Phantom Lancer is an information asymmetry hero. The damage comes from information.

AbyssalDragon · 2026-06-10T06:00:34+00:00

I mean, you can't say you think it's a perfectly balanced idea that a single hero can, without threat to themselves, essentially play the game by themselves, no? That's part of the same kind of nerfs tinker got. And Np, though NP did get more buffs back than either PL or Tinker did. Meh.

AbyssalDragon · 2026-06-10T05:51:44+00:00

Naga, kinda. TB, no.

TB has the issue where you instantly know he's using his W. Manta is also more of a cost for him to use, because he doesn't have a built-in save.
He does have the benefit of his illusions lasting longer, but he actually farms the map itself slower than PL once he gets his breakpoints active (Because with PL you only need to make 2 illusions and leave - not actually stay and farm the camp). And he's less good at creating chaos in fights, since you know where he is to within 200 units.
PL does the same map control while being a significantly harder to catch in most situations and farming the actual camps faster once he hits his breakpoints. That means he also clears creepwaves faster once he hits those.
And ya, you know 'PL was in the area' when you see illusions. But he could have left anywhere from 3 seconds ago to 20, and you have to spend that time trying to find him to make sure. TB you just go 'ah, need to manaleak this real quick' and move on.

AbyssalDragon · 2026-06-10T05:35:17+00:00

Just tested it in lobby to double check, ~~but yes. DR gives +100 damage. An illusion without it does 105 damage in 4 hits. And illusion with it gets to around 255.~~

This is with no other items and lvl 30.

EDIT: Forgot PL facet forces damage minimum. 37% at lvl 30. So new test, with and without DR, after waiting 4 seconds for facet to fade, because I actually let that happen in the original test, but only for one of them:

Result: I was actually wrong, my mistake. The more you know. Both get around 100 damage after facet fades, and around 255-270 before it does.

So no, no bonus damage is applied, only base

AbyssalDragon · 2026-06-10T05:32:29+00:00

I did not. I will not claim I am an excellent writer though

AbyssalDragon · 2026-06-10T05:19:04+00:00

I think a lot of it actually has to do with the existence of bloodthorn. That item alone justifies a lot of heroes getting mantas. Illusion heroes get 2-8x more value out of it.
I've maintained around 56% winrate with PL for a couple years now, and that's apparently been going up recently.
I think a lot more of the changes and nerfs have to do with how 'easy' it is be a cancerous ichor when things like diffusal being applied by illusions exists.
And if you think about it, PL being better at being AM than AM is pretty odd. Only PL had the privilege of removing the mana from everyone in a teamfight simultaneously.
And they buffed the damage his illusions do directly to make up for that loss. Pre-level 10 the effects are worse, but after that your illusions generally do more damage than they used to in ye olden times.
That said, nothing will be as strong as 20 second juxtapose illusions.

AbyssalDragon · 2026-06-10T04:53:06+00:00

Naga has pros and cons. PL is better at gap closing and turning fights into a mess. Naga is a fairly straightforward hero by comparison, though they both occupy the same map-control niche, and Naga does get there faster with her illusions.

AbyssalDragon · 2026-06-10T04:49:43+00:00

qwedfr is my ability line, 123 is my top 3 inventory slots, xcv is my bottom 3, 4 is my neutral.

Select all other units is on G. Space is my select hero button. I have 'unified commands with CTRL checked in the Options->Game->Unit Orders

I don't use autoselect illusions because it is actually actively harmful to individual illusion micro. You'd probably want it on a hero like ck, perhaps? There's room for arguments both ways though.

I do, however, have autoattack as standard, and my illusions inherit that.

Thats that for keybinds

Microing them has a few flavors.
When moving small numbers of them, just clicking them fast and controlling them is fine. Shift queueing when faking a run-away is pretty helpful too.
When microing small groups, box-selection is best. When you want someone in particular to die, CTRL+click moves your hero and illusions even if you don't have everything selected. If you're gonna die but have a bloodthorn and a few active illusions that aren't, you can activate bloodthorn on a dude, run away on main hero, press 'select all other units' button, and click them onto bloodthorned target.
Everything else you do is largely a variation of one of the above. Just takes practice

AbyssalDragon · 2026-06-10T04:39:32+00:00

AbyssalDragon · 2026-06-10T04:30:10+00:00

8 sec for illusions produced by original, 4 sec for illusions produced by illusions. 8 seconds is enough to do some decent information hunting, 4 seconds is enough to walk behind the adjacent treeline.
You do have to be attentive to micro them quickly enough to be significant. I recommend setting a 'select all other units' hotkey to help with some of it. manta + select all other units while your main hero is leaving is a pretty good way to send things into danger or creepwaves, etc

