General DiscussionMedusa advice please

Looks like you were following an outdated passive build.

Max snake and land the last jump on heroes in the early game. Don't rush a linkens. Get phase + Aquila/drums then a farming item - I get a maelstrom but yasha is good. Then bulk up - skadi for me. And then whatever you need - linkens/mkb/manta etc.

Dusa is super strong in lane if you max snake and use it properly.

Ahh that explains the fucked up itemization then, I was getting wrecked in lane so I was and no luck or nothing.

Thanks for that dude.

By level 5 you should have level 3 snake and level 2 mana shield, so start spamming it when enemies come close to their own creeps, in order to hit them last. Profit. There is no way you lose your lane. You can even solo vs 3 sometimes. Personally I like to have aquila in lane early on, right after brown boots, then magic wand if needed (most of the times you'll need it). Treads(or go straight for Boots of Travel, if you are farming well) -> Maelstrom -> Manta -> Skadi -> Butterfly, but you should adapt to your own situation. Don't follow builds blindly, always buy items according to what your team need/what to counter enemies.

^unless you are versus AM with orb of venom supported by Ogre Magi.

Like they said max snakes its really overpowered, i personally do snakes/stats/snakes/stats/snakes/ult/snakes/mana shield the linkens build has become pretty underwhelming compared to say ring of aq/phase/drums/maelstrom but in this meta dusa can be a very risky pick. Spec/sven can outcarry her midgame and end before she is viable, ods mana steal makes her useless in drawn out encounters, a hero like nyx makes her much easier to gank and kill early game, and of course quas wex invoker can steal all her mana in one combo for the first 20 mins.
While dusa is a lot of fun and can be nigh unkillable late-game, the direction the meta is going is going to push her out.

Why do you wait so long to max out split shot? I disagree there.

I'd go snake, shield, then max snake whenever possible, split shot second, 1 point in ult is fine until everything else is maxed, though I don't always follow this.

Items is easy. Start with wraith band and tangoes cus her dmg is shit starting and you need to cs. Then get phase boots, if you are having trouble last hitting you can get a blade of attack before brown boots if lane is pretty safe. Then aquila. Then... mask of madness. Yup. Amazing farm item on medusa, you jsut run between jungle camps clearing them with split shot plus mask active. It's epic. Then a yasha.

From there are the decisions. Sange and yasha is good if you want to fight now, otherwise you can go manta if you need the dispel. Or you can just rush skadi. But skadi is core, and you want to finish the yasha into something.

From there it's more decisions. If you need to tank more and block stuff linkens is fine, or scythe of vyse. Bkb can be really good too especially vs anti mage. Otherwise just get dmg, butterfly if they have right click, mkb if they have dodge, daedulus if none of those apply. Sell your mask at some point. My favorite 6 slot build is probably phase boots, mkb, daedulus, butterfly, skadi, s&y/manta.

https://yasp.co/matches/2234768967/purchases

you got rekd in lane because you didn't buy any more regen besides your starting items. your job in the early game is to farm and if you can't because your HP is too low, then it's much better to bring another salve (or tangos) on the courier than it is to go back to base and teleport back, since you can still stay in XP range and you may still be able to get some last hits even at low HP if it's not going to put you at risk of dying.

starting items were poor imo. for anyone that goes aquila you either get the circlet and the wraith band recipe so that you can finish the wraith band in the side shop for the 9 damage, or you start with a ring of protection so that you can get a basi in lane, and basi's extra good on dusa because mana is basically extra health, so mana regen is basically health regen.

mana snake got a huge buff in that it now steals a percentage of mana, so maxing it by 7 seems to be the standard build right now, whereas in previous patches people would skip snake entirely for stats, and max split shot to farm faster.

in my opinion it's not worth getting the second level in stone gaze until your basic abilities are maxed. the difference between level 1 and 2 stone gaze is only a 10% attack damage increase, when you could either get another point into split shot which will help you farm faster and probably ends up doing more physical damage than stone gaze's 10% increase, another point into snake which would increase the damage, number of bounces and mana drain which would do more damage and also give you more mana for mana shield, or another point into mana shield which would make you more survivable.

