Sniper

Kardel Sharpeye the Sniper is a ranged agility Carry who excels at dealing heavy damage at an incredible range. His third ability, Take Aim, allows him to deal high DPS at a safe distance, and avoiding damage as he is relatively frail. He also excels at harassing enemies due to his second ability, Headshot, which gives him a chance to do extra damage and a brief slow, and his first ability, Shrapnel, which slows and deals damage over time in an area. While he can be a nuisance to lane against, he is also extremely squishy early-game and requires supports to lane effectively. He scales into the late game, dealing a remarkable amount of dps while sitting outside of harm's reach, almost permaslowing heroes with his headshot. Though he is a rather frail hero, his potential in the hands of a good player and team is high.

Tips

 * Sniper's main advantage is his range - always remain as far away from harm as possible while still dealing damage.
 * is an incredibly versatile and useful ability with excellent range and a low mana cost. Among its myriad uses are chasing, farming, anti-juking, creep clearing and impeding chasing enemies or those attempting to close to melee range.
 * Carefully consider your laning situation when deciding which of Sniper's abilities to max first. It is common to level up first when playing him in the middle for the lane control it provides, which is particularly effective in the relatively cramped environment of the river. On the other hand, maxing  first in the safe lane can be very potent, especially against a melee solo offlaner like  or.
 * One level of is typically enough for the laning phase since it allows Sniper to outrange every enemy except  and . Only invest extra points early if you are taking very heavy ranged harassment.
 * Use to finish fleeing enemies if and when they manage to get out of range of your regular attacks, or if you are not involved directly in a fight and wish to finish an enemy off without revealing your precise location.
 * Since grants full vision of an enemy during the cast time it can be used to counter an enemy attempting to juke your allies in the trees or go invisible. The extra couple of seconds of vision can often make the difference.
 * Although not mentioned in his recommended items - and for good reason - a Mask of Madness is a fairly common purchase on Sniper as a large and cost effective increase to his DPS and farming potential at the expense of increasing his already significant fragility. Extreme care should be taken with this item choice though, as enemies who can close the gap on you easily like, or deal large amounts of damage from range like can annihilate you in short order. This goes double for enemy carries with natural mobility such as ,  or.
 * If possible, try to have at least one teammate on a hero who can get into the enemy team's face and keep their attention while you sit at range and deal damage during teamfights. and  would be good examples. Sniper is a great deal more difficult to play in lineups which lack this component to some degree.
 * Considering 25% magic resistance most heroes have, deals 240/363.75/487.5, if no other sorts of damage reduction or amplifications are affecting the target.
 * Divine Rapier is a very situational item for Sniper. While it greatly increases Sniper's damage per second and can kill frail Heroes or those with no escape mechanism, Sniper himself is frail and is subject to nuke/disable combos. Always try to keep distance and have an escape mechanism ready, such as or  if you plan on buying this item.

Trivia

 * A number of Sniper's lines are either direct quotations or paraphrases of lines used by the Sniper class in Team Fortress 2, a popular class-based shooter also by Valve. Such phrases include:
 * snip tf2 02.mp3 Thanks for standing still, wanker!
 * snip tf2 05.mp3 Let's have a go at it!
 * snip bottle 04.mp3 Jarate!
 * snip tf2 06.mp3 Professionals have standards.
 * snip tf2 07.mp3 I'm polite and efficient.
 * snip tf2 08.mp3 As long as there are two heroes left on the battlefield, someone is gonna want someone dead.
 * One of Sniper's lines while bottling a rune is snip bottle 04.mp3 "Jarate!", which is a reference to Team Fortress 2 in-game weapon for Sniper class, Jarate.
 * Incidentally, his voice actor, Gary Schwartz, also voices the Heavy Weapons Guy and Demoman in Team Fortress 2.
 * Sniper's line, " snip kill blade 04.mp3 Inconceivable!" is likely a reference to Vizzini's catchphrase in the film The Princess Bride due to the similarities in both the appearance and voices of the two.
 * Sniper's name, Kardel Sharpeye, is a reference to professional Counter-Strike player Kyle "Ksharp" Miller of team 3D, who is regarded for his skillful AWP (Sniper rifle) use.
 * Sniper's ultimate, Assassinate.mp3, also uses the same, though slightly modified gunshot csgo awp shoot.mp3 sound as Counter-Strike's AWP.
 * Sniper's model in Dota 2 is based loosely off of Gary Oldman's portrayal of the real life sniper Lee Harvey Oswald in the 1991 film JFK.
 * Sniper's fun name in DotA was, a highly skilled Russian sniper who was active during World War 2.
 * Sniper's line, " snip kill 05.mp3 What a dum-dum!" is a pun on the, also known as a dum-dum. It is designed to expand on impact in order to limit penetration and create a wound larger in diameter.
 * Sniper's line "A few bullet's more" is a reference to the spaghetti western by Sergio Leone named For a Few Dollars More starring Clint Eastwood.

