DOTA 2 - Rubick

Introduction

"First blood? What is this? I came here to be tested!"

Rubick is truly a unique hero. No other hero in the game has the ability to steal another's abilities and use them against the enemy team. Spell Steal makes Rubick both unusual and a lot of fun to play.

In the past - circa 2012 - he was often played in the mid role. His popularity as a mid hero fell off, but to this day he remains a popular support pick. His first three abilities lend him to the support role, whilst his ultimate makes him the ultimate play-maker, as popularised by Na'Vi's KuroKy.

Rubick's complete character profile can be found here.

Pros & Cons

Pros

• A rare, play-making support hero
• Fun to play
• Can steal any active ability in the game!
• Good pusher/anti-pusher
• Versatile disable
• Good ganker
• Good, scaling passive aura for the whole team

Cons

• Very fragile
• Requires a lot of game knowledge to be used effectively
• Requires good positioning, map awareness, and timing
• Mana problems

Item Build

Although a viable option for the mid lane, Rubick is almost always played as a 4th or 5th position support/utility hero nowadays. As such the item progression recommended in this guide will reflect - the emphasis is on purchasing those items which will benefit your entire team as well as synergise well with your abilities.

Starting Items

If you're splitting support duties with another player on your team then you can go for this starting build:

Observer Wards or Courier, a set of Tangos, a Healing Salve, and 3x Iron Branches (or 2x Branches and 2x Clarity).

Otherwise, your starting items will probably look like this:

Observer Wards, Courier, a set of Tangos, a Healing Salve, and 1x Iron Branch.

Early Game

Make sure that your team has a Flying Courier when it comes off cooldown at the 3 minute mark, and make sure that Observer Wards are always kept on cooldown.

Get basic Boots of Speed as quickly as possible and upgrade any Iron Branches you have into a Magic Wand.

Core Items

Keep buying wards!

As support Rubick it's best to get Arcane Boots. You'll be able to more liberally use your relatively high mana cost abilities and will also provide mana for your team.

Your first big ticket item should either be a Mekanism or a Force Staff. If the other support (assuming there is one! In pubs it's not a certainty) on your team is building into a Mekanism then go for a Force Staff instead. Similarly, if there's a core on your team which will often build Mekanism (such as Viper), ask them if they intend to do so - again, if they are then you can skip it for a Force Staff.

If no one else is working towards a Mekanism then it should be your top priority. It will give you some survivability and good stats, but most importantly you can give your entire team 250 burst healing during teamfights. If one team has a Mek and the other doesn't then that team typically has the edge in teamfights.

Force Staff is truly amazing on Rubick. It synergises extremely well with your own skillset, helps make up for your innate vulnerability and lack of mobility, and gives you team-wide utility. Force Staff itself is a very versatile item that has defensive and offensive uses. It can be used to escape if you're caught in a bad position, or to pursue a fleeing enemy. And it can be used not only on yourself, but also on teammates and enemy heroes.

Luxury Items

Drums of Endurance - Drums is a great item to transition into once you have your core up and running. Cheap, cost-efficient, and easy to build into, it gives you great stats gain for its cost as well as increased mobility thanks to the move speed aura. It also doubles up as a support/utility item, by giving your team move speed and attack speed auras. You can never go wrong with Drums.

Blink Dagger - Another great mobility item. It's quite expensive and hard to acquire for most supports at 2150 gold, but if you're having a good game then it will make you even more dangerous. It doesn't have as much all-round utility as a Force Staff, and does little to directly benefit your team (besides allowing you to position yourself more safely), which is why it's not core ahead of Force Staff.

Pipe of Insight - If you didn't buy the team's Mekanism earlier on then Pipe is a great pick-up for your team. If you did, then it's very risky getting Pipe as well as Mekanism - it's inadvisable to have both on one hero, doubly so when that hero is as squishy as Rubick.

Ghost Scepter - Will give you some much-needed survivability. If you find that you're easy pickings for the enemy DPS'ers and at risk of feeding more than helping your team then get a Ghost Scepter. It will give you 4 seconds of physical invulnerability, which will feel like an age to the enemy carry who should probably be hitting higher priority targets instead. Between this and Force Staff you'll be a real pain to kill.

