Hello! Welcome to a Raz Guide! Here! You are in the right place if you are planning to learn on filling mid lane role. Raz will be there to deal damage, initiate, poke and hard-carry games. Raz can be difficult to play because of his skill sets. He isnt a "smash all abilities button" type of hero, you are going to need good decision making skills, a lots of game sense/experience acquired from playing Raz, aiming and movement mechanics. Raz is the only energy-based hero in game, where all your abilities costs energy instead of mana and it will regenerate over time or when you hit a target with your abilities. Dont you worry, we have you covered! 

How can Raz fit in a team composition?

When your team requires:

-Mid Lane

-Magic Damage

-Poke and Burst damage against enemy front lines

-Crowd controls and follow-up initiate (works extremely well with one or two initiator such as Maloch and Arthur).

-Second/Third carry

Lore

Raz was an important figure in Thanes eternal struggle against the corrupted. The magnificent king embedded Raz deep in the darkness to be his eyes and ears.

Raz possessed superhuman speed and agility, most importantly his blinding fists struck fast and true. In his long mission, Raz won the trust of Preyta. Earning his favor, Raz was made head of a small strike team in Preytas army. Using his authority and guile, Raz was always able to stay two steps ahead of the Corrupted, leveraging sabotage and subterfuge to impede the dark army.

However, Preyta was no fool. The Plague Master could smell a rat. He lay careful machinations to catch the traitor in his midst, even Raz was blissfully unaware until it was too late. While pursuing a false lead, he fell into Preytas trap. He was immediately surrounded by an ocean of corrupted souls.

Uttering foul curses, Preyta and his ilk closed in around Raz. He could sense that the end was near, but he could not just lay down and accept this kind of fate. Using his last bit of strength Raz lashed out with a fury never before seen in Athanor. His fists were on fire, lighting up his foes and his rage, until finally he broke through. However, his hands were badly broken and his spirit greatly wounded.

Raz limped his way back into Thanes court where he collapsed onto the ground. To save his friend, Thane rushed Raz to the citadel and beseeched the angel Lauriel for aid. But in order to receive the Lights blessing, Raz would have to undergo a grueling trial, and if he failed, he would die.

But luckily, he did not. Not only did Raz triumph and heal himself, he was stronger than he was even before. His gauntlets glowed a crimson light that grew steadily stronger as his resolve to vanquish the Corrupted grew ever more steeled. His fists would tear anything down that stood in the way of his righteous fury.

Pros:

-High magic damage

-Short cooldown

-High damage poke

-Decent initiate and crowd control

-Doesnt require to snowball to shine in mid-late game

-Strong kiting with decent range

Cons:

-Squishy, crowd control is your biggest weakness, get caught and you are down

-Tank items dont scale well with Raz, you cant be tanky

-Requires high skill cap

Dont be afraid to buy these Arcanas for Raz, unlike attack damage heroes, mages uses the same Arcanas most of the time.

Violate III x10 - Grants you a total of Ability Power +42 and Magic Pierce +24.

Stacking Magic Pierce is great for Raz because his abilities has high scaling from ability power and good base damage.The ability power bonus from the Arcana would help a lot in early                           game as well.

Devour III x10 - Grants you a total of Ability Power +24 and Magic Life Steal +10%.

You can choose between Devour or Sap. They both accomplish the same thing which helps Raz sustains in the game - Magic Life Steal. 

Sap III x10 - Grants you a total of Magic Life Steal +16%.

Choose Sap over Devour if you wish to have more sustain than damage. Personally I would choose Devour III x10.

Flurry III x10 - Grants you a total of Attack Speed + 6% and Magic Pierce +64.

The attack speed from the Arcana dont matter much, you would only want the Magic Pierce. Stacking Flurry and Violate grants you a huge advantage and damage boost for your abilities                      especially in the early game. 

Boots:

Lets talk about boots first. Boots can be either first or second item. Never third item, you will lose a lot of mobility during the early game. There is plenty of choices you can choose from, and it all comes down to your preference, playstyle and situation.

Hermes Select- It gives you tons of movement speed bonus whenever you are out of battle. Very good choice for roaming but it sacrifices some of your survivability. If you are the one who likes to "make things happen", go for it.

Sonic Boots- Defensive boots against attack damage heroes. Armor and basic attack reduction. Works well against any Marksman.

Gilded Greaves - Defensive boots against magic damage heroes. It also reduces the duration of crowd controls you received from enemies.

Situational Starter Item:

Phoenix Tear- Ability Power: 60

Unique Passive: From the Ashes

When the hero gains a level, 20% of HP and Mana are restored over 3 seconds.

