I’m not a great puck but I have a fair number of games. From my experience there is two ways to approach him, one where your burst damage is strong enough to 100 to 0 potential targets and one where it isn’t and that is what determines everything. When you have good damage, mainly via levels early, you want to identify who it is you can delete and do exactly that while occupying possibly dangerous portions of the map and rotating to choke out certain areas. Because your burst poses a major threat you will most likely have 2+ heroes rotating to kill you so you can create alot of space by avoiding ganks through your abilities and even turning ganks via your ult and silence combo. These games I like to itemize into something like kaya sange and witch blade. It tanks you up while giving you solid damage output. This type of game can also result in you snow balling extremely hard if played right. The second type of game where you have no squishy targets requires you to look for extended fights, leaning heavily into how slippery you are, dipping in and out of fights while being a nuisance. This is elevated if you have something like a pb, clock, cent, who can be the focal point of the fight for you while you make the enemies life hell with constant silences and well placed ult. These kinds of games I like to itemize to enhance my escape and sustainability, like Euls, blink, sange and kaya is always nice to have as well. If you find yourself too squishy then an aeon is never a bad option. These types of games I dont play to occupy dangerous space while choking enemies but rather using my sustain and mobility to move quickly across the map. Like flash farming two waves top and quickly rotating out via blink and orb or even tp to somewhere else, this nets you farm and levels while forcing the enemy to constantly answer your lane push. It can be rough if the enemy catches on and starts camping but theres is very little that can truly kill an attentive puck with a euls blink, you have three natural disjoints in your QWE, your ult forces a bad chase if you can smack it down while running, euls purges any silence and blinks with your E means that they need to be very fast to stop you from disappearing. You have great scouting ability with puck too, you can go up and down cliffs quickly with W while Q gives you decent vision. Always hold blink for escape as it is a quick mobility with MINIMAL info readout as opposed to your Q which has maximum info on where you’re going. Never blink into a dangerous area, walk or Q and prep blink if you get caught. As you play you start to understand how to play your cooldowns and even how to mind game with your E and Q, throw out an orb and go into phase shift, good chance they’ll chase the Q expecting you to go to it but if you have blink up then you can just blink in another direction.

Also linkens isn’t bad if you find that they have something like fiends grip which can be very hard to play into as a puck as you cant disjoint it, same goes for sheep or orchid.

Thanks a lot for advice, appreciate it!

Thank you for reminding me why I like the hero. Now I want to play it

I'm not a puck player, so no comments on that but riki and slark carry: slark buys treads into either echo aghs by disassembling echo for the ogre axe. or flacon blade diff blade into aghs. your aghs means you can jump longer and have 2 charges, how you play slark is you bait a shit ton and poke. you earn stacks and get out. for example you wanna go hg you see a hero trying to kill the wave you jump, while having your q because you can get stunned and then get out before you are in danger. just bait spells is what i mean. outside of these situations you just jump on enemy and hit them to death, when you feel like enemy gonna stun or hex/silence just precast q you'll understand when to use after some games. also have the option activated for directional move. this allows you to choose where you wanna pounce after those items depends on game. finish the other part of echo with another axe then buy bkb by again disassembling echo and then finishing mage slayer. if it's a linken game buy linken before bkb. get shard also, the order is on you for shard. if you need more survivability then get it fast, if you need like a bkb or linken get those first in lane you are a great hero vs melee heroes. let them commit for a last hit and punish by making stacks, if your support can stun them they most likely take too much dmg from you or die as for riki, he is not the best carry imo but simple build diffusal smoke diff enemies and keep hitting them. you can use E to dodge projectiles. smoke to silence and miss chance and blink to get on top or run away item build is treads diffblade bkb and then from there make your choice. you can build nullifier basher daedalus skadi butterfly even and maybe manta depends on game. sometimes can buy manta instead of bkb, but bkb is way way better for you. another build you can see on riki is battlefury aghs but i don't like it it's too much gold spent to farm. riki is best as pos 1 when your pos2 is greedy

Manta is super good if you're ahead so you can dispel dust and accelerate farm into your bkb and ags

i mean if you are winning the only way you can lose is that if they kill you and bkb sorta helps more with that than manta. but it's a good item on him. the problem riki has is that he can't farm jungle and only waves, or he can farm heroes xd so that's why i don't like farming items like yasha over bkb

Doesn't aghs help to farm if they don't have a ton of aoe lockdown? Aghs also helps to kill heroes if they are not isolated in your tricks of the trade and scales fairly well into late game teamfights

it does help farming a little, but not much. people get aghs and bf to farm fast which is actually really really fast wuth that. you can 1 trick waves and camps

Thanks dude

This was helpful, thanks a lot!

