Why does Tiny have a cast time?

[pummol]

Why in the world does Tiny has a cast on his avalanche? DotA tiny has no cast, the HoN tiny does. Combine this with the inability to double avalanche and you have a seriously underpowered hero.

Here's more about small changes that have large ramifications:

Why does Lina have a ridiculous cast point now? His cast point is much lower than DotA Lina. This small change turns Lina into a severely overpowered hero.

Why is the cast point on Zeus so much lower than the DotA zeus? The DotA zeus was already very strong, and one of his few weaknesses was the ability to out-fog his castpoint with the ledge and good juking. Add on a stupid good attack animation and projectile and you have a pointlessly imba hero.

Please, if you're going to port a hero, at least do it with the idea in your head that Icefrog balanced that hero around every property. Albeit small, cast point, attack range, motion buffer range, attack point, turn speed, and stat gain all balance a hero, NOT just the skills.

These are the ones I can name. Dazzle's attack range is another one but I think that's actually a good change considering he's a fairly underpowered support hero.

Another gripe:
S2 decides to create the first 45 heroes. Does it really make sense to first import 4 invis heroes when, out of Track, Charge, Amp Damage, and Doom, only Slardar is implemented? Does S2 consider that maybe this might lead to less enjoyable beta games and ultimately fewer beta testers? This is so heavily apparent because in every game Scout, Riki, and Madman are almost always picked when available. Does it also make sense to import all of the blinking initiaters, Enigma Axe ES, when the only two counters to dagger users, Doom's fire and Silencer's last word are still left unimported? The current game is really unplayable for fun, exciting, and most importantly, CLOSE games.

[Aegd]

Well, most heroes have gotten their attack animations improved, that stormbringers cast animation is improved too isn't so strange. I have to agree with some points though. Pebbles needs to get fixed. His throw skill is bugged half the time, and when you give him an animation time for his avalanche (giving him little time to get free hits during the stun), and you get a hero that's pretty crappy.

The double avalanche was a pretty hard move to do, and players who were good with it could dish out crazy damage in a second. I don't know if it needs to come back to be honest. I think he will be fine if they just fix his throw skill and get the avalanche skill working without a cast time so he can get of a hit or two after a stun.

[ChimEuphoria]

Why does Lina have a ridiculous cast point now? His cast point is much lower than DotA Lina. This small change turns Lina into a severely overpowered hero.


Not only this, but the permanent attack speed bonus on a hero without an awkward attack animation is just absurd.

The only reason dota lina had an attack speed spell was due to her supremely awkward attack animation.

Without said anim, giving any hero permanent AS is asking for trouble.

[VortexMagus]

I agree with most of the points, I feel that HoN severely neglected the game balance aspect when making certain changes, especially in regards to creeps and new heroes. There aren't enough counters left in the game for blink, and the alteration of certain attack animations makes some heroes substantially better than they should be, and the alteration of creeps make some heroes substantially worse.

[twincannon]

HoN has like no latency compared to wc3 engine. Last hitting has gotten considerably easier too.

/thread

[Tengri1]

It's . . . in Beta. Why are you getting emotional about this? This isn't the final version, and far from it. Chill. Report your worries, and reasons. That's all.

[ChimEuphoria]

HoN has like no latency compared to wc3 engine. Last hitting has gotten considerably easier too.

/thread

lol, you cant /thread your own posts dog.

and protip: /threading only occurs when a: questions have been answered or b: all of the Op's points have been adressed/debunked/agreed with.

[pedobearpig]

The double avalanche was a pretty hard move to do, and players who were good with it could dish out crazy damage in a second.

you thought double avalanche was hard to do? why? how? when? WHAT?

[_Archangel_]

This is a retarded post in general, though I agree about Pebbles being far inferior to his DotA counterpart.

Pyromancer is far from an overpowered hero. Lina is a flawed hero in DotA as it is, and it will take a lot more than a decreased cast point to push her to competitive viability, let alone overpoweredness.

