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Sell boots for Staff of Myrddin lategame.
This is a build I have had lots of success within both conquest and other game modes such as clash.
Hera is a mage that deals most of her damage through Argus, the Defender. Hera on her own is strong as well but does lack a proper escape ability, which makes her quite vulnerable. However, Hera does have something else to defend herself that currently no other mages have aside from Eset. It is her ability to shield herself. The only flipslide is that Hera needs to use her shield Divine Shroud to make the most out of Argus, the Defender.
This build will make make Hera into a very disruptive and sustained mage. By having full CDR + the effects from Spear of Desolation and Staff of Myrddin your abilties will be up a lot especially during team fights. With Staff of Myrddin you will be able to chase gods very effectively with Argus.
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2. This isnโt even updated for Season 8, of course itโs not going to be optimal.
If you want some defenses, why not pick-up hybrid items? Celestial Legion Helm or Void Stone might serve the same purpose while keeping your damage output.
And for the most matches, the enemy team will have 2 sources of magical damage, the mid and the support. The support can dive you, but he won't deal that much damage. And the enemy mid will focus on your frontline, so I don't see a reason to get magical defense unless their jungler is a mage.
As Kriega said, Breastplate of Valor is a better option than Urchin because 1. It will protect you from the real threats, the enemy jungler and solo and 2. you'll get 20% CDR + mana for Book of Thoth's passive. This even allows you to get other items in your build (Magi instead of Focus and Divine instead of Deso, for example).
Also, Poly is really bad on Hera.
Edit: A build example.
Book of Thoth, Shoes of the Magi, Breastplate of Valor, Divine Ruin, Soul Reaver, Obsidian Shard, sell shoes for Book of the Dead.
Edit: The difference between Focus and Magi in a Thoth build is 2 power.
Edit:
Your suggested build has Shoes of the Magi which is really not efficient when you build into Book of Thoth
Poly is bad on Hera because? I find it to be extremely useful in this build. You basically gain an extra damage ability. Hera has Polymorph to set up for an easy proc from polynomnicon. Just try it out for yourself :)
I do, however, advocate that Poly gets replaced by something else. Why? Because Hera can't auto cancel as effectively as other mages.
Take Scylla, The Morrigan and Kukulkan as examples. They have a hard CC/slow on their kits, and auto-canceling during their combo is pretty common, so Poly is a good pickup on them (Also, they usually go full power builds).
Polymorph isn't a good setup ability to justify Poly (just like, let's say, Discordia's Strife isn't).
Also, Poly is taking the slot of your %pen item in the build (Either Obsidian Shard or Charon's Coin) so I'd get one of those instead.
And yes, Shoes of the Magi is viable for Thoth builds, because despiting having less mana than Focus (to add to Thoth's passive) it compensates with more raw power and a bit of lifesteal, so you'll end up with roughly the same power with stacked Thoth + either Focus or Magi.
Also you are missing the fact that Hera has 2 forms of hard cc and a slow in one of them. Poly just might not be for everyone, it is sometimes hard to use in tight situations, but that's why I have made an optional build if you don't like to build poly.
This builds main weakness are heavy tanks which is also stated in my pros and cons.
Additionally, although Urchin provides mana which will help with Thoth's power contribution, it's only 7.5 power. Building a pure protection item is going to cut into Poly's damage potential.
I do think the build does need some further considerations, however. It's just lacking too many things and the synergy you're building into her isn't fully compatible with her kit. I'm sure the survivability is pretty amazing though.
That said, I would agree with others that that build direction
However, I don't think you have tried the build out yet. This build is not a powerhouse build. But it is a build to survive longer. If you want to build full power and pen that comes with the price that you will be very very squishy. Lategame it is very frustrating to be squishy and every death can cost you the game (late game).
I have tested this build many times and it doesn't feel like I am lacking damage when I play with it. Argus damage is something not to be underestimated. Hera just has to survive in order to keep argus up as much as possible. I do not agree with "hurting the builds damage potential vs squishies" with only one flat pen item. It really is enough and please consider trying it out.
I'm not saying this is the one and only way to build Hera , as there are many other ways that will in some situations be better. I just think this is an easy flexible build in most scenarios.
One thing I didn't mention is that I do plan to try this out just to get a feel for it. But understand that you 100% are nerfing her damage potential against squishies. It's basically straightforward in that regard due to lack of pen in general, and that you're building some protections instead of damage. That's just straight numbers.
The flipside is that you can't do damage if you're dead, and this is sort of what you're pushing. I think part of her optimal playstyle is still trying for as much damage as possible, and part of that has to do with teammates (out of your control), your positioning, awareness of others players' positioning (your teammates and the enemies), and the situation and which abilities have been used so it's safer for you to go in deeper. Optimally, as a damaging mage you want to try to build as few defensive items as possible. I think this is a safe build for newer and average players.
Your suggested build has Shoes of the Magi which is really not efficient when you build into Book of Thoth
Actually Magi Shoes has mana which can work with book of thoth passive, though I also do think Focus Shoes makes more sense.
On the original build from the Author, Focus is clearly the superior option.
Of course it's not the same as Bancroft's for teamfights, but for the laning phase it helps.
1) mana AND health
2) Physical AND magical protections
3) Its passive which fits the theme of this build.
