Must Have Items
Before we get into any specific heroes or roles let's lay down the law of items that every team must have, every game. They are listed from most important to least important, keep in mind even the "least important" items on this list should still ideally be picked up every game.
This is literally the most important item in the game and it is inexcusable to end a game without a Mek on your team. When activated it heals everyone around you for 250 HP and grants a +2 armor buff. Think about that for a second. In every team fight if you hit all your teammates, you are instantly granting your team +1250 effective HP in a fight and that isn't taking into account the armor buff. Mekansm also grants a passive health regen aura, and gives +5 armor to the carrier of the item. Mekansm is usually picked up by the 4 position, but sometimes you may have a natural mek carrier in your core positions(1/2/3). If you are looking to do a push strat you may want to buy mek on one of your farming cores to get it up ASAP for those big manly pushes. Some cores that come to mind that are very good natural mek carriers are......
Pugna/Viper/Razor/Bristleback/Dark Seer/Necrophos/Elder Titan/OD. These are heroes that will often take priority of buying the mek over the 4 position support simply because the item is really good on them.
When you think of ideal mek carriers you think of heroes that are going to be right in the middle of the fight every time and are more likely to hit all 5 heroes with the mek for maximum effectiveness. Viper/Razor are often thought to be hard right click carries and some may find it confusing why you would want to get mek on them. The fact of the matter is, they aren't hard carries. Neither of those heroes will even come close to out carrying a luna/gyrocopter/AM or any other tier 1 carry. They have natural abilities that give them attack steroids, but both of these heroes benefit the longer they are able to be in a fight so building straight hard carry isn't optimal. (Sidenote-Mekansm applies a debuff to a hero when it heals them that makes them not able to be healed by mek again for the length of the cooldown, do not stack multiple meks on teams)
2. Medallion of Courage
I believe Medallion to be one of the most cost effective items in the game, it gives you so much for only a mere 1075 gold. Medallion lowers the armor of a target and yourself by 6 for 7 seconds which conveniently is the same time of the cooldown. The cool thing is the item gives you +6 armor so the debuff it applies to you just reverts your armor to what it was without the medallion. Because the duration/cooldown are the same this means you can literally ALWAYS have -6 armor on the target you are focusing. In addition to it's great use in team fights for physically bursting heroes down, an early medallion turns any team into an early Roshan team. Considering the item is 1075 gold, and killing Roshan gives your team over 1000 gold when you kill it, the item pays for itself after one Roshan. Just as with mekansm, this is usually an item picked up by supports but it can situationally be bought by a core. It is best on heroes that have huge physical burst or already have a built-in -armor spell. The best example for the brokenness of this item is on a support alchemist considering his Q is -6 armor at max level and his huge burst damage stun is physical damage, that's -12 armor. Throw spray and try to use medallion while stun is in mid air to maximize efficiency.
3. Assault Cuirass
-Armor is the name of the game. The more -armor your team has, the faster you can take rosh, and the sooner you can break the base and get that first rax. AC aura grants 3 things.
1. +5 armor to all teammates/towers.
2. +20 Attack Speed to all teammates.
3. -5 Armor to all enemies/towers in area.
From those numbers alone you can think of the ridiculous advantage a team would have if they hold an AC and the other team does not. If you are thinking of going for a base break, make sure you have that AC up!
4. Drum of Endurance
Drum is seen as one of the most cost effective items in the game as it gives +9 to all attributes as well as +5% movement speed/+5 attack speed auras. Drum also grants 4 charges which when used, give an additional +10% movement speed to get you out of those sticky situations. Initially +5% movement speed doesn't seem like that big of a deal, but it adds up and can be the difference in a team fight.
As you can see most of these must have items involve auras. Because auras do not stack with each other, these are not items that you want to have multiples of on a team.
Specific Hero/Role Item Choices
Now that we have gone over the basic items that every single team needs to have regardless of team composition, let's look at specifics to your roles.
Assessing your hero
1. Know your Hero
Before you buy items you should know your hero very well. What are your hero's strengths? Weaknesses?
Look to cover your weaknesses with your item pick-ups. Ex. Crystal Maiden's biggest weaknesses are low movement speed(280 base, lowest in game) and lack of mobility. Common pick-ups on CM would include Tranquil boots(cheap boots/Highest movespeed buff) and force staff to help with mobility and positioning.
2. Know your Team
Take a look back at those items at the top of the post. Are you the front runner for any of those items? What does your team need the most that isn't on that list?
3. Know your Opponents
What are the weaknesses of your opponents and what items would help you capitalize on those weaknesses?
Support/Utility Items
First order of business when it comes to supports and items. Remember in my previous post I talked about the 4 and 5 position supports, every single game your team should have TWO people that are supporting. Often I will see one support get courier and the other get wards, however this isn't optimal. There are 4 support items that need to be bought at the beginning of the game and they are......
Courier:150g
Observer Wards:150g
Sentry Wards:200g
Smoke of Deceit:100g
Now if you look at that and divide it properly, that's 300 gold to spend for each support. One gets Courier AND wards, and the other gets Sentries AND smoke. This leaves you with enough gold to get one set of tangos, one HP pot and one mana pot. This should be your go-to starting items on any support ever, stop buying iron branches and leaving your team sentry/smokeless.
