Bloodseeker

Strygwyr the Bloodseeker is a melee agility hero imbued with dreadful powers to fuel violence and rip enemies apart in the heat of close combat.

He can drive targets into a maddened Bloodrage, increasing the damage of their attacks, and allowing them to heal their wounds by killing their enemies. He can also cast Bloodrage on himself turning him into a nuker. His speed is unmatched when he senses the blood of the dying, and from this perception none can escape. By using Blood Rite, he can create a ritual field where his foes will be silenced and damaged in the process. His ultimate, Rupture, sunders the skin of his victims, causing them to trail their life force behind if they dare to flee.

Gameplay
Bloodseeker forces difficult decisions on his enemies. Able to drive his foes to a retreat by bathing a large area with a damaging ritual, his gruesome ultimate asks his opponents to hold still, or die.

Recommended items
Starting Items:
 * A will provide early protection from harass and allow Bloodseeker to tank up creeps

Early-game items:
 * provide chasing power and the ability to escape in some situations, especially coupled with Bloodseeker's silence.
 * s are particularly useful due to Bloodseeker's ability to spot a target anywhere on the map.
 * is a cheaper for slowing enemies, but does not provide strength and tankiness, although it has good harass potential. The slows allows for setting up an effective.

Core items:
 * Yasha provides bonus movement speed to stack with and DPS through its agility and attack speed gain. Sange provides health through its strength gain which is important for a Bloodseeker taking extra damage through  and allows Bloodseeker to survive aggressive maneuvers. Sange also has a change to slow enemies through maim. Combined S&Y makes Bloodseeker a powerful mid-game force.

Situational items:
 * gives you movement speed and mana regeneration which Bloodseeker needs as well as a way to stop enemies from teleporting away.


 * is highly recommended against disablers. A Black King Bar makes Bloodseeker inescapable when is active.
 * offers a powerful disable against enemy heroes and should not be ignored if your team lacks disables.
 * has unexpectedly good synergy with Bloodseeker. Defensively, it provides health and evasion and an active to disable hard-hitters. When used in conjunction with on right-click heroes, it amplifies damage done to them, while preventing them from doing damage-amplified attacks. Foes can, however, cast damage-boosted spells, so heroes like  with powerful nukes may not be prime targets for Bloodrage.
 * provides much needed agility and attack speed as well as evasion. The active ability can also be used in conjunction with to catch up to an enemy if needed.
 * and/or can be combined with the damage amplification of Bloodrage to deal huge amounts of damage.
 * may be useful in some situations for its minibash to prevent channeled escape spells and its True Strike that renders enemy evasion null (important against abilities such as 's Windrun, 's Smoke Screen or 's Blur).
 * is always a useful item and a strong Bloodseeker can gain much staying power from it.
 * proves to be a good source of DPS during a chase owing to Bloodseeker's incredible speed via . Radiance burn damage is amplified per second by.
 * has great synergy with . Since rupture does not do initial damage, this can be used quickly after rupture to disable Blink daggers. It also adds utility to Bloodseeker, and can be used along with Rupture as a nuke. Also provides Mana and a method of escape/catching up.

Tips

 * , whilst being an efficient jungler and dual laner, is also a prime choice for solo mid, as it gives him easy access to the side lanes for ganking.
 * Reaching level six as quickly as possible should be a priority, as ganks should not usually be attempted before is available.
 * During the laning phase, put at least one point in to remove the movement speed cap and to receive bonus damage; attacking the enemy will cause subsequent attacks to hit harder, and damage dealt in other lanes will provide a further boost to your attack damage.
 * is one of the best abilities for intercepting an enemy hero that is chasing you or your allies. Heroes with high mobility such as, , , or  suffer devastating damage when d as they are chasing or running away, and because the damage type of the skill is Pure, it pierces Spell Immunity and ignores armor and magic resistance; do not hesitate to cast the spell on the enemy carries with items or buffs such as  or.
 * One hero of note is : will deal damage even during, providing a form of disable during his ultimate. In addition,  will prevent him from regenerating his health pool if his health is low enough, as it provides vision over him.
 * When ganking, it is sometimes best to save for when your target begins running away rather than using it to initiate the gank.
 * Using in conjunction with  allows for more precise aiming of the skill, and also pairs up with abilities that change the position of enemies like, ,  and . This way, you can maximize the damage caused, silence multiple opponents for up to 6 seconds, and receive bonus damage and speed from.
 * Each individual will add to the  bonus stack.
 * ,, or even can be bought if your team lacks disables and your enemies are using Teleportation spells like s to escape your onslaught.
 * , in conjunction with, can cause significant burst damage (120/240/360) to enemy heroes by forcing them to move. It also serves as a quick escape tool, something that does not naturally possess. However, it should be noted that the burst damage is relatively little to the level of your enemies and the level of your ultimate, and may just potentially push your target to safety.
 * combined with deals even more damage for less money.
 * is a great pickup for, and can be easy to farm if you are able to gank and gain kills in the first 20 minutes of the game. The burn damage is amplified by and the item itself provides raw damage. It is very useful in big teamfights, too: burning all nearby enemies increases the chances of getting healed by d, and the 17% miss chance grants you extra survivability.
 * can be used to surprise your enemies, especially when they are alone. Backstab damage, movement speed and attack speed boosts your hunting ability along with your.
 * For enemies with passives like or high movement speed like, consider upgrading your Shadow Blade to , since its Break and Maim aid in ganking lone heroes. The damage reduction can also prevent them from fighting back.
 * can reveal any low HP heroes, allowing, or other heroes with global spells, to finish any heroes on the map global abilities. It is particularly efficient in early game against junglers.
 * Be wary of the heroes on which you use . Some heroes, such as, can travel while invulnerable , allowing them to escape easily and wasting your ultimate. Gank these heroes when they are unable to use these abilities, either by silencing them or ensuring they have no mana to cast their escape abilities. Avoid using if you cannot do so.
 * Other heroes with similar escape abilities include with, and  with.
 * Using on teammates has some very useful applications: casting on an allied hero with an AoE nuke (e.g., ,  or ) will allow for greater damage output, subsequently increasing the buffs you receive from.

Trivia

 * With his ability, Bloodseeker is the only hero which can reach the game's absolute movement speed limit of 10,000 movement speed. However, this is not achievable in a normal match.
 * This part of Blood Rite's Blood Rite cast.mp3 sound effect makes use of Blod acknow 03.mp3 this voice line of Bloodseeker.
 * Despite the character having an Aztec or Incan motif, Bloodseeker's name—Strygwyr—is likely a Welsh-influenced rendering of the Romanian word "strigoi," meaning poltergeist, often used in folklore in reference to vampires.
 * Bloodseeker's response Blod ability thirst 03.mp3 "Blood is in the air." is most likely a reference to the song "Love is in the air".
 * Bloodseeker's response Blod respawn 10.mp3 "Don't be negative… be positive!" is a reference to the blood types B-Positive and B-Negative.
 * Bloodseeker's response Blod ability rupture 04.mp3 " Lie down… have a cookie. " is a reference to blood donation procedures where patients lie down and are given sweet treats to compensate for the sugar loss.
 * Bloodseeker's response blod_begin_02.mp3 "I love the smell of serum in the morning" is a reference to a quote of the movie "Apocalypse Now" where Lieutenant Colonel Bill Kilgore says "I love the smell of napalm in the Morning.