Guide to BaneHollow the Lycanthrope
I.Introduction I wrote a Jungle-based Radiance Lycan guide about 1 year ago. It was way before the jungling craze which happened somewhere around August. It was highly effective but times changed and jungling 25mins in the forest to farm a Radiance isn’t so viable anymore. So I came up with a newer way to play him, a new build, along with new techniques for you people to try. It has become a habit for me to have my replays ready before writing a guide. So believe me, I have tested this alot of times and it isn’t just plain theorycrafting. In this guide, you will learn the the Backdooring Lycan. There is no cookie cutter build/playstyle for this… soo hooray~!, I can claim full originality for this build The concept in a nutshell — Lycan will start off jungling in early game. His items will be Basillus + 1x tango. Jungling will be quite simple. At around 10-12 mins, he will have enough cash to buy Perserverance. The hp + mana is very much needed. Later on, it will be turned into Battlefury (very important item. No Radiance~!) to help you speedfarm. Push lanes, kill towers, kill ancients, creeps and even Roshan till you get Treads and Armlet. By now, you can start backdooring. Later on, you have a choice of Lothar’s and/or BKB to aid you in your backdooring process. Rax. Win. Also included will be the conventional build and strategy for a DPSer Lycan. There won’t be an in-depth content for this one though as the way you play Lycan as melee carry is no different than how you play other melee carries. I mean seriously, he has like 3 passives. Howl, Feral Heart, and Wolfform. The only active spell is Summon Wolves, literally. This guide will therefore contain two Builds/Strategy Section. II. Changelog ~ Howl duration increased from 20secs to 35secs Strength: 22 + 2.75 per level Base armor: 1 I. Skill Description/Build/Explanation Level 1 - Summons 2 weak wolves. 400hp. Bash 15%, 15 bonus dmg, 1 sec stun Cooldown: 30 seconds. Level 1: 125 mana, 30 sec cooldown. Comments: His summons, very crucial during early game to help you jungle. As far as possible, get to level 3 fast so you get level 2 summons. Only then, you can move on to bigger camps like wolves and ogre camps. Level 1 - Adds 8% damage. Cooldown: 10 seconds. Level 1: 20 mana, 10 sec cooldown. Comments: Very useful spell to boost your damage and your pet. Level 1 - 3% movement, 15% attack. Passive Comments: Great passive. Especially the movement speed bonus. Level 1 - 100 bonus hit points, lasts 40 seconds. Cooldown: 180/170/160 seconds. Level 1: 150 mana, 180 sec cooldown. Critical strike passive, 10% to deal 2x dmg Comments: The skill that makes him the hero killer. Movespeed bonus is a ton. With maxed feral (12% move bonus) and Treads, you get 498 movespeed. Because of that, BoT is not needed. Neither is Sange and Yasha. Note that he does not get an IAS bonus, instead it is his BAT that gets changed. I will explain later how to do a simple conversion and relate to how it means in terms of damage. Skill Build Skill Explanation Summon Wolves is maxed first because you need them to farm and tank. Feral Heart is taken next and to be maxed out by level 9. This will give you maximum chasing power when in Shapeshift form. The IAS bonus is good too. Howl is taken later to boost your damage before going into battle. Stats are last to be taken since your have have strong base hp. He doesn’t need it so early. There is only one build. IV. Strategy a. Choose a Laning Strategy Jungling Normal Laning b. Choose a Playstyle The Backdooring Lycan (LoneWolf) His item build is as follows: Item Build in the order given: As a LoneWolf, I usually start with RoB for the mana regen + Armor bonus for my wolves. Then ill head off to Jungling (A seperate section on Jungling is found below). Without going to base, I would usually be able to farm around 1750 gold to buy a Ring of Health + VoidStone. With that, Mana + HP regen is covered and I can jungle non-stop. Look at the side lane, when ganking permits, use your Invis Wolves to kill the weak Support heroes. Also, it’d be great to take down the Sidelane’s tower when the opportunity arise. Around 20mins into the game, you should be able to farm for a Battlefury. If you are around level 11, you might want to kill Roshan. Pretty easy in wolf form. You’d want to kill him early as possible and every 10mins later when he respawns. A level 3 Roshan will give you Cheese in addition to Aegis, and that.. is very very handy. Hop into empty lanes and push. Try to take out towers, or at least lower them to a decent life for easier taking-out later. Use your wolves to scout the area around you for incoming backstabs. Remember to