The competitive hero tier list splits the Dota 2 heroes in different tiers based on their joint pick and ban rate. The requisites for each tier are the same every month, and aren’t influenced by the win rate or other factors. The goal is to offer a neutral comparison that, over time, will show how the competitive meta is evolving.
Often, bans are even more crucial than picks, as demonstrated from all the heroes in this month’s tier 1. Night Stalker and Nyx Assassin, in particular, were banned twice a much as they were picked. When a team isn’t comfortable against a hero, or if too many resources are needed to keep him at bay, they are forced to call a ban.
In the past week, Valve released the patch 7.06f, which improved the balance of the game with minor fixes on multiple heroes. The most feared hero of the month, Night Stalker, received a big nerf as Darkness duration has been reduced from 50 to 40 - a big deal if a team fight explodes during the day. Taking in consideration the cooldown, now he can summon the night only two times daily, just like before, but for a total of 80 seconds, instead of 100.
Nyx Assassin - used mostly as a roamer during The International 7 - saw his base damage reduced by 3. Together with Ogre Magi, he is the hero with the highest base health regeneration in the game - 3,25 HP/sec - which makes him a troublesome opponent in the laning phase as he can harass the opponent and quickly regen. The base damage reduction is a nerf to his early-game, and will hinder his competence to harass, last hit, and deny.
Earthshaker was the most played hero during TI7, and at the same time got a dominant 60,56% win rate. The recent patch increased the cooldown of Fissure from 15 to 18/17/16/15. It is a powerful tool during team fights and particularly early ganks: what matters isn’t the damage, but the capacity to split the opponents and prevent their retreat. Before, many players only took a single level of it in the early-game, and then partly directed their attention on other skills, often maximizing Fissure in the mid-game. With a scaling cooldown, a higher priority on this skill will be unavoidable to boost ES’s ganking ability.!
Necrophos is the hero with the best win rate in the tier 3, and honestly he is a real pain to face also in pub. According to Dotabuff, his win rate is almost 60% up to 3K rank, decreasing to 55% at 5K. V7.06f increased the cooldown of Reaper's Scythe from 90/80/70 to 100. During TI7, Necrophos bought the Aghanim’s Scepter only in 5 games out of 32, but now players will be forced to include it more in their builds as the difference between 100 and 25 seconds - when Reaper’s Scythe is maxed - is noticeable.
The tier 4 has most of the heroes in the game, but it doesn’t mean that they are bad ones. For example, Medusa obtained an astonishing 80% win rate over 10 matches, while Huskar and Ogre Magi have been undefeated in 3 and 5 games respectively. All the heroes in this list are valid but, in order to shine, they should be picked only in a lineup created Ad Hoc, or against precise opponents as counters.
Overall, you can consider them the most balanced ones in the game. In fact, over a total of 51 heroes in tier 4, only two of them received adjustments in the previously mentioned patch: Spirit Breaker and Winter Wyvern. The former has been called to action only 15 times during TI7, while being ignored in the ban phase. In spite of the suboptimal results in a pro-environment, he is actually an awesome hero in pub. In the 5K+ range he is the third most picked hero, and also the one with the highest win rate - 56,72%.
The tier 5 used to have approximately as many heroes as the tier 4, but IceFrog’s constant work altered this trend, and now only a minimum number of heroes falls in the “very rare pick” kingdom. During TI7 only Bane, Lion, Spectre, Tiny and Wraith King were ignored, while Techies could not be played as he is still not available in Captains Mode. We hope to witness his return into the competitive game in the future Majors.
All the unpicked heroes received buffs in 7.06f, aimed to increase their attractiveness. Wraith King saw the cooldown of Reincarnation slightly reduced at level 1 and 2, and a further increase in movement speed from his level 15 talent. Moreover, the nerf to Diffusal Blade - agility reduction from 25/35 to 20/30 - is also an indirect buff for our king, as it hard-counters him thanks to the Manabreak passive.
(Copy Pasted From My Original Article)