Phantom Assassin

Phantom Assassin
Movement speed	310
Turn rate	0.6
Vision range	1800/800
Attack range	150
Projectile speed	Instant
Attack animation	0.3+0.7
Base attack time	1.7
Magic resistance	25%
Collision size	24
Legs	2

Hero

Strategy

Counters

Equipment

Gear

Responses

Sounds

Lore

Old Abilities

Changelogs

Mortred the Phantom Assassin is a melee agility Hero fitting the role of hard carry. Mortred is best-known, and infamous for, her ability to inflict staggering damage with single strikes. Her abilities synergize supremely well with each other, rendering her an extremely formidable foe once she has acquired the items she requires. She is a very farm-dependent melee Hero, but she farms creeps with much more ease than many of her fellow carries, using her Stifling Dagger for last hitting. Besides eliminating the weakness most melee Heroes have in their farming, it also saves her from expending gold on important melee carry items like Quelling Blade. Her second ability, Phantom Strike, acts as both her escape and initiate, while Blur gives her an edge against other Heroes that depend on their physical attacks by evading them; giving her partial damage immunity to many carries. Her ultimate, the strongest critical strike in the game, is what connects Mortred with four-digit damage and what gives her a place amongst the very best support killers in the late game, since they usually fall instantly from the divine strike her ultimate provides. Mobile and able to fight back nearly every enemy that dares to face her, Mortred is a formidable foe that should never be underestimated, and with appropriate item choices and a few kills, she can snowball out of control and become next to impossible to stop.

Bio[edit]

Mortred, the Phantom Assassin
Play "I'm here to blur the line between life and death."
Role:	Carry / Escape
Lore:	Through a process of divination, children are selected for upbringing by the Sisters of the Veil, an order that considers assassination a sacred part of the natural order. The Veiled Sisters identify targets through meditation and oracular utterances. They accept no contracts, and never seem to pursue targets for political or mercenary reasons. Their killings bear no relation to any recognizable agenda, and can seem to be completely random: A figure of great power is no more likely to be eliminated than a peasant or a well digger. Whatever pattern the killings may contain, it is known only to them. They treat their victims as sacrifices, and death at their hand is considered an honor. Raised with no identity except that of their order, any Phantom Assassin can take the place of any other; their number is not known. Perhaps there are many, perhaps there are few. Nothing is known of what lies under the Phantom Veil. Except that this one, from time to time, when none are near enough to hear, is known to stir her veils with the forbidden whisper of her own name: Mortred.
Voice:	Gin Hammond (Responses)

Abilities[edit]

Stifling Dagger

Play

Ability
Target Unit

Affects
Enemies

Damage
Physical

Throws a dagger slowing the enemy unit's movement speed, dealing 65+25/40/55/70% of Phantom Assassin's attack damage as physical damage and applying attack effects from items and abilities.

Cast Animation: +

Cast Range: 525/750/975/1200

Base Damage: 65

Attack Damage: 25%/40%/55%/70%

Move Speed Slow: 50%

Slow Duration: 1/2/3/4

Bonus Targets: 0 (

1)

6

30/25/20/15

When blocked, the instant-attack does not occur. Slow persists if debuff was placed before spell immunity and when not dispelled.

Blocked upon impact, as primary and secondary target.

Modifiers

Stiflingdagger Caster: Undispellable.

Stiflingdagger: Dispellable with any dispel.

The first skill learned by the Sisters of the Veil often signals an incoming hit.

Notes:

The Stifling Dagger travels at a speed of 1200 and can be disjointed.

Upon hitting the target, the dagger causes Phantom Assassin to perform an instant attack on the target.
- Since it is a regular attack, it can proc any attack modifier and on-hit effect normally, except for the following modifiers: Echo Sabre, Jinada, and Tidebringer.
- The slow of Echo Sabre and the damage of Tidebringer are applied, but their other effects (attack speed or cleave) are not.
- However, the attack uses no attack animation, so abilities which proc on attack begin (e.g. Untouchable) cannot be procced.
- Cleave effects are based on the target's position, damaging a circular area the opposite direction where the dagger came from.
- Although the dagger may make it look like a ranged attack, the attack still counts as melee when coming from Phantom Assassin.
- This means all abilities which differentiate between ranged and melee, use their melee effects/values, not ranged.
- The performed instant-attack has True Strike, so it cannot miss. However, when the dagger is avoided, no attack is performed.

