In the game of Dota, it’s always a good strategy to have at least one disabler in your team and ensure that your team can disrupt the offensive maneuvers of your opposition. Hence, it is important to determine which heroes of the current meta (7.29d) are great at disabling and ensuring wins during team fights. In this article, we will discuss the top 10 disablers in the game you can use to win your MMRs.
During the drafting phase of game 4 OG vs. Liquid finals of The International 9 (TI9), Sebastian “Ceb” Debs mentioned that their lineup looks a little “weird” as the heroes that they are planning to pick have no stun abilities. This shows that even at the most crucial matches in Dota 2, stunners and disablers are important in a team lineup.
Of course, this is especially true in public matches where players and teams are less coordinated and need more disables to ensure kills and teamfights. Remember, your team is already playing at a huge disadvantage if nobody drafted a hero without a proper disable.
10. Earthshaker
The most famous 6-million dollar echo slam of EG.
- Divine and Immortal Rank Win Rate – 47.3%
- Initiator, Disabler, Nuker
- Complexity Level 2
- Position 4
Earthshaker is a melee strength hero who is usually played at position 4. He has four abilities: Fissure, Enchant Totem, Aftershock, and Echo Slam. His main ability is Fissure, wherein he slams the ground, creating an impassable ridge in a straight line and stunning heroes caught in its path.
His bread-and-butter skill is Aftershock, a passive skill that allows Earthshaker to stun and damage nearby enemy heroes whenever he casts a spell.
Earthshaker is probably the best hero with chain-stun skills. Meaning, he can add another stun after the first one expires.
Typically, Earthshaker’s first item is a Blink Dagger which allows him to teleport instantly towards enemies. Whenever enemy heroes are grouped together, Earthshaker’s deadly chain-stuns could easily wipe out an entire team.
The typical combo is: Cast an Enchant Totem in place -> Blink towards grouped up enemies -> Echo Slam -> Hit an enemy once with Enchant Totem bonus damage -> Cast Enchant Totem once again to add another stun -> Hit an enemy once more with Enchant Totem bonus damage -> Fissure
The chain stuns aren’t the only arsenal of Earthshaker. Because his fissure creates an impassable ridge, he can block enemies from running away. This means that enemies trapped behind the fissure must walk around it, wherein they’d probably die trying.
But, with all his good skills, why is Earthshaker’s win rate below average, especially on high MMR matches (47.3%)?
Good players can anticipate Earthshaker’s stuns and entries. When playing against Earthshaker, players with a good sense of the game avoid being grouped up together at all costs. All his stuns also do not go through Black King Bar (BKB, active Magic Immunity Item), which is often bought when fighting against him, rendering him almost useless in the crucial early seconds of teamfights.
Still, Earthshaker is a formidable disabler. In TI5, Earthshaker was the winning hero for Evil Geniuses with Universe’s $6,000,000-worth Echo Slam, wiping four enemy heroes in a single combo, bringing out the famous call of TobiWan “It’s a disaster!”.
Want to hear something cool? When itemized with cooldown-reducing items and a refresher orb, plus his level 25 talent of -2 seconds cooldown for Enchant Totem, he can stun-lock enemies for a total of 15.5 seconds! Add a refresher shard from Roshan and that’s a total of 23.25 seconds. That’s just crazy, man.
What makes Earthshaker great for disabling:
- Chain-stunning enemies with proper timing of his abilities
- Massive damage in addition to stuns
- Stunning enemies at a safe distance using fissure
- Great chase potential with a Blink Dagger and an Aghanim’s Scepter
Earthshaker Details: https://www.dota2.com/hero/earthshaker
9. Disruptor
OG.Notail's Disruptor gameplay.
- Divine Rank Win Rate – 50.4%
- Initiator, Disabler, Nuker
- Complexity Level 2
- Position 5
Disruptor is a ranged intelligence hero who is often played at position 5. His four abilities are Thunder Strike, Glimpse, Kinetic Field, and Static Storm.
