6.79 - How it will change the meta-game

Fight! Oh wait Roshan has not respawned.

 

* Roshan will respawn at a random time between 8 and 11 minutes after death

In a tightly contested game, most of the decisive battles will often be fought out near the Rosh pit as Roshan respawns ten minutes after death. Considering that the Aegis and Cheese drops from Roshan are too much of an upperhand for a team to get their hands on, both teams would scramble near the Rosh pit for an epic stand-off before a huge engagement occurs. These stand-offs are usually the highlight of the games and what could Valve do to encourage more fights and less farm? Randomize Roshan's respawn time.

By creating such a system, Valve forces the teams to constantly scout the Rosh pit just two minutes after the Aegis expires. Scouting the Rosh pit can be quite a dangerous affair considering teams without scouting heroes like Clockwerk or Nature's Prophet would have to walk in just to see if Roshan is there.

 

Are you pro at jungling? Well, that's a shame.

 

* A neutral creeps camp will no longer spawn the same set of neutral creeps twice in a row
* Small reduction to the pull timing duration of the mid Radiant and mid-top Dire camp
* Satyr Mindstealer XP bounty reduced from 88 to 62
* Satyr Tormentor XP bounty reduced from 155 to 119
* Mud Golems XP bounty reduced from 119 to 88
* Mud Golems armor reduced from 4 to 2
* Dark Troll Summoner bounty XP reduced from 155 to 119
* Hellbear Smasher HP reduced from 1100 to 950
* Hellbear armor reduced from 5 to 3
* Satyr Trickster's Purge cast point improved from 0.5 to 0.2
* Dragon Ancient Neutral Camp now have flying movement capability

We think the changelog is rather self explanatory here. Most XP bounties of neutral creeps have received a massive nerf and are now giving out a significantly smaller amount of experience in comparison to pre-patch. We assume that this is another one of Valve's plans to encourage faster paced games because more heroes in lanes generally do mean more action in the laning phase.

We are by no means implying jungle is not viable now, we are merely saying going into jungle at level one may not be as feasible as staying in lane. Perhaps heroes like Enigma would still not have a problem farming up a quick Mekansm but other heroes like jungling Batrider and Dark Seer will definitely suffer.

 

Creep pulling discouraged, hard lane isn't as hard anymore.

 

* Creeps now meet a bit closer to the tower in your offlane
* Non-Ancient Neutrals now split XP with all heroes in the AoE instead of just the team that killed them
* Swapped the medium pullable Neutral Camp with the small camp

The offlane, notorious for being the toughest lane in the game will not be as scary as it once was with the new patch rolled in. Offlaners, especially ones that could hide themselves very well would be able to farm levels off enemy pulls, provided they are in range. Besides that, it is also much easier to disrupt the creep equilibrium because all the offlaner has to do is to make sure the second neutral camp does not get pulled as well to bring the creeps towards his tower. All in all, we conclude that pulling will in fact do more harm than good for the team.

This is definitely a tricky situation for teams as they would probably benefit more from running offensive trilanes rather than placing them on the safe lane. Assuming that's the case, be sure to start changing the 3-position role from "offlane" to "safelane". Also, we wouldn't be surprised if 2-1-2 becomes the norm again.

 

No more item pooling for you!
 

Tango
- Charges increased from 3 to 4
- Gold cost increased from 90 to 125
- Is no longer shareable
- Tango can be targeted on an allied hero to create a 1 charge non-stacking tango item in their inventory. If the inventory is full, the item will be placed on the ground. This item has a 60s cooldown.

Healing Salve
- Gold cost increased from 100 to 115
- Is no longer shareable (but can still be used on a target ally)

Item pooling in the current meta-game is used to ensure the survival of the most important hero in the game, usually the solo mid. This is performed by buying Tangos and Salves for the said hero so that it could go straight into his first item at level one. This action can no longer be performed in 6.79 although Valve did mention that the Tango is shareable. However, that would require the supports to hang around whoever he wants to share it with.

Besides, no flying courier till three minutes and increased Bottle price affirms solo mid just got a lot harder.

 

The broken broken Tranquil Boots
 

Tranquil Boots
- Reworked Tranquil Boots

New Tranquil Boots
=========================
Active Boots:
+ 85 Movement speed
+ 4 Armor
+ 10 HP Regeneration

Broken Boots:
+ 60 Movement speed
+ 4 Armor
Restores when you haven't attacked or been attacked in the last 13 seconds.