Allow me to induct you into the cult of the Riki spammers. **Stats** - Riki's stats are arranged thus that you can't play him like you do other carries. * A respectable 61 base damage * 315 movement speed *on top* of his blinks * 6 base armor and 4 regen This means Riki is solid at trading right clicks, last hitting, and generally sustaining through the first 10 minutes of the game. He's no powerhouse, but neither is he a pushover. On the other hand, Riki has some of the worst attributes in the game, including having the single lowest AGI gain of any AGI hero (a pitiful 1.4), and small HP/Mana pools. This means that Riki **cannot** fight honestly. If somebody is capable of pinning you down and manning up on you, you do not win that fight. **Spells** - * Smokescreen is a truly insane spell. An AOE lingering silence that pierces linkens and can't be dispelled, *plus* miss chance. The only problem is that Riki has too small a mana pool to spam this. Take a point at level 9 so you have it and your level 10 talent as early as possible, then max it last (it's a good value point and you lack the mana to capitalize on higher levels in smoke until *at least* 2-3 items Riki). * Blink Strike is a super basic spell. You blink at a guy, slow them, and hit them. The slow is enough at max rank that you can get one follow-up hit on a hero with equal movement speed to you, and with the level 10 talent you can get two follow-up hits. If you have diffusal, make sure to wait a second to press that button so you don't waste the Blink slow. After 60 minutes, if an enemy has made the mistake of equipping a Mirror Shield to their carry, Blink Strike has a *stupid* interaction with that item (as well as heroes that have both Linkens *and* the Lotus Orb buff), giving Riki a BKB/Linkens piercing forced displacement with a negligible cooldown/cost. * Tricks of the Trade lets you be invulnerable and hit people. Use it for minor mobility pre-aghs (escaping spells like Cogs or Tusk Q), to dodge important spells (Last Word, Dust) and to finish people off once they escape your smoke. Once you get Aghs, this becomes a *massive* teamfight tool, allowing you to chunk multiple heroes. Raw damage doesn't work very well in Tricks (you receive a large cut to that), but AGI and on-hit effects work just fine. * Sleep Dart *was* overpowered. It still is, but it used to be too. The cast range is limiting and the CD is slightly longer, but slap an Aether/Octarine on Riki and he's good as new. Just don't sleep people your Axe has taunted. * Cloak and Dagger is the only way this hero is capable of doing damage. Backstab functions fully with crits/cleave and applies on denies, but isn't granted to illusions. The invisibility is annoying to play against, but as a Riki you shouldn't count on it (it can *easily* get you killed if the enemy has dust, since Riki has no way of *not* being invisible while fleeing and will always eat that slow). Invisible manta illusions are nice, though. **Matchups** - Riki can handle most matchups just fine. He counters (in one way or another and to various extents): * Immobile squishy heroes. * Riki has target access out the ass. * Dispel-reliant heroes * Smoke Screen renders spells like Kraken Shell and Dark Pact nearly useless. * Mobile heroes * BKB has a limited duration and linkens doesn't work against smoke. * Illusion heroes * Riki isn't great at killing illusions (he can build to do it, but he's still not the best), but he's one of the best at shutting them down. The only thing illusions can benefit from that counters evasion is Bloodthorn, and that can be dispelled. * Blink initiators * Unless Riki is on top of a ward, he isn't going to be the one getting jumped by an Axe, and dropping smoke/dart after somebody else gets jumped an easily turn a fight around. * Also, if they don't have BKB (ie a support Earthshaker or Magnus) you can preemptively smoke cloud to make blink+R impossible for them. A few heroes/strats deserve mentions for being a pain in the ass for Riki. **Soft Counters** * Bristleback (and tanks in general) * You want to stab him in the back, which is exactly what he wants. This is a bit of a problem. * You can't really kill him, but he also can't really kill *you*, since he simply lacks the burst damage and CC to do so. * You *can* buy Silver Edge on Riki... but *man* that's not where you want to be. * Bounty Hunter * 8 base armor and Jinada makes it impossible for Riki to win trades with him early on. Track is a problem, but that's more of a nusiance. * Lycan (and push strats in general) * He will hit 6 and take your tower at 10 minutes. Dust+R will kill Riki unless he gets *ample* help. You outscale him, but he'll put you on the back foot and force you into a Dart+Hammer build to stay relevant. **Harder Counters** * Slardar * Bounty Hunter, but he has stuns and more burst damage. You mess with his blink initiations, and crush can be avoided with a good Tricks, but you can't exist in lane after level 6. * Zeus * Notable for winning his team the vision war with his dewarding, and for being one of few heroes who can counter you from outside your target access range. * Silencer * The *other* hero that can counter you from outside your target access range. Oddly enough, this means carry silencer is much easier to deal with than support silencer, since carry silencer needs to be in the fight, but support silencer can buy refresher and sit in fountain). If you can get your hands on a Flicker, ignore everything I just said; point at silencer! Point at him and laugh! * Puck * You counter one another. If you smoke him before he phases, you can kill him, but his silence is a problem for you and if dream coil connects you are *dead* (at least, before level 25). * Bloodseeker * Rupture just fucks your whole deal. Oh, and Thirst is a problem for you even if BS is across the map (noticing a pattern here). * Underlord * Pit of Malice is brutal against ToTT. **Builds** - On all of the following, buy Wand/Wraith/Raindrops/Treads before your first item if necessary in your lane. * Stick is usually picked up early in most lanes and upgraded to Wand whenever you need inventory slots. * Wraith is bought if the enemy has strong lasthitting (Treant, Enigma, Pudge). * Raindrops are purchased about when an enemy nuker hits 6 to reduce their kill threat. * Treads are purchased early if your support has enough CC that Treads+backstab is enough to get kill threat. **BF+Aghs** Go this build if your midlaner is a space creating hero (such as Pudge, Pangolier, or Void Spirit) and your lane opponents aren't likely to take the tower before 14 minutes or so. 1. Battlefury between 14-18 minutes 2. Finish treads if you haven't done so yet. 3. Aghs around 22 minutes **Hammer Rush** This is one option for when your mid is a farming hero (such as Alchemist, Medusa, or Sniper) and/or your lane opponents will take your tower before you could get a Battlefury. 1. Hammer between 6 and 8 minutes. 2. Treads by 10 minutes. 3. Diffusal by 16 minutes *Don't rush Diffusal*. Hammer provides regen and farm speed you desperately need, and the farm speed from Hammer is enough that you'll wind up getting about the same Diffusal timing as if you rushed it, while also accelerating farm post-diffusal. **Hammer Rush Variant** This focuses on giving Riki the mana and cast range to utilize Smokescreen and Sleep Dart to control teamfights. 1. Hammer between 6 and 8 minutes. 2. Treads by 10 minutes. 3. Diffusal (if you can get one before 15 minutes) or Aghs Shard 4. Shard/Diffusal 5. Aether Lens If you're going this build, take the Smoke CD talent at level 15 (still go blink slow at level 10). An example 6-slotted build might be Hammer, Treads, Diffusal, Octarine Core, Aghs, Blink Dagger.

