Table Of Contents
1. Introduction
2. Nevermore's Story
3. Pros and Cons
4. Stats
5. Nevermore's skillset And Skill builds
6. Items
7. Play Style
8. Good Allies and Enemies
9. Replays
10. Final Words

Alright, let's get started, this is my first time writing a guide, so feel free to comment on it !

Introduction
Nevermore is considered a very powerful hero with the nuking powers of a early gamer and the DPS of a lategamer, when used properly, nevermore could 1 hit ko most paper heroes with Requiem of Souls.

PlayDota Nevermore Hero introduction
Shadow Fiend's only defense lies in his superb offense. After each life he takes, he traps their soul to empower his attack damage with Necromastery. This allows him to amass high attack damage. His ultimate Requiem of Souls can summon these souls out to inflict great damage and slow anyone close to Nevermore. His unique Shadowraze allows him to blast opponents in small areas, at three separate distances. The Presence of the Dark Lord also makes enemies vulnerable to physical damage, passively reducing their armor. Deadly from a number of distances, and vulnerable if caught off guard, Nevermore's positioning in battle is of utmost importance.

Nevermore's Story
A demon of the burning legion so abhorred that he makes the skin of even his fellow demons crawl, Nevermore is a creature of the shadows that consumes the souls of those around him. When the Shadow Fiend comes forth to battle, he augments his power with the souls he has consumed, bearing down on his enemies with spiritually enhanced attacks and powerful spiritual blasts. The Shadow Fiend is a terrifying opponent whom few have survived, and those who have perished under his tyranny have faced the most despicable fate of all.
Sounds rather scary heh !

Pros and Cons

Pros
-Destroys any lane easily
-Super farming capability
-Ultimate which could deal upto 2400 damage.
-Capable of having up to + 60 damage at level 8
-Quite high stat growth per level
Cons
-Dying is very irratating to shadow fiend as he loses his souls
-Weak base damage, almost as low as techies
-Very low starting stats
-Could not gank people easily due to lack of disables
-Low base armor for a agility hero

Shadow fiend has pretty many Pros and Cons, when played properly, you could ignore most of the cons.

Stats
Strength:15 + 2
Agility: 20 + 2.4
Intelligence 18 + 2

Well, just look at his stats, 15 Str ? Well, luckily he had a pretty good strength and agility growth compared to some agility heroes.

Advanced Statistics
Affiliation: Scourge
Damage: 35-41
Armour: 1.9
Movespeed: 300
Attack range: 500
Attack animation: 0.5 / 0.54
Casting animation: 0.67 / 0.4
Base attack time: 1.7
Missile speed: 1200
Sight range: 1800 / 800

Nevermore's skillset and Skillbuild

ShadowRaze

Gives the Shadow Fiend the power to desecrate regions in front of him at varying distances.

Ability Hotkey: Z(200 range), X(450 range), C(700 range)

This is shadow fiend main nuke, a 3 in 1 nuke having separated cooldown means, you could use each of them at different times.
Upon maxing shadowraze, you could use two raze (x) and (z) to clear a entire creepwave when aimed properly. During early game, it hurts alot to some pretty good lane controllers like viper, etc. Shadowrazes could be canceled before Shadow fiend does the casting animation, which is Shadow Fiend raising up his hands. Before that hit the S(stop) button. Even though shadow raze is only 75 mana. Do not spam it too often unless you have a bottle.


Necromastery
Ability type: Passive
Whenever the Shadow Fiend kills a target, he stores the unfortunate soul inside of him. For each stored soul he gains 2 bonus damage until his own death releases half of them from bondage.




Presence of the DarkLord
Ability type: Passive
The presence of such a horrible creature terrifies nearby enemies, reducing their armor.




Requiem Of Souls
Ability Type: Active
Summons evil spirits around you dealing damage to units in the area. Number of spirits is related to the number of souls stored and the movement/damage reduction is related to the distance from the Shadow Fiend. Lowers movement speed and damage of nearby units. The closer the units are the greater the effect.



SkillBuild
1. Necromastery
2. Shadowraze
3. Shadowraze
4. Necromastery
5. Shadowraze
6. Necromastery
7. Shadowraze
8. Necromastery
9. Requiem of Souls
10. Presence of the Dark Lord
11. Requiem of Souls
12-14. Presence of the Dark Lord
15. Stats
16. Requiem of Souls
17-25. Stats

Necromastery is taken at level 1 since level 1 of shadowraze is quite useless during early game. During level 1, try to last hit as much as possible to collect souls and always remember to deny as they give you souls as well ! After that, shadowraze will be max immediately and will be at max level at level 7. Requiem of souls is not gotten on level 6 as you wont have enough souls to deal that much damage, even triple razes will do much more damage !