Cannot be disassembled

Phase Boots
- Movement speed bonus reduced from 55 to 50

Power Treads
- Movement speed bonus reduced from 55 to 50

If you have not noticed, Tranquil Boots are currently the best affordable boots in the game right now. Tranquil Boots give a ridiculous amount of movement speed (85ms) when they are active (35 ms higher than Power Treads or Phase Boots) and 60ms when they are broken (!). In addition, Tranquil Boots do generate a significant amount of health, so we do not see any reason anybody should even go for Power Treads anymore with the +4 armor. Phase Boots are still an alright item since they are more offensive than the more defensively oriented Tranquil Boots and Power Treads.

 

Holla Holla Get Dolla

 

* Starting gold increased from 603 to 625
* Your gold income is now 1 per 0.6 seconds, up from 1 per 0.8 seconds

No it is not -apem but this is a rather significant change. According to our expert mathematician, each player will be getting 33% more gold than they previously did just from idling around and doing nothing. 5-position supporters used to have to wait 160 seconds before they generate enough income for a Sentry Ward but will only need 120 seconds to generate the same amount of gold. That should help them a little since they couldn't generate income from pulling anymore.

Carries, on the other hand, will have the luxury of farming slightly faster than they did before. Expect Midas and Black King Bar records to be shattered in the next few weeks.

 

The buyback dilemma
 

* Buyback prevents gaining unreliable gold (creeps, neutrals, etc) until your normal respawn time finishes
* When buying back, 25% of the remaining respawn time will be added to your next death

Are you sick of watching your teammates buying back right after they die to do absolutely nothing? Above is Valve's answer to them. Players now will not receive any gold for killing creeps and neutrals for a period of time after they buy out. The addition of this feature will encourage players to either not buy back recklessly or to join the team fight immediately.

While they might not get any cash from killing creeps, technically, you could still splitpush with no incentives. The increased regen on the melee barracks from 2.5 to 5.0 may change your mind though.

 

Daywalker, night stalker

 

* Day/Night length decreased from 6 to 4 minutes
* The following heroes now have the standard 800 night vision: Drow Ranger, Mirana, Puck, Leshrac, Enchantress, Ancient Apparition, Meepo and Treant Protector

Night Stalker
- Darkness causes enemy vision to be reduced by 25% (affects heroes, creeps and wards)

Let darkness be damned. Apart from nerfing the night vision of many night hunters, the day and night length is also shortened and this will have drastic effect on how ganks go down during the laning phase. Such a setup is perfect for the grand return of Night Stalker to the middle lane as the buff to the hero will help the team gain the upperhand in map control going into mid-game. However, we highly doubt Night Stalker could do much in the first night time and may have to wait till 12 minutes or when he uses his ultimate before he could do anything.

 

Some other noteworthy and unexpected changes

Axe
- Culling Blade no longer goes on cooldown if it successfully kills a hero

Bloodseeker
- Thirst bonus now stacks for each unit that is low HP
- Thirst HP threshold increased from 20/30/40/50% to 50%
- Thirst movement speed bonus reduced from 15/25/35/45% to 7/14/21/28%
- When Thirst is active, movement speed cap is removed on your hero

Io
- Tether now does a -100% MS/AS slow instead of a stun

Invoker
- Invoke Max Spells rescaled from 1/2/2/2 to 2

Meepo
- Divided We Stand leveling rebalanced from 6/11/16 to 4/11/18

Pudge
- Can now use Blink Dagger
- If you hook a unit onto an unpathable ledge, the unit gains free pathing for 5 seconds

Riki
- Riki is no longer revealed out of Permanent Invisibility when he casts spells or uses items

Shadow Shaman
- Mass Serpent Ward count increased from 8 to 10
- Changed Mass Serpent Ward placement structure

Skywrath Mage
- Added Aghanim's upgrade: reduces Mystic Flare's cooldown from 60/40/20 to 20/10/0

Slark
- Shadow Dance duration reduced from 5.5 to 4
- Shadow Dance cooldown increased from 25 to 65
- Shadow Dance can no longer be revealed by Truesight

Vengeful Spirit
- Can now use Blink Dagger
- If you Netherswap a unit onto an unpathable ledge, the unit gains free pathing for 5 seconds

Viper
- Poison Attack cooldown reduced from 4/3/0/0 to 0

Flying Courier
- Cannot be purchased until 3 minutes after creeps spawn

Linken's Sphere
- Linken's Sphere can now be cast on an allied hero to transfer the buff

Observer Ward
- Duration increased from 6 to 7 minutes
- Killing Observer Wards now grants a 50 gold bounty

Smoke Of Deceit
- Smoked units are now always hidden until the buff is removed (rather than being hidden only from minimap and partially from world)

> Read the full patch log here.