Gameplay

Playstyle
Tinker is a very mobile nuking hero with powerful pushing and disabling potential depending on how he is built. He should be played around his ultimate, as it allows him to cast his spells and use his abilities multiple times in a single engagement.
Pros	Cons
Armed with powerful magical and pure damage nukes. Very hard to push against without specific items or team composition. Skillful players can outplay multiple opponents by themselves. Generally extremely effective against single targets with the use of items in conjunction with Rearm. Semi-global presence with Keen Conveyance.	Extremely item dependant. Vulnerable to lockdowns and is fragile with no innate escape mechanism. High skill ceiling and requires high levels of awareness and dexterity to play effectively. No answer to spell immunity. No damage to building. Extremely dependent on mana.

Ability Builds

Mid Tinker
1	2	3	4	5	6	7	8	9	10	11	12	13	14	15	16	17	18	20	25

Talents

Tips & Tactics

General

• When pushing out lanes, care must be taken to avoid being jumped on by the enemy. Tinker is a very frail hero who, despite his mobility, can be easily killed if caught and disabled.
• As well, while Tinker can find farm quite easily by pushing out multiple lanes, doing so can deprive your own teammates of farm, particularly your carries. Combined with the above, this can lead to dangerous situations where your team is unable to do anything without you, and can lead to a loss in the long run as the enemy is able to kill your under-farmed teammates easily if they manage to kill you once. As such, it is recommended not to push out lanes too aggressively or take farm away from your carries if possible.
• In general, Tinker is best played in the mid lane, as his skill set allows him to take on most other mids reliably and the farm and early levels allow him to become active much more quickly. He can nuke down and harass the opposing mid and push his lane at will with his abilities, allowing for good rune control.
• Tinker can ferry allies' items from fountain much quicker than courier can by using his backpack, Rearm, and Keen Conveyance.
• Tinker's mobility items like Blink Dagger help him collect runes, so pay attention to Bounty Runes or any runes that spawn in the river.
• As Tinker can jump immediately to the front lines with Blink Dagger and Keen Conveyance, he is uniquely qualified for placing aggressive Wards that his team can capitalize on. Forward wards can give him advance warning on incoming ganks as well as provide vision for hitting targets with Heat-Seeking Missile.
• Consider using Glyph of Fortification to prevent lane creeps from dying, so Tinker can finish channeling Keen Conveyance.
• All of Tinker's basic abilities have extremely long cast backswings which you must cancel in order to play Tinker efficiently.

Abilities

Laser

• Laser is a strong pure damage nuke that inflicts blind on its target. It is a powerful harassing tool against the enemy mid as the blind allows Tinker to last-hit a creep that the enemy is attempting to deny, or vice versa.
• Never underestimate Laser's ability to change the course of an engagement. Using it against an enemy hero prevents them from trading hits due to the miss, and used against the proper target in a teamfight it can force them to retreat or activate a Black King Bar at an inopportune time to remove the blind.
• Laser can also be used as a supplementary nuke when pushing a lane. The blindness lasts for 6 seconds on creeps, so it can be used on a siege creep to remove its attack output.
  • It can be a nice last hit ability while in the lane, especially against siege creeps due to the pure damage.
• It can be used to farm Neutral Creeps extremely easily and quickly, especially when combined with Rearm. Ask a support to make stacks for you.
• It has an extremely short cast range without Aghanim's Scepter or Aether Lens, and an extremely long cast point. Be sure to position yourself well to not die while casting Laser.

March of the Machines

• This allows you to farm most of the map extremely efficiently.
• they work over a very large area, which helps keep enemies at a distance
  • Beware that the are visible in the Fog of War, and the enemy might see you coming and have time to react and escape.

Defense Matrix

• Defense matrix creates a powerful shield around an ally which totally negates a significant amount of damage. Therefore, use it to make your allies or yourself Tankier. Additionally, the damage negation can allow you to use Blink Dagger.
• Defense Matrix gives status resistance while the shield is active, which can be useful if you know the enemy has powerful disables such as Hex, or Demonic Purge.
• Generally, you should level Defense Matrix last in favour of your nukes and ultimate.
• More tips needed.

Warp Flare

• Use it defensively in order to push enemies away from you.
• It does a small amount of damage which can be useful for cancelling Blink Daggers.
• It also reduces cast range and attack range which can make it easier for you to escape by reducing the range which enemies can disable or nuke you down or attack you.
• Generally, you should avoid using it if you aren't in danger, because it can push enemies away from you and your team, potentially saving them.
• Use this to push enemies into your allies.
  • Note that it might backfire if the enemy has powerful initiation or counter initiation abilites, such as Ravage.
• More tips needed.

Keen Conveyance

• It is a free Town Portal Scroll at level 1, Boots of Travel at level 2, and Boots of Travel 2 at level 3.
• Keen Conveyance allows you to teleport in any lane that has your allies in it, all the while being able to restock on Bottle's regen during every survey of the map.
• Keen Conveyance has a longer time delay than a regular Town Portal Scroll and Boots of Travel's teleport delay, so you may have to consider predicting which fights will occur before teleporting ahead.
• Keep in mind of where you're teleporting into, as enemies may be able to read your movements and try to ambush you when you're occupied.

Rearm

• Rearm is Tinker's signature ability, allowing him to cast spells and use item abilities profligately as long as he has the mana to do so. Combined with Keen Conveyance, it allows Tinker to become one of the most active heroes in the game, globally repositioning himself to push lanes, gank enemies and take map objectives.
• Beware that Rearm getting cancelled in any way will put it on an extremely long cooldown, leaving you vulnerable for a while. Try not to take too many risks and avoid accidentally cancelling your own Rearm.
  • You can stack commands by holding Shift (also called Shift-queuing) to prevent unintentional Rearm interruptions.
• One of the most important factors in playing Tinker well is efficiently managing his mana pool. As Rearm removes cooldown limitations on his spells, you must carefully decide which spells to cast in a teamfight or when pushing, as well as how to most efficiently cast these spells depending on the situation. Using an unnecessary spell reduces Tinker's ability to cast additional spells in the same engagement, forcing an earlier return back to base and reducing his efficiency.
• Always keep enough mana handy to escape and teleport back to base, as Tinker is a very squishy and vulnerable hero when caught out in the open.
• Bottle heals with flat bonuses and gets refilled at your fountain. Therefore, move items to your stash or backpack in order to reduce the size of your mana pool, increasing the effectiveness of the flat regeneration and allowing you to get back into action faster.

Items

Starting items:

Tango sustains Tinker's health in lane.

• Iron Branches are cheap and give attributes to help with the early game. Branches can be consumed with Tango for increased healing.
• Iron Branches are cheap and give attributes to help with the early game. Branches can be consumed with Tango for increased healing.
• Iron Branches are cheap and give attributes to help with the early game. Branches can be consumed with Tango for increased healing.

Early game:

• Blink Dagger drastically improves Tinker's mobility, and gives him great survivability when pushing lanes. As it can be shift-queued after teleporting to the front lines, Tinker can instantly blink into the treeline to safely cast his spells without giving the enemy an opportunity to spot him.
• Bottle is essential for a mid Tinker, as it provides HP and mana regen critical for allowing him to stay in-lane to farm. Bottle remains vital on Tinker throughout the game, as it extends his mana pool when teleporting forward to cast spells and speeds up healing in fountain, so consider dropping it in the Stash instead of selling it later.

Mid game:

• Aghanim's Scepter gives Tinker a vast amount of teamfight contribution, as he can use Laser to blind and deal pure damage to multiple enemy heroes per cast, forcing them to dispel the debuff if they want to deal any physical damage, and bombarding them with long-range artillery using Heat-Seeking Missile. It also transforms Laser into an effective tank destroyer, as it reduces any affected enemy heroes by a percentage of their max HP.
• Aether Lens increases mana pool and cast range so Tinker can use Laser from a safe distance.

Late game:

• Dagon is a very powerful burst damage nuke on Tinker that additionally increases the size of his mana pool as it is upgraded. Combined with Laser and Heat-Seeking Missile, it can instantly blow up lone targets, especially once combined with Rearm to increase the damage output by multiples.
• Ethereal Blade gives Tinker very beneficial stats. Additionally, it is useful for augmenting Tinker's already impressive burst magic damage against enemies, especially if he has built numerous intelligence items, and can be used on himself or teammates to grant immunity against physical damage. In a pinch, it can also be used on one of the enemy's carries to prevent them from attacking if
• Scythe of Vyse greatly improves the size of Tinker's mana pool, and gives him powerful mana regen, increasing the number of spells he can cast on deployments before returning to base. The Hex is extremely powerful as combined with Rearm, it allows Tinker to permanently hard-disable an enemy for as long as he has the mana to do so.
• Arcane Blink gives the tinker extremely high mobility due to his innate ability and himself Arcane Blink has a smaller recharge Yasha and Kaya allows you to press buttons faster and gives more damage from magic

Situational items:

• Null Talisman provides Tinker with an appreciated mana pool bonus and some extra damage for last-hitting in laning phase.

• Eul's Scepter of Divinity is a good cheap mana item that gives Tinker good mana regeneration and a useful disable. Used properly, the Cyclone can be used to set up disables on enemies offensively, or buy Tinker time if he's caught while pushing a creep wave.
• Black King Bar prevents Tinker from being locked down in teamfights, particularly since Rearm is a channeled spell that can be interrupted. While it cannot be refreshed by Rearm, it can give Tinker the survivability he needs to cast his spells uninterrupted in a fight.
• Laser was already used on another target.
• Aeon Disk can be considered if you find that you are being consistently bursted down by powerful nukes and disables such as Black Hole.