Kestrel was already one of the best bot lane picks and guess what happens when you buff a hero that was already really good…
Because she is so unforgiving if your positioning is poor her winrate has actually over the last few patches been pretty poor despite her strength at high tiers.
If you looked at vgpro’s hero winrates last patch (which is data based only on t9 elo average matches and up - so roughly speaking skilled players) her win rate was 47%.
I agree in the hands of an excellent player she is too strong, but in the hands of most of us she is too weak.
The trick for the balance team will be to find a way to buff her for the rest of us while weakening her for the top players.
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I remember seeing a montage of shinkaigan calling him the best kestrel.
Edit: probably this https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=_TZ11-Ix1BE
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HOLY CRAP DUDE! yes just Y E S
How did u find this, it must have taken u quite a while to find this ancient record?!?!?
Not really tbh i was watching YouTube videos a while ago and it showed up on my suggested videos, I remembered the title and googled it.
Why they destroyed hybrid Idris, 1-shot CPLyra build but IGNORE SPELLFIRE AND ACTIVE CAMO??
yep like that makes her a beast to balance without potatoing
I am sort of laughing right now when the name of the thread came up.
Does any of the old forumers remember when was the last time there was a Thread about Kestrel being OP?
Back to the main point though, Kestrel is not OP. She is definitely top tier but her counters still exists and the addition of Kensei and the Reza buff makes her life even harder.
I think SEMC took that into consideration before buffing hwe weapon path which is perfectly valid in my opinion.
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OG WP Kestrel was one murdering machine and they smashed her so hard she couldn’t stand for like 20 patches before they semi reworked her…
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Reza does not counter Wp Kestrel. She’s one of the few bot heroes who can effectively lane against him and come out on top (all you need is an early light shield ). Her wp paths main counters are Fortress and long ranged mages . Kensei is a maybe haven’t played much with him yet.
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Maybe early game not, but Reza spikes in mid game, and once he has AS Kestrel dies easly against him
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I wasn’t referring to WP power only, sorry for the misunderstanding. CP Kestrel gets wrecked by Reza really easily.
Not against wp Kestrel . Reza’s attack is predictable, he needs to dash after using his A. You can easily mist before he dashes and even late game wp Kestrel can outdamage Reza just be sure to build some defence. I’ve recently faced quite a bit of Rezas as Kestrel and I had no trouble with them and was easily able to snowball.
Disagree, yesterday I won the mid lane with CP kestrel vs dive comp for ambushes and reza laner. The trick is to not put all in dmg, buy boots, energy, cooldown, light shield/reflex block. If you are squishy the trick is to always have one tier boots faster than the enemy, be careful, position good, farm good and have energy/cooldown to sit on your B all the time. Raped him from a distance splash As, didn’t let them to gang me 3-4 times and they even stopped trying when they saw it won’t work out. This is yesterday(poa gold), did it many times vs many heroes from 3vs3 times. I need only JB and RB, CW to not be killed.
CP kestrel is OP from a few patches. WP kestrel is really strong only in skilled hands, harder to play and generally weaker than CP kestrel. CP is hard to be catch even from assassins, B gives speed boost, RB can let you use it, JB are the sprint f*cker sprint boots and on super low cooldown. 
in team fight when you RUN (atleast it will look like that, they stop chasing most of the time and you can come back while everyone attention is dragged and rape with B below you if someone dive again).
I am starting to digress, we all played against skilled CP kestrels and know what happens with them going glass cannons. In 3vs3 was harder to pull it off without any form of defence tbh.
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That’s assuming he will dash after his A. The same way you are having no troubles with Reza as kestrel, neither I do with kestrel as Reza.
Just to confirm is this against wp Kestrel?
Imo an equally skilled Kestrel should be able to beat an equally skilled Reza. She has better poke, better damage,faster clear speed, stronger early game to snowball and she’s ranged.
No matter what you do he always has to use his A before auto attacking to maximize his damage, so it’s predictable and Kestrel has good counter measures for it. Plus Kestrel’s dps is much higher than Reza
Yes, im talking about wp. also, comparing the dps being reza a brust hero and not a sustain one (reza is hit and run) is not fair. Reza can just constantly poke (which i think it was a larger range for 0.5) so that kestrel doesnt know when is he going to jump and then in a moment B, hit and B to scape, in that 0.5s the combo takes kestrel cant penalize as much. Also, he can just use the minions to bodyblock.
Even Kestrel is a burst hero.
Reza’s poke is miniscule compared to Kestrels.
By the time Reza gets AS, Kestrels clear speed will be very fast. She can easily clear her wave and poke.
Reza would only jump if his fireball lands so yes she will know when Reza might jump.
Compared to other bot laners Kestrel has all the potential to out poke ,snowball, outdamage Reza in a 1v1 fight. She also has one of the best ways to avoid Rezas burst damage attack plus also quite a reliable stun which turns his ult into liability if he hasn’t invested in a block.
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Im not talking about killing her with the poke. If you constantly poke her from safe, she cant really know when are you going to jump. >Doing a poke fight with reza against any hero is not a good strategy, his poke is horrible. AS is quite cheap, and he can farm quite safe too. Out damage him? in the 0.5s that his combo last? nop. He has right now the best burst in the game, you are not going to match that much damage in 0.5s, in that time you have time to hit one GS and thats it.