DOTA 2, THE POPULAR CARRY OF DIFFERENT VERSION (ANALYSIS)

6.72 : DOMINATION OF ANTI-MAGE (敌法称霸）

Anti-Mage 

Reason : 

He started to get his reputation in The International 2011. He was picked and banned in 90.38% of the games and he won 70.59% of them. After The International 2011, people feared him and he was consistently banned. In fact, he is very annoying to play against. His main strength is:

1) Most mobile hero in the game.

2) The fastest farmer in the game.

3) Very hard to burst him down due to Spell Shield.

4) His right click power is decent even in early game.

5) Manta Style having Mana Break.

6) Low BAT (Base Attack Time) resulting in very high attack speed.

No doubt, he is a very powerful hero on his own. However, he also fitted the meta very well which is based on farming and split pushing as he is probably the best split push carry. Also, small hero pool contributed to his popularity as most of his counter was not yet introduced in DOTA 2 at that time. 

6.73 : ANTI-MAGE VS FACELESS VOID (敌法战虚空）

Anti-Mage

Reason : 

Due to him being overpowered, he was nefted in 6.74 which:

1) BAT increased from 1.35 to 1.45.

2) Reduced base armor by 1.

However, he still had superior BAT compared to most of the heroes (most heroes have 1.7 BAT). The nefts had not affected his popularity at all since he received very minor nefts. The main strength of this hero still remained. He is capable of getting over 700 GPM in late game with Battlefury and able to get 1 or 2 tier 4 items ahead of enermy carry hero. He can also push safely with high mobility without risking his life. 

Faceless Void

Reason : 
He was picked as a counter to Anti-Mage. Since Anti-Mage basically dominated the meta and there was no proper counter to Anti-Mage, people gave him a try. He is one of the few hero that is able to fight Anti-Mage head on. Unlike Anti-Mage which carry with massive farm, he is still able to provide something for his team even without farm through his powerful ultimate. Chronosphere, which is a BKB piercing 5 seconds AOE disable, is said to be one of the best ultimate in the game. He is also very mobile with Time Walk, thus hard to be kited and can hit his target effectively. However, he mostly failed as counter pick to Anti-Mage as:
1) Farm slower than Anti-Mage.
2) Reliant on both ultimate and Black King Bar to fight effectively.
3) Can not split push effectively.


6.74 : RETURN OF WATER-MAN (水人回归）

Morphling

Reason : 
He became popular due to huge buff in 6.73 and 6.74. Chinese teams basically dominated The International 2012 with him. Western teams just had to ban him against chinese teams. One of the most overpowered things about him is that Morph can be activated even when he is stunned. This makes him almost unkillable since healing rate of 152HP/second is too hard to overcome. He is the only hero with 3 escape mechanism with Waveform, Morph and Replicate. Waveform provides good burst damage in early game engagement as well as being mobility spell. This makes him good in early game as well as late game. In late game, he is the highest damage dealer in the game, capable of having more than 300 AGI points, able to instantly kill a support hero with his Ethereal Blade combo. Just like Anti-Mage, he is very good split push carry but also provides some utilities to his team. 

Naga Siren

Reason : 
She was the 2nd most banned hero in The International  2012. The combination of Naga Siren + Dark Seer + Tide Hunter was said to be invincible. This combination allows her to use her ultimate as initiation, then win every team fight with Dark Seer's Vacuum and Tide Hunter's Ravage. Song of the Siren serves as an reliable escape mechanism and initiation tool. Also, her level 3 ultimate has very short cool down of 60 seconds. She has a lot of utilities as a carry hero. Ensnare is very powerful since it stops her target from moving for 5 seconds and able to counter some popular heroes at that time such as Lycantherope. Ripe Tide and Mirror Image are very powerful spells and makes her very good in farming and split pushing. However, she lost most of the games and teams started to realize she will get outcarried in once late game hit in. Navi also proved that she is beatable with amazing counter pick.

