Cuttle's 6.86 Wishlog

It's that time again, in the pre-patch hype, where we discuss how we would balance the game if we were a certain frosty amphibian. I made one, as I often do.


General Changes:
Dire Jungle changes: The Far Hard Camp is now 400 units more to the east, the cliff is adjusted accordingly. (Prevents radiant offlane pulls)
Radiant Jungle Changes: The deep medium and hard camps, as well as the bot lane cliff are now south by about 600 units (as well as the jungle itself, it is closer to the bot lane now). The outer hard and medium camps are swapped in locations now. (Makes it harder to stack from mid lane, and makes it more dangerous to farm a second hard camp, so Radiant jungle is not way safer than Dire’s)
Both offlanes now cannot trap creeps in the trees for a block; the trees will lead back to the lane.
Animal Courier now has a restock time of 8 minutes.
Dropped items can no longer be attacked and can only be picked up by their original owner or their allies. Owners can issue an attack command on their ally in order to have them drop their items on the floor. Exceptions are drop on death items like Gem and Divine, as well as sharable and consumable items.
Party MMR removed, parties now use their solo MMR. People who only have party MMR will have the option to take it as their solo MMR or to discard it.
Randoming a hero no longer grants bonus gold
Gold Penalty for not picking a hero after the 0 second mark in Unranked sets your gold from 625 to 300 instead of subtracting your gold with time.

Hero Nerfs:
Tiny: Craggy Exterior no longer deals damage. Stun reduced to 1 second all levels. Grow with Aghs bonus damage against buildings from 75% to 50%.
Doom: Doom cast range from 550 to 400. Cooldown from 100 to 120/110/100.
Alchemist: Greevil’s Greed is no longer carried by illusions. Bonus gold from bounty runes from 5x to 2x, but bounty runes now grant 2x exp.
Tusk: Ice Shards duration from 7 to 5. Cast range from 1800 to 1300.
Windranger: Shackleshot manacost from 90/100/110/120 to 120/130/140/150. Windrun evasion from 100% to 40/50/60/70%.
Shadow Fiend: Requiem of Souls mana cost increased from 150/175/200 to 150/200/250. Str gain from 2 to 1.5.
Lich: Frost Blast slow duration from 4 to 3. Ice Armor movement slow now scales from 15/20/25/30% from a flat 30%.
Winter Wyvern: Cold Embrace cast range reduced from 1000 to 750. Winter’s Curse damage reduction from 70% to 80%. Aghs Upgrade Added: Reduces damage reduction from 80% to 25%.
Dazzle: Shallow Grave duration reduced from 5 to 3.5/4/4.5/5. Weave mana cost from 100 to 130/160/190.
Earthshaker: Fissure no longer has any collision for spell immune heroes. Block time reduced from 8 to 5/6/7/8.
Slardar: Amplify Damage no longer provides vision around the target.
Spectre: Dispersion no longer interacts with Pure Damage, not reducing it or reflecting it.
Chaos Knight: Chaos Strike Armor reduction rescaled from 5 to 3/4/5/6.
Huskar: Burning Spear duration from 8 to 7.
Undying: Stolen Decay Strength is now shown with one buff with a number instead of a bunch of buffs.
Rubick: Telekinesis a person onto unpathable terrain will grant them free pathing for 5 seconds.
Magnus: Skewer a person onto unpathable terrain will grant them free pathing for 5 seconds.

Oracle: fate’s edict cooldown increased from 12 to 15. False Promise cooldown from 80/60/40 to 90/60/30, Mana cost increased from 200 to 200/300/400. Added to Captain's Mode.
Earth Spirit: Rolling Boulder speed with remnant reduced from 1600 to 1400. Geomagnetic Grip Cooldown from 13 to 16. Added to Captain's Mode.
Terrorblade: Reflection AOE reduced from 900 to 600/675/750/825. Added to Captain’s Mode.
Arc Warden: Tempest Double does not refresh the cooldown of Hand of Midas when it is resummoned, it has it’s own Midas cooldown, and no longer copies Gem of True Sight or Divine Rapier. Magnetic Field miss chance reduced from 100% to 40/50/60/70%. Added to Dota 2.


