Quote (JaySongs @ Mar 4 2011 02:13pm)
Hehe, I knew someone would mention that (was waiting for it).
So first let me rebuttal with a question to know of your current opinion and reasoning so I can properly explain to you why Deadwood is a tier 1 pick, (not necessarily first pick sorry for the misconception but tier 1 as in being a dominate solo mid and just an overall good hero to have i.e. Sandwraith; but you wouldn't FP Sandwraith first so I hope I haven't confused you).
Who wins middle, Deadwood or Thunderbringer? Think that one through before reading on.
They are about equally matched at lvl 1 (chain lightning damaged compared to DW physical damage with branch), but as the fight continue to scales, DW dominates TB mid. TB is known to be an AMAZING mid, but DW is one of those melee heroes (such as pharaoh and devourer) that can really offset a lot of ranged solo mid. You don't need a hatchet, you need stout shield (not against TB since harassing DW physically with TB should lead into getting OUT harrased by DW due to TBs low DMG and short RANGE) and as many set of consumables you find necessary you'll need before you can successfully farm a bottle without dying (since that is the ultimate goal of consumable for solo mid). <---- [Going off on a tangent, you seem generally beginner players who solo mid get mass consumables where as more confident players only get ONE single set of healing consumable before they farm bottle, though if a good player knows he is against a good player, he may think other wise (hopefully you understand this logic and you aren't being super confused; it's kind of a lot to take in].
DW has the highest base damage in the game if you include his branch. I would skill his 2nd skill (I forget the name; the stick thing) at LVL 1, LVL 3, and debatable at LVL 5 (depending on whether you know how to land your uproot (first skill) or whether you feel the need of having extra damage to creep (or harass and inevitably kill the lane). From level 3, you already have 80+ damage which is more than enough to out creep any hero. If played properly, with perfect understanding on how to creep with minimizing being harassed, DW automatically turns the flow of the middle lane once he hits 6 and the best part is, you can out play with surprise. [Sorry for the giant tutorial for my explanation but it feels necessary]
For instance at hitting 6, you could instantly throw a stick, uproot your opponent and kill them (depending on situation, but for the most part your opponent will not be in position to react to your ultimate as soon as you hit 6). A lot of beginning players don't know that it's an extremely useful thing to use the stick as a purge sort of skill to land uproots 4x more easier and get the DW punch off.
Heroes that counter DW mid are high armor/high hp heroes to begin with.
Okay don't want to right an essay here.
Cheers
-Jay Songs
You already did. Anyway, I'm not sure what level of play you play at, but if we're talking competitive 2000+ psr play, Deadwood is nowhere near a first-tier hero. In fact, he is probably bottom-tier.
The reason he does so well in lower level games is because he requires very little skill to play correctly. For example, Slither is a hero that can easily dominate DW mid. However, match up a 1700 psr slither vs a 1700 psr DW, the slither will get crushed.
This trend actually continues until around 1850 psr, because to play an effective slither vs a heavy melee nuker like a Pebbles/DW/Devo, you have to have a certain level of skill and competence, whereas the enemy hero only really needs to click a few buttons. However, once that threshold is reached and you gain enough skill, you can shut down DW mid on your own without him having any chance. DW is great against unskilled opponents, but against high level players is a completely garbage pick, let me explain why:
1) The cooldown on his combo is WAY too long to be effective. 1+ minute just to kill someone effectively is simply far too great to be considered top tier in competitive play. This is why Pebbles sees alot more play, since even though he shares many of the same weaknesses as DW, his combo only has a 20 sec cooldown, and does just about as much damage.
2) DW relies on dominating mid and rune control to shine. If you get your teammates to roam to runes every 2 minutes and place a ward on his ramp so he can never grasp you, you can harass him out of mid and keep him out of exp range for the majority of the laning phase.
3) If you dual lane vs a DW mid, he's completely fucked. For pebbles, you can atleast send another support to babysit him mid and you might have a chance, since pebbs has alot of kill potential even before level 6. DW on the other hand only has grasp, which isn't that effective when comboed with another hero. He basically NEEDS to solo and get fast lvls to be useful, and that's easily counterable if you're a good player
4) Deadwood's combo just takes too long to kill someone. You typically blink in, punch, then grasp the stunned target, and whack him a few times. All of this takes about 3-4 seconds to net a kill, whereas Pebble's combo takes about 0.5 seconds. Since DW's combo takes so long, you can easily bait ganks, swap / tablet the hero being ganked out, and then proceed to rape DW hard without even allowing him to get a kill.
There's alot more I could go into, but basically DW is a completely garbage hero. He is far too easy to counter, and his combo just isn't efficient enough to be used in competitive play