Keeper of the Light/Guide

Generic Lane Support
To play a straightforward Keeper of the Light, max out Chakra Magic as soon as possible and focus on keeping your teammates' mana supply up. A value point in Illuminate offers some damage, especially if teammates have lockdowns to help you land it. You can still land Illuminate by yourself if you channel out of vision, like among trees, and toward lane creeps where enemies will most likely go to get farm. Similarly, a value point in Mana Leak provides extra control for your team. However, it does not always work against opponents who can stand their ground like, trade hits with you like with , can stay without mana like , or have dispels like.

Maxing out Chakra Magic works best if you have a lane partner who can make good use of the mana to launch spells at the enemy. A steady barrage of s, s, or s can go a long way to secure your lane and possibly net a kill.

Keeper of the Light usualy wears, as he does not really need the mana provided by Arcane Boots, so you can start the game with to complete the boots at the Side Lane Shop. If you are planning on building, then you can keep until you already finished the Mekansm. You can play Keeper of the Light as a selfless position 6, buying every support items for team. Furthermore, Keeper of the Light should always consider a as it is an all-purpose support item that can also be used aggressively on an enemy once Mana Leaked. Combined with the push from Blinding Light, you will remove just above 55% of an enemy's mana pool.

Annoying Lane Support
Some heroes deal poorly against Mana Leak, justifying some levels in the ability. Examples include heroes who run to escape such as and, and mana dependent melee heroes that cannot trade hits with you like  or.

Leveling Mana Leak increases its cast range so you can use it from a safe distance. However, the other two abilities serve as bread and butter of Keeper of the Light so you should not ignore them entirely. Therefore, you should think twice before investing further in Mana Leak.

Greedy/Core
Some players, including professional ones, think Keeper of the Light shines most with for the vision and heals he provides during daytime, allowing map control and strong pushes to the enemy throne. In the early game, you should blast creep waves and jungle stacks with Illuminate for easy farm, as well as using Chakra Magic on yourself for mana while also reducing Illuminate's cooldown to accelerate gold income. You will need at least two points in Chakra Magic before it fully covers Illuminate's mana cost, so take that second point at level 3. Also, consider buying to farm jungle before level 2 Chakra Magic.

Beginners can skip Spirit Form until level 8 or 9 and farm with Illuminate in front of creep waves and jungle camps. Better players will use Spirit Form's Illuminate to farm multiple jungle camps at once while the actual hero is stacking those same camps and aggroing the creeps in range of the blast, so they take Spirit Form at level 6. The best players will also stack and farm multiple camps, without Spirit Form, so they can also choose to skip it.

Once you have purchased Aghanim's Scepter, your farm should speed up even more and you should be able to get more items. or will provide sustain to your team to keep the pushes going, while  or  may save your life. Late game options include for the hex.

General

 * Keeper of the Light has low strength and armor, thus he relies on positioning and powerful abilities to stay alive.
 * Keeper of the Light pushes well, as he can replenish teammates' and his own mana with Chakra Magic, allowing profligate use of pushing abilities, and Illuminate can nuke entire creep waves. Along with his ability to reposition allies globally with Recall for reinforcement.
 * Play Keeper of the Light in the safelane to harass enemy with his formidable abilities. He can also play in the offlane to disrupt the enemy carry from getting farm.


 * Illuminate allows Keeper of the Light to output a large amount of damage on a low cooldown.
 * Illuminate's strong creep-killing power makes Keeper of the Light a remarkably good farmer and counter-pusher considering his support role, as he can use it to either knock down large creep waves approaching a friendly tower or blast multiple neutral camps at once. Therefore, he should max Illuminate first to farm up items.
 * However, Illuminate will only deal more damage the longer you channel, which makes it tricky to land on slippery enemies.
 * You can keep Illuminate at lower level for lower mana cost, saving a skill point for other abilities if you do not plan to farm creeps.
 * When using Illuminate to harass or nuke an enemy player, try to channel in the fog of war, such as behind the treeline, to give away as little warning as possible.
 * Rely on teammates to immobilize the enemy long enough to channel the full duration of Illuminate during a gank.
 * Using Illuminate on creep waves early on may disrupt the farm of your lane partner by killing the creeps which will push the wave closer to the enemy's tower. So, you should aim Illuminate only to damage enemy heroes by targeting the wave either at an oblique angle or behind the creep wave.
 * Illuminate reveals fog of war around Keeper of the Light while channeling, allowing him to gain vision. Remember that charging it to fulmination increases its sight range while releasing it immediately will not gain you much vision.


