Carry issues

So I was having a discussion with a friend about late game carrys and we started to compare them in the final stages of the game. I know that there isn't something like a super mega harder carry, because team composition, item choice, player skill and all that has to be taken into account, but it's obvious that in the final stages of a game some carries can easily kill the enemy carry, and even his entire team when they become 6 slotted. But we disagree in something, IMO Spectre, Medusa and Phantom Lancer are the hardest carries in the game while my friend said that Anti-Mage, Terrorblade and Faceless Void can easily win a man to man figth with any of my suggestions.

My question is, if there are two hard carries 6 slotted in the final stages of the game, and they figth one vs one, which carry do you think is going to win the battle? Which carry do you think is the strongest in the game?

It was tested long ago, back in WC3 days I think, and it was Chaos Knight.

But 1 v 1 me at rune n0b is a ******ed logic, you literally only see it in russian 2k pubs where guys who picked Ursa, Troll etc. say "go 1 vs 1 *****tain" after being 3-man ganked in enemy jungle.

CK should win any 6 slot 1v1, except against like Sven.

But being able to win a 1v1 doesn't really mean a lot in terms of carrying, given that this is a 5v5 game

I think both you and your friend need to take a more nuanced view of carrying.

Manfights don't make a carry the best carry. Carries all have their strengths and weaknesses. A 1 on 1 manfight is not a situation that arises often in late game. It may come up if both the carries are ratting and fight each other, but most people don't risk it because what if their allies show up? In that case, someone like Doom, Windranger, or Tinker would probably be the best manfighter.

All these potential "Hardest carries" have their strengths and weaknesses.

Dimony mentioned Chaos Knight, and the dude scales better with items than any other hero. 4-500% steroid with Phantasm, with each of them having a crit too to boost their damage further, and you get strength items so no one can kill you. In a battle, he will outfight anyone (including Sven, his biggest counter), except Medusa, who can kill his Phantasms. In a teamfight, he can simply Reality Rift someone on your team who isn't like a Dragon Knight and they will explode. Now, how do you get there? (Battle Fury CK is actually legit, but you will never convince anyone that is true) CK is a slow farmer, he has low base agi, and his only farming skill doesn't get him kills. He needs to max both his first 2 skills in order to kill people. He also has to fight around Phantasm's long cooldown, and is massively dependent on it as the game goes on to burst people down in fights without being kited. Then when the game gets late, CK is a terror, but he has key counters. He has no way at all to protect his phantasms from getting stunned or nuked, even with a Black King Bar, and the thing about Reality Rift is that is sets up any aoe spells the enemies have since all the CKs are together. So late game, Sand Kings, Earthshakers, Rikis, Tidehunters and especially Enigmas will stop the phantasms in their tracks, and that's not even counting heroes like Pugna and Lion who can auto-kill illusions. (Still a massive badass though).

Medusa deals a ton of damage in fights, she is super tanky and kite resistant. She also does most of her damage gradually, is too slow to deal with rat heroes, has to fight around her ultimate. Even beyond her weakness to mana burn, a fast attacking melee carry with basher will often be able to dismantle her. Her being sustained damage also hurts her in terms of BKB, because losing charges hurts a ton, and halberds wreck her harder than anyone except Windranger. Since she has no burst, someone like Slark will have a field day with her.

Spectre is probably the most reliable late game hard carry because she deals so much damage in those late game fights, her weakness lies in haunt's cooldown, having no burst damage or disables to deal with heroes like Storm Spirit or Kunkka, and having no tower pushing ability. You beat her by fighting when her ultimate is down, or by breaking and stunning her, that will kill her too. You can also dampen her damage with armor/magic resist items, and use lifesteal builds since she tries to outtank you. Also Necrophos.

I'll mention Sven too. The dude is the best hero in game at wiping teams if you execute correctly (Ember is close, but it requires stupider enemies), he deals so much damage and with warcry and bkb (which he never skips), he is really hard to hit back. Does anyone consider him the hardest carry? No, because you don't get 3 enemies standing so close that often, and also because of his weakness to kiting and bkb piercing stuns. Yet, he has the potential to be the best team-manfighter in the game, it's just a case of people seeing his weaknesses as more crippling.