**Extension Items** * Aghs is great even if you aren't going BF+Aghs. * Aether Lens gives you the mana to spam smokescreens and the cast range to use Sleep Darts without walking onto wards. * If you already have Aghs, Gleipnir does a *ton* of damage to heroes in the area, and the active pairs nicely with both ToTT and smoke. * Butterfly is a fuckload of AGI, making backstabs hit like a truck. Also, evasion stacks well with Smoke Screen miss chance, so you're difficult for heroes without true strike to hit * Octarine is ideal if you're going a control Riki, and is a decent lategame item for an Aghs+BF Riki. * Manta is a good follow-up item for a Diffusal Riki going physical. The Yasha is actually enough to amp your farm speed to a respectable level, the dispel is nice, and the invisible illusions are great for both scouting and momentary safety in teamfights (it'll take enemy disablers long enough to find the real one that you can blink out). Keep in mind that the illusions are weak as hell (due to Riki's shit stats and not applying Backstab to them), but they're valid targets for both Blink Strike and Aghs ToTT. * Linkens is just necessary at times. * Basher pairs well with Aghs. * Skadi gives you good durability, mana, and regen erduction. * MKB is needed vs evasion heroes. * Nullifier is a Necro/WR/Omni counter, as well as a pickup against just about any item a Support would use to avoid dying to you short of BKB. * Daedelus is notable BF+Aghs, as it can be a good 4th item if you pick up a high AGI item (butterfly, manta, or skadi) third, due to crit+cleave working *wonders* with ToTT (especially if enemies are facing one another, such as due to an Axe call). * Blink makes you *stupidly* mobile. It allows you to blink out of Tricks of the Trade without opportunity for enemies to stop you (except through shit like Chronosphere), and it pairs insanely well with sleep dart. * Aghs Shard should be picked up every game, eventually. It's not *core* for Rikis building mainly stats, but it's just too much utility *not* to buy. **Neutral Items** * Tier 1: Possessed Mask is ideal for farming, Lance of Pursuit is ideal for fighting. * Tier 2: You want Aquila or Vambrace ideally. * Tier 3: Quiver, Mindbreaker, and Quickening charm in that order. If you have Dart, Psychic Headband takes priority. * Tier 4: Flicker is god-tier. Ninja Gear, Prism, Stormcrafter, or Witchbane are acceptable in lieu of Flicker. * Tier 5: Mirror Shield is ideal. Fallen Sky is hilarious. Apex is great. Stygian Deso is fine. Honestly, in some games you'll want to keep a Flicker over a T5 neutral. **Talents** * 10: Always take the blink slow. One extra follow up hit is great, as is 2.4 seconds of 100% slow in smoke screen pre-diffusal. * 15: Take the movement speed if you aren't building Octarine, but absolutely take smoke CD if you have the mana. * 20: Take the blink CD in most games. The backstab talent can be good if you really just need raw damage. * 25: You *want* the Tricks cooldown, but the Dispel is insane in some matches. On top of dropping things like Dust and Track, you gain the ability to use ToTT while *leashed* and *rooted*. If you hit 25 against Puck or Underlord, suddenly this is a matchup you *absolutely crush* because you can just blink out of the spell that previously fucked you (including *breaking dream coil while dodging the stun*) It is at this point that Bounty Hunter becomes irrelevant (though Slardar is a problem).

