Competitive Dota Update

New Visage

2008-05-04T06:15:00.000-07:00

Today I want to talk about the new visage. Recent changes made to him are great and make him an excellent carry. For his skill and item build, one can refer to Beast_Pete's guide on the Dota-Allstars Forum (http://forums.dota-allstars.com/index.php?showtopic=105614). Now let us see how he is against late game heroes Spectre, Bristleback, Centaur Warchief etc.

Visage v. Bristleback:

Teams usually take Bristleback due to his insane late game attack speed and his passive Bristleback which gives him physical and magical damage reduction. Now if a well built Bristleback is against a well built Visage, following things must be observed:

1. Focus-Firing Visage by Bristleback and his teammates means that more healing to Visage's teammates.
2. Damage output of Visage is already great because of soul assumption, Revenants and grave chill(provides him attack speed and reduces opponent's attack speed).
3. This means that it will be very hard to kill Visage as attacking him means boosting his teammates HP. Same is the case with Bristleback, he is also equally hard to kill but he has no such thing like Gravekeeper's Cloak which heals his teammates. Thus on this point Visage has an edge over Bristleback.
4. Without a doubt, Visage is a better farmer than Bristleback.

I think its clear that why I think Visage is an equally good option as bristleback. Visage in many cases is more useful to his teammates than Bristleback. If he is babysitted like Spectre and Bristleback, he will definitely farm a lot faster than them(BB and Spectre).

Visage v. Spectre:
Visage basically has Reverse Dispersion. It will be a tough decision to take when it comes to Spectre v. Visage. Haunt is something that makes Spectre so unique. She can fight with other enemies at the same time when is fighting with Visage. Moreover Spectre is basically a chase down killer. That makes her a better finisher. But we must look into the fact that its harder to kill Visage than to kill Spectre. Also Grave Chill will nullify her chasedown ability if casted at the right time(Self-explanatory).Thus, we observe that Spectre is more offensive than Visage but Spectre's dispersion and dagger will be nullified by Gravekeeper's Cloak and Grave Chill(if used rightyl). In the end we must not forget that Visage is a better farmer than Spectre.

Visage v. Centaur:
Both Visage and Centaur have excellent farming and jungling abilities. Visage takes lead in terms of higher attack speed because of Grave Chill. Centaur is one of the hardest to kill heroes. Centaur has a stun which makes him an excellent ganker. Visage has no such disable. In this case Visage can win only if he farms faster than Centaur which is possible because of the Revenants. If Centaur farms first, then I think there is very bleak hope for Visage's team.

Thus we see that Visage has very good carry potential. I hope that Professional teams look into this fact and start using Visage when the new map (6.52 or 50b) is made official.

Suyash Verma

Juggernuat should be used more often.

2008-04-28T06:52:00.000-07:00

I fail to understand why pro's are not using Juggernaut as a carry. In my opinion he has an excellent carry, better than Shadow Fiend. If we compare Shadow Fiend and Juggernaut we see that the only advantage Shadow Fiend(hereafter referred as SF) has is his range. Apart from range SF has no other advantage. Juggernaut is an equally good farmer with his bladefury. Strengthwise both are same. Both of them are insanely weak. But with a few bracers or BKB, that lacuna is fulfilled. In fact Juggernaut has a much higher agility gain then SF. Without any items his agility surpasses 100 at level 25. And moreover he is an excellent ganker. Omnislash is the most insane ultimate I know of in DoTA. At level 6 itself, the omnislash is capable of doing a massive heartstopping damage of 600+. Let us analyze some pros and cons of Juggernaut in Competitive Dota:

Pros:
1. Insane Agility and Late Game potential.
2. Blade fury- This gives him spell immunity during the bladefury.
3. Inbuilt Critical- This means huge damage potential.
4. OMNISLASH- More Damage. Sureshot kill if Juggernaut catches someone alone.
5. Excellent Farming Skill i.e. Bladefury.

Cons:
1. Very fragile and low strength hero.
2. No natural escape mechanism.
3. Omnislash can be easily countered by Armor heroes like Dragon Knight or insane strength heroes like Bradwarden.

I think lategame all Juggernaut needs is some lifesteal, some warding and some strength. He can easily outmatch and outfarm heroes like Bristleback, Luna and ShadowFiend. Moreover Juggernaut is an excellent jungler.He should be supported by some disablers and a tank. Take this line up for e.g. Juggernaut Akasha Zeus Magnataur and Sandking. Will not it be insane.

Thus, I would like to say that Juggernaut should be use more often and more aggressively by the professionals.

VP Prime Defending Controversy.

2008-04-28T06:06:00.000-07:00

This is hottest topic in DoTA Community right now. Everyone was shocked to hear that VP used Fake nicking in one of their games against Check Six. It all started with Vigoss feeding the other team. Vigoss, who is considered as the best dota player of all times was feeding in that game. MYM Admins could not digest it. They decided to probe into the matter. After checking on the IP's and other details, the conclusion came against the VP team. It was concluded that two of the VP players had used fake nicking and unrostered players. Accordingly, VP was disqualified from Prime Defending Tournament. No official statement has come out yet but an informal statement was posted by Virtus.Jolie in the Dota-Allstars Forum. He gave an unofficial apology on behalf of his team and described the reasons and circumstances which led to origin of such a situation. He said that Vigoss and Light of the Heaven were not available for that match. So out of compulsion and strict timing rules, he and his team members decided to fake nick. He also explained how difficult it is to comply with timing and other restrictions imposed by the match administrators. He also further described how uncooperative Match Administrators are. According to his statement, all these situations led VP to use Fakenicking.

I think it was a very bold step by Jolie to come forward and apologize for all that has happened. According to Jolie, VP was not going to participate in Prime Defending at all. It was because of their recent additions, blowyourbrain and Light of The Heaven, that they decided to participate and do some practice for ESWC. My full sympathy and support is with VP and I totally understand their situation. Whatever was done was wrong and was accordingly punished by MYM. But this should serve as a lesson for the upcoming tournaments. I think match schedules should be framed in a manner that comforts the players and not in the manner that comforts the administration because in the end its the players who have to play and not the administration. The Link for Jolie's statement is not available at the moment as server of the Dota-Allstars Forum is down. The link shall be made available as soon as possible.

Suyash Verma

Lets Start.

2008-04-28T06:00:00.000-07:00

Lets start with MYM Prime Defending 10. Virtus.Pro and MYM are already out of this tournament. But fun and excitement is still visible in Prime Defending. It is because of the excellent game play by some new rising teams like SGC, KS etc. After the departure of VP and MYM, the favorites are SK Gaming. But anything is possible. WG, KS and SGC, all three of them are performing really well. SK is going to face their Winner Brackets match tonight against "The Elder Gods". The match will be streamed live o GGTV.

Hello!

2008-04-28T05:57:00.000-07:00

Hello everyone,

I am Suyash Verma from India. This blog has been created in order to keep an eye on Competitive DoTA. I will be posting from time to time competitive DoTA updates. This blog is totally non-commercial in nature and has been created out of passion and love for DoTA. All visitors and readers are most welcome.

Suyash Verma.