 * Mana Leak destroys the enemy's mana as they move.
 * Invest one point in Mana Leak in the laning stage, although it has a high mana cost which you can manage with Chakra Magic.
 * When setting up a kill, combine it with Illuminate. The target will have to choose between losing mana or losing HP.
 * Taking mana away from enemies early on may prevent them from using dangerous abilities to harm you and your lane partner, as well as increasing the chance to kill them since they might not have enough mana to escape and potentilly take a stun at zero mana. Lowering the enemy's mana pool enough may force them to leave the lane, as staying will threaten them with a stun every time Mana Leak comes off cooldown.
 * Leveling up Mana Leak improves its cast range, as well as the leak and stun duration. Taking early points may give Keeper of the Light more teamfight and ganking potential by using it from safety.
 * Because Mana Leak reduces mana as an expression of the target's maximum mana, making it disproportionately effective against heroes with larger mana pools. Furthermore, it can hinder melee carries that have to move much closer to their targets to attack, resulting in increased distance moved, thus more mana reduced.
 * While Mana Leak can hinder an enemy's attempts to cast spells, it does not proc if the target blinks over short distances and does not affect spell immune or invulnerable enemies. Choose your targets wisely, as certain heroes may just ignore its effects.
 * Try to use Mana Leak as early as possible in teamfights, as the enemy may have to move closer in order to engage your teammates, thus losing a sizable portion of their mana earlier.
 * Use Mana Leak to halt pursuing enemies. Your target may have to stop or will not have enough mana to use abilities.
 * Mana Leak stuns when the target has zero mana. Thus, constant usage of Mana Leak may keep a low mana target plagued with stuns.


 * Chakra Magic allows Keeper of the Light to replenish a significant amount of mana for himself and his allies, ensuring usage of abilities.
 * In the laning stage, Chakra Magic allows teammates with small mana pools or low cooldown abilities to use them more frequently. Heroes with strong disables but small mana pools like, , , and can use their stuns liberally to set up kills, while those with powerful harass abilities like , , and  can put continuous pressure on the lane opponents.
 * Put at least two points into Chakra Magic in the laning stage, as its efficiency increases more than twofold. On top of providing more mana replenishment for allies, it also greatly increases Keeper of the Light's mana, allowing him to use his other abilities more often.
 * Chakra Magic reduces the cooldown of the next ability uses in the next 15 seconds. So, use Chakra Magic on teammates with low-cooldown disables and initiation spells, since it allow them to use two stuns or nukes in quick succession, increasing the amount of crowd control and damage. Also, it affects passive abilities with cooldowns, so abilities like, , and will benefit.
 * Chakra Magic also increases the maximum size of the target's mana pool for the duration of the buff, allowing heroes with small mana pools but expensive combos to use all of their abilities.
 * For example, a without Arcane Boots will often have trouble using his full round of abilities due to the high cost of his ultimate, but Chakra Magic may allow him to use his ultimate as well as Venomous Gale and any items.


 * Spirit Form gives Keeper of the Light access to Recall and Blinding Light.
 * Spirit Form unlocks remote channeling of Illuminate, allowing Keeper of the Light to set it in place and then move on to execute other actions while it channels. A Spirit Form-boosted Illuminate allows Keeper of the Light to take advantage of a fully-channeled Illuminate without the drawback of having to sit still to charge it up.
 * When being chased, use Spirit Form to aid in your escape. You can use Blinding Light to knock back and blind the enemies, or use Illuminate in the direction you are running, discouraging the chasers with potential damage.
 * Purchasing an greatly increases the power of Spirit Form, as Keeper of the Light will always have access to its abilities, on top of gaining unobstructed vision and being able to heal allies with Illuminate during daytime. Using Illuminate will allow Keeper of the Light to continuously heal allied creep waves and heroes, significantly boosting his pushing and sustain power, while the unobstructed vision gives his team a strong vision advantage, especially once combined with.


 * Recall allows Keeper of the Light to summon a teammate to his location after a short delay, making it a powerful global mobility spell.
 * Recall will be dispelled if the target hero takes player-based damage, thus you can hardly use it for escaping.
 * Use Recall to bring a teammate to gank or teamfight, or help someone who has just respawned get back to the front lines faster.
 * Recall allows Keeper of the Light to push, defend, or gank more effectively, as he can summon reinforcements as needed.
 * Use Recall after a buyback if the target does not have Boots of Travel.


