Fayde, (nerubian assasin)

 

Skill Build:

1 - Stance
2 - Burning Shadows
3 - Burning Shadows
4 - Cull
5 - Burning Shadows
6 - Reflection
7 - Burning Shadows
8 - Cull
9 - Cull
10 - Cull
11 - Reflection
12 - Stats
13 - Stats
14 - Stats
15 - Stats
16 - Reflection
17 - Stats+
23 - Stance+

Justification / Modifications:

In my opinion Shadow Stance is superior to Scythe Stance since you want the ranged stun and melee nuke. Therefore you get 1 point into Scythe Stance right away and switch to that.
Maxing Burning Shadows over Cull is a matter of taste, but I prefer the ranged hero-only stun over the melee stun that hits creeps too. If you are going to max Cull, consider not taking the first point in Stances initially.
Extra level of Stances are not worth taking over stats, ever.

Starting Items:

2x

Core:

(Hatchet >>) Bottle >> Marchers >> Power Supply >> Striders

Striders are core. Ghost Marchers can be picked up initially to be disassembled later, but Striders are still the best boots on her.

After core:

Codex >> Codex level 2 >> Codex level 3 >> Codex level 4 >> Codex level 5 >> Spellshards >> Puzzlebox

Yep. Codex level 5. She's a nil-to-kill ganker with built-in invisibility and max movement speed. Equip her as such. The ability to instagib a carry or an important hero at any point in the game with maxed nukes and Codex is worth any amount of money you spend on Codex.

Information:

Roles: Ganker
Preferred Lane: Any
Difficulty: 5/5 (requires a different kind of playstyle than any other)
Farming capabilities: 3/5
Item dependent? - Yes, need Codex, Striders and Bottle to kill solo.
Power:
- Early Game / Lane Control: 4/5 (Burning Shadows is a very strong stun in lane)
- Mid Game / Ganks: 5/5 (Ever been instagibbed while farming neutrals before?)
- Late Game / Team Fights: 3/5 (tapers off quite heavily by the time the important targets have enough HP to survive her burst, still a mega threat to somewhat squishy key initiators/disablers like Tempest and Witch Slayer and the general run of the mill supports.

Tips and Tricks:

- Autoattack out of Reflection to get the bonus damage, and then stun STRAIGHT AWAY. I see so many people screw these two basic things up, and that's half of your damage potential gone in an instant and the gank opportunity gone.
- HP counting is extremely important for you as a Fayde player to succeed. You have invisibility, and the leisure of knowing what your target's effective HP will be BEFORE you go all-in on him. If the preferred target is going to survive without any real trouble, it is usually better to find another target or get some assistance. Someone with a Portal Key is very good for this.
- Blow all your nukes on the target straight away. There's no point in waiting. If you're going to kill them, it needs to be in the space of your stun duration.
- Sneak up invis, unleash hell. Don't just use invis to escape, that is wasted potential from level 11 onwards. You should be ganking and not farming much.
- In teamfights, if you can't annihilate someone off to the side before they can contribute - be sure to hit Burning Shadows stun on as many people as you can. It has a long range and quite a long stun duration as well. This can make or break fights.

Counters:

- A Revelation Ward dropped just in front of you, or in the midst of your team as you're pushing a tower (obviously away from tower detection range!) will allow you the time to react to her sneaking up to you to gank someone.
- She is no carry, so you don't need to be too worried about her getting freefarm. Actually let her farm, that's better than having her roaming around.
- As with any ganking hero, Wards are a good counter. But do note she has invis and can sneak past Wards of Sight.