Following the massive meta shift introduced by the 7.36 update, Dota 2 has seen some heroes skyrocket in popularity and viability. One such example is Shadow Fiend, who was a powerful pick even before the changes. Now, players are calling for him to be nerfed or at least become “less oppressive.”
The calls for a change gained traction with a June 20 Reddit thread where a player expressed their desperate wish for Shadow Fiend to be adjusted and become a more balanced pick. “Hope you SF players had your fun this month, but can this hero f**k off now?” they asked. They named several of the benefits Shadow Fiend received as part of these recent changes to the meta, which include lower mana cost on his Razes, movement and attack speed slows, lower cooldowns, Shard buffs, etc. They claim that Shadow Fiend doesn’t have a “trade-off” like other heroes do, where their power is counteracted by some other weakness, thus preserving their balance.