Introduction
“Get set for heavy weather!”
Storm Spirit is a highly mobile ganker and semi-carry. Although his abilities deal magic damage, Storm actually scales well into the late game thanks to his incredible mobility and combo potential.
He is a frequent mid pick in competitive Dota, although his incredibly high skill cap makes him less popular in public matchmaking. He benefits from acquiring levels and farm early on so that he can make his presence felt as a strong ganker and initiator with his high damage combos; combos which can be pulled off all the more effectively (and frequently) with good items and levels.
Our complete character profile for Storm Spirit can be found here.
Pros & Cons
Pros
- Incredibly mobile
- Good disable
- Good base damage
- High burst damage
- Has a great escape mechanism that can also dodge abilities
- Good initiator
- Strong ganker that can transition into a semi-carry
Cons
- Very mana reliant
- Requires excellent mana management skills
- Squishy - if caught you’ll likely die
- Hard countered by silence
- Very high skill cap
- No escape mechanism until level 6
Item Build
Starting Items
Storm Spirit is best played as a solo mid, where you want to get a quick Bottle and some decent experience (and levels) before looking for opportunities to gank. A good all-round starting build is:
- A set of Tangos, a Healing Salve, 2x Iron Branches, and a Mantle of Intelligence.
This gives you good regen as well as solid starting stats, which will allow you to compete for last hits effectively. You’ll also have enough gold leftover to allow you to get a Bottle quite quickly.
Early Game
As already noted, your aim is to get a Bottle as quickly as possible (ideally before the 2 minute rune spawn). Ahead of the rune spawn timer (remember runes spawn every even minute) start to push your wave out. Storm is able to push fairly effectively by using his Static Remnant to assist in farming creep waves. With the wave pushed towards the enemy tower you’re free to check for the rune – and if your lane opponent does choose to contest it they will miss out on valuable experience and gold from the pushed-in creep wave.
After that grab some basic Boots of Speed, and work towards your upgraded boots of choice. This is most commonly Power Treads, although beginners often fall back on Arcane Boots.
At first Power Treads over Arcane Boots may seem a slightly odd choice; Storm is a very mana-dependent hero and all of his abilities make heavy use of his mana pool, so why Treads? A couple of reasons. One, as a very squishy hero you need the health, and Power Treads allow you to transition into more of a semi-carry role after the laning phase. Secondly, raw intelligence is more important to Storm than his mana pool per se, because it boosts your mana regeneration, which is the more important factor for Storm. With Treads you can always switch to Intelligence when needed and thus gain higher mana regeneration (as well as a higher mana pool). Thirdly, and by extension, the mana cost of Storm’s ultimate is based on his total mana pool, and so is significantly more expensive to use if you opt for Arcane Boots.
Arcane Boots are situational though. It can be all too tempting to use up too much of your mana as Storm Spirit, and so Arcane Boots is a nice fallback option. The main reason they are situational viable is if you’re going for a Bloodstone. Much like Timbersaw, you can purchase early Arcane Boots and then buy up the other Bloodstone components. Once you have everything but the Energy Booster you can dis-assemble your Arcane Boots to complete the Bloodstone and then build your upgraded boots of choice. This sees you through the early game having the nice boost to mana without committing yourself to boots that are less optimal for your role.
Finally, upgraded any Iron Branches you have into a Magic Wand, and if you can also upgrade your starting Mantle of Intelligence into a Null Talisman.
Core Options
There are three core options for Storm Spirit (only two are showed in the image accompanying the build guide, because the third option – Black King Bar rush – should only be considered first if you desperately need to rush spell immunity, otherwise it’s your second core pick-up/a luxury pick-up).
So your two main options are Bloodstone or Orchid Malevolence.
Bloodstone is the more beginner-friendly item, but also often considered a slightly outdated build approach on Storm nowadays. Its advantages are obvious: a huge boost to your mana and health pools, great all-round regen, it will allow you to use your abilities fairly liberally, gives some limited team utility, and is a very snowball-y item. The downsides? Very expensive, will take quite a while to complete, pressure then to not lose charges once completed, and it has no offensive advantages aside from allowing you to use your abilities more freely.
