Introduction
“Nyx, Nyx, Nyx, Nyx.”
Nyx Assassin is a versatile melee agility hero. He is capable of fitting into numerous roles, including mid lane ganker, offlaner, and support. In competitive Dota he is typically played as a hard support hero, and occasionally as an offlaner, whilst in public matchmaking he has traditionally been picked up for his ability to effectively gank from the mid lane.
This particular guide will focus on Nyx in the support role that he has become most well known for as a result of its popularity in the competitive scene.
Recent changes have made Nyx harder to play, but he is nonetheless still a popular pick up largely thanks to his 2.77 second AoE disable, his ability to reflect damage dealt and stun at the same time, and incredible burst physical damage.
You can find our complete character profile for Nyx Assassin here.
Pros & Cons
Pros
- Great AoE disable
- Two separate stuns
- Highly survivable
- Great ganker
- Decent burst physical damage
- Very high health regeneration
- Has a source of invisibility
- Fairly item independent
Cons
- Keeps getting nerfed
- Stun is harder to land now and all too easy to miss entirely
- Spiked Carapace is not as good as it used to be
- His Vendetta and ganking presence is easily countered by detection
- Needs levels
- Melee attack range makes dewarding cliffs impossible on your own
- Mana issues
- Countered by silences
Item Build
Starting Items
If you’re running Nyx as a support you should purchase the Courier and/or Observer Wards at the start. Ideally support duties will be split between yourself and a second support hero (in which case you need only purchase one of those, otherwise you’ll have to buy both yourself).
A typical starting build for support Nyx would be:
- A set of Tangos, a Healing Salve, Courier and/or Observer Wards, and 3x Iron Branches.
This gives you plenty of regen, covers your team’s initial support needs, and gets you start on your eventual Magic Wand.
Early Game
Make sure the Courier is upgraded into a Flying Courier at the 3 minute mark, and ensure that Observer Wards are always off cooldown.
Get Boots of Speed up and running as quickly as possible, and also finish off your Magic Wand.
Core Items
Keep ensuring Observer Wards are bought whenever they’re off cooldown, and in the meantime work towards your Arcane Boots. These really are the upgraded boots of choice for Nyx, regardless of the role he’s playing; he’s a very mana intensive hero and Arcane Boots allow him to make more liberal use of all of his abilities and give him some much needed mana regen (in the form of Arcane Boots’ active).
With that you have your major core items for a support Nyx and can start working towards a mobility item. This can either be Force Staff or Blink Dagger. In professional play Blink Dagger is by far the more favoured option for Nyx Assassin, but Force Staff will give you more team-wide utility. Both are great items, however, and you can certainly pick up the one you didn’t opt for later on as a luxury extension.
Force Staff is an amazing escape tool, and can be used on allies and enemies, making it a great play-making item for clutch saves or to Force an enemy into bad positioning. Blink Dagger, on the other hand, is primarily oriented towards allowing you to get off the best Impale possible in teamfights (or in advance of teamfights, if you decide to initiate). Blink into Impale can often net you multiple stuns, allowing your team to follow up.
Luxury Items
Support Nyx has quite a wide selection of luxury items to choose from. What you opt for will be dependent both on your own farming situation as well as what your team needs most of all. Common pick-ups include:
Blink Dagger/Force Staff – Whichever you didn’t purchase as a core item earlier makes for a good luxury pick up, giving you the best of both worlds. You’ll gain the superior positioning and initiation capability of Blink Dagger as well as the team-wide utility and defensive options a Force Staff grants you.
Drums of Endurance - Drums of Endurance are a great option because they give you team bonus attack speed and move speed auras, whilst at the same time giving you plenty of stats and being easy to build into (since the components are so cheap you can buy them up whenever you have the spare unreliable gold, meaning you won’t lose much gold when you die).
Necronomicon - Great if you’re part of a pushing line-up or your team is struggling to break the base. Also a great item for teamfights and for countering any invis enemy heroes.
Vladmir’s Offering – Why Vlad’s? Surely Nyx gets very little out of it. True, but you’re not really buying it for yourself, you’re buying it for your team. Vladmir’s Offering is great to pick up on a support even if your team doesn’t have any other melee heroes because of the bonus damage and armour it provides. If your team does have a melee core and no one else has purchased one then it’s an even better utility item to purchase.
Scythe of Vyse - The likelihood of you being able to afford a Scythe during all but the longest of games (or largest of stomps) as a support is minimal, but if you can afford it then definitely get it! Another 3.5 seconds of disable for your team is absolutely enormous, and that’s on top of the stats it provides.
Dagon – One of the greedier luxury options for Nyx Assassin support. Usually Dagon is reserved for ganking Nyx’s who can get the most out of its effectiveness as an early insta-gib item. The longer the game goes, however, the less useful Dagon becomes.
Ethereal Blade – E-Blade is a great offensive and defensive item. Defensively it grants you 4 seconds of physical immunity, and allows you to give that effect either to an ally (ideally someone who’s the target of enemy right clicks), or an enemy hero (the enemy physical DPS’er). This gives you time to create distance between yourself and the enemy carry or at the very least buys your team 4 seconds of distraction time.
