Strategy
Gameplay
| Playstyle | |
|---|---|
| Disruptor is a strong teamfight hero who can control the enemy team's positioning with his potent disables. Kinetic Field can prevent enemies from leaving the area after being set up, and combines with Static Storm to silence and damage enemies for extended periods. While he lacks nuking power, he can influence the battlefield in such a way as to greatly hinder the enemy in engagements and prevent gank targets from escaping with Glimpse. | |
| Pros | Cons |
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Support
If the enemy offlaner is not mobile and your lane has enough damage, Kinetic Field should give you more than enough control to allow you and your lane partners to damage or kill them. Be aware that without a stun you cannot prevent your target from using Town Portal Scroll. The build is good against heroes like Centaur Warrunner, Earthshaker, or Abaddon.
Alternative Support
The big difference between these builds is the level 1 Thunder Strike. Maxing Kinetic Field or Thunder Strike over the other is perfectly acceptable depending on what your team needs, damage or control. Use it to zone out enemy offlaners; the cast range is higher than your attack range, so use it when they go to retreat. Thunder Strike is especially useful versus heroes when in a safelane with lower kill potential as this will allow your carry to farm during the first crucial levels. The build is good against heroes like Timbersaw, Weaver, or Axe.
Ability Builds
| Support Disruptor | ||||||||||||||||||||||||
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| Alternative Support Disruptor | ||||||||||||||||||||||||
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Talents
| Hero Talents | ||
|---|---|---|
| +200 Static Storm Radius | 25 | -12s Glimpse Cooldown |
| +0.5s Thunder Strike Slow Duration | 20 | +2s Kinetic Field Duration |
| +1.5s Static Storm Duration | 15 | +275 Glimpse Max Damage |
| +10 Thunder Strike Damage per Strike | 10 | -3s Kinetic Field Cooldown |
Tips & Tactics
General
- As a hard support, Disruptor does not need items to play well.
- He can also roam as his abilities can influence enemy positioning, setting up kills for teammates if they have strong damage output or extra disables.
- Disruptor's abilities have short cast animation and long cast range. Positioning is also important for Disruptor, as exploiting these two aspects of the hero allows him to have a powerful impact on any engagement.
Abilities
Thunder Strike
- Thunder Strike deals magical damage and reveals the target's location over the duration of the ability.
- Thunder Strike deals small damage in the early game, and lacks immediate killing power even when maxed out. However, it provides vision of the target for its duration, so long as the target is not invisible, preventing them from juking, as well as giving vision to target them with Glimpse.
- Thunder Strike deals damage to all enemies within a small radius around the target as well. If using the ability to nuke creep waves or neutral camps, it is best to cast it on a melee creep, as they will clump up near other melee creeps while attacking, resulting in all of them taking the damage.
- Thunder Strike counters Blink Dagger since it deals damage over a long duration, putting the item on cooldown.
Glimpse
- Glimpse can reposition an enemy, putting them in a location that your team can capitalize on.
- You must take into account he enemy's previous movements maximize Glimpse's effect. As such, timing is important as casting it too early or too late can move a target only a small distance, or put them in a safer location.
- Glimpse has a relatively short cast range at early levels, and its long cooldown means that it can only be used once in an engagement. However, maxing the ability out allows Disruptor to cast it on any hero within vision, and its cooldown shortens to the point where he can use it more than once in fights. Maxing out Glimpse early on can provide strong benefits for Disruptor's team due to this greatly enhanced utility.
- Use Thunder Strike with Glimpse, as it provides vision of the target for using Glimpse.
- Thunder Strike's damage interval may help with the timing for Glimpse. Thunder Strike's third damage instance happens exactly 4 seconds after cast, so casting Glimpse on the target at the same time as that damage instance will send the target to the place where they were standing when Thunder Strike was first cast on them.
- Glimpse's effects are global, and there is no maximum range on how far back it can send its target; if an enemy is teleporting in with a Town Portal Scroll, Glimpse can send them straight back to their earlier location, even if it was across the map.
- However, keep in mind that while this tactic can prevent reinforcements against tower dives or pushes, the target will still have 1.8 seconds to act before being sent back, so they can still use abilities at their destination for a short time.
- Glimpse issues stop commands to targets at the end of its effect, allowing it to cancel channeled abilities and items, such as Town Portal Scrolls, Black Hole, Death Ward, and Freezing Field.
- Glimpse destroys targeted illusions, making it decent against abilities like Haunt and Conjure Image.
- Glimpse can reposition even hidden or invulnerable targets, with certain exceptions, making it a powerful ability against certain evasive heroes, as it can return heroes through abilities like Phase Shift, Ball Lightning, and Waveform.
- While Glimpse cannot return targets to their previous location through spell immunity, it may force the enemy to activate Black King Bar or face death. Even if your team cannot kill the target, you still reduces the item's maximum duration and puts it on cooldown ahead of the next engagement.
Kinetic Field
- Kinetic Field can lock down multiple enemy heroes for a short duration, allowing allies to deal damage and use their disables.
- Glimpse may help setting up Kinetic Field. As Glimpse will mark the target's arrival destination upon cast, use Kinetic Field on that location to lock the target inside.
- Kinetic Field has a delay before the barrier forms, so enemies with high movement speed or quick reaction times can escape. So, Disruptor may want to rely on allied disables to hold targets in place long enough for the field to form.
- In teamfights, Kinetic Field can split the battlefield and foil the enemy's attempts to get in position to use their abilities. Even if Kinetic Field does not catch any enemy players within, stopping backline supports from joining the fight can make a difference. Try to use the terrain to your advantage, such as chokepoints and cliffs.
