Zeus, The Lord of Olympia Guide & Walkthrought

Once a deity of unfathomable might, Zeus reluctantly sacrificed his much relished immortality in exchange for the chance to crush the sinister armies of the unholy undead. As his soul crossed into the mortal plane, his omnipotent powers withered greatly, yet not nearly enough to quell this destructive Thunder God's resolve for justice. With sheer precision, he cleanses through the enemy ranks with an impressive mastery of electrical discharge, smiting the fool hardy with formidable bolts of lightning from the heavens above. Ever vigilant in his relentless assault, the Scourge cowers in fear of incurring the fearsome wrath of the Lord of Olympia.

I wrote this because Zeus is actually one of my favourite heroes, and seeing that everyone had such a bad impression on him, I did a search for the guides on him and only found one really really outdated guide, therefore I decided to write one on him. It may not seem like a guide to some of you, but it contains tips on how to use his skills and my way of playing him. You should, in any case, try not to ks because it is real easy to get kills with him early game. Without KSing, of course.

Pros

-has one of the strongest nuke in the game
-dominates early game - mid game
-able to kill those pesky windwalking heroes that always manage to escape with less than 100hp left

Cons

-low hp, easy target for ambushes and ganks
-low mana pool since he needs to cast his skills all at once
-dominating power starts to diminish mid-late game

Skills Description

Zeus - Lord of Olympia
Range: 350 | Move Speed: 295
Primary: INT
Str: 19 + 1.8 | Agi: 15 + 1.7 | Int: 20 + 2.7
Damage: 41 – 49 | HP: 511 | Mana: 260
HP Regen: 0.82 | Mana Regen: 0.81
Attack Speed: 1.44 | Armor: 2

Arc Lightning [C]
Hurls a bolt of arcing energy that laces through many nearby enemy units.
Level 1 - Arcs 5 times, deals 85 damage.
Level 2 - Arcs 7 times, deals 100 damage.
Level 3 - Arcs 9 times, deals 115 damage.
Level 4 - Arcs 15 times, deals 130 damage.
Mana Cost: 65/ 72/ 79/ 86
Cooldown: 2

Wow, a cooldown of 2 seconds! This is not really true, because sometimes the arc lightning takes a long time to bounce and you cannot cast another arc lightning during that period, you can only cast it after it has finished bouncing. This skill is much better than chain lightning because the damage is constant throughout, no damage loss when it bounces.

Did you know?

-Arc lightning will only bounce once on each target, it will not bounce twice or more on the same target

Lightning Bolt (G)
Summons a bolt of lightning from the heavens to strike a target enemy.
Level 1 - Deals 100 damage.
Level 2 - Deals 175 damage.
Level 3 - Deals 275 damage.
Level 4 - Deals 350 damage.
Mana Cost: 75/ 95/ 115/ 135
Cooldown: 6

This skill is actually the key to your success. A 350 damage nuke for only 135 mana and 6 seconds cooldown? Count me in!

Did you know?

-Lightning bolt deals a mini stun
-Lightning bolt reveals invisible units in a 900 AOE when casted

Static Field (F)
Whenever Zeus casts a spell, he will shock enemy heroes within 500 AoE a % of their current HP
Level 1 - Shocks for 5% of current hit points.
Level 2 - Shocks for 7% of current hit points.
Level 3 - Shocks for 9% of current hit points.
Level 4 - Shocks for 11% of current hit points.
Mana Cost: N/A
Cooldown: N/A

People seem to belittle this skill, it is now much more better than in the past although some may not think so. Now look at it this way, in the past you had to keep pressing F. But now, since arc lightning is spammable, you get 2 spells in one for the same cost!

Did you know?

-Static field cannot be reduced by magic resistance or armor
-Goes through certain skills like borrowed time and dispersion
-Static field ONLY affects heroes, it does not affect creeps at all

Thundergod’s Wrath (W)
Strike down all non-invisible enemy heroes with bolts of lightning.
Will reveal an area of around 500 AoE to all enemy heroes.
Level 1 - Deals 210 (335 with Scepter) damage.
Level 2 - Deals 335 (460 with Scepter) damage.
Level 3 - Deals 460 (570 with Scepter) damage.
Mana Cost: 225/ 350/ 450
Cooldown: 120

This is the skill which makes everybody have such a bad impression of Zeus, thinking that he is only for noob users who like to ks. But this is truly a devasting skill during team matches, this skill is similar to QoP’s sonic wave except that this skill will NOT miss.But there is one thing to remember though, never try to cut off his beard or you will pay with this.