The dagger first reduces Phantom Assassin's total attack damage by the percentage, and then adds its own 65 extra damage on top of that.
- This results in the following formula: 65 + 25%/40%/55%/70% * (main attack damage + attack damage bonuses/reductions)
- "Attack damage bonuses/reductions" includes all already existing attack damage changes, including temporary ones (Bash) and conditional ones (Quell).
- The 65 damage is also an attack damage bonus, but is added after the main damage is calculated.
- Attack modifiers which are based on attack damage (critical strike, lifesteal, cleave) include the 65 extra damage as well.
- The damage is added to Phantom Assassin's attack damage through a status buff which lasts for 0.03 seconds.
- Since the damage comes from a regular attack, it does not count as spell damage, but counts as attack damage.
- This means it is affected by damage block, unaffected by spell damage amplification and cannot spell lifesteal.

The projectile has 450 range flying vision. This vision lingers for 3.34 seconds at the target's location upon successfully hitting it.

The projectile blocks neutral creep camps.

When choosing the double strike Stifling Dagger talent, the spell launches a second projectile towards a random valid target within the cast range.
- Cannot target the primary target with the second dagger, so when no other targets are nearby, nothing happens.
- The secondary target is chosen randomly within the area. There are no priorities.

Phantom Strike

Play

Ability
Target Unit

Affects
Self

Teleports to a unit, friendly or enemy, and grants bonus attack speed while attacking if it's an enemy unit.

Cast Animation: +

Cast Range: 1000

Attack Speed Bonus: 130

Number of Attacks: 4

Duration: 4

14/11/8/5

50

Modifiers

Phantom Strike: Dispellable with any dispel.

Mortred's silken veil is the last thing her unfortunate target sees.

Notes:

Phantom Strike can be cast on allied units, without gaining the attack speed bonus.

Moves Phantom Assassin next to the target, towards the position she was upon spell cast.

The attack speed bonus lasts either 4 seconds or for 4 successful attacks, whichever is shorter.

Missed attacks do not count and do not reduce the amount of attacks left with the attack speed bonus.

The attack speed bonus is lost instantly upon successfully attacking a different target.

Phantom Assassin is ordered to attack the target if it is an enemy, automatically canceling the cast backswing.

Cannot be cast on couriers.

Blur

Ability
Passive

Affects
Self

Phantom Assassin focuses inward, increasing her ability to evade enemy attacks, and allowing her to blur her body to disappear from the enemy team's minimap when far from enemy heroes.

Detection Radius: 1600

Evasion: 20%/30%/40%/50%

Detects spell immune heroes only when they gained spell immunity while already within the detection range. Already spell immune heroes entering the radius are not detected.

Modifiers

Blur Active: Undispellable.

Meditation allows a Veiled Sister to carefully anticipate her opponents in combat.

Notes:

The evasion and the blur effect are independent from each other. The evasion is always active.

On average, Blur increases Phantom Assassin's survivability against physical attacks by 25%/42.86%/66.67%/100%.

Blur uses pseudo-random distribution, and thus, the actual miss chance on every level is 20%/29.9%/37.7%/45.7%.

Periodically checks for the presence of enemy heroes (including illusions) or creep-heroes and adapts its status.
- When the blur effect is active, Phantom Assassin becomes blurry and a status buff is placed.
- Detects invisible, spell immune and invulnerable heroes only when they gained the status while already within the detection range.
- Already invisible heroes entering the radius are not detected, unless they get revealed by True Sight while within range.
- Already spell immune or invulnerable heroes entering the radius are not detected either.
- Detected invisible heroes remain detected until they get outside of the detection range.
- Does not detect hidden heroes at all.

Coup de Grace

Play

Ability
Passive

Affects
Enemies

Phantom Assassin refines her combat abilities, gaining a chance of delivering a devastating critical strike to enemy units. Stifling Dagger shares the same critical strike chance.

Proc Chance: 15%

Critical Damage: 230%/340%/450%

Red critical numbers are before illusion and armor reduction.

A divine strike, Mortred honors her opponent by choosing them for death.

Notes:

Increases attack damage by an average of 19.5%/36%/52.5%.

The proc chances of multiple crit sources stack.
- If two sources of critical strike proc at the same time, the higher multiplier has priority.

Coup de Grace uses pseudo-random distribution.

A part of the visual effects (a white glow on her weapon) plays during the start of an attack, revealing that the attack is going to crit.

Talents[edit]

Hero Talents
Double Strike Stifling Dagger	25	+25 Agility
+10 All Stats	20	+35 Attack Speed
+20 Movement Speed	15	10% Lifesteal
+15 Damage	10	+150 Health

Notes:

Upgrading health increases maximum health capacity and keeps the current health percentage.

