Slark Overview

Lore & Bio

Dark Reef is the name of this sunken prison in the depths of the sea, where the worst of sea creatures are imprisoned for their crimes against their own kind. self. It was a prison building with walls surrounded by sharp blades, filled with dangerous Slithereen, evil, cunning Deep Ones or antisocial Meranths. In that murky labyrinth, patrolled by eels and guarded by giant sea anemones, only the most wicked can survive.

Thrown into the Dark Reef for unknown crimes, Slark has lived more than half of his life with no kin or kindness, nor can anyone trust anyone, surviving thanks to a wonderful combination of stealth abilities. ruthless, with ideas and plans kept to himself. Then, as the infamous Dark Reef Dozen prepared for their unfortunate escape, they kept their plan perfectly hidden, killing anyone who found a trace. – yet, somehow, Slark still found out, and “put” a place for himself in that scheme.

During the prison break, 10 of the 12 guys were destroyed, the other 2 were captured, escorted back to Dark Reef, executed to entertain the "prisoners". However, Slark, the thirteenth who was never known, took advantage of the chaos to hide, escaped and was never caught again.

Currently, Slark lurks among the man-eating mangroves at the southern end of Shadeshore. To this day, he is still the only one who has successfully escaped from Dark Reef.

Attribute & Stats

Level: 0 1 15 25 30

Health: 200 620 1140 1760 2000

Health regen: +1.75 +3.85 +6.51 +9.61 +10.76

Mana: 75 267 543 891 1023

Mana regen: +0 +0.8 +1.99 +3.44 +3.97

Armor: 0 3.5 7.47 12.3 14.05

Damage Block: 16 (50%)

Magic Resistance: 25%

Status Resistance: 0%

Damage: 32‒40 53‒61 76‒84 105‒113 116‒124

Attack Rate: 0.65/s 0.77/s 0.91/s 1.08/s 1.14/s

Attack Range: Melee 150 (600)

Attack Speed: 110 (1.7s BAT)

Attack Animation: 0.5+0.3

Projectile Speed: Instant

Movement Speed: 300

Turn Rate: 0.7

Collision Size: 24

Vision Range: (G) 1800

Legs: 2

Gib Type: Default

Ability Upgrades:

• Upgradable by Aghanim's Scepter.
• Upgradable by Aghanim's Shard.

Abilities & Talents

Slark can be considered as one of the strongest champions in DOTA 2 in the late game, especially with 1vs1 solo situations. Essence Shift can be considered as one of the most suitable passives for champions listed as hard carry, when basic hand attacks on enemy champions will give Slark stats and agility, then from there increase strength.

Skills building guide

Get 1 point of Pounce (W) at first level and max it first to increase enemy retention and Slark's mobility. At early levels get 1 point Dark pact (Q) to remove buffs and Essence shift (E) to increase damage. Maximize the Dark pact (Q) secondly to deal damage and in this stage you have Ultimate and a bit more health, so you can use this skill more freely. Essence shift (E) final max at this point makes sense since you need sustained damage while stealing enemy champions' stats. Ultimate of course get the correct level.

Abilities

Dark Pact

Cost: 55/50/45/40 mana

Cooldown: 9/8/7/6 seconds

Effect: when activating this skill, after 1.5 seconds, Slark will cancel harmful buffs on himself and deal 75/150/225/300 damage to the surroundings. Slark consumes 1/2 health equal to the damage dealt immediately upon casting.

Blast radius: 325

Pounce

Cost: 75 mana

Cooldown: 20/16/12/8 seconds

Effect: jumps forward, if he hits the target is an enemy champion, that person will take 50/100/150/200 damage and can't move more than 1 radius at the target location. hit for a period of time.

Impact time: 3.5 seconds

Jump Range: 700

Hold Radius: 325

Hold touch radius: 95

Essence Shift

Effect: Slark's basic attacks on an enemy champion steal 1 point each of that champion's stat, and grant him 3 agility points for himself for a certain duration.

Steal Time: 15/30/60/120 seconds

Fish Bait

Cost: 50 mana

Cast Range: 1100

Cooldown: 9

Effect: reduce enemies’ speed 30%, support truesight in 6 seconds and rewarded 75 attack speed for the duration of Pounce.

Shadow Dance

Cost: 120 mana.

Cooldown: 60 seconds.

Passive: when Slark is out of sight, he gains 30%/35%/40% Movement Speed and heals 3%/5%/7% of his maximum health per second. This passive is blocked when he attacks jungle monsters.

