Image: Valve Software
Ringmaster seems designed to be a support thanks to his large repertoire of nukes and crowd-control abilities.
The long wait for Dota 2's new hero is finally over. After first being announced in last year's The International (TI) 2023, Cogliostro Kettle the Ringmaster is now finally playable! Ringmaster is a ranged Intelligence who can dish out tons of magic damage in the form of nukes and damage-over-time skills while also having crowd control and escape abilities.
Read on as we break down Ringmaster's skill set and how to best build and play Dota 2's newest hero:
Ringmaster's abilities
Q - Tame the Beasts
Ringmaster's Q sees him twirl his whip for up to 1 second then cracking it at an area in front of him. Enemies caught in the whipped area are damaged and flee away in fear from Ringmaster. This ability's channel time exponentially increases damage and extends the fear duration, but reduces the radius it hits.
At max level, Ringmaster's Q has minimum damage and Fear duration values of 120 and 0.4 seconds while its maximum damage and Fear duration clocks in at 480 and 1.2 seconds. It also has a 16/14/12/10 second cooldown and a 90/105/120/135 manacost.
Use this ability to manipulate enemy positioning, whether it's to force them away from you or push them into your teammates.
W - Escape Act
Ringmaster's W lets him pack himself or an allied hero into a mobile, extradimensional box that basically works like the Book of Shadows Neutral Item. Boxed units gain phased movement, slow resistance, bonus magic resistance, and bonus movement speed. They are also untargetable, muted, silenced, and disarmed. The box will pop open after the effect expires or it moves more than 500 units away.
At max level, Ringmaster's W gives its target 20% bonus movement speed, 80% bonus magic resistance, 100% slow resistance, and has a 3.2-second duration. It also has a constant 80 manacost and a 38/32/26/20 second cooldown.
This ability is fairly straightforward, best used to get Ringmaster or his allies out of sticky situations.
E - Impalement Arts
Ringmaster's E is a charge-based ability that lets him throw a daggers to a precise point of his choosing. If it strikes an enemy, the dagger deals impact damage, briefly slows the unit hit, and causes it to bleed. The bleeding deals a percentage of the victim's maximum health in damage every second to heroes and flat damage per second to creeps.
At max level, Ringmaster's E has four charges, deals 75 damage on impact, deals 5% of its target's Max HP as damage per second, and inflicts a 100% movement speed slow for 0.8 seconds. When used against creeps, this ability deals 100 damage per second. This ability is also very spammable with a 1 second cooldown and a constant 80 mana cost.
This ability will be Ringmaster's primary method of dealing damage while also providing a slow on enemies that helps set up his other crowd-control abilities.
R - Wheel of Wonder
Ringmaster's ultimate lets him roll the Wheel of Wonder to a target location, knocking aside enemies along the way. After it reaches its target, enemies in range of the wheel take damage over time and are slowed by 50%. Enemy heroes who face the wheel for more than 0.5 seconds are mesmerized and drawn towards it. The first enemy to be mesmerized triggers a timer for the wheel to explode. If the timer is not triggered, it will automatically explode after 8 seconds.
The Wheel of Wonder has a minimum range of 600 and a fairly large effect radius of 600. At max level, the timer before the explosion is 3.25 seconds, deals 100 damage per second while drawing enemies in, and explodes for 600 damage. It has a cooldown of 90/80/70 seconds and a 175/275/375 mana cost.
This ability makes Ringmaster a terror in teamfights, as a well-placed Wheel of Wonder can disable multiple enemy heroes and leave them vulnerable to his teammates' attacks. The icing on this bomb cake is the huge explosion at the end of its duration, which basically makes it a supercharged Techies mine that can draw enemies into itself.
Aghanim's Shard ability - Spotlight
Giving Ringmaster an Aghanim's Shard gives him a new ability called Spotlight, which shines a spotlight that sweeps over an area. Enemies in the light have a chance to miss their attacks and are revealed if invisible. Illusions hit by the beam also fade away, losing a percentage of their maximum health each second.
