- Fixed issue where combined items would go in backpack if recipe was there
- During hero picking, if a player selects their lane on the minimap before choosing a hero, their icon will be highlighted by their player color.
- Rubick spell steal notification UI has been updated
- Rubick spell steal will now be displayed for all allies
- Talent selection will be broadcast to all allies
- Full talent tree will be displayed to spectators when any player selects a talent
- Broadcast toasts UI has been fixed and updated to Panorama with the following new features
- New dual image toast mode added
- Team images and player images, for players in the current game who have them, are now available in the image selection UI
- A Roshan status widget has been added when spectating
- Team net worth delta is now displayed beneath the time of day in the hud for spectators
- Best of 3 and Best of 5 pips have been moved to either side of the time of day display
- Fixed the "Demo Hero" control panel so players can still read lh/dn score while demo panel is open
- Edge panning while dragging will not pan while mouse dragging over the inventory or backback
- Fullscreen button will no longer be visible on the Watch Live screen when not applicable
- Added indictator to Watch Live screen when the game is in the draft phase
- Replay controls will default to hidden when viewing a live game
- Regional chat will now be restricted to players over level 5 and who have linked a phone number or have made a purchase on steam.
- Added option to disable prediction UI via cvar "dota_hud_ingame_predictions_hide". Can be used by broadcasters to hide UI if not needed.
- Champions Cup entry is now based on winning one Battle Cup
- All player Battle Cup tiers will be reset for this season based on current MMR
- Fixed some particle systems not appearing when couriers are killed

Congratulations to OG for claiming the Mystic Staff trophy to win their fourth Dota 2 Major Championship crown.

OG's path through the Main Event bracket was forged with hard-fought victories over three stalwart teams. Managing to fend off a rally by Team Random and beat back early aggression by Team Faceless for a pair of 2-1 victories, OG then outlasted a resilient EG squad in two lengthy matches for a 2-0 series win and a berth in the Grand Finals.

Facing crowd favorite Virtus Pro in the best-of-five decider, OG jumped to an early one-game lead before dropping two straight matches to find themselves on the brink of elimination. Responding with a victory in game four, they set up only the second game-five deciding match in Major Championship circuit history.

Despite stellar play by Virtus Pro to grab an early advantage in the final match, OG held on to recover en route to another trip to the winner's circle. As the only team with multiple Major Championship victories, the only prize OG has yet to claim is The International itself.

With The Kiev Major now complete, we would like to thank all of the participating teams and fans in Kiev, and all of the fans around the world who tuned in to watch the action unfold. We look forward to welcoming teams and fans alike to The International on August 7 - 12 in Seattle.

In preparation for the next event, team rosters have been unlocked, and players are now able to manage their team affiliations. Teams have the opportunity to drop players until May 16, 12:00 a.m. PDT, and add players to their roster from that moment until May 24 12:00 a.m. PDT. From that point, rosters will remain locked until the conclusion of The International.

Congratulations to OG for claiming the Mystic Staff trophy to win their fourth Dota 2 Major Championship crown.

OG's path through the Main Event bracket was forged with hard-fought victories over three stalwart teams. Managing to fend off a rally by Team Random and beat back early aggression by Team Faceless for a pair of 2-1 victories, OG then outlasted a resilient EG squad in two lengthy matches for a 2-0 series win and a berth in the Grand Finals.

Facing crowd favorite Virtus Pro in the best-of-five decider, OG jumped to an early one-game lead before dropping two straight matches to find themselves on the brink of elimination. Responding with a victory in game four, they set up only the second game-five deciding match in Major Championship circuit history.

Despite stellar play by Virtus Pro to grab an early advantage in the final match, OG held on to recover en route to another trip to the winner's circle. As the only team with multiple Major Championship victories, the only prize OG has yet to claim is The International itself.

With The Kiev Major now complete, we would like to thank all of the participating teams and fans in Kiev, and all of the fans around the world who tuned in to watch the action unfold. We look forward to welcoming teams and fans alike to The International on August 7 - 12 in Seattle.

In preparation for the next event, team rosters have been unlocked, and players are now able to manage their team affiliations. Teams have the opportunity to drop players until May 16, 12:00 a.m. PDT, and add players to their roster from that moment until May 24 12:00 a.m. PDT. From that point, rosters will remain locked until the conclusion of The International.

- Improved client performance when creating illusions.

- Improved performance when creating illusions.

* Fixed a bug with Lina's Fiery Soul displaying an incorrect duration when the effect is active while leveling up Fiery Soul.
* Added hero aliases for CK and TA in the hero selection screens.

