Flux

[foxmindedguy]

This guide is intended for use in 5v5 Non-em Forest of Caldavar pub play. The information in this guide is accurate as of patch version 2.0.28



Flux is a bad ass force of nature. He was once a legionnaire but now he is simply a strong gravitational energy, which has held together the armor around him. Surprisingly Flux is also a chameleon and can change his color between shocking pink and ocean blue. When he is feeling blue, he needs hugs (group hugs preferably) thus he increases his gravitational pull, forcing every enemy hero to come closer to him. S2 has yet to figure out why the laws of physics (Flux's gravity) works on allies and other non-hero units. When Flux is feeling infuriated, he turns pink (instead of red) thus pushing everyone away. How does a gravitational energy life-form accomplish that? Don't ask me, ask S2 with their infinite wisdom


Table Of Contents

1. Introduction
   
   • Description
   • Stats
   • Alt Avatar
   
   
2. Skills
   
   • Description
   • Skill Build
   
   
3. Items
   
   • Starting Items
   • Core Items
   • Luxuries
   • Items to Avoid
   
   
4. Gameplay
   
   • Laning
   • Ganking
   • Teamfights
   • Tips and tricks
   
   
5. Drafting
   
   • Lane partners
   • Teamfight partners
   • Vicious Foes
   
   
6. Replays
7. Credits

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Introduction

Flux is the 79th hero to be added to Heroes of Newerth. Flux excels in setting up the opponents positions, such that initiating becomes favorable for ally heroes. Flux spends most of his time pushing and pulling people and possibly slowing those who possess a threat against him or seem like a potential prey. This guide is designed to show you one of the better ways to play Flux and how to utilize his skill set to pose trouble for your opponents. Flux's largest weakness is his lack of disables and his dependence on team when it comes to ganking, carrying & team fights. Without good coordination with the team and lack of understanding when to use what skill, you will end up making matters worse for your team instead of assisting them to achieve the common goal (victory). To insure that you are an asset and not a liability to your team, having good position is key. As the direction of the pull and push, along with the magnitude of the slow, depends entirely on his position.

Role in team

Intiator, Setup maker (for Initiation), Semi-carry.

Stats

Strength: 23 (2.7)
Agility: 21 (2.0)
Intelligence: 16 (1.4)

Damage: 53-56
Armor: 2.94 (15%)
Movement Speed: 295
Attack Range: 350 (Range)
Attack Rate: 0.71

Alt Avatar

As of the 2.0.28 Patch, Flux has an alternative skin known as Steam Flux. He looks like a freakin' terminator (btw is it magnetism that are keeping his forearms in place. How does a gravitational force of nature have magnetic powers? )


The price of the new skin is 470 Silver Goblin Coins.

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Skills

Description

Release

Hero releases a charged wave slowing nearby enemies.

Action Self Position
Type Enemy Units

Type: Magic
Radius: 350
Cast Time: 0.5 Seconds
Mana Cost: 85 / 100 / 115 / 130
Cooldown: 11.0 Seconds
Required Level: 1 / 3 / 5 / 7

Activation
Does 75 / 150 / 225 / 300 Magic Damage in a 400 unit radius around Flux. Inflicts a 4 second, 20% to 70% Movement Speed Slow depending on how close or far they are from you.

Pull Polarity slows enemies more when they are closer to you. Push Polarity slows enemies more when they are further from you.

Synopsis

Flux Slow Mechanics are very unique. It has a 4 seconds varying slow (ranging from 20% to 70%) depending on which attribute you currently possess (pink/blue) and how far the units are from Flux. With pink polarity, the further the units are the more they are slowed for. With blue polarity, nearest units get slowed the most.

As of patch 2.0.37, the blue polarity Release has finally been fixed. Now it is possible to apply 70% slow on both polarities.

Additional levels in the Release skill only increases the damage by 75 per level, neither the duration nor the magnitude of the slow is changed/improved.

Magnetic Surge

Pushes or pulls target (depending on polarity). Deals Damage based on strength and your attack damage.

Action Target Entity
Type Everything

Type: Physical
Range: 400
Cast Time: 0.7 Seconds
Mana Cost: 20 / 30 / 40 / 50
Cooldown: 10.0 / 8.0 / 6.0 / 4.0 Seconds
Required Level: 1 / 3 / 5 / 7

Activation
Targeting an enemy pulls it 200 / 250 / 300 / 350 units and deals your Attack Damage plus 30 / 60 / 90 / 120% of your strength in Physical Damage.

