pullarius1 Profile Joined May 2010 United States 14 Posts Last Edited: 2014-05-16 17:19:46 #1



It’s the end of the school year, which means exams have finally finished and, more importantly, it’s time for everyone’s favorite exclusionary high school activity- Superlatives! I don’t know if this is a universal thing or if it is limited to the US, but essentially at the end of high school (or middle school or college) a class will come together in bitter social confrontation to decide who is the “best” at various things- like “most athletic” or “prettiest” or the coveted “most likely to succeed.” A sad fact about me is that I have never actually had to endure this right of passage. In high school the class above me had done anti-superlatives like “most likely to be a garbage man” and “will have the most children.” Students cried, parents were called, and superlatives of any sort were banned thereafter. In college, the student leadership just got together and assigned superlatives to every student. If the student government didn’t know you, well you just some random fact that you shared during an ice breaker freshman year. If they really didn’t know you, you just got left off entirely. If you happened to have dated the student government president but were now dating her close friend, you got an extremely awkward one very carefully crafted to neither offend nor obviously compliment. It was fun times. But I’m in law school now, and it seems like it might be the sort of superficial atmosphere where I might finally get to witness the painful horse trading and subtle campaigning that makes superlatives so exciting.



ANYWAY this is a project I’ve been wanting to do ever since Ability Draft came out. After a few games or drafting, I had realized that it was difficult for me to shake the roles that different characters had in “real” Dota. It was a breakthrough to realize that that when you get assinged a hero in AD, ALL you are getting is bunch of stats, and, since those stats have been balanced to abilities, a lot of the time heroes in AD simply can’t play their normal role. After a few dozen games, I realized that a lot of people had not quite had this realization out and instead just drafted their favorite spells without any regard to what their hero is best suited to do.



Prime example- player gets Slark. “Oh! An agility carry! I’ll take a bash, an orb, and a blink please!” NO. Slark actually has one of the worst Agility gains in the entire game at 1.5. He also has bad strength gain at 1.8, and bad, but better, intelligence gain at 1.9. Compare this to say, Bane, with an agility gain of 2.1, a strength gain of 2.1, and an intelligence gain of…. 2.1. AND he’s a ranged hero. AND he has 4 starting armor to Slark’s 1. That’s right, in AD Bane is a better carry than Slark in every respect. And this makes sense, because in normal Dota Slark can STEAL Agility and REGENERATE health at crazy speeds, so giving him too much natural stat gain would be broken. But what this means is that in AD, unless you have a plan for fixing those deficits, you are pretty much just screwed as Slark and should probably try to support, since your intelligence gain is actually your greatest asset.



Some other quick examples- Drow has the same low agility problem as Slark due to her ultimate; Alchemist NEVER breaks the 1 attack/second barrier without items, even at level 25; Crystal Maiden has one of the worst starting mana pools in the game, tied with such intellectual giants as Earthshaker and Chaos Knight. These are all things that are easy to overlook since Drow = Carry, CM = Support is the most obvious thing in the world. But if I told you that their stat gains were 1.9/1.9/1.4 and 1.7/1.6/2.9 respectively, the choice becomes a lot less clear.



SO here are a bunch of stat superlatives that can serve as a quick alt-tab guide to which heroes might be best suited to which roles, split up by the best/worst heroes in each primary stat. Of course, this is still Dota, so skills and items still make a huge difference in what a hero can do. But since every Ability Draft starts with a completely blank slate, it makes sense to at least know what your heroes natural strengths and limitations might be. If you want to look at all the raw data for yourself, click here:



+ Show Spoiler [Quick Note on Methods] + To rank heroes, I used two indicators- their stat gain, and their stats at level 11 with no items or points into stats. The listed heroes are in the top 3-4 heroes of their class in either of these two categories. Some exceptions were when a few heroes were clustered far above the others I included all of them, and when there was something like a four-way tie for the 3rd-highest, I excluded all of them. A lot about this was pretty arbitrary, and your results may vary. Feel free to use the raw stats to fact-check and make your own lists! In the future it would be cool to see similar lists for real Dota with EHP and base DPS, as well as EHP and DPS with certain standard set items (like treads/drums/BKB or phase/HoD/Armlet) to kind of establish baselines for people to theorycraft around.