Thunder Bringer is a little more powerful than Zeus, though the cast animation makes little difference. The biggest thing I'm worried about is the fact that his ultimate hits invisible units.

And for the last time, invisibility is not overpowered. Learn to buy Dust and Wards please. You don't NEED Amplify Damage/Charge/Track/Doom to own invisible heroes. All you need is a correctly functioning brain.

Blinking initiators are still countered by Radiance, which is still in the game.

Note that invisible heroes are NOT viable in competitive play, they do need some buffing. Just because they are very effective against bad players, doesn't mean you should cry about them being overpowered.


This is so heavily apparent because in every game Scout, Riki, and Madman are almost always picked when available.

Evidence from pubs are not accurate indicators of balance. In DotA pubs, the most common heroes include pieces of crap like Sniper; that doesn't mean Sniper is overpowered. Make sure you actually have some competitive experience before posting about balance, kthx.

[Aegd]

you thought double avalanche was hard to do? why? how? when? WHAT?

Ok, maybe an exaggeration on my part, but it took at least some timing, and the damage it could deal out was pretty over the top to be honest, since throw got increased damage every time you level up the ultimate, and with double avalanche damage I think you could deal around 800 damage or so in like a second and one or two free hits afterwards since the target will remain stunned. To be honest I don't think he really needs to be able to hit twice with avalanche. Just make him able to move while using it and fix chuck and He won't be useless.

[VortexMagus]

Pyromancer is far from an overpowered hero. Lina is a flawed hero in DotA as it is, and it will take a lot more than a decreased cast point to push her to competitive viability, let alone overpoweredness.



False, Lina is one of the best caster support units and early gankers in the game, with an aoe stun, a 450 damage aoe combo and an ult which basically guarantees early game kills if used properly. If you gave me a list of the most dangerous lanes possible in a competitive dota game, several dual lanes with lina involved would be at the top of the list.




Thunder Bringer is a little more powerful than Zeus, though the cast animation makes little difference. The biggest thing I'm worried about is the fact that his ultimate hits invisible units.



The casting time makes a substantial difference, as anyone experienced in fog abuse and dota mind games would understand.




Blinking initiators are still countered by Radiance, which is still in the game.



What the hell are you smoking? Radiance has neeeeeeeeever been a counter to the 6 second+ aoe stun orgies that competent earthshaker/enigma play introduces.




Note that invisible heroes are NOT viable in competitive play, they do need some buffing. Just because they are very effective against bad players, doesn't mean you should cry about them being overpowered.



What makes them powerful is not the invisibility, what makes them powerful is the invisibility combined with everything else. Madman has troll ult, two escape abilities, a slow, and a crit. If you can't understand why thats overpowered, I'm not going to explain it to you. Scout has invisibility, crit, maphack, and an 400 damage + slow ult that hits from half the map away.

And you make the common pub assumption that proper use of dust/wards of revelation/whatever are suddenly going to maphack out that scout/madman for you without fail, but in reality a competitive team isn't going to give you the time to set down wards, throw down dust, and gank down the stealth hero before he can respond, a competitive team will check your inventory every 5 seconds, note the wards of revelation/dust, and tell the invis heroes not to charge in first, but rather wait for the rest of the team to commit (which they honeslty should be doing anyway). Wards of revelation are simple to counter by a team which is expecting it. and neither madman and scout have no need to sit right next to you invis, they can both wait waaaay out of range until the fight is initiated. Dust is a reactive item - an item that you only use after you've been attacked, and assumes that your team is going to be able to focus and kill aforementioned invis hero after the dust is initiated, which is rarely the case since agil heroes usually come in after the tanks and the casters have already started the party, and your team is busy with other things.

People all go "omg madman/scout/whatever so easy just disable disable disable him" but thats so stupid, because enough 'disable disable disable' kills any hero, overpowered or not. If your madman is getting focused, your team is doing something wrong. If your scout is getting focused, someone is failing his job, especially considering scout needs to be nowhere even close to casting range in order to initiate.