have a TP scroll in your bag for escaping. During Mid-game, your main goal is to clear all the outer towers (gold for both you and your team) as well as giving you more room to launch a backdooring strike. Do not use cheap backdooring tactics like sending wolves to backdoor the outer towers. You do not want that to foil your plans. Do not give your opponents the slightest hint that you will be backdooring later on in the game. You will want to surprise them as much as possible, and deliver as much damage as possible in one, swift, strike. You should be able to complete the full item build listed here by the 40th min. Vlad’s may not always be needed but is good to have (for the lifesteal, especially good for Neutral creeping) The Killer Lycan (IronWolf) Anyways, if you play this style, you will want to grab a BKB as fast as possible. First however, you need some DPS. Since you aren’t needing to push so much, we can drop Battlefury from the list of items. This is what you will get: Item Build in the order given: Again, you would probably be jungling. Helm of Dominator is nice as a first item. Good hp regen + armor. And you can buy it from the sideshops nearby (if you have no chicken). Next up, form Strength boots. Complete your Armlet and you will have a massive DPS. You can tag along with ganker allies (eg VS, CM, SK, + all the disablers) to reap some kills. BKB should come in shortly and you will be able to handle larger team battles by then. Try not to bring wolves during ganks as they will very often block your path. Summon and send them to clear the neutral camps. Have a good balance between ganking and farming. c. Sealing the Game LoneWolf Style Your first backdoor is crucial. In most cases, you will be able to clear the whole lane (tower + melee rax + range rax) in one sweep. Never underestimate the power of Lycan. That is possible if the opponents does not TP over to defend, especially so when they are in the thick of a battle. In games where Backdooring isn’t allowed, you will execute a dual push. You will move in to strike once the main battle at mid erupts. Quite likely they will have some heroes guarding the lane you are one. It should be easy to take 1-2 of them out. If theres 3, your main team push will most likely be able to press into their base. Hold your ground and see if the heroes guarding your lane starts to leave to reinforce mid. Critical Item: This is just the gist of it, more would be explained in the main backdooring section. IronWolf Style The next best Item to get is Satanic. HotD gives a huge boost to lifesteal as well as additional damage. Satanic even gives more Dmg once activated. A huge lifesteal too (remember it stacks with your Vladimir). The next few items are up to you. Remember to stick to your team during late game. Let an ally initiate while you ready to storm in, use wolves to scout the surroundings etc. Focus on a hero to kill, preferbly the weaker support heroes near the back. You have BKB, and lifesteal too. Item Discussions The Core Items Armlet (2850) ~ This item costs 2850 gold but the bonuses it gives are plentiful. Upon activation, the bonuses becomes – Battlefury (4350) ~ An item needed when going the Lonewolf Build. A further +65 damage to add to your DPS, you also gain good mana regeneration and cleaving for speedy pushes to make your backdoors easier. BKB (3800) ~ You need this if you are going the Killer build route. Magic immunity is important. Though somewhat nerfed in the new versions (now 9secs), it is still an immensely powerful item. A HP boost from Ogre Axe, some Dmg bonusees as well as immunity to take on Disablers. Lothar’s Edge (4050) ~ An item usually meant for Agi heros, it gives +21 Agi, +21 Dmg, 9 secs of Windwalk (Activatable). Technically, you will only lose +21 dmg if you were to use on Lycan. It isn’t a huge waste since Lycan already has a high amount of DPS already. What you would want to abuse is the 9 sec windwalk which will help greatly in escapes, ganks and in team battles. The added feature of Lothar’s windwalk is that you can pass through creeps and heroes. 522ms will be useless if you keep getting stuck in between creeps during chases. The After Core Satanic (6150) ~ Start off with Helm of the Dominator for added lifesteal and damage. Then build it up to Satanic. It has quite a high price but do not underestimate Lifesteal on Lycan. 