First- some overall standouts, then the stat-specific breakdowns.



The Teachers’ Pets - Most Likely to Already Know Their Major

Phantom Lancer, Centaur Warrunner, Pugna, Skywrath Mage

Phantom Lancer, Centaur Warrunner, Pugna, Skywrath Mage



Only 4 heroes have >3.5 stat gain on their primary states: Phantom Lancer in agility, Centaur in Strength, and Pugna and Skywrath in Intelligence. Since all four are in Ability Draft, these are the heroes that you can really abuse if you get the right skills, which are actually often their own.





WARNING: WALL OF TEXT! TL;DR- Some heroes have better stats than others. Here they are. This matters a lot in Ability Draft, but I included all heroes for completeness. Scroll down a bit if you just want the good stuff.It’s the end of the school year, which means exams have finally finished and, more importantly, it’s time for everyone’s favorite exclusionary high school activity- Superlatives! I don’t know if this is a universal thing or if it is limited to the US, but essentially at the end of high school (or middle school or college) a class will come together in bitter social confrontation to decide who is the “best” at various things- like “most athletic” or “prettiest” or the coveted “most likely to succeed.” A sad fact about me is that I have never actually had to endure this right of passage. In high school the class above me had done anti-superlatives like “most likely to be a garbage man” and “will have the most children.” Students cried, parents were called, and superlatives of any sort were banned thereafter. In college, the student leadership just got together and assigned superlatives to every student. If the student government didn’t know you, well you just some random fact that you shared during an ice breaker freshman year. If they really didn’t know you, you just got left off entirely. If you happened to have dated the student government president but were now dating her close friend, you got an extremely awkward one very carefully crafted to neither offend nor obviously compliment. It was fun times. But I’m in law school now, and it seems like it might be the sort of superficial atmosphere where I might finally get to witness the painful horse trading and subtle campaigning that makes superlatives so exciting.this is a project I’ve been wanting to do ever since Ability Draft came out. After a few games or drafting, I had realized that it was difficult for me to shake the roles that different characters had in “real” Dota. It was a breakthrough to realize that that when you get assinged a hero in AD, ALL you are getting is bunch of stats, and, since those stats have been balanced to abilities, a lot of the time heroes in AD simply can’t play their normal role. After a few dozen games, I realized that a lot of people had not quite had this realization out and instead just drafted their favorite spells without any regard to what their hero is best suited to do.Prime example- player gets Slark. “Oh! An agility carry! I’ll take a bash, an orb, and a blink please!” NO. Slark actually has one of the worst Agility gains in the entire game at 1.5. He also has bad strength gain at 1.8, and bad, but better, intelligence gain at 1.9. Compare this to say, Bane, with an agility gain of 2.1, a strength gain of 2.1, and an intelligence gain of…. 2.1. AND he’s a ranged hero. AND he has 4 starting armor to Slark’s 1. That’s right, in AD Bane is a better carry than Slark in every respect. And this makes sense, because in normal Dota Slark can STEAL Agility and REGENERATE health at crazy speeds, so giving him too much natural stat gain would be broken. But what this means is that in AD, unless you have a plan for fixing those deficits, you are pretty much just screwed as Slark and should probably try to support, since your intelligence gain is actually your greatest asset.Some other quick examples- Drow has the same low agility problem as Slark due to her ultimate; Alchemist NEVER breaks the 1 attack/second barrier without items, even at level 25; Crystal Maiden has one of the worst starting mana pools in the game, tied with such intellectual giants as Earthshaker and Chaos Knight. These are all things that are easy to overlook since Drow = Carry, CM = Support is the most obvious thing in the world. But if I told you that their stat gains were 1.9/1.9/1.4 and 1.7/1.6/2.9 respectively, the choice becomes a lot less clear.here are a bunch of stat superlatives that can serve as a quick alt-tab guide to which heroes might be best suited to which roles, split up by the best/worst heroes in each primary stat. Of course, this is still Dota, so skills and items still make a huge difference in what a hero can do. But since every Ability Draft starts with a completely blank slate, it makes sense to at least know what your heroes natural strengths and limitations might be. If you want to look at all the raw data for yourself, click here: https://docs.google.com/spreadsheet/ccc?key=0AoUaXp1u73w8dEpDYzY0YnNsczJ2UTgyV2xwVmxRQnc&usp=sharing First- some overall standouts, then the stat-specific breakdowns.Only 4 heroes have >3.5 stat gain on their primary states: Phantom Lancer in agility, Centaur in Strength, and Pugna and Skywrath in Intelligence. Since all four are in Ability Draft, these are the heroes that you can really abuse if you get the right skills, which are actually often their own. The Rejects - Most Likely to Graduate on the 12-year Plan

These the the heroes that have less than 2 gain in their main stat or less than 20 in their level 1 main stat. I included starting stats for this category because it can often be an unpleasant surprise to draft, say, a tank build on Sand Kind only to find out he starts with <500 HP, so those cogs you were so happy to snag suddenly become a death trap.



Strength: Io, Alch. Phoenix, Sand King, DK

Intelligence: Enchantress, CM, Lich, Ogre Magi

Agility: Weaver, Vengeful Spirit, Ursa, Brood, Nyx Slark, Ember, Meepo, Drow



The Oddballs - Most Likely to take Intro to Modern Dance and Multivariable Calculus



There are only a handful of heroes that have significantly higher stat gains in an off-stat than their main stat. They are:

Ogre Magi - MUCH Higher Strength (3.2) than Intelligence (2.4)

Silencer - MUCH Higher Agility (3) than Intelligence (2.5)

Ursa - MUCH Higher Strength (2.9) than Agility (2.1)

Bristleback- MUCH Higher Intelligence (2.8) than Strength (2.2)



A few other heroes that have prominent offstats are:



Alchemist- Equal in Strength (1.9) and Intelligence (1.9)

Undying- Strength (2.1) close to Intelligence (2.0)

Timbersaw- Lower Intelligence (2.4) than Strength (2.1)

Broodmother/Razor/Ember Spirit - Lower Agility (2.2/2/1.8) than Strength (2.5/2.3/2.0) Ember Spirit - Agility (1.8) and Intelligence (1.8)

Bane- Equal in Intelligence (2.1), Agility (2.1), and Strength (2.1)

Batrider/Visage/Windranger- Close in Intelligence (2.5/2.5/2.5) and Strength (2.4/2.4/2.4)

It is worth noting, though, that Windranger’s starting strength (15) is MUCH LESS than those of Visage and Batrider (22/23). See below for more on start/gain discrepancies.



Dean’s List - Most Likely to be on both the Honor Role and the Football Team

Bane, Nyx, Shadow Fiend, Brood Mother

Bane, Nyx, Shadow Fiend, Brood Mother



Only four heroes have 2 or more gain in every stat (Str/Agi/Int)

Bane 2.1/2.1/2.1

Nyx 2/2.2/2.1

Shadow Fiend 2.0/2.9/2.0

Brood Mother 2.5/2.2/2.0



With an honorable mention going to Naga at 2.3/2.75/1.95 and Shadow Demon at 1.9/2.2/2.7



The Valedictorians - Most Likely to Succeed

Centaur, Sniper, Ogre Magi, Outworld, Venge, Treant, Phantom Lancer

Centaur, Sniper, Ogre Magi, Outworld, Venge, Treant, Phantom Lancer



Seven heroes have (strictly) greater than seven TOTAL stat gain per level-

Centaur at 7.4 and Sniper, Ogre Magi, Outworld, Venge, Treant, Phantom Lancer all at 7.2 and below



The Badedictorians - Most Likely to Suck/Feed

Only two heroes have less than five combined stat gain per level, both due to their terrible agility gain: Alchemist and Undying



Strength Heros





The Tanks - Most Likely to Lift (High Strength)

Centaur, Treant, Doom, Pudge



- Most Likely to Lift (Centaur, Treant, Doom, Pudge



Tanks are always a bit of a puzzle, because they don’t do much on their own. Simply staying alive is not a skill per se. You need something that makes staying alive actually worthwhile to your team.



If you can solve their mana and mobility problems, they are great initiators. Just blink in, force them to deal with you, and absorb CC/DPS while your team goes to town. You can do this through mana-granting skills, mana-restoring items, or by picking low-mana, high-impact skills such as the Clockwerk or Bristleback suites.



If you can solve their armor/attack speed problems, you can have a decent semi-carry. In normal Dota, armlet/AC are the strength carry items of choice, but in AD you have the additional options of abilities like Overpower and Rage as well.



OR you can do neither of these and embrace your tankiness, grabbing up skills like Rot and Death Pact and using your HP offensively. Or you can leverage your lifespan by getting lots positive auras and low-cooldown debuffs, like Track or Slardar Ult. Just don’t commit yourself to farming a radiance and waddling around the fight like an idiot.



The Bulldozers - Most Likely to Attack-Move (High Agility)

- Most Likely to Attack-Move (High Agility)

Magnus, Slardar, Clockwerk, Night Stalker, Axe, Dragon Knight, Sven



These guys have high strength AND agility, meaning they are naturals at tearing through teamfights with their right-clicks. None of these should be that surprising aside from maybe Clockwerk, who has terrible starting agility (13) but decent agility gain (2.3). See below for significant initial/gain discrepancies.



The Initiators - Most Likely to Blink In and Lock Down (High Intelligence)

Bristleback, Timbersaw, Earth Spirit, Legion Commander, Undying, Alchemist



- Most Likely to Blink In and Lock DownBristleback, Timbersaw, Earth Spirit, Legion Commander, Undying, Alchemist





These are the heroes you want on the front lines. They love high-impact spells like Ravage and Reverse Polarity, because they have the mana to cast them and the health to tank the initial volley of attacks. Give them some mobility and some nukes and they’re good to go.

(As a sidenote, this made me notice that there is only ONE female strength hero- Legion Commander. What the hell Valve? Also, why are there 40% more Dire Strength heroes than Radiant? Something is up here.)



The Bullies - Most Likely Start a Fight with Nothing to Back It Up (Low Intelligence)

Sven, Chaos Knight, Pudge, Lycan, Clockwerk



Strong, but dumb. Without solid auto-attack damage, a tank with no intelligence usually just kind of sits there drooling and blames everyone else for feeding. No, you didn’t die. No, you didn’t help either. Grats.



The Puny Sidekicks - Most Likely to Stay Down (Low Strength)

Alchemist, Io, Timbersaw, Undying



Not as tough as they think they are. These are the weakest strength heroes. They all have robust natural healing abilities in real Dota, so unless you pick up some extra tankability, don’t expect to last long in fights.



The Fat Kids - Most Likely to Run at You, Get Winded, and Fall Down (Low Agility)

Undying, Doom, Tiny, Alchemist



Yes they can take a lot of hits, but they won’t deal much back in the meantime. Tiny and Alchemist are the two worst offenders. I always see people pick them and act surprised when they get kited to oblivion. Remember, Tiny has the ONLY single digit starting stat in the game at 9 agility, making him hit just once every 1.54 seconds. A naked Luna can move over 500… centimeters? inches? Units. Luna can move 500 units. LUNA CAN GET THIS FAR AWAY in the time it takes Tiny to attack once.



Intelligence Heroes







Super Supports- Most Likely To Draft Two Stuns and a Nuke (High Intelligence)

Pugna, Skywrath Mage, Dazzle, OD, Lina, Enigma



- Most Likely To Draft Two Stuns and a Nuke (Pugna, Skywrath Mage, Dazzle, OD, Lina, Enigma



Remember, just as it is important for a carry to scale with farm, it is also essential that a support not need farm to affect the game. The easiest way to do that is as a high-intelligence hero with big spells and mana boots. “But Reece,” you might say, “nobody supports in AD- it’s just for fun lol.” YOU SHUT YOUR WHORE MOUTH. I support in AD, and when a Lina first-drafts Coup de Grace when the other four players on her team are low-Int melee heroes, I shake my finger at the screen very disapprovingly.



Of course, any of these heroes can probably go Mid with the set of spells. But, before you grab that Astral Imprisonment, look at the other heroes in your pool and think to yourself- “How are these idiots going to contribute to the team if we fight for the carry skills AND I take all of their farm with my super pro last hitting?” There are a few huge exceptions to this, however, with certain broken combos with Sticky Napalm, Riki Invis, Warpath/Fiery Soul, or Rearm, where only a high-intelligence hero can really take advantage of them.



The Lane Supports - Most Likely to Stunlock You (High Strength)

Ogre Magi, Warlock, Windranger, Batrider, Visage, Jakiro, Dark Seer



- Most Likely to Stunlock You (Ogre Magi, Warlock, Windranger, Batrider, Visage, Jakiro, Dark Seer





It makes sense that the only two melee intelligence heroes are on here. The rest are great lane-harassers or trilaners because they can afford to tank creep waves or autoattacks while dishing out damage. Just give them a nuke, a stun, and a passive and they’re ready to go. They also make solid offlaners if they manage to grab a decent escape.





The Midlaners - Most Likely to Snowball (High Agility)

Silencer, Ancient Apparition, Shadow Demon, Outworld Devourer



- Most Likely to Snowball (Silencer, Ancient Apparition, Shadow Demon, Outworld Devourer





A high mana pool will let you blink in, stun, and nuke, but unless you have a full mana pool and three incredibly efficient spells, you’re usually going to have to rightclick down enemies to finish the job. High agility makes sure you get those last couple of autoattacks in. High agility also grants the potential to transition into a dps carry, which is good if your teammates aren’t the type to read really long theory articles on Team Liquid.



The Dunces - Most Likely to OOM (Low Intelligence)

Bane, Tinker, Ogre Magi, Enchantress, Crystal Maiden



These are the pseudo-intellectuals of the Dota 2 world. Watch out when drafting them, and make sure to skill your hero with a limited mana pool in mind.



The Wimps- Most Likely to Faint at the Sight of their Own Blood (Low Strength)

Enchantress, Pugna, Ancient Apparition, Leshrac



Bracers and urns, people. Bracers and urns.



The Nerds - Most Likely to Break Their Glasses while Reaching for their Inhalers (Low Agility)

Skywrath, Pugna, Enigma, Warlock, Jakiro, Zeus



This class is actually what made me start this post. A Zeus first-picked Greater Bash and spent the entire game whining about RNG. Just watching him try to stand his ground and man fight with that shitty attack animation, praying for that one bash every 5 seconds was so painful. It was the closest I’ve come to abandoning out of sheer spite.



Another side-story: as I’m submitting this to TL, I have just finished a 70 minute barn burner where the enemy enigma was hitting for 250 damage due to hit intelligence gain and items, just as much as any carry on the field. So why couldn’t he take over the damage role? Because at level 25, his base agility was still just 38, so even with all those points into stats and 24k gold worth of items, he still was hitting just once a second.



Agility Heroes





The Glass Cannons - Most Likely to One-Shot You (High Agility)

Phantom Lancer, Terror Blade, Phantom Assassin, Riki



- Most Likely to One-Shot You (Phantom Lancer, Terror Blade, Phantom Assassin, Riki



Riki is the only hero in the game to start with any starting stat over 30 with a huge 34 base agility. That’s more than a Yasha’s worth. In fact, Riki’s Starting Agility is more than the Level 25 Agility of four other heroes (minus stat points)- Tiny, Undying, Doom, and Warlock. That probably explains his pubstomp status, as it can be easy to snowball. Also, it is worth mentioning here that something that this post HASN’T taken into account is Base Attack Timings and Attack Animations:



The Mid-Gamers- Most Likely to Actually Come Teamfight at 20:00 (High Strength)

Ursa, Venge, Brood, Razor, Naga Siren, Bloodseeker



- Most Likely to Actually Come Teamfight at 20:00 (Ursa, Venge, Brood, Razor, Naga Siren, Bloodseeker



High base strength gain means these heroes can start fighting with the team early in the game, and can also take a few more chances in maximizing their farm. Usually this means that you can skimp on tank items and go right into damage to hit like a truck early on.



The Farming Mids - Most Likely to Sit Mid and Never Gank (High Agility)

Sniper, Gyrocopter, Nyx Assassin, Templar Assassin, Shadowfiend



- Most Likely to Sit Mid and Never Gank (Sniper, Gyrocopter, Nyx Assassin, Templar Assassin, Shadowfiend





They have the mana to spend on initiation tools, if the other two lanes are winning they can just hang out mid and farm. Once the enemy’s towers go down, farming mids are often already snowballing, so can use their high intelligence and crazy damage to control the enemy jungle and starve them out. Note: Nyx is a bit of an exception to this, though, since his agility gain is so low for a melee hero that he isn’t very suited to straight up dps carrying.



The Wannabes - Most Likely to be Third String Placekicker (Low Agility)

Slark, Ember Spirit, Drow, Meepo, Ursa, Weaver, Brood



These are the anti-carries. All their friends are carries, and they want to be carries really bad, but they just don’t have the natural born talent, so they end up being things like “team manager” or mascots. A lot of them have worse agility than 50% of heroes in the midgame. Each one has a huge source of damage boost in the real game that would make naturally high agility just too strong.





The Preps - Most Likely to Get into a Fight and Then Have to Call his Dad for Help (Low Strength)



Antimage, Terrorblade, Weaver, Medusa, Clinkz

Yeah they may be good at “sports” like golf and tennis, but when shit goes down they never want to 1v1. These heroes all need some sort of solid escape or a serious survivability skill if they want to be able to carry their team.





The Jocks - Most Likely to Start a Fight and not Know Why

(Low Intelligence)



They know they are athletically inclined, but they are not always the best at figuring out how to direct their abilities and can often be talked down from confrontation. These can be tough heroes to carry with because they lack the mana to compete in the early to mid game. Most hit pretty hard, but without a way to slow a target or close the gap, enemy heroes can just walk away. However- if you HAVE to go for a 4-passive build, these are the ones to do it with, since you won’t have the mana to sustain more than one active ability anyway. Just make sure to mute your teammates first.



