Carries Who Could Use a Buff

There are very few overpowered heroes in the current patch: outside of pro-scene Chen, the current patch is very well balanced. That said we feel some heroes are quite heavily underpowered and as a result they are not played professionally and have limited usefulness in pubs. So today we are going to discuss heroes who desperately need a buff.

Wraith King

The hero received nothing but nerfs over the last several patches and feels heavily outclassed because of it. WK used to be a strong lane dominator with flash-farming potential who could snowball the game by having great item timings, but there are several problems with this approach.

First one is that he is simply outclassed by Alchemist. Why pick WK, when you can have a hero who farms even faster, has a comparable laning stage and scales better under most circumstances, courtesy of potential 0.9 BAT.

Second problem is that teamfighting as WK is quite problematic. Skeletons add little in terms of teamfight presence and until level 20 WK is a single target hero with very limited mobility. He has a way in, but after the initial burst, controlling and evading him is usually quite easy.

Finally, said initial burst isn’t what it used to be. Most heroes, including support heroes, are quite tanky in the current patch. The changes to the amount of HP granted by Strength isn’t something we disagree with, as it leads to a more fun back and forth in fights, but it does make heroes reliant on deleting a target at the start of the fight very underwhelming.

The end result is a hero who is outclassed in terms of farming speed, late game potential, laning presence and even burst physical damage. It is hard to find a place for the hero in the current meta and we also feel like he will remain underwhelming if not buffed directly.

Spectre

Spectre is a glass cannon hunter, possibly the best in the game. Her Dispersion is one of the strongest teamfight abilities, heavily manipulating the very balance of DPS. The problem is there are no glass cannons in the current patch and most heroes with their default builds are simply way too tanky to deal with.

Take Sniper for example. Previously, one of the best targets for Spectre that builds Aghanim’s Scepter and Khanda as his first two items in the current patch, getting to 2000+ HP with ease, without sacrificing any DPS output.

Or heroes like Zeus, who doesn’t mind going for a Kaya and Sange and also has built-in mobility. Even Tinker has barrier and Tinker isn’t even good in the current patch.

Compare all of that to Spectre who has ~1400 default HP by level 15 and typically needs both Blade Mail and Radiance to farm. With a default build the hero simply doesn’t have the HP to enable her preferred playstyle in the current patch, as most heroes will out-trade even into Dispersion and Blade Mail.

The end result is a hero who feels like she doesn’t really have a place or a game. Sure, when going late she is still as scary as she used to be and with a good start she can be devastating, but most of the time, especially in higher level games, she is simply too unreliable.

Juggernaut

The poster boy for Dota is not necessarily the worst hero to play right now, but he still feels heavily outclassed in most serious games. The hero lost a bit of his early game prowess in favour of better late game scaling and the end result is underwhelming. At least in most cases.

Juggernaut is still incredibly scary late. With 1.4 BAT and built-in crits his actual DPS output with items is pretty high. He can’t boast the highest stat gain, but with items he can and will be devastating, if allowed to engage.

Here lies the problem: it is now trivial to prevent a non-Blink Juggernaut from engaging. Previously, he could get into the fight with Bladefury and follow it up with his ultimate, but because he is now targetable even when spinning, there is no window of opportunity for him to use his ultimate in most games: chances are, he will eat a hex or a stun right before his spin ends, and will be bursted down right after.

Because of this, many players are now going for items like Aghanim’s or even Blink Dagger to close the gap and initiate with Omni- or Swiftslash. It is still a heavy gold commitment, though and doesn’t even necessarily secure a good engagement. The cast points on Juggernaut’s ultimates are pretty high, so hex reactions are possible. Failing that, there are still many save items that prevent Omnislash from being the ultimate it needs to be.

Personally, we feel like Juggernaut doesn’t need direct stat or DPS buffs, the hero just needs some QoL updates. A shorter cast point on ultimates or a small Debuff resistance during Bladefury, so that the initial stun isn’t as effective, could go a long way. Otherwise the hero will remain outclassed and underpicked in higher level games.

Closing thoughts

As mentioned earlier, we feel like the current patch is very well balanced in terms of OP heroes, but some work could be done with heroes out of the spotlight. It is hard to make every single hero viable, but many of them have been out of meta for a very long time, or were too quickly nerfed after a successful showing.

What are your thoughts on the current meta and the heroes who could use a buff? Do you feel like there are better candidates for it or do you agree with our list? Share your thoughts in the comment section below.