The point is, no single carry is an absolute checkmate late game unless the draft is right.

Edit: Timing Windows are also important. Anti-Mage getting his Battle Fury, Vlads, and Manta at a decent time will own your team before your team can beat him wins games, even if he gets owned by heroes like CK late game. Similarly, a Clinkz can get kills and take your towers with just his Deso/Orchid before your Medusa comes online.

Spectre and Medusa are generally considered the hardest carries, but even they have counters and it does depend a lot on skill and team composition.

I'd also mention the rat queen, Naga Siren. A competent 6 slotted Naga is incredibly hard to play against. Even if you knock out most of her team, her illusions can creep cut you badly, and you basically have to be able to knock down a tower with backdoor protection while also defending your own T3 towers from excessive lane push.

To take her out, you've not only got to identify the right target (amongst the illusions), but also have enough burst/control to fully silence/stun and kill her before she can press R and TP out. It's incredibly difficult to play against.

Comparing carries is hard because there are alot of different types of carries.

People consider Spectre, Medusa and Faceless Void as the hard carries but that doesn't mean there are carries that can outman fight them.

Troll Warlord and Lifestealer simply own every other carry that exists in a fair one on one fight. Terrorblade is really strong against Spectre but is really weak against Ember Spirit. Chaos knight another strong carry is really good against Faceless Void or Troll Warlord but he is weak to Sven

Some heroes who are not seen as a real hard carry like Ursa can easily take down Sven but he is not a reall hard carry unlike Sven.

Also carries are not always good. Medusa seen as the best lategame carry gets never picked in competitive.

But in a real 1v1 the winner is probably troll warlord if he fights against a not illusion hero.

If it's just about 1 vs 1, Tinker >> all. Offensively, Scythe of Vyse is instant and has 800 range, and as soon as you get sheeped it's over. Defensively he's also vastly superior to almost all other heroes because of the complete ******** that is permanent ethereal and rearming dagger after it gets disabled (which is a bug btw, OSFrog pls). Not to mention, he has one inventory space for Linken's Sphere or Black King Bar so he's extremely hard to initiate on in the first place.

But dota isn't a 1 vs 1 game. In a real game you need to take into account the ability to split push, teamfight, solo kill, the uptime for long cooldowns, etc.

I know Dota is a 5v5 game, but in the later stages of the game there are some heroes that scale better with items than others, for example a 6 slotted Spectre can be a real pain in the a** since every time you hit her your whole team is going to get damaged and since she use to build a lot of tanking items like Eye of Skadi and Satanic (I'm not a fan of Heart of Tarrasque in Spectre since I think that Eye of Skadi is just better in her) she is really hard to kill. However other carries like Ursa Warrior are single target - manfigth focused. I agree however that team composition and player skill are really important. Also Naga Siren is just annoying as hell, I have played few games against her, but the song - TP combo is impossible to stop. There's no way to stop that, right?

BKB and stun her

It's actually surprisingly legit. I thought it sucked at first as well but then I tried it out in practice games and I changed my mind. Bfury is technically the best way to farm on this hero, and by far. And if CK gets some waveclear, he can rat with his ult or manta...

Since he has no way to farm, he sits natively at a pathetic ~300 GPM. Hand of Midas buffs it up to ~414 GPM. And with Battle Fury...you can reach 700-750 GPM. Which doubles your farm rate, so completely pays off for the item in a short time frame.
Also Bfury solves CK's mana issues completely, something that drum and similar items short of skadi clearly don't.

The Quelling Blade buff to Bfury is actually insane, turns any hero into a creep exterminator.

Only remaining question is, is it worth greeding a battle fury CK over, say, playing a Radiance Spectre or a Terrorblade. Or a Medusa...or an Anti-Mage...well you get the idea.

My answer is still no.

Bettlefury CK is still 100000 times better than battlefury Juggernaut though. But then that's not saying much.

What I hate about CK is that he's balanced around Io. A side effect of that is that he's underpowered without wisp.