DotA 2 Hero Guide: Jakiro, the Twin Head Dragon

Do you love the idea of being a dragon? Do you want to bathe your enemies in a pool of fire and ice? Have you ever wanted to play a spellcaster while still being extremely strong and tanky? If so, then Jakiro is the hero for you. Jakiro is a very tanky spellcaster that offers a lot to a team, whether it is the ability to push at an insane rate, slow his enemies’ movements, or deal tons of damage. Although he requires a good amount of set-up in order to benefit from his array of spells, Jakiro is an absolute monster when used properly.

First, let’s look at his abilities.

 Dual Breath:

An icy blast followed by a wave of fire launches out in path in front of Jakiro. The ice slows enemies, while the fire delivers damage over time.

Damage: 35/70/105/140 (Magic Damage)
Burn Damage: 5/10/15/20 (Magic Damage)
Movement speed slow: 30%
Attack speed slow: 20%
Range: 500
Radius: 200 (Starting radius)/250 (Final radius)
Duration: 4 seconds
Mana Cost: 135/140/155/170
Cooldown: 10 seconds
Note: 0.4 second interval between each breath

Dual Breath is your main spamming ability as Jakiro. With its relatively low mana cost and low cooldown, Dual Breath is great for killing waves of creeps in an instant. It really is a great farming and pushing skill. It’s also a great harassment tool, as its long range will help keep melee characters off of the lane and away from your creeps. The movement and attack speed slow work wonders in team fights, especially if you are able to hit two or more people. Slowing the opposition’s attacks will help your team live through the battle, while slowing their movement speed will ensure that they won’t be able to get away safely.

 Ice Path:

Creates a path of ice that bursts in front of Jakiro, freezing and stunning nearby enemy units.

Range: 1100
Radius: 150
Duration: 1/1.33/1.66/2
Mana Cost: 75
Cooldown: 12/11/10/9 seconds
Note: Takes 0.5 seconds for the path to reach the 1100 range and activate.

Ice Path is an amazing AOE stun, freezing every enemy in a line for two seconds. It is quite a hard stun to land on its own due to its long settling time, so it is best used as a chain stun. Wait until one of your allies stuns the other people and then use it so that it will be a guaranteed hit. Ice Path is also considered to be a skill shot ability, as targeting a hero with it will cause it to miss. You have to predict where they are going to move in order to land the stun.

 Liquid Fire:

Jakiro burns his enemies in an area of effect with fire added to his attack, while slowing their attacks.

DPS (Damage Per Second): 10/15/20/25 (Magic Damage)
Attack Speed Reduction: 20%/30%/40%/50%
Radius: 175
Duration: 5
Cooldown: 20/15/10/5
Note: Works on both enemies and buildings
When used on an enemy tower, it will slow the tower’s attack speed.

One of Jakiro’s best spells and frankly one of the best pushing spells in the game. With an AOE DPS effect and AOE attack speed reduction, you can easily kill off creep waves and towers with this ability. Since the Attack speed reduction effects towers as well, Jakiro is a fantastic addition to pushing line ups, as the tower won’t be able to kill off any creep when it attacks so slowly. This ability is also great during team fights. Hitting heroes that are dependent on physical attack damage with Liquid Fire will lower their DPS quite significantly, as they will not be able to attack as fast as normal.

 Macropyre:

Jakiro lays down a line of six Flame Strikes in front of him, each dealing damage per second to enemy units in a wide area of effect.

Damage per second (DPS): 100/140/180 (125/175/225*) (Magic Damage)
Flame strikes: 6 (9*)
Range: 850 (1150*)
Effect Range: 900 (1350*)
Radius: 225
Duration: 7 seconds
Mana Cost: 220/330/440
Cooldown: 60 seconds
Scepter Upgrade: Increases cast range, distance, and number of flame strikes. (New values shown with *)
Note: Will destroy trees in its path.

Macropyre is a fantastic ultimate that can do a lot of damage to your opponents when used properly. Since Macropyre is a stable AOE effect, enemies will have to stay in the fire in order to get damaged. This is why it is best to chain this ultimate with other stun/slow effects, such as Enigma’s Black Hole, Earthshaker’s Fissure, or even your own Ice Path and Dual Breath. Macropyre is also a great space control ability, as using it will force your opponents to either run around it to avoid the damage or run through and be forced to eat the flames.

