Simple hero guide - Notrom, the Silencer

Nortrom, the Silencer

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* Affiliation: Sentinel * Attack Animation: 0.5 / 0.5 * Damage: 43 - 57 * Casting Animation: 0.3 / 0.51 * Armor: 1.3 * Base Attack Time: 1.7 * Movespeed: 290 * Missile Speed: 1000 * Attack Range: 600 * Sight Range: 1800 / 800

Note that this guide is about playing support silencer, not "carry" silencer. Silencer is sometimes played as a semi-carry, although my friendly argument below sheds light on why this may not be a good idea:

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Silencer generally semi-carries. He's there to mess up the enemy's farm, much like Bat and solomid Lion.

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There were some games where silencer was played like a carry, but I don't see why you don't just pick OD if that's your philosophy. He has better 1v1 lane control and an ultimate that instantly kills support heroes later on. Anyway the argument earlier I was making - a farmed Silencer is inferior to farmed semi-carries like visage, potm, pugna, etc. He has no flash farming spells and can't kill anything without the help of allies unless you get really lucky with runes. He's squishy, can't chase...(all poor attributes for carries).

Thus, this guide will be devoted to the "support silencer" perspective. 

Additionally, basic knowledge about picks/bans is assumed, although I will go over this more later on in the guide. 

Pros:
-Decimates certain trilanes with ease
-Neutralizes certain heroes completely during team fights
-Global Silence goes through BKB

"Cons:" 
-Extremely fragile, easy to gank
-Requires decent map awareness to use to full potential (to save allies, especially)
-Unlike most support heroes, cannot function as a "ganker" 
-Situational pick

Support Skill Build:

Level 1 - Curse of the Silent
Level 2 - Last Word
Level 3 - Curse of the Silent
Level 4 - Last Word
Level 5 - Curse of the Silent
Level 6 - Global Silence
Level 7 - Curse of the Silent
Level 8 - Last Word
Level 9 - Last Word
Level 10 - Stats/Glaive
Level 11 - Global Silence
Level 12 - Stats/Glaive
Level 13 - Stats/Glaive
Level 14 - Stats/Glaive
Level 15 - Stats/Glaive
Level 16 - Global Silence
Level 17 - 25 - Stats

Explanation: Curse of the Silent and Last Word are all you really need during the laning phase. The extra damage from "glaives" isn't worth the trade off in additional damage per second from CotS, nor is it a superior choice to additional seconds of silence to prevent follow up combos (like PoTM -> Arrow, Leap, Starfall, etc.) 

Most heroes have low starting armor, so the "effective extra damage" gained from pure damage is small early on (as opposed to, say, pure damage versus a Visage with > 20 armor 30 minutes in). 

I've seen certain replays where silencer skips glaives completely until the late-game. Exercise your own judgment. 


Since most competitive games are played in the 3-1-1 or 1-1-3 format, you'll plan your lanes with silencer accordingly. For 90% of cases, silencer will be in the trilane. 

Item Build:

 x3 x2

For the rest of the game:

 (As many as you need, make sure to have at least one at all times




 (Optional, your other support/ganker might already have bought one) -> 


If you get "rich:" (Unlikely)


Situational:



Now the question is: When should I (or the captain) pick silencer?

If you answer "yes" to any of the questions below, picking Silencer may NOT be a good idea:

Are you doing a push strategy? (Silencer is not good at pushing)
Are "low mana cost" heroes like Lich, Venomancer, Vengeful Spirit likely to be on the opposing trilane? (By "low mana cost" I mean that they have an ability costing less than 50 mana that gets rid of CotS)
Are your opponents reliant mostly on physical DPS? (Silencer won't save you from heroes like Slardar and Broodmother) 

In some instances, however, picking Silencer will prove extremely useful. 

1) "High mana cost" heroes such as Kunkka, Necrolyte, Tidehunter, Phantom Lancer, Medusa, Witch Doctor, and Sniper will be devastated by CotS. These heroes, not limited to the examples I provided, are not uncommon picks in trilanes, and have only abilities that expend large amounts of mana.
2) Blinkers like Storm Spirit and QoP are much more easily killed (Global Silence penetrates BKB and Linkens). 
3) Heroes that spam their spells in succession like Invoker, Obsidian Destroyer, Zeus, etc. will be less useful during team fights.
4) 2 specific hero mentions: Enigma's "black hole" is canceled by Global Silence (although Earthshaker is probably a better, less situational option to deal with Enigma unless Enigma has BKB). Shadow Fiend's Requiem of Souls is also canceled, but the cooldown doesn't begin until Shadow Fiend officially casts it. Nevertheless, this will give your team enough time to reposition to minimize damage dealt by Requiem of Souls. This is the same reasoning that Vengeful Spirit should swap SF when he activates BKB and channels Requiem. 

One weakness of Silencer is his lack of a stun and slow. Because of this, your other lanes should have gankers who will have stuns/slows to compensate for this. 

Basic rules for playing "support" with Silencer:

1) Your carry should be able to control the creep wave on his own. Thus, more effort should be spent on harassing as opposed to denying your own creeps. 
2) Be sure to hit all 3 heroes in the trilane whenever you use CotS.
3) If you're going for the kill, use CotS after the opponent has used his "ability." 

Example: You (Silencer), Drow Ranger, and Crystal Maiden are ganking Windrunner. Windrunner will obviously attempt a shackle (Let's say it fails) and then use "Windrunner" to escape. Often, I see less experienced Silencer players cast CotS at the wrong time, which would be before Windrunner activates her "windrunner" ability - please wait until the hero has exhausted his/her abilities already! 
4) Please check the mini-map every few seconds. Silencer is highly "map awareness" intensive, and lack of it may cost your team. 
5) Babysitting [a hard carry like Medusa], harassing, and timing are what makes Silencer important parts of a team. You won't be blamed for chicking, warding, and afking in lane as Silencer because you have no ganking power. 

Good allies:



Heroes who have disables lasting more than 3 seconds. CotS deals damage by the second, so longer disable = longer damage. 

Additionally, many of these heroes will "initiate" team fights for you, and following up with Global Silence ensures that they cannot retaliate with spells. Be sure to get the timing right!

Bad enemies:



As I mentioned, Lich, Vengeful Spirit, and Veno are painful rival supports to deal with because they have low mana cost spells to get rid of CotS. Lich and Veno can also easily wear down Silencer with their Novas/Gales, and Vengeful Spirit has the honorable mention of "swap" that spells almost instant death. If you are silenced before getting your Ultimate off during a team fight, your team will be at a considerable disadvantage. 



Doomed = no silence, and chances are, you will be the target of Doom (unless you have an intelligence carry hero like Necrolyte, Pugna, OD, or Zeus on your team) 

Thankfully Doom has been declining in popularity as a "top pick." 



A pretty common, and for you, ugly pick. Expect to be targeted by her during team fights. Ghost Scepter, Force Staff, or an ally Dark Seer are pretty much required if you want to survive, and there will be cases when you have none.

(Actually you can just TP out, assuming you have enough HP to last 3-4 hits.)

Replays: Since the newest version patch upgrade (thanks Blizzard!) you're going to need a version switcher to watch these. 

GosuGamers DotA | Replay: GGnet vs MYM
GosuGamers DotA | Replay: LGD.sGty vs Nirvana.cn