CONTENTS

1. Introduction
2. Skill Set
3. Skill Build
4. Metamorphosis and Manta Style
5. Early Game
6. Middle Game
7. Late Game
8. Allies, Enemies and Rivals

INTRODUCTION

The Soul Keeper. Late game tank, pusher, DPS. In fact, without any items or abilities, Terrorblade has the highest DPS of any hero at level 25. However, TB is initially extremely fragile as well as utterly useless, but its high growth in stats means it can easily become extremely powerful. It has one of the lowest base attack times, and the highest agility gain of any hero, hence lategame it will attack insanely fast.

In my opinion Terrorblade, or TB as commonly known, is the best carry hero. Why? It is the only ranged illusion hero (Yes, Terrorblade is melee, but in ALL major fights you will be using Metamorphosis). The other ranged hero capable of making illusions is Morphling. However Morphling’s Replicate cannot replicate itself (unless it has Manta Style) and its range is much lower than Terrorblade’s. In fact, with the exception of soul steal which, if you follow my guide correctly, you will not take anyway, all of TB’s abilities get better with better items. TB has always been regarded as one of the strongest late gamers, along with Spectre and Void. However, it has not seen much play since its movespeed nerf.


I have played so many games. So so many games. Where someone randoms or picks TB. And plays so noobishly it makes so angry. Even experienced players, who have good creep stats, play TB the wrong way and wastes this hero. This is one reason why I have written the guide.
Terrorblade does not have a stun ( Well, sunder has a ministun, but this is usually insignificant). Does not have a slow. Has very poor ganking skills, and generally useless early to mid game. But the one thing it has is the attack command. And when set up, that is just about all you need.
So what is Terrorblade? It is a PURE CARRY HERO. Apart from if you want to mess about using a sunder dagon build, or in wtf mode and spam images to crash everyone’s computer. But for all other situations, it is to be played as the primary carry. If you have spectre or luna in your team too, they go gank. You farm. You are carry. They are backup carries and will fulfil this duty only if you die too much (or somehow they get godlike). If your team is owning and don’t really need your help you farm. And farm. And farm. If game is quite even you farm. And farm. And farm. If you are losing a little, and have some towers down, you still farm, coming out on certain occasions with metamorphosis and image to defend. If you have a suspicion all heroes are out to gank you, use images to scout and call your team mates. But yes, when you can do so safely, you farm. If your teammate is getting chased, and you can go help him but risk dying, you don’t go. And continue farm. I do admit playing Terrorblade is rather dull early game, and sometimes mid game, but when you go own from about 25 – 30 minutes onwards it will feel great.

With most heroes, there are one or sometimes two outstanding primary abilities that should be maxed early. With Terrorblade, however, there is no obvious candidate for such an ability. Soul Steal can at best help keep you in lane, but its channelling property makes it an easy target to stuns and focus fire. Images are too weak early game, and the cooldown of Metamorphosis is just too long to be spammed. So what do you max? Well, the answer is, for most of the time, the yellow point, i.e. the stats point.

SKILL SET

Soul Steal

Except in exceptional circumstances, this skill should NOT be taken. If it is, MAXIMUM of two levels can be taken early game. Level 3 and 4 of this skill should ALWAYS be learnt when Terrorblade is level 24 and 25.

Why would anyone learn soul steal?

Conjure Image

This means Terrorblade’s images deal the most percentage damage for any non-ultimate illusion skill.

Conjure Image, Terrorblade’s best skill:

Metamorphosis

It also gives + 20 movement speed (not percent, otherwise it would be imba), + 1 base damage, extra 1/50/100/150 HP, as well as 3 HP regeneration per second instead of the standard 0.25. Note in this form the base attack time goes up slightly. (1.6 instead of 1.5)

Metamorphosis is perhaps the most important skill to use correctly:

Sunder

Allowed targets: Heroes, allied or enemy, including illusions. Ministun for both Terrorblade and target hero. Magic immune units will not change HP, but the hero which is not magic immune will still change HP.

