Strong Late Game Heroes in Dota 2

Dota 2 games typically last anywhere between 20 and 90 minutes. The late game is considered to be the portion of the game that starts at around the 30-minute mark. Beyond that point, you are in the late game and some heroes are simply much stronger than others during this stage.

That doesn’t mean you can’t win games with a Templar Assassin after minute 30. But you must know that she was not designed to excel against a hero like Spectre, Anti-Mage, or Slark at this point in the game, especially if the two sides have equal networth.

Here are some of the strongest late-game heroes in Dota 2 and the reasons why they are hard to beat after the 30-minute mark.

Anti-Mage

Anti-Mage has the ability to blink every 5s across 1350 units. That makes him very hard to catch. And even if you do catch him, it will take a long time for you to kill him because his magic resistance is huge and his armor is high. Plus he’s going to have a lot of HP after the 30-minute mark because of his items.

Fighting a late-game Anti-Mage is one of the most difficult things to do in Dota 2. You can succeed, but only if you have high physical damage and long-duration stuns, roots, slows, or silences.

Offensively, this hero tends to be a menace because he can blink in, use Manta Style and Abyssal Blade, drain your mana in seconds, and then cast his ultimate. If he does this on one of your support heroes or on a core with 1500 mana, your entire team could lose more than 1000 HP when that hero is killed with a deadly mana void.

Heroes like Storm Spirit, Invoker, Zeus, and Leshrac detest playing against AM and for good reason. They have very little to stop him and must rely on their other cores to get the job done. In the first 20 minutes, they can do it if they coordinate properly. But after AM has Battle Fury, Manta Style, and a Basher, it’s pretty much game over.

In some cases, he could also buy a heart and go for a super defensive build that allows him to do whatever he wants.

Spectre

Spectre has three qualities that make her a formidable carry hero. She is tanky, she can join fights from anywhere on the map, and her mobility is incredible thanks to Spectral Dagger. Apart from these qualities, she also has a high damage output if you buy the right items and you’re dealing with an isolated target.

Spectre’s talents revolve around her Desolate and Spectral Dagger abilities. Only at level 25 do you get to upgrade your Dispersion (by 5%) or your Haunt (by 30% illusion damage). This makes Spectre a bit weak in the early game. But if you get to the 30-minute mark and reach level 20, you are very hard to kill.

Spectre’s Spectral Dagger provides unobstructed mobility for 7s, as well as 22% movement speed. Desolate adds 60 pure damage to her basic attacks. Dispersion reflects 20% damage and can be combined with a Blade Mail to practically double that effect.

A 20% damage reduction is enormous. When combined with a bit of armor, this hero becomes tankier than most tanks. And the more she gets hit, the more her enemies get damaged. If you have a Radiance, the damage per second increases tremendously.

Spectre’s ultimate, Shadow Step, offers the possibility to set up a gank every 60 – 40s. In the late game, that offers you the ability to farm uninterrupted while also joining your team for fights almost every creep wave.

Some years ago, Spectre used to be always played with an early Radiance. This gave her the ability to farm quickly and get lots of kills during ultimates. The Spectre plus Zeus combo was a game ruiner in most cases.

These days, Spectre’s build often includes a Manta Style and a Diffusal Blade. Both items are really strong and offer you the ability to quickly surround and kill a target without being easily targetable. When a support hero needs to choose between three targets, he will often pick the wrong one.

Spectre’s effective HP grows enormously after level 20 if you choose the +350 HP talent. Based on your item build, you could easily have 2500 – 3000 raw HP at that point.

Slark

Slark is relatively easy to kill in the laning phase. But after he buys Aghanim’s Scepter and Eye of Skadi, he is very hard to eliminate. He can quickly disengage, find the protection of shadows, and regenerate much of his HP until he’s detected again. By that point, you might have to give up the chase because he could turn around and fight you.

Slark excels because he has a combination of speed, HP regen, and mobility. He also gets stronger the longer the fight goes because he steals stats from his opponents. With every hit he lands, he gains 3 agility while his opponent loses 1 point in each attribute.

Just 10 hits will give him 30 damage, 30 attack speed, and 5 armor. With 20 hits, his bonuses will be phenomenal: 60 damage, 60 attack speed, and 10 armor. That’s almost the equivalent of a Butterfly. This is the reason why you don’t want to pick certain kinds of tanky heroes against Slark. Their inability to die fast enough becomes a problem for their entire team.

In the early game, a hero like Tidehunter or Timbersaw is generally very strong against Slark. But after the 30-minute mark, the little fish eats the big fish.

