DotA Allstar 6.55

IceFrog has released Dota Allstars v6.55 early this morning, and holy shit, this is another gameplay-changing patch I would say.

As usual, the map can be downloaded from getdota.
And the changelog (very lengthy, including some in-depth explanation on the changes - getdota/changelog.

so after testing a bit of this map (can't play full match yet, my internut speed is throttled until 9th Oct =.=) and reading through the changelogs, my comments on some of the changes:

-Added 2 new heroes, Windrunner and Admiral Proudmoore. Both on Sentinel side. Windrunner is an int-based ranged hero, similar model to drow ranger. Posses some nice suppports/ganking skill. Her piercing arrow (Powershot) rawks (1700 range, cut tree, fast projectile), although it does not has stun like Mirana'. And her ult gave maximum attack speed increment (400%) to a single target for her hext 10 attacks, at the cost of damage reduction. While Admiral is even more awesome, a very brutal AoE str hero, with his first skill (Torrent) that lift the enemies, slow and damage, comboed with his ultimate (lulzy summoning a pirate ship) which give massive AoE damage and buff allies. His second skill Tidebringer give massive damage (free relic at level 4) as well as insane 100% cleave once in awhile. And his third skill (Xmts) is useful in many way, like casting it on a tp-ed enemy hero and he's blinked back to the same sport 4 seconds later. hahaha :D

-Added 4 new items: Magic Stick, Dust of Appearance, Phase Boots and Glyph of Fortification. Magic Stick is... well I can't really figure how is this item useful practically. It is charged whenever enemy heroes cast spells, up to 12 charges. Each charge instantly restore 12 hp and 12 mana when used. 12 hp/mana....wtf? I know it is instant heal, but how much will 12 hp/mana impact the value of spending one item slot compared to, say, tangos? Well not saying its useless, its just that until we see its true potential, I can't be sure how will this item useful. I guess this item shine more in teamfights, where everyone throw their spells.
Dust of Appearance is nice. A fairly good alternative of sentry in fight, if not better. It basically prevent enemy from going into invisible (it does not stop the skill, just that the hero will still visible after the item is used on them). So now your Clinkz/Gondar/Phantom Lancer is more or less can be screwed easier. No more easy escape against people sentry vision.
Phase Boot is another nice Boot upgrade. Give 70 MS, 7 armor, a bit of damage and phase skill (10% increase MS, no collision) at a low cost just above 1600 gold. Coupled with the buff of Boot of Travel, now all three boot upgrade (Power Thread, Boot of Travel and Phase Boot) become viable depending on hero used. 70 ms in no joke. With Phase, the speed bonus is comparable to BoT.
Glyph of Fortification has the effect of the old TP scroll - give massive armor bonus to all structure for 4 seconds. No cost, not going into inventory, a team item with 6 minutes cooldown. With the nerf on TP scroll, now tower-defend need to be carefully planned, since once you used this item, it is not until 6 minutes later when you can use this item again.

-New loading screen, as the images above. Nice screen, Invoker flying high and might, Lina looks as if she's casting Dragon Slave. Drow, Huskar, PL and his images, Void, Sven, Axe.....

-Terrain around sentinel and scourge base is reworked a bit. Now the base entrances are wider and less steep, providing easier way to push into base. Plus, Sentinel World Tree is more center just like Scourge Frozen Throne. More balance, eh? Not to mention there's like a very huge gap separating the base and 2nd tower, especially on the scourge side.... I find this a bit challenging since now we can't rely on the protection from base tower when defending the 2nd tower.

-Changes how bounty system (hero kill gold, first blood, tower kill) works. Nice one, now the value of assist increased even more. And earning gold is fairly easy even for support heroes, since the bounty is divided amongst the assitors in the area.

-Blink Dagger now only get disabled when player is hit by hero-based damage. No more annoying creep hinder your Reverse Polarity, haha. And with 15 cooldown, expect even more ganking style.

-KotL and Enchantress reworked a little. This new KotL no longer has his uber blink pusher Igniss Fatuus, rather now he has a spirit form, which increased his abilities. No longer need to channel Illuminate, annoying 80% blind AoE skill, ally teleport. His mana rupture, while it might seem less useful than the old mana leak, I like how it can stun the enemies if they run out of mana. Enchantress' Impetus is now ultimate, with 0 cooldown at all level. Damn, that's good.

-Nerf on map control. Sentry and Observer ward nerfed, Weaver' watcher nerf, Beastmaster hawk nerf. Not to mention even courier can no longer place wards. Great, jungling is easier now. But ganking is also easier too :3

Man, this will take ages to comment about everything on the change of this patch. Among others include the Aegis change, item change (BKB, Lothar, Manta) and -CM mode. Overall I like most of these changes, although I find it rather "sudden" with how this impact the metagame, since the stable league map (6.52e) has only been released a few months ago, and now we're introduced with some major alteration. But I really can't wait to see this map implemented in tournaments XD
And expect 6.55b to be released soon, I see some tooltips have yet to be filled (like those buff icon for new heroes/items) .