He has two game-changing skills that can immediately shift the balance of teamfights – Glimpse and Static Storm.
Glimpse teleports a targeted enemy hero back to its previous location 4 seconds ago. This is exceptionally strong especially for chasing enemies or forcing them away if they initiate on your team.
Static Storm, his ultimate ability, creates a circular cloud within his range that silences and damages all enemies inside it. This is often partnered with Kinetic Field to trap enemies within the storm. When used correctly during teamfights, multiple kills are to be expected.
Disruptor is a very strong support hero throughout the game. During the laning stage, he can provide good space for his carry by casting Thunder Strike on enemies. This is essentially a pseudo-disable as they are forced to back away from the lane for a while.
When one teammate visits their lane to gank, it’s almost a guaranteed kill as the enemies can’t simply escape due to Disruptor’s Glimpse and Kinetic Field. Because Thunder Strike gives a temporary vision to the targeted enemy, it’s virtually impossible to get out of ganks alive.
The best item for Disruptor is Aghanim’s Scepter. This upgrades his ultimate, adding a “Mute” ability that disables the active items of enemies which are often used to counter Static Storm, such as BKB and Eul’s Scepter of Divinity (Eul’s, grants self-invulnerability for 2.5 seconds).
His win rate is a decent 50.4% at Divine and Immortal ranks. Due to his strong teamfight abilities, his contribution to the team is indispensable. Because of this, he is often the first initial target of enemies, especially if he hasn’t used his ultimate yet.
What makes Disruptor great for disabling:
- A combination of his skills often guarantees a kill, even when the enemy is attempting to escape: Glimpse -> Kinetic Field into Static Storm -> Thunder Strike
- Massive AOE 5-second silence and mute
- A versatile hero that can be used for kiting and chasing
- Does not need to be in front of teamfights
Disruptor Details: https://www.dota2.com/hero/disruptor
8. Treant Protector
XINQ's pro Treant Protector disabling the hell out of enemies.
- Divine Rank Win Rate: 52.9%
- Initiator, Durable, Disabler, Escape, Sustain
- Complexity Level 2
- Position 4, 5
Treant Protector is a melee strength hero often played at positions 4 or 5. He is one of the first pioneer heroes of the Warcraft 3 – Defense of the Ancients game.
Treant is an overall great support with a complete arsenal of skills: sustain, tempo-control, disable, slow, and kite. He has five abilities: Nature’s Grasp, Leech Seed, Living Armor, Nature’s Guise, and Overgrowth.
His ultimate Overgrowth is one of the best disabling skills in the game. Although it can be dispelled by basic dispel skills, it is an AOE spell that affects all nearby enemies. What makes it great is that it pierces spell immunity (even if enemies pop their BKBs, they would still be locked down).
His ability to slow the tempo of the game is what makes Treant stand out, especially when he has a hard-farming position 1. With his Living Armor, Treant is the only hero that can heal towers in Dota 2 (outside of Omniknight’s GA Aghanim’s upgrade). Keeping allied towers alive for a longer period greatly affects the tempo of the game as the enemy is unable to occupy more grounds on the map.
Living Armor can also be cast on allies to heal and provide them with additional armor which are both crucial during teamfights.
All of these are the main reason why Treant has a high win rate of 52.9% at Divine and Immortal ranks. As a position 5 hero, he can control the tempo of the game while wreaking havoc in teamfights with his ultimate.
What makes Treant Protector great for disabling:
- AOE root that pierces spell immunity
- Global Overgrowth with Aghanim’s Upgrade
- Laning stage control with Nature’s Grasp’s slow and damage
- Leech Seed’s ability to slow enemies while sustaining allies
- Often itemized with a Meteor Hammer
Treant Protector Details: https://www.dota2.com/hero/treantprotector
7. Shadow Shaman
Shadow Shaman isn't only for disabling - he's great at pushing too.
