Valve and Blackhole have released new updates for DOTA 2 Beta and Might & Magic: Heroes VI. DOTA 2’s update enables Treant Protector, adds  additional dialog for Earthshaker, Pudge, Storm Spirit, Shadow Fiend, and Doombringer, and makes bots more aggressive about using couriers that are carrying their items. Might & Magic: Heroes VI’s update, on the other hand, adds new features to the map, the Archipelago map and the Custom Map Exchange feature. These updates will be auto-downloaded next time you start the Steam client and you can view their changelogs below. Enjoy! 

DOTA 2 Beta Update Changelog:

GAMEPLAY
– Enabled Treant Protector!
– Ancient Apparition: Fixed Ethereal and Guardian Angel blocking Ice Blast’s shatter
– Batrider: Fixed bug with refreshing old stacks of Napalm after upgrading the ability.
– Beastmaster: Fixed Inner Beast not affecting siege units.
– Chen: Fixed Holy Persuasion working on Spirit Bear.
– Dazzle: Fixed Shadow Wave not doing its damage around the aoe of the last target.
– Doom: Fixed Sphere working under Doom (Sphere will still block Doom).
– Drow: Fixed Trueshot Aura not affecting siege units.
– Lich: Fixed timing on Chain Frost ministun.
– Lone Druid: Fixed Entangle affecting wards.
– Lone Druid: Fixed Battle Cry not affecting other units he owns.
– Outworld Destroyer: Fixed Arcane Orb against wards.
– Puck: Fixed being able to cast Phase Shift while rooted.
– Pudge: Fixed Meat Hook interrupting channeling spells if the target is magic immune
– Riki: Fixed being unable to cast for a brief moment after using Blink Strike.
– Spirit Breaker: Fixed Charge of Darkness not getting interrupted by ensnares.
– Fixed all heroes having 1 armor more than inteded.
– Fixed Medallion of Courage interaction with Magic Immune units.
– Fixed denying an allied Necronomicon unit causing Last Will to hurt you.
– Fixed dying to Neutrals ending your kill streak counter.

UI
– You can now ping runes to let your teammates know which type it is.
– Tranquil boots now update movement speed and armor on the HUD when broken.
– You can now click on player names in the waiting for players dialog to go to their Steam or Dota 2 profiles.
– For units with lifetime (wards, illusions), the XP bar is now used to show lifetime remaining.

VISUALS
– Added a new player-only aegis post-death effect.
– Fixed some spells not obeying the “no screen shake” setting.
– Added healing overhead messages for Mek, Chen, Lifestealer, Necrolyte, and Witch Doctor.
– Added bonus damage overhead message for Lifestealer’s Feast.
– Gave Death Prophet’s spirits a unique attack effect when hitting buildings.

SOUND
– Added additional dialog for Earthshaker, Pudge, Storm Spirit, Shadow Fiend, and Doombringer.

BOTS
– Bots on medium difficulty or below will no longer try to interrupt channels.
– When doing Rosh, bots will no longer wait for their optimal tank. Now they’ll start attacking when more than one hero has arrived, and will use the best tank of the heroes present.
– Bots will no longer consider damage from passives as an indication that a human is intending to attack-to-kill.
– Fixed bug where bots wouldn’t use the courier if all their stash was empty (even if they had items on the courier).
– Bots will be slightly more aggressive about using couriers that are carrying their items.

Might & Magic: Heroes VI Update 1.4 Changelog:

– Added the Custom Map Exchange feature, allowing players to download missing maps in the lobby, from the host.
– Added the Archipelago map, previously available only during the Christmas event, in Skirmish mode (solo and multiplayer)
– Added features in the map editor:

o Help Files: Added tutorials in the Map Editor
o Initial Map Setup: Set a trigger to set up the initial structure allowing to save a map right after creation
o Unified Object Behavior: Implemented unified behavior for all affected objects (e.g.: object selection, scaling, rotation handling, etc.)
o Mini map: Removed the non-functional mini map from the Map Editor

Here is a first insight of the changes we are going to apply for the patch 1.5, focusing on the Game Balancing:

– Refitting of Core unit health and defense

o Stronger differentiation between might & magic defense of units according to their nature
o Reduction of power for Necropolis units
o Increase of power for Inferno units

– Tweaking of creature growth for some core and elite creatures

– Increase of power for Luck in general, by increasing creature luck values, especially for Inferno
– Increasing interest of abilities that affect might offense, might defense, luck and leadership

– Decrease of power of HEALING spells and abilities (HEAL, MASS HEAL,REGENERATION, MASS REGENERATION, RESURRECTION,LIFE DRAIN, MASS LIFE DRAIN)
– Refitting of healing powers of certain creatures (Haven SISTERS mainly)

– Increase of power for most DIRECT DAMAGE SPELLS, especially ZONE DAMAGE SPELLS (like FIREBALL)

– Increase of power for MASS STAND YOUR GROUND ability
– Increase of damage boost for MASS HEROISM ability
– Increase of power for ARCHERY I ability
– Decrease of the Enlightment ability to 20%

– Increase of power and cooldown time for POISON CLOUD spell
– Increase of power for MASS AGONY spell
– Increase of power for WEAKNESS spell

John Papadopoulos

John is the founder and Editor in Chief at DSOGaming. He is a PC gaming fan and highly supports the modding and indie communities. Before creating DSOGaming, John worked on numerous gaming websites. While he is a die-hard PC gamer, his gaming roots can be found on consoles. John loved – and still does – the 16-bit consoles, and considers SNES to be one of the best consoles. Still, the PC platform won him over consoles. That was mainly due to 3DFX and its iconic dedicated 3D accelerator graphics card, Voodoo 2. John has also written a higher degree thesis on the “The Evolution of PC graphics cards.”
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