Update history
{{Update History| February 04, 2015 Patch
 * Fixed {{Ability ID|Shrapnel|Sniper}} being refreshable.

April 29, 2014 Patch
 * Fixed Sniper's acquisition range not matching his maximum attack range.
 * This affects his ability to auto attack units at his maximum range.

July 18, 2013 Patch
 * Fixed Backswing behavior for: {{Ability ID|Soul Rip|Undying}}, {{Ability ID|Tombstone|Undying}}, {{Ability ID|Cold Feet|Ancient Apparition}}, {{Ability ID|Ice Vortex|Ancient Apparition}}, {{Ability ID|Chilling Touch|Ancient Apparition}}, {{Ability ID|Enfeeble|Bane}}, {{Ability ID|Shallow Grave|Dazzle}}, {{Ability ID|Thunder Strike|Disruptor}}, {{Ability ID|Kinetic Field|Disruptor}}, {{Ability ID|Static Storm|Disruptor}}, {{Ability ID|Malefice|Enigma}}, {{Ability ID|Midnight Pulse|Enigma}}, {{Ability ID|Howl|Lycanthrope}}, {{Ability ID|Stifling Dagger|Phantom Assassin}}, {{Ability ID|Static Link|Razor}}, {{Ability ID|Shrapnel|Sniper}}, {{Ability ID|Psionic Trap|Templar Assassin}}, {{Ability ID|Whirling Axes (Ranged)|Troll Warlord}}, {{Ability ID|Storm Hammer|Sven}}, {{Ability ID|God's Strength|Sven}}, {{Ability ID|Wave of Terror|Vengeful Spirit}}, {{Ability ID|Venomous Gale|Venomancer}}, {{Ability ID|Shadow Word|Warlock}}, {{Ability ID|Fatal Bonds|Warlock}}, {{Ability ID|The Swarm|Weaver}}, {{Ability ID|Time Lapse|Weaver}}, {{Ability ID|Maledict|Witch Doctor}}, {{Ability ID|Overpower|Ursa}} and {{Ability ID|Ice Shards|Tusk}}.

June 28, 2013 Patch
 * Fixed 's Trueshot component not working with Illusions.
 * Updated to higher fidelity model.

April 19, 2013 Patch
 * Added victory animations and more aggressive posing of idle, run and attack when enemy is in range.

March 14, 2013 Patch
 * Fixed not working on units like Spirit Bear, {{Hero ID|Warlock}}'s Golem, etc.
 * Fixed {{Ability ID|Shrapnel|Sniper}} doing slightly less damage than intended to towers.
 * Fixed {{Ability ID|Headshot|Sniper}}'s physical damage bonus being blocked by Magic Immunity.

November 30, 2012 Patch
 * Pseudo Random chances are now enabled for these abilities:
 * {{Hero ID|Phantom Assassin}}'s {{Ability ID|Coup de Grace|Phantom Assassin}}
 * {{Hero ID|Slardar}}'s {{Ability ID|Bash|Slardar}}
 * {Hero ID|Faceless Void}}'s
 * 's 's critical strike
 * 's {{Ability ID|Headshot|Sniper}}
 * 's
 * 's
 * 's 's critical strike
 * 's

September 13, 2012 Patch
 * Broken down a number of existing hero models into multiple parts, , , , , , and.

July 19, 2012 Patch
 * Added teleport start and end animations for Sniper, Spirit Breaker and Weaver.
 * Added spawn animations for Sniper and Weaver.

February 16, 2012 Patch
 * Fixed Headshot bonus proc damage working against Towers and Buildings.
 * Fixed Headshot working while Doomed.

November 03, 2011 Patch
 * Fixed Assassinate reveal debuff never disappearing if the target dodges it with a blink.

September 29, 2011 Patch
 * Fixed Assassinate ministun interaction with BKB

September 09, 2011 Patch
 * Sniper will only say his shrapnel line if he captures any heroes in the radius.

August 07, 2011 Patch
 * Fixed Legacy hotkeys on Sniper and Earthshaker

August 02, 2011 Patch
 * Fixed the cast time on Assassinate.
 * Assassinate keeps units from going invisible.
 * Fixing the duration on the Shrapnel's slow. It was hardcoded to 1.5 and now it is 2.0.

July 29, 2011 Patch
 * Fixed Shrapnel slow not getting upgraded per level.

April 30, 2011 Patch }}
 * Created.