DOTA 2 Guide: Juggernaut (7.06)

Juggernaut can be played either in the safe lane or in the mid lane depending upon the enemy’s draft. He can scale well into the mid game and can be a right clicking beast. For that to happen, one must have a knowledge of the hero, a presence of mind as to which build to follow for which situation and an overall game awareness.

Today, we at DireDota present you a guide to Juggernaut in the 7.06 patch. Let us start off with his abilities and his base stats and gradually move on to the builds and advanced techniques on the hero.

Juggernaut Lore

No one has ever seen the face hidden beneath the mask of Yurnero the Juggernaut. It is only speculation that he even has one. For defying a corrupt lord, Yurnero was exiled from the ancient Isle of Masks–a punishment that saved his life. The isle soon after vanished beneath the waves in a night of vengeful magic. He alone remains to carry on the Isle’s long Juggernaut tradition, one of ritual and swordplay. The last practitioner of the art, Yurnero’s confidence, and courage are the result of endless practice; his inventive blade work proves that he has never stopped challenging himself. Still, his motives are as unreadable as his expression. For a hero who has lost everything twice over, he fights as if victory is a foregone conclusion.

When to pick Juggernaut

• When you want a damage dealer in the mid game
• If you already have a late game carry who needs a lot of farm.
• If you have good disablers in your team.

Abilities

Juggernaut has four abilities out of which 3 are active and 1 is passive. Let us take a look at the abilities and understand them.

Blade Fury

No Target

Magical

Radius: 250

Damage per second: 80/105/130/155

Duration: 5 seconds

Cooldown: 42/34/26/18 seconds

Mana Cost: 120/110/100/90

Basic Facts

Blade Fury is an ability that works very well in the early game, dealing massive amounts of damage to enemy heroes. Combine it with a Ring of Aquila in the early game and Juggernaut can spam this ability.

Juggernaut is silenced for the duration of the spin. He can use items but cannot use his abilities.

Blade Fury provides magical immunity to Juggernaut for the duration of the spin. No magical spells can be used on him for 5 seconds.

Therefore, he can use a TP scroll or Boots of Travel while spinning to make sure that no one interrupts his channeling.

16/21/26/31 damage is dealt every 0.2 seconds. Therefore, someone who stays in Juggernaut’s spin for the entire duration of 5 seconds faces a massive 400 damage during level 1.

Juggernaut can right click for the entire duration of the spin but damage won’t be dealt to any units except wards and buildings.

These are some of the basic facts about Juggernaut’s Blade Fury.

Healing Ward

Affects a Target Area

Affects all Allies only

Radius: 500

Max Heal per second: 2%/3%/4%/5%

Duration: 25 seconds

Cooldown: 60 seconds

Mana Cost: 140

Healing Ward is one of the best healing abilities in the entire game. This is Juggernaut’s most underrated ability. With a healing ward by your side, you can provide healing to your entire team. You can also stay and farm while healing instead of making trips to your shrines or fountain.

Basic Facts

The Healing Ward moves at a speed of 420.

Make sure that you use your healing ward in a safe place as it can be destroyed by the enemy team with a single right click costing you 140 mana for no healing.

Once you cast the ward, it automatically follows Juggernaut. But, you can also order it to follow any other unit.

You may be confused by the percentage healing that is mentioned. It tells that the healing ward heals you with 2% of your maximum HP. For example, if you have 100HP, the healing ward heals you with 2HP per second.

This ability doesn’t affect wards and buildings.

Blade Dance

Passive 

Affects enemies

Proc Chance: 20%/25%/30%/35%

Blade Dance is a passive ability that need not be cast. It allows Juggernaut to deal a critical damage of 200%. This means that he can deal double the damage he normally deals. Out of 100 strikes, 20 strikes will deal double the damage.

Level this ability later in the game as you won’t have much damage to deal in the early game.

Omnislash

Physical

Cast Range: 325

Slash Radius: 425

Number of slashes: 3/6/9 (6/9/12 with Aghanim’s Scepter)

Minimum Damage per slash: 200

Maximum Damage per slash: 225

Cooldown: 130/120/110 seconds (70 with Aghanim’s Scepter)

Mana Cost: 200/275/350

This is Juggernaut’s ultimate ability and works well when you’re in a one on one situation and away from the enemy creeps. He leaps towards the target enemy unit and slashes other nearby enemy units, dealing 200-225 damage per slash.

Basic Facts

Juggernaut is spell immune and invulnerable for the entire duration of Omnislash.

Juggernaut cannot jump on invisible or hidden units. He cannot target buildings or wards.

If Juggernaut’s attack time is slower than 0.4, he can perform at least one right click attack between each slash.

Slashes in 0.4-second intervals which results in a maximum time of 0.8/2/3.2 seconds for Omnislash to complete when there is a target in range.

Omnislash cannot deal damage to decreepified or Ethereal affected units. He can’t deal damage to Necrophos when Ghost Shroud is activated. But, he can target them.

These are some of the facts that newbie Dota 2 players must know about Juggernaut. Before going to the builds, let us talk a little bit about his talents.

