AnuB'arak

1. What's the first thing that goes through your head about Anub'Arak?

Whisper: Annoying. The hero is very annoying. His mana burn makes it very frustrating to lane against him. Also, you always have to watch your back or he'll backstab you with Vendetta. He forces the other team to alter their play.

Loda: Gang-er.

zenition: Excellent ganker, lethal but fragile.

2. How different is playing Anub'Arak in competitive and friendly games?

Whisper: In friendly games people tend to purchase less observer and sentry wards. This allows NA to run amok uninhibited, and kill any people wandering off alone. In competitive play, his effect can be limited through smart playing, map awareness, and good ward vision.

Loda: Well, when it comes to NA it's a lot easier to dominate friendly games than competitive games. In friendly games people are much worse at getting wards and sentries etc., but when it comes to competitive games he can often be made useless if you just plant enough sentries.

zenition: Although Nerubian Assassin plays the same role (ganker) in both types of games, the usage of the hero is very different. In competitive games, NA is a very difficult hero to play, because the opposing team will focus alot on countering him, using sentry wards, necrobook etc.

3. What are Anub'Ark's strengths and weaknesses?

NA uses his annoying but effective Mana Burn.

Whisper: His strengths include his high instant damage output and effectiveness in lane. He's often able to kill most heroes by himself in the early stages of the game after he obtains Vendetta. He's weak against good ward vision. If the opponents can stay alive and farm some hit points up, then he won't be nearly as effective. Also, he's not the greatest in 5v5 team fights, especially because enemies tend to carry sentries into those.

Loda: His strengths are that he can nullify one hero totally in a battle with vendetta, impale, manaburn + dagon (if u have it). He's a really good lane-partner and can often control a lane with just the help of his manaburn. His weaknesses are that without any farm he's pretty much useless. He needs fast levels early on and if he's nerfed a lot in the beginning it can often be fatal for the whole game.

zenition: As I mentioned before, the strength of NA is his amazing burst-damage output, he is one of the few hero's in the game that can kill another hero almost instantly, and with a dagon(1-5) he stays useful throughtout the entire game. His strength is however also his weakness, as any team will, because of how dangerous he is, try to counter him with warding and truesight, leaving NA almost useless.

4. What makes Anub'Arak stand out/different from other heroes?

Whisper: It's probably the most annoying hero in the game.

Loda: Hm partly cause of the things I said before. He's a melee lane-controler and one of the best gangers, a bit like Lina, Lion, etc. I don't think there is any other melee hero that can control a lane, it's always the ranged one doing this imo.

zenition: Well, unlike most other heroes, NA can use almost any item, basically all he needs is boots of speed and a bottle. He can become an even deadlier killer with a dagon, a great support hero with an Eul's, or used as a counter to for example warlock and omniknight, with a diffusal blade.

5. What are the "must buy" items for Anub'Arak and why?

A strong lane with NA and Lina.

Whisper: Dagon to further increase his instant damage output, necrobook does the same in a different way

Loda: I think a must buy item for NA is mostly Dagon, but only if you can get it fast enough. Atleast before 30 min or so! After that point I think the possibility for NA to own is a lot lower.
Necrobook is a possible item vs some lineups like Skeleton King, tree and so on, vs heroes that relies much on their manapool but haven't got so much to begin with

zenition: As I mentioned before, the strength of NA is his amazing burst-damage output, he is one of the few hero's in the game that can kill another hero almost instantly, and with a dagon(1-5) he stays useful throughtout the entire game.

6. What's the basic strategy and gameplay for Anub'Arak?

Whisper: The strategy for NA is to annoy the other team as much as possible. You can do this by mana burning them in lane and then leaving the lane to gank once you hit level 6 you can pick good points to try and pick people off but make sure to get some farming in, because if you fall behind in levels and items you'll quickly become completely useless

Loda: The basic strategy of NA is to early on either play on a defensive lane where you help one hero to farm etc by manaburning the opponents. He can also be placed in a really offensive lane like NA + Lina or something like that. After some earlygame ganging etc he should put some time into farming a dagon imo. Many players keeps ganging and just ends up with no items at all, you need to know when farming is the right choice to be stronger later on. When you got a dagon you should try roaming around getting solo gang kills and just keep on doing that the whole game. NA is very good together with Zeus and Furion imo.

zenition: The basic strategy would be to kill as many heroes as possible. In essence, this is what Nerubian was designed for, and what he does best.

7. Do you have any tips for a newb Anub'Arak player? Such as when you should stun and when you should not, or when you should use your ultimate?

NA uses Vendetta followed with Impale.

Whisper: NA's ultimate makes a very distinct noise. Make sure to use it out of "hearing" range, and make sure you actually HIT the enemy before casting impale, and then mana burn.

Loda: hm I don't really know, some classic tips are that you should use Vendetta when u tp to a tower. Press tp on the tower and then hold shift and press v, this makes you arrive invisible to the tower and gives you an easier way to not get detected by the enemy hearing you go invis or something like that you always have to practice so you can execute all skills fast enough! If the enemy has time to react it's possible that he will survive! Be fast with Vendetta then impale manaburn + dagon, don't leave any chance of surviving

zenition: My best tip for a new NA player would probably be, not to forget to kill creeps. It's easy to forget when you're playing a hero with this much killing material, to forget that money for a potential dagon, and levelling is just as important as killing, when playing Nerubian Assassin. If you get Dagon + level 11 quite fast, NA will be able to kill most Agility/Intelligence heroes solo.