- Kinetic Field provides ground vision within the barrier for the duration. So, it can reveal the fog of war, such as up high ground, behind trees, or Roshan's pit.
- While enemies can use abilities to escape the barrier, they cannot use Force Staff to break out, though you can still push enemies in.
- Kinetic Field manipulates movement speed rather than act as an obstacle, meaning that it can foil abilities like Duel by preventing melee targets from passing through.
Static Storm
- Static Storm silences the enemies in the area.
- Static Storm combines with Kinetic Field to create an area that silence and prevent enemies from escaping, making them easy prey for your teammates.
- Due to its relatively short cooldown for an ultimate ability, Disruptor can use Static Storm for kills when combined with Glimpse and Kinetic Field. Early game engagements usually do not happen often, and the ability's cooldown decreases as it levels up.
- Like Kinetic Field, Static Storm can split up the enemies. Placing the storm over an area that the enemy must walk through will harm them, and further combines with Kinetic Field to trap them in.
- Static Storm's long cast range and short cast animation allow Disruptor to drop the cloud on the enemy casters, potentially interrupting any channeling abilities in the process.
- Without any lockdown, enemies can just walk out of Static Storm. Hence, combine it with Kinetic Field or allied area disables like Reverse Polarity or Vacuum.
- With Aghanim's Scepter, Static Storm gains the ability to mute enemies caught within. While it has no effect on spell immunity, early Static Storm can prevent enemies from using Black King Bar.
Items
Starting items:
- Tango gives health sustain so that you can last longer in lane without going back to base.
- Healing Salve also restores health in lane.
- Clarity will allow Disruptor to maintain his mana pool in the laning stage. His mediocre base intelligence and static mana costs mean that casting spells in the early game will cost a disproportionately large amount of mana, so keeping it topped up in the early game can allow you to set up kills for your team more easily.
- Iron Branch is cheap, boosts Disruptor's low base attributes, as well as builds into Magic Wand or Mekansm.
- Observer Ward provides map vision and allow allies to make use of knowledge of the enemies' movements. Disruptor can benefit from having vision over enemies, as Glimpse has a long cast range at high level.
Early game:
- Boots of Speed allow him to escape pursuing enemies, or to close in to use Glimpse, as at early levels it has a low cast range.
- Magic Stick provides burst health and mana for any heroes to use their abilities.
Mid game:
- Magic Wand provides attributes and increases charge storage for cheap.
- Arcane Boots increase the size of Disruptor's mana pool and give him a way to replenish his mana for using abilities.
- Force Staff is easier to build than Blink Dagger, and can reposition himself, allies, or enemies. The extra intelligence also gives Disruptor a bigger mana pool to work with.
Late game:
- Glimmer Cape allows Disruptor to get closer to initiate on enemies, and allows him to provide the same benefit to allied initiators. It can also protect allies when escaping with increased magic resistance and invisibility.
- Aghanim's Scepter allows Static Storm to mute enemies on top of the silence, meaning that they cannot use abilities or items, such as Black King Bar, as long as they stay within the area of effect.
- Guardian Greaves, built from Arcane Boots and Mekansm, restore both mana and health to allies, as well as dispelling debuffs off of Disruptor that may be hindering him from contributing to teamfights.
Situational items:
- Sentry Ward's True Sight combines with Kinetic Field's ground vision to allow Disruptor to reveal enemy wards.
- Urn of Shadows provides attributes and mana regeneration that helps maintain his mana pool. The active adds more damage during ganks, or to heal teammates.
- Tranquil Boots provide passive health regeneration to ensure that Disruptor is almost always at full health. The increased movement speed allows him to position for using abilities, allowing him to gank better.
- Medallion of Courage gives Disruptor more armor and mana regeneration. The active lowers the armor of gank targets, or gives an ally increased armor in a fight. It can also targets Roshan to help your team claim the Aegis of the Immortal faster.
- Blink Dagger allows Disruptor to close the distance instantly and works well with his short cast animation to disable the enemies before they can react.
- Veil of Discord gives Disruptor attributes and armor. The active lowers enemy magic resistance, benefitting Static Storm and allied magical nukes.
- Eul's Scepter of Divinity improves his mana pool and gives him mana regeneration, while the movement speed increases his mobility, allowing him to position for his abilities. He can use the active on himself to dispel debuffs, such as silences, or on the enemies to set up Kinetic Field.
- Rod of Atos improves Disruptor's attributes and gives him more mana for using abilities. The active's long cast range allows him root enemies from afar, setting up Kinetic Field to further limit their movements. The low cooldowns on Cripple and Kinetic Field allow Disruptor to use this combination often.
- Meteor Hammer has great synergy with Disruptor's combo. Kinetic Field traps enemies inside the target area, and Meteor Hammer's stun in turn pins enemies inside Static Storm.
- Pipe of Insight offers Disruptor and teammates magic resistance, as well as the ability to absorb magical damage, giving them an edge in fights.
- Shiva's Guard boosts Disruptor intelligence and armor;the aura can hinder enemy physical attacks by reducing their attack speed, and the active can slow enemies' movement speed, helping Kinetic Field to trap them in.
- Scythe of Vyse provides Disruptor with a hard disable, something he otherwise lacks. Besides the overall attribute improvement, especially in intelligence, using hex on a target will brings their movement speed to a crawl while silencing and muting them at the same time, serving as a great leading disable before using Kinetic Field and Static Storm.
