Strategy
Gameplay
| Playstyle | |
|---|---|
| Ancient Apparition is a spellcaster hero whose abilities can empower, disable, and destroy with the power of ice. His ultimate, Ice Blast, damages and freezes his foes' health regeneration, placing them on disadvantages during every team fight, thus making him scale well into the game. However, Ancient Apparition is not a beginner friendly support as his abilities requires precise timing and judgement to execute. He is also quite fragile as he does not really possesses any reliable or instant escape and disable abilities. | |
| Pros | Cons |
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Lane Support
- Ancient Apparition has little potential to roam like Lion, and limited capacity to react to ganks like Dazzle since Cold Feet's stun is unreliable, so he usually babysits the carry in lane.
- Start with Chilling Touch to harass.
- You may level Cold Feet if the enemies lack mobility, or your allies have disables to guarantee the stun.
- A value point in Ice Vortex helps with vision and movement speed slow.
- Once your carry has enough farm to either push towers or farm the jungle, you should take the lane for yourself for a while, to catch up on experience and get level 6 to help your team's pushes with long-ranged Ice Blasts.
Roaming
- Pair with a partner with disables to guarantee Cold Feet.
- For example, Wraith King has a stun and slow in Wraithfire Blast to set up Cold Feet.
Ability Builds
| Lane Support Ancient Apparition | ||||||||||||||||||||||||
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| 1 | 2 | 3 | 4 | 5 | 6 | 7 | 8 | 9 | 10 | 11 | 12 | 13 | 14 | 15 | 16 | 17 | 18 | 20 | 25 | |||||
 |  |  | | |  | | | |  | | | | | | |  | | | | |||||
| Roaming Ancient Apparition | ||||||||||||||||||||||||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | 2 | 3 | 4 | 5 | 6 | 7 | 8 | 9 | 10 | 11 | 12 | 13 | 14 | 15 | 16 | 17 | 18 | 20 | 25 | |||||
| | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | |||||
Talents
| Hero Talents | ||
|---|---|---|
| +4% Ice Blast Kill Threshold | 25 | 450 AoE Cold Feet |
| +80 Chilling Touch Damage | 20 | +5s Ice Blast Duration |
| +300 Cold Feet Breaking distance | 15 | -2s Ice Vortex Cooldown |
| +40 Cold Feet Damage Per Second | 10 | +300 Chilling Touch Attack Range |
Tips & Tactics
General
- Ancient Apparition's spells, although spammable, are very mana-expensive. Be mindful of your mana consumption.
- Any heroes that possess reliable stun/slows such as Wraith King/Lion/Shadow Demon etc. synergize well with Cold Feet and Ice Vortex; results in extensive magical damage and disables duration.
- Compare to other supports alike, Ancient Apparition scales well with levels, thus making Hand of Midas good on him.
- Ancient Apparition 's abilities require a certain amount of skill and teamwork to make the best out of him; although primarily played as a lane support hero, a good early game allows Ancient Apparition to snowball and possessing a Aghanim's Scepter allows him to scale well into late game.
- Ancient Apparition can solo mid in the early game, as he has all the necessary tools to control his lane. He will look to start ganking as soon as possible and use the early Ice Blasts to his team's advantage.
- In spite of his ability to solo, Ancient Apparition is still potent in a dual or tri lane. Cold Feet functions well as a follow-up to an ally's stun, and Ice Vortex lowers enemy magic resistance so allies can nuke them down.
- All of Ancient Apparition's spells have good range. Try to avoid close combat when possible.
- You do not have an escape mechanism, so having vision of your opponents is crucial for you to survive. Ask your teammates to ward or do it yourself whenever possible.
- Adapt the ability build depending on the allies and enemies.
- Luna won't help you trigger Cold Feet, so don't level it, but she will gladly chase enemies slowed by Ice Vortex with Lucent Beam.
- Similarly, an enemy Weaver will not care much for either Ice Vortex or Cold Feet, but he will think twice about getting a last hit if you're ready to hit him with Chilling Touch.
