With a full day of play under our belts, we thought we’d find out what everyone thinks of Dota 2's 7.22 patch. With ESL One Birmingham starting on May 28th 2019, the dramatic changes are going to make for some interesting strategies from the all-star cast of teams taking part.
The most talked-about update in 7.22 is the massive changes to Aghanim’s Scepter. In this version every hero can now use Aghs, and the upgrades make for dramatic changes in gameplay.
Arteezy said what most of r/dota2 was thinking, that everyone will now be making their Aghs first and not bother with normal builds any more. EG also first-picked Mars for s4 to play yesterday vs Team Spirit, but it didn't quite work out.
Riley from our Luckbox Discord Community was a little sore about the patch and Arteezy’s performance in the Adrenaline Cyber League:
Riley: I bet on EG yesterday and they got rekt 2-0 by Team Spirit. I didn’t know there was gonna be a patch, thanks OsFrog
Wagamama felt that this patch didn’t address his main concern about the current meta, specifically that the popular carry heroes are becoming a bit boring both to play and to face as opponents.
Also from our discord server, Jaster felt that the Drogon-esque Black Dragon Form for DK should get a buff.
Jaster: Dragonknight Aghanims is literally the largest flying unit in the game... but can't fly over small cliffs
The timing of this patch means that teams heading to Birmingham for ESL One will be faced with a whole new metagame to deal with. Heen, coach of TNC Predator, had this tongue-in-cheek comment on the patch.
Not every team is quite as worried though. Team Secret have been consistently ahead of the meta for the whole of this year, and it seems that Puppey already has his strategy nailed.
We’re excited to see how ESL One Birmingham will play out next week. For all the gossip, check out our podcast with host of the show, Redeye.
