Windranger deserve nerf?

Personally I think the fact she's now the most picked hero in pubs says something about the state of the hero, because it means she's being picked more than Pudge, that's usually a position reserved only by the cheesiest of cheese heroes in a patch.

But it's a poor argument I'll admit because it doesn't actually state anything objectively.

I'd also say there's a difference between the initial reaction to a patch log (Where everything is speculation) and judgements about how the hero functions in game. That latter is also different to how successful said hero is being, because you can have examples of heroes have unfair aspects but being overall weak (Like Bloodseeker)

Now there's an argument to be made about whether or not it's fair to leave said aspect of a hero untouched for the sake of the greater good of the hero. It's quite interesting to think about. But in the case of Windrunner it really boils down to this;

The argument isn't that Windrunner is OP, just a little too good. Because again, she is a jack of all trades that does everything a little too well.

It's not asking for anything massive, just minor number tweaks, because as Timm said; The identity of the hero means still going to do a little bit of everything. She just doesn't need to be able to do some of the specific stuff better than some dedicated heroes.

In part it's idealism when it comes to balancing, but I still think it's worth discussing.

Maybe a slight nerf, nothing too hard.

Maybe some higher mana costs.

Thats all.

I definitely agree with Sanvitch, she should be an all-rounder, it's just a little crazy that she's scary to 1v1 than a troll/ursa.

The time when WR was a versatile all-rounder is long past. Now she's as much a versatile hero as Ursa is. Jump a guy and burst him down, and land 2-man shackles. That's literally all she does. And she's a #2, that's her only role, whether she goes dual offlane or mid, she plays like a position 2. And only one item build : Aghs + blink + damage items + BKB in every game.

The thing is, back then when mek into forcestaff was a legit build on the hero, she was already an insanely strong mid hero, but there was no reason to ever play her mid, because she didn't scale with items that well. Back then WR mid was pretty much Lich mid : wins the lane but still throws the game by having a useless mid with no item scaling. Now that she is a top tier mid hero...why the hell is her laning stage far better than it was 3 years ago, with those silly 1-point wonder Windrun buffs?

Essentially for me right now, she's Ursa with a 2-man stun and the best laning ever.

I think, at most, her Shackle needs to be disjointable and her Windrun/Focus Fire be purgable.

That'd move her to the other side of the popularity chart lol.

The only hero to counterpick against Windranger is to play tanky role: Centaur Warrunner ... Go figure...

Don't think so, purge isn't so cheap and it would provide some way of countering her damage, which, with just 2 items gives the highest dps in the game.

Shackle needs to be nerfed considerably, it is no longer a skillshot and is basically a free 3.75sec stun as long as you know how to use creeps. If you are good, a 2 hero shackle is not difficult to land either. make it disjointable would be the best way of nerfing it if icefrog refuses to undo the buff to the shackle latch range.

Make it purgeable==Welcome back Oracle!

Just make Focus Fire no longer castable on magic immune targets. Lina, Winter Wyvern, Troll Warlord, Faceless Void, even Juggernaut...the history of broken heroes states very clearly that skills that can one-shot BKB'd heroes from full health are absurdly gamebreaking. Focus Fire is only the next in line, it's just the 6.85 Laguna Blade that one-shots BKBs.

And nerf the disjoint from Windrun. It shouldn't work on tower hits, and it shouldn't work if you have MKB. Her ability to tower dive needs a big nerf. That's the main big reason why she's way too good as a mid hero, she really doesn't care that there's an enemy tower since she has free 3 second evasion and can disjoint tower hits with only one point in the skill. Nerf that.

Making Shackleshot disjointable changes nothing. Zilch. That's typically the Icefrog pseudo-nerf that looks like he did something but actually he didn't. If you blink out, you're safe anyways, it doesn't matter that shackle follows you or not, as long as you don't blink in front of a tree like a scrublord that is XD
If you want to nerf shackle nerf the projectile speed so you can juke it.