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Winter Wyvern is an Intelligence ranged hero that excels in the role of a 5 support (or hard support, the hero with the lowest farm priority, but can use space to farm if possible. The greatest strength of this hero lies in her versatile supporting skillset. It's still an okay hero for beginners because of it's mechanical simplicity, but a player with greater understanding of the game and clutch decisionmaking can get much more out of it.
Winter Wyvern is part of an array of quite similar heroes: Defensive, healing supports that provide their team with sustain, teamfight and laning capabilities while being rather subpar at ganking and roaming. These similar heroes are 
Dazzle, 
Witch Doctor, 
Io, 
Oracle, 
Keeper of the Light, 
Treant Protector and 
Abaddon. Because these heroes have so much in common it is often not easy to see which one is the best pick in any given situation that requires a defensive, possibly ward*****ing support. Before I try to give Wyvern a clearer profile amongst these class of heroes, let's have a quick introduction to the hero itself.
Firstly, the base stats of this hero are something to be aware of. Her 285 base movement speed and 38-45 base damage and 1 base armor are very poor. On the other hand, 606 base hitpoints are a lot and the 325 base mana coupled with the +3.1 int gain give her an okay manapool to work with.
Her 425 attack range is only slighlty higher than Jakiro's and as such lower than that of most ranged supporters, but her first skill, 
Arctic Burn, increases her attack range to an impressive 700/800/900/1000. On lane, it should be used as harassment or escape to fly over trees and out of vision. The slow also somewhat helps your team to get in range on an enemy target. The DOT that is applied by the autoattacks during Arctic Burn is percentage based, burning 8% of the targets CURRENT health per second which makes it even more essential to be applied asap during an engagement. The DOT doesn't get refreshed by subsequent autoattacks, so if there are multiple enemy heroes, try to attack as many of them as possible with it. Apart from these usages in fights, it can be used for convenience when travelling.
Her second spell, 
Splinter Blast is a nuke with a somewhat clumsy mechanic. Often, it can be cast on creeps to damage enemy heroes on lane. In general, it shouldn't be underestimated as a short cd nuke in fights. Apart from that, it's a powerful creeping tool when leveled up, allowing Wyvern to effectively farm waves and stacks as well as counterpush.
The third spell, 
Cold Embrace is an extremely powerful asset if used correctly. It provides great HP sustain during the laning stage and later on a Shallow Grave like saving spell in teamfights. Be careful though, frosted allies still take full magical damage and you might end up giving the enemy team an easy setup on an immovable target. Also, frosted targets are still hit by physical attacks, they just take no physical damage. For example, a TA can still spill her Psi Blades off of an immovable target.
Her ultimate, 
Winter's Curse is extremely powerful. While the friendly fire can be very powerful, it's main purpose should rather be seen in it's hard, immunity-piercing disable. While killing enemies with it is possible, it's often wiser to use it like you would use Beastmaster's Roar, as an initiation or disable on a core target.
Wyvern's skillbuild is somewhat situational. On lvl 1, you either take Arctic Burn as an aggressive or Cold Embrace as a defensive spell. From there on, the most usual choice is levelling up Splinter Blast primarily to be able to farm stacks on your own and use it in teamfights, but when your lane is pressured a lot getting more levels in Arctic Burn can help you combat that. Cold Embrace should never be ignored entirely, but getting more than one point in it is only useful when your lane is much weaker and you have to try everything to reg out the enemy harassment. Winter's Curse should be taken at lvl 6, but subsequent levels can be delayed situationally.
For starting items, you can go very, very, VERY altruistic. No need for stats, all you need is reg. Buy wards AND courier – the best way to spend early gold on this hero is to give it to your team. You don't get a lot out of these items beyond what your very powerful skillset already gives you.
As far as itembuilds go, there seems to be little that is more effective than 
Soul Ring + 
Tranquil Boots. The synergy between Soul Ring and Cold Embrace is obvious. Apart from that, it let's you farm effectively by spamming Splinter Blast. Everything else is more or less situational, but you can't really buy anything besides standard support utility items. A 
Mekansm is always a strong choice if you have no core getting it, but mobility items are powerful as well. 
Blink Dagger lets you become a powerful single target initiator, 
Force Staff let's you juggle around players.
Otherwise, there are few obvious choices that would grant exceptional synergy with Winter Wyvern. Other typical pickups is generic defensive utility stuff like 
Glimmer Cape, 
Pipe of Insight, 
Lotus Orb, 
Guardian Greaves etc. Just consider what your team needs the most and if you're able to afford it. Keeping up good warding is almost always the most important thing and while Wyvern farms rather well for a support, she doesn't scale exceptionally well with items as soon as you have what you really, really need. And in fact, you need pretty much no items at all for this hero to powerful.
As mentioned before, Wyvern is part of a large array of similar heroes with different, very important nuanciations. Where Wyvern excels amongst all of these heroes are in my opinion two things: Firstly, the powerful, aggressive ultimate that gives the hero a completely different aspect besides it's defensive capabilites. Secondly, and this is what REALLY makes her unique, is that she isn't restricted to playing 4 or 5 support, but she can also play 6, 7, 8 or 9 support – This hero needs almost nothing to work with. She can keep the most difficult lanes from falling apart from lvl 1 onwards. Where the other defensive supports would long have been overrun, she simply carries on spamming clarities and healing out all the damage, juking over trees, slowing and damaging enemies to keep them at bay. A competent Wyvern understands that there is little room to play this hero in a selfish way, but will instead carry it's team's early game by clutch spellcasts, anticipation and decisionmaking. You can still pull off amazing things later on and stay an important asset to your team, but as a pick, the ability to go through the dryest deserts is what makes her stand out. I could some up more of her strengths and weaknesses, but it would go from a guide to a minute explanation from here on. A last point I want to add to the discussion of Wyvern as a pick is the fact that she's very often a good, but only rarely a bad pick and it's going to stay that way as long as the meta doesn't require aggressive roaming supports or two supports that have to be able to turn into semi-carries. She's just very versatile and can adapt easily, if times are good or bad. The one hero she is most similar to is Dazzle and often times, a drafter will decide between one of the two.
Winter Wyvern is a rather new hero to Dota, but she feels like one of those that have been in the game forever: A well rounded hero with straight-forward mechanics that is fun to play, with the ability to make big plays, but also providing lots and lots of usefulness in standard situations. She fits in so well with what can happen around her that if you would have to pick the same support every single game, she would be one of the top candidates for that role. Ultimately, she will of course come and go in and out of the meta because of how many similar heroes exist in the game and how the requirements for supports in general shift over time. Still, I think this hero's concept is strong enough to make her worth the pick over and over again as the meta changes. The way this hero rewards good play will keep her a following of competent, dedicated support players.
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