General Discussion

General DiscussionWhy is PL so weak at the moment

Why is PL so weak at the moment in General Discussion
Murranji

    44% pub win rate, not popular in pro games. He hasn’t had any particular nerfs recently and has had such buffs to phantom rush that it’s now standard to max it first so you get +44 agility for 2 seconds every 4 seconds.

    Despite this he’s apparently terrible atm. Why is that?

    efeburc

      naga does pl's job better than pl

      Libero

        I was playing a lot with PL. what i'v experienced is that this hero is super farm dependent ( some would say that PL is good in early game as carry because it needs only diffusal, but without items hes eazy to be killed without even counter hero, unlike other carrys like CK, Jug, etc.), + hes strong site (over other heroes) is attacking unaware enemies with illusions hiding himself, but more experienced players have better observation skills so main reason for its uncommonness is simply fact that without the "guess wher i am" lucky based stock of illusionss this hero overal stat, Dmg output and control are not so reliable as other heroes of type.
        I would tell, this hero is stil one of stronger in game, but to win games u need to calculate both "how fast i can farm" and "what can i do with this amount of farm", PL is just not that efficient in that, however ther are some reaaaly good PL players whom pull 120% of this hero potential, but it requires TI set of player skills tbh. Perfect Manta dis. etc.
        So yea, overalll guess for me would be: Utility of the pick and Costly mistakes.

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        Cheap Laugh Guy

          He received the "too OP" treatment and got nerfed to shit, buffing a few hits of Phantom Rush isn't much.

          DC.MASON

            he gets power creeped by other carries right now

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            CAESAR KING OF APES

              Meta is too fast for him. He does little before 3 big items. Either he has no dmg or underwhelming survability. Weak hero.

              Where is my Hu Tao

                even with farm he cant even kill supports lol

                Peelioka

                  PL is my favorite carry so I always find it a bit sad when he's in the trench but it happens quite frequently. His viability depends so much on the meta.

                  I think they over-nerfed him slightly back in 7.19/7.20, his illusions now die so easily that non-counters don't struggle against him anymore, any aoe damage can easily wipe out his army when he's not at full health.

                  Currently he is viable as a niche last pick in specific games but nothing more than that. Seems strange when Medusa is such a dominant hero in the professional scene that PL isn't picked, it just shows how weak he is.

                  Metsis

                    PL doesn't have that Burst crit hitting ability and it more of a damage over time guy with his right clicking. Leaving opposition time to line up their aoe spells and to figure out which the real one is. And the fact that this hero is so bad without some big items that it is not even funny. And the Phantom Rush, while good, it doesn't trigger when you are sitting next to someone, you would need to wade in and out of the combat to get the benefits of this skill. And he is a last pick hero as well... If you get Shakered, you are pretty much done and have to farm up to that 4-5 big item mark before you can do anything, and the games getting shorter all the time, you will never have time for that...

                    PL is great in a specific game as a last pick "we won!" type of hero... He is really bad in the early game... And probably needs like 20+ minutes to even start considering fighting... While the current Drow strat is knocking on your tier 3 towers at that point...

                    草 泥 马

                      root prevents him from doppelganger and his stats are nerfed also

                      KazeGagne

                        The patch is way too fast for PL. A lot of heroes that counter PL are relevant. And he's received a ton of nerfs to his base str and W that theres just other choices. Its too bad, I grinded on him well last big patch.

                        TheRRogue

                          Kinda disagree on the too fast sugeestion since we also got drow who just hit ancient past 6 while team 4 v 5. Right now he is really squishy and had relatively lower rate of farming compared to other illu carry like tb and naga,futhermore those two carry have ability that can outright change teamfight or give a bit of utility such sunder save,reflection aoe slow,naga net and also her powerful ulti while pl has one measly slow that cost pretty high mana that spawn some usless illu before you get diff.

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                          matrice

                            If people were doing the right item build, pl was weak to begin with. A simple crimsom guard was already reducing its effectivness to naught, but no1 was building it back when he was "op" (well he wasn't, but he was the only playable (can we even call him playable if people were building crimsom ?) carry when tb/arc/morph weren't picked).

                            Now we got nerfed pl (he at least got a little of his strength back through more recent patch) and a lot of people randomly buying crimsomguard, thus blindly countering him.

                            Also, it's really important to note that, unless you are a super great pl player (even if you are top 100 eu, you probably ain't) that hero suck at disengaging, and if you are not being dominant, you'll have to do a lot of disengaging maneuver, and since he got a lot of undeserved nerf he is NEVER dominant. Remember that some hero seem totally op when they have an edge, and totally useless from behind. Pl is one of them.

                            Important note: even if patch's change, made pl way better versus bf, it also made him way worse against mjolnir, so that a 2 mjolnir team is usually enough to deal with him, regardless of the amount of aoe your team have.