Top Tier Heroes Pre International 2

Top picks thus far are:

Lycan, Nature's Prophet, Shadow Demon, Morphling, Broodmother, Enigma, Dark Seer and Chen. Maybe I'm missing a few.

As for Rubick, he's iffy. Pros aren't going to just let you steal their big abilities. A smart tide will anchor smash directly after ulting when against a rubick. A smart enigma will get his stun or demonic conversion off directly after his ulti. Rubick can still get some nifty skills but most pros aren't going to let him get a black hole or anything.

You forgot Invoker, Atlas!

The thing with Black Hole and Spell Steal is that it forces a potential sub-par positioning for it. You basically HAVE to get Rubick in the Hole or he can steal it from the outside (whilst he's channelling it). Obviously, carries should be your main target and it can hinder your chances of doing an otherwise good Black Hole. Obviously it doesn't mean Rubick gets Black Hole all the time, but it's something pros need to have in the back of their minds, something that could delay, hinder, or otherwise injure a good initiation or use of Black Hole - they simply cannot use it when Rubick is about without getting him in it.

I agree with Rubick, when I first saw him I'd not expected to see him much, though he was only recently added to the DotA 1 CM pool so nobody really knew how he would fare in competitive play, and so far, we've seen him quite a bit. I'd definitely rate him high tier 3 low tier 2. Hell, he was a second ban by CLG just then in CLG vs Mouz in The Defence.

Edit:
Oh, also, TA is a tier 1 pick for Chinese teams (debatable for other teams) and of course, Quantic with Korok.

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He's not that iffy. He doesn't need to spell steal BHs and Ravages, and I have seen pro rubicks do that often, especially BH's if he doesn't catch you in it which is not an unlikely scenario. That puts more pressure on the enigma to have to wait to get you in it. Juts keep rubick away from the other four heroes. There are many spells rubick can make use of and BETTER than the heroes he stole them from with better casting times, not to mention he can combo them with TK. Like Demon's Rubick and Sing's sun strike stealing rubick.

Also his three other spells are really ****ing solid in their own right.

He's a very common pick nowadays by certain teams like Mouz, na'Vi, EG, Darrer, Chineses teams ETC. A solid tier 2 pick.

He might drop off before the TI like Brew kinda did and he has problems mainly sue to squishiness and mana dependence, but against certain common lineups Rubick is very viable.