Aghanim's Tier List—Supports
The final part of our Tier list will concentrate on support heroes. Unlike core heroes, supports generally have a lot less gold, hence the opportunity cost for purchasing an Aghanim’s is much higher. In most cases, their Aghanim’s will come from either third or fourth Roshan or as a gift from Alchemist.
Because of it, we decided to rank support Agh’s simply by how much they can impact the game.
- S Tier—Excellent upgrade
Dark Willow
- Attacking no longer takes you out of Shadow Realm. Each attack still has bonus damage based on the duration of the buff.
It is important to put this upgrade into context of the hero. Dark Willow is highly elusive, so her chances of survival are pretty high in most won engagements, meaning that she gets more XP than an average support. She also has a very strong GPM talent and an Attack Speed talent, allowing her to build and successfully utilize this massive increase in DPS. As a late game option, it is among the strongest for a support hero.
Disruptor
- Static Storm: Mutes items and increases duration.
This effect doesn’t come into play very often. GPM talent for Disruptor comes later and he is generally played as a position five support, but the effect of upgraded Static Storm is absolutely devastating. AoE Doom can allow his team to win most fights, regardless of the stage of the game, especially if his team is the one to initiate.
Rubick
- Spell Steal: Decreases cooldown, increases cast range and upgrades the spell to the Scepter level.
This is simply superb and allows Rubick to truly shine as a greedy support. There is a reason most position four Rubicks get a disproportionate amount of space: early Aghanim’s Scepter with Blink Dagger will allow the hero to use most of the enemy spells with higher effectiveness than the original.
Techies
- Allows Minefield Sign to hide any Proximity Mines, Stasis Traps, and Remote Mines in an area around the sign from True Sight.
It is hard to judge the effectiveness of the upgrade, given how hard it is to judge the hero overall. For some reason Techies always looks over- and underpowered at the same time. This Agh’s generally means there is a spot on the map the enemy can’t enter, though, and it is a good enough upgrade to justify S Tier. Probably.
Treant Protector
- Grants the Eyes In The Forest ability. When Overgrowth is cast, it is also cast around Eye of the Forest to deal 175 damage per second.
Vision is key. If the game ever goes late, and Treant Protector is one of the heroes better suited to ensure it, having vision across the whole map generally means a straightforward way to victory. The item isn’t generally worth rushing, but it heavily impacts how the game is played.
- A Tier—Situationally excellent or generally good
Abaddon
- Borrowed Time: Increases duration. While Borrowed Time is active, anytime an ally takes more than 525 damage while within 1600 range of Abaddon, an individual Mist Coil will automatically fire towards that ally.
This work kind of similarly to providing damage resistance, but flashier, slightly stronger than previously and with more ways to counterplay. The absence of a GPM talent really hurts this Agh’s viability, especially on a position five support, but we might see greedier Abaddon’s and they might actually be worth it.
Ancient Apparition
- Ice Blast: Increases frostbite duration.
In the games you need this upgrade, it is excellent. Otherwise getting more utility and control is probably going to be preferable. It is situationally excellent, but not the default option for the hero.
Elder Titan
- Echo Stomp now causes you to become Spell Immune while channeling and for 2 additional seconds per affected enemy hero.
It is so hard to shoehorn the hero into any role right now. He doesn’t seem consistent enough as a position four, doesn’t offer reliable protection and pressure in lane as a position five and probably not good enough as a core. The hero is in a really weird place right now, but his Agh’s is among the best in the game, especially given how it is possible to cancel the animation of Echo stomp to get spell immunity at will.
Grimstroke
- Dark Portrait: Creates an ink illusion of a target enemy hero. Illusion lasts 15 seconds and is magic immune with +30% movement speed. Takes 350% incoming damage and deals 150% outgoing damage.
This was so overpowered at release and is still pretty bonkers. In games against heavy right-clicking cores this can turn the odds in your favor immensely. It is not a default item, since you need a good target for the spell, but when it works, it works exceptionally well.
Lion
- Finger of Death: Increases damage. Decreases cooldown. Finger of Death hits all units in a small area.
This is really good in most games, since it allows Lion to become a strong, independent source of burst damage. Recent nerfs to damage from FoD stacks hurt the item, but not enough to ignore it. Blink is still a priority against highly mobile targets, but otherwise this item is worth the cost.
