Skulz's Dota Competitive Hero Tier List May 2019 - MDL Paris Major

The Dota 2 Competitive Hero Tier List for May 2019 includes data from MDL Disneyland Paris Major, for a total of 465 games played during patch 7.21d.

• All heroes are arranged in five tiers based on their draft rate. The tiers are viewed as clusters of data, and each hero is placed in the one they are closer the most.

• The requisites for each tier never change. The goal is offering a neutral comparison that shows how the meta evolves over time.

• The win rate has no effect on the tiers, but is included for further info. The tiers depend only on drafts (picks + bans), and aren't affected either by the win rate of a hero, or by their performance in pub matches.

This tier list contains all pro matches played from May 1st to 24th during patch 7.21d, including MDL Disneyland Paris Major and EPICENTER Major qualifiers.

“This is a very particular month for us Dota 2 players because Valve just released patch 7.22, which brought massive changes to the game. In order to not mix the data, this tier list includes only matches played under 7.21d.

We will talk briefly about the carry who dominated our tiers and pubs - Drow Ranger - and how the changes brought in by the new update could affect her. Note that the meta might change completely in the successive months.”

Past Tier List: April 2019

More: Updated Dota 2 Hero Tier List

Quick links

Tier 1 - Tier 2 - Tier 3 - Tier 4 - Tier 5

All tables are responsive and sortable. If you are using a phone, turn it sideways for a full view. Otherwise, zoom in or click the grey area of each table to swipe and sort them.

Tier 1

Hero	Name	P+B	P+B%	Picks	Picks%	Bans	Bans%	Win%
	Doom	449	96.6%	166	35.7%	283	60.9%	54.2%
	Drow Ranger	410	88.2%	121	26.0%	289	62.2%	47.1%
	Nyx Assassin	393	84.5%	73	15.7%	320	68.8%	61.6%
	Dark Seer	377	81.1%	85	18.3%	292	62.8%	56.5%
	Enigma	361	77.6%	76	16.3%	285	61.3%	52.6%
	Sand King	355	76.3%	183	39.4%	172	37.0%	50.3%
	Morphling	341	73.3%	111	23.9%	230	49.5%	46.9%
	Batrider	335	72.0%	121	26.0%	214	46.0%	50.4%
	Oracle	328	70.5%	130	28.0%	198	42.6%	53.9%
	Abaddon	321	69.0%	134	28.8%	187	40.2%	49.3%
	Nature's Prophet	303	65.2%	124	26.7%	179	38.5%	58.1%

Tier 2

Hero	Name	P+B	P+B%	Picks	Picks%	Bans	Bans%	Win%
	Razor	254	54.6%	87	18.7%	167	35.9%	44.8%
	Templar Assassin	234	50.3%	95	20.4%	139	29.9%	57.9%
	Leshrac	208	44.7%	115	24.7%	93	20.0%	43.5%
	Outworld Devourer	206	44.3%	48	10.3%	158	34.0%	56.3%
	Medusa	205	44.1%	66	14.2%	139	29.9%	53.0%
	Earthshaker	198	42.6%	125	26.9%	73	15.7%	48.0%
	Troll Warlord	184	39.6%	104	22.4%	80	17.2%	53.9%
	Ember Spirit	183	39.4%	101	21.7%	82	17.6%	48.5%
	Shadow Shaman	170	36.6%	99	21.3%	71	15.3%	55.6%
	Naga Siren	169	36.3%	49	10.5%	120	25.8%	55.1%
	Storm Spirit	166	35.7%	74	15.9%	92	19.8%	55.4%
	Sven	162	34.8%	89	19.1%	73	15.7%	60.7%

Drow Ranger is the queen of 7.21d

I do not remember the last time we had such an effective carry pick.

In pub games, Drow Ranger achieved a pick rate above 30% at all ranks (almost 40% at 5k+ MMR) and a win rate of 56% on average.

The win rate during competitive games in May is slightly negative simply because she has been over-drafted due to her popularity (the EPICENTER Major Open Qualifiers had teams of any skill level).