Evidence from pubs are not accurate indicators of balance. In DotA pubs, the most common heroes include pieces of crap like Sniper; that doesn't mean Sniper is overpowered. Make sure you actually have some competitive experience before posting about balance, kthx.

Sniper is constantly underrated in competitive play, he has extremely strong lane control and is one of the very few heroes which can completely outfarm and deny overpowered solo harassers like shadow fiend and viper.

I disagree with most, if not all of your points, because I think they're invalid. Yeah, both Riki and bounty hunter are completely neutralized by proper use of wards and dust, but scout and madman both have a -lot- of other options, and are not reliant on invis to be effective. If a scout did nothing all game but kill neutrals, set down wards, and ult from out of range, I'd still consider him extremely useful to the team.

[willtsay]

lol sniper recently got much better with shrapnel + range buff, its actually decent now, unlike freaking scattershot.

imo they really shouldn't have gone around buffing/nerfing castpoints/animations.
icefrog had it down pat -> don't fix what ain't broke

[_Archangel_]

False, Lina is one of the best caster support units and early gankers in the game, with an aoe stun, a 450 damage aoe combo and an ult which basically guarantees early game kills if used properly. If you gave me a list of the most dangerous lanes possible in a competitive dota game, several dual lanes with lina involved would be at the top of the list.

If you got a list of the most dangerous lanes possible in a competitive DotA game, most of them would include Nerubian Assassin. The only noteworty ones including Lina now are Lina+Sandking and Lina+Sven. Lina picks have been somewhat rare since the Dagger nerf and Hex recipe change.

The casting time makes a substantial difference, as anyone experienced in fog abuse and dota mind games would understand.

I do know this does make differences in ganks, but in teamfights it makes little difference. Also, cast animation doesn't matter if you cast your ultimate for vision so that fog doesn't become a problem

What the hell are you smoking? Radiance has neeeeeeeeever been a counter to the 6 second+ aoe stun orgies that competent earthshaker/enigma play introduces.

Try buying Radiance on Syllabear's Bear, walking it around the forests when you're pushing and when you find the Earthshaker, press M and click him. See how he well he initiates then. Radiance prevents the Blink; also you should just spread out when you approach the tower.

What makes them powerful is not the invisibility, what makes them powerful is the invisibility combined with everything else. Madman has troll ult, two escape abilities, a slow, and a crit. If you can't understand why thats overpowered, I'm not going to explain it to you. Scout has invisibility, crit, maphack, and an 400 damage + slow ult that hits from half the map away.

They're melee agility carries, which you can shut down by putting even MINIMAL lane control against unless they have a babysitter. Scout's maphack is inferior to Tree's, invis is nothing more than a decent ganking skill, crits do nothing but make him a half-ass carry and ultimate doesn't do much other than finishing or initiating ganks. I don't see how it's overpowered. He's half-carry, half-ganker but there are heroes that do both jobs better. Madman does have two escape abilities, but one of them can be countered by Dust and the other has a long cooldown. If he uses Barrel Roll foolishly you can throw Dust and punish him hard. Also, Stuns go a long way to destroying him in teamfights - he can only hit one hero at a time.

And you make the common pub assumption that proper use of dust/wards of revelation/whatever are suddenly going to maphack out that scout/madman for you without fail, but in reality a competitive team isn't going to give you the time to set down wards, throw down dust, and gank down the stealth hero before he can respond, a competitive team will check your inventory every 5 seconds, note the wards of revelation/dust, and tell the invis heroes not to charge in first, but rather wait for the rest of the team to commit (which they honeslty should be doing anyway). Wards of revelation are simple to counter by a team which is expecting it. and neither madman and scout have no need to sit right next to you invis, they can both wait waaaay out of range until the fight is initiated. Dust is a reactive item - an item that you only use after you've been attacked, and assumes that your team is going to be able to focus and kill aforementioned invis hero after the dust is initiated, which is rarely the case since agil heroes usually come in after the tanks and the casters have already started the party, and your team is busy with other things.

If this is the case, explain why invisibility is considered UNDERPOWERED in competitive DotA. You don't see Stealth Assassin, Gondar, Clinkz picked at all, nor do you ever see Lothar's.

