Glimpse

The best ability in Dota 2 is Disruptor’s Glimpse. This unique and underrated spell is the bane of low and high skilled players alike. It sets up kills on fleeing heroes, and turns a won teamfight into a full teamwipe. Currently (10/25/2023), four points in Glimpse teleports the target back to its location from four seconds previous. It has an expansive range of 1,800 units and a cooldown of 18 seconds.

Each additional point in Glimpse vastly increases the range and decreases the cooldown. I like it enough that I’ve pissed off my share of carries by going a 1-2-2 or even 1-3-1 build on Disruptor (the middle number is Glimpse), at the expense of dealing damage with Thunder Strike (the first number).

I’ve messed up my share of Glimpses. It’s a tricky spell to use well. I’ve sent enemies that my team could have killed away from battle, or accidentally displaced enemies to a superior position. I’ve used Glimpse too early, and too late. Look, it can be hard to calmly count to four in the middle of a teamfight.

There was a brief period of time, when you glimpsed a hero that had died and tp’ed from their base, they would go back to their death spot. Now, Glimpse sends heroes back to the fountain after they died and tried to teleport. There is no better feeling in Dota 2 than fountain glimpsing. Similarly, Disruptor can Glimpse any hero that teleports in to reinforce a fight.

Glimpse has never been seriously buffed or nerfed. The developers occasionally change the cooldown, mana cost, or range. Recently, Valved added damage to Glimpse, which is strange and completely unnecessary. Any player casting Glimpse to inflict its paltry damage is misusing the spell.

Similarly, Disruptor has never been too weak or too strong. He’s mediocre in professional tournaments, rarely a top pick, or completely ignored. The same is true of pub games. He’s always a middle of the pack hero. Across all three Majors of 2023 and TI 12 he has been picked 110 times, with 54 wins, resulting in a 49% win rate. In pub games across the last month he has a 48.4% win rate. Since I love Disruptor the way he is, I’m glad his mediocre stats have prevented Valve from altering his spells.

If Icefrog ever reworks Glimpse, I’ll quit Dota.

I assumed Disruptor would synergize well with heroes who provide vision. Enemy heroes can’t disengage from a Disruptor with reasonable vision and Glimpse off cooldown. According to dotaBASED, the truth is Disruptor doesn’t synergize well with anyone currently. His best synergy is with Chaos Knight, a 2% gain. Across 123 heroes, Disruptor averages a -1.7 % synergy.

He doesn’t seem to benefit from vision by Zeus, Templar Assassin, Elder Titan, Night Stalker, Earth Spirit, Bounty Hunter or Nyx.

There are a few heroes that provide some vision, and Disruptor does earn a slight synergy. He has +0.78% with sniper, who can provide vision with Shrapnel or Assassinate. Venomancer (+0.78), provides limited vision with wards on high ground. Arc Warden (+0.8%) can give Disruptor vision with Spark Wraith, while Lycan (+0.4%) can chase after the enemy.

Synergies

The strongest provider of vision for Disruptor seems to be Slardar and his Corrosive Haze with 1.3%. These are negligible numbers. Players aren’t going to pick a team around these incremental gains.

Looking at the top synergies, and again they aren’t significant, one of the more obvious is Naga Siren. Pro teams have long used the combination of the Naga Siren’s Song of the Siren to disable and catch enemies. With his enemies asleep, Disruptor waddles up, placing his Kinetic field to trap them, and his Static Storm to silence and damage them. Despite the strength of this combination, it only earns a +1.25% synergy in the current meta.

According to dotaBASED, Disruptor has a -1.97% win rate. Unsurprisingly he pairs best with currently strong heroes, like CK, PL, Venge, Slardar, and Necrophos. Surprisingly, his third best pair is with another below average hero, Leshrac (1.73%).

On the bottom end, Disruptor does not work well with Batrider (-7.7%) or Shadow Demon (-6.8%). It’s easy to see why. Both heroes are subpar. Batrider is the worst hero according to dotaBASED. Bad heroes don’t synergize well with bad heroes (though that would be an interesting article to write – the best synergies among poor performing heroes). If Batrider lassos someone, and Disruptor Glimpses them, that could break the lasso. Shadow Demon’s Disrupt protects enemies from Disruptors Glimpse or Static Storm. Another weakness of Disruptor is his minimal damage output. He silences, he hinders movement, he provides vision, and he prevents enemies from escaping. He needs to be paired with heroes that take advantage of his control, dealing the damage to kill enemy heroes.