Active: sends Slark into a mist of darkness, rendering him invisible for 4 seconds. During this time, he can use skills, basic attacks, and equipment without being visible. This stealth state cannot be detected by any skills, anti-stealth equipment, or true turret vision.

Depth Shroud

Effect: Creates a 300 AoE cloud at the target location for 3 seconds. All allies inside the radius are hidden and affected by Shadow Dance. 

Cast Range: 800

Cooldown: 75

Cast Animation: 0.1+0.8

Cast Range: 800

Effective items guides

Early game

Quelling Blade

Quelling Blade/Tango/Healing Salve/Slippers of Agility

Slark's goal is not to farm any creeps at this stage. Therefore, the ax chopping wood and a little bit of stats is the best choice in the laning phase. However, if you are confident in your last hit ability, you can skip Quelling Blade and add items that increase stats to increase your ability to kill opponents. It's also important to note that Slark is an extremely short-handed hero, so you'll be at a disadvantage when trading hits with long-armed heroes. You will even have to take a good beating while farming monsters, so buy a lot of regen items to stay in lane to level 6.

Phase Boots

Slark is an early combat-oriented hero, so the Phase shoe will be the preferred choice over other boots. A little hit damage, a little armor and penetration effects will help Slark easily capture the opponent. However, if the progress of the match tends to raise turtles, then Power Treads is a better choice to go farming.

Orb of Corrosion

Equipment for attack effects like Orb of Venom and Blight Stone is a great complement to manual damage ganking heroes like Slark. Previously, we used to choose 1 of these 2 items in the early game, however, version 7.28 allowed both effects to be integrated with only 1 single item slot, Orb of Corrosion for only 925 Gold. . Get this gear if you have a chance to snowball your opponent.

Wraith Band

An item that increases basic stats at the beginning of the game, in the previous meta, we often increase the agility of these 2-3 masks to make the heroes really strong. However, in version 7.28, you should only wear a single mask and focus on other important items.

Magic Wand

Even if your team doesn't have Zeus, or Skywrath Mage, but the hero is spamming, you should still buy this magic stick. Sometimes you just need a little health to finish off the opponent first or a little mana to use the ultimate, the amount of charge stored in the Magic Stick will save you in such situations.

Diffusal Blade

This is the first big item for Slark because it is quite cheap but extremely useful. Burning down the opponent's mana and the slow effect makes it easy for Slark to kill the opponent's fragile supports.

Mid game

Sange and Yasha

Slark needed items that were really expensive and had immediate effect. At the present time, Sange and Yasha are such an item. In the past, it would have been funny to cross-sword Slark, however, this new sword has added a new status resistance reduction, a great effect for Slark. Imagine, you just unstunned the opponent with Dark Pact, and then exited the slow effect after only a few seconds, Slark will be very "pulsed" without fear of being disabled.

Black King Bar

If your team has too many disables and magic damage, then after you go to Diffu you can close BKB to survive a long time in the teamfight. However, it is also necessary to consider this item when choosing this item because the price of BKB is up to 4050 Gold but the number of stats provided is not really commensurate. Therefore, you should only close BKB if you feel suffocated because of being disabled or when 5 slots are full.

Late game

Satanic

A philosophy when playing Slark is not to need items that increase damage, but need items to increase survivability in combat. Therefore, items for fast healing like Satanic are extremely important to Slark. Combo Shadow Dance, BKB and Satanic make slark almost immortal in all combat. 

You don't need to worry about damage because the longer Slark lives, the more stats he absorbs, the more painful Slark's attacks will be. Therefore, try to live a long time in the teamfight and then go back to all 5 enemy heroes.

Eye of Skadi

A very useful item, both providing a huge amount of stats and adding a slow attack effect.

Skull Basher

Another item that is probably more favored than the Eye of Skadi in the late game is the bash hammer. This item has the ability to instantly suppress, making it easy to defeat your opponent after just a few hits. Use the Bash hammer if you feel that Slark in your hand is tough and skillful enough to live in combat.

Situation items

Drum of Endurance

Drum of Endurance: provides Slark with attributes to improve his lackluster growth while giving him extra movement speed and attack speed to help close the distance on foes, building the early game advantage he needs to snowball.

Diffusal Blade

Diffusal Blade provides a way to slow fleeing heroes, keeping them in attack range, as well as burning mana for extra damage and suit the gain of attack speed.

