[Megathread] DotA 2

[minteK917]

I think this sentence alone sums up Alch. You've either got far more items than the other team and you totally destroy them, or you're behind and totally useless.

Thats not the problem, alch is way past that. His base stats are so trash and his actual passives are so useless to right clicks that he needs MORE FARM to simply be equal to others. Negating the fact he farm any faster. You just end up with a shit poorman ursa thats 6 slotted but still worst then a 4 slotted ursa. He needs more then twice the item to even compete with stuff like tiny/faceless/troll/pa, the list goes on. So you are never really ahead as alch, you are simply keeping up with them.

I play farming carry almost exclusively in stacks. I know my timing and shit enough and i destroyed my share of "farming alch" Oh sure on the scoreboard it says 800 gpm next to alch name. The problem is that as faceless void i just needed mom,bkb,mealstorm and deadalus to delete alchemist for any fights imaginable. Your networth means nothing if the hero cant actually make use of that farm. Alchemist cant make use of his farm right now. The regen means nothing past the 40 minutes mark. Hell something even past the 30 minute mark or even earlier. His ult was infinitely better when it gave him flat HP. NO hard carry needs hp regen, because it blows, thats why we have life steal items like satanic. Thats real regen.

[PizzaSHARK]

Apparently KoTL is good with Ogre Magi.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HA0qrJRuujE

Bunch of douchebags on both teams. Allcaps in allchat is so stupid.

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just stun him on the way in, or euls him. he's easy gold at that point.

Too bad there's a ton of ways to get around that.

[Charge me Doctor]

Thats not the problem, alch is way past that. His base stats are so trash and his actual passives are so useless to right clicks that he needs MORE FARM to simply be equal to others. Negating the fact he farm any faster. You just end up with a shit poorman ursa thats 6 slotted but still worst then a 4 slotted ursa. He needs more then twice the item to even compete with stuff like tiny/faceless/troll/pa, the list goes on. So you are never really ahead as alch, you are simply keeping up with them.

I play farming carry almost exclusively in stacks. I know my timing and shit enough and i destroyed my share of "farming alch" Oh sure on the scoreboard it says 800 gpm next to alch name. The problem is that as faceless void i just needed mom,bkb,mealstorm and deadalus to delete alchemist for any fights imaginable. Your networth means nothing if the hero cant actually make use of that farm. Alchemist cant make use of his farm right now. The regen means nothing past the 40 minutes mark. Hell something even past the 30 minute mark or even earlier. His ult was infinitely better when it gave him flat HP. NO hard carry needs hp regen, because it blows, thats why we have life steal items like satanic. Thats real regen.

His base stats are not enough to make him trash, the fact that he can get core items with ~10 minutes advantage, farm reliably AND fast, shred armour (that makes him favorable in duo-carry teams) and have decent stun makes his awesome character. Two downsides - he is extremely weak vs ganks and current meta doesn't really favors "alch support that is not really a support but farms greedily when he can and gets as much items and gold as enemy carry while also having another carry" teams.

Why don't you get purged 24/7 by SD when you pick Void? And why do you think that alchemist is a hard carry? And why do you say that HP regen is irrelevant after 40 minute mark? It always allows your team to 5 man enemy base easily without losing minions

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I think this sentence alone sums up Alch. You've either got far more items than the other team and you totally destroy them, or you're behind and totally useless. Unfortunately he doesn't really fit well into any clear role anymore. He really wants to have safe lane farm and all the jungle he can take on top, but realistically you're far better off playing another carry there who scales with more than just their total gold earned. He's too slow and too farm dependent to off lane safely, so thats out too. That only leaves mid, and as you said above, he's going to have issues there too.

As things stand, he just doesn't really have a place on most teams. He really needs a buff of some sort, but the big question is what? He has poor base stats to make up for his ult, which is basically just a pile of extra stats so if they buff one, they'd likely need to nerf the other. Buff his other skills is also out, his stun is still excellent and his acid spray is fantastic too. Any buffs to his passive is just going to exacerbate the problem further, so thats out too. What he really needs is a remake, like Bloodseeker and PL got, that keeps his theme intact but puts him into a place where he's at least able to be balanced without just breaking him further.