Hero Buffs:
Techies: Mine Bounty reduced from 10 to 2. Remote Mines damage increased from 300/450/600 to 400/525/650 (Aghs to 400/600/800).
Axe: Counter Helix damage increased from 100/135/170/205 to 100/140/180/220. Culling Blade cast range increased from 150 to 260.
Outworld Devourer: Arcane Orb now deals 100/200/300/400 bonus damage to all non-hero targets. INT gained from Astral Imprisonment is granted to illusions. Essence Aura now uses Pseudo random distribution. Stolen Astral Imprisonment INT is now shown with one buff with a number instead of a bunch of buffs.
Lifestealer: Rage now adds 10/12/14/16% movespeed for the duration. Open Wounds now has 60/90/120/150 damage at the start of the duration.
Storm Spirit: Static Remnant activation delay from 1 second to 0.6 seconds. Overload slow duration from 0.6 to 1.
Pugna: Life Drain is no longer channeling, now it disarms Pugna and slows his movespeed by 50%, he cannot life drain more than 1 target at a time. Disarm and slow penalty pierce magic immunity and cannot be purged.
Sniper: Assassinate is no longer disjointable. Shrapnel recharge time from 55 to 45.
Brewmaster: Base INT increased from 14 to 17.
Bloodseeker: Thirst scaling from 75>25 to 85>30. Reveal health increased from 25% to 35%.
Nyx Assassin: Mana Burn now has a minimum mana burned of 60/120/180/240, and will burn that amount if his mana burn will burn less than those values.
Troll Warlord: Fervor now loses 2 stacks when changing targets instead of all of them. Aghs Upgrade added: Increases Battle Trance Duration from 5 to 9, and grants the bonus to all summoned units globally, and to allied creeps in a 1000 AOE.
Phantom Assassin: AGI gain from 3.15 to 3.7. Coup de Grace chance to proc is increased to 24% against opponents below 50% health.
Faceless Void: Chronosphere’s Aghs upgrade now applies Break to all targets.
Puck: Waning Rift now pushes all hit heroes to the edge of the ability’s radius over 0.3 seconds. This does not break channeling or pierce magic immunity.
Morphling: Waveform manacost reduced from 140/155/160/165 to 105/115/125/135.
Batrider: Sticky Napalm stack duration increased from 8 to 11. Day Vision increased to 1800, but Firefly’s unobstructed vision is still only 1200.
Treant Protector: Overgrowth cast point from 0.5 to 0.3
Sand King: Armor increased by 1. Caustic Finale is no longer a UAM.
Timbersaw: Whirling Death now always reduces strength by 15% instead of the enemy’s primary attribute.
Dragon Knight: Dragon Tail Dragon form range from 400 to 500 to match attack range. Frost Breath radius from 250 to 300, to match the radius of the damage splash. Aghs Upgrade Added: Causes Corrosive Breath to disable Backdoor Protection. Lowers BAT in Elder Dragon Form from 1.7 to 1.6/1.5/1.4
Warlock: Golem armor in Chaotic Offering increased from 6/9/12 to 10/14/18. Golem magic resistance increased from 33% to 80%.
Jakiro: Liquid Fire cooldown reduced from 20/15/10/4 to 13/10/7/4.
Elder Titan: Natural Order AOE increased from 275 to 275/300/325/350. Astral Spirit return speed from 600 to 900.
Wraith King: Aghs Wraith Aura now restores the mana of those killed to 100%.
Charles ( Leshrac): Base strength increased from 16 to 18. Str gain from 1.5 to 1.8. Aghs Upgrade no longer increases Pulse Damage, instead, it now grants Leshrac a second Pulse Nova, independent of the first one.
Pit Lord: Atrophy Aura damage gained per hero death rescaled from 30 to 20/25/30/35, Creep damage bonus from 5 to 3/4/5/6. Pit of Malice duration increased from 1.8/2.1/2.4/2.7, damage increased from 100 to 100/140/180/220. Aghs Upgraded Added: Allows Dark Rift to Target heroes, and makes Dark Rift able to teleport to a target unit even if it dies. Added to Dota 2.


