Armoreating Soulstealer

[Kietharr]

There are two main schools of thought to playing this hero in DotA, one is the highly mobile and stealthy trinuke/high damage abusing bottle/BoT/Lothar's Edge version, and the other is the less common hard carry.

In this guide, I will be describing the hard carry build. This is not to say that you don't use spells at all, but the item build is focused more heavily towards carrying.

Demon Hand:
This is your nuke and how you get kills early game. Later in the game it turns into an amazing farming tool, letting you slaughter an entire creep wave in two clicks at lv4. It is unique in that it grants you three nukes in one, but they all have different ranges. Their default hotkeys are D, F, and G. G is the longest range and D is the shortest. Keep in mind that these are not targeted and shoot off wherever the front of your hero is aimed. Keep in mind that they all share a small range of overlap so you can hit the same area with two different nukes without moving position, but you have to get closer or further away to use the third.

Soul Steal: Great ability that makes SS's last hitting unbeatable provided he can get souls in. You also get souls from denying your own creeps, so be sure to do that frequently.

Dread: Not a very useful ability early game but it's essential mid/late for this build to work. For reference, it is an armor reduction aura.

Soul Burst: The caster semi-carry build uses this a lot more effectively early on than this carry build, but still a very strong AOE with a large range and a slow, the only semi-disable this hero has.

Skill build:
Soul Steal
Demon Hand
Demon Hand
Soul Steal
Demon Hand
Soul Burst
Demon Hand
Soul Steal
Soul Steal
Dread
Soul Burst
Dread
Dread
Dread
Stats
Soul Burst
Stats until 25

Take one point of Soul Steal early before demon hand because you never want to bother using lv1 nukes anyways and you can start gathering souls earlier.

Items: Start with x2 Crown of the Pretender and x2 Runes of Blight, after that build steam boots and then Shieldbreaker. The armor reduction orb plus your armor reduction aura and your bonus damage means you are dealing a LOT of damage per hit, usually upwards of 200dmg a hit against heroes which is downright ridiculous if you have someone disabling for you.

After that, Assassin's Cloak is a great option to let you escape bad situations and set up good soul bursts. If the game drags on past that point Windbow is a good option, but it is uncommon for a game to last that long.

[Euphoria]

His ultimate is useless until you have assassin shroud + level 2 at least. Save it until 10/11. You're better off maxing his nuke/soul steal since with each level of your nuke you effectively get 225 damage increase (75 x 3 spells), whereas his ulti is based on souls (without max souls it's useless, so no point in getting it even before 9).

[Netukka]

Stacking -armor and lifesteal is made of win on soulstealer.

Also, dont forget the possibility of Portal Key instead of assassin's shroud.

[Euphoria]

Assassin Shroud is often preferred over portal key due to the no collision issue. If you are standing directly on a unit and use your ultimate, almost every single expulsion will hit them, dealing 1000s of damage. This is the main boon to it.

[Netukka]

I know, which is the reason I never go portal key but always get Assassin's (I remember one shotting a 1300 hp behemoth), but I said its just a possibility : p

[Inconmon]

what they said... 4/4 steal/hand
I'd also go lifetube and manatube to avoid fountain and to get more mana to nuke creep waves

[Krangry]

what they said... 4/4 steal/hand
I'd also go lifetube and manatube to avoid fountain and to get more mana to nuke creep waves
Bottle is much more effecient, at 300 gold less, and allows you to rune whore

[Kietharr]

Yes, if you are having regen issues a bottle is the ideal item for Soulstealer, especially if you are soloing mid as you get easy access to both tablets. In fact, on the other more common build it is 100% essential.