Hoodwink
Hoodwink's earliest years were spent in the idyllic expanse of green that once filled the edges of Krimwohl. But as that kingdom grew, and the needs of both her citizens and her armies became ravenous, rival ore and timber barons scratched and clawed to outpace each other in devouring the natural beauty of the border forests, gorging themselves to meet the demands of the changing land.<br><br>To those living in the ancient timberlands, the choice came down to following the line of refugees into the pacified zones, falling to Krimwohl's black powder and steel while defending their homes, or fleeing further north to tempt fate in the haunted glens and groves of the misty Wood Tomo'kan.<br><br>So it was in those treacherous northern mistwoods that Hoodwink came of age, dodging the horrific predators of the Tomo'kan, ingratiating herself with some of the local banditry whilst antagonizing others, and finding absolutely every which way to be underfoot whenever some interesting mischief arose--often <i>allegedly</i> the cause of it.<br><br>But when the faintest whiff of Krimwohl's fires eventually drifted into her adopted home, Hoodwink's thoughts turned to any family and friends who might have survived the invasion--now made to eke out lives in the razed lands whose wounds scarred her very soul--and she couldn't help but approach the edges of civilization to get a glimpse of the devils that had destroyed her old life.<br><br>There, she saw that the monsters from her childhood weren't monsters at all. They were just...people. Soldiers, laborers, merchants...and refugees. And the soldiers, even with their black powder and steel, were nothing compared to the dangers of the Tomo'kan--real dangers with tentacles and teeth--dangers she danced around like a twirling maple seed.<br><br>Knowing she can always find safe passage in the tangles of the Tomo'kan, where most warm-blooded folk wisely fear to tread, Hoodwink now strikes out against those who dare try to further pacify the wilds, happily taking what she likes from their belongings, destroying what she has no use for, and helping guide any kindred survivors back to a life in the green once again.
Base STR
17 +2
Base AGI
25 +3.6
Base INT
21 +2.9
Move Speed
315
Attack Range
575
Base Armor
0
Attack DMG
22–29
Projectile
1800
Innate Abilities
Mistwoods Wayfarer
Hoodwink has a chance to redirect enemy attacks to a nearby tree.
TREE SEARCH RADIUS:
275
REDIRECT CHANCE:
14%
- Trees that take a redirected attack are destroyed.
Abilities
Acorn Shot
Cooldown
16 / 14 / 12 / 10s
Mana
70 / 80 / 90 / 100
Fires Hoodwink's attack with an acorn at the target unit. The acorn bounces to nearby targets, slowing them and dealing a percentage of Hoodwink's attack with bonus damage. If point targeted, a tree is created at the target position and the acorn will bounce to nearby targets. The ability may be placed on alt-cast to force this behavior.
BONUS DAMAGE:
45 / 90 / 135 / 180
BASE DAMAGE:
80%
BOUNCE COUNT:
2 / 3 / 4 / 5
SLOW DURATION:
0.3
MOVEMENT SLOW:
100%
- The same target can be hit more than once.
- Bounces will seek units in the fog of war in a 525 radius, but not invisible units.
- The planted tree lasts for 20 seconds.
Though she'll make do with almost anything, Oak and Ironwood acorns make the most effective projectiles -- and the bulk of Hoodwink's stash.
Bushwhack
Cooldown
15 / 14 / 13 / 12s
Mana
90 / 100 / 110 / 120
Tosses a net trap that stuns enemies if they are near a tree in the area. Affected enemies take damage over time and are pulled towards the tree nearest to them within the target area, and have their vision reduced to 0 for the duration of the stun.
RADIUS:
265
STUN DURATION:
1.5 / 1.7 / 1.9 / 2.1
TOTAL DAMAGE:
90 / 180 / 270 / 360
- Units can be freed from the stun by destroying the tree.
- Bushwhack does not hit invisible units.
Hoodwink favors Ironwood groves for ambushes, but the wary step carefully in all areas of the mistwoods.
Scurry
Mana
35
Hoodwink gains bonus movement speed, phased movement, and tree-walking for a brief time. While active, the redirect chance of Mistwoods Wayfarer is multiplied by 2.
BONUS MOVEMENT SPEED:
20 / 25 / 30 / 35%
BUFF DURATION:
3.5 / 4 / 4.5 / 5
There's not a nook or cranny in the Wood Tomo'kan out of reach of Hoodwink's paws.
