Gentlemen, did DA's swap skill acutally change anything?

I'd say DA is probably counted as one of the tier 2 demigods so he isn't used that much in competitive play tbh. I still think it is much because not many are good with him yet though.

You are Regulus or TB and you are swapped and you are, grasped, biten, hammered, and/or penitenced. What happens to you??

Reg and TB can be rough swap targets, but it's not that bad.  Always smart to pack a sigil and wand of speed isn't bad either vs DA.  As reg you can stand on 6 mines and put a world of hurt on the DA when he swaps with you.  TB isn't all that squishy so long as he stacks the same HP items as everyone else and hes got auras and frost nova.  Cast a rain of ice on everyone for a nice attack speed reduction as you try flee.  Ice TB can also interrupt the swap if they have any skill.

Swap's range at rank 1 is pretty tame as well.  Rank 2 not so much and 3 is really rough but by then usually the game is decided or the characters are equipped well enough to survive a significant beating.

DA is certainly tier 1 at level 15. He directly counters Shield III, rapes Rook's faces off when tower farms can barely get built as it is since creeps tear them up so fast. He can't deal with a Beast very well (Acclimation) but his swap range is larger than BatSwarm if I remember so Erebus finally can't run away from everything like a coward.

He also has insane burst.

That said, he is quite weak early game, and doesn't gain momentum until level 10 which is too late in a lot of games. Shadow Swap III has got to be the most insane thing ever though :-/

Yeah swap III is so OP(against 80% of the selection mind you) its not even funny.

Again he's very bad equipped to play in a straight fight and he lacks pushing but damn can he gank!

quite weak til 10 means hes a second tier. but sounds fun enough to play with pugs vs pugs.

if the other side has reg or TB you auto win. so i dont really take this into consideration.

He's good at level 4+ if you're not getting pressured too heavily. If you're the latecome to a fight or if you're doubling up and forcing the other team to dip in and out he's viable, but when you have to actually hold a lane it's problematic.I think he's tier 2 because he lacks versatility, but I do enjoy playing with good DAs on my team.

Also, personally, I think most people have poor favor item selection with him. It's rough early game, but I really think BotS is your best bet in the long run.

uhh. Ryan

"

quite weak til 10 means hes a second tier. but sounds fun enough to play with pugs vs pugs."

I said he was tier 1 at level 15. You do understand the tiers of demigods change level-per-level ... right? I consider him tier 2 overall, yes. But level 15+ he is one of the bestest.

He's tier 1 at level 15. His 75% crit chance and swap range make him competitve at the top tier.

see this replay - it's worth playing DA just for the port steals

The problem with being a late bloomer is that it is harder for him to hold lanes and get kills early on, which means he can fall pray to underleveling and / or end up with crappy equipment.

I'd say in the metagame right now he's a tier II, but in the future(take for example kestrels replay) I can see him getting very close to tier I.

Shadow Swap III needs no equipment. I think it's like 700 mana >>

Yes, but any character with crappy equipment will be crappy. It's hard to offset a poor start.

You can use SS to swap people /across the squares on Catract/

ACROSS THE SQUARES

ACROSS THE SQUARES

Is that a song? Cause I'm kinda getting into it...

ACROSS THE SQUARES!

You can use SS to swap people /across the squares on Catract/

ACROSS THE SQUARES

ARE YOU SERIOUS?!? That's monstrously powerful. You could swap the enemy into the center of your base if they are attacking your front door towers? Too bad demigoddb doesn't have DA yet...

Yes. Yes I am.

From the double-towers on Cata you can just barely swap someone in the middle of their ... 'base towrs' if they are too much to the left. You can cut basically on a diagonal of a Cata square. So it's not 'perfectly' across (though you I think that if both of you are exactly on the edge you might be able to do it. It would be hard though). SS III's range is absurd. You need no items.

You can get close at lvl 2 its about 5 diff disstance between 2 and 3

ok some good feedback in this thread, sadly at lvl 15 the game is over and having a subpar demigod til lvl 10 hurts a team too much to recover. HOWEVER i'd still need to play DA more to see if you can abuse him enough to make him viable (IE combo with oak)

I've been trying really hard to come up with a viable build for DA.

Was thinking this:
1-crit
2-move speed
3-spike
4-spike
5-swap
6-move speed
7-spike
8-move speed
9-save
10-spike + swap
11-13 dodge
14 save
15 assassains speed + swap
16+ crit

BotF favor, start with banded + gauntlet and go for 1st blood with auto atk before people buy armor, then buying scalemail + scaled helm as soon as you got the gold, then switch to mana + hp + armor items for mid game (narmoth + nirmoth + vlemish + unbreakable + scalemail 9k gold total), then switch scalemail for mageslayer for late game when you get assassains speed + more crit%.