Shadow Demon
- Demonic Purge: Cooldown is removed, replaced with 3 charges that replenish every 60 seconds. Also causes Demonic Purge to break its target's passive abilities while active.
Once again, in situations where you need Break, this items is stupidly strong. In other scenarios it is also pretty good, since it is a BKB-piercing slow and a continuous purge, that helps against stronger buffs, such as Warcry or Surge. It also helps a lot against multiple Ghost Scepters, if your team heavily relies on physical damage.
Shadow Shaman
- Causes Serpent Wards to have split shot, attacking two units for full damage. Increases attack range of Serpent Wards.
Depending on the game, Shadow Shamans go for either Agh’s+Refresher or a BKB. Latter better ensures teamfight victories, former increases the pushing potential of the hero immensely. Depending on the game, this upgrade is either excellent or good and identifying its priority is usually pretty easy.
Undying
- Decay: Increases strength steal.
Again, not having a GPM talent really hurts the hero, but the effect is very, very strong, if Agh’s is built relatively early. It turns Undying into a very hard target to deal with that can’t be ignored and it is something many position five or four supports want to be.
Warlock
- Chaotic Offering: Calls 2 golems with reduced stats and bounty.
Extra 0.4 seconds of BKB-piercing lockdown and a second source of damage is pretty great. Golems are strong teamfight minions, they help with pushing and can allow Warlock to occasionally farm up. The upgrade is probably not worth rushing, but it is always good.
Witch Doctor
- Death Ward attacks have True Strike and bounce between nearby enemies.
With the recent increase in damage, this Agh’s is even more worth it, but it is only excellent when there is enough lockdown on your team. Strong GPM talent at level 15 more or less means that getting to it shouldn’t be a problem in equal games and it can be a great stalemate-breaker.
- B Tier—Situationally good or generally mediocre
Earth Spirit
- Enchant Remnant: Earth Spirit temporarily enchants a hero, granting them the properties of a Stone Remnant. After 3 seconds the remnant shatters, releasing the hero and damaging nearby enemies.
This is situationally good and pretty mediocre otherwise. It can be used as a very strong save against things like Reaper’s Scythe or most forms of lockdown and it can really help with some initiations, but there are a lot of items that suit frontline support hero with 4.4 Str growth better.
Ogre Magi
- Unrefined Fireblast: Blasts an enemy unit with a wave of fire, dealing damage and stunning the target. Its mana cost is 60% of the hero's current mana.
In vacuum, an extra stun is really, really strong. The manacost on it, however, is quite prohibitive. Coupled with a rather low cast range, it becomes even less appealing. This Agh’s is generally above mediocre but not quite good, if that makes sense.
Silencer
- Causes Glaives to pierce Spell Immunity and deal 100% more damage against silenced units.
DPS-wise it is comparable if not superior to Dark Willow Agh’s, but there are several reasons it is not as good. Not having a +175 AS talent is one of those reasons, as is the lack of extra range. Most importantly, however, Silencer isn’t as elusive and survivable, so his job as a support is to generally stand far enough not to be seen an initiated on. That makes dealing right-click DPS even harder. It can be exceptional in super-late games, but shouldn’t be Plan A for support Silencer.
Skywrath Mage
- Anytime Skywrath Mage casts an ability, a different random nearby target will be hit with the same ability. Heroes will take priority.
This is borderline A Tier. If support Skywrath Mage manages to secure a good start and get an early Rod of Atos, Aghanim’s can be a natural and very strong progression. Otherwise, if the enemy has ways of dealing with the hero either through mobility or very high survivability, typical support items will take priority.
Tusk
- Walrus Kick: Kicks the target unit back, damaging them and slowing their movement speed.
This is exceptional in games against melee cores prone to being kited, but for it to have a full effect, Tusk needs several items first. As such, it shouldn’t be rushed, but can be good in certain scenarios as a slot after something like Force Staff and Blink Dagger.
Vengeful Spirit
- *Vengeance Aura: Causes the Vengeance Illusion to be able to cast abilities *
- *Nether Swap: Decreases Nether Swap charge restore time, allows swapping of non-hero units.
