DotA drafting statistics

Every match the same: What heroes should be banned, which ones should be picked? FBB.Fatal analysed 109 competitive DotA replays from our database and published the figures. Ogre Mage a guarantor for victory? Read the comments to understand the figures in the table

The following three tables list the different heroes according to their main attribute and sort them with the amount of games won. A higher expressiveness have of course the figures of the heroes which have been at least played 10 games, no matter if won or lost.

Strength: Banned and overrated?

It starts with a lot of superlatives: the top three banned heroes are all strength heroes, namely Tidehunter, Beastmaster and Slithereen Guard. Slithereen Guard and Tidehunter are very special here: they have been on the drafting board every game, but mostly in the banned hero list. In figures: Slithereen Guard has been banned in 84 % of all the games covered by these statistics. Besides that, Tidehunter has one of the highest win percentage of all heroes, with 71% won game overall. On the other side, Earthshaker, Rogue Knight and Sand King, all of which count as gank heroes, are below 50 % of won games.

Strength
Hero	Banned	Picked	Wins	Losses	Win rate
	20	57	28	29	49%
	35	50	25	25	50%
	13	46	21	25	46%
	5	40	16	24	40%
	85	24	17	7	71%
	78	22	15	7	68%
	91	18	8	10	44%
	0	9	2	7	22%
	7	9	6	3	67%
	2	8	4	4	50%
	0	7	2	5	29%
	6	7	5	2	71%
	0	6	3	3	50%
	2	5	4	1	80%
	0	5	2	3	40%
	0	4	2	2	50%
	0	4	3	1	75%
	1	4	2	2	50%
	0	3	1	2	33%
	0	3	2	1	67%
	0	2	2	0	100%
	1	2	1	1	50%
	0	1	0	1	0%
	0	1	1	0	100%
	0	1	0	1	0%

Agility: Huge differences!

The most notable figure: Vengeful Spirit is the agility Slithereen Guard, being on the drafting board every game. With one difference: She gets picked a lot more frequently than Tidehunter or Slithereen Guard with 58:51 ban versus pick statistics. Broodmother seems to be one of the most hated heroes to play against: being picked only eight times (with 6:2 win statistics), and her ban stats are nearing insanity at 50 bans. Priestess of the Moon is the complete opposite here: she participated in 79 drafts, being picked in 63 of them. That's a record.

Agility
Hero	Banned	Picked	Wins	Losses	Winrate
	16	63	35	28	56%
	58	51	31	20	61%
	8	36	12	24	33%
	13	17	9	8	53%
	39	16	7	9	44%
	2	13	7	6	54%
	5	11	6	5	55%
	7	8	5	3	63%
	50	8	6	2	75%
	23	7	5	2	71%
	0	6	3	3	50%
	18	6	3	3	50%
	0	5	4	1	80%
	0	5	3	2	60%
	1	5	2	3	40%
	1	4	3	1	75%
	0	4	3	1	75%
	0	3	1	2	33%
	1	3	3	0	100%
	1	3	1	2	33%
	8	2	1	1	50%
	1	2	1	1	50%
	0	1	0	1	0%
	2	1	1	0	100%
	0	1	0	1	0%
	0	1	1	0	100%
	1	0	0	0	-

Intelligence: Percentage record, but mostly below 50%!

Most intelligence heroes seems overrated: only three of the top 10 picked intelligence heroes have a winning percentage higher than 50. Storm Spirit is the hero with the worst figures overall (with more than 10 matches played): only eight out of 30 games won. But here's quite a surprise: Witch Doctor has the highest win percentage overall, and statistically speaking, three out of four games featuring Witch Doctor have been won.

Intelligence
Hero	Banned	Picked	Wins	Losses	Win rate
	44	54	21	33	39%
	35	49	23	26	47%
	23	41	15	26	37%
	21	30	8	22	27%
	8	29	14	15	48%
	10	28	17	11	61%
	39	25	16	9	64%
	21	20	8	12	40%
	2	17	9	8	53%
	8	17	7	10	41%
	34	15	5	10	33%
	0	14	10	4	71%
	2	14	6	8	43%
	0	12	7	5	58%
	8	12	9	3	75%
	4	11	7	4	64%
	0	10	6	4	60%
	1	9	6	3	67%
	0	9	9	0	100%
	0	9	5	4	56%
	0	8	4	4	50%
	0	7	2	5	29%
	5	7	4	3	57%
	1	5	4	1	80%
	0	4	0	4	0%
	0	4	2	2	50%
	3	3	2	1	67%
	0	2	2	0	100%
	0	2	1	1	50%
	0	2	2	0	100%
	2	1	0	1	0%

Top Ten Banned Heroes: Not intelligent

There is no intelligence hero in the five of the most banned hero, but three strength and two agility ones. As already mentioned, Slithereen Guard appears in every watch, but mostly as a banned hero. Is he just so hard to play against or is it general hate towards him? Figures show that he was only able to win 44% of the games where he actually got played.
Placement two to five have a reason to be in the top five of the most banned heroes: all of them have a winning percentage way above 50%. Broodmother and Tidehunter with 75% respectively 71%.
With four strength, 3 agility and 3 intelligence heroes, the top ten of the list of most banned heroes seems very even.

Top Ten Banned
Hero	Banned	Picked	Wins	Losses	Win rate
	91	18	8	10	44%
	85	24	17	7	71%
	78	22	15	7	68%
	58	51	31	20	61%
	50	8	6	2	75%
	44	54	21	33	39%
	39	16	7	9	44%
	39	25	16	9	64%
	35	50	25	25	50%
	35	49	23	26	47%

Top Ten Picked Heroes: Not at all a winning guarantee

One figure seems very irritating: only two out of the top then most picked heroes have a winning percentage above 50. Only the Priestess of the Moon and Vengeful Spirit have 56%, respectively 61%.

Top Ten Picked
Hero	Banned	Picked	Wins	Losses	Win rate
	16	63	35	28	56%
	20	57	28	29	49%
	44	54	21	33	39%
	58	51	31	20	61%
	35	50	25	25	50%
	35	49	23	26	47%
	13	46	21	25	46%
	23	41	15	26	37%
	5	40	16	24	40%
	8	36	12	24	33%

Conclusion: Math+DotA= not true!

After reading through all of these figures and statistics, one may wonder why he didn't win his next game; although he has picked the ten heroes with the highest win percentage.

Well, DotA is not math. Figures are just figures, and one should not take them into consideration while picking. To relativise the low percentage of for example Storm Spirit: maybe the player of that hero just sucked. Or his team. There are a trillion reasons for a loss, it's not just that the hero is underpowered.

DotA is so much more than just simple math and figures. It's laning, teamplay, timing and a couple of other things. But why not trying the Keeper of the Light more often? Nine games and zero loss says more than thousand lines of text and tables.