Sand King in patch 7.41f: what changed and how he looks now

Hi. Today I’ve got Sand King — and the reason is pretty simple: after the chain of changes in 7.41, it got interesting to see where this hero is headed. He has always been about a sudden jump in, control, and fighting out of the fog, and now his numbers have also been adjusted quite noticeably.

Role and abilities

Sand King is a universal melee hero with a difficulty of 2 out of 3. In terms of roles, he most often goes as an Initiator, but he also has room for Support, Nuker, Disabler, and Escape. This is one of those cases where the hero isn’t locked into one button and one lane: he can start fights, throw off the tempo, and survive thanks to Sand Storm.

• Burrowstrike — dives into the ground, surges forward, stuns and deals damage; it also applies Caustic Finale to affected heroes.
• Sand Storm — creates a sandstorm, makes the hero invisible, and deals damage to enemies inside the area.
• Stinger — attacks in an area around the target point, adding damage, slow, and the Caustic Finale effect.
• Caustic Finale — innate ability: attacks apply poison, and after the target dies, it explodes and deals area damage.
• Epicenter — releases a series of pulses that hit enemies, slow them, and expand in radius.

By feel, Sand King still relies on two things: a strong jump into the fight and the ability not to let the fight fall apart immediately. I think that’s exactly why any changes to Burrowstrike and Epicenter are always more important for him than small numbers on paper.

Changes in recent patches

First, the newest changes.

• 7.41d — Strength gain was increased from 2.3 to 2.5, and damage gain per level was raised from 2.8 to 2.9.
• 7.41c — base attack speed was reduced from 110 to 100; Stinger slow duration was standardized to 5 seconds; Epicenter base radius was reduced from 500 to 450.
• 7.41b — Epicenter had its attack slow reduced, and Stinger proc damage from Aghanim’s Scepter was lowered from 50% to 40%.
• 7.41 — Caustic Finale no longer upgrades with Epicenter; the innate passive had its base damage and max health damage changed; its duration was reduced; Burrowstrike got increased cast range; if the cast point ends up inside Sand Storm, the hero immediately regains invisibility; Epicenter no longer gets a damage-per-pulse bonus from Aghanim’s Shard; the talents at levels 20 and 25 were also changed.

The most important thing here for me is not the individual numbers, but the overall direction. Sand King got a little better at ramping up a fight through Burrowstrike, but at the same time several sources of overly convenient pressure were toned down. So the hero didn’t disappear, but he was trimmed in the places where he was too easily building momentum.

Statistics

According to OpenDota, in public matches over the last 7 days Sand King has 157,773 games and a 49.7% win rate. That puts him 58th out of 127 heroes by win rate and 94th by number of games. The picture is uneven by rank as well: he looks better in Herald, Guardian, and Crusader, then gradually drops off toward Legend, Ancient, and Divine.

• Herald — 51.8%
• Guardian — 51.6%
• Crusader — 50.8%
• Archon — 49.8%
• Legend — 48.8%
• Ancient — 48.8%
• Divine — 48.2%

In professional matches, according to OpenDota, he has 12 picks, 9 wins, and 12 bans. That’s a 75.0% win rate — a nice number, but I’d treat it carefully: the sample is small, and numbers like that can look better than they really are.

Items and matchups

As for items in pro matches, everything is pretty predictable for a hero who wants to start fights and not die first. An early Blink Dagger looks especially logical here, and after that you move into options for survivability, tempo, and control.

• Start: Iron Branch, Tango, Observer Ward, Faerie Fire, Sentry Ward, Magic Stick.
• Early game: Boots of Speed, Bottle, Chainmail, Phase Boots, Blink Dagger, Urn of Shadows.
• Mid game: Ogre Axe, Blink Dagger, Staff of Wizardry, Point Booster, Blade of Alacrity, Aghanim’s Scepter.
• Late game: Black King Bar, Shiva’s Guard, Skull Basher, Aghanim’s Scepter, Sange, Reaver.

In pro-game matchups, Sand King does especially well against Templar Assassin, Morphling, and Witch Doctor. Against Largo, Zeus, and Mirana, though, his numbers are worse. I wouldn’t draw overly bold conclusions without draft context, but in general it’s clear: the hero likes breaking lineups that hate a hard engage and positional chaos.

Conclusion

After 7.41f, Sand King looks like a hero who wasn’t forgotten, just carefully trimmed down. He still has a clear job: jump in, break formation, bring control, and force the enemy to play by different rules. By the numbers, he doesn’t look too strong in pubs, but in pro matches he can still deliver results. I think this is one of those cases where the hero stays relevant not because he has too much damage, but because he still has a very unpleasant way of starting a fight. And that, perhaps, matters more.

Source: official Dota 2 data and OpenDota.

Discuss on the forum (3 replies)