The main thing to consider is the ability called Sidekick. Sidekick provides lifesteal and damage, which is obviously beneficial because damage pairs well with attack speed. IO provides attack speed, so when you combine IO’s attack speed with Marcy’s damage, both characters hit like trucks. Moreover, Marcy heals by lifestealing, and each time IO hits something, IO heals Marcy, because the IO heals through lifesteal, which then transfers back to Marcy. It’s not a ton of healing, but it certainly adds up, making this combination remarkably effective. The synergy of attack damage and attack speed, coupled with IO’s excessive healing ability through the tether, makes this combo absurdly powerful.

Strategic Gameplay in Early Stages

In the laning stage, all you really need to do is execute a basic attack combo at the right moment. The critical timing is at level two, because then you’ll have a point in each, E and Overcharge, and you hit this intense spike. Most lanes spike at level three, but IO hard spikes at level two, which creates significant challenges for most offlaners who simply can’t retaliate effectively. Even when facing one of the best counterpicks, Magnus, who is theoretically strong against this combo because he can skewer the duo apart, the lane often results in a loss for Magnus, although he can still manage to survive, showing just how formidable this combination can be.

Optimizing Item Builds for IO and Marcy

In terms of item builds, it’s fairly straightforward: you want to get boots as soon as feasible. I recommend completing a Bracer, then purchasing boots, and afterward, going back for an item like a magic wand. This hero setup does have a bit of a mana problem, but with IO, it shouldn’t be the end of the world. IO should be providing pretty consistent mana support just through the tether. Therefore, getting your boots quickly is crucial because the movement speed of whoever IO is tethered to matches IO’s, enhancing mobility significantly.

Unstoppable Synergy: IO and Marcy

The IO makes the duo nearly unkillable and gives you guys insane chase potential. Over and over again, all they do is, literally just off cooldown, look for a dispose. Once you hit level four, you can jump on top of opponents as well. This lane is just unplayable—it has too much sustain and too much damage, causing most offlaners to lose. That’s why this combo is considered broken. It has almost no counterpicks in my games.

When someone first picks Marcy—twice now—I’ve seen a carry player snap pick Marcy in the first phase because no one knows what to counterpick yet. This combo seems pretty fresh and appears somewhat uncounterable, like it’s just a hard counter. Even something like Lifestealer with an Ancient Apparition is kind of okay against it, but even then, you get beaten down because it’s physical damage.

Ultimate Synergy: IO and Marcy’s Powerful Combo

The next aspect that’s really broken about this combo is the ultimate synergy. Marcy’s ultimate is on a 90-second cooldown, and IO’s ultimate, Relocate, is on a 100-second cooldown. You generally get them at about the same time because IO is constantly tethered to you. You can see why there’s so much power in this combo. Let’s take a classic combination like IO and Luna, or IO and Gyro.

IO and Gyro is a lot better in my opinion because you get Call Down with the Relocate, adding a lot of synergy. However, with Luna, it often just results in farming, so IO has to go tether someone else, which isn’t really effective as a combo. But with Marcy, the cooldowns of 100 seconds and 90 seconds create a perfect storm. It’s astonishing how well these spells synergize. The biggest issue with IO is that it lacks a stun and a gap closer.

Maximizing Early Game Potential

Nice execution from the players, but wow, they take the fight anyway—that’s really risky. Good Relocate out. You see, you just Relocate off cooldown with Marcy, and Marcy becomes like an automatic fight win in the early game in most cases. Obviously, if you’re having a bad game, that’s not going to be the case, but often it is.

Item Build Recommendations: Maximizing Marcy’s Impact

Once you have an Armlet, your hero becomes a killing machine, and Armlet should be the build every single game with no exceptions. This item offers too much damage on Marcy to pass up. What’s funny is that Marcy is a universal hero, adaptable in multiple roles, making her a versatile pick in almost any game scenario.

Item Efficiency and Gameplay Strategy

So, it’s not even like she’s a strength hero that gets the maximum damage from this item. Honestly, it’s not the perfect item on the hero, but it’s the best item for the hero nonetheless. And so, yeah, they go in; he’s top net worth. It’s funny; he doesn’t really look like the top net worth because he’s level seven, and the Razor is level nine. But that’s just IO Marcy; you shouldn’t be mad if you’re underleveled—it’s fine. It kind of sucks because Marcy actually is a hero that loves levels. You want level 12, level 18; you want max points in Rebound. It does kind of suck, so that is the drawback of this combo: you’re going to be underleveled, but it’s not that bad.

