The Biggest Winners of the Wandering Waters Patch

Dota 2

Pepijn Lamers

The latest balance patch, "Wandering Waters," has brought a significant shake-up to the Dota 2 meta. We had to wait a long time but boy is it a doozy! Some heroes that were already strong got buffed even further (Icefrog pls nerf), while we have several new contenders for top heroes.

Valve has historically been pretty quick to follow up on big patches with several smaller ones to deal with the outliers, so abuse the Wandering Waters Patch Winners while you still can!

Dragon Knight isn't worth picking right now

One of the top heroes from the previous patch may haunt your pubs even more with the Wandering Waters update. (Credit: Valve).

1. Dragon Knight - Was Broken, Is Now Even More Broken

Winrate Increase: +5.28% (48.55% → 53.83%)
Pickrate Increase: +10.71% (10.27% → 20.98%)

Dragon Knight has received an incredible boost, making him the single biggest winner of the patch. In addition, it seems like Valve is set on making sure his Blue and Green Dragon facets get some love too, with attempts to make them competitive with his Fire Facet by adding back cleave to Dragon Form as a baseline. A surge in both win rate and pick rate indicates that players are recognizing his newfound strength. Dragon Knight did benefit from a bug that incorrectly doubled the damage of his Wyrm's Wrath when using the Fire Dragon facet, but this has since been fixed.

2. Mirana - The Unexpected Climber

Winrate Increase: +5.06% (45.65% → 50.72%)
Pickrate Increase: +4.44% (3.74% → 8.18%)

Mirana’s resurgence is not entirely unexpected. She got changed back into an agility hero, but in return, all of her stat gains were buffed, on top of a big base damage increase and buffs to most of her abilities and her innate. Mirana is back baby!

Smurfs rejoice, Meepo is strong! (Credit: Valve)

3. Meepo - A Rare Rise

Winrate Increase: +4.97% (47.69% → 52.66%)
Pickrate Increase: +0.29% (1.57% → 1.86%)

Meepo, historically a niche hero, has quietly made significant gains. While his pick rate remains low and he didn't receive that many direct buffs, Meepo is a hero who is quite dependent on getting the right neutral item, and with the changes to neutral items that is easier than ever!

4. Nature’s Prophet - Universally Strong

Winrate Increase: +4.55% (44.82% → 49.37%)
Pickrate Increase: +2.20% (7.59% → 9.79%)

Nature’s Prophet has benefited greatly from the patch, and the change is simple: Nature's Prophet is now a universal hero. NP has always been a hero who can build almost every item in the game and be fine, but now he gets even more damage from it! Despite universal damage scaling being nerfed, Nature's Prophet has some fantastic stat gains and gains free 25 damage at level 30.

This man can fit so much sustain. Slaps head (Credit: Valve)

5. Dark Seer - Down With the Damage

Winrate Increase: +3.76% (49.52% → 53.28%)
Pickrate Increase: +2.02% (1.35% → 3.37%)

Dark Seer is now a weak, feeble little man, losing an absolute ton of damage (75 at level 30) due to his change back to Intelligence from Universal. This may seem bad but Dark Seer never much cared about damage anyway. Instead, he now gets a new innate that restores HP and Mana upon leveling up, which gives him a ton of sustain in lane, something that is way more important than damage. As a result, he's now on top of our list of offlaners to keep an eye on, and Davai Lama agrees!

Are we going to see lifestealers inside ancient creeps with radiances, making supports miserable again? Only time will tell. (Credit: Valve)

6. Lifestealer - A Change of Playstyle?

Winrate Increase: +3.21% (52.68% → 55.88%)
Pickrate Increase: +7.30% (11.59% → 18.89%)

Lifestealer has had some interesting changes. His Unfettered and Rage facets were removed (Rage once again being the baseline), and were replaced with a really strong basic facet called Fleshfeast that increases his scaling tankiness and chasing power, and a rather interesting facet that incentivizes initiating from within infested ancient creeps. The former seems to be more powerful for the average player, but the pros seem to favor the latter, certainly making him on of the more interesting Wandering Waters Patch Winners.

7. Jakiro - Fire and Ice!

Winrate Increase: +2.06% (49.69% → 51.76%)
Pickrate Increase: +12.47% (11.39% → 23.85%)

Fire? Ice? Why not both?! Jakiro no longer has to choose between Liquid Fire and Liquid Frost, instead getting access to both. Initially, they have a shared cooldown, but with the shard, you can use both with separate cooldowns. In addition, he now has a facet that reduces his damage penalty, opening up opportunities for a possible core Jakiro, and a strong(er?) support facet that allows for blowing up your ice path for additional damage and stuns.

The new Wandering Waters creeps, ready to be farmed by the new top meta picks. (Credit: Valve)

Conclusion

The "Wandering Waters" patch has breathed new life into many heroes, shifting the meta and offering fresh strategies. Dragon Knight stands as the biggest winner, while heroes like Mirana, Nature’s Prophet, and Dark Seer are also certainly Wandering Waters Patch Winners. The evolving meta and the mercy of the Frog will determine how long these heroes retain their newfound power, but for now, they are dominating the game.

Who do you think benefited the most from this patch? Are there sleeper picks we’ve missed? Let us know in the comments!