Anti-Mage

Reason : 
He was no longer the god tier carry hero in this version. The meta game of early 6.77 was more about pushing and he can't deal with that. The meta of that time required carry heroes to be able to contribute in early game engagement. Since Anti-Mage can't do that, he lost his popularity in early 6.77. However, teams tried to pick him up again to counter Morphling and he did that very well. Anti-Mage can easily survive Morphling's shotgun combo and can chase Morphling down with superior mobility. Mana Break is also very good against Morphling since Morphling is very mana dependent. He can also better farmer and split pusher
than Morphling. He also proved that he is still very stable carry pick and won most of the game in The International 2012.


6.75 & 6.76 : THE DEATH BALL (死亡舞会）

Luna

She was brought into competitive scene by IG in The International 2012. The meta of 6.75 was about ganking and team fighting. Unlike most of the carry heroes, she has a very long range spamable nuke. Her ultimate also makes her powerful in early to mid game team fight. She is also very good in trilane since her aura makes her and her teammates hit very hard. Her aura also contributes in pushing down towers. She can get online relatively fast compared to other carry heroes. She can also farm very fast with Moon Glaive. In late game, it is very hard to defend against her since Moon Glaive will bounce between units. However, she has several weakness:
1) No escape mechanism.
2) Easy to burst down.
3) Loses power in late game.

Sven

Reason : 
He was picked due to his great skill set. He received continuous buff since 6.72 and became much more stronger than previous version. He is very good in trilane with his AOE stun and Warcry. Warcry provides massive armor bonus for his team and is great in tower diving. Great Cleave is also very good against illusion and lets him farm and push faster. He deals massive damage with his ultimate even without farm. However, he doesn't scale that well with item and get outcarried late game. He is also very reliant on Black King Bar in order to take fight. Besides that, he is not a mobile carry, hence he get kited easily late game.


6.77 : AGE OF DIVERSITY (多元化时代）

Lone Druid

Reason : 
Here comes the bear. He was picked or banned in 100% of the games in G-League 2012, which showed his popularity. In laning stage, he can solo against any hero and still win the lane. Hence, this allows versatility in terms on laning. He can crush any off lane hero without need of support heroes, hence supports are free to rotate. He is also very tanky even without item with his ultimate, hence hard to be ganked. He also do not need to put himself in danger since he can always stay back and let his Spirit Bear fight. Once he get Radiance on his bear, he can split push very well. In early to mid game, his bear is very hard to focus down since it has so much HP. His bear also provides powerful lock down and pushing power, allow his team to push tower safely with bear tanking in the front line. He and his bear both move very fast with Rabid on them, hence he can chase down his target and burn them with Radiance. He is just overall very versatile and stable carry, there is no reason not to pick him.

Luna

Reason : 
She is still picked frequently, however she is challenged by several carry heroes such as Lone Druid and Anti-Mage. She often go for Tranquil Boots and Ring of Aquila for some cheap regeneration, then rush Black King Bar. After that, her team will group up and search for team fight or push down towers. This is really effective strategy and teams had won many games with her.

Anti-Mage

Reason : 
This just shows that he is very stable carry. In my opinion, he is the most stable carry hero in the game. He is still very good in doing his job. In fact, he has 64% win rate in G-League 2012 which is considered very high.

Faceless Void

Reason : 
Teams pick him mainly for his Chorosphere, as well as good late game power. He has 60% win rate in G-League 2012, which is respectable. He is stronger than ever since Rubick can't use his ultimate against him anymore. 


Sources
http://dota-academy.com/home/
http://www.dota2wiki.com/wiki/User:Reaverxai
http://www.playdota.com/

TIPS IN PICKS AND BANS IN 6.77

Before I start, I need to tell you the Do's and Don'ts as well as Tips in drafting.

Do's
1) Always prepare more than 1 line-up, each person around 5 - 9 heroes, depends on position in team. Normally support hero is easily replaced hence support player need to know more heroes, whereas long lane hero is fairly limited in number hence long lane player need to know less heroes. 

2) You do not need to fixed your position in your team, however it is good to do so. For example, a carry player can exchange position with other player if that player is suitable to play certain carry hero. But you should try to fix your position to get used to it.

3) Always try to have back-up plan in your mind if your strategy fails.

Don'ts
1) Picking with only counter picking in mind. This is fine but it won't take you too far. You need to have versatility in your line-up. This will be explained further in following section.

2) Picking without consider laning advantage. Some are too focused in picking so called OP heroes but never have the proper way to lane them.

3) Copying competitive player blindly without having the skill to play certain strategy.