Note that with a 62.2% ban rate she is also the third most banned hero of the month, so many teams preferred kicking Drow Ranger out of the game than spending resources to counter her.

Free ancients farm

One of main the reasons behind her success is the rework of Marksmanship in 7.20, which now gives 20/30/40% chance to kill creep units instantly.

• Even if the opponents pick a proper counter to deal with her in the laning phase, Drow can just spend some time in the offlane jungle to accumulate gold and experience at a fast rate.

• The jungle camps in this area are among the safest ones on the entire map (for both Radiant and Dire). It is a high ground position with many escape paths, and you just require an Observer Ward to cover the main enemy entrance.

• In pub games, it is worth asking one of your supports to stack the ancients for extra gold, especially if they are not of great help in the early game.

• Beside the ancients, this jungle offers a medium and a hard camp. Any core here has also easy access to both the mid and offlane creeps to maximize their gold income.

Most carries are not able to exploit this position after the laning stage because they still do not have the tools to farm ancients effectively. IceFrog really gifted Drow with a game-winning ultimate!

The Boreal Watch-Reforged loading screen for Drow Ranger - Valve

Drow doesn’t need DPS items to deal damage

Usually, ranged carries are glass cannons who must trade survivability for damage. They rely on the support and protection of the team.

Drow Ranger is so powerful because she can afford to buy defensive and positioning items while still inflicting a lot of damage with her own abilities. The new Marksmanship ignores entirely the armor of the opponents, and starting from 7.20c it also inflicts 120 physical damage when proccing on heroes.

These are the most bought items on Drow Ranger by pro players during May:

• Wraith Band - 360

• Power Treads - 121

• Dragon Lance - 117

• Force Staff - 102

• Hurricane Pike - 102

• Black King Bar - 65

• Yasha - 51

• Manta Style - 28

• Shadow Blade - 27

• Butterfly - 23

The list doesn’t include consumables and basic items.

• Thanks to her abilities, innate damage, and the 2.8 agility gain per level, Drow Ranger can focus resources on items that grant her survivability, mobility, and help her placement in team fight.

  • They are fundamental for a squishy carry like Drow who can’t deal with high mobility and gap closer heroes - such as Phantom Assassin and Tusk - who can just jump on her and burst her down quickly.

• Often (at least in a competitive environment), she is played in a team with solid front liners and disablers who must defend her from any attacker.

The combination of proper teammates and survivability items makes her almost unkillable in the right hands, while damage-wise she is perfectly fine with the agility items listed above and thanks to Marksmanship: the ability to ignore armor makes her a fearful opponent against any tank.

Traxex the Drow Ranger loading screen - Valve

7.22 nerfs to Drow Ranger

I believe that the nerfs brought in by 7.22 are adequate to balance Drow. After only one day, her win rate in pub already decreased from 56% to 51%.

• Marksmanship no longer instantly kills Ancients (still does damage/pierces).

Pro players know that to counter Drow Ranger you must defeat her in the lane and then spend extra resources and time to prevent her farm in the jungle. This can be troublesome if you are having problems in another lane; and such a degree of teamwork is almost impossible to achieve in most pub matches.

Now, Marksmanship is still helpful against ancient creeps, but she can’t abuse it anymore to recover instantly from a lost early game.

• Marksmanship now only pierces base armor not total armor.

Drow is no longer able to melt down tanks who stacked armor via items, so now she is more item-dependent than before to damage certain opponents.

A note about Gust

I believe that also Gust is a bit over-tuned at the moment.

This skill knocks back and silences the enemy units affected. In my opinion, the silence portion is too strong for an AoE spell: we talk about 3/4/5/6s silence duration with a 16/15/14/13s cooldown.

If Drow gets the level 20 talent +3s Gust Silence Duration and the level 25 one 50% Cooldown Reduction, she will obtain a 9-second long AoE silence with a 6.5s seconds cooldown. The uptime of her ability is above 100%.

