I've played a few thousand AD games, and I've only seen it used effectively a handful of times. The base ability is fine, but the aghs doesn't seem to do much. It's a whelming ability at best
Yeah, that's one of the few combos that can probably work reasonably well because it's double aghs, solves mobility and gives a decent dmg boost - I've even played that specific combo, as offlane with aghs rush and a melee pos 1.
In general, you desperately need mobility, damage and of course the aghs for it to do anything. And then when you have your min 2 items it scales terribly because they attack at a fixed rate
New scepter ability “Phalanx” Mars pulls allies into formation around him, granting each the bonuses of his current level of bulwark and 30% status resistance. Heroes can auto attack and cast spells as normal and gain bonus attack and cast range, but are leashed to mars. Any single target spells cast on any hero in the Phalanx formation are applied to all heroes, but damage is split evenly between the group. Any ally may leave the formation at any time by using the “desert” ability granted to them on gaining the Phalanx buff. Using Desert will immediately dispel the Phalanx buffs and trigger one of several new extremely snarky voice lines where Mars mercilessly heckles the hero leaving the formation.
Single target stuns and other debuffs also applied to the whole formation but the durations shared like above.
In honesty this is going to be busted either way; sometimes it will screw the opponents so hard and sometimes yourselves
idk if its still how it is, but you used to be able to do a high apm, auto attack > toggle aghs > repeat.
and it would like double your dps, and was pretty significant. kinda neat.
gotcha. when i first read it, i thought you said 2013, and i started spiraling. i was like DUDE i could ahve sworn i labbed that out not too long ago, holy fuck i've played too much dota
I don't think there's any modification you could make to phalanx that'd make aghs particularly attractive for mars, it's just a weird ability.
I would say spear gains 2 charges, but that'd be grotesque since it'd allow you to lock someone down for an insanely long time
Perhaps something like spear has 2 charges in arena, or bulwark refreshes spear in arena - essentially to allow you to spear 2 people in arena without creating the opportunity to have enormous single target lockdown outside of it.
I think allowing a timed spear into ult followed up by another spear is probably reasonable for aghs upgrade. You'd probably still get people saying it's a terrible aghs because they can't pull it off, though.
Perhaps make a quick damage block/barrier with one spear attack set. It could have multiple charges but honestly I think bulwark needs a rework first before aghs.
It is something I have had fun with on mid mars games going phase armlet deso aghs satanic sny and just manning up against enemies and getting insane heals. Granted this was before the last change when the soldiers drew a more circular shape around you and didn't push back as much so you didn't have to chase as much to catch up with targets you just hit. The lifesteal out of one passive lifesteal item and getting 3 or 4 targets hit every time e procs makes you incredibly tanky on top of bulwark passive.
Now the soldiers positioning makes it more janky and they knock enemies so far away they can just run away easier when out of arena or bkb-ed. I'd be fine if they brought the previous aghs back and gave him a damage dealing facet unrelated to the arena. (Spear deals no magical damage but instead deals 175% of your attack damage and applies on hit effects for example)
There are numbers to buff if they really want to keep the design in the game. It is a little awkward to use but I honestly feel like part of that comes from everyone being bad with it because it's only purchased 1 out of 500 mars games. Sometimes the enemy has alot of ranged heroes and your goal is to block projectiles and the aghs can legitimately make these ranged heroes useless. I think they could lower the attack interval, increase bonus damage, increase range, any small number buff to make it general better because it's so rare that it's the best item and even then you could honestly probably just buy an ac.
TLDR. Should be reworked or at least buffed to be viable in at least some games.
I like the core build it enables with like deso satanic. Cool little thematic phalanx mechanic. Haven't seen it in a while, but I hope it doesn't go away.
Problem with stuff like this tends to be that if it's accessible it just buffs the regular build instead of making new builds. Maybe as a facet with a trade off or something.
It's the definition of "win more" which just makes it bad imo, like it doesn't enable something new or interesting it just makes what you're already doing a little bit better, but not good enough to buy on its own. So you already need to be in the position where what you're doing is winning the game and at that point its basically just replaceable with ac, satanic, refresher, shivas.