Slark can be played with items like Linken’s Sphere. Combined with his Dark Pact, this item essentially allows him to block an important targeted spell. When that happens, you should immediately activate your Dark Pact and be ready to block another spell. If you don’t get targeted, just retreat and wait for your cooldowns to reset.

Or, if you want to play aggressively and aren’t afraid of getting punished for it, use your ultimate and try to get a kill during the 4s in which you regenerate and are practically immortal.

If you’re already full HP and the target cannot disable you in any way, delay your ultimate and simply use your Pounce. When having Aghanim’s Scepter, this ability has 2 charges and a range of 1000 units. A charge restores every 12s. You also gain 3 Essence Shift stacks when leashing a hero, which gives you great momentum.

One successful Pounce followed 7 quick attacks results in 10 stacks or 30 stolen agility. This can be done very easily at the start of the fight, especially if you have a Linken’s Sphere. Support heroes can’t do anything against this hero once he buys Linken’s or activates his Q or ultimate.

Keep in mind that the leash lasts for 3.25s (or 3.75s if you choose the appropriate talent). That’s enough time for 7 attacks on a hero like Slark, whose attack rate tends to be excellent after the 30-minute mark.

Tinker

Tinker is one of those heroes you do not want to play against in the late game because he can refresh the cooldown of his abilities and items in just 1.25s, using Rearm. His magic resistance is also very high, so you will need lots of physical damage to kill him. But if he has an Ethereal Blade, he’ll be hard to hit.

In the past, Tinkers used to spend all of their early game gold on Boots of Travel. But now they can skip that item and buy Phylactery, which is deadly. Combined with a Blink Dagger, Tinker gains the ability to engage and disengage at will.

The damage dealt by his spells is substantial. Laser will blind a hero for 4.5s and deal 300 pure damage. Heat-Seeking Missile also deals a massive amount of damage and can be cast from 1500 range. Defense Matrix gives Tinker 320 protection against damage and 40% status resistance for 15s. Its cooldown is only 12s.

Keen Conveyance allows you to teleport to a friendly structure, unit, or allied hero. This ability is Tinker’s second ultimate and acts like a TP scroll at level 1, Boots of Travel at level 2, and Boots of Travel 2 at level 3.

Tinker is strong in the late game because of his items and the ability to rearm them. Whatever he buys, he can use over and over. Aether Lens is very useful for this hero because he has a lot of abilities that benefit from it. Dagon is also a great tool because it can be refreshed in 1.25s and then reused with deadly effectiveness.

In Dota 2 games, Tinker acts like heavy artillery in a real battle. As long as he is protected, he will destroy the enemy team from afar and empower his allies tremendously. If he has Scythe of Vyse, he can permanently disable a target until it is killed. Even if you’re fighting against a powerful Phantom Lancer or Morphling, Tinker can deal with that hero by abusing Rearm.

Terrorblade

Terrorblade tends to be very powerful after the 30-minute mark because he has items like Eye of Skadi, Daedalus, and Manta Style at this stage of the game, but also because of his ultimate. Even if he loses most of his HP, he can just gain it back by swapping his HP with that of an ally or, even better, an enemy hero.

Terrorblade farms very quickly thanks to his Metamorphosis and Conjure Image. Buying Manta Style early further improves your farming speed. Very few heroes can compete with him after the 15-minute mark. If the game goes late enough, TB will win most team fights on his own, as long as the enemy team doesn’t succeed in chain-stunning him.

This hero often dies because of a long-duration silence or a stun. He rarely gets killed otherwise because his ultimate is very powerful. However, he has a severe weakness. When Metamorphosis is on cooldown, he’s helpless. And its cooldown is 130s, while its duration is 50s. This means that after every activation, there’s an 80s window that the enemy team can use to strike.

Troll Warlord

Troll Warlord is a hero that has a weak mid game. But his early and late game are great. In the laning phase, Berserker’s Rage gives him bonus speed and armor. If he needs to take last-hits from afar, he can switch to ranged mode.

Whirling Axes makes it difficult for his enemies to escape or to fight him using basic attacks. That’s because he slows and blinds them for 4-5s. Thanks to his passive ability, Troll deals increasing amounts of damage to a target because his attack speed increases rapidly. He can gain a total of 12 stacks of attack speed and each one gives him 30 attack speed.

Compare this to Slark, who gains just 3 attack speed and 3 damage for each attack. However, Slark gets to keep his buff for 80s, while Troll loses it as soon as he changes targets.

