Earth Spirit in 7.41f: fewer attacks, fewer charges, different talents

Hi! Today I’m taking a look at Earth Spirit in patch 7.41f, and the reason is pretty straightforward: the hero got tweaked again, which makes both his place in pubs and his impact in pro matches even more interesting.

Role and abilities

Earth Spirit is a Strength melee hero with a difficulty rating of 3 out of 3. His listed roles are Nuker, Disabler, Durable, Escape, and Initiator, but what stands out to me most is his flexibility: he’s about control, movement, and helping his teammates. In Valve’s description, he keeps enemies in disarray and supports his allies in battle — and that, to me, captures his style very well.

In short, his kit revolves around stone remnants and the ability to quickly reposition enemies. These are the spells that make it happen:

• Boulder Smash — hits a target and knocks it in the direction Earth Spirit is facing; the displaced unit damages enemies in its path, and stone remnants fly farther and slow the victims.
• Rolling Boulder — Earth Spirit rolls in the chosen direction and stops if he hits an enemy hero or gets stunned; if he passes through a stone remnant, the boulder becomes stronger.
• Geomagnetic Grip — pulls a stone remnant or an ally toward Earth Spirit, silencing enemies in the target’s path; if a remnant is pulled, the enemies also take damage.
• Stone Remnant — the innate ability that creates stone remnants and consumes charges that replenish over time; the remnants are used for the hero’s other abilities.
• Enchant Remnant — gained with Aghanim’s Scepter and turns Earth Spirit into a stone remnant that shatters after a delay and deals damage to nearby enemies.
• Magnetize — magnetizes nearby units and deals damage over several seconds; if a magnetized hero moves near a stone remnant, the effect can spread to enemies again.

I like how cohesive the hero’s kit is: almost every button doesn’t just deal damage, but pushes the fight in the direction Earth Spirit wants it to go. Of course, that also means he takes careful execution — this is not a hero you just press and forget.

Recent patch changes

Looking from newest to oldest, the picture is this:

• 7.41f — base attack speed was reduced from 100 to 95; Stone Remnant now reaches its maximum charges every 5th level instead of every 4th; the maximum number of charges was lowered from 14 to 13, and it is now reached at level 30 instead of level 28. The talents were also changed: at level 20, instead of “+25% Magnetize damage and duration,” there is now “+35 Magnetize DPS,” and instead of “+175% Strength to Rolling Boulder damage,” there is “+200 Geomagnetic Grip remnant damage.” At level 25, “+250 Geomagnetic Grip remnant damage” was replaced with “+250% Strength to Rolling Boulder damage.”
• 7.41e — base Intelligence was reduced from 18 to 17, and the level 20 Magnetize damage and duration talent bonus was lowered from 30% to 25%.
• 7.41d — the passive damage bonus per unused Stone Remnant charge was increased from 2.5% to 3%.
• 7.41c — base Strength was increased from 22 to 23, and level 1 damage went up from 47–51 to 48–52.
• 7.41 — Stone Remnant now works with a maximum charge setup of 7 + 1 every 4 levels; Boulder Smash got a longer slow duration at level 1; Geomagnetic Grip got a longer silence duration; Magnetize got higher DPS; and the level 25 talent for Geomagnetic Grip remnant damage increased from 175 to 250.

My impression is that the developers are clearly trying to keep the hero in a narrow lane: not letting him snowball too early through charges while also adjusting the value of his combos. That seems pretty logical to me — Earth Spirit depends a lot on tempo and on how confidently he can jump into fights.

Statistics

According to OpenDota, over the last 7 days Earth Spirit has been played in 189,157 public matches, with a win rate of 49.4%. That puts him 71st out of 127 heroes by win rate and 86th by number of games. Those numbers don’t look disastrous, but in my opinion he’s still just a bit short of being comfortably stable.

Looking at ranks, there’s a steady rise in win rate as the skill level goes up:

• Herald — 46.7%
• Guardian — 47.3%
• Crusader — 48.6%
• Archon — 48.9%
• Legend — 49.6%
• Ancient — 50.1%
• Divine — 51.1%

In pro matches, OpenDota shows 11 picks, 5 wins, which is 45.5%, and 26 bans. I wouldn’t draw too hard a conclusion from that sample alone, but it’s clear that on the competitive stage, teams treat him with caution.

Items and matchups

Popular pro-match item builds paint a pretty clear picture: Earth Spirit usually buys items that help him move, fight, and survive long teamfights.

• Start: Iron Branch, Tango, Observer Ward, Faerie Fire, Circlet, Observer and Sentry Wards.
• Early game: Boots of Speed, Bottle, Urn of Shadows, Power Treads, Diadem, Staff of Wizardry.
• Mid game: Ogre Axe, Spirit Vessel, Mithril Hammer, Black King Bar, Staff of Wizardry, Diadem.
• Late game: Shiva’s Guard, Soul Booster, Sange, Kaya and Sange, Black King Bar, Bloodstone.

As for matchups in pro games, he has both good and very unpleasant opponents. If we take heroes he has faced in 20+ games, OpenDota shows he performs better against:

• Nyx Assassin — 22 games, 72.7% win rate;
• Drow Ranger — 46 games, 71.7% win rate;
• Kunkka — 26 games, 69.2% win rate.

And his worst matchups are:

• Alchemist — 28 games, 25.0% win rate;
• Enigma — 30 games, 30.0% win rate;
• Zeus — 27 games, 33.3% win rate.

In my opinion, that does a great job of showing the hero’s nature: if he can force movement and break formation, everything goes much better. But if the enemy can calmly keep their distance or disrupt fights with their spells, Earth Spirit has a much harder time.

Conclusion

In 7.41f, Earth Spirit became a little less generous with resources in the late game and lost a bit of his base stats, but his core is still there: he’s still a hero about tempo, positioning, and very active control. Statistically, he looks more solid than outstanding, and in pubs and pro games alike, I think a lot will come down not so much to the numbers, but to how well the player understands his map movements and timings. I’d definitely keep him on my radar — especially if future patches keep carefully adjusting his charges and talents.

Source: official Dota 2 data and OpenDota.

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