Dota 2 is a game that is ever-changing and is constantly evolving along with the gameplay meta that changes whenever there is a patch update. This time round, the game receives a relatively huge patch update, dubbed patch 7.06 and along with it, brings the inevitable nerf/buff hammer for plenty of the previous meta-favourite heroes.
The biggest change that has received plenty of traction since the patch’s release is the replacement of Respawn Talents on no less than 42 heroes in the game. Talents were introduced during the game-shifting patch known as patch 7.00, which saw the game receiving a total makeover alongside plenty of other updates and changes. Talents were a fresh introduction into the game as it requires each hero to dedicate a total of fours skill points at levels 10, 15, 20 and 25, which provided some much-needed diversity and versatility into the game. While most talents were simple upgrades like added physical damage, movement speed, armor or even granting lifesteal and spell damage amplification to name a few, one of the biggest Talents would be reducing the death timer on certain heroes with that Talent listed in its Skill Tree. Mostly reserved for supports, this provided a significant change into the gameplay meta as a reduced death timer on heroes would allow a team to bounce back into the game, even if they lost all five heroes.
Here are some of the more notable/down-right game-changing Talents that were introduced to replace the Respawn Talent:
Warlock: Summons a Golem on death (Level 20)
Magnus: +500 Skewer Range (Level 25)
Lone Druid: +50% Spirit Bear Magic Resistance (Level 20)
Enigma: +1 Malefice Instance (Level 20)
Earthshaker: +350 Fissure Range (Level 20)
Bristleback: +10% Spell Lifesteal (Level 20)
Earth Spirit: Geomagnetic Grip Targets Allies (Level 25) *you no longer need an Aghanim’s Scepter for this*
Enchantress: +6% Impetus Damage (Level 25)
Visage: Soul Assumption Double Strike (Level 20)
Techies: +250 Attack Damage (Level 25) *this is just insanely ridiculous and I am not looking forward to my pub games from now on*
Templar Assassin: -8 Meld Armor Reduction (Level 25)
Spirit Breaker: +30% Greater Bash Damage (Level 20)
Nature’s Prophet: Removed Teleportation Cooldown (Level 25) *the rat is real*
Jakiro: Macropyre Pure and Pierces Immunity (Level 25)
Io: Tether Stuns (Level 25) *this was initially patched out to bring some balance towards Io but not anymore*
Chen: +1000 Creep Health (Level 20)
Aside from giving 42 heroes brand new Talents, which will are of equal or greater usage, patch 7.06 also brought along plenty of nerfs and buffs to 88 heroes out of the 112 in total. Along with the nerfs and buffs, plenty of other heroes received Aghanim’s Scepter upgrades, some of which, are just downright disgusting. Here are the heroes who have received an upgrade or have had it reworked with Aghanim’s Scepter:
- Reworked Scepter on Axe. Causes Battle Hunger to reduce enemy total damage output by 30%. Applies Battle Hunger on enemy heroes within a 700 AoE after a successful Culling Blade.
- Reworked Bane’s Scepter. Causes Brain Sap to have a 1.5 second cooldown. Pierces Spell Immunity.
- Fixed Shuriken Toss Scepter interrupting the chain if one of the targets is Spell Immune
- Fixed Scepter Freezing Field not interrupting targets
- Reworked Dazzle’s Scepter. Causes Shallow Grave to be a 450 AoE spell.
- Duel Scepter now additionally grants Spell Immunity to your hero during Duel
- Reworked Leshrac’s Scepter. While Pulse Nova is active, every 1.75 seconds Lightning Storm will hit one random unit within 750 AoE. Prioritizes heroes.
- Reworked Magnus’s Scepter. Shockwave comes back, hitting units a second time and applying a 60% slow for 2 seconds. Distance and travel speed are increased by 50%. Return wave deals half damage to creeps.
- Added Scepter for Medusa. Causes Mystic Snake to turn enemies into stone for 1 second. Increases by 0.2 seconds per bounce.
- Reworked Outworld Devourer’s Scepter. Grants 2 charges to Astral Imprisonment and increases cast range by 300. Damage areas stack. Replenish Time: 12
- Reworked Silencer’s Scepter. Glaives now Pierce Spell Immunity and deal 100% more damage against Silenced units.
- Aghanim’s Gush now does a small ground reveal on units that are hit
- Added Underlord Scepter. Atrophy Aura’s bonus damage is now granted to nearby allied heroes for half of the bonuses. Increases bonus damage duration by 40 seconds.
- Scepter now additionally provides True Strike to Death Ward
General gameplay mechanics also received plenty of rework to bring about more stability into the game with just a touch of chaos.
DENY MECHANICS
- Creep denies now grant the denying team 30% of the XP bounty
- Normal deny XP increased from 50% to 70% (from either lane or neutral denies)
SHRINES
- Shrines now start on cooldown and become available at 5 minutes
- Reduced Shrine count in base from 5 to 3 (removed the Shrines from the top and bottom lanes behind the barracks)
- Shrines mana regeneration growth per minute reduced from 1 to 0.75
LANES
- Added an extra melee creep in mid lane for the first 15 minutes (until the first melee upgrade wave at 15 minutes, at which point all lanes have the standard extra melee)
- Creeps meet a bit closer to the offlane tower
- Creep aggro duration reduced from 2.5 to 2.3
- Creep aggro cooldown increased from 2.5 to 3.0
- Lane creeps vision reduced from 850/800 to 750
NEUTRALS
- Neutrals now spawn every minute instead of every 2 minutes
- Neutrals now give 20% less XP and Gold
- Neutrals XP and Gold now increased by 2% every 7.5 minutes (when creeps are upgraded)
CREEPS
- Siege damage type vs structures increased from 150% to 250%
- Siege creeps HP increased from 550 to 825
- Siege creeps spawn rate reduced from every 7th wave to every 10th wave (every 5 minutes)
- Extra Ranged/Siege creeps now spawn at 40 minutes instead of 45
ATTRIBUTES
- All hero strength growth increased by 0.3
- Regeneration coming from strength increased from 0.03 HP per point of Strength to 0.06
- Reduced base HP regen by 0.25
- Intelligence’s Spell Amplification from 1% per 15 to 1% per 14
- Mana per point of Intelligence reduced from 12 to 11
- Base mana increased from 50 to 75
ECONOMY
- Reduced melee creeps base XP bounty from 45 to 40
- Reduced melee creep gold bounty upgrade from 3 gold per cycle to 1 gold per cycle
- Melee/Ranged Barracks team bounty reduced from 275/225 to 225/150 to each player
- Roshan team bounty reduced from 200 to 150
- Shrine team bounty from reduced 150 to 125
- Death cost from 100 + NW/50 to 50 + NW/40
- Tier 3 Tower Team Bounty from 240 to 200
- Tier 4 Tower Team Bounty from 280 to 200
GENERAL CHANGES
- Illusion gold/XP bounty from 5 + Level to 2 * Level
- Illusion building damage reduction from 50% to 60%
- Buyback cooldown increased from 7 minutes to 8 minutes
- Roshan now drops cheese from the second death instead of the third
- Roshan armor bonus per upgrade interval increased from 1.1 to 1.3
- Powerup Runes now spawn different runes on both sides of the river after 40 minutes
- Uphill miss chance no longer applies to flying units (i.e. Batrider using Firefly)
- Fixed various pathing issues with the bottom Dire creeps between Tier 1 and Tier 2
- Towers bonus armor based on nearby enemy heroes AoE increased from 1400 to 1600
Majority of the item upgrades were fairly understandable with no significant changes that will alter the game dramatically as most involved price, cooldown and stats changes. To read through the full changelog, click here.