Eul's Scepter of Divinity - Sometimes called the poor man's Scythe of Vyse. Unlike Scythe the target cannot be attacked whilst trapped in the Cyclone, but it will take an enemy (or ally) out of the fight for 2.5 seconds. Good to use on allies with mobility skills currently on cooldown to buy them some time, or to use on an enemy carry that you want to take out of the fight for a short while. More directly, it will give you a very nice move speed boost and will put an end to any mana problems you may still be having.

Heaven's Halberd - A good anti-carry item thanks to giving you 3.0-4.5 seconds of disarm, and it will also give you a nice health boost and general survivability. A very underrated support item.

Situational Items

Scythe of Vyse - You're unlikely to be rich enough to ever afford it, and if you are the game is likely already won anyway, but if the game is really stretching out it can potentially be a decisive item to get. 3.5 seconds of lockdown on a key enemy hero is the reason Scythe is considered one of the most powerful items in the game.

Aghanim's Scepter - Aghanim's faces the same problem as Scythe. Because it's so expensive and you're a support, the only way you'll ever be able to purchase it is if your team has already got a dominating lead (in which case it's irrelevant what item you purchase at this point) or the game has stretched on very late. Even then there are probably better items to purchase for your team (like Pipe or Scythe).

Still, if you can get it then it's a great item to have. As well as the stats it provides, it will reduce the cooldown on your ultimate, increase the range, and most fun of all if you steal an enemy ultimate with Spell Steal then you will steal the Aghanim's buffed version of that skill (if there is one), regardless of whether they have an Aghanim's or not.

Vladmir's Offering - Obviously you don't get lifesteal from Vlad's, but you're not buying it for yourself anyway. If you have a melee carry then it's a fantastic support pick up, and even if your team doesn't have a melee carry it still provides utility for your entire team with the mana regen, damage, and armour auras.

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

The above image displays a fairly typical Rubick build. Your first point should always go into Telekinesis in case of a level 1 engagement. With Telekinesis you will disable the chosen target for the 'lift duration' (1.5/1.75/2/2.25 seconds) and then stun in a small 325 AoE at a chosen location where you choose to drop the target for the 'stun duration' (1/1.25/1.5/2 seconds). The initial target is not stunned by the AoE upon landing, but any heroes or creeps on their team will be.

It can be tricky, when first playing Rubick, to actually pick a chosen location within the short lift duration. If you don't pick a location then the target will drop down on the spot from which you picked them up and will apply the stun there. This is a slight waste of the ability, because you can stun in an AoE of your choosing when you master the ability, but if you are having trouble doing it in time and are pre-occupied casting other abilities then just keep practicing; eventually you'll get the hang of it.

After that, you want to skill and max Fade Bolt. This is your only damage ability and is a somewhat potent nuke early on. You can cast it whilst lifting a target using Telekinesis.

Typically you want to max Telekinesis second for the increased duration of both the disable and the stun, although there are exceptions to this rule. If your team is struggling to cope with high magic damage output from the enemy team then early points in your passive Null Field ability may be necessary. Typically, though, you should max Null Field last.

Finally, always get your ultimate, Spell Steal, at levels 6, 11 and 16. The ability to steal the last spell the chosen target cast is extremely powerful and can turn the tide of entire teamfights (a rare thing indeed for a support hero). The extra levels increase the duration of the spell steal by an entire minute each, as well as decrease the ability's cooldown.

Gameplay Tips

Telekinesis can be used to place enemies onto impassable terrain, which makes them easier to kill or leaves them trapped until they Courier themselves a TP. This is harder to do than in the past, but is still possible. To trap someone on higher ground click just beyond the cliff/terrain, rather than on the actual spot you want them to land on.

Fade Bolt is an amazing push/anti-push nuke. Use it on incoming creep waves if you're trying to delay an enemy push. All of the creeps will take significant damage, making them easier to clear.

Naturally the best spells to steal are those big impact ultimate abilities like Tidehunter's Ravage, Enigma's Black Hole, Magnus's Reverse Polarity, Bounty Hunter's Track, and Beastmaster's Primal Roar.

One less recognised but especially good ability you can steal is Morphling's Morph ability. Use it to convert all of your agility into strength. Any form of disable or stun is also very handy to have.

Although it's tempting to try and hold out for someone to cast a big impact ultimate, don't do so at the expense of never stealing anything else. A good rule of thumb is to always steal an ability when you can so that you head into a teamfight with an extra ability, by which point your ultimate will typically be off cooldown and you can then steal a second spell once you've used the first one (or when you see the opportunity to steal an important one).

Last Updated - Patch 6.83.