Did you know?

-Reveals invisible units but will not damage them

Skill Build

OMG i wrote aftershock instead of static field and nobody pointed that out, thanks to kevin 3310 for pointing it out.

1) Arc Lightning
2) static field
3) Lightning bolt
4) Lightning bolt
5) Lightning bolt
6) Thundergod’s Wrath
7) Lightning bolt
8) static field
9) static field
10) Static field
11) Thundergod’s Wrath
12) Stats
13) Stats
14) Stats
15) Stats
16) Thundergod’s Wrath
17) Stats
18) Stats
19) Stats
20) Stats
21) Stats
23) Arc Lightning
24) Arc Lightning
25) Arc Lightning

Lightning bolt is a high fixed damage nuke, therefore it must be gotten as soon as possible of course, thundergod’s wrath is a no brainer I hope and Arc lightning helps a lot in harassing and getting creep kills. The damage increase per arc lightning is miserable and won’t make a lot of difference, and you don’t really need it to bounce up to 15 times do you? Therefore static field would be much a better choice since it probably deals more damage than arc lightning at every level.

Level 1 arc lightning is for using on creeps early if you find trouble last hitting. Level 3 lightning bolt gets you first blood real easy, seriously. I will elaborate more on this in strategy section.

Static field at level 2> lightning bolt at level 2, because you would probably deal more damage when static field procs with arc lightning than a level 1 lightning bolt

Item Build

Tangoes and Clarities

You need some of these to help your survive your early game while rushing your arcane ring. You can’t afford rings because they are too costly and will slow you down for your arcane ring, and the clarities help in using arc lightning to farm and harass at the same time.

Arcane Ring

This item is a MUST on all zeus players. It solves your mana problem immediately and surely,allowing you to cast an extra lightning bolt every 33 seconds! Even a clarity needs more than that amount of time!

of course, you forgot about the ever so important item for everybody,

Boot of Speed

Without this item, Zeus will have a hard time walking as his every so schexy beard is too long and keeps getting into his way.

So now, we have the final list of items, let us take a look at them again:

WTF, THATS ALL? Yeah, that’s about all you need to OWN.

As the game goes on, and you have more cash to spare, you might want to get the following items

Blinkdagger : Get this if you’re always getting ganked, and this helps a lot in running around the map and killing retreating heroes with your lightning bolt.

From here onwards, note that it should be situational, adapt to your own situation. For example, if you still find problems with your mana pool, then get soul booster and upgrade it into scepter later. If you find no problems with your mana pool anymore but you find yourself getting targeted and dying a lot, then get a heart instead.

Heart of Tarrasque
Shop Level: 4
Description:
+300 Hit Points
+11 HP/Sec Regeneration
+35 Strength

Why heart? It increases your hp by 900+, thus allowing to cast even more arc lightning in battle and proc static field even more!

Aghanim’s Scepter
Shop: Level 4
Description:
+450 Hitpoints
+400 Mana
+30 Intelligence
Passive: Improves Ultimates for Lina, Zeus, Furion, Pugna, Rylai, Rhasta, Queen of Pain, Venomancer, Lich, Leshrac, Lion, Necrolyte, Keeper of the Light, Luna and Orge Magi
Cannot be Dropped

It increases his ultimate by 110 damage, and it gives you everything you need, additional hp and mana pool. Certainly a must for him.

So, you have a lot of cash to spare after getting Agahim’s? Do not worry, Zeus is old and lacks stamina, therefore he starts panting late game, thus you must get for him, a ..

Refresher Orb
Shop: Level 4
Description:
+150% Mana Regeneration
+4 HP/Sec Regeneration
+40 Damage
Activate: Refresh Ability Cooldowns
210 Second Cooldown 375 Mana Cost
Cannot be dropped

Yes, you guessed it, a Refresher Orb! Why is this item so important to our every so schexy Zeus? This is a secret, but let me tell you it helps him regains back his stamina to cast all of his spells again for a cost of 375 mana! Woo, now really behold the wrath of the thundergod!