I'm pretty sure you're using Wards and Dust wrong.

You set Wards down when you push in front of their tower when you push, or in front of your own tower when they push so that when you fight, you will be able to see this invisible hero when he joins the fight. Let's see how long Scout or Madman last when they're disabled within the range of a Ward. Thus Wards are used defensively, so that you can see the hero BEFORE he hits you, rather than using Dust when he does.

Dust is used for offensive purposes when you're trying to KILL a hero who seeks to use his invisibility to escape. I'm pretty sure there's no way to counter Dust if you're an invisible hero unless you want to buy Nullfire to Purge yourself

People all go "omg madman/scout/whatever so easy just disable disable disable him" but thats so stupid, because enough 'disable disable disable' kills any hero, overpowered or not. If your madman is getting focused, your team is doing something wrong. If your scout is getting focused, someone is failing his job, especially considering scout needs to be nowhere even close to casting range in order to initiate.

Nobody would bother focusing Scout; his damage output is trash. Madman's HP is paper, so even minimal focus or disabling or AoE spells would mean that he's absolutely screwed.

Sniper is constantly underrated in competitive play, he has extremely strong lane control and is one of the very few heroes which can completely outfarm and deny overpowered solo harassers like shadow fiend and viper.

Do you want to 1v1 me, I'll play Shadow Fiend/Viper against your Sniper, see who wins? I could even solo against Sniper as Pudge. Sniper is not underrated. He is trash. Lane control is decent at best; the only thing that helps him in this is animation and range. Also with low movespeed and no escape mechanism he is very easy to gank and shut down. There's a REASON why Sniper is not picked in competitive play.

I disagree with most, if not all of your points, because I think they're invalid. Yeah, both Riki and bounty hunter are completely neutralized by proper use of wards and dust, but scout and madman both have a -lot- of other options, and are not reliant on invis to be effective. If a scout did nothing all game but kill neutrals, set down wards, and ult from out of range, I'd still consider him extremely useful to the team.

If you consider a single long-range slowing nuke, or an Blink AoE slow with long cooldown "other options" then sure. Scout is definitely reliant on invisibility for ganking. If he did nothing all game but kill neutrals and set down Wards, you would lose. Try not leveling Vanish and see how you do. Compare that to a Tree who has an AoE disable, invisibility and regeneration in lane for teammates (In DotA; the HoN replacement is kinda trash except for lasthitting) as well as Warding that is superior to Scout's - I would say that the Tree is significantly more useful.

There's my arguments, disagree with them if you like.

[Glorify1]

Why does Lina have a ridiculous cast point now? His cast point is much lower than DotA Lina. This small change turns Lina into a severely overpowered hero.

Same cast point, has just like DotA, the animation just makes it different.


Madman has troll ult, two escape abilities, a slow, and a crit. If you can't understand why thats overpowered, I'm not going to explain it to you.

You forgot to mention he has no mana base to even use all of his abilities, and the only way to compensate is to solo mid with bottle, in which case madman is NOT a very good laner in any sense. He needs to build an orchid to spam abilities late on, which completely cuts out ANY damage he deals, and if you go damage items you have no mana base to use your abilities. Sure, it's hard to gank him, but who the **** cares?


Scout has invisibility, crit, maphack, and an 400 damage + slow ult that hits from half the map away.

His ult is bad, it takes forever to cast and deals tiny amounts of damage with a bad slow, and can be easy dodged by blinks/leaps + Los. His 'maphack', is a bad ward, his crit/dodge is low/substandard.

[FiNGERS]

Back to Pebbles... Did Tiny not have a cast animation simply because the Stone Giant didn't have one? Pebbles' new stun isn't terrible as you can now reliable know where/what it's going to hit. I do miss the double stun/toss damage though.

[GaIactic]

Scout needs a buff, but I agree madman needs a slight nerf.

^_-;

[GaIactic]

I agree the cast animation for Pebbles has to go, but before you do that, FIX CHUCK FIRST!