How to skill up Jakiro:

Level 1 - Dual Breath  Level 10 - Macropyre  Level 2 - Liquid Fire  Level 11 - Macropyre Level 3 - Dual Breath  Level 12 - Ice Path  Level 4 - Liquid Fire  Level 13 - Ice Path  Level 5 - Dual Breath  Level 14 - Ice Path  Level 6 - Liquid Fire  Level 15 - Stats  Level 7 - Dual Breath  Level 16 - Macropyre  Level 8 - Liquid Fire  Level 17-25 - Stats  Level 9 - Ice Path  

Dual Breath should always be the first skill you max out first, as it gives you a high amount of burst damage, as well as the ability to slow your opponents down. After that, Liquid Fire should be maxed out next. The reason you would max this out next is because of its huge pushing potential and large amount of DPS. With the attack speed debuff, you will be able to push down towers easily with the aid on another hero. You can also use Liquid Fire as an effective harassment tool. Whenever it is up, simply right click the enemy hero and then run back. Although your right click damage won’t be very significant, the damage over time (DOT) burning effect will prove to be very annoying as it niggles away at their health.

When Liquid Fire is finished, get one point in Ice Path and then two points in Macropyre. Macropyre should be skipped until level 10 because of the fact that it requires a good amount of setup for it to be effective, which is usually not available until higher levels. It is also very mana intensive and can easily miss, making it a very costly and risky spell. Maxing out Dual Breath and Liquid Fire first is a much better choice because of the fact that they are guaranteed damage, as they are much easier to hit. The same reasoning applies to why you wait for so long to level up Ice Path. Ice Path is not a guaranteed stun, so it is more important for you to have a high amount of burst damage with your Liquid Fire and Dual Breath in the beginning of the game.

Now let’s look at what items Jakiro should get during the various stages of the game.

Starting Items:

Animal Courier: One Healing Salve: 

One Clarity Potion: One Set of Tangos: 

One Gauntlet of Strength: One Ironwood Branch: 

If your team already has a courier, then get:

Observer Wards: One Healing Salve: 

One Clarity Potion: One Set of Tangos: 

One Gauntlet of Strength: 

If your team already has both, then get:

One Healing Salve: One Clarity Potion: 

One Set of Tangos: One Gauntlet of Strength: 

One Ring of Protection: 

As a support, getting a courier/wards is pretty standard to help your team out in the beginning. Getting the healing salve, tangos, and clarities also helps you keep your health and mana high, and is quite necessary to continuously harass your opponents and push out lanes. The Gauntlets and Branches provide you with some extra stats, and the ring of protection will give you even more armor to survive. All of these items will also benefit you when you start to transition into the mid-game, as they will be used to help make items such as Ring of Basilius, Urn of Shadows, and Mekansm.

Mid-Game Items:

Ring of Basilius: 

Arcane Boots: 

Urn of Shadows: 

Mekansm:  AND/OR Pipe of Insight: 

Ring of Basilius should be the first item you get after the game starts, as it gives you and your team a nice +2 armor boost and a bit of mana regeneration. After that, you need to start working on your boots. Arcane Boots are your boots of choice, as the extra mana regeneration it grants through its active skill is great for both you and your team. The mana boost will allow you to spam your Dual Breath with no worries, allowing you to push towers as fast as you want. Arcane Boots is also great in the fact that it boosts your maximum mana pool, allowing you to cast off all of your spells during a team fight without running out of mana.

After the boots, grab yourself an urn so that you can start building up your charges. Even if you are pushing towers instead of ganking, you will still steadily build up some charges since the opponent will throw themselves at you in an attempt to defend their tower. Use these charges to heal yourself and your teammates back to full life so you can keep the pressure on.

After the urn, you will then have to check with the other support hero to see what he is getting. If he is getting a Mekansm himself, then work your way up to a Pipe of Insight. However, if he is not getting a Mekansm, then get that first and work towards the Pipe later on. Mekansm and Pipe of Insight are necessary to have in any game, so you should be getting them since you are the support hero. Mekansm provides a great 250 AOE heal as well as a +2 armor buff, while Pipe of Insight provides an AOE spell shield that will absorb 400 magic damage.

These are great for team fights and will help your team survive for a lot longer, allowing you to possibly win a lot of team fights. The passive magic resistance and the bonus HP regeneration you gain from these items will also improve your own survivability by a lot, allowing you to aid your team and continuously stun and slow the enemy with your Ice Path and Dual Breath.

End-Game Items:

Scythe of Vyse: 

Vladmir’s Offering: 

Scythe of Vyse is an amazing item, as it gives you a lot of mana, mana regeneration, health, and the almighty sheep ability. The high amount of mana and mana regeneration it gives you will allow you to spam all of your abilities on cooldown with no worries at all, while the sheep ability will give you another disable. This will come in handy when you want to kill off a single hero, or to disable the person that didn't get trapped in your Ice Path.

