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There’s nothing worse than going up against a Haze player who knows what they’re doing inDeadlock. In the right hands, this hero deals insane levels of damage and can melt down the health pool of any hero in the game. But if you’re not good with the hero, you’ll find yourself constantly zip-lining back to base to heal back up.
There’s certainly a degree of skill involved when you’re playing Haze. But your item build and playstyle also needs to be perfect. In this Haze build guide, we’ll showcase the best items you can build on the hero, her ability order, and how you want to play her inDeadlock.
-Low health pool
+Has an invisibility ability
-Ultimate’s damage depends on items
+Can solo Mid-boss and Towers
-Easy to kill
+Insane damage output
-Weak early game
+Ultimate adds evasion
+Ammo size scales with Spirit power
Haze is one of the squishiest heroes inDeadlock, with only 500 max health at the base level. Her DPS is only 56, which isn’t the best either. What makes her special, however, is that her total ammo increases with Spirit power. So once you stack up on a couple of Spirit items, you’ll have a bigger magazine, which will let you take full advantage of her powerful ultimate, Bullet Dance. Haze also has an above-average movement speed of 8m/s, which, combined with her Smoke Bomb ability, lets her dash around from lane to lane, hunting down kills.
Upgrades
Sleep Dagger (1)
Throw a dagger that damages and sleeps the target. Sleeping targets wake up shortly after being damaged. Throwing a Dagger does not break your invisibility. Sleep Dagger does not interrupt enemies' channeling abilities.
Smoke Bomb (2)
Fade out of sight, becoming invisible and gaining sprint speed. Attacking removes invisibility. Close enemies can see through your invisibility.
Fixation (Passive)
Shooting a target increases your bullet damage on that target. Gain one stack per bullet hit, two if the hit is a headshot.
Bullet Dance (4)
Enter a flurry, firing your weapon at nearby enemies with perfect accuracy. During the flurry, Haze gains a fire rate bonus and will evade some of the bullets shot at her.
Flurry Duration:3s (x0.07 Spirit scaling modifier)
Haze Build Guide (Ability & Item Progression) in Deadlock
Likemost heroes inDeadlock,Haze can be played in multiple ways. For our build, we utilized her ultimate ability, Bullet Dance, to its fullest potential. Here’s the ability build order and item progression that we recommend when you’re playing Haze:
Haze Ability Build
Haze’s ability build when you’re focusing on her ultimate is pretty straightforward. Your ability to unlock order should be Fixation into Sleeping Dagger into Smoke Bomb and Bullet Dance once it’s available. As for your AP investment, you’ll want to get Fixation to level two as soon as possible. After that, put one point into Bullet Dance and then save up 5 APs to bump Fixation up to the maximum level. Then, you’ll want to upgrade Bullet Dance to the max level.
Once that’s done, you’ll want to upgrade Smoke Bomb to full. Finally, invest the rest of your AP into Sleeping Dagger.
Sleeping Dagger serves more as an escape tool or a catch with this build.
Haze Item Progression
Haze benefits a lot from a big magazine, so you’ll need to invest in items that boost her ammo. You’ll also want to pick up a few Vitality items to beef up her poor base health. Since her magazine size also increases with Spirit power, investing in a few Spirit Items can yield good results.
Here are the items you want to make with Haze as the game progresses.
Early Game:
After getting to the lane, Haze players must choose between Spirit Strike and Extra Spirit. Spirit Strike is an exceptional item if you’re laning solo. This will allow you to trade hits with your lane opponent more efficiently. For duo lanes, get Extra Spirit for that extra bit of health, regen, and Spirit power.
Ammo Scavenger and Basic Magazine come next, giving her more ammo to work with in the laning phase. You’ll want to get Rapid Rounds after that to boost her fire rate and Extra Health to offset the health cost of Rapid Rounds.
Mid Game:
Swift Striker is the best item for Haze inDeadlock, giving her extra ammo and fire rate, both of which are essential for the hero to shine. If you have a good laning stage, consider picking it up earlier. With Active Reload, you can stay on top of the enemy hero when chasing for a kill. Kinetic Dash is also pretty strong, removing the stamina cost for dash-jumping and giving her bonus ammo and fire rate every 10 seconds.