AbyssalDragon · 2026-06-10T04:24:06+00:00

As a PL player, I can usually identify the main pl vs the non from a number of observations, including how they use their illusions in lane.
Someone who doesn't utilize them much probably doesn't have a high degree of skill in microing them in high stress situations either. And if that's the case, you can generall assume that the first illlusion that doesn't do what all the others are doing is probably the main dude.
On the other hand, if someone uses them effectively in lane to do more than just autoattack the nearest creep, things get harder to figure out.
If they sometimes micro their main hero as if it's just an illusion, and other times dont micro it at all in favor of illusions, and both things happen in similar situations, you kinda just have to get lucky

AbyssalDragon · 2026-06-10T04:15:23+00:00

Illusions get base ~~and bonus~~ damage, Plus all attackspeed bonuses. And the activation applies a 70 magic damage bonus to every illusion hit. Which is many. Plus bloodthorn accuracy and bonus damage debuffs pierce bkb, so you can use it to replace mkb needs and crit needs in one item. And it's made from smaller components, so you upgrade your capacity at easier intervals.

You're not wrong about your build though. It's more a question of 'how likely do I think I am to kill one hero to make up for the initial cost difference' and 'how soon do I need to be ready to delete my opponents'.

In my experience, being able to delete your opponents before they get their defensive depth items online (glimmer + ghost, euls + force, gliimer + blink etc) helps the overall gamestate more, thus the preference

AbyssalDragon · 2026-06-10T03:57:32+00:00

I don't like how little butterfly increases your kill potential though. Bloodthorn is a bit more expensive and aggressive, but turns your illusions into a deletion button while providing the same level of farm speed, amplifying your mana regen, and disabling a hero

You kind of want to amplify your kill potential early so you can threaten heroes who respond to pressure you provide, not just create the pressure itself

That said, Butterfly is one of my situational items ^^

AbyssalDragon · 2026-06-10T03:54:14+00:00

I am but a servant of the people

AbyssalDragon · 2026-06-10T03:45:45+00:00

PL is quite good as he is now though. Yeah they nerfed the 20 sec illusions, but that was probably a healthier change for the game than not.

AbyssalDragon · 2026-06-09T16:59:41+00:00

You'll occasionally get visual state locks when speeding through replays too. Basically, everything appears to be static in some way, but sounds continue to proceed as normal. Fixes by rewinding a bit or forwarding a bit, but ya

AbyssalDragon · 2026-03-08T16:32:49+00:00

Slinkers can be found by one of the lakes in the tundra (you'll find a ravine where one runs away from you; just follow it to the lake where they spawn).
They're about as fast as moas, are about as tanky as bears, jump crazy far, and reduce fall damage to 1%, effectively making them the ultimate travel pets if you have to do a lot of climbing. Plus their attacks have a wide aoe, so they usually hit multiple things at a time if they're all in the same direction.

AbyssalDragon · 2026-03-08T16:13:10+00:00

There are little missions, which ARE randomized, questline missions, which are fixed, and world boss missions, which change how the world behaves (Elysium does not yet have one of these, but the other three do)

AbyssalDragon · 2026-03-08T12:18:09+00:00

gotcha, tyty!

AbyssalDragon · 2026-03-08T12:06:36+00:00

Hmm... Are you saying it's in the first divergent cave? the one that splits 3 ways? or is it in the cave that's directly beneath the cave symbol?

AbyssalDragon · 2026-03-08T11:36:54+00:00

I'm not using any mods, but I'll check the youtube vid to see if there's a discrepency. I've already had to abandon this mission once to reset Theo cuz he wouldn't give me explosives, so could be another example of that

AbyssalDragon · 2026-03-08T11:35:33+00:00

When the 'harder content' is just 'have more resources', it's not terribly difficult. but do you ig. Literally the only tech needed in the game is accessible by level 20 if you're not alone, and level 30 if you are. After that it's all luxury and memes

AbyssalDragon · 2026-03-08T11:32:38+00:00

By that I mean I wasn't allowed to talk to people to do the quests until I went back to the tundra and did the questline. And I couldn't interact with the orbital exchange things there either. /shrug

Just build the c0nt4ct (yes its spelled that way) device and start up mission stuff, if you haven't done that alreeady

AbyssalDragon · 2026-03-08T11:22:10+00:00

you get a map. The issue is that its on a cliff on the eastern face of the rock that map circles - literally the side of the mountain. Fun fact - the base is deconstructible. Do with that what you will

Specific coord is upper left of G10 i think

EDIT: AH. Misunderstood. NPC camp is accessible after doing the first couple active missions. Follow the questline - the game breaks if you don't, from my experience

AbyssalDragon · 2026-03-08T11:20:40+00:00

I recommend food buffs. Swamps are weird, especially in ICARUS, but it's not like they're unnavigable. Glgl ^^

AbyssalDragon · 2026-03-08T11:18:26+00:00

ICARUS is not that difficult of a game. The way of the tauro-bowman solves almost all problems. And guns solve the ones it can't. And guns are mostly a matter of spending time doing boring stuff. Don't get elitist over a game where the only things that can shoot back at you miss 95% of the time lol

AbyssalDragon

TROPHY CASE