Sange and Yasha

Sange and Yasha allows him to chase and attack enemy heroes due to the movement speed, attack speed, and agility boost. Its bonus strength may also beef up Slark enough to survive engagements.

Black King Bar

Black King Bar's spell immunity offers protection from disables, making him almost invulnerable while under the effect of Shadow Dance.

Aegis of the Immortal

Butterfly

Butterfly offers bonus attack speed, damage, and agility; its evasion gives him more survivability against attacks.

Silver Edge

Silver Edge, upgraded from Shadow Blade, improves Slark's ganking capability even further with bonus attributes and break to disable heroes with strong passive abilities.

Orchid Malevolence

Malevolence helps Slark gank by silencing enemies, as well as regenerating Slark's mana for more frequent uses of Pounce and Dark Pact. This makes it useful against enemies that rely on blinks or other abilities to escape.

Monkey King Bar

Monkey King Bar procs Pierce that deals bonus damage and counters enemy evasion.

Moon Shard

Moon Shard increases Slark's attack speed for Essence Shift to steal attributes quickly. As the game progresses, Slark can consume it to free an item slot and keep a permanent attack speed bonus.

Enemies & Allies

Allies

Arc Warden

• Flux is dispelled by Dark Pact;
• Pounce allows Slark to avoid Spark Wraiths;
• Tempest Double allows Slark to build up Essence Shift stacks, especially when it is being used for split pushing.

Batrider

• Sticky Napalm is dispelled by Dark Pact, without it, Batrider will not be as threatening;
• Shadow Dance's passive can inform Slark when he's under enemy vision, meaning it'll be very hard to catch Slark off-guard with Flaming Lasso;
• Flaming Lasso is dispelled by Dark Pact, its casting can be prevent with Shadow Dance or Depth Shroud (it requires Aghanim's Shard).

Drow Ranger

• Pounce and items like Shadow Blade makes it very difficult for Drow Ranger to keep her distance from Slark, thereby losing her Marksmanship bonus;
• Gust is rarely enough to keep Slark at bay, as Drow Ranger has no movement abilities and will simply be chased down afterwards;
• Drow Ranger's heavy dependence on agility also makes her significantly weaker after being drained by Essence Shift.

Luna

• Luna's lack of mobility and escape abilities makes her easily gankable by Slark;
• Shadow Dance will avoid all the damage from Eclipse;
• For the same reasons, Slark is a good ally for Luna when they are in the same team.

Medusa

• Medusa cannot chase Slark in any way and has no disable beyond her ultimate, making her unable to stop him getting away and regenerating before coming back to finish her off.
• Essence Shift removes 1 of every attribute, lowering Medusa's mana pool's cap and leaving her much more vulnerable in prolonged fights.

Phantom Assassin

• Slark's Pounce allows him to close the gap on Phantom Assassin and prevent her from escaping with Phantom Strike.
• As a hero who always goes for the Silver Edge and Abyssal Blade Slark can use it to disable Phantom Assassin and her Blur and Coup de Grace, drastically reducing her damage output and ability to evade attacks, and also preventing her from acting.
• Phantom Assassin's Coup de Grace requires Random Number Generation in order to proc, which gives Slark more than enough time to escape and recover himself.

Sniper

• Sniper is one of the most gankable heroes in the game, and has no defenses when Pounced on by Slark.

Spectre

• Essence Shift deals 20 extra damage by draining one strength per hit, which cannot be reduced or spread by Dispersion.
• Pounce prevents Spectre from escaping with Spectral Dagger.
• Haunt illusions usually don't deal a lot of damage to Slark as he tends to buy a Shadow Blade, preventing Desolate's and Diffusal Blade's damage and activating Shadow Dance's regeneration to make up for any damage caused by Radiance.
• Slark is a natural Silver Edge carrier, which can break both Desolate and Dispersion.

Storm Spirit

• Pounce's leash prevents Storm Spirit from using Ball Lightning, making it hard for Storm Spirit to escape a gank from Slark.
• Dark Pact can dispel Orchid Malevolence's Soul Burn.

Templar Assassin

• Dark Pact rips through Refraction charges and still steals attributes during Refraction.
• Pounce and Dark Pact will still hit Templar Assassin while she is Melded. Since she cannot move, both abilities will be easy for Slark to land.

Warlock

• Upheaval does not interrupt Slark too much, as he can just Pounce out of the area.
• Fatal Bonds and Shadow Word can be dispelled by Dark Pact.

Counters

Ancient Apparition

• Ice Blast stops Shadow Dance's passive health regeneration, even when Slark is not in vision.

