Battlerite – Detailed Shen Rao Guide

This guide explains how to get better at Shen Rao.

Guide to Shen Rao

Сrеdit gоеs to damn those storks!

Playstyle

You should follow the playstyle of safely spamming spells from backlines until you got enough energy to cast your ex-spells or ultimate, your very first priority is to swept away back targets rushing at you with Storm Bolt, or Ascension away from them. Using Dismissal to throw them back is an option aswell.

Despite being a ranged damage dealer, you got really nice setups for healing allies or interrupting enemies, don’t forget you can always help your team by healing and boosting them with Dominion, or landing near them after Ascension, if you have Heavenly Grace on your loadout.

Basic Abilities

Ability Guide

Shock Blast is your main source of damage, despite being counted as a basic attack, deals a little high amount of 16 damage, has high cast time-cooldown compared to many other projectile type basic attacks.

Tips

Use it for guaranteed damage on enemies rooted by Dragon Roar or on enemies swept away by Storm Bolt’s stormstruck debuff.
It takes 4 Shock Blast hits to claim the orb without any optional damage, and it takes about 3~ seconds.

Ability Guide

Storm Bolt is your strongest disable ability, Storm Bolt deals a very low damage of 10, but can sweep enemies away for 1.5 seconds, while enemy is swept away, taking 20 or more damage will remove stormstruck debuff from them.

Tips

• Has a very strong synergy with Soaring Thunder, a full combo of Storm Bolt + Soaring Thunder + Shock Blast can deal a total of 66 damage.
• Stormstruck debuffs speed factor on enemies mainly effected by how far it hit the enemy from, the higher range means enemy swept away slower, the lower range means enemy swept away faster.
• If Puppeteer battlerite is on the loadout, recasting Storm Bolt after hitting any enemy will make it possible to change the direction enemy is facing, this can help to setup abilities like Dragon Roar.
• Since stormstruck debuff is gone once enemy take over 20 damage, its better to finish stormstruck debuff with a stun ability like Soaring Thunder, or any damage value over 20 to maximize damage output.
• When enemies have their mobility spells on cooldown, Storm Bolt can be combined with Dragon Storm’s second cast to deal total of 70 (85 with Mandate of Heaven) damage.
• Storm Bolt won’t sweep away the orb.
• Be careful out there for enemies with counter or parry abilities, Storm Bolt has a high cast time which makes it easy for counter/parry abilities, and you can always sweep yourself away by a reflect source from enemies.

Ability Guide

This is your primary mobility ability. Its pretty easy to use due to the fact lightning bolt attacks are AoE, so they cannot be countered, and it effectively grants you invulnerablity for 2.5 seconds, allowing you to evade over time damages like Croak’s poison, or even Death Vortex.

Tips

• With Roar of the Heavens battlerite on your loadout, its possible to Ascension + Lightning Bolt + Dragon Roar + Lightning Bolt to secure orb for your team, this combo deals 60 damage which is equal to orb’s health.
• If Heavenly Grace battlerite is on the loadout, land near allies to restore health to them.
• You can get to the otherside of the walls with Ascension.

Ability Guide

Dragon Roar is the ability that can help suspending enemies while dealing fair amount of damage, it can interrupt Jade’s Snipe, Sirius’ Light Beam and more.

Tips

• If Roar of the Heavens battlerite is on the loadout, Ascension + Dragon Roar + Lightning Bolt 2x can deal up to 60 damage to a single enemy if executed perfectly.
• Shock and Awe battlerite is really useful to pin targets on the same place and make a setup for your abilities, it can even pull the orb to its center.
• Use Dragon Roar near yourself when a melee enemy rushes at you recklessly.

Ability Guide

Ex-ability of Dragon Roar, the second hit from Soaring Thunder has the highest range amongst all of your spells, and can be used to chase enemies running away.

Tips

• Second strike from Soaring Thunder deals more damage and inflicts stun. Meaning its priority to hit second strike more carefully than first one.
• The further its used, the gap between two strikes is longer, meaning its easier to hit both of strikes when its used on a short distance, use this to punish enemies getting close enough to you.
• Best way to hit both strikes is to use it on enemies swept away with stormstruck debuff, its kinda hard to execute so practice it on battleground.
• Soaring Thunder can be used during Ascension with Roar of the Heavens battlerite on the loadout.

Ability Guide

Dismissal is the ability projectiles and melee initiators hate, hitting an enemy with Dismissal will throw them away instantly, and any enemy projectile meets Dismissal will begone.

Tips

• Whirls duration is increased every time a projectile is blocked, meaning blocking multiple projectiles at a time increases its efficiency.
• Its possible to combine Dismissal with Dragon Roar or Soaring Thunder, first use the Dragon Roar/Soaring Thunder behind the enemy whom is close to you, then knock them back with Dismissal, they will forced to take the hit from Dragon Roar/Soaring Thunder.

Ability Guide

Ex-ability of Dismissal, mostly used to redirect enemy attacks, but its possible to use it for increasing the distance gap between you and the enemy.

Tips

• Use it against the direction of projectiles whenever you feel threatened from projectiles.
• Avoid using it if enemy doesn’t have projectile abilities, or not using them as much as non-projectile abilities.
• Despite being thin/long, Jet Stream’s effect area will redirect any ability from any direction, but less accurate to hit back to enemies themselves this way.

Ability Guide

Dominion is the ability you want to use more often than other ex-abilities, its not a skillshot and can restore health of both allies and self, and move speed boost from it helps to evade enemy projectile attacks, while rapidly using Shock Blast’s without restrictions.

Tips

• Try to get near allies with low health before using Dominion, if your allies know what they are doing they are most likely get near you when they are lower on health, and you have enough energy of course.
• Spam Shock Blast’s during Dominion, try not to use other abilities since main point of Dominion is to being able to cast Shock Blast’s at higher move speed without restrictions of moving.
• Sphere of Influence can help healing and boosting many allies at a time, while granting more area to move around for you.

Ultimate Ability

Ability Guide Shen Rao’s ultimate ability, Dragon Storm, summons 4 (5 with Mandate of Heaven) dragons to orbit you, dragons deal 20 damage to enemies they contact with and slows them for a short duration. Can be recast to fire all remaining dragons on same direction to deal 15 damage for each.

Tips

• There is two ways to use Dragon Storm correctly, first is to use it, then cast Ascension to stay around enemies and let dragons orbiting you deal damage. Second, which is harder to, and which counts as projectiles making it easier for enemies to reflect/evade them, use Dragon Storm, then hit an enemy with Storm Bolt, launch all dragons facing the direction enemy swept away to.
• Ignoring the two ways of using ability correctly, launch all dragons if Dragon Storm’s duration runs out while you already have many dragons orbiting you, so dragons won’t go to waste. Warning, if enemy has counter/reflect abilities, its most of time better to let them go to waste, or launch them at orb.

Loadout

Here is the loadout I am using for Shen Rao, of course loadouts can change from person to person and we can’t tell which is the best, so I suggest you creating your own loadout thinking what you need, if you don’t have any idea on your mind, you can see mine below.

Main point of this loadout to survive with many health restore sources like Entertainment, Heavenly Grace, you can orb secure with Roar of the Heavens, and pin enemies on same spot with Shock and Awe. Mandate of Heaven is not mandatory for this loadout, but it increases damage output by a large amount. The fact that this loadout has 1 of every category (Survival / Offense / Support / Mobility / Control) makes it fairly balanced.