Phantom Assassin’s Blur - a few fatal mistakes that could be resolved easily

Phantom Assassin is the hero with the highest win rate (above 53%) among the top 10 most popular picks at the Divine rank. The situation is even more critical in competitive play where she achieved an astonishing 67% win rate with a 71% draft rate.

I do not remember the last time a hero obtained such stats. Even when our games were plagued by the offlaner Omniknight, the win rate of the hero wasn’t so high.

Blur has been reworked. Probably, IceFrog intended it as a sort of personal smoke as PA can freely move in the area controlled by the enemy’s wards without being detected, which fits an assassin.

Blur

Passive evasion: 20%/30%/40%/50%

Vanish dispel radius: 600

Vanish dispel delay: 0.75

Vanish duration: 25

Mana cost: 20. Increased to 30 in 7.20c

Cooldown: 60/55/50/45

Turns Phantom Assassin invisible. Does not dispel on attack or spell cast, and cannot be revealed with true sight. Only dispels when getting within range of heroes or buildings, with a small delay before getting dispelled.

The average player can use it to farm the ancients receiving no damage, move from a side to another of the map without being detected by wards, and push the lanes while remaining invisible.

When creating this ability, they made two huge balancing mistakes, which - in my opinion - show that the hero has not been tested properly as everyone (even lower-ranked pub players) noticed the potential of the skill after a few games.

You can activate the skill at any time, even when the enemies are inside the vanish dispel radius of 600.

There is a vanish dispel delay of 0.75 seconds.

The skill has been created as an utility tool, but in practice an experienced player is able to use it in team fight to disjoint spells - even when the enemy hero is next to you!

Valve gave PA an ability that makes her a sort of hybrid Riky, but you can detect the latter with the Dust of Appearance if he tries to escape, while PA’s invisibility is unbreakable, so it can’t be detected by any form of true sight. Void’s Chronosphere is the only skill in the entire game able to break this state.

To better understand the value of the actual Blur, we can compare it to Puck’s Phase Shift. Also the latter disjoints projectiles if used at the right time, but that’s all: you can’t move, you have no extra benefits, and you must try to escape using the Blink Dagger or the Illusory Orb once the effect ends. Of course, the comparison is not perfect because Phase Shift also hides Puck from the fight for 3.25 seconds, which has its own uses.

Phantom Assassin can disjoint projectiles, smoke at will, move while the effect is active, attack lane, neutrals, and ancient creeps without being detected, and has also a 50% passive evasion (upgradable to 75% with the level 25 talent). I believe the actual ability does too much because it can be used as an utility, defensive, and even offensive tool.

There are two easy solutions to the problem: Valve can either reduce the dispel delay, or prevent the player from using the ability when engaged in combat or if there are enemy heroes in the dispel radius. Both these nerfs would absolutely not hinder the hero, who would remain pretty strong.