Axe

• Berserker's Call forces Slark to attack him, even during Shadow Dance.
• Counter Helix will hit Slark in Shadow Dance, with pure damage. It also triggers frequently against Slark's high attack speed after having stolen agility with Essence Shift.
• Culling Blade finishes off Slark before he gets a chance to slip away and regenerate his health, preventing him from playing the hit-and-run style often associated with Slark.

Bloodseeker

• Thirst stops Shadow Dance's passive health regeneration if he is within Thirst's percentage.
• Rupture effectively takes Slark out of battle because he cannot move or pounce, leaving him susceptible to aoe stuns or forced to teleport out of the fight.

Chaos Knight

• Static Storm and Kinetic Field lock down Slark, as he cannot use Dark Pact to dispel any disables, or Pounce out while silenced.
• Glimpse puts an end to any attempts at ganking Disruptor or his allies, and also negates Slark's mobility by bringing him back into the fight if he tries to escape with Pounce.

Earthshaker

• Earthshaker's many AoE stuns help lock down Slark, and will often waste the duration of Shadow Dance.

Meepo

• Earthbind and Poof will still hit Slark in Shadow Dance.
• Dark Pact can only remove one Earthbind.
• Ransack will still affect Slark, even if he has a Black King Bar.

Omniknight

• Slark's dependence on Pounce and close range makes him very easy to hit with Purification.
• Slark's damage, even with a high count of Essence Shift, is easily negated by Omniknight's heals and Guardian Angel.

Outworld Destroyer

• Arcane Orb deals pure damage, which ignores armor granted from permanent agility stacks.
• Astral Imprisonment can disrupt any Pounce attempt by banishing the leashed ally.
• Slark's low intelligence and therefore mana pool makes him more susceptible to Sanity's Eclipse.

Phantom Lancer

• Slark has no sustained AoE to deal with Phantom Lancer's many illusions.
• Doppelganger lets Phantom Lancer dodge Dark Pact and Pounce, and partially wastes the duration of Shadow Dance.
• Spirit Lance can give vision of Slark via spawning an illusion, making it harder for him to juke and gain the passive bonus from Shadow Dance.
• Phantom Rush helps Phantom Lancer chase down Slark when he jumps away with Pounce.

Puck

• Illusory Orb and Phase Shift allows Puck to avoid most ganking attempts.
• Waning Rift and Dream Coil makes it very hard for Slark to escape bad situations.
• Puck's abilities used together also deals significant magical nuke damage, none of which are targeted and thus cannot be avoided by Shadow Dance.

Pugna

• Nether Blast will still hit Slark in Shadow Dance.
• Pugna can rarely target Slark directly with Decrepify, but he can use it defensively on an ally to prevent Slark from getting stacks.
• Despite being somewhat easy to break with Pounce, Pugna can damage and provide vision over Slark with Life Drain.

Tiny

• Toss and Avalanche deals heavy damage to Slark in the early game, making Tiny a very dangerous target to gank.

Items Counter

Force Staff

Force Staff, Hurricane Pike, and Force Boots allow users to break Pounce's leash.

Black King Bar

Black King Bar nullifies Slark's nuke damage from Dark Pact, and destroys the leash from Pounce.

Abyssal Blade

Abyssal Blade locks down Slark so he cannot escape to regenerate his health.

Heaven's Halberd

Heaven's Halberd's disarm cannot be dispelled by Dark Pact, while the evasion may force Slark to build Monkey King Bar.

Shiva's Guard

Shiva's Guard gives the holder much more physical survivability and a useful active ability which will halt Slark during Shadow Dance.

Ghost Scepter

Ghost Scepter prevents Slark from attacking the holder, wasting his Pounce.

Silver Edge

Silver Edge's break and damage reduction cannot be removed with Dark Pact. It also disables Essence Shift.

Scythe of Vyse

Scythe of Vyse's hex fully disables Slark, but hex can be dispelled with Dark Pact.

Favorable Matchups

Bane

• Bane's numerous disables help Slark position and take out his targets.
• Pounce and Dark Pact will break Nightmare without transferring the disable to Slark.

Earthshaker

• Earthshaker's many stuns help lock down Slark's targets.
• Slark can easily jump over Fissure if he gets caught on the wrong side.

