Speeed spoke about the best hero pairings at The International 2026

GamerLegion support Paul 'Speeed' Bochichio spoke on his YouTube channel about the best combinations that teams used at The International 2026.

This was one of the most dangerous combinations throughout the tournament. Mainly due to how well the connection strengthens as the game progresses. At TI people gradually realized that Io is one of the best cows because of his talents. In my opinion, his talents are simply broken.

Why are Largo and Io so good together? Basically what it comes down to is that Largo is better at amplifying magic damage than any other character, especially on heroes who consistently deal that kind of damage and can keep the enemy under pressure non-stop.

Largo also interacts with Io in a very interesting way. Firstly, a very strong combination of Largo with Tether, thanks to which both heroes are treated much more effectively. In addition, Spirit Vessel can be purchased against Io, and Largo removes negative effects.

So there are a lot of interesting interactions between these two heroes that make this combination so devastating.

Why is the safe lane combo so good? Honestly, everything is quite simple - stuns under Sacred Arrow. Tiny doesn't have enough damage, but he's great for teaming up with heroes who find it difficult to hit with spells on their own: Dark Willow, Hoodwink, Ancient Apparition, Skywrath Mage and Mirana. Many characters are great, but Mirana is probably my favorite because Sacred Arrow is the one that requires very long control. Something like Searing Chains, and in this case Avalanche and Tiny's Toss on the line.

Moonlight Shadow is also a great help for Tiny. The hero lacks mobility, so after initiation it is often difficult for him to get out of a fight and keep his distance.

Firstly, the laning stage. Dark Seer doesn't really want to play in the first levels. He's not that strong, so he wants to quickly get to level three, when he gets really strong. And Bounty Hunter doesn't really need a high level. He only needs to get the second level to be useful on the map.

Dark Seer simply casts Ion Shell on Bounty Hunter with his high movement speed, and you can crush your opponents. And if you win the battle for Sentry Ward, the enemy will not see the hero. It turns out to be a classic combination of invisibility and Ion Shell. This is difficult to deal with because the number of Sentry Wards is limited. And if you gain an advantage in wards, it will be almost impossible for the enemy to stand in the lane.

In the middle of the game, Bounty Hunter often falls behind in levels because he is constantly running around the map. In addition, he cannot push lanes and farm the jungle well. That is, he practically does nothing that allows him to gain experience. Where does he get the level from? Using Ion Shell. Ion Shell is applied to the hero and he simply pushes out lanes in invisibility and can even farm the jungle, helping the offlaner farm and earning himself experience.

I wouldn't say there's much synergy here in team fights. In fact, this is the main drawback of the bundle. The heroes have a very strong early stage, and the opportunity to help Dark Seer at the start, in my opinion, is more than enough.

I won't lie: if I could put Bounty Hunter on the list twice, I probably would. But that would be boring. So I looked at other combinations with Nature's Prophet. Clockwerk has a lot of good combinations with other meta heroes in terms of win rate. One of these bundles was Nature's Prophet.

This makes sense because Nature's Prophet currently deals too much damage. The Ents have been strengthened so much that if they get to a support without a normal way to get out or mass control, it is simply torn apart. For the same reason, Nature's Prophet simply outshines Shadow Fiend.

When you reach three Ents in the first minutes, most ranged heroes simply fall apart. For this reason, I believe that Nature's Prophet at any position is one of the best counters to Drow Ranger.

Clockwerk pairs so well with Nature's Prophet because it simply helps set up kills. It's very simple: you need control. I would advise that when playing on Clockwerk with this combination, do not skip Battery Assault. Even individual stuns from Battery Assault allow Ents to stay close to the enemy longer and hit them early, which makes a huge difference.

When playing Nature's Prophet, you need a lot of control and quick reloads because you want to play at a fast pace. For the same reason, I wanted to add Bounty Hunter to this bundle. Nature's Prophet pairs well with almost all melee heroes.

So if you want to try Nature's Prophet as a mid or carry, it's worth pairing him with melee heroes with fast cooldowns. Most heroes are suitable - just not some Earthshaker. This is a terrible option.

Previously, Paul 'Speeed' Bochichio spoke about the strengths of Bounty Hunter, whom he considers the best hero in Dota 2 at the moment.