But it is no-where near as powerful 1v1 as the spit/ooze ub build, and has zero AoE for clearing creeps.

I don't think the mana builds for DA are particularly good because his skills do such little damage for the insane mana cost + long cooldowns.

Really can't find a viable competitive build for DA which I think is a shame.

Stardock: make new heroes OP upon release so ppl play as them, then bring them back down to normal levels

Either Blood, BotS, or Essence of Magic.

Blood:

Even with Blood you won't be able to contest a lane early game with most other demigods who get Blood. You will still lose the lane sooo :-/ it's not quite as easy to justify as other demigods. It's still a prefectly good choice, however, and pretty important if there is a Reg on their team

BotS:

Allows you to health-stack. However, unlike Beast, DA /still/ has a hard time with just BotS and no other mana item. If you get Unbreakble's it gets better but in some ways you still sorta need Plenor.

EoM:

Allows you to cast while oom (this is something you cannot do with BotS. You need mana to make mana, so to speak. And since DA really can't creep very well to regain mana with BotS you have to invest skill points in a shitty skill: Warp Area (exception: Warp Area is nice against characters who rely on a lot of AoE attacks since you can use Warp Area to evade it).;

However, BotS gives a better mana pool and EoM is /much/ harder to use than BotS. Stuns also kill you because the duration (3 seconds) isn't very long.

Build:

1. Spine Attack I

2. Demon Speed I

3. Warp Strike I

4. Spine Attack II

5. Shadow Swap I :ALWAYS:

6. Warp Strike II

7. Spine Attack III

8. Warp Strike III

9. SAVE

10. Spine Attack IV + Shadow Swap II

11. Warp Strike IV

12. Demon Speed II

13. Demon Speed III

14. SAVE

15. Shadow Swap III + Warp Strike V

16-20a : Elusiveness I - III + Demon Swiftness

16-20b : Precision I - IV

-

Play style:

You cannot rtb often. You cannot. You need levels to breathe. If you are rtb before level 5 you're doing something wrong.

If you go Blood you certainly will not have mana to spam attacks. This is why I put off getting many points in Warp Strike since you won't be able to spam higher levels of both of those attacks. Use Warp Strike as an escape device (use on enemy towers/creeps) or as a get-in-your-face against squishies. Also, the early point in Demon Speed lets you cap flags and harrass better.

You should basically be playing as a ranged character for the first several levels. Even if you get Blood you won't be able to melee for long without running and that means that they will just be hitting your back -> lose ~800 hp.  This is espiecially true if you have BotS or EoM. Just use it and hit them with Spine Attack to piss 'em off.

The second you get Shadow Swap you should just start fake casting it to piss 'em off. Let them know you have it and will use it the second they overextend. This also lets you test their interrupt-ability if they are Oak.

Once you hit level 7 you should be paired with a good demigod, and preferably not laned against a UB. UB is, imo, the best counter to DA. Then just do your SS, then use Warp Strike to get back in their face. If they tend to "run on sight" of you and your showerbuddy, then don't start off with Spine Attack since the cast time of that will often let them get away out of range of Swap.

If you are a Blood build you should probably have something like:

Nimoth, Unbrekable, Vlemish, Plenor, Banded/Scailmail/Scaled Helm/Boots of Speed/whatever.

Sadly, you're an expensive build so you won't be able to contribute much to the team early-game. Make sure your teammates are aware of this and at least one of them is playing a cheap build.

Once Level 15 hits, rape face

For 16 on, you really have two choices. AA becomes insane at end game and Precision is very nice when combined with some sort of artifact, like Mageslayer. However, Elusiveness also lets you evade the enemies AA/Artifacts (plus spit ) and the Level 15 "united" ability of Demon Speed and Elusiveness is quite nice. It really depends on yoru playstyle and how the game is going before you should decide.

Note that DA/Oak/UB is a very nice combination and in general I think DA works best with a UB on his team. Oak and Rook are also a nice choice. Not a quite so much synergy with Erebus or Sedna. Some synergy with Reg (mines) but you won't be able to hold lanes for shit with Reg/DA on your team so you will probably lose on War Score and since DA can't creep well... lose to giants :-/

ignoring everything but the op for now - swap added another level of strat to the game.  I think it was a good addition.  Not OP as good players can generally compensate, but it adds another layer to the strat.  Port steals and bat swarm steals are fun as all get out though

I haven't found a dodge stack to be all that viable with him.  My build is pretty similar to dice's.