How to play Sand King in Dota 2 patch 7.34

After the launch of Dota 2 patch 7.34, Sand King has become the most successful hero in the game. His win rate at the moment is 58.3%, which is enormous. And his pick rate is 10.6%. But why do so many players pick SK and what can he do?

SK used to be picked by many players in professional tournaments. He was seen extensively at multiple editions of The International but then he disappeared almost completely from the meta. Now he’s back and people seem to be playing him in a very aggressive way.

Sand King’s strengths

Sand King was significantly buffed in Dota 2 patch 7.34 and he now has a very easy laning phase while his enemies tend to struggle. Sand Storm is no longer fixed in a given area. Instead, it follows him around at a speed of 100 units per second.

Another cool improvement is Epicenter’s Aghanim’s Shard upgrade. Instead of activating every 700 units moved, it activates every 2.5s. That’s really powerful because it guarantees that you will hit a target several times with it in any kind of engagement, especially if you’re dealing with a melee hero.

Combined with Sand Storm, your basic Epicenter upgrade will force many heroes to run away.

The most aggressive way to play Sand King is with Radiance. Sand Storm naturally reaches 105 damage per second. Add to that the Radiance effect and you’re dealing 165. Then add the Epicenter pulses and it’s above 200.

And if we also add Epicenter’s active, and Borrowstrike, you can easily cause a 1000 AoE burst in a large area in just several seconds. This makes your teammates’ work so much easier because every single enemy hero trapped in your ultimate and Sand Storm will have their HP cut by a third, a half, or even two-thirds in the case of supports.

In the laning phase, SK’s Caustic Finale makes it hard for the enemy carry to be aggressive. If he gets trapped by your slows and the explosions caused by dying creeps, he’s in a lot of trouble.

Another thing that makes SK really powerful right now is the synergy he has with a lot of other heroes. If you combine him with a Dazzle, a Witch Doctor, a Dark Seer, or just about any other powerful laner, he is deadly.

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