Synopsis



The Magnetic Surge ability of Flux simply pulls or pushes targets to or away from him. The spell's cool-down starts off at 10 seconds and gradually decreases 2 per level (ultimately coming to as low as 4 seconds at max Level)

This is the only scaling skill that Flux has. The mechanics of the scaling damage is quite easy to understand and compute. Simply put: For every extra attack damage Magnetic Surge deals one additional damage but for every extra attack damage gained through strength Flux does 1.3x / 1.6x / 1.9 / 2.2x (for level 1 / 2 / 3 / 4, respectively) extra damage.

When computing Flux's damage through just looking at your stats (during game). You can use one of the two formulas:

(Your attack damage - Your strength) + (Your strength x 1.3) or simply (Attack Damage) + (Your strength x 0.3)

For instance: Let's assume you are at level 1 and have no strength or attack damage items
Flux's Attack Damage at level 1 ranges from 53-56, let's assume 56 (the highest) attack damage was proc-ed this time
= (56 - 23) + (23 x 1.3) or 56 + (23 x 0.3)
= 62.9
= 63

Had it been level 2 of your magnetic surge the multiple would have been 1.6 (instead of 1.3). Hope you get the picture.


In addition to the damage increase per level (with respect to Flux's current Str), the pull and push distance of Magnetic Surge also increases. The pictures above show the distance Flux pulls for and pushes for, per each Level of Magnetic Surge.


Another thing to note is that when you are pulling off the Magnetic Surge > Release combo. It is usually better (especially at earlier levels of surge or when your Surge and Polarity are both maxed) to quickly switch to pink polarity and activate slow. This will hit fleeing targets towards the circumference of the slow circle thus achieving maximum potential slow.

Last but not the least, when pulling enemies they are not granted tree or cliff walking, however they are granted unit walking.

Polarity Swap

Hero changes his polarity (changing from pull to push and back again). Passively increases his attack range.

Action No Target
Cooldown: 1.0 Seconds
Required Level: 1 / 3 / 5 / 7

Activation
Changes his polarity from pull to push and vice versa.

Passively adds 50 / 100 / 150 / 200 attack range and 50 / 100 / 150 / 200 Range to Magnetic Surge.

Synopsis



The first point in this skill reaps greater benefits than further investments in it. Elaborating on that claim, every level in general increases the range of Flux's auto-attacks and Magnetic Surge by 50 per level. The first point, however, also grants 3 new skills to the hero:
-> Push on Surge
-> Push on Ultimate
-> Maximum slow on circumference of the release circle (rather than at the origin).



Note that maxing this passive will increase Flux's auto-attacks up to 550 range and his Magnetic Surge activation up to 600 range. It does NOT increase the amount Flux pulls or pushes his targets for.


With that said, the maximum amount of distance Flux can create between himself and his target through his Magnetic Surge Push is 950 units. The cast range by maxing your polarity increases to 600 and the push amount at max is 350 units.

So again, when your Surge and Polarity Swap are both maxed, upon activating pull Surge at max or near max distance it is better to pull > Switch to Pink Polarity > Release. The math in the above-mentioned claim is as follows:
> If you pull heroes at 600 units away from you, provided your Magnetic Surge ability is maxed out, you will pull target for 350 units.
> This will make the target be 250 units away from you.
> 250 units away is closer to 350 units away from you than 0 units away from you.
> Thus, activating the pink polarity Release will slow for more.
> If units are wanting to flee then they will roughly travel a 100 extra units before you pull off switching polarity to pink and releasing. Which means if you time it right and take their movement and direction into account, you might slow them for the maximum amount possible.

The above-mentioned scenario does not take into account incidents where the target is not fleeing. In such situations, provided they are an actual threat up close, you would wish to use pink polarity for surge (pushing them away) following by a quick Release. Or if they are already on you, then you use blue Release first followed by pink surge.

Discharge

Action Global
Type Enemy Heroes

Cast Time: 0.5 Seconds
Mana Cost: 125
Cooldown: 100.0 / 80.0 / 60.0 Seconds
Required Level: 6 / 11 / 16

Activation
Globally pulls all enemy heroes 500 / 600 / 700 units.