Talents

Every talent is situational and there is no fixed talent to be picked. For a newbie though, there might be some default talent tree picks.

Level 10

If you want to farm, I suggest you get the +20 damage talent instead of +175 health. But, there might be some situations where Juggernaut has to go for the health talent. When you are dying quickly in the team fights and are not able to contribute anything, go for extra health to survive.

Level 15

If you are able to survive team fights with ease, opt for the +20 attack speed talent. If not, choose the +7 armor. It is better if you choose the +175 health talent at level 10 if you want to opt for the +7 armor talent at level 15. Choose those talents only when there is more physical damage.

Level 20

Getting the +8 all stats is better than choosing the +20 movement speed talent because Juggernaut already has a decent movement speed, thanks to his Phase Boots and Yasha based items like Manta Style. The +8 all stats talent will give you survivability in team fights and allows you to be more prominent.

Level 25

The level 25 talents must be chosen carefully as this will affect your team in the late game. Generally, players prefer to get the +20 agility talent as it gives you a ton of attack speed and damage. But, if there is a lot of spell damage with the enemy team and you have some good disables, I would suggest you pick the +175 Bladefury DPS. Also, choose the +175 Bladefury DPS when the enemy heroes have a lot of armor and you can’t right click them to death. An added bonus is that you are spell immune for the duration of the spin. Be careful while choosing the talents at level 25.

Must Read: The International 2017 Battle pass quest guide

Skill Build

Juggernaut is really powerful in the early game when you max out his Bladefury. You can wipe out a wave of creeps, farm jungle and you can even TP out reliably.

I always prefer maxing out Bladefury and Healing Ward before Blade Dance because Juggernaut needs a little bit of stats and damage before he can deal a decent amount of damage via Blade Dance. If you max out Healing Ward and Bladefury instead, you can farm the jungle efficiently and get a lot of farm to be relevant in the game.

The reason we are taking a point in Blade Dance at level 2 is to farm easily in the lane and also in the jungle.

Item Build

Starting Items

Take a Tango, two slippers of agility to make a Poor man’s Shield in the early game and a Healing Salve to heal yourself when you have no point in the Healing Ward.

Early Game

• Buy a Stout Shield to complete your Poor Man’s Shield. It has a 50% chance of blocking 20 damage from creeps and a 100% chance of blocking 50% damage from enemy heroes. In the early game, PMS gives you a lot of survivability in the lane. Complete this item first.
• Now, it comes to your choice. If you want mobility early on in the game, go for boots of speed. But, if you prefer having mana to spam your Bladefury early on, make a Ring of Aquila first. I prefer to have the mobility to escape early ganks. Ring of Aquila gives you +3 strength, +9 agility, +3 intelligence, and +10 attack damage. In addition to that, you also get an aura that gives +2 armor and 0.65 mana regeneration in a radius of 900.
• Get a magic wand to have that extra mana and health in reserve so that you can use it when you are getting ganked.

Core Items

• Phase Boots are very important on Juggernaut and must be built before any other item. They give you +24 attack damage which complements with your passive as well as the Omnislash. It also gives you the extra mobility to chase enemy heroes and helps you deal huge physical damage.

Why not Power Treads?

I do not prefer to build Power Treads on Juggernaut because he already has enough mana for Bladefury and Omnislash. The thing he needs is the ability to chase down enemies and deal huge physical damage. Phase Boots provide that necessary mobility.

• The next item you must go for is Manta Style. Manta Style not only provides health, mana, attack speed and armor but also gives you an active which creates illusions of your hero. It helps you to dodge many debuffs like Orchid and also allows you to farm and push lanes.
• Go for Diffusal Blade as your next item as it helps you gain 25 agility and 10 intelligence as well as burns the mana of the opponent when you deal physical damage. Diffusal Blade also synergises well with Manta Style as your illusions too burn the enemies’ mana and it also works well with Omnislash.

Situational Items

• Sange and Yasha is also a Yasha based item. If you have an early advantage, you can build Sange and Yasha to finish the game in the early stages instead of opting for Manta Style which is a late game oriented item.
• Mjollnir provides an insane amount of attack speed and synergizes well with your passive as well as Diffusal Blade. The chain lightning procs also help you a lot in team fights.
• Blink Dagger is an item which can be used on Juggernaut to chase enemy heroes and initiate team fights with Omnislash.

Luxury Items

Buy these items when you are ahead in the game and have the gold to buy them.

• Diffusal Blade level 2 gives you some extra stats and also gives you an extra 8 charges.
• Eye of Skadi provides you the needed slow and lockdown to deal the insane amount of physical damage to your opponents.
• Abyssal Blade too is used to lock down your enemies and synergises well with Omnislash.
• Butterfly gives you insane stats like +35 agility, 30% evasion, +30 attack speed and +30 damage. It also has an active that provides 35% additional movement speed at the cost of your evasion. Use this to chase down your enemies.

This concludes my guide to playing Juggernaut. If you have any comments, leave them below or contact me on Twitter.

Torte De Lini inspired me to make this guide. You can follow him here.