I agree. It looks like they opened more "room" for him to be a dedicated support or mid laner (greed gives fuckton of gold when you eat bounty rune), but there is just so many better "dedicated supports that also farm woods or lanes" right now, and alchemist gets easily shut down by any roaming support on mid. He just doesn't fit anywhere in current meta.

I don't think that he needs a buff, he is good, he just doesn't fit and he either need his power to be fueled into one role as it used to be, or meta needs to be shifted via range of buff/nerfs to other heroes

[Deleted]

Bunch of douchebags on both teams. Allcaps in allchat is so stupid.

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Too bad there's a ton of ways to get around that.

there are tonnes of ways around everything. Most of the time a quick CC as he charges in will do it. It won't work everytime, but usually that sorts it, he then becomes more hesitant to charge and he becomes pretty useless.

[minteK917]

Why don't you get purged 24/7 by SD when you pick Void? And why do you think that alchemist is a hard carry? And why do you say that HP regen is irrelevant after 40 minute mark? It always allows your team to 5 man enemy base easily without losing minions

So you assume every game needs SD to defend alchemist? What does that have to do with it?

Alchemist used to be a hard carry. Then they gutted him, then he was a support, then they gutted him again. He is nothing anymore, he can farm fast and thats about all he does, he does very little with that farm thought. Very little that dozens of other heroes you can get even in captain mode that could do with less farm.

I was just gona facepalm at your last part, but ill answer seriously. Really you justify alchemist ult gutting because its better to tank tower damage lol. How about you get all the other heroes that are better at siege or make a freaking mek on someone, hell pick juggernaut if you really want creep to survive.. i mean really thats how far you want to justify how shit he is, tanking tower shots.......Even pizzashark wouldnt go that far lol. But yes actually even after the 40 minute mark his regen is pointless even to help creep, you dont need creep for siege damage when actually pushing 40 minutes into the game, you need them to get the protection off.

Its useless for alch and for the push. Ill do like you and include pointless hero camo. WHY IS THERE NO AA TO REMOVE ALCH REGEN? Actually forget it, you dont need AA that regen does nothing. It was a huge nerf to alch and still is now.

[Lysah]

Get solar crest, drop bombs on people. Farm woods, get bounties, win game. Alch is fine, probably a little overpowered as a support, but people refuse to do anything but carry with him.

[Deleted]

Get solar crest, drop bombs on people. Farm woods, get bounties, win game. Alch is fine, probably a little overpowered as a support, but people refuse to do anything but carry with him.

if you are support why are you farming the jungle out? that farm should be going on a core, preferably your hard carry.

[Longview]

many of the random carry players i get in my games aren't efficient at jungle farming so there's always some camps to farm as a support

i play games around 4500 mmr normally

[minteK917]

Get solar crest, drop bombs on people. Farm woods, get bounties, win game. Alch is fine, probably a little overpowered as a support, but people refuse to do anything but carry with him.

Hes left to be a utility hero in minus armor strat and thats it. There are still better crest builder in the game negating the fact you would get him either way. Overpowered as a support makes me roll my eyes a little, compared to which support?

He was always a carry before they gutted the ult. It clears hes still intented to carry, why would his ult give such bas if hes a support? But hes trash tier carry and hes not overpowered as a support, hes more like MEH. Theres too many stronger supports to even call alch support top 10.

But i get it most of people here throw the word "overpowered" on about anything, without even thinking about what it means anymore.

[Keldarin]

Meh, get a semi carry with a stun and fight your way to six slots with any hero by 30 mins. Far more fun, especially if you're on the winning team.

Early and repeated ganks is huge in this patch. SD and roaming Mirana is going to be really popular in TI5 I think.

[PizzaSHARK]

if you are support why are you farming the jungle out? that farm should be going on a core, preferably your hard carry.

Because farm priorities aren't static. Alch can spend 5 mins in jungle and have all the farm he needs for pretty much the rest of the game to run as an effective support. During those 5 mins he's a core, after those 5 mins he's a support.

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But i get it most of people here throw the word "overpowered" on about anything, without even thinking about what it means anymore.

I never heard any disagreements with the definition I presented several pages ago. A hero is overpowered when their relative sum of strengths is greater than the relative sum of their weaknesses, and a hero is underpowered when the reverse is true. A balanced hero is close to being zero sum - their strengths perfectly balance out their weaknesses.