^_-;

[wilco1]

Back to Pebbles... Did Tiny not have a cast animation simply because the Stone Giant didn't have one? Pebbles' new stun isn't terrible as you can now reliable know where/what it's going to hit. I do miss the double stun/toss damage though.

Tiny doesn't have a casting animation because it was made that way. And by not having a casting animation, it's just very obsolete and almost unnoticeable due to animation canceling and stuff.


And for all you idiots that don't think casting animation means a lot, you're absolutely wrong. Take Crystal Maiden in DotA for an example. She has an extremely terrible attack animation and casting animation. The attack animation disallows her from harassing easily as well as last hitting easily. That's not what's being discussed; but her casting animation is also godawful. For one, if you've played a game of DotA, you'd know her terrible MS doesn't get her far, specifically when you're trying to chase a hero running into the fog. With a good casting animation, you may be able to cast your disable before the hero disappears, but without one you cannot.

I remember playing a game with Chaos Knight (not a hero in HoN ATM). He has possibly the worst casting animation and I can't tell you how many times I missed kills due to him taking six hours trying to stun somebody.


Anyhow, more off topic, I do agree with the lack of anti-invis in the game. Although it's smart to buy dusts or wards, it's much easier and more efficient with Track / Doom / Amp Damage / whatever as opposed to wasting gold. The lack of invis detection does play a huge role as we notice invisibility heroes are being played much more than usual.

[FuzzyWuzzy]

Tiny was so underpowered in Dota (please don't argue, I am a fan of Tiny also, but it's true), I don't see why in HoN he is nerfed so much. Yeah, the passive is buffed, but you wouldn't take it until the end of the game (which currently is about 30 min if teams are not retards).

[bolen]

S2 decides to create the first 45 heroes. Does it really make sense to first import 4 invis heroes when, out of Track, Charge, Amp Damage, and Doom, only Slardar is implemented? Does S2 consider that maybe this might lead to less enjoyable beta games and ultimately fewer beta testers? This is so heavily apparent because in every game Scout, Riki, and Madman are almost always picked when available. Does it also make sense to import all of the blinking initiaters, Enigma Axe ES, when the only two counters to dagger users, Doom's fire and Silencer's last word are still left unimported? The current game is really unplayable for fun, exciting, and most importantly, CLOSE games.

Word, last night I played a game against a team full with either blink or windwalk and we had like nothing to counter it with. People were everywhere, flying in and out and impossible to gank anyone. Currently there's to much of the blink/ww skills in HoN.

[ChimEuphoria]

Same cast point, has just like DotA, the animation just makes it different.

Re read this, and tell me you didnt just argue against yourself.

[pummol]

Some great points, and if Lina's cast animation is not changed, then I'd attribute her cast change to the change in her third skill to increasing cast speed.

All of the points really come together into one point that I'm trying to make:
The S2 team seemed to have ported heroes at whim with the idea that a hero is balanced around his skills only. No consideration is given to cast animation, attack animation, hero pool.

Just look at their construction of Madman. Shukuchi is a very very powerful skill. The reason why Shukuchi is fine is because Nerubian Weaver is balanced around that skill. His attack animation is poor. His stat gain is poor. His scaling carry skill, Geminate, is also subpar. And he has no disables past silence. (though weaver is still a bit underpowered, you can see my point). Giving Shukuchi to a hero like Madman with a decent stat gain, two of the best carry skills in the game, AND an AoE slow + blink really shows a lack of understanding.

Seriously, why bother porting DotA heroes when you're just going to ignore the balance and counters that each hero brings by creating heroes like Madman? The same can be said about so many other skills and hero ports. Omniknight with Tidebringer that slows? Tidebringer is a fairly balanced skill. Giving Omniknight a splashsword that slows + a repel that even prevents ultimates makes zero sense.