Offensively, when combined with burst magic damage E-Blade becomes a tool by which magic damage nukers can scale into the late game. After casting E-Blade on an enemy nuke them with as much burst damage output as possible; E-Blade will buff that damage by a huge 40%.
Situational Items
Sentry Wards, Dust of Appearance, Gem of True Sight – all-important detection. You’ll need at least one of these in your inventory if the enemy line-up features an invis hero. Sentry Wards will also allow you to deward rune spots, and Gem will give you superior vision going into the mid and late game.
Smoke of Deceit – If you roam with another support in the early stages of the game a Smoke will allow you to do so more quickly and without being spotted by enemy wards. Smoke will also come in handy in the post-laning phase if your team wants to gank as 5.
Skill Build
Always skill and max Impale first as a support Nyx. This allows you to both defensively protect your carry from a level 1 gank or, if you're on the offensive, allows you to stun the enemy if your team is attempting to gank at level 1.
Impale is maxed first in order to increase the duration of the stun (from 1.27 at level 1 to 2.77 seconds at level 2) and damage dealt (80 to 260, respectively). Impale is the main reason Nyx is a viable support, and his only reliable stun; it's crucial, as support Nyx, that you learn how to land your stun properly.
Spiked Carapace is typically skilled last, but you can max it second or last. Extra levels increase the duration of the stun (from 0.6 to 2.4 seconds) and reduces the ability’s cooldown (23 seconds to 14 seconds).
Mana Burn is the ability most Nyx’s max last, but it can be worth maxing second after Impale if the opposition line-up is heavily tilted towards intelligence heroes or heroes that rely heavily on having topped up mana pools for engagements. Additional levels reduce the cooldown (28 seconds to 4 seconds) and increases the damage dealt, so if you find yourself spamming Mana Burn whenever it’s off cooldown as harassment consider maxing it second.
Vendetta is always skilled (levels 6, 11 and 16). This makes you invisible for a short duration (20 seconds at level 1) and gives you extra move speed whilst under its affects. If your physical attack breaks the invisibility you will deal bonus physical damage to the target (from 250 at level 1 to 550 at level 3). This is a considerably potent ability that is for the most part used as an offensive ganking or initiation tool.
Gameplay Tips
| Important: Impale is no longer a ‘Target Unit’ ability, it is a ‘Target Point’ ability, which means that simply clicking it on an enemy hero will not guarantee the stun will land. Instead, you have to estimate where they will be when the stun reaches them, in similar fashion to Leshrac’s Split Earth stun. This change has made Impale much harder to land, but with practice you should still be able to land it most of the time. |
Mana Burn destroys the target’s mana and deals damage based on the enemy hero’s intelligence. This means it deals more damage, and burns more mana, from intelligence heroes; if the enemy team has an intelligence-heavy line-up consider prioritising Mana Burn before Spiked Carapace for maximum harassment potential.
Spiked Carapace telegraphs its use to your enemies by spikes covering Nyx’s body. Decent players will notice this and avoid attacking you or using their nukes on you until the ability has ended. However, it is hard to avoid triggering Carapace if you have AoE teamfight abilities, so use this to your advantage to stun heroes with AoE abilities like Bat Rider, Leshrac, Lina, Luna, and so on.
Spiked Carapace is especially good for dodging slow projectiles or attacks. If you anticipate, for example, a Sniper using assassinate or a Vengeful Spirit using Magic Missile, wait until you see the ability cast and then use Spiked Carapace in the split second you have before the ability hits you.
As soon as you hit level 6 look for opportunities on the map to gank – any lanes that are pushed in towards your tower, any fragile junglers you expect to find in the enemy woods (such as Nature’s Prophet), and enemy supports are all prime target for a Vendetta gank. For those heroes a Vendetta, followed by Impale, right clicks and Mana Burn should be enough to net you a kill.
Vendetta is primarily used as an offensive ganking and scouting tool, but it can also be used defensively if you suspect the enemy team does not have True Sight detection to avoid a gank or retreat from an unfavourable teamfight. Vendetta's fade time into invisibility is also instant, and so can be used to dodge many spells provided the enemy does not possess True Sight.
| Tip: Using Vendetta does not break channelling, which means you can use it after you’ve cast a defensive TP Scroll as a clutch way to try and escape under the cover of invisibility. |
Once you hit level 16 (and have 3 points in Vendetta), the ability’s duration is the same length as its cooldown. Assuming you have the mana to cost it, you can theoretically cast Vendetta indefinitely and only break invisibility once every minute. This will also allow you to time its usage so that you can use Vendetta’s bonus damage twice in a single teamfight.
Nyx’s most common ganking combo is Vendetta > right click > Impale > Mana Burn > right click. The invisibility from Vendetta does not dispel until your attack damages the enemy, so it can usually begin your initiation. Beware of highly mobile enemies or those with Blinks, as they may then be able to dodge your Impale as soon as they see your invisibility break.
Last Updated - Patch 6.82.
