Here is my guide to the slow Bearer, another completely different way to play Torch Bearer that is also very viable and fun:
The Slow Bearer (AKA Bad Mr. Frosty, but I know that’s from another game hehe)
The slow bearer is a full frost based Torch Bearer that maximizes your frost abilities. He focuses on creep control, debuffs, and a pretty nice amount of auto attack damage. The slow bearer does not “blow you up” for the most part, but often can wear you down and make you run or kill you if you aren’t careful. Most of the time I’d say the enemy is caught off guard when all of a sudden they think they ran early enough but cant get away from from snowballs pelting them in the back of the head and a nice ice shower for the kill shot. This build is also strong for assisting teammates, freezing enemies/towers, blowing up towers yourself if left unattended, and interrupting enemies as well as of course Slowing them massively J
Here is my typical build order with some comments:
This is the basics of the build. From here you can start maximizing your shatter damage by getting higher ranks of deep freeze, or keep boosting stats for a nice boost of health/mana and a stronger auto attack with more speed/dmg. Most of the time I’d say I start increasing the deep freeze but stats to me is almost as good. Eventually you will get stats and rank 4 deep freeze, the order is up to you. I really don’t think setting up for a shatter combo is all that worth the massive mana cost unless you are level 15 and have Biting Chill (which should be your level 15 skill immediately). Even then, unless its getting the kill shot or on a really low enemy I mostly rely on auto attack and rain of ice.
Items are of course dependent on the game, your cash, who you are playing against. But I’ll list some basics I usually follow and the order I try to get stuff in with this build.
Favor Items
Poison Dagger – I used to get this item with this build mostly. When it procs and you have a teammate nearby its almost certain death for them. Or if you are 1v1 with enough time to run them down. The extra attack speed is also a nice bonus. However, it sure did seem it was proccing a lot less than 20%, I found out a while back that it has a lower chance to proc for ranged classes. Its still powerful but it makes it less appealing of a choice.
Swift Anklet – Now this synergizes so well with Slow Bearer, you are able to speed into range for your aura to take effect and also this of course helps you get away from ganks. I rarely get swift anklet on other demis but for this particular build I love it. Suprises the crap out of the enemy when at rank 2 all of a sudden they are getting slowed by your aura and you are pelting them with unstoppable snow balls until they get behind towers.
Blood of the Fallen – always nice for surviviability, I find with range, good strategy, and kiting that you don’t need it with this build.
Heavens Wrath – Love it for the creep control, and extra kill shots. Just don’t think it synergizes with this build much, its not so much burst as it is sustained damage and then following in for the kill. Auto attack plus rain of ice drop is your killer.
Regular Items (this section is copied from my fire TB build as it’s a general item guide)
Usually out of the gate I get Banded armor and save my money. Alternatively on big maps I’ll sometimes get Banded + TP + Health pot. First item I always go for is Unbreakable boots, massive boost to your health and mana pools, yes plz. After that depends. I like to get my vlemish if I can by level 7. If you are going against heavy auto attackers or armor debuffers like (UB, Reg, Ereb, Queen) Nimoth armor is usually the way to go, I mostly get this anyway but sometimes opt for the Hauberk instead. At some point you’ll want a wand of speed to make sure you can get away from bad situations or chase to hit that kill shot. These are all basic items and you can have most of this stuff pretty early. If you’ve got a ton of money to blow you can get a Heart of Life, I’ve actually found that by playing smartly I don’t need it for this build, I’d rather upgrade to a Narmoths ring or something else, mostly after those starter items above I focus on getting upgrades at the cit and saving up for purchasing priests>cats.
Special note for this build: Wand of speed is very nice, you can chase with lightning speed and run away from virtually anything. I’d probably move wand of speed higher up for this build, and possibly consider the vlemish before the unbreakable boots depending on the enemy demis and the situation. Also if you get to artifact level (after getting your creeps upgraded) orb of lightning is a stronger purchase over mageslayer. It doesn’t take up your equipment slots (which is huge) has a super nice 24 health per second boost, still gets you the 25% attack speed (also nice for this build) and an activate able 500 damage pbaoe. Try it out, u may just like it J
Tactics
First off KITE! One of the major strengths of this build is the slow aura, plus your speed, plus rain of ice being ranged allows you to drop it on the enemies head without being in danger range. Run up and hit with auto attacks, back off if they pursue. Early on I’m not always able to just run up and take a lane, but I can after they’ve been hit with a few ice waves and my creeps are free to attack them. Which brings me to the next point.