Orchid is the riskier, more offensive item. It’s risen to popularity over recent months, replacing Bloodstone as his primary core item, especially in professional play where Bloodstone is rarely ever bought on Storm Spirit. It gives you good intelligence gain, a nice boost to your mana regeneration, and a good chunk of damage and attack speed, allowing you to more quickly transition into a semi-carry role. It also extremely easy to build into. Most importantly the active, Soul Burn, amplifies the damage you deal to an enemy by 30% for 5 seconds.
As Storm is a hero who excels and quick ‘get-in, get-out’ pick off ganks, Orchid is a fantastic item on him, meaning your burst combo does more damage, killing off enemies that much faster.
The problem with Orchid vis-à-vis Bloodstone is that it gives you absolutely no health, so you really will feel extremely squishy heading into the post-laning phase. If you get caught, you’re likely going to die, and so Orchid bets all on your skill with the hero. It also relies on you having good mana management skills, as instead of a large chunk of flat mana like Bloodstone, it gives you direct intelligence, which improves your mana regeneration.
In short: there are a lot of reasons Orchid is heavily favoured over Bloodstone in the professional scene, but these rely mostly on you being skilled with the hero. Beginners and those who are not confident in their Storm play would be better served by a Bloodstone, but skilled players will get a lot more out of an Orchid pick-up.
Luxury Extensions
Black King Bar - As mentioned above, sometimes Storm players are forced into purchasing Black King Bar as their first item if they find they’re being shut down hard. If you managed to avoid doing that, Black King Bar is always considered Storm Spirit’s optimal first luxury item pick-up once he has his core.
BKB gives you some much-needed health, especially if you went the Orchid route and feel extremely fragile. Even more importantly it makes Storm almost unkillable for the duration of its active; Spell Immunity on Storm means you can only be locked down by those relatively rare disables which go through Spell Immunity, so you can effectively kite your opponents while getting off your abilities.
Orchid Malevolence – If you didn’t pick up Orchid earlier then it’s still a viable luxury pick-up (as is Bloodstone, although to a much smaller extent), especially if you don’t feel you will be able to save up the big chunks of spare gold you’d need in order to complete a Scythe of Vyse.
Scythe of Vyse – Scythe is Storm’s ultimate late-game item. 3.5 seconds of solid disable, excellent stats and huge mana regeneration. There’s a reason in the competitive scene it is often rushed as soon as he gets his core; it’s that damn good. The problem is it’s also really damn expensive. Most of the time, therefore, it’s probably best made a second luxury item rather than your first luxury item.
Shiva’s Guard – Shiva’s makes for a great late-late game item on Storm. By this stage you’re likely 5 slotted, and so it becomes a contender for your last item slot. The armour will go a good way to making you tankier, while the aura is great to have for your team. You also gain a nice chunk of intelligence (always helpful for Storm; both as a way to increase damage and to maintain his mana pool). You can also use the Arctic Blast AoE nuke whilst zipping around with your ultimate, ensure multiple enemies are hit by the magic damage and the slow.
Eye of Skadi – If you don’t want yet another active item but want to gain similar effects, Skadi is an alternative option. A big chunk of health, mana, and stats, as well as a potent unique attack modifier.
Situational
Linken’s Sphere – Linkens can be a decent luxury item on Storm. The stats it provides are decent but expensive for its price; you’re really getting it for the passive Spellblock. If the enemy team has a lot of single-target disables, or that one key ability which is really frustrating your ability to do your job in teamfights, then it’s worth considering. The Spellblock ability can also be transferred to an ally if need be, giving you a way of protecting your team’s carry if they’re the focus of stuns as well.
Dagon – Gives you even more burst damage – 400 to 800. Dagon is a good snowball item, but a terrible item to get if you’re not snowballing because it will gradually taper off if effectiveness over time. Dagon 5 is also the least cost efficient item in the game at 7720 gold for an 800 magic damage nuke. Highly situational (and risky!).
Boots of Travel – The best late-late game boots. It combines your TP Scroll slot with your boot slot, freeing up room in your inventory for an extra item when you’re starting to get maxed out. Also always reassuring to have in the late-late game when an enemy team can quickly break the base – if they catch you by surprise in a base rush you will always be able to TP back.