Item Buffs:
Octarine Core: Spell lifesteal for non-heroes increased from 5% to 25%. Octarine Core now prevents spells from being disjointable, and makes it so that active orbs will never miss.
Drum of Endurance: Now has 8 charges.
Rod of Atos: Mana Cost increased from 50 to 100. Now deals 25 damage.
Orchid Malevolence: Now deals 25 damage.
Pipe of Insight: Now gives +4 to all stats.
Mekansm: Mana cost reduced from 225 to 190.
Bloodstone: Now loses 1/4 of charges on death.
Crimson Guard: Guard cooldown reduced from 70 to 55.
Linken’s Sphere: Stat bonus from 15 to 20.
Sacred Relic: Cost reduced from 3800 to 3500.
Guardian Greaves: Guardian Aura now starts at 30% health instead of 20%.


Item Nerfs:
Blink Dagger: Max blink range from 1200 to 1000.
Shadow Blade: Will now break invis at the start of the casting of a spell rather than when it’s completed. This penalty does not carry to Silver Edge.
Radiance: Recipe Cost increased from 1350 to 1700. Miss chance reduced from 17% to 15%.


New Item:
Pike of Precision: Made from 2 Javelins. MKB now uses this in lieu of double Javelins.
Adds 42 damage.
Passive: Greater Pierce
Has a 40% chance to deal 80 bonus damage.
Passive: Seeking Strike
Has a 50% chance that your attack will hit, even if the target has evasion. Doesn’t work against buildings.

Some interesting things...

Tiny : definitely. Maybe craggy got hit a bit too hard but seriously screw this hero.

Alchemist : I definitely agree that he needs some sort of rework but IMO he doesn't need a net nerf. Just some rebalancing.

Winter Wyvern : seems good

Dazzle : That's nothing. He needs a far, far harder nerf. Shallow Grave needs a hard duration nerf, like reduce to 4 seconds at all levels. And/or a cast range nerf. Don't forget that Dazzles max grave second so it needs to be nerfed at max level not just at low levels.

Earthshaker : Fissure no longer blocking through BKB is a solid idea. But again, I think he needs a far, far harder nerf.

Slardar : definitely, he needs the bounty treatment. He still feels rather meh in pubs though, but dota is balanced around competitive, right?

Chaos Knight : what you did is actually a nerf. The whole point of Chaos Strike right now is that it's great with only 1 point in it, and there's no point in skilling it you can take stats instead for mana. CK doesn't need a nerf.
If you want to make CK a good hero IMO you need to buff solo CK without buffing wisp+CK. I don't think there's an easy way to do that though.

Huskar : The hero himself isn't OP, only his combos with Dazzle, Winter Wyvern and other defensive supports are. Just nerf the Huskar combo supports and he's fine, Huskar himself doesn't need nerfs.

Cliffing and courier feeding removed from the game, yeah baby!

Earth Spirit : Boulder Smash is actually the part about him that needs a nerf. Right now it's pretty much an overpowered Fissure, with far more range and way longer stun duration. Nerfing the stun duration on his Q is a must. e.g range reduced from 2000 to 1400, stun duration reduced to 1/1.25/1.5/1.75

outworld devourer : I still won't build Manta Style on him XD

Storm Spirit : Heroes are nerfed for a reason. They need to stay that way. Especially Overload is a skill that can NOT be buffed, because it allows to permaslow people. Don't forget that his ult was hardly even touched since 6.82 buffed it to broken level.

Pugna : sounds horribly overpowered, since you can use items like Blink Dagger and Force Staff during ultimate to constantly stay in range.

Morphling : Makes him a viable solo mid. Like it.