Sharpshooter
Cooldown
45s
Mana
100 / 150 / 200
Hoodwink charges up and fires a deadly bolt from her crossbow, dealing heavy damage, break and slow to an enemy Hero. The damage and debuff duration scale up to max after 3 seconds, and the bolt is fired automatically after 5 seconds. Hoodwink is knocked backwards for a distance of 350 from the force of the shot. Creeps hit by the bolt are damaged for half the values.
ARROW SPEED:
2200
MAX WIND-UP TIME:
3
MAX DAMAGE:
600 / 975 / 1350
MAX DEBUFF DURATION:
5
MOVE SLOW:
30 / 40 / 50%
COOLDOWN:
45
While her first arbalest was a chance discovery, Hoodwink now takes great care in carving and caring for her own -- of course with some necessary components pilfered or otherwise cleverly procured.
Talents
Aghanim's Scepter
Decoy
Cooldown
30s
Mana
60
Hoodwink turns invisible, increasing her movement speed, and creates a decoy illusion that starts aiming a decreased damage Sharpshooter at the nearest enemy hero. If the illusion is attacked or hit by a targeted ability, it is destroyed and it throws a lesser bushwhack towards the enemy.
ILLUSION DURATION:
6
BUSHWHACK RADIUS:
250
BUSHWHACK DURATION:
1.6
MOVEMENT SPEED:
15%
SHARPSHOOTER DAMAGE:
60%
The best traps trigger whether you touch them or not.
Sharpshooter
Increases arrow speed and movement speed slow.
Aghanim's Shard
Hunter's Boomerang
Cooldown
18s
Mana
125
Tosses a boomerang in an arc. Upon contact, it returns to Hoodwink. The boomerang will deal damage as it passes through or hits enemies, and apply a debuff that causes affected enemies to be slowed and be more vulnerable to spell damage.
RADIUS:
150
DAMAGE:
200
DEBUFF DURATION:
6
MOVEMENT SLOW:
25%
INCOMING SPELL DAMAGE AMP:
20%
A precious last vestige of Hoodwink's childhood, converted into deadly distraction.
Hero Performance
Median across all public matches · OpenDotaForm
49%
Win rate in recent matches
Performance
70%
KDA ratio (kills + assists / deaths)
Laning
19%
Last hits per minute over full game
Farm
48%
Average gold per minute
Fighting
22%
Average kills + assists per match
Experience
66%
Average XP per minute
Strategy
When to Pick Hoodwink?
If you are not picking Hoodwink right now as your position 4, you are genuinely leaving one of the strongest soft supports in the entire patch completely untouched—and Team Spirit's own soft support Rue just confirmed exactly that by naming her one of his top three picks for patch 7.41a alongside Rubick and Techies. That is a pro player at the highest level of the game telling you directly what to pick, and most pub players are still ignoring it. I don't get it.
Hoodwink was already good in the previous meta, and the current patch of tanky frontline cores grouped together fighting constantly plays directly into every single thing she does best—because Acorn Shot bouncing between multiple heroes in a tight space, Sharpshooter stuns catching heroes that cannot disengage fast enough, and Bushwhack rooting heroes in place for your team to collapse on creates a constant stream of kill threats that never stops from the laning phase all the way into the late game.
She is disgusting in lineups with strong burst damage that can capitalize on a rooted or stunned target immediately—Lina, Skywrath Mage, and Lion—heroes that just need half a second of someone standing still to completely delete them, and Hoodwink provides that half second on a relatively short cooldown that keeps refreshing throughout every fight.
She thrives in the current meta specifically because the tree-heavy areas of the map have always been her domain—she can move through forests faster than almost any hero, scout dangerous areas with impunity, and position herself for Sharpshooter shots from angles that the enemy simply has no vision of until the stun lands directly in their face.
She pairs beautifully with carries that need the enemy held in place to deal their damage—Faceless Void, Phantom Assassin, and Monkey King—because Bushwhack followed by a Sharpshooter stun into a Faceless Void Chronosphere or a Monkey King Wukong's Command is one of the most suffocating combinations of lockdown in the entire game.
She is also incredible against the current meta's favorite tanky offlaners—Doom, Bristleback, and Tidehunter—because Acorn Shot applies a slow and Sharpshooter's stun gives your carry precious seconds to burn through the armor reduction and damage that these heroes need time to tank through.
