Dota 2 patch 7.33e nerfs three supports and stifles Spirits

Michael Hassall

Michael Hassall

Mini-Dota 2 update 7.33 nerfs supports, spirits, and snake ladies as the game gets some spice ahead of Riyadh Masters.

After a string of micro updates in the preceding days heralding its arrival, the post-Bali Major patch, Dota 2 Game Play Update 7.33e is here. And with it, some of the most-picked and more oppressive heroes in Dota 2 at the moment have been nerfed. The patch dropped at almost exactly 6 p.m. PT, presumably pushed out just as IceFrog and his team were heading out of the door for the evening.

The patch has hit 11 heroes with Broodmother, Doom, Ember Spirit, Enchantress, Medusa, Morphling, Pugna, Storm Spirit, Techies, Timbersaw, and Undying feeling the nerfs.

Hidden patch notes?

Besides the usual patch reveal, you might have missed the Steam community page which also detailed a number of small quality of life changes that the patch include. These are as follows:

  • Kobolds that are dug up from Trusty Shovel are now ordered to follow their owner (same behavior as Juggernaut's Healing Ward)
  • Fixed newly spawned enemy units in Fog of War flashing on the minimap for a frame before becoming hidden
  • Fixed spells not being able to target invisible units that were revealed by a sentry ward
  • Fixed an issue where the hero stats tooltip for Evasion was not correctly rounding to the nearest integer value
  • Fixed Tormentor treating creep heroes as summons that should be killed instantly when no valid hero units are within range
  • Fixed a bug in the treasure UI causing rarity text to be clipped when an item is hovered
  • Fixed Lich Sinister Gaze duration ignoring status resistance
  • Fixed Phantom Lancer's Phantom Rush toggling off after dying
  • Fixed rare crash when Spirit Breaker's Charge of Darkness is interrupted
  • Fixed Oracle's "Fate's Edict Magic Damage Prevented" relic to properly count all damage that is prevented with the spell
  • Fixed hero relics not progressing in Turbo

Supports and Spirits feel the pain in Dota 2 Gameplay Update 7.33e

Undying was one of the supports hit with nerfs in Dota 2 Gameplay Update 7.33e (Image via Valve)
Undying was one of the supports hit with nerfs in Dota 2 Gameplay Update 7.33e (Image via Valve)

In many ways this almost feels like a direct nerf of the Bali Major-winning Gaimin Gladiators. The patch targets two of Melchior “Seleri” Hillenkamp’s most-played supports in Undying and Enchantress, hits two classic midlane heroes in Ember Spirit, and takes out the Doom, one of Marcus "Ace" Hoelgaard’s signature picks. 

That, however, could just be a little bit of bias. After all, many of these heroes have been played in all facets of pro Dota as of late. It’s just GG has won the most with them…

Still, several supports took a hit this patch, with the ever-annoying Techies losing some armor, some damage, and getting more cooldowns. Pugna also took some hits.

In the offlane, Doom and Timbersaw were the targets, while the ever-flexible Broodmother was hit with nerfs as well. And finally the two carries that teams have most liked to build around of late, Morphling and Medusa, took a lot of hits to their damage.

Overall, it’s not a huge patch, and it’s not the anniversary celebration update. But its something to keep things fresh ahead of Riyadh Masters which starts on July 19.

Dota 2 Patch 7.34?

In a final paragraph on the community page, and in a later Tweet, Valve dropped the prospective release date of patch 7.34: "Patch 7.34 will arrive in August before The International Regional Qualifiers start."

It's nice to have a ballpark figure on the date, but perhaps not for teams who'll be battling it out to reach TI12...


Full 7.33e patch notes available here. Stay tuned to esports.gg for more Dota 2 news and updates!