Hey everyone, Librarian Husky here! Today, I’m excited to dive into the latest strategies and hero picks that are dominating the meta. Whether you’re a seasoned player or just getting started, this guide will help you understand the current trends and how to make the most of your picks and bans. From powerful flex heroes to lane dominators, we’ll cover everything you need to know to stay ahead in your games. So, let’s get into it and see what’s shaping the competitive landscape right now!
Flexible Hero: Enigma
A couple of bans right off the bat: we have Dark Seer, a top off laner right now. Quick wit, as well as his abilities, make him a very dominant laner and very hard to counter pick. So, a lot of teams are getting rid of him.
Then we have an Enigma ban. This is a hero that a lot of teams like to flex. They’ll pick Enigma, and then it’s a strong three or a strong five that’s also very hard to counter pick. I would say in terms of Safe Laners, the only real one that I’ve seen that’s very good against Enigma is Gyrocopter. Everything else is pretty playable, and Enigma can actually win almost all of these lanes.
Chen: A Hero with Great Mana Management
If you want to invest time into a hero because the Satyr creep gives you Mana regen, it’s really crazy when you choose the Satyr Converter, which is like the innate of the hero. You get to summon a Satyr, and it gives 1.75 Mana Regen to everything around it. This includes your safe laner and yourself, and this is huge because Chen has massive Mana problems. It really solves that, and it also just gives you a Mana burn creep, which is crazy for the laning stage, making it really obnoxious.
S-King Ban: A Powerful Flex Pick
We see an S-King ban. This hero is a broken mid laner and off laner, does way too much damage, is excellent at farming, and can become stupidly tanky and obnoxious with Bloodstone. It’s a very powerful and extremely good flex for Team Falcons right now, and it’s starting to be a first-phase ban against them, which I agree with. This hero is insane.
Shadow Fiend: Lane Dominator
We see a Shadow Fiend ban. This hero got nerfed really hard, but teams are still picking it. In competitive DOTA, it mainly comes down to the flex. Being able to put the hero as a mid laner and a safe laner makes it very hard to draft against because this hero is a lane dominator and can be placed in two different lanes, countering about 30% of the hero cast in the lane.
Tiny: Reliable and Powerful
Tiny is another key hero. Being able to annihilate creep waves is very overpowered in DOTA. It makes the game easy to play, and being able to do 400-500 damage to someone without even remotely committing to them, as well as slowing them, is insane
Doom: Rising in Popularity
Finally, we see a Doom pick becoming popular. Amar loves it, 33 loves it, and it’s very powerful. This hero is starting to gain traction and is becoming a more frequent choice.
Item Selling Efficiency
I think the faster you can sell back items for 90% of their value is great because when you sell your bracers, your wand, your Midas, you just get an insane amount of value for these items that you already abused for the first 15-20 minutes of the game. So, that’s pretty good.
Snapfire: Versatile Pick
We see Snapfire come out for the side of Team Heroic. This hero is mainly being played as a five or four, but it’s also being flexed to mid, and this is why teams love Snapfire. You kind of just drop it down, pick the hero, and you’re like, okay, we have a Snapfire now. We have early game damage, and we have a good laner.
Snapfire’s Laning Strengths
This hero is a very good laner right now with either the full Boore Facet, which lets the Q, the Scatterblast, do more bonus damage when they’re further away. That’s super good for securing range creeps and poking people in general. Little Shredder does a nasty amount of damage, especially when you go 2-0-2 skill build. So, the hero as a support or a core is really OP. It can be played off-lane, mid, or in both support roles, and trust me, it feels great.
Weaver: A Flexible Choice
We see a Weaver come out for Team Falcons. This is a flex pick, but they mainly play it as a safe laner, and I like this for Team Falcons. This is a team that loves picking Weaver, Gyro—these dominant Safe Laners that are hard to gank.
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Prioritizing Safe Laners
I think a lot of pro teams don’t prioritize enough right now is having Safe Laners that can survive ganks. The reason why is currently the position five can hit the gate and get behind the safe laner and the mid laner easily. Nowadays, people are so good at hitting smokes from minute six to minute 12 and killing the safe laner.
Survivability of Heroes
When you pick heroes like PA or Sven, Sven is a bit better because he’s very tanky with War Cry and has a stun, so he’s better than some of the other heroes. This is why I think Falcons actually likes Sven a little bit too because he can flash farm, play defensively, and he’s also pretty tanky.
Weaver in the Current Meta
Weaver is really good against this meta of heavy pressure on the safe lane. He’s very good at dealing with ganks. I think Falcons thinks this way, which is why they love Gyro, they love Weaver, and these types of heroes. Dragon Knight was another hero for a while for them because it’s a hard-to-gank hero. So yeah, that’s what Weaver does.