That's it for now. See the reserved post below for some more nerdy updates in a few days (or hours). These the the heroes that have less than 2 gain in their main stat or less than 20 in their level 1 main stat. I included starting stats for this category because it can often be an unpleasant surprise to draft, say, a tank build on Sand Kind only to find out he starts with <500 HP, so those cogs you were so happy to snag suddenly become a death trap.Strength: Io, Alch. Phoenix, Sand King, DKIntelligence: Enchantress, CM, Lich, Ogre MagiAgility: Weaver, Vengeful Spirit, Ursa, Brood, Nyx Slark, Ember, Meepo, DrowThere are only a handful of heroes that have significantly higher stat gains in an off-stat than their main stat. They are:Ogre Magi - MUCH Higher Strength (3.2) than Intelligence (2.4)Silencer - MUCH Higher Agility (3) than Intelligence (2.5)Ursa - MUCH Higher Strength (2.9) than Agility (2.1)Bristleback- MUCH Higher Intelligence (2.8) than Strength (2.2)A few other heroes that have prominent offstats are:Alchemist- Equal in Strength (1.9) and Intelligence (1.9)Undying- Strength (2.1) close to Intelligence (2.0)Timbersaw- Lower Intelligence (2.4) than Strength (2.1)Broodmother/Razor/Ember Spirit - Lower Agility (2.2/2/1.8) than Strength (2.5/2.3/2.0) Ember Spirit - Agility (1.8) and Intelligence (1.8)Bane- Equal in Intelligence (2.1), Agility (2.1), and Strength (2.1)Batrider/Visage/Windranger- Close in Intelligence (2.5/2.5/2.5) and Strength (2.4/2.4/2.4)It is worth noting, though, that Windranger’s starting strength (15) is MUCH LESS than those of Visage and Batrider (22/23). See below for more on start/gain discrepancies.Only four heroes have 2 or more gain in every stat (Str/Agi/Int)Bane 2.1/2.1/2.1Nyx 2/2.2/2.1Shadow Fiend 2.0/2.9/2.0Brood Mother 2.5/2.2/2.0With an honorable mention going to Naga at 2.3/2.75/1.95 and Shadow Demon at 1.9/2.2/2.7Seven heroes have (strictly) greater than seven TOTAL stat gain per level-Centaur at 7.4 and Sniper, Ogre Magi, Outworld, Venge, Treant, Phantom Lancer all at 7.2 and belowThe Badedictorians - Most Likely to Suck/FeedOnly two heroes have less than five combined stat gain per level, both due to their terrible agility gain: Alchemist and UndyingTanks are always a bit of a puzzle, because they don’t do much on their own. Simply staying alive is not a skill per se. You need something that makes staying alive actually worthwhile to your team.If you can solve their mana and mobility problems, they are great initiators. Just blink in, force them to deal with you, and absorb CC/DPS while your team goes to town. You can do this through mana-granting skills, mana-restoring items, or by picking low-mana, high-impact skills such as the Clockwerk or Bristleback suites.If you can solve their armor/attack speed problems, you can have a decent semi-carry. In normal Dota, armlet/AC are the strength carry items of choice, but in AD you have the additional options of abilities like Overpower and Rage as well.OR you can do neither of these and embrace your tankiness, grabbing up skills like Rot and Death Pact and using your HP offensively. Or you can leverage your lifespan by getting lots positive auras and low-cooldown debuffs, like Track or Slardar Ult. Just don’t commit yourself to farming a radiance and waddling around the fight like an idiot.Magnus, Slardar, Clockwerk, Night Stalker, Axe, Dragon Knight, SvenThese guys have high strength AND agility, meaning they are naturals at tearing through teamfights with their right-clicks. None of these should be that surprising aside from maybe Clockwerk, who has terrible starting agility (13) but decent agility gain (2.3). See below for significant initial/gain discrepancies.These are the heroes you want on the front lines. They love high-impact spells like Ravage and Reverse Polarity, because they have the mana to cast them and the health to tank the initial volley of attacks. Give them some mobility and some nukes and they’re good to go.(As a sidenote, this made me notice that there is only ONE female strength hero- Legion Commander. What the hell Valve? Also, why are there 40% more Dire Strength heroes than Radiant? Something is up here.)- Most Likely Start a Fight with Nothing to Back It Up (Sven, Chaos Knight, Pudge, Lycan, ClockwerkStrong, but dumb. Without solid auto-attack damage, a tank with no intelligence usually just kind of sits there drooling and blames everyone else for feeding. No, you didn’t die. No, you didn’t help either. Grats.- Most Likely to Stay DownAlchemist, Io, Timbersaw, UndyingNot as tough as they think they are. These are the weakest strength heroes. They all have robust natural healing abilities in real Dota, so unless you pick up some extra tankability, don’t expect to last long in fights.- Most Likely to Run at You, Get Winded, and Fall Down (Undying, Doom, Tiny, AlchemistYes they can take a lot of hits, but they won’t deal much back in the meantime. Tiny and Alchemist are the two worst offenders. I always see people pick them and act surprised when they get kited to oblivion. Remember, Tiny has the ONLY single digit starting stat in the game at 9 agility, making him hit just once every 1.54 seconds. A naked Luna can move over 500… centimeters? inches? Units. Luna can move 500 units. LUNA CAN GET THIS FAR AWAY in the time it takes Tiny to attack once.Remember, just as it is important for a carry to scale with farm, it is also essential that a support not need farm to affect the game. The easiest way to do that is as a high-intelligence hero with big spells and mana boots. “But Reece,” you might say, “nobody supports in AD- it’s just for fun lol.” YOU SHUT YOUR