The new Storm

[Gruufhai]

Hi, I've been playing Storm only in the last few days and want to share some of my experience I made with him.

First, to me it is the most fun hero ever, getting the most counters on Bloodstone I ever had, and maybe the most imba hero, too.

He's weak early and midgame since his bread & butter skill Ball Lightning (the ulti) needs a shitload of rocket fuel, and he does not have the pool early/mid to escape any encounter.
Later on, he only has to fear disables. Long or lots of disables. Night Stalker's silence during night turned out to be a real pain.

My skill build aims for maximum fuel regeneration, and a good farming skill is recommended. Storm without items is nothing special. Storm with the right items is an (almost) mapwide killing machine. Since you have to farm a lot during the first 30 minutes, it would be good to lane up with some supporter who does not need to get so much gold. Being solo is great, of course, but there are other carry heroes which need the levels more than Storm. Storm just needs items.

First item should be Bloodstone, with or without Boots. Not because you might kill so much in early-mid (you won't), but because you need the pool and regen. Storm is low HP, so take care. If you cannot get your Bloodstone around minutes 15-25, you probably farm too bad for the following build.

Alright, we have Bloodstone, maybe Boots. Now go for Orchid. Orchid helps a lot in getting kills, and there should be a few counters on the Bloodstone then. Even more, Orchid is easy to buy, increases fuel and fuel regeneration. And that's all what Storm is about!
Farm hard. Jump into bigger creepwaves with the right angle, hit once, summon a Remnant and liquify them all. Creep neutrals, creep as much as you can, and have some hundred mana left to escape.

Bloodstone, Orchid, Boots - until the rest of the game, keep building Guinsoo's. Sounds crazy, but works well. When you have three Guinsoo's, sell your Boots, buy another Ultimate Orb, and complete your fourth Guinsoo at the Secret Shop.
If you want to kill their windwalkers, you may have a Gem instead of a fourth Guinsoo.

Some final rough stats:

2.5k HP
3.5k fuel
400 dmg/hit
78 mana/s plus Bloodstone counters

This is enough to travel about a 3/5 map. And a few seconds later, you can fly again.

Since you'll be raping the opposing team in the most annoying way while being low on HP, you'll be focused by them whenever they can. So be quick in getting in and getting out. Try to get a feeling for how much mana it takes to make a certain jump, and try to have enough for a quick pullback, if your victim is getting help. Oh, if I didn't mention it yet, Storm is a great sologanker, like Mirana or Nerubian maybe, yet way more mobile.

You can have up to three Remnants at once on the map, which last for 14 seconds or so, use them as wards.


I really think Storm is too strong, although he has his weaknesses and can quickly become a victim in teamfights. So I expect him to be nerfed in the next version, probably with a cooldown for his ulti.

So, if you haven't yet, try Mr.Everywhere out before it's too late ;)

[Blood.Bank]

i tried having 6 aghas on him and i didnt get that far with ulti lv 3

[J0su]

Gruufhai your right with your build.
Bloodstone for boosting hp, then just pimping the mana reg, also i could recommend a linkens sphere, instead a fourth scythe :D

[Gruufhai]

Blood.Bank: Yes, I tried massing Aghas before, and it did not work that well. Lack of regeneration.

yokR: Yeah, four Guinsoos (or Orchids, but Guinsoos give some HP which Storm needs) is only the best if you're trying to max your mana regeneration.
There are several other situational useful items for Storm, including Linkens Sphere, which you mentioned. I go for Linkens if the enemies have some targeted stuns or disables.
Other items might be:

Blade Mail
Euls
Dagon


Did anyone try a physical damage build, with Stygian, MKB or so?

[joicE.]

In what game you actually can make 4 guinsoo? AI?

[Cnacnel]

In what game you actually can make 4 guinsoo? AI?

In a very well balanced game, another option is em or -ai mode (games are nearly always very long).
Another option is when you are killing everyone and your team dies all the time. So the game doesn't end fast and only you get money.

[joicE.]

Ok, i don't play ai ,and my opinion but em is pretty low.Anyhow i know its just an exaple so ;P

[A_BIT_SOBER]

Are u all out of ur minds??Who likes a panda?? ;D ;D ;D

[Spasmolyt]

i tried having 6 aghas on him and i didnt get that far with ulti lv 3

Thats because:

Ball Lightning
---------------
Storm Spirit becomes enveloped with energy, losing his physical form, and travels until he depletes his mana or chooses to stop. While in this form, he deals damage to nearby units based on how far his electrical form has traversed. Damage, speed and area of effect improves per level.

Stops traveling whenever you run out of mana. Deals damage in a small area around you based on distance traveled.

Damage: 8/12/16 per 100 units traveled
Manacost: (15 + 7% of total manabase) + mana based on distance traveled (10+1% per 100 units)
Cast Range: Global
Cooldown: 0

Travel speed and damage AoE improves per level.
You can cast spells like Static Remnant during your roll if you are quick enough.
Specific interactions with spells/projectiles follow the same rules as Waveform does.
Most of the manacost of ball lightning is percentage-based, so you lose more mana if your manapool is larger. Thats why you need lots of regeneration on him.
If your manapool is infinitely large so the fixed 15 mana per cast and 10 mana per 100 distance doesn't limit you, the max distance you can travel is 9300 units.

[Spasmolyt]

I actually made a nice picture to visualize Ball Lightning's capabilities. As you can see, the max distance travelled goes towards 9300 asymptotically. The max distance you can actually reach in the game is with lvl 25 and 6 Afghanistan Szept0rz, which gives you 6705 mana and 8073 units travelled. You can see how far that is in the pictures in the bottom right: From the fountain to almost the exact mid of the map, which means that from the mid you could reach almost every point you wished, but you'd arrive with precious little mana left and very low regeneration, which tells us that 6 szepters suck and you need to go for a bit of mana and a lot of regeneration.

Having int power treads, bloodstone, orchid malevolence and 3 guinsoo's gives you 3520 Mana, which allows you to travel a max distance of around 7200, which is only 10.8% less than with 6 aghanims, but your casting mana is almost halved and your regeneration so much higher. Also, it's way cheaper to build, easier to build up (smaller parts), gives more killing power and lots more utility.

http://www.broesel-brzelius.de/bilder/storm.png

[Gruufhai]

Pretty nice. But I think I made jumps like this for only ~3500 mana, with {stone, orch, travels, guins x3}. Of course - I had less max mana, so the spell's cost was lower. But still I should not be able to jump that far? Could that mana regeneation really be THAT important, not only for refilling after landing, but also to increase the distance by regenerating while traveling?

[Spasmolyt]

Having int power treads, bloodstone, orchid malevolence and 3 guinsoo's gives you 3520 Mana, which allows you to travel a max distance of around 7200, which is only 10.8% less than with 6 aghanims, but your casting mana is almost halved and your regeneration so much higher. Also, it's way cheaper to build, easier to build up (smaller parts), gives more killing power and lots more utility.
The regeneration while in flight shouldn't change much with lvl 3 of Ball Lightning, because it takes less than 2 seconds to get across half the map.