Why sentries and smokes out of the fountain? A smoke is great if you need to make a lane rotation not only because of the bonus movement speed but also because it generally results in a free first blood, especially when you are playing against lower tier players that won't even think a smoke gank at level 1 is a possibility. Sentries are a necessity out of the fountain in any game because you know the other team has only TWO wards, this means if you counter even one of them you know they are practically vision-less. Countering is easy when you know who on their team has the wards and what lane they are in. Even if you don't see them ward, by process of elimination it's fairly easy to find out where their ward is from the start. If you manage to counter their rune ward at minute one you give your team a HUGE advantage immediately.
Moving forward to mid/late game item choices. I already talked about the MUST HAVE items for every game so analyze your team and decide if you are going to carry any of those. After those items are bought your future items are 100% going to vary every game, so here is a list of good support items and in what situations they are best.
Urn of Shadows
Urn is a great item to pick up in a very active/kill-heavy game. It gains a charge anytime an enemy hero dies within 1400 range of you and the charges can either be used as a
400 HP heal over time on an ally, or a 150 HP damage over time on an enemy. It's great for recovering your team after a won team fight so you can safely push if you are at low HP! Keep in mind only one urn will gain charges so don't have multiple on your team.
Force Staff
If you are ever questioning what item you should get, force staff is always a great choice. It grants mobility and an escape to heroes that wouldn't otherwise have that, and it can be used both offensively and defensively! Incredible item on every hero in the game.
Ghost Scepter
One of the most forgotten items in lower games which I find silly, considering in alot of lower games you see a ton of right-click carry pickers. Ghost scepter makes you invulnerable to physical damage for 5 seconds, which is generally enough to make the hard carry switch targets leaving you to either escape or continue fighting. Either way, you don't die.
Necronomicon
Up there with force staff as one of those "always a good item no matter what" items. Necro has tons of utility including the 3rd level granting true sight, it brings great pushing power, a mana burn that can break linkens, a unit that does 700 TRUE DAMAGE to anyone that kills it, and much, much more! Although it is great in any game, it is BEST with push strats, and against teams with lots of AOE damage. If you throw out these little pubs in the middle of the fight, someone is bound to kill them with AOE skills and unknowingly take 700 true damage. This could turn a fight. Also good against heroes that rely on a blink dagger because the minions attacks will put blink dagger on cooldown, if micro'd properly you can sick the minions on the initiator, burning their mana and not allowing them to use their blink dagger. When you don't like your teammates, make your own with Necrobook.
Vladimirs OfferingAnother one of those pesky auras but not quite good enough to make it into the "Must have" tier of items. This is because it is a situational pick-up. The aura grants armor which is great but it also grants a damage aura, and a 16% lifesteal aura to MELEE units. So if you have a melee carry on your team that needs lifesteal but can't quite afford to give up an item slot to a relatively weak 2K item, this isn't a bad pick-up.
Pipe of InsightGreat item to pick up against a team with plenty of burst AOE damage, or a team that relies heavily on big ults to win fights. Not necessarily ideal on supports because the cost and the initiator will generally get more out of the additional tankiness.
Eul's Scepter
Make any pub feel like they are smack in the middle of Hurricane Katrina with this fabulous item! Great for that extra survivability boost. Works kind of like a ghost scepter in that it will generally force whoever is fighting you to change targets and it gives + 10 Intelligence
+ 150% Mana Regeneration
+ 40 Movement Speed Better on more mana intensive supports that benefit from the regen/move speed. Leshrac is a solid example of a good Eul's carrier. Unlike in HoN, you cannot Eul's teammates however you can still Eul's yourself!
Carry Items
As we all know I think good support is the most difficult/important role in the game so that's why I put so much into those items. That being said, carry item choices are still very important but are generally easier choices to make.
Your carry builds won't fluctuate as much as support builds from game-to-game but you should still know when to make adjustments. It's not uncommon to see carries pool gold for a long time before buying a big item. This is so they can see what the enemy carry is building so they know what to get to counter their build. For example if you see the enemy building a butterfly you should definitely invest in a Monkey King Bar for the true strike through evasion.
Black King Bar is generally a core on every carry but some games it may not be the optimal choice. Say the enemy has several lockdown skills that go through magic immunity(Bane/Beastmaster ulti's) but do not have a plethora of actual magic damage and lockdown. Then you may be better off building linkens sphere/Manta Style instead of the standard BKB.
Let's Talk Linkens
Linken's Sphere
Linken's can be a great situational item on a core but it should never be a go-to automatic buy on any certain heroes. The natural pub mentality is that if the other team has TONS of single target stuns to get a Linkens to block them all right? Wrong. The more single target spells the other team has, the less effective Linkens becomes. In reality you are only burning one of those skills in a fight and if tons are at the oppositions disposal then you aren't doing yourself any favors by blocking one. Linkens is great when the other team has MINIMAL single target skills and the ones they do have are very strong skills that won't be desirable to waste. Also keep in mind that late-game Linkens will block Sheep/Orchid. So if the other team only has 1-3 single targets but they have a natural sheepstick carrier, it can still be a great pick-up! Always think through your choices.
Conclusion
I may do a more in-depth carry item analysis in the future if there is interest but I really wanted this post to be more support-focused. I think this is the area where J4K as a whole struggles with the most and I wanted to pound some stuff into your heads that you will never forget! Remember, if your team loses and your team has no Mekansm, the game is your fault because you knew better idiot. Good luck, have fun, and as always....Happy Pubbing!!!
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