- Divine Rank Win Rate – 52.3%
- Pusher, Disabler, Nuker, Initiator
- Complexity Level 1
- Position 4, 5
Shadow Shaman is a ranged intelligence support hero. His four abilities are Ether Shock, Hex, Shackles, and Mass Serpent Ward.
Shackles is the longest single-target disable in the game. At max level, a shackled hero is completely disabled for 5 seconds. He also has a +2 second Shackles duration talent at level 20, making it a 7-second disable.
Hex is not so bad itself. Targeted enemies are turned into a harmless creature (an innocent, white chicken) for 3.5 seconds at max level. Chickens cannot attack, use their skills and items. They move, yes, but they move like chickens as well – with tiny, slow steps (except if they are affected by Haste, then they are chickens with a nitro boost).
Even though Mass Serpent Wards skill does not have a stun, Shadow Shaman can trap an enemy inside it by casting it directly towards that hero. In the late game, Shadow Shaman can easily kill an isolated hero, whether a core or a support, because he can stun-lock an enemy to death, especially with cooldown reduction items, then deal massive damage with the Wards.
He can cast Shackles and Hex over and over again on a single hero, endlessly. You can try it for yourself in Demo mode. In a real game during teamfights, it is quite hard to do as you are an easy target when casting shackles. But, when a hero is isolated, you can do it.
Aside from disabling, Shadow Shaman also is a good tempo-setter. He can leave Wards to quickly take down enemy towers and allow his team to take map control.
What makes Shadow Shaman great for disabling:
- Long-duration disables
- Quick-cast disables which are great for initiation
- His disables are only dispelled by strong dispel skills
Shadow Shaman Details: https://www.dota2.com/hero/shadowshaman
6. Tidehunter
Mind_Control's signature Tidehunter.
- Divine and Immortal Rank Win Rate – 47.0%
- Initiator, Durable, Disabler, Nuker
- Complexity 1
- Position 3
Tidehunter is a melee strength hero that is often played in the offlane. He’s one of the tankiest heroes in the game with his Kraken Shell (a strong dispel passive, absurdly good).
He has four skills: Gush, Kraken Shell, Anchor Smash, and Ravage.
His disable mainly comes from his ultimate, Ravage. Upon use, Tidehunter erupts tentacles… Yes, tentacles, around him in a massive AOE radius that deals damage and a long stun duration (2.8 at max level).
Ravage is a great initiation and counter-initiation tool. With a blink dagger, he can instantly disable the whole enemy team in a teamfight, even if they are scattered around.
When timed perfectly, Tidehunter’s Ravage can turn the tides of battle to their team’s advantage. No pun intended. But why is his win rate so low at 47% in high MMR games?
Despite being one of the strongest disables in the game when it lands perfectly, Ravage does not pierce through spell immunity.
In high-rank matches, most players are in their right minds and buy early BKBs. That’s it. BKB is a difference-maker, ladies and gentlemen. Don’t believe me? The current win rate of Tidehunter at Archon is at 50.9% and that goes down every medal after (Legend: 49.2%, Ancient: 47.7%).
Still, Tidehunter is a strong disabler and he is still often used in competitive matches where team coordination is at its peak. Remember the deadly Templar Assassin – Tidehunter combo of Team Nigma in TI9? With those two in their lineup, they were undefeated throughout the tournament, except in the finals where OG just ran them down every second of the game.
What makes Tidehunter great for disabling:
- Largest AOE disable in the game by a huge margin
- Can tank enemies’ disables for the team
- Can cause damage reduction status on enemies from Anchor Smash
Tidehunter Details: https://www.dota2.com/hero/tidehunter
5. Puck
The best Puck plays in Dota 2 history.
- Divine and Immortal Rank Win Rate – 51.4%
- Initiator, Disabler, Nuker, Escape
- Complexity Level 2
- Position 2, 3, 4
Puck is a ranged intelligence hero that can be played as either a core or a support. Being flexible in terms of hero role is a great incentive especially during the draft phase of the game as the enemies are unable to easily predict and counter-pick against your team’s lineup.