4) Overestimate and underestimate strength of heroes. For example, public players tend to think that Huskar, Shadow Fiend, and Bloodseeker are very strong picks while underestimate the truly powerful heroes. You can get to recognize some good heroes by watching competitive replay. 

5) Picking so called OP heroes but do not have clear synergy between them. For example, picking Dark Seer in split push line-up is a common mistake since Dark Seer excels in team fight.

Tips
1) You can try to fool your opponent by last picking your key hero, however it's often not possible to do so.

2) If you know your opponent very well, you can ban and pick according to their play style. If you know nothing about them, standard pick and ban is the way to go.


Steps in Picks & Bans

First Ban Stage
1) You have two ban slot.

2) If you are on Radiant, you are 1st to go.

3) If you know your opponent well, then you can either ban their best hero or go for the standard ban. If not, standard ban is the safer choice.

4) Below are some examples of standard ban for 6.77 version.

Batridder

He is one of the most banned hero in this version. You can see it from G-League where he was banned or picked every single game. He is so popular right now for several reasons:
a) Very versatile in laning. This hero can go for solo long lane, solo mid, even doing stacks in jungle then clear jungle creeps with Firefly.
b) Wins the lane against almost any solo hero.
c) Reliable escape mechanism with Firefly.
d) One of the best initiator with Blink Dagger
e) Counter Magic Immunity as Lifestealer and BKB carries such as Luna are getting popular.

Nyx Assassin










He is very very annoying to play against, so annoying that you just have to ban him. He is just too hard to kill for a support hero. His stun is above average (2.77s) in terms of duration, his mana burn can easily deal over 500 damage to INT heroes in late game. If you wan to kill him, you must first have invi-detection. However, a well timed Spiked Carapace ruins your day and lets him escape safely. But, he has some weaknesses that set him back, he is too level and item dependent as a support, melee and his mana issue.

Magnus

His ulti makes Enigma's ulti a joke. 3.75 seconds AOE stun with no channeling and short cool down of 100 seconds is totally broken. He is very hard to kill with 1200 range Skewer. He can defend pushes decently due to his spamable Shockwave. He can go for solo mid or long lane solo.


5) If none of your team member knows how to play them, it is always better to ban them.

6) However if you have the 1st pick (means that you are on Radiant), you can let one of them get through so that you will get him.

7) Drafting is very dynamic, you can do your draft in other way as long as it works.

8) For example: if your opponent ban Tinker in this stage, they might be going for pushing strategy as Tinker is very good in defending base. So it is nice for you to pick up some AOE spamable spell to defend your base in the picking stage. However  you are not very sure of your opponent mind, hence versatility in your picks is highly important.

First Pick Stage
1) You can pick 3 heroes in this stage

2) Carry heroes are not easily replaced whereas support heroes can be replaced since support heroes share much more similarities. For example, Lone Druid is a very unique hero and you can't replace it with Anti-Mage as the pick works differently. However, Jakiro can be easily replaced with Leshrac or Lina and it won't affect the line-up that much.

3) If possible, pick your carry in this stage unless you are very confident and you have a plan in your mind. Why? If you do not pick your carry in this stage, your opponent will just ban good carry heroes and you are left with some medicore carry heroes. Good carry heroes are quite few right now compared to support heroes.

4) A good carry hero has 5 major characteristics: (Very Important)
- Mobility
- Escape Mechanism
- Survivility
- Damage
- Late Game Scaling

5) However, do not confine yourself with characteristics above since drafting is highly dynamic. For example: Naga Siren lacks of mobility, however her net can hold her target in place for 5 seconds so that she can hit her target effectively.

6) Picking long lane hero first is highly encouraged, as you will have more choices in your next pick. For example, first pick Dark Seer is quite a good choice since he is a very versatile hero and he is one of the best long lane hero. He can even go to jungle if things go horible for him.

7) If you are on Dire, you pick 2nd but you can pick 2 heroes at once. So you can get afford to get 2 heroes that works very well in the same team such as Brewmaster + Luna, Dark Seer + Lone Druid or Shadow Demon + Chen.

8) Always make sure your heroes can at least hold their own in lane. Laning is important since it decides your mid game, when larger scale fights start to happen frequently.