Buy Sprint Boots and Extra Stamina next to buff up your mobility. Lifesteal is extremely powerful on Haze since you’ll almost heal up to full whenever you hit your ultimate. At this point, you want to pick up Bullet Lifesteal to take advantage of this. Quicksilver Reload is your final mid-game item. Imbue your Sleep Dagger with this item to reload your entire magazine whenever you hit a target with the ability.
Consider picking up either Bullet Armor or Spirit Armor if the enemy team continuously focuses you down.
Late Game:
Ricochet is extremely broken on Haze, allowing her to hit multiple enemies with her ultimate, Bullet Dance. Once you have your core items, this is the first late-game item you’ll want to work towards. Go with Bullet Resist Shredder to further increase the damage you deal on the target. Pick up Mystic Reach next to increase the range of your abilities. You’ll want to upgrade your Sprint Boots to Enduring Speed and get Leech if you need some extra Lifesteal.
Haze’s biggest weakness with this build is that you’ll rely on your ultimate for team fights. You’ll want to pick up Unstoppable to suppress thenegative crowd-control effectsfor the duration of Bullet Dance. Silencer also works well with her ultimate since you’ll be applying Silence on any hero caught in the range of your Bullet Dance and Ricochet.
Luxury Items:
If you managed to pick up all the items we mentioned above, Haze would be pretty unstoppable at this point. But Deadlock is an extremely dynamic game. And in certain matchups, you’ll need to pick up certain items to play around your opponent’s strengths.
Vampiric Burst, for instance, adds a burst Lifesteal for a duration. This comes in handy if your enemy has an overwhelming amount of damage and you’re having a hard time trading hits during team fights. Shadow Weave can be handy if you’re playing around stealthily. The ambush effect when walking out of invisibility also gives you bonus Spirit power to work with.
Improved Spirit, Improved Reach, and Superior Stamina are natural upgrades to items you picked up earlier. If you’ve got extra Souls to spare, it’s worth upgrading them to the next tier. Lastly, you can pick up Inhibitor when you’re playing againsthigh-mobility heroes like Infernusand want to apply a movement speed slow to your target.
How to Play Haze in Deadlock
The trick to playing Haze inDeadlockis to be greedy during the first 15-20 minutes. The hero has a built-in invisibility spell with her Smoke Bomb, which can tempt players to hunt down kills actively. While it’s what you’ll want to end up doing anyway, early on, you’ll need to fill up your inventory slots.
The laning stage is her most crucial time. You’ll want to farm up your early-game items within 10 minutes. This will allow you to play actively on the map and gank other lanes to help out your team. Ricochet is your main power spike. Before you manage to get that item, you’ll need to play safe and get as much farm as possible without turning into the focus of the enemy team.
Once you purchase your core items, you can play more aggressively on the map. But since Bullet Dance can be interrupted with stuns, you’ll have a hard time getting damage if the enemy team has a hero likeBebop hooking you from a distance. With Unstoppable, things become easier. But before you get your hands on that item, you need to wait for the enemies to use their crowd-control abilities before you use your ultimate.
Also, remember to focus on objectives. Haze can solo the mid-boss with her insane damage output. In addition, you may also use your Smoke Bomb before picking up the Urn of Souls to give yourself a massive speed boost to secure extra Souls for your team. Her tower damage is also pretty decent, allowing her to split push safely thanks to her built-in escape ability, Smoke Bomb.
You’ll need to play safer if the enemy team has heroes with movement restriction abilities, likeWarden with his Binding Word. Haze has insane damage, but she is still the squishiest hero in the game. If you get locked down, the enemy team won’t take long to take you down.
Your ultimate, however, can often serve as a get-out-of-jail-free card. It gives you 50% evasion for the duration, which, combined with your Lifesteal items, can oftenheal you up to full. So make sure you’re smart with when you use it to get the most value out of it.
There are few heroes inDeadlockthat can deal as much burst damage as Haze. It’s a prettyeasy hero to play in the game,but you’ll need to adjust to her aggressive playstyle. With her ability to turn invisible, she can position herself in the middle of the enemy team during team fights and deal massive damage to all enemy heroes. Feel free to try out this Haze build and let us know how it worked out for you.
