is Voodoo Jester a competitive pick?

[aezavelo]

I looked around for another thread answering this, but didn't see, sorry if i missed. I feel like he can fulfill the roll warlock did in dota, only better. With his heal, and stun, plus the fear of cursed ground, I would think he would make an awesome babysitter. thanks for the input!

[Fenald]

only if better babysitters like lich and dsham aren't available.

[HunteR_]

simple answer, not often. He's a great hero, but he's also very easy to juke. Most teams like to run support/gank heroes with targetable nukes. Although, he does baby sit will, and teamed with a good stun it's deadly. ds/lich/hb better picks for team and babysit;late game he's not much of a contender.

[SinsofSanity]

While I don't have much to back it up with, I think he'd be sub-par as a babysitter due to the fact that his heal is very mana heavy and that he don't have a way of harrassing his opponents (apart from normal attacks, of course).

I'm in no way a very experienced player though, so my input may be completely wrong.

[Darkstrand]

The only problem with Voodoo Jester is his Cursed Ground being his only way of dealing significant damage, and he needs to be within near melee range to cast it. With his low hp, he's bound to never get it off in teamfights when it would be needed most.

He's a great ganker, but lacks in teamfights for this reason. Even so, he can most certainly be used.. But there are better picks in his stead.

[Glorify1]

Late game he requires BKB/aghanims to be effective damage, however it's very unlikely he'll ever get this.

Late game his only form of damage is completely nullified via BKBs.

His laning is weak, his healing is ineffective, he sucks.

[Otherside]

to mana heavy isnt blessed with demented's base stats/animation as well as mana costs also item dependant to deal realiable damage needs a buff.. to be viable

[EvilPenguin]

He's viable just not heavily desired. He also doesn't have to have aghanims but there are better babysitter/group fight picks. In a competitive game there are a lot of things I would mind, someone wanting to play voodoo jester isn't really one of them.

[Lews]

Well, whenever I play voodoo I usually don't even get his ward. Rushing a guinsoo with both his dots and stun is more useful imo to mid game.

For competative, I've found it to be pretty viable. It's no hellbringer though.

[zircon]

What kind of buff would Voodoo need to bring him up to "competitive" levels? He has a great AOE stun, he's an able farmer, has solid INT gain, the strongest non-ult nuke in the game, and a reasonably useful AOE dot/heal. What's not to like?

[Valor2002]

I dont know why, but in my opinion he sucks. He is an ok ganker, but thats it. For every job exists a better pick.

[Zekkei]

he will be probably picked if your team manages to get a hold on Kraken

[thewishkah]

if malediction had a (slightly) longer cast range, if he had a slightly higher str gain, he would be more viable imo.

He's still very effective in games with tempest (but ban) and kraken.

But there are better babysitters/gankers which would overall be a better asset to the team

[Thisisdota]

Late game he requires BKB/aghanims to be effective damage, however it's very unlikely he'll ever get this.

Late game his only form of damage is completely nullified via BKBs.

His laning is weak, his healing is ineffective, he sucks.
You must suck....Also Why compare him to warlock instead of witch doctor?

[Glorify1]

You must suck....Also Why compare him to warlock instead of witch doctor?

lol, heard wd blows too.

[Travakh]

What kind of buff would Voodoo need to bring him up to "competitive" levels? He has a great AOE stun, he's an able farmer, has solid INT gain, the strongest non-ult nuke in the game, and a reasonably useful AOE dot/heal. What's not to like?

Maledict should have a global cast range and a 1500 radius

Death ward should be like old SA's death wards, plant it, it shoots for 45 seconds on its own (no channel) on 35 second cooldown

[rockchalk]

The great aoe stun is random and is easily made into a single stun that does no damage.

[Llama]

Even if he got the 5+ int gain they gave him in dota, there are better choices I'd say. Maybe on a gank-heavy team, but even then there are other alternatives

[Freshpro]

yes he is.

[FuzzyWuzzy]

What kind of buff would Voodoo need to bring him up to "competitive" levels? He has a great AOE stun, he's an able farmer, has solid INT gain, the strongest non-ult nuke in the game, and a reasonably useful AOE dot/heal. What's not to like?

He just requires two simple things.

Buff the range of Cursed Ground to be usable at all, like 500 or something.

Buff the Ward damage to be magical, so it can actually do some damage to carries with massive armor.

[Vodka]

S2 should play with the idea of making his ult superior magic dmg and buffing the heal version of his mojo spell to be stronger and more consistent.

[DImported]

There has been some discussion about his ultimate in the balance section of these forums. In dota, it is chaos damage, neglecting all armour types. In hon, it is physical meaning that it's usefulness decreases a lot faster as the game progresses. Currently, this is probably the biggest weakness in the port of Witch Doctor.

That being said, his first skill can do about 7-8 seconds of stun overall (don't know how many bounces it is) which may bounce on to a hero channeling a spell on him (Pollywog's shackles, Tempest's ultimate). Cursed ground has the potential to be one of the biggest aoe damaging DoT skills. The balance is the fact that you have to be quite close and the aoe is small.

To answer the question: Yes, Voodoo Jester has the potential to be a competitive pick. However, he is currently very situation-dependent (clumped heroes, no creeps around) making him fairly unreliable.

[zulu`]

If you can team him up with a valk ult / invis + SotM ult he can be devastating...

[Condomplate]

it's retarded that jeraziah as well as BKB render him useless

but if they other team doesn't have those, he is actually an amazing hero that doesn't get the credit he deserves

[Well_Shebber]

There has been some discussion about his ultimate in the balance section of these forums. In dota, it is chaos damage, neglecting all armour types. In hon, it is physical meaning that it's usefulness decreases a lot faster as the game progresses. Currently, this is probably the biggest weakness in the port of Witch Doctor.

Chaos Damage ignores armor type, not armor value. It is reduced by armor. There is no such thing as armor type in HoN. Physical Damage is reduced only by armor value.

Chaos Damage (WCIII) = Physical Damage.(HoN). Do not confuse armor type for armor value.

[willdaBEAST]

His attack animation is much worse the WD's was, Voodoo has a pretty terrible wind-up. I think it they fix that, he'd be much more useful.

[bkid]

i think voodoo has a great potential only flaw would be his cask being too easy to run away from since it's so slow so won't bounce off to the team.

[willdaBEAST]

They fixed his animation!

[aezavelo]

So they did improve his animation, is that enough?

[Darkstrand]

He can most certainly be used with his animation fix, he's an absolute amazing ganker. I think he falls short in all but the most pristine teamfights though.