Items

Well, since i play in pubbies, and maybe sometimes in competitive scenes. If you play in pubs, your item build should be,


If your playing in a competition, where there are supporter/gankers buying a courier for the whole team,






When you earn enough money, you should buy a and a


Your Boots.
Most of the time, i would go with as Nevermore would have no problems farming it, and with it your farming and pushing capability will be increased. But if your having a rather bad early game( dying, unable to farm ) going for would be the best choice.

Positioning item
Shadow fiend needs it badly, as a well positioned Requiem of souls, will probably kill the whole team. So, we have two choices here, or . I myself prefer blink dagger over Lothar's edge, why ? Because of the limits of lothar's edge give. Juking with kelen dagger is much easier as all you need is to outran the enemy for 3 sec and blink + teleport scroll. Also dagger is much cheaper, meaning you could start using and ultimate and kill off heroes much earlier, which means you have more gold !

Magic Immunity
Now off to the most important item for shadow fiend.

Well the Black king bar is the most important item for shadow fiend, why? Cause of this, stunners wont be able to aim you, some ultimate wont be able to damage you, and most importantly, you are able to cast Requiem of souls! Most of the time, get this after having your positioning item !

Manta Style

In most games, i will buy manta style for shadowfiend. A bkb+blink+mantastyle+yourchickendance is just devastating.
And that is not all, giving you a 10 % ms boost combined with lothar's edge and Boots of travel you will have a HUGE movement speed and capable of outrunning heroes if your using lothar's edge. Manta Style also gives you some survivorbility. The images also helps you with your dps and due to your stat gain, the images are ''quite'' tanky and have some dps due to Presence of the DarkLord.

The orbs .
Most of the time i will get my orbs after getting bkb, if you get stunned, then you wont be able to attack, which means you wont be able to activate those orb effects !


One of the most preferred orbs of Sf players ! -11 armor is just hurting to strength heroes and intelligence heroes wont even stand a chance against you !


Helm of the dominator is an okay orb effect for nevermore due to his large amount of damage, and when upgraded to satanic, see your hp from red turning into full health in seconds.


This item, though it is seldom purchase by sf players, it could act as a - second bkb, well what i meant is, when the passive is casted static shield, it hurts alot when people are focusing on you, and if they are not focusing on you, well they get owned in their ass.


A manaburn and some agility gain is good, but what's better is the purge that could help you slow enemies so that you can chase and kill them !

Lategame items

Nothing much to be said, provides you with everything you need.


Though not having a combat regen, Shadow fiend kills everything quickly, meaning when the clash is over, the regen will help you GREATLY.


MKB, is somewhat situational, when they are heroes like troll and Phantom Assasin or any heroes that have evasive-like skills, getting this is a must !


Get this item if you need burst damage, i prefer buriza over mkb even though buriza gives lesser damage and gives only a critical, compared to mkb which gives a ability to stop channeling spells and nevermiss. Buriza is better due to sf high damage !

Rejected Orb effects and items.

You cant tank much, even so why do you even need it, you have + 60 damage from necromastery, which is the same as Radiance !


Well nothing much to say here, yeah it provides you the slow and movement speed, but the stats it give are just too weak. And with that money you could just buy something else better .


You do not need captain america helmet for shadow fiend ! It makes you more paper then paper, i think sf would be tissue paper after getting it. Yeah, more Attack speed is good, but sacrifacing your hp for this aint really that good for someone already paper.

PlayStyle
Always try to choose the middle lane no matter what unless there's a better laner then you, sf needs all the creeps and denies without them his just shitting in the toilet !
From level 1-3, try to last hit and deny as much as possible! Untill you get your bottle then it's time to get some fast farming and kills. If you feel that you are lacking some kills, go to the level 1 camp and if you are lucky, you might have the kobold camp, one raze and you will have 10 souls.

Early Game ( Level 1-11 )
During early game just last hit and deny. If you are having trouble last hitting, try to deny as much as possible as they give you souls as well. Once you hit level 3 ( Raze level 2 ) start razing the creep when they are somewhat in the red health.
Press (x) and try to last hit the other creeps. as you can see from this screenshot, the lowest health creep, using a (x) will gurantee a creepkill, and if you last hit properly, you might have all 3 creeps!

Runewhorring
Runewhorring is very important to shadow fiend, giving him the ability to refill his bottle and various runes that could help you in a sucessful gank !