Try to use Rain of ice when it hits the enemy demi AND something else like creeps or towers. Or if just hitting creeps try to get it to hit creeps and a tower. The only time I generally drop ice on an enemy demi by themselves is if I am trying to get a kill shot on them, or it will help another enemy demi who is fighting them. When you get higher you can use it more, but it has a high mana cost so I like to use it wisely. Eventually I almost always regain lain control if I use it in this manor.
Switch forms often, the free mana regen boost is huge. But for this build, so is the auto attack damage! When you pop back down run up and fire some at enemy demis or towers if protected. The extra damage is a real nice boost, and if they don’t turn to deal with u it adds up fast. Just don’t get overextended, still be careful to use positioning. Good thing is with your aura, the anklet, and a wand you are extremely fast and can get out of a lot of trouble.
Use frost nova when teammates are around mid to late game fighting demis. The snare and stun can turn the battle sometimes. Also just might catch them trying to cast something. Also use nova on enemy towers, freezes them for a long time and you can blast away on them to bring them down. However don’t just spam it, use it for a purpose. It also costs a lot of mana. I usually save it for big confrontations and just auto attack towers with my creep waves to not take damage, but it can be useful.
For killing enemy demis I typically rain of ice drop on them and their creeps until they are weakened and add in auto attacks by running up and hitting them, dropping back, and doing it again so they can’t get on me. Obviously if they aren’t coming for you you can keep auto attacking them till they decide to, or till they decide to run. At some point if you get them low enough you can chase them when they decide to run, your speed plus the aura typically spells doom if they waited too long, watch their health and know how much your ice will drop on them for. When they get below the ice damage POOF you can pop them with it (unless they are so far from defenses that you have time to auto attack it off). Most demis will not be able to run from you (or rather they will, but they will be getting hit and running slowly).
That’s it for now on the slow bearer, I find this to be a pretty strong TB build and am having a lot of fun with it. I think it surprises people when they find they can’t get away and snowballs keep pelting them lol.
This is the exact build I use for Ice Torch, but I've always used Poison Dagger. I may try swift anklet some time instead.
Orb of Flames is a much better buy than Orb of Veiled Storms, for only 2000 more gold u get + 30% attack speed and a ton of extra mana along with a circle of fire effect for 800 damage over time, much more useful than +25% attack, 25 HPSand a 500 damage burst I think..
Why no Boots of Speed? I really prefer the passive boost to speed rather than the limited burst from Wand, especially when quite a few people use Swift Anklet/Boots of Speed.
Also on maps like Exile and Levi you can get away with just a starter 550 mana helm or no mana helm for most of the game if you form switch often and manage to control a delicious mana regen flag.
@Mab
I used to only go with Poison Dagger too, then I tried swift anklet and I was surprised at how many more kills I was able to get. Poison dagger doesn't go off as often as I would like it to (not 20% since TB is ranged) and doesn't go off on key times I really could need it. When it does go off its powerful, but think of it this way, 25% slow every once in a while and not on demand OR 15% speed for you always, which also helps you run away when you need to. Lately I've been picking anklet, but Dagger is also good for it.
Good comment about the Orb of Flames. Usually with the Flames you can go ahead and sell your vlemish too since you won't really need it. There is something to be said about the +HPS though, my TB usually ends up with a lot of it which makes him quite beefy if I do ever let anyone in melee range. I do like the Orb of Flames though, I'll have to experiment more with that, thanks!
@Illegal
Sometimes early game I'll consider boots of speed but mainly I don't for one reason. It takes a precious regular item slot. I think of it this way (lets use a starter item just for arguments sake), if I get those boots in one of my slots I won't be able to have a banded armor in that slot. So I'm basically trading 10% more speed for 400 health +5 HPS. The wand is great because it doesn't take away another item I would have had. Secondly, with the anklet/slow aura my speed is almost always sufficient, only super speed stackers can get away, most people do not. People with only anklet/wand, boots/wand, anklet/boots, I will still catch up to by activating my wand and getting them in slow aura range.
Good comment about the maps, there are definately some real nice advantages through flags you can use to your advantage. I don't plan to have flags but I certainly take advantage of em when I can.
Has anyone noticed that Rain of Ice doesn't always hit for what damage the tooltip says it should?
That's probably because of global warming.
