Chipper

[[Poni]kippetje]

The Chipper Guide - Kippetje


last updated: july15th 2012 (patch 2.6.10)

Basic stats

Primary attribute: Intelligence
Strength 19 (+1.8)
Agility 20 (+1.6)
Intelligence 23 (+2.5)
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Basic Stats
Damage 43-50
Armor 2.3
Movement Speed 295
Attack TypeRanged (550)
Attack Rate 0.59
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Unique to HoN
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The elusive chiprel race has spent countless years avoiding conflict, but the Hellbourne are not a threat easily ignored. The Chipper has taken action, piloting an advanced tactical combat and acorn collection machine. Armed with missiles, tar dispensers, and deployable saw blades, The Chipper is ready for war.

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Table of Contents

1. Introduction
2. Pros and Cons
3. Skills
4. Skill builds
5. Items
6. Play style
7. Usage of Skills
8. Strong against, Weak against?
9. Replays
10. Changelog
11. Credits

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Introduction
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I initially made this guide for a honportal contest, so you may see this guide on their website once it is up!

Chipper is a hero that has been in competitive play played since its release. It has received several buffs and nerfs throughout. As of now I would say that he is a really balanced hero.

As for chipper's hero role, it is pretty obvious. He is a solo lane ganker that can destroy a lot of enemy solo's the moment he reaches lvl 6 or 7. In addition, he is very good at ganking trilanes due to his skills being a lot stronger when a slow or stun is on the enemy in the early game.

Please note that chipper is not a support hero, there is absolutely no reason to pick him as such.

There is also an ingame guide for this:
http://www.heroesofnewerth.com/heroe...iew.php?gid=58

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Pros and Cons
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Pros
- The ability to dish out huge amounts of dps
- Strong attack animation and ability to last hit with his rockets
- Ability to support others with skill set
- His abilities are long range


Cons
- No big stun or silence
- Weak when shut down
- Needs to use his ultimate to farm the jungle effectively
- Not the best AoE dps

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Skills
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This is your key skill At max level you deal a total of 540 magic damage with 3 rockets without the tar toss and up to 990 with maxed tar toss. (3*180 + 30*3*5)
- it does not work on neutrals or magic immune units (meaning they will pass through these units).
- when hitting a unit, clearvision will stay for 1.5 seconds.




This is the ability you will be chasing and initiating your gank with, it's also a really good escape.

The time it takes for the tar to hit the ground is 750ms, the castrange does not matter.



This is a skill that is often underestimated by both allies and foes. Though the effect is pretty direct, it can be used in a lot of different ways which I will explain later.




Your ultimate, your second damage output. It is key that you are able to use this skill effectively in order to gank properly. It has a total range of 1100! In addition, this becomes one of the strongest ultimate's when you get staff of the master. It will slow for a huge amount and go THROUGH magic immunity AND it will increase the range by 300 (not radius).
Note that the initial damage applies every time an enemy has not been in it for 2 seconds.

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Skill builds
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Old, classic Build
1. Rocket Barrage
2. Tar Toss
3. Rocket Barrage
4. Tar Toss
5. Rocket Barrage
6. Sawblade Showdown
7.Rocket Barrage
8. Tar Toss
9. Tar Toss
10. Focus Buffer
11. Sawblade Showdown
12. Focus Buffer
13. Focus Buffer
14. Focus Buffer
15. stats
16. Sawblade Showdown
17-25. stats

This build is what you should get if you do not need any magic defense early and you want to go for full damage and ganking potential. I personally like this build a lot but in the current metagame it is not as good anymore as magic damage is big at the moment.

That is why the next build is used more often nowadays:

current metagame build
1. Rocket Barrage
2. Focus Buffer/Tar Toss
3. Rocket Barrage
4. Focus Buffer/Tar Toss
5. Rocket Barrage
6. Sawblade Showdown
7.Rocket Barrage
8. Focus Buffer/Tar Toss
9. Focus Buffer/Tar Toss
10. Focus Buffer/Tar Toss
11. Sawblade Showdown
12. Focus Buffer/Tar Toss
13. Focus Buffer/Tar Toss
14. Focus Buffer/Tar Toss
15. stats
16. Sawblade Showdown
17-25. stats

Now this is weird, yes? My reasoning behind this is that skilling chipper is very situational. It completely depends on your opponents heroes. If the enemy doesn't have a lot of magic damage there is no reason to get buffer early. It's very important to look at the opponent you are laning against. Against a Hellbringer for instance, you should get focus buffer at lvl 2 to nullify his death boil. Then again, if you feel you don't need it during the laning phase you might as well get tar toss for damage. You usually have both tar toss and focus buffer at level 4 though, since they are almost always useful even at low levels.

