How Bristleback and Sniper perform as teammates in Dota 2 7.41e, from ranked matches.
In Dota 2 7.41e, Bristleback and Sniper win 50.09% of ranked matches when playing on the same team, over 22,698 matches.
Facing a Bristleback running at your team is a difficult choice. Turning to fight him means taking stacks of Quill Spray, while running away lets him slow you with Viscous Nasal Goo. This gets worse when a Sniper is set up behind him, freely attacking anyone Bristleback has slowed or softened up. Bristleback creates a massive zone of chaos that he wants enemies to enter, which is the exact kind of space Sniper needs to deal damage safely from a distance. The armor reduction from Goo also makes Sniper's physical attacks hit harder, punishing anyone who gets caught.
This front-to-back strategy is straightforward, but it has a clear weakness. The pairing offers very little protection for Sniper if an enemy hero can bypass the frontline and jump directly on him. Bristleback is great at brawling and causing a distraction, but he has no reliable stuns to peel an assassin off his backline partner. Fights often come down to whether the enemy lineup has the mobility to ignore Bristleback and kill Sniper first. Because of this, the duo can feel strong in some games and completely ineffective in others.
How this pairing performs across skill brackets — the duo's team win rate in recent ranked matches, split by average match rank. Ranks with too few recent matches are omitted. These rows use the last 30 days of quality-filtered ranked matches, all patches in that span combined — a wider window than the patch-scoped count above, so the per-rank match totals can exceed it.
| Rank | Team win rate | Matches |
|---|---|---|
| Herald & Guardian | 54.24% | 2,417 |
| Crusader & Archon | 49.66% | 3,812 |
| Legend & Ancient | 48.55% | 1,689 |
| Divine & Immortal | 42.91% | 268 |
This duo's team win rate in each recent balance patch — whether the pairing is trending up or down. Patches without enough matches are omitted.
| Patch | Team win rate | Change | Matches |
|---|---|---|---|
| 7.41e | 50.09% | ▲ +0.6pp | 22,698 |
| 7.41d | 49.47% | ▼ -1.5pp | 293,743 |
| 7.41c | 50.92% | ▲ +0.4pp | 144,419 |
| 7.41b | 50.54% | — | 148,286 |
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Data updated Aug 17, 2026.