Offlane Vengeful Spirit, new meta or team tests before The International?

On the last Dota 2 {{The OGA Dota PIT Invitational teams showed us Vengeful Spirit on the off lane, first by PSG.LGD and then taken over by T1. Let's understand the pros and cons of this hero in the offlane position.

What have you changed?

Vengeful Spirit rarely looks impressive in core position, she was usually picked for good starting stats and big attribute gains. Mainly because of these two indicators, this character was previously taken to the first position.

At the same time, the hero also deals a decent amount of damage, largely due to a large increase in agility and a strong aura, however, in protracted games, the lack of AoE abilities makes her potentially very weak. She cannot farm, so she is totally dependent on her ability to end games early, especially as a carry.

Recently, according to statistics, we can see a positive trend for this character. For example, at the moment the hero is ranked 27th in popularity among all characters in the game and has a winrate of 55.4%

Hero selection frequency

The share of victories has also increased over the last month.

Roles are still dominated by the core role, but the win rate is not much different, and when was the last time you saw Wenga in the safe lane.

Offlane Vengeful Spirit Benefits

In the 7.30 patch, Nether Swap was given a very strong buff that reduces incoming damage to allied targets and Wenge herself. This makes the potential sub-save from Wenga noticeably stronger, and she not only saves better, but she herself is more likely to survive. This is especially important on Wenge third and fourth position, which wants to have experience and money after fights. But there is another very important feature of the hero: her new Aghanim. It now works like this:

After death, a strong illusion appears in the place of the hero, which can use all abilities, deals 100% damage, takes 100% damage and moves 25% faster. If the illusion is alive when the hero is revived, he will take its place. Experience earned by an illusion is transferred to its owner.

All of the hero's abilities are good, and despite the fact that they look very simple, they are effective.

Thanks to this illusion, the hero is able to steal a lot of attention and focus from the enemy team. In addition, Wenga is not the most fragile character, and the illusion does not fall quickly.

The ability to stay in the batch after death and fully participate in the fight is the main advantage of this offlane hero, besides the aura gives a good bonus for the allied carry.

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Items

Here players come up with different options, but the basis of the assembly is the purchase of Aghanim, followed by Manta Style.

Examples of assemblies of different players with item timing

As we can see, a good time to buy an aghanim is 18-19 minutes, followed by an exit to the manta ray.

Ability boost

The most popular assembly is:

As we can see, the passive is taken only after several pumping of the camp, because there is not much sense from it on the lane, and due to other abilities, you can look for kills on the lane.

In terms of talents, the following picture:

The most controversial talent is at level 20, players prefer different options, but at 25 it's too steep a talent for stun through bkb.

Minuses

The lack of stable AoE skills is the main drawback of this hero, leaving the off lane, he does not seek to buy team artifacts, since he needs to get to the aghanim as soon as possible. In the case of a lost lane, it is very difficult for the hero to return to the game due to the slow speed of the farm, so the weak comeback mechanic also refers to the disadvantages of this build.

The most annoying thing is to play against Elder Titan, whose passive makes the illusion very weak.

Outcome

The teams have already played this hero on the offlane, and the main advantage at the pick stage was the ability to move Wenga to the support position, where she feels comfortable. This character works well against all sorts of initiators such as Batrider, Beastmaster, etc. Being able to save your hero after the start of the fight, and still continue to benefit the team, even after a quick death, makes Vengeful Spirit an offlane worth testing.