Synopsis


While his other skills are nice, his ultimate is the main reason why he is often picked. The ability to push/pull everyone on the map certain units away from or to Flux is just sweet. His ultimate, if timed perfectly, can set the enemies up to get initiated on. If they are pulled within Release radius, then the follow up becomes easier. It is kind of a steroid skill for all AOE spells about to follow.

Another use for his ultimate is to push enemies away. This can be done to mess up enemy initiations or escape a gank. Again timing is key here as well. You can ruin a pkey Behemoth ult by simply activating Discharge as soon as he portal keys in and before he pushes R. This is just one example, many other cases are applicable where Flux Ultimate ruins initiations.


While in blue polarity, Discharge pulls heroes (no matter where on the map) 500 / 600 / 700 units towards him, per level respectfully.


While in pink polarity, Discharge pushes heroes (no matter where on the map) 500 / 600 / 700 units away from him, per level respectfully.

A common misconception is that Blue Polarity Discharge (or Magnetic Surge) is often interpreted as only for offensive use while Pink Polarity Discharge (or Magnetic Surge) is labeled to have only defensive use, this is not always the case. It all comes down to your location in relation with that of the enemy.



Although Flux has no disables (stuns/silences etc). He can cancel some channels/holds by using his ultimate to break the leash range of said skills.


Additionally, Discharge gives 1000 day / 700 night true sight around all enemies affected by the ultimate for 3 seconds. Thus when in doubt about the position of your opponents, you can always rely on wasting your Discharge Skill. As it is true sight, you can also use it to get the finishing blows on low hp heroes who have turned invisible right in front of you.

Skill Build

1. Polarity Swap
2. Magnetic Surge
3. Release
4. Release
5. Release
6. Discharge
7. Release
8. Magnetic Surge
9. Magnetic Surge
10. Magnetic Surge
11. Discharge
12. Polarity Swap
13. Polarity Swap
14. Polarity Swap
15. Stats
16. Discharge
17. Stats
18. Stats
19. Stats
20. Stats
21. Stats
22. Stats
23. Stats
24. Stats
25. Stats

There really isn't one way of playing Flux. I prefer Polarity Swap at level 1 (instead of the common, level 4) because it adds to the auto-attack range, thus improving your lane farming and with 0:00 runes not existing anymore there really isn't that much need to pick nukes at level 1. However, you could also pick up Magnetic Surge if against a tough last-hitting opponent and if that helps you farm better.

It is mostly preferred to max Release first before Magnetic Surge because Surge Damage scales well later into the game and getting earlier points into it means you are going to lose on burst that you could have attained through maxing Release. Moreover, Magnetic Surge is your harass skill and if you keep it at level 1, you will be spending minimal mana (20) to harass with the skill every time its off cool-down. But like I mentioned before there really isn't one way to build Flux and it all comes down to your team, the enemy team and the play-style you wish to adapt. Obviously if you are laning against someone like Vindicator (Sage's Lore Vindi to be specific) then you would want to leave your Magnetic Surge at Level 1, as losing 20 mana is better than 40 or 50 per every time you are inflicted with Sage's Lore.

I have also seen people (and had some experience with) maxing Magnetic Surge over Release. This type of build-up gives higher lane harassment and is pro-sustained damage (and not burst), as the cool-down on your Magnetic Surge goes down to 4 seconds on max level. However, to be able to spam your second ability every time its off cool-down, you would need to stack up on mana replenishment items.

Another common issue of debate is whether to max Polarity Swap out first or Stats after putting one point in the skill. The side that prefers Polarity Swap Maxing argues that if you wish to max Stats out first then you are not investing in the skill till level 23. Thus you are stuck with petty attack range of 400 (and Surge Range of 450) till almost all of game. On the opposing end, each level in Stats grants Flux the following:
-> 38 Max HP
-> 0.06 HP regen per second
-> 2 Attack Damage
-> 4.4 Damage increase for Surge
-> 26 Max Mana
-> 0.06 Mana regen per second
-> 2 Attack speed
-> 0.28 Armor

So basically it all comes down to how you weigh things. If you think the list of attributes above are greater than the ability to push/pull people from further distance or to attack 200 units further then you can opt for Stats first. I personally like maxing Polarity Swap over Stats (because for me the 200 units is a big deal).