Hello! Today I looked at Mars in patch 7.41f, and the reason is pretty calm: the hero got a small tweak, but overall he remains the same Mars I expect in game — focused on initiation, control, and fighting around Arena of Blood.
Role and abilities
Mars is a melee Strength hero with low complexity. In terms of roles, he leans most toward Durable and Disabler, then Initiator and Carry. The feeling is that this is exactly the kind of hero that wants to start the fight first, soak up the return damage, and not let the enemy simply walk out of a bad position.
His ability kit shows this well:
- Spear of Mars — a spear that doesn’t just deal damage, but can also pin a target to an obstacle and stun it. This is one of those buttons around which all of Mars’s game revolves.
- God’s Rebuke — a shield strike in front of him with critical damage and knockback. The ability can’t miss, which makes it very comfortable in close combat.
- Bulwark — protection from physical damage from the front and sides. When activated, the hero faces the chosen direction, and with Aghanim’s Scepter soldiers appear beside him and attack with him.
- Dauntless — an innate ability that gives Mars extra value in situations where there are more enemies nearby.
- Arena of Blood — the main reason the hero is so easy to recognize in gameplay: the arena blocks movement and attacks, and enemies near the walls take damage and get knocked back.
Looking at the kit as a whole, Mars almost always plays around forcing fights in tight spaces. He doesn’t have the most subtle kit, and that’s exactly what I like about him: the hero is pretty straightforward, but thanks to the arena and the spear he can punish positioning mistakes very hard.
Changes in recent patches
7.41f
- Base armor increased by 1.
7.41e
- Intelligence gain increased from 2.2 to 2.4.
7.41d
- Dauntless: radius increased from 700 to 900.
- God’s Rebuke: now turns the hero toward the cast direction if Bulwark is active.
- Arena of Blood: spear damage increased from 80/160/240 to 80/170/260.
7.41c
- Dauntless: health restored per additional enemy increased from 40% to 50%.
- Spear of Mars: mana cost reduced from 100/110/120/130 to 90/100/110/120.
7.41
- Dauntless: allies of the ability owner are no longer counted when checking for numerical superiority.
- Dauntless: health restored per additional enemy reduced from 70% to 40%.
- Bulwark: now a point-targeted ability, and when activated the hero faces the chosen direction.
- Bulwark: Aghanim’s Scepter upgrade removed.
- Arena of Blood: Aghanim’s Scepter upgrade added.
- Arena of Blood: reduces cooldown by 10 seconds and increases duration from 5.5 to 6.5 seconds. If an enemy hero dies inside the arena, Mars and allies inside the arena restore health and mana and gain bonus attack damage for 20 seconds.
- Level 10 talent replaced from bonus health restoration per enemy from Dauntless to +1.5 mana regen.
- Level 20 talent replaced from reduced Arena of Blood cooldown to bonus spear damage for Arena of Blood.
Overall, over the last few patches the hero has been adjusted toward a more comfortable and understandable style of play: a bit less mana pain, a bit more survivability, and Arena plus Bulwark have become even more defining for his style. In my opinion, this doesn’t reinvent the hero, but it does make him more stable in the scenarios where Mars is already strong.
Statistics
According to OpenDota, over the last 7 days Mars has been played in 161,529 public matches. Win rate: 47.8%. That is 100th out of 127 heroes by win rate and 95th by number of games.
By rank, the picture is fairly even:
- Herald — 47.8%
- Guardian — 47.1%
- Crusader — 47.7%
- Archon — 48.6%
- Legend — 47.5%
- Ancient — 47.6%
- Divine — 47.0%
By the numbers, Mars doesn’t look especially strong in pubs right now. The win rate is below the middle of the pack, and the spread across ranks is small — meaning the hero isn’t broken at either low or higher ratings. To me, that suggests a stable but not outstanding position.
