Deadlock Expert Tier List - Explanations for Every Hero

Shiv

Shiv is surprisingly still very powerful despite his rework to Killing Blow and his stamina loss. Mostly due to Serrated Knives getting immensely buffed and making his gameplay much easier. Serrated Knives is so powerful now that even 2-3 knifes are dealing upwards of 1300 damage to a singular target.

Paige

Paige seems exceptional currently as a counter-pick against Dynamo since Rallying Charge is perfect against Singularity. Paige as well offers mass damage and CC in the form of Bookwyrm and Captivating Read, overall a very solid and easy to play hero in the current meta.

Lady Geist

Lady Geist is strong and well-rounded. Despite her inherent weaknesses of needing items and being very slow, she scales extremely well and is an excellent bruiser. Soul Exchange's new 2AP upgrade is very strong in teamfights as well as the 1AP upgrade now reducing the cooldown to 2 minute is also a massive buff.

Billy

Billy has maintained his position on the tierlist, as his mass CC is still very useful in the current meta. Chain Gang's 5AP upgrade gives a free Unstoppable and allows for free punches which Billy really appreciates.

Vyper

As mentioned before, Vyper is a very volatile and binary hero, and now that volatility has spiked her heavily in the meta. Her damage now seems overwhelming and seems to break through most line-ups. The lack of assassin's in the current meta is by far the biggest buff to the viability of Vyper as she doesn't have to fear spells like Death Slam and Paradoxical Swap.

Mina

Mina is also still mostly similar, as she has maintained her powerful laning and presence throughout the game. The only real notable change is now Mina must obtain 5AP Rake in order to maintain her health throughout the game. But this is not a significant change as 5AP Love Bites has changed as well allowing for players to easily swap skill order for the same impact. There may be some awkwardness as Sanguine Retreat has an annoying cast point to make dodging spells much more difficult, but with enough mastery, Mina should mostly feel the same.

Celeste

Celeste has suffered another immense nerf to her Health. With this change, Celeste is now among the bottom 3 in terms of durability, which means any slight mistake to her movement will most likely lead to a quick death. Even so, Celeste can still easily be untouchable and take over games with relative ease.

Bebop

Bebop has gotten some minor, but significant changes to his gun windup, which really helps in fights. As well as gotten a small nuke to his Hook, which may seem minor but is actually very powerful as it gives Bebop access to Stalker and Spellslinger, and they solve big issues that Bebop had in post-laning phase and the late game. I believe Bebop is now the 2nd best gun carry, with Venator being first.

Sinclair

Not much has changed with Sinclair, but Vexing Bolt has gained some much larger splash damage, leading to much more consistent damage overall. Still an overall, solid hero but requires some mastery in order to stealing powerful ults such as Kelvin and Dynamo.

Apollo

Apollo is very strong in the laning phase due to Disengaging Sigil having 130 damage right from its 1AP upgrade. Apollo also has gotten a strong buff to Riposte, as now the 5AP upgrade is now the longest stun in the game. Lastly, Itani Lo Sahn is a solid execution tool as well as offering some light CC, which can matter in large objective fights.

Seven

Seven seems to be as solid of a character as ever. Not much has changed, but 2AP Power Surge now comes online much earlier, which drastically helps Seven's farming and fighting speed. And as always, Storm Cloud is always a huge powerful ultimate that can turn any fight around.

Silver

Silver has mostly stayed the same, she is still extremely powerful. Entangling Bola / Tail Whack still is one of the strongest CC's in the game and being able to shut off stamina in any form deserves a high rating in the meta.

Abrams

Even with the massive nerfs to Abrams gun, as long as Abrams maintains his displacement power with Shoulder Charge and natural durability, he will forever have a mainstay in any team as a solid and mobile front liner.

Infernus

Infernus has become a similar position to a Wraith or a Mirage, where he is most ideal in fighting duels and taking buildings. His laning has become better with his new 1AP talent on Afterburn, but still suffers immensely due to Dispel Magic being bought in mass. Even despite it, Walkers and jungle camps still die quickly to his damage which can propel him to snowballing games.

Pocket

Pocket should have much more impact due to the healing of Kelvin and Dynamo but seems to lack in direct damage. His opportunity cost of getting the 5AP Affliction leaves him with not enough damage to actually kill other players and Pocket seems to struggle immensely throughout the mid-game, especially if a support decides to pick up Divine Barrier.

Rem

Rem has mostly seen nerfs, mostly towards his Lil Helpers giving more gold and the nerf to Tag Along healing less. But the most significant nerf is that players are simply more used to his gameplay style, and as long has Rem is unable to steal Sinner's Sacrifices, he has a much harder time staying alive in fights.

