Dota 2 Spectre Guide – Tips and Tricks

This Dota 2 Spectre guide will give you tips and tricks on how to dominate with this hero.

A few late-game monsters in Dota 2 can go toe to toe with Spectre, regardless of the meta. This is one of those heroes that can be used in a variety of situations, and she will keep getting better as time goes on. Naturally, Specre is very popular in PUB and a frequent pick among professional players.

This Spectre Dota 2 guide will show you a lot of important information about the hero that will help you when you start playing. Before diving into more details, it’s important to know the hero has 290 staring MS, 48-52 damage and 5.2 armor. She’s a melee agility hero known for her late-game potential, so let’s learn more.

Abilities

Choosing your Dota 2 Spectre build can be of utmost importance to win the game, so here’s an overview of the hero and her abilities.

• Spectral Dagger -This ability deals 220 damage and creates a dark trail that gives Spectre 22 bonus movement speed. Furthermore, Spectre can use this dark path to pass through impassable terrain, and the ability will apply an instance of Desolate to targets that do not have any allies near them.
• Desolate – The ability allows Specre to deal up to 60 pure bonus damage on each attack on an enemy that has no allies within 400 range around them.
• Dispersion – This passive ability allows Spectre to reflect up to 20% of the damage done to her.
• Shadow Step – Deals 80% Haunt Damage, lasts 7s, 4s cooldown, 150 mana.
• Reality – Spectre can change her position with her haunt and will cast Spectral Dagger on the target. The ability has a 3s cooldown.

If you get a Shard, you can activate Dispersion, increasing the damage you reflect by 100% for 5s. Players who get an Aghnaim’s Scepter will receive a new ability called Haunt that allows Spectre to summon an illusion for 7s that deals 80% damage.

Talents

The next thing that people should check besides the Spectre Dota 2 arcana is the different talents.

• Level 10 – +5 All Stats or Spectral Dagger has -4s cooldown
• Level 15 – +80 Damage to Spectral Dagger or Desolate +12 Damage
• Level 20 – Spectre Dagger slows down by an additional 12% and provides MS or +350 HP
• Level 25 – Dispersion reflects an additional 5% or Haunt’s Illusions Deal +30% Damage

Spectre Dota 2 Guide – Tips

Aside from the cool Dota 2 Spectre skins you will have access to, you also need to know how to play with the hero to be effective. Generally speaking, there are 2 main routes you can take – late game farming or mid-game dominance.

Choosing the first route will require you to farm as much as possible and get items like Radiance that will increase your farming speed even more. That said, those who decide to focus on the mid-game have to get completely different items, such as Diffusal Blade, Urn of Shadow, Aghanim’s Scepter, and more.

Besides deciding what kind of build to focus on, keep in mind that Spectre is in a unique position compared to other carries because she can farm and always take part in a team fight with her ultimate. The latter is powerful, especially against weak support heroes, so the enemy team will have a lot of problems.

Speaking of issues, Spectre’s only downside is that the hero is really weak early on, and enemies will want to exploit this. You can often see a lot of the best laners in the game go up against Spectre in an attempt to prevent the hero from farming.

Thanks to Desolate, Spectre is among the best 1v1 heroes in Dota 2. Her tankiness also allows her to outlive a lot of the other top carries, including the likes of Medusa.

Dota 2 Spectre Guide – Items

Choosing your preferred Spectre Dota 2 build means that you have to focus on completely different items. So, here are some of the things that the hero can go for.

Starting Items

The best starting items for Spectre include HP regen and stats. Usually, players get a Circlet and Branches that they can use to get a Wraith Band and a Wand later on.

Early game

Besides Boots of Speed, most Spectre players go for a Band and a Magic Wand to get more stats.

Mid game

This is where you have to decide what kind of items you want to go for. If you want to participate in fights, you should get Phase Boots/Urn of Shadow, followed by Diffusal Blade. If the hero manages to snowball, players can also go for an Aghanim’s Scepter. On the other hand, those who want to focus on the late game usually try to get Radiance as fast as possible because this item increases their farming speed. If Spectre got it prior to the mid-game, the hero could also go for a Manta Style immediately after that.

Late game

The best late game items for Spectre are Eye of Skadi, HoT, and Butterfly. However, the hero can also get AC, Monkey King Bar, Abyssal Blade, and more. 

Dota 2 Specter Counter

Spectre can be an unstoppable force in the right hands, but the hero also has a lot of counters that players need to know about. So, before checking the Spectre Dota 2 wiki, here’s what you need to know.

• Anti-Mage – AM may have problems dealing with an ultra-late Spectre, but the hero is pretty good against this hero before that.
• Necrophos – Necro’s ultimate is extremely dangerous against Spectre, and the hero deals a lot of damage to high-HP targets, which works well against Spectre.
• Troll Warlord –  Most people do not think of Troll when talking about counters, but the hero is pretty good against Spectre and among the few that can deal with her in a 1v1 situation.

Final Thoughts

Whether you have the Dota 2 Spectre Arcana or not, this hero deserves your attention. She is incredibly strong and can do a lot of damage, regardless of which type of item builds you go for. The hero is pretty strong in most metas, so give it a shot.