A few tips on how to use sunder:

In my mind, TB’s ultimate is metamorphosis, and this is really an ultimate when you use metamorphosis in conjunction with manta style. In fact, the recent change manta style has undergone immensely benefits TB: Yasha is always a good cheap item for TB to farm out, and ultimate orb is also a good item for TB. However it does mean my old way of playing TB via diffusal blade to manta style is now obsolete.

Attribute Bonus

And now the skill which is so often overlooked:

SKILL BUILD

You can learn the skills in almost any order you like, as long as you satisfy the following constraints:
• Soul Steal is learnt last.
• Sunder level 2 and level 3 is obtained at Level 11 and Level 16
• Maximum of 1 Level of Conjure Image until Level 12.
• Metamorphosis is maxed out by Level 12
• At least 1 level of Conjure Image by Level 10
Normally early game, while in a dual lane/jungle it is skilled like:



A good TB player does not follow any particular skill build; Many times it depends on the situation, and also on personal preference. As long as you follow the constraints, you should be fine

My Skill Build is such that I max stats even before conjure image as I will almost always go radiance. However, in more competitive games, I will mostly max conjure image first. The skill build is very flexible; you can pretty much learn what you want except for soul steal.

Exceptions: If you have Crystal Maiden in your team, it is acceptable to max out Conjure Image while jungling. Same if there is a KOTL to babysit you. But really KOTL should illuminate away while you jungle, buy your items, then ALT QQ. . Also if you are solo mid soul steal of two levels can be taken, but better if you can do without them. Really, the only time I use soul steal early game is when I misclicked.

METAMORPHOSIS AND MANTA STYLE

Now that manta style is reworked, manta is now a must item for TB. It gives good stats, movement speed, attack speed, image creation. What more do you want? However, as ranged illusions are much better than normal illusions, the question arises whether you can use manta to create ranged TB. Manta style is different from conjure image and illusion rune, it dispels most effects on TB. This includes metamorphosis. So if you normally just use metamorphosis, then manta, you will have 3 melee TB. And metamorphosis in cooldown. Not a good idea. However, if you shift queue this, then you can get ranged TB with manta:

Holding down SHIFT, move TB to required location, and BEFORE TB reaches that location, press metamorphosis, then manta style. Holding down SHIFT all the way through.

It is easier if you know the shortcut key for metamorphosis and manta style. (default is T and numpad whatever slot manta is in). Note that this technique also works on Dragon Knight and Lycan and Keeper of the Light and Batrider. It is quite funny for KOTL actually.

If you have manta, make sure in every team fight you do this: get 3 TB all in ranged form with manta, and immediately after another one with conjure image. Note that if you ever see an illusion rune, you can use metamorphosis and then get the illusion rune. Those illusions will also be in ranged form, and will last 70 seconds!! More than your own metamorphosis! However you cannot use this in conjuction with manta as manta images only last 25 seconds, unless you are fighting near the rune spot, in which case you can get 7 ranged illusions!

EARLY GAME

Here are possible starting items in more detail:


So, if you picked TB, I recommend these starting items(if you jungle) If you lane you will be 3 gold short. So get slippers instead of circlet. Or ask an ally to kindly donate a tango:


But a different combination is also okay, a few more branches or slippers perhaps, but NOT the recipe. Please.
Do not buy chicken: with quelling blade you cannot afford chicken as well. Also, you are carry, so try to get teammates to get you one. Otherwise do not bother, at least not to start with.