Heroic’s Bans: Targeting Amar
Then we see a Timber ban and a Razor ban from Heroic, just targeting Amar. I don’t think Snapfire is even bad against either of these heroes. If anything, the magic damage of Snapfire against Timber is very good. The cookie against Razor is good at helping people get away from Link, so I don’t really think this is a bad matchup.
Bloodseeker Ban Strategy
I think there’s banning for AAR. Funny enough, on the other side, we see a Bloodseeker Ban. They only had one ban here, and it’s just to protect the Pangolier. Nothing special here, just Rupture against Rolling Thunder, going through spell immunity. Rupture can be used on Pango when he’s rolling, so it does a ton of damage to him during the roll. It basically stops him from using it completely.
Pangolier’s Flexibility
Getting into the Pango, the reason why this hero is really good is that Team Falcons flexes it from mid lane to off lane. That’s really powerful because these early picks, when you can flex them, become very hard to counter-pick. You don’t know exactly where the hero is going.
Potential Counter Picks
On top of that, Shadow Fiend got banned out. I would say the main one that comes to mind as a Pango counter that Heroic could go for is Templar Assassin (TA). It’s very good in the laning stage, so maybe they’ll aim for that, but we’ll have to see. I mean, this Pango hero is just good.
Pango’s Synergy with Weaver
When you have a Weaver, you want some of the frontline, and Pango can reduce armor by 12 with Lucky Shot and a level 10 talent. With Weaver‘s Swarm reducing armor, now you have this bizarre minus armor strategy that also has team fight. That’s why Pango is so good in minus armor strategies. Typically, minus armor lacks early game damage and team fight, but Pango covers both.
Conclusion: Effective Strategy
On the other side, I like this Sven here. This combination of heroes and strategies shows why Pangolier and Weaver are favorable in these pro games, as they balance early game damage with team fight potential.
Rubic’s Utility
We see a Rubic come out, which is okay. You can steal Swarm, which is nothing crazy, but it’s some early game damage. You can steal Rolling Thunder and Swarm. Nothing crazy, very standard, very safe. I like the pick.
Sven’s Role and Benefits
Talking about minus armor between these two heroes, Heroic sees that it gives you a hero that can burst Weaver, and it gives you that AOE armor against Pangolier. Pang’s ultimate, Rolling Thunder, the ball is physical damage. People forget that it was changed; it used to be magical, now it’s physical. So, a hero like Rubic with items like Solar Crest, Buckler, Wraith Band, or a Halberd makes you tankier against Pangolier.
War Cry: A Counter to Pangolier
War Cry is one of the hardest counters to Pango in the game. Even support Rubic, this could be a support Rubic for sure, could be a mid Snapfire, and now you just have Rubic clicking War Cry with his Shard, giving his team 21 armor, eventually 31 armor with the talent, which is obviously insane. Big fan of the Rubic pick here; it can be a support or core. It’s also a hero that buys BKB, which is good against Pango, not being controlled.
Hoodwink: Early Game Burst
A very safe Hoodwink pick coming out for Team Falcons. There’s not too much to say here; it’s just Hoodwink. Basically, Weaver and Pango don’t have the best early game burst. Pango is okay, so Hoodwink provides early game burst damage as well as being a very reliable laner. It’s not much more than that.
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Wave Shove and Laning Strength
I wouldn’t even look into it; it’s just wave shove and good laner. Solid Enchantress comes out next. This hero is likely against Rubic and Snapfire because Rubic doesn’t have the best steals against Enchantress. It’s not too fun in the laning stage. Enchantress is reasonably good at trading since she can take over creeps, and Rubic really can’t deal with them.
Enchantress’s Role and Strengths
Assuming these are the support heroes, none of them really like dealing with the Enchantress creep when it comes online. The main idea here is that it’s going to be able to pressure towers because these heroes can’t kill it. It’s going to be able to dominate some of these heroes in the early game.
Frontliner for Team Fights
Enchantress is going to be a frontliner for these heroes, and none of these heroes really want to go in first. Pango sort of can because he gets that barrier from double jump from his W, but it’s not reliable. You don’t want to get bursted from full health. They have a lot of stuns already and a lot of burst damage here, so you don’t necessarily want him to walk in first. Instead, you’re going to go for Enchantress who can lead the charge.
Protective Wisps Mechanic
The way Enchantress is taking overprotective wisps now is fascinating. When she takes 250 damage, which is not a lot, she gets a wisp that lasts for 4 seconds, healing her up. Enchantresses are maxing their E and becoming unkillable, which is very obnoxious. It works through BKB, so Rubic can actually have a pretty difficult time killing Enchantress in the game. Definitely a fan of this mechanic.
