced Mechanics Guys for showing the aoe of puck's skills.
Those who give this guide C&C.
Ingolf's Guide to Puck for some sentences and inspiration: "My name is Puck. I am here to Fuck".
Thundercun7 for his inspiring feedback and fixing spelling and grammar errors.
Maya for fixing the rest of the spelling and grammar errors.
gwho for his awesome feedback

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Changelog
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- 2009 -

Juli

• 30th. Posted on PD.

August

• 1st. Added Ward, added damage and mana reference, some minor formatting update.
• 6th. Put in the list of Published Guides so I must edit a few things first.
• 8th. Put in the Skills AoE pic, some minor corrections.
• 10th. Coloured the skill build, made the aoe pic into a spoiler box, added extra info on skill exploitation section, and added ingolf to Credits.
• 11th. Added a replay and a link to the ward guide.
• 12th. Bolded the header of each section.
• 17th. Added Phase Shift Dodge Pic. Added Thundercun7 to Credits.
• 21th. Fixed some grammar errors, improved Core Item and Team Battle sections.
• 29th. Added a special cast to autocast phase subsection. Added a role subsection. Some errors fixed.
• 30th. Fixed some spelling and grammar errors, added To Neutrals subsection.

September

• 02th. Fixed the rest of the spelling and grammar errors. Added Maya to Credits.
• 15th. New Replay added
• 17th. Skill Build Revised
• 19th. Some improvement on guide visual. Added Bloodstone. Updated to 6.63
• 21th. Changelog Section Edited.
• 26th. Updated to 6.63b. Added pic to neutral and scout section.
• 28th. Added Drafting sub-section. Improve Lane Choosing sub section, Added Alt-Tab Mini Guide.
• 30th. Revamped the Item Build Section

Oktober

• 02nd. Added gwho to credits, added quote tags to skill esploit subsection.

[Rmndk™]

this is me,the kuya guy, and this is not a copy-paste Guide.

Thanks for your attention,
Rmndk™.

[Eumellein]

I still want to know how you get 300 more damage as soon as you hit level 11. Referring to:



Also protest against Waning Rift>Illusory Orb. Sure Silence is good and Orb costs also more Mana but still you need to get next to your target which is quit risky as Puck. At least for me and the majority of competitive players it is way easier to initiate with Illusory Orb (blink is a different story). Anyway both builds will work in the majority of cases therefore it is up to your playstyle.

[Rmndk™]

that Must be a miscalculation. I'll try to fix it ASAP.

Thanks for your feedback,
Rmndk™

[ResQ]

banned? I lol'd.

[AduhAwas]

No he's not. But why repost it with a new account? You do know you can rename yourself and that PD doesn't want you having multiple accounts, right?

[Crescent]

i'm thinking about how puck get the hp with that early items... if opposited team has a nuker, that's the problem... :-?

[AduhAwas]

Really the best solution to a nuke heavy team is a) Magic Stick (but everyone gets that anyways) and b) bulk up with a bracer or two if you're having real problems.

[173.GoodOldKuya]

I make a new account because i bored with this name and i am already rename this account and as you already know,we arent allowed to get name change again.

And thanks evil for answer the question.

[AduhAwas]

How the hell do you have 42 votes when you posted this guide just a few days ago?

[DarkMedina]

If you lure 2 neutrals camps together, you can Rift both of them and kill all the creeps with Orb. Awesome to farm at mid/late game.

[i.am.hybrid]

Nit-picking the guide...

Skill Build is standard but in regards to your item build later on, I would prefer Bracers if I max out orb since I am purposefully going to be tanking damage for a short while and because Orb has a short cooldown and a fixed manacost at all levels. While I would prefer nulls for Waning Rift because of the mana cost increase...

Get some Bracers/Nulls/Circlets if you are having troubles with game progress.

Bracers or Nulls? Having trouble surviving would be Bracers. Having trouble killing would Nulls but specify anyway...

I am not a fan of Bloodstone but how about a Linken Sphere in your build? Even just a mention for a double block

Laning Phase: Give priority to last hit over deny and harrassing since you need to get lvl six fast. If you get a dual disable lane, play safe and use your Illusory Orb to get creep-kill. If it's a 2v1 lane, try to get kills whenever possible. Illusory Orb push the lane, but pushing the lane also gives you free time to check the runes, so you have to weigh both choices. When you are level six, it's time for non-stop ganking.

I really had a hard time getting this strategy down in my head. This is typically explaining or even assuming the skill build is in favor of Illusory Orb rather than Rift. Can you make the comparison? 60 damage is hardly pushing enough to check for runes unless it's level 2 (3 is better) and, even so, Rift is hard to use in a 2v1 lane. Much less against a range hero. More rift in this explanation perhaps?

Everything else is perfect, teaching how to use his skills and such. Might I add in "Fucking Fags" -- Radiance...

Well, I'll play Puck again soon and just so you know, I level up Orb over Rift just for ganks. Rift is more useful during mid game ganks...

[Spellsy]

Decent guide, I think personally it is formatted / looks bad. But perhaps that's personal preference.

Anyway, to the content. I think your item core is bad. with bottle/magic/ward straight to BoT leaves you with no HP on a hero that is built to dive heroes, yes he has phase, but you can't phase some disables (cm's bite, shackles, etc.) you need some bracers (or some sort of item with hp) to survive one stun or some auto attacks. Going BoT burns 2200 without fulfilling the role your items need to provide, some survivability. This is the same reason I am against blink.

Travel is your primary objective since in the current metagame, pushing is one of the most important aspects and Puck has two creep-clearing skills to help defend or attack. Teleportation is the reason for getting BoT since it allows you to travel around at the speed of light.

I find this bad reason, he shouldn't be pushing lanes alone, even if he has escape mechanisms he doesn't need alot of farm (aka the reason why he is warder) if ANY reason to get BoT it would be so you could play a fast pace ganking style.

Not to mention the stealing of farm from carrys / feeding farm to their carrys (push lane lets them farm ez)

Edit: i also find your "fucking fags" section to just be unprofessional, it just makes you look bad IMO, but maybe that's just me.. I find nothing wrong with cursing, but everything has time and place, this is not one of them....

[i.am.hybrid]

i also find your "fucking fags" section to just be unprofessional, it just makes you look bad IMO, but maybe that's just me.. I find nothing wrong with cursing, but everything has time and place, this is not one of them....

Ingolf's Guide to Puck for some sentences and inspiration: "My name is Puck. I am here to Fuck".

Fucking Fags section rofls!

I don't like the cussing but I pretend it isn't there...

[stickynote]

great team hero, awesome pusher, beastly farming skills

[Wintermutant]

Nice fucking fags section and nice guide, why cant i vote?

[IdiotInBox[O.o]]

Ok in my opinion this is a great guide. I believe you should add a situational item such as a simple bracer or something... Puck (as you said) is a fragile hero. Bracers help. Also, for replays look up kev's puck. Its a monster :P

[cr4y88]

Thx for awesome guide!
I learn a lot from ur guide!

[XenoBlaze]

Kuroky's Puck also some monster

[Mr. Foxxie]

I believe Blink Dagger is a core on Puck. But you put it under luxury people may confuse it with an item that you may/may not get, meaning optional item. I suggest you put it under core, even before you get BoT.