Dota Underlords’ patch notes for the July 19 update are out

A new Dota Underlords update is live, and Valve released its full patch notes two days ago.

As Valve promised last week, a huge balance tweak is coming. Units are changing tiers and Alliances, some of these Alliances are being adjusted and receiving small reworks, and a considerable buff to three-star versions of several units is coming.

Overpowered Alliances will be weaker now. Warlocks’ lifesteal will be weaker in their level two and three bonuses, while Knights will now reduce 25-percent damage instead of 30 when reaching the third level of Alliance bonus. The Heartless alliance has also been nerfed at its last level, and it now reduces armor by 15 instead of 20.

These nerfs will alter the effectiveness of strategies like Knights or Warriors combined with Trolls. But the biggest victims might be compositions that consist of great tier four and five units combined with two or four Warlocks, which some players also know as “good-stuff ball.”

Other lesser-played Alliances got important buffs. Primordials can also disarm ranged attackers from now on, and Bloodbound units will get a 125-percent damage bonus instead of 100 when another Bloodbound dies. Trolls got a buff that grants 10-percent attack speed to all allies at any level, which might still enable some defensive strategies that need more offensive power.

But the biggest change came to Scrappy. The Alliance bonus now consists of three levels instead of two, and players need two, four, and six units to trigger each of them instead of the usual three and six for two levels of Alliance bonus. The best buff is that now the bonus armor and HP that the Alliance bonus grants to allies will double whenever you have fewer units than your opponent, which means the effect can also trigger mid-fight instead of only at the beginning.

Hero units were completely changed. Strong ones like Medusa and Troll Warlord have gone up a tier, while utility units like Tidehunter have gone down one.

Today’s Underlords change list is huge, so you might have more luck checking out the full patch notes on the game’s official website.