With -CD talents on stun and Wave of Terror this is a pretty strong upgrade, but isn’t as strong before it. Level 20 is a tough call for a sacrificial support, so it is certainly not an item you want to rush on Venge. Having two charges on Nether Swap by default also decreases the value of this Agh’s.
- C Tier—Situationally mediocre
Crystal Maiden
- Applies Frostbite to any unit that has been standing in the Freezing Field for over 2.5 seconds.
This is an item you get after Blink, BKB, Force Staff and Glimmer, otherwise it isn’t as powerful. As a way to ensure you zone out or deal very heavy damage to enemies without access to spell immunity, it is very strong, otherwise it is pretty underwhelming, unless you have godly positioning.
Chen
- Allows Holy Persuasion to target Ancient Creeps, maximum one per level of Hand of God.
Ancients don’t really have that great of consistent and reliable utility some of the lesser creeps provide, hence this upgrade is not particularly strong most of the time. There are games where it can come in handy, but they are pretty rare and typically going for support aura items is better on Chen.
Dazzle
- Causes Shallow Grave to be an AoE spell.
As a Dazzle spammer, I want to like this upgrade, but I simply can’t. Cheaper active items with 50% cooldown reduction work much better on the hero and when it comes to luxuries on Dazzle, nothing really beats Scythe of Vyse for aggressive play or Aeon Disk for safety. It can be good against heavy AoE if your team has two or even three high-contact melee cores, but then it feels more like plugging holes in a sinking ship, rather than getting to shore.
Jakiro
- Macropyre: Increases flame length, duration, and damage.
It is a zoning tool upgrade and a pretty good one, but unless your team has some godly ways to set up a fight, this upgrade isn’t something you really need on Jakiro. Once again, support items are better, as are items for extra control or initiation.
Keeper of the Light
- Allows Illuminate to heal allies during the day for the same amount as its damage values, and causes Illuminate to not require channeling.
This might be a Tier higher. The healing effect during daytime is very powerful, while the ability to skip channeling Illuminate is a good quality of life improvement. Compared to the previous Agh’s, that provided flying vision, it is still pretty underwhelming.
- D Tier—Generally not worth the purchase
Oracle
- Purifying Flames: Reduces cooldown and improves cast point.
Yes, this increases both the healing and the damage potential of the hero, but Oracle is not a DPS hero and Salve+Spirit Vessel will do more in terms of healing on an ally under the effects of False Promise. This mostly looks like a waste of 4200 gold that doesn’t provide the hero with extra options or make existing ones much stronger.
Lich
- Chain Frost: Increases damage and casting range. Removes the limit on the number of times Chain Frost can jump.
This is actually quite strong in games with Grimstroke on your team, but is pretty useless otherwise. It can be strong if your team has very strong lockdown, but the effect is not even close in terms of reliability, extra damage or how quickly the damage is dealt before the enemy can react, when compared to Aghanim’s from Witch Doctor or even Jakiro.
Bane
- Brain Sap: Decreases cooldown, cast point, and makes Brain Sap pierce Spell Immunity.
Unlike Oracle Aghanim's, this one does provide an option for Bane to be played differently. 1.5 CD on Brain Sap and it going through spell immunity is good in vacuum, but it is conflicting with Bane’s regular job of keeping the biggest enemy threat locked down. The latter is generally going to be more effective at winning the fights.
Spirit Breaker
- Causes the Greater Bash to hit an area around the initial target, decreases cooldown, and increases cast range.
This might actually be a Tier higher against multiple melee cores on the enemy team, but the situation is rare, while Agh’s is quite expensive. Typically having a way to either survive in the fight for longer or disengage for a second Charge of Darkness is going to be a priority.
Winter Wyvern
- Causes Arctic Burn to be a toggle ability, draining 30 mana per second when active. Removes limit on number of attacks per target.
This isn’t bad on a position three Winter Wyvern. It isn’t particularly good, but can be an option if your team lacks damage or long-range catch. On a position five Winter Wyvern this is outclassed by pretty much every support item: Force Staff, Glimmer Cape, Aeon Disk, Spirit Vessel, Eul’s etc. are all cheaper, while being better in terms of ensuring victory.
dark willow best support aghs? wtf
Techies need Aghanim? Seriously might as well not write about that hero. Bane agh should be core item not a situational upgrade. Not only good on paper but also in any fight.