The Spotlight has a 550 radius, inflicts a 30% miss chance on enemies, and causes enemy illusions to lose 50% of their max health for 8 seconds. It also has a 30-second cooldown and a 50 mana cost.
This ability gives Ringmaster more teamfight utility against invisibility and illusion-based enemy heroes. The significant miss chance is also nice against physical damage-based carry heroes to reduce their impact in chaotic teamfights.
Innate: Dark Carnival Barker
Ringmaster Innate ability lets him receive a random single-use Dark Carnival Souvenir whenever an enemy hero dies within 925 units of him. Additional Souvenirs are held as charges. If Ringmaster also does not have a Souvenir when he respawns he will be granted one.
Souvenirs of the Dark Carnival include a Funhouse Mirror, a Strongman Tonic, and a Whoopee Cushion. Funhouse Mirror lets him summon an illusion of himself, Strongman's Tonic lets him temporarily buff an ally's Strength stat based on his own, while Whoopee Cushion basically functions like the Pig Pole Neutral Item that also leaves behind a stink cloud that slows enemies.
While Ringmaster does have an Innate ability on release, he doesn't have Facets yet.
Ringmaster's Talents:
Level 10: +200 Escape Act Cast Range or +75 Tame the Beasts Radius
Level 15: Debuff Immunity While Channeling Tame the Beasts or Impalement Arts Penetrates One Target
Level 20: +75/+300 Tame the Beasts Min/Max Damage or +1s Impalement Arts Bleed and Slow Duration
Level 25: Escape Act Grants Strong Dispel and Flying or +100 Wheel Radius and Range
When levelling up Ringmaster's abilities, we recommend maxing out his Q by level 7 with one skill point on his W and E. Get his ultimate whenever it is available. His E should be your next priority ability as it damage will scale nicely into the later stages of the game.
You can then max his W out afterwards, though it is a very good ability even with just one skill point so you can get away with putting some points into stats instead for some added survivability.
As for Ringmaster's Talents, we recommend going for the ones that boost Tame the Beasts at levels 10, 15, and 20 as it is oftentimes his best ability.
At level 25, your choice will largely depend on what helps you win teamfights more. If the enemy team is reliant on bursting down one key target in clashes, then go for the Escape Act Talent. Otherwise, the Wheel of Wonder one is a great all-around choice.
What role is best for Ringmaster?
Ringmaster works best as either a position 4 or 5 utility support, boasting strong laning presence with his E, teamfight control and damage with his Q and ultimate, and save potential with his E.
Think of him as someone like Grimstroke, Oracle, Omniknight, or Hoodwink. Early on, Ringmaster must work closely with his laning partner to control the lane or score early kills – though he does have roaming potential if you time your lane rotations or Town Portal Scroll usages right. In the midgame onwards, Ringmaster can become a teamfight monster with his array of crowd control abilities. Mind your positioning as your skillset will likely make you a priority target for the enemy team once clashes start.
Ringmaster's best item builds
Ringmaster's item build will largely depend on whether he's being played as a position 4 or 5 support.
As a position 4, Ringmaster will take on a more offensive role and should build items that help him deal more damage or better control enemies like Spirit Vessel, Aether Lens, Ethereal blade, Scythe of Vyse, Octarine Core, and Refresher Orb.
As a position 5, Ringmaster will instead focus on providing teamfight control with his abilities while building items that assist his team. Because of this, go for items like Boots of Bearing, Pavise, Solar Crest, Glimmer Cape, Guardian Greaves, and Force Staff.
In either case, start the game with your usual fare of support items and as many Blood Grenades as you can carry to help you score early kills. Arcane Boots and Magic Stick/Wand should be your first couple of purchases to help you sustain yourself through the early game. After that, Blink Dagger and Aether Lens will help greatly with positioning and landing your abilities in clashes.
For more information on Ringmaster, check out his official hero page here.
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