Laning/Jungling

Dual Lane

If you are in a dual lane, try go with a support hero if you can. Also try go to the “long lane”: it is safer as if the lane goes too far you can pull creeps. Your job is too last hit as many creeps as possible. Early kills is just wishful thinking normally, so don’t bother hit enemy heroes. It is usually the support hero’s job to do that, which is why Warlock is so imba as a laning support. Do not get killed. Even though this is the case for most heroes, it is even more so with TB. If an enemy hero kills you and also dies, it will cost you more as your items will take longer to farm. I am afraid laning well comes with experience, especially for a weak early game TB. Creep pull is probably the best option if you are against good ranged laners: Hit the nearest creep camp at the 14-16 or 44-46 second mark (sentinel) or 11-15 or 41-45 mark (scourge), then retreat to pull them onto your lane so that your creeps will help you go creeping. Last hit all creeps. If you want, you can send an illusion to do this: However this requires good micro. Even better, you can double up on creeps by attacking and then retreating at 53 second mark, then another wave of creeps will spawn while you aggro the current ones, so when you next pull at 15 second mark you will go kill two waves of creeps. {Note: for sentinel creep pulling is notoriously more difficult, and make sure you cut down the lone tree on the side of the lane. Also cut one of the trees behind the creep camp. This way you can pull more creeps, as well as allowing you faster jungling if you go jungle.} For more on this go read a creep camp guide. Once you reach level 5 in a dual lane, you can probably farm faster while jungling. But really depends on each game. But remember: Free farm is always better than jungle, unless you cannot last hit creeps as you are lazy.

Suicide Jungling

Suicide Jungling: If you go jungle, straight away, at level 1, expect to die. If people call you noob ignore them. They are noob for being ignorant of suicided jungling. Suiciding while jungling only loses you gold: it does not benefit the opposing team whatsoever. In fact they might laugh and expect you to be noob and don’t gank you while you jungle, all the better. When you are levels 1-5, if you are low on health, buy items near fountain until you have less than 50 gold, then go suicide. You will lose less than 50 gold, and will have a free trip back to the fountain. Otherwise walking all the way back is just too much time wasted: This way it is faster. Make sure you do buy items before you die though. You can always wait a few seconds before suiciding if you are a few gold short of a desired more expensive item. (Like Boots or Belt of giant strength) Once you are beyond level 6, do not die in the jungle. Walking back is better. Once you are about level 7, you will gain gold and experience much faster if you jungle, even if you are in a solo lane. Unless, of course, no one is in lane and you can free farm. In general, from about level 7 onwards you will either be jungling , free farming or pushing a tower. This way it ensures your HP is quite high all the time. If your HP ever gets quite low in lane, it is likely you will be quickly ganked, so it is best not to lane if there are heroes there. Fast jungling generally comes with experience. You can read some jungling guides. There are a few things to note when jungling:
1. The small blue satyrs can purge your images. Kill them first before you use conjure image.
2. You can stack and pull creeps with illusions.
3. When attacking a camp with centaur/ursa, do not get more than 3 images; the will stomp you. Just get your current image to tank, and create another when it is destroyed.
4. Use your Quelling blade to cut trees to move faster between camps.

Soloing

No real difference from dual lane, except that you can max metamorphosis to spam it. You will level faster so it is only advisable to spam it if you are solo mid. Because you will be an average of two levels higher mid game, in certain situations you can level soul steal twice. Against heroes which have skills which are easier to use if you are stationary, don’t level soul steal. (VS Mirana, Pudge, Lina, Lesherac etc) If you can, do not level soul steal. Last hitting is your main aim. Unless you think you will do more damage than the enemy hero, do not target the enemy. If the opposing hero plays well, you will be mainly last hitting under towers and in ranged form. Last hitting under the first tower is easy, as you have quelling blade. For last hitting, usually it is better to move around rather than pressing stop and letting go as enemy heroes will target you if you stay still. You can learn sunder and survive with it, going aggressive with Sunder early game is risky: You might not get the kill (The enemy hero has 33% health remaining) and get yourself killed or back down to low HP. Early game sunder is for survival only, or in rare cases, ganking. Do no expect to take anyone out alone. In fact, if you jungle, you will not need to level sunder until level 10.

