Spectre=Pubstomper?

So according to Dotabuff, Spectre now has a 59.4% winrate in pubs, which makes her second only to Omniknight (who has a 60.8% winrate) in this patch. My question is this, how on earth does a hero like Spectre manage such an impressive winrate? She's a terrible laning hero (quite possibly the worst laning hero in the game), she farms slowly without an expensive farming item and more to the point, she's somewhat boring to play, at least for me.

Really though, how is it Spectre somehow manages a winrate that's higher than traditional pub champs like Abaddon, Necrophos and Zeus? Do people not know that you can punish her hard in lane? Or is she being picked against a ton of afk jungling Lifestealers?

Because she's always been better in pubs than anywhere else. She's a hero who does better when the enemy team lacks the co-ordination to punish the weak lane, or to close out the game on time. She now has a very active item build instead of just waiting to get Radiance which means her ability to jump into any fight to grab a kill or an assist or three, and then immediately go back to farming. And she's still able to go incredibly late.

Knowing that you need to punish her in lane and actually being able to do it are very different things in pubs.

That said, she's probably going to get a slight nerf, even if as some people believe she was stronger last patch, the patch itself suits her more now. In part because she's helped to define it.

Spectre's winrate jump was because of the loss of popularity of her counters.

Wraith King, Slardar, Doom, and Terrorblade make it so easy to beat her, but whether due to nerfs from last patch (Slardar, Doom), or the presence of OD in the meta (WK, TB), they don't really show up.

I think she will need a minor nerf given her strength in pubs, something along the lines of " Dispersion no longer reduces or reflects pure damage" would at least give her a new set of counters.

Well spectre recieved non-stop buffs for the last 2 years so she finally became a pubstomper. Think she is just so strong because she punishes bad positioning so hard. She does a ****load of global damage and kills all the supports, disables blink. She ganks when she wants and she farms where she wants and can still be useful in teamfights.

Also don't forget that she can fight just by hitting level 6. She changes from a melee creep into a ganking hardcore hitting truck.

I don't think how boring she is to play has any relevance- That's too subjective, and a lot of people love the grind and slow farm; remember, this game has a huge player base, a lot of which will most likely have played an MMORPG before which is literally grind heaven
Something nice about every last hit bringing you closer and closer to becoming a destructive force of nature

Her ult makes her amazing, honestly- Probably not the biggest good, but being able to initiate on ANY enemy at any time is huge; it's why I always go Vanguard or lifesteal on her, so even when jungling, I avoid dropping too low to have to ever avoid using Haunt when it's necessary

Also, she's not an awful laner; she doesn't do well against dual lanes, but against the common solo offlaner, she has a slow, speed boost (albeit a pretty weak nuke), bonus damage AND she's not afraid of getting a little hurt early on by whatever nuke/stun the offlaner will throw her way-

She's slow, but that's the point of any hard carry-
You ever got that feeling in your stomach when you see the enemy Naga reaches Radiance?
That's what I love- Like yeah, it may be a few minutes slow, but enjoy my Haunt now tearing your team up for pretty much double the damage

Haunting into a fight is also great when it's winnable, since after you win, your team can ward up the area, and keep pushing forward to create even more space for you

You will be focused a lot, which hurts sometimes, and can be frustrating, but it's all worth it in the end when you get your first triple kill-

I think the only reason she's picked now so much is due to her winrate-
Remember, 70% of players are below 4k MMR; those kind of players won't well-estimate her power, or have the skills to gank her successfully enough, or anything related

I'm only 3K, and I play Storm alot-
I've realised whenever there's a hard carry, everyone just expects it of me to take full responsibility for taking them out everytime, and it's like "Guys, we're a team of 5, if we all gank we can push after, get so much more done, and then take over her farming space, can we just work together?"
"No, we need our own farm, go kill her now"
"..Okay..Zip"

I myself have a 68% winrate with her and I disagree with your opinion. early levels into desolate and iron talon make her able to farm jungles and lanes effectively and has a good escape. also very good for harassing.

Spectre a slow farmer, yes

Spectre an afk farmer, no

I used to do the good old Radiance build on her but now I stopped rushing that item by afk farming and just getting some safe kills.

These days I play a hyper agressive Spectre trying to get as many kills I can get and belief me that isn't hard. Just get Phase Boots, Urn of Shadows, and the best item at the moment Drum of Endurance. You rip trough their team with no difficulty at all. Iron Talon and a poor man shield makes her capable of jungling and togheter with your urn charges you can jungle without losing hp.

I also max Desolate and Spectral Dagger togheter so when I'm level 7 I'm 3-3-0-1. In a hard lane I sometimes get a level in Dispersion but if the lane is rather easy I won't.


Spectre isn't a boring slow farming hero, she is a global killing machine that kills people at the moments they least expect. Everyone should be crying in the enemy team because they know that the Spectre can always start her Haunt on their meaningless lives.

I still get radiance on Spectre, i'm not so focused on an early timing anymore. Nowadays I get basi, magic stick from my starting items, then a vanguard and Urn plus boots, before getting radiance. That's over 5k gold worth of items before even considering radiance, and those items allow you to dight early and sustain yourself through the midgame. To me, a good radiance timing is 30minutes, not 18