Tier 3

Hero	Name	P+B	P+B%	Picks	Picks%	Bans	Bans%	Win%
	Brewmaster	146	31.4%	73	15.7%	73	15.7%	37.0%
	Rubick	135	29.0%	88	18.9%	47	10.1%	44.3%
	Centaur Warrunner	129	27.7%	77	16.6%	52	11.2%	46.8%
	Necrophos	128	27.5%	57	12.3%	71	15.3%	71.9%
	Winter Wyvern	125	26.9%	79	17.0%	46	9.9%	39.2%
	Monkey King	123	26.5%	59	12.7%	64	13.8%	54.2%
	Juggernaut	117	25.2%	63	13.6%	54	11.6%	54.0%
	Grimstroke	114	24.5%	87	18.7%	27	5.8%	48.3%
	Sniper	102	21.9%	45	9.7%	57	12.3%	46.7%
	Tidehunter	102	21.9%	56	12.0%	46	9.9%	62.5%
	Disruptor	101	21.7%	87	18.7%	14	3.0%	54.0%
	Lina	100	21.5%	56	12.0%	44	9.5%	35.7%
	Anti-Mage	100	21.5%	33	7.1%	67	14.4%	48.5%
	Kunkka	99	21.3%	46	9.9%	53	11.4%	32.6%
	Earth Spirit	98	21.1%	66	14.2%	32	6.9%	45.5%
	Lifestealer	94	20.2%	37	8.0%	57	12.3%	29.7%

Tier 4

Hero	Name	P+B	P+B%	Picks	Picks%	Bans	Bans%	Win%
	Lone Druid	87	18.7%	35	7.5%	52	11.2%	51.4%
	Pangolier	81	17.4%	53	11.4%	28	6.0%	50.9%
	Spectre	80	17.2%	27	5.8%	53	11.4%	48.2%
	Ursa	77	16.6%	34	7.3%	43	9.3%	67.7%
	Puck	77	16.6%	45	9.7%	32	6.9%	51.1%
	Queen of Pain	76	16.3%	36	7.7%	40	8.6%	58.3%
	Wraith King	72	15.5%	52	11.2%	20	4.3%	34.6%
	Beastmaster	72	15.5%	44	9.5%	28	6.0%	40.9%
	Bane	71	15.3%	60	12.9%	11	2.4%	43.3%
	Pugna	70	15.1%	27	5.8%	43	9.3%	44.4%
	Magnus	62	13.3%	25	5.4%	37	8.0%	36.0%
	Lycan	61	13.1%	18	3.9%	43	9.3%	61.1%
	Lion	60	12.9%	52	11.2%	8	1.7%	57.7%
	Jakiro	59	12.7%	52	11.2%	7	1.5%	50.0%
	Terrorblade	55	11.8%	29	6.2%	26	5.6%	48.3%
	Omniknight	44	9.5%	22	4.7%	22	4.7%	45.5%
	Vengeful Spirit	44	9.5%	29	6.2%	15	3.2%	34.5%
	Tiny	44	9.5%	30	6.5%	14	3.0%	43.3%
	Tusk	43	9.3%	39	8.4%	4	0.9%	51.3%
	Silencer	43	9.3%	33	7.1%	10	2.2%	57.6%
	Broodmother	42	9.0%	10	2.2%	32	6.9%	60.0%
	Shadow Demon	40	8.6%	24	5.2%	16	3.4%	75.0%
	Alchemist	39	8.4%	17	3.7%	22	4.7%	52.9%
	Witch Doctor	38	8.2%	36	7.7%	2	0.4%	33.3%
	Arc Warden	35	7.5%	21	4.5%	14	3.0%	61.9%
	Ancient Apparition	35	7.5%	18	3.9%	17	3.7%	50.0%
	Phantom Assassin	34	7.3%	24	5.2%	10	2.2%	37.5%
	Weaver	31	6.7%	22	4.7%	9	1.9%	45.5%
	Phantom Lancer	31	6.7%	16	3.4%	15	3.2%	43.8%
	Legion Commander	30	6.5%	18	3.9%	12	2.6%	55.6%
	Dragon Knight	29	6.2%	20	4.3%	9	1.9%	40.0%
	Bounty Hunter	28	6.0%	17	3.7%	11	2.4%	35.3%
	Night Stalker	26	5.6%	11	2.4%	15	3.2%	54.6%
	Huskar	25	5.4%	13	2.8%	12	2.6%	46.2%
	Enchantress	24	5.2%	18	3.9%	6	1.3%	22.2%
	Shadow Fiend	24	5.2%	17	3.7%	7	1.5%	35.3%
	Viper	23	5.0%	14	3.0%	9	1.9%	50.0%