56% Lifesteal (40% + 16% from Vlad’s) along with massive DPS will keep you alive very well. Mask of Madness (1950) ~ Quite a possible item if you are going the LoneWolf Build. You can buy this after your Lothar’s if you think you will not be able to make Satanic in time (cos game will end by then). It has 17% lifesteal which will stack with your 16% from Vlad’s and you get massive speed bonus of +75% Ias. Once you choose to form this, building Satanic will be useless since the lifesteal will not stack. Supplementary Items When you have a Rough Start … Some games can go so bad that you just get stuck with the above build even at the 50th minute. Don’t worry so much. Aim for a Black King Bar next and you should be fine. V. Specific Strategies and Details Using Wolf Summons His summons are critical when running a backdooring strategy. With tons of HP and decent armor, he can tank towers rather easily. He has huge duration of 60secs, and you can easily re-summon them again due to the low 30sec cooldown. Furthermore, you can abuse their survivability by ‘redirecting’ the tower hits. For example, if the tower is focusing on your dying wolf, you can command the dying wolf to attack a healthier one and the tower will change its target. His strongest trait however, is the massive damage he can dish out on buildings. Creeps with normal attacks deals 40% more than as compared to heroes. To have a good estimation of how strong Wolves are, they can kill a Furbolg camp while still keeping at least half of their HP. Stronger than 2 furbolgs? Sounds deadly to me. Tips Jungling Creep Pulls and Jungling Science Scourge: Wolves/Satyrs ~ Pull when they are at 2/3 HP. If you can pull this technique cleanly (Kill Small/Medium/Big Camp in one sweep), you will get to level 3 easily. This is crucial as you need Level2 wolves as fast as possible to take on higher level Camps. As a reference: Level1 Wolves: Only for Small Camps Once you are Level3, most camps will be managable, you can keep on abusing the double Med/Big Camp Pull as many times as possible also. That’s the wonderful thing about Scourge Camps Sentinel: Anti-Jungling Wards: Roshan Roshan. Very good source of cash for your team (+200 for every player) . Lycan can easily solo him with Battlefury and Treads. Use the wolves to tank and re-summon them when dead. Alternatively, you can send one of your wolves to scout the surrounding are for incoming enemies. The earlier you kill Roshan, the earlier he will respawn (every 10mins). A level 3 Roshan will drop an Aegis + Cheese. Cheese can be turn the tides during a teambattle, or even during backdooring runs. Backdooring Well not all games allow backdooring. But the basic idea on non-backdooring games are still the same. Here are some basic fundamentals to backdooring:
To pull off a good backdooring run, you should create the opportunity or seize it when it presents itself. Backdooring with Lycan: Even before you begin your first backdoor strike, you should already be in the process of building Lothar’s for you hero. Nobody.. in the right mind, will consider Lothar’s on Lycan. Again, surprises. It will catch them unprepared. Backdooring with Lothar’s will be significantly easier now and it will take some time for them to put up wards and stuff to catch you. The great thing about Lothar’s is that you can pass through creeps without being blocked, which is essential if you want to make a hasty retreat. If I were to choose BKB, I will be bogged down by the massive cooldown, which means I can’t backdoor as frequently. Abuse the Lothar’s cooldown and lay siege on their base. Keep hopping from lane to lane and backdoor their weaker lanes. You should have some Aegis, don”t be afraid to die. Keep on pulling off surprises. You can summon wolves and attack a lane as a decoy while your Hero hides in another lane waiting to strike. You can plant observer wards in their lane too especially on lanes which are already destroyed since they won’t put sentry wards on dead lanes. It helps you to see their movements in base. You can abuse Cheese while backdooring. Just when they thought they were going to kill you,… RaWR, you are back to full health. It is all about playing your cards one at a time. If you use all the tricks at one go, you will not gain the surprise advantage. Keep rolling in surprises, but one at a time. When all else fails, call for a team push. Good Allies and Bad Enemies Good Men AoE Disablers VII. Replays Can’t upload at the moment. There is some problems with the server. VIII. Conclusion This guide was originally written as a speed guide, where I spent about 1-2hrs on it. I’ve changed alot of stuff now, a new gameplay style and more strategy content. I quite hate cookie-cutter builds. And when you see me make a guide, expect something different.
. What will be written here are all going to be fresh, new stuff so make sure you read every single word I write.
Besides changes to Lycan, there are also several key changes in the game that will affect the way Lycan is played.