Lash

Similar to Pocket, Lash seems to struggle right now as well for the same reasons Pocket does. Everyone has gotten a large buff to their Health and Lash struggles with finding enough damage to make ganks successful. Death Slam will forever be a fantastic team-fighting spell, but the Lash seems to rely on his team to do the damage that he lacks.

Paradox

Assassin Paradox seems to have fell out of style, but the Pulse Grenade build seems very good currently. Pulse Grenade offers some strong damage in large fights but can be fairly difficult to execute against more mobile characters like Celeste.

Calico

Most of the assassin characters seem to have issues in general due to the Health upgrades that everyone has gotten. Calico is no exception as she now requires more rotations of her spells in order to find any kills and relies on teammates much more to make up for the damage.

Warden

Warden is a fairly mediocre Gun Carry, he seems much weaker then both Bebop and Venatorator, and his cage build gets outright removed by Dispel Magic. While not a fantastic character in the mid-game, his gun still packs a punch and his simple kit leads to a much easier execution compared to other gun carries.

Mo & Krill

Mo And Krill seems pretty bad currently, and even at his worst, his Combo will forever be a good way to shut down pesky assassins and gun carries. But gun carries are much more tankier then usual and if they don't die to Combo, Mo & Krill has a much harder time existing on the game, especially during the later portions of the game where his natural tankiness starts to fall off.

Yamato

Yamato has a really strong laning phase and has gotten signifcant buffs to Flying Slash which allows her to buy items such as Spirit Strike and Melee Lifesteal. But I find that she has a very difficult time during the mid and late game, as she lacks the damage to kill through certain characters and lacks the mobility to even catch up once Flying Slash is used. Even Shadow Transformation feels a bit lacking as its innate defenses are not enough to handle through more meta attacks such as Nox Nostra and Ira Domini.

Grey Talon

Grey Talon has gotten even more to his power by getting even more Spirit to his base boons. But its starting to feel like despite all these buffs, Grey Talon dies faster to other characters then what he can offer. With how fast certain characters can output damage like Celeste or Bebop, it seems to not matter if Grey Talon has a good game with Guided Owl as if he gets engaged on, Talon just seems to explode.

Wraith

Wraith had a strong time in the limelight, but now seems to have a very difficult time scaling. Other characters like Mirage and Infernus defeat her in the side lane and because Tesla Bullets is too weak, she now has to buy Ricochet which is a huge downtime that her team has to buy for her in order to scale.

Victor

Similar to Wraith, Victor seems to have a very difficult time surviving and scaling throughout the game in order to be effective. Even with the buffs to Shocking Reanimation, Victor lacks the tankiness due to his less then ideal HP Scaling and the loss of his Dispel Magic that was attached to Jumpstart.

Graves

Graves has lost all the wind in her sails, as she is on her 6th round of nerfs. There is nothing she offers anymore as every single spell has been neutered to complete irrelevance. The Jar of Dead does very minor damage and Borrowed Decree is way too hard to defend as Graves herself is too weak to protect it. Despite all this, Borrowed Decree is very good if positioned well and works as a strong tool in large team fights.

Doorman

The Doorman has also lost a lot of power from his Doorway, and with how volatile his gameplay can be, if he can't kidnap as people as easily, his power and usefulness drops immensely.

Viscous

Viscous has also suffered too many nerfs and lost much of his power in the meta. With the nerfs to perma stun Goo Ball and the nerfs to Puddle Punch, Viscous really doesn't have any good build or styles to play off. His only real strength still lies in the saving power of The Cube and the decent damage of Splatter.

Drifter

Drifter also seems to have lost too much power in the recent patches, as his gun really lacks power. Drifter mostly feels like a Eternal Night spammer, which doesn't feel very fun to play as the Drifter nor does it offer a strong offensive power spike either. Overall, just seems to be very lacking in the current meta.

Haze

Haze really has nothing to offer now with the loss of the evasion and +1 bounce on Bullet Dance. She is simply too weak and too slow and lacks the durability to actually do anything in the game currently. Genuinely has zero strong points throughout the game and needs some massive reworks in the future.

McGinnis

McGinnis seems a bit too awkward to play currently, the loss of Medicinal Specter's damage and healing has left her with a very uncomfortable style to play. All her builds seem a bit too lacking for her to have any revelency throughout the game. Especially with the rise of Bebop, McGinnis gets outright ran over by most of the characters in the game.

Holliday

Holliday has gotten some recent gun buffs, but I believe its still not enough to make her very viable. The buffs to her Bounce Pad does not affect her directly and with the chaos of an average matchmaking game, it will see very little gain if her teammates never choose to use it. Even though she maintains her extreme mobility, its very hard to make use of it currently, especially when compared to heroes like Celeste.

Vindicta

Vindicta is simply too brittle. Even with a good start and early stacks to her Assassinate, Vindicta is simply way too countered and brittle to exist in the current game. Any Knockdown or Displacement will easily ruin her gameplan and leave her with nothing to do.