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Items
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Chipper can go in both solo lanes, the starting item builds are different:


- solo sidelane (1) (512 gold spend)
With this build, you can get a fast ring of the teacher from the outpost in order to dominate your opponent. While doing this, you will be able to harass the opponent a lot and have good regeneration until you get your bottle as well.

- midlane (2) (259 gold spend)
This is a bottle rushing strategy, you will have good stats at the start and have your bottle before the enemy. With this you can out harass & last your opponent in the early game.



For the sidelane, you will be rushing a Ring of the Teacher (500).
For both lanes, you will get a Bottle (600) as well. Though some may detest a bottle in the sidelane, I find it very useful in winning the lane, usually making a kill. After that I will go back to base and continue to gank an other lane.

After getting your bottle, the best thing to do is get your marchers (500).
Depending on your needs, you can get a Power Supply (546) or a Blood Chalice (625). Do not get chalice when in a sidelane though, as you already have a ring of the teacher.



These 2 boots are usually the best for chipper. When choosing between these you will have to take your future items in to consideration. If you want to get a portal key after, steamboots (1450) will be the best choice as you will get some stats. When you don't think you need a portal key you should get ghost marchers (1500) and get other items (with stats) faster.

Post Haste(2700 total) is not very bad on chipper, you can get them if you are doing really good in farm. Post Haste is a very underrated item, it helps chipper a lot with ganking because of the fast ms and the ability to gank->port->gank a lot faster due to chipper's low cooldowns.



This is where you will get your last core item which is your Staff of the Master (4200).
SotM is extremely powerful on chipper because of the slow it applies. It makes the ultimate from a ganking tool & some damage in team fights to a monster game changer. Especially strong against melee heroes as they will not be able to chase anymore and it works extremely well with numerous other heroes.

Portal key (2150) is also an item you can get...
As said before, it is a tool to help you gank. Though your skills are long range, in the midgame some heroes will be able to either survive your initial burst, escape with their skills or not even get to be ganked due to well placed wards and defensive play. Portal key helps you move around the map and make your ganks a lot stronger. The big con though, is that it does not give you any stats or regeneration, forcing you to usually going back after blowing your "load" rather than going to your next target or farm.



A sheepstick (5675) is always extremely strong in the late game. It also gives Chipper what he lacks, a solid disable. It also gives you some health, which is always nice.

Just like sheepstick, a hellflower (4725) gives chipper a strong disable. A hellflower lasts longer and makes you deal more damage but has no slow and gives no survivability.




Nomes Wisdom (2240) is the item that you can turn your ring into. It gives you some nice stats and its extra effect is always nice for both you and your allies.

A tablet of command (2040) is a great item in general, it gives you a good escape and some good basic stats. It also makes you a lot more mobile, better at ganking and supporting teammates.

The reason I didn't put Spellshards (2575) in the main item list is because I feel that the item is usually not worth getting over the others. It is a very strong item and adds a lot of damage, but it's problem is that it doesn't add any survivability or mobility. It also doesn't give you a disable, which you will usually have to get in the late game (like sheepstick or hellflower). You can get this item if you don't need all of that and want to go for full damage. If this is the case, you usually get it before your staff of the master.

Stormspirit (3200) is a good item in general, it used to be good on Chipper because he could use it to make the initial ultimate damage proc twice. This has been 'fixed' however, so it isn't as good as before but still a decent item to get due to the mana regeneration & effect of course.

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Play style
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Chipper is a hero that is very aggressive, and is supposed to be played as such. The great thing about chipper is that he is able to out harass heroes with ease. A lot of players used to not understand how I played him in the sidelane and all players reacted differently to the play style. What I try to focus on is attacking the enemy hero, meanwhile taking some creeps every once in a while. When matched up against a bubbles for instance, you will be able to crush him with ease from lvl 1. Getting a kill at lvl 1 or 2 is not rare. When doing this you will already have your ring and a good chunk of your bottle. In addition, if you really manage to kill the enemy fast he will not even be able to afford a homecoming stone, giving you a huge lead. The way to do this is very hard to explain and you pretty much just have to see how it works, which is why I made this small video to show what happens in a game when you do it right:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1r0J-UEjZE4

As for playing in the midlane, you will not be able to chase as far as you might in a trilane, making the sidelane play style a lot less useful. In the midlane you have to try to keep the lane at your side of the ramp, and harass from uphill with both attacks and positioning so that you can use your rockets.

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Usage of skills
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- Rocket Barrage
This skill having a 0.1 second stun and 3 charges maximum can be very strong against heroes that have spells with long casting times. Think about behemoth fissures, hag blinks etc. A lot of players will use their 3 rockets in a burst. This is not always the most effective way. If you use them with small pauses, the enemy hero will have wasted more time attempting to casting his spell.



Using rockets from long range in a way that they can't be dodged can be hard. A few tips how to do this are to use them in the fog, or like this:



A good way to harass with rockets early is to attack + rocket as the enemy hero will often auto attack you as well, unable to dodge the rocket and in some cases even unable to attack due to stun.