~ Wolf summons duration increased from 45secs to 60secs
~ Wolf summons can now attack Air units (ie Dragons)
~ Ranged Rax now have reduced armor from 15 to 5. Regeration increased to 30hp/sec
(basically it means Ranged Rax is easier for Lycan to destroy)
~ Battlefury recipe now has been changed. Cost has been reduced from 4750 to 4350 gold.
(400 gold cheaper now. It’s counterpart, Radiance, cost a hefty sum of 5325gold)
~ Neutral Camps changed. Jungling has been made harder for most heroes
Agility: 16 + 1.9 per level
Intelligence: 15 + 1.55 per level
Base Attack Time: 1.7
Sight range: 1800/800 (day/night)
Damage point: 0.55/0.55 (point/backswing)
Casting point: 0.3/0.51 (point/backswing)
Movespeed: 295
Summon Wolves
Summons 2 Spirit Wolves to fight the Lycanthrope’s enemies.
Lasts 60 seconds.
Level 2 - Summons 2 wolves that have Critical Strike. 500hp.
Level 3 - Each wolf has Bash and Critical Strike. 600hp.
Level 4 - Each wolf has Bash, Critical Strike, and Permanent Invisibility. 700hp
Critical Strike, 10% to deal 2x dmg
Attack type: Normal (very strong vs Buildings)
Armor: 4 (heavy)
Movespeed : 400
Level 2: 125 mana, 30 sec cooldown.
Level 3: 125 mana, 30 sec cooldown.
Level 4: 125 mana, 30 sec cooldown.
Howl
An eerie howl grants an inner strength to all nearby friendly units.
Lasts 35 seconds.
Level 2 - Adds 16% damage.
Level 3 - Adds 24% damage.
Level 4 - Adds 32% damage.
Level 2: 27 mana, 10 sec cooldown.
Level 3: 34 mana, 10 sec cooldown.
Level 4: 41 mana, 10 sec cooldown.
Feral Heart
Increases the movement speed and attack speed of the Lycanthrope.
Level 2 - 6% movement, 19% attack.
Level 3 - 9% movement, 23% attack.
Level 4 - 12% movement, 27% attack.
Shapeshift
A Full Moon curdles the blood of the Lycanthropy. He transforms into a Wolf with extra damage, hit points, Critical Strike, and bonus movement and attack speeds.
Level 2 - 200 bonus hit points, lasts 50 seconds.
Level 3 - 300 bonus hit points, lasts 60 seconds.
Level 2: 175 mana, 170 sec cooldown.
Level 3: 200 mana, 160 sec cooldown.
Adds 85 movespeed at all levels
Lowers BAT to 1.4 (from 1.7) at all levels
Adds 9 to min dmg, 27 to max dmg at all levels
(18 dmg average)
1. Summon Wolves
2. Feral Heart
3. Summon Wolves
4. Feral Heart
5. Summon Wolves
6. Shapeshift
7. Summon Wolves
8. Feral Heart
9. Feral Heart
10. Howl
11. Shapeshift
12-14. Howl
15. Stats
16. Shapeshift
17-25. Stats
No alternative.
Jungling is by far the best way to play Lycan with. First off he is a melee hero, with no nukes. He can’t contribute much in a dual lane. He’d just leech XP and gold from his allies. He doesn’t need to be babysit unlike heroes like Bristleback or TerrorBlade. His strength lies in jungling, one of the premium junglers eversince the jungle remake (along with other heroes like Axe and DarkSeer. I’d rank him third best.)
Sometimes in the midst of jungling, your allies might ask for help to control a lane. If you are level 5/7 (with level 3/4 wolves), you might be of some help. Use your wolves to harass them to control the lane. Invis wolves with bash is very deadly.
Remember your goal is to farm, not gank.
So somebody wants to jungle instead and you have to lane. Well fine. If you can get a solo, it’d be great. If it is a dual lane, just leech the XP and gold. Around level 3, you can send the wolves to harass the opponent. Of course, it wont be good if they hug near their towers, your wolves will die. Around level 5-7 you can send your high level wolves to take out the neutral camps to farm for you while you stick in the lane last-hitting.
Play him like any other melee laner.
Depending on how you want to play him, the items will vary. And so does the strategy.
