Cow strats & itemization

[martY]

So it's no secret that I enjoy heroes that are bursty/have a lot of map control and I'd like to start mastering Cow.

 

I've been flobing around with itemization, talents and my skill leveling order for about a day or two, but still haven't hit upon an obvious winning combo.

 

I know I could do pure INT, but I'm looking for more of a battlemage kind of build where I can take advantage of his clips to deal big AA damage and still have enough INT to deliver a heavy hitting combo.

 

I rolled w/ something like Khala Stone, Revolver --> Atom Smasher, Grav, Goggles --> Sym Seed, Rod --> Cerebro. It sort of worked, but I didn't get enough early farm and screwed myself over in the late game a few times. The early game harass was awesome though and I pulled off a couple first bloods against non-scrubs even though I had no idea wtf I was doing.

 

So, how do you guys build your Cow now? I know there are a couple excellent Cow players on this forum, so I'm looking for items, talents & skill order.

[Darkr]

Cow has been nerfed to the ground (still playable, but very hard now tho). Build pure int, maybe atom/cerebro mid-late game. I like to open with either x2 soul engine+pots, or treasure (altho I don't do that very often, because of its new unique). I do Q-W-Q-E-Q-R-Q as my starting skills... E doesn't do too much nowadays, so I max it out later mid game. Later on just max out Q, then E, then R then your int,agi,str and at the end your W. The secret is, to get your toilets right. Only use them when u have 2 charges (u can use one if your ally is asking or u have a free kill and u have to use one to get it). Not many pubbers know this, ik you are no pubber, and probably everone knows it here in forum, but it's most important tip of cow; see them two... things sticking out of cow's shoulders? yeah they tell you how many charges you have atm. For the talents, I just go with deafult, cos most of the time I alt-tab the loading and don't have time to pick the talents for cow, but you can pick your own. Just go full-int. Get might talent.

Edited December 18, 2014 by Darkr

[martY]

Yeah the charge system is one of the reasons I enjoy Cow: you need a high level of awareness or your team dies.

 

So you don't max anything at level 7? I've been going W-Q-Q-E-Q-R-Q for max wall damage as early as possible. Since W doesn't really give you additional mobility whether it's level 1 or level 4, I've been maxing E next instead. That said, I've been toying with the idea of a jungle cow with max W, I just haven't played enough to execute it well.

 

I'd love to try Revolver/FoE for AA damage with Grav/Rod for INT or something like that. Item order is really important to my playstyle.

[Darkr]

Yeah the charge system is one of the reasons I enjoy Cow: you need a high level of awareness or your team dies.

 

So you don't max anything at level 7? I've been going W-Q-Q-E-Q-R-Q for max wall damage as early as possible. Since W doesn't really give you additional mobility whether it's level 1 or level 4, I've been maxing E next instead. That said, I've been toying with the idea of a jungle cow with max W, I just haven't played enough to execute it well.

 

I'd love to try Revolver/FoE for AA damage with Grav/Rod for INT or something like that. Item order is really important to my playstyle.

My mistake. Edited. Just played cow and realised that is was possible, just get wall first. Very handy thing.

Cow no jungle tho. You can do it with your team jungler just to get exp tho.

Don't get FoE. It's useless on cow. Revolver situational. Like when ur trying to kill a carry.

Rod is OK. Gravity too.

Edited December 18, 2014 by Darkr

[Spooky]

I used to build cow with Energy Saber, Revolver (later BHM or Atom) and INT items - but only for pubs. Doesn't rly work in inhouses. However provides nice synergy between his AoE burst damage and single target from Capacitive Clip. Anyway energy pools are lower now, so Energy Saber isn't as good as it used to be.

[OPReN]

wow you guys are so good

build attack damage on int gj

[Adamantium]

What's cows int scaling

[OPReN]

What's cows int scaling

it increases depending on how much unit did you hit :P

[HarryHootie]

you can go support with him and tell ur boros to go toilet cliff with you and pull them into ur pit

[Moo]

Doug used to play aa cow constantly, but his build relied on energy saber for a lot of his weapon damage, as only force of entropy and atom smasher gave any besides esaber. You can still try it though. He went atom smasher, FoE/Cerebro, energy saber, gravity/argus/tank items/anything you feel like.

[OPReN]

Doug used to play aa cow constantly, but his build relied on energy saber for a lot of his weapon damage, as only force of entropy and atom smasher gave any besides esaber. You can still try it though. He went atom smasher, FoE/Cerebro, energy saber, gravity/argus/tank items/anything you feel like.