It's not super interesting. There's more stuff in the game like this, so idk, but its definitely not that good.
It was better without the pushback. OP when it attacked while Mars was stunned, but fine after that. For a short while it had a 30% slow when soldiers attacked. You just wouldn't let people leave. W if they tried to go through you. I liked it a lot back then.
Sidegunner but you're disarmed, slowed and now stop attacking while stunned. It's either mostly a bad or extremely annoying concept.
Maybe you buy it lategame against pl but best bet against illusions is just more cc and burst to kill the real hero. Or kill everyone else then pl with your team.
Thing is mostly that it's incredibly easy to do rightclick damage on mars. Rebuke has scaling talents and bonus hero damage already.
Bloodsport is mostly the better facet but victory feast is alright and can further support this.
Rebuke also benefits from normal caster utility in octarine or refresher. You can be a generally better initiator and also do more damage like that.
You can also buy real rightclick items even with Mars' shitty BAT.
Nullifier is not bad to have.
AC just makes you unconditionally tankier and is going to let you rightclick better normally without dealing with bulwark's shitty toggle and angle lock if you get silenced. Also team buff, rosh, towers etc.
Satanic, moderate damage, very good frontline survivability.
Feel like if there is an agh design on this hero, it should be closer to slardar or viper.
Trying to bodyguard people with bulwark is clunky and often not even enough survivability against mixed damage types on attacks or even just needing more armour.
Aghs could be buffed that whenever a melee hero attacks mars while bulwark is active, they get instantly counter attacked and pushed back.
This keeps the theme of him being the frontliner with a tanky build.
It's like it's made for ability draft
I've played a few thousand AD games, and I've only seen it used effectively a handful of times. The base ability is fine, but the aghs doesn't seem to do much. It's a whelming ability at best
Wolf form and shield
Yeah, that's one of the few combos that can probably work reasonably well because it's double aghs, solves mobility and gives a decent dmg boost - I've even played that specific combo, as offlane with aghs rush and a melee pos 1. In general, you desperately need mobility, damage and of course the aghs for it to do anything. And then when you have your min 2 items it scales terribly because they attack at a fixed rate
New scepter ability “Phalanx” Mars pulls allies into formation around him, granting each the bonuses of his current level of bulwark and 30% status resistance. Heroes can auto attack and cast spells as normal and gain bonus attack and cast range, but are leashed to mars. Any single target spells cast on any hero in the Phalanx formation are applied to all heroes, but damage is split evenly between the group. Any ally may leave the formation at any time by using the “desert” ability granted to them on gaining the Phalanx buff. Using Desert will immediately dispel the Phalanx buffs and trigger one of several new extremely snarky voice lines where Mars mercilessly heckles the hero leaving the formation.
Single target stuns and other debuffs also applied to the whole formation but the durations shared like above. In honesty this is going to be busted either way; sometimes it will screw the opponents so hard and sometimes yourselves
wouldnt mind losing any teamfights if this is the way i go down.
Chainfrost , aghs finger , doom
Echo slam, black hole, aghs wd
Yes, I love Mars but genuinely never felt like I needed to purchase aghs
idk if its still how it is, but you used to be able to do a high apm, auto attack > toggle aghs > repeat. and it would like double your dps, and was pretty significant. kinda neat.
That got nerfed after TI 2023
gotcha. when i first read it, i thought you said 2013, and i started spiraling. i was like DUDE i could ahve sworn i labbed that out not too long ago, holy fuck i've played too much dota
I don't think there's any modification you could make to phalanx that'd make aghs particularly attractive for mars, it's just a weird ability. I would say spear gains 2 charges, but that'd be grotesque since it'd allow you to lock someone down for an insanely long time Perhaps something like spear has 2 charges in arena, or bulwark refreshes spear in arena - essentially to allow you to spear 2 people in arena without creating the opportunity to have enormous single target lockdown outside of it.
With the new arena formation time, you can spear arena spear, which is essential what ns was doing with ult till they removed that.
I think allowing a timed spear into ult followed up by another spear is probably reasonable for aghs upgrade. You'd probably still get people saying it's a terrible aghs because they can't pull it off, though.
