Riki is a versalite hero and can be played in different roles.You need to decide what role you are going to play before game and make a gameplan from there

He can be safelane carry,roamer,offlaner.All have advantages and disadvantages in different situations

What makes Riki powerful is his versatility and fear factor that he puts on the enemy team.I will list his good sides&bad sides here

Good Sides

+High damage with cheap agility items (can 2-3 shot supports with PT,Wraith band after lvl6)
+Makes enemy poor by forcing them to buy detection
+Has an amazing silence&slow&evasion with cloud (counters many mobile heroes)
+Has an amazing chase potential&nuke.(4 Blink strikes at level 6 is no joke)
+Has very good hp regen while invis

Bad Sides

+Slow.Bad movement speed
+Squishy
+No escape mechanism before level 6
+Still no escape mechanism after level 6 if no target near to blink strike
+Weak pusher

SKILL BUILD

*Maxing backstab will give you incredible damage when you start ganking&harassing and farming
*1 level of smoke is usually enough early game
*Dont max invis before backstab if you really dont need that extra hp regen&fade time (you usually will not need to go invis fast if you are farming&leeching xp)

Choose your role

SAFELANE

*Riki can be main carry with a suitable lineup against certain lineups.With a little farm he can get out of control easily

However even if Riki goes like 20-0 in game he is a bad pusher also a bad manfighter.Sometimes he will need his allies to
distract enemy&manfight while he backstabs them.His carry steroid is designed like that (He needs to attack from backside).So giving
safelane to Riki can be sometimes dangerous

But Riki is awesome if your team has another physical damage dealer&carry.He is good with SF mid for example

Farming on safelane can give Riki a fast diffusial blade and he can terrorise the game after that

Also after farming some of your core items (PT,Aquilla,Diffusial) you should go and look for kills.Riki is a bad farmer so spending time on farming more can be risky (other heroes can farm faster than you).Riki usually farms heroes other than creeps


Some Tips
GAMEPLAY&TİPS

*Rikis target are mostly supports&mobile squishy heroes with escape.He can quickly kill them at teamfights and make the fight 4v5,3v5

*Leave tanky heroes like Bristleback&Axe&Centaur&Ogre to your allies.Dont waste your blink strike charges and give enemy time to react.

*Use cloud on the moving direction of enemy.Backstab once then blink strike.Use diffusial if you have to guarantee the kill

*Dont waste your time too much on roaming if enemy starts to play 5 man dota.Use that time to farm&get xp meanwhile they share xp and lose farm

Some games after getting some kills i start to search for more and roam all the time (i do this when i play clinkz too) and end up losing :).This happens if you focus too much on roaming and sacrificing your own xp&farm

Just give a break until enemy stops 5 manning.If they continue 5man pubtrain strategy your team should overfarm them&split push and when right time comes you will smash them (if they make mistakes)

*Nukers are your biggest threat&also your biggest source of income (Lina,Skywrath,Leshrac,Lion).Rikis low hp pool makes him weak against nukes but also nukers have low hp too.So try to jump on them after they use their spells&or target them while they focus on someone else

*Your smoke cloud&backstab works at roshan.Use them to help your team to take roshan faster

WRAITH BAND
STACKING




*Some games you cant snowball out of control&find any source of farm&die few times early game.In this games you are not able to farm a fast diffusial&yasha or any kind of items

*What i do is stack cheap agility items (slippers mostly) and turn them into wraith band.Wraith band gives you hp,agility.Stacking 2-3 wraith bands can help you to comeback from a bad start and deal some damage



Misconceptions
MISCONCEPTİONS

SLARDAR COUNTERS RIKI





No he dont counter Riki.Actually Riki counters them because....

-Riki is always invisible unlike other heroes so Riki will see them before they see Riki
-Riki usually farms Diffusial blade.This means Riki can purge amplifiy damage
-Riki can purge Slardars sprint


RIKI IS USELESS IF ENEMY HAS SENTRY




People think that seeing Riki makes him useless but they forgot seeing is not killing him.Rikis most unimportant ability is invisibility.He is still strong while visible
Sentry Ward=200 gold
Dust=180 gold
Riki can counter dust when he gets his diffusial blade,Riki can deward sentries when he gets a gem
Also making enemy buy these items will make them weak in economy war
Also all map cannot be warded meanwhile Riki can be everywhere

Riki is not that much effected from detection because he can jump on enemy outside sentry range
He can use smoke&tp out

They are not that much a threat in game