Mars/Guide

Hero

Strategy

Equipment

Gear

Gameplay[]

Playstyle
Mars is an egotistical god who is amazing at breaking up teamfights in his advantage and trapping enemies within his multiple stuns and slows. While he lacks any mobility skills, he can throw the Spear of Mars to impale and stun targets at range which also makes a great defensive option. He can use God's Rebuke to farm very fast while dishing out area of effect damage while giving enemies a mild slow. His large shield serves as Bulwark against frontal and side attacks, and can be used to bash enemies into terrain. The Arena Of Blood creates an impassable circle that prevents enemies from entering or leaving, and when an enemy is speared into its walls does a huge amount of over time damage. Overall, Mars is a strong laner capable of surviving even the hardest of matchups while pushing and dealing consistent damage to enemies.
Pros	Cons
Strong laner. Durable against physical damage. Numerous disables and knockbacks. High burst damage. Good wave clear.	Low mana pool Vulnerable to pure/magical damage Requires team coordination. Spear of Mars is a point click ability, so practice is needed.

Initiator[]

No matter how you are playing Mars, Arena Of Blood is your most powerful presence and you should be looking to fight with it. Which is why maxing Spear of Mars is a very good idea in the majority of situations.
This role requires Mars to build Blink Dagger, so he can initiate fights by jumping in and using Arena of Blood.
In the early and mid game, he can set up ganks with Arena Of Blood and deal burst damage with Spear of Mars and God's Rebuke. After successfully initiating a teamfight, Mars can push waves easily with his God's Rebuke.
Building tanky items/auras such as Crimson Guard, Vladmir's Offering, Heaven's Halberd is very common to help sustain your team since you will be in the center of the fight.
Mars is very weak to magical damage, so a Pipe of Insight may be a good idea.

Carry[]

Mars as a carry is focused around last hitting effectively and being a threat in lane with Spear of Mars, which is your best laning ability. This way of playing Mars is not very common anymore since you will have much more impact shutting down an enemy carry than an opposing Offlaner.
Items such as Desolator, Vladmir's Offering, Blink Dagger, Black King Bar are very common for a carry Mars.

Ability Builds[]

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

Talents[]

Hero Talents
Arena Of Blood Grants Team +180 HP Regen	25	God's Rebuke +65% Crit
+0.6s Spear of Mars Stun	20	+12%/+6% Bulwark Front/Side damage reduction
+100 Spear of Mars Damage	15	-4s God's Rebuke Cooldown
+30% Bulwark Active Redirect Chance	10	+100 God's Rebuke Distance

Tips & Tactics[]

Mars is very strong at killing heroes early with Spear of Mars and Arena of Blood, keep an eye on how often you are using these spells for kill attempts.
Push a lot of waves with Mars with a Soul Ring, you will get a huge amount of farm.
Mars is best served in the Offlane, you don't want to teleport away unless the enemy team is diving your team and you can get a decent Arena of Blood out.

General[]

Since most of the spells of Mars have low cast point yet high cast backswing it is advisable to use stop command and issue next command right away to deal as much damage in a short amount of time.
It's important to note that Mars is a very strong pusher and early game fighter.
Most the time, your passive will stay at level 1 until much later in the game. So it may be a good idea to play cautiously in the early game.
Spear of Mars is Mars' best ability, however, it does require practice to hit on a consistent basis.
In terms of talents:
- Level 10 talents: If you want to move faster while blocking damage that may prove lethal, then -10% Bulwark Movespeed Penalty should do just that and usually taken if you're looking to buy Aghanim's Scepter. Otherwise, the increased duration in God's Rebuke slow is accessible for aggressive Mars users.
- Level 15 talents: If you find yourself relying on your Spear of Mars, then the bonus +100 damage in Spear of Mars isn't a bad idea. Same goes for God's Rebuke, the reduced -4s cooldown could help tremendously in improving your physical damage output.
- Level 20 talents: The Bulwark Damage Reduction is neglected due to its irrelevant bonus. Thus, the increased stun duration on Spear of Mars is often taken, as it mainly helps improve your Arena Of Blood's total damage output.
- Level 25 talents: If you're looking to hit harder on your foes, then God's Rebuke +65% Crit will without a doubt increase your overall damage in the late game. If you're looking forward to save your teammates from imminent death or just simply fighting alongside them, then the +180 HP Regen during Arena Of Blood is incredibly useful for these occasions, as it turns your arena into a castable fountain, highly preferable if your team has a carry that can both sustain and inflict damage upon the enemy, such as Spectre or Wraith King.

Abilities[]

Spear of Mars[]

Use Spear of Mars inside Arena Of Blood to push enemies into the undead warriors to stun and repeatedly damage them.
Use Spear of Mars to save allies by pushing back attackers.
Use Spears of Mars to hit invisible heroes. Stunning an invisible hero will reveal them briefly.
Spear of Mars can stun enemies hiding closely behind buildings. Throw the spear when there is a building right next to the enemy hero, and in between Mars and the enemy hero.
Spear of Mars is great for securing the first bounty runes when timed right.
Spear of Mars is a difficult ability to use due to the spear's slow travel time and conditional stun. Good practice and prediction is mandatory in order to stun enemy heroes with it.