9) Picking melee hero for mid solo is not always a bad idea, since melee hero get more experience even if the creep is denied. Besides that, most melee hero are naturally tanky and can stand against harassment quite well. Some good candidates are Brew Master, Night Stalker, Beastmaster and Magnus. However, if possible try to pick some powerful lane controller such as Queen of Pain and Templar Assasin so that you can win mid lane.

10) Do not pick easy to ganked hero as solo mid as it only take 1 smoke gang to destroyed your mid lane control. Shadow Fiend is no longer picked as solo mid since he stands no chance against smoke gang, whereas hero like Queen of Pain can escape with Blink.

11) You can pick support in this stage if you think that certain support is very important to your line-up, however you are advised to pick your long lane and carry hero first.

Second Ban Stage
1) You can ban 3 heroes in this stage, but do not worry since this is the easiest stage.

2) You just need to ban what opponent lacks of or what they might pick. For example, your opponent lacks carry in their pick, so you just have to ban some good carry to limit their option. That is why picking carry in 1st pick stage is highly encourage since if you do not, your opponent is going to ban all of them.

3) Banning long lane heroes is quite easy too since long lane heroes are very few. Some example of good long lane heroes are Batridder, Magnus, Dark Seer, Windrunner and Bounty Hunter. Most of them are quite likely to get banned or picked in first ban and first pick stage, hence it is very important to pick your long lane hero in first pick stage.

4) Just to remind, just ban watever your opponent lacks of unless you haven't pick that type of hero yet.

5) Banning support and solo mid heroes is a little bit tricky since the number is quite large compared to long lane and carry heroes. Just ban what you think your opponent will pick. You can also focus on banning some versatile and good heroes to limit opponent's laning option.

6) Certain heroes are just too powerful in the same line-up that you have to ban. For example, it is not wise to let your opponent get Dark Seer + Lone Druid. Spirit Bear with Radiance and Ion Shell is impossible to fight against in 20 minutes mark since your heroes will just melt to this combination. Hence, you can either ban or pick one of them so that your opponent do not get both of them.

7) Banning counter to your heroes is another good choice. For example, if you already pick Lifestealer, it is wise to ban Naga Siren since she is hard counter to Lifestealer. However, some heroes although being decent counter, is not ban worthy. For example, Blood Seeker can counter Anti-Mage to a point, but he is just not a reliable hero and banning him is a waste of ban.

8) Sometimes, it is not necessary to ban a hero that your opponent can't lane. For example, if you already pick Morphling, Anti-mage is Morphling counter as Anti-Mage can easily survive Morphling's shotgun with Spell Shield and can burn Morphling's mana and chase Morphling down with superior mobility. However if your opponent already selected their hard carry such as Lone Druid, you do not need to ban Anti-Mage.

Second Pick Stage
1) You can pick 2 heroes at this stage.

2) Normally primary support heroes are picked in this stage. Secondary support and solo mid heroes are often picked in this stage too.

3) At this stage, both you and your opponent already show picture of your line-up. So it is very easy to figure out what your opponent is trying to do.

4) These 2 picks should cover the weakness of your previous pick. For example, if you lack some lock down, pick it now.

5) Amount of reliable lock down is very important in your line-up so that you can lock down and kill your target. A team without stunner often faces huge problem later on, especially against opponent's carry.

6) Another important aspect is to pick some form of spamable AOE if your team lacks that. It is because that, sometimes you are force to stall the game by using AOE spell. A team without AOE takes too long to clear the creep wave and often faces problem in defending and pushing. AOE spells also contribute to team fight by alot.

7) Just to remind, you should pick the type of hero you lack, and your picks should cover the weakness of your previous picks.

8) Your line-up should be able to execute your strategy. For example a 4 protect 1 line-up revolving around Anti-Mage should be able to fight while Anti-Mage farms. The line-up should be able to defend base by themselves while Anti-Mage doing his split push to force opponents to back off. If the line-up fails, base will be destroyed and Anti-Mage will fail to carry.

9) Primary support should be farm dependent and level dependent. For example, Shadow Priest is not a good candidate for primary support since low leveled Shadow Priest is bad. However, some good support hero such as Leshrac and Shadow Demon is very good even at level 1.

