Maliken Strategy Guide

This is a Strategy guide to one of the newest heroes in HoN
Maliken

Maliken is one of my favourite heroes in the game, he got some nice Heal, and this ulti is just NICE!

Introduction
Maliken is a strength carry, likely you'll be able to spot similar skills from DotA heroes like Puck, Terrorblade, DragonKnight, and Huskar. While they are similar to those skills, none of the skills are carbon copies. Maliken is a very advanced hero, having five activateable abilities. He requires good reflexes and good positioning, in addition to strong laning ability to farm well. He can excel in both solo lanes, and in dual lanes, and is one of the best gankers currently in the game. One of the strongest early game heroes, and late game heroes, his strength significantly tapers off during midgame. This is where you'll be most vulnerable, and where I first saw concern while playing this hero. However, late game you're such a powerhouse if you can maintain your lane raxes, so don't despair if you went 6-0 early game and died 3-4 times mid game. You'll be coming back with a vengeance late game.

Skills


Sword throw is Maliken's bread and butter, allowing him to initiate, escape, farm, deal massive damage, heal, and just about everything else. It is the most damaging aoe skill in the game that isn't an ult, and it has a naix level slow that affects everyone it hits. This skill alone makes you a power house, allowing you to harass and farm simultaneously in addition to gank extremely effectively.



Sword of the Damned(Enchanted Flames/Life Essence) is two skills in one. You have a damage mode, which increases your damage but makes you take true damage each attack. It'll also increase sword throw damage, bumping it up to 330 damage. You also have a skill that heals you each attack at the cost of mana. Sword throw will decrease in damage, moving down to 156 but healing for 40 each target it hits with a maximum of 300 health healed. Most of the time you won't find yourself using the healing aspect, as the damage aspect is far too good to pass up.



Hellbourne Zeal will give you upwards of 50% crit depending on how much health you're missing. This skill is a very strong steroid, but not worth getting until much later in the game. It synergizes nicely with your damage aspect as you will damage yourself, thus increasing your chance to crit. It's a strong steroid spell, especially if you're allowed to remain at about 1/4-1/2 health later in the game during team fights.



Possession allows you to take a ranged form that splashes opposing players, but it doubles as an interupt/initiate skill when combined with sword throw. It 'fears' opponents around you, causing them to run around like retards and silencing them so they cannot do anything. They don't attack, and they cannot control their heroes at all. This is the first 'fear' debuff(probably taken from WoW) for any hero to have, and it's pretty powerful. It goes through magic immunity, and being a PBAoE skill it's good to rupt important ults like mag and cm. It's also an instant cast, which makes it even effective for interupting heroes with long cast animations.

Skill Builds
Solo build
1. Sword throw
2. Sword of the Damned
3. Sword throw
4. Sword of the Damned
5. Sword throw
6. Sword of the Damned
7. Sword throw
8. Sword of the Damned
9. Possession
10. Hellbourne Zeal
11. Possession
12-14. Hellbourne Zeal
15. Stats
16. Possession
17+ Stats

Laning build
1. Sword throw
2. Sword of the Damned
3. Sword throw
4. Sword of the Damned
5. Sword throw
6. Possession
7. Sword throw
8. Sword of the Damned
9. Sword of the Damned
10. Hellbourne Zeal
11. Possession
12-14. Hellbourne Zeal
15. Stats
16. Possession
17+ Stats

In the solo build, you opt for your ult generally later into the build, as it's less useful and you'll be gaining more experience. Where as if you're laning, you generally want the disable for two reasons really. First off, you're not going to be hitting 9 as quicker and as such can't afford to wait until then. Secondly, the ult's disable is probably going to be useful in a lane, rather than soloing where it won't come into much use. You don't get crit until later for basically two reasons. You're much more effective with sword throw/sword of the damned, and you don't need crit early game. Most of your damage comes from your throw anyways.

Item Builds
Basic Starting Items

This is the basic starting items I buy for Maliken, it's not set in stone, but this is very effective in increasing your mana and health while plugging in to items you have to build later in the game. The regen and mana regen I suggest to buy is pretty basic, allowing for Sword throw spam and enough regen to last. You should have a chicken, so if you run out or need more it's only a chicken trip away.

Core items

This is the goal, I can generally farm this within' the first 30 minutes of the game, and while I am listing this as core items it's only because the next items you buy are pretty variable. I would buy these items in every game, pretty much every time, this is by no means what you can win the game with however. Maliken isn't like other heroes I've written guides for, while his core is this, you need more items to effectively end the game against good players.

