NS stated that pay-to-win has been introduced in Dota 2 in patch 7.35d

Yaroslav "NS" Kuznetsov, a streamer and former esports player, believes that Dota 2 has introduced elements of pay-to-win in patch 7.35d due to a new feature available to Dota Plus subscribers.

He shared his opinion on his Telegram channel.

"For those who enjoy playing Dota seriously, gameplay patch 7.35d has been released. As usual, there are back-and-forth adjustments, +1 armor, and so on. Balancing changes are made. Objectively, they dragged it out even with this patch - a small gameplay one, ideally, should have been released almost immediately after DreamLeague. Well, better late than never. There are also some minor matchmaking changes, they added a bit of pay-to-win for Dota Plus owners (pay four bucks)"

The streamer implies that an experimental feature has been introduced in Dota Labs, which can only be accessed by becoming a Dota Plus subscriber for $3.99. With this feature, players can view an analysis of their teammates and opponents and cancel a found match without any consequences.

NS likely hinted that this method allows players to assess their chances of winning in advance and participate only in almost guaranteed matches, while rejecting bad ones. It's worth noting that to some extent, this can indeed resemble pay-to-win elements, as paid subscribers gain an advantage over regular users.

It's worth reminding that now in Dota 2, players have the ability to decline matches if they don't like their teammates or opponents.