 * Blinding Light displaces enemies and applies a miss chance on their regular attacks, making it a great teamfighting ability, and especially against attacking carries.
 * The miss chance may reduce the effectiveness of the enemy's physical attacks, giving your team an advantage.
 * However, enemies with True Strike, spell immunity, or dispels can counter Blinding Light's debuff.
 * Unlike most other forced movement abilities, Blinding Light will not interrupt enemy channeling.
 * Combined with Mana Leak, Blinding Light can remove 20% of an affected enemy's maximum mana. If the enemy is channeling, forcibly displacing them with Blinding Light after using Mana Leak can interrupt them if they have low enough mana.
 * In other cases, the displacement forces them to traverse more ground to reach their destination, augmenting Mana Leak's effects.
 * Blinding Light's displacement can move enemies over terrain, up or down a cliff wall, which may shut down an enemy melee carry if they do not have any repositioning abilities or items to reverse the terrain displacement.

Items
Starting items:
 * provides health regeneration while laning, which mitigates harass damage by lane opponents. Keeper of the Light can share it with allies if needed.
 * also restores health early on to you and teammates.
 * gives some attributes, and can be used to build Magic Wand or Mekansm.
 * should always be purchased by a support at the start of the game.
 * gives vision around the map, and helps Keeper of the Light get into a good position to use Illuminate.

Early game:
 * increase Keeper of the Light's mobility, which can be crucial for getting into position to cast his spells.
 * increases Keeper of the Light's attributes for cheap, and provides burst health and mana restoration, increasing overall survivability.
 * gets Keeper of the Light to teamfights and ganks as his abilities are needed there.

Mid game:
 * gives Keeper of the Light more movement speed for little expense. The passive regeneration keeps his health at full, allowing him to be self-sustaining as he can replenish his mana with Chakra Magic.
 * gives Keeper of the Light constant access to Spirit Form, as well as making Illuminate much more powerful at healing and pushing.

Late game:
 * may save Keeper of the Light and allies with invisibility and magic resistance. Also, he can activate it before or during channeling of Illuminate and Town Portal Scroll.
 * can be used for mobility, saving teammates, or forcibly dispositioning enemies, particularly effective when combined with Mana Leak and Blinding Light.
 * grants immunity against physical damage so Keeper of the Light can survive against enemy carries.
 * synergizes well with Aghanim's Scepter and Spirit Form to reveal invisible enemies and wards through unobstructed vision.
 * synergizes well with Keeper of the Light's support abilities, as he can heal his teammates as well as restore their mana. The overall attributes and armor also provide Keeper of the Light with considerably more survivability, while Chakra Magic covers the item's high mana cost.

Situational items:
 * gives Keeper of the Light a sustainable mana pool and increased movement speed, allowing him to be much more active on the battlefield. The active ability dispels debuffs such as silences while making Keeper of the Light temporarily invulnerable, or disables an enemy long enough for Illuminate to charge up damage.
 * gives Keeper of the Light attributes and armor, making him more survivable. Its active ability also gives him powerful teamfight contribution, especially when coupling with Illuminate, and is a good item to buy if your team can capitalize on their magic nukes.
 * gives Keeper of the Light armor, evasion, and mana regeneration. As a ranged support, you have the ability to reduce an enemy's armor for your team to capitalize on, or give an ally more armor to extend their survivability. As well, it greatly helps when your team wants to kill Roshan.
 * increases the size of Keeper of the Light's health pool and grants him evasion against physical attacks; its active ability disarm the enemy carry for a short time, useful if they have a that counters Blinding Light's miss chance.
 * grants more survivability and a larger mana pool. Its root makes chasing or escaping from single enemies much easier due to its extremely long cast range and low cooldown.
 * resists and shields Keeper of the Light and teammates against magical damage so they can survive and contribute to teamfights.
 * gives Keeper of the Light more physical survivability, a larger mana pool, and better teamfight contribution. The intelligence and armor allow Keeper of the Light to participate more in fights, while the attack speed aura and active freeze aura slows enemies' attempts to deal damage with their physical attacks and slows their movement speed with an additional damage nuke.
 * provides a large boost to attributes and excellent mana regeneration, allowing Keeper of the Light to use Chakra Magic on teammates more frequently instead of on himself. The Hex it offers is very powerful on Keeper of the Light, as he otherwise lacks an instant hard disable.
 * are a very powerful item to have on Keeper of the Light. Besides the increased mobility and freeing up an item slot, the global teleport can be combined with Recall, allowing him to bring two heroes almost anywhere on the map.
 * increases the frequency of which you can use Keeper of the Light's abilities. Illuminate will heal you for a good amount, especially if hitting the entire enemy team. Combining this item with Chakra Magic will let you use important spells like Mana Leak and Blinding Light with little downtime.
 * helps improve Keeper's poor armor and can be a good substitute for Tranquil Boots' health regen. The basic dispel is very handy for nasty debuffs like Track, Ancient Seal or Shadow Word. The active ability can let you or an ally dissuade enemies from using their targeted abilities.

Keeper of the Light/Руководство