End game items

Looking at all of these items, it's a large amount to ask anyone to farm, but you don't really need all of these to finish a game. Most of the time you'll opt for a Shunken after your core items, which gives you pretty much immunity to opposing aoe and disables. However, there are certain situations where a heart is better, for example if you're dying to an enemy carry rather than to aoe and disables. Either way, I generally follow one up with the other, so Shunken->Behemoths Heart or vice versa. A hood is useful too, which upgrades into a pipe, but I find a bkb always more effective. I wouldn't recommend upgrading into travels until you have your daemonic, or some other form of attack speed increase(wingbow, mkb, whatever you think up). One you get Shunken, it's possible to end the game, but you should always be farming to try and improve your gear.

Early game
Choosing a solo or dual lane
While Maliken is a solid solo, there are certain heroes he will have trouble with. The list is pretty long, so instead of listing off heroes I'll give attributes. A good example of a ranged hero he'd have problems with is Potm. She has burst damage, and the animation/damage to harass you out of the lane, keeping you from farming. She can also get away from any offense you might have relatively easily. She will beat you to runes, and is dangerous all together to deal with. Any hero that can consistently harass you with auto attacks and spells will keep you from farming, but more especially heroes with an escape mechanism or overall high survivability. A melee hero as an example is Bloodhunter, you can't harass him and he will simply eat you alive in a lane. Some lanes you will be able to solo against are fragile heroes with either no nuke damage(arachna) or bad auto attack(zeus). If you see an opportunity to solo, go for it, just know facing a dual lane is going to be extremely hard to farm. Your main goal when choosing a lane is 'will I be able to farm better by myself or with a lane partner'.

Maliken is extremely strong in dual lanes, as he provides a lot of offensive capabilities. Some examples of good lanes are heroes that can babysit effectively, yet have disables or powerful nuke damage. Pyro is one of the best heroes, as he has a stellar animation and can follow up your slow with a lot of burst damage. Either way, the goal is not for levels, but whichever you feel more comfortable in and whichever will allow you to farm as fast as possible.

Early solo laning
While soloing, it's very important that you control the runes with a crow. While bottle isn't bad on Maliken, I wouldn't use it and therefor most runes aren't going to be useful for you. However, even though they aren't directly useful, they can be used to gank and should be denied to your opponents as much as possible. On fragile heroes, it's important to harass them to keep them off your dick and give them the impression that you'll critically wound them if they do go on you. This can be accomplished in many ways, but the best and overall most effective way is to sword and blink to them, making sure to last hit a creep with the sword throw. This is common for many heroes, Defiler will harass and farm with wave, zeus with CL, etc. You can follow up by blinking to them and hitting them 3-4 times, which is easily done by simple attack dancing, as the slow on his sword throw is reminiscent of Naix's open wounds. You should always have your damage aspect on so that you're maximizing damage, however you don't need it on while you're auto attacking, it all depends on how much damage you want to do to the enemy and yourself. While hero kills should be taken when you can, it's important you out cs your opponent because Maliken requires quite a bit of gear. While mid, ganks should be done as much as possible, Maliken is one of the strongest if not the strongest ganker in the game.

Dual laning
Dual laning is a lot different than a solo lane, because you generally have two opponents to deal with and they have a lot more utility. As such, while playing offensive, you should open with sword. However, it's not always advisable to use your blink to get into position, because it has a very potent counter to being targeted. When you blink, it disjoints any opposing spells that can be disjointed, an example would be Sven's stun. He stuns you, hit Q and it'll miss. This is good to avoid damage and disables, and can often net you a kill. When playing offensively, opponents are likely to try and stun you since you're the closest target, however you can easily avoid a lot of stuns with blinking to your sword. Depending on your lane, you do not have to be the one who always initiates the combat, it's best to vary it up to keep your opponents guessing. The later you throw your sword, the more utility you gain from it in terms of disjointing opposing spells and attacks. You also want to get as close to the target as possible while throwing the sword, as it moves rather slow and can be evaded if you don't. Last hitting should be your priority when laning, your partner needs to be harassing and keeping them off of you. If they go on him, don't hesitate to initiate a skirmish, as you should be a relatively strong lane.

Item progression
I commonly finish my Power supply as soon as possible, unless I happen to be in the odd lane where my opponents don't have many spells. This is almost never the case, so use your own judgement on this, Power supply is important as it provides you with burst healing and mana. You're not getting any items to aid on mana regeneration, so having someone that gives you mana is important. I generally finish my strength treads after this, though if I'm having trouble in the lane I'll buy my bracer parts and finish them off first. By the end of early game you should have treads, 2 bracers, power supply, and TP scrolls to give you mobility. At this point, you're saving up for your relic so you can complete radiance. Since these first items are easy to build, you shouldn't have too much trouble with them considering Maliken is one of the strongest early game heroes.