The backdooring Lycan, a.k.a LoneWolf will be the main focus of this guide.
Although I term it backdooring, it can also apply to a pusher Lycan. The whole idea of this playstyle is to outpush the other team, take out towers, clear bases and avoid contacts with the enemy as far as possible. Lycan is a massive DPSer and along with his summons (to tank towers), he makes an ideal backdooring hero. The most crucial item you will need is Battlefury. It helps greatly to push like a madman. You will get cash rolling in fast from towers and creeps. Most of the time you will be absent from team battles. If your team can’t handle a 4v5, this playstyle may backfire on you. If you team line-up is made up of supporter heroes, a Killer Lycan will be a wiser choice.
1: Perseverance >> Battlfury
2: Boots >> Power Treads
3: Armlet
4: RoB >> Vlads
Ahh.. the killer Lycan. Ok I name this one IronWolf. Basically his job is to kill heroes with supports from his Allies. You wouldn’t want to adopt this playstyle if you have passive allies who refuse to gank and hunt for heroes. Especially so if you are in a game with 5 carries ( 
). Once I was in a game with 4 support heroes (NA, Pidge, CM, Enchantrees) yet I refused to play as Carry. It was such a lol game cos I played the LoneWolf style. Bad choice on my part, but hey, LoneWolf style is really fun!
1: Helm of IronWill
2: Boots >> Power Treads
3: Helm of Ironwill >> Armlet
4: BKB
5: RoB >> Vlads
By now you should have cleared all the outer towers. Hence begins the cat and mouse game. Depending on where and type of game you play, backdooring may or may not be allowed. The fundamentals remains the same. You Push/Backdoor when the opponent is not looking. To execute it successfully, you need to make your opponents occupied. They could either be pushing as a team or sitting in base defending as a team. This is where you will take the opportunity to strike their weak spot. Remember that you have clear the outer towers, and therefore you are free to attack from any side. Normally, mid is always taken down first but as a backdoorer, it is far easier to take out the sidelanes. You might want to organize a feint push of some sort at mid while you hide at the bottom lane ready to strike. While the opponents are distracted, move in to take out their base.
If they do, move in and strike.
For escapes and moving unnoticed during backdooring runs.
Ah simple.
Farm. Kill. Get more items.
Push and win~!
…and
or 
or 
or 
Hood of Defiance ~ more defense against magical nukes
Assault Cuirass ~ Plenty of bonus. Armor + Armor debuff + Attack speed. It makes you into a tank. The armor aura won’t stack with Vlad’s but that is fine.
Buriza ~ Mooore DPS. Lycan already has critical strike, but a rather weak one. But no matters, Critical strike stacks like bashes chances do. It is still a very strong item.
MKB ~ For the minibash. An alternative to Buriza, less dmg overall but still great.
Strength Treads (1850) ~ It is either Boots of Travels or Treads. Treads are cheaper, and gives plenty of bonuses. 30% ias will help increase your DPS. The additional +10 str gives you a cheap HP fix without the use of Bracers. TP’ing can be substituted with TP scrolls instead of Boots of Travels. Say no to Boots of Travels.
+475hp, +65dmg, +25%Ias and -40hp/sec. He gains alot of DPS and at the same time more survivability. That aside, he gets +3hp/sec regen as well as +5 armor.
There is no other Item in Dota that gives this much value for money.
Vladmir’s Offering (2075) ~ I don’t really put this as the core because you don’t need it so fast. But usually I get it rather early due to its cheap price. Plus, you already have RoB in your inventory. The lifesteal will prove useful in neutralling as well as for creep clearing (Armlet + lifesteal combo during creep waves pushes)
(*You get Satanic for Killer Lycan Build after you get BKB. For LoneWolf Build, get after Lothar’s or BKB)
Like the ones I listed — Hood, Assault Cuirass, Buriza, MKB. All these items are considered supplementary items. Or what most will call luxury items. At this stage of the game (around 50mins), I can’t tell you what you will need most. It greatly depends on your situation in the game. Use your judgement and make the right items. At this stage also, items does not play a huge role in determining your victory. It is largely dependent on how you play the game.
For me, I will usually save the gold just in case if I die, I can buyback my hero. Instead of buying more and more items.
