I'm not sure I enjoy the pace of the new games. It's very easy to get levels. Also seems easier to get multiple items as a support but I'm not sure if that's a function of easier levels.
It's easier to get items if you play support as hard 5, but if you play the typical solo support in pubs, I found it better to simply watch for empty lanes to farm here and there, while your cores run around like headless chickens. Of course, if your team is pushing a tower and you are farming, you are doing it wrong, but more often than not, there is enough downtime that you can get 1 item before 20 minutes easily, thus making it much easier to survive teamfights and snowballing from there.I'll have to monitor it more but I seem to have quite a bit of items as support (ghost scepter, euls, forcestaff, etc) where prior to the patch I'd be lucky to have 1 of those most games.
7.01
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* Added Necrophos to CM
* XP Requirement to go from level 6 to 12 increased by 140 (615/630/645/660/675/775 to 640/660/680/700/720/740)
* XP Requirement to go from level 12 to 20 increased by 140 (1175/1200/1225/1250/1275/1375/1400/1425 to 1200/1225/1250/1275/1300/1325/1400/1490)
* XP Requirement to go from level 24 to 25 reduced by 280 (same overall XP required to reach level 25)
* Fixed Jingu Mastery ignoring armor for its lifesteal calculation
* Jingu Mastery counter duration reduced from 15 to 10 seconds
* Boundless Strike critical strike rescaled from 200% to 140/160/180/200%
* Howl cooldown increased from 50/45/40/35 to 55/50/45/40
* Howl manacost increased from 15/20/25/30 to 30
* Lycan Level 10 Talent reduced from +20 Damage to +15 Damage
* Lycan agility gain reduced from 1.9 to 1.5
* Familiars HP reduced from 500/750/1000 to 300/500/700
* Visage base damage reduced by 3
* Windranger Level 15 Talent increased from +13 Intelligence to +16 Intelligence
* Windranger Level 15 Talent increased from +150 Health to +200 Health
* Windrun cooldown from 14 to 13
* Slark strength reduced from 21 + 1.8 to 20 + 1.6
* Purification manacost rescaled from 70/90/110/130 to 85/100/115/130
* Guardian Angel cooldown increased from 150 to 160
* Invoker Level 15 Talent increased from 20% XP to 25% XP
* Quas HP regen rescaled from 1.5/3/4.5/6/.. to 1/3/5/7/..
* Invoker strength gain increased from 1.7 to 1.9
* Centaur agility gain reduced from 2.0 to 1.6
* Pit of Malice interval increased from 3.5 to 3.6 seconds
* Pit of Malice cooldown increased from 30/26/22/18 to 32/28/24/20
* Nature's Guise bash rescaled from 1/1.4/1.8/2.2 to 0.7/1.2/1.7/2.2
* Treant Level 25 Talent changed from +20% 2s Bash to -50s Respawn Time
* Treant Protector movement speed reduced from 300 to 295
* Stifling Dagger base damage reduced from 70 to 65
* Luna base armor reduced by 1
* Reality Rift armor debuff rescaled from -3/4/5/6 to -1/3/5/7
* Fixed Chaos Strike lifesteal ignoring armor reductions
* Chaos Strike lifesteal increased from 50% to 65%
* Nature's Prophet Level 15 Talent increased from +10 Intelligence to +15
* Nature's Prophet Level 15 Talent increased from +15 Movement Speed to +20
* Nature's Prophet Level 25 Talent increased from -35s Respawn Time to -40
* Nature's Prophet Level 25 Talent changed from +6 Treants to 2x Treants HP/Damage
* Meepo Clones are now allowed to pickup runes
* Witch Doctor Level 25 Talent increased from +150 Death Ward Attack Range to +175
* Sven Level 15 Talent increased from +6 all stats to +8
* Sven Level 15 Talent increased from +15 MS to +20
* Incapacitating Bite slow increased from 10/20/30/40 to 14/24/34/44%
* Zeus Level 20 Talent increased from -35s Respawn Time to -40
* Zeus Level 20 Talent increased from +30 Movement Speed to +35
* Tusk turn rate improved from 0.5 to 0.7
* Enchantress base intelligence increased by 3
* Enchantress Level 10 Talent increased from +15 Movement Speed to +20
* Enchantress Level 20 Talent increased from -25s Respawn Time to -30s
* Geminate Attack cooldown from 6/5/4/3 to 7/6/5/3
* Dream Coil cooldown reduced from 75 to 70/65/60
* Lina Level 15 Talent increased from +100 Cast Range to +125
* Lina Level 15 Talent increased from -25s Respawn to -30s
* Lina Level 20 Talent increased from +5% Spell Amp to 6%
* Death Prophet level 10 Talent increased from +6 Strength to 7
* Doom Level 20 Talent increased from +50 Damage to +65
* Doom Level 20 Talent increased from +20 Health Regen to +25
* Smokescreen slow from 13/17/21/25% to 10/15/20/25%
* Ogre Magi movement speed reduced from 295 to 290
There are 896 talents with possible changes added in addition to everything that was before 7.0.Doesn't seem any more of a pain in the ass than "Hero strength growth reduced from 2.2 to 1.9" and "Mana cost rescaled from 10/15/20/25 to 15/20/25/30" and all the other shit. That's how Icefrog balances and every patch is just a long list of minor changes with a few big ones. I mean even that patch, remove all the talent shit, it's still -5 speed and -0.3 agility growth here and there.
The amount of talent isn't relevant? If Icefrog wants to change 20things about a hero, he didn't need talents to do that. The amount of things that can be tweaked increased, but the amount of things that will be tweaked isn't necessarily going to be higher. This patch is probably not a good example since it's the first patch right after the massive changes, so it probably has more changes than usual. Even then, it's still only 50changes compared to the 30 of 6.88b, after adding 900 more things that could have changed.There are 896 talents with possible changes added in addition to everything that was before 7.0.