Bounty Hunter was taken for the position of carry on a low rating in matchmaking, perhaps from time immemorial, but this strategy was not very effective. Even now, with a hero’s overall winrate of over 52%, he is only 46.9% on the safe lane. However, at a high rating, the situation is completely different. Professional players are increasingly taking Bounty Hunter to one of the three core roles. How the style of play for the hero changes when moving to the first position, how to act on a map with such an unusual carry, and why it is worth abandoning the early purchase of Desolator – in the material from Cybersport.ru.
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Bounty Hunter is really cool
As part of the DPC for the CIS, viewers saw Bounty Hunter only three times: twice he was taken by NoTechies for Zayac (and lost both maps), and once the hero was taken, on the contrary, against the Solo team – Virtus.pro decided to use him in third position. In a recent interview with Cybersport.ru, AS Monaco Gambit off-laner Vasily AfterLife Shishkin said that his team also tried to play with Bounty Hunter. However, apparently, Gambit didn’t like the character. As AfterLife himself explained, it is difficult to build an effective strategy around the hero, so the choice of BH seems dubious to him, especially for the first stage of the draft.
Probably, for a professional team Dota, Bounty Hunter is really not the most obvious peak. However, at a high rating, the hero in the first position now has a win rate above 58%, which means that, if used correctly, he can become a formidable weapon in your pubs.
BH stats on high MMR
Bounty Hunter confidently stands the lane thanks to its high starting armor (8 units), the ability to finish off creeps with Jinada without any problems, and it is effective to exchange health with the enemy offlaner for oneself, especially if the melee hero is opposing BH. In addition, the character does not need excessive farming to become dangerous: having received a level advantage and at least one transition slot, he is able to start acting with the team, which will allow imposing a high tempo on the opponent. At the same time, in late Bounty Hunter feels comfortable thanks to two powerful talents at level 20 and 25, which give +50 to attack speed and + 40% to evasion. Having collected by that time Abyssal Blade and Swift Blink, the hero can literally in a second destroy not only the opponent’s supports, but also core characters.
Desolator as the first slot is not the best choice
It is Desolator that is often bought as the first slot (and not only in the carry position) by all low-rated players who want to enter a full-fledged core. Professional esports players have never started with this subject in matchmaking. Desolator, of course, was not ignored, but they took him only after one or two intermediate slots.
Naturally, many BH players by the 12th minute want to “click” enemy supports with one hit with Desolator under Track and dominate the map. However, this strategy has notable flaws. Firstly, the timing of the purchase of the coveted item can drag on, for example, up to the 15-17th minute. All this time, the hero often just farms, losing the initial peak of strength and allowing enemy supports to completely ward off their forest and get ultimates. This passive start can be a fatal mistake for the Bounty Hunter. Secondly, Desolator does not give bonus characteristics and any survivability, and if a character after 15 minutes of farming an artifact cannot implement it, and even die, this will greatly affect the rate of its development.
Bounty Hunter has good defense against physical attacks, but is very vulnerable to magic due to its modest health. Therefore, the first thing all professional players tried to compensate for this particular flaw. The first slot for Bounty Hunter was most often taken by Drum of Endurance, which gives a small bonus to characteristics and speed. Sometimes Sange and Yasha was preferred instead of this artifact, and even less often – Battle Fury (however, this was clearly done as part of an experiment – matches with this starting item ended unsuccessfully for BH). They were immediately followed by the Black King Bar, an alternative to it could be the Hood of Defiance. And only after that, esportsmen bought Desolator, and even then not always. The choice of the following artifacts varied among all, but among the most popular are Abyssal Blade, Butterfly, Assault Cuirass, Bloodthorn and Swift Blink.
Bounty Hunter by fn
Aghanim’s Scepter on Bounty Hunter is completely ignored, since the rate is on physical damage. Most esportsmen took Aghanim’s Shard, but did not buy it until the 35th minute. This artifact is useful in the late stage of the game, when there are not so many single kills, and the course of the match depends on vision and competent positioning in mass fights. So the overview from Aghanim’s Shard can be a useful addition, but buying it should definitely not interfere with the acquisition of other, more important items for survivability and damage.
Got Track – you can go kill
The gameplay on position 1 Bounty Hunter is noticeably different from what you might be used to on other carries. For example, fn started moving around the map immediately after reaching the sixth level. At the seventh minute, he shifted to a teamfight in the center, after which he immediately took part in another fight in the forest. At the same time, due to the fact that fn made two kills under Track, and also hit the opponent with Jinada more than a dozen times, by the tenth minute he did not lag behind the enemy Anti-Mage in total value, which all this time was left to himself on the safe lane.
And here we can return to the conversation about the quick purchase of Desolator, which forces BH to just beat the creeps for a long time. Professional e-sportsmen left the line almost immediately and made money primarily in fights. For example, the statistics of one of the Nightfall matches is indicative. At the end of the game, he earned only 22% of the total value from killing creeps, while he received more than 50% for heroes. For comparison, his mid in this match received 44% of value from creeps and 31% from enemies.
Nightfall is among the leaders in terms of overall value, although by the 20th minute he has only 78 finished creeps
Of course, you don’t have to rush into the attack right away if you feel vulnerable against your opponents’ pick – Nightfall, for example, stayed in lane before buying Hood of Defiance, as the enemy had a lot of magic damage. However, he did not stand passively: Bounty Hunter constantly strained the enemy Underlord, forcing him to go to the base and ask for help from the Nyx Assassin Quartet. As soon as Nightfall bought the Hood of Defiance, he first moved to the center, and then to the off lane, where he committed a streak of kills and demolished the tower.
Active, aggressive play and constant movement around the map with teammates are the basis of the gameplay on the carry Bounty Hunter. However, it is important to understand that we are talking about team interactions – single forays in invisibility do not work for a long time not only at a high rating, but also at 3-4 thousand MMR. Having died several times under the enemy Sentry Ward, Bounty Hunter will very quickly lose its relevance and roll down in overall value. Therefore, you need to manage your teammates, organizing forays into the enemy forest, capturing the “troika” and demolishing towers.
Leveling up skills and talents
In the study of abilities, Jinada is given priority, because each new level reduces its cooldown. Invisibility is pumped once or not taken at all until the seventh or eighth level, since single kills in the enemy BH forest are not needed, and in mass fights the ability is not particularly useful. After the Jinada leveling has reached the fourth level, we study the other two abilities to the end, giving priority to Shuriken Toss.
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Nightfall boost
In the choice of the talent at the tenth level, the preferences of the players differ, but more often professionals still choose +40 damage from Jinada, and not the bonus to speed, especially if you have already collected (or are planning) Drum of Endurance or Yasha. There are practically no discrepancies in the choice of other talents: at the 15th level they take 275 to health, at the 20th – +50 to the attack speed, and at the 25th – 40% to evasion.
At the end, a few words about picks and counter picks. Carrie Bounty Hunter still does not appear on the high rating so often so that objective conclusions can be drawn about convenient and inconvenient line-ups for the hero. However, if you look at BH’s overall stats, you can see that he has a high winrate against Monkey King and Ember Spirit among the meta characters. But fights in which the opponent has Troll Warlord, Nyx Assassin or Oracle are unsuccessful.
Inconvenient matchups for BH on high-MMR
Have you played the Bounty Hunter carry? How do you assess the effectiveness of the hero in the first position?