Building Damage
It also gives them building damage, which they completely lack. Weaver, as a hero, is not good at killing buildings. He wants to go in later on in team fights and doesn’t wish to be initiated on. Sometimes it’s okay if you’re super farmed and have Satanic, but until then, it’s not the hero that wants to get gone on. So, you’d way rather play behind some sort of Enchantress.
Enchantress Versus Sven
Enchantress’s Enchant can purge Rubic‘s War Cry until he buys the Shard, and that’s really good. This makes her an excellent counter to Rubic.
Slardar Pick
We see a Slardar come out, which personally, I don’t really love. I feel like they think Amp Damage against Weaver and Amp Damage against Pango’s roll are useful. However, Enchantress can purge Slardar‘s Slytherin Sprint or Sprint, whatever it’s called, which is always problematic.
Slardar’s Lane Dominance
Slardar is pretty terrible at killing Enchantress but reasonably good against the Enchantress creep because the bash does bonus damage to creeps. Maybe that’s the idea here—they just want a dominant lane.
Lane Dynamics and Strategy
You have a Rubic–Slardar lane or a Snapfire–Slardar lane, both of which are very strong. However, I don’t feel like it pressures Weaver in lane effectively. Maybe it’s about Weaver using Shukuchi on you, and if you stun him into a bash, it becomes very uncomfortable for him. I don’t exactly know the logic behind the Slardar pick; I’m not so sure.
Potential Hero Pairings
Maybe they want to pair Slardar with some sort of Gyrocopter. I could see that because then when the Pango rolls with Rolling Thunder or if they pick a Templar Assassin (TA), it could make sense. TA could work because they don’t really have the best way to get on top of her.
Storm Spirit Pick
No, they’re going to go for Storm Spirit. So, this is just a Rubic carry. I thought maybe the Rubic would be support, mid Snapfire, and then pick another carry, but they go for Storm Spirit. It’s fine; it’s considered an even matchup against Pango, maybe slightly winning in the mid lane. Static Remnant is very easy to hit the enemy heroes with.
Storm Spirit’s Strengths and Challenges
They don’t have the best control for Storm Spirit, but Storm really struggles to kill Enchantress because you have to auto-attack. Storm is pretty good against Hoodwink because you can catch her in the tree line when she scurries. That’s kind of nice. You can get away from Pango’s Rolling Thunder sometimes by zipping away. You buy Orchid against Weaver, so I can kind of see it. I just maybe would have liked a hero that has a bit more synergy with Slardar‘s Amplify Damage.
Heroic’s Draft Strategy
I suppose they think Storm Spirit does right-click at the end of the day, so it’s not a bad pick. Heroic has a well-rounded draft with a lot of damage. The main thing they lack here is objective damage. My main concern for Heroic is whether they can kill buildings. They basically have to wait until Rubic has items to pressure a tier two. It’s not very easy for them to take tier ones; they will have to bring many heroes. You don’t need a siege hero to kill tier ones; you can just bring four or five heroes, and that will be enough.
Team Falcons’ Last Pick: Slark
For their last pick, Team Falcons is going to go for Slark. I think this Slark pick is pretty cool for a couple of reasons. Number one, I actually think it’s a good lane against Rubic. I’ve played this matchup myself, and as long as you have a support that’s helping you out, casting the occasional stun like Hoodwink, you can really dumpster Rubic. Rubic just has a hard time trading.
Slark’s Advantages Against Sven
In terms of how the game plays out, when you get on top of Rubic with Diffusal Blade, it’s really obnoxious because this hero has massive mana problems and can’t exactly fight Slark. When you burn Rubic‘s mana, the hero just gets kited. He can’t BKB sometimes as well if he’s not careful, and so it’s really problematic. With Slark’s ultimate and Slark’s shard, Rubic just can’t hit. The shard also adds to Slark’s survivability and chase potential.
Slark’s Utility and Survivability
It saves allies; you put it on the ground, and you can kite out Rubic‘s stun and BKB with Slark. On top of that, they just can’t really kill Slark very easily. Everything can be purged by his Q, so he can really get around the map.
Team Falcons’ Map Control
The last thing I’d like to say is that I think the Team Falcons draft can play a very wide map. Instead of coming together in one lane and trying to take towers, they can spread out, use Enchantress to take tier ones, and just look for pickoffs. With a very fast-paced Weaver, fast-paced Pangolier, fast-paced Hoodwink with Scurry, and fast-paced Slark, they can maneuver on this map and not necessarily take team fights, but play a very wide three-lane map.
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- Flexible Hero: Enigma
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Mastering the Meta: Top Strategies and Hero Picks for Dominating Your Games