Dota 2 Balance of Power Update Goes Live
Dota 2 Patch 6.86 also known as The Balance of Power is now live. Valve gave the Dota 2 community an early Christmas gift by launching the latest update to its popular MOBA a day earlier than anticipated. The new update has been highly anticipated by fans since the close of The Summit 4, the final competitive Dota 2 event of the year.
The Balance of Power offers massive changes to the game with the biggest being a new hero -- The Arc Warden. Only one hero, Pit Lord is still missing from the Dota 2 roster. Other major changes in the new patch include:
- New Arcana for Zeus - New base model, effects, portrait, and more when equipped.
- Desert Terrain unlocked for all owners of The International 2015 Compendium.
- Ultra Shadow Quality - A new option to render shadows at twice the previous resolution!
- New Desert Map for the Colosseum custom map.
- New Rune Type - Arcane runes reduces spell cooldowns and mana costs.
- 4 New Items - Faerie Fire, Dragon Lance, Aether Lens, and Iron Talon
- Map Changes - Slightly altered paths and two new neutral camps to explore.
- Heroes Reworked - Doom, Faceless Void, Lone Druid, Outworld Devourer, Riki, and Silencer
- Hero and Item Tweaks - Almost every hero and dozens of items have been tweaked.
Dota 2 has seen a slight fall in revenues and player numbers since The International 5 as the community grew tired of the current meta and lack of new content. This has led to MapleStory overtaking Dota 2 as the 5th highest grossing F2P MMO for the month of October 2015. With a new patch and a new professional season to follow, player enthusiasm will hopefully pick back pick up. Despite many new entrants in the MOBA field including Blizzard's Heroes of the Storm, Dota 2 remains the second most popular title behind League of Legends.
For a look at all the patch notes and new features in The Balance of Power Update, check out the official post.