Drow could be a good example of a very well balanced hero. She's very weak to heroes that can get on her and stay on her, but when she can keep heroes away from her, she gets an absolutely ludicrous boost to her DPS - the two "cancel each other out", in a way. An overpowered state might be that she still has insane DPS when far away, but when enemies get close she's still pretty strong rather than pretty weak. An underpowered state might be that the bonuses she gets for staying away can't compensate for how badly she's weakened when they stick to her.

That's the working definition I use when I say something is overpowered.

[minteK917]

I never heard any disagreements with the definition I presented several pages ago. A hero is overpowered when their relative sum of strengths is greater than the relative sum of their weaknesses, and a hero is underpowered when the reverse is true. A balanced hero is close to being zero sum - their strengths perfectly balance out their weaknesses.

Overpowered refers to things that are out of balance with the game itself, not a single hero in a vaccum of peoples imagination. You can only judge a hero to the relation it has in the actual game, how it works against and with others. If its str is useless and has no synergy with anything, it does not make them overpowered if they have no weakness on paper.

Here you take a shot at showing me in relation to the complete roster of dota supports, how alch support can be considered overpowered, by listing me the list of supports that are worse then him. You cant be overpowered when half the games roster makes better support. I bet i can name you twice the supports that are better then the worse youll find. Its the opposite of being overpowered.

You cant be overpowered and not be one of the best at your role, doesent work. Its not even logical. Unless you dont know what OVERPOWERED MEANS.

Using drow for the analogy is good, but not because of what you are saying. You are again judging the hero in a vaccum on its own as if it was theorycrafting on paper and the game was 1v1s. Drow weakness can be made up for, hell drow presence alone overpower Visage. That is what is important in this game, the relation a hero has with and against others heroes in a 5v5.

[Lysah]

if you are support why are you farming the jungle out? that farm should be going on a core, preferably your hard carry.

Fewer than five heroes in the game can farm a lane and entire jungle at the same time without already having six slots. If you are NOT farming jungle as a support during your free time you are doing it wrong. What sets alch apart from the rest is higher gpm for free and an ultimate that gives him infinite sustain and man fighting power. Other supports go oom or get stomped flat by a single stun, which makes their contribution easy to trivialize. Alch gets more items and requires more focus to deal with than a hero like wd who dies if you breathe on him.

Alch can farm a mek in like two minutes. The issue he has is pubs who think he has to be the one and only hard carry on the team.

[PizzaSHARK]

Using drow for the analogy is good, but not because of what you are saying. You are again judging the hero in a vaccum on its own as if it was theorycrafting on paper and the game was 1v1s. Drow weakness can be made up for, hell drow presence alone overpower Visage. That is what is important in this game, the relation a hero has with and against others heroes in a 5v5.

Jesus christ, apparently you can't extrapolate things on your own. I stated it as simply as possible because introducing more variables - all of the dozens or probably hundreds of variables involved in the gameplay balance of each hero - would just make the example unnecessarily murky. The point was to give you an example of how the definition is used and how it works, and leave you to finish the rest of Drow's "worksheet" on your own.

Yes, I am considering her interaction with things like Visage's bats (and apparently so is Valve, considering her aura was nerfed in a hotfix.)

Why do you think I'm acting like each hero is 1v1 or something? Here's some things Alchemist is really great at:

- Extremely hard to kill during Chemical Rage without immense burst or Ice Blast.

- Acid Spray is immense, spammable area denial that increases the damage of his other spell and stacks with similar effects (Medallion of Courage, Howl of Terror, Amplify Damage, Viscous Nasal Goo, etc.)

- Unstable Concoction is potentially the best stun in the entire game. It's physical damage (amplified by Acid Spray, Medallion of Courage, etc), it cannot be disjointed, it's AOE, and has a very long cast range. Its mana cost is also fairly low relative to Alchemist's improved mana regen through Chemical Rage.

- Chemical Rage counts as base mana regen, meaning percentage boost items are extremely gold-efficient on him. A single Medallion of Courage almost completely eliminates any kind of mana issues he might face.

