Waga In-depth TA guide!

I would greatly appreciate you making more videos. I didn't expect myself to watch this fully as a 5k with 190 of 700 games as TA at a ~65%, but even I learned a couple things. I had been doing phase-blink-deso while you still loved yasha+drums, and as buff after buff came in I was so happy the build became stronger (ninja ancient psi blade buff, refraction blink jesus christ strong) and am quite pleased you are using it now.

Things I took from this, and some questions if you don't mind. Sorry it came out to so long, but you are the best player on my favorite hero:

  1. I've never built Aquila on TA. I almost always have another natural Aquila carry on my team; if you have a Slark/Troll/etc do you still build Aquila? Do you still start with Wraith Band? I've always generally started with 3 branches, 2 pooleds, and against Viper/some solid DoT my own stack of tangos, just so I usually get bottle first wave. I will almost definitely build towards Aquila in struggle matchups in the future, but probably will stick to my usual in other matchups.

  2. I have really NEVER skilled Psi Blades first, but can see the value. Especially with the wraith band first, making it easy to last hit. And building level 2 Psi Blade against QoP, who you aren't really going to meld early anyway and meld level 1 isn't that valuable given guaranteed sentry, is incredibly strong. It's silly how much easier Psi Blades become to land, and given how quickly TA can get to 11 you will still have level 3 and possibly 4 meld when you get your blink. It's surprising how I consider almost every hero I play situational while building, but the only two things I considered situational while playing TA were going level 11 trap vs psi blade level 2, and building BKB after deso. Guess I just fall into such tunnel vision with my most played hero.

  3. The only time I disagree with you is verse shadow fiend. I've never lost a game against Shadow Fiend as TA. Yeah, this is extremely anecdotal, and I am not claiming to be better against Shadow Fiends than you nor am I playing the same caliber of players, but refraction first seems like a MUST. You are going to hit level 2 in one wave anyway, and if he takes Shadowraze first he is going to try to contest last hits with it/can't deal with refraction, and if he goes necro you don't want him to get any last hits, nor should he with ~80 damage vs ~50. You can deal with a little auto harrass with your tango because once you are three he should be zoneable/useless until level 5/7, but at that point you should be nearing phase boots while he is struggling to keep mana afloat to last hit. Literally the only time a Shadowfiend has killed me in lane (as far as I recall) was some "huge play" where he surprised me with a level 7 ult; I chase him from trap uphill, phase directly on top of him, as his ult finishes in fog, refraction instantly lost and a raze and I die. Not letting him get ANY auto attack damage until level 5 seems so crucial.

  4. The most important thing I learned was the ancient stack. I've always asked my team to stack while they can, or stack the easy jungle as Radiant and hard as Dire, but holy crap you do that effectively. I didn't even know after 700 games that the Thunderhide (I didn't even know it's name) has the attack speed buff. Clearing the trees works so well, and I never thought to farm it so early in the game. Do you notice a big difference farming them w/ Aquila vs no Aquila?

  5. The other big thing is just watching your positioning a lot. I appreciate these videos a lot because I like to compare what I'd do in that situation to what people better than me do.

My biggest struggle is against single target dominators. If they start to 5 man focus me and have a Doom/Faceless/Viper/Razor/Wyvern, I find it really annoying. I'd love to see a video of you against a Viper. Do you ever get Manta vs. him for the automatic disjoint of Viper Strike? Especially since late game meld won't work with gem/vision?

Thanks a lot dude

/r/DotA2 Thread Link - youtube.com