Predicting the Lane
1) This is actually the final stage in drafting.

2) You should already do the following things:
- Pick your carry, solo mid, long lane, secondary support and primary support heroes. Assign each hero to their player.
- Make sure your heroes have laning advantage, or at least hold their own.
- Make sure your line-up is quite balanced in several aspect and versatile.
- Make sure you have back-up plan if your strategy fails.

3) For example, an early game push with 5 INT heroes is very risky as if the push fails, they will get outcarried easily late game. Hence, having some back-up plan is very crucial. Normally, carry hero acts as insurance for your team. If anything bad happens, you can still come back late game.

4) Now I will touch on this topic about lane prediction. The main purpose of lane prediction is to make sure you can get some crucial experience and level on your heroes. If possible, you can shut down opponent's key heroes.

5) The traditional 2-1-2 laning is very bad outside of public game, hence you should avoid that if possible.

6) Consider you are now on Radiant, try to lane your heroes with 1-1-3 or 1-1-2 + 1 jungle is a recommended way to go.

7) If your off lane solo stands no chance against opponent's trilane, do not hesitate to abandon the lane. For example, Dark Seer will get nothing against Chaos Knight + Jakiro + Rubick trilane. It is wise for Dark Seer to totally abandon the lane and get some farm and level inside the jungle. After that, go back to off lane to defend the tower. If not, you will end up with level 1 Dark Seer in 10 minutes.

8) 2-1-2 laning is bad because duolane stands no chance against trilane and will be forced out of experience range. If that happens, you will end up with 2 level 1 hero. With 1 hero going solo long lane, at worst you have only 1 hero getting totally shut down instead of both.

9) This section is very complicated and will never be explained this way. You can get more details by watching competitive replay.


Practical Example

Example 1:
Radiant Pick
Magnus, Luna, Brewmaster, Rubick, Lina
Dire Pick
Nature's Prophet, Night Stalker, Shadow Fiend, Shadow Shaman, Enigma

Which team has the better pick? It is very clear that Radiant's pick is better. How is Dire take fight against Radiant 20 minutes in? Once Luna get her BKB and Brewmaster get his Blink Dagger, the game is already over. Dire just can't take fight against Brewmaster's ultimate. Unless the Dire totally outplaying the Radiant, it is almost certain that the Radiant will win. However Enigma can turn the game around, but this is not a reliable way.

Example 2:
Radiant Pick
Lone Druid, Rubick, Queen of Pain, Windrunner, Lina
Dire Pick
Magnus, Anti-Mage, Jakiro, Vengeful Spirit, Templar Assassin

The picks are very even for both team. However lane prediction gives you huge advantage. First we assume that we are on the Radiant. We can 100% sure than Anti-Mage will always go for safe lane farming, it is very likely to be defensive trilane with Anti-Mage + Jakiro + Vengeful Spirit. If we go for standard way of laning, Windrunner will go solo top against the trilane. However we can do Windrunner + Rubick + Lina trilane against Dire's trilane. By this way, we can shut down Anti-Mage farm since we have 3 range heroes. however, our trilane will ends up underleveled since Dire can do pull and stack jungle creeps to get level on their support. So we should ward their pulling spot and always try to steal their pull or even pull our own so that our support get some level. Lone Druid will get almost free farm against Magnus since his laning is very powerful. Mid lane is almost even.

Hence we get:
a) Free farm on our Lone Druid while shut down Anti-Mage's farm.
b) Get good amount of farm on Windrunner resulting fast Mekansm and Force Staff

However:
a) Magnus not getting completely shut down.
b) Our support being underleveled.


Special Thanks
Alvin Seng
Khoo Khai Yuen
Alston Ang
Ezzen Lee
Tobi Wan 


Sources
http://dota-academy.com/home/
http://www.dota2wiki.com/wiki/User:Reaverxai
http://www.playdota.com/

DOTA 2, THE POPULAR SUPPORT FOR DIFFERENT VERSION

Hello, I'm here to post some analysis on the popular support hero since 6.72. What I posted here is purely based on statistic. If you do not agree with me, please kindly reply and state your opinion.