-Very useful for early game, especially when you are trading damage against the enemy. If you have Sap or Devour as your Arcanas, you might not need this item, you may skip it. The Magic Life Steal from the Arcanas would help you sustain in lane without Phoenix Tear.

First & Second Item

Boots of Speed-

Unique Passive: Movement Speed +30

Upgrade the boots depend on the situation after your Boomstick.

Boomstick- Ability Power: 240

Unique Passive: Explosion

Ability hits trigger a small-area explosion that deals 50 (+50% ability power) magic damage. 5-second cooldown.

-Very good as your first item on Raz, it boosts your poke and burst damage from Power Surge. Short cooldown as well.

Third and Fourth Item

Rheas Blessing- Ability Power: 140 Cooldown Speed: 10%

Unique Passive: Life Shield

Gains a shield that absorbs (450+heros level*50)(+40% ability power) damage when HP falls below 40%. The shield lasts 4 seconds and has a 75-second cooldown.

Unique Passive: Magic Life Steal 25%

-Great amount of ability power, cooldown speed and magic life steal. It also grants you a shield when your HP is below 40%. Most of the times, I would buy this as my third item to counters/surviving against enemy assassins. 

Hecates Diadem- Ability Power: 200 

Unique Passive: Warlock- Ability Power +35% 

Unique Passive: Magic Pierce +75

A huge ability power boost for Raz and Magic Pierce to do even more damage. Feel free to buy Hecates Diadem first over Rheas Blessing if you are confident. Either way, Rheas Blessing and Hecates Diadem will fill in your third and fourth item.

Fifth Item

Beriths Agony- Ability Power: 140 Cooldown Speed: 10% Armor: 270

Unique Passive: Torture -Deals magic damage equal to 4% of the targets current HP (up to 80 against monsters). 1.2-second cooldown.

This is surprisingly a very good item on Raz. The item itself has a 1.2 second cooldown that deals 4% of their current HP. It deals tons of damage against enemy tanks and frontlines. Synergies extremely well with your second ability, Power Surge, which happened to have really short cooldowns as well.

Last Item

Remember to sell your Phoenix Tear to buy the last item if you did bought Phoenix Tear as your starter item. 

Holy of Holies- Ability Power: 400

Unique Passive: Enlightenment -Increases maximum HP by 1400.

Expensive but powerful. Highest ability power item in game, also gives you 1400 health. Has everything Raz needs.

Razs Hidden Passive - Mini Dash

Raz automatically casts a mini-dash at any direction you move after every spell used. For some reason, it is not listed in the abilities. It can be confusing at first, but you will control Razs mini dash when you are used to it. This mini dash cant be used to hop/bypass walls.

Raz Wall Hop with Rising Uppercut

Raz can jump between walls with Rising Uppercut, but be aware, his range isnt as long as any ordinary dash, there is some walls that he cant jump over (as you can see in the video).

Raz Power Surge Cooldown

Razs main damage all came from Power Surge, its really powerful and has lesser than 2 second cooldown (20% cooldown reduction from items, even shorter with blue buff). You can kite around with the mini-dash and make plays with it. Its impossible for a melee hero to touch you whenever their abilities are on cooldown. The hardest part is aiming and hitting your targets, it will burn all your energy if you missed all your targets. It restores 24 energy if you hit a target. Now you see, why it synergies so well with Beriths Agony and Boomstick.

Razs Full Combo

There are different type of situation where you would find Razs Full combo comes in handy, especially in the early game. 

1- Catch someone off-guard with it.

2- Initiate on the enemy team and cast your ultimate to push them to your team.

3- Follow up with an initiation from your allies.

Gameplay

During your early game phase, you would want to poke and pressure as much as possible. You could make them low health enough by spamming Power Surge which would force them to recall, wasting their time, lead and farms. You could even solo kill the enemy laner at Level 4 + Execute. Watch the map carefully and try to attempt ganks in the bottom or top lane. Focus objectives such as Abyssal Dragon and Sentinel. In the early game, you can use the Full Combo to initiate.

When it comes to mid and late game- especially a teamfight, it is not wise to initiate first. Contribute to the teamfight by spamming Power Surge onto the enemy front lines, causing them to take a lot of damage and crowd control. Before you decide to Explosive KO or Rising Uppercut to the enemy team, you have to be sure that you will slaughter the enemy carries and assassins, otherwise you could get caught and get into the respawn timer. Technically, Raz isnt an Assassin, he is more like a harasser with extremely high burst damage. its way too risky initiate first, you can also follow up with another allies ultimate to secure kills.