Why mix builds?

it will just drop your output damage so bad

pure int >>>>>>>>>>>>>>> pure damage >>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>> hybrid

[Moo]

 

Why mix builds?

it will just drop your output damage so bad

pure int >>>>>>>>>>>>>>> pure damage >>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>> hybrid

It works. Doug regularly went godlike with it and had quite a few games with more than 20 kills and less than 5 deaths. The gravity/argus increases the spell damage from atom smasher, capacitive clip, and gives energy for energy saber, so your attavks with atom smasher and E proc deal huge amounts of damage. They also make his abilities deal a decent amount of damage, obviously. The FoE and atom smasher make you decently tanky also. Atom smasher gives a ton of burst on your auto with E proc. Energy saber gives you a ton of weapon damage for the scaling on his double auto attack. It makes you a jack-of-all-trades, and if you get ahead it snowballs really hard, which is how it works in pubs. Just try it out. It might be even better with the energy changes, since you don't get a lot of early int anyways, and the base energy might be more than what you used to get from base int and lightning rod int. Energy saber is the thing that holds the build together really, along with atom smasher.

[Darkr]

Cow ulti is now crap at small range, to be honest. Deals only 250 +small number of int weapon damage. And it's only easy to toilet far range when someone's running, at least with the old one if you missed you didn't have to wait a long time before you could toilet again. E Passive is now wouldn't say useless, but not good enough. W is great. Q is brilliant.

[martY]

Why mix builds?

it will just drop your output damage so bad

pure int >>>>>>>>>>>>>>> pure damage >>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>> hybrid

 

It's not as black and white as you're making it out to be. When your hero has a skill that benefits from +weapon dmg and has the tools to hold his own in a 1v1, then you have more room to experiment with builds. Not to mention he's a strength hero, so you're also making him tankier every time you add STR for damage purposes.

 

For the reasons Moo listed above, you can really obliterate squishy heroes with a hybrid build. Cow has such a spammable skill set that Revolver procs all the time. Combined with the extra damage from E and your regular skills and you can become a pretty serious force on the map under the right circumstances.

Edited December 19, 2014 by martY

[OPReN]

It's not as black and white as you're making it out to be. When your hero has a skill that benefits from +weapon dmg and has the tools to hold his own in a 1v1, then you have more room to experiment with builds. Not to mention he's a strength hero, so you're also making him tankier every time you add STR for damage purposes.

 

For the reasons Moo listed above, you can really obliterate squishy heroes with a hybrid build. Cow has such a spammable skill set that Revolver procs all the time. Combined with the extra damage from E and your regular skills and you can become a pretty serious force on the map under the right circumstances.

It works. Doug regularly went godlike with it and had quite a few games with more than 20 kills and less than 5 deaths. The gravity/argus increases the spell damage from atom smasher, capacitive clip, and gives energy for energy saber, so your attavks with atom smasher and E proc deal huge amounts of damage. They also make his abilities deal a decent amount of damage, obviously. The FoE and atom smasher make you decently tanky also. Atom smasher gives a ton of burst on your auto with E proc. Energy saber gives you a ton of weapon damage for the scaling on his double auto attack. It makes you a jack-of-all-trades, and if you get ahead it snowballs really hard, which is how it works in pubs. Just try it out. It might be even better with the energy changes, since you don't get a lot of early int anyways, and the base energy might be more than what you used to get from base int and lightning rod int. Energy saber is the thing that holds the build together really, along with atom smasher.

i go godlike with int shadow in pub

nerf int shadow?

[martY]

i go godlike with int shadow in pub

nerf int shadow?

 

??????????????

 

Anyway, think I finally found something I like after playing a few more games: Duran's Pendant, Rod (Cerebro), Revolver (Atom Smasher), Ihan, Argus, Grav

 

I tried FoE instead of Ihan to make up for the HP, but honestly I just don't AA enough to justify the item. With Cow, your AA is more like a follow-up to your burst. Sticking around to AA enemies down tended to get my ass killed in later team fights.

 

Atom Smasher really seems to be the only STR/damage item you need with Cow. As long as you have enough INT to spam your spells, you're constantly using your clips and Revolver procs all the time.

 

For talents, I'm using Might/Cunning/Fury, Fitness/Integrity and Prodigy/Swiftness. I saw a couple replays where Cow players are using Youth and Brilliance, but I just don't think they're necessary with proper itemization.

 

Thanks for all your input dudes

 

EDIT: and to answer this question

 

What's cows int scaling

 

50% INT for Q, 30% for W, 6% for E and 40% for R (+up to 100% damage if you fire w/ two charges across max distance)

Edited December 20, 2014 by martY

[DutchOvenPro]

only 2 ways to really play cow.... first you go 4-0-3, get demigod...first item buckler... save your energy early as you will run out quick.. when u have a charge of demi use ur w to get close and poke enemy w/ your e... aa creep to farm don't waste ur charges on them... i then get pendant/Se, and from there rush argus/grav/yamato in that order... then warp shard then symphonic, then that spell leech item forget name... offers great int + cd reduction last item can be w/e int item u feel like... nitrogen or sfg or even some health item organic... I usually go pure int

 

If you want to have fun... you can get buckler,lr/cerebro/smasher/carapace and w/e else... but this falls off late game when others catch up

 

 

int is the way to go... so ez

[Darkr]

OP necro... kind of...