Nymphora's stun vs. ice path? Ice path is a little underpowered only because THD's cast point is the third highest among int casters. Nymphora's stun comes out instantly and outclasses ice path in every way? Why am I making a comparison to a hero that isn't even ported? Because by porting DotA heroes over, HoN has placed themselves automatically within the numbers realm of Icefrog's DotA. Skill dmg, duration, stat gain, base armor, base damage, etc are all balanced within this sphere. You don't see Icefrog making heroes with 7s stuns, 8s stuns, to give an extreme example.

Electrician, another hero that is very poorly thought out. Electrician has a LONG disable. Why is this imbalanced? Lets take a look:

Heroes with long disables: Rhasta, Naga, Alchemist, CK. Naga's disable only stops movement and blinks, not other skills or attacking. Alchemist requires 5s of channeling and can be dodged by ww, invis, blink. CK is random. Rhasta is the most similar in skill. Why is rhasta balanced? Because his movespeed is lower than other heroes, and his tankability is very poor, so it's easy to just focus him down if he tries to shackle in a teamfight. Electrician, on the other hand, has a mana shield, making him automatically a better tank than most other heroes. His movespeed is better than Rhasta's (not sure about this if someone could check). So it's very easy for him to simply initiate with a long disable. If he gets focused, good since he's a tank he's taking a lot of hits for his team to wipe up later. If the other team decides to run, the disabled hero is definitely dead because Electrician's disable has a stupid short cooldown. This is clearly overpowered and very poorly thought out.

It just seems that the S2 team is lacking an experienced DotA player who is knowledgeable about the game's balances and intricacies. It feels as if each of the heroes was designed by a pubber who wanted to make each new hero he creates stronger than the last. This is an old problem that DotA many ages ago suffered from; I really can't wait until the HoN Astral Trekker comes out.

Now, finally, you might be saying, why is this relevant? It's just the beta, stop crying. The main focus is to make beta games better and more fun to play. The more imbalances and senseless changes there are in this game the fewer beta testers there will be. Whether or not you really care about this is up to you. I for one would rather play a more balanced and fun beta phase of this game.

[Aegd]

Heroes with long disables: Rhasta, Naga, Alchemist, CK. Naga's disable only stops movement and blinks, not other skills or attacking. Alchemist requires 5s of channeling and can be dodged by ww, invis, blink. CK is random. Rhasta is the most similar in skill. Why is rhasta balanced? Because his movespeed is lower than other heroes, and his tankability is very poor, so it's easy to just focus him down if he tries to shackle in a teamfight. Electrician, on the other hand, has a mana shield, making him automatically a better tank than most other heroes. His movespeed is better than Rhasta's (not sure about this if someone could check). So it's very easy for him to simply initiate with a long disable. If he gets focused, good since he's a tank he's taking a lot of hits for his team to wipe up later. If the other team decides to run, the disabled hero is definitely dead because Electrician's disable has a stupid short cooldown. This is clearly overpowered and very poorly thought out.

Disable the disabler. Focus on another target, or kill him fast.

Problem solved.

It's not like you're forced to stand there hitting him. Do you're entire team always focus on Bradwarden when he initiates?

[Rippsy]

Do you're entire team always focus on Bradwarden when he initiates?

All too often... :(

eheh; but seriously interupt him- then ignore him. He does very little damage in a team fight his sole purpose is to use that grapple to start the fight!

[GLDNSWRD]

Balance will come after release. /thread

[kingcomrade]

Dust and Wards only work during team fights, and they don't counter +MS. The whole beginning of the game you can either spend a lot of money warding your whole lane to protect against ganks or you can use dust just as you are about to die. Invis heroes are also nearly impossible to gank because they all get +MS when they go invis.

Balance will come after release.Idiot

[Trasen]

lol sniper recently got much better with shrapnel + range buff, its actually decent now, unlike freaking scattershot.

imo they really shouldn't have gone around buffing/nerfing castpoints/animations.
icefrog had it down pat -> don't fix what ain't broke

That´s one of the smartest (and true) things i have heard on this forum.
Spread the word!

[_Archangel_]

Some great points, and if Lina's cast animation is not changed, then I'd attribute her cast change to the change in her third skill to increasing cast speed.

