Weaver

Skitskurr the Weaver is a ranged agility hero, renowned for being one of the hardest heroes in the game to properly lock down and kill, despite his extreme frailty. This is mainly due to his low-cooldown Shukuchi ability, which provides him both max movement speed and invisibility when used, making him highly effective at chasing enemies as well as escaping from battle. In addition, his ultimate, Time Lapse, is yet another survival tool, allowing Weaver to regain the position and health points he had precisely 5 seconds prior to activation. His exceptional ability to maneuver around the battle, seeking the most fragile enemy heroes, is bolstered by his last two abilities. The Swarm is a wave of insects projected in front of Weaver that latch onto any visible enemy they come across. Until they are killed off, they will gradually inflict damage over time, reduce enemy armor, and perhaps most importantly, provide vision to Weaver. Finally, Geminate Attack allows Weaver to passively launch an additional attack every few seconds, making his offensive all the more potent. Not a hero capable of standing on the front lines, Weaver is nonetheless a huge threat against a team that has little ability to prevent his extreme maneuverability.

Recommended items
Starting items:
 * ,, and all help Weaver sustain his health and mana in lane.
 * and can be built into a  to help with last hitting and mana regeneration.

Early game:
 * gives health and mana in a pinch, useful for playing aggressive or survivability in the laning phase.
 * give a decent speed boost so Weaver can be a bit faster when he isn't in.
 * is a cost effective stat boosting item that also helps with mana regen so that can be used more often.

Core items:
 * progresses into, offering extra attributes and charge capacity.
 * give Weaver some extra health and attack speed.
 * gives extra health and blocks spells. Combined with and, this makes Weaver extremely hard to kill.

Situational items:
 * gives lots of damage, which goes well with . Additionally, the Radiance burn allows Weaver to deal additional damage while invisible.
 * grants lots of bonus damage, which Weaver makes use of with.
 * provides damage, armor, attack speed, and evasion, making Weaver harder to kill and more damaging.
 * gives excellent damage and an armor reduction debuff that synergizes with.
 * Now that also procs items, pickups like,  and lifesteal items are excellent considerations.
 * For an offlane Weaver, can be purchased with  and, skipping  altogether. This takes advantage of Weaver's reliable solo farming and split pushing capabilities while still allowing Weaver to jump into the fight when necessary to reduce armor.

Tips

 * is one of the most difficult heroes to lock down during the game, combining the evasion from with its speed and   dispel his weakness is almost the same as elusive heroes like  and  so be careful with silences from abilities and items which prevents you from using your spells, and items that reveal your position like  and s.
 * You can use to get back into the fight immediately after your death (by quick Buyback). This is a risky maneuver, however, as you most likely won't be at full HP when you arrive. Consider using this trick when you got nuked by a strong ultimate (like 's -, or 's - ). Using Shukuchi after Time Lapse will also improve your survivability (if your HP is not full).
 * can remove most debuffs from Weaver, which is useful for removing and many other hazardous debuffs, also when you wish to escape you can run towards your enemy base and make the enemy team follow you and then use  returning to your original spot and then escape to the opposite direction, most enemies will be confused with this tactic.
 * or also provides a reliable means of removing silence, dust, or other status debuffs.
 * illusions does not trigger.
 * mix up well with allowing you to proc critical attacks twice in a single strike.
 * is great at kiting and killing melee carries (such as ) with the low cooldown of and the armor reduction effects of.
 * Since using doesn't interrupt channeled spells, you can use a  and then cast  to hide while you finish the channel.
 * This can be used when teleporting to escape or when teleporting to defend something. For example, if you cast teleport on a tower you want to defend, then right before the teleport channel completes, when you arrive at the tower, you will be invisible. This can cause confusion for the enemy, since they will not see you appear when the teleport completes, and may think that you cancelled the teleport.
 * Though treated as hard carry, is one of the most difficult heroes to lane against because of  granting him the ability to hit an enemy twice in a single attack instance, effectively multiplying his damage output by two every few seconds. Try to use this to your advantage to keep the enemy laner at bay - A few geminate attack procs is enough to mow down squishies. You can even try to push hard for a kill with it under tower if the enemy is low enough, though it should only be done if the enemy laner has no way to stun you.
 * If you want to tower dive in the early part of the game when you are much squishy, first use and aim in the creep wave and the enemy hero that you going to chase, the enemy tower will attack the beetles instead of attack you giving you a window of a few seconds to finish the job.
 * Keep in mind that you are not invincible when you cast . With vision on you, enemy heroes can kill you very quickly, since you have a low stat gain. End the game as soon as possible, do not let the enemy team buy a.

Trivia

 * Weaver's original title was Nerubian Weaver, and his original name was Anub'seran. Nerubians are a race of arachnids in the Warcraft universe.
 * Weaver's fun name in DotA was Anoob'seran.
 * Geminate Attack is frequently misread as Germinate Attack. To geminate is to double, coming from the Latin word for twin (as in Gemini).
 * Shukuchi is a Japanese term for rapid movement, or teleportation. The ability's name is a reference to an ability of the same name of a character named Soujiro from the anime Rurouni Kenshin.
 * Weaver draws many inspirations from a character of the same name in the novel, Perdido Street Station.
 * Weaver's Time Lapse icon may also be a reference to the box art of the movie Aliens 3, considering that Sigourney Weaver has the lead role in the film.