- His passive means he will virtually never fall off in effectiveness as a support because he can quickly get a lot of gold while taking comparatively few creeps to do so. A wave of 12 creeps (avg 40 gold per creep) pushing in can turn into an instant 800 gold for Alchemist... almost double the value for everyone else. Bounty runes are also worth 4 times their normal value for Alchemist with even just one point in his passive, allowing gimmicky (but potentially extremely effective) plays like giving Alchemist the 0 minute rune and having him pool a bottle to his mid; his mid starts with stats (null talisman, basilius, whatever) and a level 1 bottle, giving them an immediate and huge advantage over the enemy mid.

- Alchemist can buy his teammates Agh's so they can buy other items instead.

Essentially this means that Alchemist is one of the most versatile support picks available. Ganking, roaming? Yup, he can do that - 775 cast range stun that hits for up to 4 sec and 360 physical damage. AOE killing field for creeps and area denial for heroes to allow powerful pushes after the ganks.

Need a very fast Meka or other major support item? Yeah, he can do that too - even just one point in his passive quickly lets him get an extra 12 gold per kill. After three kills (whether they're regular creeps or little creeps in the small camp), he's essentially just killed another creep for free. Intelligent positioning of Acid Spray lets you farm (and stack!) multiple camps at once in the jungle so he doesn't have to take lane creeps away from a teammate.

Got a Lina, Tiny, Tinker, or other hero with a game-changing Agh's? Hey, Alchemist can quickly farm them an Agh's while they're farming a real item - it's not like support Alchemist needs much in the way of items (and he can get those items extremely fast anyway.) Yes, Tinker doesn't usually get Agh's, because it's generally seen as not being worth giving up an item slot for. But you don't have to sacrifice an item slot to get it if you have an Alchemist, and Tinker's Agh's is REALLY REALLY good - Laser becomes an AOE 320 damage nuke that blinds and each missile cast does up to 1400 damage spread across the four targets. This applies to every hero, though. What if Clockwerk didn't need to spend 4200 gold on Agh's? What could he get instead, if he knew he didn't have to farm his Agh's? What if AA could be present and fighting with his team instead of hiding in a corner of the map, slowly autoattacking his way to an Agh's?

Heroes like Tiny, who normally get Agh's anyway, can now go straight into real items (AC? Moonstone?) and essentially get a free, 7th inventory slot. In essence, Alchemist can be farming like a core, except still acting as a support because instead of buying himself items, he's buying his teammates items. Oh, and because of his passive, he doesn't actually need to kill very many creeps to match your average hard carry's GPM, and if he's allowed a few minutes to farm like a hard carry, he'll probably break 1000 GPM if he's being played by someone good at farming.

How many of your "top tier" supports can do that? SD? He can't buy his teammates items and he can't farm anywhere near as fast as Alchemist - Alch can have Meka+upgraded boots+Medallion+give someone an Agh's in the time it takes SD to get manaboots+Agh's of his own. VS? Her MO practically revolves around pressing R and immediately dying, she doesn't have Alch's staying power in a fight (Alch is one of the toughest supports to kill in absence of Ice Blast or overwhelming burst... and if QoP/Agh's Lina is ulting you, they aren't ulting your PA or Troll or Dazzle or whatever), she can't farm for shit and will very rapidly fall behind in farm. Skywrath Mage? He blows his load all at once and then has no mana left to do anything for the rest of the fight, Alch shits out 400+ damage stuns (easily closing in on 500+ damage with a Medallion, even more with Solar Crest), covers an entire screen in green goop that does huge damage (384 over the duration, before armor is factored) and reduces armor as if you were affected by Medallion, and did I mention he buys his teammates a 7th inventory slot?

Hell, Alch can even rapidly transition from support to core if need be, and far faster than any other choice for that role like Leoric or Sven. Alch can go from low farm, passive support to a core with 2-3 items inside of 10 minutes - he can literally catch up to the enemy mid or safelane core that's been farming all game inside of 10 minutes. Sure, Alch is weaker than that core with equal farm, but who cares? He suddenly went from "drop acid, throw stun, afk for 15 sec, repeat" to "drop acid, throw stun, bend Lion like a cheap plastic chair" practically overnight. In another 10 minutes he'll probably be +1-2 items over the enemy core, at which point he can fight them on even terms (and this, of course, is ignoring what Alch's own cores are doing.)


