Top 10 Utility Aghanim’s Scepters for Cores
Image by Alexander Frey
“The scepter of a wizard with demigod-like powers.”
On May 24, 2019, the 7.22 patch brought Aghanim’s Scepter upgrades for all the heroes in the game. Some upgrades were amazing and called for an immediate nerf. Others left people scratching their heads.
Aghanim’s Scepter is a unique item in Dota as every hero now has a reason to buy it. Some heroes buy it first, other heroes ignore it completely. Some upgrades are situational and others are required for the hero to function properly.
In this article, we’ll go over the top 10 most impactful utility Aghanim’s Scepters for cores.
Nature's Prophet
Wrath of Nature
- Increases initial damage
- Spawns a Nature's Call Nature's Call treant whenever a unit dies within a few seconds of being hit
- Killing a hero will spawn a Greater Treant with more damage and health than a normal one
Nature’s Prophet excels at creating space and pushing out the lanes. An Aghanim’s Scepter enhances these abilities to outrageous proportions.
It can be annoying to play against a Nature’s Prophet whose sole intent is to push out every lane so their cores can catch up if they’re behind. If you’re not coordinated or prepared to defend your towers, you might lose a barracks or two.
A scepter upgrade for Nature’s Prophet means lanes will continue to be pushed every time the ability is up if you don’t have a way to deal with it. This is similar to losing a barracks, the lane will always be pushed in, except Wrath of Nature can push in every lane.
Lone Druid
Summon Spirit Bear
- Allows the Spirit Bear to attack at any range from Lone Druid
- Prevents the Spirit Bear from dying if Lone Druid dies
This upgrade essentially creates two heroes. Lone Druid’s Spirit Bear is often where all the items go so when the bear gets a few items and can roam around the map without a leash, watch out.
This allows split pushing to happen like very few heroes are capable of. If one of your lanes is pushed in while you’re pushing with your team on the other side of the map, the Spirit Bear can Boots of Travel in, deal a ton of damage to your tier three tower, and force teleports to defend the base, then Lone Druid can summon back the bear like nothing happened.
Ursa
Enrage
- Can be cast while disabled
- Reduces the cooldown from 50 / 40 / 30 to 30 / 24 / 18
When this upgrade was initially introduced, many Ursa players built this item first. Now, it’s a situational item but still very useful.
In some ways, this upgrade is better than a Black King Bar. You can’t use a BKB when you’re disabled, there’s diminishing returns, and there’s no damage reduction.
With this upgrade, you can jump into fights without any worry at all. If you get disabled or almost die, you can pop your ultimate at any time and buy time for your allies to jump in or run at the enemy some more. With an 18 second cooldown at max level, you can use Enrage multiple times in a fight.
Void Spirit
Resonant Pulse
- Causes Resonant Pulse to silence and gain two charges.
Void Spirit is a new hero in this game but his role is becoming defined. Jump in, do a lot of damage, cause chaos, and jump out.
Resonant Pulse helps him with the jumping in part. He gains a shield that protects him from physical damage which is always helpful. Adding a silence to this ability increases the impact he has by jumping into fights and causes more chaos.
Ember Spirit
Fire Remnant
- Increases the cast range, initial remnant speed, and maximum charges
Activate Fire Remnant
- Activate Fire Remnant costs less mana
Ember Spirit is similar to Void Spirit in that he jumps in and deals a ton of damage and jumps out.
By increasing the cast range, speed, and maximum charges of Fire Remnant, it allows Ember Spirit to be more Ember Spirity.
With this upgrade, everything you can do with Fire Remnants can be done better. You can jump further which leads to better catch or escape. You have more charges which leads to more combos and play making potential. You increase your travel speed which helps the previous two abilities. This seems pretty useful if you’re an Ember Spirit player.
Centaur Warrunner
Stampede
- Increases damage resistance and allows allies to run through obstructions such as trees, cliffs, etc.
- Destroys trees
One of the tankiest heroes in the game, Centaur shares this tankiness with his team by upgrading with an Aghanim’s Scepter.
Stampede is a global spell that provides 40% damage reduction and allows allies to run over cliffs in the duration. This has great save potential and opens up the potential of Stampede usage.
Without the upgrade, Stampede would mostly be used for initiations or escapes. If you get a Scepter, you turn this ability into one of the best saving spells in the game.