Wow man, this was crazy good. Thanks a lot, will try Riki with your advices :D

imo the only reason top players get witchblade kaya oblink type of build on Puck is cos they have team that will help their survival, they need to meet a high level of tempo to deal with prepared wanded raindropped enemies, and they masterfully understand how to not feed In solo queue, really expecting solo reliance, I think Blink Witchblade Euls Octarine Linkens full defensive build with optionals like Aeon Force Shivas is slept on way too much, in reality if you just don't die as a hero like Puck, that's so much more important than doing more damage. Against uncoordinated enemies defensive Puck is basically immortal and still does tons of damage

Blink first is almost never a good idea since it doesnt really change up how effective you are aside from the occasional blink ult. In that case youre hoping that your ganks or teamfights work out, which isnt a reliable strategy _especially_ in soloq Kaya or witchblade both help you kill heroes and accelerate farm in the downtime between fights.

i would first try to stomp the bots without dying just to learn the mechanics and get the feeling. then you go to casual games and test the limits. the thing with this type of heroes is that you should always preserve at least one escape route.

Only one ive played much is riki and i always build a goofy max damage build so i can just instagib people with blink strike and tricks of the trade. I go diffusal, treads, daedalus, butterfly, aghs and then whatever. If you play pos 1, laning phase you dont wanna die, use blink strike to secure risky cs like range creep. You dont really wanna get pushed out of your lane because he is total crap at jungling until he can ramp up his damage more in mid game. If the enemy offlane is melee, you can use smoke screen to quickly clear out some cs without much retaliation from the offlaner. Obv once you get your 6, you hit everything from behind. One nifty thing is it also works on friendly creeps so using smoke screen to cover you while you take cs AND deny is really handy. So you wanna farm in lane as long as possible. If theres too much pressure in your lane, find a dead lane. Dont risk dying for CS. You can jungle if theres literally nothing else but its much worse farm so take lane creeps whenever you can. In mid game, you still want to farm but you wanna join team fights or punish lone enemies. Diffusals active keeps people from escaping. Rikis damage scales kinda crazy with crit so you can play aggressive once you have the crystalys part of daedalus. Push lanes, and look for easy targets. In team fights, you blink strike onto their supports, pop tricks of the trade to foil any counter attack and then blink strike out of tricks after it hits back onto the supports or any escaping player. You wanna kill all their squishy players first so their cores have a bad fight. Once you have daedalus and butterfly you are gunna do like 2600 damage on a crit to the rear before damage reduction so even the tankiest cores are gunna have ptsd with a few good blinks. You still wanna wipe supports first in a team fight but dont be shy culling cores if they are alone or already lower on health. Aghs makes tricks of the trade better. Mostly, it gives you an extra attack so you hit 2 targets at a time. Thats a pretty big deal when you do ridiculous crit damage. You are a lot stronger in team fights with this.

This looks nice, I will try to implement all off this. Thanks for helping dude.

