Nature’s Prophet in 7.41f: the map got even tighter for treants

Hello! Today I’m looking at Nature’s Prophet in the context of 7.41f, and there’s an interesting mix here: the hero still lives off the map, treants, and constant pressure, but by the numbers he doesn’t feel as convincing as his global reputation suggests. To me, this is exactly the kind of case where a hero’s comfort in play and his pub results drift apart more than you’d like.

Role and abilities

Nature’s Prophet is an universal ranged hero with a difficulty rating of 2 out of 3. In terms of roles, he can be a carry, nuker, and escape, but he is strongest as a pusher. And that, in my opinion, describes his nature very accurately: he doesn’t so much fight “fairly” as stretch the map, punish poor vision, and constantly threaten to show up where he’s not expected.

• Sprout surrounds the target with trees, traps it in place, and deals damage.
• Teleportation teleports the owner to any point on the map and grants a barrier on arrival.
• Nature’s Call turns trees in the chosen area into controllable treants.
• Curse of the Oldgrowth appears with Aghanim’s Shard: treants count as trees.
• Spirit of the Forest is the innate ability: each treant on the map grants the same bonus, but multiplied; treants also gain this ability.
• Wrath of Nature sends a burst of energy at visible enemies across the entire map, starting with those closest to the cast point and growing stronger with each enemy hit.

By feel, the entire kit pushes the same style: pressure a lane, react quickly to the map, and make the enemy team misposition. In pubs, that often only works halfway — the mobility is there, but team discipline doesn’t always let it turn into a stable advantage.

Changes in the latest patches

Starting from the newest changes and working backward, the picture is pretty consistent: the hero was buffed in targeted ways, but not reinvented. And honestly, that seems reasonable — Nature’s Prophet already has too many ways to show up in a place that’s terrible for the enemy.

• 7.41d: Spirit of the Forest now grants the damage bonus from all treants on the map with no radius limit; the level 20 Sprout talent was increased from 220 to 240.
• 7.41c: the mana cost of Nature’s Call was reduced from 100 to 85/90/95/100; treant bonus damage to heroes was increased from 4/8/12/16 to 6/10/14/18; the level 20 Sprout talent was increased from 170 to 220; the level 20 cooldown reduction talent for Wrath of Nature was buffed from 15 to 20 seconds.
• 7.41b: Wrath of Nature‘s base damage increased from 90/130/170 to 100/140/180.
• 7.41: minimum base damage was increased by 4, and level 1 damage rose from 40–50 to 44–50; Spirit of the Forest no longer scales with Wrath of Nature; the tree search radius was changed from 300/400/500/600 to 300 + 10 per level; the treant bonus multiplier was increased from 1 to 2; Sprout gained 400 vision instead of 250; Nature’s Call changed treant movement speed, reduced their health from 550 to 450, added 25% magic resistance, increased damage to heroes, and gave them free movement through trees; the level 15 talent was replaced with +100 Teleportation Barrier; the level 25 talent no longer increases the treant bonus multiplier for Spirit of the Forest.

To me, these tweaks make the direction pretty clear: the hero became better at using the map and his treants, but his strength is increasingly tied to the right windows and to how much the enemy lets him spread across the lanes.

Statistics

According to OpenDota, over the last 7 days Nature’s Prophet has 367,461 games in public matches and a win rate of 43.7%. That puts him 126th out of 127 heroes by win rate and 43rd by number of games. The numbers, frankly, are not exactly cheerful: the hero is popular, but his results are weak right now.

• Herald — 46.8%
• Guardian — 44.3%
• Crusader — 43.3%
• Archon — 42.5%
• Legend — 42.4%
• Ancient — 43.4%
• Divine — 44.8%

Across ranks, the picture stays below the middle almost everywhere. It’s interesting that Divine is higher than most other groups, but I wouldn’t read too much into that: in pub context, Nature’s Prophet often depends not on “how strong the hero is overall,” but on how well the team can play around map pressure.

In professional matches over the latest period, the hero has 19 picks, 9 wins, which is 47.4%, and 31 bans. There he looks noticeably cleaner than in pubs, but still not like an unquestionable pick.

Items and matchups

Looking at the most popular items in pro matches, the logic is pretty easy to see: the hero starts with basic mobility and small stats, then builds damage and tempo for split-pushing and finishing off targets. Nothing exotic — more of a solid package for a hero that wants to keep showing up in awkward places for the enemy.

• Starting: Iron Branch, Circlet, Faerie Fire, Tango, Observer Ward, Magic Wand.
• Early game: Boots of Speed, Power Treads, Javelin, Mithril Hammer, Urn of Shadows, Maelstrom.
• Mid game: Mithril Hammer, Blade of Alacrity, Dragon Lance, Hyperstone, Mjollnir, Maelstrom.
• Late game: Demon Edge, Hyperstone, Reaver, Daedalus, Eaglesong, Satanic.

The matchups in pro games also look pretty logical. Nature’s Prophet feels better against heroes that struggle to answer map pressure quickly, and worse against those who can spread out fast or control space themselves.

• Best against: Outworld Destroyer — 29 games, 69.0% win rate; Razor — 30 games, 66.7% win rate; Drow Ranger — 40 games, 65.0% win rate.
• Worst against: Broodmother — 23 games, 34.8% win rate; Lone Druid — 42 games, 35.7% win rate; Lycan — 30 games, 36.7% win rate.

Conclusion

Right now, Nature’s Prophet feels to me like a hero that can still do a huge number of things at once, but not always reliably enough for pubs. Patch 7.41 clearly improved his map play, treants, and several talents, and 7.41c and 7.41d further refined his comfort and damage. But based on OpenDota data, he still doesn’t look like a hero you can trust in every match without reservations. I’d expect him to feel better in more organized play, while in ordinary pubs his strength still depends heavily on tempo and team discipline.

Source: official Dota 2 and OpenDota data.

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