But really, it's the "buys teammates a 7th item slot" thing that makes him OP. Item slots are the most valuable resource in DotA, and the entire item system is designed around item slot efficiency. The more gold-efficient an item is, the less slot-efficient it is (gg branches are far and away the most gold-efficient item in the game, but far far less slot-efficient than an Ultimate Orb, which is extremely gold-inefficient.) Usually, buying an Agh's means trading an item slot for a small boost to your stats (basically ultimate orb and point booster in one slot) and some kind of improved functionality. For most heroes, they have a balanced Agh's upgrade and it represents a tradeoff. Some others, like SD and Tiny, have hideously overpowered Agh's upgrades and it's not really a tradeoff - there isn't really a better choice. In either case, it's not even a choice for them, they just plain get a free Agh's if Alch is on their team. Again, imagine what a Clockwerk can do with 4200 gold and a free item slot. How about getting a Shiva's (4200 gold is already most of the way there), or a Necrobook so you can Thunderdome people? And did I mention how absolutely insane Tinker's Agh's is (again, literally the only reason Tinker players don't get it is because they'd ideally like to have 6 items that are refreshed by Rearm in their slots, and it doesn't scale unlike Bloodstone.)

An ideal Alch team would have no more than 3 heroes that benefit from an Agh's. You could easily do something like Centaur solo offlane (or Night Stalker duo offlane with someone), Luna safelane, and someone like Lina (or Tinker, seriously Tinker's Agh's is OP as hell... AOE Laser is ridiculous) mid. Alch can go wherever, and just send him into the jungle after a few levels or gank attempts. Have him get a couple of quick items to help with ganks and pushes, eat some outer towers, and then just get to work farming the Agh's. The point is to pick heroes with very potent Agh's. Luna, for example, now has an exceptionally strong Agh's, particularly if you can pair it with a tanky blink initiator (like Centy) or someone that's almost impossible to escape from (like a maphacking Night Stalker with permanent 522 ms and a roughly 1200 vision advantage over his enemies.)

Honestly, if you don't think Alch is a top tier hero then you just aren't drafting him intelligently. Hell, part of what makes him so good is you can just build a team that makes them expect an Alch pick... and then just pick something else if they ban him (or just mindgame them and never intend on picking him in the first place.) You can pick a lineup like above, it looks like a perfect time for a 4th or 5th pick Alchemist... so they ban him, because they're not stupid. And then you just pick a different hero that also fits and they've essentially wasted a ban. Or they don't ban him because they're stupid and don't realize how strong Alchemist is right now, and suddenly you have a Lina with Bloodstone and Agh's at 15 minutes walking up and gibbing people with her R when they're at 85% HP. Or you have a Centaur with blinker and Agh's at 15 mins and you literally cannot kill anyone on his team because all he does is press R and they're basically invulnerable. Or Night Stalker hits his ult, Luna puts her Eclipse on him and suddenly your team has a Night Stalker stomping through them with a fucking Eclipse attached to his butt and it's not like you can run away from a Night Stalker (or, really, kill one) at 15 minutes.

Alchemist is fine. In fact, Alchemist is probably a little OP right now. If you draft intelligently, anyway.

[Charge me Doctor]

So you assume every game needs SD to defend alchemist? What does that have to do with it?

I assume every time hard carry that relies on passives is picked - SD is picked for enemy team

[Deleted]

Fewer than five heroes in the game can farm a lane and entire jungle at the same time without already having six slots. If you are NOT farming jungle as a support during your free time you are doing it wrong. What sets alch apart from the rest is higher gpm for free and an ultimate that gives him infinite sustain and man fighting power. Other supports go oom or get stomped flat by a single stun, which makes their contribution easy to trivialize. Alch gets more items and requires more focus to deal with than a hero like wd who dies if you breathe on him.

Alch can farm a mek in like two minutes. The issue he has is pubs who think he has to be the one and only hard carry on the team.

/sigh

the post I was quoting was implying alch could just sit there and farm up aghs for his team as a "support", which is clearly a totally silly strategy.

Of course you find farm where you can, but alch as a support brings little to the table that others dont do better. He has one unreliable (and downright liability sometimes) stun, and little else other than a gold increase, which is nice, but I'd take a high impact support that requires few items over that anyday.

