Gameplay Patch – 7.06

There's no position that lets you both get your job done and not die a lot of times, especially against AOE disables or heavy damage like Invoker or Magnus. You either stay as far away as possible in the trees and can't do **** or you come closer, (maybe) cast your spells once and die.

Dota always fights broken with broken, broken defensive actives is a response to being jumped on by a hero who is ten times stronger than yours. It's just too easy to kill a support without them, no matter how good their positioning is. I'm glad dota is less about focusing support now.

The real problem is that you actually can't focus anyone because of items like Crimson Guard (12 seconds =) ), Blade Mail, or Solar Crest.

Ghost Scepter has always existed. So did dagger and forcestaff. The "cast your spells once and die" is not a valid point.

Making a counter to magic burst on supports makes perfect sense indeed, but that's not what Glimmer Cape is. If it were, it wouldn't be castable on teammates.

But yes. You can't focus anyone. That's exactly my problem.

Why do you think I want to focus supports? Because supports can cast defensive spells and items on their cores if you focus the cores!

All this defensive meta does is draw out teamfights.

And you know who benefits from long drawn out teamfights where you can't kill anyone? Rats.

Once you go rat, you never go back.

What do you think about Mask of Madness changes? I think it kinda went under your radar. It got a big buff.

* You get more value when it's not up - the 7.00 update kinda ****ed the item's uptime, it went from almost 50% to 40% and the duration/cooldown is less convenient, and until the rework it didn;t give you anything but lifesteal when not active. Now it's constant 20 dmg and 10 as which is pretty nice.

* It's way easier to build now and you actually end up getting it a lot earlier despite it being worth 75g more because you don't have to bring the recipe from the courier which could delay the item for up to several minutes(usually about a minute, with courier finishing previous delivery and getting to you, provided no one interrupts it, which is fairly optimistic honestly).

* The main thing - it's not a burden item anymore. Previously you had to ditch it because it wasn't good enough lategame to warrant a slot, and you lose 900g, and you need buyback, and endgame components are expensive and the fourth and the fifth, and it was a real pain in the *** to get rid of it smoothly come lategame. Now you just disassemble it - in Luna's case it fits perfectly into the buildup because she can build Satanic+ Butterfly( Butterfly was the item I most commonly substituted Mask with because they kind of give the same bonuses), and it's not painful because Morbid's still there if you need lifesteal badly.

Even if you don't need both Butterfly and Satanic(a lot of MoM heroes are STR), ditching Qstaff is like 430-something gold loss. It also works the other way - Satanic now has a actual buildup instead of 3 useless ex*****ve chunks, so if you are aiming to get it, you can spare 900(450) gold on Quarterstaff to get Mask and boots your farming speed and sometimes your DPS. Don't forget there's also Bloodthorn(even though it got a massive and unfair nerf which pushed it into at best mediocre tier).


Also I personally expect Sven to be the new cancer hero - he got tremendous buffs to his ulti, his farming thanks to the neutrals, MoM/ Satanic got buffed, Heart got buffed(you lose some dmg but extra hp is worth it).

I noticed. I just was too busy ranting about the defensive meta to talk about it. But yes I agree with everything you said.

Yes it's really good on anything that wants to mindlessly right click.

Luna, Sven, Dragon Knight, Lycan, Wraith King, Troll Warlord (yes it's a thing), probably Nature's Prophet as well honestly. And rush this on Spectre every game, it's actually super legit but like crit on PA it will never catch on.

I'm wondering about MoM Morphling. I know, silence sucks, but he can purge it with manta if needed and the increase in farm speed and early rat power can be massive.

Well and there's Medusa, but she's completely unplayable now that halberd is broken.

Not talking about Sniper, since the only way to play him is obviously aghs into mass rapiras. Finally the frog made Sniper a fun hero, I never thought this day would come.

Agreed on Sven being OSfrog tier. Insanely buffed ulti + infinite jungle gold + buffed MoM + 5 second cooldown stun at level 25 = frog smash.

You can't dispel silence from Mask by Manta nor BKB, pretty sure allied and self-purges don't work either.
Would be good on too many heroes otherwise.

Also idk if that was a joke about Sniper, this hero has actually been pretty good since the 7.00 patch, he got some attention at the start of it, but after ranged Lone Druid became popular he was kinda forgotten. He's still in a pretty good place, or at least he was before the patch.

Damn. Descriptions are very unclear on that but apparently you're right.

Sniper is playable because of pike but still meh because shrapnel is so easy to dodge. And anyways he's boring as hell if going for any other build than the aghs/rapiras meme.

Shrapnel is actually the main reason he is playable and is an excellent zoning tool + with 3 charges it is REALLY strong in pre-20 min fights and basically tunrs them around. Hero doesn't actually need any items or levels behind 7 to fight, you just tp to a fight, cast some shrapnel and the fight wins itself pretty much.

Dl-mael build was indeed very boring, but I think MoM-DL-Deso is kinda legit on him and is a pretty fun build.

A couple things worth noting about the patch;

1) As with all global HP buffs, the 0.3 strength gain per level benefits cores more than supports since cores will tend to have higher armour and other sources of EHP. It also functions as a slight increase in value of all sources of armour, evasion, magic resist, and other EHP forms found on items. Functionally, though, this won't change any builds, but it's worth noting that lategame, everyone's going to be a fair amount tankier.

2) Arc Warden got indirectly nerfed. For some reason. Hero still dog****.

3) Despite buffs, PL still dog****. Somewhat less so lategame since he did get an extra 16% damage, but come on, that won't do anything meaningful.

4) One of the most undersold parts about the new Heart of Tarrasque is that it can now be completely assembled at the secret shop. It's now much more convenient to build.

Don't underestimate Arc Warden. His cancer rat potential is actually higher than it's ever been in the history of dota.

When he was created, Summon Spirit Rat ( Tempest Double+ Boots of Travel) had a 55 second cooldown and a 20 second duration.

Now, Summon Spirit Rat has a 40 second cooldown (boots of travel with 10% cooldown reduction from talent), and a 18 second duration. It's way better than INITIAL BROKEN AW.

With octarine, that's a 30 second cooldown spirit rat that lasts 18 seconds.

Personally I completely support the Mask of Madness/ Mjollnir/ Octarine Core rat power AW. Who cares about bloodthorn nerfs.

Yeah, good. Now get to that point in the game without being overrun and outfarmed because your hero's impact is completely minimal without farm, he's easy to shut down, and can't come back from his inevitably bad lane because his base damage is terrible. Also, Midas is worse on him now so it'll take you even longer.