Originally Posted by
Lysah
Sure you can't stop them if they hit you, but if you see that Bane running in you know he's going to ult so you can prepare for it. If Tide starts walking into the middle of your team you know he's going to ravage so you can prepare for it. Sniper's ult is like a double damage Zeus ult, it can be anywhere and once he's targetted you nothing will stop it. Going invis can effectively stop plenty of ults, blinking as well, assassinate will chase both of these down.
Let's keep comparing him to Drow. If you're a hero like WD, Drow can silence you and start nuking you with cold arrows. You can duck into a tree and TP out, problem solved. Sniper? Headshot will get you to half health and when you try to TP you get black hole where your head used to be. Mathematically assassinate might not look like much, but that much damage in one skill that can't be avoided for a hard carry is pretty significant. Especially since the cooldown is so low he can pretty much force the enemy mid out of lane the second he hits 6.
Actually, assassinate is *almost* as powerful as culling blade is, it trades a little bit of damage for the ability to be cast at full health and have insane range. Would you argue Axe's ult is bad as well? Pretty sure most people consider it another extremely strong ultimate. Sniper can't assassinate someone through shallow grave or refraction, I guess.