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Dota 2 7.31: How to play the reworked Omniknight - Skills and Talents

Omniknight in Dota 2 (Photo: Valve Software)
Omniknight in Dota 2 (Photo: Valve Software)

Omniknight has emerged as one of Dota 2's strongest support heroes after the 7.31 update, which notably gave him his new Hammer of Purity ability.

With this new offensive tool in his skillset, the crusader known as Purist Thunderwrath now boasts a win rate over 55% and is one of our picks for the best support heroes to grind MMR with in the current metagame.

Omniknight is in a great place right now, and support players looking to improve would be wise to add him to their repertoire.

To avoid some growing pains, read on for our two-part guide on how to play the reworked Omniknight to his full potential, starting with his skillset and talents.

Omniknight stats overview

Omniknight starts with 660 HP at Level 1 and gains 3.1 strength per level, a reasonable amount for the hero. He also has 4.5 starting armor and gains 2 agility per level.

In most cases, Omniknight shouldn’t be on the frontlines, and therefore doesn’t need any extra survivability from items to stay alive during team fights.

Overall, the hero is fairly durable, but you should still be careful to avoid getting burst down at the start of a fight.

While Omniknight has great innate survivability, the hero suffers from mana problems as he starts with only 0.8 mana regeneration a second.

And while Purist has a pretty good intelligence gain of 2.1 per level, it still won’t be enough to solve his mana issues. One or two mana items are mandatory for the hero to get.

Stats breakdown:

  • Level 1: 660 health, 267 mana, 4.5 armor, 31-41 damage

  • Level 15: 1520 health, 615 mana, 9.17 armor, 97-107 damage

  • Level 25: 2380 health, 1011 mana, 14.5 armor, 140-150 damage

  • Level 30: 2720 health, 1155 mana, 16.5 armor, 157-167 damage

Omniknight skills

Purification

Good old Purification, Omniknight's bread-and-butter spell allows him to heal allies and damage nearby enemies.

The 300 damage dealt by this skill is pure damage, meaning it doesn't get reduced by magic resistance and thus can sometimes catch enemies unaware.

While Purification is your bread-and-butter, it should be maxed second after Heavenly Grace. The spell heals more and has a lower cooldown with more levels, but its mana cost also increases.

Purification can be used on allied creeps and can disrupt enemies trying to last hit. It can also be used as a nuke when no ally hero is near the enemy.

Heavenly Grace

With all due respect to Purification, Heavenly Grace is Omniknight’s best spell by far. It allows him to dispel an ally and provide them with a massive amount of strength and health regeneration.

When used on an ally, Omniknight also casts Heavenly Grace on himself, though this does not dispel debuffs on Omniknight.

Heavenly Grace is an incredible spell as it basically makes an ally unkillable. The bonus strength amounts to 760 total health, a huge amount of extra health at Level 7.

With the buff also being applied to Omniknight, the team’s total health increases by 1520 health.

Heavenly Grace is best used on strength cores when possible, as the spell provides 38 bonus damage for them. Heroes such as Sven, Lifestealer, and Tiny are the best strength carries that benefit from the spell.

Heavenly Grace dispels allies, which allows it to remove negative effects such as stuns and silences. It’s often best to use the spell when an ally has been hit by a long-duration stun such as Mirana’s Arrow or Bane’s Fiend’s Grip.

Heavenly Grace does come with one giant flaw, though. Even as it dispels enemy debuffs, its own buff can also be dispelled by the enemy.

Some of the items and spells that remove Heavenly Grace's buff include Eul’s Scepter of Divinity, Invoker’s Tornado, and Shadow Demon’s Demonic Purge.

In such situations, it’s important to cast Heavenly Grace after these spells are used in order to avoid losing its all-important buff.

Hammer of Purity

Hammer of Purity is Omniknight’s new ability that was added in the 7.31 update, and it is a great spell for him. It deals pure damage to enemies and applies a five-second slow on a 10-second cooldown.

Hammer of Purity provides Omniknight with much-needed offensive capabilities. It only costs 50 mana at level one, allowing the spell to be spammed during the laning stage to zone out enemies and set up kills.

During early teamfights, Omniknight can use Heavenly Grace on an ally and then run in and use Hammer of Purity on enemies. Purist no longer needs to just stand in the backlines during fights, and can now enjoy laying the beatdown on enemies himself.

Hammer of Purity does have an issue that becomes more prevalent as the game goes on — it has a short 350 cast range.

This isn’t a problem during the laning stage or early teamfights when Omniknight can run into the fray. But later on, as cores deal more and more damage, it becomes risky for Omniknight to get close just to apply Hammer of Purity.

Hammer of Purity should be the last spell for Omniknight to max out. It’s a good spell, but both Purification and Heavenly Grace are superior.

