Image: Wykrhm Reddy

After a long wait for a new major patch (7.21 was in January 2019), Dota 2 patch 7.22 is finally here and it has brought with it more changes than expected! The biggest one, no doubt is the 24 Aghanim’s Scepters given to all heroes that did not have a Scepter and the fact that Aghanim’s Scepter is now consumable for 2000 gold. But in the midst of that, we might tend to forget the general changes, small ones, that tend to have a big effect on the game. Let’s take a look at those ones and how the game is bound to change due to them.







(1) Roshan now drops a consumable Scepter buff item. The third Roshan will randomly drop either a consumable Scepter item or a Refresher Shard. The fourth Roshan has both. You can select Roshan to see his inventory and find out what items will drop

This is kind of a good or bad change, depending on what situation a team is in and what heroes they have. Certain situations will warrant a Refresher Shard while in others, a Scepter might be more beneficial. But I’ll probably say the Scepter drop is better for the third Roshan as now, everyone has a Scepter which gives the team five options. If a game goes late, the fourth Roshan (and any after that) will have a LOT of importance attached to it. Aegies, Cheese, Refresher Shard and a consumable Aghanim’s Scepter! It’s a path to victory. The other gameplay changes are bound to increase game duration, so there is a good chance we get to see three or four Roshan’s in a lot of games.







(2) Added Mars and Io to Captains Mode

Mars was always coming. Valve have made it a point to add new heroes to the Captains Mode in the patch following their release, which is good as it gets to be a part of the next TI. The first tournament Mars will be displayed by the professional teams is ESL One Birmingham.

Coming to Io, it’s a bit sad to see that the hero has been added back to CM without any nerfs. A lot of players (professional) have reported the hero being overpowered in pubs, and it seems we will be going back to the days where Io gets banned in the first phase of every game.







(3) Deny XP granted to the enemy (the player being denied) increased from 35% to 40%

At the start of the year, this number was increased from 25% to 35%. Now it has gone up to 40%. What this basically means is that the player losing the lane, getting his/her creeps denied by the enemy will suffer considerably less when it comes to XP. There is still a lot of gold loss, but the dominating player(s) will have less of an advantage when it comes to levels. The effect of this change will be seen mostly in the mid lane, for unfavourable matchups.







(4) Death cost changed from 50 + NW/40 to NW/40

This is straight forward change: 50 gold less lost for any death. It might seem low, but for supports (especially position 5s) who don’t have a lot of net worth, that 50 gold can be the difference between having buyback or not. Good for early and mid game fights that can be turned around with a support buyback. Probably won’t be too much of a factor late game, but once in a while there are always those scenarios where the carry lacks just a bit of gold for buyback. That is when he/she will remember this change and bless IceFrog.







(5) Killstreak XP bounty increased from 200->1250 to 400->1800

Huge change! Killing an enemy on a streak will now give a good chunk of XP to the player that gets the kill (shared if multiple players). This, I would say is kind of a comeback mechanic which gives teams lagging behind in kills a chance to catch up on those levels by a sneaky gank or two.







(6) -Siege creeps now spawn two units at 35 minutes instead of 30 minutes

-Siege creeps can no longer be dominated, enchanted or converted

Two changes that are bound to increase the average length of games. I think IceFrog and Valve have come to the realization that good TIs only result from long games. Tournaments like TI4, which was played on a deathball meta, are events that don’t bring back good memories while TI8, which will be remembered thanks to long games and comebacks is what the community loves. A gank won around the time the double Siege creep wave spawns can lead to a quick push and destruction of the opposition base. Moving it ahead by 5 minutes, which is a lot of time in Dota 2, allows the team with the slower, late game draft additional time to come online and mount a challenge. Inability to convert the Siege creeps is a nerf to all Helm of Dominator builders and more so to the likes of Enchantress and Chen. Kuroky showed against Evil Geniuses (MDL Disneyland® Paris) what that can do as Liquid took a set of racks in 12 minutes thanks to Chen’s pushing power. Those plans are now out of the window with patch 7.22.







(7) -Tier 3+ towers damage increased from 152 damage to 175

-Tier 1 Tower Protection aura armor bonus increased from 2 to 3

-Tier 2+ Tower Protection aura armor bonus increased from 4 to 5

-Tier 2+ Towers now have a multishot attack when glyph is activated. Attacks up to two additional targets. Prioritizes the closest units.

This takes me back to patch 7.00 when attacking high ground was difficult due to the plethora of shrines available in the base. Patch 7.22 makes sieging highground difficult again and is another factor that will elongate games. Additional armor aura makes the enemy heroes a tad bit more difficult to kill while the increased tower damage and tower multishot are bound to make teams reconsider those high risk-high reward ‘let’s go highground’ plays!







On the whole, definitely some interesting changes coming our way with the release of Dota 2 patch 7.22. These changes combined with the new Scepters and the changes to heroes are bound to change the game a great deal!







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