Keeper of the Light

• Chakra Magic allows Slark to significantly increase his farming speed, as without mana issues, Dark Pact can deal lots of AoE damage very quickly to neutral camps.
• Pounce helps Keeper of the Light charge up a full Illuminate. Along with early points into Dark Pact, the two can deal massive damage in the laning phase and bully the enemy out of the lane.
• Solar Bind is a good follow-up to Pounce to keep enemies from escaping ganks.

Luna

• Aghanim's Scepter upgraded Eclipse can be cast on Slark before he jumps into the fray, allowing both heroes to wreak havoc on enemy team.
• Eclipse also triggers night, allowing Slark to take advantage of his superior night vision and the enemy's reduced vision to initiate or escape.
• While Lucent Beam has a short duration, it is useful to help Slark leash escaping enemy heroes with Pounce.
• Lunar Blessing provides Slark bonus damage and armor for teamfights and gankings.

Magnus

• Reverse Polarity is a perfect setup for Dark Pact, and usually allows Slark to pick off one target before the long stun ends.
• Empower helps Slark farm significantly faster, as well as gank more efficiently.

Kunkka

• Pounce gives Kunkka plenty of time to land all of his abilities.
• Ghostship's buff makes it very difficult for enemies to kill Slark, as he takes reduced damage during team fights, then quickly regenerates his lost health while the delayed damage is applied.

Omniknight

• Pounce keeps the enemy close for an easy Purification.
• Heavenly Grace provides a strong dispel and status resistance. Combined with Dark Pact and Shadow Dance, this makes it very difficult for enemies to keep Slark locked down.

Pugna

• With Slark always having his HP at 100% with Shadow Dance, Pugna can cast Life Drain to restore his mana;
• Pounce keeps enemy in place so that Pugna can cast Life Drain on them;
• A defensive Decrepify can save Slark if he gets into trouble, buying him time to use his abilities.

Skywrath Mage

• Concussive Shot helps Slark chase down slowed enemies.
• Pounce locks enemies in place for Skywrath Mage to nuke them with Mystic Flare.

Underlord

• Pit of Malice helps Slark land his Pounce and Dark Pact.
• Pounce helps Underlord land his Firestorm.
• Essence Shift's attribute steal combined with Atrophy Aura significantly reduces their enemies' base damage.

Witch Doctor

• Pounce prevents an enemy from moving away when Witch Doctor uses his Death Ward, ensuring at least one kill in most circumstances.
• Essence Shift's attribute steal causes enemies to take proportionately more damage from later ticks of Maledict.

Zeus

• Slark's ability to detect and pinpoint enemy vision allows Zeus to deward very easily with Lightning Bolt.
• Pounce keeps enemies under Zeus' Nimbus for longer.

Game plan

Early Game

At this stage you need to farm and get exp to level up first. Once you've reached level 2 or level 3 or higher, having acquired a few basic items, your ability to rush into a duel has been greatly improved. 

You can easily defeat a cockroach, but a certain cockroach if he is negligent without the help of his teammates (in a 1vs1 situation). And if you go offlane, you only have to hold the pole to get exp to enjoy the level, then calculate the way to farm to compensate. You need to get to lvl6 fast to get the most out of your mobility.

Mid Game

Now that you have the ultimate, you should go with your teammates to gank and push the tower to benefit from this job. With the ultimate you can easily hit the turret to defeat the target, with the passive coming from this skill, you sneak into a hidden corner to heal extremely bad, then turn around again. 

Use Dark pact (Q) properly to solve the disadvantage buff at the right time. With skills that stun you should time them to turn on before they hit you. 

Once equipped with Blink dagger/Shadow blade, killing a physiologically weak person is as easy as turning your hand with the mobility of the equipment and the Pounce (W) skill. The farming of soldiers in this stage you can take advantage of when there is no view of the enemy or they have just entered the counting board. 

Shadow dance (R) is a very annoying eye detection skill that when you pass a place where there are eyes, you will lose the passive, from which you can alert your teammates to let them avoid that area or break eyes. With 1800/1800 vision, you can easily hunt at night

Late Game

Slark is not a good turret push hero so it's very difficult to push odd turrets, so you should go with your teammates or if you are confident, you can hunt odd targets during this phase, especially at night, when your visibility reaches 1800/1800. 

In total combat, after the initiators have unleashed all their skills, you choose the appropriate position, jump into support>nuker/carry>other category to beat and defeat them as fast as you can in 4 seconds ultimate (or you can hit first and then activate your ultimate if you already have bkb). Because Slark is in the genre of getting stronger, so no one dares to stand alone for long if they can't finish you off quickly within a few notes when you already have a lot of equipment.