Slark's Position in Metagame: Will He Be Relevant Again?

At last week’s Epicenter XL tournament, Slark suddenly reappeared as carry main. It appears 25 times in draft, 13 times pick and 12 times tire. Out of 13 uses, he won 11 times. This makes him a hero situational pick (appears between 10 and 15 times) the most successful in the tournament.

This happens not only in the competitive realm but also in pub games. Since April 26 aka patches 7.12, Slark is getting more and more popular with pick-rate the average rose from about 11 percent to 23 percent. Not only is he getting more popular, he’s also getting more and more successful with win rate which increased from 49 percent to 52 percent.

What happened? Why is this hero so popular? Then most importantly, will he be more popular in the future?

Slark Before 7.12

Slark’s disappearance from the radar has been around since patches 7.07 with Hex which cannot be removed with dispel. Due to this one change, the Dark Pact made Slark lose his potency kill that he has faced support like Lion or Shadow Shaman. step on late game one of the heroes core Opponents can also purchase the Scythe of Vyse, rendering the Dark Pact useless.

However that was not the main factor that made it almost extinct in meta-game. The more influential factor is with gameplay popular in meta-game at the moment.

First, offlane no longer a position that is always sacrificed and placed in difficult situations. dual lane like Tiny and Chen were always feared. Support actives like Sand King and Tusk can also always appear in safe lane to do harass or gank. safe lane no longer a sure safe place to do farm. This doesn’t count the hero’s tendencies off lane who cut creepwave first from behind tier 1 tower opponent.

Lane setup This exploits one of Slark’s weaknesses, namely the laning the bad one. Even though this hero needs a phase laning which is safe so that he can do farm and play more actively once you get items key like Shadow Blade. With phase laning the bad one, Slark is having trouble or late getting items main. If that happens, the potential is within ganking will decrease, he can’t snowball, and ended up being useless entering late game.

The popular style of play that focuses on push timing which is faster with heroes like Dragon Knight, Death Prophet, and Terrorblade is also another factor. If you lose map control, Slark is also difficult to do gank or maybe farming. This exacerbates his problem of finding timing and power spikes The ideal.

All of the above factors make Slark no place. It cannot be placed in lane setup aggressive (eg dual off lane), but placing it in safe lane also not always safe. Without momentum, it could easily become useless.

Slark After 7.12

Patch 7.12 give buff in the form of HP regen as well as turn rate to Slark. But the key change for Slark is in patches 7.13 which changes the bonus for each attribute.

This change provides two advantages for Slark. First, new bonus for heroes agility make Essence Shift give more armor and also attack speed. Not only that, if you attack a hero strength, Essence Shift also drains more HP. It means hero strength opponent can die faster.

One more change that makes Slark’s position easier is with a change to creepwave first in patches 7.14. As long as it’s well taken care of and gets all last hits, he should be able to get at least one creepwave. Besides, it prevents damage creep equilibrium since wave first. Because off lane opponent can no longer cut creepwave since wave first.

Final, patches 7.12 also increases Slark’s HP regeneration from 1.5 to 2.75 per second. With how regeneration works and scaling, this allows it to last longer in lane.

Overall, this makes early game and laning Slark made it easier. That way he could make the transition to late game easily.

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In the end, Slark still has the same weakness, that is laning which is weak and can be countered with Hex. But Valve clearly gave Slark a place in meta-game.

The question is, what is Slark’s position in meta-game in the future? He is a hero who is quite difficult to find the point balance. With just one change, he can become a hero who is too strong alias broken, or completely useless. We’ll see next week on patches 7.15 onwards.

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