Introduction Top
Hey guys, I'm Skyflame23 and I've been playing Vain for about 7-8 months now. My first match, Glaive was on free rotation, so I decided to play him because he looked really cool. I mean, come on, his rocket axe looks downright nasty. After playing him for 5 minutes, I completely fell in love with his damage and ability to destroy laners. Needless to say, Glaive was my first main hero.
Throughout different matches, I slowly weened myself off of the recommended build to buy items which, in my opinion are essential for Glaive. After a period of trial and error, my build was refined into what you see before you now.
My philosophy when it comes to heroes is to have a couple of core items, and then base all the rest of your item choices off of what the enemy is building. Every game of Vain Glory is different, so why have a build that doesn't change? It's useful to have multiple options to work with because it allows you to directly counter heroes instead of having a one-size-fits-all build that may or may not actually suit the threats of your current match. Having adaptability makes you prepared for practically any situation in any game.
How to Glaive Top
For those of us who aren't familiar with playing
Glaive, he is meant to be played almost as a cross between a tank and an assassin.
He has the highest base health in the game (about 2000) at level 12 and his low resistances can easily be compensated for by either building a
Fountain of Renewal or by having a designated team tank to soak damage while you wreak havoc upon the enemy.
Bloodsong also gives him passive lifesteal up to 20% which, when combined with the weapon power of this build, allows for great sustain in jungle and a heck of a long time to bring you down in a fight.
:How to use his abilities:
Afterburn: This is probably the best gap closer in the game, and is an absolute monster at ganking the lane. When activated, it launches you in a direction of your choice, damaging all in your path. The next hit you inflict on an enemy hero will send them flying back as well as stun them. With a base energy cost of 120, try to use this sparingly in the early game. Although it is a tad difficult to master, once you do, you'll be racking up kills all day. The following are situations I normally use it in:
- Ganking the lane: I typically start doing this once I have Phase 1 of the build complete. The key is to dash out behind the enemy laner and then stun them into yours. This traps the enemy as they are within the range of your laner, but if they try to run, you're their to block their escape and deal a handful of damage. This almost always results in a kill if done properly.
- Quick escapes: One thing quite a lot of people do not know about is that this ability allows you to dash through walls. This is quite useful for escaping fights in the jungle that would otherwise be lost. By denying the enemy jungler from getting kills, you are also depriving them of gold and making them waste time that they could be using to farm.
- Isolating enemies: The knockbsck stun can be used on one hero in a teamfight to seperate them from the team. I typically do this to their main damage-dealer so you can take them out as quickly as possible.
- Chasing fleeing enemies: The dash lets you catch up to enemy heroes that are tring to run from your onslaught with ease. However, try to get ahead of them, and then knock them back, or smash them into a wall. If you slam them ahead of you, they'll most likely get away. With some practice, almost no one will be able to escape you.
Twisted Stroke: Glaive's second ability is practically an enhanced basic attack. Passively, it increases your critical hit chance, and when activated, it unleashes a boosted critical hit. Every time you level it up, cleave damage is increased by a percentage. Feel free to use this as often as you want, whenever you want.
Bloodsong: Glaive's ultimate is not as impressive as other hero's, but nevertheless, it has the potential to deal a lot of damage. A useful feature of bloodsong is the fact that it generates stacks that boost its damage and its passive lifesteal with every basic attack you deal and receive (caps at 20). With a 16 second cooldown, you'll almost always have it available to you after level 6. One thing to consider is to try to have as many stacks as possible before heading into a teamfight. A bloodsong with 0 stacks is the most pathetic thing to witness. Additionally, the passive lifesteal gives you some nice sustain in jungle and allows to survive for longer in teamfights.
:
Hunt the Weak:
- If you aren't taking advantage of Glaive's heroic perk, you are building him wrong. This makes all of his critical hits area-of-effect cleaves that affect a cone in front of him. The damage dealt applies on hit effects such as a
Frostburn slow and
Bonesaw armor shred. This can absolutely devastate in teamfights since you will be doing damage to multiple people as well as apply debilitating effects to them.
A Discussion of the Items Top
You might be wondering why the core build doesn't finish off
Sorrowblade. When you think about it, it makes sense. The damage with both
Heavy Steel and
Six Sins is 110. With sorrowblade, it gets increased to 150. However, you will have to pay 1300 gold for an extra 40 weapon damage. You might as well buy another Six Sins, which can be built into other items to increase your weapon damage even further. This saves precious time and gold. Save Sorrowblade until you absolutely need to buy it to free up an inventory slot.
:After you have built these items, it's time to adapt to the enemy team composition and their build:
-
Bonesaw: Shreds enemy armor by 12% and stacks five times. Armor shred diminishes an opponent's armor value temporarily, and allows your entire team to benefit from it For example, a
Catherine that has built 100 armor to counter you will get melted as she watches her armor plummet to a minuscule 40 units. Suddenly, she's not so much of a tank anymore.
