5. What are the "must buy" items for Nevermore and why?

Xali: Competitive (6.48b) -- Dagger for sure, and Boots of Travel. Dagger let you escape to safety, you can dodge spells, or jump into fights. BoT allows you to farm whole map and also help your team when it's needed anywhere.

Drayich: Black King Bar -- so you can get your ultimate off and not getting focused down too fast.

wtfmate: Blink is definitely a must-buy (especially in 6.48b) just because it is the best item in the game (the pre-nerfed one). It allows for easy escape and easy follow-up/finishing. BKB is another must, especially since in a competitive game, the other team is going to have a lot of disables, so you can do your dmg freely without having to worry about getting nuked. The next items depend on the game; if you need HP you can get skadi or heart, damage you can get Stygian, etc.

In fun games, you can get whatever you want :). Typically, the people I play with usually get Lothar's and then whatever item they want afterwards.

6. What's the basic strategy and gameplay for Nevermore?

Shadow Fiend soloing middle lane.

Xali: Taking solo lane is best choice. Even if we can see him going on double lane, I think that his potential is maximized at soloing. Your job is to farm a lot and get as much gold as you can from solo.

Also checking runes is important, gives you much advantage and allows you to gang too, depending on rune. Important is to not die, being careful of ganks and having good map awareness. If your enemy is agressive and trying to harass/nuke you, feel free to use Razes a lot.

When you're getting Dagger ur chances for dieing are low. After Dagger you need to aim for BoT. With these two items you should be able to farm a lot. You can aim for your first powerful item, Black King Bar (BKB). With BKB you are able to jump to your enemies and do a lot of dmg with ur ulti and some razes.

The point is you need to know when to jump.. you'll get it after massing this hero and having some experiences with him. Also try to farm some late game items like Stygian Desolator, Assault Cuirass, Butterfly or Skadi/Satanic is also powerful. I prefer to help in team fights, so I teleport out from farm.

Drayich: I'm not so familiar with the new version and playing him - but earlygame its really important to get your last hits so you get your damage up. Nevermore is very fragile and have very low damage, if you fail to creep in the beginning you will fail even more later. So the early minutes are important, then next step is Dagger/Lothar's and final step is BKB.

wtfmate: The key strategy is just to survive. You also need to learn to work with your teammates; for example, you have a teammate Sven, you're going to want to time your razes or attacks with his stun. If you have a Magnataur, you should be ready to follow up his Reverse Polarity (ultimate) with either your Ultimate or your razes. In short, make sure you can survive and help out your team! Also, know that if there are no lanes to farm, you can always pull neutrals and just raze them. Nevermore is one of the easiest heroes to farm with.

7. Do you have any tips for a newb Nevermore player? Such as how to aim Raze properly, or how to effectively use its ultimate?

Nevermore's ultimate gets cancelled.

Xali: You need all your souls to make the highest possible damage. Try to Blink to nukers as Lina/Leshrac/Zeus, and be sure that they are focusing someone so their reaction won't be that fast to run away, or disable you. You don't need to initiate it first. As I said, enemy can just react really fast, move away and wait till your BKB ends, then you're easy kill for disablers/nukers. Better effect is when you jump later and take down 3/4hp of more heroes, than you jump at start and do nothing!

Drayich: Practice!

wtfmate: First tip, you need to work on last hitting early. His damage SUCKS in the beginning, but once you get used to that, and with Necromastery, you'll be fine. Also, when trying to raze, you might not be facing the way you want to be. What I do is before I raze, I right click the target I want to raze just so that I'm facing it, making it easier to raze and almost ensuring that I won't miss. As for his ultimate, it's best to do it when you are following up a teammate, but if you see an opportunity, like when the other team uses all their spells, that would be a great time to use it in a team fight. Just make sure you have full souls before you use your ultimate!