Troll’s ultimate, Battle Trance, lasts for 6.5s. During this time, he is unkillable and gains lots of lifesteal, attack speed, and movement speed. However, he loses control in the sense that he will attack the closest hero to him and you can’t do anything about it.o

In a late game scenario, Troll is powerful because he can root targets repeatedly for 2s. His chance of doing that is 20%, so he only needs 5 attacks on average. But the fact that he attacks really fast allows him to essentially root a target for 2s every 2s. This makes him very hard to fight against directly.

Arc Warden

Arc Warden’s Tempest Double allows him to gain vast amounts of gold until the 30-minute mark using Hand of Midas. In the late game, this hero typically has powerful items and the ability to protect and buff himself tremendously for around 15s at a time. He’s also quite mobile because Boots of Travel is part of his natural item build.

Because of this, he can split push and there’s very little that you can do to stop him. He will destroy your base with ease if you don’t keep the lanes pushed, and having one hero to defend the base won’t be enough.

If you have a ranged hero, always buy Monkey King Bar when playing against Arc Warden. Otherwise you’ll miss every attack against him while he’s protected by Magnetic Field.

Death Prophet

Death Prophet has an ultimate that becomes very powerful after level 18. On top of that, DP also has powerful talents at every level. When she reaches level 20, she can either improve by Spirit Siphon by 30% or she can increase the movement slow of her Silence by 15%, from 25% to 40%. At 40% MS slow for 5s, most heroes can do almost nothing.

This isn’t just a movement speed debuff. It’s also a silence. So you can’t just blink away. Against DP, the only defense is buying Eul’s Scepter or Manta Style. Black King Bar won’t be enough because it lasts very little while her Silence has a 12s cooldown.

Death Prophet’s ultimate, Exorcism, deals physical damage. This means that magic immunity won’t be of any use against it. The damage is 64 multiplied by 24. That’s a massive amount of damage that’s ongoing for 40s. DP also gains 20% + 12% movement speed from it.

When you play this hero, buying items like Shiva’s Guard or Kaya and Sange is super useful. Or you could buy Yasha and Kaya if you need more movement speed than you already have. The goal is to always put yourself in a position of strength that allows you to overcome your opponents. Figure out how you can get killed and then equip yourself to prevent dying.

Figure out how your enemies will try to escape certain death and then equip yourself to prevent them from running away. There are plenty of good items that you can buy when playing this hero and the choice is yours.

Medusa

Medusa is one of the hardest heroes to kill after the 30-minute mark because she deals an enormous amount of damage to multiple targets simultaneously and is also very hard to kill thanks to her Mana Shield, which absorbs 3.6 points of damage per point. Needless to say, anything that gives you mana regen effectively gives you HP regen.

Medusa farms very quickly after she buys a few damage items because her standard damage is greatly amplified by Split Shot. This ability allows her to hit 4 additional targets and deal 85% of the standard damage to each of them. That’s a massive damage increase and allows her to farm stacked camps with ease.

If you try to outfarm a Medusa after the 20-minute mark, you will lose. The goal is to force favorable fights before it’s too late and hope that you can win them. If you can’t dominate a Medusa lineup between the 10 and 30-minute marks, you will almost certainly lose because you can’t kill a Medusa in the late game unless her team is underfarmed and full of useless heroes.

Invoker

Invoker is quite weak in the laning phase because he lacks damage. Some years ago, at least he had a lot of HP regen. But now he doesn’t have that either. This hero becomes powerful after he gains enough levels and some basic items.

In the late game, Invoker can use effectively all of his 10 abilities, as well as items like Blink Dagger, Eul’s Scepter, Aghanim’s Scepter, and much more. His combinations are deadly and cannot be stopped unless you’re using a Black King Bar. Even then, he can run away while your BKB is active and return seconds later to finish the job.

While invisible, he will move at near maximum speed and slow the movement speed of his enemies tremendously. The movement speed difference, including the buff and debuff, is somewhere around 75%.

The deadliest Invoker combo is Tornado + Chaos Meteor + Deafening Blast + Sun Strike or EMP. But this hero can use numerous combos after level 20 and his talents will greatly enhance some of his key abilities, such as Chaos Meteor.

With any kind of assistance from his supports, Invoker will deal deadly damage in just several seconds to most enemy heroes, killing them with ease.

This is one of those heroes that you often see in rampage videos on YouTube. That’s because his spells work in a large area, controlling and damaging heroes in ways that make it impossible for them to defend without having debuff immunity.

When playing Invoker, it’s always a good idea to buy items that increase your mana pool, mana regen, but also your mobility, and durability.

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