from the replay I see you have midas on quickbuy - midas is a crap farming item for carries anyway. carries that get midas get it because midas accelerates their level gain. examples would be invoker and slark, and maybe wraith king. invoker wants to level up his orbs and slark wants lv 2/3 ultimate. wraith king wants reincarnate maxed for the much lower cooldown. for most other carries, the extra movement speed from either a yasha or madness and the sustain from lifesteal will allow you to farm faster than a midas would.

until 47 minutes your only significant item was a manta style which doesn't have a high impact. it's a defensive item for removing silences or dodging stuns, not a damage item which is a pretty big misconception.

having a skadi would have been more useful as it gives more stats (so more survivability), as well as a slow which is useful since dusa can have issues with being kited. manta doesn't help you farm much more than the yasha does, so if you upgrade yasha to manta it's basically 3k gold that's wasted that could be spent instead on a farming item like maelstrom.

if you had gotten your items in a decent timing it probably would have still been okay to build suboptimal items, the fact that you had only aquila and boots by the 14 minute mark was a much bigger reason on why your impact was so low that game, which was because you tried to get a naked midas and also didn't buy any extra regen to allow yourself to keep farming, so you spent most of the time hiding under your tower when you could have been farming creeps if you had brought yourself a salve on the courier.

^ That's true about Midas. I used to rush Midas on Dusa when I was 2k scrub until I realise that I wasn't really that level dependent. Once you have ult, you're good to go on your farming game and avoid ganks in order to build up more farming items to farm more to get even more farming items. Talk about logic.

Honestly, medusa is really OP if there are no mana burners on the enemy side. Also, I don't understand how do people lose lanes with her easily, she can stand against a duo lane really well unless they're too agressive (mainly because her 600 range). Also, in most cases you won't need your ult early, it costs a lot of mana and you won't need to max it until later. Put one point in it at something like level 11 and don't max it until over 17-18. And linken's is OK in most cases. But you shouldn't upgrade yasha into manta unless you really need that dispel.

I like to go 1-4-1-1 by 7. The casual point in split shot lets you farm camps if the wave is pushed too far and the point in mana shield is needed to keep you alive if you get ganked. Max snake for lane dominance. Medusa is weakest before level 5. After that snake can pretty much just win most lanes. Always get one point in ult at 6 because its almost a guaranteed escape when used with a TP scroll. Don't skill ult again Until you have a major damage item.
If you're forced to be in fights or if you get pressured a lot while farming max mana shield second. Otherwise max split shot to increase farm rate.

For items: I like getting Aquila>boots> maelstrom as my first few items. I get linkens next only if I'm definitely going to need a Linkens this game. Otherwise I go straight skadi. After the Skadi/Linken's I get a damage item. MKB if I need one and Daedalus if not. I don't like butterfly this early since the evasion can be countered and the damage from the agility gets reduced by split shot, whereas raw damage from Daedalus does not.
After the damage item get skadi if you don't have one, then just get more damage items. Get BOTS once you run out of space for TPs. If needed don't be afraid to get Rapier. But also don't buy it unnecessarily. Butterfly Moodshard and Scythe are all good late game items.
I really don't like Manta on medusa. I feel it doesn't do enough in either damage or survivability to warrant buying it over other items. You can usually live with being silenced since mana shield should never be off late game and you should usually have split shot on. You can win fights late game without Ult and snake and in any case its rare that the enemy will kill you within the silence duration so you will probably be able to get ult off anyway. If you're so out of position that they can kill you in a silence duration then manta probably wouldn't have saved you anyway.

Remember you're pretty much the hardest carry in the game, so even if your team has a bad start you can always make a comeback, so don't give up.

snke shield split snake snake

Maelstrom is ok but you already have aoe skill for farming

Aquila phase perseverance maelstrom is your early game. Perseverance becomes linkens, and manta is a horrible item because you remove so much of your ehp by using the active.

After linkens I like mjolnir into fly/skadi then around half the time I just go divine, the other half mkb.

Just experiment to see what suits your playstyle best!

Actually raw damage gets reduced, too. It isn't shown in the hus tho.