Dont tell Treant players to buy agha. They try to rush agha right after brown boots and as result they do nothing all game. They should remove this agha to prevent that kind of shameful behavior.
Skywrath agha is definitely S tier. Literally doubles everything the hero does and also as side effect makes the hero good at farming. The only reason its not broken is because the hero has a million weaknesses like lack of mana, lack of armor and lack of hard disable.
Silencer and Wyvern agha would be good if they had movement speed talents so that they wouldnt be jumped on so easily.
Ogre Magi agha is definitely E tier. 60% of your mana? Seriously? For 1.5 to 3.0 seconds stun? You might as well buy Vyse and Abyssal.
Did I miss Shadow Fiend in the Agh's series?
You missed in the Techies Aghs bit that it also increases the damage and cast range of his remote mines. Another reason why we all panic when we see techies aghs
Before any of you nerds complain be grateful that the dotabuff team took time to analyse all of these and make a decent article.
stoopid artikel
Abbadon aghs A tire!!! How does that work??
Ogre Magi Aghs is great... Another roll on the x4 stun is just game breaking. Usually it ends up killing one core on the enemy team when you use both of the stuns on the target and it will be locked down for like 7-8 seconds total... And even the weaker core players can kill one dude in that time.
And to top that off, Ogre has a solid mana pool and his spells are not really that expensive... And to top it off... What is 60% of 1 mana in your mana pool? That is some cheap casting... You can always cast this 1.5 to 6 second stun even without mana and it doesn't have much for cool down either.
And that Midas is still way superior to Ogre than any other hero in the game... Way more better. But that also means that you shouldn't play slot 5 support Ogre as you should get some farm for Midas and other items. The beauty here is that Ogre is a solid block of health so survivability is not a big concern or channeling some huge spell... So he has no huge need for a BKB or other survivability items... And that one x4 stun can wreck a slot 1 players life... And Aghs gives you a second swing at it...
That Elder Titan Agh is should play a bigger role. Damn, I might even rush it if I have good DPS teammates. Unstoppable stomp, let others kill, continue ahead. And then repeat.
To any new player reading this article - forget about it, the author has no idea about game and what heroes roles are.
@Quartermaster
How is it decent? It's a 2k analytics lmao
Where is Shadow Fiend in this series?
i mean come on.. you guys even put this cancer techies in your articles but no sf?
@Metsis
The value you get from a midas is certainly worth the price of admission as it means ogre is stronger in the late game than many supports would be, but it's not always worth playing the hero in this manner. If you're playing against an early draft, ogre is able to withstand a lot of punishment compared to other supports, but still falls off into squish territory fast and needs to get immediate items. By the end of a long game, ogre probably will have more items if he gets the midas, but the benefits of an early rod of atos or medallion are difficult to ignore vs an early draft.
The problem I have with aghs is that while that one stun can be amazing against that one hero, your team will likely have enough damage in general to handle it anyway. You're getting more overall control from grabbing other high cost items like hex and orchid and rod than you are from the single target reroll. It's not that it's bad, you are guaranteed to always have a stun in your pocket with the item and that's hard to ignore, but think of it this way: if I add together all the possible damage from four heroes' right clicks over the course of a disarm, it will likely be more damage than the carry will be able to put out during the entire teamfight. That's harder for me to ignore.
Kawai kid seriously go back to a fuckin night market to sell socks.
Are you a 1k or just no brain?
Man you think spirit breaker agh is good? How the hell in this world would you not mention wisp while you mention hero who never build agh.
Is your mum webmaster of this page or what?
Once again if you don't understand game all around just go educate first,this is horrible.
Or winter wyvern? Kid this even make that spell worse in some cases. Holy shit man
*miC
You may or may not have noticed that in each tier, the heroes are in alphabetical order.
I am sorry to see how much criticized the last three article were, so much that although I wanted to write about utility phoenix is not listed before, I hesitated and decide to cheer our most beloved author to keep his good work and stay positive -Ring of Fire Country-
I am always PMA, perks of getting older, I guess.
Different opinions is what makes Dota great and discussing and defending them is a part of being a passionate Dota player. There are rarely universal truths in this game and everything is situation-dependent.
Wisp is absent because he was hit with a patch right before the article was supposed to go up and I am not too sure about the hero any longer.