Early game TPs, counter ganks, ganks
While in a dual lane, if you're rolling the lane it's best for your ally to run off and gank and allow you to farm. However, if you can't seem to score any kills and are being outlaned Maliken can run off to gank, allowing the ranged hero to turtle and farm levels. Maliken should be opening almost every fight, as he can blind-side opponents with his imbalanced slow, and blink in allowing your allies to then come in and follow up with damage and disables. There really isn't much beyond this other than avoiding warded positions, especially runes, as if you're spotted they're likely to turned behind a tower and a gank can quickly turn sour. Not only does a tower do lots of damage, but it provides a control point for allies of your opponents to TP to and counter gank. This brings me to the importance of counter ganking, and TPs on Maliken(every hero really). If opponents tower dive, you should TP, this will almost always lead into 1 or 2 sure kills on your allies turning into 1-2 sure kills on your enemies, especially with good teamwork. A tower is compareable to another hero this early in the game, and depending on the enemy's armor it could be up there as two heroes. Maliken is very important as a TP carrier for another reason as well. While this is more geared towards later in the game, it can be applicable early on. When you're getting ganked, you can simply sword throw off the map and blink, sword throw into trees or up and down cliffs and TP. Pretty much someone where you won't be seen until the TP is up. If you clip the enemy it's twice as effective as it slows them by a ridiculous amount and holds them there long enough for you to get away.

Map awareness
You should be constantly looking at the minimap for incoming heroes, or just to spot where your opposing lane heroes are headed. This is very important mid, as you can call out where the enemy is going and it's near impossible to be ganked mid without a rune. I cannot stress how clutch calling an enemy zeus or DP is going top than simply mia, it gives your allies a little more direction on where the opponent could possibly be and thus saves deaths. Also, map awareness is important because you can blink away from enemies long before they arrive, even if they think they're covering all of the angles.

Mid game
Item progression
The only thing you should be getting now is TP scrolls and radiance, TP scrolls are the most important item and you should never be without one. It allows you to farm, allows you to turn the tides of fights at towers, and is your only means of map travel since you have treads. You can farm far into enemy territory and throw your sword out of the map, blinking and TPing back to base. As previously explained, it's a viable means of escaping a gank while letting your farm. There is basically two items you get after radiance, and it's either Heart or BKB, normally it'll almost always be BKB but there are situations where a Heart will be more effective. One of these situations is countering a Defiler carry, a BKB does nothing to stop her damage where as a heart will keep you alive long enough to blow her up. Mid game you should finish radiance, and work on either of the two items you're going to build.

Mid game weakness
This is where Maliken is the weakest, he's lost that early game luster and lacks his late game power. Do not get discouraged if your dominating streak suddenly ends and you find yourself unable to do much in team fights. This will happen, and the goal during midgame is to farm it up. You're not very prevalent in fights at this stage, so avoid them and turtle until you can farm a BKB or heart. After these items, you get far stronger and can survive teamfights long enough for your damage to kick in and melt opposing players.

Team fights, when and how
Team fights should be avoided, turtling behind towers and harass nukes(Defiler wave, Tort nuke, basically pushing the lane and harassing the enemies to the point of being unable to push) until you finish your next item after radiance. If they are hell bent on a team fight before then, obviously you should concede towers to them, but do your best to not die. Naturally at this point with radiance you might feel you should be in the middle of ****, but this isn't the case as you're not strong enough yet. Ult should be used defensively, for example if a mag stun/ults, or a cm blink and ults. It'll go through magic immunity, and as such can be an effective counter to many channeling spells. It'll also make anyone nearby freak out and run around like a chicken with it's head cut off. You can actually start team fighting as a team once you get your first item after radiance, be it BKB or heart, and at this stage you can safely initiate on opponents. Now is when you should be in the middle of ****, you have a radiance after all. Your ult can easily wreck enemy coordination and win you a team fight, and on top of it you splash with every attack. After the fear, the most important attribute of your ult is the range and the lower BAT(base attack speed), this turns you into a DPS machine. Maliken should target whoever takes priority, it could be a Jeraziah, or a tempest, really anyone who needs to be taken down asap. Sword in, ult, focus something down. It's also best to position yourself away from your teammates after you sword in. They'll normally be coming from direction A, you need to head to the opposite direction to minimize aoe damage and force opponents to choose either in front or behind them.