Today's update focuses on improving the matchmaking experience with the restoration of Solo Queue, the addition of Phone Linking, and multiple other adjustments.

Quality matchmaking is a core component of an enjoyable Dota session, and today's changes work to address several issues that can affect the player experience when queuing for a game.

LINKED PHONE NUMBER

The first major change is that players must register a unique phone number to their account in order to queue for Ranked matches.

Players using multiple accounts create a negative matchmaking experience at all skill brackets, so our goal is to add just enough friction to this process that the number of players doing this will be noticeably reduced. Having more players using their primary accounts will have a positive effect on both Ranked and Unranked Matchmaking.

There will be a two-week grace period from today during which players have time to register a number, but starting on May 4th, accounts without a registered number will no longer be eligible for Ranked play. If a phone number is removed from an account after registration, a new number can be added, but there will be a three-month waiting period before the removed number can be registered on a new account. This is to prevent using the same number on multiple accounts. Online services that provide phone numbers are not allowed.

SOLO QUEUE

With the return of the Solo Queue, solo players who enter Ranked Matchmaking can now choose to be matched only with other solo players. Any player who selects this option will be placed into matches where all ten players are queuing solo.

PARTY CHANGES

Starting today, if a player's Solo MMR is higher than their Party MMR, queuing in a party will result in the matchmaker assigning a higher MMR to that player. Effectively, these players will search for a match as if their MMR were halfway between the Solo and Party MMR values.

While the current Party MMR number generally reflects the likelihood that you’ll win a given match correctly, we’ve found that when a Solo MMR is dramatically higher than a Party MMR, the match becomes extremely volatile, resulting in an unpleasant and uncompetitive experience for both teams.

Simply having an even chance to win over the long run does not necessarily correlate to having competitive matches, but this change will make it so the matchmaker is able to take into account both the party teamwork skill component and the individual capability of the players on both teams. With both teams having this same mechanic applied to them, the chance for each team to win over a large sample will still be the same as before, but with reduced volatility on a per-match basis.

MATCHMAKING BEHAVIOR

This update also includes several changes intended to remove undesirable behavior from the matchmaking pool.

First, being marked for low-priority matches now results in a duration-based ban from the Ranked queue, in addition to the current game-count-based low priority requirement. The ban will start at a low threshold of a few hours, and increase up to four days for players who are very frequently in low priority.

Next, it should go without saying that while the wide variety of playstyles that Dota players bring to a given match will always be welcome, intentionally ruining games for other players is never condoned. To help address concerns in this area, we've also added better detection for clear cases of intentional feeding, and will be applying stricter punishments to those who violate this rule.

Finally, we’ve also added detection for users that are botting, and with this update have issued a permanent ban to a large number of recently-detected bot accounts. This should help resolve several areas in which these bot accounts have a negative effect on the experience of the Dota community.

REGIONAL CHANGES

Ranked Matchmaking will no longer be available in South Africa, India, and Dubai. We will update these servers as the unranked populations in these regions grow to the critical mass needed to be able to support splitting the user base into Ranked and Unranked queues.

While there are some players that used these servers for Ranked, the low populations made them prime targets for various Ranked Matchmaking abuses. For the time being, players in these regions will need to join Ranked Matchmaking queues in one of the other nearby supported servers.

Today's update focuses on improving the matchmaking experience with the restoration of Solo Queue, the addition of Phone Linking, and multiple other adjustments.

Quality matchmaking is a core component of an enjoyable Dota session, and today's changes work to address several issues that can affect the player experience when queuing for a game.

LINKED PHONE NUMBER

The first major change is that players must register a unique phone number to their account in order to queue for Ranked matches.

Players using multiple accounts create a negative matchmaking experience at all skill brackets, so our goal is to add just enough friction to this process that the number of players doing this will be noticeably reduced. Having more players using their primary accounts will have a positive effect on both Ranked and Unranked Matchmaking.

There will be a two-week grace period from today during which players have time to register a number, but starting on May 4th, accounts without a registered number will no longer be eligible for Ranked play. If a phone number is removed from an account after registration, a new number can be added, but there will be a three-month waiting period before the removed number can be registered on a new account. This is to prevent using the same number on multiple accounts. Online services that provide phone numbers are not allowed.

SOLO QUEUE

With the return of the Solo Queue, solo players who enter Ranked Matchmaking can now choose to be matched only with other solo players. Any player who selects this option will be placed into matches where all ten players are queuing solo.

