General DiscussionIs tidehunter support still relevant?

I rarely see tide, it feels like he died and losses games because in fights he stopped doing as much as he was able to do before.

Tide is always strong. He and lich are the two heroes that I have sealed away (i.e. refrain from playing) because they are so strong and never irrelevant since my first game at 6.10. It really take the fun out of the game when you play those two because they are the really tryhard heroes. I only touch them when I am on a 10 game or more losing streak.

For 6.84.
Skill build: 1-1-3-1 (or 0-2-3-1) to 1-1-4-1 (0-2-4-1) to 1-4-4-2. Always ensure you have a value point in gush by level 8 or earlier (if you want to roam and gank).

The passive had been buffed so much that it is much more worthwhile to max it over gush. Either way, balance your offensive and defensive need between gush and passive. You can leave smash at level 3 and max it later as well. There are a lot of flexibility in the skill build.

Item build: Arcance --> dagger --> Meka --> Guardian. I always prefer arcance and meka playstyle in the past more than urn --> refresher rush. This make you not so reliant on ult and much more tanky in the front line. This item build just get buffed with guardian greeve.

Optional wand if needed. No need for stout/oov/qblade. You have no slots for those. Dust if neccesary. Help to ward occasionally.

Extension items are flexible. HH/Shiva/AC/Vlad/Hex/Refresher/Force staff/Eul/Heart are all very solid choice. Optional BKB and/or blademail if really needed.

Lane: Go offlane and leach level. You need level 6 more than gold. In that regard, jungle is not good as you clear nc too slow and do not need gold. However, if you are forced to jungle, get a qblade and amend your skill build to 1-3-1-1 or 1-2-2-1. Do not forsake one level in gush as it help you gank from jungle. However, you should only take gush from level 4 onwards. Otherwise, you will not be able to jungle effectively with only level 1 passive.

Once you reach level 6, go gank and force a team fight whenever your ult is off cd. Repeat and win.

Sorry misread the header.....You can still "support" as an offlaner with the ocassional ward, courier, arcane and meka.

For Position 4, i.e. nc --> it is viable but it is really slow.

For Position 5, i.e. hard support --> no, unless you enjoy being just a walking ultimate.....In that regard, you should then max gush followed by passive with 1 value point in smash....follow-up with blademail to contribute to team fight...come late game, dagger ult --> spam gush and smash --> blademail --> force-staff out when shit goes south......

Dagger/force-staff/arcane boot/blademail/TP/obs --> Your inventory will look like this....

Ideally, a hard support should be a ranged hero unless you are omni or LOA.

We used to run position 4 TH back in Dota 1 days

I haven't seen it since then but I actually think that he is still viable in a game where there is consistent aggression.

Imagine having a strong offlaner and a Tide Ravage to back it up during mid game.

Gush is maxed out first when played as 4.

Gush was maxed in D1 because smash was a passive back then. The game has become more dynamic now with more focus on jungling, so I feel smash-shell build is more viable as Position 4 for jungling purpose, with 1 value point in gush......

Now that I think about it, even as a position 5, Tide should still go nc and go smash-smell with 1 value point in gush because you just could not zone out the offlaner. Just leave the nc last hit to your position 4 if needed.

Tide is an ok support because of gush and can get some farm threw stacking and anchorsmashing

^I feel like sand king or earth shaker is way better then tide and do what he does, just not offlane, but for offlane there are better offlaners such as wr or bb

earth shaker is a good offlaner atm

^ I see a lot of ppl maxing q on him and I hate them so much, just keep q at lvl 1 and max w and e, allows you to kill ppl early and have strong ult.

Tide's really good, just do one level of gush and max everything else. Just use gush for the slow when ganking.

If left 1v1 vs a melee carry he can actually win lane due to kracken shell dmg reduction and anchor smash reduction + dmg spam. And I know that sounds stupid, who would leave a melee solo vs tide, but it happens a lot when support will roam or go jungle CM + SK stupid shit like that and you can then proceed to own the spectre, PA, void left behind.

^ I was replying to TripleSteal comment

yeah for sure, I don't see anyone maxing gush, cus you don't need to. If you max kraken early, skip gush altogether, go like 0/3/2/0 at 5, the enemy offlane is probably lvl 4, how much dmg do heroes do at level 4 like 50 on a support, 70 on a carry with a couple items? So you can block over half their dmg, it's nuts, u can trade shots so easily.