Introduction
"If you can see me, you're already dead."
A perennial favourite in public games, Riki is a melee agility carry who excels at picking off heroes under the cover of invisibility and smoke.
Although potentially countered by invisibility detection and rarely picked competitively, Riki nonetheless continues to pose a sizable threat even when revealed thanks to his scaling damage and an oft-underestimated teamfight silence, slow, and miss chance AoE.
Riki's complete character profile can be found here.
Pros & Cons
Pros
- Permanent invisibility when he hits level 6
- Great ganker and chaser
- Scales well
- AoE silence, attack and movement slow, and miss chance skill
- Low mana cost spells
- Fun to play against fairly squishy line-ups
- Forces supports to buy detection and remain cash-strapped
Cons
- Hard countered by cheap-ish items (Sentry Ward, Dust of Appearance, and Gem of True Sight)
- Low health
- Struggles in co-ordinated teamfights
- Needs farm
Item Build
Riki has a fairly standard core item build which you should almost always aim for. Once you have your core though you have much more freedom of choice when it comes to luxury late-game items.
Standard starting items are: a set of Tangos, Healing Salve, Stout Shield and 2x Branches. This build gives you plenty of regen, the Stout Shield will allow you to withstand a decent amount of harass whilst getting the last hits that you really do need, and can be combined with the Slippers of Agility to later make a Poor Man's Shield. The Branches can also be upgraded into a Magic Wand later on.
Early-to-mid game you want to make that Poor Man's Shield, pick up some Boots of Speed and upgrade them into Power Treads, and optionally build a Magic Wand.
Your core item pick-up, and go-to big ticket item is Diffusal Blade. As well as the agility gain (which will stack with your passive ability Backstab) and extra mana, it gives you mana burn and, most importantly, an active purge, which will allow you to connect significantly more hits on enemies under your smoke. A typical combo once you have your Diffusal Blade is: Blink Strike > Smoke Screen > cast Diffusal's Purge on enemy > Attack, Attack, Attack > Blink Strike to finish them off.
After that, you have your core mid-game build complete, which opens up many more possibilities for extensions. These are largely situational, but I'll run down the pros and cons of each:
Black King Bar - Strongly recommended. As a carry, BKB is always a fantastic secondary big-ticket item. 10 to 4 seconds of spell immunity is especially good on Riki because he tends to be focused in teamfights in the mid-game.
Vladmir's Offering - If you're part of a dual core or tri-core line-up then Vlads is quite possibly the best item to get after Diffusal, especially if your allies are melee. Even if they're not, all of the auras except for lifesteal will work on them, so don't automatically rule it out even if you're the only melee hero on the team. It's cheap, easy to build, and has great utility.
Diffusal Level 2 - If you run out of charges on your level 1 Diffusal this is a no-brainer. It's also a no-brainer if your inventory is getting pretty full and you have spare gold lying around. Both Diffusal and BKB are items that, once you're 6 slotted, you should consider purchasing anew to get a fresh set of charges when you're in the very late game.
Butterfly - The ultimate late-game item for any agility carry. There are two downsides: one is it is very expensive, the other is that one third of it is cancelled out (the evasion) if the enemy team has a hero with Monkey King Bar.
Manta Style - It has a bit of everything you'll need; good agility, damage, move speed, attack speeds, minor stat gain and a decent active (creates illusions), but I find it to be a bit lacklustre on Riki and he doesn't get as much out of illusions as typical Manta purchasers.
Skull Basher - Riki is squishy, so the strength on Skull Basher is nice to have. The passive bash proc chance is why you'll be getting this for the mostpart as it extends the time an enemy hero will be under your cloud taking bonus damage from Backstab. Can later be upgraded into an Abyssal Blade for even more lockdown.
Assault Cuirass - A great utility item in the same vein as Vladmir's Offering. Your entire team will gain a large advantage from it and you'll do more damage as well. Don't under-estimate the effects of minus armour! Usually you shouldn't be aiming for this on Riki, as there'll probably be a better Assault Cuirass carrier on your team, but if there isn't it's a good item to have.
Skill Build
Your first point should either go in Permanent Invisibility (if you are not very confident about the safety of your lane), or Backstab (if you're in the safe lane and expect freefarm).
| Note: Casting items no longer breaks Riki's invisibility, so you can use items freely under the cover of invisibility. |
Your second point should go into whichever you skipped at level 1. Your third point should then go into Smoke Screen. After that, max Backstab first for its damage scaling.
The second ability you want to max is Smoke Screen. By this time you'll be coming to the end of the laning stage and starting to engage in teamfights, so the increased Smoke Screen radius and miss chance will come in very handy.
Always get your ultimate, Blink Strike, whenever you can (levels 6, 11 and 16). This used to be Riki's second skill but it is now his ultimate and allows you to teleport behind a target unit, striking for bonus damage if it is an enemy.
Finally, maximise Permanent Invisibility. It's a great skill, and so should always be taken over Stats, but as far as scaling goes it only reduces your fadetime by two seconds at each level and slightly icnreases your health regeneration; fairly marginal benefits.
| Tip: Blink Strike can be used on creeps as well as heroes, and can also be used on allies as well as enemies. This allows you to use it as an escape skill, Blinking onto a teammate or creep. |
Gameplay Tips
Your typical ganking combo is to find an isolated enemy, Blink Strike onto them, cast Smoke Screen and whilst under Smoke Screen attack them. Since Blink Strike takes you to the back of the enemy, your attacks will be augmented by Backstab. If they decide to stand and fight, the miss chance and attack speed slow provided by Smoke Screen will give you a huge advantage, even though you won't be getting Backstab's bonus damage.
| Warning: Sentry Wards, Gem, and Dust of Appearance reveal you, as do skills such as Bounty Hunter's Track, but you may not realise that silences also reveal you. Any hero with a silence or Orchid thus counter your ultimate. |
As soon as you get Diffusal Blade - which is core on Riki and should be the first high-price item you purchase - during these Smoke Screen ganks you should cast Diffusal's purge on the enemy whilst they are under your Smoke Screen. This will slow them down even more and means you can get in a few extra Backstab hits.
| Tip: Try to predict where the enemy is headed based on their current trajectory and then cast your Smoke Screen slightly ahead of them. This will increase the amount of time they're under it. |
As mentioned earlier in the guide, you can cast Blink Strike on allied heroes and creeps as well as enemy ones. This makes it a solid escape ability as well as an offensive initiation and/or chasing skill.
Slardar, Bounty Hunter and Doom Bringer are especially annoying enemies to face off against as Riki. Not only do they have abilities that reveal you and prevent you from going invisible, they also have a lot of utility; Doom will prevent you casting any abilities, Bounty Hunter's Track gives his team bonus gold, and Slardar's ultimate drastically reduces your armour.
Last Updated - Patch 6.83.