Vladmir’s Offering should be your very last item, as it is not really necessary to have, but will help you quite a lot. It will give all of your melee teammates lifesteal, provide a +5 armor aura, a small mana regeneration aura, and most importantly a +15% damage bonus aura. Even if you don’t have any melee heroes, get this item! The +5 armor aura is really nice to have, and the +15% damage bonus aura is absolutely amazing. Vladmir’s Offering is very cheap for all the bonuses it provides, so get it and watch your team own.

(Please note that all skill/item builds are simply guidelines. There is no real skill/item build for any hero, as everything depends on the current game situation. Use these suggestions as a starting idea and then work them to your liking as your game progresses.)

Now that we’ve gone over all of the skills and items, let’s see how to play him.

The basic combo for Jakiro is to first use your Dual Breath to damage and slow as many heroes as possible. After you’ve done that, use your Ice Path to stun them and then cast Macropyre on top of them. Remember to always right click the carries when your Liquid Fire is up so that you can reduce the amount of damage they can pump out.

Also remember to stay as close to the enemy team as possible. Since you are so tanky, you will be able to survive a lot of what the enemy throws at you, so stay near the front lines and always try to land your Dual Breath on two or more heroes.

Let’s look at what Jakiro needs to be doing during the three stages of the game.

Laning (0-15 minutes):

Jakiro’s lane can vary depending on the type of heroes you have. He is great in both the top lane and bottom lane, so send him to the lane where he will be needed most. During the laning phase, do your best to last hit and deny. Use your Dual Breath from afar to gain multiple last hits at once while also hurting the enemy heroes.

Make sure to right click all of the creeps a little bit so they will all die at once when you use your Dual Breath, giving you lots of gold and experience. Use your large farm potential to rush your Ring of Basilius and Arcane Boots so that you can quickly push the lane and start killing their towers. Also make sure to use your Liquid Fire on their tower as much as possible so that you can slowly kill it off.

Mid-Game (15-30 minutes):

If you’ve laned successfully, you should now have a Ring of Basilius, Arcane Boots, and have your Urn of Shadows done. Your Mekansm should also be up by around the 22-25 minute mark. Your role now is to help support your other teammates, push lanes, and engage in team fights. With a level 4 Dual Breath and a level 2 Macropyre, you are a very scary dragon and can deal a lot of burst damage and DOT damage.

Your Dual Breath should be used constantly during battles to hurt and slow as many people as possible, while your Macropyre should be used to blanket the battlefield with fire. You can also push towers really easily by spamming out your Dual Breath, using your Liquid Fire to burn and slow towers, and healing your creep and allies with your Mekansm and Urn of Shadows. Also remember to keep buying wards, as having continuous map vision is great for your team and will give all of you a greater sense of security and control while also allowing you to push and gank with ease.

Late-game (30+ minutes):

You should now have your core supporting items and be working up to your Scythe of Vyse. Scythe of Vyse will make you an incredibly tanky Support caster, making it very hard for the opposing team to kill you. You can use your Scythe of Vyse to help set up your Ice Path so that it will be a guaranteed hit, essentially stunning that hero for 5.5 seconds. This can be enough time for your team to catch up to you and kill that person, or for you and the carry to destroy them on your own.

It is also great for disabling any other enemy that was not caught in your Ice Path, giving you the power to basically disable the entire opposition with 2 spells. Try to stay alive for as long as you can during these fights by always popping off your Mekansm and Pipe whenever possible. Surviving is one of the best things you can do for your team so that you can always supply them with a lot of damage, slows, and stuns. The goal for your late game is to stay with your team, survive, and kill off anyone who gets in your way.

Extra Tips:

-Make sure to use Ice Path as a chain stun rather as an initiating stun as much as possible so that it will be a guaranteed stun.
-If you have to use Ice Path as an initiating stun, make sure to predict where the hero is moving and aim it there instead of aiming it where they are at the moment.
-Try using Macropyre in a diagonal fashion instead of in a straight line. That way it will cover more of the battlefield and have the ability to do damage to more people.
-Use Macropyre to clear out trees if the enemy hero tries to juke you through them.
-Don’t forget that you are a very tanky spellcaster. Don’t be afraid to be the first one to dive into the tower or to dive into a team fight. Your large HP pool will allow you to live through a large amount of attacks and spells.

If you want a video demonstration on how to play Jakiro, click the YouTube video below for a little highlights reel I compiled.

That’s it! I hope you learned a bit about Jakiro and I hope you get out there and start owning some faces :D If you have any further questions, feel free to leave a comment down below. Thank you so much for reading, and have a great day!