All of the points really come together into one point that I'm trying to make:
The S2 team seemed to have ported heroes at whim with the idea that a hero is balanced around his skills only. No consideration is given to cast animation, attack animation, hero pool.

Just look at their construction of Madman. Shukuchi is a very very powerful skill. The reason why Shukuchi is fine is because Nerubian Weaver is balanced around that skill. His attack animation is poor. His stat gain is poor. His scaling carry skill, Geminate, is also subpar. And he has no disables past silence. (though weaver is still a bit underpowered, you can see my point). Giving Shukuchi to a hero like Madman with a decent stat gain, two of the best carry skills in the game, AND an AoE slow + blink really shows a lack of understanding.

Seriously, why bother porting DotA heroes when you're just going to ignore the balance and counters that each hero brings by creating heroes like Madman? The same can be said about so many other skills and hero ports. Omniknight with Tidebringer that slows? Tidebringer is a fairly balanced skill. Giving Omniknight a splashsword that slows + a repel that even prevents ultimates makes zero sense.

Nymphora's stun vs. ice path? Ice path is a little underpowered only because THD's cast point is the third highest among int casters. Nymphora's stun comes out instantly and outclasses ice path in every way? Why am I making a comparison to a hero that isn't even ported? Because by porting DotA heroes over, HoN has placed themselves automatically within the numbers realm of Icefrog's DotA. Skill dmg, duration, stat gain, base armor, base damage, etc are all balanced within this sphere. You don't see Icefrog making heroes with 7s stuns, 8s stuns, to give an extreme example.

Electrician, another hero that is very poorly thought out. Electrician has a LONG disable. Why is this imbalanced? Lets take a look:

Heroes with long disables: Rhasta, Naga, Alchemist, CK. Naga's disable only stops movement and blinks, not other skills or attacking. Alchemist requires 5s of channeling and can be dodged by ww, invis, blink. CK is random. Rhasta is the most similar in skill. Why is rhasta balanced? Because his movespeed is lower than other heroes, and his tankability is very poor, so it's easy to just focus him down if he tries to shackle in a teamfight. Electrician, on the other hand, has a mana shield, making him automatically a better tank than most other heroes. His movespeed is better than Rhasta's (not sure about this if someone could check). So it's very easy for him to simply initiate with a long disable. If he gets focused, good since he's a tank he's taking a lot of hits for his team to wipe up later. If the other team decides to run, the disabled hero is definitely dead because Electrician's disable has a stupid short cooldown. This is clearly overpowered and very poorly thought out.

It just seems that the S2 team is lacking an experienced DotA player who is knowledgeable about the game's balances and intricacies. It feels as if each of the heroes was designed by a pubber who wanted to make each new hero he creates stronger than the last. This is an old problem that DotA many ages ago suffered from; I really can't wait until the HoN Astral Trekker comes out.

Now, finally, you might be saying, why is this relevant? It's just the beta, stop crying. The main focus is to make beta games better and more fun to play. The more imbalances and senseless changes there are in this game the fewer beta testers there will be. Whether or not you really care about this is up to you. I for one would rather play a more balanced and fun beta phase of this game.

Excuse me, but Rhasta is far more powerful than Electrician is.

[willtsay]

imo electrician is... ok will have to see more down the line haha DotA rhsta is better than elec, is the current one's cast range still gimped?

but aside from that pummol has a point, S2 should stop leave alone the dota ports, icefrog did a realllly good job on his errr 95? heroes (although i feel alch still needs some tweaking)

but back on topic, tiny "needs" the ability of being able to cast avalance and walk toward them rite away so he can get an extra smack in :)

[_Archangel_]

After you stun and break Electrician's grip there's no need to focus him seeing as he doesn't do much else. If Electrician is not being attacked, then what's his Mana Shield for? Quite useless.

Rhasta is so powerful he's even been called a "carry" in the way that if he places his Wards and Shackles well in consecutive teamfights, he carries his team to a win.

Electrician can do no such thing. All he can do is gank with grip and purge and even Rhasta ganks better than him