Heroes Of Newerth ( HON ) Introduction

Introduction

The ultimate goal of this guide is to provide a quick reference for each hero in one thread. The information is as compact as possible while still giving enough insight to be worth reading. It can be used as an alt-tab guide or simply as a source of references for you to learn understanding the game. I also try to include some of the not commonly known or too obvious tips and tricks for each hero with the intention to also provide some benefit for more advanced players.

Why this guide?

It has been done before, I know. Many times.
The main reason I am writing yet another Big Hero Guide is the fact that there currently is no complete "All-Heroes-Guide" available which is up to date and somewhat insightful (in my opinion at least). This guide is loosely based on SyyRaaaN's Big Hero Guide which unfortunately was lost a few weeks ago.
Another reason for writing this is to become more familiar with each hero and hopefully improve my own understanding of the game.
And last but not least to give back something to the HoN Community who is nothing short of amazing! <3
Who am I to tell you how to play your hero?

I am the typical pub and f-list player, hovering around 1800 PSR with around 1000 games played (4 accounts with 1700+ PSR). I do have some competitive DotA background in division 2b but this is more than 3 years back. I am not involved in the competitive HoN Scene (yet?) but I do follow it closely, watching a lot of replays (VoDs) and soaking up every information I can find.
I consider myself - especially after writing this guide - to have a pretty good understanding of how the cookie crumbles in HoN.
But still, don't take everything I say for the one and only truth. A lot of information in this guide is based on my experience and judgment of the current meta-game. There are always different opinions and points of view. This is why I encourage you to constructively (i know, weird word isn't it?) reply to this guide when you feel that I was completely mistaken in some aspects. You can also provide feedback by sending me private messages on the board or in-game (Newti).

Thanks!
How is this Guide organized?

As I stated previously, the structure is loosely based on SyyRaaaN's Big Hero Guide. However since this guide is no longer available, the only thing in common are structural aspects. The content is 100% based on my own judgement and not taken from the Big Hero Guide. I also expanded the Idea of the Big Hero Guide, going beyond just listing skill builds and item choices.
You will also find brief justifications and tips on how to play the heroes. 
This is what you can expect to read for each hero:

Name and easy-find-tags.
If you are looking for Night Hound simply press Ctrl+F and type ".night hound". But ".nh", ".riki", ".stealth assassin" and ".sa" will find the correct hero too. As a rule of thumb you can use "." followed by the full hero name in HoN or DotA or one of the common abreviations. This is important if you are using this as an alt-tab guide as the loading screen is only ~20 seconds .
Skill Builds

I present my preferred Skill-build for each hero and sometimes also an alternative, situational build.
In the following paragraph I try to briefly justify my choice of skills and point out what modifications can be made under what circumstances.
Items

I list the starting Items which I recommend you to buy with the 603 starting Gold.
Then I describe the different Item Paths this hero can follow and if it makes sense I separate a Core and (multiple) After-Core builds.
For most heroes I explain in a few words why I chose these Items and how they synergize with the hero.
I assign one or more of the following roles to each hero:
Hard-Carry, Carry, Semi-Carry: Carries are typically rather weak in the early stages of the game and need to have a decent gold income through farming to reach their potential. When they do however, they are capable of winning a game almost by themselves. Hard Carries have more potential than Carries who have more potential than Semi- or Soft-Carries. Lower potential ususally means they become effective earlier in the game or they have other strengths and uses but just carrying.
Disabler: A hero with one or more immobilizing abilities.
Ganker: A hero that can and should be looking for opportunities to team up and kill opponents during the late early and mid game once he reaches a certain level (Usually 6 or 7).
(Dedicated) Roamer: A hero with no fixed lane. Typically a Roamer stays in his opponents' forest and waits for opportunities to gank their short or mid lane from level 1 on. His aim is to keep the enemies undergeared and underleveled and not allowing them to farm. The Roamer however will be outgeared and outleveled himself pretty quickly. Roamers are rarely seen in pubs but they do appear in competitive play.
Babysitter: Usually a ranged hero with abilities that allow him to protect and/or support a carry hero in the early laning phase. A babysitter will harass the enemies and deny his own creeps while he leaves the last hits and killing blows to his babysat carry whenever possible. He ensures the carry will start to become effective as soon as possible by giving him "free farm".
Supporter: A hero with one or more beneficial abilities which are castable on his allies. Usually these are healing, protection or combat buff spells.
Jungler: A hero who can level up by killing neutral creeps in the forest from level 1 on. This will give the team two solo lanes and usually more overall experience.
Initiator: Initiation is the art of starting the combat with a big advantage for your team. Initiation typically involves one hero instantly appearing next to the enemy team (by means of Portal Key, Flash, Invisibility, ...) and starting the fight with a very powerful ability that is capable of turning the tide in his team's favor (e.g. Whirlpool, Shockwave, Eruption,...). Generally every team needs some kind of initiation to be able win the game. Know how to use your initiation abilities correctly when playing an Initiator!
Tank: A Tank's aim is to draw as much enemy fire on him as possible to allow the rest of the team to move and fight freely. Tanks shine through their high physical and magical damage reduction, high Health pool and tanking related abilities. It is a common misconception to assume that every team needs a tank. You can win games without a tank easily (unlike initiators).
Nuker: A hero with one or more directly damaging abilities. These abilities are strongest in the early game and tend to lose power as the game progresses.
Ward Hoe: Usually a hero with low item dependency. Ward Hoes are responsible to buy and place wards of sight and revelation if needed. This always has priority over buying personal items.
Pusher: A hero with one or more Spells to destroy creep waves and/or buildings very effectively in the early- and midgame.

General Hero Information
Prefered Lane: Short means bottom for Legion and top for Hellbourne while Long is the other one.
Difficulty: Indicates how suitable this character is for newer players. From 1 (Very Easy) to 5 (Very Hard).
Farming Capabilities: Indicates how well a hero can kill lane and/or neutral creeps to receive a lot of gold in short time. Each hero is rated from 1 (Poor Farmer) to 5 (Excellent Farmer).
Item dependancy: Indicates how much farm and therefore how many big items the hero requires before he becomes effective. From 1 (Very Low) to 5 (Very Heavy) dependency.
Early Game Power / Lane Control: Rates each hero from 1-5 on how dominant he is in a lane and how much impact he has on the early game stage.
Mid Game Power / Ganks: Rates each hero from 1-5 on how well he performs at ganking and how much impact he has on the mid game.
Late Game Power / Team fights: Rates each hero from 1-5 on how well he performs in the late game where most of the action will be decided in team battles.

Quick-'n'-dirty 

Additionally I wrote a "30-Seconds-Guide" for each hero. It consists of some hopefully not too commonly known or obvious tips and tricks to playing the hero successfully. I try to keep it short so it is readable within 30 seconds as the name suggests. You can read this while loading, waiting for the creeps/runes to spawn or when you happen to be dead .

Counters
"Omg this **** night hound is owning me, WHAT KEN I DOE?"
This section contains hero- and item choices as well as gameplay hints to counteract or gain advantages against the specific hero.
I try to not only list the obvious counters like "OMG BUY WARDS" so keep an eye out for these when one of your opponents gets out of hand.

Maybe later I will also include some basic Item information here like the Steam Boots vs. Ghost Marcher dilemma or the Power Supply issue.

Any feedback is of course welcome!