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Both American teams made top 8! USA USA USA! Too bad they were both violated by the top Chinese teams. I'm really liking DK's 4v5 style but I'm not jumping off the Zenith bandwagon just yet. Anyone have any recommendations on games to watch? iG v MTW and Mouz vs DK were my favorite series by far. Mouz v Zenith really showed Mouz's unique ability to throw games.

Groups and the schedule for the International have been announced. The only way Zenith could have it easier is if Darer were in their group as well. http://www.dota2.com/international/prelims/schedule/sunday/

Nonsense. She isn't Earthshaker or Tidehunter but the ability to trade VS for an important enemy hero is incredibly useful.

Let's talk about the real best initiator, Vengeful Spirit.

A bit of rap for my fellow thumbs. I've been trying to tell fools for the last decade that Billy Woods is the best ever but it wasn't until earlier this year the he put an album out worth the time.

If he was split pushing you should have been able to outright stop him with your aghanim's ult. You're not really going to shut NP down once he's got a Midas without giving a lot up to the rest of his team. Usually you're not going to lose to a carry Prophet without something else going horribly wrong for you. I know the feeling you have though. I was having a great game playing support Undying last night but our two biggest team fight heroes were absolutely useless. Sand King that went Blink Dagger to Satanic and never blinked anyway and a Leshrac that loved to put himself in perfectly gankable positions. Even then I still felt like we should have won but it wasn't to be.

I really don't see the appeal of this at all. You set sliders and hope that Chris Crawford's interpretation doesn't totally defeat your expectation. It's like a Paradox game with less (no) play.

I'm probably the only person that always wants Visage in his lane. Trips to the fountain for everything that comes close.

I played this with Korax and another cuddy of mine a few weeks past. It's a lot of fun even if it is really difficult. Haven't played it much since then, the utter lack of success partly driving that.

I sure do love Undying with a hood and a vangaurd I really do feel unkillable. We've been running a lot of puck/undying to great effect. Dream Coil with a Tombstone in the middle and at the end everything is dead or running on a spot waiting to die.

Yeah but it's not like Chen creeps, you make the boar auto-attack your target and you send your hawk to scout (plus you can totally pass the bird to someone else, the boar is just drag and click). Beastmaster doesn't need a great deal of farm, is a great lane presence on any lane, and is very hard to mess up big time. I think he teaches a lot more about the game than most other heroes as well.

I couldn't agree with Twig more, a new player should not be playing farm heavy heroes like Drow and Leoric. Especially so for those two heroes because they are so susceptible to ganks. You're leaving your team at a horrible disadvantage when your carry doesn't know how to farm effectively. We tried this recently and had to basically 4v5 every game we played. edit: For my money, Beastmaster is a great beginner hero.

Had a Dota LAN party last weekend and had a sweet basshunter moment. I'm screaming at a friend for not using Nyx's stun at full range at the same time his mom walks into the room bewildered at the scene in front of her. The only thing I could think to say to excuse my behavior was "you know, dota". When did this song get 30 million views?!

My absolute favorite video game soundtrack. The world needs more string quartets.

The problem with most DoT reliant heroes is that Lanaya will kill them almost instantly if she attacks them. They'll put in work during team fights but otherwise they should stay far away.

Thanks for the recommendations, guys. Unfortunately I own everything mentioned already.

I haven't seen anything that really grabs me so I'll ask you fine folk. Are there any $5 games that are must-haves?

Windrunner has two treads 25 minutes in. They have a long way to go.

Na'Vi lost the Dreamhack grand final to mTw a few weeks ago. I'm really looking forward to watching mTw, Na'Vi, Zenith, and DK at The International. I really can't see any of the other teams winning. In a Beyond the Summit match today Zenith chose not to ban any hero against Orange (another International team); gave up a Lycan, Prophet, and Chen but still managed to stomp.

Mouz was stomped in two. Na'Vi are really just a level (or two) above Mouz.

There are few heroes in the pool that I wouldn't give a farmed Phantom Lancer the edge over. Outworld Destroyer (a hard counter to PL), Spectre, Faceless Void, and Mortred are probably it for me. Even then Void would need his ult and Mortred would need lots of crits. The problem with PL is that he doesn't have much usefulness until the late game. Once PL is farmed he can 1v5 his way to victory, before that you're a low damage nuke and another dead hero. Most games just don't go on long enough for Phantom Lancer to be any good. Still, he's a hell of a lot better than Alchemist and Sniper.

Rubick was added to the test client. This is by far the best possible dota news. I played around with him a bit and he's just as trollish and awesome as i remember. Zeus casts his ult, I take it and give it out again.

I discovered Alan a few days ago and am very glad to have no reason to watch a purge video again. Your descriptions are spot on. I've been playing a lot of different heroes lately and forget just how much I enjoy playing as Death Prophet. By the end of the game all 5 enemy heroes were banging on me and I managed to kill 3 before I walked away.

Phantom Assassin and Spectre are ridiculous in the late game. Dire couldn't have won at any point past 45 minutes in a regular 5v5 but with that extra gold they were screwed from the start.

When do you guys usually get together for games? Solo-queueing is really taking a chunk out of my soul. It's like people go out of their way to shit on their team. I just finished back-to-back games where a hero with natural crits bought crystalis and then critiqued everyone's items.