LOL
I wanted to try nearly the exact same build with just a few changes. Think this is a viable alternative? I always play fire tb and really want to try the below as ice.
Favor: Blade of the serpent
Starting items: Totem of revelation, Banded Armor, Gauntlets of brutality.
Secondary: Unbrekable boots, Boots of Speed, narmoths
Closing: Sludge slinger, Wand of speed. lots of teleport scrolls
Theory: Try to hold lane early with ice aura + blade of serpent + gauntlets of brutality causing high auto attack dmg, along with fairly constant rain of ice spam using blade mana regen. Later in the game use large number of attack speed, and run speed debuffs + wand to survive even with lower run speed.
Sho
Hi Sho,
You can try using that, a lof of people like the Blade and activation to save them from getting a mana helm. For me I feel it leaves my mana pool a little too low for my tastes. Also for me I can bust out rains of ice a TON of times even early game by just switching forms often enough to keep my regen up. Also I really like that early speed and even though boots are only 5% less it really seems like it makes all the difference when I play, costs me kills, and takes up a valuable item slot.
All that being said it certainly looks viable, might be better suited to your playstyle. I'd be interested to hear the results. I like the idea of the guantlets + Blade for some nice extra early aa damage. I often grab the gauntlets early on when I play now as well if I can't get any of the other upgrades I want then I just sell em later. I'd be interested if you could run down a sedna or beast with just the boots and the ice aura, i found with anklet I almost always can. Good thing with the wand and good positioning is you can survive pretty easily as ice TB even without speed items (besides the wand), but without the speed can you run down the enemy, that's important for me too.
I played this build twice last night ( I always random so lucked out! ) and it worked VERY well. Your mana pool is a bit small until you get the unbreakable boots, but after that you have essentially 0 mana issues even at full spam. I didn't have much luck with the sludge slinger, it just didn't seem all that useful for getting away or for fighting, but I likely under utilized it (first time trying). As for escaping demis, I found with permafrost and frost nova, I didn't have any issues. The rare occasion I was facing someone who could overcome both I just used wand of speed.
Good to know, maybe I'll try it next game I play as Torch, variety is good anyway hehe.
Ice is a lot weaker than fire.
Ice can auto attack ,chase, interrupt, slow, stun, slow attack speed, has a mana regen aura.
Fire can uhh, do damage, a small speed boost aura, and miss auto attacks on targets standing still? Did I mention his main damage spell has a long cast time and a very obvious animation?
Take your pick.
Ice is useful for auto-attacking and interrupting. The rest is junk.
Chasing requires you to be within close range of the enemy demigod so they get caught in the slow aura. A lot of demigods are too smart for it. Fire aura on the other hand is always on, and furthermore it boosts your allies' speeds as well, allowing them to join the chase (or run away faster), and it's useful even when you're not in combat.
Mana regen is also useless. With vlemish + plenor and form switching, you will not have any mana issues whatsoever.
Stun is pretty meh as well. Long cooldown and huge mana cost make it prohibitively expensive with only limited utility.
At the moment, fire's only major weakness is the inability to auto-attack while moving. I do suspect this is a bug however and will be fixed sooner or later.
Until the fire aa bug is fixed fire is far weaker than frost. Frost can do as much damage as fire but doesn't suffer the same retarded aa issue drawback. Also frost mana regen for your team is excellent, frost nova snare plus stun excellent, interupt is very excellent against so many things, cooldown increase.
Even after they fix the aa bug the forms will be more equal, but frost still has way more utility. It should be that fire has superior damage to make up for it, but with the aa bug I would argue it does not.
I will never understand picking just fire or just frost.
They are all viable and fun in their own ways imo. Full fire, full frost, and hybrid, really they are all viable.
I understand what you are saying, for you the hybrid is the best build. I can see why with having good skills from both lines. However there are a lot of abilites to get, going hybrid causes each form to have a good skill, going full fire or frost allows your form access to skills at all times. There are definately some good strengths to that for both builds. I can't get max rain of ice, ice aura, interupt 1 point, frost nova and I really like having all of those on my frost build. At level 8 I can get 3 ice, 3 aura, 1 interupt, 1 nova. No room for any fire there and I really enjoy the power and synergy of those points. Save 9 and get rain/nova at level 10 and still no room for fire.
In any case, I'm not saying hybrid isn't viable or good, because it certainly can be (arguably is better but I'm not totally convinced). I'm just saying you should be able to see how picking just fire or frost can be viable too (mostly frost right now due to aa bug with fire).
