Night Stalker/Guide

Roaming Support
Night Stalker mostly needs levels and some cheap items to function as he does not scale particularly well. Once night begins, he becomes a tremendous ganker in the first night and should focus on getting kills.

Void should always be maxed first as the nuke damage and slow durations scales well.

If you are snowballing or you are getting a lot of experience points early, consider delaying skilling Darkness at a later level. By the time you are level 6, it should be (or at least near) night. So casting it at night does not do a whole lot other than reducing your enemies vision. The vision reduction for is not particularly useful in the early skirmishes and a skill point in Crippling Fear might be more useful than your ultimate.

General

 * Unlike other heroes in the game, Night Stalker has below-maximum sight range in the daytime, with only 800 compared to most other heroes' 1800. However, he more than compensates for this by possessing 1800 night vision, a value only equaled by a few other heroes in the game and more than double the rest. This means that while Night Stalker is relatively easy to sneak up on and gank in daylight, he possesses powerful vision at night, which can allow him to use his abilities to the utmost.
 * Become active during nighttime and gank the enemies as Night Stalker is at his peak then. Save the farming for daytime.
 * On top of having high mobility, Night Stalker has high strength and armor as well, making him ideal at diving towers.
 * Most often times, Night Stalker can play support as his abilities offer great disables during ganks and he does not need many items to work. Once he has some levels and the first night arrives, he comes online and should find kills for his teammates.
 * In many situations, Night Stalker can be a very strong solo mid laner. His excellent base damage and high base armor allow him to get last hits and denies reliably, and he benefits greatly from solo experience as he can take advantage of the levels once the first night hits. As well, being mid gives him the option of ganking either top or bottom without the need for a Town Portal Scroll, as he can reach either lane easily and quickly due to Hunter in the Night.
 * As he can be very strong with just early levels, Night Stalker can be a relatively strong offlaner. His high base strength and armor, along with respectable base damage allow him to survive relatively easily in the off-lane, and use his early levels to punish the enemy's safe lane once the first night comes.


 * Void deals damage and slows target's movement speed so they cannot run away easily.
 * Max Void first to unlock its high damage. Due to its low cooldown, Night Stalker can use it twice or more to secure kills during engagements.
 * When laning, Night Stalker may choose to leave Void at level 1 while holding on the skill points until ganks. Doing so will preserve its low mana cost so Night Stalker can use it more to get difficult last hits.
 * Void mini-stuns its target during nighttime, so Night Stalker can use it to cancel channeled abilities, particularly Town Portal Scroll.
 * Against smart opponents though, Night Stalker may have to wait to use Void until the enemy attempts to use their Town Portal Scroll, as using it to initiate a gank can give them a window to begin channeling an escape, since Night Stalker does not possess any other interrupting disables.
 * Void's low cooldown makes it a strong spell for breaking on an enemy. This can pave the way for allies to use additional disables on the target, or for Crippling Fear from Night Stalker himself.


 * Crippling Fear allows Night Stalker to inflict an enemy with a powerful silence and miss chance, which increases greatly in potency at night.
 * Crippling Fear has relatively poor scaling, as it gives Night Stalker a 5 second silence with one point but only increases slightly in duration with subsequent levels. So, spend one skill point in the ability early on, but leave it at level 1 until both Void and Hunter in the Night are maxed out.
 * In fights with multiple enemies, try to target Crippling Fear on an important enemy caster in order to remove them from the fight for at least 5 seconds, as it can prevent them from hindering your team during the fight.
 * Depending on the situation, use Crippling Fear the enemy carry so their attacks will miss at night. However, most often times the carries will buy to counter these disables.
 * While weak in the daytime, Crippling Fear can still buy a small window of opportunity if use on the right target. Even though Night Stalker is relatively weak during daytime, he can still disable the enemy with his abilities if forced to.


 * Hunter in the Night empowers Night Stalker's attack speed and movement speed superbly during the night, making him a very powerful ganker during the earliest parts of the game.
 * Because it can greatly boost Night Stalker's hunting prowess, max out Hunter in the Night after Void. The greatly enhanced movement and attack speed allow Night Stalker to chase down and tear apart enemies with his attacks.
 * With the movement speed bonus from boots and a secondary movement speed increase (e.g. ' active ability or ) added on top of that, a level 4 Hunter in the Night will boost Night Stalker's movement speed to nearly haste speed of 550. Use this speed to your advantage to chase down enemies or escape with near impunity.
 * At night, Hunter in the Night's flying vision allows Night Stalker to see enemies in the trees.
 * Hunter in the Night enhances Night Stalker's mobility by letting him fly over cliffs.
 * With True Sight, Hunter in the Night's flying vision helps Night Stalker spot enemy wards.