The attack damage is added as bonus attack damage, and therefore does not benefit illusions.

The lifesteal is not a unique attack modifier and fully stacks with other sources of lifesteal.

Recommended items[edit]

Starting items:

Healing Salve and Tangos provide basic regen to stay in lane and continue farming despite enemy harassment. Given that Phantom Assassin is an agility melee carry who must close in to get last-hits, regen is important to ensure that she can survive the early game and transition smoothly into farming by herself.
Iron Branches give a very cost-effective increase to Phantom Assassin's attributes, and can be built into a Magic Wand.
Stout Shield helps reduce harass damage taken from lane opponents, increasing survivability.
Quelling Blade can be crucial for increasing Phantom Assassin's farming ability in the early game. Being able to last-hit more easily and kill neutral camps faster allows her to farm the items she needs to start becoming effective in a match.

Early game:

Boots of Speed are important to obtain early on. Phantom Assassin must be able to easily move in and out of range to last-hit, as well as chase or escape as needed without having to rely as much on Phantom Strike.
Poor Man's Shield provides increased damage block, and additional agility for more base damage and armor. It can greatly improve Phantom Assassin's lane survivability and aid in getting last-hits.
Magic Wand can greatly improve Phantom Assassin's survivability and effectiveness in the early game. It provides a small amount of attributes and tremendous charge storage for burst health and mana regen, both of which are crucial on an agility hero with low strength and intelligence.
Town Portal Scroll is crucial to carry at all times. As a hard carry, Phantom Assassin is the linchpin of her team, and her absence in teamfights can be greatly detrimental to her team's chances of victory.
Ring of Aquila is a strong stat item that greatly aids Phantom Assassin in the early game. It provides agility and bonus damage to improve Phantom Assassin's last-hitting power, and the flat mana regen aura replenishes a larger fraction of Phantom Assassin's pitiful mana pool than it does for other heroes, allowing her to utilize her spells more regularly.

Core items:

Power Treads boosts Phantom Assassin's combat effectiveness and survivability greatly. The extra attack speed increases her damage output, whether it is for attacking heroes or creeps; with greater attack speed comes more chances for proccing Coup de Grace. Attribute switching is very important, as it can be switched to strength for more health, agility for more damage output, or intelligence for using spells, particularly for repeated casting of Stifling Dagger.
Desolator is a useful utility mid-game item that can be built relatively easily. It allows Phantom Assassin to apply the armor debuff from long range with Stifling Dagger, softening up multiple targets for her team and for her own attacks. The damage boost also greatly improves the killing power of Coup de Grace, particularly when combined with the armor reduction on enemies that Phantom Assassin jumps on.
Black King Bar gives Phantom Assassin much-needed spell immunity, allowing her to ignore enemy disables and nukes as she directly engages enemies in fights. The extra health helps increase survivability, while the damage improves attack power.

Situational items:

Phase Boots can be situationally useful over Power Treads depending on how they are utilized. The bonus damage helps with last-hitting and increases the potency of Coup de Grace, while the extra movement speed allows Phantom Assassin to more easily chase down enemies or flee when both Phantom Strike and Stifling Dagger cannot be relied on.
Helm of the Dominator provides health regeneration and attack speed, keeping Phantom Assassin healthy and improving her damage output. The active ability allows access to useful neutral creep abilities, such as the Alpha Wolf's Packleader's Aura, the Satyr Banisher's Purge and the Ogre Frostmage's Ice Armor. The dominated creep can also be used to escape fights by providing a Phantom Strike target.
Battle Fury is a strong item for allowing Phantom Assassin to secure her ability to farm into the late game. The damage and cleave allow her to easily clear bunches of creeps, whether it is for farming or pushing/counter-pushing, while the health and mana regen ensure that she can always maintain her health and mana pools while farming.
Satanic improves Phantom Assassin's survivability in teamfights, allowing her to quickly refill health with Coup de Grace crits.
Mask of Madness provides an alternate source of lifesteal and attack speed. Phantom Assassin's survivability is based on evasion instead of armor and her damage comes from a passive ability, partially offsetting the debuff, but not being able to use Stifling Dagger or Phantom Strike can be costly when trying to chase or flee, making this item a dangerous purchase.
Abyssal Blade can be crucial for giving Phantom Assassin the lockdown and damage she needs to quickly eliminate key opponents in fights. The bash gives her a chance to stun an enemy after jumping on them with Phantom Strike, while the active allows her to instantly hard-disable any foe through spell immunity, long enough to bring them down with Coup de Grace. It also increase her survivability giving bonus health and health regeneration and blocking 40 damage from incoming attacks.
Butterfly greatly boosts Phantom Assassin's damage output, as well as providing additional evasion. While stacking it alongside Blur runs the risk of having both nullified by the enemy building Monkey King Bar, purchasing a Butterfly can punish certain lineups by forcing their heroes to purchase Monkey King Bar over a different item that synergizes better with their strengths. As well, Butterfly's active allows Phantom Assassin to more easily chase or flee in circumstances where Phantom Strike proves impossible to use.
Vladmir's Offering is useful as a utility substitute over Helm of the Dominator. It provides many of the same bonuses, but despite its higher cost it is not registered as a Unique Attack Modifier, giving Phantom Assassin the option to purchase one that synergizes better with Stifling Dagger.
Monkey King Bar is a situationally useful damage item to build in order to counter enemy evasion. As well, the increased damage and attack speed is one of the best options for increasing Phantom Assassin's damage output as she does not benefit as much comparatively from building a Daedalus due to her ultimate.
Assault Cuirass greatly increases Phantom Assassin's damage output through more attack speed as well as the enemy armor reduction aura. The improved armor also greatly increases her survivability against physical damage, and the aura helps give teammates more armor and attack speed as well, which can be very useful depending on team composition.
Orb of Venom is a useful purchase in the laning stage that helps Phantom Assassin to secure kills alongside her team. Combined with Stifling Dagger, it can reduce an enemy's movement speed by up to 62% from long range.
Drum of Endurance is useful for allowing Phantom Assassin to fight earlier instead of attempting to farm for extended periods of time. Its easy buildup allows it to be purchased quickly, and it provides all-around attributes, particularly strength and intelligence to boost Phantom Assassin's health and mana pools. The aura increases her movement and attack speed, allowing her to be more mobile in fights, and the active is a powerful combat booster that gives her and her team an edge in teamfights.
Skull Basher can be a strong mid-game purchase in order to give Phantom Assassin some lockdown once she has acquired enough attack speed. Jumping on top of an enemy with Phantom Strike can give her a chance to stun enemies, stopping them in their tracks while Phantom Assassin continues to damage them. The extra strength gives her some more health for survivability, while the damage increases the potency of Coup de Grace.
Diffusal Blade is a situationally strong utility damage item in Phantom Assassin's hands. It boosts her agility and intelligence, giving her more damage output and mana, and the active can remove buffs from enemies while greatly slowing them for her to jump on.
Sange and Yasha is a situationally powerful mid-game item that is easy to farm and allows Phantom Assassin to begin participating in teamfights earlier. The agility and strength-based bonuses give her more damage output and health, while the movement speed makes her far more mobile, allowing her to chase and escape far more easily. Greater Maim can slow enemies down and prevent them from running away from her, and has a chance to proc with Stifling Dagger as well, potentially slowing an enemy by up to 82% movement speed.
Eye of Skadi is a powerful carry item and can greatly boost Phantom Assassin's combat effectiveness. It grants stats across the board, giving Phantom Assassin more health, mana and base damage. The Cold Attack passive can be used alongside lifesteal, and allows Phantom Assassin to slow enemies with her attacks and Stifling Dagger, greatly reducing their movement speed and preventing them from easily escaping her.
Refresher Orb is a very rarely built item, but can be used for double Satanic active, refreshing the cooldown of Black King Bar, and other uses.

Gameplay[edit]

Strategy & Tips

Counters &
Matchups

Audio[edit]

Responses

Sounds

History[edit]

Lore

Old Abilities

Changelogs

Equipment[edit]

Trivia[edit]

Mortred's name is derived from Mordred, a character in the Arthurian legend who betrayed and fought King Arthur at the Battle of Camalann.
"Coup de grâce" is a French term (pronounced "coo d'grahss") which literally means "blow of mercy", and refers to the killing blow of a wounded person or animal, friendly or not, to end their suffering.
Mortred's level-up line Play "I'm an immaterial girl!" is probably a reference to the song Material Girl performed by Madonna.
In DotA: Allstars, Blur caused Mortred to become transparent to the enemy, scaling with levels and making her nearly invisible and untargetable to unexperienced players, thus her title "Phantom Assassin". This aspect of the ability was not ported to Dota 2.
Mortred's idle animation is a typical fencing stance, with perpendicular feet, one arm extended forth and the other one folded and up in the air. However, her weapon is wielded not with the extended arm, but with the arm at rest.
Mortred is featured in the Dota 2 comic, The Contract.