Sand King : Sure, why not, but Skadi is still going to suck on him, and I'm not even talking about deso and satanic Keepo

Dragon Knight : Aghs is not an item for carries. If you make an aghs for DK, it shouldn't be carry stats, you already have damage items for that. Instead it should be utility stuff for teamfighting and/or pushing. Like a Macropyre that damages buildings or something in that spirit.

Warlock : As long as you see him as a dual lane hero in the lines of Lich and Tusk and not as a solo mid, he's legit as hell. This hero doesn't need aghs/refresher to be effective, only levels. Probably doesn't need buffs.

Octarine Core : sure

Blink Dagger : I don't like it, at all. Nefing range nerfs the initiation part about the item. But nerfing initiators is not what we want. What we do want however is nerfing every part about the item that's not about initiation. Like, remove completely the escape/kiting possibilities of the item. Adding a lot of ways to disable it is fine, we don't need more.
The point is not to nerf initiators, the point is to stop every hero that's *not* an initiator from having a reason to go blink.

Techies, Sniper : I think these heroes need more of a rework than a buff. When a hero concept straight up blows, that's the only way out.
And seriously rework Sniper's voice. I want to see a redneck gun freak shooting "A bear! It's coming right for us!" in Jimbo's voice in South Park when killing Ursa. Not some annnoying dwarf.

I see, a lot of this is pretty good input. Perhaps I should dial back the Pugna buff.

And removing Sand King's UAM is not for Skadi or anything, it's for Orb of Venom, so he can super bully melee laners with extremely heavy slows.

I'd prefer a change to Shadow Fiend that rebalanced his early game nuking power.

Basically increase his base intelligence + gain, and also the cost of Shadow Raze and Requiem of Souls with the same ratio. The idea being that the cost of his spells is the same relative to his mana pool, but that the ability to recharge them from a Bottle is more difficult. This should cut back on his early ability to clear stacks so easily.

I don't really like the change to the bounty runes you suggested for alch. Increasing the gold by a considerable bit instead of the experience seems to fit the hero more. Perhaps revert the change from 6.85 or change it to 3x gold. Also I feel that concoction may be in need of a slight buff to make alch a slightly better support. That's just my opinion, but I may be a bit biased as I like alchemist.

I like what U did with Phantom Assassin, I really love the hero, but rigth now she isn't the super killer she use to be. I also love Razor and I don't know why he is almost never picked, at least in lower levels (Go Team Secret) Sorry for the fanatism :D!

i feel that all the aghs upgrades are not for the hero themselves to buy, but rather for alche to give free buffs to his team.

This might just be the remnants of 6.83 talking, but God God what were you thinking with the Troll Warlord Ag's? Battle Trance still has a 30s cooldown; which means that every creep wave that spawns can benefit from it one at a time.

It can be allied summon units, it can't be allied creeps. Affecting wave minions with that sort of thing is bollocks.

Also why are you nerfing the cast range on Doom? The actual ability is kinda underwhelming because of the cast point, making the cast range worse is threatening to dumpster the hero. He just needs minor tweaks on Scorched Earth and he's fine.


I'll comment on other stuff later, these two just stood out to me.

The intent was just to heavily speed up a push you are already doing with Troll Warlord. I should've specified that that would only affect nearby allied creeps. Global summoned units seems cool tho. I'll go add it in.

What is the point in nerfing Alchemist ?
Icefrog just buff his Grevils gold, i dont think he will reverse buffs ( he never do this)
the hero just need a viable way to buff his teammates more than himself, Turn viable aghamihn rush for everyone and not some radiance thing, also dont kill morphling alchemist combo with this illusion nerf :///////////
i thing the huskar guy is in need of some buffs( as you are buffing mosot of his counters), something to lifebreak (Break efect would make sense LOL)
Also what is the point of this leshrac aghamihn ? it should be some defense/escape thing he lacks
overral this 6.86 nice, could see octarine having moar lifesteal just 25 % is garbage even on heroes