A couple of weeks ago I talked about heroes who could use a buff, but today, after the conclusion of the Bali Major, it is time to talk about heroes who desperately need a nerf. They are probably not going to surprise anyone, as they were the biggest meta trendsetters of the tournament with some of the highest win probabilities.
Universal hero with high farming potential, good late game scaling, built-in damage, mobility and scouting is simply too good. There are no two ways about it: the hero must be “weaker” numbers-wise to make up for how strong she is in terms of her overall design.
Perhaps Insatiable Hunger could be dispellable, like most buffs of this type are. Or maybe the hero could lose some movement speed, so that she has to rely on Silken Bola to chase her targets and not just max out stats for extra damage and tankiness.
Perhaps Universal heroes as a concept need another look: it still feels like 0.7 damage per stat is way too good in the later portions of the game, with many Universal heroes dominating the meta in all core positions.
It is the reason why we won’t even consider 
Morphling to be one of the heroes who could use a nerf. Him stealing 40% of enemy Universal hero attributes and still only winning ~50% of his high level games is very telling of how problematic Universal heroes are and Broodmother is definitely the most problematic of them all.
Medusa is still a bit too good for one simple reason: unless you counter the hero during the draft stage, she will get away with the game. Sure, she has some issues in the ultra-late, but when she gets to hit her 
Manta Style + one major item timing pre-minute twenty, she is unstoppable.
Maybe Stone Gaze could cost a little bit more mana, so that it is more of a trade-off between different types of survivability. The activation duration on it could also be tweaked. Right now attacking Medusa feels like a very bad play and that’s what makes her such a strong carry.
Increasing the duration necessary to turn enemy heroes to stone could go a long way, without once again tweaking the numbers on her Mana Shield. The hero is not dealing too much damage and she doesn’t even necessarily feel “too tanky”. She just feels tanky, with an extremely powerful punishment if you don’t get through her double HP bar in time.
This is where I feel the problem lies with the hero, so hopefully we will see some changes in the future.
I’ve touched on the hero last week, but some players might have missed the memo. Clockwerk is currently one of the strongest position five supports to lane with a ranged core. He has very high mobility, strong aggressive potential and scales exceptionally well.
The hero also provides a ton of scouting. It is very important on the bigger map, but it also provides tactical advantages in a fight. Having the ability to start the fight by jumping backline cannot be underestimated.
Finally, the hero is very flexible and can function with pretty much any build, making him a very versatile support. Depending on the situation, he can go for any of the top tier defensive support items, or he can go aggressive with items like 
Blade Mail, 
Spirit Vessel or even 
Orchid Malevolence.
The hero is underperforming in pubs, but I feel like it is temporary. The Bali Major really showcased how and when to play Clockwerk and soon he can become a problem. High adaptability coupled with high peak power make for a very explosive combination.
It is safe to say that the current meta revolves around a handful of heroes, who are strictly better than the rest. Of those, several stand out even more and can be considered overpowered. It also looks like they won’t meta-out with some smart counter-pick, so it is unlikely we will see huge meta shifts without direct Valve intervention.
That said, 7.33 was a very big patch and it will definitely take time to balance it out properly. Moreover, while the pro meta is very much set in stone, the pub meta is still somewhat fluid, with many viable heroes and just a handful of very bad ones.
All in all we do hope to see a couple of patches before the upcoming big tournaments, but we also feel like they should be primarily focused on the professional scene, rather than pubs. Do you agree with us? Share your thoughts in the comment section below.
