Orphea does mage things, no surprises here. Combo people and clearing waves is the name of the game. Regularly you might find yourself needing to duo-soak or even solo lane, which is fine and I'll explain how to solo lane with her later. However if possible, leave these tasks to a dedicated bruiser like Sonya or Blaze if possible, as her follow-up damage can be quite important in skirmishes.

As you might expect, you want to first slow someone with her E, which becomes easier once you hit Freight on the standard build, and then use her Q and W abilities appropriately in conjunction with it. Keep in mind that not only is the E making those abilities easier to hit, but Ancestral Strength is also applying a significant bonus of 20% to them as well, if the target was not already CC'd.

There will be a lot of time where using W is too risky, but Q should usually be following up E at the very least, unless you are merely stacking the E quest later on. In the following chapters I'll go over the individual micro aspects of Orphea.

The first thing I must stress about Orphea is that her AAs are the strongest of any mage by default, so make good use of them. Not only weaving them between the abilities, but independently using them without abilities as well if need be. In this aspect she feels similar to the likes of Raynor, building up the damage from AAs is one of the factors that can lead to you getting targets peppered up and set up for being killed.

However, her trait is going to let you stack Chaos up to 3 times, and remember that since you pretty much always take Ancestral Strength, targets that are being CC'd in any way are going to grant an extra Chaos stack upon you hitting an ability on them. Thus, the concept of spacing out her abilities to maximize trait usage becomes paramount.

But what does this mean in practice? Well the first thing that should become clear is that using E and hitting subsequent abilities after it is going to become the primary way Orphea sustains herself in a PVP environment. Assuming you are already level 4 and have Freight, this is what her self sustain should look like in PVP:
E 1st tick + 2nd tick + Q + W = 1 + 2 + 2 + 2 = 7

If you don't already know, this is a lot of healing. It is not only paramount that you get all the healing you can, but you are also dealing the maximum amount of damage this way too. So remember that once the 2nd E tick hits, AA them, and then after the next ability... and etc. However, keep in mind that using the full combo is not always possible, but the concept of maximizing the trait usage is always present.

On a side note, I've seen some people asking how to not mess up her dash. Remember that the next right-click input you put in after the Q hits an enemy is going to dash you in that direction, so take a moment to choose as soon as it does hit is all I can say. It should become quite natural over time.

Orphea is all about risk assessment, much like any assassin. Using the Q to poke and W to finish or simply apply more damage is all dependent on what the enemies can do in retaliation. Even though this advice is pretty universal, keep track of the enemies CC ability CDs, and try not to play into anything major, like a Diablo charge for example. As a general rule of thumb, other ranged assassins will give you a lot of trouble if they know how to dodge your stuff, so be extra careful against them, as Orphea is typically much stronger against melee heroes.

The Q itself is an important ability, it provides a dash and CDR upon landing it on heroes, however this should not discourage you from using it on minions or camps. Personally I like to use Quick Cast for all of Orphea's abilities... except Q. Obviously you don't want to take too long in aiming Q at enemies, but you don't want to be too hasty either. There is a fine balance, and I'd say taking around 0.25-0.5 seconds to aim the Q is what I'd usually aim for.

The W is more about what you can simply get away with. If you are finishing a target and you know W is necessary to get the kill then its usage is fairly obvious. However, W can also be used to merely get more damage onto a target as well, but remember the risks. You typically have to dash to the target, and then spend a moment in close range doing a short animation which can be interrupted. With these limitations in mind, only use W when you are sure the enemies won't just turn on you.

This is my favorite part of the guide, as it is probably the most demanding aspect of Orphea. As Blizzard had hoped, Orphea can be a strong duelist when played well, and can dominate solo lane matchups. As stated before, she is very good against melee heroes, so putting her against laners like Thrall and Dehaka can be a great idea. However, generally speaking, with the way comps work nowadays, the bruiser on your team should still typically solo lane, as committing ranged dps onto the solo lane is not recommended in most cases. There can still be reasons for her to be in the solo, such as your bruiser dying, or your bruiser is taking camps.

So how do we fight the likes of Thrall? A key concept is trying to learn how the player you are facing likes to play, or in more concrete terms, how much does he attempt to juke your abilities? When they go to AA your minions, poke with Q to see how they react. Opponents who do not dodge it will mean that you can be more liberal with trying to hit them with E, and subsequently your whole combo. If they do dodge it, you will have to be far more conservative in your ability usage. As stated before, always take a good moment to aim the Q appropriately, and try to predict how they will move.

Remember to always AA them, as it adds up nicely over time. The reason you are able to so this quite liberally, despite them being able to retaliate, is that once a melee commits to Orphea, it becomes very easy for her to land a full combo on them at point blank. With this in mind, you can keep AAing them, with the occasional Q, but hold onto W and E just in case they decide to hard engage. With proper usage of the trait as mentioned above, you will out-trade most of the roster, chunking them for a lot of HP, and healing a significant amount in the process.

I almost forget to mention that the point-blank combo is the regular one, except you switch the W and Q order, so E - W - Q. Additionally, when you get ganked by melee heroes like Zeratul, try not to panic, and use a point blank combo along with trait usage to get away, or in some cases, simply kill them in retaliation.

I'll go over why I choose the talents in the Standard Build:

Ancestral Strength: Overloaded despite nerf to 20% additional damage, the extra Chaos stacks are too good to pass up

Freight: Still the best level 4 purely because it turns the 2 Chaos stacks from E into 3, meaning more damage and self-sustain

Mind Devourer: Safe and consistent stacking ability which leads to a CDR which, once again, leads to more Chaos stacks. More damage, more healing.
Ravenous Hunger has its place in QM, but I'd say that it enforces unhealthy habits like becoming obsessed with getting stacks through last hits, making it an unreliable talent choice.

Ults: To be honest, I feel like Orphea's power comes much more from her base kit and talents, so I wouldn't worry over the ults too much. Feast is actually the more consistent one, despite it being the butt of jokes (zoning ult), but it has applications in wombo combos, disengage, and boss control.
Crushing Jaws is a great ultimate... but there is not guarantee the enemies will let you get massive value from it. Grabbing only 1 or 2 heroes in it is already great, so don't be too hesitant in using it. The worst mistake you can make with Jaws is becoming too passive and waiting for a moment that never comes.

Invasive Miasma: I've had a lot of discussions over this one VS Determination, but I'm adamant that this is the better choice 99% of the time. Its more waveclear, its more damage and healing, its more Chaos.
The most important thing is that this talent just lets you live that much longer in PVP scenarios, and living longer on this hero is a snowball effect which can lead to more chances to heal and damage the enemies. Whenever you think you'll be in close proximity to the enemies (they dive you or you dash into them), just pop the D a bit beforehand.

Bonds of Anguish: I think this is the talent pick here much for the same reasons that Miasma is the pick: More survivability. Healing for half the damage Q does can be clutch in living in scenarios where you would have otherwise died.

Engulfing Oblivion/Eldritch Conduit: Both are strong contenders for 20. Oblivion has the potential to allow multiple Jaws in one fight, and the armor reduction is simply very powerful in making huge plays. Conduit on the other hand is more consistent, and is potentially providing a huge damage ramp-up.

If you didn't realize by now, Orphea is an incredibly fun hero to play with plenty of out-play potential. Recently she sat at the top of Hotslogs winrates, even above the Probius one-tricks, but she has been nerfed as of yesterday. The nerfs, particularly the health nerf, will normalize her winrate a fair bit, but personally I still find her to still be one of the strongest heroes in the game. I am not familiar with how she does at lower ranks, but assuming you are good with her, she should be an excellent choice because she waveclears and trades very well.