Now, I quite like alch, but run him as a core, so you can take advantage of his farm speed to get him powerful before the enemies cores come fully online. Get your actual supports to stack camps and alch can rip through them, get his items and snowball off that, using the excess farm to then (after he has his own items) get some aghs for your supports so they scale into lategame better or your other cores if they are ones that can delay aghs over other items.

My point was, you dont run an alch and give him farm unless he is a core. If the game is going bad and he is running as a support, he won't get farm as you will have limited areas to farm and your cores need it, and without farm alch is useless. Run him as a core and he can bring midgame power to the early game, and be 6 slotted before the enemy heroes hit their powerzone.

Alch makes a poor support and aghs farming is a bad idea, its a gimmick that hurts your team more than it helps, its something to make greevils greed useful later on after you are farmed, and a bonus if you are ahead to farm the aghs up and effectively 7 slot your team, not a strategy you should aim for.

[Charge me Doctor]

/sigh

the post I was quoting was implying alch could just sit there and farm up aghs for his team as a "support", which is clearly a totally silly strategy.

What? Where did you get that?

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Of course you find farm where you can, but alch as a support brings little to the table that others dont do better. He has one unreliable (and downright liability sometimes) stun, and little else other than a gold increase, which is nice, but I'd take a high impact support that requires few items over that anyday.

Um, sure thing, the only support who has better stun that Alch is Sven

And you speak like acid spray that zones enemy offlaner out of exp range just for 130 mana is nothing. Well, he still can get exp, but he will be murdered if he stays in armour shredding zone that also damages him. Seriously, what other support brings one of the most powerful stuns, zoning and pushing/counterpushing tool, sustain steroid and he can get solar crests, meks and shit faster than anyone else?

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Now, I quite like alch, but run him as a core, so you can take advantage of his farm speed to get him powerful before the enemies cores come fully online. Get your actual supports to stack camps and alch can rip through them, get his items and snowball off that, using the excess farm to then (after he has his own items) get some aghs for your supports so they scale into lategame better or your other cores if they are ones that can delay aghs over other items.

Off course you do, like 99% in pubs who pick him on mid and get shat at by Nevermore. If you want supports to sit without money and fuel it all into one character - there is much better options like Magina, Void or Yurnero than Alchemist. And you shouldn't build aghs because you can, you should build them if they are needed, and you decided that before you even start playing. If you have Zeus on your team - you tell him that you'll get him Aghs and he can go for Refresher or whatever shit he wants instead, and boom, at 7 minute mark he has two core items

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My point was, you dont run an alch and give him farm unless he is a core. If the game is going bad and he is running as a support, he won't get farm as you will have limited areas to farm and your cores need it, and without farm alch is useless. Run him as a core and he can bring midgame power to the early game, and be 6 slotted before the enemy heroes hit their powerzone.

Your point is somehow valid for TI4 times, but now it's totally outdated. Alchemist can always get the farm, question is, if he is able to leech exp from wood camps as well, you just throw it into a FoW and listen to "ding" sounds while staying in safety. Without farm Alch just farms lane and stops enemies from advancing with Acid. He doesn't need to be run as a core, he is perfectly fine as a support, all he needs is, basically, solar crest, mekanism, and w.e. you want at this point

[Lysah]

Of course you find farm where you can, but alch as a support brings little to the table that others dont do better. He has one unreliable (and downright liability sometimes) stun, and little else other than a gold increase, which is nice, but I'd take a high impact support that requires few items over that anyday.

Cask can almost one shot most support heroes with medallion from full health early game.

[Drunkenvalley]

To be fair, I have to give credit where credit is due: Sometimes, the afk farming alch gets you stuff like this. (Not shown: I got a free aghs at 24 minutes.)

[Sorcereria]

Issue with alchemist is basicly levels.

Run greed build - you have no aoe, utility
Run utility acid/coco build - you have no farm booster

Now imagine you have a control of the laning stage with greed build and suddenly game goes wrong. Yes, you are left with a skill that speeds up your farm but actually you are not able to benefit from that - like enemy controls your jungle and lanes are simply too dangerous. A walking creep alchemist.

I believe the hero winrates are skewed below 5k, due to player nature being so greed that even if lane is shit from begining, they wont max acid/coco first. Happens too often. I bet I could win more games going acid/coco with 1 point in greed more often than with greed maxed.