Sometimes for some odd reasons, your opponents keep paying you a visit in the forest, and you keep dying. When it is really hard to farm the gold for your needed items, a cheaper build will be necessary. You will have RoB at start, so I’d suggest forming like 2x Bracers. Slowly form your Treads, get a helm of Iron Will and aim for Armlet. It’d be best you get Helm of Iron Will early for the armor + hp regen bonuses even before building Treads or Bracers but sometimes it is too hard to even save for 950 gold. What you will get in the end will be like this:
Treat the wolves as movable wards.
I won’t be going through jungling basics. You can read it in my other guide here:
However, specific to this Lycan Guide, there are some tricks and tips I will like to discuss on jungling. There aren’t many but very important to ensure your jungling success.
Map layout of the creep camps
In -ap mode, neutral creeps will spawn at 2:30. Remain at fountain until 2:00 and then summon wolves and head to camp Small Camp8. Heal your mana before moving out. Clear the small camp and wait at the Medium Camp11. Creep-pull them out at 3:15 and let your allied creeps kill them. Take note of their HP. Your next move is to pull the Big Camp10 Southwest of it to your allied creeps. If you pull too fast, the creeps in the medium camp may not have died yet and the big camp creeps will simply return back to your camp. Too slow and the medium camp creeps will be dead and your allied creeps will move away from that location. As a general guideline, you will start pulling when you see the Medium camp creeps are at around 1/2 to 2/3 HP in total.
Ogre/Golems/Centaur ~ Pull when they are at 1/2 HP.
Level2 Wolves: All Camps except for Furbolgs.
Level3 and 4: All camps.
. This technique is not limited to Lycan but other heroes as well.
Same thing, you start off with Small Camp1 and then head to Medium Camp5 to pull at 3:15. You have a tango in your inventory which you can use to eat the single row of trees in that camp to pull the upper camp (Med Camp4). It is less rewarding than Scourge camps, that’s why I love playing on Scourge with this hero more 
. As a general rule however, pull them around 1/3 to 1/2 hp of the current camp considering the distance travelled is much shorter compared to that in Scourge.
If your opponents were to counter, most likely they will plant a ward on your pullable camp ie Camp 5 and 11. This means you will not be able to double pull. You can either have a sentry ward up (from a generous ally) or just carry on normal laning at the side lane. If there are already 2 heroes on the lane, go to mid. You will just hang around leeching xp and some gold. Once you reach level 3, go back to the forest and kill the creeps.
Lycan preparing for a backdoor. He sends invisible wolves to scout for the new wave and waits for them to pass before moving in
For example:
1) When a team battle erupts, use that opportunity to strike their base. Most of them will be engrossed in the battle. It will be too late before they realised their base is being destroyed.
2) You can also stage a team battle. Call for a mid push. When the enemy sees 4 heroes on a lane, it will send out hints of an impending push. Their heroes will usually gather in that lane ready to defend. It can also work well in non-backdooring games. Usually, a team battle doesn’t erupt immediately. It is often a standstill, a waiting game where one team waits for the other to initiate a move, and hopefully make a mistake. During this time, Lycan can speedily push a lane. When the battle starts, he will strike their bases.
3) Likewise, if the enemy team is organizing a push. You can seize the opportunity to backdoor while going unnoticed.
Your first backdoor will be your surprise attack. It is fairly easy to pull off a good one since your opponents are unprepared. Make sure you have sufficient DPS on your hero (preferbly Treads, Armlet, Battlefury). A melee rax will fall in under 10 secs. Ranged raxes usually takes two-thirds as much time as a ranged rax (due to lower armor). In most cases, I can destroy a whole lane (tower/ranged/melee) in one sweep. By now they will start noticing and start buying TP scrolls. As you continue doing backdooring runs, you will find it increasingly harder as they step up on their defenses and awareness. This is where Lothar’s come in.
Right-Click on Raxes.
Win.
~ Having him on your team means a free BKB which lasts 20secs!
~ These heroes has damage buffer spells like Bloodrage, Bloodlust and Empower. Your DPS will increase by a ton.
~ Heroes like Pitlord (Pit of Malice), Rooftrellen (Overgrowth), Enigma (Black Hole) are great supporters for Lycan.
I hope you enjoyed, whether through reading the guide or watching the Replays. And give it a try.