- An allied Zeus will care only for the magic resistance reduction of Ice Vortex, as well as the vision it provides to keep spamming Arc Lightning.
- Ancient Apparition makes a decent mid-laner. He has a good attack animation and fair base damage. He can secure last hits and harass with Chilling Touch. He can sort of zone an opponent in a 1v1 situation with Cold Feet, as either they will cancel it and perhaps miss a last hit or two while doing so, or they will get stunned by it in which case you can hit them (with buffed up right-clicks) a couple of times. You can also hit them from the low-ground with the vision provided by Ice Vortex. And once you reach level 6, you can gank the side lanes without moving with Ice Blast. The thing you will struggle the most with is enemy ganks, since you have no defence or mobility whatsoever. Since you're such a bully in a 1v1 scenario, there are high chances that the enemy will choose to simply push the lane with any AoE ability, something that you lack as well. As for items, an early Dagon will definitely help you reach the enemies' shatter threshold.
Abilities
Cold Feet
- At level 4, Cold Feet's cooldown is only 9 seconds while the stun lasts for seconds and it takes 4 seconds to trigger it. It is possible to keep an enemy always under the effect of Cold Feet, either the stun or the damage.
- The damage part is dispellable by any dispel, so don't waste your mana against a hero that will shrug it off with a low-cooldown spell (such as Abaddon with Aphotic Shield and Legion Commander with Press the Attack).
- Tiny's Toss counts as distance travelled, and will therefore remove Cold Feet's debuff, even when the target is tossed straight up.
- Use Cold Feet to harass in the early game, but mind your mana pool.
- Eul's Scepter of Divinity in combination with Cold Feet can almost always guarantee a stun (though at the cost of Cold Feet's damage over time). It also allows you to land a short-range Ice Blast in quick succession. Rod of Atos can do the same while maintaining the damage over time, though unlike Eul's, it can be disjointed.
- More tips needed.
Ice Vortex
- Ice Vortex's cast range is huge. Use it to scout Roshan, to give vision of the high ground, to reveal common juking spots etc.
- Ice Vortex's cooldown is only 10/8/6/4 seconds. In the later stages of a game, once you have enough mana, spam it.
- If you already used Chilling Touch and you're too fragile to get near a team fight to use Cold Feet, you should at least stay behind and spam Ice Vortex.
- Ice Vortex can slow enemies when chasing or being chased, as well as reducing their magic resistance.
- Ice Vortex's magic resistance reduction works well with every one of Ancient Apparition's abilities as they all deal magical damage.
Chilling Touch
- Use Chilling Touch to harass and slow enemies in the laning stage from a safe distance.
- Chilling Touch's slow may keep enemies within radius of Cold Feet or Ice Vortex.
- More tips needed.
Ice Blast
- The only ability in the game that prevents healing, making it a direct counter to a plethora of heroes.
- There are only four abilities that can help you regain life while frostbitten: Terrorblade's Sunder, Weaver's Time Lapse, Undying's Decay, and Phoenix's Supernova.
- Heroes who rely on regenerating rapidly during teamfight with abilities such as Alchemist and Abaddon or those who wields healing items like Mekansm will be rendered useless under the effect of Ice Blast, thus placing them on disadvantages during the encounters. Although becoming spell immune prior to getting hit by the blast can negate the impact damage, the freezing debuff pierces through immunity and cannot be dispelled.
- Remember that Ice Blast debuff prevents all health gain, including healing spells, natural health regeneration, lifesteal, health gained indirectly such as from activating an Armlet of Mordiggian, and even bonus health gained from the strength obtained by leveling up under its effects (however, there ARE a few exceptions, namely abilities that directly manipulate health such as Sunder or Supernova). Landing this spell on the enemy team at the start of a team fight will put heroes that rely on survivability such as Huskar, Necrophos, or Death Prophet into dangerous situation.
- Ice Blast is a multi-purpose spell that can be cast to anywhere on the map. Use it to aid your allies in ganks, initiate team battles, finish off low-HP heroes, and clear large creep waves.