6.72

Lich

Reason:
The games were much slower and based on mobile agility hard carry such as Anti-Mage and Spectre. Hence, Lich shined as one of the best laning support for the carry. He can control the creep equilibrium by denying so that the creep wave always near to the tower to ensure carry safe farming as well as denying enermy farm and experiences. However, he faded away in 6.73 due to:
1) weak ganking
2) weak against pushes
3) completely countered by pipe and meka

Ancient Apparition











Reason:
He was picked for his laning power, as well as his ultimate. He is also an amazing trilane support to provide follow-up stun. He had one of the best ultimate in the game. He can assist gank globally as well as being one of the best team fight support with his ultimate. His ultimate also completely shut down meka, Chen's ultimate and magic stick/wand burst heal.  In 6.73, his popularity dropped due to competition from other support.


6.73 

Venomancer

Reason:
He is the most successful support hero in the late history of dota. He was picked for his versatility. He has several advantages over other support:
1) Strong at level 1 with Venomous Gale
2) Ward is very good against push
3) Ward provides good vision as well to protect his team
4) His ultimate is good even in late game
5) Able to get himself some farm by using his ward
Even if enermy tried to focus him down, as long as he cast his ultimate before dying, he has done his job. Just to remind, his level 3 ultimate is able to deal 1215 magical damage to each enermy hero.

Chen

Same as Venomancer, he is the most successful support hero in recent history of dota. Unlike other support, he can farm very fast in the jungle, resulting very fast meka for his team. One of his selling point is his ultimate, global burst heal can safe his teammate no matter where he is. If he get a good creep, he can start ganking with another support and start pushing down tower. One of the most overpowered ability with him is his ability to send back his teammate. 


6.74

Venomancer

Reason:
2nd most picked and 3rd most banned support hero in The International 2012, this alone justified his position. He was also picked and banned frequently in most major tournaments.

Chen

Reason:
1st most banned support hero in The International 2012.

Leshrac 

Reason:
1st most picked support hero in The International 2012. Actually he was ignored for very long time despite being very strong hero. In 6.74, games were shorter and push strategy was very dominant. Hence, having skill to clear creep wave is very important. Leshrac is one of the strongest pusher in the game due to Diabolic Edict as well as having huge amount of AOE burst damage. He is simply too versatile not to be picked. His stun is easier to land than Lina's and deal very good damage at level 1. He can even transition to semi-carry if given the farm.


6.75

Jakiro

Reason:
Ice Path was reworked in 6.75 from an unreliable weak spell, into a spamable long range AOE stun with low mana cost. His popularity rised also because of neft on popular support, including Chen, Leshrac and Venomancer. His aoe and team fight potential is pretty much insane. His ulti is not reliable but can be used together with some chain stun, dealing huge amount of damage in team fight. He is also tanky with natural high base STR.

Rubick

Reason:
He was actually much more popular in 6.74. But he was not played as support hero, but solo mid position instead. He was picked due to his versatility as well as his broken ultimate. He has some anti-push on his own, a very reliable disable, and very useful aura for his team. He can transition into utility hero if given the farm.


6.76-6.77

Keeper of the Light

Reason:
He was picked to shut down the push, as well as being one of the best trilane support. Chakara Magic can refill mana for the trilane. Mana leak as well as his ultimate, provide some utility to his team as well. The main strength of this hero is that Illuminate can clear all the creep wave no matter how big they are, and he alone can cause big issue if his enermies try to push. Unlike other support, he can actually get his farm and buy utility item in mid to late game.

Shadow Demon

Reason:
This hero was picked mainly for his Disruption. This spell can set-up gank, safe his teammate, provide aditional dps by creating illusion of carry. His Soul Catcher make tanking impossible. He can also provide scouting tools with Shadow Poison as well as some nice damage. His ultimate works on magic immunity is one of his selling point since BKB carries like Luna and Sven is seeing a lot of picks.


Sources
http://dota-academy.com/home/
http://www.dota2wiki.com/wiki/User:Reaverxai
http://www.playdota.com/

DOTA 2, THE POPULAR CARRY OF DIFFERENT VERSION

The purpose of this post is to look back the popular carry of previous version. And to see what is the changes in popular carry pick in changing meta game.