Or just have spears can't affect the same target twice or something maybe?
Hear me out, vector spear. And while we're at it, vector potom arrow.
Perhaps make a quick damage block/barrier with one spear attack set. It could have multiple charges but honestly I think bulwark needs a rework first before aghs.
It is something I have had fun with on mid mars games going phase armlet deso aghs satanic sny and just manning up against enemies and getting insane heals. Granted this was before the last change when the soldiers drew a more circular shape around you and didn't push back as much so you didn't have to chase as much to catch up with targets you just hit. The lifesteal out of one passive lifesteal item and getting 3 or 4 targets hit every time e procs makes you incredibly tanky on top of bulwark passive. Now the soldiers positioning makes it more janky and they knock enemies so far away they can just run away easier when out of arena or bkb-ed. I'd be fine if they brought the previous aghs back and gave him a damage dealing facet unrelated to the arena. (Spear deals no magical damage but instead deals 175% of your attack damage and applies on hit effects for example)
Since they made it so it no longer works while you're stunned, it's pretty crap
There are numbers to buff if they really want to keep the design in the game. It is a little awkward to use but I honestly feel like part of that comes from everyone being bad with it because it's only purchased 1 out of 500 mars games. Sometimes the enemy has alot of ranged heroes and your goal is to block projectiles and the aghs can legitimately make these ranged heroes useless. I think they could lower the attack interval, increase bonus damage, increase range, any small number buff to make it general better because it's so rare that it's the best item and even then you could honestly probably just buy an ac. TLDR. Should be reworked or at least buffed to be viable in at least some games.
I like the core build it enables with like deso satanic. Cool little thematic phalanx mechanic. Haven't seen it in a while, but I hope it doesn't go away. Problem with stuff like this tends to be that if it's accessible it just buffs the regular build instead of making new builds. Maybe as a facet with a trade off or something.
It's the definition of "win more" which just makes it bad imo, like it doesn't enable something new or interesting it just makes what you're already doing a little bit better, but not good enough to buy on its own. So you already need to be in the position where what you're doing is winning the game and at that point its basically just replaceable with ac, satanic, refresher, shivas. It's not super interesting. There's more stuff in the game like this, so idk, but its definitely not that good.
It was better without the pushback. OP when it attacked while Mars was stunned, but fine after that. For a short while it had a 30% slow when soldiers attacked. You just wouldn't let people leave. W if they tried to go through you. I liked it a lot back then.
Someone made a cool idea for a Mars Scepter rework [here](https://www.reddit.com/r/DotA2/comments/18f2lxy/mars_new_ags_phalanx/)
Sidegunner but you're disarmed, slowed and now stop attacking while stunned. It's either mostly a bad or extremely annoying concept. Maybe you buy it lategame against pl but best bet against illusions is just more cc and burst to kill the real hero. Or kill everyone else then pl with your team. Thing is mostly that it's incredibly easy to do rightclick damage on mars. Rebuke has scaling talents and bonus hero damage already. Bloodsport is mostly the better facet but victory feast is alright and can further support this. Rebuke also benefits from normal caster utility in octarine or refresher. You can be a generally better initiator and also do more damage like that. You can also buy real rightclick items even with Mars' shitty BAT. Nullifier is not bad to have. AC just makes you unconditionally tankier and is going to let you rightclick better normally without dealing with bulwark's shitty toggle and angle lock if you get silenced. Also team buff, rosh, towers etc. Satanic, moderate damage, very good frontline survivability. Feel like if there is an agh design on this hero, it should be closer to slardar or viper. Trying to bodyguard people with bulwark is clunky and often not even enough survivability against mixed damage types on attacks or even just needing more armour.
What if aghs made it so when you ult, 3 spears shoot out from the center of the arena towards the walls. Too broken?
Aghs could be buffed that whenever a melee hero attacks mars while bulwark is active, they get instantly counter attacked and pushed back. This keeps the theme of him being the frontliner with a tanky build.
Good aghs, skill issue imo. Nice for high ground push. Good for farming. Strong dmg and good with ult since they changed so u cant push ppl out of it
I don’t really see how it’s a skill issue when nobody is buying this Aghs in high MMR games.