Items and opponents
According to OpenDota data from professional matches, Mars has a pretty predictable set of popular items by stage of the game:
- start: Iron Branch, Gauntlets of Strength, Tango, Quelling Blade, Circlet, Magic Stick
- early game: Bracer, Boots of Speed, Chainmail, Soul Ring, Phase Boots, Morbid Mask
- mid game: Blink Dagger, Mithril Hammer, Aghanim’s Shard, Ogre Axe, Staff of Wizardry, Phase Boots
- late game: Black King Bar, Mystic Staff, Scythe of Vyse, Reaver, Refresher Orb, Aghanim’s Scepter
And that lines up well with his kit: Mars wants to enter the fight first, hold the arena space, and not fall apart under the counter burst. Blink Dagger, Black King Bar, and Refresher Orb make especially good sense — the hero simply loves having a way to start the fight and survive it in the middle of the action.
In professional matchups, the picture looks like this:
- best against Chaos Knight — 47 games, 63.8% win rate
- best against Medusa — 83 games, 59.0% win rate
- best against Drow Ranger — 55 games, 58.2% win rate
- worst against Treant Protector — 109 games, 35.8% win rate
- worst against Chen — 72 games, 37.5% win rate
- worst against Spectre — 29 games, 37.9% win rate
My impression is that Mars is especially annoying for heroes that don’t want to fight in confined spaces, while against heroes that can drag fights out or break the tempo, he has noticeably more trouble. That said, I wouldn’t draw too many hard conclusions here: the sample comes from professional matches, so a lot also depends on the draft around him.
Conclusion
In patch 7.41f, Mars got a very small tweak, and it feels more like a light adjustment than a major update. Overall, the hero still lives off initiation, durability, and control of space. By the numbers, he doesn’t look like a hero suddenly pulling ahead, but I wouldn’t call him a failure either. To me, this is still the Mars you pick when you need a straightforward frontliner with a strong fight start and a very nasty arena in the decisive teamfight.
Source: official Dota 2 and OpenDota data.
Discuss on the forum (2 replies)
47.8% and still 100th is rough. Feels like the hero is stable, just not exciting enough for pubs right now.
Марс взагалі-то не від броні живе
Та без щільності він просто падає
Падає, але не через броню ж
arena is the whole hero
Not really, the spear is what makes the arena scary. Without a good catch tool, people just walk around the edge and the ult becomes a fancy wall. In my games the difference between a good Mars and a dead one is usually whether he lands the first stun, not just whether he presses R. The armor buff helps, but it does not change that part.
the arena still wins fights
Йому б ще без блинка?
Мне кажется, Mars сейчас не столько сильный, сколько очень честный. ОН понятный, без лишнего хаоса, и поэтому в статистике выглядит ровно, а не как герой, который внезапно ломает паб. Для про-игр это даже плюс, а вот в обычных матчах он часто упирается в то, что команда не умеет драться вокруг его кнопок.
Да, если тимплей есть, он очень неприятный.
Ага, а в пабе тимплей как обычно в отпуске.
Мені тут подобається саме стабільність. Не бачу різкого буста, зате героя й далі можна брати, коли потрібен простий вхід у бій і нормальний контроль простору.
had a mars yesterday who missed spear twice and still won the fight because arena trapped their whole backline lol
spear tax was waived i guess
that is just arena doing the work
If he missed two spears and still got a clean fight, then the enemy already gave him everything. Arena is strong, but without follow up it is just a box on the ground. Usually the Mars player has to land at least one key spell or the ult ends up looking way better than it really was. In good games, sure, it can carry the whole fight, but that is not the normal case.
Вот это как раз норм, без резких перекосов. Mars не стал имбой, но и не превратился в бесполезного фронтлайнера, а это уже неплохо.
The +1 base armor is tiny, but it does line up with how he plays now. He is basically asking to be first in and sit on top of people, so even small durability bumps matter more than they look on paper. Still, the pub stats staying mid feels pretty honest to me.