How to play Muerta as position 4 support guide: best item builds, talents, ability choices
On March 7 Valve Corporation finally released Muerta, a new intelligence carry in Dota 2. But, unlike many other new heroes, she ended up underpowered at the start. So, the players tried to look for other ways to use the character. And the most successful of those ended up a position 4 support. So in this guide we will figure out the build. Let's go.
Update from March 18: With recent update, Valve made this playstyle weaker with nerfing early levels of Dead Shot and moving talents around. It's still useable, but it's harder than it was before, keep that in mind.
Original article: In first few days of matchmaking, carry Muerta was barely winning 42% of the matches. At the same time, as position 5 support she had a 50,5% winrate among pros, and position 4 was winning even more — 52,1%. Among Immortal rank players the stats are a bit worse, but still significantly better than Muerta-carry: 49,6% and 49,7% accordingly.
Why Muerta is better as a support
So, why Muerta failed as carry? She simply didn't have enough damage. Her main source of damage, ultimate, is countered by Black King Bar. Using it at the wrong moment just wastes all your potential. You have to poke the enemy to force it to BKB first, and that's just not that easy to do in matchmaking with random teammates. Unless she will get buffed, it's just a weak hero in this role at the moment.
Muerta-support is different. First, she is a decent laner due to her very annoying first skill, Dead Shot. It deals a decent amount of damage, breaks positioning, and stops enemy carry from farming. One step too close, and he runs under tower while taking hits. And if Muerta's teammate on the lane is some strong offlaner with a stun, like a Centaur Warrunner, it's quite easy to set up a kill and punish for mistakes in positioning.
Second, Muerta has a lot of impact in teamfights without any items. She breaks your formation, while dealing a decent amount of damage. And it's hard to focus Muerta in the fight due to her ultimate granting physical immunity.
How to build Muerta on position 4 support: abilities and items guide
When you are playing position 4, you don't really need to deal a lot of damage — let your cores cover this. So, we ignore third skill completely in the first part of the game. The passive will push lane while trading, and it's unlikely you will have space to farm with it either. Your priority are first and second skills, which will give you the biggest advantage on the lane.
When choosing the items, you have a lot of options. Most players buy Arcane Boots and Urn of Shadows, and then move to Blink Dagger or Aether Lens afterwards. Some buy Tranquil Boots and Drums of Endurance with Force Staff. In late game, it's good to get a Scythe of Vise and Guardian Greeves, if your offlaner isn't going to buy it. Overall, there is not much special in her build, just buy support items.
If you really feel the need, you can transition to semi-carry, provided the game will go long enough with you having space to farm. But if you have decent cores, it's better to support them and provide catch — Muerta is not some Tiny 4, who can deal tons of damage with just two items.
What talents to choose for Muerta support:
- Level 10: +100 Dead Shot damage
- Level 15: +250 Dead Shot Cast Range
- Level 20: 2 Dead Shot Charges
- Level 25: The Calling summons 2 additional revenants
How to play Muerta on support
Your main task during laning is to make enemy carry feel as bad as possible. Force him to lose farm by making him run away from creeps, setup kills with your offlaner with Dead Shot. On the sides there is a lot of trees and units around, so you will be able to hit it most of the time. If you need to get used to vector targeting, you can do it in Demo hero tab.
The second tool on the lane is The Calling. It will slow your enemies, both their attack and movement speed. And if you will combine it with Dead Shot, there is a good chance the target will hit a ghost and take even more damage. The combination of these two spells is your main tool in teamfights as well. You are not a carry, so even during your ultimate, try to use Q and W before auto-attacking enemies. But if you still want to try to play her as carry, we have a guide as well:
