Gameplay

Playstyle
Visage is a highly flexible hero capable of fulfilling a diverse set of roles. His stats-based single target slow allows him to chase down fleeing enemies and withstand one-on-one fights. His powerful, reusable, single-target nuke can quickly dispatch targets during ganks and team fights with relative ease. His innate high armor and magic resistance provides natural protection to burst damage and can also be branched upon to create a semi-physical or semi-magic tank. Finally, his Familiars offer high utility; able to scout areas, push lanes, stack creeps, harass enemies and achieve team objectives. Visage is an effective team fighter that thrives in chaotic situations where sources of player damage fuel his abilities. It is also in these situations that Visage is hardest to use, requiring the player to make split-second decisions while juggling in between the hero and his Familiars. Visage lends him fame for having a difficult learning curve with a strong dependence on effective micromanagement, mechanical skill and quick-timed decision making. Once mastered however, Visage becomes a devastating force to be reckoned with, a perfectly balanced mix of physical and magical damage with long ranged disables that can carry his team to victory.
Pros	Cons
Adaptable to any role (carry, support, tank). Adaptable to any lane especially trilanes. Familiars have high utility (push, gank, scout, creep stack, etc.). Deals large amounts of single target damage. Packs a powerful slow that can overturn one-on-one situations. Active abilities have low cooldown and are highly abusable (except Familiars). Able to absorb large amounts of magical or physical burst damage. Packs a surprise area stun with a respectfully long duration. Powerful early to mid-game presence. Destroys towers with relative ease. Exceptional strength gain for an intelligence hero.	Requires high micromanagement and mechanical skills. His hybrid nature makes him subpar over other heroes with dedicated roles. Severely under-powered without Familiars. Does not scale well into late game. Familiars give 100 gold each when killed. Very weak against damage-over-time sources. May require lockdown assist from allied heroes to secure kills. Slow movement and attack speed. Level dependent. Quite item dependent. No innate escape abilities.

Ganker/Pusher

Visage is usually played as a support who can aid ganks and pushes. Grave Chill reduces the target's movement and attack speed while giving it to himself, leaving not only his victims vulnerable, but also strengthening Visage's damage output and ability to chase. This becomes of great value when ganking. Soul Assumption is a devastating nuke ability. Every time a friendly hero in range takes more than a hundred damage it gains a charge, while ganking a hero under their tower or near their allies you can expect to gain several Soul Assumption charges. A successful gank would be: cast Grave Chill on the enemy, slowing them, attack them with increased attack speed along with your team and cast Soul Assumption when you have enough charges to hurt considerably. Due to its short cooldown of 4 seconds, you may use it again if needed but always keeping an eye on your mana. Visage is also able to push enemies towers really fast with Familiars, due to their decent damage and fast attack speed.

Usually, Blight Stone and Medallion of Courage are core items on him as they increase his damage output. Generally, Visage uses his gold building supportive items that bestows aura, like Mekansm, Drum of Endurance, Assault Cuirass, etc.

Carry

From the middle lane, Visage can quickly gain enough gold and experience to obtain Helm of the Dominator and Summon Familiars. Then, he should organize early pushes with those creeps and allies. Grave Chill steals attack speed and movement speed, increasing his and Familiars' damage output, along with his powerful nuke with low cooldown, Soul Assumption, he can unleash tons of damage in a single fight.

The Familiars benefit from Grave Chill and Gravekeeper's Cloak, so max those out as soon as possible for damage output and survivability. The Familiars deal huge physical damage at extreme fast rate, so building armor reduction items like Solar Crest work great. With advantage in buildings, items, and levels, Visage can close down the game before the enemies can build up their defenses.

Ability Builds

Ganker/Pusher Visage
1	2	3	4	5	6	7	8	9	10	11	12	13	14	15	16	17	18	20	25

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

Talents

Tips & Tactics

General

• Visage's abilities make him a very strong hero to have in teamfights, as he can bring a powerful array of nukes and disables to bear. He can also use his abilities effectively in ganks to jump on and disable targets with little warning and burst them down quickly.
• Unlike most intelligence supports, Visage is a survivable caster due to possessing a high strength growth and powerful damage resistance in Gravekeeper's Cloak. Combined with his other abilities, Visage can engage enemies head-on in teamfights and hold his own in the initiation phase.
• With a 0.2 second cast animation and long cast ranges on his abilities, Visage has great reach if played properly. However, his low base movement speed and slow turn rate also make him relatively sluggish, so positioning is important if he is to take advantage of his strengths.
• While Visage is usually played as a support, he can also become a strong carry if started in the middle lane. He can be played as a hard support or a farming support, depending on what his team needs, and transition into a ganking or split-pushing role.

Abilities

Grave Chill

• Grave Chill is a targeted disable that reduces the enemy's movement and attack speed while boosting up Visage's and any nearby Familiars'.
• Because of its scaling, only one early point in Grave Chill is normally needed. Each additional level only increases its duration slightly, and the reduced cooldown does not become useful until much later in the game, unless the familiars can get a substantial increased damage buff that makes the attack speed worthwhile.
• Grave Chill is a strong ganking ability, as it can inflict a strong slow on an enemy while also robbing them of attack speed, allowing Visage to position himself to easily body-block the enemy's escape path while bursting them down with right-click attacks. These aspects also make Grave Chill a strong counter-gank spell, since it can greatly hinder an enemy that is chasing a weakened ally and reduce their ability to finish off their target with right-clicks, allowing Visage to turn the tables on them.
• The increased attack speed provided by Grave Chill means that Visage benefits from building intelligence items rather than simply mana items. Not only will increased intelligence give Visage a bigger mana pool, but it will also increase his base damage to allow him to use his right-clicks more effectively due to the attack speed bonus.
• Use Grave Chill on creeps to buff yourself and your familiars, useful in farming and taking buildings or running toward objectives.
  • When pushing, Visage may want to keep enemy creeps alive as targets for Grave Chill.
• Visage is a helpful hero for taking Roshan. Use Grave Chill to rob his attack speed, reducing the chance of Bash so your teammates can hit him freely. Additionally, Visage usually prefers to buy Solar Crest that decreases Roshan's armor which makes killing him a cinch.

Soul Assumption

• Soul Assumption is a potentially powerful damage nuke that increases in strength based on the amount of damage that heroes in Visage's vicinity take.
• Soul Assumption makes Visage extremely powerful in tri-lanes, as the amount of damage dealt during ganks and small-scale engagements allow Visage to quickly build up Soul Assumption charges to launch a powerful nuke at an enemy. Additionally, its extremely short cooldown allows it to be cast more than once in a fight, which can allow Visage to deal more and more damage the longer a fight drags on.
• Soul Assumption's long cast range makes it a powerful finishing nuke against fleeing enemies. If an enemy has been weakened by allied attacks and spells and is almost about to escape, casting Soul Assumption on them can often be enough to finish them off if the salvo has built up enough charges.
• Keep in mind that Soul Assumption builds charges based on damage taken on both sides. This means that not only can Visage add more damage on top of his teammates' when damaging an enemy, but also when allies or Visage himself take damage, making it a strong nuke no matter which side is ganking.
• The yellow bars above Visage's model represent the number of Soul Assumption charges he currently has. You can wait for the maximum of 6 bars to release Soul Assumption, dealing the most damage.
• Due to the limited window during which charges are maintained, Soul Assumption is more powerful in situations where burst damage is being dealt, as damage-over-time spells can result in charges expiring over time.
• Because of its high nuking potential, Visage benefits greatly from maxing out Soul Assumption first among his abilities. The huge nuke potential of the spell allows Visage to deal large amounts of damage whenever fights break out, giving his team more chances at getting kills against the enemy.
• Beware that since Soul Assumption has a very low cooldown, it is easy to run out of mana to cast it if used repeatedly. Be mindful of when kill opportunities are possible, and try to conserve Visage's mana as needed.
• Due to its low cooldown, Soul Assumption can be cast as an initiating nuke to break an enemy's Linken's Sphere prior to slowing them with Grave Chill. After breaking an enemy's Linken's Sphere, Grave Chill's low cooldown allows it to be cast at least two more times without interference.

Gravekeeper's Cloak

• Gravekeeper's Cloak is a powerful survivability passive that gives Visage all damage reduction.
• Gravekeeper's Cloak acts as an aura that affects Visage's Familiars; the damage reduction is based on the number of layers Visage currently has. Therefore, you should engage enemies with Familiars when you have the maximum amount of layers, which is four, to minimize the chance of Familiars dying and feeding gold.
• The floating stones around Visage's model as well as the buff icon on unit display show the number of Gravekeeper's Cloak layers he currently has. Use them to quickly gauge your chance of survival during ganks and teamfights. When you have more layers through your talent, the floating stones are still 4 and start disapearting when your layers drop below 4.
• The layered nature of Gravekeeper's Cloak makes Visage quite resistant to burst damage, which can help him to shrug off initiation nukes by the enemy. However, this also makes Visage very weak against damage over time spells, as multiple small instances of damage can easily shred the resistance layers and leave Visage open to nukes.
• Getting multiple early levels of Gravekeeper's Cloak can make Visage quite survivable in the early game, particularly when few enemies have the attack speed to use their attacks to quickly shred the cloak. However, beware if the enemy team's composition is capable of dealing damage over time, which can easily negate armor layers.
• Even with multiple levels in Gravekeeper's Cloak, it is recommended to build up Visage's armor and magic resistance, in order to give him some measure of survivability if he must engage the enemy without his armor layers.
• Each layer of Gravekeeper's Cloak has a independent recharge timer.

Summon Familiars

• Summon Familiars allows Visage to summon two Familiars that can roam the battlefield.
• Proper Familiar management is crucial in order to play Visage effectively. Used properly, the Familiars allow Visage to gank targets, push undefended lanes, scout out enemies in the trees, stack neutral camps, aggro enemy lane creeps away from defending towers, chain-disable multiple enemies, and deal large amounts of sustained damage in fights.
• Unlike other summons, Familiars will last until they are destroyed, and can still be controlled even if Visage himself is dead. Try to always be active with the Familiars, using them to accomplish tasks no matter Visage's status.
• Familiars possess flying movement that allows them to ignore terrain. However, they have limited vision range and low attack range, making them poor scouters and forcing them to attack enemies at close range.
• Because of their ability to ignore terrain, Familiars can find safety in hovering over trees, where the enemy cannot easily find them. They can also escape destruction by flying over impassable terrain in order to prevent enemies from easily pursuing.
• Familiars do not have to be at Visage's side all the time. There are many strong advantages to moving them all around the map, since they can assist teammates who are ganking on a different part of the map, push an undefended lane, attack the enemy from behind during a teamfight, and many other uses. Be creative with how the Familiars are used, and try to always catch the enemy off-guard.
• Be wary of the long cooldown on Summon Familiars, and try not to allow the enemy to kill the Familiars. Not only will this give the enemy a large gold bounty, but can leave Visage without his primary method of burst damage when he needs them.
• If the enemy is about to kill the Familiars and they have no path to escape, casting Summon Familiars will instantly kill any active Familiars, preventing the enemy from getting a gold or experience bounty. However, beware that this will also leave Visage without his Familiars for an extended period of time if they are killed again.
• Since Familiars do not lose the buff received from Grave Chill, when teleporting away from Familiars, consider first using Grave Chill in order to give Familiars a boost of movement speed to head towards Visage's teleport destination.
• You can use items on Familiars. Force Staff, Glimmer Cape, and Solar Crest should help keep them from dying to enemies.
• Towers and creeps prioritize attacking other units over Familiars.

Stone Form

• Stone Form will cause the controlled Familiar to turn into stone, dealing damage and stunning any enemies in their impact radius while also making them invulnerable and healing them.
• The most general way to utilize Stone Form is to heal the Familiars. Additionally, Stone Form can be used as an additional damage nuke and stun, adding more disable and damage to an engagement.
• Because of the autonomous nature of the Familiars, Stone Form can be used to stun enemies with little warning and through defensive measures by maneuvering the Familiars into a position of surprise and dropping them in place when the opportunity presents itself.
• Beware that Stone Form has a delay between commanding the Familiars and them becoming invulnerable and impacting; the Familiars can still be killed before they complete the transformation, so be careful about when and where to cast it.
• By staggering Stone Form and casting it one after another on the Familiars, it is possible to chain-stun enemies within the impact area, allowing two Familiars to stun for a maximum of 3 seconds (4.5 seconds with Aghanim's Scepter/Talent and 6 seconds with both scepter and talent).
  • This can be doubled up, at risk, by instantly re-summoning the Familiars at close range and executing another cycle of drops.
  • This can also be repeated again with aid of a refresher orb for a potential stun duration of 18 seconds as well as with the refresher shard (dropped from the third Roshan kill) for a total of 24 seconds of stun.

Items

Starting items:

• Tango sustains Visage's health during the laning phase, keeping him from returning to base due to enemy harassment.

• Healing Salve also restores health to Visage in the laning stage.

• Clarity allows Visage to maintain his mana in order to cast his spells in the laning phase, particularly Soul Assumption, which costs roughly half of his base mana pool and can be important for securing kills during ganks.

• Iron Branch is cheap and give Visage a small amount of attributes, a useful way to spend his remaining gold. They can be used with Tango for more health restoration, sold for inventory space, or built into Magic Wand or Mekansm.

• Magic Stick is a useful burst healing/mana item if the enemies in lane will be casting many spells. It can later be built into a Magic Wand.

Early game:

• Magic Wand, built from Magic Stick, gives Visage bonus attributes and increased charge storage for burst regeneration. As a support, Visage can benefit greatly from both if lacking farm.

• Ring of Basilius gives Visage's lane increased physical survivability and some mana regeneration to sustain spell casting. Past the laning stage, it can be upgraded to Vladmir's Offering.

• Boots of Speed are necessary to rectify Visage's poor movement speed. Getting boots as early as possible in the laning phase allows Visage to pursue enemies during ganks, particularly to get within range to cast Grave Chill to slow them.

• Medallion of Courage is a powerful utility support item in Visage's hands. The item provides armor and mana regeneration, giving Visage more survivability and maintaining his mana pool. The active allows him to either buff up an ally's armor to help them in fights, or reduce an enemy's armor to increase the amount of damage they take from allies, Visage's attacks, and most importantly his Summon Familiars.

Mid game:

• Phylactery gives very cost-effective stats and low cooldown nuke that synergies with Soul Assumption.

• Solar Crest, upgraded from Medallion of Courage, provides many of the same benefits. The increased armor, stats, and mana regeneration give Visage even more tankiness and helps keep his mana topped up even in the late game. Can be used on enemies to slow and increase familiar damage by lowering target armor. Can also be used on a familiar while attacking towers to give +80 attack speed.

• Vladmir's Offering, grants bonus damage, lifesteal, and armor to familiars. 1.75 mana regeneration also helps Visage to maintain the mana pool.

Late game:

• Assault Cuirass greatly boosts Visage's armor and attack speed, making him a strong presence in teamfights and ganks. The aura can boost his Familiars' attack speed and reduce enemies' armor to allow the Familiars' attacks to deal additional damage.

• Orchid Malevolence gives Visage many useful benefits, including physical damage output, more mana and mana regeneration. The silence can prevent enemies from casting escape spells during ganks, and deal powerful burn damage from Visage's powerful burst damage at the end of the silence. Can be upgraded into Bloodthorn.

• Scythe of Vyse is a strong support item that, while expensive, provides extremely strong benefits. The all-around attributes, larger mana pool and increased mana regeneration allow Visage to better contribute in teamfights, and the instant hard-disable can be crucial for getting off successful ganks and disabling important targets in teamfights.

Situational items:

• Glimmer Cape saves Visage and teammates with magic resistance and invisibility.

• Force Staff gives Visage more intelligence, increasing his base damage and the size of his mana pool, and provides some health regeneration. The active allows Visage to quickly re-position himself to cast his spells during ganks and fights, and can act as an escape if needed. It can also be cast on teammates caught out of position in order to save them.

• Mekansm gives Visage increased utility and allows him to further support his team through healing them. The increased attributes and armor also vastly boost Visage's durability, making him tankier in fights and allowing him to contribute more. Can be upgraded into Guardian Greaves.

• Pipe of Insight can give Visage increased survivability and utility for his team. The magic resistance allows Visage to weather magic nukes more effectively when Gravekeeper's Cloak is down, and the magic barrier can shield teammates from magic damage during fights.

• Lotus Orb's Echo Shell deters enemy heroes from using single-target abilities on Visage or affected allies for fear of reflection. Otherwise, it grants armor and regeneration so Visage can survive in battles a little longer.

• Shiva's Guard boosts Visage's survivability against physical damage and greatly improves his mana pool and base damage. The active can be used as a slow and nuke, further slowing an enemy alongside Grave Chill and building up damage for Soul Assumption.