[Megathread] DotA 2

[veiledy0]

my experience with asking people to take wards is that nobody ever takes them

even when i buy wards for the supports as a non-support

i swear to god most people dont even read chat

You know you can just brute force the chicken to drop the wards into someone's inventory, right?

[Deleted]

No, they can, it's called blaming someone else and it's quite common in 3k MMR

I doubt 3k MMR players are even good enough to be using the courier constantly.

[Longview]

You know you can just brute force the chicken to drop the wards into someone's inventory, right?

yes but only if they have room

[veiledy0]

yes but only if they have room

Everyone has room during the laning phase. Or the first 30 minutes of the game, rather.

[Longview]

Everyone has room during the laning phase. Or the first 30 minutes of the game, rather.

that is not my experience but i cant really say that i ask people to pick the wards up very frequently so i dont really know

[Charge me Doctor]

I doubt 3k MMR players are even good enough to be using the courier constantly.

Usually for magic want recipe or shit like that.

[Longview]

Usually for magic want recipe or shit like that.

ring of protection for safelane basi ring at 2 minutes is a classic

[PizzaSHARK]

What surprised me about both Tide and Panda is that there hasn't been any Spectre picks against them, and she's the ultimate counter to blink initiators. She's also a great counter to Void, because of her natural tankiness from Dispersion, so she doesn't even need much items to survive Chrono, and the chances of actually catching the real one during Haunt are low. You wouldn't have to play her as your usual Radiance Spectre because you'd need her earlier on, but Spectre also works with Phase/Drums/Yasha/Diffusal, and if you would manage to get through the first 20 minutes w/o losing rax, she'd be able to win you the game with ease.

I honestly would put Spectre in the top 3 or maybe top 5 of carry picks, in a general sense. She has very little lane presence, but she still has noteworthy early teamfight presence with Desolate and Haunt, and she scales harder than pretty much any carry in the game with the POSSIBLE exception of Dusa... and even then I think Spectre scales better because Dispersion is damage in addition to extra health.

Spectre with boots of travel can easily push out a lane, Haunt into a teamfight, and then boots of travel right back to the lane she was pushing the second her team has an advantage. She is incredibly strong if done well, and Dispersion honestly needs some kind of nerf... 22% extra health is kind of ridiculous.

And like you said, once she has Radiance she can pretty much permanently shut down blinkers for the duration of a teamfight. Hell, with its short cooldown, Haunt's even useful just for finding out where the enemy team is and what they're up to. Global true sight for several seconds plus a bit of damage is pretty nice.

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No, they can, it's called blaming someone else and it's quite common in 3k MMR

More common than anything else. Did you die? Wasn't your fault, was definitely your team's fault. Did you just feed three kills in a row in mid? Wasn't because you're a dumbass, it's because your noob supports only have one rune warded instead of both. Did enemy team deward your team's wards? Fucking noob supports need to snap their fingers and make wards refresh instantly.

[Jester Joe]

Everyone has room during the laning phase. Or the first 30 minutes of the game, rather.

Pfft, fill those empty spaces with branches

[Charge me Doctor]

Pfft, fill those empty spaces with branches Bracers

Literally mine thoughts when i started playing dota

[Jester Joe]

Literally mine thoughts when i started playing dota

I'll be honest, my first thought from playing Dota was "Why do I need boots? Movement speed can't be that great and they're so expensive"

[veiledy0]

I honestly would put Spectre in the top 3 or maybe top 5 of carry picks, in a general sense. She has very little lane presence, but she still has noteworthy early teamfight presence with Desolate and Haunt, and she scales harder than pretty much any carry in the game with the POSSIBLE exception of Dusa... and even then I think Spectre scales better because Dispersion is damage in addition to extra health.

That's why she's my highest winrate hero, if I don't count the ones with less than 10 games played. Her lane presence isn't as bad at all. Desolate damage is very good early on because it bypasses Stout Shield/PMS, so every attack from her actually counts. She's only weak if going against something like a ranged 3 lane that has a Luna, but then again which hero isn't.

Pfft, fill those empty spaces with branches

You sell all the branches you bought at the start the first time you die to afford a TP Scroll anyways because you spent all your gold on quickbuy before death.

[Deleted]

I honestly would put Spectre in the top 3 or maybe top 5 of carry picks, in a general sense. She has very little lane presence, but she still has noteworthy early teamfight presence with Desolate and Haunt, and she scales harder than pretty much any carry in the game with the POSSIBLE exception of Dusa... and even then I think Spectre scales better because Dispersion is damage in addition to extra health.

Spectre with boots of travel can easily push out a lane, Haunt into a teamfight, and then boots of travel right back to the lane she was pushing the second her team has an advantage. She is incredibly strong if done well, and Dispersion honestly needs some kind of nerf... 22% extra health is kind of ridiculous.

And like you said, once she has Radiance she can pretty much permanently shut down blinkers for the duration of a teamfight. Hell, with its short cooldown, Haunt's even useful just for finding out where the enemy team is and what they're up to. Global true sight for several seconds plus a bit of damage is pretty nice.

