Valve Introduces Final Dota 2 Patch Before The International
Valve has released the newest update for Dota 2 and it’s set to be the version that’s to be played at The International 9, the world’s biggest esports event.
Players and teams will be hunched over their computers checking out and studying the latest patch notes for 7.22f, the new version of Dota 2. There are a number of different changes that will likely change the way certain heroes function in specific strategies, as well as a couple of items changes that could make for a big impact.
Heroes that have been popular in the past such as Centaur Warrunner, Juggernaut and Wraith King have received nerfs. They don’t seem to be nerfs that will stop them being picked completely, and there’s a good chance Wraith King will still be a popular pick. The Juggernaut nerf was a hit to his base stats, making him less viable earlier on in game, while the Centaur took a Retaliate percentage decrease.
Dragon Knight received a buff increasing his Elder Dragon Form Scepter magic resistance from 30% to 40% and also had an increase in his gold per minute talent. Drow also had an early game buff, giving her added strength and agility and an extra 10% Gust Blind in her level 15 talent. For some reason, Invoker still gets buffs, even though he’s an exceptionally strong hero, and he received a base intelligence increase along with a buff to his Cold Snap ability.
Tinker is another great hero that has picked up some buffs, although these are only talent buffs. He now can get an increase cast range at level 10, spell amplification at level 10 and 11% manaloss reduction, instead of the 15% spell lifesteal at level 15.
A few other nerfs for some popular support heroes including Omniknight and Ancient Apparition are also listed, with the mid lane weakening somewhat too, with nerfs on Outworld Devourer, Ember Spirit and Morph. Finally, the recipe for Aghanim’s Scepter has been lowered from 2000 to 1800 gold. This comes off the back of the first 7.22 gameplay update that added Scepter upgrades to all of the 24 remaining heroes without upgrades, and where it could be consumed as a buff. There seems to be a lot of gameplay based changes around getting abilities upgraded through the item, so this patch should change some of the gameplay to allow for more heroes to utilize the item.
The prize pool for TI9 is just short of $31 million at the time of writing, and still has some time to go. Regardless of how high it goes, this is the biggest prize pool in esports history, eclipsing even that of the recent Fortnite World Cup. Dota 2 players who purchase the Battle Pass or levels for the Battle Pass, will find that the money spent goes towards the prize pool of the competition. With TI9 being less than a month away, there’s still opportunity for the prize to grow, but it’s unlikely to grow much more.