Combat Efficiency with IO

Basically, the reason why I think this is such a strong carry hero is that it’s easy to play. When your ultimate is down, guys, you can fight. Obviously, you have the option. You hit for 200—what is he hitting for? 270, which is criminal, with the IO attack speed. Usually, the problem with Marcy is, without her ultimate, she can’t really kill anyone because she hits hard but very slowly. With Overcharge, you actually can kill people without your ultimate, and that’s another nice part of the combo. It makes fighting without your ultimate realistic because you have attack speed, which usually you just don’t. So, that is nice.

Simplifying Gameplay and Strategy

But the easiest way to play the hero is literally just, “Oh, my ultimate’s down; I’m hitting neutrals with the IO, with my Armlet on, because IO sustains me.” And you’re just afking until Relocate Ultimate comes up, and you can just do that over and over and over again until the game is over. Right? And it’s a reliable, consistent, strong strategy, and it’s an easy way to think about Dota and avoid making a major mistake, which would be fighting without your ultimate.

Effective Experience Management

And honestly, what happens here, this is a quick side note, but I actually like it. The IO leaves the Marcy for a short period of time, and I think this is intentional. I believe Artour is probably asking for solo experience here because, I will admit, every time I’ve played with IO Marcy, the only thing…

Level Advancement Strategies for Marcy

I’d say one common issue is that Marcy will get stuck at level 10 or 11. Perhaps, she should have been left alone for a short period of time just to hit Level 12 because the level 12 is a huge spike with the ultimate. It’s a strong decrease in cooldown from 90 to 75 seconds. The bonus attack speed goes up by a ton, so you hit faster; it adds more slow, more damage, and more strikes. It’s a massive spike, and so, it is something I actually think is a good idea with IO Marcy—to be left alone strictly when you’re coming close to the next point in the ultimate.

Strategic Use of Abilities in Combat

Coming here as a kind of cool example of why you don’t need the ultimate, they go in, the Mars finds a jump on the Magnus, hops in, and usually, you would just lack a good amount of damage here, but with the overcharge, you hit pretty hard and they clean up the Magnus. Upcoming here, this isn’t even the real timing yet because he doesn’t have a major damage item; his next item was BKB and then Basher, opting for complete, just reliable items—not going for a Daedalus or Desolator, which is something you can do, but I think it’s terrible.

Choosing the Right Items and Synergy

There’s also a point about Ancient Apparition, but I don’t think the AA is that good with IO because it lowers the cooldown, and I just think that like it’s better to synergize all cooldowns with Relocate a lot of the time—not that you have to play around Relocate, but I personally think going full right-click is just better with IO because you have more sustain. You can kind of adopt more of a Chad build, rather than more of a utility build.

Maximizing Combat Efficiency in Team Fights

In this team fight here, he’s just going to beat down the Razor, and this is when the hero looks insane. You hit this BKB timing, which maybe he’ll use here—okay, he didn’t even need it—and just, oh God, that is a farmed Razor just getting beat down. Okay, and as we come close to the end, let’s talk about talents real quick. At level 10, it’s tempting to take Sidekick Lifesteal because you’re with IO, but it’s just the Rebound Cast Range that’s too good. It just makes you be able to hop really, really far, then you take Rebound Movement Speed just so you go really, really fast.

Optimizing Talent Choices for IO

I guess it gives it to your teammate, but it just makes the IO that you hop off of really fast, or like your teammate really, really fast. Dispose damage is kind of a cringe talent. I also think that maybe there’s an argument for taking stats, but 10% movement speed is like an insane number, so it’s probably overall better just to take the 15 talent on like 90% of the time.

Team Fight Analysis and Item Build Strategy

But now we’re going to see this team fight, and once you have Daedalus complete, good God, this is damage. I mean, look at this Razor—what, like bro? And that is their most farmed hero. Imagine if someone was low armor, oh my God, oh great. Alright, so yeah, in terms of the follow-up items, guys, to finish off the build, there are a couple of things that I recommend.

Advanced Item Recommendations

Number one, I think Sange and Yasha is really, really good. So instead of going Basher and BKB, you have the option after Armlet to just go Sange and Yasha because it amps your Lifesteal, and it makes you really tanky as well as really fast, which is great with the IO. And it’s a buffed item in multiple regards, so I’m personally a big, big, big, big fan.

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