*: this is under construction. Though I am not against comments im planning to ignore comments until I get the bulk of my guide applied.


Assassin Power Unleashed



Phantom Assassin (or PA) is arguably one of the strongest heroes of the game, though not seen as such by professional players. Her abilities are so simple, yet compliment each other amazingly well. With professional skill, PA could definitely be seen in competitive games. Though I dont play enough online to play competitively, I have developed a lot of strategies that a competitive player may try her with. My aim is to push her to see competitions even after I am done.

Pros

[+]Basically the best AGI gain/AGI start in the game (only lv21+ Terrorblade and lv4- SA have greater core AGI!)
[+]Above avg MS
[+]Good base armor... even for an AGI char.
[+]One of the best chasers in the game
[+]Great in late game and a Force of Destruction very late game
[+]Can become a disabler/nuker's worst nightmare, who are generally nightmares for everyone else
[+]Very Spammable mini-nuke early game

Cons
[-]Weak in beginning game though has an average STR overall
[-]very often the target of ganks since she's a hard carry
[-]MIGHT not become very effective in a very short game
[-]Has THE WORST INT gain/INT start in the game (only tied with Troll Warlord!)
[-]Below avg starting damage

The Skills

Stifling Dagger


Hurls a dagger which deals minor pure damage and slows the unit's movement speed for a short duration.

This is the greatest mini-nuke in the game, hands down. It harbors up to 80dmg to enemy heroes (double dmg for creeps, great for early game use), excellent casting range, avoids being canceled by most escape methods (ie rofl, jump, blink), gives vision upon its whole chase (good for anti-juking), lures creeps effectively, great for last hitting, good slow against heroes, low mana cost, and low cooldown. This is an exceptional amount of pros for 1 skill to harbor, the only con being the lower damage.

Phantom Strike [B]

Teleports to a unit and attacks it. Gains 100% attack speed for 3 seconds while attacking that same target. Maximum of 4 attacks.

This is a powerful skill. It allows you to instantly blink to any unit and if the unit is foe, attacks with a small dose of Battle Trance. From my experience, you get 4 low-cooldown attacks, which means if your AS is fast enough and your opponent doesn't move far, you'll get in a 5th attack. Note the cast distance increases by 100 each level.

Blur


The Phantom Assassin becomes hard to see by blurring her body. Some enemy attacks miss.

As most good players know, this skill is overrated thanks to an annoying green line. Early game, it is only good for a big boost of evasion. However in mid-late game and forward the 'blur' part becomes more useful while evasion becomes more useless (except to high dpsers with no mkb and creeps/towers). This skill can increase what nearly no other skill can do: reaction time.

Coup De Grace


Mortred has refined her hero-killing skills to a high degree.

The best critical in the game. Need I say more?


Skill Build*
Lane Pushing/Defensive Build
1. Dagger
2. Blur
3. Dagger
4. Phantom Strike
5. Dagger
6. Coup De Grace/Phantom Strike
7. Dagger
8. Phantom Strike
9. Phantom Strike
10. Phantom Strike/Coup De Grace
11. Coup De Grace
12. Blur
13. Blur
14. Blur
15. Stats
16. Coup De Grace
17-25. Stats

Reason:


Desperado:
1. Dagger
2. Phantom Strike
3. Phantom Strike
4. Dagger
5. Dagger*
6. Phantom Strike
7. Phantom Strike
8. Dagger
9. Stats*
10. Coup De Grace*
11. Coup De Grace*
12. Stats
13. Stats
14. Stats
15. Blur
16. Coup De Grace*
17. Blur
18. Blur
19. Blur
20-25. Stats

Reasons:


Jungling Build
1. Phantom Strike
2. Dagger
3. Dagger/Blur
4. Blur/Dagger
5. Dagger
6. Coup De Grace
7. Dagger
8. Phantom Strike
9. Phantom Strike
10. Phantom Strike
11. Coup De Grace
12. Blur
13. Blur
14. Blur
15. Stats
16. Coup De Grace
17-25. Stats

Reasons:

Defensive Pros:
[+]Can delay the game into the late game where you are strongest
[+]If starting game was bad catching up is possible
[+]Less Deaths
[+]More consistent, good farming

Aggressive Pros:
[+]More Hero kills
[+]Faster leveling if ganks succeed, even if you didnt get the kill
[+]Great early game becomes extreme late game
[+]Still Effective if the game looks like it'll be short

The Cons are the opposites of the other's pros.

