Scout (i personally hate him)

Skill Build:

1 - Electric Eye
2 - Vanish
3 - Vanish
4 - Disarm
5 - Vanish
6 - Marksman's Shot
7 - Vanish
8 - Disarm
9 - Disarm
10 - Disarm
11 - Marksman's Shot
12 - Electric Eye
13 - Electric Eye
14 - Electric Eye
15 - Stats
16 - Marksman's Shot
17 - Stats+

Justification / Modifications:

Straightforward build. Eye is taken at level 1 to ward rune with one spare one for use in lane. If by some reason you're in the vertical lane, ward their pull camp rather than the rune. Make your team suffer for putting you in the vertical lane and buy wards for the rune (they're better anyway).
Get more levels of Eye early instead of Disarm if you want to block more creepcamps in the jungle, or feel you need more vision to stay safe in your lane.
As of the re-alignment patch, Marksman's Shot is now worth taking at 6.

Starting Items:

3x

Core:

(Hatchet >>) Power Supply >> Sustainer >> Steamboots >> Runed Axe

CK or die.
Power Supply can save your life with only 2 charges to be able to vanish. Mana Battery is worth the initial pickup, just for the charge mechanic giving you warning and survivability. After that get Lifetube against a strong lane or Manatube against a weaker lane first (Manatube allows for Vanish spam while Lifetube counters their harass). Complete Sustainer, pick up Steamboots and finish off runed axe. If your farm is really good skip boots until after Runed Axe (this means if you can get a <17min Runed Axe go for it).
Ghost Marchers are ok as long as you realize that it detracts from survivability, but adds slightly more damage than Steamboots for Vanish. Activating Phase breaks Vanish. Be careful.
Once you get Runed Axe, you can clear a full wave of creeps in a matter of 2 seconds out of Vanish. Make use of that to farm your luxury items.
CK or die.

After core:

Savage Mace >> Shrunken Head >> Symbol of Rage

Savage Mace is the DPS item of choice for a Scout whose carry potential is entirely within the space of a Flurry from Vanish. Pick up either lifesteal in the form of SoR or even a Shrunken Head to make sure you can do your thing in teamfights and live to see another Flurry.

Alternative Items:

Shieldbreaker: The listed build is relatively passive and safe. If you are farming very well, you can replace the lengthier Savage Mace with a quick Shieldbreaker beforehand. Farmed before the 25-30 minute mark it is very very effective.

Information:

Roles: Hard Carry
Preferred Lane: Horizontal lane, with a babysit.
Difficulty: 2/5 (a fairly easy hero to play, but has several important nuances to do with counterwarding and silencing effectively)
Farming capabilities: 3/5 (SEVERELY crippled until he gets Runed Axe, one of the fastest farmers in the game with it)
Item dependent? - Yes, very.
Power:
- Early Game / Lane Control: 1/5 (Contributes nothing particularly, short of an Electric Eye in lane to silence)
- Mid Game / Ganks: 3/5 (Starts putting out a bit of damage after Runed Axe, ult is pretty good as a pickoff skill or initiation)
- Late Game / Team Fights: 4/5 (very strong if not countered by anti-invis)

30-Seconds-Guide:

- Is it time to win yet? If yes, genocide. If not, farm.
- Get eyes. Plant them before the creeps spawn at your rune spot and, if in the long lane, in their neutral pull spot (put it into the trees next to the camp. This will still block the camp and they can't easily spot it).
- Is it time to win yet? If yes, genocide. If not, farm.
- If they have a jungling hero consider putting both wards into their forest, or even getting a third level of Eyes early. It really ****s up a Tempest or Ophelia.
- Is it time to win yet? If yes, genocide. If not, farm.
- Set an Eye before ganks and blow it up by pressing "E" one second after you break out of Vanish.
- Is it time to win yet? If yes, genocide. If not, farm.
- Once you get Electric Eye level 4, plant wards in their forest to check for easy gank opportunities. The beauty of Electric Eyes are that they stay indefinitely, but have a short vision range and are detected by proximity (walking close to them). You can afford to put them in obscure places, where nobody will feasibly walk near but still give vision of people passing by.
- Is it time to win yet? If yes, genocide. If not, farm.
- Early on, staying in Vanish for extended periods of time will drain your mana dry very quickly. Generally, you want to use it initially as a distance closer, or just to flick on and off to get yourself Flurry. The initial cost is only 30 mana, but the upkeep cost is 5 mana/second at level 4. It may take a bit of practice, but get in the habit of simply using it as a damage output when you need to with its low cooldown.
- Is it time to win yet? If yes, genocide. If not, farm.
- Electric Eyes are most useful for counterwarding as they reveal all kinds of invisible units. This is Scout's main way of ensuring that nobody comes to give him any surprises, by heavily cutting into any map control that the other team is trying to extend into your territory. This also cuts down on the burden of Wards and counterwards on your support heroes (if any are actually buying them!) and allows them to be used in more offensive ward spots. This allows the rest of your team to be much more aggressive without being blind to what they may be running into, which is ALWAYS a good thing.
- Is it time to win yet? If yes, genocide. If not, farm.

Counters:

- The obvious counters to Scout are invisibility revealing items: Dust, Wards of Revelation and Bound Eye. Dust and Wards are the best choice until later in the game when you can safely buy an Eye and push.
- He has high physical burst damage from Flurry so armour and especially Barbed Armour will work very well.