How is 120 seconds cd short?

Also I think Spectre is one of the worst carry heroes right now. Yeah, Haunt can disable blink, but its not Spectre's team initiating usually. The hero needs a lot of farm, and its not like he can just rush a radiance like a Naga Siren. Unless your team can win the match 4vs5 early, and provide a lot of space, you can't really do much.

This isn't really the meta of carrys going boots-->farm item-->get 6 slot anymore.

[Charge me Doctor]

I don't think that Spectre will get back to its place after her dispersion change (it used to hurt enemies for last hitting and killing heroes), back then she was really painful to deal with, now she is just "meh".
Still her free damage reduction is kinda good, i do hope that icefrog will buff desolate damage

[Jester Joe]

Is there any way to set it to a keybind to focus the camera back on your hero or something? I'd rather quickly press a button than double click on the portrait, and I couldn't find the option anywhere in the options.

Also realized I still have quite a few heroes left to try it seems, randomed Queen of Pain for the first time last night, actually was rather fun (Even if the other team's invoker told me BKB is bad for QoP)

[veiledy0]

Is there any way to set it to a keybind to focus the camera back on your hero or something? I'd rather quickly press a button than double click on the portrait, and I couldn't find the option anywhere in the options.)

Select Hero in unit actions. You still have to double tap it tho.

Also realized I still have quite a few heroes left to try it seems, randomed Queen of Pain for the first time last night, actually was rather fun (Even if the other team's invoker told me BKB is bad for QoP)

Invoker will always tell you BKB is bad if you're playing against him

[Jester Joe]

Select Hero in unit actions. You still have to double tap it tho.

Ah ok, thanks! I'll definitely fiddle around with that then

Invoker will always tell you BKB is bad if you're playing against him

True enough lol, I got it because of him and skywrath, it did save me a handful of times so I considered it worth it.

[veiledy0]

True enough lol, I got it because of him and skywrath, it did save me a handful of times so I considered it worth it.

BKB is almost always worth it against Invoker because it renders him partially useless since 8 out of his 10 spells are magic damage/disables (Alacrity and Forge being the 2 exceptions, plus Ice Wall if it affects you before activating BKB). Right click Invoker (Mjolnir/Crit Deso/AC) is an exception, but you rarely see this in pubs. Then there's also the Zoovoker build, but BKB lets you kill the Necros.

[StrawberryZebra]

How is 120 seconds cd short?

Also I think Spectre is one of the worst carry heroes right now. Yeah, Haunt can disable blink, but its not Spectre's team initiating usually. The hero needs a lot of farm, and its not like he can just rush a radiance like a Naga Siren. Unless your team can win the match 4vs5 early, and provide a lot of space, you can't really do much.

A 120 second Cooldown is still shorter than Ravage or Black Hole, as well as one or two other teamfight ults. But I agree, its not exactly short in the way that Mystic Flare or Walrus Punch are. It allows her to participate in team fights across the map while still farming, and even join in to swing the fight for her team if needed, the global presence itself is a game changer. Its also guaranteed damage output to everyone on the other team, as well as a way for her to reliably, and safely, reach high priority targets. It's far too strong to have a cooldown much shorter than 2 minutes.

What makes Spectre strong are her two passives. Desolate deals sixty five bonus pure damage on hit to isolated targets, and the radius for it is 325 away from any allied units. That's about Luna attack range, if you need help visualising it, so its basically no distance at all. What really makes it shine is the fact that illusions get this passive too, so your ult alone can potentially kill squishy supports before they even have a chance to contribute to a fight. Combined with a Manta or an Illusion Rune you can kill anyone without a BKB, other carries especially, extremely quickly in 1v1 situations. She should have it maxed out fairly early on too, meaning she has noticeable damage at a time where most other carries are relatively weak.

Her other passive, Dispersion, gives her roughly 28% extra effective health which makes her naturally more tanky than most Agi carries right off the bat. Secondly it deals as much as 22% of her max health as damage if you kill her to everything in the area. Unlike some other carries, she wants to be right in the middle of fights and doesn't care too much if she gets hit back. If nothing else it means she is extremely unlikely to lose a straight fight with other carries with equal farm. It also opens up the option of building tanky and, along with Desolate, still deal very respectable damage.

The two combined allow her to build reasonably well on a budget too. Phase, Drums, Yasha are all cheap and effective items for her and are easily farmed. You can even throw in an Armlet too if you really want to take advantage of cost effective stats. You do not need to be 6 slotted at all for her to have significant game impact, as long as you get over her early game hump, you're well on your way to winning.

[Deleted]

Spectre has a good spells. But let's list her weaknesses and see if we can find the reason for why she isn't picked that much.

Firstly, she is weak against aggressive tri-lanes. Secondly, she has no anti-push or push. She can't split push fast nor can she defend well. Before she gets her big items she struggles to survive in fights and she can only really fight every 120 seconds.

Now, let's look at what the meta has been: pushers with strong teamfight and who take fights more often than every 120 seconds. Do you guys see why she struggles to find her place? The meta needs to change or she needs a lineup that can handle this current meta to be viable.