With the release of six new heroes in versions 6.48 and 6.48b, the face of competitive DotA will change, as the competitive potential of these heroes is discovered. Which heroes will be removed or picked out of every pool? Which heroes will be used occasionally? With this, let’s begin to look at the viability of these heroes in league play, starting with Puck and Templar Assassin.

Puck

The most obvious choice for competitive play is Puck, whose skill set is most similar to a current top pick, Queen of Pain. Puck is easily the top choice in many high level IHL draft games and has seen limited exposure in some Asian competitive leagues, where new heroes are not banned.

Puck’s skill set is simply amazing. Illusory Orb is an area of effect nuke similar to Lina’s Dragon Slave but doubles as a blinking ability. This allows Puck to quickly move in and out of combat; an ability that is essential to keep up with the current fast paced style of play. Waning rift is an AoE nuke, though weaker than Akasha’s Scream of Pain, that offers a 3 second silence to compensate. Phase Shift in the right hands allows Puck to dodge high damage spells and disables, allowing him to survive against much stronger early lanes, as well as large team fights throughout the game. Finally, Dream Coil is one of the best initiating skills in the game, on par with Magnus’ Reverse Polarity or Sand King’s Epicenter, especially if accompanied by a good Waning Rift.

Steven '420-Splash' Hua of Distribution DotA stated, "Puck is a relatively unique hero with all of the abilities that most of the standard heroes picked in xl have, blink, silence, aoe and all that, its even got a phase shift making its survivability even better, puck is going to be within the standard pool of heroes to get picked in XL."

The strength of Puck lies in his versatility and effectiveness all game. He is a strong early game hero with heavy nuking capabilities. Because of this, he can either be used as a solo hero with above average lane control or as an excellent lane partner. Throughout the mid game, Puck can gank and initiate team fights while still keeping up in farming thanks to his two AoE spells. When played well, Puck has the potential to be one of the strongest side carries, similar to the Queen of Pain or Priestess of the Moon.

Henrique 'h4wKK' Rodrigue's from HNet.Team stated, “Puck's coming out for sure. It's already being used a lot in IHCS, matching the normal first picks (Queen of Pain, Sand King, Warlock) and gaining a huge number of fans, for being an awesome hero, with versatile skills, a nice nuke, silence, stun and etc, that fits in most strategies and it's surely going to start being used (and probably banned) as soon as it's allowed."

Despite Pucks fragility and lack of disable, I predict that he will probably be removed or be a top pick in every XL game. The combination of a powerful skill set and versatility makes him as valuable to a team as any of the current top picks in high level games, such as Queen of Pain, Sand King, and Zeus.