Various tips when taking a rune.
Before the start of the game, as seen in the picture, by standing there you will be able to see the runes.
Try to take the runes when the timer is like 1.40, or 3.40, 5.40, etc etc. Taking runes at that time would allow you to ''stack'' runes. Do not spam the bottle immediately if you get hit or just by using one raze, bottle are not like tango.
Some useful runes,
Illusion: not really useful but good as a decoy, hiding in the forest and sending it first from the front, and then come out from the back
Invisibility: Perhaps the most useful rune early game for ganking, go behind him and give him a taste of Sf Triple raze, and kiss goodbye to him (:
Haste: Almost the same as invisible rune, but more risky. Most of the time will have a kill with this rune.
Double Damage: Not so useful rune for ganking, but useful for last hitting, and harassing your enemy !
Regeneration: Nothing much to say about this right? one more advice, when your regen rune is taking effect, try to spam razes, even if they dun hit, having more regen is better then less regen !

Midgame (Level 11 - 16)
Shadowraze still hurts like hell, even though is it midgame, and it is midgame where shadowfiend completely owns almost everyhero, due to a good early game farming. Midgame is also a very important part of the game for our shadowfiend ! If shadowfiend loses midgame, your lategame might not have lots of hope. Unless you manage to kill them off and rax them !
Mid game is also a part of the game where you will have your dagger/lothar's edge, and ganking will be alot much easier !

Killing people with Requiem of Souls(kelen's dagger) tips:
If you have max souls find someone with 900 hp in a lane farming, or in the jungle! Dun try to engage him near the tower, and once in range blink + requiem of souls, most people would take about a sec to react to this, and your requiem of souls take 1 second too, if your lucky he might get 1 hit ko, or he is in his red health, just finish him with your shadowraze(z) or normal attacks. If he doesnt die, due to his imba amount of hp, chase him, but if he is near the tower, just retreat.

Killing people with Requiem of Souls(lothar's edge) tips:
If you have max souls find someone with hp around 1100 or lesser in a lane farming, or in the jungle! Dun try to engage him near the tower or if he is retreating. Once you have prepared, immediately use lothar's edge and run to him. Remember STAND(overlap) into him, as this deals the highest possible amount of damage. He would probably die to one Requiem of souls, raze him if needed. If he doesnt die, due to his imba amount of hp, chase him, but if he is near the tower, just retreat.

If you have nothing to do, try to do something, either kill or farm, dun idle or afk, as this could be a great problem for shadowfiend. If there are no creeps, go and whack a neutral. Just continue to farm till lategame, where the real DPS output of shadowfiend come. If you think you could rax or end them early do so, because there are other hard carries that could kill shadowfiend !

Lategame(Level 16-25)
You would probably have 5 kills and above by now, having outfarm lategamer and most players in the game. It's about time to end your enemy. Your item slot should have Manta Style, Bkb, Stygian Desolator(or other orb effects), Boots of travels, magicwand and perhaps a bottle. With items like this, your damage output should be at 150 ++. With stygian + presence of the dark lord, your damage would hurt like hell ! End the game as quick as possible, if the time exceeds 60 mins, shadowfiend power will decrease to superlategamers ! But if your still farming, shadowfiend will win them still.

Good Allies and Enemies

Allies

Almost any stunner could be sf allies. But there are some special mention :
Darkseer, though getting nerf, still is one of shadowfiend's best allies, a well placed vacuum is just instant death for every enemy combined with Requiem of Souls.


Murloc nightcrawler, though a new hero, i believe he could help shadow fiend greatly with his pounce, the enemy moving range is only 325 AOE leash range. Meaning if you stand in the middle, no matter what, you are capable of dealing high amounts of damage with requiem of souls.


Nothing much to say about enigma, midnight pulse + blackhole, + requiem of souls is just one hit ko. After murdering the enemy proceed to take their Tree/Throne.


Same like enigma, but due to Bane being a single targeter, requiem of souls is rather unneeded, if he uses fiend's grip on the enemy, just use shadowraze (z),(x), and (c).

Enemies
All the above mentioned allies would be your worst enemy, almost anyone could take down sf. Chainnukers are your worst enemy too. A stun + laguna blade is kiss good bye ! Am and Na are also a pain in the ass, as sf have rather have intelligence, and depends on his shadowraze. Always stay on high alert for anyone.

Replays
Currently i do not have any replays and will post them when i have some, but you could check out some videos posted in youtube to see some shadowfiend tribute!
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GTjuF99gJpo
YouTube - DotA - Nevermore The Dark Knight

Final words
Shadow fiend requires precise skills to be played well, though i am just above average shadowfiend player, there a very good shadowfiend out there like YameteH, etc etc. Have fun reading my guide and playing shadowfiend, dun get frustrated if you die. Just keep trying and practice !