This year’s The International has come and gone, and you’d think one of the best heroes at the pinnacle Dota 2 tournament would see an uptick in pick and win rates as players replicate the pros in their Herald matches. Not so this time, it seems, with this year’s top support Naga Siren floundering.
Naga Siren was the most contested hero at TI 2024, notching an impressive 96 percent contest rate according to stats site Spectral. She only made it through draft 12 times but in three-quarters of her matches her team won thanks to her adaptive kit and the all-important Deluge Hero Facet. Yet, despite all of this, her needle’s barely moved in ranked; she sits in the bottom 10 for win rate as casual players keep plugging her in as a carry hoping for a miracle.
With a 47.79 percent win rate across all ranks in the last seven days on Dotabuff, it’s clear her impact at TI hasn’t been enough to trouble your average Dota player… but perhaps it should. Pros the world over have gone in-depth into what makes Naga Siren so powerful as a support—but the bulk of her effectiveness comes from Deluge. This switches Naga’s armor-reducing Rip Tide for an active effect that reduces status resistance and slows.
Even better, this occurs at each of Naga’s illusions spawned with Mirror Image or from Manta Style, meaning she can affect multiple enemies in a teamfight and increase slows and stuns. This also boosts the duration of Ensnare, and in a patch where stunning enemies is far less effective than rooting and trapping them in place, Naga can turn a team fight in her team’s favor on her own.
Auras have proven to be incredibly powerful too, so before forking out on carry items, support Nagas have been loading up on wards and building Mekanism and Arcane Boots before upgrading to Guardian Greaves and a Blink Dagger to land that crucial Ensnare.
Following this, the pros pick up the final piece of the puzzle, an Aghanim’s Scepter, which grants the Reel In ability that drags Ensnared enemies to her location.
A well-rounded stat growth means Naga Siren’s armor and health’s very high, she has passive Evasion when her illusions are nearby thanks to her Innate ability, and Song of the Siren can reset a team fight and salvage a losing situation in the blink of an eye. What’s not to like?
So, if you’re struggling to get back the MMR you lost via double-down tokens during Crownfall and the TI season, hit up support Naga—but do so quickly before Deluge gets nerfed into the ground.