She has five abilities: Illusory Orb, Waning Rift, Phase Shift, Ethereal Jaunt, and Dream Coil.
Puck is one of the best initiator-disablers in the game. Illusory Orb allows her to jump in and out of teamfights with ease, especially when partnered with Phase Shift (Immunity through hiding).
Dream Coil, her ultimate AOE ability, applies a brief initial stun, damages, and locks enemies caught in its AOE within the latch of the coil. Heroes attempting to escape the coil will break the coil, causing them additional damage and another stun with a longer duration.
Her ultimate, partnered with the long silence of her Waning Rift, is a deadly combination that can secure a lot of teamfight wins when done correctly.
During game four of the final series of the first-ever The International, Dendi of Na’vi and his deadly Puck’s 4-man Dream Coil against EHome won them a million dollars. Two TIs later, S4 of Alliance secured their win with multiple epic Dream Coils whenever Na’vi was attempting to escape to defend their base.
Puck is one of my personal favorites. She doesn’t need many items, especially when played as support. But, when played excellently, a position 4 can easily impact the game like a 2 or 3 position hero. An early Blink Dagger can drastically change the momentum of the game and snowball towards a victory because of her map dominance.
She’s a complexity 2 hero, but in my opinion, she’s a complexity 3 (which means playing her requires more experience and skill). In the hands of a god Puck player, she’s easily one of the best heroes in the game with the ability to go in and out of battle continuously, applying heavy damage and disables in between.
What makes Puck great for disabling:
- AOE Stun and Silence
- Excellent stun initiation
- Hard to catch with multiple escape skills
- Often itemized with other disabling items (Eul’s, Hex)
Puck Details: https://www.dota2.com/hero/puck
4. Bane
The best Bane player - Zai.
- Divine and Immortal Rank Win Rate – 50.6%
- Disabler, Nuker
- Complexity Level 2
- Position 5
Bane is a ranged intelligence support hero often played at position 5. He has four abilities, Enfeeble, Brain Sap, Nightmare, and Fiend’s Grip.
Bane is one of the strongest counter-pick heroes versus hard carries. His main disable comes from his ultimate, Fiend’s Grip. When he targets an enemy with Fiend’s Grip, he disables it for 6 seconds, stealing 5% of their mana every half second and dealing heavy damage per second.
His Nightmare ability is also a strong disable. He puts the targeted enemy to sleep for 7 seconds at Max level. Sleeping units are basically stunned, except that they are awakened when attacked.
My favorite skill on Bane is his enfeeble. It’s so underrated right now it’s criminal. It causes huge status reductions on an affected enemy: 60% attack reduction, 60% heal/regen reduction, 30% cast speed reduction. It lasts for 11 seconds with a cooldown of 7.
But in my opinion, Bane has consistently had high win rates because Fiend’s Grip pierces spell immunity. This gives Bane the ability to disable enemy heroes that has their BKB activated.
What makes Bane great for disabling:
- Fiend’s Grip pierces spell immunity
- Unlimited enfeeble effect on enemies
- Can disable two enemy heroes at once for a long period
Bane Details: https://www.dota2.com/hero/bane
3. Rubick
Miracle's Rubick is a god-level rubick.
- Divine and Immortal Rank Win Rate – 46.8%
- Disabler, Nuker
- Complexity Level 3
- Position 4, 5
Ah, my favorite hero.
Rubick is a ranged intelligence support that is usually played at positions 4 or 5. He has four main skills: Telekinesis, Fade Bolt, Arcane Supremacy, and Spell Steal.
Rubick’s bread-and-butter skill is Spell Steal, which allows him to learn the last skill used by his target enemy. With an Aghanim’s upgrade, the cooldown of Spell Steal goes down to 2 seconds.
In the hands of an experienced Rubick player, he is one of the best disabling supports in the game, especially when the skills of his opponents are also strong. A lot of pro-players’ highlights are full of Rubick God plays that are simply just amazing to watch.
