Diretide - best heroes

natures is great with force staff, tp in, grab some candy, force staff to a safe spot, tp out

Weaver is surprisingly good - with 2 built in escape mechanisms and someone who can feed off the huge exp/gold gains in a short space of time - presents a really good 'killer'
quick treads/aquila in 5 mins or so, then straight to butterfly. it's quite easy to take out most heroes, even those with great movement like stormspirit.

Orchid and blink daggers has to be the must have item for this game mode - never seen so many silences it's hilarious!! :D

Meepo exploits this relatively well. I tend to grab Tranquil Boots as a first item and the moment the 10 minute mark comes I send each individual Meepo to a creep camp and squash each camp using Poof. Surprisingly effective.

I am a big fan of going sand king and defending the candy. I start out with a quelling blade and make a little base in the trees behind the pumpkin and when the opponents come to take the candy I can channel my ulti inside the trees then burrow strike out. Then again I have played a few games were the other team did not take candy from me once yet I lost because my team could not farm. On a different note after 10 minutes neutral creeps drop candy I was wondering if there are any heros that could exploit this.

I've been having fun with Diretide and the distinct metagame is a breath of (somewhat) fresh air. From my experience thus far, I would say top heroes bring one of two things to the table: (1) raw power (e.g. Drow Ranger) and/or (2) utility/cheese (e.g. Furion). I'd just make sure your team has a good balance of the two and you're set.

Without going into a fullblown list of characters, here are some general guidelines:
-Some heroes are just plain gamebreakers. Shut them down or it's over.
Ex: Meepo and Naga Siren.
-When in doubt, pick a powerhouse.
Ex: Anti-Mage and Drow Ranger.
-Heroes like Crystal Maiden have little to contribute. You want someone who scales with levels and gold to a certain degree. Others will fall behind quickly, because they have no way to exploit the chunks of xp/gold coming their way.

Cheers

Morphling can do that with his Replicate too.

Wisp and fusion are the best

Wisp can use ult and get all the candy he can an be teleported back safely. Fusion gets all the candy and tps out. Super fun

I just think Riki and a lot of other invis heroes aren't as great as you might expect. Can't get away as well which is more important than being able to get in. Most invis are also squishy as hell and getting lots of candy doesn't help with that. Clinkz is an exception since he has ms.

i recently played a match as Riki, and we won the candy grab mode very easily. I guess just being invisible is tonnes easier

Clinkz since he has good damage and strafe and max ms with skeleton walk, Centaur Warrunner because hes op like that :D stuns and double edge (which is great against those people who took lots of candy), Slardar for the stun and ms and amp damage since many people pick invis and because amp damage is just so good. A good Meepo who gets aghs and 5 hearts is also quite op since he can just stand there and take all your damage, then auto attack everyone to death.