Skill Build
Static Remnant is skilled first, but is usually maxed last. The reason it’s skilled first is to help you secure last hits if need be, as well as start to push the creep wave ahead of the rune spawning. If your lane opponent is a melee hero they’ll find Remnant spam particularly frustrating to deal with.
Finally, Remnant is also the most cost effective way to create an Overload charge; before level 6 it’s you’re only method besides Electric Vortex, which you always want to save for ganking enemies and so can’t afford to waste just to get an Overload charge.
Electric Vortex is usually skilled last, but is typically maxed first (sometimes second, depending on personal preference). Your only true disable, Electric Vortex disables an enemy target for 2.5 seconds and pulls them towards you. Extra levels increase the pull duration and distance, as well as reduce the cooldown, which is extremely useful for ganks.
Overload is skilled second and usually maxed second as well. Overload augments your physical attacks with burst magic damage which briefly slows enemy targets. In order to acquire an Overload charge you must first use one of your abilities and you can only have one charge at a given time.
| Note: Overload is the reason timing is so important with Storm, and one of the reasons why he also has an incredibly high skill cap. The put him to best use you never want to waste an Overload charge, which means timing your abilities so that they take place between physical right click attacks, without allowing the enemy to escape. |
Additional points in Overload only increase the damage it deals (from 30 up to 90), but this is applied to every attack you use after using an ability, which is why it’s typically prioritised ahead of Static Remnant, whose damage output is dependent on the enemy coming into contact with it.
Finally, your ultimate Ball Lightning is always skilled at level 6. It is only at this stage that you go from becoming an incredibly squishy hero who is easy as heck to gank to a frustratingly mobile hero who is nigh impossible to gank without chain stuns. Ball Lightning allows you to travel in an invulnerable ball of lightning to your chosen location, with the distance determining how much of your mana it uses up. It also deals damage based on the distance travelled in a small AoE.
Ball Lightning is such an incredibly versatile skill, allowing you to offensively gank or defensively avoid ganks. It makes Storm Spirit the most mobile hero in the game… providing he has enough mana left to support its use.
Gameplay Tips
As touched upon earlier in the guide, Static Remnant is very useful for pushing the wave at all stages of the game but especially early on in advance of the rune spawning. This allows you to clear the wave quickly and forces the enemy to either give up the rune or give up some experience and gold.
| Tip: Static Remnants actually give flying vision. You can use them in trees and around juking spots to give clear vision of the immediate area. Another good use of this is to use them from the high ground in the trees above Roshan if you want to check if the enemy team is doing Roshan relatively safely. |
At level 3 Electric Vortex will pull the target far enough that they will come into contact with a Static Remnant that is placed at the cast point, providing the target is not moved out of range. Thus, a good way of making sure Static Remnant deals damage to a chosen target is to cast it after Electric Vortex.
Because an Overload charge is triggered every time you use an ability, and it slows the target when it impacts, and good strategy when chasing an enemy down is to perform ‘mini-zips’ of Ball Lightning, followed up with a right click attack powered by Overload, before again Ball Lightning towards the target.
Remember to try and always use your Overload charge by right clicking an enemy before casting your next spell, in order to get the most burst damage potential in a short space of time as possible.
While using Ball Lightning Storm can also use items and abilities, so you can for example plant a Static Remnant mid-travel if you intend to jump slightly ahead of a retreating enemy, or you can Hex a target using Scythe of Vyse. Remember also that Ball Lightning deals damage in a small radius, and that the further you’ve travelled the more damage it deals (8/12/16 for every 100 units travelled).
Storm is invulnerable during Ball Lightning, which makes him a very difficult hero to pin down and kill unless you manage to stun him before he enters Ball Lightning. Indeed, the main weakness of Storm in this respect is that he has a fairly long cast time (0.3 second cast point and 0.51 seconds cast backswing), so will not instantly transition into Ball Lightning once you activate it.
A typical Storm Spirit ganking combo is: Ball Lightning > Attack > Electric Vortex > Attack > Static Remnant > Attack > Ball Lightning > Attack.
Last Updated - Patch 6.83.
