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The new Razor meta building around Dota 2 patch 7.32d brings to light the potential of Bloodstone on the Lightening Revenant.
Dota 2 patch 7.32d was released around a week ago as a post TI11 balance patch. With every small patch, there are a few major winners that rise through the ranks, thanks to minor buffs. For patch 7.32d, one of the biggest winners is Razor. The path to Razor’s new form though, is not what many would have predicted. It is because of an item which was deemed useless on any hero except Leshrac – Bloodstone.
The buff that has Razor running riot in pubs is a small one – an increase to the Aghanim’s Shard damage from Forked Lightening due to the upgrade to Storm Surge.
In case you don’t know what Razor’s Aghanim’s Shard does, it sends out a 170 magic damage nuke on to three targets in the vicinity every time Razor is targeted by spells, and 18% of the times when he is hit by a right click. This damage was 120 till Dota 2 patch 7.29, but a couple of buffs has now taken it up to 170 (41.67% increase).
So where does Bloodstone come into the equation? Bloodstone passively provides 30% spell lifesteal against heroes, which goes up to 75% when its active ‘Bloodpact’ is used. That gives Razor an immense amount of pseudo tankiness in the midst of a team fight, the same as it does for Leshrac. A Razor with the Bloodstone active will heal for 287 HP for each proc of Forked lightening. The heal increases with the use of Plasma Field and when Eye of the Storm is active. It makes Razor insanely difficult to bring down without incurring major damages to multiple heroes.
According to Dotabuff, since the release of patch 7.32d, Razor’s pick rate and win rate both have gone up by about by about 9% in just a week! The new build definitely seems to have picked up a hero who was hit by nerfs in the last few patches.
(taken from Dotabuff)
In the past week, Aghanim’s Shard has been the most used item on Razor, with Bloodstone being the fourth most used. Both have a win rate of well over 60%! And lurking in sixth place is Aghanim’s Scepter, that has an over 70% win rate. Aghanim’s Scepter adds another Eye of the Storm target, further increasing the damage and the heal as well.
(taken from Dotabuff)
Bloodstone, which for the longest time was purchased only by Leshrac, had significantly more purchases by Razor last week.
(taken from Dotabuff)
So how exactly does the build work? The typical way is to get a Hood of Defiance to help Razor tank up. A common practice is to build Vanguard, and then disassemble it. The Ring of Health can be used to build Hood, while the Vitality Booster goes into building a Soul Booster for the Bloodstone. Bloodstone is followed up by Aghanim’s Shard (or you could even get the Shard first, depending on how the game is going). The next line of progression depends on the game – BKB, Aghanim’s Scepter, upgrading Hood to Eternal Shroud are all good options. The longer Razor survives, the longer his different sources of lightening bring down enemies while healing him at the same time. And this is not just a phenomenon in low level pubs. The new Razor build is also making a mark in top tier pubs, and TI11 winner Oliver “Skiter” Lepko, Tundra Esports’ carry, is already tired of it.
The interesting thing here, is that Bloodstone was deemed to be useless on any hero except Leshrac till not too long ago. A small buff to Razor has made it viable on him. How many other heroes are close to making the item look good? The stats show that Bloodstone is quite decent on heroes like Bristleback, Viper and even Pudge, although the sample size for those heroes is significantly smaller than Razor and Leshrac.
The renewed Razor can be played as a core in any lane, but playing him as a position 1 or 2 helps him get to Bloodstone a lot quicker. There is a good chance that either Razor’s Shard or Bloodstone gets nerfed, but till that happens, the Lightning Revenant is a good way to earn some MMR!
