Dark Seer/Guide

Hero

Strategy

Equipment

Gear

Gameplay[]

Playstyle
Dark Seer is a semi-support hero, most focused on AoE Battles. He is able to farm safely due to Ion Shell which can also be used to damage his enemies. He can make himself and his allies reach incredible speeds with Surge, along with using Vacuum and Wall of Replica in conjuction with each other to initiate and deal damage using the enemies's own power.
Pros	Cons
Strong solo offlaner. Extremely annoying to lane against. Strong team fight presence. Excellent at escaping or disengaging. Great area-of-effect capabilities. Good initiator and solid pusher. Can push lanes without being there allowing for a numbers advantage. Good counter to illusion and aura heroes.	Melee attack range. Initiation combo often requires a coordinated followup. Struggles against spell immunity and crowd control. Very resource intensive in lane. Lacks a real reliable stun.

Offlane[]

You should almost always level Ion Shell at Level One. You can use Ion Shell on melee creeps to help you score last hits. Immediately use the Shell when the first creep wave meets the enemy wave, so the wave will be pushed into the enemy Tier One tower, and the enemy second creep wave will come closer to your Tier One tower. You also have great survivability due to the bonus movement speed provided by Surge. If your lane is not going well, you can always fall back on farming the jungle with Ion Shell on yourself or a neutral creep. If at Level Six you have leveled all of Ion Shell, Vacuum, Surge, and the Wall of Replica, you may aim for a kill by first using the Ion Shell on yourself, then pull your target to yourself using Vacuum and immediately cast the Wall of Replica on yourself, and then surge yourself should the target try to run away.

With some items like Blink Dagger and Mekansm, you help teammates dominate any teamfights as long as you can land Vacuum into Wall of Replica, dealing great damage and positioning your enemies in a disadvantageous situation. As always, you continue to apply pressure on multiple lanes with Ion Shell on creeps, threatening to put your creep waves near enemy towers for much of the game, so enemy heroes will not have much opportunity to make rotations for fear of losing towers and map control. Remember you need to be near the Ion Shelled wave to get the experience, at the risk of exposing yourself for an easy ganking target.

Ability Builds[]

Offlane Dark Seer
1	2	3	4	5	6	7	8	9	10	11	12	13	14	15	16	17	18	20	25

Talents[]

Hero Talents
350 AoE Surge	25	2 Ion Shell Charges
+50 Ion Shell Damage	20	-40s Wall of Replica Cooldown
Ion Shell Provides +250 Max Health	15	+100 Vacuum AoE
+50 Ion Shell Radius	10	+20% Wall of Replica Illusion Damage

Tips & Tactics[]

General[]

If laning, be sure to harass enemies with Ion Shell by placing it on their melee creeps (for melee heroes) or ranged creeps (for ranged heroes). Additionally, placing Ion Shell on the second allied melee creep to arrive at the creep line is a good way to push the lane as well as create a moving damage-dealing creep that chases enemy heroes. This can make it hard for the enemy carry to last hit, as they have to do it under the tower and while taking damage from creep aggro and Ion Shell at the same time.
Dark Seer can farm rapidly in lane and jungle thanks to Ion Shell. To jungle, stack the hard and medium camps several times, and then place an Ion Shell on one of the lesser creeps. The shell should clear out the whole camp (including the stacks). Do this repeatedly to accumulate a large sum of gold. However, be sure to stay within experience range.
Use Vacuum before Wall of Replica to disable them. If you use wall first, the enemies may have a little more time to react.

Abilities[]

Vacuum[]

Use Vacuum to move enemy targets toward Wall of Replica or your allies.
Area abilities, especially those that require positioning, greatly benefit from Vacuum, as it can place all of them together to ensure a hit.
Due to Vacuum being able to clump up a large group of enemies fast, and Ion Shell's high damage output considering enemies are affected by it for a longer while, they permit Dark Seer to synergize extremely well with area abilities like Black Hole or Macropyre to maximize area damage and maybe turn the tide in battle.
Use Vacuum to destroy trees to reveal hiding enemy heroes when you are ganking or pushing towers.

Ion Shell[]

When chasing, self-cast Ion Shell and run next to the enemy without attacking, using Surge if the enemy is faster. Even better, use Surge to body-block enemy heroes (that is, get in front of them to hinder their movement) and deal damage with physical attacks without moving out of range of the Ion Shell.
In order to push, you want to put Ion Shell on the second and third melee creeps since the first melee creep will likely die first from attacks of enemy ranged creeps, taking Ion Shell away.
Ion Shell's damage stacks if you place them on different units. In other words, using Ion Shell on two different melee creeps will push the wave faster than using Ion Shell on one creep. Similarly, placing Ion Shell on two allies and have them engage the target may produce a kill in less time.

Surge[]

Use Surge on Courier, allowing it to get out of danger or finish its delivery faster.
Surge's haste makes it hard for the enemies to lock down Dark Seer as they cannot slow him, so he can push or farm safely.
Use Surge on yourself before initiating teamfights since it may help you find a good spot to blink from.
Use Surge on allies to help them escape or catch up with enemies as well.

Wall of Replica[]

Use Vacuum on enemy heroes to send them through Wall of Replica, creating illusions of them, as well as slowing them.
Dark Seer can control the illusions to attack certain enemies that your team wants to take out first.
Try to draw the wall along the escape path of the enemies to keep slowing them.

Items[]

Starting items:

Tango sustains health in the laning stage.

Healing Salve restores health to stay in lane.

Clarity sustains mana to use Ion Shell.

Iron Branch boosts Dark Seer's attributes, builds up to a Magic Wand and/or Mekansm later on and can be paired with Tango for more healing.

Enchanted Mango gives health regeneration and can restore mana in a pinch, before Dark Seer acquires Soul Ring.

Early game:

Regular Stick gives nothing.

Soul Ring covers most of your mana issues and allows you to constantly use Ion Shell in order to harass your lane opponents and get some last hits.

Boots of Speed gives mobility for chasing or running away.

Infused Raindrops gives mana regeneration and absorbs some magical damage.

Mid game:

Magic Wand sustains health and mana in fights.

Helm of the Dominator allows Dark Seer to pull off Vacuum combos by yourself. Also, gives you an additional controllable unit to use Ion Shell on to fight or to push out waves.

Arcane Boots increase your mana pool and allow you to restore your teammates' mana.

Mekansm adds to Dark Seer's teamfight effectiveness and increases durability. Also his decent intelligence gain means he will generally have enough mana to use the heal.