PARTY CHANGES

Starting today, if a player's Solo MMR is higher than their Party MMR, queuing in a party will result in the matchmaker assigning a higher MMR to that player. Effectively, these players will search for a match as if their MMR were halfway between the Solo and Party MMR values.

While the current Party MMR number generally reflects the likelihood that you’ll win a given match correctly, we’ve found that when a Solo MMR is dramatically higher than a Party MMR, the match becomes extremely volatile, resulting in an unpleasant and uncompetitive experience for both teams.

Simply having an even chance to win over the long run does not necessarily correlate to having competitive matches, but this change will make it so the matchmaker is able to take into account both the party teamwork skill component and the individual capability of the players on both teams. With both teams having this same mechanic applied to them, the chance for each team to win over a large sample will still be the same as before, but with reduced volatility on a per-match basis.

MATCHMAKING BEHAVIOR

This update also includes several changes intended to remove undesirable behavior from the matchmaking pool.

First, being marked for low-priority matches now results in a duration-based ban from the Ranked queue, in addition to the current game-count-based low priority requirement. The ban will start at a low threshold of a few hours, and increase up to four days for players who are very frequently in low priority.

Next, it should go without saying that while the wide variety of playstyles that Dota players bring to a given match will always be welcome, intentionally ruining games for other players is never condoned. To help address concerns in this area, we've also added better detection for clear cases of intentional feeding, and will be applying stricter punishments to those who violate this rule.

Finally, we’ve also added detection for users that are botting, and with this update have issued a permanent ban to a large number of recently-detected bot accounts. This should help resolve several areas in which these bot accounts have a negative effect on the experience of the Dota community.

REGIONAL CHANGES

Ranked Matchmaking will no longer be available in South Africa, India, and Dubai. We will update these servers as the unranked populations in these regions grow to the critical mass needed to be able to support splitting the user base into Ranked and Unranked queues.

While there are some players that used these servers for Ranked, the low populations made them prime targets for various Ranked Matchmaking abuses. For the time being, players in these regions will need to join Ranked Matchmaking queues in one of the other nearby supported servers.

* Matchmaking Update: http://blog.dota2.com/2017/04/matchmaking-update/

* Players can now edge pan while dragging items
* Fixed a visibility exploit with Monkey King
* Fixed an issue where players would not see pregame inventory purchases displayed in the UI in certain modes
* Fixed compendium predictions not allowing picking of players from DC, Team Random, and Mousesports.
* Fixed the Games Played compendium prediction to have correct values.

THE KIEV MAJOR

Final preparations for The Kiev Major are in full swing, and the Swiss-style Group Stage kicks off on Monday, April 24 at 9:00 a.m. EET. Make sure to fill out your Tournament Predictions and set your Fantasy Lineup, and then tune in via the Dota 2 client or Twitch to watch the action unfold.

After Group Stage wraps up, the single-elimination Main Event will kick off on Thursday, April 27 at 10:00 a.m EET from the National Palace of Arts in Kiev, with sixteen of the world's best Dota teams battling to capture the last Dota 2 Major Championship before The International in August.

THE INTERNATIONAL



Once a champion is crowned in Kiev to cap off the Winter season, the focus of the Dota community will turn towards The International and debates over who can walk away from this year's tournament as the undisputed best Dota team in the world.

As such, it's nearly time to unveil The International Battle Pass—once all immortals are sufficiently polished—and prepare for the annual celebration of top-tier Dota that draws fans, pros, and neophytes alike to KeyArena in Seattle.

This year, to distinguish the players who support The International and contribute directly to the tournament prize pool, all TI Battle Pass items will remain exclusive through next year's International. Items that you earn can each be gifted once, and players who unlock Ultra Rare items will still be able to trade them as in the past.

For teams who would join the ranks of the year's top tournament, The International Regional Qualifiers will be held on June 26th – 29th to determine the final contenders who will meet in Seattle August 7 - 12 for a chance at ultimate victory.

TODAY'S UPDATE



Today's update includes the addition of a Stats section to every hero's About tab. Now you can easily see details on each hero's Attributes and level gains; their base attack, defense, and mobility stats; and base health/mana pools and regeneration.

We've also updated the report-granting mechanism to scale directly with the number of games played, fixed the Player Conduct Summary not showing recent commends, and changed report functionality so enemy players can now only be reported for communication abuse.

There are also some performance improvements to help during teamfights on various low-end hardware configurations, and a fix has been added to stop calculating player XPM once they reach level 25.