Reasons:

For Desperado (Hyper aggressive):


Item Build*

Starting Items (Safe Mode):
1 Gauntlet (to become bracer)
2 GGs
1 Quelling Blade
1 Tango

Starting Items (Gamble Mode):
Nothing!

Starting Items (Anti-Int/Range):
1 Poor Man's Shield
1 Tango

If you're not playing -em (and most pros dont except to have fun), I highly recommend Gamble Mode, as farming up PA's highly-expensive build, you need every ounce of gold you can get and that makes Safe Mode almost worthless. If you're actually looking at building the Anti-Int starter, keep in mind that you are basically broke in terms of getting your core for a while and will not work if you're even slightly reckless once those tangoes are gone. It really pays off during the early-mid transition and even partway through the mid game. Safe mode though is good for survivability and Quelling Blade does a descent job with damage seeing as you dont have great early starting damage anyway.

Phase 1: Baby with a Blade- Levels 1-7

Phase 2: Farmer Brown- Levels 8-14*
Phase 3: Time to Shine- Levels 15-21*
Phase 4: DONT PET THIS KITTY! 22+!*

Comboes and Usages:*
Dagger

Phantom Strike

Blur

CdG




"A Dagger, A Blink, A Boom"
The above description says it all. This is PA's most common (and almost the only ever mentioned) combo. Basically you slow the enemy down in order to get all of your strikes in from Phantom Strike. Odds are you will critical atleast once for greater damage.



"How is this different from the 1st combo?"
Well this combo has 2 uses... 1 you can save allies by daggering oncoming enemies and blinking to your ally (assuming you cant kill the enemy). But 2. This combo is also used like the first... basically you blink to the enemy and if they attempt to escape, you dagger them from point blank range and continue to attack. Keep in mind Phantom Strike lasts for 3 seconds as long as you attack the same target, and Dagger does not interrupt this process.



"All the Stealth you could want without actually being invisible"
This is a SA-like combo where you stick to blinking around and using your lack of visibility to your advantage. This combo has 2 uses: 1 this is your juking combo: you're harder to spot as it is and if you blink to another target, you are nearly IMPOSSIBLE to find after that, especially if you blink into a large group. 2. This combo takes advantage of another factor that few if any skills or combos ever use: reaction time. The less likely an opponent is to notice you and respond, the more strikes you will get in uncontested, and by the time you actually ARE noticed, it will be too late.


'Just for fun' Section:*

Though Im not being serious with this in any way, this section is dedicated to more crazy ideas I come up with, just to open DotA for more possibilities. They arent completely stupid (or maybe they are lol) but if you want to mess around and have a wild game on the pubs then this is the section for you. This section is also intended not to influence ratings unless you want to give a higher rating b/c you liked an interesting idea or you laughed at my expense. Yeah laugh a little... it's a game after all! Course who knows... some of these ideas may actually work with a little more practice...

Hand of Midas

Changelog:
2/25: One month of little editing, so I have slipped to where most people wont comment on my guide until it is published. Good. Completing Gameplay, combos, and friends section, possibly editing guide layout. Pics to come soon.
1/25: Edited various typos, better descriptions given. More emphasis on 'fun' in the 'just for fun' section, as some people seem to believe that using Hand of Midas is an actual build of mine. Lol Silly people...
1/21: v0.2: Guide Begun on All-Stars. Added Skill Build And Midas section for fun. Strategies portion of guide being implemented off-site.
1/7: v0.1. The Guide has Begun.