Famous for their Rubick plays are Fy, Tims, Jerax, and Yapzor. In a lot of their pro matches, they were able to carry their team to victory by playing God-mode in Rubick support. Jerax’s stolen Ghostships and Fissures during the final game of The International 8 versus PSG.LGD played a huge role in their victory.
Stolen Blackholes, stolen Ravages, and a lot more game-changing ultimates have been returned to their enemies in such a jaw-dropping fashion. It’s as if you are playing 10 versus 5 with Rubick.
I remember distinctly that I played a game with Rubick (I played position 2 Mid) against a Tidehunter and Enigma, a tandem made famous by Kuroky and Puppey drafts. I had Aghanim’s, and I was able to steal their ultimates and even used them both consecutively at some of our clashes. GG EZ.
But then again, the Win Rate of Rubick is just 46.8% at public high MMR matches and it’s relatively low as well even on lower bracket MMRs. This is mainly because Rubick is a very situational pick, and the position 4 and 5 supports are usually the first two players to pick during the draft. When you pick Rubick, the enemy already avoids picking heroes that have strong spells (which, if you think about it, is sort of a disable already right?).
What makes Rubick great for disabling:
- Unpredictable disables from his stolen spells
- Telekinesis is also a great initiation and saving tool
- With Aghanim’s upgrade of Spell Steal, his disabling potential is unlimited
Rubick Details: https://www.dota2.com/hero/rubick
2. Enigma
The best Enigma moments in Dota 2.
- Divine and Immortal Rank Win Rate: 52.0%
- Disabler, Jungler, Initiator, Pusher
- Complexity Level 2
- Position 3, 4
Enigma is a ranged intelligence support hero who can be played as a support or a core offlane. He has four skills: Malefice, Demonic Conversion, Midnight Pulse, and Blackhole.
Malefice is his first disabling skill which stuns and damages the target every 2 seconds for 3 instances. It’s a relatively weak disable in itself but combined with the Eidolons from his Demonic Conversion and Midnight Pulse, Malefice allows you, your summons, and your team to dish out significant damage to a single target.
Of course, Enigma wouldn’t be at the top 2 list of the best disablers in Dota 2 without his Blackhole.
Blackhole is a channeling spell that summons a vortex that pulls enemies toward the center of the Blackhole. Enemies affected are unable to move, attack, cast spells, or use items. This has a four-second duration that deals 200 pure damage per second at max level.
When stacked with Midnight Pulse (7% max HP magical damage per second that pierces spell immunity), Enigma can easily get a rampage with a 5-man Blackhole.
Like Rubick, Enigma is also a situational pick. You must ensure that the enemy heroes do not counter Enigma for you to play him to his full capacity.
Some heroes that counter Enigma are Silencer, Vengeful Spirit, Rubick, Medusa, and Winter Wyvern.
Still, Enigma has consistently maintained a high win rate across all medals. At Divine and Immortal ranks, he has a high 52% win rate.
At the early laning stages of the game, he is constantly able to deny ranged creeps from the lane, which is a huge experience and gold loss for cores. He can farm himself even as a support because his eidolons can farm in the jungle.
With a Blink, BKB, and a Linken’s Sphere if needed, Enigma’s Blackhole is unstoppable without a hero to counter it. This almost guarantees a teamfight win. And in the late stages of the game, the cooldown of his Blackhole is relatively low enough, allowing Blackhole to be ready once the enemies respawn after dying.
What makes Enigma great at Disabling:
- A large AOE skill that deals massive damage and long disable duration
- One well-placed Blackhole is enough to win teamfights, secure towers, and potentially win a game
- Because he can farm well, he can buy a Refresher Orb to cast two Blackholes consecutively
Enigma Details: https://www.dota2.com/hero/enigma
1. Winter Wyvern (7.29d)
- Divine and Immortal Rank Win Rate: 51.8%
- Disabler, Nuker, Sustain
- Complexity Level 2
- Position 2, 3, 4, 5 (7.29d)
Winter Wyvern is a ranged intelligence hero that is often played as a position 5 hero. But, because she is absurdly strong in the current 7.29d patch, Wyvern is now being played at any of the four positions except position 1.