MIDDLE GAME

Footwear

Below are the two main builds, mix and match, especially with the boots, is fine normally. Generally, if you have a better game you go the first build to farm even faster. Otherwise the second build is more suitable. Note that I put these as mid game items: I assume you farm fast, and can obtain these through the mid game, and definitely have them by the start of the end game.

Ricing Mid Game Build

Standard Build

During mid game, you should be farming as much as you can. Your illusions will also get stronger and may have the capability to farm by itself, so you can send it to weaker creep camps or onto lanes to obtain bonus gold. Note that if you have radiance, illusion farm will increase by at least 3 times, if you took my advice of only 1 level of conjure image, and if you keep spamming illusions.
Once you have one major item (Radiance, Manta or S & Y usually, though the last is not recommended), you can also participate in team push or gank. You and your images will create an enormous amount of DPS against towers, and if your allies can stun or slow a hero, once you focus it, it will more than likely die. Note that both in ganking and pushing, it is much much better if you are in ranged form, hence the importance of metamorphosis. Think carefully about your HP if you are considering using sunder: A well timed stun when you are in red health can see you unable to utilise your ultimate.
But generally, the aim of the mid game is to farm as fast as possible. In creeps, neutrals, towers or heroes; by any means necessary. Do not overextend yourself in chasing heroes: you lose time and you may die. Just carry on farming, or if you have radiance, send an image after the hero.
However, it is still important to play passive mid game:

Do not go near enemy heroes alone, do not attack heroes unless you are SURE you can kill them, just AVOID being hit by any spells. Harrassing them will cost you farm time and health, which in turn costs you more farm time.

LATE GAME

Below are just some of the possible builds, with items from 3rd slot onwards obtained in shown order.

Fast Farm & Push Build

Max Stats Build

DPS Build

Many other combinations or builds are possible: But it is best if you have Travel, Manta, Butterfly and Skadi first. The rest is up to you. For DPS get Buriza/MKB/Divine. For survivability get Heart or Satanic. For fountain get Cuirass. For fun….get anything you want.

Late game is when Terrorblade is strongest: All the skills you use are stronger, notable the images. You will probably be the team’s main DPS, and also possibly the team’s best tank. If you farm really well you can often push alone and kill all that stand in your way; Getting Ultra Kill and Rampage is not that difficult. If you died too many times, however, you will probably need to push with allies, but it is still probably the case that you are the single most influential hero in the field. Remember to use manta in conjunction with meta in every team fight. Once you have skadi and you focus a hero, it will pretty much die before getting out of your range especially if you get some support.

Also, Terrorblade is the most fearsome of pushers. Often if the enemy is concentrating in taking down your towers, you can often go take down theirs; It takes a whole team of them, while it takes one of you. And you even do it faster. Many times I have played against teams who underestimate the power of this one hero in pushing. While they are slowly pushing a 5v4 advantage, I have already taken down 1 lane. If they TP back, they must do so in numbers, or risk getting killed instantly. So TB has travel too, you pushing alone is pretty much equivalent to 5 of them pushing.
If your team is owning late game, you can actually kill the enemy fountain. Killing the fountain does not obtain anything for you at all, it only shows how dominant you are, and also that whenever their heroes spawn, the will have no mana regeneration and they have no place to heal. Plus the fact that if you stay in the area afterwards they will die on resurrection.
Killing the fountain requires you to have at least butterfly, manta, skadi, heart/satanic/cuirass and also allies to tank for you. LoA/Omni with refresher is best. If not, any other high HP/armour hero will do. You will also need the Manta/Meta combo. When the fountain starts hitting the real TB, you can summon illusion and the sunder the illusion when you are getting towards low health. In any case, by the second time you properly attack the fountain, you will probably be able to take it down. I have done this on numerous occasions, but usually this requires forward planning with teammates.

ALLIES, ENEMIES AND RIVALS

As a conclusion, we will look at the pros and cons