Another very useful way to use this skill is to scout out the area. Is the enemy attempting to kill kongor? You can check it very easily with this skill. Also useful to scout while pushing or even farming to see if enemies are around.

- Tar Toss
This skill is all about being unexpectable. You have to make sure the enemy doesn't know where you will use it, walking right into it. The best way to do this is to use it from fog, in a sudden moment while last hitting and suddenly going on him in a good situation or with the use of a portal key.



The most effective way to use your skill set is tar toss -> ultimate -> rocket barrage 3x. As usually tar toss will not have landed before your rockets hit. Be sure to always try and wait with your rockets till your tar toss has hit, as it deals a lot of extra damage.


- Focus Buffer
Using this ability is pretty straightforward. Then again, who do you use it on?
When ganking, it's almost always best to put it on yourself. But in team fights, putting it on either the initiator or the carry is very useful. If they are tanky enough you can choose to put them on supports if they get bursted down all the time before doing anything. Something that's also good while regenerating in the well, to use it on heroes that are porting somewhere, allowing them to absorb some damage on "the battlefield".



Note that because the duration and cooldown are the same, you can constantly reapply this skill to your target. The best moment to initiate would be to use it, wait for it to almost be off cooldown -> initiate -> apply it again.

- Sawblade Showdown
The most obvious way to use this ability is to hit a many heroes with it as possible, this is usually the best thing to do as well. But when you have boosted it with your ultimate, putting it on the enemy melee carry can be huge as they will not be able to reach anything to attack. You can also use it to block of enemy heroes from fights (or forcing them to walk through it).



You can also use this ability to farm. You will be able to get tristacks killed quite easily with this ability. Try to pull as many camps together and use your ultimate, it will give you a lot of extra farm.

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Strong against, Weak against?
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Chipper is very good against a lot of heroes, but he is one of the few heroes that is able to beat the following:


One of the stronger solo's, his death boil gets countered easily by the focus buffer.


Same deal as with Hellbringer, a very strong solo yet the good harassment is based on magic damage, and it is not instant so easily countered.


Pharaoh is melee and his tormented soul doesn't do anything against chippers focus buffer. He also won't be able to get very close to chipper without taking a big chunk of damage.

In addition, Chipper is strong against a lot of other heroes that are either magic damage heavy and/or do not have a lot of range.


What is chipper bad against then?
There are heroes that are good against Chipper, or that are extremely good as solo in general. Here are a few examples


Succubus wins the lane (almost) every time. This is because of her high base damage, her decent range, her ability to harass and regen up at once and ofcourse her ability to rune control by mesmerising you.


He gives and gets magic armor with his flash, and he consumes your mana. I'd say this is quite obvious. At least you will only face this guy while ganking or later in the game.

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Replays
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Sadly, Chipper isn't played that much anymore at this point. Because of this you may find the amount of replays lacking.
Here is an old game.

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Changelog
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Here are all the changes made to chipper since first appearance. Thanks to Cyber-Kun for this, see here for all of the heroes/items changelogs.
Chipper: .chipper .the chipper .chiprel

0.3.2: Makes first appearance.

0.3.4.1:
Walk noise reduced by 66%.
Rocket Barrage mana cost changed from 50/65/80/95 to 50/60/70/85.
Hitting a target with rockets from under 175 range deals full damage.
Tar Toss now physical instead of magical, can be purged off.
Focus buffer reworked to absorb 150/300/450/600 magic damage. Cooldown and duration both 20s.
Sawblade Showdown SotM support: increases range from 700 to 1000 and adds a 70% slow to heroes in the aoe.

0.3.5:
Delay on Tar Toss reduced from 0.4s to 0.25s. Projectile travel time increased from 0.35s to 0.75s.

0.3.6:
Tar Toss no longer slows magic immune targets.
Sawblade Showdown SOTM upgrade changed: now gives a 90% snare that decreases over 4s.
*Won't slow couriers.

1.0.2:
Rocket Barrage damage reduced from 105/130/155/180 to 85/115/145/180.
Sawblade Showdown cooldown from 60/45/30s to 50s at all levels.

1.0.3:
Attack time increased from 350ms to 450ms.