Useful to get if the enemy is building their resistances, but always get this in your build regardless, since base armor values can get high at level 12. What's awesome is that if multiple heroes are caught in your cleave, they will all be given a stack, which means they will recieve more damage on the next cleave. This combined with the added 50% attack speed allows you to completely destroy enemies at lightning speed. However, try to only have one on the team, as its effectiveness reduces and it becomes a better option to build more damage or support items.
By the way, 5 stacks on Kraken makes it so much easier to take down.
- Anti-Tank: This comes between
Tension Bow and
Aftershock. Tension bow is better if the enemy has only one tank, since it has the guaranteed 180 burst attack while contributing to your overall damage with an extra 45 WP and 15% armor pierce. However, if the team is building a lot of health, Aftershock is the better deal since the damage it deals is 15% of their max health, which will often be higher than the 180 you would get from Tension Bow. Note that to get maximum effeciency from Aftershock, you should time out your abilities to strike when the 4 second cooldown time on the burst is finished.
-
Tyrant's Monocle: Adds a significant boost to your already powerful af criticals. If you're playing against a really squishy team, they might as well surrender. Build first against such teams, but if they start building resistances, get Bonesaw first to tear right through it.
-
Fountain of Renewal: Adds a little health while adding armor and lots of shield to withstand bursts. When activated, it can save you and your team from certain death. The passive also allows you to quickly recover missing health after a skirmish in the jungle. Your insane base health makes
Crucible a little overkill anyways.
- Damage Resist: This kind of goes without saying, but if someone is totally wrecking you, it might be a good idea to build some extra shield or armor to mitigate their damage. The only thing i have to say is that
Atlas Pauldron is much cheaper than
Metal Jacket. This allows you to build resists and then move on to damage as quickly as possible.
Ideal Matchups For Glaive and Strategy Top
First thing's first, GLAIVE IS A GOLD-HUNGRY HERO!!!!! He absolutely needs items to make himself powerful. This said, any jungler that will compete with Glaive for gold will cripple him. This especially includes the assassins. If your team decides to go double jungle, make sure that the other hero with you lets you get all the last hits. Only sacrifice monsters when you have the core items built.
If you are playing with a support in jungle, make sure to be in constant communication with him/her. Work together to lock down the primary damage threat and steal their farm whenever you can. The more you can set an enemy assassin behind (like
Taka), the less likely a gank will happen on your laner, giving them more time and safety to farm. Nothing is more deadly than a well-coordinated jungle team.
Glaive also has the highest level 1 health, and since no one is exceptionally powerful enough to take him down quickly in the early game, you can do some incredibly aggressive and successful jungle invades in the first 5 minutes. However, if you do so, don't over-commit with turret dives and excessive chasing. The respawn timers are so low that retreat is just as good as a kill (tactically, of course). Once you drive the enemy junglers out, steal some of their farm, go back to the safety of your jungle, farm some more, and repeat. To keep your laner safe, you want to constantly pressure the jungle and keep the assassin from getting to level 6 for as long as possible.
But never invade just to invade, only enter the enemy side if you are confident that you will have the upper hand. The last thing you want to do is feed the enemy gold. And if working with a support, always stay together. The reason why you lose jungle dominance is often because you were picked off one by one.
:Ideal Allies for Glaive:
Ardan is a really good choice to support Glaive since he can dash out to follow an
Afterburn. This allows you to do some nasty jungle invades since he can match the aggression of Glaive's play style. Also, Afterburn can be used to smash enemies into the wall of
Gauntlet for double damage and stun.
Skaarf is an excellent choice in lane. If your teammate knows how to play him correctly, he can compensate for the lack of any significant burst damage on your team. A
Spitfire and
Goop combo melts away health at an astonishing rate. And if paired with Ardan's ultimate, he can unleash an unescapable
Dragon Breath that's guaranteed to devastate the enemy team.
Celeste also has a decent amount of burst and her crystal build varies the damage sources on your team (since you are building weapon power).
Krul with an
Ironguard Contract is surprisingly a great damage support for Glaive, provided he doesn't steal farm. Having two tanky junglers with outstanding chase capabilities (
Afterburn,
Dead Man's Rush, and
From Hell's Heart) and damage almost guarantees that you will dominate the jungle. Additionally, having two warriors in the jungle often causes confusion as to who is building damage and who is supporting. You can use this to your advantage early game as they will not know who to focus in the event of a jungle invasion. Once they realize that you are the threat, it's already too late and you've already racked up a couple of kills.
Vox is also a candidate for lane. He can do a lot of damage and has impressive mobility through the use of his first ability. If he goes with a weapon build, a
Bonesaw on the team should help regain damage lost to any built up armor.
Thanks for Your Time! Top
It took me a while to finish this guide. If you have any questions or suggestions, comment and I'll do my best to answer you in a timely fashion. Don't forget to upvote if you like this build!
Repectfully,
Skyflame23
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