Solo Bakasura Season 3

At the beginning of Season 3, the warrior solo lane was king. Bruisers like Vamana and Osiris, with their considerable late-game control, ruled the short lane and laughed at anyone else's pitiful attempts at solo. Sure, Loki was still a comfort pick for many solo laners due to his absurdly safe farm and ability to instantly delete a back-line damage dealer, but the fact remained that he wasn't well-positioned in a meta where the solo laner was expected to just stand in front of damage and spam taunt while his team took kills and objectives.

Then HiRez in their infinite wisdom decided that hunters weren't strong enough, and that resulted in a major buff to the entire Golden Bow tree. The area damage was increased, giving gods like Apollo and Rama who suffered under the Transcendence meta to make their return to top-tier choices, and Apollo was even considered viable in solo lane again.

Enter Bakasura. The king of incremental advantage with his ability to Eat Minion a boar at full health, but with better clear thanks to Golden Bow. While his teamfight control looks a bit lackluster on the surface, that's because he's not controlling via CC but via health bars. It turns out that Butcher Blades and Qin's Sais on a Baka who's built Hastened Fatalis is not fun to stand near. This will either turn the focus onto you (good if your team takes advantage) or force them to spread out. Either way, you're just this adorable death bunny smacking the ever-loving **** out of anyone close by, and nobody likes that.

Pros

• Great damage
• Large presence due to movement speed on Insatiable Hunger
• Easy to snowball out of control
• Reasonably safe laning phase

Cons

• Squishy, definitely not the front line character that a Hercules or a Bellona would be
• No crowd control (outside of a cripple) in the kit
• Weak to Runic Shield or Witchblade

When you start out from base, don't purchase a relic. As your passive plus boots plus Hastened Fatalis really negates the need for Teleport unless you lose lane, I'd buy no relic going into lane. If you need it, you can always go back and get it.

Also, your multis are more important than your health potions. Since you've got Eat Minion to sustain, you're usually just topping off rather than doubling up. Later in the game, go for wards and mana potions.

Most of solo lane is a poke war, and on the surface Baka is trash-tier at poke wars. He has no Spirit Flail to poke from a nice distance, nor does he have one-ability clear. So expect to be poked out a little. However, unless you're up against a hunter, your Golden Bow lets you farm easily. Use your passive to catch up with the opponent, hit them a couple with Butcher Blades, then back off and heal up off a friendly archer minion (or enemy boar). At Level 5, you've got a decision. If you're ahead and your opponent has no ultimate, go for the kill. If you're not guaranteed a kill, save it and steal their jungle. Your goal is simply to out-farm them. If you're against someone who rushed Breastplate of Valor, you probably have no kill potential. In this situation:

• Out farm them and rotate.
• Proxy their wave between the tier 1 and tier 2.
• Make yourself a nuisance by contesting every blue buff that they don't split 3 ways.

In teamfights, you have two modes:

1) You have your ultimate ready and you drop it to go ham on everyone.
2) You don't have your ultimate ready and you're a totally single-target god.

In situation (1), you prioritize the squishy targets like normal. However, there's a secret to playing Bakasura in a teamfight: split your ult. What this means is that you use your barf and minions to slow and cripple the front line, both leaving them uncomfortably exposed and preventing them from peeling for your targets. Then, turn around and use those wonderful giant choppy basics to tear through the carries. Note: I haven't figured out precisely why, but it's always better to pop Butcher Blades after your ultimate finishes.

In situation (2), there's a lot more mind games. This is where you look for someone who's just slightly out of position with nobody to peel for them. Walk up (do not jump in, you're plenty faster than they are) and hold left click. If the team rotates to deal with you and your team isn't in position to capitalize, just walk off. You'll have another chance later.

Bellona

Scourge

Bludgeon

Regurgitate

Things to Know

• Bellona's Bludgeon does more damage on the ground-slam if it hits you, so standing in your wave makes her job much easier. Make her choose to either hit you or the whole wave with the swing.
• Scourge is on a similar cooldown to Butcher Blades, so expect to be disarmed every time you press 3.
• Tower diving a Bellona with ult is suicide. She will ult in place and you will die.
• Despite her fantastic clear, you have the potential to steal her blue whenever you want it. Follow her there, hide till it drops into range, and *nom* it's yours. Jump away and laugh at her distress.