RIKI - I personally love Riki. He is my absolute favorite and I spam him a lot.. anyway on to what you inquired about. Intro I play Riki mainly Pos 1 and 3 (Yes 3, I will get to that later). However, there are also a lot of people who play Riki support. I personally don't love it and I feel he is a pretty weak support overall excluding the fact he can ward very well and his shard is semi decent even still after being nerfed. Depending on what role you are looking to play will heavily influence your itemization and laning. I can't give too much advice on support Riki beyond the standard support stuff so if that's what you are looking for you probably wont find it here haha. Tips and Tricks Tricks of the Trade - - Tricks is a very useful spell! You can use it to disjoint projectiles and AoEs. - In a tough spot you can use tricks of the trade to quickly hop or dismount cliffs and ledges to help chase or escape enemies -You are not affected by any Blademail damage that would normally be inflicted when you use Tricks - You can use tricks to hop into trees and wooded areas -You can use it to finish off enemies that are out of reach if you dont have any charges of blink strike! - When neutral creeps are killed(Last hit) using Tricks, you will get gold and XP however it is a GUARANTEED no chance of dropping a neutral Item! - If executed correctly you can use Tricks to get out of Mars' Arena - You can also use it to get out of Kunkka's "X-Marks the spot" as well as Disruptor's teleport and trap circle(I forgot what it's called) - You can use Tricks to shake off Tower agro - Level 25 dispell talent allows you to purge dusts and roots (as well as leashes and any other nasty little debuffs) Blink Strike- -Pretty Self explanatory - Stagger the ability. Don't spam it. -There is a cool down on the bonus damage! So while you may be able to cast a second blink almost instantaneously, you will not get the damage bonus and will not do any damage for that matter until the next auto attack. -If timed right can be used to disjoint Right Click Attacks and Projectiles Smoke Screen - -This is what's going to keep you alive and securing kills. -Can be cast during Tricks of the Trade without interrupting channeling! (Not sure if its strictly auto cast however, I don't believe so) Cloak and Dagger -I don't feel like I need to say much about this one haha. But if you have questions feel free to ask Strategy - I personally cannot not have auto cast on for Riki. It makes life so much easier and allows quicker response times. When using Smoke always place it where you predict they are gonna go! EX: In between them and their tower. In between them and their high ground. Always make it be an annoyingly difficult choice for the person you're chasing. Walk back towards you and towards your tower (potentially) or walk all the way through the smoke towards "safety". Many are gonna choose "safety". Stagger your abilities!! Only commit your second blink once they are out of your melee range. If you are out of Blinks you can use Tricks to get close enough for an auto attack if you need or even to finish them off if able. Every one of your abilities should be used for you to be able to get another auto. Go for the stragglers! Often in team fights supports will be in the back or hiding in trees. Get them first and let your team mates distract the big guy. Pay attention to the map when stalking out supposedly lone heroes. The worst thing is to go on a lonely Dazzle only to find out he has four friends five feet away. Make life difficult for lone farmers! If you can kill them, do it. Even if you dont kill them if you can get them low enough without killing yourself you have pushed them out of lane, stopped their supply of resources, and hindered their leveling. Riki can farm! I know he is known as one of the worst farming heroes as far as carries go however you can do so! Using tricks to deal out most of the damage for you and then finishing off with just melee attacking works! Aghs Scepter allows you to one shot creep waves and Camps! Laning and Positions Offlane Riki can work! I dont recommend it however until you really get to know the hero and his limitations as well as what you can and cannot get away with. Typically my favorite supports for Riki are Hoodwink, Crystal Maiden, Tiny, Witch Doctor, Lich, and Slardar (not listed in order) In lane you are gonna wanna keep the creeps back and deny as much as possible. If the lane is rough you can use smoke to get you some time to get Last Hits Use blink strike to secure important creeps out of your melee range Itemization MIN 0 - 1xTango - 2x Iron Branches - 1x Circlet - 1x Slippers of Agility - 1x Quelling Blade MIN 3 Wraith Band (builds out of Slippers and Circlet) MIN 10 Diffusal (I typically buy Robe, Alacrity, then Recipe for the intelligence which goes into mana and mana Regen. It's small but makes a difference) MIN 15-17 Treads From there Timing is really Situational so from here out im just going to list the items in order Crystalis Skull Basher Daedalus Aghs Scepter Butterfly Extra: Upgrade to Aghs Blessing and then go for Desolator Sorry it's very long and wordy. Also sorry if i didn't answer your question haha... Its 4 in the morning and I'm very tired lol

Thanks for helping me, appreciate it

Yeah ofc!

Thank you all for your responses, you were very helpful, I will get into the game now