In tier 4 and 5 we find all the situational heroes. They are strong when paired with others, or against specific lineups. These heroes aren't bad, they just don't work in every game, so the pick and ban rates aren't outstanding.

Tier 5

Hero	Name	P+B	P+B%	Picks	Picks%	Bans	Bans%	Win%
	Keeper of the Light	19	4.1%	18	3.9%	1	0.2%	61.1%
	Meepo	19	4.1%	5	1.1%	14	3.0%	60.0%
	Venomancer	18	3.9%	9	1.9%	9	1.9%	44.4%
	Undying	16	3.4%	15	3.2%	1	0.2%	40.0%
	Chaos Knight	16	3.4%	8	1.7%	8	1.7%	25.0%
	Lich	15	3.2%	10	2.2%	5	1.1%	60.0%
	Chen	14	3.0%	11	2.4%	3	0.7%	72.7%
	Death Prophet	13	2.8%	11	2.4%	2	0.4%	27.3%
	Timbersaw	11	2.4%	7	1.5%	4	0.9%	71.4%
	Dark Willow	10	2.2%	7	1.5%	3	0.7%	42.9%
	Invoker	10	2.2%	6	1.3%	4	0.9%	33.3%
	Pudge	10	2.2%	7	1.5%	3	0.7%	42.9%
	Underlord	9	1.9%	6	1.3%	3	0.7%	16.7%
	Elder Titan	9	1.9%	6	1.3%	3	0.7%	50.0%
	Faceless Void	9	1.9%	7	1.5%	2	0.4%	57.1%
	Phoenix	8	1.7%	7	1.5%	1	0.2%	28.6%
	Bristleback	8	1.7%	7	1.5%	1	0.2%	57.1%
	Warlock	8	1.7%	6	1.3%	2	0.4%	66.7%
	Techies	7	1.5%	3	0.7%	4	0.9%	33.3%
	Clinkz	7	1.5%	5	1.1%	2	0.4%	80.0%
	Clockwerk	7	1.5%	4	0.9%	3	0.7%	50.0%
	Windranger	7	1.5%	5	1.1%	2	0.4%	40.0%
	Mirana	7	1.5%	6	1.3%	1	0.2%	50.0%
	Dazzle	6	1.3%	3	0.7%	3	0.7%	33.3%
	Zeus	5	1.1%	4	0.9%	1	0.2%	75.0%
	Crystal Maiden	5	1.1%	4	0.9%	1	0.2%	75.0%
	Luna	4	0.9%	4	0.9%	0	0.0%	50.0%
	Slardar	4	0.9%	4	0.9%	0	0.0%	0.0%
	Ogre Magi	3	0.7%	3	0.7%	0	0.0%	0.0%
	Spirit Breaker	2	0.4%	2	0.4%	0	0.0%	100%
	Riki	2	0.4%	2	0.4%	0	0.0%	100%
	Bloodseeker	2	0.4%	2	0.4%	0	0.0%	0.0%
	Axe	2	0.4%	2	0.4%	0	0.0%	50.0%
	Treant Protector	1	0.2%	1	0.2%	0	0.0%	0.0%

Heroes not drafted

Io and Mars were not available in captains mode during 7.21d.

Gyrocopter

Skywrath Mage

Slark

Tinker

Visage

Next Tier List: June 2019

Header image (Eldwurm's Touch loading screen for Drow Ranger) and hero icons: Valve - Statistics: DatDota