Weaver
Time Lapse
- Cooldown is reduced
- Can target allied heroes within range
This is one of the more unique spells in the game. Time Lapse allows Weaver to travel back in time before he was hurt.
The Scepter upgrade grants Weaver the ability to force his allies to travel back in time as well. No longer do you have to live with the regret of running uphill into four heroes and losing 80% of your health. Your buddy Weaver will be there to turn back the clock and give you another opportunity to say, “You know what? It’s not a good idea to walk uphill into the enemy jungle with no vision.”
A well placed Time Lapse can be game changing. If the enemy blows all their cooldowns trying to kill your ally and you use Time Lapse on them, they’ll be demoralized like nothing else.
Storm Spirit
Electric Vortex
- Becomes a 475 radius ability around Storm Spirit
- Requires vision over the units to affect them
Electric Vortex has a 16 second cooldown and what the Aghanim’s Scepter upgrade does is essentially turn it into a mini black hole. Except with a shorter duration and area of effect.
Still, any disable that can affect five heroes needs to be considered before everyone jumps in to kill a Bristleback.
Storm Spirit’s natural playstyle involves jumping in and out of fights. With this upgrade, he’ll be able to jump in, disable multiple heroes, jump out, and repeat this process every 16 seconds.
Puck
Dream Coil
- Increases break damage from 300 / 400 / 500 to 400 / 550 / 700
- Increases break stun duration from 1.5 / 2.25 / 3 to 1.5 / 3 / 4.5
- Increases coil duration from 6 to 8
- Stun pierces Spell Immunity
This upgrade turns Dream Coil into the best anti Black King Bar spell in the game.
Dream Coil already forces the enemy to stay in one spot or get damaged and stunned. This spell, and many others are countered by a BKB but what do you do when your counter gets countered?
BKB is the answer for many core heroes to enable their rampage through the enemy team. When the enemy carry gets a BKB, the strategy becomes to run away. But when Puck gets an upgraded Dream Coil, that strategy gets turned around and you’re able to fight anyone.
Zeus
Nimbus
- Creates a storm cloud anywhere on the map that automatically casts Lightning Bolt Lightning Bolt on the closest enemy within range
Last on this list is Zeus. Nimbus is an amazing spell with so much impact. The amount of damage it does and area it controls is second to none.
Catching the backlines is one of the most important tactics in the game. It can be hard when you have to go through a Mars or Slardar to catch the enemy supports. But with Zeus being able to cast Nimbus anywhere, you have an easy access to the backlines to interrupt their play.
For Aghanim’s upgrades, Nimbus is arguably the best in the game. It does so much when it’s used and Zeus can cast it anywhere, forcing the enemy to run away or fight in a literal lighting cloud.
Furion's aghs is straight-up feeding gold
Core Weavers don't build Aghs. Utility core Weaver is weak AF compared to damage-dealing core Weaver. If you built it on utility support Weaver, sure
double jebait when content is more misleading than the title
Sigh....
NP's aghanim is literally for feeding, not any useful, in fact a downgrade if against a powerful wave clearer
LD is not even an utility, and neither does Ursa and Ember Spirit
Puck rarely use his aghanim unless late game or against jugg/lifestealer/pango
Centaur also didn't have enough space for his aghs. You will need all 6 item to came online (Crimson, Pipe, Blink, Tarras, BM and boots) and aghs is probably last line of defense.
the rest are fine, but splish splash your opinion trash
i think it depends on the team setup. no agha can be good in the right teamplay
- UTILITY Aghs build review
- NP/LD are the first two heroes mentioned
This content is supported by Bulldog. Kappa
Tidehunter is an excellent choice to Aghs.
2200 range gush with area effect, can control lanes and teamfights. When upgraded with the talents can deal 340 dmg and 11 armor reduction
Legend V wrote this article...interesting 🤔
Dotabuff should have a required MMR to write such ‘guides’ imo. Just think about countless number of newbies who would rush aghs on Furion after reading this
^
Yongelee was Divine 1 when he started writing for Dotabuff, I didn't even notice that he dropped hard in MMR until you pointed it out KEKW
I thought he was going to mention my Jakiro's agh, with increased dmg, cast range, and duration. Then at lvl 25 he has talent which is pure and pierces spell immunity.
Thanks for mentioning fusion agh in here enemy just tried this build in ranked and it practically griefed his whole team.
sniper???
lol NP aghs is a mistake, they can provide free farm to an enemy if the player mis-manage its treants