- Do not worry about using your ultimate sparingly, it has only a 60/50/40 second cooldown and therefore can be used even for harassment or as a deterrent for pushing. The cooldown starts running upon launching the initial tracer, so it already starts cooling down before the actual blast even released.
- Ice Blast's tracer gives vision, allowing you to use it for global scouting with free harassment on the side if it hits. Firing it into Roshan's pit at an inopportune moment can be particularly lethal.
Items
Starting items:
- Iron Branch gives cheap bonus attributes which is helpful for laning and can be build into Magic Wand.
- Clarity is needed because Ancient Apparition is very mana dependent in the early game. These potions will make spamming Cold Feet possible.
- Tango grants health restoration, which is very important for a fragile hero.
- Healing Salve also restores health to you and allies.
- Animal Courier carries items to team.
- Observer Ward not only helps your team out by providing vision, but help you out, too, by scouting low-HP enemies to Ice Blast.
Early game:
- Urn of Shadows gives some overall attributes and good mana regeneration. Its ability will make ganking easier, while it can also be used to heal allies.
- Magic Wand helps with sustaining both your health and mana.
- Boots of Speed are needed for the movement speed bonus.
Mid game:
- Arcane Boots provide Ancient Apparition and his allies with much-needed mana sustain, as well as increase Ancient Apparition's own mana pool.
- Eul's Scepter of Divinity gives plenty of mana regeneration, some mana, and some movement speed. You can activate its ability on an enemy after casting Cold Feet and the opposing hero will be stunned and frozen most of the time.
Late game:
- Force Staff is an extremely useful item which can be picked up as an escape mechanism or a chasing item. It can be used to help teammates as well.
- Glimmer Cape grants magic resistance and invisibility to help Ancient Apparition and allies escape or initiate without being seen.
- Aghanim's Scepter gives Ancient Apparition a much needed improvement to his attributes as well as increasing the duration of Ice Blast's debuff to seconds, effectively preventing all enemy support heroes with healing spells from healing for an extended period of time. This makes your ultimate ability extremely lethal to low-health heroes, and even tanky heroes that rely on their regeneration or lifesteal to be effective.
Situational items:
- Hand of Midas can be a good item choice when Ancient Apparition has an above-average early game, sustaining him with a steady gold and experience gain.
- Mekansm is a great utility item which will make you and your team much harder to kill. Use its ability to heal you and nearby friendly heroes at the cost of some mana, while buffing everyone at the same time. It can be later upgraded into Guardian Greaves.
- Tranquil Boots can be chosen over Arcane Boots to sustain Ancient Apparition's health, as his high Intelligence growth and low mana costs make mana less of an issue.
- Ghost Scepter makes Ancient Apparition immune to physical attacks, allowing him to survive when enemy carries are coming for him.
- Kaya boosts Ancient Apparition's damage output, making Ice Blast in particular more dangerous, at a cheap cost. It can be upgraded into Kaya and Sange for a much needed boost to durability.
- Rod of Atos grants a decent amount of overall stats, padding out Ancient Apparition's anemic health pool and bolstering his mana. Its root combines very well with Cold Feet, Ice Vortex, and Ice Blast.
- Spirit Vessel is a natural upgrade to Urn of Shadows, and the percentage-based damage synergizes nicely with Ice Blast.
- Scythe of Vyse is a very strong late-game item that gives a great attribute increase, all the mana regeneration you'll ever need, and an amazing disable. Its only downside is its hefty price.
- Shiva's Guard gives a lot of intelligence and armor. Its ability slows down enemies and damages them in a large radius, making it perfect in teamfights where you are the first priority target.
- Octarine Core is good on most spell-casters and Ancient Apparition is no exception. But it's extremely expensive and should never be considered as the first major item on Ancient Apparition.
- Refresher Orb could theoretically prevent any kind of healing for 20 seconds with a double Ice Blast, an ultimate late game item.