End game
Maliken's strong point
This is when Maliken really starts to shine, rivaling his early game power with his late game carry. While you may feel like you should be in the very center of the **** when things go down, and you should ult right away, this is hardly the case. Your ult at this point should be a counter to opposing heroes like tempest, magmus, cm, electrician, rhasta, etc. Popping your ult can single-handedly turn the tide of a team fight in your favor, as it disables everyone around you in addition to pumping your DPS way up. Maliken is pretty gear dependent, but even under-geared the mechanics of his skills make him a power-house and an annoyance to have to fight during team fights. While he cannot solo an entire team, he can critically wound an enemy team even if he were to get ganked. He rivals just about any other hero in terms of farming, and when played properly it's hard for a zeus to keep up in terms of damage.

In depth team fights
This is what decides the game, a team fight in either team's favor can easily spell the end of the game at this stage in the game. Even so, Maliken can turtle extremely effectively if ever put in a position where it's a 1v3 or even 1v4 situation by throwing his blade and popping ult if he gets into danger. The goal of team fights in this stage is to remain spread out, especially if you don't have a very aoe orientated team, or are facing one. If opposing players go on you, they're going to have a hell of a time taking you down because you have your ult up. Don't pop it right away, wait until you hit about half health, sword, then ult pick either balled targets or an important target. You can easily take someone down during the duration of fear, and blink to sword just as it runs out to escape. You can choose to rejoin the fight, or back and heal, but either way you've likely inflicted massive damage. Since his crit percent gets so high, he can crit just about every attack, and while splashing enemies and attacking so fast and so hard it'll tear opposing squishies down in a matter of a few seconds. At the same time, you're draining their health via radiance, and hitting for a large amount with each sword throw. It's almost impossible to get away from a maliken once the opposing team crumbles, as he has radiance and sword throw. You don't ever want to be the first into combat, you're generally not strong enough to tank their entire team for very long, which'll cause you to pop ult prematurely and allow enemy aoe to come in.

Farming
It's so ridiculously easy to farm at this point, walk up to enemy creeps and hit each melee one with your damage aspect on once, then sword and they all die. You can also hit them normally if you're deep in enemy territory and wish to save sword for an escape mechanism. If enemies do come, you really never want to throw a sword into them, but rather into an area they'd never be able to catch you without a blink of some sort. This could be through a patch of trees, out of the map, up cliffs, etc. Farming is critical through-out the game, and really you should be farming through most of the game while you're not ganking or defending/pushing. The most important key to farming is always keeping a TP scroll, it'll save you more times than not, and if it doesn't save you it'll let you get back to base in time to defend.

Ganking
Ganking is pretty important in this stage of the game too, and Maliken is still a very strong ganker. His sword can be thrown from fog, and lands a crippling blow on the enemy which also moves you in position to attack. While it is important to be aware of possible offensive ganks against their team, it's also important to be aware of possible ganks against your own team. At this stage in the game, an ally dying can easily spell the end of the game, especially if you're just barely holding them off in fights or are lacking towers. One of the best strategies to do if they're constantly ganking, is to bait someone and counter gank. This can lead to sweeps in your favor, and allow you to either rosh or rax. Once Maliken is fed, if he grabs aegis it's extremely bad for the other team, as it allows him to deal massive damage by initiating and they're forced to either ignore you or focus you down. While being focused, you deal more and more damage until you're refreshed by aegis, and having to deal with maliken once is hard enough.

Item progression, X vs Y items
At this stage of the game, I'd expect you to have core items plus a luxury item(be it BKB or heart), your next items are really dependent on what opposing enemies have. If you're blowing up to aoe, especially if you purchased a heart, a very strong item would be Khadgar's pipe. This increases your spell EHP and provides a barrier which massively reduces opposing aoe skills. This works in favor of you buying a heart, because if you had a bkb you're not going to take much spell damage anyways and you don't have the hitpoint base for a hood to be effective. If an opposing carry has a bfly, you can buy an MKB to counter the evasion and increase your damage by a large amount. Since it also adds attack speed, you're benefiting from everything the item has to offer. If you require more hitpoints, or protection from disables(depending on what you bought, bkb or heart) you can buy the opposite of what you bought earlier. Satanic can also be a very useful item, as it allows burst healing to come back from the brink of death. Since you're constantly critting when nearly dead, you gain lots of health via popping the satanic.

 I like this guide and that is why i wanted to share them with you, though i wouldnt buy this item build, i prefer a Whispering helm, and Rifshard

 This is a guide copied from FORUM

by  [TT]Glorify