Avoid picking her into lineups with a lot of instant gap closers that can reach her before she finishes her Sharpshooter channel—Slark, Lifestealer, and Phantom Assassin—heroes that will just dive directly into her trees, cancel the channel, and delete her before she can do anything meaningful.
Also feels genuinely terrible into silences that shut down her entire kit—Silencer, Skywrath Mage, Death Prophet—because a silenced Hoodwink in the middle of a fight with no Bushwhack, no Sharpshooter, and no Acorn Shot is just a small squirrel standing in a very dangerous forest with absolutely nowhere to go.
And if the enemy team has a lot of AOE tree-clearing abilities—Earthshaker's Fissure, Nature's Prophet's Sprout, Dragon Knight's Breathe Fire—they can systematically remove her treeline mobility and force her into open ground where she is significantly more vulnerable and significantly less threatening than she appears when she has her natural environment to work with.
Tips & common mistakes
- Sharpshooter is your most impactful spell, and most Hoodwink players waste it constantly by channeling in obvious positions where the enemy can just walk toward them and cancel it with a right-click. Always channel from behind trees, from unexpected angles, or from high ground—anywhere that gives you maximum range advantage and minimum risk of cancellation. The moment the enemy knows exactly where you are during the channel, the shot is already compromised.
- Bushwhack root duration scales with how many trees are nearby when it detonates—the more trees around the impact area, the longer the root. This means you should ALWAYS be aiming to bushwhack into treeline areas rather than open ground, and you should be positioning fights near forests specifically so your bushwhack hits at maximum root duration every single time.
- Acorn Shot bounces between the nearest units — heroes AND creeps. In the laning phase this means you need to think about where the creep wave is before you fire it, because a bouncing Acorn Shot that hits three creeps instead of the enemy carry is three wasted bounces that could have been applied as slows to the actual target you wanted to kill. Clear the creep wave first or aim specifically at the hero you want to slow.
- Hoodwink has a passive that gives her bonus movement speed inside forests and a free disjoint when she enters a tree cluster. Use this aggressively for repositioning during fights—if the enemy is chasing you, duck into the nearest treeline immediately, and the movement speed bonus plus the disjoint will often completely negate their pursuit before they even realize you are no longer in the position they were chasing.
- Sharpshooter's stun duration scales with how long you channel before releasing — a full channel delivers the maximum stun and the maximum damage. But a half-channelled Sharpshooter that actually hits the target is infinitely better than a full channel that gets canceled by a right-click from a hero who walked up to you during the channel. Learn to read how much time you actually have before committing to the full duration.
- Stop building Hoodwink like a pure damage dealer and ignoring utility items entirely. Aether Lens is one of the best items on her right now because it extends Bushwhack's range significantly—the difference between a Bushwhack that barely catches someone at the edge of its range and one that comfortably roots from a safe distance is enormous in practice. Buy it early and feel the difference immediately.
- You are not as safe as you think just because you are in a tree cluster. A Sentry Ward placed in your favorite camping spot, a Gem of True Sight, or simply an enemy hero who tracks where you ran after the last fight will find you and kill you before the next sharpshooter channel even starts. Vary your positioning constantly and never channel from the same spot twice in the same fight.
Summary
Hoodwink is genuinely one of the best soft supports in patch 7.41a right now—Team Spirit's own position 4 named her a top three pick for a reason; the meta of tanky grouped cores playing right into her poke and root kit is perfect for everything she does; and her ability to create kill threats from the safety of the treeline on a low cooldown makes her one of the most annoying and impactful supports the enemy team has to deal with from minute one all the way to the final teamfight.
Pick her into lineups with burst damage that can capitalize on her lockdown, always channel Sharpshooter from unexpected angles the enemy cannot easily reach, and make the entire enemy team paranoid about walking anywhere near a tree cluster without first checking if there is a small squirrel waiting inside it with a fully charged crossbow pointed directly at their face.
Just don't pick her and then stand in open ground playing her like she is Crystal Maiden—because a Hoodwink without her trees is not a soft support; she is just a ranged hero with a channeled stun and absolutely no plan B for when things go wrong.
Strong Against
Popular Items
Starting Items
Early Game
Core
Late Game
Popular Neutral Items
Pro Players Known For This Hero