Slow Bearer is fun, I played it several times earlier this week. It doesn't have much power in 1v1 lane confrontations but its really useful for supporting a 3v3 fight from the back.
Full fire is *not* viable. Maybe you have won a game when using it, but that is not the same as viable.
Fire simply does not have the depth to deal with quality opponents, since all it does is damage. A deep freeze may do a little damage on the surface, but when you negate a 1200 hit point heal with it, or a 4000 hit point potion, or similar, it is worth its weight in gold.
QFFT
I have no idea what you're talking about. Sure, the interrupt is nice, and so is auto-attack, but ice in general has far, far less damage than fire. Furthermore, deep freeze may be able to interrupt, but it becomes useful only if you're keeping it in reserve for the enemy to use a portion or scroll, in which case you are sacrificing almost half your burst damage potential.
Let's compare the nukes:
Fire:
Fireball - 1050dmg, 7 sec cooldown, 540 mana
Fire Nova - 800dmg, 15 sec cooldown, 1375 mana
Circle of Fire - 1500dmg over 10 sec, 10 sec cooldown, 800 mana
Frost:
Rain of Ice - 800 dmg, 14 sec cooldown, 1100 mana
Deep Freeze - 650 dmg max, 15 sec cooldown, 725 mana
Frost Nova - 0 dmg, 3 second aoe stun, 15 sec cooldown, 1250 mana
As you can see, Frost is SEVERELY lacking in damage. The fact that the main nuke has a 14 second cooldown is a huge problem because that means you're casting fireball twice as often in the same time period. Over 15 seconds, fire can dish out 2900 direct damage and 1500 damage over time if the enemy stands in the circle (which they have to if they want to keep attacking you). Furthermore, if they are standing in the circle attacking you this means you are auto-attacking them back. That's a ton of damage.
What can frost do? Yeah sure, you do your Shatter combo for 1450 damage and some debuffs, stuns, and interrupts, and then auto-attack the rest of the way? Auto-attack may be useful for chasing down enemies but it simply is not satisfactory as a main source of damage (you have to do almost 3000 damage with auto attack in less than 15 seconds in order to be on par with fire, which is impossible).
Look, I am not saying ice bearer is bad. In the hands of a skilled player (like RobWild, whom I played with last night) it is very good. But fire, in the hands of an equally skilled player, is far more effective and deadly. Lack of auto-attack while running is actually not a problem at all, since fireball has a very low cooldown and fire aura allows you to catch up to enemies even when they are far away (i.e. they would otherwise be out of range of your frost aura). I get the majority of my kills by chasing down and fireballing runners. I do not ever say "man, I wish I could auto-attack while walking" because the low cooldown of the main nuke more than compensates for it.
This means you are open to getting stunned and ganked and burst etc etc, ice TB would only be being hit from ranged attacks.
You play with pugs, where damage is usually the only thing that matters because most of your opponents are bad and more often than not so are your teammates, so you can't rely on teamwork so solo damage becomes even more of a necessity.
You can't get burst if you have 5k health and 50% mitigation.
I mean, I see some TBs running around with 2500hp past level 10, so maybe sitting in the circle waiting for people to come to you may be a bad idea for them, but properly played, TB can tank as well as any other character.
Furthermore, even if they don't sit in the circle, that's a good thing, because that means they are not in range to auto-attack you.
And come on, you know you won't get ganked if you're paying attention.
I don't know what you're trying to say here.
I'm trying to say that the game is quite different if both teams are organised, where pure damage counts for a lot less.
I play hybrid when I play TB, just to get fireball, I focus the rest on ice. Consider this skill set at level 7:
rank 3 fireball
rank 1 deep freeze
rank 1 frost nova
rank 2 rain of ice
I have 1250 'burst' damage, even if deep freeze hits for 0, that doesn't require my opponent to be near me. I can switch to ice and have two different interrupts while I auto attack someone. If I lay in solely with fireball until time has come to win the kill, I can be extremely mana efficient, and 'splurge' on control effects.
What does full fire have here?
rank 3 Fireball
rank 3 circle of flame
rank 1 fire nova
The difference is that you have one incredibly inefficient damage spell (nova), a defensive spell (circle) compared to two spells that can generally prevent or deal significantly more damage.
At level 10, this becomes even more noticeable, as the strategies offered by adding ice let you prevail in scenarios where 'more damage' just isn't the solution.
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