1.0.5:
Players are now deny-able if they are burning from the Tar + Rocket combo 
Tar Toss duration lowered from 5s to 2/3/4/5 secs 

1.0.13:
Removed the 0.1s cooldown when a new charge is available for Rockets

1.0.15:
-Tar Toss 
*Cooldown from 25/20/15/10 to 18/15/12/9
*Cast action time from 0.25 to 0 
-Sawblade Showdown
*Initial damage increased from 100/200/300 to 200/300/400
*Can not take the initial damage again for 2s after leaving the saws even if you re-enter them 
    
1.0.18:
Chipper's stacking DOT from rocket+tar is now 15/20/25/30 per charge (Down from 20/30/40/50, which was nuts)

2.0.17:
Sawblades cooldown increased from 50 to 65 seconds  

2.0.30:
Focus Buffer from 150/300/450/600 to 125/250/375/500

2.2.0:
Offset the Rocket Barrage projectile so it won't hit units behind him

2.2.7:
Fixed Rocket Barrage hitting units behind Chipper

2.5.8:
Rockets Barrage touch changed from Physical to Magic

2.5.20:Chipper Sawblade Showdown 'refresh' time upped to 3 seconds to avoid taking the initial damage twice if a Stormspirit is used

2.6.10:
Rocket Barrage Manacost rescaled from 50/60/70/85 to 45/60/70/85
Rocket Barrage Damage rescaled from 85/115/145/180 to 80/115/145/180

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Credits
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Drasha - for being allowed to use a few screenshots @ usage of skills.
Cyber-Kun, for being awesome with the changelog thread.
Everyone who gave feedback in the comments!

Thanks for reading my guide, please leave feedback or discuss!


Don't mess with chiprels!

[[Poni]kippetje]

reserved just in case

[[Rsta]Az]

pro guide by a not so pro player

[Korok]

flint is not a good hero vs chipper mid

[[Poni]kippetje]

flint is not a good hero vs chipper mid

fixed, made some parts long time ago, ups :3

[[Dodg]Ar7style]

Just want to tell you that a maxed combo of missles / tar toss got a potential dmg of 3*180 + 30*3*5 = 540+450 = 990 not 690

The debuff from the oil actually stacks with each missle... altho getting that actualy sum is close to impossible due to all 3 missles have to hit when the oil hits...
Anyway, havent read the rest just wanted to point it out :I

[Memnom]

Pk is usually core and should be taken before finishing staff, no?

[[Poni]kippetje]

Pk is usually core and should be taken before finishing staff, no?

As I explained in the guide, a portal key is something you don't always need on chipper. It is a nice item to help you gank but you are not an initiator and most of your spells are long range. This means you usually don't need a portal key. Then again, you could take in some situations in which case you will get steamboots instead of ghost marchers

Oh and yeah, if you get it, you get it before finishing staff (glowstone->pk-> staff usually works)

[[FT5]reticoRe25]

whats korok doing in the guide forums

[Wheelz]

hmm , As a chipper u do not want to face a vindi too, anyways good guide..(Y)

[[TLP]BelowAverage]

Nice guide, good layout and in-depth. I might've missed it, but using rockets to scout (sorry cptn. obvious) is very useful, especially for ganks as mid. Also I think one would regret getting striders, any hero with spam spells like rockets wont utilize them very well.

[man_guy]

Stormspirit(2800) is a good item in general, but it has an extra use in the case of Chipper. When combining this with his ultimate, the initial damage will trigger twice. Usually dealing a bit more damage. It also gives you some extra mobility.

Also lets you hit Tar Toss for max.

Would be interesting to know how long it takes for Tar Toss to take effect (cast time, travel time of projectile--if it takes a varying amount of time to reach its final destination near or far) since you (probably) want to open with it when using Portal Key. Prior to getting SotM anyway.

It's worth noting that Focus Buffer's duration matches its cooldown, so if you want to keep someone constantly protected, you can.

[[Poni]kippetje]

bump, updated some stuff

[[Poni]kippetje]

bump, did a huge update
- removed striders mention from guide, was useless
- changed layout
- fixed table of contents
- added 'back to top'-like feature
- fixed some screenshots(changed/added)
- added credits section
- fixed typo's and other minor stuff

[Jezu]

You are concise when writing guide, just like me
There isn't that much things I actually found, but here they are

Items
Starting items 2, Runes of Blight > Health Potion ?
Mention Resto Stone + Puzzlebox + Harkon's (they are situational, but possible pickups)

Strong & Weak against
Mention Soulstealer as strong against, i think it is important.
Weak against; Tablet of Command (for obvious reasons )

Typos
Pros and cons, 4th sentence, should start His, not his
Play style, 3rd row, "to play play style"
Usage of Skills, Sawblade, 2nd row, should be "..ultimate, putting.." ?

You could also add "Best Allies" -section.

[Drasha]

needs image range for tar toss

[[Poni]kippetje]

needs image range for tar toss

done

[Shwank]

Thank you for this guide it is really good, I learnt some things about the ulti that I didn't know..

Good work

[[Poni]kippetje]

Thank you for this guide it is really good, I learnt some things about the ulti that I didn't know..

Good work

thanks <3

[RecoOn]

I've read it through and what I don't like is getting Tablet and PK together. Seems obsolete to me. I rather it being a PK or Tablet. I've seen people go both, and they really lack some stats in my opinion