4) its not expensive.
5) Breastplate is limited to only physical protections. Its not bad Hide of the Urchin is more versatile.
In this build urchin is a core item. This build is meant to be more beafy and less squishy, but not to the point where you deal lots and lots less damage.
Honestly, try this build out and tell me what you think.
The results of my test was that % pen does affects argus damage. On a 250 prot target of lvl 20 argus hit for:
with cdr boots and Spear of Desolation: 21 and 29. shroud hit for 9 (15 pen baseline)
with cdr boots and soul reavr it hit for 22 and iirc 30. shroud hit for 10 (10% pen. Should have dealt reduced damage with your statement. It does not proc soul reaver passive on any of those.)
before you ask this is because the items give different power then hover over the items and you will see both give 110 power.
when I tested this by adding Charon's Coin on the Soul Reaver and adding a Soul Gem to the Spear of Desolation to offset the power increase this difference became more clear.
% pen hit for 34 and 64 shroud hit 13
15 flat pen for 17 and 27 shroud hit for 11
thereby I declare your statement false % pen works just fine.
Also I think I would consider grabbing Mantle of Discord for the protections since it gives more, does not need to be stacked and provides an additional 10% cdr. This way you can grab Divine Ruin if anti heal is needed or Shoes of the Magi (or antoher item for pendant). it will also provide more protections if someone tries to burst you from melee range with the stun. Hera is not really tanky
I used Staff of Myrddin because it has the same power as spear of desolation. The rest of the build is kept the same.
My question for you is, have u tested the soulreaver with the full build? if so then the damage increase would be cause of the mana power conversion from Book of Thoth.
Right now My damage from Divine Shroud on a target with 100 protections is :
30 ; with Spear of Desolation
29 ; with Staff of Myrddin
Grabbing Mantle of Discord would only be viable at the very end of the game. Since the item is very expensive. It also does not have any health or mana added to it so it does not make sense in this particular build. If anti heal is needed then you are better of not building into this build at all and focus on more early cooldown. Hera is not really a god that can make use of anti healing a lot and Argus, the Defender does not apply it either.
So in conclusion, you might be right about the %penetration statement I made is statistically not correct, but this is only the case if protections are in the 250 range, which is very unlikely.
I will edit the statement I made in my build though.
250 is a lot and I mostly picked it as I was testing if percentage pen would work (making anything below 150 with 10% pen (which also hits 15) harder to see clear differences). Also not that uncommon. supports easily hit it and most solo laners can easily hit around 200 prot (or more commonly above 175 prot), unless they focus a lot on damage and therefore losing their ability to frontline.
I used Staff of Myrddin because it has the same power as spear of desolation. The rest of the build is kept the same.
My question for you is, have u tested the Soul Reaver with the full build? if so then the damage increase would be cause of the mana power conversion from Book of Thoth.
Right now My damage from Divine Shroud on a target with 100 protections is :
30 ; with Spear of Desolation
29 ; with Staff of Myrddin
Also flat pen will always outperform % pen when targeting squishies as they usually won't hit 75+ (considering you're picking up a 20% pen item). They do stack though so grabbing both is never bad.
Grabbing Mantle of Discord would only be viable at the very end of the game. Since the item is very expensive. It also does not have any health or mana added to it so it does not make sense in this particular build. If anti heal is needed then you are better of not building into this build at all and focus on more early cooldown. Hera is not really a god that can make use of anti healing a lot and Argus, the Defender does not apply it either.
My reasoning was more that usually in teamfights you're either going to be bursted by an assassin or slowly whittled down by their solo laner. So the stun and cc immunity would be pretty usefull.
Argus, the Defender might not apply the anti heal, however Royal Assault with your amount of cdr can easily keep divine's passive up. ANY GOD can use a form of anti heal, some only do it better than others.
So in conclusion, you might be right about the %penetration statement I made is statistically not correct, but this is only the case if protections are in the 250 range, which is very unlikely.
I will edit the statement I made in my build though.
(y)
1. Any competent support player will reach 250 prots in a game. Thebes + Sov + Heartward + Spirit Robe will give you around 220 prots each, and this is a pretty common build path for supports. So no, it's not unlikely to face a target with 250 prots.
2. Staff of Myrddin is a bad item for Hera, because the passive only procs after Argus despawns.
That's why Soul Reaver and Obsidian Shard/ Charon's Coin are so popular for mids, because the 2 items together give you 30% pen and damage based on health.
In the same sense, that's why hunters get The Executioner and Qin's Sais.
Well that usually and sometimes the enemy jungler as well. Also if the enemy team is running any weird picks like Set ADC.
That's why Soul Reaver and Obsidian Shard/ Charon's Coin are so popular for mids, because the 2 items together give you 30% pen and damage based on health.
In the same sense, that's why hunters get The Executioner and Qin's Sais.
You are both right and wrong, it depends on your team comp and what kind of mage you play. Not all mages are good at bursting down tanks. I think melting tanks is mainly the role of a Hunter.
And don't forget that non-tank characters also have inate prots, and they increase per level. Also, a support with auras will make squishies less squishy, so %pen is always a good idea.
Also, double flat pen is the "meta" build for mages this season: Divine Ruin + Shoes of Focus + Spear of Desolation.