To give you a sense of how strong she currently is in this meta, here are her win rates across all medals:
- Divine and Immortal: 51.8%
- Ancient: 54.1%
- Legend: 55.4%
- Archon: 53.9%
- Crusader: 53.7%
- Guardian: 52.8%
- Herald: 51.1%
She currently has the fifth-highest win rate in the Divine and Immortal ranks, only falling behind Broodmother, Meepo, Luna, and Dark Seer. At Ancient ranks, she is third behind Brood and Meepo and at Legend ranks, she is second only to Meepo. But Brood and Meepo are often used by smurfs in those brackets, so I honestly think that Winter Wyvern has the highest win rate in those ranks.
As a support hero, that’s just ridiculous.
She has four skills: Arctic Burn, Splinter Blast, Cold Embrace, and Winter’s Curse. All her skills can apply a disable at different levels. Let me explain.
Arctic Burn gives Wyvern a flying movement and a 575 bonus attack range while applying a 40% movement slow to each enemy she hits and a 9% health burn per second for 5 seconds.
Enemies hit by Splinter Blast are slowed by 30% for four seconds.
Cold Embrace is a targeted heal to allied heroes by a 45-base plus 5% max health heal per second. But, it doesn’t just sustain. It also blocks all incoming physical damage, essentially rendering all attacks towards the healing hero useless.
If that’s not enough, she currently has one of the strongest ultimates in the game: Winter’s Curse. Wyvern freezes a target enemy, rendering it completely disabled for 5.5 seconds. All surrounding enemies are now cursed as they are forced to attack the target during the duration.
Does it pierce through spell immunity? Yes.
It’s essentially an upgraded Fiend’s Grip, except that Wyvern is not vulnerable during the duration, and it affects multiple enemy heroes at once. That’s just sick. It’s almost a Blackhole that cannot be canceled or a Ravage that cannot be BKBed.
How do you counter it? Some several heroes and skills can mitigate the effects of the Curse.
Here are some:
- Shadow Demon’s Disruption
- Oracle’s False Promise
- Omniknight’s Guardian Angel
- Pudge’s Hook
- Weaver’s Time Lapse with Aghanim’s Upgrade
- Phoenix’s Supernova with Aghanim’s upgrade (BKB needed)
- Abaddon’s Borrowed Time and Aphotic Shield
- Pugna’s Decrepify
- Outworld Destroyer’s Astral Imprisonment
- Arc Warden’s Magnetic Field
- Io’s Tether and Relocate
- Vengeful Spirit’s Nether Swap
- Snapfire’s Gobble Up (BKB or Aether Lens and Seer Stone are both needed),
- Pudge’s Dismember Shard (BKB or at least a 100 cast range bonus is needed)
- Earth Spirit’s Enchant Remnant (BKB or Aether Lens and Seer Stone are both needed)
- Centaur’s Stampede with Aghanim’s upgrade
There are only three items currently that can help mitigate – I say that again, mitigate, not eradicate – the effects of the Curse, and that is Aeon Disk (which happens to be the meta item now), Ethereal Blade, and Wind Waker. The curse of force-attacking the targeted hero can also be avoided by BKB, only if they were not affected by the spell initially (since they cannot cast BKB if they are already cursed).
All of these counters work, assuming that they are not initially affected by the Winter’s Curse. And that’s a hell of an assumption to wish for.
In the 72.9d meta, Winter Wyvern is the best disabling hero that wrecks hard.
What makes Winter Wyvern great at Disabling:
- Massive AOE disable that pierces spell immunity
- All her four skills work to disable enemies to a certain degree
- Can be played at multiple positions
Winter Wyvern Details: https://www.dota2.com/hero/winterwyvern
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