 * Darkness will reduce the enemy's vision range for its duration, affecting all units and wards, but not buildings.
 * As Darkness costs no mana to activate, Night Stalker is free to use it whenever the situation requires it.
 * Because time continues to pass for the duration of the ultimate, Darkness can be most profitably cast whenever it is off cooldown during the daytime. By doing so, you effectively reduce the amount of daytime there is in the game, as daytime will continue to tick down during Darkness. At level 18, the enemy team will only have 90 seconds of daylight out of the 8 minute cycle, effectively reducing daylight to 18.75% of the time.
 * At night, reserve Darkness for until Night Stalker's team is preparing for a gank. While the enemy will suspect something once the ultimate goes up, reducing their vision range will also affect Observer Wards and towers, allowing Night Stalker and his team to move under the cover of Darkness.

Items
Starting items:
 * gives health regeneration to stay alive.
 * restores health in the early game.
 * restores mana so Night Stalker may use one more Void in the early game to secure kill.
 * allows Night Stalker with low base intelligence to maintain his early mana pool so he can use Void to harass and gank.
 * provides damage block that can greatly increase survivability in lane, and can upgrade into later.

Early game:
 * adds movement speed slow to attacks. Together with Void's 50% movement speed slow, it greatly reduces the target's chances of escaping.
 * stores charges that restore HP and mana for Night Stalker to stay alive and use abilities during ganks.
 * , combined with Hunter in the Night, increase Night Stalker base movement speed, granting him unparalleled mobility at night.
 * fits the active Night Stalker, giving him charges that heal or hurt heroes. It also increases mana regeneration and armor so Night Stalker can stay alive to contribute to ganks.
 * allows Night Stalker to move around the map, looking for gank opportunities.
 * grants vision so Night Stalker can set up ganks; his high mobility at night makes placing wards deep inside enemy territory easy.

Mid game:
 * provides attributes and restores HP and mana to Night Stalker.
 * grant Night Stalker extra movement speed and damage, synergizing well with Hunter in the Night's attack speed and movement speed boost.
 * gives useful health and movement speed, as well as ability to counter enemy healing and health regeneration which may make ganking easier.

Late game:
 * removes terrain restrictions on Night Stalker's night vision, allowing him to take full advantage of his mobility and giving him a critical edge in map control, particularly when Darkness is active. It also gives him more health to build tankiness, and more mana to use abilities.
 * gives Night Stalker a blend of self-sustain and survivability through the health and mana regeneration as well as the additional armor. The active applies dispel and may discourage enemies from using targeted abilities on him or allies, prolonging their lives during team fights or preventing gank targets from easily using disables to escape.
 * gives Night Stalker both offensive and defensive power. The extra armor makes him much tankier, synergizing well with his high strength growth, and the attack speed bonus combines with the enemy armor reduction to greatly improve Night Stalker's and teammates' physical damage output.

Situational items:
 * helps Night Stalker get crucial kills by masking his and allies' presence from enemy wards.
 * reveals invisible enemies and wards. Combined with 's unobstructed vision during nighttime, Night Stalker commands great vision over the map.
 * 's Damage Return can keep Night Stalker alive as enemies may choose not to deal any damage to him, lest losing HP themselves.
 * gives Night Stalker armor and evasion, hardening his resistance against physical attacks, as well as mana regeneration to sustain his mana pool. The active decreases a gank target's armor and induces a miss chance that stacks alongside Crippling Fear, reducing their ability to fight back and increasing the damage they take from allies' attacks.
 * 's disarm works well with Crippling Fear's silence to completely prevent an enemy from fighting back. It also provides a chance to proc Maim on an enemy, further slowing their attack and movement speed on top of Void.
 * makes Night Stalker immune to most disables in team fights so he can focus on using abilities and attacking the enemies without interruption; it also gives him more health and attack damage.
 * gives Night Stalker bonuses to attributes, attack speed, and attack damage. Shadow Walk, combined with Hunter in the Night, allows him to gank while moving at maximum speed, inflicting bonus damage and break to ruin enemy powerful passive abilities.
 * helps Night Stalker locking down targets with stun and bash; its damage block and bonus health also add to his tankiness.
 * greatly increases the size of Night Stalker's health pool, making him much harder to bring down in fights. The extra strength gives him more base damage as well, and the passive health regeneration makes staying active on the map easy.
 * lowers cooldowns of Night Stalker's already spammable abilities and items. More importantly, it reduces Darkness's cooldown to only 60 seconds with a 40 second duration, effectively keep up near-permanent nighttime, which, in conjunction with upgrade and, means enemies will have next to no hope of obtaining map control ever again.

Night Stalker/Руководство 暗夜魔王/攻略