WHORE MOUTH. I support in AD, and when a Lina first-drafts Coup de Grace when the other four players on her team are low-Int melee heroes, I shake my finger at the screen very disapprovingly.Of course, any of these heroes can probably go Mid with the set of spells. But, before you grab that Astral Imprisonment, look at the other heroes in your pool and think to yourself- “How are these idiots going to contribute to the team if we fight for the carry skills AND I take all of their farm with my super pro last hitting?” There are a few huge exceptions to this, however, with certain broken combos with Sticky Napalm, Riki Invis, Warpath/Fiery Soul, or Rearm, where only a high-intelligence hero can really take advantage of them.It makes sense that the only two melee intelligence heroes are on here. The rest are great lane-harassers or trilaners because they can afford to tank creep waves or autoattacks while dishing out damage. Just give them a nuke, a stun, and a passive and they’re ready to go. They also make solid offlaners if they manage to grab a decent escape.A high mana pool will let you blink in, stun, and nuke, but unless you have a full mana pool and three incredibly efficient spells, you’re usually going to have to rightclick down enemies to finish the job. High agility makes sure you get those last couple of autoattacks in. High agility also grants the potential to transition into a dps carry, which is good if your teammates aren’t the type to read really long theory articles on Team Liquid.- Most Likely to OOM (Bane, Tinker, Ogre Magi, Enchantress, Crystal MaidenThese are the pseudo-intellectuals of the Dota 2 world. Watch out when drafting them, and make sure to skill your hero with a limited mana pool in mind.- Most Likely to Faint at the Sight of their Own Blood (Enchantress, Pugna, Ancient Apparition, LeshracBracers and urns, people. Bracers and urns.- Most Likely to Break Their Glasses while Reaching for their Inhalers (LSkywrath, Pugna, Enigma, Warlock, Jakiro, ZeusThis class is actually what made me start this post. A Zeus first-picked Greater Bash and spent the entire game whining about RNG. Just watching him try to stand his ground and man fight with that shitty attack animation, praying for that one bash every 5 seconds was so painful. It was the closest I’ve come to abandoning out of sheer spite.Another side-story: as I’m submitting this to TL, I have just finished a 70 minute barn burner where the enemy enigma was hitting for 250 damage due to hit intelligence gain and items, just as much as any carry on the field. So why couldn’t he take over the damage role? Because at level 25, his base agility was still just 38, so even with all those points into stats and 24k gold worth of items, he still was hitting just once a second.Riki is the only hero in the game to start with any starting stat over 30 with a huge 34 base agility. That’s more than a Yasha’s worth. In fact, Riki’s Starting Agility is more than the Level 25 Agility of four other heroes (minus stat points)- Tiny, Undying, Doom, and Warlock. That probably explains his pubstomp status, as it can be easy to snowball. Also, it is worth mentioning here that something that this post HASN’T taken into account is Base Attack Timings and Attack Animations: http://dota2.gamepedia.com/Attack_speed . Hopefully I’ll get to that in a future post.High base strength gain means these heroes can start fighting with the team early in the game, and can also take a few more chances in maximizing their farm. Usually this means that you can skimp on tank items and go right into damage to hit like a truck early on.They have the mana to spend on initiation tools, if the other two lanes are winning they can just hang out mid and farm. Once the enemy’s towers go down, farming mids are often already snowballing, so can use their high intelligence and crazy damage to control the enemy jungle and starve them out. Note: Nyx is a bit of an exception to this, though, since his agility gain is so low for a melee hero that he isn’t very suited to straight up dps carrying.- Most Likely to be Third String Placekicker (Slark, Ember Spirit, Drow, Meepo, Ursa, Weaver, BroodThese are the anti-carries. All their friends are carries, and they want to be carries really bad, but they just don’t have the natural born talent, so they end up being things like “team manager” or mascots. A lot of them have worse agility than 50% of heroes in the midgame. Each one has a huge source of damage boost in the real game that would make naturally high agility just too strong.- Most Likely to Get into a Fight and Then Have to Call his Dad for Help (Antimage, Terrorblade, Weaver, Medusa, ClinkzYeah they may be good at “sports” like golf and tennis, but when shit goes down they never want to 1v1. These heroes all need some sort of solid escape or a serious survivability skill if they want to be able to carry their team.- Most Likely to Start a Fight and not Know WhyThey know they are athletically inclined, but they are not always the best at figuring out how to direct their abilities and can often be talked down from confrontation. These can be tough heroes to carry with because they lack the mana to compete in the early to mid game. Most hit pretty hard, but without a way to slow a target or close the gap, enemy heroes can just walk away. However- if you HAVE to go for a 4-passive build, these are the ones to do it with, since you won’t have the mana to sustain more than one active ability anyway. Just make sure to mute your teammates first.That's it for now. See the reserved post below for some more nerdy updates in a few days (or hours). @pullarius1