GosuGamers StarCraft

Membership

Forgot password?

Navigation

News

Replays

Forum

GosuBet

Rankings

Blogs

Search

Blogs \ A PotM (dis)appears!

CoConi @ 15th August 2010 01:21 (Read 2270 times).

Hello gosugamers.net community,

a few versions ago: Mirana was picked in every single game. I guess many of you guys remember especially Misery's or Playmate's potm - and not to forget one of vigoss' comeback(only for 1-2 weeks though) games with PotM.
But nowadays, Mirana gets rarely picked. During the last god-knows-how-many versions, PotM was a standard pick. Was she just a phenomenon?
Lets figure it out:

Short introduction of PotMs' core aspects:

Role: Semicarry/Ganker (=>often refered as "ganking Carry")
Laning: Solo/Dual
Common Duallane partners: Tide, ES, SK, [insert any supporter here], [insert any (non-carry) hero with a disable/stun here]
Common Items: PT/BoT, diffu, manta, Buttefly, Skadi, Maelstrom, Desolator, Wraith band, Bottle, Magic Wand (linkes/bkb situational)
Farm/level dependance during the lategame: medium-high (~upgraded boots + 1-2 statitems + bottle + 1 Core at <30min) 1-2+ level above the average is a common thing
Changelog history:
6.68
Moonlight Shadow's cooldown rescaled from 160 to 180/160/140,
Moonlight Shadow's duration rescaled from 7/9/11 to 11.
6.66
Moonlight Shadow manacost from 200/250/300 to a constant 175
6.65
Starfall AoE increased by 50 to fix issues with it not hitting units on the edge of your attack
6.63
Starfall random chance to hit in 600-900 range removed

This hero covers many aspects - maybe too many :-).
Her role is one of the best combinations ever - flexible and strong. However the game(or even the picks) turns out to be - PotM will fit in most cases

Her laning qualities are also really good. Shes not in need of any specific lanepartner or she can even go solo(and Mirana is a decent solohero).
Her items are standard items for ranged-agi heroes. Most of those items recieved a buff/tweak during the last versions, but almost all of them turned out to be good for her.

Her farm dependance is just medium. She has a strong spellcombo which is totally independant from items. On top of that, she has a farmspell, but it cant be spammed that much.

The last changelogs consisted of tweaks or small buffs, except for the 6.63 Starfall change, which is not enough to remove this hero from the current metagame. Most PotM try to get the double star anyway. Apart from clashes, this spellchange has only a small impact.

In my opinion, she got replaced by a quite similar hero called Windrunner. When this hero was released my first thought was:
"Does Icefrog want to give a PotM to each team?"
Why this?
Starfall + Arrow = Shackle Shot + Powershot

PotM:A long stun with a nuke and an AoE Nuke. Long cooldowns.
WR:A long stun with an "AoE" Nuke. Rather short cooldowns.
=>~2 Powershots per gank=>similar damage

Windrunner and Leap
Both of them are some kind of mobilty mechanism with the possibity to avoid something(dodging Projectiles for leap, Evasion for Windrunner). Similar cooldown, when maxed(15 secs for WR, 20 for Priestess). Manacosts do differ a bit.

Focus Fire and Moonlight Shadow:
Both of them are situational ultimates. Thats all what they have in common.
PotMs' ulti can be countered by truesight and is more supportive.

Skillbuilds, Role and Laning of PotM and Windrunner are also quite similar.
The itembuild does differ a bit, the amount of gold spent for the coreitems does barely differ . Its easy to imagine how Windrunner s picked instead of Potm nowadays.

Shackle Shot vs Arrow:
This is ,where the difference is.
Shakle shot provides you a safe 3.75 second stun without any special tricks On top of that, you can even disable 2 heroes with shakle shot for 3.75 seconds.
Arrow is not a reliable spell. I would not call it situational, but its acutally quite dependant from so many aspects. Apart from that, arrow can be detected by magic wand and/or manually dodged. Furthermore, you have to walk to your stunned victim first, if you have scored a long stun.

On top of that, Winrunners lanecontrol and farmin is better, because of the cheap Powershot with a low cooldown and higher range.

Whats your opinion about the disappearing PotM-phenomenom?

CoConi

comments

Caissa 1 year ago

I believe that many players have been aware of this phenomenon.

She falls into the "semi-carry" category that is ever-rarer nowadays. I wouldn't say that the so-called "unreliability" of Elune's Arrow is the cause, but the metagame has changed a lot, and she is not as flexible lane-wise. She does best in a dual lane, and well enough as a solo hero, but, in my opinion, she can't compete with other heroes single-handedly.

Let's take Windrunner for example: Windrunner is very hard to kill in the lane phase, she has a decent escape ability and also a reliable stun, while PotM only gets a 400 range leap with a whopping 40 second cooldown. Her main nuke isn't spammable, while Windrunner's is... other heroes such as Doom or Necrolyte outclass her in a solo lane. Late-game, her carry capability is average at most.

Today's metagame is mostly based off 2 exceptional solo heroes + a good trilane with another carry. Did I mention dual lanes are almost dead? And she can't solo as well as she used to (smaller hero pool back then + different strategy + bottle was buffed)...

This is why I think PotM is rarely picked nowadays.

matthe 1 year ago

PotM is still a strong hero... Played in Pubs all the time. Just because competitive doesnt play her means, that she is dead. PotM is one of the most used heroes in public!!

brasi 1 year ago

Compared to Morph (harder to kill, better farmer) and windrunner (superior laning and farming), potm looks like a third class hero, indeed.
Not to mention she needs a ton of items to deal dmg due to her bad stat gain and base dmg.
Well, at least her ultimate got buffed which will give her some play again, when the new ver. becomes stable.

Digital-Archangel 1 year ago

I feel Arrow should be changed to not be blocked by Linken and Leap given better cooldown scaling - like 20/18/16/14. 40 is just too long, and it's left at that cooldown until mid-game because Arrow and Starfall are more important. I feel this may remedy the situation a little.

Eighty8 1 year ago

You Guy are so wrong man
its not becoz of Arrow's Accuracy or something
its just becoz of Formation and playing style
let see
Potm stay can use in competative scenes and one of the best ganker stay
its just all about the Serious Laning and she can't gank or farm
but she stay can use as Annoyer only by arrow and Black-Space shoot
just need to using right My eng is suck and Ican't tell you freely
of her theory and