As long as my waifu DW doesn't get too much attention from pros (meaning no nerfs), I'll be a happy man.

Regions that had won majors so far = EU, CIS, SEA and CHINA. NA Sobayed?

"105 different hero picks and only seven ignored heroes across 97 matches is a definitive proof that 7.14 was a great patch." Is this alleged diversity homogeneously represented at the level of hero roles? From a viewer's perspective it feels like theofflane and carry departements have a very limited pool, somewhat undermining the claim that 7.14 was a great patch.

no mention of nyx ?? similar stats to slark, but picked in first phase for about ~2/3, while slark is either last pick or before last pick (50/50)

Lmao nobody notices how OP huskar is lol! Can't wait for huskar to be buffed

@No Handshake

That point is certainly worth exploring, but it's hard to imagine that less heroes picked would have had a better effect on that.

@MM.Brock Hall
The possible scenarios I have in mind would be like:

game version A:
- more cores than in scenario B are relevant
- less supports than in scenario B are relevant

game version B:
- less cores than in scenario A are relevant
- more supports than in scenario B are relevant

, where 'relevant' is defined in terms of pick/ban in relation to win rate.

From a viewer's perspective, scenario A is preferable since they are more supports than cores in the hero pool anyway, and cores make up for the majority of any game's particular hero pool (6/10). Under this assumption, one would hope that 7.14 is/was closer to scenario A than to B. But Dotabuff's writers almost never bother to distinguish between roles in their claims about current hero pool variety (that is is definitely something I would like to see them improve on in the future). So just from reading their articles it's not clear whether their claims about variety hold. In particular, articles like the above don't rule out the possibility that 7.14 was more like scenario B, and thus arguably less diverse than A (in the role-relativized sense I used above).

I remember TnC losing to VP's Troll Warlord lately. Typical Trash team

^TNC weren't even in this major. That game was in DAC. Meta was different then. Stop inserting your hate for PH teams everywhere.

Who are the 7 hereos? Are they going to get buffed?

^Riki, Enchantress, Clinkz, Phoenix, Winter Wyvern, Weaver, and Bloodseeker
Most of them are either nerfed, really unfavorable or just plain forgotten

Edit : Also worth mentioning, Ursa, Mirana, Spectre, Arc Warden, Bristleback, Crystal Maiden, Sniper, Meepo, Anti Mage, Batrider, Monkey King, Wraith King, Tiny, Broodmother and Techies although picked, they never won a single game
And also special case for Keeper of the Light, Huskar, Lich and Necrophos all 4 of them never been picked but they were banned at least once

Do the pros use bloodseeker to counter slark? I feel like he's really good at it, but by the time you see the slark you probably have your 4 already and BS as a 1 is pretty shit right now i think.

nyx nyx nyx

@No Handshake

I understand your preference, but I personally don't have a large problem seeing the same core over and over (unless it gets to 6.78 naix levels). Players have different methods of utilizing heroes, and small changes in drafts will change how the game plays out in large ways. I also don't immediately agree that there are more support heroes in the game, and I would say seeing as Dotabuff counts offlaners as cores they would consider there to be more cores than supports as well. Again, I would love to see those statistics, so I agree with you there, but I would still guess that if we were in an 80 pick pool the diversity you are looking for would be less than the diversity we currently have, assuming diversity scales with pick count.

> Do the pros use bloodseeker to counter slark?
Obviously not, he was not even picked once in this tournament.

@MM. Brock Hall
Thanks for your reply; I fear I swapped tow occurrences of A/B in my post above; does it make any difference to your view?

slark won 11/13

"situational"

LOL

@No Handshake

For me the necessity of having a higher pick pool overall is a little unimportant, so I suppose not. When I first started watching Dota it was during the Navi powerhouse days, and every meta was hugely focused on a core set of heroes. The way people talked about drafts back then was 'are they going to ban x hero or try to pick it up for themselves?' where x was in literally every game. People called it boring, but watch the draft from 'The Play' and you'll hear the excitement from the crowd when Juggernaut is picked, as he was not a popular pick at the time.

My point is that what makes games exciting is not kill counts, pick diversities, etc. What makes games exciting is teams trying to be clever. The Play was massively clever (Lumi says Puppey talked about the Naga counter right after it happened) and nobody saw how it was going to work until it happened. Lesh being used in every role is clever. Shotgun Druid is clever. Liquid winning TI by giving farm to KOTL to enable a relentless deathball is clever. And if everything is different every single game, it's hard to call any of it exciting.

I still LOVE statistics, as it helps me understand more about how the game works, and informs my reading of the next game I watch. So if there were an article getting more in depth with pick diversity as you request, I would be very much game for it.

You cann't pick bs to counter slark when slark is last picked and/or you already got your carry yourself.

Mid bloodseeker and pos4 bloodseeker needs HEAVY commitment in your pick, so they are not even a thing to counter slark.
even carry blood need some special commitment, cause it's so garbage at finishing the game.

(and that's not even mentionning the utterly garbage item build pro are usually doing on bs)

How many times was Core kunkka picked, and actually won?