SPEEDPAINT: Zephyr vs. Pestilence

Kingaby is disgustingly talented. He won the Steelseries HoN mousepad contest with this.

HoN Zephyr Hero Guide

Zephyr

Zephyr is a HoN-unique melee Agility hero.  This big, bad owl is a master of jungle and has been known to carry even the heaviest KingRavens on your team.  Let’s take a close look at his abilities:

Gust (q)

Zephyr “summons a gust of wind in the direction of his choosing,” which pushes, damages, and stuns an area of units.  Zephyr lost some chasing and escaping power in the 0.1.66 patch with the removal of his Leap ability, but in its place Gust has given him a much greater team-fighting spell.  The combination of forced movement on multiple units, damage, and even short duration stun all in one spell is so powerful that Gust will likely be nerfed heavily in future patches, so enjoy it while you can.  Gust is also a very unique ability as it is the only one in HoN or Dota cast by first clicking then dragging to pick the start location and direction of the gust (direction is indicated by the arrow in the upper left image).  This is pretty simple to do, but requires you to act quickly so that enemy units don’t move out of the targeted area while you are still cautiously aiming the direction arrow.

Cyclones (w)

Zephyr summons a small cyclone around him with every last hit.  These cyclones patrol around him and deal magic damage to enemy units they touch.  They may also be consumed one by one to heal Zephyr for 30 life a piece, or will automatically be consumed after several seconds to heal him for only 15 life.  In the 0.1.66 patch, Cyclones were changed to no longer require mana to consume and no longer give mana back when consumed.  At Level 4, the Cyclones ability allows 8 cyclones to be active at one time, which will deal a great amount of damage in a small area around Zephyr and allow him to quickly kill creep camps or any enemy heroes to which he can stay close enough.  The Cyclones ability is complemented well by items like Mock of Brilliance or Frostfield Plate that can add further damage or slow to an AOE around Zephyr so he can continue to put out high damage.

Wind Shield (passive)

Zephyr “uses his control of the wind to create a protective barrier around himself”, which grants increased movement speed, evasion of melee units, and a chance to deflect an incoming ranged attack.  These passive abilities only trigger for a few seconds after Zephyr lands an attack, so he must be actively involved in a battle to make full use of it.

Typhoon (r) (ultimate)

Zephyr “creates a mighty Typhoon”, which slows and damages enemy units based on their distance from its center (with most damage and slow being dealt at the center).  Similar to Tempest’s ultimate, this is a great AOE spell for team battles.  Typhoon also resets Zephyr’s Cyclone count to max so he can quickly dish out even more AOE damage or consume them to recover life.

Strategy

Recommended Skill Build

1. Cyclones
2. Gust
3. Cyclones
4. Gust
5. Cyclones
6. Typhoon
7. Cyclones
8. Gust
9. Gust
10. Wind Shield
11. Typhoon
12. Wind Shield
13. Wind Shield
14. Wind Shield
15. Stats
16. Typhoon
17. Stats -> Level 25

Explanation: Cyclones and Gust are essential early game and should be maxxed out quickly.  Typhoon is useful early to help generate kills if you are ganking your lane, but you can also hold off on learning it till Level 9 if you see yourself sticking to the jungle and just not using it early game.  Wind Shield is not needed until later in the game when Zephyr will be absorbing a lot of punishment in team battles, and can learned after Gust and Cyclones are maxxed.

Early Game

Recommended Early Game items:

+ +

Logger’s Hatchet + Iron Shield + Helm of the Black Legion

So much of Zephyr’s success is dependent on getting last hits to generate more Cyclones, so make use of Logger’s Hatchet early to help you get creep kills and denies.  An Iron Shield will also help with creep kills by adding 6 Agility, and will give you some much needed damage protection from harassment during the time you spend in lane.  Early game you should be pulling creeps until you are strong enough to hit the jungle, come then gank your lane periodically if your teammate needs help.  Grabbing an early Lifetube from the side shop will help you keep your hp up and not return to base while farming, and can be turned later into Helm of the Black Legion, which will let you kill any level of creep camps and tank you up to start being more aggressive to get on top of enemy heroes to get kills with Cyclones.

Mid Game

Recommended Mid Game items:

+ maybe

Mock of Brilliance + maybe Shaman’s Headdress

Mock of Brilliance is a lot of work to farm but once you get it you are almost certain to carry your team.  Mock adds a ton of AOE damage to the AOE damage you will already be doing with Cyclones and Typhoon in team battles.  You should also consider getting a Shaman’s Headdress or Barrior Idol if the other team is putting out a ton of magic damage, but you will probably need to also get more hit points to make this worthwhile.

Late Game

Recommended Late Game items:

+ or or

Behemoth’s Heart + Barbed Armor or Daemonic Breastplate or Frostfield Plate

Late game it is time to tank up so you can get to the center of battles and stay alive while dealing as much damage with your Cyclones and Mock of Brilliance.  Behemoth’s Heart is essential, and one of the above three armor items.