I also don't think P9^ quite understands how tiers work, since both WW and Spirit Breaker are in the lowest one.)
Deer LORD people have a lot of hate to give ! P9^ showing a lot of confidence explaining to an immortal that he doesnt know anything about the game from the top of his archon V rank !
I do think that KotL could be a tier higher, and I would like to point out that Spirit Breaker Aghs is pretty much his only option against illusion heroes (but like drow, it should be a fallback rather than a plan A). Other than this I think these articles are pretty nice. Thanks for the content keep up the good work !
Jakiro should be higher. Its actually pretty good when you are defending tower or taking high ground. You can compare that to using MK ult to take the raxx safely.
@tonyshane289 and @P9^
When I started reading KawaiiSocks' articles, I was an Ancient 3, he was a Legend. Now he's an Immortal and I'm still a Divine, though I sometimes disagree with his points too.
You know what, your opinion doesn't matter when you don't have a star beside your name. So go home cry in your mom's basement :)
Shit my IQ dropped to 3 now talking with degenerates :(
And my opinion doesn't matter too since I have an anime profile pic :X
Welcome to Divine, @guuz
I honestly don't think I've ever been Legend. I've calibrated back in the day at 4.5k and was growing slowly, but surely to ~5.8 over the last year, after getting annoyed people don't take my blog posts seriously. Street cred and all that, you know, though it doesn't really work as well as I expected))
On the Aghs series I've also been consulting with Cptn.Canuck a lot, who is at 6k+, NA servers, as opposed to my EU/CIS. There is a lot of interesting differences at how we perceive and analyze information and neither is necessarily more correct, just different nuances of different things. So, yeah, Dota is beautiful, so keep it PMA and never stop arguing in a constructive and polite manner)
Socks, this blog is full of trolls/monkeys, don't expect too much from people.
Sure people will have their own tier list because it's very subjective.
valve will read this article and make every aghanim STier.
You're a good boy Kawai but i clearly think io agh is way better than SB one or WV one... Way way better. Keep it up i like your honest reaction.
P9 is so good at dota, you can see all normal skill tier game in his dotabuff account, thats absolutely superb, we need to agree with his comment
well , thats why i love ranking system
bastard archon 6 , 1800 games , its mean his IQ limited
cant play act like he is immortal
btw P9 , dont expose ur public match kid , if u want to talk shit like that again
btw , even kawaii is legend , im still appreciate his work , rather than not give idea at all
good work , keep going kawaii sock
You two kids 1vs1 me, i will rekt you with literally least winning hero in game any time of the day.
All you can do kid is farm with your 90% core acc. Blame supports and cry couse mmr seems to be everything in your life.
Im proud archon 6,have nothing to hide so why i would?
Yeah i know its hard to understand for infected kids what proud is actually.
In my opinion, I prefer Aghs on Nyx support, he's like bringing the fountain with him and that CD reduction and range is sick. KotL would probably S-tier for me, his heal and damage is game changing, Groot's Aghs would also be S-tier for me but pls don't rush, buy some utility items for the team since you're a support, free wards and pseudo-global root with damage is also sick.
Ogre aghs is really trash, 60% mana? u sure? I'd rather buy sheepstick or rod. And by the way P9, stfu, you know nothing.
So many saltiness yet some might be true. In reality some of this aghanim might (or might not be) that worth it.
Oracle should be around borderline B-C tier as an Oracle spammer, 3 or 4 purifying flame could be the difference between life and death in false promise
Ogre Magi sounds bad on a paper but on reality it could be for last resort against heavy mana burn and with his newfound midas build, anything is possible
Undying as good as it was, getting aghanim will be hard especially as 5th post or as the only strength heroes since you are more likely to focus on Guardian Greaves, Pipe, BM and Crimson
While I agree magic don't really scale on late game, Skywrath could eliminate literally anyone within matter of seconds. Even during midgame, aghanim was worth it after eul and rod of atos due to its double silence as well
With pure macropyre, Jakiro would caught anyone off guard especially that was 20 second and not even bkb can protect those pure damage. With both of those upgrades, Jakiro can even be an anti tank
shouldn't AA be on s tier?
Jakiro and cm should be on ss tier, my favourite xd
slardar aghs...no?
Mirana aghanime...