God's Rebuke[]

God's Rebuke works with attack modifiers.
- Build lifesteal items to heal Mars quickly in fights.
- Build Desolator to apply the armor reduction debuff to multiple enemies at once.
- Build Maelstrom or Mjollnir for Static Charge active effect.Only one instance of Chain Lightning will be cast.
- Build Shadow Blade to apply the extra damage to all targets.
- Build Eye of Skadi to apply movement slow and attack speed slow to all targets.
- God's Rebuke's critical damage does not stack with items like Daedalus.
Use God's Rebuke to position enemies for a stun with Spear of Mars.
- Slow from God's Rebuke also allows Mars to hit Spear of Mars more reliably.
Use God's Rebuke inside Arena Of Blood to push enemies into the undead warriors.
Since God's Rebuke overrides the knockback effect of Spear of Mars, it can be used right after Spear of Mars if the target would not be stunned or would be knocked away from allies.
Works very well with Orb of Venom for a low cost.

Bulwark[]

Face a melee attacker to tank and stall while teammates arrive.
Bulwark only blocks attack damage, leaving Mars vulnerable to spell damage, including physical spell damage.

Arena Of Blood[]

Arena Of Blood can be used defensively to block enemies attempting to chase Mars.
- However, units that are spell immune can move through Arena Of Blood.
Use Arena Of Blood to block tower and fountain attacks when diving.
Use Arena Of Blood to quickly dispose of squishy heroes.
Can separate fights in Mars' favor.
Many abilities cannot go through Arena of Blood. However, abilities that are considered flying can go over it without being knocked back and damaged.
Spear of Mars can push enemies over the Arena if coupled with an ability that launches them into the air, such as Torrent, Toss, Walrus PUNCH!, Impale, Telekinesis, etc
Abilities can still be cast in Blood of Arena, so be careful who you are trapping inside it as they may force you to run out.
Right clicks do not work from the outside, so you are safe from ranged right clicking heroes for the duration.
As the abilities' unpassable terrain blocks the fountains projectiles it can be used to farm kills in the enemy fountain.

Items[]

Starting items:

Tango's health regeneraion helps Mars stay in lane.
Healing Salve also restores health to Mars.
Enchanted Mango restores mana so Mars can keep nuking his enemies.

Early game:

Soul Ring allows Mars to keep use Spear of Mars and God's Rebuke.
Clarity's allow you to sustain your mana pool and farm at a much faster speed than most heroes.
Boots of Speed help Mars get into position to use his abilities.
Magic Stick provides burst health and mana restoration to keep Mars fighting.
Bracer is situationally good which gives Mars some magic resistance early on and some stats.

Mid game:

Phase Boots gives armor which Mars is lacking and allows him to move around the map faster.
Magic Wand, upgraded from Magic Stick, provides additional attributes.
Blink Dagger positions Mars to land stuns with Spear of Mars, and to initiate with Arena Of Blood. This can be upgraded to Overwhelming Blink, that helps him deals damage in a large AOE upon jumping while increasing both his base damage and health.
Armlet of Mordiggian can be essentially good when Mars requires quick physical damage at a reasonable cost. This compensates his lacking armor while allowing his physical damage to scale well especially when he is casting God's Rebuke, his only critical source.
Desolator allows Mars to take towers quickly during the mid game which is where he is strong, and makes God's Rebuke much more lethal.

Late game:

Black King Bar grants spell immunity which may be required if the other team has a lot of stuns and can stop you from being effective and disruptive.
Assault Cuirass provides Mars a great bonus amount of armor while granting bonus physical damage output both to him and his teammates during teamfights.
Heart of Tarrasque further increases Mars' already high health pool and his base damage, while also allowing him to sustain to the point of nigh-immortality.

Situational items:

Vladmir's Offering allows Mars to fight early with his team and some sustain when farming lanes, as he can do it much quicker than most heroes as tanky as him. It also gives burst healing with God's Rebuke.
Pipe of Insight's magic resistance allows Mars to stay alive against magical nukes.
Vanguard will make Mars a hard target to kill from physical attacks when the enemies are not attacking Mars from the front.
Crimson Guard is very strong againts multiple physical damage dealers and can help your team push.
Heaven's Halberd allows Mars to stop a hero from attacking who may have some form of break or spell immunity (if he can use it before them).
Aghanim's Scepter upgrades his Bulwark into a moving bulldozer, allowing him to constantly sustain damage while pushing the team forward, as he slows enemies and deals physical damage caught in his sights. If combined with Eye of Skadi, this further increases his potent damage while providing a constant slow for the late game.
Refresher Orb can be considered if Mars has a good game,as his ultimate is powerful in teamfights.