Ringmaster seems designed to be a thanks to his large repertoire of nukes and crowd-control abilities.
The long wait for Dota 2’s new hero is finally over. After first being announced in last year’s The International (TI) 2023, Cogliostro Kettle the Ringmaster is now finally playable! Ringmaster is a ranged Intelligence who can dish out tons of magic damage in the form of nukes and damage-over-time skills while also having crowd control and escape abilities.
Ringmaster’s abilities
Q – Tame the Beasts
Ringmaster’s Q sees him twirl his whip for up to 1 second then cracking it at an area in front of him. Enemies caught in the whipped area are damaged and flee away in fear from Ringmaster. This ability’s channel time exponentially increases damage and extends the fear duration, but reduces the radius it hits.
At max level, Ringmaster’s Q has minimum damage and Fear duration values of 120 and 0.4 seconds while its maximum damage and Fear duration clocks in at 480 and 1.2 seconds. It also has a 16/14/12/10 second cooldown and a 90/105/120/135 manacost.
Use this ability to manipulate enemy positioning, whether it’s to force them away from you or push them into your teammates.
W – Escape Act
Ringmaster’s W lets him pack himself or an allied hero into a mobile, extradimensional box that basically works like the Book of Shadows Neutral Item. Boxed units gain phased movement, slow resistance, bonus magic resistance, and bonus movement speed. They are also untargetable, muted, silenced, and disarmed. The box will pop open after the effect expires or it moves more than 500 units away.
At max level, Ringmaster’s W gives its target 20% bonus movement speed, 80% bonus magic resistance, 100% slow resistance, and has a 3.2-second duration. It also has a constant 80 manacost and a 38/32/26/20 second cooldown.
This ability is fairly straightforward, best used to get Ringmaster or his allies out of sticky situations.
E – Impalement Arts
Ringmaster’s E is a charge-based ability that lets him throw a daggers to a precise point of his choosing. If it strikes an enemy, the dagger deals impact damage, briefly slows the unit hit, and causes it to bleed. The bleeding deals a percentage of the victim’s maximum health in damage every second to heroes and flat damage per second to creeps.
At max level, Ringmaster’s E has four charges, deals 75 damage on impact, deals 5% of its target’s Max HP as damage per second, and inflicts a 100% movement speed slow for 0.8 seconds. When used against creeps, this ability deals 100 damage per second. This ability is also very spammable with a 1 second cooldown and a constant 80 mana cost.
This ability will be Ringmaster’s primary method of dealing damage while also providing a slow on enemies that helps set up his other crowd-control abilities.
R – Wheel of Wonder
Ringmaster’s ultimate lets him roll the Wheel of Wonder to a target location, knocking aside enemies along the way. After it reaches its target, enemies in range of the wheel take damage over time and are slowed by 50%. Enemy heroes who face the wheel for more than 0.5 seconds are mesmerized and drawn towards it. The first enemy to be mesmerized triggers a timer for the wheel to explode. If the timer is not triggered, it will automatically explode after 8 seconds.
The Wheel of Wonder has a minimum range of 600 and a fairly large effect radius of 600. At max level, the timer before the explosion is 3.25 seconds, deals 100 damage per second while drawing enemies in, and explodes for 600 damage. It has a cooldown of 90/80/70 seconds and a 175/275/375 mana cost.
This ability makes Ringmaster a terror in teamfights, as a well-placed Wheel of Wonder can disable multiple enemy heroes and leave them vulnerable to his teammates’ attacks. The icing on this bomb cake is the huge explosion at the end of its duration, which basically makes it a supercharged Techies mine that can draw enemies into itself.
Aghanim’s Shard ability – Spotlight
Giving Ringmaster an Aghanim’s Shard gives him a new ability called Spotlight, which shines a spotlight that sweeps over an area. Enemies in the light have a chance to miss their attacks and are revealed if invisible. Illusions hit by the beam also fade away, losing a percentage of their maximum health each second.
The Spotlight has a 550 radius, inflicts a 30% miss chance on enemies, and causes enemy illusions to lose 50% of their max health for 8 seconds. It also has a 30-second cooldown and a 50 mana cost.
This ability gives Ringmaster more teamfight utility against invisibility and illusion-based enemy heroes. The significant miss chance is also nice against physical damage-based carry heroes to reduce their impact in chaotic teamfights.
Innate: Dark Carnival Barker
Ringmaster Innate ability lets him receive a random single-use Dark Carnival Souvenir whenever an enemy hero dies within 925 units of him. Additional Souvenirs are held as charges. If Ringmaster also does not have a Souvenir when he respawns he will be granted one.
Souvenirs of the Dark Carnival include a Funhouse Mirror, a Strongman Tonic, and a Whoopee Cushion. Funhouse Mirror lets him summon an illusion of himself, Strongman’s Tonic lets him temporarily buff an ally’s Strength stat based on his own, while Whoopee Cushion basically functions like the Pig Pole Neutral Item that also leaves behind a stink cloud that slows enemies.
Ringmaster’s Talents:
Level 10: +200 Escape Act Cast Range or +75 Tame the Beasts Radius
Level 15: Debuff Immunity While Channeling Tame the Beasts or Impalement Arts Penetrates One Target
Level 20: +75/+300 Tame the Beasts Min/Max Damage or +1s Impalement Arts Bleed and Slow Duration
Level 25: Escape Act Grants Strong Dispel and Flying or +100 Wheel Radius and Range.
