Dark Seer/Guide

Hero

 

Strategy

 

Counters

 

Equipment

 

Gear

 

Relics

 

Responses

 

Sounds

 

Lore

 

Old Abilities

 

Changelogs

 

Known Bugs

 

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' own power.
Pros	Cons
Strong solo offlaner. Extremely annoying to lane against. Strong team fight presence. Excellent at escaping or disengaging.	Melee attack range. Initiation combo often requires a followup.

Offlane

You can use Ion Shell on melee creeps to hopefully score last hits and harass enemy heroes. You also have great survivability due to movement speed of 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. 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 position enemies in 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 opportunities to make rotations for fear of losing towers and map control.

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
+150 Ion Shell Damage	25	Parallel Wall
400 AoE Surge	20	15% Cooldown Reduction
+75 Vacuum AoE	15	+12 Health Regen
+90 Damage	10	12% Evasion

Notes:

• The attack damage talent does not benefit illusions.

• The evasion talent stacks multiplicatively with other sources of evasion.

• The cooldown reduction talent stacks multiplicatively with Octarine Core and additively with Arcane Rune.

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 Animal Courier, allowing it to get out of danger or finish its delivery faster.
• Surge's haste speed makes it hard for the enemies to lock down Dark Seer, so he can push safely. During this time, enemies cannot slow him.
• 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.
• Do not forget to control the illusions to attack certain enemies that your team wants to take out first.

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, build up to a Magic Wand and/or Mekansm later on, or use with Tango for more healing.
• Enchanted Mango gives health regeneration and can restore mana in a pinch, before Dark Seer acquires Soul Ring.
• Stout Shield blocks some physical attacks whether you are laning or jungling.

Early game:

• Magic Stick gives burst health and mana in a pinch.
• 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 Raindrop gives mana regeneration and absorbs some magical damage.

Mid game:

• Magic Wand sustains health and mana in fights.
• Helm of the Dominator allows you 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.
• Blink Dagger can help you positioning to place a better vacuum wall combo.
• Town Portal Scroll allows you to be at any lane for a gank, countergank, or push in seconds.

Late game:

• Guardian Greaves restores both health and mana to team; the health regeneration and armor aura works better on wounded allies.
• Shiva's Guard grants you more punch to your Vacuum and Wall of Replica initiation, and gives you armor and intelligence.
• Lotus Orb removes debuffs from Dark Seer or an ally, as well as granting Echo Shell to reflect spells.

Situational items:

• Force Staff changes position of Dark Seer or any heroes.
• Pipe of Insight grants you and your allies protection from magical damage.
• Crimson Guard can protect your team from physical attacks in teamfights.
• Aghanim's Scepter effectively allows your illusions to deal more damage than your opponents, thereby significantly increasing your team fight potential.
• Ghost Scepter should be considered to counter high physical damage dealers, ensuring your survival to use abilities.
• Black King Bar guarantees your initiation with spell immunity to ward off almost all disables.
• Scythe of Vyse grants mana regeneration and Hex to completely nullify an enemy hero from using abilities or attacking.
• Refresher Orb allows you to use your abilities and items twice in a row if needed.
• Radiance for dealing more magical damage combined with ion shell and 17% miss chance combined with your evasion.
• Octarine Core will restore your health because of your aoe magical damage abilities and lower cooldowns for better influence in fight.