I am looking to add more cp mages to my roster and skaarf looks good right now. What abilities to max on him? What is his general playstyle and how to make make plays around his goop?
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@vinhdaboss i think you can do this
A and B max. Don’t invest in the Ult until level 11.
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As with the other poke-oriented mages (Sam, Celeste, etc.), Skaarf should always be as far away from enemies to safely poke with Spitfire, but close enough to place Goop puddles. While it is fine to be close enough to AA for the bonus damage from his perk, it is quite risky to do so because of his squishiness. His primary damage comes from the obvious Spitfire + Goop combo, so they’re the two abilities worth overdriving. Both of their overdrives provide good damage and CD boosts, with the CD reduction and duration increase from the Goop overdrive greatly improving his damage output by allowing two puddles to be up without any CD items. As for actually preforming the Spitfire + Goop combo, you should first throw out the Spitfire and then throw out the Goop a little bit before it actually hits to ensure that the burst damage from the ignition actually damages the target. Finally his ult should generally be used as a last resort measure to secure kills, especially for aces, with the slow for enemies and speed boost for allies, as he’s quite vulnerable to stuns and other forms of CC both during the channeling and while using it.
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Use the directional spitfires to hit both minions and enemy heroes at the same time.
Your basic attacks will deal burning damage when you have already set someone on fire.
Place the B behind or in front of an enemy in the direction they are going. If you have a clockwork you can light a goop with a goop.
Gooping a turret and lighting it is very very powerful.
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A and B, don’t invest on the ult + in general in 5vs5 the ult is most of the time doing harm vs good.
Skaarfs ability to melt turrets.
I witnessed a fully fed skaarf take down 2 turrets single handedly AND melt the armouries away within 2 minutes in the late game, changing the entire flow of a sure loss into a win.
It’s not even a case of the enemy not noticing the Split push. Turrets just fall so quickly when goop fire is on them.
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Simple guide:
Max A first
Max B second
Take Ult at 11 and 12
Start crystal bit and battery
Early: Poke often. You have range 12.5 Spitfire and range 9 Goop which gives you a range advantage on opponents. Take 1v1 or 2v2 fights and use autos to max your damage.
Mid: Take turrets!! Push your wave and take mid turrets with a group. Don’t be afraid to solo an outer lane and die for a T2 and/or T3.
Late: Play from the very back line. The Ult is for chase or distracted groups of enemies with low health.
Builds:
- Max turret take - SG, CW, BM, SG. - allows double Goop with high base damage of SG over DE
- Team fighter - DE, CW, BM SF. - allows the fastest Spitfire to stack DE
- Snowball - SG, Eve, SF, BM. - allows high early game damage (SG/HP) with an Eve to 1v1.
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Light goop with a goop? How? Use B+A+B or A+B+A+B?
Just place a Goop over another puddle that’s already ignited. You can actually pull it off at level 2 by igniting a puddle a little bit before it disappears to refresh it’s duration, allowing you to put another on it before it disappears for good. Having a CW or the overdrive makes it much easier to preform by removing the need to use the refresh trick to have two up at once. However, if you do use the refresh trick with them, it’s possible to have three ignited Goops out at once.
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I play Skaarf all the time. I always max my A, but sometimes I max my ultimate in some situations. But always, always max the A as fast as you can. It’s just so good for lane, because your A is the most consistent and long ranged ability in the game. Eve, Clockwork, BM, Spell fire, etc. Are all excellent on him. Maybe Frostburn, but it’s overshadowed by Spellfire.
This one game, I went 15/1/11 with Skaarf, and I maxed my A and ult. The ult is actually really good in cleaning up team fights, or just to make them disengage.
Only 3 people upvoted me post-game 
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Everyone posted great advice already. I’ll only add that sometimes maxing the Ult is good. It has good shield pierce and if you build a BM on skaarf, his ult becomes quite deadly to multiple enemies if you’ve got someone to support you. Your ult is also great for team support. Goop used to be too but the nerfs really shot goops support potential to hell. Contrary to popular opinion, you don’t always need to max his A, however depending on who you’re facing, I wouldn’t max his B either in some situations. If you’re dealing with enemy heroes that have reposition abilities, maxing his B isn’t as useful as maxing his ult. If you’re dealing with a lot of melee heroes, maxing his A is not always as useful as having his B and ult maxed. Ranged heroes, definitely max A, also when dealing with slower, stationary heroes, max B as well as A.
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The A is a skillshot, and will tear though turrets with the B. Basically what everyone else said. But I like to use his ult for chasing.
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Oh hey, just had a match with you… Captain baron, right? 
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Lol yup yup. You were on skaarf, and I was on samuel. @TheInterpreter was on Baron captain mode. You did a lot of good work 
@TheInterpreter sorry I got stubborn! Didn’t wanna lose 2 in a row 
Glad we didn’t surrender in the end lol. Ggwp!
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The key for the lil dragon is learning how to be offensive while farming. Once you learn that positioning and rhythm, you can basically control almost any lane opposition 1on1.
The goop becomes deadly one you learn to predict where your opponent wants to go. Forcing someone to walk through it (or better yet walk on it and light it themselves lol) becomes the payoff of controlling their position.
Otherwise there’s tons of good skaarf tips here!
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I like to play skaarf as a melter of turrets in 5v5. Max B first, get shatterglass, spellfire, broken myth. If an enemy lets minions get to a turret, you goop, light on fire with spitfire, and one more spitfire destroys the turret.
I almost never ever use my ultimate. Skaarf needs to maintain great positioning and distance from the enemy to be safe. When you use your ultimate it rushes you into your enemy team and puts you in danger. I would only ultimate if an enemy team is already retreating to finish them off.
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Samuel, right?
You did pretty well yourself!
57k damage and 8 kills are nothing to sniff at. 
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Aww thx @Rivet! It was fun to play with ya