6.72

Anti Mage

Farming Core
Poor Man's Shield ($550) + Power Treads ($1400) + Battle fury ($4350) = $6300
Online Timer = 13 - 16 minutes

Ready-to-Fight Core

Poor Man's Shield ($550) + Power Treads ($1400) + Battle fury ($4350) +  Manta Style ($5050) + Heart of Tarrasque ($5500) = $16850
Online Timer = 29 - 35 minutes

Carry Power
4.8/5


Spectre

Farming Core
Vanguard ($2225) + Phase Boots ($1350) + Magic Wand ($509) + Radiance ($5150) = $9234
Online Timer = 19 - 22 minutes

Ready-to-Fight Core
Vanguard ($2225) + Phase Boots ($1350) + Magic Wand ($509) + Radiance ($5150) +  Heart of Tarrasque ($5500) = $14734
Online Timer = 28 - 34 minutes

Carry Power
4.2/5


6.73

Anti-Mage

Please refer to 6.72 for details.

Faceless Void

Farming Core
Poor Man's Shield ($550) + Power Treads ($1400) + Battle fury ($4350) = $6300
Online Timer = 13 - 16 minutes

Ready-to-Fight Core
Poor Man's Shield ($550) + Power Treads ($1400) + Battle fury ($4350) + Black King Bar ($3900) + Butterfly($6000) = $16200
Online Timer = 29 - 35 minutes

Carry Power
5/5(one of the hardest carry in the game)



6.74

Naga Siren

Farming Core
Arcane Boots ($1450) + Magic Wand ($509) + Poor Man's Shield ($550) + Vitality Booster ($1100) = $3609
Online Timer = 8 - 9 minutes

Ready-to-Fight Core
Arcane Boots ($1450) + Magic Wand ($509) + Poor Man's Shield ($550) +  Radiance ($5150) +  Heart of Tarrasque ($5500) = $13159
Online Timer = 24 - 29 minutes

Carry Power
3.8/5 (cannot solo carry the team)

Lycanthrope 



Farming Core
Vladmir's Offering ($2050) = $2050
Online Timer = 7 - 8 minutes

Ready-to-Fight Core
Vladmir's Offering ($2050) + Power Treads ($1400) + Black King Bar ($3900) = $7350
Online Timer = 18 - 21 minutes

Carry Power
3.5/5 (lose his power in late game)

Morphling 

Farming Core
Power Treads ($1400) + Magic Wand ($509) + Ring of Aquila ($985) + Linken's Sphere ($5175) = $8789
Online Timer = 18 - 21 minutes

Ready-to-Fight Core
Power Treads ($1400) + Magic Wand ($509) + Ring of Aquila ($985) + Linken's Sphere ($5175) + Ethereal Blade ($4900) = $13689
Online timer = 25 - 30 minutes

Carry Power
4.8/5

Lone Druid 

Farming Core
Tranquil Boots ($975) + Radiance ($5150) =  $6125
Online Timer = 13 - 15 minutes

Ready-to-Fight Core
Tranquil Boots ($975) + Radiance ($5150) + Assault Cuirass ($5350) = $11475
Online Timer = 23 - 27 minutes

Carry Power
4.2/5(spirit bear dies easily late game)



6.75 - 6.77(latest version)

Luna

Farming Core
Tranquil Boots ($975) + Ring of Aquila ($985) + Magic Wand ($509) = $2469
Online Timer =  5 - 6 minutes

Ready-to-Fight Core
Tranquil Boots($975) + Ring of Aquila($985) + Magic Wand ($509) + Black King Bar ($3900) = $6369
Online Timer = 13 - 16 minutes

Carry Power
3.8/5(lose her power in very late game, but often can end the game fast)

Lone Druid

Please refer to 6.74 for details.

Anti-Mage

Please refer 6.72 for details.

Conclusion
As you can see, the popular carry is getting softer and softer as ultra hard carry can't actually be used unless in very defensive line-up. The game has become so fast that carry need to get online as fast as possible to join their team. Besides that, buff and nerf that Icefrog made has greatly affected the popularity of heroes. For example, Morphling was nefted heavily in 6.75 hence he fell out of favour. What I posted here is based on what I saw from replay and if you don't agree with me, kindly reply and state your opinion.



Sources
http://dota-academy.com/home/
http://www.dota2wiki.com/wiki/User:Reaverxai
http://www.playdota.com/