In some cases, it’s not even a bad idea to simply leave it as a one-point wonder and max out your stats instead.

Guardian Angel

Omniknight’s ultimate applies a 100% physical resistance shield on allies within a 1200 radius. The physical immunity lasts for five seconds at level one and eight seconds at max level. The spell has a lengthy cooldown at all levels.

Guardian Angel is a decent ultimate for Omniknight. Almost every carry in Dota 2 deals physical damage, and being able to negate that can be game-winning. The spell has a generous radius as well, making it easy to apply the shield on all allies during a teamfight.

Guardian Angel does come with its flaws, though. The biggest is the fact that, similar to Heavenly Grace, it is also dispellable. A hero like Brewmaster can simply apply an area-of-effect dispel and remove the ultimate as soon as it is used.

Guardian Angel also comes with a long cooldown and a big mana cost. Both these factors make the spell difficult to use. Should Guardian Angel be used to save an ally support hero? The enemy Ember Spirit is diving in, is it a good time to use the ultimate, or is he just poking?

Guardian Angel is easily Omniknight’s most difficult spell to master. The spell still deserves a point invested into it whenever possible. Just be aware that Guardian Angel comes with quite a few issues that players need to keep in mind.

What talents should you get?

While Omniknight has a flexible item build that can adapt to whatever the game throws at him, his skill build is a little more set in stone. In most cases, there is a clear winner for which talent to take on Omniknight.

Level 10: +50 Base Damage vs +4 Heavenly Grace Duration

50 Base damage is a lot, especially at Level 10. However, Omniknight rarely swings his hammer at enemies and the bonus damage won’t speed up his farming speed or structure damage enough to be worth taking.

Four extra seconds of Heavenly Grace allow the spell to have 100% uptime. That means allied cores should always be buffed up with bonus strength and health regeneration. Heavenly Grace is Omniknight’s best spell and this talent makes it even better.

It’s a no-brainer at level 10, extra duration for Heavenly Grace is too good to skip.

Level 15: -30s Guardian Angel Cooldown vs -2s Purification Cooldown

This is a tough choice and largely depends on the player’s playstyle and enemy draft.

Guardian Angel is a solid ultimate but it suffers from a long cooldown. Reducing it by 30 seconds goes a long way to solving that problem. Similar to Aghanim’s Scepter, this talent is worth taking when facing physical threats and largely useless against magic damage.

The other talent reduces Purification’s cooldown by two seconds, bringing the spell’s cooldown to 10 seconds at max level. It’s not the most amazing talent in the world, but it's a nice upgrade for the spell.

Players can pick either choice at level 15. The purification talent is generally more useful, especially when combined with a Holy Locket. Upgrading Guardian Angel isn’t worth it in most games but can definitely be a game-winning talent in certain matches.

Level 20: -4s Hammer of Purity Cooldown vs +4 Heavenly Grace Strength/HP per Stack

On paper, this looks like an easy choice and it usually is, Heavenly Grace is great, why not make it better?

But in reality, when Omniknight hits level 20, the game will be close to ending 90% of the time. When approaching the late game, Heavenly Grace should be used before fights begin for the buff and not as a dispel.

It’s too risky to hold Heavenly Grace to dispel a stun on an ally. Enemies can simply target Omniknight first and bring him down.

Heavenly Grace greatly buffs Omniknight, so holding the spell and not casting it gives the enemies too many openings to exploit.

Of course, there is more to it than that.

During late game fights, Omniknight might cast Heavenly Grace two to three times in battle.

This is when the talent really shines. When the first Heavenly Grace expires, the carry player will likely have a couple of debuffs on him. With the Level 20 talent, Heavenly Grace provides 10 bonus strength and regeneration per debuff, that’s a massive amount of extra survivability.

On the other hand, Hammer of Purity’s cooldown talent reduces the spell’s cooldown to 6 seconds. With some bonus cast range, Omniknight can safely cast the spell to apply a significant amount of pure damage and slow the enemy.

Overall, the Heavenly Grace talent is usually the better option, but there is plenty of value in reducing the cooldown of Hammer of Purity, too. Players can experiment with both and take whichever suits them.

Level 25: +75% Hammer of Purity Damage vs +160 Purification Damage/Heal

At level 25, it’s another no-brainer talent choice to support Omniknight. An additional 160 heal that also nukes enemies for pure damage is incredible, especially when combined with the level 15 cooldown reduction talent and a Holy Locket.

Extra damage for Hammer of Purity is nice, but there is no justification for taking it over the incredible value provided by the other talent choice.

Keep an eye out for the second part of this guide, which tackles Omniknight's item build.

Otomo is a long-time gaming enthusiast and caster. He has been playing games since he was 10 and is the biggest Dota 2 fan.

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