Best reworks in Dota 2 patch 7.40, ranked

Dota 2 patch 7.40 delivered an aggressive balance patch in terms of balance, item overhauls, and reworks that reshaped several heroes. Some heroes received a makeover to their full kit, some abilities were restructured, while others received a small, but meaningful addition to round out their abilities.

After some time with the patch, the community has adjusted to the changes, ironing out their quirks while experimenting with the most optimal build. As of Patch 7.40b, these are the most successful hero reworks in Dota 2.

Valve is back with another rendition of conceptually ruining Brewmaster. Bluntly, the changes are rough for the handful of Brewmaster mains out there as Valve attempted to consolidate its discarded Facets into the base kit.

Brewmaster’s Liquid Courage (derived from the Drunken Master Facet) is now an innate, granting bonus Status Resistance at low health, along with this awkward effect that alternates his movement speed between fast and slow. Cindew Brew’s barrel roll is now baseline, and Drunker Brawler is now a toggleable stance.

The worst part is that Void Brewling was removed from Primal Split, along with the associated stance. By trying to do all of his recent iterations at once, Brewmaster has too many things going on and is in an abysmal state.

Slark’s small rework seemed confusing, as it shifted around his abilities without addressing the issues of the hero. Essence Shift is now the hero’s new innate, moving Barracuda’s effects to Shadow Dance instead. That means that Slark’s health regen and movement speed when unseen won’t be in effect until level six.

A new ability called Saltwater Shiv now takes the place of his old third ability. This auto-attack modifier steals movement speed, health regen, and health restoration, and each use of the ability refreshes all stacks. 

It sounds good on paper, yet the duration only becomes longer than the cooldown after three points in the ability. It doesn’t help that the mana cost for the ability is too high for an ability you’ll proc constantly. This rework is an effort to curb the annoying position four Slark, yet it’s the carry who suffers for their sins.

Treant Protector was one of the most hyped heroes during the Dota 2 new patch release date, as his huge ability and Aghanim’s Scepter pointed towards a potential position three role. While the community had their fun by turning into a gigantic tree like an Ent in Lord of the Rings, he still had issues like farm speed and needed too many big items to come online.

As a support, Treant Protector excels in the laning phase, bullying the opposing heroes with his massive auto attack damage and reworked abilities built for brawling. Yet, he struggles to save his allies in the middle of fights as well as before because of the range limit of Leech Seed, which is now an attack modifier.

Treant’s greatest change is that he can secure vision much earlier with Eyes in the Forest, now granted by Aghanim’s Shard instead of Scepter. His natural invisibility from Nature’s Guise and added vision make him strong for scouting and catching enemies deep in their own jungle.

If you’ve read Dota 2 patch 7.40, then you’ll have come across Lone Druid’s intimidating wall of text. Let’s highlight the important bits to better understand his major rework:

After the rework, Lone Druid plummeted and became the second-lowest lowest winrate in Dota 2, which can be attributed to players adjusting and also unfamiliar players coming to test the hero. LD has slowly clawed back to a ~47% winrate, but remains an unpopular hero.

Both Lone Druid and Spirit Bear survivability were gutted with nerfs to their armour and magic resistance. Losing the bonus attack speed on Spirit Link is also debilitating for farming and scaling with items. 

The changes to make Entangle more consistent are welcome, and the hero potentially hits much harder, but now players have to be more conservative during fights. Overall, a net nerf, but with finetuning, Lone Druid could be a competent carry.   

In Dota 2’s patch history, Diffusal Blade always went hand-in-hand with illusion-based heroes because of their natural synergy with Manabreak. That’s why it was a surprising change when they removed that effect in patch 7.40. Naturally, the community thought this signalled the death of Phantom Lancer.

It’s indeed a rough nerf for the hero, losing an early power spike and the ability to counter mana-hungry heroes like Bristleback. But, Valve made up with a substantial buff to his reworked innate, Illusory Armaments, where Phantom Lancer’s illusions can’t have less than 18% of his damage for three seconds, scaling with levels. 

This means that PL is no longer dependent on the Diffusal Blade and opens up his build path. Currently, Phantom Lancer is finding success with a semi-caster playstyle, opting for Phylactery and an early Aghanim’s Scepter.

Earth Spirit had a minor rework when compared to the other heroes in the patch, but it was enough to pull him out of a year-long slump into a playable state. The hero gained a significant damage buff to his innate ability, Stone Remnant, passively granting bonus attack damage per unused charge.

Not only that, he can boost this to a larger damage buff after using an ability on the Stone Remnant. With new talents that make him scale better as a core, it’s no wonder he’s slowly returning as a midlaner in pro and pub play.

For supports, Earth Spirit also had his lifesaving pull in Geomagnetic Grip baked into his kit instead of requiring a shard. Even though he’s still a fairly unpopular hero, he now has a healthy 50% winrate in higher brackets (owing to his difficulty) thanks to his buffs.

Spectre has had her abilities shuffled around to make her a more active carry. The biggest change that allowed her to flourish as one of the best carries this Dota 2 patch is reworking her previous ultimate, Shadow Step, into a basic ability. This made space to slot in her original ultimate, Haunt, back where it truly belongs.

The reworked Shadow Step gave Spectre early access to a point-and-click gap closer. Combine this with Phylactery for added burst, then she can start joining skirmishes as early as 10 minutes. This is a far different timing from the usual Spectre, who would mindlessly farm the jungle for half the game while occasionally joining fights with her ultimate.

Spectre’s rework is much more fun to play and dominates the lower and middle ranks, but falls off in effectiveness the higher you go.

Clinkz is undeniably the star of Dota 2 patch 7.40, becoming the most successful and popular rework of the new patch. The skeleton archer is one of the most reworked heroes in Dota 2’s history, and maybe Valve has finally found the right formula for the hero, even if he’s currently overtuned.

Clinkz welcomes back a much-needed returning base ability, Searing Arrows, which eases his terrible laning stage by giving him more harass and damage to secure farm. But his real power comes from his new innate, Infernal Shred, which allows him and his skeletons to apply a stacking debuff that pierces the target’s armour.

With Clinkz coming online much earlier, he’s a perfect fit into this Dota 2’s tempo-driven meta. Where other carries are busy farming, Clinkz is ready to hunt as soon as 15 minutes, only needing a Falcon Blade and Desolator to start snowballing the game.

Dota 2’s patch 7.40 batch of reworks showcases how Valve is unafraid of experimentation. Even if it doesn’t land immediately, finetuning and balance passes usually do the job. Heroes like Clinkz, Spectre, Phantom Lancer, and Earth Spirit got the right push they needed to make their way back into the meta, while Brewmaster was overly complicated and lost cohesion.